Transforming Clients into Raving Advocates for Your IT Services Company, with Stuart Selbst.

Freddy D: 00:02:01

Stuart Selbest, known as Stu, serves as a Director of Client Experience at Nothing But Net, where he plays a crucial role in overseeing the sales team and ensuring the success of all of our clients. With over three decades of experience in the IT industry, Stu has an impressive background.

He has worked in both corporate IT and has also successfully managed his own IT firm. His experience extends beyond national borders as he has provided consultancy services to IT firms and software companies worldwide.

Stu's career highlights include serving as CEO of a thriving software company. Stu is not only a seasoned IT professional, but also a dedicated business leader with a genuine passion for helping others achieve success.

In addition to his professional commitments, he organizes a popular monthly networking event named Business and Brews, which fosters connections among local businesses at nearby craft breweries. Residing in Mesa, Arizona, Stu shares his home with his wife, Lori, and their cherished feline companions, Cliff and Chloe.

An enthusiastic sports fan, Stu enjoys embracing life and immersing himself in the world around him. His love for adventure extends to travel, where he seeks to experience all that the world has to offer.

Stu takes great pleasure in treating his friends and family to mouthwatering barbecue creations. Welcome, Stuart, or as you'd like to be called, Stu Selbis, to the Business Superfan podcast. How are you this morning?

Stuart Selbst: 00:03:36

I'm good, Freddie. I'm good. Yeah. It's a Friday morning.

Freddy D: 00:03:40

It is a Friday morning. It's an exciting Friday morning. We're ready for the weekend.

Stuart Selbst: 00:03:45

Yeah, I'm ready for the weekend. I need some downtime. This has been a crazy work week.

Freddy D: 00:03:49

Yeah, I can. I can relate. I can totally relate.

Share with our audience your story of how you got to where you are right now, which is Director of Customer Experience for an IT company called Nothing But Net, which is a cool name.

Stuart Selbst: 00:04:06

Thanks. I'm quite proud of the name.

y own IT company in the early: 2000

And when I decided that it was no longer time for me to be my own boss, I bounced around a couple companies and I actually saw a position open with Nothing But Net. And I know the owner, Bob Cox, has been a friend of mine for 16 or 17 years throughout the industry.

Because when I was speaking and consulting in the industry, we would run into each other and obviously both being from the Phoenix area, we would talk about things going on and just had a nice rapport. So I. I told him years ago, I said, someday I'm going to come work with you. And so he was advertising on LinkedIn for a director of sales position.

And I applied and I called him up, I said, hey Bob, I applied for this director of sales position. He's Steve, come on in. And so I came in, we sat down, we talked.

I'm like, hey, I really don't think that we should ever use the title director of sales because it comes across salesy, very old school title. And I do believe that the client experience starts with the sale. So I want to direct the client experience.

So the title is director of client experience. I run sales, marketing, customer success, things along those lines. So that's how I really came into this position.

But what really drives me here is as I was interviewing, there were these wooden letters PLJ up on the wall. And I asked Bob, I'm like, what's plj? He's you don't know? I said, no. He says, we've known each other a long time. You don't know what PLJ is?

He says, plj is our corporate identity. PLJ Information Systems Incorporated. Doing business as nothing but net. So what does PLJ stand for? Says Peace, love and joy.

And I was sold because that's the concept of what we're about. We're not just an IT service provider.

We are a service company that does IT services and we're very engaged in taking care of our clients and we want to do it with peace, love and joy. Right? Have a happy day, have a happy world. We know things.

You're going to hit speed bumps along the way, but you know what if we can have a good attitude about it. And Freddie D, you've known me long enough.

Freddy D: 00:06:22

h, we met back long time ago,: 2000

Stuart Selbst: 00:06:24

So. So my whole philosophy in life is be nice to people.

I've had my ups and downs in life and we all have had our ups and downs in relationships and whatever.

But the whole concept of nothing but net, of the peace, joy and love and having that literally on the wall of the office every single day, where you have to see it, makes it ingrained in your thoughts.

Freddy D: 00:06:46

That's an important thing that you said right there, is having it up on the wall. I think companies, regardless of the industry, should have a mission statement for their whole aspect of what they're about so that you see it.

Because most, like you just said, it gets ingrained in your head and your whole culture, your mindset, your belief. It's a game changer.

Stuart Selbst: 00:07:10

Absolutely. It goes back to one of the philosophies that I strongly Believe in and eos. Right. Traction as part.

And I'm not a, I'm not an EOS consultant or whatever, but I do believe in it, having been a chief operation officer and understanding operations. But a big part of that is have your mission up on the wall, right? Yep.

Freddy D: 00:07:30

Everybody, everybody is on the same page.

Stuart Selbst: 00:07:34

Becomes cultured, it becomes embedded, it becomes second nature. And I believe leading by example. I think that's the way my boss Bob does that because he is always about the peace, love and joy.

He's always about taking the higher road and being the better person. And sometimes every now and again, you'll lose the battle but win the war because you take the higher road.

I'm okay with that getting beat up a little bit, but I'm not going to get destroyed.

Freddy D: 00:08:02

Sure. It's. Think of a rowing team, okay. And everybody's got to be on the boat.

Everybody's got to be rowing at the exact same time and going in the same direction. By having that mission statement up there where everybody sees it daily, it gets everybody in tune on the same page.

Or basically go back to the rowing boat. They're on the rowing boat and they're all rowing at the exact same time. Going in one direction now. They're efficient. That's really important.

Stuart Selbst: 00:08:31

Again, like you don't become super efficient in rowing or anything, hockey, whatever, baseball, without practicing. And it's practicing all the time.

I use the PLJ IPS Love and Joy a lot and sometimes, ever so often, I lose my cherub like demeanor and I lose the peace, love and joy and it frustrates me. But then I step back into why I'm here. I'm here to do a job. But the mission of the organization is bigger than the job.

It's bigger than the one person, it's bigger than anything that we can do. I think that's the reason that we're a successful organization.

And one of the reasons that I am here is to bring that customer focused, consultative approach of technology and business to the masses, especially the businesses in Arizona. And it doesn't matter the size of the organization, but to consult and just have a.

Have a sit down with somebody and they don't have to become a client. Sometimes it's not a good play, it's not a good fit.

Freddy D: 00:09:40

But here's a cool thing that I one of the other individual that I had on a previous podcast, Rick Benton, talked about the fact that even though they were not a good fit for his previous business, he still wanted them to become a super fan of his organization.

Because even though they didn't do business, or in your case, you didn't do business with some XYZ company, the fact that they appreciated who you are, they're still going to tell other people and they're going to be your. Your brand advocates, or I call super fans that are going to be promoting you anyway.

Stuart Selbst: 00:10:17

Absolutely.

So it's funny you say that, because a couple months ago I was meeting with a company, a nonprofit, actually, because we do a lot of work in the nonprofit space.

And as I was sitting down with them and learning about their business and their infrastructure and whatnot, and they're a Mac, mostly Macs, and no servers, no real infrastructure. It wasn't a good fit. However, the conversations have been still going on. Hey, Stu, we want to do this and this.

Okay, now fast forward six months later. I was having a conversation with one of their leaders. I thought about what you said six months ago. We've really been considering it.

I don't want to replace all our computers, but is there a way that we could have that same level of security? I said, yes, we could put every. Everybody into a remote desktop and we can have the servers and domain. So now the conversation is now going to.

we want to put that into our: 2025

They're still a fan of what we do and wanted to find a way to work with us because they had talked to five other IT companies and they all told them the same thing. We don't work with Max. We don't do this. But they knew to come to me or come to nothing but Net, and they'll.

We'll come up with a solution that will work. So you're right. It's a super fan and it takes a while to build superfans. You know, people will be advocates, right? Yep.

But there's a difference between an advocate and a super fan. Yeah.

Freddy D: 00:11:43

Super fan is advocates on steroids.

Stuart Selbst: 00:11:46

Yeah.

Freddy D: 00:11:47

Think of the sports team, and you've got the fans, and there's the fans, and then there's the super fans. And the super fans, as you can see in my background, got the faces painted, got the jerseys, got the banners, got the hats, got the bumper sticker.

And they're promoting the team and are spending their own money buying the gear, promoting the team.

Stuart Selbst: 00:12:09

Years ago, I did a presentation in the IT industry called Selling IT Services how not to Suck at it. And I did it at different conferences and everyone Loved it. And it went on for three or four years. Hey, Stu, can you refresh your presentation?

But as I was putting it together, I thought about superfans. Right. I thought about advocacy for businesses.

And there's one company out there that has the biggest super fans in the world, where their fans are so dedicated, they will tattoo that company's brand on their body. And that's Harley Davidson.

Freddy D: 00:12:44

Absolutely correct. Yep.

Stuart Selbst: 00:12:45

They will brand themselves with that logo. I don't see anybody putting the Nothing but net logo on their bodies.

I would be really happy if someone ripped off their shirt, said, hey, look at nothing but net. But when you think about that, how long did it take Harley Davidson to be to get to that level? It was probably 50, 60, 70 years.

But they kept at it right from the time they started to the time they sold to AMC and then they bought themselves back. You just work it. But they're at it every single day.

One of the things we need to do as small businesses or leaders is we need to be at it every single day talking to our clients. And we always have an excuse. All right?

And one of the things I'm just trying to shake off is I manage the sales team and whatnot here, but I still need to go and do some door knocking with my clients. Yeah, I'm just trying to get that on my schedule right now.

I look at my calendar and it's filled with other stuff and I'm just gonna start canceling crap.

Freddy D: 00:13:48

But that's what I'm creating, this business superfan movement.

And I like I'm calling it a movement because really we need to blend old school ways of doing things and incorporate new ways of doing things and blend the two.

Now you really got the best of the best because you're leveraging technology, but then you got the old fashioned in person touch, in person phone call. It's not automated as we are today, but it still differentiate. It's like sending somebody a thank you card through the mail.

Stuart Selbst: 00:14:20

Right.

Freddy D: 00:14:21

Versus a thank you text.

Stuart Selbst: 00:14:23

But here's the thing, Freddie. And this is something that I'm struggling with.

And people in our age group probably also struggle with this because we're in the twilight of our career. Right? We're not our customer anymore. We're not the demographic of our customer. Our customers are millennials now.

People that are making the buying decisions for IT services or consulting services or whatever.

Freddy D: 00:14:47

Services, whatever, whatever.

Stuart Selbst: 00:14:48

They're millennials.

So the way that we did business and our parents did business and our grandparents did business, the handshake and Going, seeing people and bringing the gift and the thank you card and things like that. I'm not sure that's still valid, even though in my mind, the nice touch.

Freddy D: 00:15:07

I think it's still valid because I've gotten people that would text me, I'd send them something and they would go, wow, that was really nice. I appreciate that. Because it's different. They're not used to it. They're used to the instant text and everything else.

Again, I say you got to blend the two. And that's why I wrote the book Creating Business Superfans and I've set up the business superfan accelerator.

Community is really to blend old school with new school because it works a multi prong approach. You can send a text, but at the same time, all of a sudden they get a real card in the mail, for example.

Or you send recorded video and you send it over to somebody to wish them happy birthday. You just click a quick video and you send it to them. Big difference.

Stuart Selbst: 00:15:53

It's not personal touch, right? No, it goes to personal feelings, right?

Freddy D: 00:15:59

Yep.

Stuart Selbst: 00:15:59

And again, this goes way back. We've talked about this for years, you and I. People do business with people they like and trust.

Freddy D: 00:16:07

Yep.

Stuart Selbst: 00:16:08

Okay.

Freddy D: 00:16:08

Also forget what you said, but they'll remember how you made them feel.

Stuart Selbst: 00:16:12

Always remember how you made them feel. So that's my philosophy. I'm with you on that. I think building superfans is great.

I think using the Harley Davidson analogy again, I mean, we need to all find more Harley Davidson kind of people that are willing to tattoo nothing but net on their bodies or at least promote them or even wear our barbecue aprons that we're giving out this summer. Yeah, that's our summer swag. Barbecue aprons of barbecue tools and me and my barbecue.

Freddy D: 00:16:40

So let me ask a question.

Stuart Selbst: 00:16:41

Yeah, go.

Freddy D: 00:16:42

We're talking about this stuff. What do you think IT companies in general are overlooking and doing to creating super fans with their customers?

Stuart Selbst: 00:16:52

It's a good question. I could tell you what we do, but let me make it more broad because I think it's a broader question you're asking IT companies in general.

We're a boutique firm. We're very customer focused. I think the problem, and I'm going to call it a problem, maybe even a pandemic, so to speak.

But technology companies are so focused on the technology, not the results, not the solution, not the people.

So I think when you lose touch of who you're serving and you think you're a technology company like managed service providers like us, we typically do not invent anything. We're not building software. We're not creating the next microprocessor. We work with companies like Microsoft and Intel and Lenovo and Cisco.

They're the ones that are building stuff. We're an integrator. We're. We're the service provider. We're a reseller. Okay.

What we do as technologists, we're still going to call those technologists. Typically, the industry focuses too much on the what, not the why.

You know, me, I'm a big Simon Sinek fan, so I'll talk about that golden circle, right? The golden. And we try to focus on our why. Like, just recently, I went through a exercise of breaking down our unique value, our U V P. Right.

And put in a presentation to my boss and my sales team. This is what we're about, you guys. We broke it down. We got granular. You should see the whiteboard in the conference room.

We got really granular what we did. I even took it to the next level and did a SWOT analysis for my internal team.

I wanted to know what everyone thought about our strengths, our weaknesses, our threats and our opportunities. So I did a SWOT analysis with. With our team. And I think that's what companies are missing as a whole.

Freddy D: 00:18:37

Right?

Stuart Selbst: 00:18:37

You have an advocate for the customer, which was, let's call it me. Okay, but then you have 20 technicians that are just. They want to do the work.

Freddy D: 00:18:45

Made me think of something. Yesterday I was working with one of my customers and they brought in a monitor as I needed an extra monitor.

So the guy shows up with his companionette, okay. To deliver a monitor, hooks it up, it's dusty, it's dirty and everything else. And he goes, I'm sorry, it's a dusty monitor.

But the company got a really good deal on this thing. I didn't say a word. I just thought to myself, wow. Was just absolutely horrible experience because it showed that he didn't care.

0 customer service and totally indifferent.

Stuart Selbst: 00:19:28

So something like that would never, ever happen in our world. Okay. Even if we had a used monitor that we were giving to a client, right.

My team would clean it up, polish it, put it in a box, or at least a bag to keep it dust free, lay it down, test it, make sure it all worked. That's the difference. That's the plj. That's the peace, love and joy. Right?

Freddy D: 00:19:48

Exactly.

Stuart Selbst: 00:19:49

That's how our clients know that we care. And again, like I said earlier, there's going to be times that we trip over our shoelaces, right? They're going to hit a speed bump.

We're going to screw something up because we are human. Right?

Freddy D: 00:20:02

Like you described. You guys will go above. My perception is the guy really didn't give a crap. He was just there to just. Here's the.

Here's your monitor by a couple squirts.

Stuart Selbst: 00:20:13

Of Windex and a paper towel go a long way. But you know what? A lot of IT type people do not think about that.

And the funny thing is we're looking at a marketing firm right now and I asked for some references. I want to check everybody out. So they gave me one.

I talked to and it was a very small firm in Maine that I spoke to a one person managed service provider in the state of Maine. We're having a conversation. She's very happy with this marketing company.

But the thing that disappoints me a little bit is the marketing vendor gave me a company that doesn't even come to our demographic. We're a 19 person organization in Phoenix. 7th largest city in. We're actually in Chandler, but Phoenix metro area.

We're the seventh largest city in the U.S. why don't you give me somebody who's closer to our size in a larger city like Denver or Chicago or something like that to talk to because they're experiencing some of the same issues that we are. We're in Phoenix. There's a lot of competition. I want this marketing company to help me differentiate myself.

I can tell people we create super fans, that we do things better. But until they know, until they experience the nothing but net way, they don't know. They can just assume. And I never want people to assume something.

Okay. And I never want to be salesy even though that's my job. I want people to believe in our message.

I want people to understand that we are here to serve our community. We are here to help our clients and our prospects. And I reached out to a prospect today that we're supposed to meet late next month.

I asked him, can we meet a little earlier? I really want to get to know your business better and talk about the collaborative partnership. Not about, hey, can I sell you IT services?

Can I sell you some IT stuff? No, I want to know more about them.

Because if I know more about them, what they do, what their mission is, what their passion is in the back of my head because you know me, I'm going to try to find a way to help increase their business.

I'm going to not only come up with good solutions from a technology perspective of where we should take them but also, who do I know that could utilize them? Because givers gain.

Freddy D: 00:22:32

That goes back when I was selling manufacturing software. You made me think of my old selling days, and I would never get into the features and functions of the software.

I would be talking to the head guy, the owner of the company, or the president of the company, and I flat out tell them, our product does the job. The other product that you're going to look at does the job, and the other product that you're going to look at, they all do the job.

And ask, where do you want to be in five years? What's your strategy? What's your vision? And we got out of the conversation of does it turn right, does it turn left? Is it blue, is it green?

Stuart Selbst: 00:23:10

Where's it going to take your business?

Freddy D: 00:23:12

We're looking at, how can I help you grow your business? What's your strategy, and what's your timeline? How can we help accomplish that goal?

And really, the sale becomes backwards because, okay, to reach your goal, Stu, that you just told me that you want to do, in three years, you want to increase by $2 million. We need to back this up because you got training. You got to run systems simultaneously. You can't just shut one off.

You got to run two systems temporarily. Make sure everything is going blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, based upon your timeline you just gave me. Stu, you need to issue that PO to me tomorrow.

Stuart Selbst: 00:23:49

Yesterday. Yeah, no, I'm with you a thousand percent.

Freddy D: 00:23:53

Fun.

Because you leave everybody else behind because they're all busy talking about this turns blue and it does that and it flips this and works so wonderful about that.

Stuart Selbst: 00:24:03

Yeah. You don't talk about features. You talk about how it's going to benefit. I got two stories that I want to share.

They're both current clients, just a fantastic construction company. And they've grown so much, they've outgrown QuickBooks. Right. So they're talking to me.

And because they know I come from that ERP world and stuff like that, I said, we can go a couple different ways. We can go to Sage, because Sage is really designed for the construction business. However, let's really look to the future.

Let's look five, seven, ten years out there. I said, let's look at a true ERP system. Let's look at NetSuite. I'm a big fan of NetSuite. We're actually a referral partner to them.

That's all we do is refer the business. He says, okay, so we've been working with netsuite and them a Little bit. And he's pretty impressed. But we're going to evaluate a couple other things.

But for him to come to me and say, stu, this is where we're at. I said, okay, let's look at these different solutions. Now, we don't sell them, but we have that trust.

Freddy D: 00:24:57

Right.

Stuart Selbst: 00:24:57

And they understand that.

We are going to look at how it affects the user community within the organization, how it can, from a technological standpoint, how it can take their business to the next level, and what other things are they going to need, whether it's bandwidth or infrastructure, whatever, to run these systems. Okay. So we can plan accordingly. That's what I try to get across to every client. You know, that's the end.

Freddy D: 00:25:22

I'll call that the unexpected extra, because you're not getting paid for this, but you're helping that business go to the next level, which in turn is going to transform them into your super fan.

Because the owner of that company knows other owners of other companies, and they're going to be having beers or conversation or coffee or whatever, and that's going to come up and go, oh, man, you got to talk to my buddy Stu. He'll help you out.

Stuart Selbst: 00:25:47

Well, and that's. And that's how that came about. So a good friend of mine is the guy's business coach, and he was having problems with his IT companies.

Oh, you gotta talk to this dude. He didn't miss a beat. You gotta talk to this dude. And we met the next day and signed on with us.

The other client that I wanted to talk about, he goes, I want to go to the cloud. Okay, what do you want to put in the cloud? I want to put everything in the cloud. Okay. So we start talking about these things.

He's got some products with big databases and stuff like that. So we're looking at Azure. And I'm like, you're going to spend $25,000 now? I don't want to go to the cloud. Then we start to narrow it down.

He just wants to move his file and print to, like, sharep and stuff. Like, okay, so he's trying to do it himself. And so it's just funny that they know. They have a vision, the owners have a vision of what they want.

But I try to tell people, stay in your lane. You do what you do best. Let us console, you know, what, have what I call diarrhea in the mouth.

Just throw it all up and tell me what you want to accomplish. And then I'll put the pieces together. It's like a game of Tetris. That's what technology, that's what being an MSP is about.

You take the client's vision and you put the pieces together to make it work for their company.

Yes, there's a cost to that, but if they try to piecemeal it together without a complete system or a complete plan, then they're going to trip over their shoelaces, they're going to fall flat on their face, and then it's going to cost them more. So that's what I recommend to people.

When you're into your technology company, if they're engaged in your business the way we get engaged with our clients, sit down and talk to them, Tell them what they. Tell them what you need, tell them what you want.

And it's not just a salesperson, but most IT companies should have a customer success manager who's more consultative.

Freddy D: 00:27:40

Right back to what we were talking about earlier is what's the company's vision? And you're just a component of helping them accomplish that vision. You're just one piece. You're one piece of the puzzle.

Stuart Selbst: 00:27:53

We also have a seat at the table. We have a seat at the big boys table. We're not sitting on the kitty table. We're helping them strategize and build, process and budget.

I'm sitting in those meetings with our clients, or Bob is. And we're having those budgetary meetings. We're doing those quarterly business reviews.

We're engaging with the client from a business perspective, not just helping them find the any key or get their Microsoft Word to print.

Freddy D: 00:28:17

It's really what's the vision and how can we help you get to your vision?

Stuart Selbst: 00:28:21

Absolutely.

Freddy D: 00:28:23

That's how you create superfans. So what's the one thing that just about every IT company could do better to foster Superfans.

Stuart Selbst: 00:28:30

This is something that I'm also working on because this is one of our failures. We need to, instead of looking for new business, we need to cultivate the business we have. Right.

I don't think IT companies, and I'm going to blame myself for this, I don't think, even though we do a good job of working with our clients, I don't think we're engaged enough. I call it tripping over my shoelaces. And I just finished off my first year here at Nothing but Net.

I'm coming to a realization that I've taken the first year to learn our systems and learn some of our clients, things like that. Now I really want to step it up a notch.

Freddy D: 00:29:06

Right.

Stuart Selbst: 00:29:06

I think in the IT business, we're so focused either on the technology or finding that new logo to put up on the wall, the new client or the new vendor or whatever that we forgot where we came from. We forgot the people that. I wouldn't say forget, but I'm going to use that word just because it's the one that came to my mind.

We're forgetting the people that got us there.

Freddy D: 00:29:26

The goal is in your existing customers. That's your base.

Stuart Selbst: 00:29:30

My low hanging fruit, that is. Those are my super fans. Those are the people that I need to engage. I'll give you an example.

So we have some very large clients and we do a lot of work for them and we do some sponsorships of their events and things like that. And, and they know that we're engaged.

So one of the things I've worked on for my 20, 24, 25 plan is to have a loyalty program, create a loyalty program for our clients that, that renew or send referrals or whatever it happens to be. And so I, I'm putting the final touches on it, but I think it's a really good plan to reward our clients for being our clients.

Freddy D: 00:30:05

Yeah, I talk about her book or loyalty program.

Stuart Selbst: 00:30:08

I just didn't read your mind. But one of the things I put in there is a budget for sponsoring their events, right?

So clients have events, they have open houses, they have golf tournaments, they have things like that. And we're asked all the time and I've got to go and ask and get permission to. For a couple hundred bucks or a couple thousand dollars or whatever.

It happens to be this way with my loyalty program. I've got money. I'm setting aside MDF funds for helping the clients so I don't have to go and ask permission.

Client says, hey Stu, would you sponsor our golf tournament for $500? Let me look at what you spend. Let me look at my kitty. You know what? $500 is outside of the budget based on your spend, but I can do 250.

Can you give me a whole sponsor or something like that for that? It's just those kind of conversations where I'm putting the money where my mouth is when I say I want super fans, I want to support our clients.

I'm putting the money where my mouth is because they spend money with me. I want to give part of it back to them to, to their events. And you know, we're building out a referral program.

Mary Jane, the receptionist at one of our clients, she wants to refer her, her dad's business to Us or whatever. You know what? We'll give her a cash reward of up to $1,000 for the referrals. And Mary Jane probably makes 20 bucks an hour.

A nice thousand dollars bonus from nothing, but none. Visa gift card or cash wired.

Freddy D: 00:31:31

Could be a ticket to.

Stuart Selbst: 00:31:33

To see the dance or whatever.

Freddy D: 00:31:35

Yeah, Baseball team, football, hockey, whatever.

Stuart Selbst: 00:31:39

Yeah. So that's just one of the things. And so we also have another thing for gift cards and stuff like that that I'm putting together.

It's rewarding people for being our fans. And I'm not trying to buy their love. My wife would call it buying their love. No, it's.

If you think of me, if you think high and highly enough of me that you're going to tell somebody to come meet with me because you trust me, I want to do something nice for you. I want to do something. I want to thank you for that. So for the referral that gets a meeting, hey, here's a gift card.

If we get the business, here's something a little, little extra because you played a part in our success.

Freddy D: 00:32:12

One of. One of my quotes in the book is people crawl through broken glass for appreciation and recognition.

So what you're doing right there is you're appreciating them for the referral number one. And once it converts into a customer, you're recognizing them from that perspective as well. So now you've just transformed them into a superfan.

They're going to go, wow, he really appreciated what I gave him. And I feel special. I want to do this again.

Stuart Selbst: 00:32:43

Well, we do get those referrals and stuff like that.

I'm going to have one of those giant checks printed up, the whiteboard checks and presented and take pictures and social it out, because that way people know that, hey, Mary Jane or Freddie D. Gave us a referral. We got the business because Freddie D. Trusts Stu or nothing. But dad and hey, we're people of our word where we say, hey, we're going to get.

Give you a check.

And even when I had my consulting company, I got a referral from someone and I had a referral program, actually wound up cutting them a check for 500. Yeah, it was. I got the check. I took a picture of it.

Freddy D: 00:33:17

You hit a point. There's. It's sharing that. Because if I turn around says, hey, Stu, really appreciate that referral. Thank you so much.

Okay, you feel wonderful and you got your little gift and all that stuff. But if I turn around and say, hey, everybody, I want to take a moment to recognize Stu for giving us this referral and really appreciate him.

Now all of a sudden you feel like a rock star because now you got edified in public or whatever or.

Stuart Selbst: 00:33:44

In a newsletter or whatever, night and day difference.

Freddy D: 00:33:47

Because now you feel important.

Stuart Selbst: 00:33:49

You feel important. You're on top of the world. It's like you're wearing a tuxedo.

Freddy D: 00:33:53

So that's how you create superfans. Exactly the way Cool. Stu, it's been a pleasure. How can people find you and what's the free offer that you have for our listeners?

Stuart Selbst: 00:34:05

Nothing's free. First of all, they can find us@nothingbutnet.com you can check us out there. You can Find us on LinkedIn, on Facebook, Twitter or X or whatever.

So the free offer is anyone who's listening to this that would like for us to give them a second set of eyes on their network, on their cybersecurity, I'll make that offer to them.

It's typically a: 1500

-: 6604

Go to our website nothingbutnet.com you can call us and get a hold of us and just ask questions. We're here to help. And like I said earlier, not every business is a perfect fit.

At the end of the day, we want to help people and we want to be friends with people and we want to build more super fans. And I'm willing to go to the ends of the earth for people. At some point it's going to have to be a two way street.

Let me be a super fan of yours as well as you be a super fan of mine.

Freddy D: 00:35:34

No, great point. And one of the things I tell people is that I'll just use you and me as an example.

We may never do business, but if we don't take the time to learn a little bit about each other, we'll never know the opportunities that could potentially happen. Because you and I may not do business together, but you may know somebody or I may know somebody that could use your services.

Or somebody that could use my services four months from now.

Stuart Selbst: 00:36:04

Absolutely, Absolutely. And everybody has it, and everybody knows about it, and everybody. And sometimes you just need a coach.

Sometimes you just need someone to push you to that next level. I was a business coach for eight years, and people would do really well in business, and they would get stuck.

Well, it's almost like having a coach doesn't have all the. Have all the answers. Right. And if you look at some professional sports. Yeah. Look at the Chicago Cubs, right? Great team.

But they're in the cellar right now. Okay. And it's not always the coach's fault. It's how the coach is leading and how the people are responding to it.

So with you being an author, a podcaster, a speaker, an advisor or coach, you can't do the work for them. You can just advise and help them build a place.

And just like in it, we do business consulting, but sometimes there's no money in the budget to do something or something along those.

Freddy D: 00:36:58

At this point in time, it could be tomor. But if you don't stay in contact with them.

And that's why I created the Business Superfan accelerator, which is an online community, is because exactly what you just said. Trying to solve it by yourself, and you got nobody to talk to. To brainstorm.

Stuart Selbst: 00:37:17

Take the village.

Freddy D: 00:37:18

Anywhere you're going around in a circle, your blood pressure's going up, your stress level is going up because you go, I can't figure this out. Where. If you went into a community where you can say, hey, I've got this question. Does anybody know anybody that can help with me on this stuff?

It's a game changer.

Stuart Selbst: 00:37:35

Yep, absolutely. So it takes a village, right? It takes a village to raise kids. It takes a village to run a business.

And I used to say it's easy to start a business, but difficult to run it.

Freddy D: 00:37:46

Yep.

Stuart Selbst: 00:37:47

There's so many moving parts, and I don't know. That was a single solo practitioner for a long time back in the day, and I don't know how I did it. I just don't know. And I couldn't do it today.

I couldn't be a solo practitioner today. Thank you for having me on. Appreciate it.