The Happy Entrepreneur (ft. Mark Long)

Mark Long 0:00
What are your goals, and how are you going to get there? If you put it down on paper and you say, Hey, I’m going to do a million in sales this year, you’ll find a way to do a million in sales this year. And doing that is far better than not doing it. Even if you do 950,000 this year, at least, we had a goal. We were striving towards something so easy to get caught up in the day to day stuff without looking at the big picture. As a business owner, your job is really to try and create the vision and the roadmap on how to you’re going to get to where you want to go.

Brandon Welch 0:34
Welcome to the Maven Marketing Podcast. Today is Maven Monday. This is the place where we help you eliminate waste in advertising, grow your business and achieve the big dream. Today, I’m joined by a dreamer, an entrepreneur, a servant and a leader. You definitely need to know Mark long is a serial entrepreneur, two time franchise founder, and just an all around heck of a good man. And thank you so much for being here. Well, thank you for having me. Yeah, excited, yeah, Mark and I had the had the pleasure of meeting in a rotary and then a number of other nonprofit organizations, and you’re going to hear his story in just a minute, and it’s actually, this is the fun part for you and everybody, because I get to read all these good things about you while I’m sitting across the table. Sound like fun? Can I leave that? Yeah, you can leave and come back, but it is the obligatory bio reading. I’ll just get it out of the way. Okay. Mark long as an innovative and versatile professional with extensive knowledge of multiple industries, experienced in managing large and small group dynamics, as well as leading, mentoring and motivating, he is recognized for his ability to formulate strategic solutions to complex situations for the benefit of satisfaction of staff and customers after serving in the United States Marine Corps. Thank you very much for your service. Thank you. He dedicated 29 years to the Orange County Sheriff’s Department. We’re going to hear some of those stories leading every corner of the department, and retiring captain of the North ops division, leading strategy, accountability, focus and evaluation. After his law enforcement career, he continued to serve as a consultant on law enforcement, technology and leadership, being featured as a keynote speaker for Microsoft, holy smokes and other technology organizations. In 2018 with three decades of leadership experience, he reinvented himself once again as an entrepreneur by founding the garage experts franchise in Missouri with his wife, Shelly. After six years, they sold their garage experts location and are now on to their next business model, custom home organization with 417, closets. He’s bearing the badge proudly today, guys, I’m so excited for Mark to share his experience with you and the lessons learned as he’s continually reinvented himself and pursued excellence in both public and private sectors. And I think it’s just it’s so rare that someone, after, you know, all those years, reinvent yourself as an entrepreneur, and not only once, but twice. And I’m just seeing that looking out across the troops, as they say, of the entrepreneurial world, the owner operators that we love so dearly, and the ones that we serve on this podcast, there’s just a over stimulation, a disorientation happening at all levels. And it’s, it’s, it’s not any one person’s fault, and it’s not that we’re defeated. But I think, I think there are weary warriors out there, and you just have such a fresh optimism about you, and you’ve done this multiple times. And so I just, I think that everyone can use a fresh American entrepreneur story. I’m gonna, I’m hoping, to dissect a little bit of your energy today and transfer it to our our tribe here. So thank you so much for being here. Thank

Mark Long 3:40
you. Excited to be here. Like to talk about this?

Brandon Welch 3:44
Yeah, a California guy landing in Missouri. Yes. Did you intend for that to happen? Like,

Mark Long 3:51
no. If you would have told me I was going to move to Missouri 20 years ago, until you’re out of your mind, couldn’t find Missouri on a map. And quite frankly, I was snobbish California. I used to think there’s two types of people in the world, Californians and those that want to be Oh, wow. Well. And you know, California has like, 12 or 13% of the population of the country, so there were a lot of people moving to California. Oh, I grew up there. It was beautiful place to grow up. But since I’ve moved to the Midwest, I feel more at home here in the 10 years that I’ve been here than I did in the 53 years prior to living in Southern California. Well, point for Missouri. Yes, point for Missouri. And, you know, people talk about the weather and the weather and the weather, and that’s really the selling feature of Southern California, because the negative side of that balance sheet is is there’s traffic and pollution and population and politics and the high cost of living, and it’s just really a hard life

Mark Long 4:58
living there. And so I. Yeah, come here, all of that, and and you come

Mark Long 5:03
here, and people are friendly, people are nice. It’s it’s easier to live here than it is there. There’s not the traffic concerns. Everything you need is here. And like I say, I like the people here. I feel an affinity towards them. So, yeah, you know you and I sat at a fundraiser together, and we didn’t know each other, and yet, we had a great conversation, had a great time. And here we are, and here we are. So, yeah,

Mark Long 5:29
I love being in well, that’s, that’s the

Brandon Welch 5:32
Midwest. Way. It is welcome. I think you, I think you fit right in. I would have never picked you out as one of those folks from out there. And I do love California, but I was told

Mark Long 5:39
when we first came out here, don’t mention you’re in Southern California. Southern California. It’s

Brandon Welch 5:44
so bad. It’s those other areas. But hey, we, we have, we have Californians on here. We love them, and we serve businesses all over coast to coast. So what I want to know is, man, you, I’m going to guess, after a 30 year career like that, you didn’t have to work anywhere.

Mark Long 6:03
You didn’t have to,

Brandon Welch 6:06
you know, put the labor into building a business. Why and how did you first choose to be an entrepreneur? And then I’m going to ask you, like, What drew you to home service and particularly garage experts? Well,

Mark Long 6:19
you and I were talking earlier about, you know, kind of my traumatic childhood. I never had any money. So what drew me to that? No, I don’t have to work, but I made a list of everything that really makes me happy. I like people. I like relationships. I like improving things. You know, someone said you should always leave things better than what you found them. And I always want to do that. I want to I want to leave something behind where, hey, you know what? It’s better as you as a result of you being there.

Mark Long 6:51
So, so how do you how

Mark Long 6:54
do you take it? You can’t retire at 53 I don’t golf, I don’t fish. So it’s like, what are you going to do? So, bored? Yeah, I’m going to be bored. So you look at that and go, Okay, what are your what’s your skill set? What do you like to do? It’s funny because I’ve been studying happiness for the last two years. I’ve probably read about 15 books on happiness. I’ve listened to all kinds of podcasts on it. I’m a student of happiness. I didn’t realize this 10 years ago when I was doing this survey, but part of it is, is it’s not a bad way of going. What makes you happy? What? What are the things that you do in life that cause your happiness? Do more of those and do less of the things that make you unhappy. It’s not real

Brandon Welch 7:35
hard. And so sounds like simple math, right? Is

Mark Long 7:38
and so I like relationships. I like people. I like I like being able to give something back. And when you’re a business owner, you either you have resources that other people don’t have, I can. I can. When we own garage experts, we donated a lot of different floors to different causes, and it allowed people to raise money. You know, you give discounts for different things. So, and then how I got into that businesses is, is, I’ve always been a do it yourselfer, and I ended up, when I moved out here, there weren’t a lot. There was really not many people doing epoxy floors. I had one in California. It was, it was a pretty standard if you lived in a nice house, you you had an epoxy floor in California. You come out here, it doesn’t have the same degree of acceptance. Yeah, it was. It didn’t

Brandon Welch 8:24
catch on yet. It didn’t catch on. And you folks out on the coast, that’s what’s cool,

Mark Long 8:28
well, and the Sun Belt states, Florida, everybody has an epoxy floor there. You know, Phoenix, all those areas have it. You come out here, and I don’t know, because of the weather or whatever, people don’t think that it’s a viable option. And I did my own and then when I looked around at owning a business, it was a natural fit. So

Brandon Welch 8:47
I want to, I want to dig into something, and we may go ahead and change the title of the episode, just on what you said. The student of happiness, how to be happy.

Mark Long 8:57
I think so many

Brandon Welch 8:59
leaders have a craft that they’re naturally inclined towards, and maybe have a skill set that they’ve capitalized and built on, and then that’s just the thing. Well, they might as well go do that. They might as well do do the business for themselves, because they can make more money. And that’s maybe the foundational why you didn’t really have any of that, not, not career wise. No that natural passion and just like occurrence to go, oh, well, this feels right, and I want to go do that for people, and the impact you can make that that was foundational to your business, and happen to know it was a very successful business. And I happen to know, you know, you were able to get out of that and make good money and all of that stuff. But did I hear from you that that sort of came secondary?

Mark Long 9:48
Yes, I think when you’re when you’re starting a business, you know you you do what you have to do to survive. When we first started, there were days. I had one employee and we had nothing to do, and that is a really scary proposition. The biggest challenge, especially starting off, was, how do you take your your your workload and match it to your staffing levels? Because if there’s no work to do, you don’t want to tell the send the employee home, because they’re going to go find another job really quickly. And you spent a lot of time training them and teaching them what it is you want them to learn about how to run the business. So, I mean, we we pressure washed people’s floors, I moved furniture, we did all kinds of things that we would never do later on, you know, stay in your lane, bro. But we got out of our lane out of necessity, yeah. And, but as as the business grows, and as you start to refine your processes, there’s, there’s jobs that you won’t do, yeah, but part of it is, is, is, as you get a little bit older, then you start to sit back and go, Okay, what? What are, you know, I, I’m, I’m a big proponent of SWOT analysis, what our strengths, our weaknesses, our opportunities and our threats. And as you, as you get more seasoned, as you get more customers, you become more discerning. You can look at your operation and be a little more critical about it. So,

Brandon Welch 11:25
so you saw this through the vantage point of Gosh, I’ve done. I built a career. I’m in and out of that. I’ve got the freedom. I’m going to pick home service. I’m going to pick this thing that I have natural strengths at. I

Mark Long 11:37
don’t take it with that way. I think, like we you talked about, I moved out here 10 years ago, didn’t have didn’t know anybody, didn’t have anything to do. I ended up working for a software company for a couple years, but in doing that, I realized that’s not what I wanted to do, and I didn’t want to do law enforcement, because 30 years of it, I was done with it. So you’re it’s more of a let me eliminate this. Let me eliminate that. What’s left? I wanted to I knew I wanted to be a business owner. I didn’t want to have to go work for someone else. Okay, so then you go, Okay, you want to work? Do you want to own a franchise, or do you want to start a business from scratch? Because then those are your two choices, right? Franchises. Franchising offers certain opportunities that starting your own business in advanced age that I am, you know, Hey, you don’t have as long a runway to build that business. So I opted for the franchise model. I happen to garage experts is a great franchise model. They’re a great franchise partner, and you build the business from that, and yeah, and you build it one customer at a time. When I got done with training, I was a garage expert franchisee, but I didn’t feel like an expert, so I went out to Texas to the franchisee out there, because he’s the most prolific franchisee in the Indus, in that in garage experts catalog. Yeah, and I rode with his guys for a couple of weeks, and when I left there, then I felt like an expert.

Brandon Welch 13:07
So, yeah, you got to see it firsthand, right? Hey, how

Mark Long 13:11
do they? How do they? What does their day look like? Yeah, let me walk through their day.

Brandon Welch 13:15
So that’s it’s a natural step I think a lot of entrepreneurs take out of the gate, certainly ones who are copying a model or looking to fast forward and get off the ground without a long runway. Man, what if we did that as business owners? 10 years in, you and I were talking about mentorship earlier, yes, and having that constant drive and like, without mentioning too many specifics, you went from like nothing to a really successful business. I’ve seen a lot of startups over the years. I’ve seen a lot of Home Improvement companies. And to do what I think you got to take, take some people well into 1015, years, and you did it faster on the topic of creating a profit center. We’re talking you know, that’s kind of kind of the actual title the episode today. Like, how crucial was that mentorship and modeling after others. For you,

Mark Long 14:03
well, for me, it was huge. That was the that’s one of the biggest appeals of franchising, is you have a lot of people that have been there, done that. Any question that you had, you send out to the group, you would get a response right away. The downside, though, is is every market’s different. We I was fortunate enough my wife had a lot of marketing background so and she’s very good at tracking where our leads came from and how to generate additional leads and and so we kept very close tabs on where are we getting our business. How do we generate more business? We’re constantly questioning that. What? What market do we go into? What? What medium do we try and expand our business without breaking the bank? You know, that’s that’s a delicate balance. Yeah, you want business, so you have to advertise, but you don’t want to ever spend on average. Advertising if you don’t have any business. So, yeah, yeah, it’s chicken and the egg idea. But we saw steady growth, and as you see steady growth, and then it creates other opportunities.

Brandon Welch 15:11
So you’d mentioned you were spending, I mean, in this market I’m obviously very familiar with but under six figures a year in advertising, correct, you generated a lot more business than most people do with that type of budget. I have a hunch as to why that happened, but do you have any yes inside this as to why you were able to do that? Because one of my favorite quotes on marketing is that advertising is just a tax we pay for being unremarkable. Wow, and and the inverse of that is that the more remarkable you are, the less you have to advertise. Now, pair that with advertising actually will just make happen. What was going to happen anyway, faster, right? But you made it happen without that abundance, I think my world, at least my perspective,

Mark Long 16:03
what say you on that? Well,

Mark Long 16:06
I told you, I went two weeks and spent in Texas, and the franchisee there told me, the more jobs you do, the more jobs you do. And so it kind of as a snowball effect, as long as the jobs that you do are done professionally into the satisfaction of the customer.

Brandon Welch 16:27
I love that

Mark Long 16:28
I was on every job. I personally, personally on every job up to the day we sold. The last week that we had it, I was out installing the floor. And it’s rare. It is rare. But the customers here in the Midwest, they like to see the owner out on the job. They they’d like to know your name. You know, I told you I moved here 10 years ago. Didn’t know a soul. Now I go around this town, and we did, you’re a big deal. We did over 1000 jobs, over 1000 floors, and so it’s hard to go anywhere in this town without running into someone who’s a former customer or a member of the rotary that we’re in, or some of the other groups that I belong to. And that really gives you a sense, going back to happiness, gives you a sense of place. It gives you a sense of belonging that you know, you I take a lot of pride in the jobs that I do. We did floors if a customer wasn’t happy, we redid floors at a loss because we were adamant about making sure that we’re building our reputation about doing a quality job. So I’m

Brandon Welch 17:38
talking to the guy or gal who may be driving in their truck, or, you know, on the job, or work in the grind of the lead generation. It’s harder than it has been last few years. We’ve talked about that on this show, something as simple as, the more jobs you do, the more jobs you do.

Mark Long 17:55
I think it’s just, it’s so like, doesn’t sound

Brandon Welch 17:59
a new and profound. However, what if we got back to we’re just trying to do jobs. We’re trying to make people’s experience exceptional in that way that I’ve seen you. I’ve seen you show up. You actually did a job for my in laws and did such a awesome job on that. So I know that’s true about your company. Realistically, this is a podcast about marketing and sales and growth. What were the challenges to growth, even though, you know, it looks like success from six years behind, but what were the what were the milestones and some things that you maybe didn’t expect? You

Mark Long 18:36
know, one of the things I used to say is, is the days are long, but the years are short. You know, in hindsight, you can look back and go, Oh, well, we were successful, and it wasn’t easy. It was constantly trying to figure out, once again, the biggest challenge always is, how do you take your workload and match it with your labor force, because that’s really a challenge without I’m I pride myself on being efficient. I don’t like wasted I don’t like downtime. That’s why I started a business, really, since I just sold the other one, I I’m not good with idle time, and I’m not good with employees sitting around not doing anything. So I’m always constantly, how do I, how do I fill this week up? So what those were, one of the biggest challenges. Another biggest challenges is, how do you, what are your goals, and how are you going to get there? Super goal oriented. But I also truly believe that if you put it down on paper and you say, Hey, I’m going to do a million in sales this year, you’ll find a way to do a million in sales this year. Yeah, and doing that is far better than not doing it, even if you fall short, yeah, even if you do 950,000

Brandon Welch 19:56
this year. Okay, cool, right?

Mark Long 19:59
At least we. We had a goal. We were striving towards something. What I would say is so easy to get caught up in the day to day stuff without looking at the big picture. And as a business owner, your job is really to try and create the vision and the roadmap on how do you where you’re going to get to where you want to go?

Brandon Welch 20:18
Yeah, sounds to me like you had a ton of respect from your team, and you were able to ingrain that envision or that vision and remind them of it constantly. By your example, I think there’s a lot of people that may get caught up in the finances or the back office or and they forget that connection with their with their frontline folks. I read a quote today that says, Where do you find where do you find hard working people that are dedicated, loyal and productive? You find them on your team, right? They exist there. Sounds like that’s what you did. So well. I

Mark Long 20:51
read that same quote. I just can’t remember where it was. Yeah,

Brandon Welch 20:54
I think it was Don Harkey, actually, that’s exactly on Facebook, really is was great. So shout out to Don for that, but so you chose garages just because it had a natural, you know, Venn diagram alignment with who you are. And that’s just

Mark Long 21:11
actually a process of elimination. I didn’t want to be a subway owner, yeah, no offense to Subway owners. I just didn’t want to be in the food service.

Brandon Welch 21:20
I have some good friends or subway owners. I

Mark Long 21:22
didn’t, I didn’t want to have a mobile dog grooming. Or that’s the mobile dog grooming. There’s just when you when you look, I did a lot of research what franchises are available, and the home services just really appeals to me. Because going back to I like improvement. I take a lot of pride in my own house, yeah. And I like helping other people improve theirs,

Brandon Welch 21:48
yeah. So you’re right now. Your business is doing whatever, whatever it is right now, and it’s probably maybe a little harder than it has been on the topic of inventing new profit machines. Go back to that passion, and it’s like, do more of what makes you happy. Maybe there’s a customer set. Maybe there’s a type of person you’ve been serving. Maybe sometimes, maybe it’s an employee you just you don’t

Mark Long 22:11
align with. It’s like studying happiness.

Brandon Welch 22:16
Choose those things less, get out of them and lean into the strength part of it that seems like a key ingredient to,

Mark Long 22:22
well, you know, there’s big fan of the happiness lab by Dr Lori Santos. And what she talks about, she had a segment on there that basically, if, if you’re unhappy, if, if you look around and your circumstances aren’t what you want them to be, you have to change. Okay, you can’t expect the world to change around you. And so going back to Hey, why am I starting a new business? Or why am I creating this? It, it’s, it’s more driven by, I want to make myself happy. And those things that make me happy are relationships with people, creating something that is lasting, leaving someone leaving a house better than what I found it and giving the customer satisfaction. Money is a is a secondary concern by product, it’s a byproduct. Yeah, and, and I want to learn new skills. I want you know, I haven’t we hung a lot of cabinets in garages, but the new company is different, and then takes a different skill set, and it’s a different product, and some of the closets that I’ve done have turned out awesome, and, man, customers are very happy, and it’s like I’m doing what I love to do. So

Brandon Welch 23:39
love that. So find, find the parts you love. So talk to me about that new business. So you, you built franchise, sold it, which I’m ask you your advice on that in just a second. Okay, but what are some of the things you are for sure going to do again in your new business, and some things that you are sure you’re not going to do and starting a new profit Well,

Mark Long 24:03
the the things that I’m going to do, I’m going to focus on meeting the customer’s needs, seeing what it is they want.

Mark Long 24:13
You know, there’s, there’s a book I read

Mark Long 24:15
a couple years ago called The organized mind, and one of the things they talk about is, is, if you want to be organized, you know, they talk about the complexity of modern society and how it’s grown, and they give a lot of examples from, you know, 200 years ago, things were simple, and 200 years later, things are very complex, and our mind hasn’t been able to keep up with it. So you have to create systems that allow your mind to offload. So where do I put my car keys? Where do I put my wallet? You know? Why? How do I not lose these things and and so you you have to become organized. There’s a lot of there’s a lot of research that says, the more you get rid of, the more you offload. The happier you become, because your mind isn’t cluttered. You don’t wake up at three o’clock in the morning trying to solve, you know, where this is or where that is becoming. I’m not quite a minimalist yet, but I’m I’m approaching

Brandon Welch 25:11
it’s a hack, though, because, I mean, roller G is a finite tank. You think about the guys like Steve Jobs, or think even Zuckerberg. They were the same thing exactly. So they

Mark Long 25:19
that’s it. Einstein did the same thing he wore. He wore the same, same suit.

Brandon Welch 25:24
I’ll give my I’ll not give my energy to that, because I can save it for other things, right? That’s it. Because for entrepreneurs, you

Mark Long 25:31
really do have a finite ability to think about things. And when you are when you’re worried about mundane things, it really clouds your mind. Obama, you say I wear a gray suit or a blue suit? Period? Yeah, I don’t. I have too many decisions to make. I don’t want to worry about what tie I’m going to wear and and so may have

Brandon Welch 25:51
had a few people to help him with those decision decisions

Mark Long 25:54
he did, but you still are the one having to put it on, and you still have to think about it. And bottom line is, is, the more we can download those things that we don’t, we don’t want to have to think about on a regular basis, the more you could focus in on, really, what’s important? Yeah, so what’s important for me? And going back to the, you know, I know it’s important to create a profit center. I know it’s important to make money. You know, I got a book here. The purpose of the purpose is profit. That’s the whole idea that you’re in. The purpose is profit. And this guy talks about how to start a business and the things that you need to take into consideration. I’m not your typical business owner, in the sense that I’m not starting a business to make money. I’m starting a business to fulfill a need, both in my customer and myself, and money, I believe, will follow. There’s

Brandon Welch 26:50
got, well, there’s guys here that are just going, shaking your head, going, this guy’s, you know, smoking grass or something, because he’s, you know, unicorns and rainbows. But let’s, let’s just say that you got the proof. Now you may have had the luxury of not having to, like worry so much about the dollars and cents for living. You may, I’m not sure if that situation or not, but, but look at the proof, though, that’s how you started it, and the profit was a byproduct. And what if we could just suddenly? But

Mark Long 27:18
one of the principles that I try and follow is, is you always operate ethically. You always do what’s right for the customer you you’ve you know, people always talk about, hey, if you find your passion, do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life. I don’t believe that it was hard work because I enjoyed it. I had a lot of passion for it. It was still work, yeah. However, if, if you approach it like I’m, you know, all of, all of capitalism is about fulfilling a need, fulfilling a want, and doing it more efficiently and cheaper than the competition. That’s the That’s Adam Smith, you know, that’s the bottom line of capitalism. So if you, you start off with that mindset, and you you find whether it’s a viable business. Do I, do I have enough clients? Is, is the is there enough business in this area to support what it is I’m trying to do? Can I provide this service that customers want, that they’re willing to pay for? And you do it the right way, people will flock to you. People will a lot of people that I’ve talked to that have been successful business. People don’t advertise at all. They say, hey, you know, I’ve been doing this for so long, it’s just word of mouth. Yeah, that’s how I operate. But I because they do a good job. The more jobs you do, the more jobs you do. And and they’re if you do the good if you do a job well.

Brandon Welch 28:42
So yeah, the more you do, the more you do, right? So I’ve met a lot of those people. We actually love those people that come to us with businesses that grew without marketing. Because, dude, you pour a tiny bit on it, and they explode like wildfire. The book that I wrote, the Maven marketer, the whole, the whole premise of the book is encountering business owners and then me as the marketing guru, trying and failing, trying and failing, and realizing that the businesses that were growing, it wasn’t marketing doing it all along. It was strategy and their approach and what we call their vision, values and vows and you’re just, you’re you probably have never written or read our book. I’m gonna get you a copy of it, but you’re doing that. You’re you’re articulating that from your own experience. And I think it’s true, and it’s a good data point, good validation to have, because that’s what we see over and over and over again. So I have a couple of final questions, just for somebody, I want so much for people to experience business the way you’re experiencing it, because, dude, I’m watching you like a kid in a candy store with this new company, and it’s it’s your remodeling closets. And sounds like a thing is organization you’re bringing to people’s lives, but and what a hack, like removing complexity is is the answer to more energy. But I. You sold the business that you had built. Yes. Do you have any advice for somebody who wants to get to that point, try

Mark Long 30:07
and make your business as attractive as possible by keeping good books? Number one, you know there’s, there’s a lot of people that do things that are trying to avoid taxes and regulation and everything else, but that doesn’t translate into taxable income. When you’re selling your business, you’re selling one of two things. You’re selling the cash flow from that business, or you’re selling the assets of that business. If the business is losing money, all you’re doing the only the only asset the business has are the physical assets, the equipment, the vehicles, inventory, property, maybe some of the intellectual but if you’re losing money on it, then what’s that worth? Yeah, if you’re profitable, you’re selling cash flow. And so you want to, if you’re getting ready to sell a business, you want to maximize the amount that your business shows in terms of cash flow, because as a business buyer, that’s what I’m buying. Yeah, I’m, I’m looking for opportunity for growth, obviously. Hey, is this business poorly managed? Can I do a better job managing it and increase the sales? But right now, hey, you know, and it’s always a percentage of of cash flow, yeah, or multiple cash flow that, and that’s what the bank looks at. Is this business making money? Are you going to be able to afford the loan payment that I’m going to make for you to buy it? Yes. So I would say if, if you’re losing money, well, I’m not sure I could give advice on that. If you’re making money, make sure that your books reflect that positive cash flow, because that’s what the buyer is buying. Yeah, put yourself in the shoes of the buyer.

Brandon Welch 31:54
Man, you’re making this sound like it’s so easy.

Mark Long 31:57
It’s not rocket science. It really is.

Brandon Welch 32:01
I think this is, I hope this is energizing for anybody listening. It’s like the keys to happiness are really lean into the things that you can take to the customers with joy. Get back to that purpose and passion for the original thing. Pour that on your team work side by side, or constantly reinforce that vision with them. Make sure you’re doing the right things. Give back. Give back, get back, is what I’m hearing from you and and then make the business attractive. Final question, do you have any parting happiness insights for weary? I do

Mark Long 32:41
as leaders. You know the happiness lab that she starts off every segment by saying, the things that we think are going to make us happy don’t make us happy if we make more money. The studies have shown, Multiple studies have shown you’re not. There’s not a significant happiness commensurate happiness increase with making more money. But the things that, and there’s actually a there’s been a study, and that the study started in the 1940s one of the original study participants was John F Kennedy, and what they did is they studied people from the inner city, and they studied the privilege class. John was obviously in the privileged class. And they looked at happiness levels, and what they found, and you would think that the people who are privileged were happier than the people inner cities, and they didn’t find that to be true. And that study is ongoing today. The author of there’s only been three directors of that study, the newest one wrote a book called The Good Life. But what they talk about is the things that they we think make us happy aren’t making us happy. And so what are the traits of happy people? What can we distill from happy people, the things that cause our happiness and reverse engineering? Yeah, exactly. And one of the things is, as happy people are grateful, they express gratitude. Happy people are generous. They’re generous with their time, their talent or their treasure. Happy people get back. Happy people are involved. The reason you and I are talking is because happy people reach out and have relationships, and I’ll talk to anybody, anywhere, anytime. Yeah, the guy with the Get off, get off my yard sign is not a happy person. Yeah, you know who sits on his porch and is miserable because everybody’s a jerk out there.

Mark Long 34:34
Happy people like people? Yeah, happy people are involved

Mark Long 34:41
the volunteer they they try and build relationships happy, you know, the it’s interesting, because I know I’m getting off a little off topic here, but one of the psychologists she interviews describes the three circles of relationships. There’s the immediate. Family, my husband, my wife, my kids, my parents, yeah, there’s the next level, the people, your co workers, your friends, people you hang out with, the camera guy. Make the camera guy. He looks happy. He is happy. And then there’s that outer circle, the barista, the dry cleaners, the restaurant waitress that you see on a regular basis, the mailman, and he says, building relationships with every single one of those, it’s really important for your level of happiness. Wow. And one guy talked about, you know, Happiness isn’t a destination. It’s a journey. And you know, it’s not like, Okay, I do a certain thing and then I’m happy, because all of that is fading. You have to practice it on a regular basis. You have to build relationships. You have to say hi to people. You have to find a way to create conversation. Have to ask people about them in their day and actually express some genuine concern. You have to pretend, not pretend. You have to care.

Brandon Welch 36:06
Well, some, sometimes you have to, I think, when you’re when you’re out of energy, you have to just put those actions in to dig under the surface and find that and like, we’ve all been there where it’s just like, not another conversation, like your batteries can be drained by the end of the day. But Right, right. It’s the one of

Mark Long 36:24
the books I last book I just read was called The Art of small talk Gary Whitaker recommended,

Mark Long 36:31
and for him,

Unknown Speaker 36:33
and Gary’s an excellent conversationalist,

Brandon Welch 36:37
but the best, well, the best I’ve ever met. And

Mark Long 36:39
you read this book, and nothing in it so shattering. She talks about the study that they did. They gave this guy, he went to a dinner party, and his line, he had to repeat this line everybody he ran into, what’s your sign? Something from the 70s. And they they made it so ridiculous that people would go, Oh my God, that how stupid. Yeah. And what they found is people opened up to him based upon just the opening line, the the question is irrelevant. It’s the the effort that you put into it, and that someone actually asks you a question.

Brandon Welch 37:13
That’s a highway of emotional exchange, exactly, and that

Mark Long 37:17
emotional exchange actually gives you a shot of dopamine, and it gives you that that happiness, it gives you that high that people look for in, you know, likes on Facebook, or whatever that really is. And there’s another book I’m reading right now called the anxious generation, because they’re so involved in their phones. You know, suicide rates among young boys and young girls has skyrocketed. It’s atrocious pandemic. Yes, it’s a pandemic. The new cigarette because they have no social skills, they’re not building relationships in face to face relationships.

Brandon Welch 37:54
Okay, we’re officially changing the title of this how to make profit and be happy. We could do a whole segment on happiness. We’re going to we’re going to have you back on that. I’m

Mark Long 38:05
a fan of true story. I

Brandon Welch 38:06
didn’t know we were going to go there, but I was looking for it in your entrepreneurial story. And I think what I just found out is that it is you as a being, and that obviously permeates to your business and your people and the companies you’ve built, and I know that the organizations that have been better you’ve left them better than you found them, and I’m just so grateful you shared that with us today. Man, be generous. Be grateful. Get involved. Be involved. Find purpose. And I think all of the secrets to profitability and longevity and quicker growth and all the things that we all want for that big dream, I think they happen. And thank you for showing us the way. Thank you. Hey, if you enjoyed this, please hit that subscribe button so you can see all of our newest episodes. Forward this to somebody who could use a little nudge towards the light. I know you encountered somebody this week that needs that reviews are always welcome and grateful. Hit the like button. We’d like however many stars you feel like giving us on Spotify or Apple or any of those. And if you have any questions for Mark and his experience, first person who sends a question, I’m going to give him a copy of purpose is profit. We’ll fund that. And then Nate the camera guy is going to link to the podcast that you mentioned in the episode, and then also to all the books that you just mentioned. And you’re onto something read like this man reads, and I think you’re going to be in a lot better spot. So we’ll be here every Monday answering your marketing, advertising business growth questions, because marketers who can’t teach you why are just

Mark Long 39:39
a fancy lie. Have a great week.