MBG Episode 1: John Geystone

0:00:03 – (Ron Sell): Welcome to the membership Business Growth podcast, the number one podcast for martial arts and fitness business owners. We’ll dive deep with industry legends to bring you insider secrets on marketing, sales, retention strategies, and life’s balancing act. Get expert tips for business growth right here, right now on the membership Business Growth podcast. Let’s kickstart the action with your host, Ron Sell.

0:00:35 – (Ron Sell): I’m so excited because this podcast is really going to do a lot of great things for our industry. And this is going to help people learn a little bit more about what other school owners are doing in the industry, what’s working, what’s not working. We’re going to try to be as transparent as we can with numbers and ideas because our goal is to help you reach a broader audience. Whether you’re stuck in a plateau or if you’re struggling, we hope to help get you unstuck.

0:01:08 – (Ron Sell): So here we go. It’s my first episode and I’ve got one of my great friends with us today. His name is John Gason. John Gason actually is my business partner locally in a martial arts school here in Tampa, Florida. And what’s really cool about John is I’ve known him probably 15 years or so. I guess I don’t even know. Seems like a lot longer than that John. But anyways, I’ve known him for like 15 years or so, and I’ve always watched him because he owns schools up in Illinois and I’ve always watched his growth. And what he does is in the content that he puts out on social media.

0:01:38 – (Ron Sell): And it always just resonated with me. I knew that this was a guy that was so awesome of a person that just spilled out into everything that he do when he taught classes or ran a business, or even when I saw him speaking at just, you could always just tell he was one of the good guys, one of the ones that really cared about this industry. And so a couple of years ago, he came to Florida and he says, hey, ron, I’m on vacation, but I’m going to move here. And I’ve heard this so many times for so many people. People love the Florida lifestyle. They love our weather here.

0:02:10 – (Ron Sell): And I’ve heard it so many times that I didn’t believe him. I’ll just be honest, I didn’t believe him. A few months later, he calls me up, says, I’m in Tampa. I got my whole family, we packed everything up, and I’m like, did you sell your school in Illinois? And he goes, no, I’m still running it. I’m like, how in the world are you going to run a school in Tampa and all the way up in, in Illinois? But you know what? He’s doing it. I think it’s like 1200 miles away or 50,000 miles away. It seems at least a four hour plane trip. But he’s doing it. He’s running two different schools, one in Illinois, one down here in Tampa. And I’m lucky enough that he’s my business partner. So anyways, John, welcome. I’m so glad for you to be here, man.

0:02:51 – (John Geyston): Well, thank you. That was a great lead and I hope I can live up to some of it.

0:02:57 – (Ron Sell): You already have, man. You’re just an incredible martial artist. You’re real. You teach real martial arts. It comes from a place of your heart, I can tell. But you crush it in the business sector, too. So it’s like the best of both worlds. Someone that’s really doing great works in the industry, but also is rewarded handsomely for that in the financial side of running a business.

0:03:22 – (John Geyston): Thank you.

0:03:23 – (Ron Sell): I’m excited for you to be here. Let’s go back to the beginning if we like. Why did you decide to open up martial arts schools? I’m not talking about now here in Tampa, but I’m talking about at the, like you’ve been in this a know. Can you remember back then why you got involved in martial arts?

0:03:40 – (John Geyston): I can remember way back then. It found me. I always say that. It truly found me. I did it when I was nine for a summer. I did it when I was 15 for about a year and a half. And it never stopped just because it really didn’t live up to what I thought it was going to be. And at the community college, they were running a program. And I walked by it probably for about a month before I ever said anything. And then one day somebody, I noticed that there was a bunch of people with gee doing stuff and I’m watching and it was between two of my classes I had in the afternoon.

0:04:19 – (John Geyston): And then finally I just talked to him and I started working out and the rest is kind of history. And it was a community college two year program. So the person who was teaching, we were a satellite program of a main school in town, Shudokan karate.

0:04:33 – (Ron Sell): And he was leaving.

0:04:34 – (John Geyston): I mean, he got his two year degree. He took a job in Tennessee. And the instructor came to me and another guy, I think I was green belt. It was green then. I want to say the belts went green, purple, then brown. I was a green belt. The other guy was a purple. And he asked if we were both named John, he asked if we would teach the program and if we would, we get free membership at his academy. Well, I’m delivering pizzas and stuff and everything I can to pay my way through the community program. So I’m all about it later. I always joke about that. I negotiated my first work contract.

0:05:08 – (John Geyston): Everybody gives me credit for being great at business, but I negotiate to work about 15 hours a week for 52, 50 a month. So I wasn’t that brilliant in the beginning, but I just fell in love with it. It connected with me. It was not my goal to teach. Year later, I opened up my own academy. I continued teaching for my instructor at the college. I opened up one that built up really well. I ended up buying a building by a community next to me at 21, 22, and the rest is just history. Just kept falling in. In 96, I walked away from my career, six figure income at that point to pursue this full time. And I always tell people, the very first year I made $5,000, take all pay.

0:05:53 – (Ron Sell): Yeah. What were you thinking walking away from a 100,000 or more job to get a job making five grand a year?

0:06:00 – (John Geyston): Right. And that’s when I realized no matter how many tournaments I won or know how good I fought, I wasn’t teaching. It didn’t matter. What I needed was someone to teach me. The business and united Professionals was my first introduction. I didn’t know anybody personally, and I think today people have so many resources. At that point in 96, I did not know a single soul on a personal level that was teaching as a career or full time. I was told you couldn’t do it.

0:06:31 – (John Geyston): And I had three phone calls the week that I left my job and started to go full time. That told me not to do it, not to do it. So that was more of the challenge, like, okay, well, don’t put your restrictions on me. If you couldn’t do it, let me see if I can.

0:06:48 – (Ron Sell): Right over.

0:06:48 – (John Geyston): That was just my personality. So I’m so grateful that I did. But that’s kind of how it found me. I never found it. I didn’t see myself doing this. And I’m sure my story is very similar to a lot of people. I don’t think anybody really said, hey, unless you came up in a system like with your dad, you watched a successful operator, it’s very easy to say, man, I want to do that with me.

0:07:10 – (Ron Sell): I didn’t. Part time people, I didn’t know any different. Like, all I knew what to do in my entire life was becoming a martial arts instructor because both my parents are martial arts instructors. Right. So that was my end.

0:07:24 – (John Geyston): Right.

0:07:25 – (Ron Sell): You know what? I want to go back for a second. What’s interesting to me is you started off in, like, a satellite type of a program. It wasn’t a commercial building that you went to. It was kind of a satellite program. And it reminds me of me, like when I was a kid, like, literally before the age of ten, and I started martial arts. My mom ran those types of programs. My dad had the commercial school, and that was the headquarters, and that’s where the business was located. But my mom was traveling to, like, six different rec centers in three different cities.

0:07:59 – (Ron Sell): And I tagged along with my mom. And every day. Monday we were in Plant City, and Tuesday we were in Lakeland, and Wednesday we were back in Plant City, and Thursday we were in Winter Haven. And I think Friday and Saturday we were at different churches and we were doing these small programs. But that’s really neat, right? I remember doing the same thing in Tampa. Someone said, hey, I had a martial arts school here in Tampa, and the local residential place had a place to do martial arts. And they asked me to come in, and I remember just how powerful that kind of program is. And it seems like you went through the same type of, you know, it’s.

0:08:36 – (John Geyston): It was funny. I always joke because when I did it, we were in a classroom over in the college.

0:08:43 – (Ron Sell): Move the desks off to the side. Yeah.

0:08:46 – (John Geyston): Then when it had come down to us taking over the program, they moved us and they literally put us over to the gym. And I thought, yeah, they put us in the hallway. All the athletes, like the basketball players, the baseball players, soccer, everything that they had. We had to stop class so they could go to the locker room. We were like, right in front of the doorway on a tile.

0:09:09 – (Ron Sell): You’d get kicked upside the head.

0:09:11 – (John Geyston): Yeah. It’s funny is that two of the baseball players went on to become pros and played, and we became friends from that.
0:09:20 – (Ron Sell): Right.

0:09:20 – (John Geyston): Obviously, because I’m a karate guy wearing the pajamas and these guys are doing that. And it was funny because we were out at a Christmas event and everybody swarmed over. The guy who came back from, he was playing for the Cardinals then, and he looks over and he goes, cry guy. What’s up, brother? And out of all the people, just because I was teaching in a hallway, they had to crawls every day. Well, it wasn’t the best of situations, but there was a lot of good.

0:09:46 – (John Geyston): I talk to people all the time, and there’s a lot of great martial artists that come out of those settings, out of being taught in the hallway again today. There’s so many opportunities to sit with a mentor, to be mentored. What you guys are doing with Spark and the information that’s given out, that just wasn’t available. And I don’t know if people understand that. And then to have Matt’s, oh, wow, okay. That would be awesome.

0:10:16 – (John Geyston): We were on a tile floor in a hallway.

0:10:18 – (Ron Sell): Yeah.

0:10:19 – (John Geyston): So, I mean, the industry has evolved. It’s changing a lot of lives. But I’m grateful for how I started. I think I’m grateful that it found.
0:10:31 – (Ron Sell): So let’s talk about know currently here in, you know, you came to Tampa and you said, hey, I want to open up a martial arts school. And I was words. You remember that day we were at lunch and I was like, hey, do you want a partner? And you were gracious enough to say yes. And then I got home, and I’m like, why in the world?

0:10:51 – (John Geyston): But at first, I didn’t know it was you. And I’m like, no, right? I don’t know. And then you said, I go, you know somebody? And you a mean, I go, why would you? As soon as it was you, I was like, yeah, 100%. In a heartbeat.

0:11:04 – (Ron Sell): Yeah.

0:11:04 – (John Geyston): The reason I said no in the beginning, but not knowing it was you.

0:11:08 – (Ron Sell): Okay, so you thought I was offering someone else to be your partner.

0:11:12 – (John Geyston): Well, I thought you knew somebody that wanted to partner up or invest. And then I had mentioned that about starting, and you said that I’m like, no, man. I don’t really want a partner. Me? Heck yeah. I’ll consider that.

0:11:27 – (Ron Sell): Partners are tough. Yeah. The reason I did that was that I believe in the mission of martial arts. Right. I’ve personally witnessed so many people get so much benefit out of being in our programs, in our martial arts programs. I don’t have to say this, but I’m going to anyways. How many kids have you seen that were shy, that became confident as a direct result of you teaching them martial arts? Or how about the adult that also had no confidence and his life was miserable, or life was miserable, and through the martial arts, they got this new sense of self worth, right? Or how about those that are getting in the best shape of their life because of your martial arts program?

0:12:10 – (Ron Sell): The list of benefits that I’ve seen through our programs is enormous. And I’m like, man, I believe in John Gason so much. And I know he has a good spirit, a good heart. He’s in it for the right reasons. And he’s also a really good businessman can really make money doing this. So it’s a real win win. I just wanted to be part of that. And I know, I believe it’s money well spent because your program is blowing up here in Tampa.

0:12:36 – (John Geyston): It’s doing well.

0:12:39 – (Ron Sell): It’s never as good as we want.

0:12:40 – (John Geyston): It is.

0:12:41 – (Ron Sell): Obviously.

0:12:42 – (John Geyston): You got to balance that. And we’re talking with school owners. You have to balance that. You have to provide opportunities for your staff to have the career that you have. You have to provide a great service, you have to provide a great facility. And that’s going to require that you have your business in line. You just can’t go out and be just amazing kicker or an amazing jujitsu guy or an amazing Louis Thai. You have to be amazing at that and then understand business and be just equally, if not more amazing than that. And then you got to put the component in there of teaching.

0:13:18 – (John Geyston): I know so many world champions that are great, yet they can give you some insights at a seminar, but are not really great at teaching a curriculum for twelve weeks straight, five days a week.

0:13:31 – (Ron Sell): Right.

0:13:32 – (John Geyston): And that’s balanced out. And I think, again, the resources that you provide me, that spark provides everybody, allows for everybody to get good in.

0:13:45 – (Ron Sell): All three of those areas. Yeah, super.

0:13:48 – (John Geyston): I appreciate that. But at the end of the day, the end result is what you just said. We’ve seen so many lives. I think we’re at 20 months, 18 or 20 months, I don’t know. I’d have to sit and count it out on my fingers. But not quite two years yet and it’s already there. I’ve had adults telling me how they’re dealing with how this program has helped them deal with their depression, helped them deal with their anxiety.

0:14:15 – (John Geyston): And some of the adults that shared that with me, when I look at them at face value, I wouldn’t even guess those adults struggled with that.
0:14:21 – (Ron Sell): Right?

0:14:21 – (John Geyston): And then you’re talking with kids who have ADHD on the spectrum and you got parents that are emotional because the kid who would run around for every 90 seconds and sprint off the floor, now he’s leading the creed at attention stance and all the kids are following him and the parents are tearing up over that. And that is it right there. That to me is still my highlight. That’s still the highlight.

0:14:49 – (Ron Sell): Yeah, right on. It’s so important how we teach martial arts. Like we have to continually become better and better instructors so we can become better leaders. Because if we do, if we improve ourselves, that’s going to impact those lives and that turns into real money. You know what I mean? Our product is that floor. So it’s so important. And when I say the floor, I mean the class that we’re teaching.

0:15:13 – (Ron Sell): So important for us to make ourselves the best instructor that we possibly can so that we impact lives and those people become our students, become raving fans. And once they become raving fans, we start filling up that school. But it starts with the instructor. How great of a communicator, a leader. How great can you inspire and influence your students to become their absolute best? Would you agree?

0:15:40 – (John Geyston): No. 100%. And it’s an amazing. And that’s when I shared that career that I left was a great career. So many benefits to that career, but it wasn’t the same. It’s not to say I wasn’t as happy and there was not near the fulfillment of what I get to experience every day. And what you watch lives be impacted and literally transform, transform. When you see people becoming the best version of themselves and transformed into something that they didn’t even know was there. But we all know it’s there. And we, you and I and everybody probably listening to this, that’s a school owner.

0:16:25 – (John Geyston): The reason we’re doing this is because we know what it did for us. And now we’re 100% on the wow. And at the same point, that student who knows, I mean, that student that’s on my mat that I’m changing their lives, may get the black boat and be the next person that’s with empowered, opening an up academy and changing 500 more lives through their academy, it’s definitely empowering. And I think that is the key.

0:16:56 – (John Geyston): That is your underlying foundation, that you have to build everything else on your.

0:17:00 – (Ron Sell): Teaching skills, your skills.

0:17:01 – (John Geyston): But if you don’t have that, there’s a lot of other ways to make money that’s easier.

0:17:06 – (Ron Sell): 100%. Right? Yeah. If it’s not about having excellent martial arts skills, excellent teaching skills, then go do something else. Right. There’s more money, at least initially. And the other things. Let’s talk about your school a little bit more and let people get to know you a little more. So you started off in traditional martial arts, but then, like, 15 years ago or whatever, you went hard and heavy into jiu jitsu, correct?

0:17:35 – (John Geyston): Yes. 1985, I got my black belt in Shiro Khan karate. Okay. And then I was getting a little bit involved in Goju show Ray because I want to learn some of the forms. And then it kind of took me towards Kimple. So probably 89, 90 is when I started really getting heavier into the kimple. Did my black belt ranking through that. Did the krav maga, did the muitai. But in six, yeah, I went to seminars. I was that guy. I’d be at this kali seminar.

0:18:07 – (John Geyston): I would be at this wing Chung seminar or anything with martial arts. I just. That guy, I wanted to see what those were doing. And I did a Henzel Gracie seminar in 93 before UFC one ever came out. It was in Chicago, so I dabbled, but I never committed to it. And then six is when I was rolling with a couple of blue belts that were there. Nobody would roll with them. I said, hey, guys, I’ll roll with them.

0:18:34 – (John Geyston): Japanese jiu jitsu background. I know the locks and stuff. And, man, I just got schooled. And then I found out these people have 18 months experience and then like 30 something years of my time been zero at that moment in that position.

0:18:49 – (Ron Sell): Right.

0:18:50 – (John Geyston): So next day I’m like, where do I learn jiu jitsu? Yeah. And that’s kind of what guided me that. And after 17 years.

0:18:59 – (Ron Sell): 17 years.

0:19:00 – (John Geyston): It took you 17 years?

0:19:02 – (Ron Sell): Yeah. Well, you earned every second of it.

0:19:05 – (John Geyston): Thank you and congratulations.

0:19:07 – (Ron Sell): That just happened a few months ago that you got your black belt. And who did you get your black belt through?

0:19:12 – (John Geyston): Hoiler Gracie, JW Wright under the oiler gracer banner. Gracie Banner. So we’re with the Gracie Humaita. I spent 910 years with hoist, but the last 1415 years of that has been with the Gracie family.

0:19:28 – (Ron Sell): Right on.

0:19:29 – (John Geyston): Yeah, for real.

0:19:30 – (Ron Sell): And so in our school here in Tampa, we teach kids martial arts, but we also have a pretty big adult program too, right?

0:19:38 – (John Geyston): Yes, very solid. I was just talking to someone yesterday and they’re like, oh, the adults that do the martial arts are usually between the age of 18 to 25. Well, I have data that will say that that’s different because I went to class last night. I was out of town and drove back in town. I dropped off there, dropped some belts and stuff off. When class was going on, there was twelve people and the average age on the floor was 35, 40.

0:20:11 – (Ron Sell): Yeah.

0:20:12 – (John Geyston): In that class we offer the self defense side, the traditional side of Gracie jiu jitsu, which is very similar to krav maga. Then we’ve got the rolling class. They’re two separate things. And then we run no gi and muitai workshops as well. And then weapon defense. We do the same kind of weapons, knife, gun club and those too. So I think that is the stuff that, for the adults, they want that. And I’ll use the term reality based for lack of I shouldn’t say the audience that we have, the demographics that we have, I’m focused on what we do, but they’re looking more for that. And I think that’s where we see. But at the same time, I have to provide a culture where that 40 year old can do jiu jitsu and not get his shoulder tweaked out by an 18 year old that’s trying to prove he’s a man yet.

0:21:08 – (Ron Sell): Right on.

0:21:08 – (John Geyston): Created a great culture for that.

0:21:12 – (Ron Sell): We hear that all the time. We got a great culture. We’re building this culture. But how exactly do you manage that culture? Because obviously you’re going to have a younger people that come in and they might not even do it on purpose. They might just go as strong as they can, thinking it’s all about muscle, which we know it’s not. So how do you do that?

0:21:32 – (John Geyston): No, you’re right. I don’t think anybody that comes hard, I don’t think they do it intentionally. It’s just I thought we were fighting. I can remember we had five or six krav maga practitioners. A couple of them were black belts. And I remember when they started our jiu jitsu, I was in a morning class one day, I said, hey, we’ll just go nice and easy and I’ll roll with them. First I want to get a feel for.

0:21:57 – (John Geyston): And I come home, tell Amy that was the closest I’ve been to street fight in my entire life. They just came hard and they didn’t mean to.
0:22:05 – (Ron Sell): Right.

0:22:06 – (John Geyston): So it’s really explaining it. And then also, I used to say this when we started, my first ten adults will help us set the culture. And we had one adult that was, he didn’t fit our culture. And I said, I’m not telling you your jujitsu is wrong, but it’s wrong for here. It’s been nice to know you and dismiss that person.
0:22:28 – (Ron Sell): Right on. Because at the end of the day.

0:22:30 – (John Geyston): It wasn’t going to go to the direction that we envisioned. Right on. Constantly reinforcing it, constantly being there. And there are some guys that are.

0:22:40 – (Ron Sell): Good sort of ramp up, though, because I’ve seen your more advanced students and they go at it. Practitioners, they’re winning tournaments.

0:22:51 – (John Geyston): Yeah, we have a lot of people winning tournaments and fighting mma and all that. And they do well.

0:22:57 – (Ron Sell): So it’s possible to create this culture of we’re not going to hurt each other, but yet we’re all going to grow together and we’re going to become really elite versions of ourselves. You can have both of those 100%.

0:23:09 – (John Geyston): And I think you can’t expect it. You have to inspect it.
0:23:14 – (Ron Sell): Right?

0:23:15 – (John Geyston): You got to inspect what you’re going to expect, and you have to communicate what the expectations are. And sometimes we physically have to communicate what the expectations are.

0:23:24 – (Ron Sell): So when you’re trying to go hard.

0:23:26 – (John Geyston): And I go loose and then sweep you like, hey, man, you fucked yourself. I was just here. I was just participating in your energy, that’s when. And I don’t have to crank him back. I don’t have to be an enforcer. And then once they see that, then they understand, man. And I always tell everybody, regardless of whatever the style, if you have speed, power, height, strength, muscle mass, God blessed you with some amazing attributes.

0:23:53 – (John Geyston): But what he didn’t bless you with was martial arts. So if you allow me to give you the martial arts, then you can always add that stuff in later. Let’s form the technique first, because once you get the technique, then the rest of it comes.

0:24:06 – (Ron Sell): So, yeah, that’s a good way for instructors listening to maybe explain it to their students as well. I love it.
0:24:13 – (John Geyston): You got the attributes.

0:24:15 – (Ron Sell): Yeah. So tell me about our price points here in Tampa so people can kind of get an idea. Well, like a six month program.

0:24:23 – (John Geyston): Yeah, we’ve kind of went from a. We’re actually in the third tier now where we want to be, maybe not where we want to be. I think we got room, but we do a one time, two time a week. A one time a week, two times and then unlimited. And those price points can be. Right now the price points in Tampa are 199 to 209. I’m sorry, 179. 199 and 209. My apology there.

0:24:54 – (Ron Sell): Okay.

0:24:55 – (John Geyston): So the one time starts at 179 and then the other goes up to 209.

0:25:00 – (Ron Sell): All right. And then somewhere in the middle is the twice a week or whatever.

0:25:03 – (John Geyston): Yeah, the 199 is the two times a week. Okay.

0:25:06 – (Ron Sell): And is that for kids and adults or is it. Yes, it doesn’t matter. What. This is our price.

0:25:12 – (John Geyston): Yeah, we run age specific.

0:25:13 – (Ron Sell): Sorry.

0:25:14 – (John Geyston): I think the garbage pickup is happening right outside my office window here. But we run age specific classes. So four and five, six to seven, eight through twelve, and then 13 through 17, we put in with the adults, where we try to keep the teens together and then adults, but we run the same price structure for everybody.

0:25:41 – (Ron Sell): Okay. Yeah, that makes sense. You’re teaching the same thing to each age group, so it makes sense. So as a business person, tell me about what are the KPIs or statistics that you sort of worry about, like, daily? You think, I’m going to keep my eye on these numbers, or do you just not look at numbers at all and just get out there and teach great classes? I mean, tell me a little bit about the business side of things and how you monitor whether you’re growing or staying the same.

0:26:09 – (Ron Sell): Know those types of things.

0:26:10 – (John Geyston): Yeah, I think you do. It’s just the same thing as, like, if I get in a know, I’m proud know. About a year ago, after one year, I was able to tell Amy, I can get beyond my neighborhood now without a gps. But when I first moved down here, I didn’t go anywhere.

0:26:25 – (Ron Sell): I mean, I couldn’t tell you how.

0:26:26 – (John Geyston): To get to Walgreens. So Walgreens, I had a GPS on. People be calling me. I’ll be like, hey, I can’t talk. I got to listen to how to get to.
0:26:37 – (Ron Sell): Know.

0:26:37 – (John Geyston): I think it’s the same way. In our business. You can’t expect to reach that destination if you don’t know if you’re on the. Do I take a right here?
0:26:46 – (Ron Sell): Do I go left here?

0:26:47 – (John Geyston): Oh, there’s a construction site. Got an obstacle. I need to take a detour. That’s exactly the way I teach my staff how to look at the numbers. So we need to know what our leads are. We need to know how many we’re setting payments we set, how many people show and whenever something, and then how many intros, how many convert, and if there’s something not matching that 80% or whatever, that benchmark that we set, then we know there’s a problem there.

0:27:19 – (John Geyston): So I need to back up. Like, what are we doing on confirmation? Because we have less than 50% or less than 70% showing up for their intro. So let’s back up. So it helps us to know where our problems are. So I think those are the basic numbers that probably everybody. I also look at the arm, the average rate per member. We have a number that we want that number to be. And again, that’s how much that student.
0:27:46 – (Ron Sell): Is worth that month.

0:27:47 – (John Geyston): Yes. So let’s say, for example, if we’re doing just for the simplicity of math, if we’re doing 20,000 this month and we have 100 students, then I know I’m at a $200 arm. So the average arm can bring in all the other. It could be the down payments. It could be if we’re doing prepays, testing, equipment sales, workshops, seminars, all those factors and generators come into that. And then the other part is the leg, the length that they’re with us, the time that they’re with us. So what is that, Lane?

0:28:27 – (Ron Sell): How many months, average. Does the normal student stay with us?

0:28:31 – (John Geyston): Yes.

0:28:31 – (Ron Sell): Right.

0:28:32 – (John Geyston): And I think you got to know that because it’s real easy. What an old mentor. You’ve heard this line because we had one of the same mentors in the past, right?

0:28:47 – (Ron Sell): 20 years ago.

0:28:48 – (John Geyston): Numbers is truth, and everything else is an opinion. Right, on. Too many people get hung up on their opinions and then one day they’re surprised by their truth. Well, if I’m checking it twice a day, I can’t be surprised by that truth because it’s not sneaking up on me because I’ve seen it coming. I think it’s very important to reach that destination, to understand those numbers and then to be able to read those numbers and understand what those numbers indicate, too.

0:29:18 – (Ron Sell): Right.

0:29:19 – (John Geyston): And then I have a healthy drive to this destination where I got some things I got to overcome on this drive, right?
0:29:26 – (Ron Sell): And you know why most people don’t track their numbers? Because it’s hard. It’s really hard to do that unless you have something like spark to just keep track of it all for you. It does it right there. A lot of people, they’re so busy in their business that they forget to look at their numbers. And it’s like being in the car. I’ve ran out of gas before in my car. And the reason why is because I wasn’t paying attention to the gauges, right? Like, I jump in the car, I’m busy, I’m running, and then before I know it, it’s too late. I’m on the highway, no gas station in sight, and I’ve run out of gas, right? It’s the same thing in your business.

0:30:01 – (Ron Sell): You have to look at those numbers. I was in one of the Facebook groups yesterday reading this guy’s message, and I’m just shaking my head. He’s like, no, I don’t take attendance in my school. I’m like, holy crap. He goes, they don’t need to have certain amount of attendants to get their belts. And they get their belts when they’ve earned them, when they’re ready. It has nothing to do with attendance. And I’m like, this guy is missing the point.

0:30:28 – (Ron Sell): Attendance isn’t about getting belts. Attendance is about, hey, where’s Johnny at? And we need to call him because he hadn’t been here in two weeks and we miss him. And if we’re going to help this kid get better in life, where he’s got to be in class, that’s what attendance. But if you’re not looking at those numbers and clearly this guy’s not looking as a tenants. Unless he only has ten students, right? And he can remember if only nine people show up. But the majority of us that really want to grow our business, we better look at these numbers. And the bigger our business grows, the more important these numbers are, because a little slippage here and a little slippage there and a little slippage here, and we could run out of gas in our business in the middle of the highway.

0:31:09 – (John Geyston): No, 100%. In addition to that, without doing attendance. Let’s say Jimmy’s been gone for a while, and I haven’t checked on Jimmy. I find out that Jimmy fell off a bike, has a concussion. He’s been in the hospital for two weeks. Where’s the service? I should be checking on my students because they don’t work for me. I work for them.

0:31:31 – (Ron Sell): Hey, Jimmy.

0:31:32 – (John Geyston): Why isn’t Jimmy not in? Listen, you know, send the card, go see. Don’t. If you don’t do that, are you going to do scream at Jimmy when he shows up and then feel like, oh, I didn’t know he was in the. Yeah.

0:31:45 – (Ron Sell): How are you going to get your belt if you’re not in class?

0:31:47 – (John Geyston): Yeah, you wouldn’t know that because you didn’t do attendance. You didn’t know he wasn’t.

0:31:51 – (Ron Sell): You know, I use that attendance as an example. But we could say the same thing with how many prospects are coming in.
0:31:58 – (John Geyston): Yes.

0:31:59 – (Ron Sell): Or how many of those prospects are raising their hand and saying, hey, I’m interested. Or how many of those are scheduling first appointments or first classes or trials or whatever? And how many of those people are showing up and out of those people that we asked to enroll in our program, how many of those people say yes and no? I mean, all of these are so important. And the reason they’re so important is because if you’re looking at the numbers and you see that there’s a big gap at enrollments, then, you know, maybe you’re not communicating the benefits of your program good enough. Right? So you got to go work on yourself.

0:32:33 – (Ron Sell): And if you do that, you might have to eat a little crow, or you might have to admit that you’re not as good in certain areas. But that’s beautiful, because if you can admit that you’re not great in a certain area by the numbers, that means you can fix it. You can correct it, right?
0:32:48 – (John Geyston): Yeah.

0:32:49 – (Ron Sell): No.

0:32:50 – (John Geyston): Right. There’s so many things that the numbers teach us, right? Like, if I’m signed up 95% to 100%, there’s a good chance my rates are probably the cheapest in town. Are they signed up because I’m that amazing in my intros, or am I the cheapest guys they’ve been to? So even that, that’s a number. Like, hey, 90% is great. We’re at 90%. So we’re at 91 for the year. And I’m just like, we’ve raised our prices twice.

0:33:22 – (John Geyston): And I’m like, yeah, that means we need to raise our price point, because not that I want to make more money, but I want to make sure that my floor is not congested with people that don’t see the value in what we’re doing. I want the ones that see the value in what we’re doing.
0:33:37 – (Ron Sell): Right on.

0:33:38 – (John Geyston): How would I make that decision? And then there’s knowing my numbers and rather than taking pride. 91%, baby.
0:33:45 – (Ron Sell): Okay. Yeah.

0:33:45 – (John Geyston): I want to get it to 80.

0:33:47 – (Ron Sell): Why would I. Yeah. Because I’m too need to do a class on this stuff to teach people how to get to that 91% or better.
0:33:56 – (John Geyston): Yes. And you want to be good at all that, right? You want to be 100%.

0:34:03 – (Ron Sell): I don’t know if you remember Zig Ziglar. My parents were good friends with Zig Ziggler, and so I spent a lot of time with him when I was a teenager, which was really cool, by the way.

0:34:11 – (John Geyston): That would have been amazing.

0:34:12 – (Ron Sell): You have this thing called the wheel of life. Do you remember that? And the wheel of life had these five areas of your life, and, like, let’s say financial and relationships. And I wish I could, on the fly, tell you all five, but just say physical fitness. And basically the wheel of life, zero to ten. How would you rate your finances, your personal relationships, your fitness, and the other ones? And you would rate it, and then you would draw a circle, and that was your wheel. And a lot of times, your physical fitness would be really high, but your personal relationships was low, so that made a really bumpy ride in life.
0:34:49 – (Ron Sell): So stats are like that. If your physical fitness is really low, then you might want to put some effort in that physical fitness. And now your tire becomes a little more round, and then you just keep adding to all five areas until you’ve got this really beautiful life that you’re coasting on. I haven’t achieved that yet, but it’s the same thing in your stats. In your martial art school, you got to have the stats of life, right?
0:35:12 – (Ron Sell): Of your business life, where each of those areas you’re saying, okay, am I getting enough prospects? Give me a score to one to ten. All right, I’m an eight in prospects. All right, now I’m going to look at my stats for how many of those people are raising their hands. All right? Maybe get an eight on that, too. Okay, great. Now they’re coming in, they’re showing up, and then I got a four on enrollments right now. I say, okay, I’m going to spend a lot of my time on getting these enrollments. Maybe the way I present my program to them, maybe the way I make them feel when they come, maybe making them feel more comfortable. There’s so many things that go into that.

0:35:47 – (Ron Sell): You just keep making adjustments until you start seeing those numbers round out. Right?

0:35:52 – (John Geyston): Yes, go ahead.

0:35:55 – (Ron Sell): Sorry.

0:35:55 – (John Geyston): No, I was going to say, I like that because too many people, when they think of numbers, they’re thinking only business numbers, right? I need to know, like, hey, I have this dropout rate. Where’s that dropout rate? And maybe that’s at blue belt. Okay, well, maybe my curriculum isn’t as strong, or maybe it’s too strong at that. So know the numbers. We can make all the adjustments, not just on business success, but business success is our students success.

0:36:25 – (John Geyston): That is business success.

0:36:26 – (Ron Sell): Yeah, for sure. Right back. Students do better, your business does better.

0:36:33 – (John Geyston): Yes. And then they refer people. And then back in Illinois, I’ve done it long enough now. Starting 1982, I’ve done it long enough now where my adult students have their grandkids in my program. So I literally am teaching 30 years.

0:36:50 – (Ron Sell): Is that 40 years?

0:36:51 – (John Geyston): Generations, right?

0:36:53 – (Ron Sell): Yeah. Is that 40 years?

0:36:55 – (John Geyston): 40 years. 42 years. Come February and you’re still on the.

0:37:02 – (Ron Sell): Mat rolling around teaching martial arts after 40 years.

0:37:06 – (John Geyston): I still love it. Still love it.

0:37:09 – (Ron Sell): Hey, so listen, I know this question before I ask, but you’re using spark, right? Yeah. Tell me how you use spark in.

0:37:17 – (John Geyston): Your business to help you in every way. Gosh, I don’t even know where to start. But the dashboard, everything’s right there. We used to have all the tasks spelled out for our staff, but I always tell, look at the dashboard, confirm what our appointments are, make sure they’re being confirmed. So I know. And how does that calendar look? Do I look like, can I reverse engineer into our goal of sign up 20 this month if we know they’re at 80%? Do I have at least seven intro.

0:37:47 – (John Geyston): Let’s say I got eight. And I know that seven, six to seven got a show in order for me to sign up my five. So looking at it that even just the calendar, and then I’m looking at the stats that it keeps for us. Right. What are my conversions? It’s our communication tool all the way around. Text messages, push notifications, emails.

0:38:10 – (Ron Sell): Yeah.

0:38:11 – (John Geyston): And then notes. We got the notes so that in Illinois. I hate to say this, and I hope none of my students watch. I go up there. Now, I’ve been gone for two years, so when I go up there, if you’re below the belt of our third, 4th belt, there’s a good chance you only know me from the guy that comes up and teaches a seminar. You weren’t there when I.

0:38:33 – (Ron Sell): You got a picture on the wall, don’t you?

0:38:35 – (John Geyston): No, I don’t. I need to. I need know. And I got a funny story on that. I’ll come back to it just. It helps me to communicate with them and to know who they are because I can, you know, I can look at the picture and remember, oh, that was the. That’s. What was that kid’s name? Wes.
0:38:54 – (Ron Sell): Wes.

0:38:55 – (John Geyston): I look him up on Spark. I can write mom, but I can make a note because maybe Rick and Mason have talked to him and I don’t know. But by looking at the notes now, I know what the story on Wes is.

0:39:07 – (Ron Sell): Right.

0:39:07 – (John Geyston): And now I can relate to him when I talk to him or when I call and the mom expresses his concern. Well, I look back at the notes. Well, mom had a concern with him losing interest three months ago. What did we do to do that? All the business tools are there, but I think it’s the simple things. The notes, the communication, the staff. It gives us, all of our team, one place to go where everything is that we need.

0:39:34 – (Ron Sell): Right. Super powerful, big time saver. You get back. A small school can get 5 hours a week back in their lives.
0:39:43 – (John Geyston): I always say it’s another employee, if not more, if not two, for sure.

0:39:49 – (Ron Sell): So what do you think has been. There’s probably schools out there that are struggling right now. There are probably schools out there that have hit a plateau. Tell me what activities you think gave you the biggest difference in your success.

0:40:07 – (John Geyston): As far as, like, when you say activities, give me a direction.

0:40:12 – (Ron Sell): Yeah, activity. What’s a day look like in your life where you’re like, you know what? These are the activities I got to do to push my business and my students forward.

0:40:21 – (John Geyston): Got you.

0:40:22 – (Ron Sell): What are the biggest ones? Just give me just a couple of them. Sure.

0:40:26 – (John Geyston): Wherever we come in, we’re on our text messages right there. I’m big about service, so we’re looking at has somebody written, do we need to respond to them? I always tell, make sure every text is responded to before you leave it tonight and you got it set up and we can set it up in spark. Then I can write you at 10:00 p.m. But it won’t go to you until 09:00 a.m..

0:40:46 – (Ron Sell): Tomorrow.

0:40:46 – (John Geyston): But now I can clear that out so I know that’s there, right? So I want to make sure if you wrote me at four and we’re on the floor teaching, I want you to know that we took care of that to make sure that we’re not leaving any loose ends out there. We look at the calendar right from the beginning. So when I get up in the morning, my thing is I sit down and I write down my scribbles and this won’t make sense to anybody else that looks at it, but it makes a lot of sense to me and that’s my general, like, here’s where I.
0:41:18 – (Ron Sell): Need to go, here’s what I’ve got.

0:41:20 – (John Geyston): All these different things and I move it to the next day if it doesn’t get done. And then it’s been right back to spark. I’m messaging, I’m putting the notes in there. So we’re planning everything. The calendar and appointments is the next thing that we look at, obviously the voicemails and the voice messages. And then we have our task. Like do I have some delinquencies that we have to check on? Have I talked to them? And maybe as a circumstance. So for example, we had a delinquency. Nobody wants a delinquency, right? But I don’t reach and say, hey dude, payment didn’t clear, bro, what are you going to do about that?
0:41:58 – (John Geyston): Hey, sir, I noticed that this, maybe it’s just a credit card number.

0:42:02 – (Ron Sell): Here it is.

0:42:03 – (John Geyston): No, we had a medical emergency. I’m sorry to hear that. I hope, first of all, is everybody good? And then we talk about what can we do to catch that payment up and not even interrupt the class flow of your child making classes. So it’s making sure we communicate, but I have to be looking at that delinquencies, I have to be looking at the surveys. It’s all good to look at surveys that are giving us five stars, but that one star, we automatically get in like really care for that woman. Anyway. I don’t like her attitude.
0:42:38 – (Ron Sell): Right? We get defensive.

0:42:39 – (John Geyston): We get defensive. Like, of course she’s going to complain, but if there’s 1oz of truth in that survey, we have to own it.
0:42:48 – (Ron Sell): Sure, and you own it. You do something about it.

0:42:52 – (John Geyston): Yes. And you would if she has that perception, we did something to give that perception. Own it and let’s communicate. So before we hold a. I think I posted on Facebook the other day, before you hold a grudge, try to hold a conversation. Yes, communicate.
0:43:09 – (Ron Sell): World would be a different place.

0:43:10 – (John Geyston): Yeah. Because I think a lot of times it’s just all miscommunication. So we want to make sure that we’re following our outlines of our task. We’re communicating starting the day. I like to do that. Then I go to the gym, right? Then I go to the gym and work on me. And then I come back and give everybody time to respond to those texts, respond to those emails, respond to those phone calls. And then I’ve written down my five things I need to do today, and then I come back and start checking them off and go back to work.

0:43:43 – (John Geyston): I think you do have to have a ritual, and I think everybody needs to find theirs. My ritual may not be the ideal ritual for you. I’m not going to do that cold plunge thing.

0:43:53 – (Ron Sell): Come on, join me, man.

0:43:54 – (John Geyston): No, I’m not going to do it, man. I don’t like. Our water heater was out for like three days, man. I’d be like, running in there, running back out.
0:44:04 – (Ron Sell): I’d shampoo my hair, stick it in.

0:44:06 – (John Geyston): There as fast I could and get back out. Cold water. And I don’t get along. So that cold one, you can keep it. I’ll do the sauna. I’m fine with that sauna. So everybody’s routines have to be for them, right?
0:44:21 – (Ron Sell): Yeah, sure.

0:44:22 – (John Geyston): What’s it mean for them? And I think that’s the same thing. All the people using Spark don’t emulate somebody, that it doesn’t resonate or align with your philosophy, your culture. And I see so many people, they go on this, oh, this is a great intro. They come back and they try to teach you intro that has nothing to do with their curriculum. And that’s the worst thing you could do because when they get in your.
0:44:49 – (Ron Sell): Regular classes, it’s not what it looked like, it’s not what you show.

0:44:53 – (John Geyston): Yeah, but use that intro that you watch and how can you modify it for the way that you believe and that it’s your academy? So I think finding you’ve got to have this ritual, these habits, these tasks, there are the essentials. There are the essentials, but sparks laid that out. Spark has laid that out on the dashboard. It’s laid it out in your stats for you. You don’t even have to have a.

0:45:16 – (Ron Sell): Spreadsheet if you’re not good at a spreadsheet.

0:45:18 – (John Geyston): Just follow what I can’t remember smart stats.
0:45:23 – (Ron Sell): What’s it called? Oh, ultimate stats.

0:45:25 – (John Geyston): Ultimate stats, right. Be smart and go to your ultimate stats.

0:45:29 – (Ron Sell): Yeah. For real. Sparks laid it out for you. Yeah. Say, listen, what are you doing right now to get students in the door? Because everybody wants to know that. So what are you doing?

0:45:38 – (John Geyston): I’m begging people.

0:45:40 – (Ron Sell): Are you going out to the parking lot and inviting them to come in?

0:45:43 – (John Geyston): Yeah, I’m on a street corner. It says, I will do martial arts for students.

0:45:48 – (Ron Sell): Yes.

0:45:49 – (John Geyston): No, we’re doing a lot. I did 14 classroom talks about two weeks ago in a one day period. We do first night out events at West Chase where we set up a booth. We’re doing a referral. We’ve got a referral drawing and referral contest going on, and we’re doing digital marketing. All the, you know, I think too.

0:46:16 – (Ron Sell): Know, we use the spark ignite and.

0:46:18 – (John Geyston): Get that out on your social media if you’re not coming up with your own content, spark ignite lays out the content and the images for you to edit in canva and try to make it easy. Keep your social media going. And the months that we see that our numbers are low on leads is also the month that we were low on not consistently posting because you can’t just say, hey, I’m going to spin ad. I also need to keep my Facebook pages active and moving and doing those posts and stuff as well.

0:46:54 – (Ron Sell): I love that you are doing multiple things for marketing. I talked to so many schools and they’re like, hey, we’re struggling for leads. I’m like, what are you doing? We’re spending all this money on ads. Spending all this money on ads. I’m like, okay, what else? And they’re not doing anything else. I don’t know if they’re like, hey, I don’t have to do marketing anymore. I’m a martial arts instructor.

0:47:19 – (Ron Sell): I’m not a marketer. So I’m just going to let them do it and I’m not going to do anything. But I tell you, the schools that do well, they have 5678 things every month they’re doing in addition to buying ads on social media. So it’s nice to hear that you’re out there in the community, in classrooms at elementary and middle schools, talking to kids, doing presentations. I love to hear that you’re out in the community on the first Friday doing an event outside of the dojo. I love to see that you got a referral program you instituted. You also do digital marketing. I mean, you keep adding, what’s great about that is this, and I see this time and time again with schools that I talk to is like, one month digital marketing will crush it for you and you’ll get so excited and the next month it’ll do a little less. And the third month it does nothing.

0:48:09 – (Ron Sell): The fourth month it goes back to being great again. It’s a roller coaster of leads, right? Basically, if you got this roller coaster of leads and you need another roller coaster that’s going the opposite direction to kind of fill those gaps. And if you can do three, four, five other things, eight other things, right. If you can do that, then you’re going to have an unlimited supply. If digital ads are crushing it and parasite out is crushing it for leads, now you got double the leads.

0:48:38 – (Ron Sell): Digital marketing doesn’t work this month for some reason. Who knows what it is? But I’ve seen that happen. But yet you’ve got some birthday parties scheduled and you got 60 new leads from your birthday parties. It’s all going to kind of, instead of this big, crazy up and down leads, it’s going to be smooth sailing. Right. The entire month. Hearing that, it’s going to be like.

0:48:59 – (John Geyston): I think traditionally everybody I’ve talked to, November was slower than average months. And you’re going to have those.
0:49:06 – (Ron Sell): Yeah, you will.

0:49:09 – (John Geyston): I say this to my staff all the time, too. So we didn’t get anybody to call us from first Friday. All right, let’s see how it goes next month. Yeah, let’s see how it goes the following month. Because too many people try something and when it doesn’t happen, then they cut it. I think there is a time you can say, hey, man, I’ve been doing this for nine months now. I’ve gotten enough data to make a decision, right. You can’t make an informed decision. It’s like taking out one radio commercial and hoping somebody heard it.

0:49:39 – (Ron Sell): Yeah, sure. You know how I look at this is that anytime you do something new, you’re a white belt again, right?

0:49:47 – (John Geyston): Yes.

0:49:47 – (Ron Sell): So let’s say that you’ve heard everybody tell you this, and I’ll guarantee it. Birthday parties, I got tons of enrollments off of them because I had one student and 19 friends, right. That weren’t my students, right. And for the first year, I got nothing. I’m like, this is Bs. Like, I’ve been doing this for a whole year. I got nobody. And I just thought, my thought at the beginning was you just throw birthday parties and people signed up. I didn’t realize there’s a process that you go through.

0:50:17 – (Ron Sell): So finally I pull up my buddy that claimed he enrolled all these people and he goes, hey, come on over and watch us do it. And I actually was in the birthday party, right? As if I was a staff member and I watched every little thing that they did. I went back my very first birthday party, I did enrolled one person. I was like, this is like 100% more than I did last time, right? Within a couple of years, it was two or three of those kids. And if we did four birthday parties a month, I was enrolling twelve people a month just on that one birthday party, our four birthday parties, but that one idea. Right, right. And so a lot of times when you have these ideas that other people have done, you’re a white belt, you got to earn your first stripe on your belt, all right? Then you got to earn your second, your third, and maybe test for your gold belt.

0:51:04 – (Ron Sell): And eventually you become that black belt marketer for that one thing. But then you say, okay, I’m going to go do school talks. Now. I’ve heard so many people say, well, we’ve been into so many school talks and we enroll no one. Well, there’s a process to that. And I got that process down Pat because I heard everybody else doing this. They got all these results or I thought they were. Either they got the results or they were lying to me about the results is what I thought. Right, sure. And so again, I started talking to Roland Osborne and some people, like you claim this, but I’m not getting the same results. Help me figure that out. And we worked through it and it was amazing. Another 1015 new students every single month just from doing school talks, right?

0:51:44 – (Ron Sell): So I think people have to realize that when they’re doing anything new that someone has told them works. Sometimes you have to go back to the drawing board and realize, hey, I’m a white belt. I’m just trying to get through it. I’m just trying to get to that first strike. And then once you’re there and you’re a little better and so on, it’s.

0:52:01 – (John Geyston): No different than the martial arts. You don’t even have to be a white belt. You can be a black belt that just, hey, all of a sudden I can’t land my sidekick back fist anymore. And it could be that, hey, you’ve developed this habit that you have being realized that you developed it, just letting everybody know you’re getting ready to do it. You get with your instructor, he’s like bringing your knee up too early and you’re like, whatever, he makes it correct.

0:52:26 – (John Geyston): So sometimes it is, we don’t know what we don’t know. So I constantly want to know what I don’t know. I’m tweaking, and business is the same thing. Find somebody that’s doing it and say, listen, I’m doing this, this, and this. What do you think I’m missing? Or as you said, go watch them do it. It’s better because at the end of the day, as martial artists, if we see it, we can go out and imitate it, but sometimes we hear it. It doesn’t sink in with us. I need to see how that is, the energy.

0:53:00 – (Ron Sell): And some of us, like me, it takes me a while to learn stuff, man.

0:53:06 – (John Geyston): Yeah.

0:53:06 – (Ron Sell): And so now that I know that as an adult, I will just pack in 12 hours of learning in one sitting, because I know I have to go super deep and super fast and super strong with it. I have to practice it over and over, and then once I’ve got it, got it for good. Right. But if you’re a slow learner, it’s just going to take time, and that’s okay.

0:53:25 – (John Geyston): Right.

0:53:25 – (Ron Sell): You’re either going to get it or you’re not, depending on your effort that you put out of it. Sure.

0:53:29 – (John Geyston): 100%.

0:53:30 – (Ron Sell): I want to talk to me before we go, Mr. Gaiston.

0:53:36 – (John Geyston): Yes.

0:53:37 – (Ron Sell): Talk about, man. Talk about this. This is John Gason’s book. Oh, look at there. This is John Gaston’s book that he just published. It’s doing so good. I see so many pictures on Facebook, on Instagram of kids that are in other states, not even here in Tampa. You’re the author. You’re in Tampa, but they’re in other states. They’re holding up the book, saying how it’s helping them. I think this is wonderful.

0:54:07 – (Ron Sell): So this is a book for kids, and correct me if I’m wrong, but let me go through a little bit. It’s a book for kids and maybe even preteens. I ordered six of them, plus the one you autographed for me. Thank you very much. I ordered six of these, one for each of my kids here. And we have started going through this already. And I think that this is brilliant because I know your heart. You want to help people.

0:54:29 – (Ron Sell): You probably make, I don’t know what, $100 per copy sold.

0:54:33 – (John Geyston): Make $100 per copy sold. I wish.

0:54:36 – (Ron Sell): He probably makes pennies. It’s not for the money, that’s for sure. But I’m telling you, if you have kids, you should get this and you should go. Let me just read some of the things that’s in this book. The title of the book is embrace your awesome. A journal to empower kids and build self confidence. We all want that for our kids, even if our kids are the crazy ones that have all the confidence in the world. This book right here is just awesome.

0:55:03 – (Ron Sell): So listen at some of the things in this book right here. It’s a journal. So they read and understand, then they write out stuff, which is really awesome, because anytime you write down things, it just really makes. It just hits you, right? So the benefits of self esteem and confidence, the power of affirmations, build your confidence, overcome fear. I’m just reading out the table of contents here, right?

0:55:28 – (Ron Sell): Mindfulness, the magic of gratitude. Listen, I don’t want my kids always to say thank you and please and all that stuff, but sometimes they don’t. But when someone like you, someone outside my family says, excuse me, they do it. So this is like reading this book is like having you as a mentor in our own hole. And the way I see people using this is martial arts schools that are listening. Buy a case of these books.

0:55:55 – (Ron Sell): Buy a case of them. And every single prospect that walks in that does a first lesson with you before you enroll them, hand them this book and say, hey, my friend John Gaston wrote this book, and I’m really inspired by him because his mission is to impact kids’lives, which is the same mission that we have here at my martial arts school. And I’d like you to read this with your kid and then do the exercises. Don’t worry. It’s not like homework. These are really great things that’s going to help you as a parent.

0:56:30 – (Ron Sell): I mean, if I owned a school, hey, do me a favor, John, in our school. Buy some cases of these and do the same thing, would you?

0:56:37 – (John Geyston): We are. First of all, I wrote the book on a personal goal. It was 20 years ago. I wanted to write it, and I finally just made myself sit down back in March. I’m like, you know what? You’re a hypocrite, because you’ve never written this book yet. So don’t tell anybody else how to live their dream when you’re not living it. So I made myself write it, and it was received really well.
0:57:05 – (Ron Sell): It has been.

0:57:05 – (John Geyston): And multiple schools. The thing was to write the book and put the book out, and I wanted to, how can I impact people beyond my four walls? The same type of stuff that we would say in class or if we were in a one on one meeting. And then I had a couple of friends, hey, I want to use this for our leadership team. How could I get 50 copies, right? Well, I don’t. Oh, let me call. I know Amazon won’t do, but let me see what.

0:57:33 – (John Geyston): And I don’t know how. I mean, I’m all new to this. I had an editor know, a company that helped me get it out there. So I called him.
0:57:39 – (Ron Sell): I said, how can I do this?

0:57:40 – (John Geyston): So then we set up bulk rates for good. Some that are doing it for their leadership team, some are doing it now as what you just said, they’re using it as a giveaway in the new.

0:57:53 – (Ron Sell): Student package or just because coming from so much value, right off the bat, you’ve come to our school. This has a perceived value of probably $10 or so, right? I didn’t look at the price on Amazon.
0:58:05 – (John Geyston): Yeah.

0:58:05 – (Ron Sell): How much?

0:58:06 – (John Geyston): 1299.

0:58:07 – (Ron Sell): Okay. It’s got a real retail value of $13. You probably can get them from John cheaper than that. And you hand it to him and say, we care about your kid, and we’re going to give this to you as a way to help your family, because that’s who we are as a martial arts school. We’re in it to help families. And you are impacting lives, John, because I do see all these photos from all over the country, not just Illinois and Tampa, but all over the country of kids and parents and martial arts schools that are using this book to really impact more lives.
0:58:37 – (Ron Sell): So congratulations on that because it’s all.

0:58:39 – (John Geyston): Up and that’s been great. I mean, to see that, and I’d get eight to twelve year olds where we target it. But give you a perfect example, Amy’s grandma, 92 years old, she was in town and she’s reading the book and she read over from Orlando with Amy’s mom. They drove over here yesterday and she said, grandma Rosie read the book the entire time in the backseat.

0:59:07 – (Ron Sell): She goes, I can relate to everything in this thing. That’s awesome.

0:59:10 – (John Geyston): Even in 92, I had a lot of adults say the same things. Like my uncle called me one of the greatest testimonies. Testimonies that are reviews or whatever you want to call that I had in the beginning was Johnny, your aunt Karen bought that book, buddy. And I got to tell you, if I had this when I was twelve year old. Oh, mana.

0:59:30 – (Ron Sell): Yeah.

0:59:30 – (John Geyston): Millie would have had no limitations on himself.

0:59:33 – (Ron Sell): Absolutely. I love it.

0:59:35 – (John Geyston): Yeah, I love it. That’s pretty cool.

0:59:36 – (Ron Sell): Listen, if anybody’s listening to us and you’ve got any comments or questions or you got any insights that you got from us, please let us know. Either leave comments if it’s appropriate, or reach out to us. And our goal here over this entire podcast series and all the guests that I have is really how do we help you grow either out of your plateau that you’re in, or how do we get you from not struggling to really impacting your community and doing well in your business, too, because you deserve it. Martial arts instructors, some of the most passionate people that I know, they do this because they care about their communities.

1:00:16 – (Ron Sell): They love the martial arts, and so do we, John. I mean, that’s why we’re in this stuff. I’m in the software business because I taught martial arts for 23 straight years. I own multiple schools, 23 years. But the reason I did all that is because I fell in love with the martial arts when I was like nine years old. Right. And I know you fell in love with the martial arts too, 40 years ago because this is really a passion for all martial arts instructors.

1:00:42 – (Ron Sell): I mean, it’s just something that we all just love. And we love teaching. We love sharing with other people. And that’s what this podcast is all about, loving and sharing and helping each other grow. And so, John, you are the best man. I mean, I’m thankful to be your friend. I’m blessed for that. And I’m also blessed to be your business partner. And I appreciate your wisdom and the things that you shared with us today, and hopefully we can do this again real soon.

1:01:12 – (John Geyston): I appreciate it. You know what, anybody that’s listening, too, is if you’re struggling, don’t carry that by yourself. Lean on somebody. Lean on spark. Lean on it. Begin. If you want automations, get ignite. If you need help with something, reach out. Reach out. There’s so many people in spark around Spark. People are there, man, I see all the time with the Facebook page.

1:01:39 – (Ron Sell): Yeah.

1:01:39 – (John Geyston): Ask a question. Everybody wants to help. Everybody wants everybody to be successful.

1:01:43 – (Ron Sell): Right on. That’s a good point, John. If you’re struggling with something, reach out to somebody. I think that’s the best advice that you’ve given this entire time.
1:01:54 – (John Geyston): Yeah, well, we all too often think because of that certificate, I can’t tell them I don’t know what. Yeah, yeah.

1:02:03 – (Ron Sell): No, you can.

1:02:04 – (John Geyston): Just because you got that certificate doesn’t mean nothing about you running your business. Sometimes we got to get out of our own way because our own way is the problem. You heard me just say that recently to you. I have to get out of my own way right now for a little bit on a few things. Lean, you don’t have to be the resource. Lean on the resources.

1:02:25 – (Ron Sell): Hey, that’s powerful. Man, that’s powerful. Well, thank you so much for being my guest today. Thank you.

1:02:31 – (John Geyston): I appreciate it.

1:02:32 – (Ron Sell): Yes, sir. All right, everybody, thank you so much for taking the time out of your day to listen to us or into your life.

1:02:43 – (Ron Sell): Thanks for joining us on the membership business grow podcast. We hope you take what you learned and use it to propel your business to new heights. For more information, episodes, show notes and to get social, hit us@wordpress-1575743-6143215.cloudwaysapps.com. Membershipbusinessgrowth.com if you want to go deeper or send us comments, you can email ron@sparkmembership.com. We’ll see you next week for another episode of the membership business Growth podcast with Ron Sell.

1:03:13 – (Ron Sell): Thanks again for listening.