In this episode, #1 Bestselling Author and Highly Acclaimed business & Entrepreneur Expert, Mel Abraham, talks with Justin Herald about his perspectives on business and life, how he started and the valuable lessons he learned along the way.

About Justin Herald

Justin herald is an author, entrepreneur and motivational speaker. At the age of 25, he started his T-shirt business with only 50 dollars and his business transcended into the company Attitude Inc. His clothing brand took off with international licensing success with revenues over 20 million dollars a year.

Justin is the author of eight international bestselling books and he mentors over a hundred business owners each year. As a motivational speaker, he speaks all over the country and internationally in front of 150K people a year. He is one of the most sought after speakers from Australia.

In 2005, Justin was named The International Entrepreneur of the Year and recently, he was awarded the Future Leaders Award which recognizes him as one of the 50 most influential leaders of the next generation in Australia. He recently launched a brand called ReferUs which helps businesses to magnify their sales with the help of word of mouth referrals.

What Justin Stands For

Justin likes to keep it real. He thinks that money doesn’t make you a success but it is a by-product of doing it all. When it comes to character traits: (1) Integrity and (2) Ethics are high on the list for him.

Key Takeaways

• NEXT: Walk away from things quicker.
• To grow, you will have to get out of your comfort zone.
• Business does not have to be difficult or complicated.
• Things and mindset change so give it another try.
• Don’t do it because it’s always been done that way.

Looking into the future

People spend too much time looking into the future. 5 year, 10 year plans sound great but we should rather look at what we are doing now. Don’t let time master you and grab the opportunities that are here today.

The Nightmare Gift

The breakup of his marriage. It led to a new, better spark.

Interview Links

• JustinHerald.com
• ReferUs.com

The Doozy

• Don’t change a thing

— Begin Transcript —

Hey everyone, welcome. This is Mel Abraham the author of the #1 best-selling book, The Entrepreneur’s Solution and the founder of Thoughtpreneur Academy. And today, I get a great opportunity to have a conversation with a friend, a fellow entrepreneur, a change maker, a difference maker. You’re going to learn about this guy Justin Herald that kind of took us Australia by storm—not only by his innovative ideas but by his attitude and you will understand that when we get a little bit more into his story.

So, let me give you a little rundown of Justin and his history and then, we will get his perspective because his uniqueness and distinction about how he approaches not only business but life will change the way you think about things. At the age of 25, with only 50 dollars to his name, he set about changing the course of his life and he created a company Attitude Inc., a clothing brand that ultimately became an international licensing success with revenues well over 20 million dollars a year and his success was so well noted that he was named The International Entrepreneur of the Year in 2005.

Recently, he has also awarded the future leaders award which recognizes his as being of the 50 most influential leaders of the next generation in Australia. Recently, he launched a brand called RefersUs.com. I’m going to ask him about that as we get into this which is a brand new way to engage customers to become the biggest and most effective sales force for any business at a click of a button.

In effect, it’s a brand that allows you to create an army of salespeople through this process and utilizing today’s technology. Companies big and small around the globe are jumping on board with the system as the success rate has been amazing. His website is JustinHerald.com. He receives thousands of hits a month.

Also, the author of eight international bestselling books. He also personally mentors over a hundred business owners each year. Justin is regarded as one of Australia’s most sought after speakers with engagements booked all over the country and overseas; speaking in front of over 150 thousand people a year. I also know that he has embarked on a new chapter in his life; recently married. Incredible entrepreneur and a gift to have on our show today.

Mel Abraham: Welcome Justin, it’s great to have you.

Justin Herald: Thank you so much.

Mel: So, do me a favor. Give us your quick glimpse of your journey and if this is really where you expected to be, how you ended up here in this process?

Justin: I guess, I was what they now phrase as an ‘Accidental Entrepreneur’ or actually, even the word Entrepreneur or something like that it’s not comfortable with me because I think a lot of people want to be one but I just want to do well. So, if that’s got a title then that’s great but if not doesn’t bother me.

I started my business really in a very Australian way. Over here in Australia, if you can upset someone, it’s a good thing. So, I had a lady; my father was a minister and he was the head of the religion. So, growing up in that probably that, but there is always people telling me how I should be living my life; not my parents but other people.

And I was 25 years old and a lady who really had it in for me over the years told me how I had an attitude problem. So, the only reason I decided to start a business was just to upset her the following Sunday by putting “I Love My Attitude” on a T-shirt. And I went to the bank to see how much money I had.

At age 25, I only had a dollar twenty five in the bank. So, my little brother Dean lend me some money. So, it’s 50 dollars and I convinced a printer to print that out. For 50 dollars, I got 4 shirts made and sold 3 of those shirts to 3 of my mates. One of them friendly enough, was my brother. So, Dean had to pay me another 20 dollars to buy the shirt.

And I went to the church the following Sunday and people loved it and the lady was upset. She still is upset with me; so, it’s the best 50 dollars I’ve ever spent in my entire life. But yes, people just loved it and I started to sell; because I didn’t know what I was doing and that’s I think the biggest team and I; especially when I’m mentoring clients is trying to get them to understand that it’s okay that you don’t know.

Because I think that there is this pressure that amounted with so much information out that that we are supposed to know what we’re doing. I actually like it when I don’t know what I’m doing because that gives me more (using the word) more entrepreneurial sway to fit…

There’s an old saying. I’m not sure if you have it over there but there is an old saying, “You can’t see the square peg in a round hole.”

Mel: Yeah, we have that too. Yeah.

Justin: Well, for me you can if you force it. So, that’s where for me entrepreneurialism is right at the startup is forcing that square into the round hole. So and my favorite 4 letter word has always been ‘Next’. So, if things aren’t working I’m quickly moving on to the next thing.

So, it just took up and I sold them to my friends because I didn’t know anything else to do and sold to friends of friends and after a while I rounded up people that liked me. So, I then went into some stores and they didn’t want it because they’ve never heard of it which was bizarre in itself because you wouldn’t have heard about anything you’ve never heard of before.

So, my way around that was to get my friends to ring up the same shop week after week to ask for my brand and after a while, I went in and the guy said, everyone is asking for your brand right now. He didn’t realize it was my friends. He put it in and it sold out in 2 weeks and then, it sort of took a life of its own and I quickly learnt that opportunities are made not many of them present themselves in front of you and when they … you got to capitalize that in a very short period of time and the ultimate outcome of Attitude.

I’m giving you a very long story in a very quick time. We were approached by a company you have it over there. Philips Electronics, they approached us and wanted to license my brand which I had no clue what that was at the time. But because I had a huge market share at that stage, it was over two and a half thousand stores here in this country, let alone all around the world there was more.

They were stalking my brand so they wanted to tap into that add in to 25 year old market by putting on to their stereos and televisions. It was a huge deal.

And then, after that I figured out that I really did like the licensing thing because I got paid a royalty for every sale and then I licensed it to brands around the world to over 180 companies with over 900 products underneath those 180 companies and I’ve got between 2 and 22 and a half percent of turnover all because a stupid woman told me how I had an attitude problem.

Did I expect to be here? Not at all. I’m a little bit different to how some people sync (I guess) or I have heard stuff in the past where I actually don’t aim too far out when it comes to goal setting. I actually have a one day goal and that is to do better than I did yesterday because for me that’s manageable.

I have clients that sit in front of me and I will say, “What do you want to get out of your business?”

They go, “I want a Ferrari.”

And I go, “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of. How about you just pay and then we might go to the next level after that.”

So, I didn’t expect to be here. I’m extremely blessed that I am but I don’t take it for granted either and the other thing for me is right back early on because I retired when I was 32. When I sold the brand but I decided I was going to stop doing business because I love it and as you know and you do as well, I speak in front of a lot business audiences all the time. So, I got to make sure my content is current but I love it, I love business.

Mel: You know, the cool thing about you Justin, just so you know and I think you said some really important thing in there and probably the biggest one is that (1) You didn’t intend to do it, you started moving and there is something that I talk about called The Corridor Principle that the doors of opportunity are outside in the corridor and if we sit in our hole, we’re never going to see that.

And the licensing deal was something that you didn’t even know existed but because you went out there, took action and got out in the corridor, things started to present themselves that you wouldn’t have otherwise had the opportunity to do.

Justin: Exactly right and the issue with nice people is well, they never actually succeed and this is not because of lack of skill because really the only thing I passed in school was lunch time. So, I wasn’t the smartest. But it’s more about and when I talk, I actually, when I finish doing my whole story, point I make out of everything.

So, the last 20 years in my life is the reason that most people would never succeed because they wouldn’t even go to that meeting in the first place because they don’t know what it’s about. And the one thing that I know for an absolute fact and I don’t care how long people who are listing in many business, this is a 100% fact and that is what you currently know is not what is needed to get to where you want to go to and I can prove that based upon the fact that if it was, you should already be there then by now.

So, there is more stuff that they need to learn and I personally believe there is more stuff we need to unlearn to get ourselves to the next level.

Mel: Totally agree. So, Justin and I kind of met indirectly because I happen to be out speaking to entrepreneurs in Australia and I don’t remember who the person was, but someone was in the audience and I was telling Justin’s story because I wanted to tell a story about an entrepreneur; dynamic entrepreneur and I just found Justin’s story online and as I’m telling the story, I guess they texted him and then, they came up to me afterwards and said, “I’m a friend of Justin’s and here is his contact information.”

And we’ve been in contact supporting each other’s journey ever since. So, it’s really kind of cool that to realize that behind every entrepreneurial journey is just a real person.

Justin: Yeah and it’s about not changing too. I’m the same person I was before. I’ve got the same friends. Nothing has changed about me and that’s probably in the realm that I spend a lot of my time out which is corporate speaking and mentoring. The no. 1 comment when I finish, people just come up and go, “You know, you’re just normal.”

And I tell them, “I’m supposed to be normal.”

And I don’t want that success from a financial perspective to shape or change who I am. My net worth has nothing to do with my self-worth; never has. So, I need to ensure that I stay grounded. Hence why, I’m just a guy that did okay with a few T-shirts. It’s the way that I view it from myself. And if I can assist other people to get to the next level in anything—whether it’s in my information, my mentorship or in products that we’ve released to the world then that’s my role and I’m blessed to have a crack as we say that here in Australia.

Mel: Dynamite, dynamite. So, this kind of leads me to this next question which I; if we had a chance to talk to some of your closest friends or customers, what you stood for, what would they say to us, what would they tell us about Justin Herald?

Justin: Look, it’s funny. As you know, I only got married last week and when people are doing their opinion of Justin or opinion of Renee at the wedding the most common thing which is really hard to sit there and listen to people talk about you but especially with my friends you never know what’s going to come up.

Mel: Yup.

Justin: The most common thing is that I’m always hard under my sleeve. I always have. I will go for the underdog. I’m always battling there for the underdog and I think, I don’t know. They’d probably tell you I just kept it real.

Sitting in a tree doesn’t make you a tree. Making money doesn’t make you a success. That’s just a by-product of doing it all. So, for me, I’ve been given a great opportunity. I’ve grabbed them with both hands and sometimes other people’s hands at the same time to make sure it doesn’t go away and I’m just continually doing that all the time. So, I don’t know. I don’t really think about it in a great deal.

What I’ve got integrity and ethics are probably at the very top of my tree when it comes to the character traits that I will always advice by. The way I was brought up which I’m glad I was brought up that way and the win-win situation. Someone’s got to win before I win that’s just the way that I’ve been really. So, that’s why I find business very easy and very hard to do.

• Easy because I’m going to make sure everyone wins.
• Hard because I find it that people seem to be; they find it easy to be dodgy than to be ethical. So, these guys.

Mel: And the one thing in our short time knowing each other, I can absolutely attest to is you are what you seem you are on the surface, you are true to you word and you’re pretty well transparent and direct. It’s no BS and here is the way it is and here is what we need to do and it’s a refreshing change from some of the stuff. Especially, look we’re going through crazy, crazy politicians these days here in the states and it is certainly refreshing to have complete transparency and know where you stand.

Justin: Well, you got to be. That’s not anything I have to do. I don’t have to wake up and think of how am I going to be today. It’s by default that that’s all worked out. At the start, even speaking, best example: When I first was asked, a lot of people want to become a speaker and [I never that was;] people just asked me because I had a lot of media attention over here, “Could you come and talk at our conference and stuff.”

Really, no idea what to say because for me it was no big deal that the business went. Well, I had to make sure that I had more than a dollar twenty five in the bank. So then, when I started speaking at conferences and then, I looked at how other people were presenting, what their content was, I was sitting there and going, “You’re kidding me.”

Like, there is nothing out there and when I finish, people come and go, “Thank you so much for being so refreshing. I found that difficult because I wasn’t being refreshing. I just was being myself and then, over a period of years, I figured out that actually being me was what people needed to see because I want them to be like that in their business. Don’t change who you are. See, personality will outweigh product every day.

Most employees are forgetting their personality and leaving it home because they’ve been drummed in their head that they got to be product-driven or process-driven and it’s not the case. The consumer these days, you got me on my bandwagon now. But the consumer these days has got one thing more than ever before and that is choice.

So, the product, there is a million of those products everywhere. So, what’s the difference?

And so, the difference for me is me. I don’t have to make it up. I can just get out of bed and be me. So, that’s why I find it very refreshing to be me instead of, hey now I’m accepted for who I am with. Realistically, when I was younger I used to get in trouble for who I was. So, it’s pretty cool.

Mel: Yeah, absolutely. I think that’s what society needs to see business or otherwise. It just needs to be real and I love that theme. If you looked at it and I think that if you looked at it—the habits that you have, which ones, what couple of habits do you think contributed most to your success that people can kind of take away?

Justin: I think, like I said, before my four letter word, NEXT. I’m a, and this goes against what a lot of people have learned (I guess) or have heard in the motivational aspect of stuff. I’m a very good strategic quitter and I think a lot of people need to learn that skill because not everything is going to work. (Right) People hang on to it for too long. Then they get themselves all upset because it didn’t work when they, well it wasn’t going to work in the first place. So, if only you just walked away quicker, you wouldn’t be emotionally attached to the non-outcome because it was never going to be an outcome.

So, when I start seeing things – either slowing down or not going the way that I needed to go, not the way that it needs going because sometimes there is a natural progression but sometimes that natural progression is not where I want to go then I will just quickly move away and go, “You know what? This is not going to work.”

And I have an A team in businesses and they all fit into each other in a direct or indirect way. So, if I then start something new and it’s not fitting into anything else that I’m doing well that requires a lot more work than if it had fit in. So, that makes it an easy decision. So, I’m out pretty quickly.

And I think the other thing is stickability too. Not everything is going to be easy either. So, I get there is a natural progression but sometimes, especially anyone listening who is trying to start a business at the moment and has never started a business; well, odds are you’re not going to know what you’re doing. Which means, you’re going to get frustrated which is normal.

Anytime, this is a thing that is—I lose my mind when people seem to get frustrated, especially in startup. Any time that you are out of your comfort zone, there is this is common sense and common sense is actually like a deodorant if you really want to know people really need to really use it really do but common sense says that if you are outside of your comfort zone, you will be uncomfortable. That’s the whole purpose of startup. You are uncomfortable because you have never done it before.

Now for me, I live in my learning zone outside of my comfort zone. I can’t live in a comfort zone and you will never grow out of your comfort zone while you’re in it. So, if you start to embrace that level of, “Oh this is getting scary”, you will succeed big time. If you won’t do that then you’re only going to get the same result you’ve always got. And unfortunately, some people’s results I have always got is none.

Mel: Right absolutely. They just, they cower and they don’t, they’re not willing to try. Look, I kind of talk about it in the context of let’s prototype things. If we know that we’re just prototyping things we know that we’re not putting everything in. We’re testing it, we’re testing it and we fail it fast or we succeed and we just head on.

Justin: Yeah, it’s not that hard. Like I think what we’re going to do is simplify the whole process. Most of them inside our heads before outside of our heads because if we get it; to me business is as simple as 1 + 1 = 2. It doesn’t need to be difficult than that.

Mel: Yeah, it doesn’t need to be complicated; it’s common sense

Justin: And that’s where I’m different too. A lot of people, I guess, hopefully now accountants will listen to this one. But I’ve never done a profit or loss, I’ve never done a forecast, I’ve never done budget, never borrowed money, never had an overdraft.

So, I’ve never done anything you’re supposed to “Do” in business but it worked for me. So, I think that’s where—especially, in startup. Startup is my little hit baby with everyone but in startup there is a whole lot of people trying to get everything right first. Says who? Why do you need to do that?

Mel: Yeah, yeah. This, when you start to look at things, I think this next question really I think it’s going to—because I love the way you look at the future. But looking out into the future the next 5 to 10 years, where do you think we need to spend our time where we can have the greatest impact. And I know that, you and I have similar bents on this but I’d love to get your perspective for the audience and all that stuff.

Justin: Well, I don’t know. I can’t remember when I said those questions what I wrote down to be entire honest because I might view changes every day but I think people that are spending too much time looking into the future, I think the way that business is going to go if we’re going to talk from a business perspective—coming up or having systems, procedures, anything that actually engages the customers in a quicker way is where business needs to go.

I think, if we as individuals want to look forward and I get this all the time when I sit down with people and they’re telling me that 10 year, 5 year plans and it’s awesome and sounds good and if they write it down it will look great. But I just look at, what are you doing now? I just would rather look at what I’m doing now. I have no clue where I’d be in 10 years to be very honest or 5 years.

Pretty easy, because if you asked me 20 years ago where would I be in 20 years would be nowhere near where I am right now. So, what it’s proven to me is because of the power of opportunities and being in the right place at the right time sometimes but doing things in a way that opens up more doors. See, if opportunity is not knocking at your door build a door, pretty simple stuff really.

Mel: Right, right, right, right.

Justin: So, that’s where for me. Now, I don’t know like this new business that we’ve just launched globally; if you ask me (we’ve been working on it for a year now), if you ask me a year ago where we would be in a year, nowhere near; where this going global in a matter of weeks; nowhere near it.

Had I planned that this was going to go global in 4 years’ time, guess what would have happened, we would have gone global in four years times. I would have missed the opportunities that have happened over the last few weeks. So, that’s why I don’t allow time to be a factor in anything that I do.

So, a lot of people let time master them. I master the time aspect, so, it doesn’t need to be done now. It doesn’t not need to be done now or could it be done now. We will just cross that bridge when we get to it.

I have had people sitting in front of me and go, it’s not the right time for me to grow this part of my business right now. Just I’ll lose my mind once again. Why not? Well says who?

And I think we sometimes allow our circumstances to dictate to us how we operate and that’s essentially using an analogy like getting in the car and saying to the cab, “Will you drive me where you want me to go?” instead of “We’re in-charge of that process.” So, if I don’t like the road I’m on, I will take a different route.

So, same in business. Just have fun with it. That’s what I do. I don’t have a clue what’s going to happen tomorrow.

Mel: But you’re open to it. You’re not so set in the pattern, you’re not so set in the journey that says, it has to happen this way. Whatever comes your way, you’re willing to deal with it.

Justin: Exactly. I was talking with you before you started this. I’m going to a franchise conference today with all the franchisors from all over Australia. Now, that only came up last Thursday, the opportunity. I could have gone—it’s Saturday morning here. Beautiful day, really a great time for me jump on my Harley. I’m not going to do that now. No, I’m not going to go there.

I know by Monday, there will more opportunities from what we’re going go through today at the conference would refer us; then I would have been there, had it going on to my Harley; that’s just common sense. But where is that latest, don’t know, don’t care but really excited.

Mel: That’s awesome. That’s so awesome as we look at that. So and I think that that’s an important thing for us to consider is to be present in the moment, be present to the opportunities that might pop up and because, I think both your journey, my journey—if I look back a decade ago, I certainly wouldn’t have expected to be where I am. I wouldn’t have expected to be in a situation—I wouldn’t even expect to be chatting with you; I didn’t’ even know who the heck you were.

And yet, the opportunity came up and even how we connected was just ceasing the opportunity and just staying in touch saying, “I don’t know where we’re going. I don’t know what we’re going to do together but let’s just stay in touch” and here we are doing different things and possibly more stuff together. So, we got to stay present in the moment.

Justin: Yeah, we do and that’s the thing most people don’t; they’re living in La La land.

Mel: And someday, someday. Well, someday is not a day of the week. So, let’s get over it and let’s live today.

Justin: And that’s the problem that I think; oh, it’s not a problem. That’s one thing people need to get their head around right now is—I don’t care if things have not worked for me in the past. But it’s not going to stop from giving it another crack right now because

• Things change
• Our mindset change
• The landscape of business changes
• The type of people we’re dealing with changes

I have had meeting where they flat out said, “No, we’re not interested in something.” Go back two weeks later, the mindset has changed in that business or the staff more or so have change in the business and I present the exact same thing and they go, “This is brilliant.” I have not changed.

So, that’s where…now is not. My father, he is a very smart man but he used to come up with all those little saying but my dad has always said, “There is no such word as can’t.” So, we would just keep giving another crack. So, once again round peg square hole.

Mel: Which kind of looks at the next thing that I call, The Nightmare Gift is that when we are out there putting ourselves out there the way you do in what you’re doing, inevitably things happen. Things happen in our past that at the moment that it happens, feels like it’s absolutely devastating. It’s that nightmare in our life that at some point is we get distance from it and we take the learnings and the lessons from it, and look back on it.

I know for me it was my partnership breakup in ’96, ’97 that turned out to be one of the greatest gifts and kind of a turning point for me that I know that had that not happened I wouldn’t be here having this conversation with you today.

What was in your life? What was that one of the places because I’m sure there is many of them that you look at it and say, “How did I transition? What allowed me to get past that nightmare and see the gift in it?”

Justin: I think for me it was probably a personal thing where it was a breakup of my marriage where your sort of sit there and go, “I’ve been doing everything right. Been working my rear end off to give lifestyle and it’s all gone.”

Probably the thing for me, I’ve struggled with the most because I actually, I might call it, I lost my mojo because the reason as to why I was doing it had gone. So, you sit there and go, “How does this work?”

Couldn’t see a way around it. Like, everything else in my life I’ve been able to control and this is the first time I was out of my control. So, I struggled with that for a fair while and it wasn’t until I met my now beautiful wife who also owns a very successful businesses that things started to make sense.

So, out of one tragedy and misery came something that just was even better. Gave me back my spark but actually gave me a spark in a totally different way, released me into being a better me. So, business stuff I’ve never really looked at any business failure or things that don’t work as anything other than that’s just part of the process. So, I’m a realist when it comes to all that.

So, the stuff is that not everything is going to work and that being the case, I’m not going to put too much money into anything just in case it doesn’t work so, they will take their financial aspect out of it, they can still be more entrepreneurial but all my stuff’s been; like I have had a major motorbike accident when I was 17 where I was in a coma for 5 months but what’s that taught me? Well, don’t get on the back of a bike with a guy that doesn’t know how to ride it.

So, I think my stuff then because I do with my heart and my sleeve, anything from a personal perspective saying it to effect has effect it’d be more than a business thing not working because it’s funny a lot of people do leave to be that business person but my businesses are the things that I do to get the stuff that I want. So, I just got to do them well so I can then have nice stuff or be able to provide for my family better. So, part of that process is something’s going to work, something’s not going to work.

Mel: True and I hate people asking me, you’re flying on and they go, “So, what do you do?”

I say, “I’m an entrepreneur.”

And they want to look at you like, well is it contagious. It’s like a disease and it’s like they believe that, “Oh you’re a daredevil, you’re a risk taker” and I think actually quite the opposite. We are risk mitigators. We look at things, we analyze things, we find ways to build things and do things to create a better life for people in that process but it’s not about just going out there for an adrenaline rush.

And look, I’m a CPA by education so the last thing you’re going to compare; kind of put it in a bucket as an accountant, say, “Yeah, accountants take a lot of risk” because we don’t. And I think that entrepreneurs when they do their stuff don’t but they’re willing to move like you are saying, they’re willing to read the signs and say, “Time to get out. Let’s move on.”

Justin: Exactly right and the other thing for me, it’s all about trying to find that shortcut. That’s one thing entrepreneurialism is. So, it won’t take me a long time to find a short cut but there is a better way of doing everything. There is always a better way and what we have is a culture within all of my stuff (yup) is what’s the better way.

Don’t do it because it’s always been done that way. That’s not a solution to anything. It’s, “I want to be in the full front of innovation.”

Mel: It’s the death nail of a business to sit back and go, “That’s always the way we’ve done it.”

Justin: Well, that’s what happened with the current business we just launched. We go into places. We have had a 100% success rate which is a pretty good statistic to have but we’re always met with, “We’ve always done it this way.”

Just because you’ve always done it a certain way, doesn’t mean it’s the right way and I think that’s where we’ve got to, as business owners, really take a little bit more of a risk; if you are not a risk taker, this is probably the best way to take a risk and go, “You know what? What part of my business right now could I potentially approach in a different way?” Not the whole thing because it’s not your…not that person who is going to freak you out.

• But what one thing can we do little bit differently?
• What can we make a little bit easier?

I think any integration with consumer, customer or clients; if we can make that see past them, your business will go straight away, anyway.

Mel: Huge.

Justin: Just because for the last 100 years, my company has been doing this a certain way with our customers, so what?

Mel: Exactly, exactly. And I think that, that’s kind of this venture that you’re in right now and the thing that we’ve talking about this tack, I think this is where we go if I ask you this concept of, “What’s one of your technology, tools or tactics that shifted your ability to connect or be productive at the highest level?”

I think this is really kind of cool as a development from a technology standpoint, at customer standpoint and consumer standpoint.

Justin: Look, it’d have to be and luckily for me, in this conversation, it happens to be the thing that we’ve just launched. The one thing that I always do what I call a stop tag in my business. Now, I look at the stop tag of how we’re doing things and are there things under the shelf that we’re still doing stuff in our businesses or processes that are out of date? So, we constantly do that all the time.

I’ve always grown my businesses through word of mouth. It was a natural thing that happens and if your business, anyone listening, if your business or new clients retention and also introduction to your business, if it’s not the no. 1 area is word of mouth. If it’s not in your business then you are not doing your business correctly. It will always…it has to be word-of mouth because that’s the greatest foundation.

So, we just found over the years and that’s what’s happening. I have never advertised. I don’t spend any money on marketing. Never have, people just bring business because we are doing a good job. So, I looked at that and I thought, “Well, that’s just a natural thing for us.” And people are trying to do that now through social media. So, how can we now get that into a business?

Now, there is two ways as you would know that businesses get valued these days. Firstly, it is their turnover or the financial aspect and that’s what most people are aiming for. But a second one which is the new way is also the reach. So, how many people are they reaching—whether it’s making money or not—you have a look at Whatsapp, an app that sold for 19 billion dollars. That had reach; that’s why it sold for that much. They didn’t have turnover of 19 billion dollars.

So, what we decided is to come out with a tool that any business who has a customer, don’t care what sort of business it is, how do you get them to become greatest referrer. And we looked at different referrer models, I’ve always looked at different referral models and they are so convoluted and just too hard to get your head around.

So, I thought, “Well hang on. Companies that are spending a lot of money on marketing, let’s just use the billboards perspective.” They’ve got the billboard up the top and everyone’s got their face in there. Why don’t we put a company and business on the phone, which it is, ReferUs is a system that then also download not an app, that also downloads on to every single one of your customer’s phones for free so you could have a million customers referring you for free.

You offer a reward that when they have got, when they are in front of one of their friends, they can just say, “Oh look, I know you’re after is a hairdresser. You have to hair dress up. My hair dresser is fantastic. Here give me your name and number”, put it into the system, push the “refer us” button, off it goes. Referral is done. It goes straight through the business. You are out of the equation now

Now the referrer takes about 10 seconds to refer someone. You don’t have to know a great deal about the business. You just know that they do a good job. Then the business then will contact that person, if they become a client, you get rewarded with whatever the reward has been set up for by the business in the first place.

The biggest aspect of it all is the reach part. So, then all of your customers and referrers can push their social media button on their phone and that then will go to their own Facebook page and they can promote that business now to all of their people with their own unique code. So, for me I’ve got 4 and a half thousand people on my personal page. If I was to promote you, you get in front of 4 and a half thousand people that you would not normally get in front of.

Now, on top of that, they say on average people have around about 300 friends on Facebook. So, a few times then well 4 and a half thousand people, I’m really putting you in front of 1.35 million people for me clicking one button and you go straight through to other people.

So, we’re going to give you reach and that’s why every company that we’ve seen so far have started off with some of them, “Yeah, look we’ve seen this sort of stuff before.” When we finish they go, “How do we get it?”

Mel: So, let me map this out for folks. What this is, is a system, it’s called ReferUs and I as a business become a client of ReferUs and I have my clients and they can download this system on to their phone. So, as they go about their day, if someone needs what I have, they simply connect us through their phone. It sends me a note. It sends them a note. If the person hires me after I contact them, the person that referred me, gets a prize (whatever it is) and the person that came in, I might give a discount or some sort of incentive too and it’s completely transparent.

Justin: It’s 100% transparent. That’s the thing. We all want my clients to know that if they’ve given me and I have always been this way but if they’ve given me a referral there is a whole … goes with this program which not only you as the business have but your client or your referrer has the same system for them.

So, they can see what we’ve done with that referral that’s come in and as soon as that referral come into us, and become a client, it takes off in the backend and that regional referrer gets an instant SMS saying please contact us for your reward. So, that’s why it’s just keep on. That’s happened to me.

I will give you a perfect example: I put it out to (because you can promote your own business through social network as well); it’s not only about social media. This is also traditional. I’ve put it out to my 4 and a half thousand people to become my referrer. If you wouldn’t mind just become my referrer. Picked up over 480 people within a day who said, “Yeah love to. Thank you so much Justin.” And I paid 10% of my speaking fee.

Following week, I get 6 speaking jobs. So, I get paid. So, I made 36 thousand dollars in one week. Two of the people that referred jobs to me had never heard me speak before and this is where we’ve got something that no one else has done. So, what we’re doing in business with referrals up until now two things.

No. 1 we it’s one to one. Here is my little referral code. Next time you have a friend that needs hair done or whatever, can you give them this card and they can come in (one to one). We’re now one to a hundred, one to a thousand, one to 1.3 million people we’re going to put you in front of.

And the other thing that goes wrong is we don’t know really who is actually referring us. Now in the backend of this system, this is the powerful part for me as well, I now know:

• Who my top referrers are
• How many people they’ve referred
• When they’ve referred
• Why they have referred

So, when it comes to launching any product as a business do I go, “Okay I’m just going to spend a fortune on trying to get new customers in”? Or do I go, “Hang on, let’s go to my top 50 people and give them an experience and treat them really well and give them a red carpet experience” because I know they’re going to impact another 100 thousand people without me doing this.

Mel: Beautiful. That is cool because now we’re marrying—I believe that social media has actually in some senses de-socialized because we’ve disconnected and this brings that connection back. It’s really cool. Really cool.

So, I’m going to ask you one more question and then we will give them where they can get in touch with you and I’ll make sure that we have the links of all the stuff that we talked about in the notes too. But, This is what I call the Doozy question for some people but I gather, what I think your answer is just knowing you and hearing some of the other answers.

If you could go back in time to day 1 of your startup time and had 15 minutes to whisper in your ear about what was to come and hopes to may be saving you some mistakes or heartache, what would that conversation go like? What would you tell yourself?

Justin: Four words. That’s all I’m going to say. “Don’t change a thing.”

Mel: I had a feeling. Yeah.

Justin: Some stuff’s going down that probably wasn’t the most pleasant over the last 21 years but it might me who I am today. So, the one thing that you can’t unscramble eggs and I think the biggest thing that people will make a mistake is if they don’t; made some mistakes sorry, if they made some mistakes, either in business or personal life whatever, they’re too busy trying to undo that. Well, that’s not the point. It’s what should have been done.

And so to me, the things, the successes, the highs, the lows; they are all part of shaping who Justin Herald is and I like the guy that I am a lot more than I actually like the guy before I started. So, those things have shaped me. It’s the clay makers hands of the last 20 years that have actually pushed and actually turned.

Now, where would I be in the next 20 years. Probably … with the experience. But I wouldn’t change anything and I actually, I’m a bit different because a lot of people aim for the highs. I actually aim for the lows. I embrace those to be honest because it’s when you’re at that point is when you know where your strength is not your …(yeah) You know where you suck and you know what you’re good at and that actually brings out the stuff that needs to be changed. So, I wouldn’t change a thing.

Mel: It’s the greatest point of growth and learning that comes out of those and I think that as entrepreneurs, as people trying to be successful, if we can embrace those downtimes, those challenging times that when we come out of them, we flourish like you said, as a different person, a different business, a different dynamic comes to life in us.

I know for me at one point I got one-third of all my net worth wiped out in Ponzi scheme and I could have crawled into a hole but who I am today is carved by that. Could I have said, “God, I wish I didn’t go through that”? Yeah! But 18 months later we re-built it to 3 times over where we before we started and I think that it’s that, that creates us and sometimes we’re afraid to embrace that but I think you said a couple of things that are our theme here and I hope that the listeners really take away.

1. To be more in tune with the moment.
2. To realize that, for lack of a better term, crap is going to happen and be okay with it and let it go.
3. To embrace it for what it is, learn from it and get on with it.

I really think that’s it.

Justin: And I think number 4, if you don’t mind me putting another one is: You’re going to get dirty when you dig for gold. Don’t assume that everything is going to be easy. It’s not easy. If the success was easy everyone would be successful. So, it’s not for everyone and it’s not one of those things that one must be cut out for … no, I think everyone can be cut out but you just got to figure out how hard it is going to be and am I willing for the fight.

Mel: Beautiful, beautiful. One last thing Justin. People who want to find out about Justin Herald or what Justin is doing and some of the things out there. Where can we send them? Where should they go?

Justin: Okay, so for the many part of it all, JustinHerald.com is probably the best way to go. It’s where that’s my speaking site, my mentoring site I guess and there is some product on there as well. For the ReferUs thing because it’s something that as you know, it’s my passion right now because when you get in franchise all over the world it’s something, I want it. It’s something that I’m thoroughly enjoying and that’s ReferUs.com.

And anyone that goes there will set up a code. If they put in the coupon MEL we will give them a 10% discount straight away. It’s not expensive; this whole thing and this is when we tell people, this is … people just freak out especially corporates when I tell them how much this is going to cost them for the year, for the entire company and that’s 400 dollars. That’s all it costs, it’s 400 dollars for a year.

Mel: It’s about a buck a day, come one. We’ve spent more than that on coffee.

Justin: And then, if you don’t own a business you can even be for free a ReferUs referrer where you pay you a referral fee for that. The other thing that we will do for anyone listening, if anyone joins up, we will also have a system to set it up and sells with them as well. So, it only takes 10 minutes to set it up.

We want to make sure that anyone; it’s a service where our businesses are also focused. We want to make sure that we give such great service but also, if you’re going to purchase something, we want to show you how to use it straight away so you can get straight out there and start marketing your business to have a greater impact and reach.

Mel: Beautiful, beautiful. Thank you, thank you, thank you Justin. I know that you’re across the world in another hemisphere and I can’t tell you how grateful I am (1) for you reaching out the way you did, the way we met and being open to having conversations and having the chance to develop a relationship and friendship with you and I look forward to seeing some of the incredible things that you’re going to continue to do and how we might be able to do some things together and so, thanks again for being part of the show.

Justin: Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.

Mel: Alright, my friend. Be well and we will talk soon.

Justin: Thanks.

— End Transcript —

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