0003: What is the #1 thing you should consider before starting any mastermind for your business or organization? with Mastermind Expert & Publishing Expert Everett O’Keefe

Mario Fachini  [0:00]  

I am excited to be here with you tonight. I have none other than Mr. Everett O’Keefe. And let me just tell you about Everett. I have known him for quite some time. And he is one of the people that actually cares about other people. He is a best selling author. He’s a speaker, and he is also a mastermind expert. And I get a lot of people that come to me. And they’re like, you know, what about your mastermind, this and that. And I personally haven’t done one yet myself. I have my eight week training, I do speaking training my books, all this stuff. And I’ve always wanted to, and that’s why I’m excited to have him here. Because I’ve got some questions. I want to ask him to learn myself. But so many people ask about masterminds. And it’s like, what should I do? It’s not just getting the people together, so I can’t do him justice. I’m going to bring them up right after this. But let’s thank our sponsor, Charity Music. 

SPONSOR-Charity Music  [1:00]  

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Mario Fachini  [1:42]  

Here he is, ladies and gentlemen, I am proud to pronounce and introduce to you Mr. Ever O’Keefe. How are you doing, Everett?

Everett O’Keefe  [1:51]  

I am doing absolutely great. Thanks for having me on. I appreciate it.

Mario Fachini  [1:56]  

Did I just try to marry you off on the demo reel here or something? Did I say I now pronounce you?

Everett O’Keefe  [2:01]  

You did say I pronounce you? I wasn’t quite sure where you were going with that?

it alone. But you know,

Mario Fachini  [2:08]  

I gotta be honest, I don’t know where I was going with that either. I caught it midway so thanks, brain. But I’m so excited to have you here and even watching the demo reel. mastermind expert, inspirational speaker. You ready to jump into it?

Everett O’Keefe  [2:22]  

Absolutely. I’ve been looking forward to this.

Mario Fachini  [2:25]  

So have I and… So speaking of inspiration, and you’ve inspired me, and you’ve done a lot for me even offline, I’ll maybe touch on that later. But sincerely, I’m excited to have you here. I’ve seen you speak on stage. I know some of your clients, I’ve seen you interact with them. I know all the people around the country in the world that you’re you help. And I’m sure there’s a lot of people that want to ask questions. You know, what about this? What about that? I got one for you. What’s your inspiration? What made you want to start doing what you’re doing and helping who you’re helping?

Everett O’Keefe  [3:03]  

Oh, wow. So I was… My first foray into business was where I basically had to market myself as part of another company. And I was young and energetic. And I was actually able to take over a lot of the market share in my in my local area with it. But it was simply because I was young and energetic and willing to put myself in places that my competition wouldn’t. As I think… I think as I got older, I realized that there was, you know, there were best ways to do things, efficient ways to do things that didn’t require necessarily slamming your head up against the wall 24/7. And I just… I’ve just, I don’t know, I’ve always been passionate for helping people. And as I became more experienced in business and marketing, I wanted to help more and more people when it when it came to their business and marketing. That’s in general, but I’ll tell you, I was inspired by masterminds. By the first time I participated in one and when I realized what was going on and how it worked and just what an amazing benefit it was, I was like, “This is phenomenal. I need to participate in more masterminds.” So it’s been an amazing, it’s been a great, it’s been a great ride, I have to say.

Mario Fachini  [4:16]  

Well, I’m happy to hear that. And we’re going to get into it in a little bit. The case studies and success stories. I know some of them. And I’m excited to get into those. So with your masterminds, who who would you help? And how do you help them? What is the benefit of the mastermind? If there was… Someone was starting off right now going, “You know what? I’m going to start my own thing. I’ve been to masterminds, I want to start mine, I got as much courage and determination as ever”, what’s the number one thing you would tell them before starting any mastermind?

Everett O’Keefe  [4:50]  

Well, knowing who you’re serving is really important. So for instance, our mastermind group is called the Business Accelerator group. And it’s really focused upon marketing consultants, really people who are building brands for other people, and people who are building their own brands, and who are kind of on that… on that journey at one stage or another. So it’s really focusing… the focus is definitely upon market… marketing and expert positioning. And we know that that’s the focus of our mastermind group. If someone is going to start a mastermind group, they definitely need to know what population they’re serving. Is it going to be across multiple industries? Or is it focused on just one? And you know, the… the interesting thing, mastermind groups can be done to benefit any industry. I think if you got together a group of garbage collectors and had a mastermind group about how to be better and more efficient garbage collectors, there’d be a lot of value in that for those people. I think that this can be applied to any industry. I’m just thinking, Coach, you know, let’s say someone’s water polo coaches, or I don’t know, you just, I’d be hard pressed to find one it wouldn’t work for.

Mario Fachini  [6:06]  

Well, I appreciate you sharing that. I was actually going to ask you what do you think would be a very unique industry. And since we’re a family… family show here, we’re going to be PC and say sanitation engineers, right?

Everett O’Keefe  [6:19]  

You know, I’m not exactly sure what you mean by that. But I can… since we just gave it PG disclaimer… No, I’m literally…

Mario Fachini  [6:28]  

Instead of garbage collector. I’m just making a joke. I don’t believe in that crap. This is our show. This is… We get to say what we want. So…

Everett O’Keefe  [6:36]  

That is right. Exactly right.

Mario Fachini  [6:39]  

Sanitation engineer vs. garbage collector. But yeah, you’re absolutely right. Because so many people… I remember when I was learning some marketing strategies. Have you ever heard of contrarian?

Everett O’Keefe  [6:50]  

Like contrarian thinking?

Mario Fachini  [6:52]  

Yes. One of the things that stood out to me was, and I’m not going to turn this political, but it’s a very easy example when people go, you’re either on side A or B. And you’re, you know, you polarize the audience. The contrarian view is generally why people butt heads. And it’s what I love about the masterminds because you have a group of people that might not all believe the same thing. Or you take something from a different industry. I was telling my dentist, I go, “Have you ever considered publishing a book or speaking? Do you know a lot of doctors, lawyers, chiropractors dentist, someone that owns a restaurant?” Or is it generally the coaches and experts field that do these type of things? So the contrarian view with that is, what can you borrow from another industry that’s very successful and apply to yours even if it doesn’t fit? Like you were saying the garbage collectors, sanitation engineers, whatever, that was a joke. But the mastermind, I see as a way to go, “Well, our industry doesn’t do that.” Good. So be the first one. Would you agree? 

Everett O’Keefe  [7:53]  

Absolutely. And in fact, for instance, our… the business accelerator group, we’ve got people from, I mean, everyone had… comes with different experiences. And they bring in something unique from one thing or the other. We’ve got people in the group that are publishing experts, people who are video experts, we have people who are all about webinars or funnel creation. We have people that are doctors, we have people that come from, you know, the corporate, corporate world, and, you know, fortune 100 companies and that type of thing. And they all bring their own. And in fact, I think if someone were to set up a mastermind group, creating one in their local area, where they pull one or two people from very a variety of different industries, you know, let’s say 10 people in your group or 20 people in your group, nobody shares the same industry. There’s a ton of things they’re going to learn from each other. Absolutely. I mean… For instance, the dentist asks, gosh, you know, I’m really struggling, struggling to get referrals and the financial advisor goes. I’ve been training on how to get referrals all my life, that is my entire career. And so let’s talk about that. And financial advisor shares. And the dentist is like scribbling notes feverishly, right.

Mario Fachini  [9:22]  

Yeah, I mean, that tip alone, I was talking with the client earlier today, and we were talking about finances and numbers. And a lot of people think, well, do I need to be on Facebook, LinkedIn, and all this other crap. And it’s like, all you gotta do is look at your numbers and go, where can we save money? And where can we make a little additional, and you might be able to give yourself a 10% boost just by looking into your accounting.

Everett O’Keefe  [9:43]  

That’s right. That’s exactly right. Hey, you know Mario one thing I think we ought to cover is what is a mastermind group? Because there’s a lot of people who just hear this phrase, it sounds really cool. I don’t, but they don’t know where it comes from, or really what it pertains to. Other than… 

Mario Fachini  [9:58]  

That’s a great question. How would you explain that? In your words? 

Everett O’Keefe  [10:01]  

Yeah, because as you know, high performers are almost always in a mastermind group. That’s one of the things I’ve seen. So first, what a mastermind group isn’t, okay, it isn’t a referral group. It is not BNI or another group like that. It’s not a leads group, okay. The members come together in order to build each other up and support each other. They are not there to necessarily market their services to one another. In fact, a group that’s created with that foundation will fail quickly. Instead, a mastermind group is really just a gathering of people with a contribution mindset, meaning they like to give, they like to help get these people together in the same room. Napoleon Hill is famous for kind of creating the phrase “mastermind” and he basically said, in Think and Grow Rich, that when you get people together, you know, when you get two or more people in a room, a another mind is created, you know, so in the room, it’s a mastermind, that that that it is far more powerful than any of the individuals or even the sum of the individuals coming together because of the synergy that’s created. It’s also… a mastermind group is not a social gathering. While you hope that people will be social and that type of thing, its main purpose is not to just get together and shoot the breeze or talk politics, that would be horrible. But that’s just… that’s not what it is. It is people coming together, to share their challenges to share their successes, and with the express intent of helping people have greater success and to get through their challenges.

Mario Fachini  [11:47]  

You’re making this just too easy for me because that segues into the next question, which is two part. So that’s not two part, its two questions. Your specific results and your success story. So let’s say someone goes, I want to be in your mastermind right now. And just if someone is interested, where can they find that? What’s the what’s the website, you want them to check out the upcoming events?

Everett O’Keefe  [12:12]  

Yeah, really a couple of ways. First, if you want to reach out to me personally, you’ll find me on Facebook. I’m Everett O’Keefe. And there aren’t too many of us around the… But, you will find information about our group and especially this retreat that we that we have coming up right now, at mastermindretreat.net, mastermindretreat.net. Everett O’Keefe on Facebook, mastermindretreat.net on the… on the web.

Mario Fachini  [12:39]  

Excellent. So they’re interested, they want to learn more about it. And they go check it out and everything. So the specific results, when you’re taking someone on, you… they have to apply, right? 

Everett O’Keefe  [12:51]  

Yes. 

Mario Fachini  [12:52]  

They have to apply. What is your desired outcome for them? What specific results do you want them to get from applying and going through your mastermind?

Everett O’Keefe  [13:02]  

Yeah, so of course, a mastermind is a very highly individualized experience. And everybody comes to it from a different place, they’re all headed to a different place, even if they’re in the same industry. You may have someone with an inkling of experience who is at the beginning of their journey, sitting at a table with somebody who you know, has 30 years in the industry and and is looking for another challenge, like how to monetize their exit from the industry. So there’s some different things there. We’re looking for people in, in our particular group who have some level of expertise in their subject matter. They don’t have to be… they don’t have to know it all. But they need to know something that they’re going to bring to the table. 

Mario Fachini  [13:47]  

Contribution. 

Everett O’Keefe  [13:48]  

Absolutely, they’ve got to have the right attitude. And I’ll be honest with you, there’s a little bit of, you know, part of the reason for the application process is some people just don’t belong in some mastermind groups. And that has to be kind of weighed out. We love people to contribute, and we love people who like to give but we don’t like people who are just takers. Takers don’t last long in a mastermind group.

Mario Fachini  [14:14]  

Takers don’t last long anywhere. It’s the same reason I have an application for my masterclass. And when you said we’re not looking for, you know, you want some level of expertise, but you don’t need to be a know-it-all. I’m thinking I don’t want to be around know-it-alls, because you’re not going to learn a thing.

Everett O’Keefe  [14:30]  

Yeah, I mean… let’s put it this way. The best experts are those people who are who are experts, and recognize that they’re not experts. At the same time. If that makes any sense whatsoever.

Mario Fachini  [14:31]  

It does, it very much does. Because you can be at a high level yourself. But you’re it’s that always wanting to learn attitude where, you know, you don’t want to be the smartest person in the room, nine times out of 10 you are though, but you know, you can still do more. And there’s still more to learn.

Everett O’Keefe  [14:57]  

I’ll tell you as a… Myra Jones is very famous. Famous, I mean, very accomplished. Most people won’t know who he is. But he’s a TV producer. In fact, he was one of the ones that discovered Sean Hannity. And he’s been instrumental in a lot of television and news careers. So Myra came to our very first retreat, his comment was “Yes.” He says, the second you walk into the room, you are no longer the smartest person in the room. And there’s this magical give-and-take that happens. We at our at our events, our live events, which are different than just a standard mastermind group, you know, we do hot seats for people where people can sit down and they can say, “Look, I’ve got this challenge, or I’ve got this idea, and help me.” And then for the next half hour, that person is the focus of all the minds, all the brainpower in the room. And you know, most of these people in the room charge two 300 bucks an hour for their time. So that little half-hour experience among the group would cost them a fortune to have. And it’s astounding. People come to our groups, to our events and they go on just the mastermind group or the… just the hot seat alone was was well worth the effort to get to the event. And then of course, in my mind, the way I run mastermind groups is we talk about content. We’ve got content blocks, where members from the group are sharing in a particular area of expertise they have, that we have. We have the hot seats. And then we have those times where people are like, “Hey, what are you discovering? What’s what’s the coolest thing you found this week? And that you can share with the group?” In fact, can I share one right now?

Mario Fachini  [16:42]  

Yeah, absolutely.

Everett O’Keefe  [16:44]  

Alright. On our last call, let me…Let’s talk about this at some point, but that’s the let me set it aside. On our last call, someone said, Hey, we discovered this really cool thing. And over at… Dang it, it’s not… It’s VISTA Print. Sorry about that. At Vista Print, this thing called the promo box. Have you seen this promo? Oh, okay.

Mario Fachini  [17:11]  

No, I want to see yours. I think I know what you’re talking about from them, though.

Everett O’Keefe  [17:14]  

Yeah, so it’s this little deal. And the first one’s only five bucks because they want to get you sucked into it. But then if you sign up for a subscription for like, 20 bucks a month or whatever. What they’ll do is every month, they’ll send you a box of goodies branded to your company. Just random. Say what you want. You just give them your logo and your shirt size and your tagline and they start sending you stuff. So mine came today. 

Mario Fachini  [17:28]  

Oh, nice! Perfect timing. 

Everett O’Keefe  [17:28]  

So I’m gonna I’ll open it up. There’s some like sales material with it, right? And then a nice card that, that they bring… Am I full screen or just part screen here?

Mario Fachini  [17:49]  

You’re getting cut off. All I see is the box right now.

Everett O’Keefe  [17:51]  

All right, well, now Alright, that’s fine. That’s what I want them to see. Okay, so and then I open it up, I’m like, oh my gosh. So first, they’ve given me pictures of all this stuff they can create for me. They created a bunch of branded stickers for my publishing company.

Mario Fachini  [18:05]  

Ignite press?

Everett O’Keefe  [18:06]  

Yep, for Ignite Press. 

Mario Fachini  [18:06]  

I see the flame, very nice.

Everett O’Keefe  [18:07]  

They created some really nice postcards and sent it with envelopes. And they didn’t like just send one. There’s a stack of

Mario Fachini  [18:17]  

Yeah, it looks like a lot. I remember when I got the initial hey, here’s our different types of flyer material – gloss, matte – all that years ago. There’s a lot of varieties for this stuff.

Everett O’Keefe  [18:29]  

And then they sent me a T shirt branded to me as well.

Mario Fachini  [18:32]  

So you gotta hold that… I got to see that. Hold that up.

Everett O’Keefe  [18:34]  

Whoops, I got it upside down. So now this has a purpose. This isn’t just talking about fun. Okay, though, this is nice, right? The reason I bring this up is because in a mastermind group, people share stuff like this. It’s like I discovered that I discovered that. So BlueJeans video conferencing tool – you and I’ve talked about before. We discovered it because one of our members is a video is a live casting expert, and had stumbled into them and gotten into their beta before anyone knew about it. As a group, we were using it. And nobody in the world knew about it. In fact, we set up a special relationship to get the world to know about it. This kind of stuff, what’s the best tool? Have you tried that? Have you bought that? Happens all the time. And as a result, I find a mastermind group actually saves me tons of money, because yes, they do cause me to see some new shiny fish. But there’s a lot of shiny fish I don’t have to buy, because someone in the group’s already bought it. And they’ve checked it out. And they’ve said, Yeah, you know, you don’t really need that.

You have that collective wisdom.

Absolutely. If you could, if you’re sitting where you are right now, okay. If you could multiply your business experience by a factor of 10, what would the result be? And that’s what happens when you’re in a mastermind group. You are you are multiplying your business experience by… exponentially so that when you discover a problem, someone in the group has already gone through that challenge more than likely. And if someone else has a challenge, you’re the one who’s already been there, and you’re helping with the challenge. Someone else goes, “Hey, I’ve got this idea. I’m going to create this and we’re going to create that and then I’m going to make it do this and I’m going to tie it together with that.” And someone else goes, “Okay, look you’re way over-complicating it. Just to do… just do these two things. That’s all you need.” Oh, I just I needed somebody to tell me that. I… Andy Falco said it really clearly. He said, he said, when you’re in a mastermind group, yes, you are in business, maybe for yourself, but you’re not in business by yourself. Because the mastermind group really functions as your board. 

Mario Fachini  [21:02]  

Your board of directors. 

Everett O’Keefe  [21:03]  

Yeah, it is. You can bounce stuff, ideas, off them and stuff like that. And they’ll guide you through this process. So, many of us are in business alone, right? So there are so many people that are solo-preneurs out there. I would argue if you are in an effective mastermind group, you are no longer a solo-preneur. And, and I’m just going to keep rattling on because stuff keeps coming to me. So, bear with me. Even if you are the CEO of a huge company, you are alone. You are largely alone because you cannot communicate some things to your board and to your employees that… 

Mario Fachini  [21:43]  

No one else relates to it and knows what you’re going through. 

Everett O’Keefe  [21:46]  

Yeah, that’s right. And there’s stuff that you can’t share, because it might cause the train to go off the tracks. You know, I’m thinking about closing off this division and opening up this division. Well, you can’t just discuss that openly with everybody in the company. And there’s some things you can’t discuss with your board. But you can discuss them with your mastermind group. Because those people are not in your business, their paycheck is not dependent upon your decision. And…

Mario Fachini  [22:12]  

So, they’re going to give you the unbiased, you know, here, here’s the honest to god truth. And when you made the comment earlier about the hot seat and… I’ve helped people run them and give advice. And I’ve also been on the other side where it’s like, what do you think I should do? And you were saying, you know, they might be charging hundreds to thousands of dollars just to receive the advice. But the benefit of it is not just…well, maybe it cost 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,10 grand… you know, that’s not much for business for learning this stuff. I know I’ve invested well into that. But what you can learn from that… I’m thinking of someone you know, right now – we’ll just say, advertising expert- that, from advice, changed their whole business model. 

Everett O’Keefe  [22:57]  

That’s right. 

Mario Fachini  [22:58]  

I know other people that, you know, it saved them 50, $100,000, $200,000. Other people go, you know what, I was going to invest the next 12 months of this. Now I got the time back and it took one small tweak. Now I only have to give an extra hour or two a week, you know, and they’re still getting the desired result they want. You know, I go through my… I tell my clients that all the time. I’m like, Where do you want to be? 12? Yeah, I already did that one. today. 

Everett O’Keefe  [23:25]  

You’re good. 

Mario Fachini  [23:26]  

I, I go, where do you want to be 12 months from now? And they’re like, I want to be here. I go, Great. One of my favorite clients, Lori. She goes, I’d love to publish a book by Christmas. And this was around April of that year. And she… I go, “Okay, what if we did it by September?” and she was like, “Oh my gosh, that’d be even better.” And I was like, “Great, we’re going to do it in three months.” And now it’s two months, and there’s some people it’s been two or three weeks. So it’s like, here’s your… here’s your goal. But when you get someone with the expert level advice from the mastermind coaching, just not keeping it yourself. Maybe it doesn’t need to take as long and now you can enjoy the next six months and share the accomplishments with the group and inspire them.

Everett O’Keefe  [24:10]  

And that’s why it’s… our group is called the business accelerator group because you should be able to accomplish stuff much more rapidly in the confines of a mastermind group. And and honestly, that goes back to Napoleon Hill. He said when you’re equipped with the brain power and the other research resources of your mastermind group and you can accomplish stuff oftentimes in a year that would have met maybe taken you a lifetime in in your career. And and we’ve we’ve seen that. You mentioned about transformations. I think Yayel who’s in who’s in our group, she she doubled her rates coming out of one of our retreats because we counseled her to double her rates. She was terrified to do it. But they said, no and it’ll work. She doubled her rates, she maybe lost 5% of her clientele. Now you do the math on that double your rates, but lose 5% of… 

Mario Fachini  [25:01]  

You’re still up 45%. 

Everett O’Keefe  [25:03]  

Is that okay? Is that a decent return on investment? Now, by the way, she just did it again. She She just increased her rates again. And so it… you know, it’s these are the types of things. By the way, I saw Kelly’s comment here talking about passion, determination, drive, creative minds getting together is a win-win. It is. It’s also super fun. Like, I have never… Like, the first mastermind event that we put on… I came out of it. And my buddy John Writing, we sat down we we have never had more fun in our lives than doing our mastermind retreats. Of course, part of that is because we have a lot of food and some good drink. And we have, we can go do fun stuff too. But, amazing! If you’ve not been in a mastermind experience, you need to make sure to do that. It will be transformational. And I know that word gets overused. But I have seen it, time and time again.

Mario Fachini  [25:57]  

I don’t think it’s overused. I think it’s underused. Because, there’s people that come to me and… you know, I say I provide a transformation, which I do. And people come to me, tell me what they do. I’m like, “Holy crap, they’re frickin rock stars. They’re magicians.” And they’re like, “Oh, all I do is that that that…” My client was consulting earlier… Let me see here. I got the… Okay, there’s no notes that you can see on here. But, who would like this? Going from zero to over 10 grand a month in five months… 

Everett O’Keefe  [26:34]  

Huge. 

Mario Fachini  [26:35]  

…to going from 40 grand a month to 90 grand a month in six months. I’m like, and he’s just saying this so nonchalant. For dozens and dozens of people. I’m like, why is none of this in any of your marketing? What you know? And that’s what we’re doing? Because so many people don’t see that. So we’re going to get into that. But the last one, that’s not the last one. But you were talking about Yayel. And she’s awesome. She’s worked with me too. And I’m happy to hear she’s doing that now. But success stories? Is she your biggest success story? Or is there another one? Who’s the biggest success story you’ve seen? You know, the transformation that we’re talking about. They came into the group, had the transformation from the mastermind, and now what are they doing?

Everett O’Keefe  [27:23]  

So, I’ll just use her first name. But, Carrie. And you know, Carrie, she came into our group as a neophyte in the publishing industry. She knew she wanted to publish a book, and she wanted to publish a book, publish books for others. But she, she came in now she had experience in the business world, and a phenomenal person with excellent poise, huge heart, one of the kindest people I know. She came in. And because of the she came to our first retreat with which I think was it, which was in Yosemite. With that event, and then our follow ons and the support and the accountability that comes with the group, within a year, she was an international publishing expert. And we have people in the extended community coming to her because she was the expert in regards to international book launches. That happened in the space of a year’s time. And she blew right by a bunch of people who were far, much further down the road than she was. It’s, it’s amazing. I don’t know if that’s the biggest one. But it is one of many transformations, one of many success stories that have come out of participation in the mastermind group.

Mario Fachini  [28:48]  

That’s fantastic. I remember her, I know what you’re talking about. I remember before and then, you know, we stay in touch. And I was like, “What have you been up to?” And she was telling me a lot of good stuff, too. But, that’s… what you’re saying is the people who are more experienced, you can learn that and you know, you’re taking their expertise. And if you have that ambition and want to go further, you know, the phrase, you’re standing on the shoulders of giants, it’s you know, I I’d imagine that’s what every parent wants for their kids. I got here, and now you’re starting here and you, you know, leaving a legacy. So we’ve been talking a lot about, you said video experts and publishing experts, which… How would you say video has helped your business?

Everett O’Keefe  [29:32]  

Oh, videos. Absolutely critical. I mean, look, here we are, right, we’re us. We’re on video now. We use video conferencing for our meetings. We use live casting to promote events and to promote clients. In fact, some of my best clients I do live cast for. And and I learned that, you know, from from people like yourself, and including yourself, it’s like, what I watched the a lot of the things you do, one of the things that I still cannot manage to do is out dress you. And I guess I just have to kind of cave and go with that. But no, video is it… Here’s my mind. In my mind, in almost any industry, if you’re not communicating with video, you’re leaving on the table your most effective tool.

Mario Fachini  [30:23]  

Why is it your most effective tool?

Everett O’Keefe  [30:26]  

Well, because it’s the only medium that you can use, where you can connect with somebody basically eye-to-eye, but one-to-many. You know, I can have a personal conversation with thousands of people at the same time. But, but not be in the same room with them. People connect with your emotions, they connect with your facial expressions, they connect with the stupid mistakes you make – the uhm’s, the aah’s – the things that are not perfect and professional.

Mario Fachini  [30:57]  

Knocking the pop filter off the mic like five times.

Everett O’Keefe  [30:59]  

Knocking the pop filter off the mic. That is, that’s exactly right. All of those things are really just about being real. And I’ll be honest with you, I’ve seen people speak from the stage that were so polished, so professional. Every word was planned in advance and just crafted and every little motion perfectly crafted. And I can’t relate with those people at all. And they can’t sell me anything. Because I don’t see the reality. I don’t I don’t see…

Mario Fachini  [31:31]  

You don’t believe it.

Everett O’Keefe  [31:32]  

I don’t believe it. And and yet, video gives a chance for people to just be authentic and communicate with each other.

Mario Fachini  [31:40]  

And it keeps it very interesting when you decide to do everything live because there’s never any tech issues.

Everett O’Keefe  [31:46]  

Yeah, so that’s the thing about live casting, right. And I’ve learned a lot.

Mario Fachini  [31:50]  

Were you laughing and smiling at me when your video was playing? Because I could see you there. And I think you knew what I was doing before we started.

Everett O’Keefe  [31:58]  

Oh, I mean, honestly, I couldn’t tell if you were running it without audio. I couldn’t tell if you hadn’t switched it to the right camera.

Mario Fachini  [32:05]  

Yeah, it was that one.

Everett O’Keefe  [32:06]  

Any of that. But I knew that my job was to grin and smile at the camera. So…

Mario Fachini  [32:11]  

I saw you, and I was sitting there like this at one point. And…

Everett O’Keefe  [32:15]  

Yeah, I’m wondering, that actually came out. Actually, I was like this, “is he sure the cameras not on him when he’s going like that.”

Mario Fachini  [32:21]  

Well, everyone knows what was going on now. But they were only seeing the video and there was something and I was like, “Oh my gosh!” like the first four seconds. This is how I’m kicking it off. And I see you smiling like that with your nice smile. And I’m like, because you know, you know what’s going on. And it’s not like, Oh, I don’t know anything about video. But that’s the thing, you just got to roll with it. So, video is huge. You can be authentic, I tell people that all the time. Even if you screw stuff up, just keep rolling with it. So, video is important. This is the last thing, then we’re going to go to the sponsor, but how has publishing helped you?

Everett O’Keefe  [32:59]  

Publishing. Publishing is the single best thing you can do to give authority, to elevate your position as an expert. Video allows you to communicate one-to-many and to establish rapport. Publishing, I believe is key to establishing authority, that position of expert status. So, that’s why we publish books. That’s why our clients come to us over and over, because they need to get their message out. They know publishing is effective. And we still, even at this time when it’s easier than ever to publish a book, we still regard authors with this. We give them like God status almost and we give them with such high regard. And then add to that number one bestseller. Now, people are breathing rare air indeed.

Mario Fachini  [33:50]  

An international bestseller.

Everett O’Keefe  [33:52]  

In our international number one bestseller. That’s right. All of, all of that gives expert status in a way that not many other things do.

Mario Fachini  [34:01]  

Yeah. One of my favorite things, I think the cameras off it now, but physicality.

Everett O’Keefe  [34:09]  

Oh, yeah. That’s right.

Mario Fachini  [34:10]  

“Well, I have an E book. I have an E book.” For you, I have a real book.

Everett O’Keefe  [34:14]  

Here’s my PDF. I, we call it “thud factor”. Books have thud factor. You can put them on someone’s desk in or put it in their hand.

Mario Fachini  [34:22]  

Yeah, how? Oh my gosh, that’d be awesome for like a video to do! Have an SPL meter and like just drop them and be like, nope, you need this one. See who has the loudest decibels on it. Right? Alright, so we’re going to thank the sponsor real quick, and then come back and get into some very specifics like who would like to learn what’s the fastest path to… Nice, can’t edit it. What’s the fastest path to the cash? Everett will be answering that in just a moment.

SPONSOR-Charity Music  [34:58]  

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Mario Fachini  [35:05]  

And we’re back. So… while we’re being authentic…

What’s the next question for you? Rapid fire, shortest path to the cash? What’s one thing your audience could do to increase their profits the fastest? Take it away, Everett.

Everett O’Keefe  [35:50]  

Been 30 days and publish a book.

Mario Fachini  [35:54]  

Would you care to elaborate on that?

Everett O’Keefe  [35:56]  

I don’t know. I thought this is supposed to be really fast. So I’m just being really fast. 

Mario Fachini  [35:59]  

Oh, cool. 

Everett O’Keefe  [36:00]  

Yeah, our first little… we had the idea to publish a book, make it a best seller on Amazon. And I called my business partner on the way back from a conference. I said, “Tomorrow ,we’re meeting in the conference room writing a book.” He said, “Yeah really, what’s it about?” I said it’s about video marketing. And he goes, “Really? Okay.” And we sat down and recorded a book in about two and a half hours time, had it transcribed and then went through a publishing process that we had learned. And that book immediately brought people out of the woodwork who wanted our services. So…so, there you go.

Mario Fachini  [36:34]  

Excellent. All right. Rapid Fire, 60 seconds. What is the biggest problem you see your audience make and the fastest and easiest way to fix it?

Everett O’Keefe  [36:45]  

Biggest problem people make is over complicating things. They need to find an expert, follow the expert, do what they say. Don’t necessarily go buy every product of theirs and feel like they have to consume it. Find one strategy that is promising and execute on it. That’s it. You don’t have to go, you don’t even have to go find the best strategies, or the best expert, you have to find a strategy that works. Find “best” later. Find… go do “effective” now and find “best” later.

Mario Fachini  [37:17]  

All right, very good. Customer lifetime value. What’s one way joining a mastermind could maximize your customer lifetime value?

Everett O’Keefe  [37:31]  

So, if you’ve ever done that calculation of the lifetime value of a customer, right? It’s how much money are they paying you now? How much money are they going to pay over the next year or a lifetime? And who might they bring to you? All right. So there’s multiple equations there. And if a mastermind group helps you just to change any one of these three, even by 5%… Over the lifetime of that customer and the lifetime of your business, you will see an exponential increase in your revenue. And mastermind group… like Yayel, she changed the… what’s the, what’s the value of a transaction, she made that 100% more. Okay, so what does that do to the lifetime value and the value of people she might bring? A mastermind group will give you countless ways to to change those factors.

Mario Fachini  [38:22]  

I agree. And I misspoke earlier, you said she lost 5% of her clients, which were probably the ones that were difficult to work with in the first place. And I said, Well, she still has 45% left, when really she has 95% left. The confidence… So you do it once, you’re making twice as much, your confidence goes up. You do it again, your confidence goes up even more, regardless of the money. You’re now at a level where you’ll communicate with people. I know… For anyone that wants to push the limits to go beyond and go, “Oh man, I wish I could be there”, you already are. It’s more of a mental shift. I know people that have been to conferences, that won’t go talk to the speaker. And I think, if there’s one thing you do, if you were sick, because this has been my case before, I was literally physically sick, I still went and I remember my mentor at the time goes, “Well, you should still throw up, you should still show up. Because if you’re gonna get sick, there’s a bathroom across the hall this way you’re going to at least learn.” I showed up and I barely had the energy. But if there’s one thing you can do, always talk to the speaker. Because if you can’t, it’s more a self-image and confidence thing that the second you do, they might be the only person worth talking to in the room. When you get to that point where you go, I’m charging X amount, and you have that confidence, you’re on the same level. And there is stuff you can get invited to just because people see that you’re playing the game at this level, and not down here. You may never have to change any of your content, you might be doing the same thing. Pretty much everyone that comes to me go, “What should I do?” Increase your price, increase what you’re doing and just think about it a little bit differently, because I don’t work with anyone who’s not an expert. But some of them don’t see themselves that way. 

Everett O’Keefe  [40:15]  

Right. That’s exactly right. 

Mario Fachini  [40:18]  

So, the customer lifetime value, you’re saying 100% year 1, 100% year 2. But, what’s the compound for 5 or 10 years?

Everett O’Keefe  [40:25]  

Oh, it’s crazy. It’s crazy. And and as you pointed out, it’s transformational to to her mindset as well. And she just needed the nudge and the accountability of going “well, I’m going to go back to my mastermind group next week, and tell them what I did with their advice. And if I have to go back to “Yeah, I just really didn’t do a blah, blah, blah”, that’s going to be hard. So, she executed on it. And now like I said, she’s like she didn’t increase her rates again, without us even mentioning it to her this time. So… and and the result is, you know, she’s working with the best clients. Right? Would you rather work with the best possible people? Few, let’s just say fewer of the best possible clients versus a lot of the worst possible clients. Another thing that I you know, picked up very quickly was, you know, quit pricing your stuff for mainstream. Don’t, you know, don’t feel… don’t price yourself, for every customer in your in in your market. Hone it down to the best customers in your market and price your materials and hone your offer for the best ones. So… and that’s it, that’s invaluable. That, that’ll take you from working for pennies an hour to working for, you know, getting a very good return on your time.

Mario Fachini  [41:41]  

Well, I’ve appreciated you sharing. And it sounds like people can benefit a lot from your mastermind. Let’s give them that link one more time. And, you know, kind of talk about what, if they reach out to you, what they… the surprise we talked about?

Everett O’Keefe  [41:57]  

Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay, so… So two things. If, if you just want something for free, I have this spreadsheet for you or not spreadsheet, a mind map. And you won’t be able to see it very well here. But, it is, on the one side, it’s the value of a mastermind group. And the other one is notes about how to create a mastermind group and how to, and also to create a mastermind event. So I have put, I put this here, if you message me, personally, I’ll make sure you get it. Okay. So just reach out to me through Facebook and message me there. And then on the retreat coming up…

Mario Fachini  [42:33]  

I gotta be honest, I am so tempted to grab my phone and say I want a copy of that, because I do.

Everett O’Keefe  [42:38]  

Ah you know… You know I’ll give it to you. Absolutely. And actually, that’s the foundation for a course I am creating about how to create and run mastermind groups. I’ve actually filmed it all, it’s in the can and I haven’t done anything with it yet. So, that’ll happen at some point.

Mario Fachini  [42:55]  

I’ll tell you this, I’ll make sure when we publish the video, I’ll make sure it goes on to the site, we can put a link on there for people to contact you through the show episode.

Everett O’Keefe  [43:06]  

So then, the other one is mastermindretreat.net, I will tell you that as we’re recording this, we’re heading to Nashville, in a very short period of time where we have rented a, it looks like a plantation. But it’s it looks like something from Gone with the Wind a little bit. And we will gather there for three and a half days, we have a private chef and her assistant that come and cook all the meals. We personalize all the meals because we have a small group of people. So, we can cater to not just people’s allergies, but to people’s tastes. Just kind of cool. And then we’ve got some surprise activities planned while we’re there. And all the food and beverages are included. So if you are interested, it is an investment in your future. It’s not cheap, and nothing great is. But, if you go to mastermindretreat.net, if you get there now, you may see that there’s a registration link for last minute registration. If you’re watching this on a recording depends on when you’re, you know, there’ll be something there about our next retreat. So if you’re interested, come join a group of marketing experts and let us help you with your business and you become part of a really great family.

Mario Fachini  [44:23]  

Excellent. Well, Everett, I appreciate you for coming on and sharing your knowledge and wisdom with the audience.

Everett O’Keefe  [44:31]  

Yeah, really appreciate it.

Mario Fachini  [44:33]  

A lot of fun and I can’t wait to get this out there. So like they say it on Bugs Bunny and all that, that that that that that that’s all folks. We’ll see you next time. 

Everett O’Keefe  [44:45]  

Alright, thanks, buddy.