Episode 1 - Let the Journey Begin with Andrew Lees and Clint McPherson

Andrew Lees: Hey guys, this is Andrew Lees and I'm here with Clint McPherson and we are That Entrepreneur Life. Clint McPherson: That's what's up. From idea to launch and beyond. Andrew came up with that tagline and I'm digging it man.

Yeah, for sure. Andrew Lees: It's simple but there's a lot to it even with that simplicity. So, we're trying to talk about what it's like to be an entrepreneur, daily life of that. But at some point, you're going to get bored with that.

So what we really want, the most important thing is we want to talk to people who are interested in taking action. Maybe you've got a business idea, maybe you've already started a business, but what we want to do is talk to you about how you can efficiently start a business, grow a business and what are the things you can actually do. We don't want to just inspire, we want to inspire you to do things for sure, but we also want to give you the guidance and give you those tasks to do along the way. We're going to be interviewing some cool people hopefully in the near future.

Clint McPherson: Yeah. Andrew Lees: And, we've got a few people kind of lined up. And so some episodes it'll just be the two of us, and some of the episodes we'll bring in some awesome people who can teach us about their entrepreneurial journey and at the same time teach you. Clint McPherson: And add value, right?

Andrew Lees: Right. Clint McPherson: That's what this is all about. Andrew Lees: Right. Clint McPherson: So, just to piggyback on what Andrew just said, I mean adding value is what we're all about.

We show that to our clients on a daily basis in our own endeavors that we currently are pursuing, and I think just the adding value portion is what he and I talked about a little bit offline just a few minutes ago. But adding value, man, is where it's all about, right? Then over time once you put yourself as that subject matter expert or you position yourself as that authority, the money comes, right? Andrew Lees: Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Yes. Clint McPherson: I really think once people start seeing that you're really about that life, right? That entrepreneurial life like we are, that's why I think that episode or the title of our podcast is just legit and it really hits home because it's going to fit into any possible angle we take on this podcast, right? From interviewing the people that we bring on, the successful entrepreneurs, or even some of the local entrepreneurs that are out there grinding, guys, it's not always easy, right?

Andrew Lees: No. Clint McPherson: There is a struggle that comes along with it at the beginning. But once you learn and once you grind that out and you learn... And that's what we're going to do too, lessons learned right?

Andrew Lees: Yeah. Clint McPherson: What we struggle with- Andrew Lees: What we face. Clint McPherson: What we failed at. Andrew Lees: Yeah.

There are always mistakes. I don't care what level you're at. If you're running a $1 billion company, you're making mistakes. And it's a matter of learning from those mistakes and figuring out how to be more efficient.

And that's the thing, as we progress in business we're getting more and more efficient. We're learning things. We're learning from our mistakes and working on improving those things and learning from other entrepreneurs too. Because there's a lot of information out there, some of it's good, some of it's really bad.

Clint McPherson: Yes. Andrew Lees: It'll lead you down these rabbit holes that Clint and I have both gone down where you're lucky to only have wasted your time. Clint McPherson: Yes. Andrew Lees: Sometimes you're wasting time and money and still, you come out of it not really knowing, not being necessarily any better for it, but hopefully, at the very least you're always learning because there's always something to be learned from every success and every failure.

And that's an underlying principle I think of being an entrepreneur, is you're going to fail. You're going to fail a lot. Clint McPherson: Exactly. Andrew Lees: But it's a matter of pressing on and continuing.

Clint McPherson: Right. Andrew Lees: Because if you throw in the towel, it's pretty easy to throw in the towel, but if you're committed to it, if you have a really strong purpose and why you want to be in business for yourself and you're committed to being successful and adding value, then you will be. You might have to pivot your business a few times. You might have to drop one business and start up a new one, and there's no shame in that, but if you're committed to being an entrepreneur, you stick with it.

Clint McPherson: Yeah. And it's good to also know when to cut the cord, right? Andrew Lees: Right. Clint McPherson: When to actually pick up and move on instead of- Andrew Lees: Yeah, it's tough.

Right Clint McPherson: Go dig in deeper and deeper down that hole because when you start something, obviously nobody wants to fail. But like you said, it's how do you fail and continue to move forward. Andrew Lees: Right. Clint McPherson: You continue to look at yourself at the end of the day just because you fail at something right?

It doesn't mean you've failed at that end goal. Right? It's just you fail at that moment in time. Andrew Lees: Right.

Clint McPherson: Get your ass back up and continue to move forward. And that's, as entrepreneurs, we're already crazy in the head, right? We're already stepping out of the comfort zone. Andrew Lees: Right.

Clint McPherson: We're already doing things that other people are scared to do. Andrew Lees: Yeah. Clint McPherson: Right? We've already picked up our stuff and out of the corporate world, I came, or out of the military, the same thing, right?

It's one of those things is picking up your stuff, knowing how to move forward, knowing how to get an education along the way, knowing who to listen to. Andrew Lees: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Clint McPherson: And like you said, about all of this crap and clutter that gets in your way and you go down the rabbit hole, right? Andrew Lees: Yeah.

Clint McPherson: And then we find ourselves lucky to like again, no lucky that we're ... Maybe it's just time that you lost. But again that's time you can't get back. Andrew Lees: Right.

Clint McPherson: So it's really learning how to focus, and again, just because you failed, move forward. Right? And that's, that's what it's been about for me, for the last several years. It just continues to move forward no matter what.

You're going to face adversity, how do you face that adversity? Andrew Lees: Right. Clint McPherson: But step out of your comfort zone, which we'll have an episode all on that. The same thing with what you mentioned earlier, adding value, we're going to have an episode for that.

We're also going to bring individuals on that we know, individuals we have networked with and we're going to be networking with hopefully at Podfest 2020 coming up shortly, and with Adam Bird at Heroes Media Group, Mike Penny at 5 Paragraph, and a whole bunch of these other entrepreneurs that are local to us and that we know that we can just get some key nuggets out of. I think that's going to be fun. Andrew Lees: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yep.

Yeah because every journey is different? There's no set path to being an entrepreneur, to being a business owner. I guess more and more there is some formal education about it, and about how to be an entrepreneur, and how to start a business, or what's the roadmap to success. But there is no one roadmap, and I think the journey is not linear for sure.

And so, you're going to take some sideways steps and some backward steps and but hopefully- Clint McPherson: Some somersaults. Andrew Lees: Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.

Yeah. But some somersaults that you may very well not be getting, it may not be getting that exciting in a typical work environment. So, yeah we're going to take you through that journey, through our journeys and let's kick it off with our background and just give you some idea of where we came from and what led us to start businesses. So, Clint, I'll ask you first, what led you to this point?

Clint McPherson: That's good. And we had this conversation a little bit earlier just getting our preparation, but the cool thing with this and how I became an entrepreneur, right? I was already not normal, to begin with, right? Going into the military doing my own thing, but I've always been on a sports team of some type, right?

My love at the time was college. I went all the way and played through college in baseball. Growing and doing that and learning the discipline and stuff to be good at it, right? Always gave me that drive to be better.

Fast forward, join the military and saw in the military I was an officer. Right? So, skip the line there, went from enlisted to an officer, but when you look at it, it was a journey of seeing all of the toxic leadership that I encountered during the whole that process. Right?

I'm not saying there was, I had some awesome leaders, don't get me wrong. I mean there are some great guys in the military, but always having that passion of saying, "I'm going to be better than that guy. No matter what happens." Right? "I'm not going to lead like him because I know he's not leading the right way." And so, when that happened, and just backtrack a little bit on that.

I was a marketing manager before locally, got the pink slip, right? I'm not afraid to say that, but it wasn't a pink slip that I caused. Right? That's because of the economy.

2008-ish timeframe. Andrew Lees: It was out of your control. Clint McPherson: Out of my control. Right?

I was the new guy, the low guy on the totem pole and boom, next thing you know it's like me going to my locker and finding I have a pink slip. Right? Andrew Lees: Right. Clint McPherson: Crushing.

Because I'm thinking like, "Oh I landed this gig, I'm going to kill it." Right? And again, no fault of my own, but getting that pink slip, knowing how easily you can lose something. Right? And then the same way when I go into the military getting injured, and having that 20 year plan initially to see it out as a career, going through several surgeries, getting injured in Afghanistan, and having several surgeries from that and having a recovery each time.

I didn't think that it was just conducive to my lifestyle anymore. Right? I love the military. I wouldn't trade that experience I had for anything in the world, outside maybe if you told me you were going to take my family away, maybe I would have traded it then.

But outside of that man, the experience I had and the journey I had along the way, it was meant to be right? So I went down that path, but it wasn't meant to be the 20-year mark that I thought initially. But seeing that toxic leadership transferred over into getting out and looking at it from like, "Okay, what am I going to do now?" I was a digital market... I was not a digital marketer, I was a traditional marketer when I had a marketing management job in Raleigh.

And then I was like, "What am I going to now?" Okay. I went down the athletic, sports administration, or sports management side of things hated that at NC State. Decided that was not the way I wanted to go. If I was going to grind, it was going to be grinding on my own terms, and again saw bad leadership in that area.

And then looking out, it's like, "I cannot work for anybody else." Right? "I have to be the guy that makes that decision." And so having that little bit of entrepreneurial spirit just at the time, it wasn't just a little, now that I'm in it I can say that basically you like translate it over to why I'm doing what I'm doing today because I'm not going to be that that garbage leader, whether I have individuals under me or not, I'm going to be successful because I am successful, not because I had to go against what my leader said because it was a dumb idea. Right? So, that's my path and that's how I got here.

How I chose the digital marketing space? At the time it was one of those things that are hot right now, and then my having the business administration degree on top of the marketing management degree, even though it was not a degree, but time. I served that position for almost a year. I had a background in marketing so it wasn't something that just came out of the blue, but it just seemed like a natural transition and it was a lot more natural.

Right? Because we all have- Andrew Lees: Yeah. Something we had experience with. Clint McPherson: Exactly.

We all have a cell phone, right? Andrew Lees: Yep. Clint McPherson: I'm always on Facebook or doing something initially. Andrew Lees: Yeah.

Clint McPherson: So it was just natural for me. Andrew Lees: We're all being marketed to. If you can just take a step back and figure out how to reverse engineer that, that's it right there. Clint McPherson: Exactly.

Andrew Lees: And sometimes it's, I deal with some marketing myself, although I have an engineering background, which I can get into, really whenever I try and over complicate it, and I'm sure you've had that experience. You try to over complicate marketing, and try and think a little bit too hard about it, and really dial in the perfect formula, or the perfect this or that it, maybe it works, but also maybe it's just complete overkill because at the end of the day there are things that, like we're being marketed to all the time, all of us are, and we all know what works to get our attention, to really get our attention. And really think about the times that you've been entertained, you've been interested in watching something, listening to something, and then ultimately purchasing something. What are the times that you're taking out your wallet and you're happy to do it because you want something that maybe you've seen over the course of a year and you finally decided to buy it, but it was not rocket science of how that company, got their product in front of you?

Clint McPherson: Right? Andrew Lees: They were just there providing value and they're providing some product or service that you found valuable and that you were okay with spending money on it. So, yeah, I think it's important to simplify and just reverse engineer what works for you. And that's a good start.

Clint McPherson: Oh yeah, and you hit the nail on the head when you're talking about like a lot of us can really... We're trying for that perfect formula, right? And we all think we could get there, but as I learned, as I've gone on this journey, you got to put it out there, right? No matter if it's perfect or not, you just, whether it's creating content, whether it's just doing something, creating a post, we're always trying to find that perfect recipe, that perfect formula.

We're always trying to dial in everything to a T. But again, not everything works the same for everybody. What works for one client or what works for one customer might not work for the other. The niches are different.

People's trying to captivate the individual's attention might be different as far as their target audience. So dialing in that perfect formula, that never happens right? But we all find ourselves wasting time trying to dial it in. Andrew Lees: Exactly.

Yeah. Clint McPherson: So with that said, man, tell us how you got started on your side, brother. Andrew Lees: Yeah, so I think I've always had this entrepreneurial spirit from when I was a kid. I really think I always knew that I wanted to start a business.

I didn't know what kind of business, and I wanted to work with products. I did know that. So, I wasn't exactly sure what kind of product I wanted to develop. But that's where my entrepreneurial journey began.

I was kind of like a kid inventor and I actually wrote a little book when I was, I don't know, probably like 11 or 12. Clint McPherson: That's dope. Andrew Lees: Maybe even younger, about inventing. I think it was called Inventing From A Kid's Perspective.

Clint McPherson: A little Einstein over here. Andrew Lees: I don't know, if you read it it's not that super complicated, but hey, there's some pretty good... I think there are some pretty simple, maybe some pretty true principles in there. I know some of the things that I put in there, I read it, I actually read it recently and I'm like, "Yeah that was-" Clint McPherson: Some nuggets in there.

Andrew Lees: Yeah, there's some good nuggets and did some cover art in Microsoft Paint on Windows '95. Clint McPherson: That's even better man. Andrew Lees: Exactly. Yeah.

It's pretty sweet. But, so I think right around then is when that journey started for me, I'd always be sketching out different ideas for products, and some of them were pretty wild from like super compact helicopters, too little things that could help clean the kitchen table after dinner. Clint McPherson: Nice. Andrew Lees: Because I was just tired of wiping the table off.

As simple as that is that was one of my chores. Andrew Lees: And so, I coupled that with this interest in science, interest in physics, and math, and engineering from a kind of a young age. My grandfather was an engineer so that's where I was like, "All right I have this interest in tearing things apart and putting it back together and inventing things. How do I..." I knew from a young age that I'd probably go to college, that that might be a good idea.

So, I was trying to figure out what can I do in college? What kind of formal education can I get that would wrap that all up or give me at least a good foundation to be more of an inventor and more of a successful product developer and mentor. So, I decided to get a degree in mechanical engineering. And so I went to Lehigh University up in Pennsylvania and I studied mechanical engineering.

Then I kind of thought, "Hey, maybe I'll work on aircraft." And always wanted to fly fighter jets, but I didn't want to necessarily go into the- Clint McPherson: Who doesn't? Andrew Lees: Yeah. What young boy doesn't want to fly around super fast? But being in the military wasn't necessarily something that appealed to me.

So, I thought, "All right, well maybe I can design aircraft. I can design jets and spacecraft and all that stuff." And that was cool and I still have some kind of an interest in and things like that in aerospace. But I got out of college, I worked for a big company, which I didn't work for an aerospace company right out of college, but aerospace companies are typically pretty big companies and I worked for a company that made power plants. It was a huge company and I realized right away that that was just not for me.

Working for somebody, I kind of always knew that I wanted to do my own thing. That was the end game. But I realized that as much as I loved aerospace, I probably wasn't going to be, unless I turn into Elon Musk, which would be great, maybe like Richard Branson or something, who are kind of both idols of mine, but I thought that it was more realistic than I have some kind of business focus and I didn't try and go through... I could've been in the aerospace industry for like 30, 40 years and not really had as much of an impact as I wanted to have in the world.

I might be working on this small component of the spacecraft and like that just didn't appeal to me. Clint McPherson: Yeah. I like the angle you're taking because the whole time you're speaking man I'm finding all of this very interesting, right? Because guys, me and Andrew, we've known each other for a little while now, but we've never really had this deep of a discussion together.

So, learning this side of it was pretty awesome, but all that was going through my mind while you're talking through this, "This dude's Elon Musk." Right? Just in a different form, right? Cooler, Elon Musk is a cool guy, right? Definitely one of my idols too, and somebody that I wish I can emulate some of the things and some of the successes he's had, but at the end of the day, he's a weird cat.

I watched him on Joe Rogan. Andrew Lees: Yeah. Clint McPherson: He's definitely a different man. So, his brain works a lot differently than a lot of people in this world.

Probably like 99.9% of people it works differently than. Do you know what I'm saying? This guy's just, he's just different and that's not bad. Andrew Lees: For sure.

Clint McPherson: Right? That's awesome. Because he is who he is. That's why Tesla is where it's at.

Right? Andrew Lees: Exactly. Clint McPherson: So yeah, man, sorry to interrupt on that, but I just wanted to throw that in while I was thinking about it, man. Andrew Lees: No, you're right.

Yeah, absolutely. I mean you definitely have to have... I think to be an entrepreneur, you've got to be different. You got to think differently because, I mean, the path to being an entrepreneur is not this standard paved path that most people go down.

If you want that you're going to go to college, you're going to get a degree in business, or accounting, or finance, or engineering. I did that. But, you're going to get a job and do that job, and you're good at it, and you have this level of comfort, which we're going to talk about comfort zones. Clint McPherson: Exactly.

Andrew Lees: And the danger of staying in your comfort zone and really where the magic happens, where the success happens is stepping out of your comfort zone, but that'll probably be a whole other episode. Clint McPherson: Without a doubt. I mean, we're going to go down the rabbit hole on that for sure. Andrew Lees: Yeah.

So, it kind of came full circle after college and after I had that job experience where I realized that I wanted to start developing products. So, I worked for a company up in Philadelphia where we were developing products and we were doing mechanical engineering consulting for companies mainly in that tri-State area up there. But I still had the hunger, had the desire to start my own thing. So while I was there I started a business called Grass Racks, and that is I surf, I snowboard, and a skateboard so I've got a lot of boards, bikes, and equipment that I didn't really know where to put, so I thought...

It really started from I had a surfboard, snowboard and I wanted to put them up on my wall and display them in a cool way in my apartment. Not in a garage or not in a basement or anything. So more of a display thing than storage. And that's where we're Grass Racks came about.

I couldn't find anything that really met my needs in the market. Everything was kind of junky and meant to be put in the garage and more storage type things. So, I stumbled on bamboo as a really great material, started making some prototypes, and just started kind of grinding away at that over the years. And I started that about seven, eight years ago.

Clint McPherson: Nice. Andrew Lees: And man, the struggle along the way, in the beginning, it was very real. I had no idea what I was doing, and I'm still learning things. Clint McPherson: Every day.

Andrew Lees: There's still a ton to learn. Clint McPherson: Yeah. Andrew Lees: But I think that's where it really clicked for me. That's where my entrepreneurial journey started.

Clint McPherson: Yeah. Andrew Lees: And then after that, I started Stoke Ventures, which is my consulting company, my product development, engineering, consultant company. And so, with that business, I wanted to help other entrepreneurs start to develop their products and help get them to market. So, that's how I got here and how I started building businesses and it's been an exciting journey, but definitely, as we talked about a little earlier ago, it's not linear.

Clint McPherson: Right. Andrew Lees: You have no idea what is going to provide you with value, what's going to take you to that next level, or- Clint McPherson: Exactly. Andrew Lees: What's going to help your business. Clint McPherson: There's no streamlined approach, right?

Like whenever you're in the traditional form of out there, you're employed, or you go to college for this specific job or whatever, you're groomed to do this. It's a more linear approach, right? Because you're going through a systematic approach to be an accountant, to be whatever you're going to be. Right?

And there's not much of, "Okay, you can change along the way obviously, but you spent all these years doing whatever and now you're not going to do it." It kind of leaves you lost. As an entrepreneur when you do this is like you were just saying, it's not linear man, because we can jump around and do so many different things and we can take just the market changes from time to time, the same way with McPherson Marketing Group, right? My digital marketing agency, where I'm able to just shift at any point in time in what I do, right? Because- Andrew Lees: What kind of clients that you take on.

Clint McPherson: Exactly. Andrew Lees: What type of businesses that you're working with. Yeah. Clint McPherson: Exactly.

I don't have to pigeonhole myself and just focus on accounting as an accountant, right? I'm able to branch out and do all forms of digital marketing and serve my clients in so many different facets and so many different ways. It just helps out. And also if I don't want to do this, I'm able to podcast like this or do something else.

Invest or start another business, right? Same way with you, right? Grass Racks, where you're entrepreneurial as far as your entrepreneurship journey actually started and whenever you embark on that journey, but it led you to where you are today with Stoke Ventures. You're still doing Grass Racks, you're successful, but again, as you said, failures along the way, lessons learned, and that's really why we're here, man.

To talk about all that, to talk about our journey, but to also talk about lessons learned, what not to do, things that we know work. But again, just because we might give you a checklist or say, "Hey, this works for us." It doesn't mean that works for you because it comes into your determination, your motivation, how you go about getting those steps. If you skip from one to 10, you didn't do it in order. Different things man, play into it.

Different points in time, where you're at. And again, it's not easy. For the last three and a half years or whatever, for me and my business, I've been successful and been able to say, "Hey, I've beat the statistic of, me being a new business and failing." Andrew Lees: Yeah. Most fail.

Clint McPherson: I've already passed that, right? Andrew Lees: Right. Clint McPherson: So I've got past that year mark, or whatever it is, that year and a half, I forgot exactly what the statistic is, but most small businesses fail. I haven't failed yet in this, but that doesn't mean strategies that have been placed in my business haven't failed, but I've had to just wiggle out of it and step back and analyze the situation.

Andrew Lees: Yeah. Clint McPherson: And actually just take it in the direction it needed to go and not being oblivious that fact, because me having a Type A personality, if I want to do something a certain way, that's typically the way I want to do it, and so that can get- Andrew Lees: Yeah. I understand that. Clint McPherson: That can get in your own way sometimes, right?

Because you're like, "I'm not going to fail no matter what." But it's not working. So you're failing. So how about plan B needs to be initiated, even if you have one right? Andrew Lees: Yeah.

Got to address, you've got to adapt. Clint McPherson: You have to adjust fire, the same way... I use the adjust fire because I was in the military, but you got to learn how to adjust course, right? And make sure, "Okay, this is definitely not the path that you've even though I've thought everything through, things change." I learned that on the battlefield.

You come up with a plan, that plan when things happen, things go down not as expected, you have to change or you're not going to survive, one. But, it's just the angle that you need to take. You've got to be able to adjust. Andrew Lees: Yeah.

So can you see why people, why businesses, why a lot of businesses fail? I mean going through it, can you... What would be the number one thing that you think businesses do wrong and lead them to failure? Clint McPherson: Well, I mean, and I think we talked about this, one of the main things is not really having the full-blown strategy in place, which ties into the go-to-market strategy that you incorporate in your own business.

I think just thinking everything through before you act, because what I see a lot of small businesses do now because that's what my passion is and that's what I work with. I see a lot of them just, they get an idea, they have a budget, but not a budget enough to really say "This is a business budget." But enough budget to get a door open somewhere. Andrew Lees: Yeah. Clint McPherson: But they don't think it all through, right?

Whether they have to hire employees, whether they have a marketing budget to invest in marketing for the business they just opened. A lot of them just open their doors and they're like, "I'm here." Without any strategy or any buildup of saying, "Hey, this is coming soon." Type stuff. Andrew Lees: Right. There's no hype.

Clint McPherson: So, I really think the lack of hype that they try to generate for the business and not having a strategy in place outside of say