Chris Miles, the Cash Flow Expert and Anti-Financial Advisor, is a leading authority teaching entrepreneurs and professionals how to get their money working for them TODAY! He’s an author, and podcast host of the Chris Miles Money Show, has been featured in US News, CNN Money, and EOFire, and has a proven reputation with his company, Money Ripples getting his clients fast, life-altering financial results. In fact, his personal clients have increased their cash flow by over $200 Million in the last 10 years!

• CEO Hack: Book- The Pumpkin Plan by Mike Michalowicz
• CEO Nugget: Follow your guts
• CEO Defined: Visionary, The buck stops here

Website: https://moneyripples.com/
www.blogtalkradio.com/moneyripples

Facebook: www.facebook.com/moneyripples
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chriscmiles/

FULL INTERVIEW

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Transcription

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00:20 – Intro

Are you ready to hear business stories and learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales and level up your business from awesome CEOs, entrepreneurs, and founders without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresh values your time and is ready to share with you the valuable info you're in search of. This is the IMCEO podcast.

00:55 – Gresham Harkless

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the IMCEO podcast and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Chris Miles of MoneyRipples.com. Chris, it's awesome to have you on the show.

01:02 – Chris Miles

Always, man, always a pleasure.

01:05 – Gresham Harkless

Definitely, pleasure is all ours and definitely looking forward to hearing more about you and all the awesome things that you're doing. And before we jump in, I want to read a little bit more about Chris so you can hear about all of those awesome things. And Chris, the cashflow expert and anti-financial advisor is a leading authority teaching entrepreneurs and professionals how to get their money working for them today. He's an author and podcast host of the Chris Miles Money show and has been featured in US News, CNN Money, EO fire and has a proven reputation with his company, Money Ripples, getting his clients fast life-altering financial results. In fact, his personal clients have increased their cash flow by over $200 million in the last 10 years. Chris, are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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01:48 – Chris Miles

I'm so excited. Let's do this.

01:50 – Gresham Harkless

Let's do it then. So to kind of kick everything off, I wanted to rewind the clock a little bit here a little bit more on how you got started. Could you take us through your CO story? Well, then you get started with your business.

01:59 – Chris Miles

Yeah. So, it's funny cause I actually had no intention of going to business other than being a consultant, right? My whole goal was to become a business consultant, but I figured I wanted to do that. Should I have real-life business experience? So I was in my, it was in the middle of college. I was just about to get my bachelor's. I decided to drop out with one class to go. It actually wasn't a class. It was a paper. I just had to create a paper. It was an independent project. Finished that, I got my bachelor's. So I dropped out and said, I'll just take a one-year hiatus, right? Just build some extra experience before I get my master's. Well, the first thing that came up as creating a business was being a financial advisor, not realizing they take anybody off the street, right?

So I said, hey, let's do this, great, it's commission only. So really I was thrown into being an entrepreneur right from the get-go. The thing is I ended up liking being an entrepreneur because I want to control my destiny. I want to control my freedom. And that was really my motivation. I didn't want somebody else to tell me what hours I needed to work and how much money I could or could not make. So I actually dropped out of college, and never went back. Although I did try once after I had retired when I was 28. And they said, sorry, you're gonna have to take a year and a half of school.

I said, for a bachelor's in sociology, no, thank you. You know, that's not worth it. So I dropped out. But that's the thing I started going on that journey. I did that for 4 years as the traditional mainstream advisor and realized that people who were doing that, following that advice, including advisors themselves were never financially free. So I left that sort of phone with other like business owners and real estate investors people were doing. And then I was actually able to retire myself when I was 28.

03:36 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. Absolutely love that. And now you're giving that, you know, all the keys to the car, so to speak, or keys to that, all the knowledge away to so many people. But I think that's, you know, so, you know, true about so many people where you don't actually become financially free. You hear that this is the way to do it, but you don't really have that knowledge and information on how exactly to make that come to fruition. So I appreciate you for creating so much opportunity for people to do that.

03:59 – Chris Miles

Yeah, absolutely.

04:00 – Gresham Harkless

So, I know I touched a little bit upon what people can find on your site. Could you talk a little bit more about that, how you serve your clients, and also what we can find and listen to on your podcast?

04:09 – Chris Miles

Yeah, so now I'm kind of in semi-retirement mode, right? I can never fully retire because nobody wants me to. So I just do a couple of things part-time. One, I do like consulting. I actually help clients figure out ways to get out of the rat race, and retire early, right? And do it generally outside of like the stupid stock market and things like that. But whether it's in real estate or wherever it might be, getting them to be financially free and out of the rat race where they work because they want to not because they have to, and that even includes business owners because the thing is we think we have a business right we kind of paint ourselves into a job and that's the thing is like how do we free ourselves from that the shackles of that business even to where we work by choice, not by necessity.

04:52 – Gresham Harkless:

Yeah, and that's absolutely huge because I think so many times, especially, you know, if you're passionate about what you start as far as your business, you really love what you're doing. But as you said, sometimes they can quickly turn into that job that you want to get away from, but you can't even fire yourself. So you get kind of stuck by, I love, you know, how you're able to kind of help people, you know, free themselves, you know, no matter where they're at.

05:13 – Chris Miles:

Yeah, absolutely. Awesome.

05:16 – Gresham Harkless:

And can you talk a little bit more about what you can find in your podcast?

05:21 – Chris Miles:

Yeah, my podcast, kind of just goes into that. Like your show, it's pretty quick. I try to keep about 20-minute episodes, you know, but it's really all about changing your mindset around what you think about money is true, right? Because everything we've been talking about is money with the mainstream media and everything is completely false. It's really just brilliant marketing is what it is. Like banks and these financial institutions that want you to throw money with them forever, right? And it kind of brings me back to when I was the traditional financial advisor, right?

I remember I met with a brother-in-law of mine who his family had become self-made millionaires, right? Like his dad, I remember was, it was so awesome. His dad had actually in the 1960s, been homeless at age 16. He ran away from home. And then when he was 18, he was able to go to Georgia and convince Chrysler to start the first Chrysler dealership in the state of Utah. Right. And the cool thing is by the time he was 21, he was a millionaire. And in the 1960s, being a millionaire was a lot bigger than being a millionaire now. It's not hard to be a millionaire now, right?

But then he was actually able to be a millionaire by the age of 21. And so I remember I went to talk to my brother-in-law. I was like, I'm going to put on my best suit. I'm going to prepare, like overly prepared to show him why mutual funds are the place to invest, right? And I went into them and I gave them my nice little 45-minute spiel, a little PowerPoint presentation I made just for them, right? And I even brought the best guy from my office to back me up so we could try to convince him that he was wrong. And by the end of it, my brother-in-law said, okay, let me get this straight.

You have 10,000 bucks that if I just gave you $10,000 to play with, you're saying you can make me 12% or that's 1200 bucks a year, right? It's like, well, there's no guarantees, But yeah, that's what's done since 2000 BC, right? You know, so yeah, pretty much like 1200 bucks. Isn't that awesome? He's like, now Chris, I can take the same 10 grand. And and I have a big, you know, he has a semi-truck business, right? He's like, I can buy a semi truck view a down payment with 10 grand on a semi-truck, turn around a few months later, flip it, and make $30,000. So Chris, why would I invest my money with you?

And I was like, well, you should be diversified. You shouldn't pull your eggs in one basket. You should put more money in other places like the things I offer you, the things that I can sell you. And that's when I realized I was a salesman in a suit. That's really all I was, that financial advisors are not financial experts in any way, shape, or form. Ask a financial advisor if they've ever been able to retire off of the investments, not off the commissions they're earning off of you, but actually the investments they're recommending. And you won't find them, I guarantee it.

Like it's so rare you'll find somebody. And usually, it's because they made so many millions of dollars in their business from sales, and then they just throw it in some crappy account that pays them a little bit of piddly interest, right? But the truth is as a business owner, you have the greatest opportunity for wealth possible, right? There are other things. I mean, almost everything outside of what financial advisors offer is better than what they offer, right? So you can actually create more freedom doing it that way. And that's really what my show and all my stuff, my website, and everything goes into.

08:22 – Gresham Harkless

Nice, I definitely appreciate that. And I think so many times as you kind of reference and we definitely know as entrepreneurs and business owners, you want to have ownership, you want to have freedom. That's why you created, that's why you put your, you know, blood, sweat, and tears into everything that you do. And you quickly find out that you're listening to the marketing, as you said, and the sales, not so much the, I don't want to know if I want to say logic, but just that information that we sometimes aren't aware of. So I appreciate you for creating, you know, that information, that knowledge, and that awareness in so many different ways for people.

08:52 – Chris Miles

Absolutely.

08:54 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. So what would you consider to be what I call your secret sauce, which is the thing you feel kind of sets you apart and makes you unique? It could be for yourself or your business.

09:03 – Chris Miles

Yeah, I mean, they're kind of one of the same in some ways, shapes, or forms, right? I mean, definitely, with my business, I mean, you just won't find people that are telling people to do the opposite and actually create real results where they become free. Right? And part of my gift that I have is that I've always been good at finding patterns and seeing things. Like I remember in fourth grade, we're doing our little multiple times tables, right? And then we got to the 10 times table. And I remember as I was going through it, I saw the pattern and I raised my hand to the teacher and it was a quiet test, right?

And I was like, I just have to add a 0 behind all these numbers. She was like, shh, don't tell the rest of the class. And she was making them do 0 times 6 of this. And then, you know, trying to do the whole long multiplication way. I'm like, screw that. Like I'm going, no, I'm just getting this thing done. Hand it in. And that's kind of what it's been like for me. I'm really good at finding resources, finding the potential and the money, and saying, how can we make this create more? I get so many people, even business owners that have cash that's sitting around, whether in their business or at home, they're like, what do I do with this?

Because I don't trust these stupid financial advisors in the stock market. Because I really, if I'm going to invest in a company, it's going to be my own. Right. And so what do I do with this money? And that's the thing that's so much fun is that there are so many options to actually create those multiple streams of passive income to create freedom.

10:19 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. So I wanted to switch gears a little bit and I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an Apple book or habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

10:31 – Chris Miles

It may not be an app or anything because I'm kind of low-tech, but I'll tell you the number one books that I listen to, I don't read books, I just use Audible, right? So there is an app I use. But on Audible, there's a great book called The Pumpkin Plan, which is by Mike McCellwitz. So if you've heard of Profit First, which he's most famous for, great book. But he has another follow-up book that's lesser known called The Pumpkin Plan.

And this is what changed my business in 2015 because I started becoming more active, right? Like I had to retire a second time in 2016. Well, to do that, I had to cut off all the crap that was there. And the Pump Keep Line is really about that. It's finding those core activities that drive the majority of your revenue. Who are the best clients at everything and feed the crap out of that.

11:19 – Gresham Harkless

So, I wanted to ask you now for what I call a CEO nugget, and that could be a word of wisdom or a piece of advice. It might be something you would tell a client or if you hopped into a time machine, you might tell your younger business. So,

11:30 – Chris Miles

The biggest thing I would say is to follow your gut, right? Like trust your intuition. Even if it goes against advice you've gotten from mentors, business coaches, or whatever. Because I'll tell you that in 2015, I had a business coach telling me to do one thing to expand my business. I did the opposite because my gut just said, you know, that doesn't feel right. In fact, I'm going to do not more like she recommends. She wanted me to do more live events. I started doing less live events. And the funny thing is my profits went up and my revenue still went up too. And I think that the key is that it might seem crazy, but if your gut says do something, do it. If your gut says don't do something, don't do it. Follow that despite whatever logic you might hear out there.

12:09 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, I love that. And in so many different aspects that we kind of talked about in your story, how you've been able to kind of do that. And I think so many times we feel like we should be doing everything, especially in entrepreneurial form. A lot of times you're by yourself, so to speak, because you're going against the grain. And sometimes that's the uncomfortable part. But a lot of people that become free and become, you know, wealthy, however we define that are because they go against the grain and they try something new.

12:34 – Chris Miles

That's right. Yeah, and that's fine. We're entrepreneurs. We kind of go against the grain anyways, because we don't want the freaking W-2 job. We want to create a different life that other people don't have. And if you follow that gut, that intuition, I'm telling you like that will pay you more money than almost any, any advice you're going to get out there.

12:52 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, I absolutely appreciate that. And now I wanted to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. And we're all going to have different quote-unquote CEOs on this show. So Chris, what does being a CEO mean to you?

13:04 – Chris Miles

To me, being a CEO means the buck stops here, right? Like ultimately everything rolls up, you know, whether you succeed or fail, it's really up to you. You have that control, that ownership, you know? And as a CEO, you have to speak different languages. You have to be able to speak the language of marketing. You have to be able to speak the language of operations. You have to be able to speak the language of finance. You have to speak the language of just about everything.

You have to understand all your departments, but you don't have to be the expert in all of them. And so you really are that visionary. You are that person who's helping to move forward that vision and that passion, that real vision of the company and what you're trying to create when you're trying to create value for other people. So I really feel like you are kind of the generalist, right? You are the person that's kind of, you know, really the captain of the ship to lead it forward.

13:52 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, I love that kind of, you know, metaphor you talked about learning and knowing these different languages, because I think so many times in business, so many different moving parts, that it's really hard to kind of control everything, but you wanna be able to be versed in that knowledge and language, whether you're working or you're working with experts like yourself to be able to kind of understand exactly what's going on.

And I think that you talked about that decision piece when, you know, with the business coach that was telling you to do X, Y, and Z. And I think a lot of times we forget that the decisions that we make allow us to be able to serve our clients on a higher level because if you had not made that decision, maybe we'd be having an entirely different conversation. So sometimes those decisions that we make add up to the impact that we can have as well.

14:36 – Chris Miles

Exactly.

14:37 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome, awesome, awesome work. Chris, truly appreciate that. And I appreciate your time even more. What I wanted to do is pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional you can let our readers and listeners know and of course, how best they can get a little view, subscribe to the podcast and find out about all the awesome things you're working on.

14:53 – Chris Miles

Yeah, I just say, I encourage you guys that no matter what level you're at, man, there's always another level, there's always a next, right? And keep that fire burning, that's the big thing. You can follow me in 1 or 2 places. You can either go to money ripples.com like you mentioned earlier, or you can go follow my podcast, the Chris Miles money show that you can find on iTunes or any other podcast app as well. But yeah, love to serve you in any way I can.

15:15 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Truly appreciate that Chris, and then make it even easier. We'll have the links and information in the show notes as well, too. But I appreciate all the work that you do. Appreciate the time that you took today, and I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

15:27 – Outro

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts, SUBSCRIBE, and leave us a five-star rating grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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