IAM2562 – Revolutionize Your Recording Experience: Day 220

Gresham Harkless shares an update about shifting priorities, the challenges he's facing, and the evolving direction of his business focus.

He admits that while he initially intended to dive fully into franchise brokering, he never completely stepped away from his digital marketing business, which has remained his foundation.

Now, he sees CEO Hacks taking on a more prominent role as it offers more flexibility and revenue potential, especially through affiliate partnerships and future subscription models.

Gresham is also reevaluating his outreach strategies, especially for his “Be Possible” initiative, recognizing the need to identify and test a clearer target audience.

Moreover, Gresham is committed to staying the course, adjusting his approach, and continuing to build forward with clarity and purpose.

• Blue Star Franchise: http://bluestarfranchise.com
• Browse the Franchise Inventory: https://bluestarfranchise.com/franchise
• Is franchising right for you? Check this out to see: http://bluestarfranchise.com/assessment
• Franchise CEO (A CBNation Site – coming soon) – http://franchiseceo.co

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Transcription:

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Intro 00:01

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 I AM CEO Podcast.

Gresham Harkless 00:28

Hello, hello, hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO Podcast. And this is a special episode of our I AM CEO Podcast.

And this is actually going to be a snippet of a snippet, so to speak. I'm just doing an intro because I've been starting to document my journey into starting what is now called Blue Star Franchise.

We're also going to do a kind of sub-site within CB Nation called Franchise CEO. So, you'll see some links in the show notes related to that.

But just wanted to give you a little bit more insight, give you a little bit more color in some of the aspects of why I'm actually doing this.

Because one of the things I was doing as I was going through training to start up this new business was realizing and hearing from the founder of FBA, the Franchise Brokers Association, that it'd be really cool to document your journey going through and building this out.

I think it's something that would be super helpful, obviously for people that are looking for and thinking about starting franchises.

But frankly, if you're starting anything, any type of business, I think it's really cool to kind of just even see the journey and how it's been going from there.

So, I'm going to share a few of those snippets from the first couple of videos that have been created.

But definitely, of course, subscribe to our YouTube, check out a lot more where I figure out exactly where we're going to post this.

So, I'll have that information that's available to you. But regardless, if you're a builder, continue to keep building, continue to do your thing.

The world definitely needs exactly what you're trying to build and needs you to be your unique self.

So, make sure to run your own race, because nobody can run your race like you.

This is Gresh signing out. I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

And it's day 220 of the Franchise Broker Journey. I'm doing this way later than I usually do these. So, it's the end of the day.

I actually slept in this morning, so I didn't get any chance to actually record. But I want to try to stay as true as possible and try to remember to do these recordings.

I thought I found out a way to do it on my phone. Turns out that's not working with the software.

So go figure. That's life. You continue to move and adjust and see what you can make happen. But with that being said, just taking a step at a time, a day at a time.

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Things are going to be shifting, probably. I broke down kind of a percentage of what I wanted to do related to the Franchise Broker Journey.

I feel like I went more in. I won't say I went 100% in. 100% in would mean that I stopped the digital marketing business, which has never happened.

Means I didn't do anything with the CEO hacks, which I said that was probably going to be the number three thing that I was focusing on.

But now I think that there's going to be shift where the number two thing is going to be CEO hacks, and then the number three things probably going to be this franchise broker journey.

So, all that basically means is that it's going to be a little bit more on the back burner, but it doesn't mean that I'm not going to be working on it because I still think there's incredible opportunity.

I think it's so synergistic with everything that I'm doing that I still feel like there's definitely something there, but it's just a matter of understanding, like, what are the ways that I should build and grow this?

And I thought that this would be a better way. I thought that there would be more, you know, closed business for myself.

But frankly, I thought that there'd be more all across the board for people that are in the industry, in our organization. I'm hearing those numbers are even low as well.

It's kind of wild to kind of think about it, but it's just, it's just such a topsy-turvy time. And I think that the biggest thing you want to have is flexibility.

And I think the CEO hacks provides more flexibility during a time like this, because it just very much so.

Kind of a similar model where you don't necessarily need to purchase anything, but I do want to add a subscription aspect to it.

But if people just go and use affiliate links, that's going to be a kickback for us. So, I'm starting to really look into these partnerships, see how best I can explain what these partnerships are, what they ultimately look like.

And, I'm just excited to see, like, where everything goes. I think, man, I just think that I'm switching gears, but it doesn't mean I'm stopping.

I'm still going to continue on. It's been a little bit slower, with everything. I'm seeing that the candidates that I did have they're somewhat not working out there.

I'm not getting the replies and follow ups and things like that. So I'm still holding some hope that one of these is going to close.

And frankly, honestly, if one or two of them closes, it changes the game. And I'm still going to continue to kind of prospect, but I'm not going to.

I've stopped and be possible last just because I think that we really need to go back to the drawing board and find an avatar and figure out who that avatar is and figure that out by testing.

And what I don't want to do is be so focused on I don't want to be so focused on doing what everybody else is doing that I'm not seeing the breakthroughs that I want to have.

So, I think it's a perfect time for me to kind of change and switch gears. And I probably will definitely do that.

And we'll ultimately see what happens from there. So, that's kind of it, as far as this day, I'll go actually sleep and wind down, get ready for the weekend tomorrow.

I think this might be week 11 or so, my 12-week year. So, my goal was just to have some deals closed.

Again, I wanted to definitely have something close, I think by the by the end of this month.

And it's wild to me that it's been six, seven months that there hasn't been a closed deal.

But, continue to do the things that I was doing. I did see some traction with organic outreach and Facebook groups.

So that's something that I need to continue to do and probably even double down on.

So, it's something I will, and then we'll just see kind of how things go from there. Between that, the content creation, I think we'll see a little bit more traction.

I think it's going to be more quality, maybe not as much as the quantity. And I think there's good and bad with that, because I feel like you feel a little bit like that opportunity cost, like I have to catch back that opportunity cost.

But I think I'm at this place now where if I don't feel like pouring more money into something that's not getting the ROI that I want, then I can scale back and try to do some other things.

So, we'll see what happens and then hopefully kind of take it from there.

Please let me know if there's anything I can do to help. And of course, looking forward to giving you more and more updates.

Outro 06:32

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by CB Nation and 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.

Want to level up your business even more? Read blogs, listen to podcasts, and watch videos at CBNation.co. Also, check out our I AM CEO Facebook group. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless Jr. Thank you for listening.

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