IAM2659 – Mastering the Art of Fitting in Every Day

In this special episode, Gresham provides an update on a significant shift in his business focus.

He acknowledged making a sizable investment and trying hard, but the lack of movement and leads has brought him to a crossroads. The speaker is now contemplating whether to switch gears entirely or continue on a reduced basis, realizing he must prioritize other areas of his business that are showing more activity.

Despite the shift, he has re-joined BNI (Business Networking International) specifically for the franchise brokerage opportunity, recognizing it as the highest potential revenue stream.

Gresham concludes by outlining his current business priorities: Blue 16 Media is the bill-payer, CEO Hacks is the most in alignment and unique, and the Franchise Brokerage has the largest financial upside, despite being his third priority. He is taking a step back from the franchise business because it proved more challenging than anticipated, choosing to navigate the “ebbs and flows” of his ventures one step at a time.

• Blue Star Franchise: bluestarfranchise.com
• Browse the Franchise Inventory: bluestarfranchise.com/franchise
• Is franchising right for you? Check this out to see: bluestarfranchise.com/assessment
• Franchise CEO (A CBNation Site – coming soon) – 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 Jr. 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 subcite within CB nation called a Franchise CEO.

So you'll see some links in the show notes related to that. But I just want 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 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. It 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 today is I don't know what day. And honestly, I just wanted to do an update just because I still wanted to continue to kind of make these videos as often as I can. I completely changed so many things and I think it's still important for me to continue to do these videos, do a recap and an update to kind of see where I'm at.

Because honestly, I was more gung-ho on this franchise brokerage business. I'm less, you know, now, now it's kind of like the number three on the things. I feel like I gave it space to try to see what could happen. And I'm looking now and I'm saying, hey, this is something that can be really good if I get the opportunity, get the referral, see those things happen.

But I'm not seeing as much movement as I thought that I would. And part of me has to prioritize those things so I can focus on other things in the business to kind of get those up and going. So I definitely made a sizable investment into this business. And I can't literally sit here and say I didn't try.

But now I'm at a crossroads where it's like do you continue on in the way that you've been continuing on or do you decide to switch gears and stop?

And coming up at, you know, the year as far as like where I'm at, I think it's so important for me to continue to kind of, you know, switch those gears, continue to kind of like pay attention to the things that I'm doing and continue to kind of draw up those leads and opportunities.

I don't necessarily think that I can't, you know, growing leads and opportunities, but I just don't know yet I have the space to do it as much as I did before. So I joined BNI. I joined BNI, rejoined BNI I should say. I joined it as a franchise broker because largely if I was to get a franchise broker deal that would, you know, pay for my BNI, my BNI, um, meeting my BNI registration for a number of years.

And it just makes the most sense. Like I think anytime you're doing high ticket sales, if you can, you know, push those opportunities, generate leads, it's going to just pay for itself tremendously.

So if I'm picking anything from the business that I have, I'm going to pick that. The reason I'm going to pick that is because It just pays, you know, a lot more than everything else.

I can get, you know, even a lot of sales, a lot of website sales. I can try to find different marketing or try to do the CEO hacks, but those things are not going to pay like it would for the franchise broker.

So I just have to really commit to doing the one-to-ones, really commit to getting to know the people and continue to kind of develop and cultivate that. and realize there's definitely some opportunity out there.

It's just a matter of being in front of the right people, having those correct conversations, and just ultimately going from there. So we'll see how everything goes. I'll take it a step at a time. But I want to give this update just because it's definitely moved to the third priority.

But I know it has the largest upside out of everything. It's not the thing that's most in alignment. The thing that's most in alignment is probably going to be the CEO hacks and how to develop that. The blue 60 media is what's paying the bills.

So that's kind of how those things filter. It's like, okay, you got to pay attention to blue 16 because that's what paid the bills. But probably the thing that's most in alignment and most unique is going to be the CEO hacks. But the thing that could probably pay the most and you can provide the biggest impact is going to be the Blue Star.

So it's kind of understanding like how those things kind of fit in terms of pieces and try to figure out your day by day just based off of that. But I feel like I did put a lot of energy in the Blue Star. Had I done that and I gotten some leads and opportunities, I probably would have doubled down into that. But because it is more challenging than I thought it was, then I don't see myself double down.

I actually see myself taking a step back from that. But yeah, you know, you just continue to kind of have those ebbs and flows. I know there's a lot of changes that have happened and You know, you take it a step at a time and see ultimately like where you are at the end of the day. But yeah, that's ultimately where I'm at.

And we'll see what happens from here. 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 05:46
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.

Don't forget to schedule your complimentary digital marketing consultation at Blue16media.com. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless Jr. Thank you for listening.

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