Conversations on Law Firm Growth and Leadership

Will  0:00  

Welcome back to another episode of the Legal Currents podcast. Today, joined by Gary Sarner, man who needs no introduction. And if you have been on the road to any conferences, any events over the span of the last three to four plus years, you have certainly had a conversation with Gary as well. You have felt his energy, and I’m really excited to have him on the podcast today to talk a little bit about radio and how that plays a part in a modern law firm’s strategy, Gary. I would not do you any justice if I tried to introduce you myself. I’d love to hear from you and have you introduce yourself to the listeners.

 

Gary Sarner  0:36  

Well, first, thanks for having me on, Will Gary Sawner, ROI 360 plus, the radio experts. It’s all about you learning, and if there’s a way that we can help, I’m here for you.

 

Will  0:51  

Love it. So, Gary, I know we were just talking a couple weeks ago, and the start that you got to ROI 360 plus, or really even into the legal space in general, is something that I thought was super fascinating. I don’t know how many people are familiar with your story, but tell us a little bit about how you got to where you’re at today.

 

Gary Sarner  1:11  

Wow! So that goes back to 2013. I was working for radio stations here in Miami, which was my entire career, and there was a lawyer, Mark Anajar, and his firm Anajar and Levine, that was not happy with what was happening at a radio station, and the conversation was pretty loud. People heard it throughout our building, and I went into management, and I was like, “Guys, I know the Anadjar family. I don’t know Mark, but give him to me. I’ll go in there and fix it up. That was the first time I ever walked into a law firm’s office. I had worked with attorney referrals prior, but not a law firm. Put on my best suit, polish my shoes, tied the tie, even button the button. I walk in, and there he comes out in jeans, t-shirt, and flip-flops. I’m like, oh boy, you know, it’s just like you go into the mechanic with a suit. It should have been okay. I was uncomfortable. He literally undid my tie. He says, “When you come here, we have fun. And we sat down. He says, “Do you drink brown or white? I said, “I drink both. He poured four shots at 930 in the morning, and we started having a really, really good conversation. And making a long story short, the best salespeople in the world-and well, you’ll be able to agree with this-could read upside down. And in his credenza, he had a stack of envelopes with call letters on it, and I knew that they were invoices. And I said to him, “Do you look at those? He’s like, “Nah, my people take care of me. They love me. Not going to tell you exactly what I said, but I’m going to give you the roundabout. If you’re not inspecting what you expect, you’re getting hosed. And he’s like, “What do you know about my business? I said, “Nothing. I know my business, and there has to be accountability. So he said, “Okay, Hotshot, I want you to audit one of my stations. Well, I found 50-8% of what he ordered ran wrong, and when I came back to report it to him, he was far from happy. He looks at me and he says, “You’re my new ad guy. I’m like, “No way. We ended up getting one of the stations to come in while I was there. He made a statement to this TV station and said, “From now on, you deal with Gary. So I really didn’t get a choice, and. And fast forward 13 years later, Anadar and Levine and ROI 360 plus now have been you know so it’s been 13 years I’ve been working with him so before the agency and now for five and a half years at the agency.

 

Will  4:46  

It’s incredible. It’s incredible, and it’s a super fascinating story. You know, I want to pick your brain on a couple things there that I was curious about. One of the things that you mentioned, right, was the idea that he kind of had those envelopes and hadn’t. Like looked at them himself. Now, obviously, to not really understand what you’re getting, right, or, or I think in your words, like what you should be expecting, is an issue, right? But on the flip side, there is a level of trust that you’re looking for, right? And and I could see how an agency, you know, would appreciate having that consistency of like, hey, I trust you to be doing your thing. Radio is something that I’d imagine a lot of firms that you work with are not super experienced in prior to working with you, right? Or maybe don’t have that level of expertise. How how would you suggest that people find a balance of trusting the people that you work with and allowing them to be those experts, but also having a healthy level of skepticism.

 

Gary Sarner  5:44  

You know that’s an interesting question because we’re probably talking to 90% lawyers, 10% other marketers like us. When a prospective client picks up the phone and speaks to a law firm. There’s a level of trust and commitment, and the word I use over empathy and sympathy is compassion. That’s who signs the case. Well, law firms meet people like you and I, on a daily basis, whether they want to or not, they are inundated with emails, phone calls to the office that never get through. So, building a relationship first, trust in the person, because look, you as a sales manager of a monstrous team at a huge agency, they speak to you, but they don’t do day to day with you. I try to stay involved as much as I humanly can, but it’s a little bit different today with team members and and over 35 firms that work with us. But I stay actively involved on a daily basis in some way, shape, or form. But the answer to your question, it all comes down to two things: trust is number one, and do they know somebody that works with you? Because that call is going to happen, whether you give them names or they just go find for themselves, and there’s nothing like a referral in our world, just like a referral in their world. Treat people well, give them your all. The one thing that you, me, and anybody else out there can’t do can’t sign a case, and that’s what we are all looking to help happen on a daily basis.

 

Will  8:21  

Yeah, and something that you and I have talked about on the side, right, is the unique one of the more unique elements to you know the radio approach when it comes to like that how it plays a role in the overall marketing investment as a whole, right? Is that you guys are oftentimes not going to be the ones who have some sort of direct attribution tie to it, right? Like digital is going to get a lot of the benefit for some of the efforts that you’re helping to create, right? How do you find that balance of allowing the firm to understand, hey, there may not be a one-to-one direct tie at all points in time back to the work that we’re doing here, but also establishing that confidence or showing proof of concept that it’s beneficial for a firm.

 

Gary Sarner  9:08  

So it’s funny. I actually say to anybody that I sit down with, I’ll ask them, “Who is working with you for your website, your SEO, your PPC, your LSAs, your GMP, everything online, because that is the law firm’s home today. It is not the building that they’re in, or the 20 offshoot offices they may have in a state. It is the website. So once I established that, and let’s just say it’s BluShark. I’m gonna. The first thing I’m gonna say is, okay, mr. and mrs. Lawyer. If we work together, I’m gonna make Will look better than he looks already, because nobody. In today’s world, is going to say, “Oh my God! I heard you on W X Y Z radio. I saw you on W T P P TV, or I saw your billboard. 90 plus percent go to Google. Now, our hope at ROI 360 plus is that they type in the law firm’s name. Yeah, we’re building the brand. But if you are doing a great job and you handle all of it, they’re going to show up at the top of the fold, and all that paid. So they may pay for a click, they may pay for a call. But did the brand help make that choice? Because they were familiar and they liked the story that the law firm was telling, whether it be in radio, TV, or their billboards.

 

Will  11:08  

Exactly. Yeah. Spot on. The conversion piece as well, right? Like, obviously, there are things that you can look at when it comes to branded search, right? Search volume. There are ways that you can make an educated decision, or you know, an educated guess that the conversion that quote came through digital right was really supplied and and was made prior to them getting to your site. The piece that is a little bit more difficult to track but is very much a part of the overall experience as well is to what extent did this help us convert upon that visibility because visibility in itself doesn’t mean anything right and so it’s. I couldn’t agree more that we’re all sort of working on a team in that in that regard.

 

Gary Sarner  11:45  

At the end of the day, last touch attribution is important, but maybe it isn’t as important as people think, and there’s decisions that are made by law firms across America based on last touch attribution. I have seen it firsthand. I’ve heard about it second and third hand of a firm going on radio, TV, or billboards-it doesn’t matter which one. Well, I’ve been doing this for a few years now, and nobody mentions any of those things that I’m doing. It’s always Google, Google, Google, Google. Great, but guess what? If they don’t know who you are, why are they going to choose you over one of the 13 other firms that they see on Google who actually have a brand, Morgan and Morgan, okay, they they are everywhere, everywhere. You can’t miss them in any market that they’re in, but they don’t have a huge market share because their marketing resonates with some. It doesn’t resonate with others, and that’s any firm across America. I speak to a lot of smaller firms who will reach out via Instagram because I’m very active there, and they’ll say, “But how do I compete? Well, you start in an area that you could own, and then you have to build upon it. What people don’t realize is that these huge brands out there, like Morgan and Morgan, like Anna Jarwin Levine, like Ken Nugent, like Sweet James, they started small, and they kept reinvesting into their business to grow. What is the best marketing campaign where you are everywhere. You’re on digital. You’re on radio. You’re on TV. You’re on billboards. You’re at the parks, local, touching the families and their kids. It’s not

 

Will  14:36  

easy. Not at all. Not at all. And and for me, I usually you know my my my recommendation when people ask what’s the best form marketing, right? It starts by okay, what is most aligned with who you are, right? The you know what what is going to allow you to be most successful. You mentioned one thing in particular that I’m curious to pick your brain on in the sense of the consistency to an extent, right? Like it’s it’s you know being every. I know that when it comes to radio, there are likely you know playbooks that are tried, true, and tested, but may not be the right approach for every single firm based on what makes them different, what makes them unique. How important is the branding itself or the message, the unique approach to your own you know, firm when it comes to the success of the campaign, or is it truly more about the consistency? The other things less important.

 

Gary Sarner  15:28  

So creative is everything. You get to be intentional with your message. You get to invite people business with you when they need you. There are firms that advertise big recoveries. The general public then starts to believe that every case and every fender bender is worth a million dollars. Guess what? I don’t want to know anybody who’s gotten a recovery of a million dollars plus something bad, really. On the flip side, you have firms that are trial firms that have to give that message that the average person doesn’t even understand. What is the number one local category in marketing across the United States today? The

 

Will  16:37  

number one category in in local marketing.

 

Gary Sarner  16:39  

Uh huh.

 

Will  16:40  

Are you referring to like on a on the Google Business Profile?

 

Gary Sarner  16:43  

Just what type of business advertises more on a local level than anything else?

 

Will  16:50  

I I would assume law firms are up there.

 

Gary Sarner  16:52  

Number one,

 

Will  16:53  

yeah.

 

Gary Sarner  16:54  

Number one, it’s taken over automotive car dealers, so they’re doing radio TV billboards at a much larger pace than anybody else today. Yet here’s the interesting thing, and I’m sorry, I’m digressing a little bit. 30% of the people who get in a car accident today will not pick up the phone and call a lawyer. Who are they going to call? The

 

Will  17:22  

police, probably, or the hospital, maybe someone you know right? Someone they know a family member.

 

Gary Sarner  17:29  

the insurance company.

 

Will  17:31  

Insurance company for sure.

 

Gary Sarner  17:32  

So aside from medical need, the first call for 30% of the people who are in an accident, they call the insurance company because think about this: if you take all the law firms that we know and all the marketing they do on digital TV, radio, and billboards, it’s a pimple on the insurance company’s ass. You’re in good hands. No, you’re not. But that is branding.

 

Will  18:14  

Yep,

 

Gary Sarner  18:15  

and that matters.

 

Will  18:19  

It’s a fascinating point, and you see it a lot today, right? The the backing that you know they’re providing, the insurance companies are providing to certain legislation, right? To try and implement certain caps, right? I know that out in California, right? That that has been a big topic of of discussion, and the the thought to almost consider that branding as well is a is a very interesting one. When it comes to giving like radio a fair chance, right? I’m curious what what would you tell somebody who is coming to you saying, Gary, I want to give you everything that you need in order to allow this to work, right? I understand that results can be a tough thing to measure, but you know what should I be looking for what is a fair amount of time, and what progress is a reasonable amount of progress?

 

Gary Sarner  19:06  

So one of my favorite sayings to people is marketing campaigns are built in years, not weeks, not months, and I don’t care where you start, whether it’s in SEO, paper click, radio, TV, billboards, it’s not going to happen overnight unless you get lucky, and some do get lucky. So I speak of the word patience, which everybody says they’re patient until one thing happens. They write the first check. Then we all become professional handholders. Yes, they trust us, and and all the people that do what we do, and there’s many great ones out there. But once that cash is out of their bank account, they want results, and 90% of the time, people forget about the conversation about patience.

 

Will  20:27  

Spot on. We we see that ourselves as well, right? It’s it’s very easy to be aligned going into a partnership nine months in, right? That alignment is oftentimes forgotten, and so there’s at least on our end as well that that element of consistently reinforcing right the expectations, you know, progress along the way, talking them through certain things. I’m not envious of your guys’s position, right, where you don’t necessarily have as much data, and you know, perhaps, right, depending on the digital agency that you’re working with, access to any data whatsoever, right. It is to a degree dependent on the firms providing that and the agencies sharing that information, so

 

Gary Sarner  21:04  

we we do have access to read only data on most of the firms we work with.

 

Will  21:13  

Yeah,

 

Gary Sarner  21:14  

which I think is very important.

 

Will  21:16  

I would say it’s essential. Yeah,

 

Gary Sarner  21:18  

we’re not looking to beat up anybody else on the things that are there, but most digital agencies are also not looking at their branded search because what’s happening on Google or in the whole AI world now-that’s where you guys help them. So the focus is different, yet it should be together. And there’s very few firms that ask for meetings of their digital agency and their radio TV agency together, where that is very very beneficial. I like to say to the firms we work with and the firms we potentially will work with, if we understand their average fee and we understand their full marketing budget, how is that fitting together? Because if you are going like this, I’m sorry you can’t hear going up. If you’re going up, where it’s coming from, I don’t know if that is the most important thing. Versus, how many did you miss in intake? Looking in the mirror, and and and no different for me or you. What are we doing to help our partners? What are they doing to help themselves? And it’s really a hard conversation, right? I don’t know what you guys do at Blue Shark, but we do a lot of ghost calling.

 

Will  23:21  

We do it as well. We we secret shop their intake. Yep.

 

Gary Sarner  23:25  

I heard a call the other day. I’m not going to mention the firm. And hi, I’m calling you about a death. Oh, we only handle car accidents. They hung up. Where was the compassion? Of oh my God, I’m so sorry you are dealing with that. We’re here to help you. Somebody was trained to say we deal in car accidents. That death may have occurred in a car accident may not have, but man, I would have wanted a full conversation there.

 

Will  24:08  

And if nothing else, right? You want that brand to be one of you know being warm of welcome, right? If I can’t help you, let me get you in touch with the right people. The intake side of things is is so crucial because without a strong intake, doesn’t matter how great either of us are doing in our respective roles of marketing, we’re we’re not set up to be successful, right? And and these are are important things that firms oftentimes overlook,

 

Gary Sarner  24:31  

and no different than conversations I have and you have with firms across America, who say, “Hey, do you know somebody in this space? Why? Because they trust you. They trust me. Who are we gonna refer to them? Now, there’s, yeah, we’re in a funky world in our space. There’s more and more people coming in because they see. Fast money versus doing what’s right for somebody, and you know that’s something I learned a little bit later in my career after I had opened up a franchise, and I had to put money into marketing. I’m like, I don’t have the money for this. I’m not going to get an ROI. And I immediately switched the way I did business in radio, as to who I would work with, because I don’t want anybody choking. because they’re investing on something, and here’s the interesting thing, and I’m going to challenge you. I haven’t figured it out yet. Tell me one other business in America where you invest in marketing and you don’t get paid on average for 14 months.

 

Will  26:01  

Nothing that comes to mind, you know, to immediately. It’s it’s a you know maybe maybe in the athlete world, right? You’re you’re writing contracts before the season starts or before the performance is is there. But you’re absolutely correct, right? Getting the case in is just the first step, but oftentimes that actual return is far down the line.

 

Gary Sarner  26:21  

Far down the line, and it takes a lot of great work from a lot of great people within a law firm to get it from prospect, signed case, medicine, negotiations, or trial. So again, another one of my favorite lines is “Great legal work matters, and I’m sure you have heard from bottom to top some pretty wide numbers on average fees, pretty easy to figure out what kind of legal work they’re doing.

 

Will  27:08  

There’s a you know when whenever I hear that a firm gets a lot of their cases referred over to them, right? That’s a great example of that. Usually speaks towards the quality of a firm, right? That’s somebody saying, “Hey, I know you could get me more for this case, than I can, right? Let’s get it in your hands. Things like that.

 

Gary Sarner  27:25  

I have a very interesting story. I spoke at TBI in San Diego in 2022.

 

Will  27:36  

Was that your first meeting as well? I think I saw. Right. It

 

Gary Sarner  27:39  

was. Yeah. It was the first time I was invited. I did it with Bill Houser, and there were I don’t know 2100 people at that TBI conference, and eight people in the marketing room, and I had a gentleman come up to me. I’m not going to give names today. Who said to me, “I really love what you had to say, but I’m a lawyer’s lawyer. I’m a judge’s lawyer. Yet all these mills get all these great cases. I said, “Well, congratulations for for being a great lawyer, obviously, people come to you because you try cases and you try them well. I said, but you want to know the difference between you and them. He says, yeah. I said they invite people to do business with them. You’re sitting waiting for them to send you a case that they can’t handle, but then you write them a check for 345, 100,000 1,000,002 million, $3 million and I said, “Could you imagine if you invested and told your story? You don’t have to sound or look like the marketing firms. You get to be intentional with your story. Well, because people matter. I was having dinner with a friend that night after I met this person, who said he was good friends with him, texted him and said, “Hey, Gary is one of us. You’re in good hands. Five minutes later, he’s like, “When can you be in my market? I left San Diego, flew back to Miami. Three days later, I was in his market, and he made a decision quickly, and he owns the radio dial, and we have now worked together for almost four years, and I am so proud of that relationship, the people that we get to work with. But more importantly, for them, they stepped out of their comfort zone after 50 years as a firm and did something so different, so scary. And oh, by the way, it worked. And I will tell you, when the paperwork was signed, because I hate the word contract, I said to him, “I just want you to remember one thing: you’re gonna have brown underwear for the next 90 days. Wish you had never done this, and that’s reality when it comes to marketing. You’ve seen it too. It doesn’t matter what form it is when you start doing something you’ve never done before, unless you’re lucky. It’s going to take time. People have to learn who you are.

 

Will  30:55  

Agreed. Agreed. Yeah. And after you know things get real, right? When that partnership form is is authorized and the work really starts because, to your point, as we we mentioned earlier on, right? Just because the work starts does not mean it is going to immediately produce the ROI or the cases to justify it. And that you know that story is fascinating. It also ties back to the idea of having that reputation, right? Like having people that can vouch for you and endorse your work, but with that trust, right in the proper time, that is where you can really see these decisions, you know, return, you know, cases, right? The success behind it, and just overall, you know, even outperform some of those expectations. One thing I did want to ask you: we’ve talked about a couple different things that are important in a successful campaign. I want to ask you to power rank a couple of them for me from what you would consider to be least impactful, least important to most important. First of those being the idea that you know there’s a certain dollar that needs to be invested, right? We’ll call it size of investment. Second, being the consistency piece, right? Giving it proper time to to produce the returns. Third piece being maybe the differentiating factor, the personality that comes through in the campaign itself, and then the fourth being just having the right target audience, the right market segment.

 

Gary Sarner  32:17  

All right, so so I’m going to go to where you started on size of a campaign investment, well, that has to first be comfortable. Once we determine that it’s ownership, what does ownership look like? Now you could own a medium, radio, billboards, TV by having more share of voice, share of ear, share of eyes, or you could bring it down a level and say, I want to participate in the African American market, the Hispanic market, the white market. Now, I don’t know what your conversations are like. I can only speak of mine. And most firms want the African American or Hispanic market over the white market. You ready for some statistics?

 

Will  33:22  

Let’s hear them.

 

Gary Sarner  33:23  

Pick a market, any market in America that has a million residents. Okay, a million residents is going to have 20 to 30,000 accidents that year, but they are going to mirror the population. So if the population is 50% white, 25% African American, 25% Hispanic, and obviously I’m making this all up, that’s where the way the accidents are going to play out. So you can own a piece of something. So. the size of investment is number one. Where are you most comfortable that you’re not choking? Ownership, and then back to the word patience. Yes, you could see results immediately if you’re lucky, but for most firms, you’re not going to see it for nine months to 18 months. And if somebody is speaking to you in marketing and they tell you something differently, you are being told a lie, and that’s somebody who wants money versus a partnership. Lead gen is a whole different world. We haven’t even talked about that today. Some smaller firms need to do that to get it rolling, but. At the end of the day, your brand matters, and yet better build it somehow.

 

Will  35:09  

Agreed, and and that’s one of the different differentiating factors that I view when we talk about some of these larger firms at Morgan and Morgan, so to speak. Right, oftentimes people get very concerned if Morgan and Morgan stepping into their market because they say, “Hey, I don’t have the dollars to compete. Right? They’re spending X, Y, Z on on you know marketing compared to us, small percentage of that. But I think what a lot of people fail to understand is how their brand can play a role in that. Right? And just because a big player is in your space does not mean that the people going to that firm or even the people that you’re looking for in the first place, right? It’s it’s having that that understanding.

 

Gary Sarner  35:45  

I’m I don’t remember. Were you at the Morgan Conference in Vegas?

 

Will  35:49  

Not this year no.

 

Gary Sarner  35:50  

Okay, so he had the Grow or Die Conference. I went out there, and this is something he has said before that, and at the conference, that should resonate with anybody out there. Forget the size of Morgan and Morgan. When I he said, I’m paraphrasing, so I might screw this up a little, but I’m I’m going to give it my best shot. If we come into a market, we are going to outspend everybody, but it could take a year, two, five, maybe longer, for us to become profitable. He said, “I get tax write-offs, which help along the way, but when the spigot opens, it’s Niagara Falls. Think about that. If you’re a firm that’s doing four cases a month, and you go to eight, that’s Niagara Falls. If you’re doing 100 and you grow to 200 it’s not happening overnight. It’s going to take several years. I like to ask people. I’m sorry. Well, I  get so excited about this.

 

Will  37:20  

i love it. Keep going, please.

 

Gary Sarner  37:24  

I asked them, “Okay, you’ve been in business now for 10 years, and it took you that long to get to this revenue number, and you want to double it in a year? It’s impossible unless you have endless money, so being realistic over time, how do you grow? We we listen to people at conferences on stage, law firms, really really great law firms, that talk about how big their businesses are. Yet most of the people in the audience that are listening are small, and we don’t get to hear the pain that these big firms went through to get there. And that’s the reality for anybody who’s in business today, doing under $5 million they want to go from five to 10. Are you investing 30% of your revenue in marketing? Because a growing law firm needs to invest that much to grow. If you’re going to invest 10% expect the growth to happen very slowly. You’re taking your owner’s benefit and pushing it out to multiply it by so much by reinvesting in marketing, and that’s what drives a law firm today.

 

Will  39:08  

And do you have the infrastructure to support the extra cases? Right, the the instant gratification, the idea of that in general. It’s something that I I found personally is more and more prominent in the age of, to your point, people going up on stage speaking, right? Social media highlighting all of the wins, and it has resulted in people, I would say, overestimating what you can do in the span of a year, but underestimating what you can do in the span of 10 years.

 

Gary Sarner  39:33  

Bingo, and I don’t know if you hear this from law firms. Oh man, if I do this. I gotta hire 15 people. No, you don’t. Push your people to almost uncomfortable, but still doing great work. Then hire people, or as you see the shift happening, and it’s not going to be in month one. Because the best organizations are always recruiting. There should be a bench of people that you want in a role at every company for when the time is right. You’re ready to strike. It might be paralegals, case managers, lawyers, intake people, but when they start with BluShark or they start with us at ROI 360 plus, day one is not happening. You don’t need more people. You need to let it start to happen.

 

Will  40:39  

Agreed.

 

Gary Sarner  40:40  

Then,

 

Will  40:41  

agreed.

 

Gary Sarner  40:41  

Start.

 

Will  40:43  

Agreed and you know all all all the while, right? Throughout this process, you know we also have the cost of inaction that that we’re weighing, right? You know if if the goal is to be here by X number, you know of years down the line, right? X whether it be revenue, you know whatever that goal is, right? Those processes need to be initiated early on, so couldn’t agree more. Before we wrap up, I had a couple rapid-fire questions for you as well. One of them, well, now nothing crazy here, but for me, you know, when I was thinking about questions that I wanted to ask you specifically, you know, I think about the brand that you built for yourself on social media, and one of the things that you post more often than not, is a morning like picture, cup of coffee, right? Something along the lines of make today great. And for me, I couldn’t help but see certain parallels in the consistency that you take in your day-to-day life, the social media side of things, your own personal brand, alongside the consistency of showing up in radio, right? And I’m curious if you feel like one of those came first, you know, or if it’s a chicken or the egg situation.

 

Gary Sarner  41:46  

So it’s funny. I before I started going with make today great, I had positive over negative with my coffee cup, and I do believe in consistency of the brand. And I do practice what I preach to everybody and to my children. You have to be real. You have to be you. And you’re not for everybody. You’re for the right people. Just don’t hurt somebody.

 

Will  42:28  

It’s good advice. It’s good advice.

 

Gary Sarner  42:30  

It’s you know I’ve got two lawyers. Two of my four kids are lawyers. I’ve got one that runs an executive search firm, and then I’ve got one going to dental school. They’re all very different, but they are all one thing. They are all good people, and when you be a good person first, everything else will follow. Some people don’t need to make a million dollars, so people are very, very content. Gary VEE talks about this all the time. He’s got friends that make $60,000 a year and struggle, or are the happiest people on earth, and he’s got multi-billionaire friends who are the most miserable people on earth. So, finding who you are and being authentic is important in business, in life, and in messaging. So you know when I say make today great, I mean it. I want you to have a great day. Jen Gore, she came up to me at one of the conferences, and she’s filming as she’s walking up to me, Gary. Why do you point in every picture? And I don’t have to think about my answers ever, because it’s about you. It’s not about me. I’m gonna do okay if I do what’s right for you. Always. love

 

Will  44:03  

it, and that goes back. Something I always like to talk about is increasing your surface area for luck, right? Doing the small things that increase the you know area for something lucky to fall into your plate, right? And it starts with those with those tiny interactions. To me, when you say that story as well, that also makes me think it doesn’t matter why you point. All that matters is that people know that you do it, and that comes to mind, right? That’s a part of branding as well.

 

Gary Sarner  44:28  

Even the shirt. I mean, today is very subdued, but I didn’t know that the shirts were going to be the catalyst of my business. I was embarrassed beyond belief to put on the clown shirt the first conference I went to, but I got 20 compliments in 10 minutes, and then I changed at lunch. You know, my better half said, “This is the way you do it, and I listened. And at lunch, all of a sudden, you’re the loud shirt radio. Guy and weren’t you wearing something different? Yeah, I was. People notice. People look for people that could be a part of their circle that will help them. Sometimes some of those people are very selfish. Most of the time, they’re not.

 

Will  45:22  

Fully agree. Fully agree. Especially in the world that we’re both in, when we’re attending conferences, right? There’s hundreds of 1000s of people at times wearing all the same suit, right? Look exactly the same. How do you stand out? That’s a huge part of it. I’m also curious. What’s your favorite cup of coffee? Like, give me your go-to. What’s your order?

 

Gary Sarner  45:40  

Black. I will not use the word venti or any of those funky sayings. In a by the way, one of my biggest pet peeves is buying coffee at Starbucks. I will do it in a hotel or the airport. I’d rather make my coffee at home. I’ll drink six cups before I leave in my office. I have a Keurig machine. I actually have a very fancy DeLong coffee maker that was gifted to me.

 

Will  46:13  

Yeah,

 

Gary Sarner  46:14  

that I don’t have the right spot for. One day I’ll open it. Do I love a good cup of coffee? Yes and no. It’s just something that I have to have because otherwise my brain doesn’t work. Young people, every year I don’t drink or eat anything, and I get the worst caffeine headache you could imagine. One day I might slow down. It’s not today.

 

Will  46:42  

For now, it’s six cups a day. One other thing that I learned about you was, if I’m, you know, if my research is accurate here, that you grew up in a family business, right?

 

Gary Sarner  46:55  

My grandfather was in the furniture electronics business. My mom’s dad, my father worked for him after they got married, and he eventually figured out that hey, I better open my own business if I’m going to be as successful as I want to be, and he picked us up and moved us from New York to Atlanta in 1976, and it’s interesting. He opened the business with probably 15,000 cash and everything else on consignment. You couldn’t do that today. He was a pioneer in the consumer electronics business. He was a pioneer in consolidation before consolidation was cool. He put me on this sales floor at 13 years old, selling something that you probably never used-a cassette tape.

 

Will  47:59  

Got some in my childhood bedroom. I’m sure.

 

Gary Sarner  48:03  

But I learned a lesson from my father when I was about 14 and a half, 15, and now I had free reign to the sales floor, and I loved loved stereo equipment, whether it was for the car or the home. Music matters. Music motivates and inspires people. But I’ll never forget it. Never, ever, ever. A guy walks into the store. It was my up, and he was in gas station waiters. I don’t know the correct term, but he was basically wearing overalls with the gas station patch on it. And I said to one of the other sellers who earned a living, you know, I was just there earning extra money and learning. I said, “You take that guy. He spent $30,000 in cash on a Nakamichi stereo system. There were high fives everywhere, and my dad asked the salesperson, “How’d you get that guy? He said, “Well, it was your son’s up, and he gave it to me. I’ve never. I don’t remember my dad really running. He ran up to me and he grabbed me by the ear and he dragged me to the back of the warehouse. And he says, “The next time you ever judge a human being by the way they look, is the last day you’ll ever work for me. And it went deeper. There, there was a real life lesson there. He actually took me the following weekend to go buy a Mercedes, and he put on shitty jeans, a white T-shirt, all gross and dirty. And for 30-five minutes, nobody. Came over to talk to us, and he said, “This is what happens when people judge people. And he walked into the sales manager’s office with a check, and said, “Here you go. I want that car. So I learned young to really think about how you treat people, and look, it’s a lot of hard work because I, I, I think I am a very, very, very good servicer, and I expect that same level of service everywhere I go. It’s taken a lot of time and wisdom to not have that same expectation, and I’m going to just throw this back at you a different way. You’re a sales manager, right? You have sellers under you. They’re not you. They can’t do it your way. They have to be the best they could be. How do you inspire them to reach that level, so I guess part of this is how do you just inspire people to have a good day and make today great?

 

Will  51:10  

No, I love it, and and it’s a message that people, you know, it’s easier said than done, right? But step one is to show up, right? You show up, make you know, put full effort into making every day as best as possible, right? That that effort absolutely compounds, and and it reminded me quite a bit of what we’re talking about here when it comes to radio, right? It’s that compounding effort over time that really produces the strong return as a result of it, right?

 

Gary Sarner  51:35  

Consistency in anything you do in life will pay off.

 

Will  51:40  

Yeah,

 

Gary Sarner  51:41  

good or bad.

 

Will  51:42  

Yeah, yeah. One of my favorite quotes is the idea that discipline wins over motivation. Right, every time it’s easy to be motivated, but you’re not going to have motivation every day. You know, it’s about the discipline. It’s about the consistency of your process along the way. Right, that’s that’s what you need to to fall back on.

 

Gary Sarner  51:59  

You know who had a great line. Have you ever read a book by John Wooden?

 

Will  52:04  

I have not.

 

Gary Sarner  52:06  

You know who John Wooden is?

 

Will  52:08  

An author.

 

Gary Sarner  52:09  

No.

 

Will  52:11  

No, I don’t. No.

 

Gary Sarner  52:12  

Okay, so he’s one of the greatest basketball coaches ever at UCLA.

 

Will  52:19  

Okay, I was wondering if that’s who it was. I I know the name. I’m not gonna lie and act like I’m very familiar with his coaching though.

 

Gary Sarner  52:27  

So the line is perfect practice makes perfect, but what he did with his teams first thing they had to do the new team is together for this year. Everybody sat down and they had to take their shoes off and tie their shoes. Everybody ties their shoes, puts their pants on the same way. But here’s the key to his success: his starting five in practice had to play against 10. So when they played a game against five, they were like lightning speed. I think you’d enjoy reading as a leader John Wooden’s outlook on how basketball in life should be. Just be, yeah. You you said. said motivation before, you know, and so many people misconstrue motivation and inspiration. Motivation comes from within. We can only inspire people to be their best. They have to have that. And then back to what you said. Most important, the discipline to do something, no different than working out. How long does it take to make something a habit? Do you know how long?

 

Will  53:52  

It’s it’s maybe it’s roughly 14 days or so.

 

Gary Sarner  53:56  

2121

 

Will  53:57  

Yeah.

 

Gary Sarner  53:58  

21 days is a habit, and that’s hard because life happens. I’m not somebody that goes to the gym, but I say I want to walk every day. Life happens. I haven’t become that disciplined in my walking because I also want to be in my office by 8:00 a.m. every day, and I am every day.

 

Will  54:23  

Yeah, and it’s about it’s about working it into your your day to day life, right? And you know, I I think the last thing that I guess I want to ask you is, you know, you are not only someone who is fantastic at what they do, but you’re also someone who’s very knowledgeable about the industry as a whole, right? Where can people reach out to you if they are interested in learning more about your services? But also, I’d love for you to plug ways that people can connect with you and just enter into, you know, your your world.

 

Gary Sarner  54:52  

Well, thank you for that. First, I’m available to anybody in our space, whether it’s a law. A lawyer, not even an owner, a young lawyer, or to any of the people who do what we do to help lawyers. My cell phone is 954-560-6371 I answer my phone, even an unknown number, because you never know what might be on the other side of the phone, but if you really want to see what Will brought up about my first cup of coffee and and about making today great, my Instagram is my name Gary Sauner. Our business Instagram is R O I 360 P L U S. There’s a lot of similarities in them because sometimes, unfortunately, my business is my life. But I am excited. I’m heading out of town tomorrow, and I’m actually going to try and shut my phone off for a few hours because I actually have an amazing team here that can handle everything that I do. Anyway, I’m grateful for you having me. This was fun.

 

Will  56:09  

Yeah, it’s been a pleasure. You’re somebody that I’ve really looked up to since I started coming to to shows and conferences. The way that you handle yourself, right? But also the way that you treat others is something that I very much admire, and you know, I would say that there is infinite value in anybody who’s listening here to reach out, connect with you. Obviously, you are phenomenal in the work that you guys do at ROI 360 plus. When it comes to the radios, is is it speaks for itself. But beyond that, you are somebody who is going to be a positive addition to to anyone’s life who’s listening here, so truly can’t thank you enough for joining. Looking forward to seeing you many many times over the coming years on the road, and you know maybe I’ll join you for one of these morning cup of coffees and a nice walk.

 

Gary Sarner  56:55  

Well, first, thank you so much, and and let’s call a spade a spade. I look up to you, Will. You don’t look up to me.

 

Will  57:02  

Well, the height, the height, something that you can’t, you can’t teach. the The height, the height is my, my patterned shirt. We’ll call it.

 

Gary Sarner  57:11  

Well, you stand out.

 

Will  57:13  

You stand out. You do stand out. You do stand out.

 

Gary Sarner  57:16  

And if you could tell, I’m trying to grow my hair out like yours after 15 years of being shaving my head.

 

Will  57:23  

Well, I’m I’m thinking about cutting some of this off, so maybe I’ll I’ll bring some of it. Maybe yeah, put it. We can put it to good use.

 

Gary Sarner  57:31  

It gets the turkey one day. All right, thanks, Will. This was really fun. I’m grateful.

 

Will  57:37  

The the pleasure is all mine. Appreciate it a ton, and and like I said, definitely encourage everybody who’s listening here to reach out, connect with Gary, and and see it for yourself.

 

Gary Sarner  57:46  

You make today great wherever you are.

 

Will  57:48  

No, there we go. I need to get a picture with you where I can get in with the point. I feel like I’m missing out there. We’ll have to. Watch this.

 

Gary Sarner  57:55  

I’m going to do this right now. Ready? You point, and I’m pointing. There’ll be a post, maybe with a cup of coffee.

 

Will  58:09  

Love it, love it. All right, appreciate it, Gary.

 

Gary Sarner  58:13  

Thanks, Will.

 

Will  58:15  

Alright, appreciate that a ton. I know that we we went long, so appreciate you you hanging on with me? I know it’s something that everyone’s gonna really love listening to.

 

Gary Sarner  58:24  

Listen, at the end, all we want to do is make a difference in one person’s thought process.

 

Will  58:31  

Yeah,

 

Gary Sarner  58:32  

and it may not be with you or me, but maybe we get a pat on the back one day.

 

Will  58:39  

Yeah, you know what? I had someone. I had someone reach out to me about a month ago, and for me, like the whole you know purpose behind this is just to help like introduce people into the sphere of like the firms that we work with, right? Like help make those connections. And I had the first instance of a fractional CMO that we brought on, and then one of the firms that we work with signed up with her after after hearing us on the hearing her on the podcast, and that to me was just like the most incredible thing ever. So like stuff like that. To your point, like I know that you the value that you bring to the table goes well beyond right the niche that you guys support from the marketing side of things, and so it it really means a lot. And I mean everything that I was saying about looking up to you. I very much admire all of that, the way that you handle yourself, the way that you approach every day. So, true pleasure, and I really appreciate you jumping on with me.

 

Gary Sarner  59:27  

Well, tomorrow, hopefully, we will be working on a similar account together.

 

Will  59:33  

Ah,

 

Gary Sarner  59:35  

we had so you remember Serge and Harry, obviously.

 

Will  59:39  

Yeah,

 

Gary Sarner  59:40  

they came to Monsters Illegal Marketing. Yeah, I was just out in California two weeks ago with them.

 

Will  59:45  

With the World, yeah, you went to the World Cup game with Serge, right?

 

Gary Sarner  59:48  

I did, and tomorrow we’re going to present the radio plan to them.

 

Will  59:53  

Oh well, best of luck. They’re great people to work with. They,

 

Gary Sarner  59:56  

I love Harry and Serge both.

 

Will  59:58  

Yeah, you know, I, I, I. That there’s probably quite a bit of overlap. You know, the delayed gratification, we’ll call it, when it comes to digital, is similar, right? Probably not exactly the the same as radio, but but it’s very similar. And they are not people that are scared away by the delayed gratification. Where they’d be great partners. Let me know if there’s anything that we can do to help there. Honestly, like for us, the more like quality people supporting just the overall marketing as a whole helps everybody, right? Because that’s all we’re looking for is signed cases at the end of the day, and like you know, you guys do work that supports us. Hopefully, the work that we do supports you. Let me know if there’s any anything I can do to help there, but they’re they’re fantastic people, as you know. Cool deal.

 

Gary Sarner  1:00:45  

Absolutely, I’m grateful for you, my friend.

 

Will  1:00:49  

Yeah, I appreciate it. We’ll shoot over.

 

Gary Sarner  1:00:51  

You ready for this? I just got a text. Turn the recording off.

 

Will  1:00:56  

Okay. Yeah. Let me. You know what? I don’t know if I even. I’ll. I’ll give you a call. I’ll give you a call.

 

Gary Sarner  1:01:04  

Okay. All right. Bye.