210 – Hustle, Burnout, Work Life Balance, Weight Loss and More with Geno Quiroz

[00:00:00] Josh: Hello friends. Welcome in to episode 210 where I am thrilled. I am pleased. I am honored. I’m excited. I’m all the things to bring in one of my very favorite colleagues in the web design world and a Threepeat guest on this podcast and somebody who actually really inspired me to launch my brand@joshhall.co.

[00:00:22] Josh: This is none longer than Geno Quiroz if you’ve been in the Divi community, he likely needs no introduction. If you’re not in the divvy community, Geno, uh, was somebody who really inspired me to start sharing what I knew about web design and my processes and my methods and how I built sites, because Geno is still a tutorial creator, and is somebody who has been an entrepreneur.

[00:00:46] Josh: In a variety of different ways, especially even more so, as we talked in this episode, I find out my gosh, how many things did he do at one point? But, um, we talk a lot about in this episode, really what doing a lot of things has led to which unfortunately for Geno was in full transparency as well here in this episode was a lot of burnout, a lot of stress and a lot of weight gain and a lot of health and life balance issues that he’s worked through.

[00:01:13] Josh: And he’s right in the middle of progressing in such an incredible way through a lot of this stuff. So Geno has been really open about. His journey on weight loss and work life balance and managing work and life and all the things. And I think in this, this day and age, especially right now of mental health and quite frankly, just staying sane while you’re working from home and running your business with all that’s going on in the world, I thought it would be a really cool time to bring Geno on and just get to hear from him on like what he’s learned and what he’s implementing right now, which as I found out were some really strategic things that I think anyone can apply to to your life.

[00:01:52] Josh: No matter where you are in your journey and health and wellness while you’re working and while you’re building your business, cuz this gosh. It is so important that you take care of your mind in your body and all of the things that make you human. If you’re going to run your business for the long haul, cuz a lot of people, sorry, I’m like going on the soapbox before we even dive in.

[00:02:14] Josh: But I just have to say this. I see so many people go hard and they go wild at first and then guess what happens? They burn out or they fizzle out or I never hear from ’em after about six months to about a year. And I don’t want that for you. I want you to build your business for the long haul. So anyway, I think that’s why I was extra excited to, to bring Geno on here to talk about this.

[00:02:35] Josh: And before we dive in one thing that’s kind of cool about this is because Geno, uh, had such an impact on me and encouraged me to share what I knew in regards to like tutorials. This episode is actually coming out on the five year anniversary of my first tutorial. Five years ago, August 22nd. In 2017, I launched my first divvy tutorial, which was a sip slippery slope into the world of tutorials and was when I launched my brand.

[00:03:02] Josh: So I’ve got some stuff coming up. I’m gonna share some lessons I’ve learned in building Josh hall.co. I’m gonna save that for the next episode, but, uh, it’s kind of a cool little side note to, to Geno. I didn’t really intentionally do this, but I thought why not release Geno’s, uh, interview in this conversation we had on the five year anniversary of my first tutorial, because there’s not many people who deserve more credit than Geno for, um, encouraging me and encouraging so many people around the world.

[00:03:27] Josh: But anyway, speaking of encouragment here’s gen and we’re gonna have a long, good in depth, just casual conversation about what he’s learning in his journey with hustle, worklife, balance, weight loss, and everything, while running a business. So without further ado, here’s, GNO sit back, grab a coffee, grab whatever your drink of choice is or some popcorn. If you’re feeling it and let’s have some fun.

[00:03:53] Josh: Oh man. So good to chat with you. How the heck are things going right now, man?

[00:04:00] Geno: Oh, great. Great. Uh, Josh it’s, um, a new season new year, uh, 20, 22 and, uh, excited for what’s lying ahead. Um, it’s it’s been a great start. So it’s already halfway through the year. It’s almost the second half. We’re already to the fourth quarter. What everybody say here? Yeah. But uh, yeah, good year. So far doing, doing good. How about you?

[00:04:21] Josh: I’m pumped about stuff moving forward. We were just kind of chatting be before we went live here. I’m, I’m really excited to kind of hit the next evolution of my business, moving forward and offer some more resources and programs to help folks really take their business to the next level. And I know you’re kind of pivoting is, well, maybe, maybe not pivoting completely, but just re maybe is it fair to say, like you’re just kind of tweaking and revamping your online brands? Is that fair to say?

[00:04:48] Geno: Yeah. Yeah, it is. Um, you know, and those, those who’ve been, you know, kind of following my journey and, and following Monterey premier and, and the ketos.co kind of tutorials, which has kind of been, you know, lagging a little bit and new, fresh material and content, but, uh, you know, I’ve been making some, some major changes, health wise, you know, in the last last episode, we talked a little bit on that on emotional, uh, um, like just health, you know, emotional health, physical health, and, and changes in business and pivoting and stuff like that.

[00:05:21] Geno: And, uh, and here we are, you know, maybe six months later. Uh, and, and we’re kind of seeing some of the fruit of that. And part of that has been taking a look at the last, you know, 6, 7, 8 years of my journey in the WordPress community with, uh, with divvy and elegant themes and, uh, and that whole journey. And, uh, yeah, so I am kind of this year and some people who’ve. Been with me, you’re starting to see some of those changes, um, in, in the shift, in, in where Monterey premier and Geno kudos and kudos dot go are going.

[00:05:53] Josh: I almost wore my, my divvy shirt. I was really close to wearing it. I probably should have,

[00:05:59] Geno: I was trying to get my divvy lights working, but I got too much sunlight coming in windows. I do. I guess I’m better blind. There we go.

[00:06:08] Josh: I do have purple on behind me for those watching. I can change my colors now in my office. So, um, but yeah, you were on an episode, 1 44. We had a great conversation about. Yeah, marketing, pivoting, um, some of our past, so that’ll be worthwhile for folks going back to if, if they don’t, they don’t know you yet gen, but I wanted to specifically focus on like your mindset with health.

[00:06:31] Josh: You you’re killing it with weight loss, like, and I, I think that’s all gonna play a big part in your brand and how you show up online. And is it fair to say I’m, I’m just totally curious. We can get as personal or as nonpersonal as you want, but like with you feeling, you know, tremor and healthier, is that helping you feel more comfortable to be on camera and getting out there in front of your brand?

[00:06:52] Geno: A absolutely. Absolutely. You know, in the, in the past we talked about, and I think it, it’s, it’s an important topic, especially for those in, in our kind of community, building websites, working it behind a desk in an office and, and it always comes up, you know, what happens when you’re in a chair too long, or you’re in the office too long, or you’re isolated from people cuz we’re working remotely.

[00:07:12] Geno: I think more people can relate to our world now yeah. Than COVID that was our world. Right. So we’ve been living that for years and uh, and so part of my journey has been breaking out of that, seeing. Um, what is gonna work for where I’m at now? You know, where I’m at now, physically and age wise is not where I was six years ago when I was doing Divi camp or, you know, WordPress work camps and, and doing divvy meetups and all that stuff down in LA and orange county and stuff like that.

[00:07:40] Geno: And, uh, so it’s taken some shift. My kids are growing up too, you know, got a teenager in the family. And, uh, so there’s, there’s all kinds of shifts. And, um, so yes, a part of, of getting out of that routine of just working and getting physically well, physically healthy, mentally, emotionally has allowed me to come back into the game after burning out when best people don’t come back after burnout.

[00:08:08] Geno: Yeah. Being able to get through that hump come back, refreshed recharged, um, able to, to communicate better. Again, all that other stuff, you know, that comes with the health and being overweight or anything else, back pain, whatever it is, um, is no longer front and center, you know, and you can just kind of be yourself and it’s really opened up, uh, a lot of, um, doors that had, I didn’t realize I’d been shut because of all that stuff.

[00:08:37] Josh: That’s so cool, man. Well, I remember it’s, this is all like flashing back to me now cuz our conversation. Yeah. our conversation in 1 44 was after your burnout. Like I remember you really had a pretty serious bout of like, you know, almost calling all of it quits and doing something new, but you came back stronger than ever.

[00:08:59] Josh: And we talked about how you marketed and pivoted your business. What we did not talk about that was the like physical and mental health aspect of all that. Like we were, you, it looked like you were like fresh in business and excited, but there was also the physical side and all these other aspects that like the reality is, and I’ve learned this as, as a business owner and, you know, I I’ve, I’ve like kind of got away from some of my physical disciplines and stuff that I’m feeling more and more challenged to get back to.

[00:09:28] Josh: And I can make all the excuses I want as a dad with toddlers and our third babies coming soon. Like there’s tons of excuses, but the reality is I need to make sure I am as capable to lead my business and my family because no one else can do that. So I say all that to say, it’s cool to see that you’re taking a real emphasis on health as a, as a whole with, with your business. I mean, was there, was there a breaking point for you?

[00:09:54] Josh: I mean, you had your, like mental burnout with business, but you came back strong, you worked through that again. 1 44 is there for anyone wants to go back through and spend a couple hours with us to, to talk through all that cause we had a good conversation, but when did the health side of things come, particularly your weight loss? Cuz I just, it seemed like one day on SOS. I just star you, I saw you started to lose weight and then I’m like, dang, do you know? You’re looking good, man. Congrats. So when did that all kick off for you?

[00:10:18] Geno: Well, so, so the journey has been ongoing. It it’s been a while now. And I would say like, um, in, in early 20, 20. It’s probably, um, you know, when I, I got really sick and hospitalized and this was just as COVID was going around, this was right before it was like really out there. And, um,

[00:10:36] Josh: You’ve, you’ve always, you’ve always been a trend setter, first Divi tutorials, first guy with a bad case of COVID like, you’re on the fore-front man.

[00:10:47] Geno: And shift been out there. I was in the hospital for a couple of weeks. Um, and, and, you know, it was really serious. Um, different parts of, you know, different organs were failing. Doctors didn’t know what was going on. We had no clue I got out and it was a slow in fact it was a, it wasn’t, it was a very hard recovery. And as everything was happening COVID we were learning what was happening to me, but also there was everything else going on, being shut in.

[00:11:13] Geno: Uh, um, so I got really worse and worse and then I would. It was in may of last year, I had hit my peak and weight that I had ever weighed on a hospital visit. I was, I was in the hospital in and out regularly. Um, but, and when I first went to the hospital, I’d lost so much weight. They were scared, but that was cause I was super sick with the COVID.

[00:11:34] Geno: But then when I came out, I can barely move. I was physically unable and because we were shut in and we didn’t go anywhere, then what happened is I ballooned in weight. And then I went from losing a bunch from COVID to gaining a bunch of being that heaviest, ever weight. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t get around.

[00:11:51] Geno: And, um, and so that’s really was the wake up call for me and, uh, what the doctors had said, cuz I’d been going in and outta the hospital was that my organs were failing. Mm. And it’s most likely related to COVID, but other things as well. And it was in that, that I started to realize that there was some emotional and mental health issues accumulating because of all that.

[00:12:11] Geno: And uh, so I would say the journey began then the wake up call, but it was a long process until I, uh, accepted the mental health and the emotional health had to come first. I couldn’t, I could never deal with the physical health until I dealt with the emotional health and the mental health first. Mm. That needed to be addressed.

[00:12:35] Geno: I’m not talking when we talked to doctors, we talked medicines, all that stuff, and it ended up that wasn’t the route that just took me down to a whole further, with more medicines and more treatment. So I just, it was a wake up call. And after going that route and trying everything and getting worse, and then just coming to the end of myself and realizing that, um, something has to be completely drastic and different.

[00:12:58] Josh: Gotcha. Gotcha.

[00:13:00] Geno: And I did, there were some personal things that took place here in the home and then the house and, um, really heavy things. But in that process, um, it shifted my, my, the way I work my whole office, uh, my environment, what my priorities are, what I’m gonna focus on. And, um, and a lot of other things, you know, and priorities.

[00:13:23] Geno: And that’s kind of really, really where it started. And then there’s the whole, how did I do it physically? That’s a whole nother story, but yeah, mentally, emotionally is how it really started for me I needed to do something if I was gonna stay in the game.

[00:13:35] Josh: Well, dude, first, all the game of life. Listen, thank you so much for being transparent on this. I think this is really important, especially for web designers. Like you said, we’re in our chairs a lot where it’s so easy to just do your work and to just kind of let yourself go physically mm-hmm um, and I was making, you know, I was making light of your situation and joking, but you, I know it was really serious for you, so I don’t wanna, you know, I hope you realize I don’t discount how serious that was like.

[00:14:03] Josh: Um, but. Sometimes it does, you know, sometimes it does take a moment or something like that to, to really make you like, look, look back and look at where, where you’re at and what you can change and what you can do. You would mention it’s for you. It was a lot of you mentality and, and your, your thoughts, your head controls your, your, your body, and look sometimes just getting physical and doing things like that can help work upwards and, and help your mind.

[00:14:29] Josh: But you were, it seems like you were in such a spot where you had to start with your mind first. It, it looked like, yeah, it looked like you, you could make all the physical changes to help, but it was, you had to tackle some stuff mentally first, but yeah. You mentioned like your environment, you post on your socials about just cleaning up your house and keeping things tidy and what that does to your mentality.

[00:14:50] Josh: And I’m in a season of life right now where we have little toddlers. So me and my wife have to like, we’re like, okay, we want it to be perfect and tidy, but we have toddlers. So sometimes you just gotta go with the flow, but, um, yeah, like what, what was the start. Oh, go ahead.

[00:15:04] Geno: Yeah. You know, as you’re touching on it, and I think this leads into your question, what was the start? And, and I think for me, what I found, what was happening to me is so anxiety started to become the issue. That’s when I realized that this was a mental, emotional, I started having, um, uh, anxiety breakdowns. So I went from having the sick, to being sick to where, when I’d start getting stressed out from work, I’d start getting the shakes and I would start getting faint and I’d have to go lay down like real anxiety, stress, breakdowns.

[00:15:37] Geno: And I was starting to get ’em frequently. Like at some point, at one point I remember being on a chamber meeting or a city council meeting talking and then when I got off, I just broke down crying, like balling. And I couldn’t like, I couldn’t think I couldn’t check my blood sugar and I just had to go lay down. My wife was like, are you okay? and, uh, and I started to get them frequently and every time I’d come into the office, I’d have these. So I realized it was anxiety. So what was it?

[00:16:05] Geno: And I started to realize that every waking moment, because there were so many things, life throws at you, you start thinking finances, money is the issue, get the business going. So you start waking up and you work in a home office. You’re thinking I got things to do. I got, then you’re sick and you’re behind. So you’re constantly thinking about that. So I had to get to a point where I can say, you know, what, whatever happens happens. I’m gonna get up slow. I’m gonna stretch. I’m gonna put on some yoga, even though I can’t get on the floor, do real yoga.

[00:16:37] Geno: I’ll sit on the edge of the bed, put on wheelchair yoga and start there. Right. And, and, but that, wasn’t just a physical thing. It was the mental I’m gonna put drapes on my blind so that I can open them in the morning and breathe into sunshine. I’m gonna clip the bushes in front of my window so I can see my neighbors and stuff like that.

[00:16:55] Geno: And, and little things like that. Like my morning routine went from, get up, get ready, get coffee, go to work to get up, stretch, do my morning routine. Now I got a little home jam so I can get in there and stretch, uh, do my morning devotions. Um, you know, part of my morning routine is going into the living room, opening up the blinds, opening up the curtains, opening up the windows, putting a little thing on the, on, on the curtains, a tie like we never used to do stuff like that.

[00:17:26] Geno: We, we had a fairly modern home, right. Curtains who has curtains anymore. Are you now? you know, I have my routine with my dog, just like the different things just in the home that you normally rush through to get to work. That was the key. And I had to get through that process. And it’s okay if I get in at nine, not because I’m sleeping until nine.

[00:17:48] Geno: The key is I’m okay. Getting up at six, but not getting in until nine. That was the key. And once I got through that, it was easy for me to break away and say, the world’s not gonna fall apart. You know, the world doesn’t need me that bad. It just doesn’t it’s I want you put that mindset and the clients end up being okay with it and everybody’s okay with it. Most people are. Um, but it’s that people pleasing process, you know, we all have different things.

[00:18:15] Geno: Some of it’s people pleasing, some of it’s, um, you know, it’s low self-esteem, whatever the case it is it’s getting through that anxiety and figuring out what is it that’s causing you that anxiety and, and then began to start there that’s what helped me. That’s what, that’s where I started.

[00:18:31] Josh: It’s so great to hear what power is in a morning routine. And even just the idea of like starting slow. Cause I’m sure everyone who heard that is like, yep. That’s me either right now or has been in the past where, or you feel like you’re getting to that where there’s just so much to do you wake up coffee, boom go. And I fall into that trap, you know, quite a bit, but I I’ve tried to combat that. And it, sometimes it does depend on life depending on your situation with family and littles and schedule, but like overall, and there are some times where I’m like, I have a busy day today and quite frankly, I wanna go like, I’m ready to get going, but it doesn’t need to be every day.

[00:19:09] Josh: I found that to be the issue is when you program yourself to everyday business, first me second. There’s a book called profit first, and I’m sure there’s another book out there somewhere that’s called, like, you know, you first, all right. I’ll know something like, you gotta focus on you first and then make sure you’re centered.

[00:19:30] Josh: And maybe that’s a 10 minute routine. Maybe it’s an hour routine. I don’t know. It might be different for everybody, but I, what a great reminder to like wake up center yourself, whatever that looks like spiritually, physically, whatever it is. And then you’re so much more fresh and no client’s gonna be like, Hey Geno, I saw you, weren’t active on, you know, base camp till nine. Uh, and not eight what’s going on, you know, like they don’t care just as long as you get the work done. Yeah. Focus on you first. I love that reminder.

[00:19:59] Geno: And, and you added to that and I think this is so important because it depends on the season of life you’re in. When I was in my twenties and thirties, that is the season to hustle and get out there and sure. You’re starting a family, but that’s still, when physically you have your, a lot of prime, your, a lot of learning, you’re gonna make a lot of mistakes, you know, those 2030s. So it is a different season of life. But I think the key is, is learning that you can shift and don’t get stuck in that season of routine.

[00:20:25] Geno: Don’t get stuck in that routine because that’s temporary. It’s like football. When I played football in high school, I ate like a king. I ate spaghetti and carbs all day long and I was two 80 fit running around. And, uh, the problem is after that season of life in 19 20 21, I wasn’t doing that, but I was still eating spaghetti and God, right.

[00:20:46] Geno: Different season of life, you gotta change your routine. And so what happened for me is I was stuck in my entrepreneur, Silicon valley, 2030 mentality, where, you know, running a gun in, spend a lot of money, grow, grow, grow, do this do and, um, and it was hard. I knew I had to break out of it probably about six years ago, five years.

[00:21:06] Geno: Right. When I started pick it up, I knew it was too much, but I didn’t listen to myself. I didn’t listen to myself. And it, it, it just, fortunately, you know, it’s never too late for anybody, you know, at just the longer you don’t list to yourself, the harder the road is to get back.

[00:21:25] Josh: gosh, I’m just so excited for you Geno honestly, I feel like you’re at such a cool season in life and, and you’re, you’re old enough to have experienced the, the entrepreneurial journey where you’re at, but still young enough to make these type of changes, which is really cool too. And like, you’re able to make pivots with your business and change some things that kind of, I would say, probably align with your new routines.

[00:21:51] Geno: Yeah.

[00:21:51] Josh: And new head, you know, mentality and stuff. Like, how has, I’m just kinda wondering how has, what you’ve learned. Physically with weight loss and putting yourself first and just a little more focus on your, your head space and your mentality. How has that affected your business? Has it made you slow down? Has it made you do less? Has it made you set boundaries all the above? Uh, what does that look like?

[00:22:14] Geno: All, all of the above, you know, it’s great. And it kind of leads into something I, uh, we touched on, I wanna talk about, and that’s kind of the new direction I’m thinking that that I’m the vision I’ve been receiving to go. Um, but, um, in, in, in general, um, you know, It has, you know, slowing down my routine in the mornings and throughout the day has it has to flow into my workflow. And that’s kind of my thing is I gotta live this work, this impossible work life balance.

[00:22:51] Geno: Like if I’m going, if I’m gonna have a goal I’m going to make do the impossible. And this worklife balance is an impossible goal. So that’s gonna be my goal. And, and, uh, so what I’m doing is, since I get to work from home is I’m just blending my home life with my work life. I know you, your many books will say not to do this, but I find it really cool that, you know, I can have this call, get up, walk into the living room, feed the fish, make a sandwich, um, go in the backyard, you know, relax in the sun for a little bit.

[00:23:22] Geno: Come get ready for the next call. Work for a little. Head over, do the laundry. This is my word thing. Now look.

[00:23:28] Josh: All those, all those books do, you know, were written before COVID so like you said earlier, it’s like, Hey, corporate America welcome to our world is work from home web designers.

[00:23:39] Geno: Yeah. And, and so, and, and how that has helped me is that’s allowed me to give more attention, one and more attention to detail, which has allowed me to get more into the web development work. Um, but I’ve also, we’ll talk about this is I’ve handed off a lot of project management. I’ve handed off a lot of clients actually to other companies, but I’m still doing the work and what company in particular.

[00:24:03] Geno: And we’ll talk a little bit more about that. Um, but that’s been really neat because at the time I realized, you know what, I just wanna build. I wanna be creative and this is what I’m good at. And what that leads into is me being, and this kind of leads into where the business is gonna be. Geno the go-to consultant. If you can get on his list for a bill this year, you’re good to go. And that’s kind of the new direction of Monterey premier and stuff because me being in there, um, just these last few weeks by me being in there, just building sites and talking to the clients, but not managing the clients or the project.

[00:24:40] Geno: But working with them and being the lead developer on these projects and being the core developer has really allowed me to grow and say, Hey, you know, this is what I do now. Eventually there’ll be a team and I’ll probably focus on that. Um, but my main goal really isn’t so much, I know I could do sales, marketing and branding, and fortunately we’re, I’m in a place where the business comes, but, um, less about the big agency and more about the relationships.

[00:25:06] Geno: And you know, some of the things I do now with the clients, our clients, whether it’s my client or one of my white label partners, clients is these weekly meetings where I’m getting, I’m having, like, after this, I have a call with a client we’re, we’re actually gonna build three pages to get or build some pages together. And I know that when people have been doing this, you know, let’s train and do this together and stuff like that, but it’s more about relationship building with the than it is.

[00:25:30] Geno: They’re not paying me to train them. I’m saying, Hey, we’re having these weekly milestones. You have a lot of questions and stuff, as I’m do, showing you these things, let’s build one together and ask me those questions. And he is like, yeah, that’s what I’d love to do. It’s not about me training him as much as it is about building that relationship, taking it slow, getting to know him. And that is totally like opened my eyes to where the, the vision and the future of where I wanna be is.

[00:25:54] Josh: So, and I think it, so two things I just captured from that. It’s like, it looks like what you went through physically and mentally with your health has kind of made you sit back and realize number one, the work that you enjoy, the work that you enjoy doing, then that fills you up and doesn’t burn you out. And then two quality over quantity, like deeper relationships, rather than just a bunch of work with hustle and scale, which.

[00:26:21] Josh: I don’t know anyone who does business at massive scale that’s at least in the web design world specifically. That’s like, I just, I wake up and I love making template sites that thousands of people can do. Like, that’s just what fills me up in the day. No, I don’t know anyone who says, I know that’s different now to like product. I’m not dishing anyone who does product creation or stuff, but like a lot of web designers ask me, should I have like a $500 template option?

[00:26:50] Josh: And I’m like, maybe, but is that what you wanna do? Like, do you wanna wake up in the morning and be like, I wanna sell this template, uh, maybe for a season, but I, it seems like I say that to say again, and all seriousness, you are at a place where on the outside looking in, it looks like you realize you wanna focus on the, the work you love to do and deeper relationships with the people we love working with. Yeah. And that seems like it’s working for you.

[00:27:17] Geno: Yes. Very well, very well. And, and on a couple different fronts, I mean, so like, you know, we’ve talked about in the past, I do a lot of work for other agencies or even individual freelancers. Um, and as, as their developer and I love those long, those relationships, cuz we’re working with many clients, we’re learning from each other.

[00:27:37] Geno: Uh, one in particular, I’m doing a lot of work with right now, Jessica light from JJ socialite. We’ve gotten to a point where, when I got really busy, as I was going through these transitions, I would refer them to her, letting them know that I’m her developer and I would still most likely get to work, but I wouldn’t be managing the project.

[00:27:56] Geno: Now. Obviously there is a, there’s a pay cut in that for me obviously. Right. Uh, but that’s okay because I’m still working on the project and it’s a divvy client that came to me cuz they have divvy. So I already know they’re a good client. They’re legit. And uh, and, and they’re gonna, I’m gonna work well with them cause you know, I’ve already, those are the leads that usually come in.

[00:28:15] Geno: But also, you know, her skillset is at managing projects is better than mine. It’s a wonderful, and I’m getting to learn from her. She’s learning from me. We’re tag teaming projects. That’s a relationship. And then together, we build this relationship with their team and we’re, it’s just, it’s wonderful. I mean, the phone calls, even though they’re weekly and their work, they can be pretty fun.

[00:28:36] Geno: Yeah. Lots of labs lots of joking around happy clients. That’s what I’m talking about. There’s nothing like a stressful phone call. Oh, it’s right. It’s worst, right? Yeah. So if all your calls are fun and like this, then that’s what I’m talking about. And the way to make that happen is relationships. Forget the sale, build a relationship that way every call’s not gonna be an anxious call. It’s gonna be a call.

[00:28:58] Josh: I appreciate that. As a podcast host for you, like when I reached out to you, what I don’t want to have happen is for you to be like, oh, Josh wants to interview me on his podcast. Again, this is gonna be stressful. Or, uh, maybe, you know, like maybe next year, uh, I want you’ve, you’ve scheduled a call like the next week.

[00:29:17] Josh: I will i, I want that for, for people to be like, oh, I’d love to chat for a little while. That’s, that’s definitely my goal with this. And I think that’s an interesting mindset to have as a web designer, too. Like, and for clients like you want clients who, you, you get a call from them being like, Ooh, alright, I’m excited to talk with them.

[00:29:32] Josh: Not, oh God, this, how long is this gonna take? Um, so, you know, and I realize it’s harder to do that early on, but what a goal, what a goal to look forward to be like, I wanna refine my circle of people I work with and stuff to where like it’s good clients who fill me up and, you know, make me excited to, to wake up and do this thing.

[00:29:55] Geno: Yeah. And, and it takes meeting them where they’re at. You know, that means having to budge a little bit. Like I don’t force all my clients at the base camp, you know, in fact I’m leaning more to Google drive cuz that’s where they all like to work. You know, most of them, if, if they like anything or, or rather just send me emails, but you know, we have to budge a little bit, but it’s all about the relationship. Give and take, give and take, make, make good friends.

[00:30:18] Josh: Yeah. And you, so on a practical sense, you mentioned like work life. I’ve heard it termed as work, life integration. And like I said, you mentioned it, the corporate world welcome like welcome to our world, corporate America, this or corporate world outside of America too. This is how we do business. We work from home. We have deadlines, but as web designers we can work when and where we want.

[00:30:42] Josh: However, you have to be your own. Boss and say like, Hey, don’t work from like 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM every day. Cuz you can quickly do that. Cuz there’s an endless amount of work you could do on, on your projects and on your business. So how has, well kind of a two part question. I wanna know how your like daily changes and habits like that with work life integration with your family. Like for me personally, today, let’s see today I woke up at like eight 30 went. I grabbed my puppies, we went and grabbed Panera for breakfast.

[00:31:17] Josh: I brought it home eight with my wife and my little girls and I started at nine 30 and then I stopped at noon. We went for a walk, I had lunch and then I had a call at one. And then now we have a call at two after this, I’m gonna do some emails and that’s it. That’s it for the day. Now some days are busier than others. Some days are lighter than this. This is kinda like an average day for me. I say that to say, I have crafted my days and my week intentionally, I still get my work done.

[00:31:43] Josh: It’s just in the parameters. I’ve set. So for you Geno, like how has that helped you and then also have you, how did you learn to craft your week and what changes did you make? I’m sorry, I just asked you like eight questions, but yeah. How did this, like this new work life integration and how you schedule your days and stuff? How, how how’d you do it and how has it helped?

[00:32:02] Geno: That’s a, that’s a great question. And, and one that will never get answered to this podcast or in any podcast ever, but , let’s go there anyways. It’s funny. Cuz we had this, I was on DVY chat last week and that was the topic. And uh, it’s interesting in that, you know, it, all this, the say we could talk about this forever.

[00:32:23] Geno: Um, but for me, you know, really what it came down to is, is I wanna. This is what I said on D chat. And this is kind of, my new thing is find consistency where you can, so we have to be flexible, right? I mean, my days are flexible, so where can I be consistent? So one of the ways, and I’m gonna talk about first, I’m gonna talk about end of workplace.

[00:32:45] Geno: So in so consistency so we know about routines at home, right? Wake up, do your coffee. You know, we have routines, but in the workplace, how do I make the workplace? Work for this new balance that I have, where I wanna be able to have the freedom to, to do my errands and, and all that stuff, and still be disciplined.

[00:33:02] Geno: And, and that is find consistency where you can so that, you know, certain days, some people it’s blocks of time. You know, I, I set aside for certain blocks of time for me. It’s I know my, my Tuesdays and Thursdays is what I try to do is every time I have an active project, a new website build or anything I’m involved in, I try to establish a weekly schedule from the very beginning of the project that I’m gonna get on a call with them, whether we do or not.

[00:33:27] Geno: So we establish a day at a time. So we’re gonna say Tuesdays at three o’clock for the next six months. We’re gonna be on the phone. And so I try to set those consistencies now with all my clients, whether they require weekly calls or not. Cause what that does is it keeps me accountable. I got a routine. I don’t fall into the, ah, I’m not gonna talk to them till next week.

[00:33:47] Geno: So I don’t have to worry about those goals today this week. Uh, even though, you know, you put it on this week, cuz you know, you won’t have time to do it next week. So that’s for me personally, who’s an undisciplined guy who will wait until the last minute I had to make my wrong custom thing and that was the weekly calls that helped me be accountable.

[00:34:04] Geno: My, my call, her, my boss, Jessica, uh, she’s my white label partner. And that makes her happy cause she knows I wait till the 11th hour on everything that I do. And uh, and I just like the challenge. I can’t help it. I hate to admit it. I like, uh, that proud feeling of pulling something off last minute. Uh, but it drives me crazy and stresses me out and everybody else, including my family. So.

[00:34:28] Josh: That’s your self aware, you’re self aware of your, your, uh, S right?

[00:34:35] Geno: Yeah. Yeah. So create consistencies where you can in those schedules. And, and then, uh, so the only way I know my Wednesdays, I know I’m gonna have a block of time to, to work, but I’m also gonna have a lot of freedom. My Fridays are very flexible. So if I have to take a call schedule something last minute, I know I can on Friday, but also I know I can break away, go see a movie and Mondays I don’t schedule calls because I want that freedom to be able to take an emergency weekend.

[00:35:01] Geno: You know, I have to follow up on something. Or just catch up and, and put out the weekend fires, cuz I’m no longer gonna respond weekend fires. Yeah. But also the flexibility comes a couple weeks ago. I got a call on a Friday night about five o’clock. Hey Geno, any chance you have any availability? We have a friend of a friend she’s in DC and, and they have a big trade show and their site crashed and they can use your help. And we, we only, we can only think of you.

[00:35:26] Geno: It’s WordPress us jumped on, ended up doing like a 48 hour weekend project rebuilt the entire site in DVY on my hosting over the weekend, launched it at three in the morning on Monday, just as they were starting their trade show in Wisconsin. It’s a big government project. It’s a, uh, uh, engineless flights, you know, planes and stuff like that, that like they go use space and stuff like that to, to fly without fuel.

[00:35:51] Geno: And, um, You know, I love that freedom of being able to say, Hey, I could still, I may be 47, but I could still pull a hackathon over the weekend and bring together a seven page site from scratch, you know, and build it and launch it. Um, And, and it’s crazy. So like you said, you know, sometimes you’re ready, you gotta get that cup of coffee and you’re gonna put on rock music or stop all weekend long, crank the music up, and you’re gonna pretend like you’re a teenager again, and you’re gonna suffer for the next two weeks cuz you’re 47 years old and you shouldn’t have done that, but Hey, it it’s, you know, that flexibility.

[00:36:28] Geno: So because I rest on the days when I can, even though I know there’s work to do, it allows me to be rested for when those kinds of things.

[00:36:37] Josh: I love that. So this is like this type of schedule, this freedom. I’m sure a lot of people who maybe earlier on in the journey, this is inspirational. They wanna get to, I mean you and I let’s face it. We’re both a little more we’re seasoned in our, in our journeys and we’ve learned a lot the hard way and we’ve set, you know, set some parameters up in place. Do you think you could have had that schedule set up in the very beginning? And do you think it could have worked or do you feel like you need to go through a certain amount of years of a lot of work and hustle to get to a point where you could have that type of freedom based schedule?

[00:37:10] Geno: I, I would imagine that that the hustle has to happen at some point. I, I can’t, I can’t see how anybody could really do that without that initial hustle. Um, but I’m sure there are people that, that can share how they’ve done that journey. But yeah, I think if it wasn’t for that experience, I wouldn’t be at peace. Like, you know, I might still be striving, you know? Um, I don’t know. I feel like I, I got lucky that I went through that burnt out at a somewhat, fairly early age and came through it. Um,

[00:37:48] Geno: I, I feel like more experienced. I, I don’t know if I could have had that schedule back there. That’s a good question. I don’t think I could have how long it could have.

[00:37:55] Josh: How long do you think is a reasonable amount of hustling before you should, you know, as a web design, you know, the industry really well, obviously you, you D you, yeah, I know you’re not a dabbler, but you, you like doing different things. So it was a lot of different things, which that is exciting as that is.

[00:38:12] Josh: That’s one of the things I often have to reel my students in and be like, okay, you’re doing too many things. Do like one thing yeah, really good. That’ll make life way easier. Then you can add more things to it. But, um, I have a lot of different thoughts on how long it might require to hustle before you need to, you know, potentially reel it back. What about you? What do you think? Like, what is Geno’s proper hustle amount? Um, well, I’m trying, I’m in a hard time phrasing this, but what’s, what’s Geno’s hustle timeline.

[00:38:39] Geno: This is a good. And, and, and you know what I think, I think what’s, what’s great about you asking the question, the way you did is it got me thinking is that it depends on the person. So there are folks who are a lot more disciplined at like business plans and, and at an early age, they go into a prepared and, and they kind of have advice. They have dads or, or friends who are in business and, and they have advice.

[00:39:07] Geno: Then you have some knucklehead who didn’t go to college, who’s just winging it and watch a couple good movies and likes, uh, Silicon, you know, likes Steve jobs and thinks he could do it too. And does whatever he can throw out there and makes, puts on a big show and fakes it until he bakes. Uh, because he started at a late age. So it really depends on who you are and what your personality is. I’m not saying that I was one or the other, all I’m saying is that it really depends. So for me, I kind of always had that ambition.

[00:39:39] Geno: And so when I was young in my twenties, I always wanted to have my own business, but, uh, I didn’t really launch out. And then I tried several times, but I was, it was never enough for, I always needed a job. It wasn’t real income. And, uh, when I finally took that risk, I, at the time my kids were, when I took the risk to start my own business, I got out of ministry.

[00:40:03] Geno: Cause I, I went from full-time business to full-time ministry, back into business, working for somebody else. When I decided now screw going back to business after that, it’s time to start my own. And so at the time I was willing to do whatever it took. Gotcha. Our kids were young, very young. So. Within our family, um, dynamics, we’re only married a few years, but our kids were just babies.

[00:40:28] Geno: And my wife was like, let’s do this. Let’s go for it. So I could put in a lot of hours. And I did, um, to the point when we hit our peak, probably around 20 16, 20 15, when we did the meetup in orange county, the first divvy meetup, I would say that’s when I had my hands and everything. We had the marketplace, we had a lot of developers working with us and, uh, we were creating products.

[00:40:50] Geno: I had my hands and everyth. At that point, I should have slowed down. I think that’s where I was. I was ahead of myself. I was put it on the credit card because, you know, you gotta spend money to make money, you know, and you know, you, you get yourself out the market, put your name out there. I felt like, you know, remember the show so valley from HBO, I felt like that one rich investor that’s like spending all the money on marketing materials.

[00:41:16] Geno: he’s blowing through all the cash on billboards and stuff like that and not putting anything out there that kind of felt like where I was for at a point there, everything happens so, so fast.

[00:41:26] Josh: Is it fair to say, like, sorry, I didn’t mean to cut you off there. Gina. Is it fair to say though it may not be an exact amount of time, but as soon as you feel like you’re overextending consistently, it’s time to it’s time to make a change. It’s time to do something. Yeah. Yeah. And I, I noticed it in, um, I noticed it for me personally and the music I started listening to.

[00:41:49] Geno: I started listening to, I noticed like when I, when I would get away on a break or a road trip, I was listening to songs like on burnout and breakdown, and I need a vacation and listening to songs like UBI 40, the elevator, where it talks about working your way up the ladder only to work your way back down the ladder and die. Just noticing it into music, Jack, Jack Johnson. I hope this whole trade breaks down, you know, a song about just getting tired of the rat race running around, uh, listen that, and I noticed that that had been going on pretty much since.

[00:42:18] Josh: Wow. So you may not realized it initially. It was just like the outward things you were doing that were sending you signs. It sounds like.

[00:42:26] Geno: Yeah. And it was, and, and, and at the time I thought it was just disguise that, well, that’s just part of the hustle. That’s just part of the race, you know? Yeah. You feel like you’re gonna break down, but you gotta keep

[00:42:36] Josh: it’s really tricky. Isn’t it

[00:42:39] Geno: gonna break down, broke down.

[00:42:41] Josh: It’s it’s it is a tricky, it’s a tricky line to, to balance though, because I agree if you start a business, you’re gonna build yourself. You’re gonna have to hustle. You gotta get your work, work boots on. Yes. Um, I recently had Amy Porterfield on the podcast who has been an entre entrepreneurial legend for many years and was one of the first like online course graders. And so as a pioneer, I would say in the industry, and she’s had the same thing.

[00:43:08] Josh: She said, you have to hustle, but her advice, which I echo, and it sounds like you echo as well, is that you have to learn to turn it. Or at least you have to learn to like, yeah. Uh, kind of like contain it and do hustle and spurts. And you really, you’re gonna get, everyone’s gonna get to a point where either your health is gonna suffer mentally, physically. Your business is gonna suffer because you’re just, you’re not leading at a capacity.

[00:43:33] Josh: That is, is gonna be sustainable. Your team is gonna suffer if you have a team because you’re gonna burn people out and they’re gonna be like, I’m not gonna follow this guy. He’s like losing control himself. I’m gonna go right down with him. And then everything, everything like, everything can suffer if you don’t kind of reel it in and, and be aware of the hustle. And I look, I understand the draw.

[00:43:54] Josh: This is interesting. Yeah, because. We live in a world where you always wanna see the graph go up into the right, as far as your numbers in your revenue. And I’m at a place this year where I I’m looking at doing, uh, offering some new programs and stuff moving forward. And my, my business will shift a little bit here in the next evolution. And I’m like intentionally taking my time with that. And I’m, I’m essentially okay with making less money this year.

[00:44:22] Josh: So this will be the first year that I’m probably gonna make less money than I did last year. Every other year has been up and to the right. But this year I’m okay with that. Well, there’s a lot of personal changes and things like that, but I’ve learned there. You have to swallow some pride and you have to be okay with like, I’m gonna put my health, my family, my myself first, as long as I’m making enough to keep the lights on and, you know, stay somewhat profitable and I’m not going backwards. I’m okay with that.

[00:44:48] Josh: But it’s been a personal challenge for me to like, look at the numbers and say my my mental state is a little more important than just getting a higher revenue number this year. Just for the sake of my pride. Have you dealt with anything like that? Like literally like revenue wise, is that, do you think some of that caused some of your stress as well with those highs and lows of, of entrepreneurship?

[00:45:11] Geno: Yeah. Yeah. It, it did. It did. And, and in fact, you know, before I lose my train of thought on that, the last time you and me were on DVY chat together, it was the episode on fighting the lane. And we were talking about that. And that actually kind of what led cuz back then we talked about that like stop looking at what everybody else is doing. And you remember, I was talking about how like I used to be caught up in what the divvy community and everybody else is doing in there. If we’re finding your lane back then I wouldn’t be here where I am today.

[00:45:41] Geno: Now I found my lane and now this is like the lane. And like what you’re talking about right now with where, where you’re going. Um, so. As far as, as, let me see. Maybe you can kind of the question again.

[00:45:59] Josh: Well, I’m just kinda curious, like, because I, I personally had to realize in order to make sure I’m staying sane and, and mentally that like, I, I take care of myself and my family and I’m not stressed out and I have a sustainable, you know, PA like a sustainable schedule and stuff. I’ve learned that it’s not all about the numbers and I, I guess, long and short of it is I’m becoming okay with like good months, bad months. And I’m, I’m becoming okay with the fact that I might make less money this year.

[00:46:29] Josh: I think next year is gonna be way different. But this year I might make a little less now that terrifies like the accountants and the CPAs and stuff, cuz they just wanna the, to the right scale, scale, scale, grow, grow, grow. So I was just kind of wondering if you had, have you went anything if you went through anything like that during your kind of like mental and physical health journey with this? I mean, gosh, I imagine when you were in the hospital. You probably took a pay cut during those months. Right. Like, I don’t know. What, what are your thoughts on that?

[00:46:56] Geno: Yeah, and actually, yeah, that was a, a big part of it. The first time I was in the hospital and I had a pretty good size team still at the time. And I realized then afterwards that I wasn’t a, I wasn’t great at developing, uh, leadership within the team. And, uh, and that was on me. And, uh, and so it was more stressful coming back, pleading up the mess than it was not being there when things were happening and going wrong. I was gone. And, and so that was a huge, like, uh, stressor for me.

[00:47:31] Geno: And that’s when I began thinking about, do I wanna be accountable for seven or eight different people, you know? And, um, you know, That was when I had to make the decision. Well, that’s gonna be a huge hit financially because now if we’re going back to just me, um, that’s uh, about a third of the income. So there was that decision I made then, and then there was the fact that physically then after making that decision, I got even more sick.

[00:48:08] Geno: So we talk about finances. Yeah. There’s the finances of my business decision to, to consolidate a little bit and, and, and get my ducks back in a row and figure out what’s going on. We got C, we got crisis, got a team, we got burnout. I had to figure something out and I can’t do it with a large team, cuz I can’t be re responsible for their families as well.

[00:48:30] Geno: A and, and, and, and them being paid if I can’t even keep all my ducks in a row. So there was that. But then when I got sick, then okay, then we started experiencing. Well, if I don’t work, I don’t get paid again. Oh yeah. Forgot that freelance.

[00:48:46] Josh: I know. That’s the, that’s the tricky thing, right? It’s like, you know, I’ve been talking about taking time focused on yourself, easy schedule, but you gotta pay the bills. You gotta make money. So it’s such a hard balance.

[00:48:55] Geno: Sometimes you’re either our consultant, you get paid really good money, but you’re only getting paid when you work or, you know? Yeah. So, or, or you have an agency and, and, and the team is working successfully. Um, and so, yeah, so there was, there was two things, uh, and, and I did, and I’m okay with that I was, I was okay with the decision to that. We were gonna take some hit on finances.

[00:49:21] Geno: the repercussion of that. I’m still okay. That, okay. I only got paid, uh, because of what I’m doing. And it did cause me to rethink a lot of things. And in the process, I started building up my monthly maintenance and hosting stuff. And, you know, since I make some shifts so that I’m not just getting paid. So I do have, you know, I do have two sides of the business. There’s the stuff I love. And I do love the hosting and maintenance because they are all divvy sites. They are good people that I work with that I talk to. I don’t have any penny pictures on my plans and I don’t market to everybody. And my prices aren’t for,

[00:49:55] Josh: yeah. You already weed them out a little bit to get to you.

[00:49:57] Geno: Yeah, yeah. Totally weed them out. And uh, and so, you know, those are good. Those are great clients. And I do get work from them too. And I love that. That’s a, that’s a lead that’ll come in, Hey, I’m ready to update some new pages and this and that. That’s all billable stuff. Right. So, um, so there’s those things that, that, that I’m, I’m using to help kind of balance that out.

[00:50:17] Geno: So the money’s not like necessarily what it used to be. Heck you know, when I had the marketplace, we were doing like 20, 30,000 a month in sales, just did the marketplace alone on, on a regular slow month, you know, come black Friday or July you know, that would be my cash cow for the year, you know? And that’s just, you know, and then by,

[00:50:40] Josh: but was that sustainable? What, you know, like yeah.

[00:50:44] Geno: Was sustainable. And then, and then what did it do to my health and what did it do to it stretched us out. I mean, there was a lot of different factors and all that, and yeah, I will, um, I’ll take the picture.

[00:50:56] Josh: Hear, I love that. I love that we’re talking about this. Cause that what you just said right there, at one point you were running Monterey, premier doing white label work, hosting and maintenance. You know, you’re running an agency with a team, you had a marketplace selling divvy products and child themes and stuff that did and the other people’s product. Yeah, that’s right. The marketplace. So it was other people’s products. Um,

[00:51:20] Josh: I completely, I completely forgot that I had some layouts on there. One. So black men and you dipped your toes and courses at one point I remember. And other training. So on the outside, it looks like you are like Geno is the man doing all the things, growing

[00:51:43] Geno: planning, a church but me. Me and my mom, that house is on fire. I’m like that meme of from SpongeBob. Right. And everything. He’s on my here and he’s just sitting down coffee.

[00:51:58] Josh: I know, I know we’re making light to this, but it’s really important. Like things can be so deceiving when technically yeah your numbers looked awesome. The business was growing, but at what expense, like my, my, yes, my whole my whole mentality in business has shifted to ask that question at what expense, like, what are you willing to yes. Sacrifice to get that amount of scale or amount of income. Is there a way where we can meet in the middle? Like, can we make a good enough income?

[00:52:29] Josh: I mean, if you can make, if you can scale and you love it and that’s your thing and you want to go, wow, and you wanna hustle, hustle, hustle, and you’re filled up doing that. Awesome. It might be seasonal though. Like, I, I definitely experienced this sense of hustle shift when I had a family. And as I’ve gotten elderly at 35, like I understand there’s a different ti , you know what I mean?

[00:52:48] Josh: Like there’s different seasons for us, but what a great point that just remember when you guys like this, I wanted to speak to everyone listening or watching this. When you see people who are outwardly, like they look so successful, just remember things are not always what they. I think that’s such an important point.

[00:53:05] Geno: Absolutely.

[00:53:05] Josh: And I have met a lot of agency owners in my career and in my time as a web designer and freelancer and agency owner myself, and I knew a ton of people who I was jealous of until I got to hear them talk about their business. And they were like, yeah, sales are great. But like, my turnaround is crazy. I have constant churn. I’m like working 90 hours a week. I never, I never see my kids. And you know, like, I’m trying to figure out if I can just sell this thing, like that is so common in our, in our world.

[00:53:34] Geno: It is right. It is very common. In fact, um, not even, not even just alone in our, our world of web design and being in the, in the chamber of commerce and being in ministry has allowed me into the lives of many other individuals in different industries and stuff. And, uh, yeah, I mean, it’s, it is, um, it’s real, the struggle’s real, and everybody has to put on the show. That’s marketing. You have to look successful.

[00:54:03] Geno: You know, in fact, my, my wife would gimme a hard time. Like you’re always on social media, right? I mean, that’s marketing, you have to be, you have to be marketing and putting yourself out there. So you have to find that fine line of, I like what you said earlier, being able to turn it on and turn it off. It made me think of, uh, one of my very first mentors early on when I was in sales and marketing and they took me to a trade show in Vegas and it was my first trade show. It was an international sales and I was a young kid in my early twenties, 21.

[00:54:33] Geno: And she said she was telling me about the old sales guy. Cause we had, it was a Vegas trade show. So you have three breakfast meetings, three lunch meetings and three dinner meeting with different clients. Right. So how do you do it? Right? How to pace yourself, how to, as you know, the last guy he was so good.

[00:54:49] Geno: He could turn it on and turn it. And I always took that to being turn it on. That was the most important aspect. Turn it on, turn on the sales charm. Like you could be like tired, grumpy, whatever, go from one lunch meeting to the next lunch meeting, but you turn it on. What I learned now is what you said earlier is that turn it off is the most important part.

[00:55:09] Geno: Not to turn it on. Anybody can turn it on with enough practice, but if you’re not careful and you don’t learn how to turn it off. And that’s what happened is I became a turn on all the time, entrepreneur hustler. That’s interesting. 24 7, just like that. JP Sears always hustling, always be hashtag hashtag, always hustling, right? Yeah. I mean, that’s,

[00:55:30] Geno: that’s so interesting that it was even in the sales type of situation, there was such an emphasis on, on and off because there is a, it is tricky because you wanna I’m so conflicted by what you said, gen, as far as you always wanna, you know, show up and, and look good because yes, I do uh, I’m having even a hard time explaining how I feel because I feel so conflicted on this. It is definitely. So important to show up and be out there.

[00:55:58] Josh: But at the same time, I never wanna do it fake, which is why sometimes if you, if anyone follows my social media, you may see me just not beyond much for a couple weeks. And it’s not because I’m crouched in a corner depressed, but I’m just like, I just don’t have much. I just don’t feel like posting. And I’m actually about to hire, uh, Kevin, who’s done some ads for me. Who’s gonna take over my social media. I’m gonna start doing it in batches. And then he’s gonna be doing the ongoing social media posting and stuff.

[00:56:29] Josh: That way I’m not literally posting every other day or a few times a week, like I’m able to batch it. But I say that. I, I have always, and I, more that I’ve thought about this, I do feel like I don’t want to show up fake. Like if I’m, if I’m tired and I’m just not feeling it, it comes through, like, you can tell when somebody, like, I’ve seen some ads from agency owners and like coaching programs and I’m like, this dude just looks freaking tired.

[00:56:56] Josh: I don’t know. I mean, look, and I’m, I’m empathetic to that cause I have toddlers and some nights don’t go well and I’m like, I have to show up for this Q and a yeah. I have a call scheduled. I have a podcast scheduled. It doesn’t matter how tired I feel. Or like I gotta do this. But when it comes to like putting on a, a, I’m not, not putting on a front, but like, you know, putting myself out there, I have learned that like I do what I need to do, but I’m not going to fake it.

[00:57:22] Josh: I don’t know. There’s not really a point to that. But just to say, like, I I’m a little conflicted by the thought of just putting yourself out there, no matter what.

[00:57:31] Geno: Yeah. Yeah. And, and there’s, I think that’s the importance of also having that, um, you know, there’s that being able to, that’s why I think what I’ve come out of this saying part of that work life balance, part of that integration, uh, means being genuine in the workplace and outside of the workplace. So yes, we’re, we’re out there. You have to put yourself out there and that’s why I think it’s okay. Putting yourself out there, the good and the bad, you know, um, the pros and the cons I’ve learned now, transport transparency for come back and hurt you.

[00:58:11] Josh: I was just thinking, but my, my, uh, caveat to that would be like, you may not wanna go too far just in case you’re like, Hey, everybody, I’ve been super depressed for two weeks and I can’t get outta bed and they’re gonna be like, I feel so bad for you, but what about the website? Like we gotta get this done on time. So it’s probably a mix of that, right. Yeah.

[00:58:34] Geno: Yeah. And, and, and there is, and there’s some times where I got off the call with the client and I’ll get with the phone with Jessica afterwards. I would go, yeah, I know you caught that. Yeah. That one slipped.

[00:58:47] Josh: Well, that’s a good point. Like how, how far is, uh, okay. Let’s, let’s focus this in, on this. How far is too far with like, being transparent about not feeling it, especially online, because it is, it is worthwhile being a little careful on like how far you go with, with potentially your feelings and stuff.

[00:59:05] Geno: Yes. Yes. And this is really important because especially if you’re establishing relationships with their clients and that’s your goal. Your goal is to become friends and you’re, and you’re really trying every effort to do that is you can get too comfortable and you can, if you don’t know the boundaries and so you kind of always gotta be aware of the boundaries, there’s political boundaries, there’s social boundaries, um, there’s all that stuff you gotta be aware of.

[00:59:32] Geno: And then there’s the transparency of yourself. Like, um, what, like, like we’re talking about in this case, burnout, depression, like, dude, I do not wanna be on the call with you today and you’re driving me crazy. Uh, so I’m not gonna say that. And there’s sometimes where things might slip where you’re a little bit short and you’re a little bit snappy because you’ve been on the call with that client three times that week. And you’re working with that client. Cause they’re a spec. They’re not a special case, but everybody’s unique.

[00:59:57] Geno: Every client’s unique. And, uh, and, and, and, and because I wanna work with every client that I choose to work with, I’m, I’m making the decision that I’m gonna meet them halfway. And whatever that looks like in this client. So it may not be what I enjoy doing the most. I like to work when I’m coding. I like to be figuring things out on my own, not with somebody looking over my shoulder, asking me questions while I’m trying to think

[01:00:20] Geno: So, you know, in that case, I’m not gonna be completely transparent at the same time I will. Uh, I’m also not gonna fake it, you know? And so he knows. So G I took away your Zen today. Didn’t I I’m like, yeah, did, but it’s cool. We’ll get it back

[01:00:38] Geno: so you can be real, but the key to is the, the smiling, knowing that, Hey, we’re bud, we can joke. We’re gonna get this done. The bottom line. We’re gonna get it done. We’re gonna get it done your way. We’re gonna get it done. Right? I’m gonna please, you you’re gonna be satisfied, but at the same time, I’m gonna push back a little bit, you know, if you’re gonna kinda poke me a little bit, I’ll you back.

[01:00:56] Josh: Those, those examples are an interesting difference between maybe being a little more transparent and real when you have an existing relationship. Versus like leads and people who might become your clients. Like if you show up on social media in a really transparent, vulnerable state and your social media is where you’re getting a lot of your leads from or something that they may be like, I, I don’t know if I trust, you know, this guy or this gal handling my website presence.

[01:01:23] Josh: If I they’re mentally, not in a good spot right now. Whereas if you already know somebody yeah. And they know Geno’s a rock star, but he’s just going through a bit of a tough period like that. I, I guess to say it seems like it would make sense that once you have an relat relationship established, you have a little more freedom to be a little more vulnerable, be a little more transparent. That’s kind of what I, what I get from, from where you’re at. It seems like.

[01:01:51] Geno: Yeah, I think so. I mean, I mean, you can’t, you do have to be careful. It does take you being at a certain season in life, you know, to be able to do that. I mean, early on when you’re. I mean, the sooner you could be, and this is where you get to the conflict, um, where do you be yourself and where do you not be yourself?

[01:02:15] Geno: Mm. And how do you find that balance? Um, I, I learned very early on in my TW I learned in high school years, how to be somebody else really early on. I, I was one of those kids that went from school to school elementary, to elementary, the junior high, a lot of moving a lot of town to town. So I, I went from, from ghettos to upper class, to middle class, to lower class and everywhere in between.

[01:02:38] Geno: Um, so I’ve learned to, you know, kind of listen, adapt, learn, and then shift and, and, you know, respond accordingly depending on what group you’re in. And it could be any given group, you know, from a life threatening situation to completely harmless. And, you know, you take that into the business world. You do the same thing, um, with your clients.

[01:02:57] Geno: And I think in the same with social media, when you’re first, you know, I social media’s kind of new now. So obviously there’s a lot of things. When I was first hustling and getting out there that wasn’t out on social media. So I guess it is a different new beast that people who are just starting in the hustle, trying to be transparent. Yeah. You gotta the social media, thing’s a whole new beast that you gotta navigate around. It could work.

[01:03:23] Josh: Yeah. But the same thing can apply. Like if you’re in a chamber of commerce or a networking group, or you’re meeting a lot of people for the first time, or that’s kind of your, that’s your sales funnel. So I guess yeah, whether it’s social media or whether it’s whatever channel you’re in, like the first impressions are, are what I would say. Like, you know, you don’t wanna be somebody fake, but you definitely wanna put on your, your, your, your best front as, as you can.

[01:03:45] Josh: And those type of situations, just because, yeah, like if you, if you join a networking group, for example, and you take a month off and then you go for a couple more weeks and you take another month off, guess what? You’re not gonna get leads. And whether it’s like, you just gotta show up and there is, there is power in habit and there’s there I’ve found too, like. It’s interesting. Cause I’m not somebody who has struggled with depression or anxiety.

[01:04:09] Josh: I’ve always felt like I have a mission and I have drive. And I have things that when I, my lows aren’t terribly low typically, but I do have times where, like, I just don’t feel like doing this. I’m not in the mood. I’m not depressed. I’m just not feeling it. But yeah, I got bills to pay and I’m gonna do it. And I have learned to save those feelings a little bit. Like it doesn’t mean that I’m gonna be like, hi, I’m perfect. And everything’s great, but I’m just, I might be a less energetic version of myself, but I’m gonna like bottle this up and then after the meeting’s over and I’ve got some time, then I’ll sit on that a little bit.

[01:04:45] Josh: Um, so that, I don’t know. That’s my that’s, that’s my from that is like, you know, you’re gonna have highs and lows, but just save, you know, save it a little bit. I know that’s easier said than done, but there’s also another point I don’t want to glance over. And you said, um, like you’ve gotta work on your yourself, like how you really are and what you really feel like that, that leads to an interesting point.

[01:05:09] Josh: Like it may get to a point where you need to work on yourself and you might need to work on these two really important words cause called person. Development, and you might need to work on your attitude. You might need to work on your outlook on life. You might need to work on your knowledge. You might need to get over yourself in a lot of ways.

[01:05:29] Josh: You might need to put your focus on other people. And I mean, we talked about caring for yourself, but sometimes there, I know so many people who are so stuck in their own heads. They are so not self-aware that they are never gonna get in a better place in life, because they are not aware of how they’re coming across to people.

[01:05:47] Josh: Why people don’t wanna hang out with them. Why people don’t wanna talk to them? Cuz guess what? If you can’t, if people can’t stand to be around you, you’re gonna have a really hard time getting clients. Cuz nobody wants to work with somebody who they can’t stand to be around. So I don’t know, I’m re I’m just kind of throwing out thoughts there, but I think it’s really, it’s a good reminder that personal development is really important when it comes to like how you come across to other people. Like how do you come across to somebody you meet every day? You know, I don’t know. It’s a great reminder.

[01:06:21] Geno: It is. It is. And, and you’re right. I mean, I mean the, the common sense, like, are you gonna gravitate towards somebody who’s always, always negative, you know? Uh, was that the first person when you walk into a party, uh, that person’s totally gonna ruin my day. Let me go over there. You, you’re not gonna right. And so, I mean, that’s the same relates to in, in, just in the business world and life in general.

[01:06:47] Geno: Um, and, and you know what, the, the, the interesting thing is not to steer away, but like in pastoral ministries, one of the things I saw early on is that in, in pastors tend to do the same thing. That’s why you see so many crash and burn is because there’s this tendency not to be able to open up. You feel like you gotta be the strong, you gotta be the rock. And, uh, one of the things that I learned is it’s so important to be able to have those people, that network, that circle of friends, you could be totally open, totally transparent with about everything.

[01:07:19] Geno: And now we kind of get into like faith circles or, or it might be like, you know, consultants or coaches or mental health, uh, it might be a counselor or therapist, whatever the case is. Um, but you know, having that has been point crucial to my walk, talking about everything, talking about, talking about the depression, because I, if I had to open up with that person first.

[01:07:44] Geno: Before I could open up with you or anybody else in the world. And if I didn’t have that person, I, would’ve never, that’s a great point talking about it right now. And look, you know, I take it for granted because I’m in ministry and that’s kind of what we do as we talk, we get prayer and, and, and, and, and a lot of people like having been in ministry, serving in ministry, I fell into that trap of everybody coming to me and praying and being the rock and the same with my family and everything.

[01:08:14] Geno: It’s like, you know, so I, I know a thing or two about that. Put it on that, that turning it on and turning it off, not just on sales, but in life. Now, people come to you and they’re, their marriage is on the rocks, or they’ve just lost a loved one real life, like tragedy. And, and, you know, the first thing you learn is like, if somebody comes, Hey, you know, I killed somebody, don’t look shocked because they’re not gonna tell you the rest and come to you for counsel.

[01:08:35] Geno: Right. So you have to learn how to put on the face. Right. And, and. And, and be there and be a comfort or, or whatever the case, or be a smile or bring joy. Yeah, I think that’s all part of being just good people. That’s not on a face being a comfort being encourager, but being able to be, have people to be completely transparent with will allow you to be a comfort or an encourager or a winner, a salesman, whatever the case is, as long as you’re not completely living behind.

[01:09:06] Geno: You know, who you gotta be, this hat, this role, you gotta have transparency with someone. And most of the time it’s our spouse. Not everybody has a spouse and sometimes it can’t be the spouse. Cause maybe sometimes just you need that another guy, friend or another girlfriend or another other friend, whatever that is guy York or whatever, um, that you can talk to about just deep, deep, deep stuff. that’s where faith comes in for me too. Um, that’s a whole nother topic, but

[01:09:32] Josh: well, and that applies to business too. Like of course all those things in the, on the personal side of things crucial and in the business realm. A lot this it’s actually really interesting. I’m glad you brought this up because we often think about that type of thing. Like in our personal life, no matter what our beliefs are, no matter how, what your worldview is, you’re generally gonna have people you can fight in and who hopefully you can reach out to and, and be transparent and, and expressive with.

[01:09:59] Josh: And then there’s people who you’re probably never gonna, you know, get past layer one, as far as your surfacing kind of stuff. The same, same thing is true in business. That’s one reason I love having like a mastermind group. I’m a part of now where we talk about the stuff that I’m not gonna talk to my students about, and I’m not gonna talk about, you know, to other colleagues. Um, I might be a little more transparent with you, you know, cuz I’ve known you for years than people who I just met type of thing.

[01:10:22] Josh: So it’s actually really important. I think it’s a great reminder to surround yourself with like the different levels of, of people. And like you mentioned, I mean my wife, she, she understands a lot of what I do and it’s awesome. She’s a great sounding board sometimes, but there’s sometimes where like, I might need to talk like you or Tim Stifler or some of my other, you know, buddies in the industry who have been in this for a long time or, um, somebody who knows my, my industry really well, and I can really bounce these challenges and, and ideas off of.

[01:10:51] Josh: Cause there’s also, there’s nothing worse. I know we all know that person who like is checking out at a grocery store and they’re hitting the clerk with like all their life issues. And you’re like this person, this, this person needs, needs to talk with somebody. They need like a therapist. They need to go to church. They need something, they need a small group. They need something to like somebody else to talk to. Cause they’re holding up the freaking line and I’m sorry, but we gotta go. So you know what I mean? Like, so you, you wanna be wary of being that person.

[01:11:24] Josh: I know, I’m trying to keep this business centric too. Like, you don’t wanna be that person with potential clients and like, I, oh, let’s see. Yeah. I was, I was white labeling for a, a digital marketing agency in Columbus, one time building sites. And they allowed me to sit in on some of their sales calls and I heard some of those where it was like, why is this dude talking about this stuff on this sale? There’s no need, need for this right now.

[01:11:49] Josh: It’s like a sale, you know, it’s like everything, you know, you should focus on like the, the exciting stuff. There was, I had thought a little bit ago. I wanna, yeah. I wanna reiterate get outta my head when, when we were talking about like complaining and working on yourself and being personal, like perks personal development when you are in a sales situation.

[01:12:10] Josh: And when you’re like talking with potential people, if you complain and you dog other web designers and you just kind of bitch and mowing about the industry or social media or whatever it is, the client is gonna pick up on all of that. And they’re gonna be like, I just don’t know if I want to work with this person. You know?

[01:12:27] Josh: I mean, there there’s a time and place to like mention some things, but overall I found it to be so important when you’re working with people, especially in that first, that first touch is to be inspirational and look like, you know, I, I don’t know. Yeah. Maybe that end is an interesting segue to like, yeah. How do you. How do you stay positive? There’s a question for you gen. How do we stay positive in a changing world that right now we’re in a situation where globally, there are a lot of questions and uncertainties economically. So how do we stay positive during all this?

[01:13:06] Geno: that, that that’s great. And, you know, I think for those of us who are, are happen to have the sales hat in them, in this industry, understand that, get it. That’s, that’s not new. I think there’s a lot of people in our, in our industry that don’t have a sales hat and I think they struggle with it. I think that’s, that’s a great question to, to have, and, and yeah, absolutely. I think every first touch, like it’s, it’s good to be personable. Like we’re very personable and I don’t write this on the calls, but initially.

[01:13:36] Geno: You, you want to be a motivational speaker, to be honest with you, you wanna be, what does a motivational speaker do they make you feel good when you leave? You feel inspired. You feel motivated if you can get your client feeling that way. And so how does I do it? I first, you know, I’d listen to them. You know, you listen to the client.

[01:13:56] Geno: Okay. You know, tell me why you’re here. What you’re looking for. Listen, take notes, make sure to bring up something on every major point they made. Just acknowledge it, how it is. Don’t give an answer. Don’t give us a solution. Acknowledge it. And don’t just say, okay, you said this, you said that. No, no, no.

[01:14:14] Geno: You’re gonna listen. You’re gonna talk. Uh, and then you’re gonna hit some of their pain points, not by listening, but just addressing them without saying the pain points, like encouraging. ’em like I came to the right place. So you get all their pain points out of. Then, you know, how, what the answer is. So it’s really easy, right?

[01:14:31] Geno: It’s really like, you, you, you tell, tell you what their pains are and then you, you know exactly how to sell them. So it’s really a no brainer. Um, but that’s the key is you find out what their issues are and then you address them. You let them know they’re in the right place. Like when I got that call on Friday, I didn’t know if I’d be able to rebuild the site by Monday.

[01:14:50] Geno: But my whole thing was, they were panicking. They were freaking out. I say, Hey, listen, I’m on it. I’ll be with you all week. And I’ll see you through you guys. Go rest tonight. This is your job. Your job is to go rest. I’ll work on things. I’ll do some evaluating. And the first thing in the morning, I’ll have some answers for you.

[01:15:04] Geno: Let you know what’s gonna happen. But from here on up, you guys got, you know, you can rest. I know it sounds arrogant or whatever, deep down inside, I’m like, oh, I’m gonna put my foot in my mouth. I know this. But you know, that was my job. It was to motivate them, encourage them, inspire them. And then to work my butt off all weekend, you know, uh, playing tunes, drinking, coffee, drinking soda, and then, uh, come Monday at launches and, and they’re super happy.

[01:15:28] Geno: And that was the thing they remembered that I calmed them down. I brought peace. And so in a call, you, you, I talked about getting into a situation, identifying the people, identifying what’s gonna motivate them. What’s gonna get them excited. Are they tired? Are they frustrated if they’re gonna tired of their old web developer?

[01:15:44] Geno: Don’t join that pity party, like you said. No, no, no. That’s probably dumb. So don’t complain about them. Oh, I hate when people do that or yeah. Some people lock you into the contract or oh, some web designers, they just go away. Cuz they’re young that I used to say those things too, but now you just kind of focus on their issue or, you know, one of the things that we could do is this, this, and this and this, instead of focusing on what they did, get their attention away from that, get ’em focused on the positive, not the negative, have them walking away saying, you know what?

[01:16:13] Geno: I don’t know about that pricing, but I really like that Geno guy, you know, then three weeks later, then you can dump all your drama on them. Cause they’re already solo. They’re already bought into you. They like you. They love you, but you gotta get ’em to like you and you gotta just meet them where it takes listening.

[01:16:28] Geno: You can’t just sales your way into it. You really have to listen. I call it personable, relational sales, real genuine. We lost track of that in the digital world. You know that relational sales, but I, I, when I was younger, there was, I, my first introduction to sales was relational sales, where I actually had relationships.

[01:16:49] Geno: With, um, agents into different countries that I worked with regularly. Then when that business got bought out, I went to the other kind of sales, telephone sales. I was introduced to that world where it’s all a numbers game and that’s a different sales approach that you just run people over until they buy.

[01:17:05] Geno: I watch people just get a sale on every call. Cause they never got, let a word in edgewise and then they call McDonald’s and tell them that, Hey, I was just there, you messed up my order. I’m coming in. I’m gonna get another feedback right now. I’ll be right there. Boom, go get lunch, come back. And everybody make stuff up, you know, and just get whatever you wanted, different kind of sales.

[01:17:20] Geno: But I hate that sales that’s a one time sale. Relational sales is gonna bring the relationship, make it fun. You do gotta meet them more. You can’t dump on them.

[01:17:28] Josh: And I love that because right. To dump on them to, to answer the question I pose of like staying positive, I think relationships is what keeps that going. Like the, the Le like you said, the less salesy you are. Yeah. The more that you can get to the core of the issue and present the solutions. And would you like to know G my hidden tip my gold gym for sales that I use from day one, even when I was not a great web designer that helped me build a six figure. Would you like know it is excite?

[01:18:03] Geno: I need to know. I need to know excite.

[01:18:05] Josh: Seriously, get the client excited about working with you. That is the most important thing that, that will over everything. If they leave that meeting, they’re like, well, I’m excited. I have, I have a vision like Josh shared some ideas that got me really pumped up. I like, I wanna move forward. Everything else is easier. Excitement is the most underrated sales tip tool, whatever you want call it. Um, and that could, that can definitely be in the relationship into things like you mentioned. So we’re on sales. I had to mention that since we’re we’re diving sales now

[01:18:46] Geno: week weekly call, I mean to, to have a client say, this is the one call I look forward to every. I mean, I, we literally have one client that said, of course that the same that said, oh man, I ruined your end but we’re gonna make it work. Cause we scheduled another call today and we’re gonna finish his site together. And he loves it that I would take the time. And that wouldn’t normally take that long. Not much time, but give and take. Right,

[01:19:11] Geno: because then there’s gonna be time when I’m gonna need a favor because I’m not having a great day and I need to push that meeting out awake and he’s gonna be, you know what, Geno, you’ve gone outta your way for me. Absolutely. That’s a relationship right there where you can be transparent. You can’t have, you know,

[01:19:26] Josh: this has been such a great combo, man. Um, We, we very good, but I love it. I know I never have any, I never Pinn in a title when I talk to you, cuz I’m, who knows where we’re gonna go. But I, I, I am really excited to unpack some of your journey, what you’ve learned with, you know, pivoting and mental health and, um, physically your weight loss and how that’s impacted your business.

[01:19:51] Josh: I’m kind, I’m just curious, like where you’re at now. You’ve been an entrepreneur for a while. You’ve been in, you’ve been in sales, you’ve been in ministry. You’ve been, you’ve been in a lot of hard industries and you’re, you know, you’ve worked with a lot of different people, different personality types.

[01:20:06] Josh: You’ve scaled up, you’ve scaled back. You’ve scaled in, you’ve scaled out. You’ve done all the things I feel like. I feel like you’ve, you’re, you’re in a well rounded life experience in business. What’s what’s ahead for you. Like what, what are you gonna do that you’re excited about with where you’re at in business?

[01:20:25] Geno: Wow. That’s cool. That’s cool. Well, right now, you know, we, we talked about, you know, working together with other people and learning and growing, and I’m finding myself in that phase again, where I am being able to work with people and learn and, and grow with them. And, and, uh, so I’m excited. I feel like I’m entering into a new phase of new growth.

[01:20:41] Geno: Like, I feel like I’ve, I had, uh, plateaued for a while there in my own personal growth, uh, business and development growth. I feel like, I feel like born again in the sense that I just watched the matrix again and just kidding, but I did actually. Um, but I do feel like in the sense that. Um, like, you know, in the, in the time that I was quote unquote, maybe asleep or plateaued or whatever, there’s been so many new things that have sprung up around me in, in the WordPress community and stuff that I’m excited about, you know, were what lies ahead for me personally.

[01:21:19] Geno: And, and then, so for me, what, because I’m excited about that. I have scaled back from Monterey premier being an agency, and I’ve actually taken what I’ve learned over the last couple years with ketos.co and the self-branding and the power that, uh, that gave to the business and the name and, and allowed me to launch Monterey premier, cuz if it wasn’t for the self-branding of ketos do co I wouldn’t be doing divvy websites and probably wouldn’t even be wearing this shirt, you know?

[01:21:48] Geno: Um, so there was a lot of power in that. And when I moved to Monterey premier, cause I wanted get away from divvy and not put all my eggs in one basket. Um, I wanted to have something that was just totally non Geno branded, but at the end of the day, I, I realize I like the best of both where it’s an agency still it’s Monterey premier, but, uh, what I’m gonna be doing is I’m gonna, instead of going after every client, I’m really gonna consolidate who I’m going after, because at, at one point I don’t want the wet design to be necessarily what I do to make a living or an income.

[01:22:21] Geno: I enjoy doing it now, whether it’s it’s in, you know, overseeing a team at some point or coming on as a consultant for another company or an agency. Um, but I, I want to scale back and hand select and have a, a list of the clients like lined up for the year that of the projects I’m gonna work on. So I wanna get to a point where I’m booked for the year in advance of big, nice, solid project with a few here in between some emergency stuff.

[01:22:47] Geno: So be that high end high ticket that, you know, high end agencies come to for development in the WordPress divvy world, uh, for white label, uh, maybe have a small team, maybe it’s their team work with their team or something like that, but be that consultant that comes in and builds their teams.

[01:23:05] Geno: So, uh, Monterey, Premier’s gonna take on the ketos do cobranding. So you’re gonna see more of my face, more of my name, more of my images, a lot more of my, myself. We talked about not being fake. I’ve always had a hard time having other people do my social media. Sure. Most people who know me know what’s mine and what’s not.

[01:23:21] Geno: And I even like have to reword some of their posts so that people know it’s not me speaking. So I’ll intentionally go in there and say me, Olivia , blah, blah, blah. And, uh, I edit their, their stuff before I let them publish it and approve it. And, uh, but I’m going back to like, you’re doing, we’re packaging it up.

[01:23:38] Geno: So it’s, I’m not posting every day necessarily, but it’s, it’s gonna be my messaging, my blog post, I I’ve cut back from all the guest blog post authors. I saw one of the things I did was a multi blog. I had, sorry, I forgot about that. Author contributing blogs daily. And I had, so I had editors that would, you know, go through all that,

[01:23:58] Josh: man no wonder, burned out so many things going.

[01:24:05] Geno: I had writers, you know, I, I was, I think I was the first one to hire Randy after elegant themes. And then now, you know, he was already a writer doing really well, but, um, you know, he’s still doing a lot of writing, but, you know, I had, uh, a few of the writers, um, writing that we’re paying as well as editors and then the guest blog.

[01:24:22] Geno: But anyways, what I’m doing now, and I haven’t fully done it yet, but I’m shifting. And so that the blog is gonna go back to being me. So I’ll still do keto co tutorials, um, for the diehard divvy community, as I get back into it. In fact, I got some cool things I’ve been working on, um, just this week, some cool new stuff that I found can’t do in divvy.

[01:24:42] Geno: Um, but I’m gonna focus a lot on the business community. And so the new, uh, weekly marketing material is building community and going back to the old, uh, the old, uh, phrases out there, build, teach, learn, and love and build community. And, uh, I’m gonna go after the business community in general and, uh, business owners, like my clients, they’re plumbers, their dentists, their agencies, and really go after coaching them in the digital marketing space, not just WordPress and websites, but how to grow your business, be strategic, you know, do you have an FAQ form?

[01:25:16] Geno: Are you doing this? Did you know, you could reduce your, uh, inquiries and phone calls if you do this. So how to integrate business with the website. So forget the website, building stuff, how to make better SEO decisions, stuff like that. So I wanna get into that niche. I’m doing a little bit of SEO, but I don’t wanna be just as service provider anymore. I’m gonna be the guy they go to to get guidance on those kinds of things.

[01:25:38] Geno: While I have hosting and maintenance going on on the site over here, and then I’m constantly keeping myself busy enough to date some really nice projects.

[01:25:47] Josh: I love that direction for you. It seems right. Like, it seems like you, you have so much strategy and wisdom and value that you’ve learned over the years. It’s it’s time to like, you know, I mean, doing work, doing website, building and stuff is extremely valuable, but if it can be done by somebody else, no one knows what Geno knows in your, you know, how many years of being in the web design world over a D well over, I mean, Oh, gosh, I, I, I, my first question was that like, I mean, I websites.

[01:26:22] Josh: Yeah. So you like, you’ve got all this wisdom that should, you know, should be shared, uh, outside of just, you know, doing the, the great web design work you’re doing. So that, that makes a whole lot of sense. I’m excited for you. I have one final question, Gina. And that would be, if you were speaking with somebody who was in, and I, I mentioned this because I did a Q and a earlier today for my students.

[01:26:45] Josh: I do a monthly Q and a for all my web design students. And I asked how business was going for through the year. Like, if you could rate a one to 10, doesn’t have to be just money just overall. How are you feeling? What? And I had a lot of like fives and sixes, and I asked what were some of the pain points?

[01:27:00] Josh: And multiple people said they’re overwhelmed. Uh, for one of those people and they ask you Geno, I’m inspired by the changes you’ve made and in your business, I’m feeling overwhelmed. What would just some general advice be? Would there be like one little nugget of thing you might just recommend? That’s really made a big difference for you?

[01:27:24] Geno: Can you give that one?

[01:27:24] Josh: Uh, cause it could be a hundred different answers. I’m sure. Depending on the, the circumstance, but I just wonder if there’s like something that might apply to most people that could help. If they’re feeling overwhelmed,

[01:27:39] Geno: I would say is there, if there’s anything you feel you’ll, you’ll miss or are missing and maybe start there? I don’t know. Necessarily what that looks like for everybody else. But for me, I, I, uh, I, we all know we’re overwhelmed, but we have to stop and think, well, what’s missing in my life. What’s missing. It’s not what’s happening. Well, no, what’s happening. That’s, what’s overwhelming you what’s missing where’s that piece that you once had. Cause life’s always gonna be overwhelming. So what happened?

[01:28:23] Josh: I love that. What a, what a closing thought. That’s right. That is. That’s the way to end this combo, man. I think that’s a wonderful thought to end off on. So thanks Geno for your time. I know you got more calls coming up and stuff. So man, another great chat. I could talk with you all day, man, uh, about life and business and all the things. So I hope everyone listening found a lot of nuggets from this they can apply. And man, thank you again for being so transparent and, and for being you Geno.