Growing a Fruitful Brand Q&A: Ben & Raj Answer Your Questions
A couple of months ago we asked our followers to send in your questions about branding and running a small business.
This week on Growing a Fruitful Brand, branding experts Raj and Ben are answering your questions in part one of a multi-part episode!
We got so many great questions, we couldn’t address them all in one episode and we can’t wait to tackle the rest.
In the episode, Raj and Ben dig into why experimentation is crucial when finding your core product offering and how to find (or create) time to keep growing, professionally without sacrificing your personal time.
Don’t miss an episode, subscribe where you listen to your favorite podcasts.
We want to hear more of your great and thoughtful questions!
Ep. 48:
Growing a Fruitful Brand Q&A: Ben & Raj Answer Your Questions
Automated Transcript
Ben Lueders (00:03):
We asked for questions and you delivered. Today is our first Q and A episode. Hey, welcome to Growing a Fruitful brand where we discuss how to create and grow a brand that makes the world a better place for you, your customers, and your employees. I'm Ben Lueders, founder and art director of Fruitful Design and Strategy. This is my business partner and brand strategist Raj Lulla. Raj, we got some questions.
Raj Lulla (00:25):
Yeah. My first question is, how'd you get so tall?
Ben Lueders (00:28):
What? I can adjust that. Is this better? That's much worse. Much worse. I was born this way, well, not this tall, but I was a big baby. Yes,
Raj Lulla (00:38):
You were.
Ben Lueders (00:39):
That's nice. I didn't know we'd get to ask questions too. We have so many questions. Oh, we
Raj Lulla (00:42):
Have questions from other people.
Ben Lueders (00:44):
Other way to make up questions, man. Oh, don't make me ask you some questions. I do have some questions.
Raj Lulla (00:51):
That'll be a whole different episode.
Ben Lueders (00:52):
So these are our first question. We'll podcast. Here we go. You want to just dive right into these or?
Raj Lulla (00:58):
I mean, I think all the episodes of the podcast have been questionable, but yeah, no,
Ben Lueders (01:02):
Let's jump in. This is the most questionable. Okay, so the first one, you want to do this one first?
Raj Lulla (01:07):
Sure.
Ben Lueders (01:08):
Okay. I know you guys can't see this. We got our little secrets. They're secrets. Secret secret screens here from Benji Mitchell and Benji. He's an agency owner, is that right?
Raj Lulla (01:17):
He runs an agency, yep. Yep. Down, I believe North Carolina.
Ben Lueders (01:20):
North Carolina. Benji, Benji, thanks for sending this question in. How do you hold to your core services and not get spread too far outside of your wheelhouse?
Raj Lulla (01:31):
Yeah, so this is a little bit of inside baseball sort of, but the reason I wanted to answer this question was because this is true for a lot of service-based businesses and nonprofits too. I see this all the time with nonprofits where both service-based businesses and nonprofits, you have people who are offering you money and then the temptation is to say, yes, we do that and answer the question, how do you hold your core services and not get spread too far outside your wheelhouse? For us at Fruitful, this has looked like we are in the specialties of branding, websites, messaging, and then there are services that are adjacent to that that would make sense for us to expand into if we can do that competently. So one that does make sense for us and works pretty well is video. And now the way that we've expanded into that service is mainly by partnering with great video people like Remotion here in Omaha, like Tri Art Creative in Denver, and so getting people who are expert in those areas.
(02:39)
And so we sell the service, but we manage the creative process, which we are expert in and we do all the time, but then we let that provider do their area of expertise and so the client gets a seamless experience and the same high quality level of work without you or me picking up a camera and going, all right, smile, which would not be a great experience. On the other hand, there are things that we've figured out that are not necessarily our strong suits, and so there's a lot of stuff in the digital marketing world where it takes a lot of almost computer science level analytics, statistics, all of those things. And
Ben Lueders (03:23):
We are not that smart, let's just come on.
Raj Lulla (03:27):
And so there are a few customers that we've built custom solutions for that are very effective, but it's not something we could scale. And so while we had built these custom solutions, we don't offer them to everybody else because we had to be so specific in finding the right vendors for those clients that we know that we can't just say, oh, well the deliverables on this are like this. We do this standard procedure every time, and so everything is great every time for every customer, and if we can't meet that standard, I talk about how consistency equals trust. When you're building a brand, consistency equals trust. That's both in your visuals and in your sales process, in your delivery, in your contracts, all of those things. If you are consistent, people will trust you. This is like Starbucks, right? Where most people don't think that Starbucks serves the best coffee in the world.
Ben Lueders (04:27):
I definitely don't.
Raj Lulla (04:29):
But what they do believe is that if you go to a Starbucks off of a rest, stop off the I five in California, you're going to get about the same coffee there as you are at a Starbucks that's in New York City.
Ben Lueders (04:47):
Oh, that is absolutely true.
Raj Lulla (04:49):
Yes. And so it may not, again, may not be the best cup of coffee in the world that came from the digestive trek of
Ben Lueders (05:00):
Vietnamese fert or whatever,
Raj Lulla (05:04):
Supposedly the best tasting thing in the world, even if weirds the rest of us out. But what it is going to be is it's going to be essentially the same cup of coffee. This is also why McDonald's works. This is also why Chick-fil-A works. It was because you're going to hear my pleasure when somebody says thank you at a Chick-fil-A. You're going to get a weird robot voice at the drive-thru now at McDonald's, and then you're going to get a broken ice cream machine. It's like you can count on the same things no matter where you are with these businesses,
Ben Lueders (05:33):
McDonald's, if you're listening and we know you are, we'd love to help you rebrand your experience.
Raj Lulla (05:40):
So yeah, the biggest thing is kind of just sticking with this idea, number one is can we provide a consistent experience? Number two is I actually think, and I'm sure there are people who disagree with me out there, I actually think that you should try things that you should do research and development. So sometimes you should expand outside your core services and see if on a small limited basis you can experiment with something and then see if that could be delivered consistently.
Ben Lueders (06:11):
I think that's super important. Raj, I think the timing of this is really important. I was actually just listening to Rich Webster's podcast. It's one that Raj and I listen to. He's this guy who coaches people on how to be solopreneurs, but there's a lot of things that apply to what we're talking about right now, and he talks about how when you're first starting your company, you don't know what your core services necessarily are yet. You have to say yes to everything. That's actually a really important thing. Sometimes people, when they start a business, they feel bad that they feel like they're saying yes to everything. They don't know how to say no. That's called starting a business. That's how you find out what you enjoy and what's profitable. And I think that's a big part of this too, is just because that's what a core service should be, right? It's the thing that you're good at that you like doing and it actually makes you money. I tell you what, there are some things that I like doing that don't really make us money. We talk about this, and you got to get those things to align. And so what Raj is talking about is later on now you've got transition from that phase of saying yes to everything, to actually being more discerning with your time and resources. But that doesn't mean becoming stale or stagnant.
(07:23)
We're always learning here and we are always trying things. We're always, we just did this recent branding experiment. You've got to experiment with stuff and try things even on like he was saying on a small scale to know maybe this should actually be one of our core services. There's times where you may have to pivot from technology from the market changes and stuff like that, that your core services, let's say, boy, our core service is a o L website set up or whatever it is. I'm going to set up juno.com emails forever or something like that. You might need to pivot. You might need to be experimenting with things on the side to see if that should still be a core service
Raj Lulla (08:06):
In the area of
(08:08)
Service-based businesses and nonprofits. One thing that's really important to talk about is productizing your services and what that looks like, at least for me, and there are people who are more expert in talking about this, but one of the ways that we have done it is we just sit there and think about, okay, when things go well around here, what happened? Instead of trying to necessarily dream up everything that a client's going to want and all that, just start with what's worked in the past. And this is part of why you have to try everything at first. And for us clients doing Squarespace websites more often than WordPress, although we do both, it means that we get zero questions about hosting because Squarespace does all of that. We get zero questions about cybersecurity because Squarespace does all of that. And so that was something that we immediately said, Hey, for most website projects that are not complex, that are just brochure sites essentially, then Squarespace is the right answer, and everybody needs messaging to put on their website. If they're doing a website, they need their messaging to be in place because nobody likes to sign up for a website and then immediately turn around and go, what should it say and go, I don't know either.
(09:26)
So website or messaging. One thing that we've noticed too is that if you have an old dated logo and you put it on a brand new website, it doesn't look very good. It's like putting an old goodwill tie with a brand new $5,000 suit and you're not going to feel good about that.
Raj Lulla (09:44):
So
Raj Lulla (09:44):
We recommend doing that together in a lot of cases, not every case. And then we also know you're going to need a photo and video for that. So is that something you should be purchasing along with that? And so when projects go fast, when they're fun, when the client's really satisfied, what did we do to make that right? And then on the other side of that, you have the pricing question, which is not necessarily in here, but that is part of the profitability question is what impact did this or could this have for the customer? And we like to try to use a one to 10 rule that if this could make the client a hundred thousand dollars, then it should cost $10,000 or if it could make them 200 or $300,000 would cost 20 or $30,000 because we want to make sure that even if their return on investment was half of what they thought it was, there's still five. Even if it was 20% of what they thought it was going to be, they're still doubling their investment, even if it's only 10% as effective as they thought it was going to be, they're still breaking even. And to me,
Raj Lulla (10:50):
It's so good to think of it that way
Raj Lulla (10:52):
In
Raj Lulla (10:52):
Terms of investment.
Raj Lulla (10:53):
That's such a win-win scenario where the potential for serving the customer is really well, is almost limitless, feels almost limitless. And then the downside risk for them is so low that everybody just goes, yep, let's go. Let's do this. And so putting those services together in a package makes it really easy for the customer to understand what they need. And then of course, there's always those little add-ons or changes here and there that it's like, oh, we want the website, but we don't need a new logo. It's been doing pretty great for us for a long time.
Raj Lulla (11:34):
Yeah, wouldn't touch it. Wouldn't touch
Raj Lulla (11:35):
It. And so not everybody needs the exact same thing, but being able to say, Hey, most people are successful when they do this. And that starts with a confidence from you as the provider saying, Hey, this is what we do well and we've seen this work for other people who are like you. That's what most people want to know when they come to an agency or a service provider because it is not just agencies either. This could be chiropractors or it could be dentists or mechanics. Anybody who is in a service-based business, accountants is like, Hey, we've seen this situation a bunch of times. If you do this audit or if you do this repair or if you have this adjustment or whatever, most likely your pain will go away or you'll make more money or your car will be running again. And that helps people know that, hey, you're an expert in this. You've got this and I can trust this.
Ben Lueders (12:32):
I think the last thing I'll say on that before we get to the next question is, Raj is talking about how can you combine services that kind of work together that everyone needs? I think one thing that can happen once you've been doing that for a while is you start wondering, do we really have to do every part of this? What if we could just do this one part? And that could just be our thing, because when you start niching down, it's hard to stop sometimes. But I think one of the things that we've kind of wondered about and even kind of discovered is how linked some of those things can be. There are times where it's like, man, it'd be nice if we could just design logos, but when you think about the money that you might be saying no to or just the opportunity you might be saying no to, and doing the full website and some of these other things too. For example, garage, he's really good at messaging and he could just write messaging all day. He'd run his own company, don't do this, Raj Lulla messaging, but messaging just works so well and sells so well with a website. Would he be able to sell the same way if he didn't have the design of the website with it? Maybe it's yet to be seen, but I wonder if some of our success has come from the fact that we're kind of a one-stop shop. You can come here and get most of what you need for your rebrand for relaunching a website right here.
(13:56)
And I think people really like that when they have to worry about three or four different invoices going out to three or four different things, having those things together. And I think that's really the genius of productizing those things. You're making things simpler for people and easier for them to say yes to more money.
Raj Lulla (14:12):
And I mean, to that point you talked about what are you saying no to, but also then what danger are you putting the customer in? Because we do make beautiful websites. If we were to only make logos and then say, okay, go find somebody who can put this on a website, which is okay for some companies, yeah, some do that, but for us, we know that it's like, well, in the price point that you're thinking, I don't think that many people do it as well as we do it. And not trying to be high on our own supply here, but just saying that, Hey, I mean legitimately for this price point, these are some of the most beautiful websites and easy to use that you could possibly get because we've refined this process down over 10 years to something that works really well. So just knowing from a customer service perspective that we'd be kind of throwing them to the wolves or leaving 'em out to be on their own. And this kind of goes into when has it gone well? And sometimes when customer's like, I can only afford a logo right now, and then they go put it on their own website and then we go, oh,
Ben Lueders (15:19):
I
Raj Lulla (15:19):
Mean, I get what you were trying there, which everybody starts somewhere and that's okay,
Ben Lueders (15:25):
But
Raj Lulla (15:26):
Sometimes it's better to just put it on the card or take out the small business loan or do whatever that you need to do to start right than it is to try to save money and hamper yourself at the beginning to not do it well.
Ben Lueders (15:40):
Good. Well, I think that that question is sufficiently answered. Let's see if we have time for another. Let's move on to we got a question from our good friend, Jess Verano. Thanks so much. She sent a bunch of questions in, we might get it to a couple of 'em today. She asked, how do you make time for learning in a busy small business? And thank you for your question, Jess. This one's really near and dear to us. I think because one of our four values is that we're always learning. What would you say to Jess here, Raj?
Raj Lulla (16:12):
Yeah, so I think that rhythms of a small business are something that are really important to learn. And for me, one of those rhythms is knowing when I learn things well and when I don't. That's good. And so for example, typically I will not listen to business podcasts in the car for me ramping up to work on the way in and winding down from work on the way out. I like to listen to Mike Lia, Pete Holmes, this American Life. There's all sorts of podcasts that are not business related that I will listen to. I actually think that's part of how I learn too, is that I like to pull from different sources. That's
Ben Lueders (17:02):
Good too
Raj Lulla (17:03):
Than maybe other people do. I was just listening to Mike Bigley on the way in and and Taylor Tomlinson were talking about how you get good at comedy. Everybody gets asked this all the time, and one of the things that they said was, you just have to show up that you have to get on stage as many times as possible and that you have to suck until you don't. Yeah, Jerry
Ben Lueders (17:24):
Seinfeld has a lot of good stuff around that. It's a job
Raj Lulla (17:27):
And everybody that is consistent with all advice I've ever seen in that. Now we're in a creative business. So the one-to-one is pretty obvious for us here where it's just like, Hey, the way that you get better at writing is to write. The way you get better at presenting is to present. So all of those things, podcasting even. It's just like that's true. Keep making episodes until you're good at it, and we'll let you know when we get there. So part of it is learning from unusual sources, non-traditional sources. Another one for me is the just media of learning, where I have discovered that I read a lot more on a Kindle than I do in physical books. And there's Why is
Ben Lueders (18:16):
That?
Raj Lulla (18:17):
Well, part of it's, I
Ben Lueders (18:17):
Still don't have one. So
Raj Lulla (18:19):
My Kindle has a backlight, so I can read in bed even then, I probably prefer to read fiction over business books, but it's very portable because I can read on my phone as well as on the device itself and a physical book, the weight of putting it in your backpack. And then this is the classic thing, right? You take a book on vacation, sits in your suitcase the whole time,
Ben Lueders (18:44):
Just
Raj Lulla (18:44):
Did that. It just added weight to your suitcase and you didn't read it. So, oh, okay, I'll put it in my backpack. I'll read for five minutes on muddy. You don't do it after a certain number of days, you're going to stop adding that weight to your backpack because it's all as it's doing is hurting your back, making
Ben Lueders (19:01):
You stronger.
Raj Lulla (19:02):
And so Kindle, having my entire library in several ounces is something that I can do all the time, and I've got this routine down. So picking the right media of that, I learned really well. Business stuff I learned really well through video. I like the business made simple courses that Donald Miller has. I like YouTube for those types of things. Me too, me too. That's really
Ben Lueders (19:26):
Good. And audio books for me for business stuff I listen to. And to me it just feels like a long podcast or something. But video too. And I really like what you're saying here, Raj, because I can't, Jess write, Wright said, if you're a busy small business, we're busy.
(19:45)
Raj, if you saw Raj's schedule, I mean you'd be hard pressed to find a busier person than Raj. I mean, he packs it in, and yet he always is learning. And I am inspired by Raj because of how he gets inspiration from these other sources from here. He is a brand strategist. He's not just listening to brand strategy podcasts all day. In fact, he should probably listen to more. But yeah, he's listening to comedians, he's listening to other things and watching movies, reading fiction on his Kindle, not just business books because it's crazy how you learn from things that are not necessarily in your industry. And I think the other thing I'd say to that too is what can you learn? Now I know what she's getting at. She's getting at the intentional time of learning something new, so we should get to that. But there could be a false dichotomy there too, where learning is this thing that happens when I'm studying something over here with no distraction, where think of all the things, Raj that we've learned in just doing the work and just being busy.
(20:55)
That's something that I think has really benefited our business over the years is, and even in we've talked about before, that both Raj and I are in the process of, we have recently written books and in the process of getting them published, and most writers are going to tell you the thing that Raj just said of you just got to write if you want to get better as a writer, you just got to kind of do it. And so there is a life learning that kind of comes from just trying things, doing things, of course. But then the other thing I think is kind of what Raj is getting at is not everyone learns the same way. There are certain times that you're going to learn times of the day that you're going to learn better than others. There's going to be certain mediums with so many mediums to choose from.
(21:39)
Now, some people hate audio books, some people love audio books. Some people like a Kindle, some people like the paper. This is not a one size fits all thing. And maybe for you listening to a business book, double speed on your 30 minute commute is how you learn, and that could be a huge unlock for you. Others. That sounds like the most stressful thing you can possibly imagine to bring into your day, and you need to listen to a comedian or listen to nothing or have some time of self-reflection. And so yeah, I think knowing yourself and how you learn is a huge first step.
Raj Lulla (22:16):
Yeah. Two more things about learning that I think are important tips that I've learned. Number one is people. I would say people are the biggest resource that I learned from. And
Ben Lueders (22:28):
So
Raj Lulla (22:28):
When I have a question
Ben Lueders (22:29):
Forgot about people,
Raj Lulla (22:30):
That's good. Rod, our friend Jason Rothfus over at Red Fox Consulting, when we kind of hit a crisis point in our agency and had to make some major changes, the first thing he said to me is, I want you to think for this next season who not how. And
Ben Lueders (22:48):
So
Raj Lulla (22:49):
Some of that was who can do the jobs that need to be replaced? Not how can you do them yourself. But the other thing was, who has the answer to this? Not How am I going to figure this out?
Ben Lueders (23:01):
It takes that pressure off a little
Raj Lulla (23:02):
Bit. Oh yeah. I mean, I had a great, great conversation with Dan Thrasher probably three or four months ago, and it unlocked a whole thing for me. And I will say it was incredibly generous. His company is so much bigger than ours and so much his time is so much more valuable than ours, literally.
Ben Lueders (23:23):
Thanks, Dan,
Raj Lulla (23:24):
We appreciate
Ben Lueders (23:24):
You.
Raj Lulla (23:26):
But him being on our podcast and taking that one meeting with me gave me what I needed to get 10 steps without having to meet with him regularly. And he's still willing to meet with us again and discuss more. You're
Ben Lueders (23:38):
So good at this, by the way, rj.
Raj Lulla (23:40):
Thank you. I've noticed this
Ben Lueders (23:40):
With you. I think even more so than me. I would be maybe more prone to, even though I am a people person, I think, I don't often think of other people this way, but I've noticed when you're in a place, you tend to go find someone and they help you. They're your guide. And which is funny. I feel like you're the quintessential
Raj Lulla (23:59):
Guide,
Ben Lueders (24:00):
And I know you do this for other people, and I wonder if maybe that's why it comes to your mind. You value that position of guide you to others, guiding others. I wonder if, so it's like when you're stuck, it's like, well, I just need to go find someone that has the answer or can help me unstuck it.
Raj Lulla (24:17):
Yeah. I think a lot of this is just how I've figured out that I learned best is that I honestly hate business books. Part of the reason I haven't written one yet is because, and most people joke about it, it's like, oh, you read the first 20%. You get the whole idea. And so yeah, there's services like Blinkist or whatever that summarize those things, that 10 minute chunks for you. But for me, I would rather talk to somebody like Dan who has implemented this in his business and go, oh, yeah, read this book. Not go stand at the business book section of Barnes and Noble and go, I don't know. And then hope that you pick the right one.
(25:02)
Go find somebody who has obviously solved the problem that you have, and then ask them how they solved it. And even if they give you homework for, one thing I would say is that if we take those meetings, take incredible notes, show them that you're engaged, that you're taking them seriously, that you're not wasting their time, and this isn't just for justice for everybody that you are going to do and take seriously the things that they give you. Again, this is a little bit like what we just talked about with the nonprofit thing is when they take a meeting with somebody who can provide no other value to them, it's not going to make their business more money. They're hiring you to do something in their life. Maybe they get satisfaction out of teaching, out of coaching, out of giving back to their community out of something. And if you fail your end of that by not taking notes or by one that really bugs me is arguing, well, I've tried that, and it's like, you came to me, me and asked this question, and that's not the same thing as digging deeper and saying, okay, in the past when I've tried this, this has gone wrong. Can you advise me on that? It's not the same thing. It was like, no, I've tried that. It doesn't work. That
Ben Lueders (26:15):
Ends the conversation. Totally.
Raj Lulla (26:16):
It's like it shows you don't care. Okay, I didn't realize you asked me to coach you so that you could be the expert in the room.
Ben Lueders (26:23):
Okay. Another pet peeve since you brought this up is I get a lot of portfolio reviews for here's, students are reaching out. They want me to look at their designs, tell 'em what's good and bad. I do get excuses sometimes where people kind of saying, no arguing with me. That doesn't happen so much. The one that really drives me crazy when I give what I think is really great advice on how to make it better, and then they come back a year later to have another conversation, they haven't changed any of the things that I told them. It's like, okay, well maybe you haven't gotten a job in the last year because you didn't actually apply the feedback that you get. So yeah, you make sure that you're in a place to receive learning. If you're reaching out to someone to help, you need to make sure you're opening up your heart, you're opening up your mind to be wrong, to be challenged, to try things and instead of arguing or just receive it, receive it and see, and it's okay, like he's saying to dig deeper, but that's different than just down.
Raj Lulla (27:26):
And also to get multiple perspectives. One of the things that's horrible in business is survivorship bias, where if somebody asked me, if someone were to ask me how to become a brain strategist, I'd have to explain them to them that I started a nonprofit, became a wedding photographer, and then got a brand strategy when probably truthfully, the thing that really started the whole trajectory was taking journalism in high school. And so if you're 35 and asking me this question, sorry, it's too
Ben Lueders (27:51):
Late. It's too late. Yeah, I get similarly, you'd be like, how did you do? It's like, dude, it's such a weird path. No, you could not recreate how I got, and we're different people and it's okay.
Raj Lulla (28:02):
One other really, really big thing with learning that I wanted to make sure to mention is that schedule, schedule schedule is so important. I was
Ben Lueders (28:10):
Just going to say that Raj talk on it,
Raj Lulla (28:13):
And
Ben Lueders (28:14):
I love a good schedule.
Raj Lulla (28:15):
And here's what I mean by that. I would argue, and this might be controversial, I don't think it is, but I would argue that whatever your job is in any role where especially in information businesses where you have control, and it's not customers coming through the Starbucks line kind of thing or fixing somebody's pipes, but especially in knowledge businesses, you should try to get your work done in four days a week or 80% of your time, and then you should reserve 20% of your time for learning, for experimentation. That research and development stuff for even just review of how things have gone and what we could maybe do better, all of those things. Part of the behind this question, the why behind this question is how do you make time for learning in a busy small business? And one of the answers here is you have to structure your job and your business itself to account for learning time because if you don't, eventually you will just do things the same way until you burn out or until the business dies
Ben Lueders (29:32):
Because
Raj Lulla (29:32):
The world changes around you and the world is going to expect you to change. But if you don't make time to embrace that change, again, I think it should be about 20% of your time, then you are going to get left behind. And not everybody has that much autonomy in their business. And so part of it is sometimes you have to lead up to your managers and to your bosses and those kinds of folks, but pitching this and pitching it well to them is a very, very good idea. My personal schedule, I reserve one hour a day for what I call review slash work time. Now, most of the time that's emails and slack messages and getting back to people reviewing things, that sort of stuff. That's why it's called review. But if I happen to not have anything that day, what am I going to do? It's not scroll on Instagram. It's not mess around. It's going to be to go learn something that I'm curious about right now. Even just little things like how do I make that sell in Google Sheets, do the calculation that I need it to do. Just those little bits of improvement daily or weekly add up to, I mean, I am so much better with spreadsheets this year
Ben Lueders (30:46):
Than I
Raj Lulla (30:46):
Was two years
Ben Lueders (30:47):
Ago. If you have any spreadsheet issues,
Raj Lulla (30:48):
Go away. That's
Ben Lueders (30:49):
Our new core service. We have a spreadsheet genius here. It's right. You have gotten really good and it's like, man, next level.
Raj Lulla (30:57):
I think I've gotten too competent from incompetent with them
Ben Lueders (31:01):
And I can actually, I'm still incompetent read
Raj Lulla (31:02):
Them. I can actually manipulate them a little bit now enough to where I need to where I wasn't at that level before. And so daily review and work time is a big thing. And then as far as how I structure my week, I do my best to not take any client meetings on Friday ever. And so it's all internal work time. What that tends to do is that most of my work for the whole week will be done by Friday around two or three, and that leaves time for networking, for reaching out to those people who can teach you things for investing in other people who by the way, half the time when you invest in other people, you learn something from them. You got to give yourself space. And one of the ways that this ends up working its way back into your business is that if your prices aren't such that you can give yourself that much time, your prices are wrong because again, the market is going to demand of you that you keep up. Your client's not going to be happy if you're using five-year-old methods on current websites. And if you aren't giving yourself or your employees time to keep up with the things they need to, they are going, your business is going to fail eventually. You're going to become the joke on the street. And we don't want that for anybody.
Ben Lueders (32:31):
Absolutely. So one thing that's coming to my mind here that I think is an important thing to call out is Raj is an introvert and I'm an extrovert,
(32:41)
And you hear Raj talking about learning sounds like although he is learning from other people, a lot of it's like, Hey, he's scheduling this time, he's talking about, but you can learn together too. And I think that's another important thing too, is if you're feeling the need to need to be learning new things and to grow personally, I bet especially if you are leading a company, everyone on your team needs that as well. That's why it's a value of ours and a way that you show that you value it is you make time for your whole team to learn together. So that can be in lots of different ways, but one way that we've done it is for our design team to set aside a certain here's an hour time slot every week that we're all going to learn together. Now, I will confess that we kind of got off that schedule.
(33:25)
Our schedules didn't align where it used to on Wednesday morning. We need to get back to it though, and it could be different things. Sometimes we would be looking at big rebrands that just happen and just learning how to talk about good and bad design. Sometimes be watching a tutorial, watching a Skillshare class together, learning a design technique. It could be anything. So anyways, that could be another thing to do is if you value this, other people on your team should be valuing this as well and do it together. And then that way there's accountability there too,
(34:02)
And it's super fun when you learn together, then your whole team is starting to, their knowledge is increasing, their abilities are increasing, and there's a sense of, and it's not just a sense as the reality of growth is happening, their minds are expanding. And that's when you start getting to when your team is really embracing that always learning thing, especially together, that's when you can start really experimenting and defining some of the stuff we talked about in the first question about how could we expand our core services or should our core services change? Because you're learning, you're growing, you're being aware of market changes and trends and technology. The worst thing that can happen is it's so busy doing the work, the world's changing around you. You're not learning it. You're left behind and you're that guy who never learned, and we don't want that for you. We don't want that for ourselves. That's why we made this a value of ours to always be learning. And so let's elevate that together
Raj Lulla (35:07):
And it doesn't have to look like taking a class. One simple thing that we do is when Apple has its hardware event and software events, I just throw it on conference room and we happen to provide around here, we provide stuff for sandwiches for lunch and that kind of stuff so that people could just grab food and come sit. It happens to always be at noon central time, so it's easy. Yeah, it's like everybody's already got a break anyway. I throw it on. Sometimes people gravitate in, sometimes they don't. But I mean, I remember the one where they released the Apple Vision Pro headset and we had a decent argument afterwards. Half the team was like, this is really stupid. I don't see this getting used. And then I was on the other side being like, no, I think this is huge and we'll see who's right. But getting to see how they're thinking through it and talking about business cases and what might this mean for websites and work and all of this things, seeing how York
Ben Lueders (36:11):
Team reacts to innovation and change and it's
Raj Lulla (36:15):
Just, and great presentation and visuals and so much to talk communication.
Ben Lueders (36:19):
And I think another thing on that is that when you find something that you really love and are passionate about, you make time for learning about
(36:30)
It. And I think that's another thing that I think is really fun is Raj obviously is passionate about comedy, and so he finds ways to get comedy into his life. Same with us and Apple technology or whatever. It's like we are kind of nerds about it and we like to know what's going on and we find ways to get our whole team to watch it. And so if learning feels like this thing that you have to do because of, you know what I mean? You have to cram in. Maybe you're not learning the right things or focusing on the right things, find those things that maybe are even adjacent to what you're doing for work that you just get excited about it. I think there's something to just getting passionate, nerdy, and excited. I was chatting with Jonathan Kaiser who was just on the podcast. He's really passionate about the design of watches, and I got really excited about that and talking to him and he just can nerd out and go really deep into the history of these brands and the technology and all this stuff. And it's just funny when you are really passionate about something, you do find the time for it, and so I think that might be part of it. Just make sure your heart is in it and that you're excited about something.
Raj Lulla (37:44):
Although I will say the other side of that though is that when people ask me how to get into creative business, one of the things that I always tell them is learn the business side first because you're going to naturally learn about the creative thing. And so yes, I a hundred percent agree with that, that you're going to naturally learn about the things you want to learn about, but there are some things that you have to strap yourself to the chair and learn in order to get the fundamentals of it,
Ben Lueders (38:08):
Or you just partner with someone who does that for you.
Raj Lulla (38:10):
Well,
Ben Lueders (38:12):
That said
Raj Lulla (38:13):
Though, I mean along the lines that you're saying is that that doesn't mean that it has to
Ben Lueders (38:17):
Be hard,
Raj Lulla (38:18):
And one of the best books that I've read in the last few years was Effortless by Greg McEwen, and he just asked the very simple question, can this be easy? And so one of those pieces of learning, then it could be going to somebody going like, Hey, I don't think that I'm ever going to get spreadsheets out of my life. How can I make this easy? Our C F o, Mike from C F O S, our fractional C F O, he met with us our first time and I explained to him the frustrations with our numbers. I didn't like the way that our profit was being represented on the spreadsheets, and I didn't like not having just this clear view of what's happening every week and what money's coming in, what money's going out and those things. And he goes, oh, well, that's easy. And so part of it is just like, Hey, here's all my frustrations. How can we build something that's easy? We hired an expert to build the system for us, and then the system runs. And so some of it isn't necessarily that you're ever going to get out of it eating your vegetables or exercising part of work. It's like, so sometimes you just have to do the thing that's healthy, but it doesn't mean that it has to be hard.
Ben Lueders (39:34):
Yeah. Well, and that's a big premise of that book, atomic Habits Too,
(39:39)
Which I read, and if you haven't read that, that one really unlocked something for me in my personal life. It's always been so hard for me to schedule working out. Working out is the thing that's just so easy for me to skip. It's been hard for me to, I've been a member of so many different gyms and then cancel my membership. I never go, and one of the things that in Atomic Habits, it's this exact thing of how can you make it harder to say no? So one of the things he used, the example I think of a gym where it's like, how about the gym is in between your workplace and your home? You don't have to go out of your way
Raj Lulla (40:17):
Ever.
Ben Lueders (40:18):
So it's like something you literally have to pass by every day and you have an opportunity and that the classes class times for the gym or whatever it is that aligns with a certain time in your schedule. And so I did that. I analyzed a gym that was between my home and my work, and they have a class time as I get off of work, and so I'm literally, most days I'm driving right by my gym with at the time that my class is starting, which is
Raj Lulla (40:48):
Obviously strategic on their part too. Oh
Ben Lueders (40:50):
Yeah, super great, but it's just in the last year. I've been there a year now and I have worked out way more consistently there. They also charge you way more money, so you feel like you have to go. There's a little bit of that, and there's something about that. Our money can speak to this. You pay for a class, you pay for a conference, you're going to show up,
Raj Lulla (41:09):
Right?
Ben Lueders (41:09):
There's something when you put that skin in the game, and so there might be something there too, but yeah, atomic Habits effortless. Is that the other? Yeah.
Raj Lulla (41:17):
Well, and along those lines that you're talking about, I have a habit with working out in particular that in terms of making it easy, I got a lot of equipment from my home so that it's right there, but literally, I mean, this is, and some doctor or somebody's probably going to yell at me for this, but literally one of the things that I discovered is I don't have to wear shoes. If I'm lifting weights, I'm pretty sure my posture is actually better when my feet are flat on the ground and the reason why I wear shoes at the gym 24 Hour Fitness or Lifetime or wherever is because other people are there, but if I'm in my own home, it's not like the cloth of the top of the tennis shoe is going to prevent me from smashing my toes with a weight, and so I'm not wearing steel toed boots to work out, and so just literally just not wearing shoes is one way to do that. The other thing with working out in particular that I'll do, and this goes into learning, is I have a little reward system that I do.
Ben Lueders (42:17):
Yeah,
Raj Lulla (42:18):
Yeah,
Ben Lueders (42:18):
That's good. And that's an atomic.
Raj Lulla (42:19):
There was a podcast, the West Wing Weekly that I only listened to in the gym. I would only allow myself to listen to it in the gym, and so it was a little treat that I got for working out now because it's in my house. I have a TV down there.
Ben Lueders (42:33):
I love that you listen to West Wing Weekly while you work out. I got to be pumping up music or Jocko Willink or something. You're like, I'm listening to this nineties TV show or whatever,
Raj Lulla (42:44):
Early two thousands TV show
Ben Lueders (42:46):
Commentary.
Raj Lulla (42:47):
Yeah, a hundred percent.
Ben Lueders (42:49):
He's pumping steel in there,
Raj Lulla (42:52):
But it's like I pretty much only watch Star Trek Picard while I'm doing that. In part because working out by myself, my wife doesn't watch a show with me, but it's like, it is this kind of me time, and so it could be for you that it's a can of Diet Coke and a business book, or it could be a piece of chocolate and a podcast or something. When you schedule those things, you make the reward frequent. You actually begin to look forward to this part of your day.
Ben Lueders (43:19):
Again,
Raj Lulla (43:19):
The structuring of it is so important because otherwise, if it's random, it's just not going to be prioritized.
Ben Lueders (43:24):
Raj, I think this is a two question episode. We do have more questions and we're going to have another q and a episode soon, but please keep sending in questions. This is really, really fun, and if you have other topic ideas, we've got some of those as well. Some things that people have sent in that we're going to do whole episodes on. This is really fun. It's really fun to hear where people's minds are at that are listening to us, and it's really fun to riff on these things for ourselves as well. Anything else we want to say to close,
Raj Lulla (43:55):
We'll put a link in the show notes to submit more questions, and we would love to. Yeah, this helps us to know what you want to hear about, so thank you.
Ben Lueders (44:03):
Thanks for joining us today on Growing a Fruitful Brand.
Ben Lueders (44:05):
If you found today's
Ben Lueders (44:06):
Show helpful, don't forget to subscribe and consider sharing it with someone who might
Ben Lueders (44:10):
Also
Ben Lueders (44:11):
Enjoy it.
Raj Lulla (44:12):
If you'd like to work with Fruitful on a branding website or messaging project of your own, you can always reach out on our website Fruitful Design.
Ben Lueders (44:20):
But until next time, don't forget to grow something good.
