Jeremy Delk Joins Us On The Join Up Dots Podcast
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Jeremy Delk
Jeremy Delk jumped into entrepreneurial ventures with the naivety of a child and the tenacity of a tycoon.
He started day trading at the age of sixteen, learning and failing with each trade.
The paramount to his business success has been the process of adapting through failures.
Now he is a serial entrepreneur with a passion for disrupting industries.
Jeremy’s knowledge and skills as a day trader helped him land a job as one of the youngest brokers at Fidelity trading institutional equities in Boston and later in New York.
It didn’t fulfil the entrepreneurial spark within him, so he decided to go out on his own creating Delk Enterprises.
How The Dots Joined Up For Jeremy
More than 20 years later, Delk Enterprises has holdings in biotech & healthcare, consumer brands, technology, building materials, and real estate developments.
His businesses have earned hundreds of millions in revenue, created hundreds of high paying American jobs, and other notable distinctions.
Jeremy now focuses on investing and advising entrepreneurs through speaking.
His upcoming book shares his reality of the Good, Bad, and UGLY of entrepreneurship.
It serves as a not-so-subtle reminder of fundamental principles he’s learned through his journey – while great times don’t last forever, neither do the truly bad ones.
So what it is about failures that scare most people, when without adoubt it’s the key to ultimately building success?
And where does he find his passion to keep going when much of entrepreneurship is the bad and the ugly?
Well lets find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Mr Jeremy Delk.
Show Highlights
During the conversation Jeremy shares the environment that creates a fear of failure and why we are almost trained to run away from the stuff that leads to success.
Why simplicity is such a powerful intention to build into your business when you start with truly trying to solve your customers issues in life.
Jeremy breaks down the greatest trick in creating rabid loyal fans in your business in the easiest way possible.
and lastly…..
Why pivoting is always a huge important stage for your business and should never be seen as giving up.
How To Connect With Jeremy Delk
Return To The Top Of Jeremy Delk
If you enjoyed this episode with Jeremy Delk, then why not listen to some of our favourite podcast episodes such as Ron Stelle, Ted Yoder, Sean Swarner or the amazing John Latta
Or if you prefer just pop over to our podcast archive for thousands of amazing episodes to choose from.
Full Jeremy Delk Interview Transcription
Intro [0:00]
Life shouldn’t be hard life should be a fun filled adventure every day. So now start joining up dots tap into your talents, your skills, your God given gifts and tell your boss, you don’t deserve me. I’m out of here. It’s time for you to smash that alarm clock and start getting the dream business and life you will of course, are dreaming of. Let’s join your host David route from the back of his garden in the UK, or wherever he might be today with another JAM PACKED episode of the number one hit podcast. Join Up Dots.
David Ralph [0:40]
Good morning, and welcome to Join Up Dots. Thank you so much for being here with us once again. Well, we’ve got we’ve got time to spare today because we’ve got somebody who’s had quite a journey. He jumped into entrepreneurial ventures with the naivety of a child who says and the tenacity of a tycoon, and he started day trading at the age of 16, learning and failing with each trade. Now, paramount to his business success has been a process of adapting through failures, which I imagine we will discuss today is a real serial entrepreneur with a passion for disrupting industries and with his knowledge and skills as a day trader. It helped him land a job as one of the youngest brokers at a trading institutional equities in Boston, and later in New York. It didn’t fulfil the spark with him, you kind of know when it feels right. So he decided to go out on his own creating Delk enterprises and more than 20 years later, he’s been holding holdings in biotech and healthcare, consumer brands, technology, building materials and real estate developments, is businesses about hundreds of millions in revenue created hundreds of high paying American jobs and other notable distinction. Now, he’s got an upcoming book, everyone’s got an upcoming book, but this one looks good. It shares the reality of the good, bad and ugly of entrepreneurship. It serves as a not so subtle reminder of fundamental principles he’s learned through his journey. While great times don’t last forever, neither do the truly bad ones. So what is it about failures that scare most people, when without a doubt is the key to ultimately building success? And where does he find his passion to keep going when much of entrepreneurship is the bad and the ugly? Well, let’s find out as we bring onto the show, to start joining up dots with the one and only Mr. Jeremy Delk.
Jeremy Delk [2:38]
Good, good. Thanks for having me. Really excited to be here.
David Ralph [2:40]
It’s lovely to have you here. So obviously, you are of American descent. Whereabouts are you sir?
Jeremy Delk [2:47]
So I’m in Lexington, Kentucky. I grew up in a small town. But our south here called Bardstown, Kentucky, with the bourbon capital of the world. But then I lived in New York for about 10 years. And last, so I got a muddled accent a bit, right. So I’m not don’t sound like the southern drawl Kentucky that you may be accustomed to. But yeah,
David Ralph [3:08]
I’ve been to Lexington, Kentucky, and I have wandered the streets of your hometown. So I know, I know exactly what you’re doing. So let’s jump straight into because this is interesting. It’s the bit that made me really want to speak to you. And it was this one line. Great times don’t last forever, neither do the truly bad ones. And we all kind of know that because we all wake up every morning, we’ve lived another day, we’ve lived another year, and we’ve lost people that we love. And we’ve been fired from our jobs and think that the end of the world is nice. But things change seasons change. So why do you think people are so frightened of the bad times? When actually they’re the ones that teach you so much?
Jeremy Delk [3:54]
Yeah, look, I think it’s a great question. And probably one with a lot of layers really, you know, I think part of it is is early in life, right? And maybe even just like the conventional education system, that’s, you know, on the US and probably, you know, in abroad like we’re you are, there is this innate component to try and steer away from failure, right, even at a young age, like, you know, how you’re how you’re grading in school and what you’re doing, you know, that, that success or straight A’s to failure is really, hey, you need to work hard, you need to work hard. And, and I think early on, subconsciously, we learned that or taught not and basically learned that failure is a bad thing. And it’s something that’s scary. And, you know, then we’ll, as you’re going through adolescence, well, what if I fail? And what are people going to think and say about me? So, unfortunately, for the most of us, we have this huge, you know, environment around us that, in my opinion really teaches us the complete opposite about failure. Your though as opposed to being scared of it, it’s something that we should really embrace because as you said, that is truly where the magic happens. You know, I get embarrassed often on one of these podcasts and you read this, you know, this bio, you just kind of read on me and yeah, that’s, that’s all the good stuff, right? That’s the Jeremy Delk call calling card and sexy stuff. That’s the sexy stuff. But you know, Inc 500, and big exits and taking companies public, all those things. That’s all BS really, right? I mean, I’m proud of them. And I don’t want to discount them. And we are the 24th fastest growing company in the US fourth in healthcare. Those are all big accomplishments. And I don’t want to discount them. But that’s the result of a massive, massive amount of failing, right. And that’s the lessons that I kind of have learned and taken away. And retrospectively looking back that that’s really where the magic is. And that’s why I’ve been so successful is kind of continue to keep going, and why my strike rate tends to be better. I’m not smart, David, I’ve just seen a lot of things failed a lie.
David Ralph [6:06]
Yeah. But I’m gonna jump into that, because that is smart. Seeing a lot of things, I think, is the key, where a lot of people just get their head down and just stay in one environment, and they don’t look around. And so they hate a job. And then they get another job in the same kind of environment. And I always think to myself, Why do you do that? But it’s because they haven’t seen the things and seeing the things and curiosity is a key, isn’t it?
Jeremy Delk [6:33]
Absolutely. Absolutely. Now,
David Ralph [6:36]
what are you always curious as a young chap, were you always somebody? Because I was always somebody that would say, why, why why do we have to do it that way? And I always used to get the answer. Well, that’s the way we’ve always done it shut up. But I always just looking at it thinking, this seems stupid, I could do this in half the time and get the same result. So why, and it was always looked at as a kind of a bad thing. I was cutting corners. I used to think, well, that’s great to cut corners get the same results in half the time you can build on more results. What about yourself?
Jeremy Delk [7:10]
Yeah, well, I mean, I think that I, I framed it now in this, you know, looking back at life, I think I understand a bit more. But I was always desiring and wanting more, I mean, not to get into like a whole counselling session with you. So I lost my dad when I was young. And that was a bit of a traumatic event in the fact that, you know, obviously, it’s a tough thing, and everyone deals with loss. But I think for me, I was seven. And it really taught me a huge lesson that I didn’t understand until later in life, but you’re not promised tomorrow. So it’s really kind of had that level of me wanting to always go and do more, see more and be more and that’s really how I kind of frame for my life. And then combining that with, you know, that curiosity of wanting to learn for me, that’s what I really enjoy. And it’s industry agnostic. I mean, I’ve been from building materials to health care telemedicine, dying. I mean, there is no talk of the show Join Up Dots, there is no way you could have framed this out and drew a plan. They’re just there’s zero possibility. But it was always that constant pursuit of wanting to learn and do more, and just experience and be exposed to things and things that were interesting to me. And to the point that the line you just said, I’ve heard it all my life. And that’s where I’ve been so successful, is I pay zero attention to how things have been done. I don’t care. Don’t tell me, I have zero interest. Because what I found in life and in business, that, you know, people are people are people, people do business with people, I don’t care what industry b2b b2c, you know, that’s what it is. And if you go down to that human element, that’s all that matters. And that’s when if you do that, with that, naivety that you talked about, and you go into it, and you’re like, Hey, I’m gonna go do it this way. With this perspective, that’s when you can now a lot of times it doesn’t work. And this isn’t a sure surefire pan. But when it does, you have the ability to truly disrupt something because you weren’t going in at it and approaching something at a completely different way. So I actually purposely try not to know how it’s been done. Because that’s just my opinion, just clogs it I want to go through with how would I do it from a fresh perspective, and that
David Ralph [9:27]
doesn’t teach you something, knowing what other people do you know, for example, if I was given a load of twigs, and I was told to start a fire, and I’ve never seen anyone else start a fire, I might sit there scratching my head for a while trying to work out, you know what fire was in the first stage and how to do it. So doesn’t it teach you something looking at other people, even if you look at them and think, have I stupid, I can do it better?
Jeremy Delk [9:51]
What you just said was that was the was the kind of but but I mean, I’ve adapted right I mean, I now I approach things So much more tactically than I did 20 years ago. But let’s use your example of twigs if I, I go deeper, why do they want fire? Well, they want fire because they want warmth, perhaps, maybe they want to cook food or sterilising things, I go back into the desired outcome of what they’re trying to achieve, then try and achieve that because at the root of it, people are buying things consuming things, meeting things, because they’re trying to feel a need or a want, period. So I focus on that customer obsession, then work backwards, you know, along the way, you know, ostentatiously in this, like from from, you know, being around it, you may have some understanding of how other people are doing it. So I’m not like I’m cognizant of that. But it’s not part of my process, to getting me to where I’m going, I really go and focus on what the end result is.
David Ralph [10:54]
So you are key on as I say, reverse engineering, you think, why does somebody want that car? What can I do to give them that thing? And how to make it happen?
Jeremy Delk [11:06]
Absolutely, absolutely. Now, that is,
David Ralph [11:08]
you know, that is amazing business advice. And effectively, we’ve written every business manifesto in about 10 words. So why do we need so much complexity of it? Because I am passionate on simplicity. As I say, I have always looked at things and why is it being done that way? Even very first podcast I recorded. I always thought to myself, How can I minimise or not minimalize but minimise the amount of effort afterwards? By doing stuff at the same time? What is it about business that is overcomplicated over time? Why can’t we just look at it as simply as perhaps Steve Jobs did.
Jeremy Delk [11:56]
And so, I will preface this by saying you know, I have a four year college degree and you know, so I’ve done that piece. So I am a product of that institution. And in the same thing, I will tell you I’m not I didn’t go to school for a trade and trade is not just you know, welder, it’s in my opinion, a trade is a physician, a doctor, a lawyer, engineer, that’s, that’s a trade. I’m of the opinion that most entrepreneurs, most people in business, you don’t need that conventional pathway. What I learned in college, I use very little of the, from the book textbook side, what I what I use from college is hat, being able to have a conversation with a billionaire multinational CEO, to the housekeeper, and be able to speak, understand and hear what someone’s needs, desires, thoughts, wants and be able to do that, that, for me is the skill set, I really took away from school from going through a diverse campus background. So just like I preface that by saying I’m not the biggest proponent of conventional education, because just like what we learn, as adolescents going through and failures about thing, I think that a lot of times, unfortunately, the ones that are teaching us are making it more complicated than it needs to be. You know, I spoke at the university Kentucky here last year. And I was just shocked. I genuinely just felt bad, right? Because the entrepreneur teacher had never been an entrepreneur, like what are you talking about? Like you’re reading theorise stuff from a textbook like it just not real. And I think it just does a disservice. So you’re 100%? Right. Most times, the most direct line and the simplest approach is the best. You don’t need to make it complex. Look at some of the technology. You talked about Steve Jobs and look at that basic component. There, that vision that Steve had was to that was unheard of. No one needs a computer, personal computer, that just for like Harvard, MIT and supercomputers. And for the nerds, no one would ever need that. Like he went back to the what I kind of mentioned on you know, well, why would someone want fire food warms that type of piece? He went down to that really core component. And in looked at it from the human element. And then how do we deliver that, you know, the advent of the mouse to be able to kind of point we initially do point when we’re having conversation. So breaking it down that some simplicity? Yeah, you need tech and you need some things to actually make it work in there was a huge what he did for technology’s absolutely amazing. But it started with that basic premise of, you know, what someone wants?
David Ralph [14:41]
That makes sense. It makes total sense. And I was hanging on every word fair, because, you know, the way that I do business is basically yeah, at the end of the day, if we’re being totally open about it, it’s to open somebody’s wallet. Yeah, we’re all in it for business. We’re all in it for profit. But I always think how can I put that person’s mind One line at rest. That, you know, I don’t call things sales funnels, I call them trust funnels. And I always mentioned that word a lot and Join Up Dots. Because I think ultimately, when somebody is in a position of guy, yes, I can put my credit card in there. And I will be all right. You’re ahead of the curve. And I think we miss that belief that there’s somebody behind it. When they click on a button on a website, or they purchase, ultimately, it’s somebody have in their mind put to rest. So how do you build that into your businesses? When you’ve got so many strings to your bow? How do you build that trust into it? But customers look at you and go, I don’t have to worry. It’s fine.
Jeremy Delk [15:46]
Yeah, well, I think it’s a great question. And I think I can’t agree with you more, especially with EECOM. Right with EECOM. There is. So I’m a I’ve got a media company as well. So I know you know, Russell Brunson and I can talk to you about funnels and upsells and down cells and retargeting. So I know all the shtick and the trick, and sometimes as marketers or as entrepreneurs, we get so innate to the art and the craft of like the funnel and the trip wire, and like all of those things, that you totally lose sight that at the end of it, it’s someone in Oklahoma, that’s putting in their credit card, and that there’s a customer on the other side of it. So I think the way to do it is just make yourself do that. Hey, listen, we had 100 orders yesterday, stop and think about that. That’s not like that’s not a process. Of course, it’s a process you need to do to ship and fulfil them. It’s an email confirmation, all those things. But you touched 100 individuals yesterday with whatever is your good product or service. Right? You did that? So if you want and everyone’s like, Oh, how do I get 200? How do we three, like in so many people just try to go wider. I will give you a great tip on how to go so much deeper, and how to build raving fans with your customers. And it’s really complex. David, it’s really, really crazy, crazy idea. So you might want to write this down. What you do is you reach out, not with a ringless voicemail, or like a multi channel text campaign, you reach out and fucking call them. And you say, Hey, David, it’s Jeremy. Thank you. You just bought my good product or service? Tell me about it. How was your experience? How can I help you get the most out of it? You will blow their mind. Because no one does that. We spend so much time and money in an effort to capture that customer, then we throw them away and get on to the next one. That you all that efforts, all the things that you’ve done to get them there. And then you just curb them when you got them. Now go deeper with that customer. Why don’t you buy this, David? What else do you need? What’s your problem? How can I help you solve that? Right? It’s, it’s so simple, yet no one is doing it. And if you want to differentiate yourself, I don’t care what you sell information, bottlecaps twigs to make fire, you will be a complete standout amongst any of your competitors in the industry. I guarantee it.
David Ralph [18:30]
Well, everyone who downloads anything from my website, and its most of its free, will always get a personalised video from me that I send by email to just say, Thank you, you’ve downloaded that, you know, if you need any help, let’s go forward and make it happen. And you get very rare, you get responses. But the responses build up, you know, and I don’t think it takes a lot. I’ve actually got an offline business as well. And one of the things that we always try to do in the offline business is make the customer feel special, you know, greet them, when they come in. As soon as they walk through the door, just smile at them say hello. And it’s that personal interaction that’s been lost from the days of the marketplace where you’d set up a stall and you’d catch people’s eyes and you bring them over to your wares. Do you think people are scared of connectivity now, that the fact that they can sit behind their laptops and their mobile devices and send out victory IO on Twitter and think that nothing can come back to them? Do you think on the other side of actually building businesses? We want to stay hidden as well?
Jeremy Delk [19:42]
Yeah, I mean, I think that’s a deep question. I think if you look at some of the best marketers and I know like, you know, Ryan Deiss Edwin, the Fraser Perry Belcher, I mean, I know like somebody they created Digital Marketer and you know, I’ve trained 10s into In the 1000s, of marketers, if you look at some of the greatest marketers in the world, most of them are actually introverts, right? They like they can, they can have the biggest voice and the biggest personality, but you know, you set up and meet with them over coffee, and they’re just like terrified. So I think that that is true to it to a degree. I think, people however, even they have the fear and are introverted. people crave connectivity, they crave an end. And I think on the back of what we just came out of this global pandemic with COVID is that there’s a yearning for even more look at concerts. Right? I mean, Steve Jobs, iTunes, Apple, I mean, we can get music instantly, right? On straight away. What you don’t have is that connected feeling experience with why concerts now are selling out everywhere, just because people want to have had that. So I think the way you’re doing it is brilliant. Because you may, it may be an SR download of the video, but maybe you’re giving them an opportunity to have that. So this way, with yours, you are still getting, hey, I consume this piece of free content or paid content from David. And he checked in on me and see how it was. And then you offer like, hey, good luck, here’s some tips and trips to how to maximise it. And then you maybe you give that offer, hey, if you want more. Now, let me know, I’m happy to hop on the phone or get someone on the phone to chat with you. And at least give him that opportunity to do it. So you’re serving everyone. But I feel like in this day and age, there’s a higher need and want desire for connectivity
David Ralph [21:44]
than anything else. Because I was hoping when COVID here and whenever you listen to this podcast we had, we had some weird shit going on in 2020. And you might not even know about it. So ask your parents if you ever listen to this podcast, but I thought that it was going to be a reset. And I don’t see it was now I think it was just a pause. I think the things that we realised that we wanted, we wanted quietness, we wanted simplicity, we wanted better air quality. We wanted deeper connections with people. You know, it was the first time in life that I’d said hello to my neighbours, four houses down, which it never happens. You say hello to the people next door to you, but for houses down whoever they were. But now it’s gone back exactly as it was before. And I think that we we missed a trick with that. And I also think that we missed the ability to actually understand what it is to be human somehow, which is a big part of business. Because we’re dealing with humans, I think we should have looked at this and learnt the lessons. But we’ve gone back to the darkest dark ages instantly.
Jeremy Delk [22:56]
Now I agree. I agree. 100%.
David Ralph [22:59]
But I’m glad you do. Jeremy, let’s hear from Oprah. And we’ll be back with Jeremy,
Oprah Winfrey [23:04]
the way through the challenge is to get still and ask yourself, what is the next right move? not think about, oh, I got all of this. What is the next right move. And then from that space, make the next right move, and the next right move and not to be overwhelmed by it. Because you know, your life is bigger than that one moment, you know, you’re not defined by what somebody says, is a failure for you. Because failure is just there to point you in a different direction.
David Ralph [23:35]
Now, she says that the phrase while great times don’t last forever, neither do the truly bad ones. But for many people, that decision making is very, very difficult because they haven’t got enough knowledge to know what the next right thing is. And yeah, we can talk about intuition. And we can talk about, you know, the feelings of vibes and stuff. But ultimately, how do you do it? Jeremy, when you’re moving into a new environment, and you you don’t know what the next right thing is? What do you do
Jeremy Delk [24:10]
you just move forward. I mean, I think you have to have some level of conviction. And you know, I’m a very passionate guy and I know what I want to accomplish. And I look at the destination and really enjoy the journey and I really do enjoy the process which includes, you know, a lot of a lot of failing. But for me, it just that can continue level of just moving forward and keeping going. You know, I don’t believe you’ve ever truly, permanently failed unless you quit. You may have setbacks and the little things and you call those failures but that’s the learning for me. That’s the magic. I try to fail every business I have really quickly I’ve got models to break things as quickly as I can to test the market because failure is where you kind of know and test it out. So I I actually do I don’t mean of course, no sort of business to ultimately fail, but I try to pressure test everything I do. And if they make it, then you know, you may have something and then you kind of keep keep going. But I don’t think you’ve ever, quote unquote, failed until you quit.
David Ralph [25:15]
And what we mean by quitting is actually stopping the journey because we’ve all entrepreneurship, you pivot, you know, if you were just doing the same thing over and over again, you know, there are times when you’ve got to quit, and you’ve got to look at it and go, that wasn’t working, let’s go in a different way. So we’re not just saying just keep on ploughing on head down are we
Jeremy Delk [25:37]
know and that’s, that’s a great, great point, right? Pivoting is crucial. And when I say I tried to fail things, I actually define success and failure. Early on, because, and I’ve had times in businesses that I didn’t do that, right. Sometimes business, you have the best product, the best idea you have, you have everything that just the best, the right thing and whatever. But sometimes your baby’s ugly. Sometime, it’s too early for the market, the markets understand the need is so expensive, just sometimes it doesn’t work. But because you’re so ingrained and passionate, you’ve been working on it for a year or something, it’s hard for you to remove it and you can’t be emotional, you can be passionate, but not emotional passion as drive emotion is what fears do, you kind of go through and you, you put blinders on. So there’s a very big distinction. So what I do is, let’s say I’m launching a new EECOM product, we’ll say we’re gonna put $30,000 into ad spend, and we’re going to give it three months. And unless it’s giving this type of ROI, or you know what our customer acquisition cost is, or LTV lifetime value, unless it’s doing this in three months, we’re scrapping it. And if it’s doing this will keep on falling off for another three months. And if it’s not, then we’re gonna double down and start spending 50,000 hours a month on ads, I set that goal early on that way, when I get to that check in point in three months, I’ve already I’m not comparing Well, it’s really, really good. And I know it hasn’t done this. It’s binary, it’s done it or it hasn’t. And then you’re the neuron. But then it’s just a definition, not just doing the same thing. Because it just trying, you know, pivoting there was a little company in the US that used to send you DVDs in the mail, right, and then you you rent the DVDs and you send them back and then it’s great, you’d have to go through that rewinding and, you know, whatever they struggled. I haven’t got a DVD in the mail in a very, very long time. But I’ve got this little app on my phone with a with a red end on it called Netflix. Right, Netflix was failing, try to sell to Blockbuster for some stupid not on number, a super cheap blockbuster laughed him out of the thing. And I don’t think there might be one blockbuster left and like somewhere in Oregon. And Netflix is probably one of the biggest content producers in the world and worth a lot of money. They pivoted their business model needed to change or they would die. They pivoted and created streaming right now every Disney HBO they created Starbucks, they created streaming they they scaled to streaming. And yeah, that’s that’s the best example of pivoting and in the modern era.
David Ralph [28:18]
And I think it’s Alaska, actually the last blockbusters while I held a keep on going, but I think it is in Alaska. So what I wanted to do was jump in there and ask the question, imagine you haven’t got 30 grand to test these things out. You’re sitting there, you haven’t got anything is the star of your runway, you’re building it. What do you do to test these things out?
Jeremy Delk [28:44]
Great question. So, you know, there’s, you know, you mentioned my book, title, my book is with without a plan, a memoir of taking unbound action, and failing my way to success. And in this book, you’re going to hear like my life story, and you hear my personal journey of things I’ve done, I think there’s some really good nuggets just on relationships, love and what you should do. But a lot of business stories, and a lot of business stories that’s going to, you know, go into a lot of depth on the colour that you just talked about an inc 500 and me sitting down with Sheikh Mohammed and Dubai and having tea and all these things that are really, really exciting. And then you’re going to see the basis of them and all these businesses are still around that i i Don’t say I won’t say I had no idea what I was doing. But I had 2% of it worked out. The difference is I took action period, and that unbound action is getting there. So I talked entrepreneurs, I coach them or use a coach a bit now. I’m trying to segue that off, but I hear all these things. You know, Jeremy, I’ve got the greatest idea ever, ever, ever. If I only had this in this, just get sorted. Okay, I’m in a different space now and I’ll throw things at the wall and just you know, I don’t I’m probably to the extreme of fear, I’ll just go forward and in plough through it, and don’t worry about the consequences sometimes. But you don’t have to be that extreme. You if you’ve got a great job and you’ve got a family, I’m not a proponent of saying, Well, you need to go all in quit your job and just sink or swim. That’s stupid. It makes no sense, right? I’m wired that way. And I’m a bit crazy, probably. But you have friends, don’t you? David, right, you have a network, you’ve got someone that you can go through, you can whittle a prototype and go through I mean, you can do product market research at Thanksgiving or Christmas holiday, right? I mean, you can go through, but just get started. If you really believe in it, just get started in some small way. And when I talked about labelling, you know, success or failure, make that your early roadmap. So I said 30,000 hours, it fails, it doesn’t make it. If I could talk this up at a coffee shop to five people, and they’re interested, then that that that little thing we have any conversation will cost nothing. If I do that in people, two out of five or three out of five seem interested, then I’m going to try and have something at my church, or I’m gonna have something at my rotary club. And then if 20 people, so just make a goal, and set some sort of success or failure like well, now I’ve talked to 100 people, they are really like it. Now I may ask my friends and family to tip in 100 bucks. And now I got to just get started. Get started
David Ralph [31:32]
now. But I think that takes us into the environment that we were talking about at the beginning, where people want to just sit behind their laptop. They don’t want to have 100 conversations with real people, do they? They want to keep everything precious. Until today. They’ve been spending three years building something, but they deliver to the world and nobody actually wants it.
Jeremy Delk [31:55]
Right. But even if you’re not going to have the conversation at Starbucks, I mean, there’s a little thing called social media. Right? And there is a there is a Facebook group and message board. Are you gonna read it for everything? Yeah. Do you like antique kite knitting, I guarantee you there’s a frickin antique kite knitting club somewhere in the world that you could go through and say hey, what do you think about this yarn or whatever there is a group so if you don’t like that, you know social component, physical social, go digital and have that and then put it hey, this what I’m thinking about doing or posting a try some stuff on Etsy, right? I mean, there’s so many platforms different than me. I don’t know how old you are. David. I’m a 42. couple kids. Man when I had an idea 20 years ago, shit was hard man. Like you had to have a store to shopfront Do you can launch a business for nothing. Next to nothing, there is no excuse at all period in the story. If I wish we could turn this into a radio show and we open to callers give me anybody. There is no excuse to not just get started not to go to work. I also think I don’t know that everyone’s built to be an entrepreneur. But there are so many things that make things make it easier now Shopify building a website I couldn’t develop anything myself and I still can’t I’ve got a team but you know, with with Bronson’s Click Funnels, like you could build a lander, it’s there’s so many things that are out there, YouTube, the amount of your site as as, as a resource, there’s so much content to be consumed for free. Right, you can get any question answered that you would ever want, by a little website. This guy surrogate created it his partner called Google,
David Ralph [33:40]
it’s pretty popular. It is pretty popular.
Jeremy Delk [33:42]
I think it’s gonna last I don’t know. But I think it’s gonna last
David Ralph [33:46]
I think he’s got legs somehow along the line. And probably an anagram of Google is legs in there somewhere. Now, one of the things that I had on a show was a guest who basically would go off to lunch, he would spend $30 on Facebook ads. And basically he would say, I’m thinking of doing this product. Would you buy it? Yes or no. And basically, he would just come back after go into Starbucks and having a cup of coffee and a sandwich. He’d come back, and he’d get 60 responses. And he would look at that. And that would be the starting point. And I listened to that. And I thought, that’s just simple, isn’t it? It’s like, so simple. It’s where we struggle on business. Because simplicity seems like it’s not serious enough, but it’s the key and I scream at it at people.
Jeremy Delk [34:38]
Yep. But I mean, what’s the what’s the old adage they taught you? I don’t know where you learn about it. Was it kiss right that
David Ralph [34:44]
keep it simple, stupid, simple, stupid. Yeah, right. Yeah, I heard about you can lose 26 calories by kissing just before you came on. I was listening to the radio and I thought that’s a business. People want to lose weight. There you go. Just just move on. So where do we start them? For somebody out there that listens to podcasts? And they keep on listening to podcasts and reading blogs. And when they listen to more podcasts? What would you say, to become an entrepreneur? What’s the first step?
Jeremy Delk [35:15]
Yeah, I think the first step is, of course, just get started get going. And that’s, that’s obviously easy. And I think, oversimplified and good or bad. I think the other piece is to, that’s more important, is to lock into that emotion and that feeling of your why, why? Why do you want to do this thing that you want to do? Right? And I don’t believe that everyone is meant to be an entrepreneur, I think there’s everyone plays different roles. But I think, What’s your why? Why do you want to do it? And if it’s because you see Tai Lopez driving a stupid car, or like you see these fake influencers, and they live in this life? If that’s your why a Can I can tell you, that’s not happiness, right? Things are nice, but that should not be your y ever. And you likely won’t get there. So really, truly, what is your why? And if you have that, you know, real deep conviction that that has legs, right? I mean, I think you need to have this obsession with your good product or service, that this is so good. If I sell not that if I sell a million these widgets, I make a million dollars, that can’t be it, David, it needs to be this good product or service is so good. I have failed my customers, or the world or the market. If they don’t have it, maybe they don’t know they need it. And they don’t know why. Because they don’t know that they need fire or, or food yet, right or heat or food, they don’t know they need that. So I it’s my job to passionately explain to them why they need that. If you can anchor in with that obsession. It’s going to be hard to stop you. But you have to truly believe that you can’t be wonky, and like just lying to yourself, you have to truly believe it. But if you can do that, you’re pretty hard to stop.
David Ralph [37:22]
What’s your why? Because I realised recently what my wife is, and my wife is on a sort of business sense. I want people to believe I want people to believe that it’s in their hands, they can take control, they can do it. You know, I don’t think it’s a super talent. I think it’s just waking up every morning and working towards something with a clear goal, end of story. But I think people lack that belief that they can make it happen. So they don’t even bother. What’s your why?
Jeremy Delk [37:56]
Yeah, well, it’s a great, great question, I think, a couple a couple of layers to it. Personally, my Why is learning being exposed and experiencing things right? We’re only given one one, you know, shot at this little game they call life. So and you don’t know how long your game last, right? So if it’s worth doing, fucking do it today, right experience that you want to go on the trip, you wanna go this place you go and just go through and that’s in business and life, you have a great idea, try it today. Go see it works maybe doesn’t work, we’ll revisit again. But it’s that concept component of trying to do as much as you can to experience as much as you can pleasure or pain. That’s really it. You know, success has brought, you know, bring comes with some spoils and allows me to spend more time with my kids and travel and see new things. Those are obviously nice, but that’s not the why it just goes hand in hand with me seeing and wanting to be able to do more and have more experiences. So I think that’s me, the deep component of why I do what I do and continually go back and forth. I don’t know if I need to work anymore. Is the learning. I love that process and love learning and understanding is why I went several different industries because I really just enjoy something that is curious. And if I can help solve a problem, that’s great. And then now like with the book and like doing this podcast, I feel like I have an obligation. Probably much like you is you know, the foreword of my or the the introduction of my book do I’m a middle class kid from anywhere USA. I shouldn’t have been able to do what I’ve done. There’s no There’s no there’s nothing special about me at all. Nothing. So I hope that the takeaway of my story, give someone that setting you know, and you know, Brighton or in the UK or in you know, Tulsa, Oklahoma. It gives them that level of Hey, okay, I’ve had these thing that happened to me and that’s that that sucked. Or, but I can go and do this as well, there is no secret special sauce, other than getting started in, keep on going, don’t get hung up, don’t don’t feel bad about yourself failure happens, right? You know, it happens not to you, that happens most time for you. And a lot of times it’s hard to emotionally get yourself out that you don’t understand why and you can feel bad about yourself. But that’s not helpful. You just got to keep moving forward. And I think that’s that’s kind of that’s why why now is I want to kind of help teach people and let them know that failure is okay, you should embrace it, run towards it. And you can do anything you want. I mean, this world is a very special place. And humans are very, very resilient animals. So
David Ralph [40:48]
yeah, well, anything you want to let’s hear from somebody that has more personal failures and public failures than most people, Steve Jobs.
Steve Jobs [40:56]
Of course, it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards. 10 years later. Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something, your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. Because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well worn path. And that will make all the difference.
David Ralph [41:31]
So are you off the path? Or are you just on the bang? right path for you?
Jeremy Delk [41:37]
Yeah, well, I don’t know exactly where it’s headed at all. But I know that I’m on the right path, right. And I think it’s annoying as hell to even some of my staff, it goes through and like you’re hit with this bad news or this this event and oh my god, and like, how are you not upset? I think in embrace I just I’m well that’s funny. It’s interesting. Like, how is that funny? Well, it’s gonna be interesting how that plays out, because it will play out. Right? That you talked about some of that one of the lines of my book, you know, it’s the worst. I mean, it’s hard to when you’re in it, it’s hard to remove it. Now I embrace him like, wow, this is gonna be interesting. This is gonna make for a great story on David’s podcast. I had no idea how this is gonna work out. And if that didn’t work out, I wouldn’t have had this. And that’s happened way too many times in my life to be coincidence. So I take it as it’s all part of the ride the good and the bad, it just part of the journey. But I’m confident that I’m I’m on the I’m on the right path. But I have no idea where it’s taking me.
David Ralph [42:36]
It makes sense. It makes perfect sense. And if I’m ever in a pub telling stories, it’s always about the bad things that have happened to me that after a while become amusing because they were the bad times. You know, you’ve never retained that. That that? I don’t know, suggest that pain or suppose you never retain it, it becomes just something to reflect on. Really?
Jeremy Delk [42:58]
Yeah, for sure. I mean, or badge of honour. I mean, I blew up when I was 20. I grew up 3000 Our portfolio, it’s about 2 million bucks. Pretty cool accomplishment. What’s cooler is I blew it up in four days. 2 million to zero. Man in that moment. Worst thing happened ever. Today I will I will go to my grave thing is probably one of the top three things. One of the top three best things that ever happened to me not losing the money. That sucks. But the lesson that I learned from that invaluable.
David Ralph [43:30]
Yeah, that’s the way to move forward. Well, we’ve been moving forward on the show with Jeremy and we’re now at the point that every show heads to a sermon on the mic when Jeremy gets to go back in time and speak to his younger self and if he could speak to the young Jeremy, what advice would he love to give him well, we’re going to find out because I’m going to play the music and when it fades is better time to talk the Sermon on the mic
Unknown Speaker [43:59]
here we go with the best bit of the show the Sermon on the mind the sermon on
Jeremy Delk [44:17]
I would say Jeremy remember when you were deathly scared of taking that you know first pedal on a bike because you were scared about falling and hurting yourself and going through and your dad told you you’re gonna fall and it’s gonna hurt. But that temporary pain is never going to replace the you know, life joy, that biking and learning a new skill can can do. Just like you heard that lesson. I’m going to tell you that Things are gonna happen to you, and you’re gonna feel like a victim, you’re gonna feel like this shouldn’t This isn’t fair and like, whatever I’m telling you that those happen for you. And even though you have no idea whatsoever, why they did, you have to trust that there’s a bigger path and a bigger plan. And never stop. Keep moving forward.
David Ralph [45:21]
Yeah, great advice. Great advice for everyone. So Jeremy, for the people that have been listening today, but Join Up Dots fans, what’s the best way to connect with you?
Jeremy Delk [45:31]
You know, you can go to my website, it’s Jeremy delk.com. And I’m Jeremy s delc, de el que en all all social platforms.
David Ralph [45:40]
And when does the book come out the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Jeremy Delk [45:44]
November The eighth comes out. So yeah, if you, if you want, there’s a there’s a link on my website to sign up. And anyone that has, I’ll send him a couple of chapters for free. And I’ll come back when when when it gets close to launch, I’ll come back to you and give a give you and your listeners maybe even a free link to an e book or something like that to download because we’re launching with hardback, but I am going to do a limited release of ebooks. So if that’s something you’re interested in for your audience, sounds great. To give those for free. Yeah,
David Ralph [46:14]
yeah, brilliant stuff. So Jeremy, thank you so much for spending time with us today. Join those dots. And please come back again, when you’ve got more dots to join up, because I believe that joining up the dots and connecting our pasts is always the best way to build our futures. Jeremy Delk, thank you so much.
Jeremy Delk [46:31]
Thank you, sir.
David Ralph [46:34]
Okay, so failure, failure, failure, failure is true. And you can’t run away from failure. And I know that people sit out there and think that they, they’ve got to have all the dots joined up, aha, you’ve heard enough of these shows to know that things kind of take care of themselves. And little by little you look at it and go, Oh, yeah, I can see where I’m heading. And you can make it happen, you can make it happen. And for anybody who needs the help or the kickstart, just come across, drop me an email, I’ll send you some help or come across and get your dream business idea going. We’ve got a master email marketing to just give you the starting points of getting going. And then you can take it further but it’s all coming to you from Join Up Dots, as will new episodes as well. So until next time, thank you so much from Jeremy, thank you so much from me, I’ve given myself a pat on the back there. I’ll see you again soon. Cheers. See ya. Bye bye.
Outro [47:29]
That’s the end of Join Up Dots. You’ve heard the conversation. Now it’s time for you to start taking massive action. Create your future create your life. Easy only you live. God. We’ll be back again real soon. Join Up Dots during the gods Join Up Dots. Gods Jolina Join Up Dots
