Juggling Fatherhood, Acting and a $60M Business

Hi everyone, my name is Dongju Kim. I am the CEO of Cherry Assistant and the host of Behind the Founders. Today we have Leonard here. Leonard, please introduce yourself to our audience and tell us about what you do and what's brought you here today. >> Hello everybody. My name is Leonard Jackson. I'm the founder and CEO of Norfleet Transportation. Uh we're a >> freight transportation provider. Um we service the I guess the world. We uh import uh cargo from other countries and we move the freight all over the United States and um been doing it for quite some time. And what brings me here is Mr. DJ here. I guess he heard about me.

You know, everybody knows Northley Transportations. [laughter] I'm kidding. We're mostly B2B, so a lot of people haven't heard of it, but uh I'm glad to be here. Thanks for having me. >> Awesome. And I see on your LinkedIn you have a couple of things that you've done. Um you have Leonard Jackson Inc., You have Northfleet Transportation and Logistics and you have Factor E Funding. Can you tell us a little bit about these different businesses and how they work together? >> Absolutely. So, Leonard Jackson, Inc., um, so I've also produced and star in a lot of television and commercials. So, and we're starting to do a lot of commercials for our own entities now. U, but I used to do a lot of commercials for, you know, Pepsi, Coke, State Farm, Geico. I've done all that over the the same course of time that I built my business. I've always had the I don't know, I got bit with the acting bug when

I was really young. I just could never turn it loose. I did stand up comedy for a little while. So, I always had this thirst for entertainment, but also this hunger for business. And I'm one of those guys where there's, as Master P would say, no limit. I just go for it. And uh and so far I've done over 200 TV commercials, about a 100 TV shows, uh a few movies, and um I built a midsize business, >> and I ran for governor last year. [laughter] >> This year, how did that go? >> It went well. I was doing really well, and I had it I ran into a brick wall because the post office uh I shipped my five years of tax returns that they need. Uh, I shipped it through the post office and they delivered it late. So, that excluded me for the ballot just like that. So, I'm very disappointed, but I'm coming back even stronger next time.

>> So, how do you balance doing all these acting gigs with running Norfleet? Um, where does your time go and how do you manage that? >> You know, this happened to me when I was really young. I was playing a lot of video games and watching a lot of sports and I said to myself, it just hit me one I was like, man, I wonder how much more I could get done if I stopped playing these games. And I found myself actually having way more time on my hands than I thought I would have. Um, people don't realize it doesn't take a whole lot to be successful. You just have to, as Nike says, you just have to do it.

And before you know it, it's like, man, I got plenty of time on my hands. I mean, I still watch sports. I don't play as many video games, but you know, I have four kids. I have a wife 20 20 what is it? We've been married 26 years. I have four kids and I very active dad. I go to all their games. I coach them. I run all their uh programs. A lot of the programs with the school. >> Um I still go to auditions. I still do acting jobs. I I I you know people don't realize [clears throat] time management is one thing. If you could get that down it will change your life.

>> Right. And where does factor E funding fit into this? >> Yes, sorry. So factor E, so a lot of companies in my space, um, you know, we're a transportation logistics company. So we do ocean, air, uh, rail freight, uh, full truckload freight, less than truckload freight. Um, and a lot of companies in my space, what they do eventually, um, is they start a factoring company. What is factoring? Well, uh, a lot of these truck and companies that you hire to do your loads, they're a lot of mom and pops. They don't have a lot of capital. So, factoring allows for them to get capital instantly. So, for example, if they do a shipment, they deliver it. They send an invoice to the factoring company. The factoring company gives them like 90% of the face value of that invoice. Then the factoring company sends it to their customer. And when the customer finally pays the factoring company, the

factoring company will give them the the remaining 10% but they hold, you know, 5% fee for that. >> So, right now, what we're doing is we have a uh what you call quick pay. So, we offer Quickay to the carriers that do our loads, >> but we're going to um evolve into just a full-on factoring company so we can help them get their money quicker, not just from doing our loads, but other companies loads. >> Interesting. Okay. So, it's almost like like payday loans but for companies where they can get their invoices paid faster. And >> that's a great way to put it. Yep, that's a great way to put it. And so, we're digitizing the process. I've always thought about doing it. Um, I recently graduated, got my MBA from Pepperdine, I would say how long ago now, almost 5 years ago. And we had a special topics weekend and it was it was pretty much focused on digitizing things. Uh this is a little bit before

AI became in everybody's conversation. Um but I that weekend really hit me hard because I thought man you know this process there's still a lot of manual there's still a lot of human interaction with these processes. It's not automated enough. So um a partner a colleague of mine in my cohort in my class uh we partnered up and we started this this company called factory and it's totally digitizing the entire process. Actually it's two started off with just one other person from my cohort but now it's it's three of us total now. Um and uh we're going to roll it out hopefully I would say by the end of the year. Um, but it's going to totally revolutionize the pro the I would say the whole entire industry.

>> Yeah. And is there is there any other companies that are doing it now or is this kind of like a new innovation? >> No one's doing what we're doing. Yep. This is and you know it's funny. I just went to a conference last week in Nashville to to to answer that question. I wanted to see who else is doing this. Is it here? Is it coming? Is it on its way? And no one's anywhere close to thinking about it, which I love. >> And it's and it's just digitizing the factoring process. >> Well, it's a little bit more than that.

Um, don't want to say too much cuz, you know, obviously no one's doing it. I don't want to give anybody ideas, but yeah, digitizes the process. It almost fully automates the entire thing. Um, but there's a few other um components to it that uh if I let it out now, it may I may create some competition, but it uh it it helps without saying too much. Uh it it allows for each party to find each other easier and to interact uh easier. Um, and it allows >> more like a kind of marketplace where you're matching people that do the factoring and people that need it, or is it a all-in-one platform where you come to get your factoring and you as a company factory provide it?

>> All the above. >> All the above. Okay. Wow. It's quite a quite a platform. And when when's that um rolling out? >> Yeah, we're looking to get it roll we're looking to have the MVP by the end of the summer. Uh we've been working on it for a while. So we're hoping to have it ready to ready to roll out to market by December, January. That's the that's the goal. We've been working on it for quite some time and we we've made a lot of inroads and this uh trip to the the conference. I really wanted to see are we not are we wasting our time, but are we going to have a lot of competition and where are they in the process? And I didn't see any. Now, there's probably people there that are holding it close to their vest, so they don't want people like me to know what they're doing. So, that may be happening, too. But, you know, but MySpace was out here before Facebook. No one's talking about MySpace anymore. So,

>> you know, >> I generally believe that ideas are dime a dozen and it's all about the execution. I mean, anyone probably has the idea. It's all about can you execute it or not at the end of the day >> and how you execute and how you execute. Yeah, I agree. So, going back to norlelet transportation. So, you've been doing that about 30 years, you said. >> Yeah. God, it sounds so bad. I mean, it sounds bad because there's companies that's been around as long as I have that are bohemoths. You know, they're massive enterprise companies and you know, we're midsize. You know, we're >> Okay.

>> You know, do you >> tens of millions versus hundreds of millions? >> Yeah. Is there any kind of numbers that you would be open to sharing about your company whether it's like topline revenue or valuation? >> People could look it up. Our top line is you know I think our largest year was just under 60 million. >> Okay. >> And that's and that's not u you know in my space these these companies do billions. >> Yeah. >> So uh and then you have some that are nowhere close to where I am. So, I think we're kind of in the middle, you know.

Um, they call us a midsize company, but >> for someone that doesn't um for someone that isn't familiar with the transportation and logistics industry, can you break down the business model where you know, let's say that 60 million revenue comes from? >> Yeah, sure. I mean, it's real simple. It's simple, high level, but when you get to the granular, it's a little bit more complicated. But a high level we haul freight from one point to the other. For example, the US military is one of our largest accounts. So they will say we have some uniforms to move from you know New Orleans to Chicago and we will say okay we'll charge you this much and they'll say okay that's fine.

So we agree on the rate then we send a truck to pick up the freight. They pick it up they deliver it. The driver gives us a what they call proof of delivery. It's a signed bill of lighting. [snorts] So, you know, Yeah. Well, I was going to say when you ship freight, you have to have a bill of laden at the shipper and then when you get to the receiver, the receiver signs to Bill Leaden and then that becomes a proof of delivery, right? So, the driver gives us a proof of delivery, we invoice the customer, and that's the A to Z of the transaction.

>> Makes sense. Okay. And I imagine for a company like that, there's probably different ways to do it. Like I assume some freight companies might own their own trucks whereas some companies might like subcontract that out and they're just like a broker for the freight. Is that >> 100%. So a lot of companies like JB Hunt, Warner Enterprises, um you see those on the road probably a good bit. They all have their own trucks and they all have uh a brokerage just like us. They're just much larger than we are. They're the ones that are doing 2030 billion dollars in revenue, but they also been around for a hundred years. Yeah. Um, but then you have your own trucks and brokerage.

>> Okay. >> That's correct. We have our trucks and brokerage. But there's some companies like CH Robinson, TQL stands for total quality logistics. They don't have any trucks and they are strictly brokers and they're doing, you know, 20 30 mil billion dollars in in revenue. So, uh, you don't have to have a truck. Clearly, they made that very clear. But we we like to have a little bit more control. That's why we keep our asset, they call it asset division. >> Yeah. What is keeping you from growing to the same size of these other companies that have been in the industry for a similar amount of time as you?

>> Excellent question. There's one thing I just discovered late in my career is a a process called EOS, op entrepreneur operating system. Are you familiar with that? >> Yep. >> So, we just ran into that and I'm so grateful because I'm starting to be able to put a lot of these ideas and processes into place and measure them. They say if you me if you can measure it, you can improve it. So that's right. >> We're trying to make sure our processes are solid and we're measuring it. And this is new to me. Whereas before a lot of my sales was just me meeting people and you know and then I would hire salespeople and nobody wants to pick up the phone anymore. You know, everybody wants to rely on emails and uh automated processes on LinkedIn and stuff like that. Nothing beats good oldfashioned, you know, well, first of all, nothing beats good oldfashioned face to face.

There's nothing beats that. That's why so many people win when they go to conventions and conferences and expos. But then I think the second thing is you got to talk to them on the phone. You have to build a rapport. You have to build a relationship. And that's where I think we really suffered. But I'm locked into that now. I have a solid team. I think um we're going to double revenues, you know, every year from here on out. So, I'm really excited about that. But the fact that I've we've been able to do, you know, 50 60 million just off of my relationships is I I got to pat myself on the back a little bit. But shame on me for not implementing a solid sales process prior. But I will say this, you know, most if not all companies in my space, they all like when you see accident attorneys, their number one expense is marketing.

>> Yeah. I don't know if you ever seen Morgan and Morgan, all these companies, you see billboards, their number one expense. Same thing in my industry cuz there's so many >> companies like ours, the competition is so steep that >> the sales process has to be solid. So when you see the big boys, they all have an amazing sales process. So the fact that we've been able to do as well as we have without it has been quite incredible, but now we're about to really show people what we could do. >> How big is your staff now?

>> Uh we have about 120 people. >> Okay, that's pretty good. I mean, doing what? About half a million in revenue per employee. >> Yeah, that's good math, man. You're quick. That's pretty good. Um, yeah. I mean, looking to expand the number of people or what are you, I guess, what is your plan to kind of increase your revenue? You said you're looking to double revenue from here on out. >> What into that? >> Yeah, we're going to have to have more sales staff and we're going to have to have more um operators, people who are actually handling the transactions. Uh, we're automating like crazy. We have a lot of AI because everybody wants to automate everything which I love. And we're not um letting people go. We're just moving people around. So that's really nice. Um and retraining people on, you know, for the future really.

Like a lot of these processes that we've been, you know, that we've been doing for years, they're not going to require adults, I mean, not adults, but humans to to process these things. So, I'm [snorts] trying to train people to stay ahead of that and and stay employed whether they're here with us or somewhere else. >> And let's get into the AI aspect a little bit more. So, as AI gets better and better, what are you doing within your company to one stay competitive, right? Because as AI gets better, that also means your competitors also get better because you all have the same access to the better and better AI tools. And two, are you looking to, you know, like what does that training look like for your employees to use AI? Are you bringing in outside trainers in? Is it something that you yourself are becoming more familiar with and you do hands-on training? What does it actually look like to kind of run a business now

where AI is getting better? right now the companies that I'm working with that are providing the software that has AI, [snorts] they provide a lot of the training, but you know what what am I doing? I'm just making sure my staff goes to the training and takes these courses and you know they're doing what they're supposed to do. Um, but it's such a it feels like it's still kind of a wild west, you know, cuz a lot of the stuff these guys are promising once we implement it like, "Hey, I thought I could do this. I thought I could do that. I thought I could do this." Oh, yeah. Well, you got to do this, you got to do. So, it's not fully automated. It's not it's not as automated as I thought it would be. So, for example, you know, we want to provide visibility to our customers and uh the AI bots are supposed to um provide updates to our customers every 15 minutes or every half hour or whatever they want. It's just

not doing that. the proof of deliveries that I mentioned earlier when they when they're sent in from the driver, it's supposed to automatically match it up to the the the proper load that it delivered in our system. It's not doing that. So, you know, we're still I feel like we're still figuring out this new tool called AI. You know, I know there's a thing called paperclip. I don't know. I I just learned about that the other day. Apparently, you could train the bots to do exactly exactly pretty much what you want. However, you have to put in like really serious boundaries because it'll go off and do all kind of things. So, >> and it takes a lot to figure >> it takes that's what they're telling me.

>> So, I was thinking, man, how much time is, you know, I have to work, you know, I have to how much time am I willing to put into that? So, >> it's still a wild west. I feel like I feel like we just have to really be careful, be focused, be diligent, and be aware that it is still fresh and don't rely on it too heavily just yet. You know what I mean? Like really look under and check things out. Don't don't don't rest on your laurels just yet with AI. That's where I'm at. >> Do you have any predictions on where it's going to be in a couple of years?

>> Oh god. I say in the next it's so fast it's moving so fast that you know AI it learns right it's cons it's constantly learning you know I thought chat GPT was amazing and now I hear you I just got Claude is it claude >> yeah you >> that's a whole another level >> open claw Hermes all these different AI agents >> Perplexity Gemini it's like a race uh and I mean I'm I'm going to be honest with you I'm looking at contract contracts, for example, you used to just sign it and just, you know, that was it. You just throw it in the one of these uh chats and it's like, "Hey, you got to sign this. Did you look at this? Did you look at that? Did you look at this?"

I'll create a response to that person, let them know they need to change these things. Like, that's going to change the game so much. Um, so in the next couple years, I I do think the bots are going to be a big deal. I just saw that Salesforce p uh acquired Slack and now they have these Slack bots. >> Yep. >> Man, we're about to see some stuff. So, I think this time next year, our conversations are going to be like, can you believe this is happening? Can you believe that's happening? You know what I mean?

>> To have you back on the podcast in a year from now >> and we can talk about changed. >> Yes. And I have a podcast, too, by the way. It's called No Halfstepping U with Leonard Jackson. Uh just go to no halfstepping.com. You'll check all my stuff. But we talk a little bit more about uh worldly things. Maybe not so much about business, but having this conversation is making me think I should probably talk a little bit more about business on my podcast. >> Yeah. Yeah, you should. I mean, it seems like you have a wealth of knowledge to share.

>> Thank you. 30 years. If I haven't picked something up in 30 years, shame on me. >> Yeah. [laughter] Yeah. Um Okay. And who is taking the initiative right now inside the company to implement and try these different AI things out? It seems like you've tried a couple of things. Is it, you know, are you just trying it out and see if they can try it out? >> It's really me right now. I want to say something. I really want people to, you know, if I don't say anything, I want to say this because I really want people to hear this. One thing I've learned in business and uh and maybe it's just me, but you got to do a SWAT analysis on yourself. You got to know your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. But one thing I've learned being in business as long as I have is uh you know, if I would have spent more time on my weaknesses or pick people to fill that void where I'm weak, I'd

probably be a lot further along than I am. Now, don't get me wrong. I know we do pretty well and a lot of companies fail after a certain amount of time. I know all that. But I just think I look at these my competitors that are doing hundreds of millions, billions. I should be right there. But these areas like hiring people, I'm not the best because I give people too many chances and you know, but this EOS thing, I think I needed to know about this years ago. Had I really know really paid attention to my weaknesses, I probably would have done it a long time ago. So know your strengths, know your weaknesses, and totally fully utilize your strengths, but also do something about your weaknesses. So I just want to make sure I say that. All right. So what was that question again?

>> People take frameworks like SWAT analysis and they kind of chalk it off as like, oh, that's some MBA framework, but it's actually really helpful for pretty much anything that you're doing, >> anything, anything. Even if you're a pro basketball player, you know, you might be really good at dunking the ball, but your your jump shots are not going down. and your overall game would be much better if you did. I know people talk about Michael Jordan all the time, but I'm a big Michael Jordan fan, too. But that's that was him. He's like, I got to work on my my jump shot. That's my weakness. And um and then when he couldn't beat the Detroit Pistons those two or three uh seasons, he went to the gym, started working out. So you if you you know, obviously you want to capitalize on your strengths, but you got to address your weaknesses. So uh and be a doer. I know you said something earlier. You got to execute. You know,

we talked a lot about this in grad school as well. You have a lot of thinkers and you have a lot of doers. You have thinkers. If you can be a little bit of both, I think that's the key. Probably more on the do side because when you do, you learn as you do, right? Because you're going to fail. Hopefully, you'll fail because you'll learn so much from the failures. >> You got to fail fast and get up and keep going. And that's the only reason why I'm in business cuz I I failed like crazy. The first year, the first year and a half I got in business, I quit. I was like, "Well, I tried, man." You know, I did the best I could [laughter] because things kept going wrong. And I was like, "All right, I guess it's not for me." And my dad said, "Are you really going to just walk away after all you put into this thing?" I said, "You know what? He's kind of got a point."

So, I went back at it and here I am today. So, you know, when you when you think it's the a brick wall, it's it's a speed buck. I I know we've heard it before. It sounds cliche, but I promise you, I'm not the smartest person in the I'm far from it. But you just got to have some uh tenacity. You got to have some fight in you. If you don't have fight in you, then yeah, maybe it's not for you. Uh go get a job and, you know, work for somebody. But if you want to have your own thing, you got to know how to pivot. You have to know how to problem solve. and you got to have a little fight in you.

>> Is there any specific advice you would give to someone who's maybe wants to get into a similar industry as you, whether it's a kind of brokerage firm or maybe they want to get into freight and logistics? Is there any specific advice you have there? And and let's say I mean obviously it's different than when you started your company 30 years ago, but knowing what you know now, is any specific advice you give to someone who wants to start out in your industry? >> Run for the heels. I'm just kidding. [laughter] No, you know, it's funny. I I was listening to a podcast today. I usually don't listen to podcasts, but I'm going to start more, but I was listening to one today. There's a guy from a company called Reed Transport. They got bought by Wernern Enterprises. Wernern is massive. But he he was talking about his beginnings. He graduated college and then he ended up um driving a forklift

at UPS and then he ended up going up from there. I actually started by working for when I was in high school. I was working for a friend of mine's dad who had a very small trucking company, but he had a trailer repair company. And he just had me he literally had me cutting the grass. And I said, "Well, I'm a pretty good I could type. I'm I'm pretty good with the keyboard. I could do stuff in office." So, he brought me in office. I think a few days later, he couldn't believe how fast I could get these invoices typed up. and I ended up being the vice president of his little company in two years. And I thought to myself, this is not that hard. Like [laughter] I've always kind of had a business sense, you know, and I would ask him, "Why aren't you doing this for this customer? Why aren't you doing that?

Have you thought about this? I've never doing that a lot." And he's like, "Oh no. Oh no." So I was like, "I'm doing this myself. Like this is crazy. He's not doing these things." And that's where I got started. But, you know, I think if you want to get in logistics, I think it's very wise to work for companies like mine to kind of learn the ropes. Um, uh, to come in as a truck driver, I don't know about that. I I don't think it's a bad idea, but I don't see a lot of these guys transition from truck driving. They kind of get there and they kind of they're kind of there, you know.

Um, but if they want to be a dispatch or they want to get into uh being a logistics specialist or uh do sales, being a sales for a logistics company, I think is key. That's huge. Especially if you want to have your own business at some point. >> Yeah. Everything >> because sales is all right. Yeah. You already know what I'm talking about. If you don't sales for for our viewers, what why is everything sales, >> man? Shoot. If you're a great sales and you can get the business, you could plug in a a CPA, uh a billing specialist, a insurance company, a bookkeeper, like you could plug those people in, operations manager, but I'm going to tell you right now, if you don't have sales, you don't have a business, period. I mean, obviously, if you have some novel amazing product that everybody needs and it totally revolutionizes some space that you're in, yeah, you may not need sales as

much, but if you're in a Red Ocean, I don't know if you familiar with Red Ocean and Blue Ocean, there's a book called Blue Ocean. I think you guys should all pick up there's three books you all need to get to listen to me right now. Rich Dad Poor Dad, uh Dale Carnegy's How to Blend Friends and Influence People, and Blue Ocean. If you want to have your own business and be successful, I highly recommend those three books. Blue Ocean, I didn't read until grad school, which is recently. And they talk about industries where there's a lot of competition, but you want to stand out. You gota So they call the they call that a red ocean when it's just everybody fighting for the same customer. But if you come up with something novel within that space, you create a blue ocean and you just you you you now are in demand because you have a differentiator. Uh so I highly recommend that book and I'm not sure if I answered

your question actually. >> We both forgot it. >> Yeah. Yeah. I think the last question was what would be like a specific um like insight or something that you give to someone who wants to get into your industry which I think you'd answered. >> Okay. Okay. All right. My bad. I I know I go on tangents but there's certain things I really want people to hear. >> Yeah. >> And this is not just me talking. This is other entrepreneurs I talked to. So, you know, um but yeah, I think those are very important things to remember. And you know, I'll say something else. Um, you know, not everybody has a stomach for this, man. You know, I I I think if you are prone to be high stress, high high anxiety, can't handle uh, you know, problems and, you know, you can't develop the problem solving muscle. I I think it's just gonna it may not some people are better off, [snorts] you know, working for for someone and

and that's not a that's not a bad thing, by the way. That's not a bad thing because you got to think about it when you're an entrepreneur, you don't get a day off. You can't take uh work comes home with you. Even if you hire a COO or you hire someone to run your business, it's you're still the guy, >> you know, there's an accident. >> Yeah. >> Yes. Yes. Um, the one thing I talk one thing I remember which is that's why I'm thinking about exiting my company. The one thing that sticks with me when I talk to people who who have sold their company is and I can't even imagine what this is like cuz it's been so long. But they said they don't even wake up and have to go to their phone first thing and check their email and wait holding their breath like, "Okay, what went wrong?"

You know, like not having that. I can't even imagine what that would be like. like you know so if you if you can't handle that then you don't need to get in this business get in any business. Um but I will say this as well I'm that guy who takes a break cuz I know if I don't I'm going to burn out. You know there's some people like my son that's your age. I'm assuming he's your age but he goes and he doesn't have a you know he doesn't take a break. He just goes goes goes goes goes. You can't do that, man. You're gonna burn out and you're gonna you're gonna cook everything. So anyway, I'm going on a I'm rambling now. So, >> well, last question for you as we're wrapping up here. Is there any certain marketing or growth strategies that have worked really well for you in your business? Because I know that you told me a lot of your um business comes from government contracts. So, maybe tell me

a little bit about, you know, any sort of sales or marketing tactics that have worked that has gotten you generally the most business. Where does a lot of that come from now? >> Well, first you mentioned conferences too. Is that is it a lot of conferences? >> Conferences, meeting people face to face is nothing's going to beat that. I I just don't think anything could beat that because let me let me give you an example. And I and I'll try to speed this up, try to condense it, but when you're doing cold calls, you got to get through the what? The gatekeeper, right?

And then if you're lucky enough to get through the gatekeeper, you got to convince this person to listen to you. uh give you a try, give you a shot, return your call, stay engaged. That that's an uphill battle. You go to a conference or expo or something like that, you meet someone, you guys kind of hit it off, talk about the Lakers or whatever, you call him next week, he's picking up that phone, you've already kind of earned the right to be in a room, if you will. >> So, nothing beats face to face. Now, the next step, I think, is phone calls. You know, some people a lot of people hate cold calling. A lot of people hate it.

And so that gives you an advantage right there. But if you finally get through that gatekeeper and you catch that guy or that lady at the right time, they might say, "You know what? I just had a car. I just had a company fail on me. Let's give it a shot. I I'm so upset with this company. Yeah, let's go." You just never know. This email thing, obviously, that's what a lot of people are doing now. Email and LinkedIn and all these messages. I'm going to be honest with you. I I once I realize it's a spam or it's, you know, something like that, I check out unless it's something I'm really needing, you know what I mean? So, my success has been the relationships. I go visit customers. I check on how their kids are doing, like the rapport, the relationships. God dang it, I said I was going to condense this.

The last thing I'll say about that is if you have a good rapport, a good relationship with your customers, when someone tries to back door or when someone tries to go to your customer cheaper rates or a better something, they're probably not going to just say, "Yeah, I'll take it." They'll come back to you first and say, "Hey, man. I'm going to just tell you this guy's coming. He's offering this, this, this." I mean, can you beat it? Can you match it? What? You know, cuz now my boss is looking at me like, "Why aren't I using this company? Why am I still using this company?" Right? You follow what I'm saying? So if you have they're not going to just cut you like that, >> right?

>> Michael Scott strategy. You watch The Office? >> Oh, I've I've seen some episodes because my kids like it, but >> Yeah. Yeah. It's just a very human element, right? Like Michael Scott in the office, he has a rolodex of every single client. He knows when their niec's birthdays are. He knows everything about them and he keeps it intact. He color codes everything so that it is as human and memorable as possible for every single customer. I can't I know it's a TV show, but I can't stress that enough. I think that's massive.

That's massive. >> And I think that's probably going to get more important as AI gets more and more prevalent. >> 100%. I mean, can I add something? So, you know, even in the dating world, like everything is this now. Like when I was dating, I I you know, there was no apps and all that. I I literally I met my wife through some friends or at a bar or at a club. Clubs are hot back then. I don't think they hide that anymore. But I had to It was a face to face, right? It was a face to face. You meet people and um I think we're getting away from that and it's making me sad. I mean, you look at the birth rate the birth rate is plummeting. Like >> it it's just it's just very And then now AI is coming and and then guess what's right behind that? Robots.

>> Yep. But they're already making them. They're already making robot companions. It's out there. See, that's that's that's where we're going to really see. >> Yeah, >> it's going to be bad, man. I not to go on a tangent. You could edit this, but I think it's going to be bad because if you could create the perfect >> companion, spouse, whatever. Why would you even date anymore? Like, I want you to cook. I want you to clean. I want you to have long >> brown hair. I want you to have green eyes. I want you to be this. And then p, you know, right there. I don't want you to argue with me.

>> [laughter] >> Yeah. Yeah. >> You know, um I want you to watch football games with me. Whatever. >> Man, we're in trouble. I I just hope that day doesn't come, but I don't know. >> It's probably going to come. >> It It's coming. It's inevitable. [laughter] >> And how do you how do you find the conferences that you go to? >> Um being in the industry, you know, somehow they know my email address. Maybe because I went to one thing and now my email, my name is circulating.

But I mean nowadays, honestly, you could say to Google or Gemini or chat or whatever, hey, I'm in this business this I'm in this space. I'm in this industry. Give me some uh conferences or expose or conventions that I should attend. [snorts] Um, and I actually did that. And he told me some that are geared towards my industry, but what they're not thinking about is any any industry that has a product that needs to be shipped, >> I should be at that conference. >> Yeah. >> To tell these people, I can ship your freight.

>> Um, so um, yeah, I mean nowadays with all this technology, it's so easy to do. >> Is there a certain strategy you do when you go to the conference? Like, are you a person that goes around the room and just talks to everyone? Do you set up a booth, like a dedicated booth, or you sell your services? Like, how do you approach conferences? I need to start setting up a booth. I think the booth idea is fantastic. I haven't done it yet. What I do is I walk around and uh I like talking to people, you know, uh but I also know people that aren't really big people people.

Uh you know, too personable and they they they do what they have to do. But I actually enjoy it. I actually enjoy meeting people, learning from people, talking to people. So, I walk around and uh I get cards and then I just follow up, you know, hey man, it was nice meeting you at the thing. Let me give you another example. I went to that conference last week. I have probably the second day I got home 10 15 people. Hey, it was great meeting you, blah blah blah. And I'm entertaining them. Whereas, if it was a LinkedIn person or something like that, I wouldn't even respond. But they're like, "Hey, Larry, it was great talking to you. Can we set up a demo next week?" I'm like, "Yeah, sure." You know, so yeah, just like you said earlier, the human element is a real thing, you know. Uh you don't have to have a big personality or anything like just be a just be yourself and talk to people like you would.

>> Yeah, we appreciate that, you know. So, uh yeah, that's my two cents on that. >> Okay, awesome. And to wrap it up, Leonard, if people want to contact you, I think you mentioned a couple things like, you know, maybe what if someone wants to work with you or I think you even mentioned you're thinking of selling your business, how would people contact you? Do you want to be contacted? How do they find out more information about you? Where would you like them to go? >> Yeah, man. Um, I I know I said I don't really respond to uh stuff on LinkedIn and emails, but if if you reference, hey, I heard you on DJ Kim's podcast, learn to talk to you about XYZ, I'm all for it. So, you can email me. Uh, you could find me on LinkedIn.

Um, yeah, I think those two those two avenues would probably be best. >> Okay, awesome. So, we can put your LinkedIn in the description and if anyone wants to find you, they can connect with you and send you a message and hopefully it's not just some spam. >> Perfect. That's perfect. Yeah. >> But, okay. Is there any last talking points you wanted to cover? >> I just want to say you do a great job, man. You know, something told me to do this. I usually don't respond to a lot of stuff that come at comes at me, but I felt like this would be a good one, and it and it is. And and and I'm glad I made the decision to come on here. I think what you're doing is great and hopefully a lot of people are paying attention. Last thing I'll say, I think, you know, at the end of the day, I don't know who came up with that whole just do it, but they are spot on. Dude, if [snorts] you have an idea, don't let

it sit in your head too long. Don't wait until it's perfect. It will be it will never be perfect. If you have an idea and you could kind of vision, if you can have a vision, uh, you just got to start because I'm telling you, you can have a perfectly laid out plan, I promise you, it's not going to go as planned. You're going to have to pivot at some point. Trust me on that. So, just get out there. Get out there and do it. >> All right. And that's the final message for everyone. Just get out and do it. Well, thanks so much, Leonard. This is Behind the Founders with Dangju Kim and this is Leonard Jackson. Thanks so much for your time and we'll see you in the next one.

>> My pleasure. Take care.