In this episode of The UnNoticed Entrepreneur with me, we are joined by George Liu, the founder of Gym Pillars. George is going to share with us his amazing journey of building a multimillion-dollar business by offering a service and a money-back guarantee. He will also tell us how he helps gym clients to get out of the “Bermuda Triangle of Marketing” and monetise their memberships into $20,000-$30,000 a month extra.
George shared with us his journey from being an entrepreneur with no resources to having a systematic approach to success. George also emphasises the importance of engaging with the market to understand their habits and who they are, so he can serve them better; talks about the six ways to get in front of people, including direct outreach, earned media, affiliate, referrals, paid media, and owned media. He then explains the principles behind the Five-Minute VSL, where consumers are engaged with a strong offer and guarantee that reverses risk, as well as social proof. Lastly, he shared his approach to hiring based on his values and cultural fit.
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The UnNoticed Entrepreneur is hosted & produced by Jim James.
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Jim James:Hello! Welcome to this episode of The UnNoticed Entrepreneur with me, Jim James. And today, we're going all the way to Los Angeles, California, to talk with George Liu. George, welcome to the show.
George Liu:Thanks for having me.
Jim James:Look, you are on the show, and I'm delighted because you are running a company called "Gym Pillars". And you have a few things you're gonna tell us about. One is how you help your gym clients to get out of the" Bermuda Triangle of Marketing". You're gonna tell us how you've built a business by offering a service and a money back guarantee, which is amazing, and you yourself have built a multimillion-dollar business, but you're helping gyms to monetize their memberships into $20,000-$30,000 a month extra. So, George, we've got a lot to cover. Thanks for coming on the show.
George Liu:Thanks for having me. Yeah, more than happy to provide value whenever.
Jim James:Yeah. Well, look, let's "Lift some weights and do some reps". Sorry, I couldn't forgive myself with the analogy there. A bad pun, I know. George, so tell us a little bit about "Gym Pillars" and about, how you've managed to get the brand of Gym Pillars noticed. Let's start there and start with your story.
George Liu:Yeah, that's a good question. So, how we first got started, I'm listening to any other entrepreneurs. Well, I didn't know I was an entrepreneur, and I didn't know anything about entrepreneurship. And as far as resources, at the end of the day, we have just two types of resources. We have "time, attention, and energy", right? And we have "money". So at the beginning, I had neither. So, what it took to get this off the ground, it was actually a lot of hustle. To go from zero to one, the path that we took, for me, the earlier days, I didn't know what I was doing at the time. I was just doing anything and everything I can to just build traction. And what I realized, I just needed to talk to people. Because ultimately, businesses, especially service based businesses, it's both "by people for people". So for me, I took the fastest approach, which is "cold calling". A skill that I realized I needed to learn earlier on, however, I just didn't know how to do it effectively. So for me, like how I landed my very first client, that wasn't within my internal network, it was just through sheer cold calling. It was identifying which gyms I would want to work with. Having a call with them, searching up YouTube videos on "How to cold call?". And then just fumbling and tumbling my way through it and I still remember each dial that I made, my hands would be sweating profusely. I wouldn't know what to say. I didn't know where to go with the conversation. However, with enough reps, you get better with each rep that you do. And in the earlier times, you just got to do anything and everything to really just get started, right? Fundamentally, what I realized and what I learned over time is that I started developing a much more systematic approach. For me, one of the things that I had always been big on is just investing in myself to learn from other people because I think we, as human beings, we have the ability to learn from other people's mistakes versus just going through our own. Very early on, I invested 25 grand, in terms of my personal, coaching or different masterminds I've been part of. And from there, I was able to just learn different systems and how people that have succeeded. But just modeling what successful people have done, how they think and how they do. So, once they jumped into those programs, one of the things I started digging deeper into is just the value of having a system and the value of actually having wider touchpoints. Early on, there are really six ways to get in front of people when you break it down. First of all, "Direct Outreach," where you're just directly reaching out to people, whether it's calling, emailing, texting, right? It's like, just speaking with them or Instagram DM, Facebook DM, practically, right? So, that's "Cold Outreach." So, that's one. You have "Earned Media", which is in terms of investing time and attention, whether in the form of blog post, or whether in a show, or whether in a podcast, or whether in Facebook and Instagram posts, or anything related to you putting time in to ideally get in front of more people that you want to get in front of and be able to turn to what we call "traffic" and turn those people into conversations. So, that's "Earned Media." You also have "Affiliate", which is you reaching out to other people that serve people that are similar to you. And so, let's say if you're a gym, then going down the street and talking to a physical therapist, right? Or someone who is able to serve rehabilitation centers, right? So, being able to form a partnership with them in a way that's the win-win for both parties. So, "Affiliate Marketing", you have "Referrals", which is another very common way. Once you get started, you can ask your clients, "Hey, like, do you happen to know anyone?". You know, like I just looked through this process and really enjoyed it. By the way, here's a benefit for you if you were to refer to another person and there's benefit from them. Then there's also "Paid Media", right? So instead of "Earned Media", "Paid Media", instead of investing your time detention to get in front of traffic, you'd be investing money to platforms to be able to get in front of people and eyeballs and traffic. So, "Owned Media" are the database that you build up over time, once you have been in business in which you own in terms of an asset, whether it's a email list, or text, or phone numbers. However, use whichever medium you prefer to communicate with them. So those were the six ways. However, "Owned Media" typically comes from you do the thing for the five to get started, right? So for us, these are things that I didn't know in terms of framework earlier on, I was just trying everything and anything that I could possibly try to gain traction. So in the earlier days, I was just calling gym owners and that was extremely helpful because I was able to directly receive market feedback from the people that I wanted to help. And how we even established our processes down the line in our model was just by having these conversations and by learning what their experience were, right? Because very early on, if I didn't talk to gym owners, I would've no idea what they want, what they care about, what they have been through. So the more conversations that I had, although painful and awful times because I was awful at it, and I had no value to give, really. Earlier on, it was extremely helpful in terms of just understanding what, where the market is. Because the market is just a pool of people that you're choosing to serve, right? So, the more you engage with the market, the more you understand their habits and who they are, what they care about, and what they have been through, the better you're able to serve them. So, the more dialogue that I had, I almost treat it as like interview. So to understand, "How do they feel about marketing companies?" Both of them has had really negative experiences. So for me, from day one, in terms of how that affected my model and processes down the line was, "I never want to be one of those marketing companies". Because, the way I feel about that is that's just not right. You know, because if I'm charging for a service and they're getting absolutely nothing, that's kind of like "blood money". I wouldn't want to touch that, right? So, how I got my start earlier on, which is from that place of wanting to help people was, "Hey, like, listen, don't even worry about it. Don't pay me anything. Let me just help you get results. Then you can pay us." That's it. That's because I was awful at sales that was able to help me get my foot through the door for them to hear something that they've always wanted to hear. That's like, "I just wish there was a marketing company that was willing to put their money where their mouths are." So, when you hear that consistently enough, I'm like, "I have nothing to lose, let me do this. I wanna learn and I want to help you get results."
Jim James:And George, that comes across now because on your website you've got a proposition, I think you help gym owners to add $20,000 to $30,000 a month or their money back.
George Liu:30 grand over 90 days. Yes.
Jim James:Okay. $30,000 over 90 days. But I love that you're so specific on your website about what it is you're offering. For those that can't see it, we will put a link to gympillars.com on the show notes. But just explain your website because I was struck by its simplicity and it's sort of call to action.
George Liu:This applies for any marketing at all and any sales at all. The fundamental principle that fuels it is like a triangle. You have "Traffic", which is ideally the people that are coming to you that you would want to serve. So "Traffic" is always there, right? So like, whether it's coming from word of mouth and the work that you have done. Whether it's coming from the post that you have been pushing out, or the podcast that you've been a part of, or the blogs or articles or paid media, or the advertisements you're running, or the reach outs that you're doing, there's always traffic of people like checking like, "Who is this?" Probably oftentimes with the layer of skepticism, rightfully so, because they don't know you, they don't like you, and they don't trust you yet. So next piece, and that's what we call in marketing called "Top of the Funnel," right? So ideally, "How do you get more people on top of the funnel?" The next piece is "Conversion". So, "How do you move people down the funnel?" So, how do you have people build more trust and learn more about you, who you are, how you're able to help them, what you're able to help them with, why they should believe in you? So that affects "Conversion". And there are other frameworks, some it's a flywheel. However, funnels are helpful to visualize, the more you move people down the funnel, from traffic down to conversions, the more conversions you get. In other words, the more new customers you're able to work along side with you. And naturally in traffic conversions, "Economics" is also important because the numbers have to make sense. if you are operating as a business, make sure that however you're providing value, that it costs you less than how much value you have to provide. So if you are able to make "X amount", hopefully it costs you less than "X amount". This applies for marketing sales as well, regardless of whichever channels you're on. This is also like a cautionary channel, if you will, where oftentimes organic channels earlier on are more helpful because what you're doing is you're trading time for money. So when it comes to economics of it, it doesn't cost you any money when you don't have any, but it costs you time and attention and also skillset. However good you get at that, is how much "traffic" you're able to generate. In business where you have more cash flow where you're able to invest and to pay traffic, then at that point, you're able to trade money for more money, and that's when leverage takes place, right? It's like in the form of beyond just time, because we all have limited time, attention a day. So, the principles behind, like how simple it is in terms of what we do is, I've just invested a lot over the past four years. Probably over 150 grand to 200 grand for me personally, just in terms of coaching, right? And I've also seen a lot of ads and trenches and played around with a lot of things. So, at one point you're able to see different trends that work well. So the simplicity behind our funnel, it's called the "Five-Minute VSL". There the consumer environment VSL, there's a higher likelihood of them consuming a five-minute thing versus like a thirty-minute 30-minute thing.
Jim James:Yes, right.
George Liu:I mean, people don't wanna sit down. It's like, "Ah, right." So if they consume it, that's great. But if they don't, you'd want to have another way of engaging with them. So, the Five-Minute VSL, we don't bank on that.
Jim James:Sorry, what does VSL stand for, George?
George Liu:A Video Sales Letter.
Jim James:Okay, right?
George Liu:Yeah, so "Five-Minute Video Sales Letter", in which you're just engaging with the prospect. You're just explaining "Hey, here's what we're doing. Here's why. Here's how we can make it work. Here's proof. And here's if you want to take action." And all those best practices and the nuances, the more you learn about it, that affects your ability to convert "traffic" into "conversions". So, your ability to know what to do and your skillset stacked around these pieces will affect the economics of how well you're able to turn traffic into conversions and make money as a result versus lose money. So for us, it's just a Five-Minute Video Sales Letter of a very strong offer with guarantee that reverses risk for the right client. And also explains why we're able to do what we do with social proof, which means like, "Hey, like we've done this before, here's why." And with the curiosity hook in which it kind of leaves the person wondering, it's like, well, how do they do that. If they do consume a Five-Minute VSL the likelihood of them looking at chat, looking at call, like a 15-minute intro call with zero pressure is pretty high. So we do have a lot of people that goes through the funnel and just books a call on their own. But even if they don't, what we want to avoid as entrepreneurs is a leaky bucket for any and all businesses. So what happens if someone visits a website that we want them to visit and they don't do the thing that we want them to do? Well, they're just going to be like, "Ugh, boohoo", right? So ideally, if you care about the conversions of people turning to customers, you would have, correspondingly, a way to engage with them outside of like digital medium. So, what I mean by that specifically is like, text them. We want to engage them not just online, but also offline. So convert them offline to drive them down the funnel to build trust. When you text them, when you call them, and when you email them, that's when it comes to play. So those are things that are all move people downwards towards the funnel because ultimately we run up. If you run a service-based business at all, it's always about the people. So, that's one a "Lead Nurturing". So top of the funnel, you have a brand awareness. People that have seen your things, right? But for me, to make it practical and relevant, what I consider top the funnel is "Lead Generation". How many leads do you have of people that opted in to say, "Hey, how does this work? Where is this?" So the bigger you get the top of the funnel, the more will flow downwards depending on how good you are at converting people and building trust.
Jim James:Now I noticed though, George, you've got a "Six-Minute VSL," as you call it. And then you've got a body of the offer and then you've got a nice testimonial from people, which you say "Social Proof". But that's it. There's no Twitter, there's no LinkedIn. There's no Instagram. There's no Facebook, no TikTok. Why have you not got, if you like all these other channels popping up and "Connect with me here." "Connect with me now." What's the thinking behind that simplicity?
George Liu:Good question. Website designers probably wouldn't like me. Well, if we want to think of the point of like a website, or like a page, right? It's important to identify the goal, the objective. So, for us, the "Five-Minute VSL" as well as the "Social Proof", the goal is to get them to build enough trust to take action. So anything that would deter and take away from that, I would just want to remove as distractions. So, if the goal is to build enough trust for them to take action, "What would build trust?" "Social proof" is one of the best ways to build trust, because we, as human beings, we want to make sure like, "Hey, like I'm not taking out risk for something that's never been done before," right? So, "Social Proof" is incredibly important in any kind of marketing. So, that's the first piece. The next piece is to get them to "take action." So, how do you get them to "take action"? Well, if they were clicking on it, all of a sudden they were engaging with a person that would drive the conversions up, right? However, what's the level below that? Well, it's like if there was a person that was selling for you in terms of speaking with conviction, articulating things and being a human that would probably drive the chances up. So, hence, the "Five-Minute VSL", right? With all the marketing tactics, if you will. Just sprinkled into it to drive the conversion up for them to be able to take action. So anything that's not that which is like cut out.
Jim James:Yeah. I think that's wonderful. The simplicity. A real case of less is more. George, we're gonna run out of time, but I do want to talk about how you've managed to get that within your team because you are plainly passionate and articulate, and you've got a background where you learnt about your body and fitness to overcome some insecurities when you were younger and that sort of driven your values. What about for the team, as you grow the business beyond, George? How are you getting the team to share those values and share that energy and passion when they're doing the work for you?
George Liu:That's a great question. So transparently, that is the biggest area of opportunity for me to actually dive deeper into and learn more about, right? However, as it stands, my belief currently is that "If you are the person that is exuding and forming the values and you hire your team based around that values what's most important, awareness and self-awareness with who you are and what is it that you value". That's the fundamental piece because everything distills from what you believe in and just carries down. So, for me the work around doing that is like making sure I get extremely clear on my own values and then putting it down on a piece of paper. And then hiring based on how my intuitive feel in terms of "Does this person share the similar values as I do?" So that's one of the first round interview that we go through. So, having a very formal recruiting hiring process is critical. If you're able to have a first round at which you're able to sit through cultural fit. In the second round, it's more so technical expertise to see if they have the chops in comparison with other candidates, that'll set you up for success in terms of filtering out the candidates that are not qualified. And ultimately, having a third round in which you bring other people involved, if there's gonna be working with another person, that's going to be helpful as well. So, making sure our team works in alignment. We actually just passed month or two. And this is something we implemented early on when we have identified as the 80/20, which is a process called, "Objective and Key Results". So, Google implemented that in their business. I can't remember when. However, that was the best practice that was taught to me by our mentors. So, forming the "Objectives and Key Results", you at the top, identify, "Over the course of next quarter, this is where we want to go." So, let's say like, if it's a number, if it's revenue, if it's a number of clients, if it's growth, whatever that goal is, you put it out there. Ideally it's measurable, right? It's like, measurable, attainable, like SMART goal. So, same framework. Identify it. Then what needs to happen for that to happen, right? So there, it bridges out into different key results that need to happen. And how I think of business is that, it's the fundamental two sides. So there's "How do we get new customers?" And "How do we service existing customers?" So then, whatever this goal is, how does that correlate to acquisition, which is our front-end of the business, and how does that correlate with the back-end of business? So from there, it just splinters in. Which ideally in a "perfect world", everyone has one of the key results in the words of Gino Wickman, that's called "rocks," in the book traction. So ideally, everyone has their own set of "rocks" that they're moving towards. So, we implemented a version of that. That's more so the acquisition side is easier. The back-end's a little bit harder. So within the past three months, that's where we really started nailing down to make sure that at the front-end and the back-end, both simultaneous are nailed down. And that each person are very clear on their roles and responsibilities. And actually we've gone through. Like a lot of learning challenges and struggles as well. A lot of painful mistakes.
Jim James:Yeah, George as we all do, as we grow our business. But that idea of being, the found and the guardian of the values and getting them inculcated within the team but hiring on the basis of those values and communicating those so clearly to all your team. No wonder that's why you're really rocking it with your clients. George Liu, thank you so much for joining me and sharing. I know you've got a great deal of wisdom for an entrepreneur that's only been out of the gate for the last sort of four or five years. You've accomplished a great deal and plainly got a great future ahead of you. And thank you so much for sharing what you've learned so far and this has been a great workout. Thank you so much.
George Liu:Appreciate that, Jim. Thanks for having me once again.
Jim James:It'd be my pleasure. So we've been listening George Liu over there at Gym Pillars in Los Angeles. And of course, I'll include George's details in the show notes. And until we meet again, we wish you the very best and do encourage you to keep on communicating. If you've enjoyed this do please share this with a fellow entrepreneur. If you've got time, review it on your player, whatever that is, because it all really helps to get the show rated by the major channels. And until we meet again, this is me, Jim James, signing off as the fellow unnoticed entrepreneur.
George Liu:Thanks for having me and hope you enjoyed this episode and then yeah, happy to share whatever value that could be helpful. Bye. Thanks for listening.
Prowly:Now I'd just like to mention our sponsor for this show. The Unnoticed Entrepreneur Podcast is sponsored by a company called "Prowly." Prowly is an all in one software for leveraging your public relations activities. You can boost the media relations game for your business. Find media contacts, send out press releases, and get more coverage while saving time and money on everyday tasks. Check it out prowly.com.