Follow The Brand Podcast with Host Grant McGaugh
Are you ready to take your personal brand and business development to the next level? Then you won't want to miss the exciting new podcast dedicated to helping you tell your story in the most compelling way possible. Join me as I guide you through the process of building a magnetic personal brand, creating valuable relationships, and mastering the art of networking. With my expert tips and practical strategies, you'll be well on your way to 5-star success in both your professional and personal life. Don't wait - start building your 5-STAR BRAND TODAY!
Follow The Brand Podcast with Host Grant McGaugh
THE DAILY DECISION: Dre Baldwin's Masterclass in Personal Branding and Marketing Success
Ever wondered how a Division III college basketball player could become a digital content powerhouse? Meet Dre Baldwin, whose extraordinary journey from the court to the digital realm is nothing short of inspiring. Join us as we uncover Dre's path to success, built not on a single viral moment but on relentless consistency since 2005. His transformation from basketball tutorials to a mindset coach is a masterclass in personal branding, showcasing how authenticity and dedicated content creation can pave the way for an empire of over 100 million views online.
Explore the nuances of personal branding and its power to monetize influence in today's digital landscape. Through Dre's experiences, learn how a focused, engaged audience can be more valuable than sheer numbers. We'll share insights into Dre's early ventures into YouTube ad revenue and selling basketball training programs, illustrating how these early steps evolved into significant income streams. Dre's story is a testament to the importance of targeted audience engagement and the immense potential of turning digital influence into tangible success.
In this deep dive, the importance of leveraging personal strengths and embracing collaboration is a recurring theme. Discover Dre's proactive approach to outreach, where strategic emails and personalized outreach videos highlight the impact of merging digital marketing with traditional methods. Whether you're building a personal brand or elevating your business presence, this episode offers strategies for maintaining a positive online footprint and crafting a legacy that stands the test of time. Get ready to master the art of personal branding and digital marketing with insights that could transform your approach to success.
Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Follow The Brand! We hope you enjoyed learning about the latest marketing trends and strategies in Personal Branding, Business and Career Development, Financial Empowerment, Technology Innovation, and Executive Presence. To keep up with the latest insights and updates from us, be sure to follow us at 5starbdm.com. See you next time on Follow The Brand!
Welcome to another episode of Follow the Brand. I am your host, grant McGaughan, ceo of 5 Star BDM, a 5 Star personal branding and business development company. I want to take you on a journey that takes another deep dive into the world of personal branding and business development using compelling personal story, business conversations and tips. Development using compelling personal story, business conversations and tips to improve your personal brand. By listening to the Follow the Brand podcast series, you will be able to differentiate yourself from the competition and allow you to build trust with prospective clients and employers. You never get a second chance to make a first impression. Make it one that will set you apart, build trust and reflect who you are. Developing your five-star personal brand is a great way to demonstrate your skills and knowledge. If you have any questions from me or my guests, please email me. At grantmcgaw, spelled M-C-G-A-U-G-H at 5starbdm B for brand, d for development, m for masterscom. Now let's begin with our next five-star episode on Follow the Brand. Welcome to the Follow the Brand Podcast. I am your host, grant McGaugh, ceo of Five Star BDM, where we help you to build a five-star brand that people will follow. Every wonder that truly separates fleeting success from a legacy that lasts. It's really those viral moments that everyone chases. It's more about showing up day after day and building something very real. Today's guest embodies this perfectly. Now imagine this you are a Division III college basketball player. Most people would say that's where the story ends, but for Dre Baldwin, it was just the beginning. He turned that humble start into a digital empire amassing over 100 million views. What really caught my attention wasn't luck or a viral hit. This man has put out content every single day since 2005. Basketball tutorials turned into mindset coaching, then high-level performance training. And the way Dre reached out to me on this show shows exactly what he teaches no cold email, no generic pitch. Instead, he sent me a personalized video explaining why he wanted to be on the Follow Brand Show. Now that's the one who doesn't just talk about personal branding. He lives it. And in this episode you will learn why consistency beats virality, how to transition careers without starting over and how to build a brand that stands the test of time. And if you have ever thought, how do I build something that lasts or what's next for me, you are in the right place. Let's jump into my conversation with Dre Baldwin, the man who turned basketball drills into digital excellence. I am Grant McGaugh and this is the Follow Brand Podcast, where we are building a five-star brand that you can follow. What's up whites? Welcome everybody to the Follow Brand Podcast. I am your host, grant McGaugh. We're going to keep it right here in downtown Miami. We're going to talk to Dre Baldwin. I love Dre. We were just chopping up, just found out that he's right here. Look, I'm like what. Oh, okay, we're going to have a great conversation.
Speaker 1:Now, just a little bit of background. Dre found me and when he looked he said you know, I'm always looking for different podcasts. That, I think you know, aligns with my vision, my mission, my values and the things I'm trying to get across to an audience. And we saw Follow Brand. And then he sent me a customized video inviting me to say hey, check me out, brad, I want to be on your show. And I went. Man, this guy went through all of that for him to become a guest on the Fall Brand Podcast. We got to have a conversation. So, dre, welcome to the show.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me on Grant. I'm excited to be here and glad that Reach Out worked hey it worked like a profession.
Speaker 1:You're talking about branding right First brand, how to build your personal brand. You just showed a tactic and a technique. First, I got to see who you were. Not just a cold email, but actually your authenticity, what you're about, why you came across in a story, like within two to three minutes, of why you'd like to be in a show. You can never get across that kind of impact via email. Just won't happen, and I personally yeah, I probably get you know, but that's the next best thing. So I want you to tell the audience just a little bit more about you and why you chose to follow a brand to be on this show.
Speaker 2:Sure. So I come from the city of Philadelphia. I've been down here in Miami for since about 2008. I was always playing sports growing up. I eventually got into basketball around age 14, which is pretty late if you're trying to go play a sport like in college or pro. I only played one year of high school ball, walked on to play Division III college ball, which is the third tier of college sports, in other words, not a level that produces pro players.
Speaker 2:Got out of college, wanted to play, play pro, but nobody was calling my phone. So for a year after college I worked a couple just regular jobs worked at footlocker, worked in ballet, total fitness, which is now out of business, but not because of me. I sold a lot of memberships for them, but then, uh, in 2005 so give everybody a timeline in 2005 I started my pro basketball career via going to this event called an exposure camp. It was like a job fair for athletes. You basically pay to go to this destination event and try to prove that you're good enough to play pro. I went to one of those events, played pretty well and I leveraged that experience to get myself an agent Agent, got me my first job and I played professionally overseas for nine years in eight different countries. First place was in Countless Lithuania and at the same time, in 2005, I started posting videos to this new website called YouTube and they said you can put as much video up as you want for free. And I started doing it. So I putting basketball videos up just to basketball audience.
Speaker 2:So my first five years online from 2005 to 2010, just a bunch of basketball players learning how to play basketball on me not because they were looking for me, they were just looking for basketball and I happened to beat it. And around that time, about 2009, 2010, I found myself unemployed from basketball. Phone was not ringing, but at the same time, I had this little audience being built on the internet and I've always been kind of a closet internet geek. A lot of people don't know that, so I started finding ways that I can make money on the internet through basketball. So I just wanted to combine those three things money, the internet and basketball and that's when I started to build out more of what we now call a personal brand. So that's when I started to write more articles, write more blogs, make videos on a consistent basis more intentionally. My audience grew. I started selling products. The first product I sold was $4.99. So it was not like I just blew up out of nowhere. I just started selling little cheap products to basketball players Not cheap, but valuable, low-cost products to basketball players.
Speaker 2:Self-publishing became a thing, so I started writing books. Then I found out well, if I can take this idea and turn it into a product, well, I have more ideas Now. I can do this. I can do this forever. I came to realize that intellectual property a phrase that I didn't know back then I could leverage that longer and stronger than I could leverage my physical property, my physical ability to run and jump no, 40 inches in the air. You can't do that forever, but having ideas and turning them into products and making money from it, I could do that forever. So that's really what I started focusing on. Good thing is the fall ring again.
Speaker 2:I kept playing until 2015, but during my last five years playing basketball, I was also building my brand at the same time, and even to this day, grant, if somebody sees me in the mall or in the street when I'm walking my son, they know me from YouTube. They don't know me because I was a pro basketball player. They know me from the internet. All right, so the internet. Thank God for the internet, because that's really what led to my brand being what it is, and that's a long story short, and I'm sure we'll get into some details here. That's how it ends.
Speaker 1:No, for sure, For sure. Because that kind of intentionality is so important, because in 2015, no one's really. Youtube has been around for a long time and some people have been utilizing a lot longer than others to create opportunities and to actually get into e-commerce and to sell certain things, but, most importantly, to sell themselves and what you don't think, gary Vee right? Gary Vee said, hey, I started doing. You know, his father owned this liquor store. Basically, they sell wine, and so you know what? This is a great way to advertise. It's free. Why not do that? And he grew his audience and was intentional about putting something out there every day.
Speaker 1:That was the process, and it sounds like you were doing something similar, and I love the fact that you knew, even before your basketball career was ending or you know it would come to an end that you leverage yourself to a point where, once you step out of that room and that door closed, you already had a furnished room already ready for you, called your personal room, because you had been building it in it, and you begin to have that entrepreneurial mindset that'll get you into another state of being able to support yourself and have a way to support your family. I think that's wonderful. I think a lot of people don't really understand the power of personal brand B. I want to ask you this, because now you've lived it what's your definition of a personal brand?
Speaker 2:Personal brand is a good question. The way I define it is how people see you, in other words, what you're about, what you represent, and when your name comes up, what's the first thing they think about? Or, if they think about that thing, do they associate your name with it. That's what I see a personal brand as. So it's basically your reputation, but the interesting thing about it is that it can be very relative, because my reputation with you is different than my reputation with someone who's known me for 10 years. Right, it's different. It varies depending on who the person is. So to some people my reputation could be negative they don't like me and some people my reputation can be positive they do like me and some people know me as a basketball guy, some people know me as a business guy. So your personal brand is really just how other people see you.
Speaker 1:And then, from our personal perspectives, it's what are you putting out there so that you're controlling that conversation as best you can Can't always control it, but you can try to see that different platforms allow for different things to take shape and that when you're in a smaller world you can influence a sphere. Like I said, you were playing basketball Obviously someone that were following your basketball career or knew what you're doing over here they're going to follow, they know that particular trade right, and even the ones even in high school and before that they didn't think oh great, special basketball, wow, no he was no, no, he's like yeah.
Speaker 1:So these different personas exist, but they're what I call smaller niche circles of experience. Once you step into that world of digital technology and amplification and social selling and digital media and leveraging as a tool for digital marketing, for whatever reason it is, I call that amplification. Now you amplify who you are and you amplify what you're doing, so that small niche circle becomes very, very big. It has potential to go worldwide, worldwide. Tell the audience now, because I don't think they realize how big your sphere of influence has grown since you started YouTube wow.
Speaker 2:Well, youtube is really where it started. So the start was I was actually I was blogging before I got on YouTube, but my blog never blew up, so YouTube is where the audience started to find me. But over the over all these years the last two decades my content has been viewed over 100 million times, whether that's written, audio or visual, just digested a hundred million times, and that's not counting all the times I've been pirated over in China. So we added China and you can probably multiply that by 10. They got a lot of basketball fans, so I know my videos are on their websites, but I can't read Mandarin. So I see myself, but I don't see what it says.
Speaker 1:So here's the question is People are like but why? What happened? Do you feel, as you went going through that process, that you had your videos were going viral? You had virality. How did you get to that 100 million viewership? What do you think was happening?
Speaker 2:Well, here's the interesting thing I've never had a piece of content go viral, not one. So the thing is, I'll just put out a lot of content. So I've put out content. I put out at least one thing every single day since 2005, whether that's written audio or video, and many times it's been all three. And there were times where on YouTube, for example like you said, about 2015, there weren't so many people publishing quite yet. We started to hit critical mass around that time when people stopped watching YouTube and started making YouTube. But between 2005 and 2015, there wasn't a lot of competition, but there was a lot of audience. So I remember in 2011, I was putting out four or five videos a day on YouTube and they weren't cannibalizing each other because there were so many people watching the content that it didn't matter. So it was.
Speaker 2:It's just been the consistency. Grant has always been the consistency. I'll put out probably estimation probably 30,000 pieces of content. I never had anything just pop off immediately. Some are more popular than others, of course, but even on YouTube, I had some videos with over a million views, but that's over a million views in 10 years. It's not like a million views in a month. So I've never had that happen. I wish I did it. But if it doesn't happen, you can still be consistent and build your footprint, build your digital footprint.
Speaker 1:This is important. I want the audience to truly understand what you just said Process consistency, stick-to-itiveness, not looking to always go viral, always to get your message out there on the platform. Because I was just at lunch with another individual. I said what would you rather have? Would you rather have a room of 100 people that can immediately buy what it is that you sell your product, your service or would you rather have 10,000 people that barely know what you're product, your service? Or would you rather have 10,000 people that barely know what you're doing on your YouTube? Youtube, right. So what that question is of all this time? How are you able to monetize?
Speaker 2:Great question. Well, what you just said is a great metaphor for what I try to help people understand all the time is that you are better off with 10 dialed in buyers than a thousand surface level freeholders. And when it comes to selling stuff, let's say monetizing. Well, the first thing I monetized was when YouTube got bought by Google and now you can run ads, so that was the first money I made on the Internet. My first check from Google slash YouTube was $410. And that was about 2009, 2010.
Speaker 2:The next thing was selling training programs to basketball players, and I had no marketing strategy. I've never ran an ad. All I did was make a video on YouTube about, let's say, doing a crossover dribble. And then I said, well, I have a program for getting better at dribbling Just. And then I said, well, I have a program for getting better at dribbling Just, go to my website and buy the program, click the link in the description. And that's how I started selling $4.99 programs and we were selling those in volume because, again, I was putting out three, four, five videos a day and the videos were the feeder for sales.
Speaker 2:The next thing that I monetized, I mean, I started writing books, but books didn't really blow up. Most people don't make a ton of money on books. They just know where to add on. The next thing was I just started making bigger programs for higher prices, and that was really what I did. I did that for a long time, from 2009 up to about 2014. We did a lot of selling of a lot of programs just to the basketball players as I was doing it because I was still playing basketball at that time and then after that I started selling more mindset stuff, like courses, and then people started asking me do you offer coaching? I didn't, hadn't even considered being a coach. So I was doing a live stream on this app called Periscope. You remember Periscope? Yeah, I do. Yes, I was doing a live stream on Periscope. Somebody in the comments said do you offer coaching? And I had anybody. I just, of course, I said yes, and he was my first coaching client, and now coaching is the main thing to be focused on here in our program.
Speaker 1:So that's how we started to monetize was just taking advantage of whatever it was that was right there in front of me. See, I I think a lot of people they're missing the boat when it comes like oh, social selling.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I see people on the internet. I know I'm on instagram or maybe it's Facebook and things like that. I see the ad, but I don't want to participate. And then you're like I want you to take a page, just go over to the NASDAQ. Just walk over there to the NASDAQ and just take a look at what stocks are trading and who has the highest volume. And you're going to see small companies like you know Microsoft. Small companies like I'm just thinking of Uber. Small companies like Airbnb. Small, you know these little dinky companies that don't have really any product service, but they have a platform and they're making a ton of money, like Amazon.
Speaker 1:And you start to realize, hey, this digital economy or these digital platforms are very, very real and you need to start paying attention to these things, especially now as the financial world is starting to change, with Bitcoin, things of that nature. And look at now before, we used to walk around with a pocket full of cash, a million wallet. Now you just walk around with either a card and that's being replaced by just your phone. You know, the world is changing all around us and those that know how to take advantage of it and leverage it will be the ones that will win in the long run. And it's still. Digital marketing, I feel, is still in its infancy and there's still so many people that don't know how to leverage it to the fullest. Now I want to understand more about this coaching. You said you're a coach now, so, coach Dre, talk to me about your coaching program.
Speaker 2:It's funny when I first was putting the basketball videos out, some players, cause they're younger than me, they will refer to me as coach, even though I've never coached sports at all. I don't have the patience for coaching sports, but once I started talking more about mindset and basically extracting what works in the sports world and then translating it over to the business and everyday life worlds, that's when my audiences started to merge and that led to the transition between sports and where I'm at now. So the first guy who asked me if I coached on Periscope, I said yeah, and I didn't even know what to charge him. I charged him 500 bucks and coached him for like three months, something like that. But as I came to just look at the business landscape because the first thing I wanted to do when I stopped playing ball Grant was professional speaking, and I did a good amount of that still do it to this day. But one of the things I didn't like about that business was that there's a whole other entity in control of your next paycheck. I'd rather me be in control and have people have a direct, personal, more intimate relationship with, such as in a coaching program where everything's in-house, as opposed to the speaking world, where it's kind of outhouse, so to speak, and you got to keep calling people or they got to call you and I just didn't want that to be the main thing. I still do it. I didn't want that to be the main thing.
Speaker 2:So then, as I learned more about what I had to offer and it's another thing about people who build brands is that we tend to discount and devalue our own knowledge and our own expertise because it's so normal to us. So when I started explaining mindset things, I thought everyone thought this way, because the thing like a mindset grant, unlike with, let's say, a physical tool, is that you can't see it, you can't count it, you can't measure it, so you can only assume the way another person thinks. So when I started talking about the way, I thought people would just say to me I've never heard anybody explain discipline that way or confidence that way, and I realized that my, my real superpower is my ability to take something that may seem complex and break it down to very simple terms and then explain it in a way that anybody can get it. I did that in basketball and I do it with mindset, I do it in business and that's the superpower that I started leveraging and it fits perfectly into coaching, because that's really what coaching is about. It's not necessarily about having all the answers, it's about helping people ask the right questions, and that's what I do best.
Speaker 2:And when I can just have a conversation with someone, find out what their challenge is, what question are they asking, then I tell them well, I get, you're asking that question, but how about we answer these questions over here?
Speaker 2:That'll actually help solve your problem instead of just addressing the symptom. So that's what I do as a coach and the biggest thing we did there, the biggest change I made in my coaching, let's say over the last two or three years, was really just focusing on going high ticket in coaching, and that's really what's helped kind of push the coaching program that we call Work On your Game University. What's really helped push that forward is just looking for ways that we can go high ticket, which means most people consider high ticket like $5,000 or more, and that's the area that I really start to focus more on. We still sell books, still have my basketball programs website up. Somebody wants to learn how to do the crossover, move still books, courses, et cetera, but move and still books, courses etc. But most of the stuff we do is under the consulting wing, which is the coaching now see the audience is fortunate I could.
Speaker 1:I could feel like all right, grant and dre, I see what you guys are talking about, but I'm more of a, an introvert. I don't know if I can get out in front of the camera and promote, especially if I want to be an entrepreneur, even in business. I have a career and I truly believe people that are following the career. You've got to get out in front of things because searching social is so prevalent in our society. That's the first thing that people are going to do. How do you coach someone who's a little reluctant or a little camera shy about promoting who they are and what they're about?
Speaker 2:Great question, and the easiest thing I found is to give them a framework to use. So when they get on a camera, they are not just trying to figure out what's it. So what I help people do is come up with a framework. So if you're selling a product, then okay, this is what you're going to explain. So if you're selling a product, then okay, this is what you're going to explain. First, you're going to tell them who you are, then you're going to tell them what the product is, you can explain why they need it and you're going to tell them how to get it. That's a very simple framework. Anybody can use that.
Speaker 2:But now, when they turn the camera on and push the record button and I found actually I know for a fact most human beings are very good at following rules. If you give them rules, we can follow rules our entire lives, as kids, at school, at work. So if you just give people rules and say follow this process step one, step two, step three, people are usually pretty good at doing that. So what I do is break things down, make it really simple. If you can just follow these steps, you can read English then anybody can pretty much achieve their outcome. My job, then, is taking the stuff that I already know how to do and I've done successfully and deconstructing it in such a way that I could explain it to someone else, and the biggest challenge I find a lot of people have is that, even though they've done a thing successfully, all the knowledge is up in their heads and then, when it comes time to kind of put it on paper, so to speak, it's not as easy as they thought.
Speaker 1:Ready to elevate your brand with five-star impact. Welcome to the Firebrand Podcast, your gateway to exceptional personal growth and innovative business strategies. Join me as I unveil the insider strategies of industry pioneers and branding experts. Discover how to supercharge your business development. Harness the power of AI for growth and sculpt a personal brand that stands out in the crowd. Transform ambition into achievement. Explore more at FirestarBDMcom for a wealth of resources. Ignite your journey with our brave brand blueprint and begin crafting your standout.
Speaker 2:And that's one of my best skills is being able to process out certain things.
Speaker 1:I love that. That is it. That is your writer's block, so to speak. Camera comes on, you freeze up. However, you already know what it is that you do and why it's important, and a lot of times when I'm talking to clients and individuals, hey, grant, you're doing this podcast, you're already out there. You make it look so easy. Well, it's not so much that it's easy. Is that what I have found to your point? There's a couple of things.
Speaker 1:I love what you just said. I tell people this all the time. First of all, it's always great to have a guy or coach. It's going to get you where you want to go a lot quicker than just trying to do it by yourself. The other thing, what you said so important, is that you have a process. You've got to have some kind of framework, and it's a proven framework for you to follow. Isn't it a lot easier, if you're trying to go to your local mall, that you know the directions of how to get there, as opposed to trying to figure it out and walk a few miles and then you know eventually you don't get there but it might take you a long time. So if you have a coach and then you have a process or a framework, and then you've got to have determination and a will. You've got to be able to consistently apply the knowledge.
Speaker 1:Now, what I found was that when I knew what I was talking about, I would you could throw me on anybody's stage, I don't care if it's 100,000 people or not. I will light it up and I'm great. But if you start talking to me about something that I'm not that familiar with, I'm going to stumble and I'm going to stutter and I'm going to get nervous and I'm not going to do as well. So you've got to know your subject and what it is that you are good at. I love how you said even earlier about I know what my superpower is and if you're in my lane, I'm going to go into that phone booth and I'm going to come out as Super Drake because you're in my superpower, you know you're right there. You've got to know what those swim lanes really, really are and when. You know that. This is great advice I got from someone a while back, so so important. He said you know what, brent, you are in the unique position to be a mentor for the person that you were five years ago, 10 years ago. So if you're able to mentor the person that you were five years.
Speaker 1:Talk about those things because there's someone right now. Someone right now is coming out of basketball or they know they're about to get out of basketball Wouldn't it be great? And they can go and look at 30,000 different types of content that Dre has put out there and start to get their confidence and begin to understand these things. That's one thing I love about content is that it's not like sending out an email or just having a conversation. That content lives forever, for a very long time. You said that earlier. I'll put that content out there. I'll get a hundred million views, but it wasn't just in a game. That's over time, but it's still there. Talk to our audience more about that the power of digital marketing and how it lives far beyond the real time that it took to create it?
Speaker 2:That's a great question. And going back to your question you asked earlier about a brand, a lot of people would say your personal brand is just what Google says about you, and that's the way many people look at it, because if you just hear of a person that you've never heard of before, what's the first thing you're usually going to do? You're going to Google them or if you're using, but it's what the internet has already basically indexed about you. And the great thing about creating a whole lot of content, as I have, is that when you look me up, you're going to see stuff that I said from my own mouth about me and it's coming from me, and usually we put stuff out on our own that we want people to see and we want them to know about. So I was just talking about this the other day on a live stream. If someone was to write a bad article trying to take me down, it wouldn't get to the front page of Google because all my content is going to bury it and nobody will ever see it. So that's the good thing about creating content is that when people look you up, they're going to see only the stuff that you made about you. So just put out good stuff about yourself and use your name in it, and when someone looks your name up, they're just going to see you or they'll see, let's say, this interview comes out and my name's in the title that's going to show up, but this is usually going to be something positive about yourself. So that's the great thing about building that digital footprint, because it builds credibility. The first thing people want to know if I'm in the elevator and somehow it comes up that I write books, so maybe I have a book in my hand they say you write books. I say yeah, I write books. And what's the first thing they ask you Are you on Amazon, right? And they look you up on Amazon and Amazon is a search engine. So if they see you on there, then it gives you credibility immediately because you're in a place that they look for as credible.
Speaker 2:So that's the third thing is, especially in the world that we're in now, with technology like artificial intelligence is it's here and it's coming at the same time is that we can in so many different ways now repurpose content from five years ago, ten years ago, six weeks ago, into other formats, because the same material is worth a different amount when it's put into a different format. See, a youtube video is worth this amount. But if I take that youtube video, get ai to transcribe it into text and then make it into a book, now it has a whole different price. The youtube video is generally free. A book cost money.
Speaker 2:If I take what's in that book and make it into a course, the course usually is expected to cost more. So it's the same material but the value of it is different just because of the package that it's in. And there are some people who will see my YouTube but they won't read the book. And there's some people who read the book. They don't see the course. And there's some many different ways that you can use things when you embrace the technology, as you said, like what's going on digitally, and I know a lot of people are resistant to this stuff. But I suggest you get unresistant or you team up with somebody who is not resistant, because the opportunity is really huge and is going to allow people like ourselves, who have a ton of content, to do so much with what we already have, let alone creating new stuff. So much we can do with what we already have and I'm talking monetizing, not just content creation, 100% the repurposing of content, of intelligence Data.
Speaker 1:A lot of times you know I've been in information technology for a long time, been in that world. Data typically is reactive, it's in the past, it's in the rear view, it's like, hey, you know, you did a double triple last night on the court range. Light it up. That is what he did last night. Right? So it's in the past. It may be an indication of what he may do in the future, or it may not, because the future has not actually come yet. So we're always in the present, moving into the future, understanding the past and make better decisions. That's where we're trying to get to right. So, understanding data and where it's at it gives you a better roadmap. But it's up to you to be creative because you can create a different outcome. Right, the data might say you're going down the road at 50 miles an hour and you're going to pass a certain tree. That's only if you stay straight. If you deviate from that, you get a different outcome. Understand that that realization should tell you how to create a different future for yourself. So if you don't like the path you're on, if you don't like the path that you live and you're looking at your current state and you get a feeling that, hey, I'm running into that same tree that I just passed. How do I then dip and change course? Digital platforms is a great way to do that, because you think about. I think about it like all right, yeah, you're doing great. And first of all, I'm going to applaud you for not giving up and living out your dream and becoming a professional basketball player. It took a lot of moxie, a lot of grit, and then you did that. But you also had the realization I can still dribble real well, but I know this is a finite path. I know that in the future I can't keep jumping at 40 inches. That's going to change because of physical reality.
Speaker 1:However, your mental state and what your intelligence is, you can leverage that to do other things and you have the democracy and understanding to do that even early on, right? So you can even talk to an individual right now like how do I change my path? Because you don't have to just stop doing what you're doing. My career is over. I'm done playing basketball. What do I do now?
Speaker 1:You know, enter something different. You are an example of that. You are doing that at a high level and you've got a lot of memory muscle into it right now, a lot of great memory muscles that you know what I can repurpose these things and I've been doing it for a long time so many different ways. You'd probably love when AI really became more mainstream, because it would take a long time. To take something like a YouTube video and then dictate it right and then have someone try and write that into a book could take a long period of time, or, of course, he's like, wow, without that, that's 90 days, six months. Now you're doing it in days instead of months. Right, understand ai, what capabilities are and how you can then leverage who you are and what you do to the highest, highest levels. I want you to help us talk to us about how you utilize your personal brand to create business opportunity. Walk us through your process of doing that.
Speaker 2:Well, one of the things we already talked about, that's the content. So just continually putting content out there, you make yourself findable and you make yourself discoverable. And the great thing about creating a ton of content as well especially when you're doing something intimate like coaching is that people don't usually sign up for a coach from a one-minute instagram app because they don't know you. They don't know what you're about. They got to get a feel for who you are. Good thing about creating a lot of content is that people can get a feel for who you are just by going through your content on their own and then, by the time they show up to be interested in your coaching, they already feel like they know you, and I've had many people over the consumer to consume, so they can get a taste and a feel for everybody out there and then pick who they like. So that's one of the best things about it. The other thing you were asking you said how to use a personal brand to get business opportunity. Well, one is the findability you want to be findable and another one is it lends credibility. So even if I'm the one making the outreach, I'm making the outbound call. When someone gets a message from me. They're going to say Drake Baldwin, never heard of this guy. They're going to look me up and they're going to see oh, this guy's credible. Wow, he has all this, he's done all that. He's talking over here. He has followers over here. That credibility does matter. Now, while social media followers are what we call vanity metrics and you can't pay bills with them, it still does lend credibility to your name when you have them. I'm not saying you have to have them, but if you do have them, I wouldn't be shy about it, because that lends credibility to your name when you have it. And then the other thing when it comes to creating business opportunity is also there's collaboration. So right now, there are people in your audience Grant who never heard of probably most of your audience, but they're listening to this now. They're like, okay, I like this dray balding guy. He's interesting. You know what? I'm going to keep listening to grant, but I'm going to add dray to the list of people who I pay attention to. So that collaboration allows you to mix. It allows other people's audiences to also become part of your audience. And the good thing about content creation is that we're not competing, because it's not like that one of your fans starts to listen to me, they have to stop listening to you. So we all benefit from that, that process and creating the business opportunity.
Speaker 2:And then, of course, as I said, it's still, we still go out and do outbounds. I mean, I look forward to the day when 80% of my business comes from incoming calls and I just got to pick what's one I'm going to take. But we still do a good amount of outreach. I still send out emails and we still send out text messages. I still create content. I still make cold calls to this very day, still get people emailing us back mad because we won't stop emailing. We still do that stuff. And that's just the. That's just in my bones, in my nature, that I'm not going to sit around and wait for the phone to ring. If the phone's not ringing, I'm ringing some phones. If the door's not knocking, I'm knocking on some doors. So that's just the hunter. You got to be a hunter if you're going to be an entrepreneur. That's just the game.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely. I love how you just stated that. So I want people that they feel like, oh, I got to stop doing what I've. That Digital marketing is that top of funnel. You've got to put this on top of your funnel. Right to drive your car fast. You still got to do those other things, like you just stated. The email and the phone call and the physical touch All those things are still very important, but you've got to add this component on top of it.
Speaker 1:Now I'm talking to you through the exact scenario of how I came to know Dre Ball and I talked about it a little bit earlier in this conversation. But I want you to understand people. Is that what he did was first he sent me an email and in that email, like hey, hey, grant, because he did some research, he said love your show, follow the brand. It's like something. I really would like to be a guest. This is who I am and he started giving me his magic. Say I've got a hundred million downloads. I've done this. I've been on YouTube for ten plus years. I'm an ex-pro basketball player and I made a video for you. I'm like video. So then I hit the link and there he is. I get to see him, just like you're seeing him now, and he's talking about me. I'm like you make the video for everybody. It's a private video, it's made just for me and it talked about my show, talked about why he really wanted to be on the show. He thought it was very important and I completely agree with what he said. It's the co-mean wing of audiences.
Speaker 1:A lot of people in his world Paula Brand, grant McGaugh not familiar with. Who's this guy? What's this about? Right, and vice versa, because now all his followers, my followers they start to come together. But the point is to have value that you share value. He shared his values with me and he shared the value that he was gaining from being on my show and knowing who I am.
Speaker 1:And then he just took a shot like you know what. Maybe he looks at it, maybe he doesn't, I don't know. Everybody gets a lot of information thrown at them. I think there was a stat that said something like we get 80,000 different micro-messages every day from advertisement. We don't even so. We're desensitized from a lot of different stuff. So you get an email from somebody that you do not know, typically you're probably deleted. But if you're very specific and there's something, and this probably just showed up in my little preview. Right, you get an email. You can just look at their preview without even opening that. You get an idea and it caught my attention. And then it continued to get my attention and it showed value in the beginning and there was no.
Speaker 1:What was he asking me to do? He's asking me simply to be a guest on my show. I think I can do that. Why not? Because does he check all the boxes for me? Does he know about personal branding? Yes, he does. Does he know about entrepreneurship and branding? Yes, he does. Does he know about entrepreneurship and business? Yes, he does. Does he have a good personal story that I think will resonate with my audience? Well, yes, he does. You know what? Why not? Why not? So here we are with Dre Baldwin. I want my audience to truly know exactly what they will gain by working with you.
Speaker 2:Talk to my audience. Sure, I appreciate you breaking down how all this came to be. First of all, grant, and to answer your question, what we do here is we focus on three specific things in order. That is, high-level performance, done consistently, to produce results. And one of the things that I tell people all the time is that we are in a performance and results-based business.
Speaker 2:Business that we're in called life, and your career or your business, is based on your ability to perform and produce results. When you produce results, you get rewards, and rewards are money, followers, fame, likes, happiness, hugs, whatever it is that you want. So that's what our business is based around those, those pillars, and the way that we do that is through taking the tools to help athletes get to the top 2% of the sports world and translating those tools over to the business world and to your everyday life. And then we have pillars that do that, such as mindset, strategy systems and accountability. Then it goes into all the details books, courses, coaching, et cetera. We have a lot of different methods through which we do it goes into all the details books, courses, coaching, etc. We have a lot of different methods through which we do it, but the bottom line, if anyone wants to. This is an elevator pitch level thing.
Speaker 1:Performance, consistency and results that's what we're about I love that and there's a lot of athletes or former athletes here in the south florida area. Yeah, there's no shortage of potential clients for dre ball. Dre Baldwin, without question and I know you talked about you have children now. Children right now are heavily immersed in media, social media, and they're consuming a lot of information, some bad, some good. Some will say it's more bad than good. How do you, if you were coaching your, your child right and about juice utilization of social media, what would you?
Speaker 2:tell them. Well, my son's only two years old so he can't quite understand it yet, but, uh, when he's he's not going to have a device until he's probably 15, 16, maybe something around there. So keeping them off the screens, I think everyone the experts, so to speak, on childhood rearing and people who know things about the internet say there is no positive to it. It is a drug, and people are addicted to these things, and adults as well. I'm not just talking about kids. We are addicted to these devices and addicted to these screens.
Speaker 2:So what I would tell him about using social media when he's old enough to understand it and appreciate it is it depends on who he wants to be. If he wants to be a public figure, then you have to be in the public. You got to be somewhere where people can find you, they can see you, they can hear you and get a feel for you. And if you don't want to be, then be careful, because anything you put out there can and will be used against you. As they say, you just got to be careful what you put out there, depending on what kind of life you want to live, because once it's out there, you can't take it back 100%.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, we're right now. I'm going to say right now. Today is September 20th, 2024. Just so everybody gets some context at the wrong time. What happened just now is that a Republican GOP gubernatorial candidate I didn't forget no big deal Big guy, you know. It looked like he's, you know, going to be a top candidate and he's a big candidate in the party. And then it just leaked a story I think it was today that he had some social media comments on a certain site, like 10, 12 years ago it was a long time, it wasn't like last week, a long time ago.
Speaker 1:And now they have this information because I tell people all the time, it's public knowledge, it's in the public, it's not private. So whatever you're putting out there in the social world, whether it's LinkedIn, instagram, facebook, whatever it may be, it's public. So if you don't want that information, I'll date myself like in the newspaper. You know, because you tell it out there, you're publicizing it. If you wouldn't want that written about like in the newspaper, you know, because you take it out there, you're publicizing it. If you wouldn't want that written about you in the newspaper, don't put it out on social media, because it'll be a point in time, someone's going to look at it and get an idea about you, whether you still have those views or you don't. They're going to assume it because you wrote it.
Speaker 1:Did you not write this? Yeah, I did. You know you wrote it. Did you not write this? Yeah, I did. Then you had these meetings. Yeah, well, I did, but I broke. So that could cost you a job, cost you a business opportunity and it could decompress your brand very, very, very quickly, because a court, a public opinion, is ruthless. So you've got to know and I think you're a person who's curated their information, you've made sure and I love how you said that earlier about I already know what you're going to see when you Google my name. I did the same thing I already.
Speaker 1:Google works for me. So what do you mean, Grant? Because I already know what you're going to find. You're going to see my LinkedIn. You're going to see my LinkedIn. You're going to see my website. You're going to see different podcasts that I've done or that I've been on. You're going to see different awards that I have. All that's going to come right at the top of the feed, because those are the things that it looks for first. If you put something out there, like on your Facebook, that's negative and that still has traction, it's going to come up first and that still has traction, it's going to come up first.
Speaker 1:Now, I don't know exactly how they did this on this particular individual, but it has caused him a lot. It will probably tank his candidacy and it's gone. That's something that was 10 years ago. So think about what Dre just said. He's been doing this since 2015. And I'm going to go on a limb and say I'm pretty sure that he's very intentional about the information and the videos that you're putting out there for the last 10 years are very about his brand, about his business, about being educational, that he's adding value and those are his pillars of his brand identity. Would you like to add to that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so it's actually been 20 years. I started in 2005, so I thought it was basketball related up to about 2010. But yeah, you're 100 correct. And with that that uh politician that you mentioned, he probably wasn't thinking he would be in the position that he's in when he was writing that stuff, whatever 10, 15 years ago.
Speaker 2:And when you step into certain realms another thing to understand whatever realm you step into certain realms another thing to understand. Whatever realm you step into, you have you're in the politics. Half the people don't like it, so they're looking for something to use against you. So you got to decide what lane you want to run in. Because you run into that lane, then again you just set yourself up for half the people to try to knock you down. And the higher you go, the more they're going to look and they're going to find whatever they can. They're going to use it against you.
Speaker 2:So again, he probably wasn't thinking about that back then, but now he has to. It's probably going to end his career politically, at least as far as ascension. He's probably not going to ascend any further because that happens. So it doesn't make him a bad guy, just means they can. Anything you say can and will be used against you. That's just the way the internet works. So what I would say to that is, again, that cur, that curation, knowing what you have out there, and if there's something out there that you don't like, it's not like you can make it go away, but you can do your best to kind of bury it by putting other more stuff out there. So that's basically the way you beat the game. That's all I would say.
Speaker 1:That is so important, Very important. I want everyone to understand, especially younger individuals. Remember, this is a public forum, so just be very careful about what you're putting out there. You can't always take it back. Can I get some take-backs on that? You don't always get some take-backs on that. You can't just apologize a lot because the information is right there. So be very careful about, especially when you put your point of view, certain opinions, if they're very strong opinions. Just be very, very careful about that. I want to ask you this because I'm curious. Right, You're curious because you've got a lot of content. You've been on a lot of different shows. How are you like now? You've been on the follow break. How do you feel?
Speaker 2:I feel excellent. I feel great that we're having this conversation here. I met a new person in business who I previously didn't know, and now some of the people in your audience. Hopefully they decide, hey, they like Dre Baldwin and maybe they'll come listen to a thing or two that I have to say and then, once this comes out and I share it with my audiences, they'll come listen to you and your future interviews and get a taste for what you're doing as well.
Speaker 1:That's what collaboration is all about. I feel the exact same way. I want to make sure the audience knows They've got to know how to contact you. I think they know the why. Why do they want to contact you? I think we've done that. I think we understand what that's about. They need to understand the how and the why. Tell us how to contact you.
Speaker 2:You can just go to workonyourgameuniversitycom. There you can see some case studies, testimonials of people we are actively working with, have worked with in the past, and maybe you could be the person we work with in the future. And then, as far as social media, all of you know how to use that. So pick your favorite application. Put my name in type, my name in Dre D-R-E Baldwin, and I'm very easy to find all my profiles in public. So whichever one you like, just look my name up. I'm right there.
Speaker 1:All right, man. This has been wonderful. Thank you for being on the Follow Brand Show. I encourage your entire audience to look at all the different episodes of Follow Brand at 5 Star BDM. That is the number five. That is Star BDM. That's for Brent and velvetmasterscom. Thank you again, and I will definitely have to come down and maybe we'll shoot some hoops down there when I get down to my head. You never know.
Speaker 2:All right, stand still, homie. I'm not running and jumping, but stand still.
Speaker 1:Me and you both. We're playing a game of horse.
Speaker 2:How about that Horse exactly. Yeah, horse is good, you got it. That was great. Thank you again. Thanks, Grant. Thanks for joining us on the World of Red Podcast.
Speaker 1:Big thanks to Full Effect Productions for their incredible support on each and every episode. Now the journey continues on our YouTube channel. All of Red TV Series Dive into exclusive interviews, extended content and bonus insights that will fuel your success. Subscribe now and be a part of our growing community, sharing and learning together. Explore, engage and elevate at. Follow Brand TV Series on YouTube, stay connected, stay inspired. No-transcript.