Bigger Than This & Present Your Power

Bigger Than This & Present Your Power

Fabian Geyrhalter is the founder & Principal of Finien, a Los Angeles-based consultancy specialized in creating strategic, verbal & specialized in creating strategic, verbal & visual brand clarity. His client list ranges from high-growth startups such as Jukin Media & Survios to established brands like Warner Brothers, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation & Goodwill. . .

Sponsors & Partners

Bigger Than This

Fabian Geyrhalter is the founder and Principal of FINIEN, a Los Angeles-based consultancy specialized in creating strategic, verbal and visual brand clarity. His client list ranges from high-growth startups such as Jukin Media, Survios, and Vimmia to established brands like Warner Brothers, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Goodwill, W Hotels and Honeywell.

Fabian is also a columnist for Inc and Forbes, and has been published by the likes of The Washington Post, Mashable, Entrepreneur and The Huffngton Post.

Transcript

Are you ready for an open discussion with the best of the best and the best of what’s next? Welcome to the Tony DUrso show. Join in on a great conversation today with some of the world’s great influencers as they showcase great advice and techniques that made them the game changers they are today. Now here’s Tony DUrso._____________________________________________________________________________________ Fabian Geyhalter

Tony:

Welcome, I’m your host, Tony DUrso. I interviewed some of the most successful people in the world and I thank you for joining us to show is dedicated to helping you turn your vision into reality and here are successful entrepreneurs who provide insights and guidance you can use to move along your vision path and you can listen to all of my shows on most podcast platforms and if you have Apple podcasts, AKA iTunes, please subscribe if you like what you hear. A kind review really makes my day. Now before we get going, here’s a big thank you to some amazing sponsors of our show. Please stay tuned for an important message from Zapier about an online automation tool that connects your apps and services. You need this coming up is a significant message from Zebit who has a radically better way to shop online, to buy what you need and pay over time. Listen to a vital message from Online Trading Academy with tips and tools from investing experts to help you make the right moves in the financial market. And lastly, check out this message from privacy at last great protection. When you buy your stuff online. More info on them just ahead. So please stay tuned. Today’s show is about Bigger Than This and Present your ower with Fabian Geyhalter and Abigail Rebecca Pugh. Let’s see what we can learn today. Here’s some info on Fabian GeyHalter Fabian is the founder and Principal of Finien, a Los Angeles based consultancy specialized in creating strategic, verbal and visual brand clarity. His client list ranges from high-growth startups to established brands like Warner brothers The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Goodwill. And by the way, at the end of this interview, I’m going to do a summary recap of what we went over. So stay tuned for that. Here we go. Welcome to the show Fabian. I am indeed honored to have you on with us today.

Fabian:

Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Tony:

Fabian of brand branding, learning about branding is something near and dear to just about every single person’s heart that’s in my audience as well as mine. I like branding too and I like to know about it and to me, this is like a branding feast Fest. I want to learn everything in the next 20, 25, 30 minutes. But before we do that, I really love to know, we all would love to know how did it all start? You’ve Fabian what’s your backstory?

Fabian:

Well, I’m going to keep my back story short because I’m, I have to teach you everything about branding. There is to know in 20 minutes. I’m originally me and my accent we’re both, I’m originally from Austria. I came here to study in the United States. I studied at the art center college of design up in Pasadena, the Los Angeles area. And you know, I studied communication design, which is really graphic design with a little bit, you know of advertising in its end. After that I stayed in the US and I became a creative director at an agency and that led to a number of jobs and so I’m still here after all those years. But the minute that my green card came in the mail, I started an agency and I was pretty young at the time. That was in my, in my mid to mid-twenties and early twenties, I guess at that time and started an agency, grew it organically. We were at some point 12 full-timers, you know, plus a good six, six freelancers or so up to like 18 people total. I did a lot of work for very large clients as well as smaller clients, a lot of branding work, graphic design work. And about 12 years into doing that I realized that my passion is, is it’s deeper, it’s more strategic. I actually want to do more brand strategy rather than a lot of, you know, producing, producing websites, producing logos, doing all that. So about six years ago from today, I pretty much from today I relaunched as a, as a consultancy by the name of Finien and we know creates a strategic verbal and visual brand clarities. So I work with companies who basically have a big opportunity in front of them and they know that they need a brand that is big enough to fit their aspirations and goals. So those are typically medium size to large corporations that are relaunching or launching spinoff start-up brands. And I craft the brand strategy they name the overarching brand identity with them as well as often stay on board as a consultant.

Tony:

Well great. There are lots to go on here and we’re also going to talk about your last book called Bigger Than This. And I’m very curious about, and I would love this explanation cause I understand how deep you go into some of this. You say branding is the new advertising and I have to ask, well, don’t we have to promote and advertise for people to know that our brand is there?

Fabian:

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. When I, when I said branding is the new advertising, the way that I feel is brands these days are very transparent. They have to be very honest, they have to be purposeful. And with social media, as we all know, brands are naked right they are out there. Whatever brand do you know it will be, it will be heard. It will be shared very quickly, especially if it’s something negative. So advertising, when we think about advertising and especially the advertising of the 80s and the 90s that a lot of us grew up with, we think about fake personas, selling products in a very fake but maybe entertaining way, right? Show camels sold camel cigarettes and it’s like, you know, it made something here. In a way that it was actually not true to the product benefit. And that has changed. So to me, branding the idea of actually thinking about how a company can come across in a very authentic and very empathetic manner that’s true to the benefits that the organization or company actually provides to customers or consumers with that really is the new advertising. That’s what people buy into. So we used to buy into ads, but now we actually buy into the brand’s and brand’s message rather than their big billboards to try to make us buy something.

Tony:

Now that said, and I understand that we still have to promote to let people know that our brands are there because McDonald’s, Pepsi, Chevrolet, Mercedes-Benz, Coca-Cola AT&T, all of these brands that I’ve just rattled off, every single person in our audience has heard of them. For one reason. Only these companies continue to promote themselves and make themselves known over and over and over again. And we don’t know too much about the companies that don’t promote because it has to stay in the public mind, the public awareness. So with branding being the new advertising, are you kind of also saying that that branding has to be so unique? I’m not trying to put words in your mouth, but so unique, so different that it stays current with people regardless of being promoted or advertised.

Fabian:

Absolutely. So there’s so much to go off on with what you just said. Tony, I love that this is it. This is a good, a good dialogue because you set that, you know, we all know brands because they’re advertising. In one way or the other. I think it is changing. I think that a lot of customers actually know brands these days because they’re being recommended by other people. And because someone on social media says, hey, I love this product, and they share a picture of the product and just say this, this is the best thing that happened to me today. I absolutely love this product. So the way that we advertise became much more often buy for people. And I think that’s why I put this big statement out there that you very rightfully poke holes into that advertising. You know, the branding is then you’re advertising. That’s what I mean by that. Brands now, you know, they have ways to stand out and they have people that carry their message rather than billboards that carry the message. And yes, absolutely advertising is still necessary but advertising became more truthful so it comes back down more to the soul of a brand rather than, you know, a big campaign that a brand, you know, fictitious liquids,

Tony:

Fabian I really got it. That is brilliant. And to make great tents, I understand that on a new level. And I thought I knew about branding, so thank you for that. And I can clearly tell you have cracked the code on branding, which is why I’ve been so excited to have you on my show and talk about it. You understand this intrinsically inside and out. And so here’s another one that I found like ah, and you said this earlier, that you specialize in strategic, verbal and visual brand clarity. And that comes to my mind, well what is verbal brand clarity and how do you do it?

Fabian:

You know, verbal brand clarity is a brand. Clarity is really, you know, making sure that the brand very clearly and consistently talks about their position in the marketplace, right? Like why would people deeply care about that product that is even outside of the product, right? Why do people buy Toms shoes? It is not because of Tom’s shoes, but it is because what Tom’s shoes stand for, they give one pair to people in need when you buy a pair. That’s a very simple example. And then creating verbal brand clarity, that means that every brand needs to know how they should create a voice of their own, right? There are some brands that you know that are like the Siege brand. So you think about national public radio, that’s a siege brand. And then there are brands that are, you know, elite or brand. And then there are brands that are, you know, a rebel, you know, like Redbull that said it’s a rebellious brand. And so do you define the personality of a brand and then you define how that should be replicated in social media on their website when, when they speak in person, you know like how do affiliates of the, of the brand represent that brand? So brands have a tone of voice and us as customers, consumers, we know Deb, but very subliminally we don’t, we don’t really notice it. We just feel like, you know, I’m drawn to Nike over Adidas and I don’t quite know why. But it is because that strategic verbal and visual Brand clarity, right? It’s not just the design, it’s not just a strategy as far as what types of products they are trying to get in front of me, but it is also verbal. How, how do they speak to me?

Tony:

I liked that. That’s a very good point. It’s verbal. So when a company wants to come out or refresh their brand or put out a new brand or a startup has a brand, you want to see that, well, how are people going to refer to us in the social media or talk about us, for example, something I heard years ago and I didn’t know what it was right away. And it was very interesting. It was how about existing brands? I’m gonna tell you in a second, an existing brand got rebranded by some people to be something else. That still means to brand. That firm was Mickey D’s. And I’m hearing, I’m hearing people go, I’m going to go get him Mickey D. I’m going, what’s the Mickey D? And then when I found out, it’s like very interesting. It was as if colloquially people rebranded a brand so that they could better verbally communicate that brand to their friends.

Fabian:

It’s fascinating, right? Yeah, absolutely. So these things happen, happen all the time or, and another story that a lot of people are familiar with this is Shinola, right? Shinola brand that creates watchers. That is out of Detroit, that was a brand that was basically a brand name Shinola that was just purchased by a CEO by a founder, a businessman in Texas. And he said you know what, I want to start a company in Detroit to make Detroit into a great productive city again. And I’m going to buy that name Shinola because it really works for me. And so there’s, it’s, there are even brands that are out there that are dying and someone just buys the rights later and creates a different totally new brand out of that same name just because the name has a good ring to it.

Tony:

I liked that Shinola, this is Fabian Geyhalter Bigger than this. And you can find him at finien.com which I’m going to spell F I N I E N.com. This is the Tony DUrso show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Just ahead the chat continues about bigger than this. And present your power with Fabian Geyhalter and Abigail Rebecca Pugh. But first, it’s time for us to take a short break. See you back here in just a moment. This the Voice America Influencers, channels be inspired. Hey guys, after a couple of years into podcasting, I’m proud to say that I toil less and enjoy the fruits of my labor much more. I would scare you if you knew what my shows take me in time. Gone are the 80 plus hours a week. It took years to tweak and adjust anything and everything that could affect my show and help bring it to the world-class brand that it is today and now I’m automating more and more to make this all a very part-time affair. Say goodbye to busy work and focus on what really matters by using Zapier to get your software to work together automatically. I’m almost afraid to tell you how much I use Zapier to help spread the word on the elite entrepreneurs I interview each week. Zapier is the easiest way to automate your work. It connects all your business software and handles work for you so that you can focus on the things that matter most. Connect just about any app to any other app. The possibilities are endless. For example, you can have your Facebook posts automatically go to LinkedIn. You can connect a Webber to any other social media that you like and how about an automated email when your Google sheets have an updated row or an email when someone fills out your Google Form. I’m setting that up now and once done, that will relieve my VA of tasks and that saves money as well as time. I love it, and that’s just scratching the surface. Zapier supports more than 1500 business applications, so the possibilities are virtually endless. I’m a kid in a candy store. Zapier is making me happier. Just go to our special link, zapier.com/tony connect to apps you use most and lets Zapier take it from there. It is the easiest way to automate your work so you can focus on the things that matter most. Like listening to my interviews with some of the world’s most successful people who share their stories to inspire, motivate, and educate you to create more success in your life. Just go to our special link, zapier.com/tony connect apps you use most and lets Zapier take it from there. Join more than 4.5 million people who are saving an average of 40 hours per month by using Zapier. Zapier does make you happier and right now through November. Try Zapier, free by going to our special link, zapier.com/tony that’s Z A P I E R.com/tony for your free 14-day trial, zapier.com/tony that’s T O N Y right. Get your 14-day trial and please tell me how Zapier does for you. What do you like about that? Share that on my Twitter at Tony DURSO We’ve all been there, suffered through those times when we really needed something, you know, a bigger TV to watch the game, new tires on your car, a tablet to keep track of your busy schedule, a new tablet for school children. And so forth. You know there was a time when I was looking for a specially built laptop for my show which was going to cost $4,000 and that wasn’t easily available back then. You know, and I also wanted to upgrade the tires and rims on one of my Jeeps. I needed new glasses and I’m looking to upgrade my recording. Microphones and the list just kept going on and on and on, but how many of you have the cash lying around to cover those expenses and that’s why you need to check out Zebit with Zebit, Z. E. B I. T. you can shop millions of products from your favorite brands and pay for them interest-free over time. That’s right. Interest-free overtime. You simply choose a product you love and you just pay a small portion of the price at checkout. The rest you pay overtime at 0% interest. That’s 0% check this out for example on eyeglasses. The eyeglasses you see on some of my images are the Spy Luke glasses. They don’t make them anymore, which is sad. Why do they do that? The Spy Von eyeglasses are probably the next best thing for that style. And you know I can buy them from Zebit for $92 and 99 cents I can pay $7 and 74 cents to start the process or $23 and 24 cents to ship it ASAP and I have six months to pay for it. Wow. And those glasses cost an average of $107 and 91 cents to $150 if you shop around and try to get it anywhere else. Now that is double, super cool. And in addition to interest, free credit Zebit has no cost to join, no late fees and no membership fees. This is like crazy great. Sign up for Zebit today at zebit.com /Tony and get up to $2,500 credit to shop to zebit marketplace at zero interest in zero costs to join. That’s Z E B I T.com/tony for $2,500 of interest. Free credit zebit.com slash Tony and Tony we know is T O N Y. So sign up, check it up and tell me what you like about it. Share that on my Twitter at Tony D U RSO. We don’t follow we lead. Join us the Voice America influencers channel. You’re listening to the Tony Durso show with key influencers. We’d love to hear from you via email. Be sure to send questions and comments to Tony at tonydurso.com now back to Tony and his guests.

Tony:

All right, we’re back on the Tony DUrso show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Let’s see what we can learn today. Today’s show is about Bigger than This and Present your Power with Fabian Geyhalter and Abigail Rebecca Pugh. At the end of this interview, I’ll give you a summary of what I got out of this and share some pointers, knowledge, and so forth with you. So stay tuned for that. And here’s some more info on Fabian. Fabian is also a columnist for Inc and Forbes and has been published by the likes of the Washington Post, Mashable, entrepreneur, and The Huffington Post. All right, and now back to the chat with Fabian. How can we turn any venture into an admired brand, whether it’s a failing brand, a new brand, startup brand, an old brand that we dust it off and this is where we’re going to pick your brain and learn everything you know, in a couple of minutes.

Fabian:

Excellent. Very good, well look, I mean, you know, you think about what you know, like what brands turn into an admired brand today and you think about technology and innovation, that’s all we hear about D and D out Silicon Valley, right? I would innovate, disrupt. Those are the words and surprisingly enough in my new book, which, which you mentioned bigger than this, which has the subtitle, how to turn any venture into an admired brand I know, that’s why you poke me on this. In this book, I talk about no innovation, no technology whatsoever. I’m not even talking about the sign, which is dear to my heart, but I talk about a new crop of companies that are found in a surge over mums and mums of reading magazines and really trying to figure out are there companies out there that actually offer a complete commodity-type product? So I’m talking about shoes and socks and office supplies that really are completely unchanged. No tech innovation, you know, like, like no new design just to see more products and people go crazy over them. And they found so many of those, and this might be a relief to some of the listeners where it’s kind of like a so what product offering or so what service offering. And yet they found a way to sell like pancakes and figuring out people’s just go crazy over them and they build these tribes around the other ways. So what type of products? And so that was exciting to me as a brand strategist because I figured out the only way that these companies connect with today’s consumer is through an emotional connection. And funny enough that is the one thing that the tech industry is lacking, right? They want an emotional connection with the customers, but they’ve got a really, really hard time. So I figured, you know, I have to collect and analyze these types of brands and share my findings. So many small business owners, startup or even seasoned entrepreneur or marketer can actually infuse to ventures with the new type of brand thinking and along with the answer to a quick question, how can you turn into an admired brand? It is really all about owning a brand story, right? Maybe it’s that you share a belief with your audience. Maybe that you are embodying a cause. So there’s a company called Bombas socks and the socks are pretty much talks like any other socks. But Dave realized that homeless people cannot get socks anywhere. They can’t go to a salvation army or Goodwill because they can pick up used socks. It’s just not hygienic. It makes sense. And that’s the number one thing that they need. So I studied this brand Bomba Socks and with them. It was all about cost. So people buy there, otherwise, you know, very commodity type of product. It’s just plain sock. They buy it because they have a connection or Shinola, we talked about Shinola is all about heritage. Did you buy a Shinola watch? Even though the watch looks pretty identical to a lot of other watches out there before them, right? It’s not about design innovation, there’s no tech innovation, but you buy it because you believe in the story of Detroit. You liked the heritage of that brand and you want to buy a made in the US product. And I came up with a lot of these different traits that these type of companies showcase and I feel this a lot for any brand to learn from it and start realizing, wait, there’s one of these trades that really resonates with my brand and I’m already doing this, but now let’s think about how can I actually make this into a trade that my company stands for and actually owns and starts talking about

Tony:

Now what we just talked about is in your book bigger than this?

Fabian:

That is correct. Yes.

Tony:

And can our audience, if we go to finien.com, of course, go to Amazon, that’s F I N I E N.com. If we go there, we can find out more about your book?

Fabian:

Absolutely. There’s a tab called books already. You can just go to biggerthanthis.com.

Tony:

He’s crack the code and he knows this stuff to really very good stuff here. Highly recommended.

Fabian:

You know it’s, it’s really, it should be, it should be very self selfless. It should be, it should be authentic and empathetic, but it should be a cost. Like if you as a company say I’m going to give back to a very specific cause or a specific organization, make sure that that costs and that organization have something to do with your brand. So that it makes sense for a consumer to understand, Oh, that’s why they’re doing that. So the example that I gave with Bombas they produce socks, they gift socks, to homeless that don’t have socks. It’s a story that I can, I don’t feel like they’re fishing for a story. It’s like that makes sense. You know, this is, this is very one-to-one and you know, another point that I wanted to make about purposeful companies, the next generation, and I’m not even talking about the millennials anymore, I’m talking about generation C, where do they want to work? Do you want to work for companies that do more than just produce yet another product? They want to work for in an environment where they feel like they’re part of the change and they’re doing something better for this world. So it is again rather selfishly for a company if you want to keep hiring people and if you want, if you want people to like you as a brand, it makes a lot of sense for you to start looking inwards and like what can you do to actually make this world a better place?

Tony:

You talk about transparency and empathy, taking over innovation and technology and let’s throw into that emotional connection as well. I like to kind of go into some of these points, some more branding points by you.

Fabian:

Yeah, absolutely. I mean look, technology and innovation is crucial. It is absolutely important. I’m not telling anyone who listening to stop innovation. That is absolutely not what I want to preach, but if you are not big into technology as a brand and you’re not constantly innovating, I want to tell everyone that there is hope. You can actually find ways like transparency as you mentioned, Tony. It is like if you say, you know what, our brand can be 100% transparent. We tell everyone exactly what we do, how we do it, how much it costs, where our stuff comes from. It is a huge, huge, huge thing to do for a brand. Because so, long, you know, for the last like decades, of consumerism, brands have been very quiet about what they really do. There was the annual report, but that was pretty much it. And now they are brands like Everlane, which is an apparel company and they share everything on their website about the origin of each one of their garments as well as the cost. And they call it like radical transparency. So they actually tell you as a consumer how much it cost them to create a certain garment. So they tell you that in the end, that garment that you buy for $80 actually only custom 43 but here’s where the money went to and here’s where the rest of that money goes to because they need to run a sustainable business. But by doing that, they had a bestseller and I think it was a cashmere sweater and they had a cashmere sweater and they always said, well, we’re completely transparent about everything because it was a bestseller. They had to create a lot more, right to, if there’s demand you have to produce more. So they figured out how to create a more efficient factory line to produce these cashmere sweaters and their price their own price in producing it dropped $25 so what would anyone at Walmart or target or the big box retailer corporations say? I mean they would say, who array? We have more money. Shareholders. This is good. This is a good year, like $25 more profit from each one of our bestselling items. But Everlane and said, hey, guys and girls, you know, like this is your favorite product. We were able to figure out how to produce them less in a less expensive manner because you really liked them. So we wanted to get more out of them. So from now on, they are going to be $25 less. And that is radical transparency and that’s really amazing because you know what happens when you write that email saying, Hey, from now on you know, this is not a gimmick. This is not, again, this is not the advertising. This is just us sharing with you that we were smart enough to cut off $25 that creates trust. So if you are a transparent brand, you are 100% trusted until of course, you screw it up.

Tony:

Fabian, so much more to talk about brands. We’re going to have to have you back because I think you know, a couple more things.

Fabian:

I would love that. This was great. Lots of fun, Tony. Thank you.

Tony:

This is the Tony DUrso show where you can learn from the wisdom and success the others to help you move on your vision path. Just ahead the chat continues about Bigger than this and Present your Power with Fabian Geyhalter and Abigail Rebecca Pugh. But first, it’s time for us to take a short break. See you back here in just a moment. Change starts here. Change starts now. The voice America influencers channel. Let’s be honest, most people weren’t taught how to invest in school and if you’re like me you’ve probably wondered why does wall street seem to win so consistently? Have I got some interesting news for you as a leader in investing and trading education? Online trading Academy teaches people just like you and me, a step by step process designed to help you make the right moves in the financial markets. You’ll discover common investor mistakes, learn about risk management skills and how to develop a personal income and wealth education plan. I’ll tell you my story. Years back, and I mean years back, I bought the books, got the newsletters, and spent hours upon hours and hours learning how to trade in the market, and then I just jumped in and started buying and selling stocks. I know you’re going to laugh, but in my first year, I made $24,000 boy, that was a lot of work. And guess what? It costs me $23,000 so my profit was $1,000 after all that work, ugh. Now fast forward, here’s online trading Academy, and in the first hour with their free introductory class, I learned so much that I explained all the errors I made before. And why my gains are just like my peers. I started learning how to think like the big institutional funds’ thing and to buy when they buy and sell when they sell. That information really turned everything around for me. The online trading Academy classes are so easy to view and understand they are clear and simple and well-explained. I wish I knew about this years ago and this is why I really want you to check it out and see for yourself how cool it is. What would you do if you knew skills designed to help you generate income and build confidence towards your retirement goals? Hey, get started by joining the more than 500,000 people who have attended one of their free classes and they have over 190,000 reviews. Sign up for a free three-hour introductory class at OTAtrade.com/tony. That’s a free class in your area, register at otatrade.com slash Tony you’ll even receive their professional insiders kit just for attending. That’s otatrade.com/tony. Begin taking control of your financial future today with no obligation. Now, what would you do if you knew a path to take control of your financial future? We’ll start knowing today. Get your kit and learn the step by step strategy designed to help you think and act like the professionals. Good otatrade.com/tony that’s OTAT R A D E.com/TONY so sign up, check it out and tell me what you like about it. Share that on my Twitter at Tony D URSO. Hear the story. Be motivated. Be Inspired. Join us today. VoiceAmerica Influencers. You’re listening to the Tony DUrso show with key influencers. We’d love to hear from you via email. Be sure to send questions and comments to Tony at tonydurso.com now back to Tony and his guests. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Abigail Rebecca Pugh

Tony:

All right, we’re back on the Tony DUrso show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Let’s see what we can learn today. Today’s show is about bigger than this and presents your power with Fabian Geyhalter and Abigail Rebecca Pugh. At the end of this interview, I’ll give you a summary of what I got out of this and share some pointers, knowledge and so forth with you. So stay tuned for that. And now we have Abigail, Rebecca Pugh joining us. Abigail is the presentation coach, CEO, and founder of the Whole Shebang Project. After working over 20 years in corporate as a senior leader, training and mentoring thousands of people on public speaking and talking to the camera, Abby decided that enough was enough, moved to the seaside and embraced her inner hippy. And by the way, at the end of this interview, I am going to do a summary recap of what we went over. So stay for that. Here we go. Welcome to the show, Abby. So glad to have you on finally with me. This is great.

Abigail:

Hi Tony is such a pleasure to be on your show and thanks so much for inviting me.

Tony:

The honor is mine. And you know I’ve been through your site and I’ve been through what you’ve done in the corporate world and I just have to tell you, I know I’m a little out of sequence cause we should talk about this later in the show. But I just got to say, it felt like you were talking about me because I totally share that pain and we’re going to go over that. I’m very interested in, I urge the audience, check this out, what she says. It just resonates with me so much. But before we go into that more, but just the wait one moment, everybody, Abigail’s, tell us about your history and how it all started for you and what’s your backstory?

Abigail:

Yes so, I would to in the corporate world for many years, over 14 years I worked in the corporate industry as an executive in the UK. But before that, I traveled the world. So all my three, my twenties I traveled the world, had the most amazing experiences, lived in lots of different countries and in Europe and the States and Canada. And then I came back to the UK and felt that I really had to kind of settle down inverted commas and get a proper job and start a Korea. And I did. And I had a very successful Korea. I used to manage a big team. I was, you know, I had managed a big budget. I had a lot of responsibilities, but I just wasn’t happy. I really, really wasn’t happy. But I kept ignoring that nagging feeling that was going on in my guts and just thought, Oh, I’ll be okay and just get on with that. And that carried on for many, many years until my body actually had different ideas and my body decided to tell me otherwise and created a situation, a heart condition actually, which I couldn’t ignore, which actually forced me to slow down and created that space in my head to really start to think about what I wanted to do in the future. And I think that that, you know, scared me. And it shocked me into realizing that I didn’t want to carry on my life as I was living. I was stressed out. I was unhappy. I didn’t feel that I was living a purposeful life. I felt that I would always have a glass ceiling in terms of the money that I was earning as well while I was working for somebody else or while I was working for a big corporation and they finally gave me a reason to explore how I could leave corporate and do something different with my life. So that kind of set off a chain reaction in a place where I really created a corporate escape plan and I left corporate, I’m kind of the story, very short hair because that was a long long process and it’s very, very scary and lots of limiting beliefs coming up for me. But I did it and I left. And that was three years ago and I’ve set up a successful business. I’m based in the UK, but I coach women all over the world, either online or in person. And I’ve kind of transitions from being a presentation coach where I used to teach, I used to teach entrepreneurs, female entrepreneurs to speak on stage and speak to the camera. And I have transitioned into a coach who helps women escape that as those seeking corporate jobs. So really to help them do exactly what I did because I just think, gosh, if I can do it, then anybody can. And I just love what I do. I love helping women really unlock that potential and realize that they can be living a life where they’re free and they’re happier and they have financial abundance. So that’s what I do.

Tony:

That’s amazing. I love it. And as I alluded to just earlier at the intro, I’ve been through this, I’m reading about you where you know, just like you, I worked a corporate job in an executive position. I made a lot of money, I had a lot of responsibilities and it gets in a way, scary if you leave too to go do something else. Cause you’re talking about the livelihood of your family and all the financial responsibilities you have and how that can just domino and fall apart. Yet it’s not satisfying somehow. And it’s so weird. It doesn’t mean everybody gets into this, but for me, the same thing happened. I just wasn’t satisfying. Maybe it’s because I knew I was destined to become a podcast host someday or you know, or whatever. Something else was calling me and tapping me on the shoulder and it just didn’t feel great. And it’s just amazing that you have the same thing, not only to have you been through it, you help people to transition now I’ve got to say, cause I’m speaking from experience, it’s very scary. If you walked up to me and said, Tony, I’m going to help you leave you’re, you know, high six-figure digits job to go work for yourself. It’s like, what do you, you know, yeah, I need it. But you’re crazy to think of it, you know? So how do you get people to go from a to B? Because it sounds very fast. It’s just two letters of the alphabet. But there’s a big gap in between.

Abigail:

Yeah, it’s really scary, isn’t it? I mean, I, I think back to when I made that decision though, right? I’m going to do this and then the next question was more, how am I going to do it? Do you know? How and earth am I going to be able to leave and support myself and pay my mortgage, pay my bills, you know, and all these fears were coming up. Like what if I don’t succeed? And then I lose the house and we’re living in the car and we are homeless. All these fears come up. And I think that, puts me in a really good position because I really understand what my clients are going through. So the name of my programs and the name of my process, I guess within my business and how I help my clients is coping change small steps. And it really is taking tiny steps because I think if you were to look at the whole picture, I’m going to leave my corporate job, I’m going to leave the security, not just the money, but also the number of hours that I’ve put in to get to where I am. You know, you said that you were a senior manager, an executive in a corporation that doesn’t, how can overnight. You put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into that. So to actually, you know, give her that and replace it with something else is overwhelming. And that’s where most people fail. You know, they want to do it and they have this big desire to do it, but the thoughts of it are just so overwhelming. It’s so scary they just can’t do it. So they continue to suffer in silence or maybe not in silence, but they continue to work in their soul-sucking job and they don’t do anything about it. So really with my clients, it really is taking them through the stages step by step by step. And you know, I use a three-stage approach within the first part of the work really is the inner step. It’s the inner work. It’s really understanding yourself, getting to know yourself. What will I do? How on earth will I make money? What will I do? What is my purpose? And really overcoming those fears and those limiting beliefs and those stories that we have that we can only earn money in a certain way. And I think that when you work incorporate when you’re an executive and you are used to having that salary every single month, it’s very difficult to get out of that mindset and really open your mind up to the possibility that you can earn money doing different things. You don’t have to be reliant on a paycheck every month and actually, you can earn even more money by doing it that way. So there’s a lot of the inner work and obviously, I deal with, I work with women so we deal a lot with, you know, self-love and self-acceptance and confidence. And then, and then the outsiders you know, how am I going to communicate money thing to my friends and family. They’re going to think that I’ve gone crazy. How am I going to reach out and connect with people that are going to be able to help me, support me with my dream? And then the feds, that really is the strategy. You know, if we’ve worked in corporate we are very good at managing projects, well this time it’s time to manage your own project. Like you are the project. So actually what are the steps? And breaking it down into very manageable chunks. What are the steps that I need to take to get me to where I want it to be? And that is where I come in I how to support them on those steps so that they create this kind of escape strategy, this exit plan. And then I help them deliver that and I held them on the whole of that journey and very often my clients want to sell their own business or you know, they want to, um, start their own show or whatever that might be. And I helped them all the way through that process, which I have to say is the most rewarding job that I’ve ever done Tony.

Tony:

This is Abigail, Rebecca Pugh talking about how to present your power. You’ll find her as abigailrebecca.com, which I will spell AB I G A I L R E B E C C A.com. This is the Tony DUrso show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Just ahead the chat continues about bigger than this and presents your power with Fabian Geyhalter and Abigail Rebecca Pugh, but first, it’s time for us to take a short break. See you back here in just a moment. We don’t follow we lead. Join us the voice America influencers channel. This podcast is brought to you by privacy.com/tony privacy.com/tony lets you buy things online using virtual cards instead of real ones protecting your identity and bank information on the internet. It happened just a few months ago. 100 million people had their personal information hacked through a major credit card. You can search that easily and read all about it. And yeah, my information and my wife’s is in there too, and a few months ago I found someone who was charging small monthly amounts on my card and then after a while increased the monthly charges. Yeah, I got my money back, but it’s not always easy to find a suspicious charge among household spending. Good thing I did find it, but you know it can happen again. Anytime we buy anything online, we give access to our personal information to merchants and their data partners and their data partners and their data partners. This happens without our clear consent. Security protection isn’t always the sexiest, most fun topic, but it’s important to ensure that your online presence is safe and secure. privacy.com/tony is a free tool that makes it super easy to manage your financial lives online without sharing your real banking information. That’s why I recommend privacy.com/tony to all my followers for security. You can feel safe about making purchases anywhere online, especially on websites you’re unfamiliar with or have never used before. Sensitive information is secured using military great encryption, which means that your information is encrypted using split team encryption with partial keys held by separate employees. This is amazing. No single person can access the sensitive info on the server because it requires multiple keys to decrypt and you can take control of your finances by setting the spend, limit and control your subscriptions and recurring payments. You can make sure that you’re never accidentally billed twice or upgraded to another service without your consent. This happens more frequently than you think, and it’s happened to me. Set a spending limit to what you should be paying with that service per month to catch these and there’s no interest or annual fees. How cool is that? So let’s do this. Head to privacy.com/tony to sign up and start shopping. And as a special treat for my listeners, new customers will automatically get $5 to spend on your first purchase. Hey, that’s free money to use on any online purchase. Go to privacy.com/tony and sign up now. Okay, sign up, check it out and tell me how you like it and share that on my Twitter at Tony DURSO. This is the voice America influencers channels be inspired. You’re listening to the Tony DUrso show with key influencers. We’d love to hear from you via email. Be sure to send questions and comments to tony at tonydurso.com now back to Tony and his guests.

Tony:

All right, we’re back on the Tony dear soul show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Let’s see what we can learn today. Today’s show is about bigger than this and presents your power with Fabian Geyhalter and Abigail Rebecca Pugh. At the end of this interview, I’ll give you a summary of what I got out of this and share some pointers, knowledge, and so forth with you. So stay tuned for that. Abigail retrained as a personal stylist at the London College of fashion and now empowers purpose-driven entrepreneurs like you to create incredible success in your business in life. By sharing your message in a passionate, authentic, and stylish way on stages and video. Her mission is to create a million voices, a million people to stand up and speak their truth. And now back to the chat with Abigail.

Abigail:

The first step I always take my clients through whenever I start to work with them. And yes they come and see somebody like me because I don’t just help them with the plan I also help them create the plan if they so wish. And very often I have people that come to me that don’t really know what they want to do and they feel that they should have a purpose, but they don’t really know what that purpose is. So I really help them dig deep into what their purpose is. You know, what do they want to be creating in their life? How do they want to live their life? So I really how they dig into the things that make them happy. So you know what brings you joy in your life? Notice the tasks that you are doing in your everyday life, which are the tasks that really feed you, that really feed your soul, that make you happy, that give you energy and which are the tasks that drain you, that suck that energy, that make you unhappy. And they create a map. They create a list of all the things in their life that gives them energy and they create a list of all the things in their life that suck their energy. So actually they look at all the things in their life that give them energy. Then these are the things that they can be really doing more of or working towards doing more of because the whole purpose and people talk about, well, what is my purpose? I would say, well, your purpose. What if your purpose was to create joy? What if your purpose was to have a joyful life? Doesn’t that make it really lovely and simple and easy? And then there are different vessels that you can use to bring that joy into your life on one of those vessels is the vessel that you use to bring much energy into your life. So don’t think about how you can actually create a vessel to bring that money into your life that also brings you joy and brings you happiness. And you know, it’s funny, I was working with a new client actually the other day and I got her to really map how, you know, what would her perfect life be? What would her ideal life be when she wakes up in the morning, what does she want to see, what she wants to smell, you know? Well just her, what does that look like? What did the sheets feel like? Who is she with? What is she eating for breakfast? I’m really starting to visualize, you know, almost like bring it to life. Like she’s already living it already. Because I think that the more that we do this, the more that we really start to dig deep into our desires, into our heart desires and start to bring them to life, even if it’s just initially in our heads. That really helps us to almost like reprogram our brain, like trick our brain into thinking that it is already happening and actually it is possible. So that is one of the first steps that I take my clients through. And I just, you know, they find it very, very powerful when they do this. Very powerful to visualize. So you know, I encourage anybody that’s listening just to do that. Like really you are the creator, you have the power to create your future. So if you were to remove all your limiting beliefs, all the obstacles that are in your way, either internally or externally, what kind of future would you create? Even if you don’t truly believe that you can create it at the moment and you might think that it’s a bit of nonsense, it’s just playing with that, have fun with that and just start to create something. Even if it’s just a fan and it’s just a game, to begin with. Actually, the more you do this, the more that you can really sort of start to understand that this is a possibility and then you really start to believe that you can create this and once you believe, that’s when you can actually implement it and it will happen.

Tony:

Everything. She said, ladies and gentlemen in the audience, what she said is so spot on. You got to check her out at abigailrebecca.com this is the real deal and I just love it when I talked to people who’ve, you realize it, you’ve observed it, you and you teach others so great, so great to see Abby. I love it. What’s the whole shebang project?

Abigail:

The Whole Shebang Project was a great program and the I created, and I’m a mastermind I created actually for women who felt that they couldn’t have it all, so I’m either going to have the family or the career, I’m going to have this spirituality, all the money I’m, you know, I’m going to have the travel, all the responsibilities, and I’m like, honey, you can have it. All. The whole shebang. I just love that phrase. It’s something that I created really to change the mindset of anybody who feels that they only have a certain limit, that finally, everything runs out and it was really for them to understand that we live in a world of abundance. It is our birthright to live a life of abundance. That’s an abundance of love. It’s an abundance of joy. It’s an abundance of wonderful friends. It’s an abundance of experiences and opportunities and travel and many if all these experiences just are unlimitless. So the big shebang, right? People, it’s about.

Tony:

We want it all.

Abigail:

We want it all. And you know, I do feel that sometimes we might feel like we are being a little bit greedy for wanting everything. And you know, we’ve got all stories from our childhood and probably things that our parents told us about, don’t be a greedy child and you cant have it all, and there’s not enough to go around and don’t ask for more than than you should do. And I’m like, I want to smash your all that. So this was really something. And you know what? This is my dream for the future as well. So my real purpose and my dream are to help as many people as I can to escape corporate and to escape these executive jobs and to create something wonderful in their lives if they’re unhappy. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with working in Culebra and I know a lot of people that are happy. You know, we live in a life of abundance. We feel that it’s our birthright. And then as we get older, we learn normally from my parents that we come half those kinds of things and that there are restrictions. And then we start to create these stories that stop us from achieving that when we’re older. So I really want to be able to help and work with young people and educate them, not just that you do, you can go and work in corporate and so much money for actually you can create this really abundant life for yourselves and you can have anything really that you want in life. You just need to believe in and you just need to do the stats like you just said,

Tony:

Abby, we’re now going to call you the whole shebang coach.

Abigail:

Okay.

Tony:

You want the whole shebang. Go see Abby at abigailrebecca.com she’ll show you the whole shebang,

Abigail:

Thank you, Tony, so much for having me. It’s been a real pleasure Tony’s Insight

Tony:

To my visionary audience. Thanks for hanging out with me while I featured elite entrepreneurs who took their vision to reality. I hope this was as inspiring for you as it was for me to do these interviews. I learned so much. The insights are so valuable. How did you like them? Fabian Geyhalter talking about bigger than this. Wow. What a branding Feast Fest. Branding is to new advertising. Can you see how people tend to buy into brands and the message instead of an advertisement that just says, you know, try and make us buy something. Branding is definitely key. If you don’t have that in your head, you should have that in your head. Now listen to this. Again, branding is where it’s at. Put more into branding and less than the advertising and I believe that that’s going to really do great because the branding is the perception and that’s going to be very, very strong and it’s going to stay out there and I really like how advertising was forced to become more truthful as a result and how it rests on the soul of the brand as opposed to fictitious advertisements that we used to see decades ago. Verbal brand clarity, making sure a brand talks about its position in the marketplace. Why would people buy or care about the product? Great examples here of companies that give back something to the community or the needy with every purchase. I liked that. There are leader brands, Sage brands, rebellious brands and everything in between. What kind of brand does your company, what is it that draws you to one particular brand and not the competitor such as do you buy from Nike or Adidas? What is it that draws you? And then there’s the rebranding to provide a better brand clarity such as Mickey D’s example I gave and the Shinola brand that really surprised me. What do you think about buying a well known and dying brand and using it for something totally different? Very, very clever. How can we turn any venture into an admired brand and what makes an admired brand really great on owning a brand story? Have you heard of Bombas socks before? Do you buy from them or how about Shinola watches? Do you have one? finien.com F. I. N. I.E. N. find out more about the book bigger than this. I believe in brands giving back to their community makes it, it just flows so much nicer and it helps the brand stand out such as in the Bombas. Socks really makes sense. Emotional connection with brands, transparency, and empathy. It creates trust in great points. Abigail Rebecca Pugh presents your power. Are you still working any kind of a job and what would it take for you to leave that and be on your own and if you are on your own, what did it take to leave the job? You could’ve been forced to go out on your own for one reason or another, or you could have had a great opportunity and a way to finance it, and there are many reasons, but you can all agree that it takes something definite to go from a happy, cushy job to working on your own. Okay. Maybe it’s not a super happy cause she job, but if you have family or any financial requirements, then it’s still scary to leave steady money for the risk of not having money. Again, right away, I’ve been through this several times. I know where this is at and where are you on this chain? Let me know. As Abigail mentioned, I put in a lot of years to climb up my ladder and make good money. As a senior executive. There is a price to pay for that and that makes it even harder to leave to go out on your own. It can be overwhelming, right? I could totally see how someone like Abigail is so vital to us entrepreneurs who want to venture out on her own and call the shots and control our own future. It’s great. Once you get there, but again, just like moving up in the corporate world, it’s a process to do it per stage is very cool. One was inner work. Understanding yourself, what’s your purpose. How do you communicate this to friends and family? How do you get help and support to accomplish your dream? Three strategies. What are the steps in manageable chunks to get to where you want to be? Consider it an exit plan or escaped strategy. Very needed. What’s that first step? I like that she helps people find their purpose. Do you know what your purpose is and what do you want to create in your life? How do you want to live your life? What makes you happy? What’s a perfect life for you? What gives you energy? What sucks out your energy? She’s so right about living in an abundance. You could have anything and everything you want. There’s plenty for everyone. Let’s start on what your ideal life is and using her help and my vision map book to work out your vision path to the ideal life for yourself and your family. Do you believe it’s your birthright to have an abundance? There’s so much more I got out of these interviews. What did you get? I would love to know how you use this information to help with your business or career. Tell us, tell the world tweet at Tony DURSO grab hold of your vision. Decide you’re going to either start something great or take it to the next level. You have to decide first. It always starts with a decision and you can get my vision map to help you along the process. The free ebook is still online. At some point, the full book will be released with much more info, but for now, get that and use it to stimulate your success. I created my empire in just a few years, that’s all I took. I had the vision map as my guide. You can do it too and please follow me on social media. You can find most of those links on my homepage at tonydurso.com and you can also get the vision map there. And if you have iTunes or access to any Apple device, look up my name, Tony D U R S O, and subscribe to my show, a kind review there will get you a tremendous appreciation back in return. Thanks and remember, success awaits those who persevere and remained steadfast despite the odds. So good seeds do good deeds. And join me on the next episode of the Tony DUrso show We hope you’ve enjoyed this week’s edition of the Tony DUrso with his key influencers. Be sure to tune in again next Friday at 4:00 PM Eastern time, 1:00 PM Pacific time on the voice America influencers channel.

Explore The Show

New here? Start with:

Get The Newsletter

Level up faster - discover the insights of Elite Entrepreneurs who’ve built empires in their industries.

Get The Newsletter

Level up faster - discover the insights of Elite Entrepreneurs who’ve built empires in their industries.

Community-based outreach supporting those in need. Learn more

Your Ideal Client Dr. Jürgen Strauss
The Reckless & Guerrilla Negotiating Strategies
Go to Top