Fitness Business School – Paul Routon Jr

Full Transcript

Hey Pat Rigsby here and in today’s episode we have a very special guest, our good friend, videographer podcast, producer, Paul Routon, and we are gonna be diving deep into some really interesting and cool questions. I am so excited. So let’s get to it.

Welcome to the fitness business school podcast. The show for fitness business owners who want to grow their income, increase their end impact and improve their lifestyle. Be sure to listen to the end of this episode, because we have a brand new special offer exclusive for listeners. So stay tuned.

All right. So in today’s episode, we are with our good friend, Paul. And to give you a little bit of background here I had asked Paul you know, when he was here helping me with podcasts about a week ago, I said, okay, you know what? You’ve spent the last almost decade and a half with us at this point. Paul has been around longer than, than our youngest son, Alex has been around really helping us in almost every facet of what we do in some way, shape and form. I mean, he was our videographer for all of Holly’s products and DVDs of the month and all that fun stuff for years and years. Then he started getting involved with us doing, you know, the video for the information products. We’d create all of the, the other brands that, that I was a co-owner with. He videoed our live event. He traveled around and videoed in other venues. And then he even got to the point where he was working with you know, a lot of our friends in the industry, people that maybe we had done some collaboration with, he’d go off and do projects with them separately. And then it’s kind of come full circle and now he’s here pretty much on a weekly basis. Running all things podcast for me, I, I have the good fortune to sit here and talk and Paul does everything else. And so I thought, man, wouldn’t it be cool if I just said, Paul, you know, you’ve been with us for a really long time. Let’s, let’s look at maybe some of the things you learn, hopefully some of the things that, that either you learn through observation, learn through what we say, and now I need to give you fair warning. This is uncensored. So he may learn that I’m an imbecile that may be what, what he shares. So who knows? So welcome Paul.

Hey pat, thanks for having me on, I guess very, very excited to be on the microphone and not behind the scenes. So For, for the record, since this is an audio only podcast, Paul’s level of enthusiasm is palpable. Let me tell you so Paul, you’ve been with us for quite some time. And so what I wanted to ask you is just kind of some, some questions about things that, that maybe you got to, to be a part of things that, that you learn, because I mean, at this point you probably know our IP as much as I do. So I, I guess I’ll start with this. Are there any kind of takeaways, any, any big takeaway that stands out above all else when it comes to business, when it comes to growing and sustaining a successful business? Well, I would say to start off, I could probably open and have a pretty healthy fitness business. If I wanted to. Now I’ve had more than a decade of just top training that I’ve actually been paid to learn just being here, but that is not an interest at all to me, I would say really, when you talk about your concept of an ideal business, like it’s people, I think you take, you just kind of throw that term out there, but it really it really works like having your ideal business for your ideal life, because what you do, you know, works for you, you know, who you, you know, you know who you are more than anything. So I think knowing who you are and what you’re trying to get out of your life and out of your business is really, I think a lot of people just when they start out, they put their head down and they’re like, how much money can I make? How, you know, how successful can I be? And if, as you do it year in and year out, you’re like money is not as important as the life that the business builds for you.

So I mean, your money can buy you a big life, but it can also, if your business is too busy, it takes you away from the important moments with your family. And, you know, you see it with your kids growing up. I’ve been able to see it here with Alex, especially, you know, cause I’ve been along longer than him how you’ve built this business, but you also have your time to say, Hey, this is important. I could always go back and start a new business or make more money. But when the kids grow up, you can’t go back and have that. And having two kids on my own, that’s really kind of been a thing that I didn’t think about starting out, but that’s really been important to me. And I think my girls would appreciate that. They don’t realize it, that I try to tell ’em all the time. You know, some people don’t have their data here all the time. They don’t have someone to take them to school and pick them up and, you know, they can drop anything if they need to on a dime to come to school or to come see a, oh boy, these, these concerts and these presentations they do at school that, you know, they’re sweet. They’re not real great, but it’s nice to be a part of it where my wife, unfortunately, you know, for years was a teacher and couldn’t just leave her school to go to my kid’s school. So they always had someone there. And I mean, to me, that is more important than money and not in my business in my life. And just seeing you do that and say, well, this is not it’s not the model most people think of when they think of business where they think, you know, I’m gonna get in there, I’m gonna just throw everything I have into this all day long. And then one day I’ll hopefully, you know, have millions retire big, but then you realize you miss all the, what I would call the important stuff along the way more so than, you know, financially there’s more to life than financial success, I guess. So Very true, very true. I nah, I, it, it is something that I probably didn’t intuitively get early on and I’m glad that I arrived at later and I’m thrilled to be able to, to help other people move on that path. So in addition to the, the time that you spend with me, I mean, you’ve filmed stuff for Mike Robertson, Eric Cressye, Dave Schmitz down the line. I mean, it’s been kind of a never ending list of people who I think are, you know, just top the field really accomplished or are there any kind of common threads that you see with all the, the, the talented and successful people that you ha have been able to, to fill?

Well, I mean the easy, common line through all that is you, you know, of their their association with you. But I mean, I think just having just a sense again, of who, of who they are and what they’re trying to accomplish, where, you know, if like Mike I’d say is probably more similar to you where he’s got, you know, his eye fast, he’s got his Roberts and training systems, but then he also, you know, if he needs to, he can cut it off and say, Hey, I’ve gotta go. A couple months ago, we do a a monthly shoot at his building. And he was like, I’m gonna have to be late because there’s an art show at school. And I was like, oh, alright. I understand. So, you know, he had to drop what he was doing, put things off a little bit and say, Hey, my kids come first. You know, I’ve got all this going on, but I’m in a place where I can do that. And I know Dave Schmitz, the Bandman, he, he was very busy. He never had to drop anything, but his schedule he’s a different kind of person. He was, he was always there for his family. And, but he did it by having 20 hour days. It seemed like where he would just, he would, he would cram more into one day than I often do in a month than it was really something to say. So maybe, maybe a lot of it success was, I don’t know, but I, I feel like I see a lot more maybe somehow I’m attracted or I get attracted by family based you know, businesses, funnily enough, before I started fitness, I worked for in every say retail in every job on my own where I didn’t work for myself. I somehow ended up in a family business and they were never run somehow. This is, this has been kind of a remarkable journey if you saw what I was doing before, all the different companies and the different people who involved their families in their jobs. And, you know, some of them ended up you know, with us coming in and closing them down. So, you know, we had, it was quite, it was quite a show day in and day out. So, you know, maybe I took a lot of that growing up saying, I don’t really want that as part of my, my journey when I’m older. So you’ve been kind of put in a spot where you’ve had to point the camera at some people who are really comfortable in that setting. Some people who are uncomfortable in that setting.

You know, I, I feel like it, it’s probably a little bit of a leading thing, but if I look at the, the people that you filmed, the, the ones who have done the best typically have found a way to get comfortable, putting good information, good content out there on a consistent basis. All the, you know, all the people I just alluded to, I don’t think any of them are like paid advertising juggernauts, but they are very good at taking what’s inside their brain and sharing it with the world on a really consistent basis. So you know, when I think of the common threads, I mean, do, do most of the people that you work with that are, that are effective? Are they, are, are they good, you know, teaching not necessarily in the confines of like what your wife did for a living or whatever, but just, you know, helping other people get better, are they, you know, are they, are they more consistent? Are they you know, are, are they just able to overcome the, the, the anxiousness that comes being in front of a camera? Well, so, I mean, that takes me back to now what I do, like when I say an ideal business, part of that would be, you always talk about who is your, who, and as I’ve progressed in there, my, who has become more along the lines of people who are better at that, I have met some really brilliant people that do this and do, and not just fitness, but in all, whatever, but I’ve also there’s a far, a far smaller population of those people who are actually good on camera or should be on camera and the ones who know that I think.

And so lemme start over. There was, there was a time where I was just like, Hey, this person wants to hire me. Let’s do it. And I’ll make it work. And then I mean, we’re not naming names, but you know, after a while, you’re like, I don’t know if the money is worth this day of trying to get this person who, I mean, in all regards is an amazing amazing coach, an amazing teacher. If you could talk to a room of a thousand, people could just sit down and just tell stories or just, you know, make them faster, make them stronger, make them better. But if you put ’em in a room with one person in a camera, could not get their name out to save their life. And I think the people you named are some of the people who, yeah, they’re definitely better at getting what’s in their brain, out of their brain. And I, I would love to take all the credit in the world for that, but I can’t at all because that’s something you’re born with. I, if you could see me right now, I am not having a great anxiety time even talking on microphone. So I am not one of those people who could just, you know, get up there and start wowing a camera as I’ve tried several times in my past to, you know, do these little videos and things like that. But I actually started my production career by being in movies in college and realized that after seeing myself in a few of ’em, I am better better suited to hold onto the camera, edit, you know, write anything, but be the present. So I think it’s important for people if they’re listening and they want to really start marketing, there’s, there’s other ways to do it than you being the one and only you know, face, you know, talking head of your company.

So you need to get out there and have, you do need to have marketing and do need to have content. But if, you know, for a fact you don’t feel comfortable doing it. I would there’s, there’s creative ways around that. So, but I mean, just like there’s so many, I’m just gonna get rambling. So if I get rambling, feel free to cut me off. There’s so many parallels between fitness and like what I do, like marketing media production, that kind of thing of, if someone came into your gym, they weren’t good at a, at a movement. And you were like, Hey, you wanna get better at this? Let me show you what to do, but then you do it over and over. And the more you practice the movement, the more you do it, the more you get comfortable with it. And eventually, I mean, it might not happen overnight, but eventually you will get better. And it’s the same for being on camera, but most people just don’t have that kind of time or they don’t value the payoff enough to practice and put in the reps of speaking on camera. So for me, I don’t have quite frankly, for as bad as I am at it, I don’t have the time to put into it constantly, but I think a lot of people don’t realize the value if they were good on camera, they don’t because the money doesn’t come to them immediately. It’s, it’s the slow, the slow play that again, that you often talk about that, you know, this is not a, an impulse buy that you wanna do.

So I’ve got a, a, the few additional questions here. So that kind of leads me. It kind of reinforces something. So I just want to get your take on it. You certainly didn’t get into video production thinking. I’m going to specialize in working with the fitness industry and or fitness and sport performance industry and everybody, not everybody, but a lot of people talk about, Hey, follow your passion, this, that, or the other. I, I mean, in all honesty, it was kind of a, a chance thing that you responded to an inquiry I put out about coming and filming some stuff for Holly, but now you know, I, I don’t look at your financials or anything, but I would tell you that a big part of your livelihood is very much fitness industry stuff. And you’ve kind of become a specialist in that way that you understand filming exercises. You understand, I mean, you’ve put together all the video IP for everything from info products to certifications, to follow along workouts. And, you know, through that, you’ve learned a lot of different things about how to, how to best shoot certain things, how to present what the, you know, the, the experts trying to convey. So, so what’s your take on this man, maybe, maybe you arrive at being a specialist by just saying, okay, over time, I’m getting good at something to the point that I’m a specialist in it versus pursuing your passion, which I don’t think this was your passion going in. Well that’s true. So like a lot of I’m doing quotes in artists you know, I really had a lot of thoughts of like, well, you know, making a movie would be fun or getting to do entertainment more so than informational or marketing, that kind of thing. But I also very close to my family and also very introverted. So Louisville, I wasn’t really gonna leave here and we didn’t really have the best film industry in town, as you know, I’m sure Tyler is seeing as, as what he’s doing now, but we you know, we got together and I started doing this and, you know, kind of fell into the fitness industry that I honestly did not know was, you know, did not even think about niches and things like that. I was mostly doing weddings just because that’s, that’s always a need for people no matter what, but I mean, if you can get specialized in, you know, find your niche, that is, and what I do, that’s, that’s amazing because so many people are so broad.

And for so many years, like I said, I was so broad. Like if you’re willing to open your wallet, I will do what you need to do within reason, you know, video wise. So I mean, I’m sure that works in any industry that the more you can specialize, the more you can charge and the more people that actually it’s an easier sell because people know what they’re looking for. And you’re the one there. You’re not, they’re not looking at a big sea of people they’re looking at, oh, this guy does this. I was shooting a friend of mine. I was actually helping them out at a school. They were working at last week and they said, one of the guys there, he hit, I mean, you know, unbeknownst to this guy when he started out, he is the used car, lot specialist niche in Louisville. Apparently the guy just goes to use car lots and that’s, that’s all he does. That’s. And I was like, well, there you go. Like, most of what I do is fitness based as stranger as it is. And the face people, when they ask what I do, there was like fitness business. And I’m like, no, who knew, who knew that was, you know, a market that you could really tap into video wise, but it turns out everything is a market when you look at it. So, All right. So, so I’m gonna ask you some, some different questions different types of things. So you, you spend a lot of time. I don’t know this for a fact, but I would assume that my wife and I have been the two people you’ve either filmed or recorded the most. Yes. What’s the biggest difference between working with Holly and working with pat?

Well, does Holly listen to this? She doesn’t listen to anything I say, whether it’s live or recorded. Okay. I, I don’t know. I don’t that’s really on the spot. I would say you both have your you’re both very good at what you do in the space that you do it in. You’re very you’re very wise, let’s say, you know, and you get on there. I mean, you get here and you, you know, you give people actionable tips and you’re like, Hey, do this and your business will get better. And, you know, I was trying not to say anything bad about your wife, but she is videoing me through the glass right now. So, so she is very good at doing the same thing, but she would do it with more dancing and, oh gosh, I really don’t know. I don’t have a good answer for that, that I would say it, it Seemed, man, you were, you were trying to, to tow the line of being, You were much more prepared and much Holly was never hard to work with, but you were very easy to work with. Very what a laser focused, as opposed to, you know, they say like chasing cats, but in, in the way that my brain works and the way that my life is, I’m probably more similar to your wife. So, and you’re more similar to my wife. So how I see how the dynamic works, watching her do what she does now, and think she’s acting just like pat, but she’s getting, she’s doing a very good job of that kind of stuff. So seeing that in other people, I’m like, oh, that’s instead of saying that person’s good at business. I’m like, oh, that’s very pat like so Well, and your wife’s already been recognized and like wall street journal and everything disgusting, like in the first six months of her new professional journey, It was more like the first six hours of it.

That was, it was, it was shenanigans. So kudos to her. Alright. So hardest thing about working with me mm-hmm is man, I don’t know. I would, I mean, it’s being put on a podcast, I would say there’s really, there’s, there’s not much that I would say you are. I mean, when people put like their north star of what they’re looking for in a client, it would be, I would say you, somebody who’s consistent with the business, but they know what they want. They know what I have to offer, and they understand that. And I mean, with your you know, how you say delegate and elevate, well, a nice little rhyme there of saying, Hey, I know what I want, and I know what I need in this department. And I know that I don’t wanna do that. And I have somebody that can do it, let them do it. And you know, it gets done. You don’t have to worry about it. And I think a lot of people are like, well, Hmm, I could, I could do this on my own. And I understand that thinking, because I mean, you’ve called me cheapest person, you know, maybe , it’s just in several things. I’m I like to say frugal, but it’s fair to say cheap. So people there are like, I don’t really want to spend the money to do this, but they don’t have they don’t have the time. They really don’t understand what their time is worth, where you could get on YouTube. Youtube’s amazing by the way, as it, as it has developed since we’ve been together more so than it’s kind of killed a lot of the industry that we started out doing together, because information is free now to the point where people used to be able, I would make DVDs and videos of things that, I mean, you would say, I don’t know the price points of these things, but me and Mike Robertson were talking about it that, you know, a $50 DVD, 10 years ago of stuff you find on YouTube for free just, and you don’t even, not just one person you go, I mean, you type it in the search bar and you get 50 results of someone telling you the information, but you can get on YouTube and find out how to do most things. And what I, for the most part, what I do is it’s specialized to an industry and to marketing, but it’s nothing that if you had the time to put in the hours, you could figure it out. You could learn how to use cameras. You could learn how to do editing. You could learn how to do all this stuff, but then you’re not working on your own business because you’re trying to spend all of your time doing this. So I think my business has moved more from from, I would sell it as actually videography, as opposed to helping people make better use of their own time. That wasn’t the question at all. It was the hardest thing about working with you. And I’d say I don’t find anything really difficult with it. I really, I mean, I enjoy coming over here every week and I, I mean, I enjoy whatever’s going on out in the other room with Holly every week. and you know, oh, we have a lot of similarities that, you know, things we enjoy, but I mean, I’m never, I never wake up and go, oh, I gotta go over to pants today.

But there are definitely still times, you know, jobs I have where I wake up and I’ll just think, oh, if it would just, something would come up today and I could just not do this. I would love it, but it’s never once happened here. So. Wow. Well, that’s that’s flattering. And to give you guys a little bit of context about what Paul’s talking about, Paul comes over here and after some just random chatting, catching up, or Holly and I bickering back and forth for amusement with Paul being in attendance or and usually trying to do what he did there. When I ask a question about me and Holly, like toes, a line of not, not wanting to, to take sides you know, we, we jump in, we record and that is the last IC of it till it magically on the internet. So yes, I I’m, I’m a big fan of staying in your lane, playing to your strengths and letting other people play to theirs. All right, Paul, I have put you in this uncomfortable, I consider this like a 50 50th birthday gift that you were willing to get out of your comfort zone. Well, this counts then as a gift, that’s Good. This much to do this because yeah, Paul Pauls and I have a good time, which and you, you do a podcast, a Disney podcast of all things, a Disney travel podcast. Well, that it’s, I mean, it seems to be on indefinite hiatus, but I’d like to break it back around for some other things that I’ve got planned going on. But yeah, I, I was more of the entertainment part of that podcast as, as opposed to the information. So You’re always the entertainment part of, oh man. Thanks podcast here, Paul. Yeah.

So, alright. Final, final question. Any parting suggestions for listeners that like, Hey, you know, this has been a golden nugget I’ve taken out of recording now and a hundred plus I, I have no idea how many podcasts we have by the way, a hundred plus podcast, any, any one or two golden nuggets that have stuck out of all the things that we’ve talked about? Well, I think that you know, you speak a lot about Walt Disney and we both, we share the love of Disney world and things like that. Just think about how you are treating your clients, whether, I mean, I’m, I assume most people listen to, this would be fitness, gym people mm-hmm . And you know, there may be a stray business person here or there from something else. But think about when you go somewhere, how the people, how you feel when you go into an establishment. And like, we were just at Disney last month and you walk in and then the minute almost you go into the sign, it’s almost like you’re in a different world. Every, you know, I don’t, I’m not a big complainer at customer service. I just don’t go back to businesses, but there I was, you know, chatting with the people there. They’re very friendly. It’s very, there’s just a, an ease at the place when you’re there about, oh, if you’ve got a problem, come to us, we’ll fix it, that kind of thing. And if you could do that, it, if you could, if you’re in doubt, if you could defer to what would they do at Disney world, or what would Disney do for the most part that is, that seems to be a nugget that pat talks about here and there. But I mean, I know that we’ve been to gyms in the past that they’re just, you just get a bad sleazy feel when you start signing up and they start trying to, you know, they’re teaching on fees and they’re doing, they, they brought you in with one deal and then they’re trying to, what if you did this? And it was, you know, oh, we’ve got this also signup fee. That’s a year’s worth of membership. And you’re like, wait a minute. I, I don’t know about this, but then we’ve also been to places that you walk in and, you know, you just feel comfortable when you’re inside because they’re very attentive. And if you’ve got an issue, they come solve it. And the more that you could put clients and potential clients at ease, I think is, you know, the best thing you could do, that’s just from the start, the minute that people walk in, or even in the parking lot, if you can make people just excited to be there. That’s that’s really for Jim, I would imagine the best thing to do any kind of barrier to any kind of barrier you can knock down before, you know, before it’s a problem is the way to go because people, a lot of people don’t want to go to gyms for whatever reason. And if you can, you know, fix those problems, whether in person or before they get there.

That’s most businesses, but I mean, fitness one, especially because it’s kind of like the dentist or the doctor to a lot of people where it’s something that they know they should do, but you know, if they don’t have to do, they could think of a million excuses. And if you can give ’em a million answers, then you know, you’ll be very successful. Very good. Well, Paul, thank you for getting out of your comfort zone and being a, you know, an interactive person on the podcast, instead of just making the podcast, go know this, wasn’t your favorite thing. So I appreciate it more than, you know, and so we’ll be back to the next episode of the fitness business show.

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