Anthony Franco is the founder of Launch Partners and a serial entrepreneur with six successful ventures across various industries. Franco shares his insights on the trials and triumphs of entrepreneurship, including the delicate art of delegation and the necessity of simplifying messaging to connect with audiences.

Franco delves into the challenges founders face, such as overcoming ego and staying connected to the operational intricacies of their business. He underscores the importance of addressing felt customer pain points and crafting messaging that resonates emotionally. Highlighting lessons from his Shark Tank experience and the impact of building strong teams, Franco emphasizes the need for relentless drive, clear vision, and a willingness to look foolish in pursuit of success.

Franco also offers practical advice for founders on finding support through community, podcasts, and networking with other entrepreneurs to combat isolation. His wisdom is as actionable as it is inspiring.

Want to learn more about Anthony Franco's work? Check out https://www.howtofounder.com.

Connect with Anthony Franco on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthonyfranco/.

Key Points and Time Stamps

• [00:00:30] Introducing Anthony Franco: Overview of Franco's background in founding and scaling businesses.
• [00:02:10] Shark Tank Insights: Franco's experience pitching to Kevin O’Leary and lessons on attracting investors.
• [00:05:07] Simplifying Messaging: Why clarity in communication is critical for engaging customers.
• [00:10:58] Replicating Success: The challenges of launching multiple successful ventures and avoiding complacency.
• [00:14:00] Lessons from Elon Musk: Reflections on leadership, vision, and operational excellence.
• [00:21:30] The Framework for Effective Messaging: Crafting messages rooted in customer pain points and emotional appeal.
• [00:25:30] Advice for Founders: Building support networks to combat isolation and share strategies.
• [00:28:04] Closing Remarks: Invitation for leaders to share their stories and connect with the community.

Transcript

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:30:16
Craig Andrews
I was in a coma for six weeks while the doctors told my wife I was going to die. When I woke up, she told me the most fantastic story. My team kept running the business without me. Freelancers reached out to my team and said, we will do whatever it takes. As long as Craig's in the hospital. I consider that the greatest accomplishment of my career.

00:00:30:18 - 00:00:51:08
Craig Andrews
My name is Craig Andrews and this is the Leaders and Legacies podcast where we talk to leaders creating an impact beyond themselves. At the end of today's interview, I'll tell you how you can be the next leader featured on the show.

00:00:51:08 - 00:00:56:10
Craig Andrews
Today I want to welcome Anthony Franco. He is the founder of Launch Partners.

00:00:56:09 - 00:00:57:21
Craig Andrews
He helps people,

00:00:57:20 - 00:01:05:06
Craig Andrews
launch, build and exit business. He's a founder, builder, deal maker with over 20 years of experience,

00:01:05:05 - 00:01:17:08
Craig Andrews
turning ideas into thriving businesses. He's founded six companies across industries like tech, manufacturing, AI, consumer goods, and digital marketing. And,

00:01:17:07 - 00:01:18:13
Craig Andrews
assets.

00:01:18:15 - 00:01:22:20
Craig Andrews
Included sales and, to public companies. And,

00:01:22:19 - 00:01:25:04
Craig Andrews
something's really interesting. He actually,

00:01:25:03 - 00:01:28:14
Craig Andrews
pitch to Kevin O'Leary on Shark Tank. So we're going to explore that.

00:01:28:15 - 00:01:30:01
Anthony Franco
I did.

00:01:30:02 - 00:01:33:12
Craig Andrews
Kevin. I'm sorry. Anthony. Welcome.

00:01:33:14 - 00:01:35:11
Anthony Franco
Thank you. Thank you for having me.

00:01:35:13 - 00:01:40:06
Craig Andrews
Yeah. Sorry. Getting the names and stuff. So. So tell us about,

00:01:40:05 - 00:01:41:12
Craig Andrews
Kevin O'Leary.

00:01:41:11 - 00:01:51:19
Craig Andrews
I mean, I've. I've actually met somebody else who pitched to him directly, not on Shark Tank, but externally. And I'm interested in what your experience was relative to his.

00:01:51:21 - 00:01:55:22
Anthony Franco
Yeah. Everybody. Everybody loves talking about Kevin O'Leary. First of all, he he's,

00:01:55:21 - 00:02:08:01
Anthony Franco
a beloved character in the media. Like, everybody loves Kevin O'Leary. So he was great to have on our cap table because, you know, when we were doing pit media pitches, we would say we can get Kevin O'Leary. And,

00:02:08:00 - 00:02:10:10
Anthony Franco
all journalists just love the guy.

00:02:10:12 - 00:02:12:18
Anthony Franco
He really, despite his,

00:02:12:17 - 00:02:15:04
Anthony Franco
I don't know if I'm supposed to say this, but despite his,

00:02:15:03 - 00:02:18:13
Anthony Franco
persona on Shark Tank, he's actually a really good guy.

00:02:18:12 - 00:02:19:04
Anthony Franco
And,

00:02:19:03 - 00:02:24:05
Anthony Franco
loves his founders, now really wants to see them succeed.

00:02:24:04 - 00:02:27:08
Anthony Franco
He wasn't super operational in our business, but, you know, every time we had,

00:02:27:07 - 00:02:34:23
Anthony Franco
something that we wanted to release or something, we needed to get the word out, and he was he was completely on top of that.

00:02:35:00 - 00:02:45:19
Craig Andrews
You know, the. Did you have to go through the ordeal where not only did you have to negotiate with him, but you had to negotiate with the networks and get licensing agreements and all that.

00:02:45:21 - 00:02:46:10
Anthony Franco
No.

00:02:46:09 - 00:02:50:17
Anthony Franco
Not at all, actually. So,

00:02:50:16 - 00:03:10:13
Anthony Franco
the process of getting on Shark Tank is quite rigorous. I mean, 40,000 people to try out for Shark Tank a year and only 20 get a deal. So it's it's it's a really rigorous process. And, and then you have to go through and it's truly their first time seeing you.

00:03:10:13 - 00:03:25:19
Anthony Franco
So it's the way it plays out on TV. They record you for a lot longer than the segment airs, but it's really their first time. So they have to go through their own due diligence to make sure that you weren't full of it, on the episode and,

00:03:25:18 - 00:03:29:11
Anthony Franco
and that due diligence was also very, very rigorous. And then,

00:03:29:10 - 00:03:31:03
Anthony Franco
after that, there was no

00:03:31:02 - 00:03:35:09
Anthony Franco
once, once week the deal, there was no more licensing that we had to go through.

00:03:35:10 - 00:03:39:14
Craig Andrews
Interesting. Yeah. The the person I talked to,

00:03:39:13 - 00:04:00:14
Craig Andrews
he runs a business called Tax High. Val Vorm, Utah. You know, he he talks about meeting Kevin for dinner, and he had all of his numbers, and he started going through the the pitch and the thing that struck me about his recount, recounting of the situation was he barely got into the details.

00:04:00:14 - 00:04:19:10
Craig Andrews
And Kevin was like, stop, stop, stop. I'm in. Here's who you need to call. Here's who you need to, you know, talk to. But at least from his perspective, Kevin Kevin was interested in the high level story, not the down deep details. Was that the case for you?

00:04:19:12 - 00:04:21:00
Anthony Franco
Yeah. So,

00:04:20:23 - 00:04:26:16
Anthony Franco
Get Kevin. But look, most, most investors,

00:04:26:15 - 00:04:46:23
Anthony Franco
most experienced investors, there's this there's this phrase bet on the jockey, not on the horse. And they, they look at who is pitching them and whether or not they can articulate a story and whether or not they believe they can execute on that story. The the the the numbers.

00:04:46:23 - 00:05:07:11
Anthony Franco
Right. The the forecasting of numbers and the and where I think my business is going to go and what I'm planning on doing all of that and fundamentally is unintended bias because you just don't know what the future holds. What you're looking for is can somebody navigate? Does somebody have a good idea and a good grasp on how they're going to get there?

00:05:07:13 - 00:05:24:14
Anthony Franco
And do that? Do you feel like they can execute and the rest of it is like, can they also do you think they they can pivot along the way? The rest of it is just minutia. And a lot of experienced investors that have had wins, like Kevin, just kind of realize that.

00:05:24:16 - 00:05:31:17
Craig Andrews
Yeah. Well, I think it's a problem. It's it's a problem. I seen a lot of entrepreneurs, you know, a lot of my clients,

00:05:31:16 - 00:05:33:12
Craig Andrews
it exists in myself.

00:05:33:11 - 00:05:36:10
Craig Andrews
So I need somebody outside of me to call it out.

00:05:36:09 - 00:05:47:06
Craig Andrews
Call me out on it. But my clients will try to dive down into the deep details and convince their customers of the nuance differences between their service and what?

00:05:47:06 - 00:05:48:06
Craig Andrews
Somebody who's substantial.

00:05:48:08 - 00:05:52:03
Anthony Franco
I love the subject. Yeah, I love this subject. Yeah. It's,

00:05:52:02 - 00:05:56:10
Anthony Franco
we are all more infatuated about

00:05:56:09 - 00:06:16:23
Anthony Franco
what we're doing than anybody else looking in. And the hardest thing for us as entrepreneurs is to recognize how we make purchasing decisions and then apply that to our own business. If I had to spend more than 10s on somebody's website to understand what they do, I'm out.

00:06:17:01 - 00:06:33:14
Anthony Franco
And but we want to we want to fill everybody in with all the details right up front, because we're proud of what we're doing. It's it is such a common. It is the most common mistake I see entrepreneurs make when trying to explain what they do to other people. It absolutely is.

00:06:33:16 - 00:06:45:20
Craig Andrews
Yeah. And I mean, honestly, I struggle with that in my own marketing. That's why I need other people. You know, I need other voices in my life to say, Craig, we don't get it. That's too detailed.

00:06:45:22 - 00:07:04:22
Anthony Franco
I know this, I'm fully aware of it. And I still don't feel like I still need like you. I need other people to tell me, hey, I don't get this. You need this. Clear this up. Yeah. It's it's you're just too close to it. It's it's it's common because it's. You're too close to it. Recognize it?

00:07:05:00 - 00:07:18:04
Craig Andrews
Yeah, I you know, but the thing that I always find amazing, I can think of a couple times in my life where I was talking a few times where I was talking to somebody, I realized I was talking to a true expert. And,

00:07:18:03 - 00:07:20:15
Craig Andrews
I'll give an example of, of one. There was,

00:07:20:14 - 00:07:22:22
Craig Andrews
a guy named I met Paul at a,

00:07:22:21 - 00:07:26:07
Craig Andrews
event called Product Camp here in Austin, and it was funny.

00:07:26:07 - 00:07:49:06
Craig Andrews
It's, it's kind of a they call it an unconference. You know, you show up not knowing what the talks are going to be. Everybody calls them what they want to hear about. And so if you if you come with the talk prepared, you may find out ten minutes before you're talking that you got you got selected. But I'd seen this guy walking around this tie dye t shirt that look like Sonny Bono.

00:07:49:08 - 00:07:58:05
Craig Andrews
And I just remember thinking, what a goofball. And and unwittingly, I ended up in his session because I like the title and,

00:07:58:04 - 00:08:05:12
Craig Andrews
and he worked for AMD at the time, the chip company and competitor Intel. And he was talking about how they,

00:08:05:11 - 00:08:07:09
Craig Andrews
how they projected out,

00:08:07:08 - 00:08:12:11
Craig Andrews
what they needed to be working on five years in advance, which is extremely hard.

00:08:12:13 - 00:08:36:14
Craig Andrews
It's extremely hard. And I was fascinated after the after his talk, I said, hey, can we grab a drink? I just want to learn a little bit more. And I said, Paul, how do you do this? And like two minutes? He's like, oh, it's really simple. We just we follow the pioneers. When we see the pioneers dabbling in something, we know the time from when the pioneers are dabbling with it until it's mainstream will be about this much time.

00:08:36:16 - 00:08:47:14
Craig Andrews
So we just check in at different points. And he made it sound so simple that I thought I at the end of the conversation, I thought it was something I could do. Of course I couldn't.

00:08:47:16 - 00:08:55:06
Anthony Franco
But yeah, well, you got to get the pioneers to talk to you. Yeah. But, it's hard.

00:08:55:08 - 00:09:06:11
Craig Andrews
Well, and it's, it's also looking at a few other markers. I mean, you know, an idea I had years ago. Do you remember the era of home theater PCs? You know, the idea was you had this PC that also had a,

00:09:06:10 - 00:09:12:11
Craig Andrews
amplifier in it, and it was going to be, you know, it's kind of like an evolution of the DVR.

00:09:12:13 - 00:09:19:10
Craig Andrews
And I thought, and the pioneers were tinkering with it, and I was fascinated by it, and I, I actually talked to VC and he's like,

00:09:19:09 - 00:09:23:04
Craig Andrews
this is going nowhere. And, and the VC was right. You know,

00:09:23:03 - 00:09:36:00
Craig Andrews
I've. Yeah, it's wrong. And so I think that's part of the challenge is, you know, Paul, Paul knew how to qualify, not just what the pioneers were tinkering with, but what would make it what.

00:09:36:02 - 00:09:58:22
Anthony Franco
Yeah, it's it I think, essentially what you're looking at is the tastemaker, right? Somebody that that that really has this attuned sense of understanding what people are going to want five years from now. I think that's that's not something you can that's not a skill you can teach yourself. It's just something that intuition you're just born with.

00:09:58:22 - 00:10:22:21
Anthony Franco
And there's just so few people that have that. It's it. It and there's people that say they have it. They just got lucky a couple of times. Yeah, yeah. And then. And then the third time they're completely wrong. Right. So it's it's the only way to be certain about what you're going to launch is to launch it and find out what customers say, which sometimes is too late.

00:10:22:23 - 00:10:50:13
Craig Andrews
Yeah. Well, and yet you bring up a really good point, you know, the, the ability to repeat success. I mean, I know specific people that I've met that had, over the moon successes. I mean, the, the stories of legends, VCs, you know, like, drool in their presence and they go off to launch their next venture and it's like, yeah, it's okay.

00:10:50:15 - 00:10:54:12
Craig Andrews
No billionaires were made in the process.

00:10:54:13 - 00:11:00:08
Anthony Franco
Yeah, that that happens a lot. It's, and there's,

00:11:00:07 - 00:11:12:21
Anthony Franco
we can dive into the reasons why that happens. One maybe they just got lucky. They just hit on the right idea at the right time. Timing is a lot. The other is also, you're not the same person launching your next company as you were your first.

00:11:12:23 - 00:11:15:16
Craig Andrews
Oh. That's interesting.

00:11:15:17 - 00:11:19:00
Anthony Franco
Yeah. I mean, so.

00:11:19:02 - 00:11:20:15
Anthony Franco
Launching a company

00:11:20:14 - 00:11:41:01
Anthony Franco
is hard. It's really hard. And getting a company to scalable profitability is even harder. And you don't, you you have to be willing to do things that normal, normal people wouldn't be willing to do.

00:11:41:00 - 00:11:49:04
Anthony Franco
You have to live an unbalanced life, and you have to be willing to look foolish as you're doing it. And once you've won, right?

00:11:49:04 - 00:12:11:07
Anthony Franco
Once you've won once or twice, you're now the person that believes that you can do it without doing all the stuff that you had to do when you launched the first one. So you get complacent and you start to believe your own PR about how great you are when in reality, launching a company, there's there's no formula for doing it.

00:12:11:08 - 00:12:27:12
Anthony Franco
Again, without the the really hard, unreasonable stuff that a founder needs to do. There's only one person that I can think of that's been successful at that, and that's Elon Musk. I've never met anybody else that's been able to do it.

00:12:27:11 - 00:12:32:15
Anthony Franco
Even at a smaller scale than him, he's just recognized the fact that you have it.

00:12:32:15 - 00:12:36:17
Anthony Franco
It's it's it's it's eating glass every time.

00:12:36:19 - 00:12:56:08
Craig Andrews
Yeah. Well, one of the things I've heard about Elon Musk, I, you know, I heard somebody one I think it was somebody from the Tesla team that, you know, I mean, Elon used to meet with like Tesla in the morning and space in the afternoon. You know, he's sitting there running these two massive companies.

00:12:56:10 - 00:12:57:07
Anthony Franco
Yeah.

00:12:57:09 - 00:13:09:05
Craig Andrews
And and they said that he was driven by a few things. He was like does this go to Mars if this doesn't get us to Mars, we're not working on it. And

00:13:09:04 - 00:13:24:13
Craig Andrews
and it was just a level of anxiety that lived in him that if he couldn't get to Mars, it was a huge failure. So when you look at, you know, Space-X everything they've been doing, you know, recovering rockets and,

00:13:24:12 - 00:13:26:20
Craig Andrews
you know, and reusing rockets and what have you.

00:13:26:22 - 00:13:35:19
Craig Andrews
I mean, each one of those, those weren't the targets. Those were stepping stones that he needed to leave to reach Mars.

00:13:35:21 - 00:13:43:15
Anthony Franco
Yeah, he he has that. So having a great vision for where you're going. Absolutely critical.

00:13:43:14 - 00:13:58:11
Anthony Franco
But it's it's way more than that. It's like he still goes in and gives everybody honest. He, he understands the fine details. He walks the factory floor.

00:13:58:10 - 00:14:06:13
Anthony Franco
Look, I, I will admit I am a total fan and admirer of Elon Musk and also recognize I'm not him.

00:14:06:14 - 00:14:07:00
Anthony Franco
Right?

00:14:06:23 - 00:14:26:18
Anthony Franco
I couldn't do what he does. But but but there's a lot of things that he does that I, you know, I strive to do, which is just understanding the details of your business at a very ground level basis. He he does that in an exceptional way.

00:14:26:17 - 00:14:30:20
Anthony Franco
And the reason why most founders don't is because it's just hard.

00:14:30:22 - 00:14:33:06
Anthony Franco
It hurts, makes your head hurt.

00:14:33:05 - 00:14:48:09
Anthony Franco
Having all that stuff in your head. I don't know how he has. He must have ramped up upgrades in his head or something. That that that with Neuralink that I don't understand because the amount of information that guy has in his head and and recall he has is unbelievable.

00:14:48:11 - 00:14:58:10
Craig Andrews
So let's kind of circle back to the whole, you know, once you've been successful, once you know, the replicability of it. So, you know, here,

00:14:58:09 - 00:15:18:03
Craig Andrews
here's a thought and this, this may be a misunderstanding on my part. So I'm really interested in your take on this. So when you launch a business once, I mean, a lot of times your you're, you know, sweat equity, bootstrapping, what have you, you don't have a lot of resources, but the only resource you have to put in your into the business is your time and your mind.

00:15:18:05 - 00:15:26:12
Craig Andrews
You know, you don't have a lot of financial resources to put into it, but if you've been successful and you,

00:15:26:11 - 00:15:40:19
Craig Andrews
you know, and you're launching a new business, some of these things where it took the extra, you know, sweat and perspiration to achieve before, wouldn't you be able to hire that saying, okay, day one, I'm going to hire an ops guy.

00:15:40:22 - 00:15:49:22
Craig Andrews
Day two, I'm going to hire somebody with this skill who's going to do these things that I'm not naturally good at, and that will help me launch this new business.

00:15:50:00 - 00:16:01:15
Anthony Franco
How many founders do you know? How many owners of businesses do you know that are constantly frustrated with back when they delegate something, they don't don't do it as good as they do?

00:16:01:17 - 00:16:02:08
Craig Andrews
Yes.

00:16:02:10 - 00:16:21:13
Anthony Franco
It's it's it's everybody and and and you can't delegate taking ownership. Can't delegate it. So to an extent you have to in order to scale your business, you have to delegate beyond yourself. Absolutely.

00:16:21:12 - 00:16:30:17
Anthony Franco
And that takes a certain, a certain amount of discipline. But in the early stages of a startup, there's two things. One, you can't delegate that that relentless drive.

00:16:30:19 - 00:16:32:07
Anthony Franco
And the other thing,

00:16:32:06 - 00:16:56:12
Anthony Franco
the other thing that a startup requires is the founder to have no ego. In other words, the success of the business is more important than me looking good. And that's hard to give up once you have 2 or 3 wins under your belt, it's hard to give up the fact that you might. It's hard to recognize that you might look foolish by failing by doing this.

00:16:56:14 - 00:17:01:02
Anthony Franco
So you you take reputational,

00:17:01:01 - 00:17:22:08
Anthony Franco
you take reputational risk off the table, which makes it much more difficult to succeed. So I think the combination of those two things, one is thinking that you can delegate stuff, something that you can't and not and not being willing to allow your reputation to take a hit for doing the wrong thing makes it a lot more difficult to have that second, third and fourth win.

00:17:22:09 - 00:17:25:14
Craig Andrews
Well, and going back to the Elon Musk example,

00:17:25:13 - 00:17:37:21
Craig Andrews
Ethan clearly doesn't care about his reputation. I mean, when he bought Twitter, everybody said, dude, you're nuts. You've ever paid for it. And he probably did, but he, you know, he just doesn't care.

00:17:37:21 - 00:17:40:23
Anthony Franco
He says he did. Yeah.

00:17:41:01 - 00:17:41:23
Craig Andrews
Yeah.

00:17:41:22 - 00:17:46:02
Craig Andrews
I personally think he messed up Lane changed it to X.

00:17:46:01 - 00:17:49:21
Craig Andrews
You know.

00:17:49:23 - 00:17:52:22
Anthony Franco
I, I struggle to argue with that. Yeah.

00:17:52:21 - 00:17:54:23
Anthony Franco
I,

00:17:54:22 - 00:18:04:16
Anthony Franco
it was newsworthy. So you could give him that. I think I was he was it was own personal. Like he wanted to call people X. Yeah. And so,

00:18:04:15 - 00:18:09:21
Anthony Franco
he owned X.com, and he's like, I gotta make use of this. He loves. He actually named his side ax, right?

00:18:09:21 - 00:18:19:23
Anthony Franco
So he has this affinity with the with the with the letter. So, I think it was just something he wanted to do and couldn't let it go.

00:18:20:01 - 00:18:25:04
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah, but you know what?

00:18:25:03 - 00:18:46:05
Craig Andrews
Maybe under anyone else's leadership, you know, renaming your company away from something that's actually become a verb in our lexicon, you know, to something else that just is a little bit awkward, you know, that may sink many companies. And Twitter seems to be, based on the metrics I'm seeing. It seems like it's, you know, it's growing.

00:18:46:07 - 00:18:48:13
Anthony Franco
It is. Yeah, it is growing. Yeah.

00:18:48:12 - 00:19:03:06
Anthony Franco
It's it's now the X is now the number one news source for, I don't know, 30 or 40 countries including the US. So it's it's pretty fast what he's done for it still not quite profitable.

00:19:03:05 - 00:19:03:23
Anthony Franco
But

00:19:03:22 - 00:19:12:13
Anthony Franco
yeah. You know, there's a lot of things that he was doing with X that I was like, I don't I don't think that's a good idea.

00:19:12:15 - 00:19:32:05
Anthony Franco
But I didn't vocalize. I didn't tell anybody because it's like, how could you bet against Elon Musk any time that somebody said, Elon Musk is an idiot? I'm like, what do you like, give him time and and you're gonna eat your words. Like, what do you say? Like, it's kind of funny to me. That's for somebody that has done nothing to criticize somebody like Elon Musk.

00:19:32:05 - 00:19:33:22
Anthony Franco
It's just fascinating.

00:19:33:23 - 00:19:39:05
Craig Andrews
Yeah. And in full disclosure, there was a period of time I was critical of them.

00:19:39:04 - 00:19:41:08
Craig Andrews
But I'll tell you, when that changed was when the,

00:19:41:07 - 00:19:43:00
Craig Andrews
the,

00:19:42:23 - 00:19:43:22
Craig Andrews
what was it the,

00:19:43:21 - 00:19:55:23
Craig Andrews
model three when the Tesla model three launched, you know, I was like, okay, anybody can take a bunch of money from the government and and spend it and produce something that's not hard.

00:19:55:23 - 00:20:12:10
Craig Andrews
But can you build a profitable company? And, when I was saying this, Elon Musk had yet to turn Tesla profitable and the model three had yet to launch. And as I remember thinking at the time, the dude's distracted. He's playing around with flamethrowers and all sorts of crap.

00:20:15:14 - 00:20:17:20
Craig Andrews
He needs to make that model three,

00:20:17:19 - 00:20:33:20
Craig Andrews
successful. But back to your point. He started sleeping in the factory. He was at the factory? Yeah, pretty much full time. And he got the thing launched, and he turned Tesla profitable. And then some court tried to take away his his,

00:20:33:19 - 00:20:36:20
Craig Andrews
compensation for doing what? He. You know, what the shareholder.

00:20:36:20 - 00:20:36:22
Craig Andrews
Yeah.

00:20:36:22 - 00:20:56:23
Anthony Franco
That was recently upheld, too. Fascinating. Yeah. I had to say, like, I had similar thoughts when they launched the Cybertruck. I'm like, this guy's this guy's lost it. He's totally lost it. That Cybertruck announcement, I was like, it was terrible. They they they they they cracked the window during the during it during the presentation to show how strong the window was.

00:20:56:23 - 00:21:08:04
Anthony Franco
I was like, they do not know how to launch a product at all. That I've been proven wrong. I've been proven wrong the multiple times when when thinking that Elon didn't know what he was doing.

00:21:08:06 - 00:21:09:02
Craig Andrews
Yeah.

00:21:09:04 - 00:21:11:00
Anthony Franco
Yeah.

00:21:11:02 - 00:21:20:02
Craig Andrews
Well, yeah, we talked about talking about a whole bunch of other things in the green room, and we've covered none of those. But I think this has been fascinating.

00:21:20:03 - 00:21:28:03
Craig Andrews
As we wrap up, here's I guess there's a couple things that maybe let's just kind of recap, because I think these are really critical.

00:21:28:02 - 00:21:35:06
Craig Andrews
A couple of themes from what we talked about was one, the importance of simplifying and clarifying your message.

00:21:35:08 - 00:21:41:17
Craig Andrews
You know, you know, get un enamored by by the details and get enamored by simplicity.

00:21:41:16 - 00:21:58:05
Craig Andrews
And then just the what it takes to launch a business and have it succeed. So kind of, wrapping up, what what are your closing thoughts? If you were to meet an entrepreneur or what would be your advice to them in those areas?

00:21:58:07 - 00:21:59:14
Anthony Franco
Well, so,

00:22:02:06 - 00:22:22:21
Anthony Franco
You know, if you're talking about messaging. Right. But the, the goal of your messaging needs to you need to treat messaging not as a, as a dating process. I guess that's the that's the analogy I'd be looking for is initially, you're just trying to get the person interested.

00:22:22:20 - 00:22:32:03
Anthony Franco
And, and so it has to be really simple and essentially solve a pain or solve a pain point for the customer.

00:22:32:09 - 00:22:48:22
Anthony Franco
Like, I am going to help you solve this pain and that's it. Like, just get them to lean in and want to learn more. And then you give them a little bit more and then you give them a little bit more. So in other words, you you gradually introduce them to your product and service instead of trying to convert them on the first introduction.

00:22:49:00 - 00:23:14:15
Anthony Franco
And that still can be the first visit to your website, but you have to you have to simplify it so they can have the mental model of what it is that you are going to do. For me immediately. But then with a hard punch. So some and the only way to do that is simplicity. How many complex products have you?

00:23:14:15 - 00:23:21:20
Anthony Franco
But just ask yourself, how many complex products or services have you bought in the last year, and what does that sales cycle look like?

00:23:21:19 - 00:23:32:22
Anthony Franco
It's it's it's a monster. So if you have a complex product, you have to carve it up in simple, simplified chunks. Otherwise you're never going to get somebody to convert.

00:23:32:23 - 00:23:52:18
Craig Andrews
Yep. Yeah. Absolutely. And you said something in there that's really key. It's, you know, a little bit of a hobbyhorse issue for me is it has to be about their pain, not the pain that you, you know, they have that they don't know they have has to be about the felt pain that makes them say, oh yeah.

00:23:52:18 - 00:23:59:16
Anthony Franco
So on my podcast, this just this last week, I uncovered,

00:23:59:15 - 00:24:04:02
Anthony Franco
for my guests, the master key to this,

00:24:04:01 - 00:24:15:00
Anthony Franco
and the master key is a it's essentially two things. When when you're drafting that first line, the positioning statement of,

00:24:14:23 - 00:24:28:01
Anthony Franco
for your customers, you need to do two things. One, you need to you need to write that in the in the language of one of the seven deadly sins,

00:24:28:03 - 00:24:36:22
Anthony Franco
And you have. And two, you have to get that customer to envision themselves committing the sin.

00:24:37:00 - 00:24:38:05
Craig Andrews
Wow.

00:24:38:07 - 00:24:48:10
Anthony Franco
And I and and I actually rewrote a lot of I that I rea I promise that I've written based on that fundamental. Here's the math. Here's how you position creative,

00:24:48:09 - 00:24:59:23
Anthony Franco
messaging framework using the seven deadly sins and two. Now you have to get that person and imagine themselves committing the sin. Now that's sin is like pride is a sin.

00:25:00:01 - 00:25:16:23
Anthony Franco
But the things before it, like having an ego and having ambition, aren't so any any good thing. Take it to its extreme. It's a sin. So it's it's the sin is that the is the easy way to think about it. But it's if if somebody has ambition, you have to give them to picture what your your

00:25:16:22 - 00:25:23:13
Anthony Franco
life helps them achieve their ambition, how your product helps them achieve attracting women, how your

00:25:23:12 - 00:25:27:04
Anthony Franco
product helps them achieve relaxation or gluttony.

00:25:27:04 - 00:25:29:04
Anthony Franco
Right. So so,

00:25:29:03 - 00:25:40:14
Anthony Franco
that's a really good framework for the first introduction. And your company needs to get somebody in the mindset of committing one of those sins.

00:25:40:16 - 00:25:44:20
Craig Andrews
And and you're saying committing one of their sins in a good way of yeah.

00:25:44:20 - 00:25:47:17
Anthony Franco
Isn't it a good. Yeah, I got a good way. I guess I want to.

00:25:47:17 - 00:25:52:14
Craig Andrews
Make a commitment. I want to eat that meat, women. I want to eat wonderful food.

00:25:52:15 - 00:25:54:05
Anthony Franco
Right, right.

00:25:54:07 - 00:25:57:19
Craig Andrews
Wow, that's really interesting. That's fascinating approach.

00:25:57:21 - 00:26:04:10
Anthony Franco
Yeah I, I love I, I it's like one of those things that I've been searching for my whole life. And I uncovered it last week.

00:26:04:12 - 00:26:07:08
Craig Andrews
Yeah. Oh, cool. And how about,

00:26:07:07 - 00:26:17:20
Craig Andrews
your advice to founders that, you know, maybe are, you know, floundering a little bit and just trying to figure out what they're, they're missing to kind of get them get them over that hump.

00:26:17:22 - 00:26:19:15
Anthony Franco
Yeah. So for founders,

00:26:19:14 - 00:26:20:15
Anthony Franco
being,

00:26:20:14 - 00:26:28:22
Anthony Franco
you know, early stage or late stage founder, no matter where you sit, it's lonely. Yeah. It just is lonely.

00:26:28:21 - 00:26:29:09
Anthony Franco
So so

00:26:29:08 - 00:26:32:13
Anthony Franco
I run a my podcast is called How to Founder.

00:26:32:12 - 00:26:41:10
Anthony Franco
And it's designed for two things. One, to make it less lonely by just having me and my, my co-host Chris, we just been there and we talked about it.

00:26:41:10 - 00:26:49:15
Anthony Franco
And so you're not alone in the problems that you're solving. And and the other thing is that we help we we dive deep into a single topic or tactic,

00:26:49:14 - 00:27:03:20
Anthony Franco
each episode. So you can do that by listening to podcasts like yours and mine or I also recommend go find other founders and just, you know, if it's formal, like a vintage group, great.

00:27:03:20 - 00:27:05:15
Anthony Franco
If it's informal,

00:27:05:14 - 00:27:14:07
Anthony Franco
you know, this is improvisers and there's a bunch of others that are just great groups to be a part of, just so you're not lonely, and also so that you can bounce ideas off of

00:27:14:06 - 00:27:22:04
Anthony Franco
the founders that have different perspectives. You can do that formally or just go find some folks, go to local founder meetings, go to Denver founders.

00:27:22:04 - 00:27:26:23
Anthony Franco
If you're in Colorado just to hang out with other people like you,

00:27:26:22 - 00:27:29:20
Anthony Franco
and then develop an informal group if you if you need to.

00:27:29:19 - 00:27:37:05
Anthony Franco
So go around that for those struggling, the best anecdote for that is another founder.

00:27:37:07 - 00:27:41:07
Craig Andrews
Wow, Anthony, this has just been a fantastic conversation.

00:27:41:06 - 00:27:43:14
Craig Andrews
How can people reach you?

00:27:43:16 - 00:27:46:23
Anthony Franco
So, so on LinkedIn, I'm just at Anthony Franco.

00:27:46:22 - 00:27:54:10
Anthony Franco
And my the podcast is just how to founder.com and, and we broadcast live three times a week.

00:27:54:09 - 00:27:59:23
Anthony Franco
But we're also available on Spotify and Apple just go to, to founder.com. And that's how you can get engaged with us. There.

00:28:00:01 - 00:28:03:22
Craig Andrews
That's awesome. Well hey thanks for coming on leaders. And like this has been great.

00:28:04:00 - 00:28:08:18
Anthony Franco
Great. Thank you for having me. Really appreciate it.

00:28:08:18 - 00:28:35:13
Craig Andrews
This is Craig Andrews. I want to thank you for listening to the Leaders and Legacies podcast. We're looking for leaders to share how they're making the impact beyond themselves. If that's you, please go to Alize for me.com/guest and sign up there. If you got something out of this interview, we would love you to share this

00:28:35:13 - 00:28:37:08
Craig Andrews
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00:28:37:10 - 00:29:00:18
Craig Andrews
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00:29:00:20 - 00:29:09:00
Craig Andrews
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00:29:09:00 - 00:31:11:01
Craig Andrews
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