Episode #200: The Secrets of Building Community with Norm Farrar

Norman Farrar doesn’t lead by barking orders—he leads by building trust. In this episode, he explains how strong leadership isn’t about being the loudest voice in the room. It’s about showing up consistently, listening carefully, and creating space for others to lead.

Norm shares how his leadership style evolved from his early days in manufacturing to running global teams across e-commerce and brand development. He dives into how he builds loyalty—not just with customers, but with employees—by leading with vulnerability and owning his mistakes.

Craig Andrews presses in on what makes Norm different. The answer? He doesn’t separate leadership from life. His personal values guide every business decision. That means putting people first, leading with patience, and fostering a culture where everyone is heard.

If you think leadership means being in control, this episode will challenge you. If you think leadership means being consistent and clear, it’ll reinforce what you already know.

Want to learn more about Norman Farrar's work? Check out his website at https://lunchwithnorm.com.

Connect with Norman Farrar on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/normanfarrar/.

Key Points & Time Stamps:

(02:14) Norm’s early lessons in leadership from manufacturing to e-commerce
(07:35) How transparency builds stronger remote teams
(13:08) Leading through failure: why admitting mistakes gains respect
(18:40) Building brand culture through leadership values
(23:15) How Norm keeps team members accountable without micromanaging
(30:02) The role of empathy in high-growth leadership
(36:27) Why consistency and patience are underrated leadership traits
(42:05) Norm’s advice for new leaders building from scratch

Transcript

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;30;20
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 in my career.

00;00;30;23 - 00;00;51;10
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 this show.

00;00;51;10 - 00;00;54;12
Craig Andrews
Today I want to welcome Norm Farrar.

00;00;54;12 - 00;01;14;05
Craig Andrews
Not just Norm, but my my friend Norm. I met him through a mastermind group and have been on his podcast. Norm is one of the nicest guys that you'll ever meet and cements guys like Norm in your podcast. Like the number one Amazon. He's like, well, that's that's what Apple says. You know, just very, very humble.

00;01;14;07 - 00;01;21;00
Craig Andrews
Norm hosts Lunch with Norm and the Marketing Misfits. And he is a,

00;01;21;00 - 00;01;36;09
Craig Andrews
entrepreneur, provides online marketing and managed e-commerce solutions for brands. He's worked with fortune 500 companies such as Coca-Cola, Mercedes-Benz, Microsoft and 20th Century Fox, and

00;01;36;09 - 00;01;48;26
Craig Andrews
hang in there because we're gonna be talking about a number of things, including building an audience and why that's with what's going on in search, at least from my perspective.

00;01;48;26 - 00;01;59;00
Craig Andrews
I think it's more important than ever that you figure out how to do what Norm has done, and I'm going to be listening along as well. Norm, welcome.

00;01;59;02 - 00;02;00;23
Norm Farrar
Hey, how are you?

00;02;00;26 - 00;02;04;01
Craig Andrews
I'm doing great. I'm doing great.

00;02;04;01 - 00;02;05;12
Craig Andrews
The,

00;02;05;12 - 00;02;18;01
Craig Andrews
You know, we'll get into this in a couple minutes, but, you know, I just I feel so inept in building an audience and, look at,

00;02;18;01 - 00;02;32;11
Craig Andrews
I look at what you've done, and you make the hard stuff look easy, and it's easy for folks like me to look at that and figure that's always been easy for you.

00;02;32;13 - 00;02;33;26
Craig Andrews
Has it always been easy?

00;02;33;27 - 00;02;35;26
Norm Farrar
No, no, I am,

00;02;35;26 - 00;02;42;13
Norm Farrar
I am an introvert, so I've had to learn how to come out of my shell.

00;02;42;13 - 00;02;46;23
Norm Farrar
Like, going up to people and talking to people was very hard for me.

00;02;46;23 - 00;02;59;17
Norm Farrar
Actually, my first time speaking, I. I turned down my sister in law to be the MC at her wedding because I was that fearful of going up in front of everybody.

00;02;59;19 - 00;03;03;23
Norm Farrar
But my first time speaking was in 2017, and,

00;03;03;23 - 00;03;04;17
Norm Farrar
I was doing,

00;03;04;17 - 00;03;22;05
Norm Farrar
a talk at Cellar Con, and it was 1500 people in the audience. I was sick. I was shaking, I was to go on like, I'm just saying, how did I why did I do it? Why did I say this? This is the worst possible thing for me.

00;03;22;07 - 00;03;37;21
Norm Farrar
And then I get up there. I broke a tooth. Like going down like that. That day, I broke a tooth. And like, I, I'm sitting there going, somebody telling me I shouldn't go on, but,

00;03;37;21 - 00;03;42;16
Norm Farrar
I got through it and everything was okay, and it wasn't as bad as I thought.

00;03;42;16 - 00;03;45;08
Norm Farrar
At first it was a little tricky, but,

00;03;45;08 - 00;03;51;28
Norm Farrar
then my my son's a musician, and he goes, I take these pills for stage fright.

00;03;52;00 - 00;03;54;20
Norm Farrar
And a lot of musicians do this. A lot of people

00;03;54;20 - 00;03;56;08
Norm Farrar
do this to break,

00;03;56;08 - 00;03;58;19
Norm Farrar
bad habits or fears. If your fears,

00;03;58;19 - 00;04;01;20
Norm Farrar
if you have spiders or you can take these,

00;04;01;20 - 00;04;04;02
Norm Farrar
pills, I forget what it's called. It's like,

00;04;04;02 - 00;04;14;14
Norm Farrar
poly pro proline or something, and. Oh, my gosh, it worked like a charm. I could go on the stage.

00;04;14;21 - 00;04;37;08
Norm Farrar
I after that, somebody asked me to come on a podcast, be sort of a co-host once a month with them. And that was just as nerve wracking. But then I could settle down. My hands were steady, I talk slower, and I eventually, you know, got out of that shell. But going up to people even saying, oh, hey, I'm Norm, you know, I'm Norm for our,

00;04;37;08 - 00;04;39;05
Norm Farrar
wow, that was tough.

00;04;39;05 - 00;04;40;10
Norm Farrar
And then I joined,

00;04;40;10 - 00;04;58;05
Norm Farrar
what's called E. Oh, it used to be called y yo, and I just learned how to approach people and just start talking to them, you know? Don't don't just sit there and nod your head, but actually start to become engaging with people.

00;04;58;05 - 00;05;04;17
Norm Farrar
If you knew what the subject was. If not, just introduce yourself and let them know who you are.

00;05;04;19 - 00;05;22;03
Norm Farrar
And so networking is actually my biggest asset. I've got some people say like, they can't believe the network I have if you want to. I had another podcast during Covid called I Know This Guy because if you want to know somebody, I probably know them. Or I could get you two of them. And,

00;05;22;03 - 00;05;24;14
Norm Farrar
it's all because of y.

00;05;24;14 - 00;05;36;13
Norm Farrar
Yo back in the day. And, yeah, that's now I'm. I'm still an introvert, and it still takes me, like, doing this. I still have that feeling in my gut, like,

00;05;36;13 - 00;05;40;06
Norm Farrar
what am I going to screw up?

00;05;40;08 - 00;05;42;24
Craig Andrews
Well, it certainly doesn't come across,

00;05;42;24 - 00;05;46;03
Craig Andrews
do you know, you know, Rachel Miller, the show?

00;05;46;03 - 00;05;47;28
Norm Farrar
Yeah, sure.

00;05;48;01 - 00;06;08;19
Craig Andrews
You know, I see all of her videos, and she's just, you know, she's got her hair out and she's like. And I remember meeting her in person, and I thought I was going to blow her all over. I mean, she just she struck me as like, in real life, very introverted, but as a master of just building these massive audiences.

00;06;08;21 - 00;06;10;22
Norm Farrar
She's the queen of that.

00;06;10;24 - 00;06;18;00
Craig Andrews
Yeah. I mean, is that your impression that. I mean, she struck me as very introverted when I met her one on one.

00;06;18;03 - 00;06;18;19
Norm Farrar
Yeah.

00;06;18;19 - 00;06;22;02
Norm Farrar
I it comes across that way, I think. But,

00;06;22;02 - 00;06;37;10
Norm Farrar
get her in front of a camera, and she is. She just holds the audience. I mean, she that's her stage. I mean, the camera in front of the camera. She is awesome.

00;06;37;12 - 00;06;43;29
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah, yeah, well, that's neat. I, I would have never guessed you were an introvert. And,

00;06;43;29 - 00;07;01;03
Craig Andrews
And that's amazing. Well, before we get to. Because we, I do want to talk about growing an audience. But you were telling me some story about how things started looking really great in your 20s, and then they weren't looking so great.

00;07;01;06 - 00;07;03;07
Norm Farrar
Right? It's happened a couple times.

00;07;03;07 - 00;07;12;12
Norm Farrar
Yeah. So back. I think this is in the 80s. I know. Yes, it was 1989.

00;07;12;12 - 00;07;22;11
Norm Farrar
I was working, in the promo industry, and these guys heard about me because I was I was a pretty good salesperson back in the day, and,

00;07;22;11 - 00;07;26;26
Norm Farrar
these guys approached me and said, hey, we want you to be part of the company.

00;07;26;29 - 00;07;48;09
Norm Farrar
So they had this clothing company, and that's all they did. They didn't own. They contracted out the clothing. They wanted to become the manufacturer. They wanted to be more vertically integrated. So they were buying up equipment and it sounded interesting. So I thought, okay, this is when manufacturing still existed,

00;07;48;09 - 00;07;55;00
Norm Farrar
in Canada. I'm a Canadian, and I took on the role, so they brought me in as one of the owners of this company.

00;07;55;00 - 00;07;57;06
Norm Farrar
I didn't have to put in any money.

00;07;57;06 - 00;08;02;12
Norm Farrar
It all I had to do is go out there and sell with this other person,

00;08;02;12 - 00;08;08;27
Norm Farrar
who is another owner. So there's three of us. So then they said, look, why don't we,

00;08;08;27 - 00;08;15;02
Norm Farrar
why don't we get a line and then we can really grow? Now, I went to film school.

00;08;15;05 - 00;08;26;00
Norm Farrar
I did not go to business school. So everything that I learned is on the street. Now, this wouldn't happen today, but back when I was in my 20s.

00;08;26;00 - 00;08;31;21
Norm Farrar
Yeah, I did not. I did not know the red flags came up, but,

00;08;31;21 - 00;08;33;02
Norm Farrar
they showed me this,

00;08;33;02 - 00;08;42;13
Norm Farrar
400 and I think it was 450, $480,000 line. They wanted to know if I wanted to come on the line, they would give me more.

00;08;42;13 - 00;08;44;15
Norm Farrar
So it'd be a third, a third, a third.

00;08;44;15 - 00;08;50;21
Norm Farrar
But this would just be money we'd be dipping into. Not that we even needed it, but this is what the,

00;08;50;21 - 00;08;57;24
Norm Farrar
the bank was willing to give us. I said, okay, yeah, who signed on? And then,

00;08;57;24 - 00;09;05;22
Norm Farrar
about a few months later, it all of a sudden I'm driving down the road and we're bringing on another person.

00;09;05;22 - 00;09;15;15
Norm Farrar
So it's going to be four of us. And they introduced me to them. I didn't even know the guy until they introduced me. So we were getting ready to bring on him, and I'm going down the road with the one,

00;09;15;15 - 00;09;18;25
Norm Farrar
this one guy, and I hear him talking to the other,

00;09;18;25 - 00;09;21;14
Norm Farrar
partner and he says, yeah,

00;09;21;14 - 00;09;28;18
Norm Farrar
that we were over on the line and I'm sitting there going, holyfuck.

00;09;28;20 - 00;09;37;07
Norm Farrar
I like I didn't hear what I just heard. He didn't realize I was in the car and he, like, didn't put two and two together. And so,

00;09;37;07 - 00;09;43;05
Norm Farrar
all of a sudden we get back and there's a story about me injecting another 25,000 bucks,

00;09;43;05 - 00;09;48;02
Norm Farrar
you know, just to hold it over. Well, I called the bank, I became,

00;09;48;02 - 00;09;49;22
Norm Farrar
really good.

00;09;49;24 - 00;09;58;12
Norm Farrar
I had good connection with the the the bank manager, and he told me straight out, the bank is completely overdrawn and, or. Sorry, the,

00;09;58;12 - 00;09;58;22
Norm Farrar
the

00;09;58;22 - 00;10;08;05
Norm Farrar
operating line. And so I called the the guy that I highly realized, I said, do not put any money in. He was going to put 25 grand in.

00;10;08;05 - 00;10;10;13
Norm Farrar
This is a scam.

00;10;10;15 - 00;10;17;18
Norm Farrar
And so he didn't believe me because he was really good friends with them. But here's the here's the thing. My wife was nine months pregnant.

00;10;17;18 - 00;10;26;07
Norm Farrar
I was 28, and I was a millionaire. Without their money, without anything. I was a millionaire. Had my own house,

00;10;26;07 - 00;10;28;22
Norm Farrar
had a couple of car. I mean, it was. It was good.

00;10;28;22 - 00;11;07;24
Norm Farrar
Everything was good by 28, like 28.5. I was broke, completely broke. These guys had put all their assets outside of the business so they weren't responsible for anything. Me being naive put my name on, which I personally guaranteed. And the day that all of this happened, I had to bring my son out of the hospital like a day, two days old, to the lawyer's office and sign the bankruptcy papers.

00;11;07;27 - 00;11;09;10
Norm Farrar
Oh.

00;11;09;10 - 00;11;10;23
Norm Farrar
It was horrible.

00;11;10;23 - 00;11;37;12
Norm Farrar
It was horrible. So, you know, within months, millions to nothing. Absolutely nothing. The cars were gone, the house was gone. And get this. So we sold the house, and I, I like because I was in bankruptcy, my, my wife wasn't, but she was able to keep her half of the profit of the house.

00;11;37;14 - 00;11;40;27
Norm Farrar
Well, the trustee came back and said

00;11;40;27 - 00;11;59;10
Norm Farrar
you're going to be charged with fraud. I said, what are you talking about? You signed the papers to sell the house. I said, yeah, to know we were supposed to do that. If you don't give us your half of the profit and hers, then you're going to jail. I had no idea.

00;11;59;12 - 00;12;21;24
Norm Farrar
You know, now it's a whole different story, but I had no idea they had to sign. And not me. But the scumbags that they were took my wife's half of the only money we had. We had to start fresh. I had to give up my dog. I had a beautiful Saint Bernard. I couldn't keep it anymore. I had nothing, I literally had nothing.

00;12;21;27 - 00;12;24;02
Norm Farrar
Yeah, it was awful.

00;12;24;04 - 00;12;50;14
Craig Andrews
You know, my dad had his own business and and his partner had been doing some things they didn't tell my dad about that were a little bit unethical. And one of the senior guys in the company kind of spun up his own company within the company, started using the company resources to do it. And when my dad went after him, he's like, oh, you can pursue me in court, but I know where the bodies are buried.

00;12;50;14 - 00;12;54;14
Craig Andrews
And my dad was like, what bodies? He's like, oh, let me show you.

00;12;54;17 - 00;12;56;22
Norm Farrar
And that's the horrible thing.

00;12;56;22 - 00;13;05;07
Craig Andrews
I mean, you go into business with these people and you, you trust them and you're like, Holy cow, how could you do such a horrible thing?

00;13;05;10 - 00;13;20;04
Norm Farrar
It turns out that the one partner was in the witness protection program. Oh, he was the accountant. He was one of the accountants that brought down the Philadelphia mob.

00;13;20;07 - 00;13;21;29
Craig Andrews
No way.

00;13;21;29 - 00;13;22;02
Craig Andrews
If.

00;13;22;02 - 00;13;34;27
Norm Farrar
You ever want a story, check out the Philadelphia how they brought down the Philadelphia Mob. I had no clue about this until afterwards. That this guy, this guy went on the run,

00;13;34;27 - 00;13;38;21
Norm Farrar
witness protection program, and he was our,

00;13;38;21 - 00;13;40;03
Norm Farrar
CFO.

00;13;40;06 - 00;13;42;04
Craig Andrews
Oh, my goodness.

00;13;42;07 - 00;13;42;24
Norm Farrar
Yeah.

00;13;42;24 - 00;13;45;11
Norm Farrar
It just gets better, you know, it gets better.

00;13;45;11 - 00;13;53;29
Norm Farrar
I'll give you just another quick one from this scenario, right? Our receptionist, our receptionist was going out with a,

00;13;53;29 - 00;14;06;05
Norm Farrar
bike gang. It wasn't Hells Angels. It was a notorious back bike gang. We had no clue. We fired her because we caught her stealing. Okay, all of a sudden, she's out.

00;14;06;07 - 00;14;13;24
Norm Farrar
I think this was on a Friday. All of a sudden, all these bikers come in. I'm the only one in the office. The guy's name?

00;14;13;24 - 00;14;15;19
Norm Farrar
I won't say the guy's name.

00;14;15;19 - 00;14;28;04
Norm Farrar
The guy comes in, we're sitting in the boardroom now. All the chairs are taken up by these guys. And I knew the guy because I could see you're going out, you know, with the guy.

00;14;28;06 - 00;14;28;19
Norm Farrar
And,

00;14;28;19 - 00;14;55;14
Norm Farrar
he puts a gun on the table and he says. And now you're going to give her $5,000. You do this or this? I had to write a check for $5,000. Even though she stole from us these lessons from the past that you would never would learn in school, you know, how do you protect yourself about the eye?

00;14;55;14 - 00;14;58;00
Norm Farrar
Oh, man, I got a thousand stories.

00;14;58;03 - 00;15;03;02
Craig Andrews
Yeah. That is wild.

00;15;03;02 - 00;15;06;18
Craig Andrews
That's, that's just insane.

00;15;06;18 - 00;15;17;11
Craig Andrews
But that's, you know, and it's it's it's it's interesting because, like you said, these are the I don't know, I don't know, the class you take.

00;15;17;13 - 00;15;38;11
Norm Farrar
To not there's not prepare for that. There's nothing and there's millions of other examples of this like if, if it has to do with cash flow, hey, you're running your business. I got to make payroll. How do I do that? And, you know, okay, I got to be creative. What am I going to do about this? Now? There's a lot of ways of doing this, and,

00;15;38;11 - 00;15;41;26
Norm Farrar
a lot of them aren't great ways, like taking credit cards,

00;15;41;26 - 00;15;45;04
Norm Farrar
getting all sorts of credit cards so you can balance different balances,

00;15;45;04 - 00;15;48;10
Norm Farrar
transferring credit cards because they'll give you 1%.

00;15;48;12 - 00;16;10;02
Norm Farrar
And these are all of the things that you learn. Probably not the best things. But, you know, now you get a thicker skin and the one thing you'll know right off the bat, I mean, are you a are you a true entrepreneur? Well, one thing I'll tell you, do you have resilience? Are you willing to get up even though, you know, you get kicked between the legs hard?

00;16;10;04 - 00;16;13;13
Norm Farrar
Are you willing to do it and are you willing to do it again?

00;16;13;13 - 00;16;29;25
Norm Farrar
If you're not, then you're not cut out for this because everything as an entrepreneur, everything you do, you've got to first of all be able to get up, be resilient. You got to be able to think on a dime. You got to be able to be creative.

00;16;29;28 - 00;16;37;26
Norm Farrar
And if you don't have these skills and you got to be constantly learning because it's lonely, being an entrepreneur and so,

00;16;37;26 - 00;16;52;26
Norm Farrar
one of the ways I get away from that is I join incredible masterminds just like where we met, and we can spin ideas off of each other. Or if somebody is happens to be getting screwed over with two partners,

00;16;52;26 - 00;16;56;12
Norm Farrar
you know, with double books, having double books, that's what they had.

00;16;56;15 - 00;17;00;26
Norm Farrar
You can get some great advice. Yeah, but, yeah, that's,

00;17;00;26 - 00;17;06;15
Norm Farrar
I could give you a if you wanted content, I could give you content on stories. Right.

00;17;06;17 - 00;17;10;08
Craig Andrews
Well, let's let's, let's talk about something else. We were talking about,

00;17;10;08 - 00;17;11;20
Craig Andrews
search,

00;17;11;20 - 00;17;28;11
Craig Andrews
you know, Google search. And, you know, I published something recently about, you know, SEO ain't what it used to be. And, you know, I feel like I keep running into people who are kind of stuck in a 2010, 2012, 2015 mindset.

00;17;28;11 - 00;17;35;18
Craig Andrews
Hey, we're just going to put a whole bunch of content out on the web, and it's and it's going to generate traffic and, and bring things in.

00;17;35;21 - 00;17;46;27
Craig Andrews
And it feels like we're in a, a real inflection point on how people are searching for information. And I don't know, what's your take.

00;17;47;00 - 00;17;49;28
Norm Farrar
There's a lot of things going on right now. And,

00;17;49;28 - 00;17;51;26
Norm Farrar
it's going to be interesting because,

00;17;51;26 - 00;18;11;24
Norm Farrar
we were talking before the podcast, but I don't use Google as much as I used to. In fact, I'm always I'm turning more to perplexity and gathering information. Now, what's happening with perplexity is it's learning from Google how to become better and better and better.

00;18;11;24 - 00;18;22;12
Norm Farrar
And I think at some point we're going to see perplexity become ranked higher than Google. I don't know, that's just my thought. But,

00;18;22;12 - 00;18;32;20
Norm Farrar
just with the quality of the searches that you get and the be even the ability to prompt for better information, I think that's,

00;18;32;20 - 00;18;38;13
Norm Farrar
that's interesting. The other thing that Google has going for it right now,

00;18;38;13 - 00;18;40;04
Norm Farrar
and I learned this.

00;18;40;04 - 00;18;41;05
Norm Farrar
I was that deal,

00;18;41;05 - 00;18;48;01
Norm Farrar
deals con in Nashville, Tennessee, who is their brilliant, brilliant, brilliant guy. And,

00;18;48;01 - 00;18;58;28
Norm Farrar
he started talking about, well, you've got to become an authority. So the way that the algorithm is looking for people right now and giving getting responses,

00;18;58;28 - 00;19;12;07
Norm Farrar
are you an authority? Are you the person, the brand, the company? And here's how to to make sure that you look like a professional, that you're you have that authority.

00;19;12;09 - 00;19;15;07
Norm Farrar
And one is I don't know if you have this, but,

00;19;15;07 - 00;19;16;22
Norm Farrar
Google knowledge panel,

00;19;16;22 - 00;19;22;07
Norm Farrar
that is the first thing you have to claim. Your panel, go to Google Knowledge panel, claim your panel.

00;19;22;07 - 00;19;34;10
Norm Farrar
It's not as easy as just getting verified on Facebook. You got to prove that you're an authority. Many people get rejected, and if you do so, you've got to go over and you've got to start, you know,

00;19;34;10 - 00;19;38;29
Norm Farrar
writing blogs and guest blogging or go to one of the, the main,

00;19;38;29 - 00;19;42;01
Norm Farrar
social media sites and start adding content.

00;19;42;04 - 00;19;45;24
Norm Farrar
Once you get to a certain point, they'll agree that you're a,

00;19;45;24 - 00;20;10;19
Norm Farrar
an authority in whatever you do. Then that leads you to this crazy, crazy thing called Google Knowledge Graph. And you have a podcast. I have a podcast. We're lucky because within Google Knowledge Graph, we can take this and we can start building out our community. And it's incredible because I was with,

00;20;10;19 - 00;20;16;02
Norm Farrar
a buddy of mine, we have a business together and another podcast together, misfits.

00;20;16;05 - 00;20;19;23
Norm Farrar
His name is Kevin King, so he's big in the Amazon world.

00;20;19;23 - 00;20;35;25
Norm Farrar
We go to a lot of events together. We take pictures. Boom. Take another picture. You know, I'm going to Iceland. I'm going to take a picture with him over there. He's having an event. Every time I take a picture, it tells the algorithm, oh, these guys know each other some way, somehow.

00;20;35;27 - 00;20;46;17
Norm Farrar
And the more I do it now, I'm picking up and I'm expanding and expanding the spider web of authority that I have. Ryan Dice,

00;20;46;17 - 00;20;55;05
Norm Farrar
Roland Frazier. Hey, take a picture when you're at a at when you're at these events. I never used to take pictures. Dennis. Dennis,

00;20;55;05 - 00;20;59;07
Norm Farrar
you said take pictures. How? I'm taking pictures of everything.

00;20;59;13 - 00;21;02;29
Norm Farrar
I'm taking pictures of set ups of my podcast studio.

00;21;02;29 - 00;21;04;08
Norm Farrar
If I'm working,

00;21;04;08 - 00;21;09;21
Norm Farrar
if I'm with anybody. And I went from, I saw,

00;21;09;21 - 00;21;11;24
Norm Farrar
if somebody looked up my name,

00;21;11;24 - 00;21;13;23
Norm Farrar
440 searches,

00;21;13;23 - 00;21;17;04
Norm Farrar
I had a lot of a 440,000 searches,

00;21;17;04 - 00;21;26;13
Norm Farrar
that I had pages of. I had a lot of content out there. Now using this, my ranking has gone through the roof.

00;21;26;15 - 00;21;35;08
Norm Farrar
Just after the podcast typed my name, Norm Farrar. And you'll see exactly. If you don't know what a Google knowledge panel is, either on your phone or,

00;21;35;08 - 00;21;39;10
Norm Farrar
on a desktop, it it's unbelievable.

00;21;39;10 - 00;21;42;01
Norm Farrar
The difference in search that you'll get,

00;21;42;01 - 00;21;45;28
Norm Farrar
than your competitors. I have over 400,

00;21;45;28 - 00;21;55;24
Norm Farrar
4.4 million mentions now from 440,000. Now, that is the start of an incredible community.

00;21;55;26 - 00;21;58;09
Norm Farrar
So that is something that if,

00;21;58;09 - 00;22;01;05
Norm Farrar
I don't know if if you've done that yet.

00;22;01;07 - 00;22;03;25
Craig Andrews
No, I need to, I need to.

00;22;03;26 - 00;22;07;24
Norm Farrar
Yeah. And it's it's not just like this.

00;22;07;24 - 00;22;13;16
Norm Farrar
I was I was talking to our mastermind, our group that we belong to, and doing a workshop in that,

00;22;13;16 - 00;22;27;08
Norm Farrar
but there's a lot of people who don't know about it. And now you become that authority. People can trust you because Google says that you are the expert. You are the authority.

00;22;27;08 - 00;22;36;17
Norm Farrar
And what you do, it can tell you about your brand and can tell you about your company. And also, this is I can't have credit for this. Dennis,

00;22;36;17 - 00;22;45;22
Norm Farrar
you says, okay, you can't just be like Norm for our own Instagram. And I have my lunch with Norm stuff there.

00;22;45;22 - 00;22;47;21
Norm Farrar
I have to have three different profiles.

00;22;47;24 - 00;23;11;14
Norm Farrar
I have to have my personal profile. Okay. Great. Personal. My brand, my company. You know, it could be a group. So in Facebook, it would be your profile, your Facebook page for lunch with Norm and my group lunch with Norm. And then you do go over to these other 25, 50 different channels, including like Reddit. So I just opened up a subreddit, but I only did it for lunch with Norm.

00;23;11;14 - 00;23;37;13
Norm Farrar
I didn't do it for the three. Every single social media you should have the three and then you just start sharing those photos. The other thing that most people do, I do, I take a picture and where is it stored? It's stored on my iPhone. Well, if I really want to get noticed out there, share it on Google Photos, share it on Amazon.

00;23;37;16 - 00;23;57;08
Norm Farrar
You know, Amazon Photos. You get the word out there. And now you're being associated and with all these different images. And that's the same with videos. And that whatever you you do with these podcasts, you know, right after my podcast I go to notebook LM. So that's a Google

00;23;57;08 - 00;23;59;14
Norm Farrar
lab. And you can go into Google,

00;23;59;14 - 00;24;02;00
Norm Farrar
and I'll ask it to do a,

00;24;02;00 - 00;24;06;25
Norm Farrar
a review of my guests and extract out,

00;24;06;25 - 00;24;14;21
Norm Farrar
the, the four main points of the or discuss the four main points of the podcast.

00;24;14;23 - 00;24;21;18
Norm Farrar
And I can even take part in the interview that is going on, which is crazy.

00;24;21;18 - 00;24;34;24
Norm Farrar
So these I can take, like, just little snippets of that and I can use it. Then I could take snippets of that and put it into a faceless video. I could take snippets of that, you know, put it into,

00;24;34;24 - 00;24;35;13
Norm Farrar
into,

00;24;35;13 - 00;24;36;07
Norm Farrar
posts on

00;24;36;07 - 00;24;42;04
Norm Farrar
any social media, these, these just recently,

00;24;42;04 - 00;24;42;23
Norm Farrar
ChatGPT

00;24;42;23 - 00;24;48;18
Norm Farrar
just had the announcement of the image generators that are the enhanced image generator.

00;24;48;18 - 00;24;53;29
Norm Farrar
So you could take a prompt or you could just upload a really crappy image of,

00;24;53;29 - 00;25;07;22
Norm Farrar
I saw one of, Lamborghini, and it just look like a crappy Lamborghini. And then just a simple prompt, and it turned out to be incredible. Or a product picture where it was really bad lighting,

00;25;07;22 - 00;25;10;20
Norm Farrar
on a cylinder. And it was poor lighting.

00;25;10;23 - 00;25;27;29
Norm Farrar
So it looked like just amateur and then extracted a 3D rendering just by saying, create a 3D rendering of that image. And it was perfect. So I don't usually say perfect, but the image was perfect. I'm having,

00;25;27;29 - 00;25;29;19
Norm Farrar
a cigar event.

00;25;29;19 - 00;25;48;07
Norm Farrar
Kevin and I enjoy our cigars, and we're having an event in Tampa. I just put in a prompt that I wanted two whiskey glasses, cigar with a burning ash smoke coming from the ash on an ashtray with a cigar aficionado style magazine with the name of the event.

00;25;48;09 - 00;26;11;01
Norm Farrar
I had to revise it twice. Well, guess what? That's going to be our image for our website. So all this stuff that you can do to, start this community and I know that, you know, this is kind of down a rabbit hole of a rabbit hole, but if you want to grow a podcast community, you've got to

00;26;11;01 - 00;26;12;14
Norm Farrar
start somewhere.

00;26;12;16 - 00;26;23;16
Norm Farrar
And so why not start with your podcast, create like repurpose snippets from the podcast. Our podcast, we do about 150 different,

00;26;23;16 - 00;26;31;06
Norm Farrar
types of repurposing. And then that goes into the different social media channels we monitor for,

00;26;31;06 - 00;26;39;09
Norm Farrar
any questions or keywords. And then we answer right away and we always try to keep in mind, you know, our newsletter,

00;26;39;09 - 00;26;43;17
Norm Farrar
which is just saying news.

00;26;43;19 - 00;26;58;22
Norm Farrar
You know, we've got this newsletter that is 100% value. Yeah. You won't see any promotions in there. If you want, if you want to have a community, you can't be promoting, promoting, promoting.

00;26;58;22 - 00;27;05;26
Norm Farrar
As my buddy says, you have to get engaged before you get married. And it's so true. And then,

00;27;05;26 - 00;27;10;26
Norm Farrar
for us, anyways, we do our our podcast is live.

00;27;10;27 - 00;27;21;22
Norm Farrar
The one is and people come on, I know them, I know them, and I can say, hey, Stephen, how's it going in Chicago?

00;27;21;22 - 00;27;34;05
Norm Farrar
I know them. A lot of them. I even know their family. And whenever we're doing something or whenever we need help, hey, we need some reviews or. Hey, we're doing this really cool 500th,

00;27;34;05 - 00;27;34;25
Norm Farrar
episode.

00;27;35;01 - 00;27;37;00
Norm Farrar
Can you shout this out to any of your,

00;27;37;00 - 00;27;57;16
Norm Farrar
to any of your followers or people that you know? You know, they do a lot of the work for us, and you could do that with a brand, too, if you're building up a list of people and I can get into how to build the list. But if you got a list of people that love your brand, they're either brand ambassadors or they just love it.

00;27;57;19 - 00;28;14;15
Norm Farrar
Just, you know, they the way that you treat them, you get retention, which builds loyalty. Then there's your list. If you're launching anything, hey, here you go. And guess what? You don't have to give any discounts. Usually they just want your product.

00;28;14;18 - 00;28;20;23
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah. And I mean, you're you're speaking my language when you say get away from,

00;28;20;23 - 00;28;24;00
Craig Andrews
discounts is it's,

00;28;24;00 - 00;28;40;01
Craig Andrews
I know that's such a, such a powerful tool in getting people to move, but, you know, I prefer to have a really, really profitable business. I'd rather have a business where people and pay a premium for what I have, rather than trying to bribe them into buying.

00;28;40;01 - 00;28;41;03
Craig Andrews
When I'm selling.

00;28;41;05 - 00;28;44;09
Norm Farrar
It's called perception. So if you come up with,

00;28;44;09 - 00;29;02;18
Norm Farrar
for about podcast, if you got really crappy lighting, a bad video camera and a poor mic and your guest has the same, then guess what? If you're trying to push this as a really high quality podcast that you got to listen to,

00;29;02;18 - 00;29;04;15
Norm Farrar
your ratings aren't going to be there.

00;29;04;17 - 00;29;31;05
Norm Farrar
And, you know, what's unfortunate is there is a lot of really good podcasters out there that quit too early. They they don't push through the hard times they have, like they're different. They might not be a professional interviewer. I'm not. And all of a sudden the quality's there. But the perception that they have in their social media or on their website is crap.

00;29;31;13 - 00;29;54;04
Norm Farrar
So people might look at it and hearing, wow, this is really good. But if they start, if they try to find them on search and they go and they see crap, well guess what? You're either going to have a lower star review or they're not going to listen. So you have to yeah, I believe in perception. And I'll give you an example with a knife that I did.

00;29;54;04 - 00;30;11;29
Norm Farrar
So in AMA with within Amazon, a product that we were doing, guy comes to me with a $16 knife selling at $49. It was ugly. It was in a clamshell. So I said, give me the product, I'm going to repackage this for you. I put it into a hard, rigid,

00;30;11;29 - 00;30;16;19
Norm Farrar
package, with a magnetic clasp. I had a laser cut,

00;30;16;19 - 00;30;21;04
Norm Farrar
Eva foam where it would lay inside and it was covered.

00;30;21;04 - 00;30;25;07
Norm Farrar
So you had to kind of unveil it with a nice message on the,

00;30;25;07 - 00;30;26;04
Norm Farrar
inside of the

00;30;26;04 - 00;30;48;10
Norm Farrar
box. And it was inside an iPhone box. So you had the anticipation. So it was $3.25 for the packaging. We went from 49, 59, 69, 79, 89. We ended up at between and selling on Amazon right now, 99 to 124. Then we went and we took the same knife.

00;30;48;12 - 00;30;58;08
Norm Farrar
We hammered it, we put a different handle on it and we did the same thing. But it was the premiere edition and it was the elite edition.

00;30;58;08 - 00;31;03;16
Norm Farrar
Put it in the opposite colors of the box and had elite on the,

00;31;03;16 - 00;31;10;19
Norm Farrar
on the blade. And those were $16 and knives with the $3.25 and packaging. And we saw them for 225.

00;31;10;21 - 00;31;30;08
Norm Farrar
That is perceived value. And you can do that with any community. But if you keep an eye out on any aspect of that, if it's a website, social media misspelling, you know, or grammar poor grammar on your blog articles, people eat into that and they red flags come up and they click off.

00;31;30;10 - 00;31;44;22
Craig Andrews
Yeah, no, absolutely. And you know, every now and then it's fine. When you say poor grammar, every now and then I'll make up a word and some of my copy. But when somebody is reading it, it's abundantly clear it's a made up word. Yeah.

00;31;44;24 - 00;31;46;18
Norm Farrar
That's fine.

00;31;46;20 - 00;31;59;17
Craig Andrews
Which is different than bad grammar. And yeah I think that's an important is like in one piece a copy I think of I said and power pointed. Well PowerPoint isn't in any dictionary.

00;31;59;19 - 00;31;59;28
Norm Farrar
But.

00;31;59;28 - 00;32;10;11
Craig Andrews
People know what it means. It's more active word that's different than, you know, just having something that people look at and they're like, I don't think he really intended to say this.

00;32;10;13 - 00;32;12;10
Norm Farrar
Yeah, I you know what? I'm,

00;32;12;10 - 00;32;22;00
Norm Farrar
fairly famous for bunker isms. You know, when I'm talking live, you know, and if you don't know what bunker isms are, they,

00;32;22;00 - 00;32;30;20
Norm Farrar
it was all in the family back in the 70s. Archie Bunker had all these crazy made up words, and it was just a hoot. And it's just your own way

00;32;30;20 - 00;32;34;24
Norm Farrar
of saying a word that doesn't exist.

00;32;34;26 - 00;32;39;18
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah. Well, Norm, this has been amazing. I,

00;32;39;18 - 00;32;46;29
Craig Andrews
I know I, I spend another hour, I, I, you know, we just unfortunately, we have a short form,

00;32;46;29 - 00;32;52;14
Craig Andrews
podcast, but this has just been really powerful. I've got some things,

00;32;52;14 - 00;32;58;29
Craig Andrews
that I'm, I have some immediate action. So I need to go in and get my own knowledge panel.

00;32;59;01 - 00;33;20;21
Craig Andrews
Gotta set, set up. And we were sharing about, you know, deploying that building, that spider web of content across different channels. You know, that's that's powerful. And I think so few people do it that if you do that, I would imagine it's really easy to stand out.

00;33;20;23 - 00;33;35;15
Norm Farrar
Yeah. It's it's more than just your simple content marketing. It's actually a web. And if you do it right, it's incredible. If you want to know a lot more about it. Dennis, you has,

00;33;35;15 - 00;33;39;23
Norm Farrar
some incredible courses that are around.

00;33;39;23 - 00;33;48;19
Norm Farrar
I don't know if he's got the graphics course out, but he's got some really great content about SEO and building your content marketing.

00;33;48;21 - 00;33;52;04
Norm Farrar
I have nothing to do with Dennis. I just he blew me away when,

00;33;52;04 - 00;33;58;17
Norm Farrar
when I was there and going, I thought I knew something about Google. Like, I know a lot about Google, and,

00;33;58;17 - 00;34;08;24
Norm Farrar
he taught me something. I didn't know him, by the way. One other hint. You might have more than one knowledge panel that you can claim.

00;34;08;26 - 00;34;18;17
Norm Farrar
I've seen about 12 for me. So you can go in and you can you can merge all of these into one panel.

00;34;18;19 - 00;34;23;22
Craig Andrews
Wow. Well, this has been amazing. Thank you.

00;34;23;22 - 00;34;25;22
Craig Andrews
Norm, how can people reach you?

00;34;25;24 - 00;34;28;22
Norm Farrar
Well, they it's easy. You can go to,

00;34;28;22 - 00;34;37;21
Norm Farrar
Norm at AMC, like Amazon Dot club or watch the podcast launch with Norm or the Marketing misfits.

00;34;37;21 - 00;34;42;13
Norm Farrar
They're on YouTube. They're on Apple, wherever you want to find them. And,

00;34;42;13 - 00;34;58;11
Norm Farrar
like I said, a little bit earlier, we love the format of our newsletter. If you want to check out something that's a little bit different, I go and I create a personal story and I turn it into a business lesson, and then I give a whole bunch of updates,

00;34;58;11 - 00;35;00;17
Norm Farrar
with outselling anything.

00;35;00;19 - 00;35;09;08
Norm Farrar
So that's at, news or sorry, Elwood Dot news and enjoy. Subscribe.

00;35;09;10 - 00;35;12;02
Craig Andrews
Well that's awesome. Well, thanks a lot. All right.

00;35;12;02 - 00;35;15;16
Norm Farrar
You're very welcome. It was great.

00;35;15;16 - 00;35;42;10
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 Ally's for me.com/guest and sign up there. If you got something out of this interview, we would love you to share this

00;35;42;10 - 00;35;44;05
Craig Andrews
episode on social media.

00;35;44;07 - 00;36;07;19
Craig Andrews
Just do a quick screenshot with your phone and text it to a friend, or posted on the socials. If you know someone who would be a great guest. Tag them on social media and let them know about the show, including the hashtag leaders and legacies. I love seeing your posts and suggestions. We are regularly putting out new episodes and content to make sure you don't miss anything.

00;36;07;21 - 00;36;15;26
Craig Andrews
Please go ahead and subscribe. Your thumbs up. Ratings and reviews go a long way to help promote the show. It means a lot to me.

00;36;15;26 - 00;38;18;01
Craig Andrews
It means a lot to my team. If you want to know more, please go to Ally's for me.com. Or follow me on LinkedIn. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time.