07: How to become an educator and lead your community with George B Thomas

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George B Thomas is a talented team member of The Sales Lion and the co-host of the popular podcast The Hubcast. He has all of the HubSpot certifications and is a HubSpot Accredited Trainer. No matter if you are an Inbound beginner or been around the HubSpot block a couple times. George will make sure your educated and entertained at the same time. In today’s podcast George shares with us his journey to becoming a leader in the HubSpot community and what you can do to become and educator and lead your community.

[spp-tweet tweet=”@GeorgeBThomas shares how to build your community on The Daily Hub!”]

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Time Stamped Show Notes

(click the time stamp to jump directly to that point in the episode.)

  • [02:20] – George gives us just a taste of his background and his personal life. George tells us how his desire to entertain and educate combined with his free spirited attitude motivates him.  He is a certified horse back riding instructor and father of 4 kids
  • [04:05] – George tells us about how he initially got into the world of Hubspot and what motivated him to become a thought leader in that space and in particular in the education space.  Prior to 2012 he was just another web developer who liked design and development. In 2012 he attended his first HubSpot conference and watched Gary Vaynerchuk which inspired him to one day be the guy that was presenting at a Hubspot inbound conference and changing people’s lives
  • [06:11] – After deciding to immerse himself in HubSpot George took massive action and now has every HubSpot certification
  • [08:04] – George reflects on the value he has added to people’s lives  that have followed him on his journey and watched his approximately 370 video tutorials on HubSpot on Youtube
  • [10:06] – HubSpot Intensive Trainings are where George comes to your premises and looks at everything from your user experience to your inbound strategy and your HubSpot tactics.  Typically when done people have 8-14 notes of things they will change about how they are marketing their business, with actionable items
  • [10:45] – George gives some actionable tips about how he has built his community. If you are focussed on creating a community, there are three words you should wake up and focus on every day: 1) being helpful, 2) be human, 3) be happy
[spp-tweet tweet=”If you are focussed on building a community be Helpful, Human and Happy: @GeorgeBThomas”]
  • [12:07] – Samantha asks about how to have the faith to start building a community when you start out talking to no one and build it to a massive following
  • [16:09] – George shares how video and being on camera is the key to being recognised as a leader in your community
  • [17:04] – For people who aren’t as confident on video – GET OVER YOURSELF!  The need for you to educate is way more important than for you to feel good about yourself so put yourself out there, create the content and let the magic happen.
  • [20:00] – When you’re about to step in front of the mic or camera, think to yourself “It’s not about me, it’s all about them
  • [21:00] – The amount of tweets and emails since George bared his soul in the last 8 minutes of his presentation at INBOUND16 are exactly the reason he will hustle to educate and to get people to realise they need to be educators
  • [23:15] – George talks about how much of the HubSpot Intensive Training (HIT) days is focussed on mindset and buy in, as well as demolishing sales and marketing silos
  • [23:23] – For people who can’t attend training in person, The Sales Lion has the Content Success Formula which is an online course with 60 videos with the first two modules about mindset, buy in etc, then its about what to do next like buyer personas, building content etc. Then there’s a new course being developed called the WP Inbound Machine. This is inbound training for people who can’t afford or aren’t ready for a tool like HubSpot and suitable for small, medium and large businesses
  • [27:02] – George shares his biggest success with inbound marketing which has been the launch of their podcast called The HubCast.  It has generated over 6 figures in revenue just from the podcast itself through promotion of their workshops and training.
  • [28:11] – Samantha asks George about whether starting a podcast needs to be complicated.  His response… people in general put these hurdles in front of themselves that don’t need to be there eg. equipment needed.  Just record and publish!
  • [30:18] – George confesses the worst thing that has ever happened for him with Inbound Marketing.  He decided to create a ‘come to us’ model of training for group training and he had no response.  This caused him to second guess himself and cost the company significantly. “While you have many successes, those one or two failures smarts”
  • [33:13] – George’s response to this failure was to think about it for a week and then double down on content creation and move on
  • [33:48] – The one thing George is most excited about today is to see what the next year to 5 years brings with his personal brand and The Sales Lion Brand. 2012 to 2016 he has achieved and well exceeded his goal to speak at Inbound with overflow sessions and encore
  • [34:54] – George is thinking about what more he can add value with eg. he has just started a new podcast called One Last Tool.
  • [20:00] – When you’re about to step in front of the mic or camera, think to yourself “It’s not about me, it’s all about them”
  • [37:16] – The Lightning Round
    • This content is available to The Daily Hub Subscribers.  If you’d like to see the answers to the lightening round questions below, subscribe now and you’ll receive access to the full interview and lightening round answers right in your inbox. Questions covered here are:
        • What was holding you back from growing your business? 
        • What’s the best advice you’ve ever received? 
        • Share one of your personal habits that contributes to your success? 
        • Share a resource or tool that you’re using right now? 
        • What book would you recommend to Hub Nation and why? 
        • Imagine you woke up tomorrow morning and your business and success to date are gone and you know no-one. You still have all the experience and knowledge you currently have, your food and shelter are taken care of, but all you have is a laptop and $1,000 dollars. What would you do in the next 7 days?
      • Note: If you are a subscriber to The Daily Hub and can’t see the answers above you need to login to view the answers.

Parting piece of guidance

      • To get access to Content Success Formula just email george@thesaleslion.com and he will let you know when the next course is running.
      • To get access to WP Inbound Machine the next course is starting February 6 so go here to register.
      • Don’t ever let yourself be the person who tells you that you can’t do something, there will be enough of people out in the world what will do that for you.  So always believe in yourself, always go for what you want to go for.  Have a dream. Turn that dream into a goal.  And on your journey to reaching that goal make sure that you are being human, that you are being helpful, and that along the way you are always being happy!

3 Key Points:

      1. The need for you to educate is way more important than for you to feel good about yourself so put yourself out there, create the content and let the magic happen
      2. If you are focussed on creating a community, there are three words you should wake up and focus on every day: 1) being helpful, 2) be human, 3) be happy
      3. Have a dream. Turn that dream into a goal.  And on your journey to reaching that goal make sure that you are being human, that you are being helpful, and that along the way you are always being happy!

Resources Mentioned:

      • WP Inbound Machine course that George has created for people who are not ready for HubSpot can be found here
      • George’s One Last Tool podcast can be found here
      • Mautic – an open source free marketing automation software can be found here
      • Books: Crush It by Gary Vaynerchuk and Steal the Show by Michael Port
      • Connect with George on Twitter @GeorgeBThomas
      • Connect with George on Facebook at Mr.GeorgeBThomas
      • The HubSpotters – Global (Unofficial) Facebook group can be found here

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