The Brain Science Behind Successful Marketing

The Brain Science Behind Successful Marketing written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

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Overview

On this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, John Jantsch interviews Michael Aaron Flicker, founder and CEO of ZenoSci Ventures and co-founder (with Richard Shotton) of the Consumer Behavior Lab. Michael shares insights from their new book, “Hacking the Human Mind: The Behavioral Science Secrets Behind 17 of the World’s Best Brands.” They discuss how the world’s top brands—sometimes knowingly, sometimes not—leverage deep principles of behavioral science to drive memorable marketing, build loyalty, and create legendary campaigns.

About the Guest

Michael Aaron Flicker is the founder and CEO of ZenoSci Ventures and co-founder of the Consumer Behavior Lab, an organization dedicated to applying the science of human behavior to media and marketing. Alongside renowned behavioral scientist Richard Shotton, Michael explores how behavioral science can be practically applied to build more effective brands, campaigns, and customer journeys.

• Website: consumerbehaviorlab.com
• Book & Masterclass: consumerbehaviorlab.com
• Podcast: Behavioral Science for Brands

Actionable Insights

• Great brands often leverage behavioral science—even if they’re not aware of the academic research behind their strategies.
• Marketers should focus on concrete, image-rich messaging (e.g., “a thousand songs in your pocket”) rather than abstract claims or feature lists; concrete language is proven to be more memorable and persuasive.
• Specificity and the illusion of effort (e.g., “17 brands,” “5,127 prototypes”) increase credibility and audience trust.
• Creating peak moments—unexpected, memorable experiences—can dramatically elevate brand loyalty (e.g., a popsicle hotline at an average hotel).
• Behavioral science helps decode why people really buy; understanding these principles arms you to design smarter campaigns and better experiences.
• Marketers must use these tactics ethically; understanding human shortcuts is about guiding, not manipulating, decisions.
• The best way to apply these principles is to test them: run A/B tests, observe outcomes, and iterate—even small businesses can experiment and learn.
• Success comes from a mindset open to science, measurement, and continuous observation—move beyond gut instinct to evidence-based marketing.

Great Moments (with Timestamps)

• 00:55 – What Does It Mean to “Hack the Human Mind”?
  Why the book starts with brands, not academic studies, and always ends with “so what?”
• 02:00 – Ground-Level Psychology
  Why both big brands and small business owners have direct insight into consumer behavior.
• 03:20 – Debunking the Feature Stack
  The Five Guys story: Why less is more, and focus beats feature overload.
• 06:53 – The Power of Concrete Messaging
  How Apple’s “a thousand songs in your pocket” leverages proven behavioral science.
• 09:21 – Why “17 Brands”?
  Specificity and the illusion of effort make numbers more credible and memorable.
• 11:00 – The Peak-End Rule and Creating Brand Moments
  Why a popsicle hotline at an average motel generates top-tier reviews.
• 13:32 – How Any Business Can Create Peak Moments
  Small, intentional actions can create powerful, memorable experiences for any brand.
• 15:10 – Ethics and the “Dark Side” of Behavioral Science
  Why marketers must use these insights responsibly and educate consumers.
• 17:20 – How to Get Started in Behavioral Science Marketing
  Adopt a science-based, test-and-learn mindset—not just gut instinct.
• 18:52 – Measurement and Testing
  Why even small businesses should observe, experiment, and iterate.

Insights

“Great brands use behavioral science principles—sometimes knowingly, sometimes by instinct—to create memorable, effective marketing.”

“Concrete, image-rich language is four times more memorable than abstract claims. Show, don’t just tell.”

“Specificity and visible effort—like a precise number of prototypes—build trust and credibility.”

“A single, unexpected peak moment can make an average experience legendary in the minds of customers.”

“Behavioral science is about understanding humanity’s natural shortcuts and designing better, not more manipulative, marketing.”

Duct Tape Transcript

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Consumer Behavior Lab (00:00.365)

perfect.

John Jantsch (00:02.467)

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Michael Aaron Flicker. He's the founder and CEO of ZenoSci Ventures and co-founder of the Consumer Behavior Lab alongside renowned behavioral scientist Richard Schotton. The CBL's mission is to explore how behavioral science can be applied to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of media and marketing. Michael Aaron and Richard's book.

is what we're going to talk about today, hacking the human mind, the behavioral science secrets behind 17 of the world's best brands. So I go welcome the show.

Consumer Behavior Lab (00:42.191)

Thanks so much for having me, John. Excited to be here with you.

John Jantsch (00:44.909)

So let's start, a lot of times I have to start with the title of a book. So what does it really mean to hack the human mind in the context of marketing and branding?

Consumer Behavior Lab (00:55.723)

So, so many books about behavioral science, about the academics of marketing start with the studies or start with the, with esoteric research. And we said, what if we turned it around? And what if we said some of the best brands in the world have insights into human psychology that they're taking advantage of whether they know it or not. So let's take those examples.

break them down, understand what they're doing, and then explain some of the science behind it so that you can have confidence using it in your own business for your own brand. So we wanted to start with the brands rather than with the academic studies and make sure that we always ended it with, what? So what do I do with this knowledge so that I can apply it to the brands or the businesses that you're running?

John Jantsch (01:48.579)

So you mentioned something I was curious about. said whether they know it or not. I mean, how often did you find that brands were like, what are you talking about? I mean, we just, it's like, that's why my mom said you should treat people. Is that not good?

Consumer Behavior Lab (02:00.014)

I think what we find is that great marketing strategists, great marketing creatives have an insight into human psychology in a way that many of us do not have. But we also found folks that are selling hot dogs on the street, those that are running florist shops on the corner market have those same insights because they're this close to the consumer.

They're next to the consumer, they're selling every day. And so at both extremes in the vaulted agencies and brands of the world, and at the ground level, when you're actually selling to people every day, you learn things about human psychology that get put into practice. so it was, so our, our, our belief is that most of the campaigns, most of the brands we looked at, they understood that they had access to something special.

We don't think they knew many of the academic studies behind it that proved why it was likely to work.

John Jantsch (03:01.687)

Yeah. So in some ways you were validating something they had already discovered, but didn't realize it was a secret. So were there any myths or best practices in quotes that you found that you could challenge head on or that you were even trying to challenge head on?

Consumer Behavior Lab (03:05.902)

It's a nice way to say it.

Consumer Behavior Lab (03:20.375)

I don't think we sought, we set out to challenge this, but one of the most common things we see marketers do is they have something they want to sell and then they start stacking the RTBs, the reasons to believe this thing goes faster and is quieter and by the way, it'll clean your teeth while you do all those other things. And you know, we did not set out to debunk that, but we opened the book with a story about five guys.

which is, if you're an American listener, one of America's fastest growing, better burger chains. And that founder, Jerry Morrell, started with an insight that he was just walking along a Maryland boardwalk where he sees one company stall with a massive line when everybody else's stalls were empty. And Thrasher's fries on the Maryland boardwalk

John Jantsch (03:48.697)

Mm-hmm.

Consumer Behavior Lab (04:16.63)

had this massive line. And he got to thinking, is this stall that only sells one thing fries, doing something better than everybody else that sold burgers and milkshakes and sodas? And so anyway, that's one of the founding beliefs of Five Guys. And even to today, $1.6 billion franchise, they don't sell chicken, they don't sell salads, they don't sell ice cream, they only sell burgers and fries. And there's some interesting academic

studies that back that up.

John Jantsch (04:47.213)

Yeah, yeah.

I can think just in my own experience of some kind of local places that only do like fried chicken or something. And they're just, they're kind of legendary because they, I think there's something about the experience of that too. It's like, we know why we're going there. So let's get into the lab work. mean, you, you and Richard are both, I mean, you have consumer behavior labs. So there is a little bit of laboratory work involved in that, right. In the research. How do you take insights?

Consumer Behavior Lab (05:15.55)

That's right.

John Jantsch (05:19.006)

I don't know, academic behavioral science and turn them into like real campaigns or product design.

Consumer Behavior Lab (05:26.528)

I think what we're always looking for is that there's an incredible wealth of knowledge happening in the universities that stops short of, so what do we do about it? And so it's this goldmine of insights and goldmine of observations that gets validated. But then the question is, so what do you do? And so what we've been looking for is saying, well, we have high performing campaigns in the UK. They have something called.

John Jantsch (05:38.497)

Yeah, yeah.

Consumer Behavior Lab (05:55.786)

the IPA effectiveness database, is campaigns that are proven to drive sales. And there's a lot of data supporting that. So you look at famously effective campaigns, and then you look at, what's the academics that could help understand that. And there's not always a match, but when you can find a match, you can mine the academics and you can match it to the effective work. Now we have a starting spot.

But if that match is just kind of a fun uncover, we don't think that matters. Then we have to make sure you can apply it to a business or a brand that you might be working on. And then we feel we have some material that's worthy of conversation.

John Jantsch (06:39.641)

Do you want to give me a couple of concrete, specific, detailed examples about, I don't mean a whole campaign necessarily, but here's one human behavior that we discovered you could impact this by doing it. Give us an example.

Consumer Behavior Lab (06:53.515)

So often as marketers, we get this idea that we can just paint in the picture of the mind of somebody, how amazing our brand or our product is, that they're just going to buy it. And what the data tells us is that may be true, but how you paint it really matters. And a brand that we dissected in the book was Apple, but not all of Apple, specifically when Steve Jobs

reveals the iPod and he stands up in stage and he holds the iPod up and what he says is it'll be a thousand songs in your pocket. And up until that point, everybody else was saying five gigabytes of storage, 128 kilobytes of this. And so what we got thinking was, well, what's the science behind why a thousand songs in your pocket really connects with people?

And the study that we went to was in 1972, Ian Begg, Western Ontario University, recruits 25 students and he reads them 22 word phrases. Some phrases are impossible amount, rusty engine, flaming forest, and others are apparent fact, common fate. And when he asked the group to remember as many terms as they could, they can recall

just about 23%, just about one out of five. But here's the observation that matters. They can only remember 9 % of the abstract words, like impossible amount, but 36 % of the concrete terms, like white horse. That's a four-fold increase if they can picture it in their minds. And so what it teaches us is that great taglines, great phrases,

Conjure an image in your mind red bull. It gives you wings Eminem it melts in your mouth Not in your hand skittles taste the rainbow Maxwell's house good to the last drop you can picture what I'm saying as you say it and that really can make the same idea much more sticky and much more concrete in the mind of the buyer

John Jantsch (09:09.594)

Great example. I was curious when I read the subtitle, did you choose 17 different, was there some sort of like psychological trick being played or hack being played by the number 17?

Consumer Behavior Lab (09:21.606)

the answer is yes. The answer is yes. And, you know, there's, there's a few things at play here, but the illusion of effort is something that Richard and I are really, are really interested in. And the basic psychological principle here is that by getting to a very specific number, it shows a lot more intentionality and a lot more purpose. We think if we had said 20 of the world's best brands, know, we just roll right over it.

There's some interesting science behind it, but that's why. Yes, we're trying to show specificity. We're trying to show the effort that went into that. And we know that that has caught more people's attention because of it.

John Jantsch (10:03.354)

Yeah, 3000 % increase as opposed to 3217. Way more believable, right?

Consumer Behavior Lab (10:09.916)

In our book, we dissect a brand Dyson. And I don't know if everybody knows this is a famous vacuum cleaner. James Dyson is the inventor. And when he invents it, his first ad that he puts into the market was 5,127 prototypes to get to the world's first bagless vacuum. He loves it so much in his autobiography. It's the first line of his autobiography. Look at the effort to get that bagless vacuum. It's just more believable.

John Jantsch (10:35.508)

the

Consumer Behavior Lab (10:39.721)

than if he had said 5200 prototypes.

John Jantsch (10:44.056)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. you, since you did profile and you, actually chose 17 brands, were there any like that really surprised you? mean, somebody doing something behaviorally significant or savvy that, that you didn't expect.

Consumer Behavior Lab (11:00.714)

You know, I think there was one that had a big impact that I wouldn't have originally thought. And it's this concept that comes from Daniel Kahneman, Nobel Prize winner economics. 1993 Kahneman and his colleague, Donald Radelmeier come up with a study on colonoscopy patients. And here's how the study goes. The colonoscopy patients are going through an actual procedure and every 60 seconds,

they register their pain level. At the end of the experience, they get two chances to give a retrospective rating. One right after the experience is over, and then another one a month later. And what you find is that those retrospective ratings do not correspond with the total pain level at all. In fact, the retrospective ratings, whether it was the hour after or a month later, coincide with two

critical moments, the peak intensity that happened during the experience and the final moment of the procedure. so Kahneman calls this the peak and rule. So that's kind of interesting. Like this is where academic stops. But what does that mean for brands and marketers? There's a LA hotel called the Magic Castle Hotel. It was featured in Chip and Dan Heath's book, The Power of Moments. And the Magic Castle Hotel

has top 5 % of all TripAdvisor hotels in LA. 94 % of their reviews are very good or excellent, better than the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills. But what's surprising about this hotel is it's a 1950s motel. Gated decor, mediocre rooms, small swimming pool in the courtyard. But what have they done so well? And what does almost every review talk about? They have a popsicle hotline in the pool. And you pick up the phone.

John Jantsch (12:44.74)

Mm.

Consumer Behavior Lab (12:59.165)

day or night, and they will bring out on a silver platter as many popsicles as you'd like to eat. It's a peak moment in a average hotel, and that makes everybody love going there, and everybody loves to dial the phone. So thinking about how you can use what would otherwise be a very hard to advertise LA motel and make it into an all-star in the city, you don't have to redo everything.

John Jantsch (13:05.242)

Yeah,

Consumer Behavior Lab (13:26.736)

In fact, if you could just come up something that everybody loves, a lot more people will be endeared to you.

John Jantsch (13:32.858)

Well, and I suspect also one of the key ingredients is it's kind of unexpected. Like, who does that? Right.

Consumer Behavior Lab (13:37.98)

I think you're right. Yeah, I mean, I think that the point of the peak is that it stands apart from everything else. If they had just the softest pillows, somehow you think it might not make as much of a difference, but something fun and social in a courtyard surrounded by all these relatively uninspired rooms, it stands out.

John Jantsch (14:02.298)

Yeah. And I think the beauty of that message, I mean, obviously it's a hotel, they've got a different application, but almost any business could do something like that, couldn't they? mean, something that just really has somebody go, you got to see what these guys did.

Consumer Behavior Lab (14:16.416)

I think it can be a customer experience like that. It could also be, we had a guest on our podcast a few weeks ago and they were talking about, go every month they go to this shore town and when they get there, they always go to their favorite restaurant. And the favorite restaurant has flowers on some of the tables.

But whenever they come in, he brings over the flowers and places it on the table they sat at. And they say, now the table's ready for you. It's a small act. It's intentional. He's just using this little vase with three flowers sticking out of it. But it makes the person feel special. That's a peak moment that requires no extra money, requires no grand strategy, but it does require intentionality and consistency. And that's another example of how anybody can use it.

John Jantsch (14:50.68)

Yes.

John Jantsch (15:10.522)

All right, let's go to the dark side, shall we? Understanding these things, what risk do we run in exploiting, manipulating, using them to not necessarily do what's in the best interest perhaps of the customer?

Consumer Behavior Lab (15:13.286)

Yes.

Consumer Behavior Lab (15:30.951)

So we would say, first of all, that these insights into human behavior and human psychology are facts. And understanding them is first about understanding why we are naturally prone. We have a quote from Kahneman in the beginning of the book, thinking is to humans like swimming is to cats. They can do it, they just prefer not to.

Humans naturally want shortcuts. naturally want to think as little as possible to get to the decisions we need. first, understanding these is about understanding humanity and human psychology. Second, we write books for everybody to read so everybody can be aware of them. So we're educating marketers about how they can use them for positive ends. And we want consumers to understand that these are

our natural leanings and inclinations that we got to be aware of. But yeah, for sure there's ethics in behavioral science, like there's ethics in marketing, like there's ethics in AI. And we have to be aware that we've got to use these for ethical and moral purposes.

John Jantsch (16:43.07)

Years ago, had Dr. Childani on the show wrote influence, know, probably the earliest. Yeah, yeah. And, and he told me during that interview that he actually wrote the book, so people wouldn't be exploited. And of course, you know, then, unfortunately, you know, people turned around and used a lot of what was in it, you know, in a way that wasn't intended necessarily. So if a marketer is listening to this, and they want to hack their own campaign,

Consumer Behavior Lab (16:47.59)

a seminal book in our field. Yeah.

John Jantsch (17:12.154)

or customer journeys or whatever it is they're working on. Are there certain habits or mindsets that they're going to need to adopt? mean, where do they start?

Consumer Behavior Lab (17:20.678)

Yeah. So we would say that this is a field, behavioral science is a field that's really blown out in Europe and in the United Kingdom. Here in America, it's a much more nascent budding place. So if you're interested in the approach of behavioral science and how it could prove marketing, lots of material online, lots available, of course, including our book.

But in order to get started, think you have to have an interest in the academics and the science that powers why we do what we do. If you're a marketer that believes everything's done on hunches or on gut instinct, it's going to be hard to embrace this type of marketing because this is based on a belief that you can decode human behavior through science and through observation.

It's not that you can guarantee what's going to happen, but you can make your campaigns more likely to be successful if you use this science-backed thinking. So we're increasing the probability that you're going to have good outcomes in your marketing.

John Jantsch (18:33.754)

The flip side of that mindset though is measurement, mean, understanding, okay, this is our hunch, if this is our hypothesis based on research, how do we prove that we were right? And is that become a stumbling block for a lot of folks?

Consumer Behavior Lab (18:38.757)

you

Consumer Behavior Lab (18:52.269)

We would say that there's a massive industry around consumer insights that has its place for some marketers, but for every marketer doing tests and seeing the outcomes, everybody can do. So if you are an e-commerce based or a web based, A-B tests are very easy to do. If you're not, we would advocate for observational research.

John Jantsch (18:59.876)

Mm-hmm.

Consumer Behavior Lab (19:19.043)

do something and see what happens. And you could do that on a small scale and you can watch the outcomes and then you can continue to innovate or go down this path. So what we would say is, if you're a small business owner, if you're a solopreneur, use these tactics and then find ways to test them small and learn from those tests.

John Jantsch (19:42.01)

Mike Irwin, I appreciate you stopping by to talk about Hacking the Human Mind. Is there some place you'd invite people to connect with you?

Consumer Behavior Lab (19:48.866)

We have our website, the consumerbehaviorlab.com, where you can learn about the book, about the masterclass. And then we also have a podcast that's been much shorter than John's called Behavioral Science for Brands that we invite everybody to take a listen to.

John Jantsch (20:06.383)

Well, again, I appreciate you taking a few moments to stop by and hopefully we'll run into you one of these days out there on the road.

Consumer Behavior Lab (20:11.791)

Thank you, John.

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Adapting Agencies for the AI Era

Adapting Agencies for the AI Era written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Listen to the full episode:

Overview

On this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, John Jantsch interviews Brent Weaver, CEO of E2M Solutions—the leading provider of white label WordPress, SEO, content, and AI solutions for agencies. Brent shares his view from the front lines of agency evolution as AI, automation, and changing client expectations reshape the digital marketing landscape. They dive into the real impact of AI on agencies, the future of marketing leadership, the enduring value of strategy over tactics, and why human expertise still matters more than ever.

About the Guest

Brent Weaver is the CEO of E2M Solutions, a top white label provider of WordPress, SEO, content, and AI solutions for digital marketing agencies. With deep experience both running and supporting agencies, Brent is a recognized voice on AI, agency growth, and the new skills required to thrive in a fast-changing industry.

• Website: e2msolutions.com
• Email: brent@e2msolutions.com
• AI Event: joinvistara.com

Actionable Insights

• AI is rapidly raising the bar—not just for agencies, but for clients who now expect faster, better results and more transparency.
• The white label model is evolving fast, with providers like E2M embracing “AI first” internal training, education, and even offering fractional AI services to agencies.
• The hype of AI often exceeds reality—experiments abound, but many projects never deliver, so agencies and business owners must remain adaptable and strategic.
• There’s still no “all-in-one” AI marketing operating system, but the industry is heading toward more integrated, seamless solutions.
• SEO is far from dead; but marketers must get creative, focus on proprietary expertise, and optimize for both LLMs and Google—especially for local businesses.
• Human leadership and strategy are more vital than ever. AI makes agencies more competitive, but also increases client expectations and the need for specialization and niche expertise.
• The human element remains central: The future belongs to those who can combine AI tools with strategic thinking, EQ, and deep client understanding.
• Agencies—and marketers—need to retool, learn continuously, and be ready to lead and manage, not just “do.”

Great Moments (with Timestamps)

• 01:10 – The Elephant in the Room: AI’s Impact on Agencies
  Brent shares how AI is changing agency operations, results, and client expectations.
• 02:25 – White Labeling in the Age of AI
  How E2M is retooling with “AI First Saturdays,” fractional AI services, and ongoing education.
• 04:46 – Will We Ever Get a True AI Marketing OS?
  The reality (and limits) of current AI tools and what’s coming next.
• 06:18 – The Hype vs. Reality of AI Projects
  Why many AI initiatives fail—and why experimentation is still worth it.
• 08:10 – Is SEO Dead?
  Brent’s take on what’s changed, what still works, and how local and LLM optimization are evolving.
• 11:55 – Why Agencies Are Working Harder, Not Less
  AI may automate, but competition, complexity, and client demands are rising.
• 13:31 – The Human Element and Future-Ready Skills
  Why strategy, specialization, and leadership will define the next era of agency growth.
• 15:17 – AI Agents, Frictionless UX, and What’s Next
  How AI will reshape customer journeys, jobs, and digital marketing roles.
• 18:17 – From Doing to Managing: Evolving Careers and Teams
  The growing need for strategic thinkers, EQ, and continuous learning.

Insights

“AI has raised the bar for agencies and clients alike—faster, better results are expected, but human expertise is still at the center.”

“There’s no magic all-in-one AI solution yet, but those who combine tools with strategy and leadership will win.”

“SEO is evolving, not dying—marketers must focus on unique value, local search, and optimizing for new AI-driven experiences.”

“Agencies need to retool for an AI-first world, but the need for deep specialization, leadership, and EQ is greater than ever.”

“The future of digital marketing belongs to those who can marry the best of AI with strategy, creativity, and relentless learning.”

Duct Tape Transcript

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John Jantsch (00:01.405)

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch and my guest today is Brent Weaver. He is the CEO of E2M Solutions, the leading provider of white label WordPress SEO content and AI solutions for digital marketing agencies. So guess what we're going to talk about today? We're going to talk about agencies and we're going to talk about digital marketing. So Brent, welcome to the show.

Brent At E2M (00:28.728)

Great to be here. Thanks, John.

John Jantsch (00:30.427)

I did get the title right. Didn't I? You're the CEO currently. Yeah. Okay. I was.

Brent At E2M (00:34.446)

Yeah, yeah. Joined E2M in June of 2025. So I'm wrapping up my ninth week on duty. So it's been a new adventure for me.

John Jantsch (00:40.198)

Yeah.

Ha ha ha.

John Jantsch (00:47.197)

Well, E2M is not new necessarily, so it worked with hundreds of agencies. Just in your time and what you've learned or from the folks there, what do you see as some of the biggest changes in the agency landscape right now? And I know it's evolving rapidly, but I'm curious what you're hearing because you pretty much talk to agencies all day long.

Brent At E2M (01:10.722)

Yeah. I mean, the obvious elephant in the room is artificial intelligence and what that's doing both in terms of how agencies are run and also how they're deploying services and also how clients are expecting, you know, what the clients are doing with AI as well. So it's not just like the agency using it, but the clients are using it. So I think some expectations are changing and also speed to results is changing because a client might say, well, Hey, if I can just have AI do this in

three minutes, right? Like, why is it gonna take you three or four days and just kind of working on how to up level your level, know, what you're doing for your clients in terms of results. mean, that bar has certainly been raising very, very quickly in terms of what expectations are. And so I think a lot of agencies are feeling a little bit of squeeze, but at the same time, they're feeling a lot of excitement. So there's that whole topic, yeah.

John Jantsch (02:00.833)

Well, so to tag, I was going to say to tag onto that though, of course, your primary function is to, in most cases, act as a white label support for that agency. So I'm curious, has the white label mode evolved? mean, how are you, because it's affecting agencies. So how's it then in turn affecting what a white label provider like yourself is doing?

Brent At E2M (02:25.614)

And we've really like planted a flag that we want to be an AI first agency. And so we are doing lots of internal, kind of retooling education. have a thing called AI for Saturday where our whole company comes in every first Saturday of the month. some of that time has been dedicated to education, working on projects kind of, you know, within the teams doing demo days, hackathons. and so we're definitely taking AI very seriously. Our team's taking AI very seriously.

we're also doing fractional AI services for agencies. So actually going in and helping the agency implement AI solutions. And so I think it's, you know, people want better results. They want them faster, right? It's kind of like, you know, dealing with Amazon, right? Like people used to think, I ordered something on the internet. It's okay that it takes seven to 10 days to show up, right? But in the post Amazon world, you're like, well, like my kids, for example, they're like, why I ordered this

30 minutes ago, why is it not already at the front door? I think some of that impatience is seeping its way into the business to business service model. And I also think some of that kind of what people expect in terms of a customer centric centered business, like Amazon will give you refunds on just about anything. think customers are expecting some of that for some of their agency customers, but you know, it's certainly having a huge impact on the overall industry.

John Jantsch (03:40.967)

Yeah.

John Jantsch (03:49.917)

So, since you opened the AI can of worms, I'll go there directly. You know, what I'm seeing a lot of people do is, you know, it's like we're in this wild west days still where there's 473 tools. People are hacking this $20 a month thing together with this $20 a month thing. They're talking about agents and what they can do. What I'm seeing on the business side, the small business side, it's like, okay, I get it. I get it. We need to do AI.

but this is exhausting. And, you know, is, there ever going to be a day you think where some, a business owner can actually buy the full like marketing operating system that is AI run and installed in their business and not, you know, have to lean on their agency to do this and an SEO person to do that with AI to me. And again, I'm, just asking your opinion because it doesn't exist today, but, but I feel like that's where we're going to go.

Brent At E2M (04:42.083)

Yeah.

John Jantsch (04:46.237)

There's going to be the $5.99 a month solution that's sort of an all in one as opposed to custom this and custom that and custom, you know, whatever.

Brent At E2M (04:56.494)

And perhaps, you know, I think John that the more I've gotten into AI personally and the more Like projects and use cases that I've seen it. It's it's like the more, you know The more you realize you don't know and I certainly think that that's true with AI and and we're seeing a lot of people do some what I would almost consider to be magical things with AI but then there's also this like

maybe they do something where they don't really have the foundational skillset. They're using a tool like lovable and they're doing vibe coding and they build an application that gets to a certain point. And then the client says, well, hey, we actually need this for a business requirement thing to do this other thing. And then all of a sudden that other thing maybe isn't possible within the vibe coding interface. And all of a sudden you have this thing that an agency has spent weeks on in terms of a vibe coding application build.

John Jantsch (05:27.292)

Yeah, yeah.

Brent At E2M (05:49.6)

And then the thing that they needed to do from a business case is not possible within the AI. And so then we're hitting this wall and we have to go, my gosh, we're going to have to completely, we have to build this new ground up without vibe coding in order to make the business case work. I there was a study that said that something like 40 to 60 % of enterprise AI projects, and I should probably have a source on this of them quoted, but 40 to 60 % of AI projects at the enterprise level are being abandoned or never seen the light of day.

John Jantsch (06:18.609)

Yes.

Brent At E2M (06:18.85)

and if we all know, from reading wall street, like how much money is being invested in AI, that means like over half of the investment that major corporations are making are, basically being thrown in the trash. And I I'm seeing that same level of kind of experimentation, happened at the agency level and also at the small business owner level. And so I think there's still, gosh, there's just so much learning that has to be done. And the upside though, is you find an AI, automation or

agentic workflow that, that works, it gets to a hundred percent. it can have game changing impact on the business, right? Like the ROI on it can be, you know, infinity. And so it's certainly worth making these investments, but it doesn't mean that every investment is going to pay off.

John Jantsch (06:51.869)

Mm-hmm.

John Jantsch (06:57.223)

Peace.

Mm-hmm. Yes.

Yeah, I think one of the challenges in the the window that we're in right now is, is in some cases, the hype of AI is actually outrunning the reality of it. And I think that a lot of people are like, we can fire everybody and do it all with AI. I mean, you see these people, you know, on Facebook ads, like, I have a $16 billion company and I only have two employees, you know, you're like, you know,

Brent At E2M (07:13.848)

Sure.

Brent At E2M (07:26.982)

They like show this big like screenshot of all their automation crazy I've replaced 64 employees right like maybe I don't know I mean usually I find when you kind of double click on those things and you go in there's there's usually some smoke and mirrors around those things but I don't want to like bash anybody that's

John Jantsch (07:31.482)

You

John Jantsch (07:35.909)

Yeah.

John Jantsch (07:41.341)

Well, they're 100 % there is. And I think that, you know, it's like all things. It's kind of like taking advantage of the craze is actually making the reality a lot worse and a lot harder for that business owner that just needs a couple things, you know, figured out to, you know, to make, to not even to replace people, you know, but to actually empower their people in ways to do better and more work. All right. So I'll get off my soapbox on that one and move to, let's talk about SEO.

Brent At E2M (08:06.993)

Hahaha.

John Jantsch (08:10.727)

you know, which is a tactic, of course, a channel, if you will, that, that you guys play in quite a bit. There's that's another one of those where there's, you know, like, it would take me about two minutes to find somebody who, who today put on LinkedIn SEO is dead. And so, you know, how are you, how are you, by the way, it's not, but how are you advising clients? How are you changing even your routine and working around the reality that a lot of top of funnel

Brent At E2M (08:10.819)

Yeah.

John Jantsch (08:40.679)

types of content that used to generate traffic has certainly gone away. We can debate whether or not it was that valuable anyway. But how are you evolving your model when you think about SEO practices?

Brent At E2M (08:54.414)

I mean, if there's a piece of content that you could easily just ask, you know, chat, and you would get a great answer for that content, if that's what you're gonna be putting on your client's website to help them grow their rank or grow their traffic from the LLMs and things like that, I mean, that's certainly probably not gonna be a great strategy. And I think most people got that memo when they saw how much traffic decreased for...

John Jantsch (08:58.781)

Right.

Brent At E2M (09:19.566)

Those kind of common things right like how do I make great guacamole? Right is just going to be the user experience to ask that question on On chat is going to be far better than on a Google browser unless somebody has some type of proprietary ingredient or approach or they can actually build some intellectual property around it and kind of protect that unique recipe right in that case or they have a really great personality around

John Jantsch (09:36.199)

Yeah, right.

John Jantsch (09:42.727)

Mm-hmm.

Brent At E2M (09:47.054)

teaching people how to make guacamole or whatever, and they're a great YouTuber, and there's some type of thing that's unique that AI cannot replicate that they can bring to the marketplace. So I do think marketers have to be a little bit more creative. There's kind of a reinvention that's going on. That being said, there's also a ton of people that are now using LLMs to search for business recommendations, to search for services. And certainly there's...

John Jantsch (10:09.307)

Yeah, 100%.

Brent At E2M (10:13.248)

a whole cottage industry. our, amount of SEO business that we've had has, has categorically gone up year over year, right? And that's kind of in the post AI world. And a big thing on the, on the E2M team is how are we optimizing our clients' websites and search strategy for the LLMs, right? Kind of the AEO strategies while we're also using, you know, continuing to invest in Google. And I think Google, for instance, I I don't know if search traffic, you know, the

John Jantsch (10:15.035)

the

John Jantsch (10:21.661)

Mm-hmm.

Brent At E2M (10:40.738)

The Google usage has necessarily gone down. mean, I think they're still driving a lot of traffic to businesses. Google Local, massively important for businesses to be active, right? Especially if they're a service business or they're working locally or regionally, right? That's something that I think the LLMs aren't doing nearly as well as Google. And so there's certainly still lots of blue oceans, I think, on the SEO side.

John Jantsch (10:47.132)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

John Jantsch (11:02.119)

Yeah.

John Jantsch (11:05.853)

Yeah, and I think you're 100 % right. mean, I'm speaking in a conference next month of all remodeling contractors. And they're all talking about like, what do need to be doing to change? And it's like, hey, you know, show up in that map pack, do a better job of your reviews, you know, that, you know, answer, you know, have a lot of FAQs, you know, that answer questions that people would have about remodeling, because that the trust, I think, with the map pack, whether it's deserved or not, you know, that the consumer has is going to, I think, give that

a life for a long time. And I don't think you're going to see the AI overviews for somebody that's, I mean, you can go there and say, you know, in AI mode, you can say, what's the best for modeling contractor in this town. And it will give you an opinion. But I think people still value the map pack and the proximity and all the things that come with it.

Brent At E2M (11:55.086)

You know, one thing I think there was this like undertone of like, is AI going to make agencies like obsolete or something? And, and it's weird because like I've asked this to a lot of agency groups have been like, okay, in the post AI world, like who here is working less, right? And I asked people like raise their hands and like, nobody raised their hand. I'm like, okay, the, the right, they're working more. They're working way more. Right. It is weird. It's a weird paradigm, right? Because you would think, Hey, artificial intelligence, the computer is going to do all the work for me.

John Jantsch (12:00.955)

Yeah, yeah, you bet.

John Jantsch (12:11.133)

It's more. They're all working more, in fact.

Brent At E2M (12:24.718)

You know, it's like the logical outcome of that would be that we wouldn't have to work as hard. And, you know, even though these tools do magical things, I don't think they make finding leads and customers any easier. If anything, they're just making it even more competitive. They're giving advanced marketing tools to a lot larger group of people. And so it's getting more competitive out there. And that means that businesses...

John Jantsch (12:42.993)

Yeah.

Brent At E2M (12:52.51)

still need agencies and specialists now more than ever. In fact, they need specialists that are specialized in specializations instead of specializations. And that was the other thing I was going to kind of bring as a theme is, is looked like knowing who your customer is, having niche expertise, you know, really knowing your market backwards and forwards, knowing your market better than your clients know their industry, I think is now more important than ever. You know, the idea of just being a general

John Jantsch (13:15.783)

Mm-hmm.

Brent At E2M (13:21.432)

Hey, I'm Brent, I'm the web guy, right? Like I don't think that's gonna fly in 2026 and beyond if it is even flying right now.

John Jantsch (13:24.401)

Yeah, right.

John Jantsch (13:31.293)

So let's talk about the human element. think a lot of people are wringing their hands around. mean, every time you see these headlines that, you know, Microsoft says are 40 % of all jobs will go away by, you know, the next three years. I think you have a lot of people kind of wringing their hands around about like, is this going to destroy the world? know, if people, 40 % of people are out of jobs. How are...

I tell you what we see is I see a lot of people that are working more, as you said, and a lot of it's because the consumer or the business owner behavior has changed a little bit in that they expect more. So that's part of it. our mantra has always been strategy before tactics. We actually feel that if you develop a great marketing strategy, marketing becomes less complicated, but far more effective.

and, and so, you know, what I see is a whole lot of agencies that were, have always been delivering tactics are now just using AI to deliver a new set of tactics. and not still not thinking strategically. I think what Mark, what businesses are going to need in the future is marketing leadership and not marketing doers.

Brent At E2M (14:48.78)

Yeah. Yeah. mean, I think we're running this event. It's all about AI for agency owners. And I promise this is not just a direct plug for our event, but obviously it's my duty to promote our event right now. But one of our attendees, and he's kind of an AI first person, he registered for our event, right? Went in and purchased a ticket.

John Jantsch (14:50.845)

I should have posed that as a question, but it was really more of a statement.

Brent At E2M (15:17.166)

All using his chat GPT agent. So he literally just you know driving in the car Said hey Go buy a ticket to Vistara and his agent, know went and it takes screenshots and says hey This is what I'm doing along the way, but you know, he just kind of had to say yep Yep in the agent already has all of his information and it has all of the information that it needs in order to make that fill out the web forums and actually purchase a product and

It's, it's almost like every business from that perspective, every business's website just became kind of the Amazon one click shopping experience. You know, if, we fast forward two, three years, if we all have these agents that have, you know, secure access to our banking details and to our PII and they know kind of our preferences. mean, what could you do if you can line up an experience that you know is going to meet the needs of a specific target audience? you know, you have.

very few barriers standing between you and them making a transaction, becoming a customer. And I think in that way, AI is going to be disrupting some of these workflows, some of these user interfaces, just as web professionals and digital agencies, how we view creating those experiences. And so I think that while AI is certainly going to destroy some number of jobs, whether it's 40%, 20%, I don't know what the number is.

John Jantsch (16:40.976)

This is...

Brent At E2M (16:42.646)

I trust Microsoft, they're now worth $4 trillion. They must be doing something right. But I think for every job that it destroys, there's going to be new jobs created. You know, if I was, if I lived in a Waymo city, I was just out in California. I rode in my first driverless taxi. Would I still have a car? I don't know because I'm like, well, what if I just used Waymo to get everywhere I needed to go? And when I'm in the car, I'm going to work on

John Jantsch (16:45.309)

You

John Jantsch (16:52.625)

Yeah, I'm seeing that already, right.

Brent At E2M (17:10.094)

I'm going to be productive. I'm going to do work. I'm going to be calling, I'll call 10 more agencies to see if they can come to my event. Right. So I do think that there's like some things that are not super exciting in terms of jobs in the marketplace right now that likely are going to go away, right? Like data entry, data harvesting from the internet, you know, content editors, right? Like I can get a lot of my content. can dictate it to chat and

John Jantsch (17:28.943)

Mm-hmm. Just basic research. Yeah.

Brent At E2M (17:38.52)

gives me pretty good content. It even gives me some suggestions on how to evolve it and gives me different, know, hey, here's a version for LinkedIn. Here's a version for Facebook. Here's a version for Instagram, right? Here's a script that you can go and put, take a video and record, right? So things that I would have relied on three, four or five people before I can get done myself. And a lot of times I don't think I was necessarily hiring those people. I just wasn't doing it, right? I'd post maybe on one platform instead of four and I wouldn't hire a social media person to do that.

John Jantsch (17:45.917)

All right. Yep.

Brent At E2M (18:07.022)

And so I think that some of these things are certainly going to destroy jobs, but you know, like what will my kids' jobs be in 15, 20 years? I have no idea, but they'll have something to do, I'm sure.

John Jantsch (18:07.867)

Yes.

John Jantsch (18:17.841)

Yeah. Yeah. I'm even seeing that in our organization. you know, people that, that really were good doers, good implementers, you know, we're really pushing them to, know, they have to be more, they, whether they have employees under them or not, they have to really think more like leaders and think more like managers, who are going to optimize, you know, some of these tools, as opposed to, you know, writing the, every bit of social media content, they're going to be, you know,

looked more as managers. And I think that that from a skill set standpoint, that's, that's probably not everybody's sweet spot. I mean, there definitely are people that are just very good at give me an SOP and I'll follow it. But I do think that from a career standpoint, you know, if you're one of those people, you probably need to really start looking at how do I, know, how do I, my strategic thinking, my EQ skills, you know, over and above, you know, being able to, to manage a spreadsheet.

Brent At E2M (19:15.79)

And sometimes, you know, not to like be like capitalist or whatever, but like, think at some point, right, if people aren't willing to move towards that opportunity voluntarily, they will, you know, maybe have to earn some, learn some hard lessons. And in those, some of those might be expensive lessons. think certainly as an entrepreneur, I've had to learn some expensive lessons when I didn't pivot hard enough or, you know, change my business or change my mindset fast enough. And then you...

John Jantsch (19:32.327)

Yeah, Yeah.

Brent At E2M (19:43.51)

And then you're like, was a hard lesson. I'm never going to do that again. So I think, you know, people don't evolve right now and they don't invest time. Like again, we're doing these AI first Saturdays as a team. And at first people were like, I to come in on Saturday. we're like, Hey, look, this is the reality. Like we're all working an extra, an extra day right now to make sure that we can properly retool and learn enough about this tech because during the week, we're all very focused on client work. We're focusing on.

John Jantsch (19:46.097)

Right, Yeah.

John Jantsch (19:55.121)

Yeah, right.

Brent At E2M (20:11.758)

know, doing the day-to-day business. so, you know, we've, we've made that as a priority all the way up to our leadership team. Right. I mean, I'm waking up at four o'clock every Saturday, joining, joining the team and you know, working on AI stuff.

John Jantsch (20:25.713)

Well, Brent, we've frittered away a perfectly good 20 minutes here trying to help people talk people off the cliff a little bit. Is there some place you'd invite people to learn more about e2m's solutions?

Brent At E2M (20:39.34)

Yeah, you can definitely check us out at e2msolutions.com. You can always email me brent at e2msolutions.com. We're running an event called Vistara at the end of September, depending on when this episode airs, join vistara.com. So we're doing two full days on artificial intelligence and agency growth. So, I mean, we're, think this is such an important topic. We're running a full two day event on this in Denver, Colorado. So if you're interested, certainly reach out.

John Jantsch (21:01.319)

Yes.

John Jantsch (21:06.791)

Well, I'm just down the road. should probably come down and speak at the event. Well, let's make, let's, let's make it happen then. All right. Awesome. Well, again, I appreciate you stopping by and hopefully we'll see you soon out there on the road.

Brent At E2M (21:10.606)

I think so. I think so. should. Let's make it happen.

Brent At E2M (21:20.942)

Thanks, John.

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Why Inner Excellence Creates Outer Success

Why Inner Excellence Creates Outer Success written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Listen to the full episode:

Overview

In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, John Jantsch interviews Jim Murphy, high-performance coach, speaker, and creator of the Inner Excellence Methodology. Jim has coached world-class athletes, Olympians, and business leaders, helping them master the inner game that leads to breakthrough results. He shares the story behind his book’s viral moment with NFL star AJ Brown, the practical spiritual approach to peak performance, and why detaching from outcomes is the secret to true excellence—on the field, in business, and in life.

About the Guest

Jim Murphy is a high-performance coach, author, and creator of the Inner Excellence Methodology. With a background as a professional athlete and decades of experience coaching Olympians, pro athletes, and top business leaders, Jim’s work blends science, spirituality, and practical tools for living—and performing—at your best. His book, “Inner Excellence: Train Your Mind for Extraordinary Performance and the Best Possible Life,” has sold over half a million copies and is available in more than 25 languages.

• Website: interexcellence.com
• Book: https://geni.us/innerexcellence
• Retreats & Newsletter: VIP Newsletter Signup
• Instagram: @interexcellence

Actionable Insights

• Viral validation: Wide receiver AJ Brown’s sideline reading of “Inner Excellence” sparked global interest, taking the book from niche to worldwide bestseller.
• Lasting results come from mastering your inner game—moving beyond tactics to focus on mindset, heart, and presence.
• Detach from outcomes: The best performers focus on the process and personal growth, not just external results or wins.
• Redefine success: Go beyond achievements and ask, “Who do I want to become? What do I truly value? How do I want to live?”
• Freedom to fail is essential for high performance—joy, excitement, and learning are key to resilience and breakthrough.
• Inner Excellence applies equally to athletes, business leaders, and entrepreneurs: the inner game is universal.
• Daily practices for entrepreneurs and marketers: Learn and grow every day, give the best you have, be present and grateful, focus only on what you can control.
• Embracing vulnerability and humility (accurate self-view, not over or under-inflated ego) leads to greater confidence, peace, and fearlessness.
• Lasting change happens when you strip away “doing” and shift toward “being”—starting with speaking the truth and expanding beliefs about what’s possible.

Great Moments (with Timestamps)

• 01:30 – AJ Brown’s Sideline Reading Goes Viral
  How an NFL star’s ritual turned “Inner Excellence” into a bestseller overnight.
• 04:37 – From Minor League Struggles to Mindset Breakthrough
  Jim’s journey from pro baseball disappointment to coaching and creating his method.
• 06:41 – Letting Go of Outcome Control
  A Ryder Cup client story and the power of trading “small lollipops” for a bigger vision of success.
• 09:11 – Fear of Failure and Redefining Success
  Why baseball teaches resilience and how to focus on what truly matters.
• 10:49 – The Inner Game for Athletes and Executives
  How mindset mastery is the same for business leaders as for pro athletes.
• 12:08 – Daily Practices for Entrepreneurs and Marketers
  The four goals: Learn and grow, give your best, be present and grateful, focus on what you control.
• 14:21 – Vulnerability, Humility, and Embracing Failure
  How accurate self-view and “letting go” drive real breakthroughs.
• 17:25 – Shifting from Doing to Being
  Why speaking the truth and expanding your beliefs unlocks new levels of possibility.
• 18:46 – How Viral Success Changed (and Validated) the Work
  Jim reflects on confidence, humility, and seeing himself as a messenger, not the “originator.”

Insights

“Detach from outcomes. Go for the whole candy store: fullness of life, not just small tangible wins.”

“Redefine success. Ask who you want to become, what you value, and how you want to live—not just what you want to achieve.”

“Freedom to fail and the joy of learning are essential for high performance—whether on the field or in business.”

“Humility is an accurate view of self—neither overinflated nor underinflated. Let go of ego, and you can be fearless.”

“The most important change is shifting from doing to being—stripping away what isn’t true and expanding what you believe is possible.”

Duct Tape Transcript

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John Jantsch (00:00.773)

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch and my guest today is Jim Murphy. He's a high performance coach, author, speaker, and the creator of the Inner Excellence Methodology. He's coached world-class athletes, Olympians, and business leaders, helping them achieve breakthrough results by mastering their inner game. His own journey from minor league baseball player to elite coach led him to develop a practical spiritual approach to peak performance.

that goes beyond tactics and into mindset, heart, and presence. We're going to talk about his book, Interpresence, or I'm sorry, Interexcellence, Train Your Mind for Extraordinary Performance and the Best Possible Life. So Jim, welcome to the show.

Jim (00:44.194)

Thanks, John.

John Jantsch (00:45.851)

Few years ago, I had Captain Sullivan on the show. You may recall he is the airline pilot that landed his airplane after taking off in New York City in the Hudson River. Do you remember that a few? Sully, right. And then I turned it into a movie. Of course he had a book. So I had to start that show, you know, as he said, well, I have, you know, I have to tell that story, you know, every time I now am asked to talk about, you know, how that went. So he certainly had the story down. Not nearly as dramatic, but.

Jim (00:57.336)

So weak.

John Jantsch (01:15.451)

You have a bit of an AJ Brown story. want to, I'm sure people are asking you and I'm sure you love telling it. You're probably getting tired of telling it, but you want to tell us kind of your kind of moment happened. Gosh, what was that now? Eight, nine months ago.

Jim (01:30.254)

Yeah, John, I'm very grateful to tell it. So on January 12th, uh, AJ Brown was a, he's a wide receiver for the Philadelphia Eagles. It's a wild card game Packers versus the Eagles. Um, Sunday night football, the only NFL game on and, um, in middle of the game, he's reading the football reading, reading inter excellence on the sidelines during the football game. And so the TV station zooms in on it's like, what is AJ Brown doing? And then, oh my gosh, he was reading a book and Kevin Brown and

John Jantsch (01:37.051)

me.

John Jantsch (01:57.435)

you

Jim (01:59.81)

Tom Burkhart made a big deal about it afterwards. They asked him, what were you doing? Were you bored? Were you? He said, no, it's a book that I read before I bring to every game. Read it before the game to get centered and read it after every drive to get re centered. My teammates call it the recipe. And so that was the first time I actually heard about him doing this. I saw a picture of him on social media of like a month earlier, but I had no context. didn't know anything about it. And so I found out what the rest of the world.

that he was doing this at that time. And just an amazing thing for him to do to be true to himself, that find something that helps him be better at what he does and to be more fearless and show all of us that we all have time to read.

John Jantsch (02:40.687)

Well, and then of course the punchline, I suppose, what happened to you next?

Jim (02:48.424)

a few things, john, a few things. Yeah, my world changed a lot. The you know, the message that selfless is fearless, as you know, spread around the world now, love, wisdom and courage. And so the book had sold maybe seven or eight or 9000 copies in nine years. mean, sorry, 16 years, initially was was published in 2009 by McGraw Hill. And then I

John Jantsch (02:49.563)

Hehehehehe

Jim (03:18.329)

put out a revised edition self-published in 2018 or 2020. And then so that's the book AJ Brown has been reading. And since then, it's sold, I don't know, close to half a million copies, I would say.

John Jantsch (03:32.123)

So, I'm curious, how did you print the books without that sort of immediate demand?

Jim (03:42.21)

Yeah, so it's amazing how the world is now with Amazon and they print on demand. so if

John Jantsch (03:44.645)

Yeah, yeah.

John Jantsch (03:48.527)

Yeah, but they were able to print on that kind of demand. Yeah, yeah.

Jim (03:52.27)

Well, apparently they did run out at some point. So they've got print centers all over the world. And so there was a time when the demand was so high, it's sold tens of thousands of copies every day for the first few weeks that they did run out at one point.

John Jantsch (04:09.435)

Yeah, that's a crazy story. Well, good for you. know, frankly, I love to hear stories like that. Persons out there doing their work and you know, as a magical moment happened, I think we all deserve it. You start the book talking about your own struggles as a minor league player, the mindset, you know, performance anxiety, self doubt. Would you say that that was instrumental to you developing kind of your own framework?

Jim (04:37.78)

yeah, yeah, absolutely. My whole life since I was a little kid, I obsessed about being a superstar. I was going to play in the NFL like A.J. Brown or I was going to be in the NBA or Major League Baseball. And so when I got drafted by the Cubs, it was a dream come true. But I had a vision problem that was with me for my entire professional career. I played five years in the minors and then eventually had to retire because of it. And my identity was completely wrapped up in my role as a pro athlete. And when I lost it, I felt like I lost everything. And so

I got a job with him. asked got out asked to coach a high school baseball team in inner city Seattle and I had no interest in coaching but I took the job was driving a truck for FedEx and we went undefeated and I realized wow I love coaching. Who knew? And then so I went on this journey to become a pro baseball coach. I got went to grad school got a job with the Texas Rangers two weeks after graduation. So now I felt like I was somebody again and then I quit six months into the first season and so.

devastated again my identity, you know, I was somebody and I lost it and then somebody again I lost it and so I kind of got tired of this merry-go-round of feeling like I was someone and no one and end up leaving for the desert to go live a life of solitude to figure out what to do with my life and that's where Interactionless was born. I spent five years full-time writing and researching how to have peace and confidence under the most pressure and what I found John was that that The path to having the most peace and confidence under the most pressure is the same path of building an extraordinary life

when filled with deep contentment, joy and confidence, independent of circumstance. It's a wholehearted path where you understand what the human heart deeply needs and wants and how to get it.

John Jantsch (06:15.611)

So you started touching on this idea of your identity and you spend a lot of time or one of the core principles really is kind of this idea of letting go of the need to control the outcome, which is, you know, being very attached to the outcome. Can you, do you have a client story, executive athlete, I suppose you don't want to name names, but where, you you help somebody kind of overcome that control of the outcome.

Jim (06:41.582)

Yeah, I'll tell you. When I was at the Ryder Cup years ago, it's one of the biggest events in golf pro golf. You have the team USA versus Team Europe. And one of the players top 10 in the world said Jim, I'm too attached to the results of my my performance. You know, I get too tense. What can I do? And I said, Well, imagine there's a little kid who loves lollipops, and he's got a lollipop and you want to take it from him, but you don't want to struggle. Is there any way you could get him to give you the lollipop?

by volunteering it to give it to you. And he said, you know, I don't know. And I said, well, what if you had a bigger lollipop and asked him to trade? And he said, he'd probably trade. What kid wouldn't trade a small lollipop for a bigger one? I said, that's what you need. Your lollipop is too small. Your lollipop is, I just want to get birdies and I want to win the tournament. And I, you know, I want to be successful. I want to get some tangible results. That's way too small. First of all, you don't even know if that's good for you to get birdies and

Good results and have more success. Is that going to be good for you in the long run and your family? You don't know what you need is to pursue fullness of life and develop yourself in that way, which we know is good for you where you feel fully alive and make that your your Pursuit go for the whole candy store. Don't settle for these little these 10 these tangible things that you don't even know if will make you happy let alone fulfilled

John Jantsch (08:06.651)

You talk a lot about fear. You identify a number of them. Um, one of them of which is true. don't care what you're doing. Fear of failure shows up in a lot of people's lives when they pursue anything. Um, I'm curious. I'm a huge baseball fan. That's, that's my sport. Um, and you know, it's very cliche to say, but I'll say it anyway. You know, the best baseball players fail 70 % of the time, right? In the, in the, uh, hitting world. Um,

So, so how does, I mean, how do they get through that and you know, that, that idea of I'm, afraid to fail, but you know, and, what's weird about it is 20 hits in a season might make the difference between being seen as a failure or being seen as, as a superstar. So, you know, how do you, how do you, how do, how did you, or how do you see baseball players in particular? This would apply to all athletes, I suppose, but I just.

I feel like baseball has more failure in it than any other sport. So, you know, how do, how do you, they deal with that?

Jim (09:11.534)

You got to redefine success to something that's meaningful to you and then break it down into smaller components Specifically, how do I want to feel in my life? How do I want to live? Who do I want to become? Who am I meant to become? And What is my purpose? What do I value most if you're not clear on those things then the default is I just need more success I need more base hits and But that's too far out of your control. It's just you

John Jantsch (09:37.115)

Mm-hmm.

Jim (09:40.844)

Now you're just happy if you get hit, sad if you don't, and stressed when you need it, and you're never gonna be your best when you're stressed. We need to have freedom to fail to be your best. There needs to be an element of joy and excitement to be your best. In order to have that joy and excitement, we need to focus on the reason why you want the base hit. Why do you want the base hit? Well, so I can have a good batting average. Why do I want that? So I can become an all-star. Why do you want that?

So I can make more money. What do you want that? Well, I want a great life. Really. I want a more comfortable life. Well, what is it that you really want? Is it just a $10 million house on the water? Is that what you want? Or is it what you think that will give you, which is great experiences and deep enriching relationships where you're learning and growing and making a difference, where you feel fully alive? Is that what you okay? That's what you want? Well, I'm going show you how to go for that directly and let everything else be added to you.

John Jantsch (10:33.932)

So we have been talking mostly about athletes, but you coach a lot of business leaders who are certainly not performing in the same way. Is it any different or is it really basically get down to the same bottom line?

Jim (10:49.582)

Exact same thing. I don't teach people what to do, how to do their job. Unless it's pro baseball, I might have had a few couple things there, but it doesn't matter if you're a CEO of Google or you're a pro athlete or Olympic swimmer or anybody. It's really how do you be fully engaged in the moment when you're performing unattached to what you're trying to do? How can you expand what you believe is possible? How can you perform with freedom and passion?

John Jantsch (10:58.361)

Yeah.

Jim (11:18.848)

unattached to what you're trying to do. And that's, that's everything I'm telling you about is really clarifying these things that are most meaningful to you and, pursuing them.

John Jantsch (11:28.123)

So athletes today, I mean, obviously they've trained their body. mean, that's kind of a lot. That's, that's what comes with the deal. Increasingly, you're seeing sports psychologists. You know, you're actually seeing people in the dugout, uh, that are, you know, mindset related. Business owners don't necessarily, well, a lot of them don't train their body like an athlete, even though they need to perform, but they certainly don't have the same idea of training their mind. Are there exercise? I know there are exercises in your system. Uh, you want to talk a little bit about.

ones that are really geared towards entrepreneurs or even have a lot of marketers on this show that would help them train their mind.

Jim (12:08.684)

Yeah, well, with the InterEx Lancers, the number one goal every day is to learn and grow. If you want to be great at business, we need to be creative. We can't be attached to the results and circumstances. We need to think clearly. We have to have a clear mind and unburdened heart. If you want to be great at anything, business included, we can't be caught up in the past and future. so learn and grow every day is the number one goal. And then within that, we have four daily goals.

Give the best of what you have some days it's not going to be good. Be present, be grateful, focus on your routines and only what you can control.

John Jantsch (12:46.575)

There certainly is, you talk openly about the spiritual elements of what you teach, presence, gratitude, acceptance, in addition to like performance metrics. Do you ever, especially with business leaders, do you ever get any skepticism, pushback that, just like give me the tools, give me the, you I don't need that woo-woo stuff.

Jim (13:09.68)

yeah, yeah. Pro athletes, business leaders. Yeah, definitely. If you're a high achiever, then you don't want the woo woo. You want tangible results. You don't want to mess around. You don't want to waste your time. And I get it. The question is if something is really important to you, if this is the biggest year of your career, maybe your free agent or maybe you have a massive deal you're working on or just trying to get a job and you need the money.

The more important it is to you, then the more important the process of how you live and what you do every day is, you know, then it's more important. So the question is, what's the best process for you to be your best every day? And that's what InterEx is, is I present to you what I think, what I've learned is the best process for the majority of people to be fully engaged in the moment, heart, mind and body on a test and what they're trying to do.

John Jantsch (14:02.297)

You talk about in the book embracing, excuse me, vulnerability and even failure in some cases. You want to talk a little bit about whether it's on your own personal life or with the client where you've helped, we're embracing that imperfection has kind of led to a breakthrough.

Jim (14:21.922)

Yeah, I define humility as an accurate view of self, not overinflated and not under inflated. And so

John Jantsch (14:25.563)

Right.

Jim (14:34.382)

pro athletes and most people they come to me because they're underperforming and essentially they come to me wanting they're obsessing about things that they want can't control and then they just try harder and then the trying harder causes them to be more tense more anxious and worse performance and so then they just that causes more stress and then they feel like they need to become more needy and so it's just this endless loop and so essentially

They're coming to me for low level needs and desires. Become world number one. Be the best in the industry. That's a low level need is, well, one, I call it low level because you don't even know if it's good for you, let alone gonna make you happy. Say you got a million followers or $10 million or $10 million house on the water. Is that gonna make you happy? You might think so and hopefully, but it may not. And so, but that's people come to me because I've helped people achieve extraordinary success.

John Jantsch (15:09.275)

Mm-hmm.

Jim (15:32.438)

generally most people their first year together, they have the best year of their careers. It's because we focus on developing themselves as people giving inner strength and inner peace, let everything else be added to them. So, this is the crucial thing.

John Jantsch (15:48.773)

So how do you balance the fact that, especially in the field that you're working with, mean, that people are taught their entire lives to strive for excellence, to hustle, to work harder, to outwork everybody else. I how do you balance that? Because you're not, I mean, they obviously have to have the skills they have to put into work, but you're telling them something completely different than what society is probably pumping in.

Jim (16:14.998)

Yeah. Society says the only thing that matters is the results, bottom line, black and white, zero sum score. Like it's either win or lose. There's only only so many pieces to the pie. And I'm saying, we live in an unstable, unfair world that has a lot of, horrible things in it. And, if you don't have a clear system, you're going to get sucked into negativity and because of all the instability and even evil and violence.

So we need to have a clear system to make sure we're focusing on who you can become and what's possible in your life. And so, Inter Excellence is about developing the habits of thought and action every day where you can be fully engaged in the moment more often, unattached to the results of what you're trying to do. And we do that by training your heart to love most what's most empowering.

John Jantsch (17:03.493)

So I'm guessing a fair amount of people you work with need like you need to strip some stuff away, you know, because they come to you with being full on being doing. What's kind of the first step to get somebody to shift their mindset from that, you know, away from doing and more towards, I guess you would call it being.

Jim (17:25.762)

how they speak. The first thing we do is we make sure that we're speaking the truth. That's Inter Excellence has nine disciplines and one of the disciplines is to speak the truth about the past to create possibilities in the future. So people come to me and they want to perform better. they're, they often will talk to me about how they're struggling with something. And, but the thing is your subconscious is what's running your life and creating these beliefs that are limitations on what's possible.

It's really, really hard to outperform your beliefs, the subconscious comfort level with what you feel is possible in your life. And so, Inter-Excellence is largely about expanding what you believe is possible by getting yourself to see possibilities and feel it as if it's real. And so we need to be able to come to edge of our feelings and beliefs and not resist those moments where we're super uncomfortable.

John Jantsch (18:18.393)

Because your work went from being exposed to X amount of people to a much larger X, has that changed just because I'm guessing you're getting a lot more feedback, you have more people reaching out to you saying, hey, I want a piece of you. Has that changed not you, but has that changed anything, how you think about your system, how you think about the work, or is it only validated?

Jim (18:46.894)

Oh yeah, it's changed a lot. My life has changed a lot. Um, I think of what if I would have died January 11th or before, you know, I, the majority of the things in the book that I wrote 16 years ago are the same. And it was selling one to two copies a day before January 12th. And then, um, you know, now it's like I said, it's going to be in 26 or 27 languages and it's sold half a million copies or whatever. And so, um,

John Jantsch (18:58.255)

Right.

Jim (19:14.646)

what's changed is is well, I want to more definitely more confidence in the message. Like in the past, I you know, I believed in the message for sure. But there's always a wonder like, why don't more people? Why isn't the book more popular? didn't understand it. And so now it's just kind of that's really cool. But I don't think of myself as as the originator of this.

John Jantsch (19:32.304)

Yeah.

Jim (19:41.876)

or even author. I'm just a lowly messenger. And so because it's so extraordinary, everything that's happened, it's, I mean, it's, there's no way that I could say, I did this. And so the moment we start to think that I'm doing it and that I'm somebody because I'm doing these great things, then we start to get afraid of, what if I make mistakes? But when you can take yourself completely out of the picture,

John Jantsch (19:52.123)

Thanks

John Jantsch (20:06.521)

Yeah.

Jim (20:10.904)

there's no concern for self, then you can be fearless. God's given me this gift that I realized, you know, at the very most I've added maybe one or 2 % to anything good that's happened in the last six months. And since I know that there's no like, I'm somebody now. I know I'm nobody.

John Jantsch (20:30.873)

Yeah. Well, Jim, I appreciate you taking a moment to share with our listeners. Is there some place you would invite people to connect with you? Obviously the book's available everywhere, but if people want to learn more about your coaching or just really, you know, anything, explore anything deeper from the book.

Jim (20:53.09)

Yeah, I would go to interexcellence.com and sign up for the newsletter. We have a VIP newsletter that talks about our retreats and workshops. We've got a retreat coming up in Mexico here very soon. and then social media, Instagram, InterExcellence, InterExcellence, Jim Murphy, and other social media outlets. You'll find me.

Jim (21:16.28)

Thanks so much, John.

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