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(00:01) welcome everybody it’s Francois Lupien from How To Become More Podcast it’s a pleasure to see you today and we have a special guest today Eric Lofholm but before I introduce him Eric is so special that is the first time that it’s not a live podcast and it’s something that is wonderful when there’s when we have lemon we make lemonade he’s a very busy man and so get ready for excellence Eric Lofholm has taught is proven sales system to thousands of professionals all around the world and
(00:32) he’s the president and CEO of every gloss home International an organization he founded professionally to train people on the Art and Science of selling and he’s been doing it for over 25 years Eric welcome good to have you. It is great to be here and thank you for creating this special opportunity for me to record this with you I appreciate that and welcome to all the listeners thank you so much so let’s get going right away tell us a little bit about you professionally and personal background a little bit so we can be
(01:04) situated for people that may not know you sure I live in Rocklin California which is basically the Sacramento area and I’m married I have four children ages 16 to 20. I’ve been teaching sales full-time with my own company since 1999 and I love helping people with ideas to make more sales absolutely lovely I love it so if we talk about entrepreneurs what gets you Eric fired up as an entrepreneur and why did you decide to actually become an entrepreneur what happened well I never had any Vision to do that
(01:42) I ended up going into sales and I never really liked sales initially I always love teaching and so once I got really good at sales primarily due to the mentorship that I had I found that I was really effective at teaching sales and so I decided to start my own training company and what gets me fired up is seeing one of my clients take the ideas that they learn and have it transform their life and uh once they learn the ideas they have them forever so that that gets me really excited that’s awesome and you said something
(02:18) that you said really quickly some great trainers give me some of the names of the people that were actually were your mentors because I believe they’re absolutely amazing yeah I’ve had the privilege of working with some of the best in the world Dr. Donald Moyne in sales, Tony Robbins of course, Steve Hardison known as the ultimate coach, Les Brown, Michael Gerber these are all people that I personally know in some cases I worked for them in other cases I’ve team-taught seminars so I’ve had the privilege of being mentored
(02:53) by some of the best in the world. And so how interesting that you’ve been mentored by them and now, in turn, you’re paying back mentoring other people so they can get access to their information but more importantly I believe that with the time that you’ve been in sales, you have put in your own secret sauce in there that puts everything else that you have learned into steroids yeah it’s really true you know I’m not just teaching what I was taught you know I’m taking what I was taught and then
(03:20) I’ve gone out and I’ve applied it, for example, I do 25 or more prospecting reach outs Monday through Friday so my sleeves are rolled up I’m in the trenches I’m extremely consistent so when I’m working with my clients or coaching somebody you know that’s what I’m bringing to the table is my real-world experience having closed thousands and thousands of sales and done you know a lot of prospecting through the years and getting referrals and all that good stuff so um I’m able to teach what it is
(03:49) that I do that’s awesome and I like the fact that a lot of people just learn things and regurgitate it but you’re still in the trenches you say you do 25 outreaches each and every day yeah every day I reach out to at least 25 people today for example I reached out to the CEO of The Hunger project which is one of the most influential non-profits in the world and I booked an appointment with the CEO he’s going to be coming out from the East coast to the Bay Area and somebody be driving down to
(04:20) have lunch with him and I also prospected Ray Johnson who’s one of the most influential Christian Pastors in the world and I have a meeting with him next week I’m not always prospecting the elite human beings on the planet but today those were two of my what will end up being 25 outreaches by the end of my day today excellent I love it teaching by example so that gets you fired up but what do you love most about what you do and why well I think it’s working with somebody who wants a
(04:55) the better life you know they’re not really sure what to do sometimes people are uncomfortable asking for the order I was talking to a person who’s coaching and he doesn’t have a full practice and so I want to teach him you know how to have that full practice and then he’ll have that skill set for the rest of his life I love teaching people how to increase their sales so they can invest more. I love sharing ideas to make a relationship like a romantic relationship better and just helping another human being better their life I
(05:25) talked to a client yesterday and she’s just about to publish her book and I mentored her on how to do it and she’ll be a published author forever and she’s just as you can imagine grateful excited you know proud of her book and I’m really grateful that I was able to help her uh get the book you know it’s just about at the finish line now that’s awesome so you get I call that psychic money it’s not only the income that we generate but the benefits that we can have so when we hit the pillow at
(05:56) night we’re gonna have a smile on our face that we contributed to someone else’s individual who in turn can contribute to other people which is a Rippling effect that is wonderful yeah you make a really great point you know there’s many aspects to wealth and it’s not just our net worth or you know money in the bank um could be wealth in our marriage it can be wealth in our health it can be wealth in our friendships you know I recently um generated a new friendship and it’s that friendship’s bringing me a lot of
(06:27) joy in my life and so it really is rewarding like you said to put your head down on the pillow knowing you went out there and did your best to make a difference in the world that’s awesome from the many aspects that you’ve mentioned even helping writing a book sales seems to be the pivotal point or the thing that you like most and why would that why in all this did you choose sales is there something that happened when you were young and then you had a hard time and then someone helped you and then it
(06:57) transformed your life maybe yeah that’s pretty much it you know I never I don’t know that anybody ever dreams of going into sales and um I don’t think speakers people that want to become a professional speaker think about oh yeah I want to go teach sales for a career but what happened for me I met Dr. Donald Moyne who is from my view the brightest sales mind living today and when I was about to lose my job because I couldn’t sell he started training me and within 60 days I became the top
(07:29) producer in that company and he’s been my mentor and coach now since 1994. so I learned some really Advanced things about selling that not a lot of people know and so I ended up deciding that I want to plant my flag with sales training and so now I have things that I do to help people with their wealth or help them with their Fitness but the core of what I’m known for and why people are usually drawn to me is they want to make more sales and so it really is because I acquire this highly specialized knowledge
(08:03) and I just decided that that’s the mark that I want to make in the world awesome I did some quick math this year to 1994 is 29 years so you’ve been at it for 29 years you’ve been around the block a few times and I’m sure that you’ve learned many things through the ups and downs of the economy what works what doesn’t work and then you’re helping others apply it I I’ve heard something that and the reason I ask sales is such an interesting thing last week someone told me that in business
(08:30) not in life but in business there is no problem that more sales cannot solve because you get more casual if you can’t do it you can actually outsource it and have others do it so that that sales direction that you’re taking is helping so many people in many many ways that’s for sure yeah I think especially in early on in an entrepreneur’s Journey you know when they’re getting their first clients or their you know reaching six figures for the first time or they’re growing their business more where they can they
(09:05) can hire a full-time assistant or an appointment center you know a lot of what stands in the way of entrepreneurs and doing these things is um cash flow you know the revenue to generate the sales and you know as the business grows the sales can be less important but one of my entrepreneurial friends talked about cash flow Is like oxygen you know if if you don’t have the cash flow it can really create a lot of stress a lot of fear a lot of anxiety and so helping you know I you know helping somebody make their dream happen of course is
(09:42) special but also just helping somebody get out of anxiety around money and fear around money I talked to an entrepreneur today and uh he wants to get his coaching business going and he’s in a lot of fear right now financially and he was telling me something like you know I know it’s my money story and I said I said no it’s not I said if your cash flow is tight if my cash flow is tight it would create anxiety it’s not your money story you need more cash flow so I was um assisting him in that and essentially
(10:18) saying that we need to get your Sales Systems going so you can bring in the cash flow and there’s a lot of there’s a stigma of cells in our culture so some entrepreneurs are uncomfortable with sales then they need to make the sales and I just love helping people see a path to sell by serving others which is one of my statements selling equals service awesome you pointed something that is very powerful fear stress anxiety almost maybe depression are things that are very intangible but through the lens that you
(10:54) bring it to say Hey basically it’s a cash flow problem and then let’s address the cash flow problem so it’s something tangible that can be dealt with and you’re an expert in dealing with this so therefore you’re making the intangible tangible they can deal with it and then overcome it I absolutely love it well you bring up a great point because some people think they’re depressed and the reality is they just have a cash flow problem they’re not depressed but they if they just went and made more sales all of a
(11:21) sudden the depression would just you know disappear and so I think it’s important to know you know what is the problem am I is it that I’m dealing with anxiety because if my cash boat tightens up or if I’m having business problems my anxiety might go way up but it’s not an anxiety problem it’s a problem of whatever it is that I’m facing so if I can fix the employee challenger if I can fix the whatever it is fix the cash flow problem no more anxiety and so sometimes entrepreneurs they’re misdiagnosing if
(11:52) you will and they’re thinking that they have something like anxiety or depression in the realities it’s just a cash flow problem absolutely so out of all this you’re a champion you’re a winner and you help others become winners but let’s find out about Eric maybe dig a Little deeper this is a part of this podcast that I really like because it makes you uh more tangible more someone that approachable if I may say and the question is what is the biggest challenge you have faced in your professional life maybe something
(12:24) that one day you just didn’t want to get out of bed and put blankets on it says man, I’m not doing this anymore and how did you overcome it yeah you know we could do several shows on the challenges um that I’ve faced in my lifetime because probably like most people have had all kinds of challenges but I’ll share with you the low point of my life is when I started my first company and the company failed and so I took on the identity I am a failure so I started operating from that position and uh my wife and I split up
(13:03) and it was I own that like it was me that created that out of me taking on the identity I’m a failure so my marriage failed then I was broke I didn’t have any money and uh I ended up homeless and um I was sleeping in my car and a friend of mine found out about what was going on with me and it was very you know embarrassing to be in that situation when you know I had previously been a business owner and now I’m you know sleeping in my car and so that that was the low point of my life I’ve had many many other low
(13:42) points my business has been on life support before I went through a divorce which was emotionally the most uh devastating experience I’ve ever gone through um I lost my dream home in short sale and had to you know tell my family my wife and kids hey you know we have to move we I was unable to pull it off for us so I’ve had a lot of setbacks but the lowest point was when I became homeless wow how do you overcome it ?you know I got a job waiting tables on a graveyard shift so I’m working 11 o’clock to seven o’clock in the
(14:17) morning Reno Nevada at Harrah’s casino and I’m making like a dollar a table in tips but something happened to me when I got that job is energetically I felt a shift and I learned that small wins create confidence so my life had been spiraling downward lost the business you know my marriage was breaking up I’m homeless and then I got this place to live and I got that job and all of a sudden energetically I started feeling better and as my life had spiraled down then it spiraled went back up and so I started
(14:54) building on those successes one success at a time and ultimately I ended up going and working for Tony Robbins and had a really great run with Tony and then started my own company in 1999 so it the way I turned it around was like literally one brick at a time and the first brick after getting the job was saving up money for a month to get a one-bedroom apartment so got the job got the apartment then I repaired my marriage said I got my marriage and then we went through a bankruptcy and then I got another job
(15:25) and then I got the job with Tony Robbins so it was just kind of like Rick by Brick piecing things back is how I turned it around wow I have this little card that says success is a straight line but the reality is that it’s a broken line for people not seeing this it goes up and down up and down one of the things that I mentioned a nugget that you said is you hit bottom and then you took action and it wasn’t and you said a graveyard shift from 11 P.M to 7 A.M
(15:57) like not many people would do this but you were humble enough to actually say okay I’m gonna own this I’m gonna do it and then you started to it shifted your thinking because let’s face it if you’re down and out and you go from 11 P.M to 7 A.M it takes guts to do that so so you had it within you there was a winner inside of you but at that time it was big pretty deep but you started to take action you moved on on and then you saw and sought mentors that actually helped you out and to this is for all
(16:28) the listeners right now who are heart-centered and service-driven entrepreneurs who want to share their mission vision and passion we all hit walls all of us but it’s what we do once we hit that wall and you’re a great example of actually doing this so what’s the word of encouragement would you give to a struggling entrepreneur right now someone that’s saying man this is brutal like it keeps hitting me again and again so because it’s a reality tongue-in-cheek I say if you ask entrepreneurs how are you fine great but
(17:02) we all know that hey man we have to put in the hours and the struggles that we’re facing every day and we have to overcome them and these type of conversations we’re having right now is making it real for everybody that hey I’m not the only one that struggles but then there’s ways as you say giving a hand up to people so what words of encouragement or advice would you give a struggling entrepreneur right now well what I would say is what I remind myself when I go through my struggles and it’s simply this that God is
(17:29) preparing me for something greater so when I’m going through those struggles I’m getting more resilient I’m becoming mentally stronger I’m having to get up and take action even though I don’t feel like it even though I might feel down I might feel depressed it’s like teaching me you can still take action and I’ve had many many extreme challenges that I faced but I just remind myself I’m being prepared for something greater and that’s something that’s really helped me and if you’re you know going through
(18:07) tough times as an entrepreneur me too it’s called that’s part of being an entrepreneur and you’ve been selected God selected you for this work and you’re you never know how God’s going to use you in the future that’s for sure I like it one of the things you mentioned, in other words, is you were reframing the situation to look at the good and that’s a power that you have you can reframe this or just stay there and stay stuck or decide to say hey there’s something
(18:37) better and I like it it’s something that pulls you up and something bigger is happening is coming and so I’m prepared for it he’s buffering me up he’s getting the draws out of me so I can shine even more burning me through the affliction and someone says if you’re going through hell keep going don’t stop that’s right absolutely this is really cool I like it and that’s one of the things that I also love teaching is sales structures all these things are important to have but the mindset also
(19:09) to help us and that reframing you mentioned is exactly that we have the power over our own thoughts maybe not over the decisions that others take around us although, through some techniques and some art centered service driven uh service that we provide them, we can help them make a better decision nevertheless you cannot force people to do things but we can help ourselves and take control to make things happen in our life I love it cool so do you have a special MVP like Mission Vision passion formula that you can share with the
(19:42) audience well I think and I mentioned this earlier that this mantra of selling equal service and that’s something that I live by and it’s my intention to serve whoever’s in front of me and sometimes it’s coaching clients sometimes I’m delivering a sales presentation but I’m still even if I’m wearing the sales hat I’m still wearing the service hat and I’ve shared that with a lot of entrepreneurs and you know they think well you know if I’m a photographer when I’m doing the photography I’m serving
(20:13) but then when I’m selling over here I’m doing this thing that I don’t really want to do but I have to do it’s like this necessary thing but I don’t really want to do it and if you can look at the selling as a service that’s part of serving it’s part of your service hat even though you got the sales hat on too and that’s really served me that’s awesome I love it I was talking to a client today and he was with that serving selling and I said one way is to reduce the stress on our shoulders is
(20:39) that not everybody gets sold but everybody gets served and by doing it this way uh I have a a mentor called Eric Watson he says either you win or you double win so everybody and by doing it that way it reframes the situation so we keep on going excellent so what’s next on your to-do list any professional projects plan in the future for Eric yeah I’m actually working on eradicating world hunger so solving that problem it’s not like I’m going to solve the problem it’s going to be solved by I’m going to say 10 million
(21:17) people doing a little bit right and it might be something local it might be them donating money it might be them helping one person that is struggling right now and needs some food but that’s the product that I’m working on and that’s why I reached out to the CEO of one of the most influential hunger organizations in the world and I’m gonna go meet and have lunch with him because I want to learn from him and so I’m in my knowledge Gathering phase right now to really understand
(21:44) what exactly is the problem apparently 800 million people right now are dealing with Hunger related issues on a daily basis and so um I want to do my part and uh so that’s the most recent project that I’m up to beyond my sales training company absolutely and those of you who are seeing this live those are there hearing it I suggest you go to YouTube and find out the video and go back and when I asked the question Eric I’m sort of a pro at this and whenever I ask a question, someone if their eyes start to
(22:15) go right left up and down I know they have no clue of what they’re doing but when I ask you the question Eric you look straight at the camera and you were exact with the words that you said and we can feel the certainty about it and you’ve taken action and have appointments with leaders that can make it happen plus you’ve given it some thought saying hey it’s going to take so many millions of people to make it happen so it shows that not only is it a direction that you want to do or the way I say is a professional project
(22:46) that’s planned but you’ve put some thought into it and you’re backing it up with action which makes you a wonderful winner and so everybody Eric laugh home you’re gonna see is going to be part of something that happens with world hunger and that’s awesome you want to line up with him I’m sure you’ll have some things that we can do to participate in this so This actually ties into my next question is what Legacy would you like to leave to future generation maybe it’s with that relieving hunger or maybe
(23:11) there’s something else what would it be yeah I don’t really think so much in terms of Legacy I just think more about serving while I’m here and so I’m 52 now I want to do this work until 89 I’ve got a 37-year run left to me God willing help permitting and it’s really just about serving while I’m here and after I’m gone whatever ripples are created from the service is wonderful but my focus is really on the time that I’m here I love it and thanks again for sharing it shows the kind of individual
(23:43) that you are that’s life is not about me but it’s about others and once we figure that out then we don’t run out of energy because serving others is rejuvenating thinking about ourselves we’re limited because it’s self-centered and that’s it but when we put it outside then their feelings their smiles is rejuvenating us and then we keep on going and it’s something that’s wonderful thanks for sharing that’s awesome cool Eric it’s wonderful all the things that we have shared we don’t
(24:11) have too much time left but I’d like to ask you because I ask everybody just for fun if you had a superpower what would it be and why some people that’s flying some people that’s but what would a superpower be that Eric would love to have you know I would love to have a stronger memory you know sometimes you know you can go search stuff on the internet and whatnot but I find myself on a daily basis you know wishing that I’d remember these certain things so that that would be a really useful thing
(24:41) that would help me on a daily basis cool that’s awesome right on cool so hey thanks so much what’s the best way for people to reach you it’ll be in the descriptions below but you can voice it out loud right now what would be the best ways for people is it email social media platforms there’s something that you’d like to offer people yeah so I’m the only Eric Lofhalm on the planet so if you Google Eric off of him that’s me and I’m on all the social medias LinkedIn, YouTube, Facebook
(25:12) Instagram, TikTok Etc. so whatever social media platform that you resonate with you know I’d love to connect with you there I’m very active on social media so that would be the best way to excellent any last words that you’d like to leave an audience that’s heart-centered, service driven and wants to be fired up about their mission vision and passion well I think because my Courier of expertise is sales I want you to know that you can get better at sales it is possible even if you’re uncomfortable
(25:43) with sales I just want you to know that there is hope and if you put the work in you can get better and as you get better you’ll have that skill set for the rest of your life to help you get your message out to the world to make your goals and dreams come true right on Eric love home thank you I like to finish Always by saying stop tiptoeing through life ladies and gentlemen someone needs to need a message and they needed to hear it from you keep going if you fall down dust yourself get back up and make it
(26:11) happen because you can make a difference this is Francois from the podcast How to Become More.com thank you so much Herrick for being part of us today and to everybody God bless and all that you do. Thank you.
