How Joy Gendusa Built a $50 Million Postcard Empire

PostcardMania Founder & CEO – Joy Gendusa

I’m ecstatic to have Joy Gendusa back on the show. Joy Gendusa is a direct mail expert and Founder & CEO of PostcardMania, which she founded in 1998 with only a phone, a computer and zero capital investment.

Now it’s a nationwide marketing firm, has been an Inc. 500 company with a revenue of $50 million in annual revenue, pumping $9.5 million in salaries and wages into the community. Since the last time we spoke she’s she’s doubled the size of her company and now has 247 employees.

Check out these episode highlights::

How she created a $50 million postcard empire
Why speed of particle flow alone determines power
How she created a marketing team that is now an industry juggernaut
Why you need to go BIG on your quantity, and then tweak it for quality

Joy’s Websites:

PostcardMania.com

Transcript: Download

Video Transcription provided by GMR Transcription Services.

Jaime Masters: Welcome to Eventual Millionaire. I?m Jaime Masters and I have the wonderful Joy Gendusa back on the show. She?s from postcardmania.com and it was many years ago that she came on. I?m so excited to have her back on the show. Thanks so much for coming on the show again.

Joy Gendusa: Oh, you?re very welcome. Happy to be here.

Jaime Masters: And it?s insane. I was reading some of the information from when we chatted last time and now you?ve doubled the size of your company and it?s huge now, right? Tell me about the growth that has happened over the last few years.

Joy Gendusa: Oh, goodness gracious. Yeah. We?re just growing in leaps and bounds, fortunately. It?s always fun and stressful. Let?s see. What would you like to know about it?

Jaime Masters: How many employees are you at now?

Joy Gendusa: 247.

Jaime Masters: 247! I can?t remember how many we had before but it was a lot less.

Joy Gendusa: It wasn?t that many.

Jaime Masters: Exactly. So, why do you think that?s such a massive growth in the industry right now?

Joy Gendusa: Well, it?s funny because I think last time we spoke the economy was not that great and now the economy is boom, boom, boom. So, when you?re talking to small business owners; they?re very gritty kind of boot strappy kind of people. So, in a bad economy, we do fine because you can only say bad economy for so long before a small business owner just goes, ?Well, that?s THE economy and I have to figure out what I have to do which marketing of course.? So, we help the market. In a good economy, they?re like, ?Yay! We want as much business as we can get. Let?s market even more.?

Jaime Masters: Nice. So, do you think that?s the only reason we?re on a trend up and especially right now because everyone?s talking about, ?Oh, crap? The economy?s going to crash.?? Are you guys worried about any of that stuff?

Joy Gendusa: Can you believe that? It?s just like whatever. Anyway. I don?t listen to any of that stuff. Try not to watch the news, people. Here?s the thing. We have integrated a lot of online digital marketing with our direct mail campaigns so this is very exciting. And another thing, marketing speak and marketing products all move a lot faster than small business owners do and small business owners are just trying to get used to this new marketing thing when a new thing comes out. And they?re like, ?I don?t even know how to do that one yet. How am I supposed to do this one??

So, what we?ve done is we?ve packaged a bunch of marketing tools together into a nice integrated one-off campaign where they don?t have to talk to different providers and make sure that they?re all working together and spending all that time. So, we sort of make it very turnkey and that?s added a lot of growth to our company.

Jaime Masters: See, I was checking out the website and everything and it does seem like you do way more than just postcards and direct mailings. If you could give me one industry and walk me through what you really will do for somebody because the hard thing about marketing is there?s a thousand things that you can be doing and as a small business owner, you can?t see the forest for the trees because everybody?s telling you to be online. But then people are like, ?Well, postcards don?t work.? You know what I mean? So, give me a walkthrough of one of the industries and what you do for them.

Joy Gendusa: I?ll just talk to you about one that I?m working with personally right now because ? okay, you?ve heard of cool sculpting? You must have heard of that?

Jaime Masters: Yes, I have.

Joy Gendusa: Okay. So, there?s another technology that?s even better and faster, faster appointment time and you?re not attached to a machine. Anyway, it?s just better. And I can?t remember what it?s called but they just decided to do a campaign and I?m friends with the two gal owners of this place called Trim Studio. And one of the gals is a marketer and she has her own little consulting company and she has a lot of clients. So, when I was explaining to her our product ? it?s hard to explain but it?s like you take your direct mail piece, a traditional direct mail piece and you add a bunch of new components to it.

So, you add Google Ads, Facebook ads, call tracking phone numbers, mail tracking codes so you know when it?s going to hit mailboxes. You just add these different components and it?s all done in one fell swoop. All the ads are designed at the same time and I thought she was going to kind of poo poo it and be like, ?Oh, I can just do that myself? because she?s a marketer and she was like, ?Oh my goodness gracious. Thank goodness.? She was so happy about it now that she?s a business owner too and doing it for her own business.

We also add pop up boxes with testing each one. They call that AB testing so basically let?s say somebody gets the postcard, they get excited, they go to your website ? by the way, 96 percent of the people who go to your website that are interested in what you have, leave without doing anything. So, if you can capture them, even if it?s just the IP address if you can capture them when they?re there and then follow them around the internet with ads on Google, Facebook, and Instagram; they?re going to be like, ?Oh, yeah. I remember I really was interested in that.? And people can think about things and move slowly if they want to unlike me and you.

Jaime Masters: Yeah, exactly.

Joy Gendusa: We are Speedy Gonzalez?s here. So, what we do is we?ll give people these pop up boxed that you see on every retail site for them and you can put some kind of offer there and it?s all part of the same campaign. We capture the identity, we email them, those people that filled out the box and then also we?ll do follow-up emails all in one. And we have all these cute little names for them like the catch that lead tool is the box and catch and close is if you add the email follow-up because it takes so many touches for somebody to make a decision. Not me. I make fast decisions but most people; it takes a zillion touches before they go, ?Okay, I?m ready to buy.?

So, you?re sort of building that credibility and trust as you go. So, did that answer your question? I?m sorry if ?

Jaime Masters: It does. No, I want to break it down even further. No, totally. Because the thing is that trying to integrate both sides and a lot of the people listening are marketers also. They understand quite a bit of it but what?s interesting especially in making a congruent campaign like you were saying because usually with postcards it?s one separate thing and then they have to make sure they set up the tracking pixel and all the rest of the stuff in order to be able to do it.

So, on that first initial postcard or do you do a series of postcards? What are the calls to action? Is it just to the main website or are you looking to actually create a landing page where they have to type in your site/whatever? How do you start with that?

Joy Gendusa: Many ways. If the company is simple like Trim Studio; they?re one product, this is what they do, one service; don?t need a landing page. But I once asked my girlfriend who?s a chiropractor, ?So, what?s the main ailment that you handle? What?s the main thing? Who?s your main audience?? She?s like, ?Everybody. Everybody.? Okay. They would need a landing page because you never want to try to sell every single thing you have to every type of person out there on one postcard.

You?re going to be very specific to the product or service and you want to ? the landing page is just going to continue the communication that the postcard started. So, yeah. We?ve packaged it all up so that the business owner doesn?t have to think about all the different channels and make it congruent themselves. We will make everything match and everything beautiful and we?ll even upload your mailing list to Facebook and start hitting those people prior to the postcard being mailed so they?ll see ? they?re not going to click on it probably. But they?re going to see the ad and when they get the card, they?ll be like, ?Oh, I saw that in my Facebook ad.?

And then they?ll go to the website and then we?ll hit them again from that angle and these small businesses feel like the big companies. When re-targeting first started, people would say to me, ?Wow, Joy. Postcard mania is everywhere. I see it everywhere.? I?m like, ?Yeah, yeah. We?re retargeting. Whatever.?

Jaime Masters: Seriously. Well, I guess that?s always the question then too because so you?re saying you can start not with just getting cold leads; you can actually upload your email list in advance, have Facebook ads come up so that way they?re seeing you even a little bit just on the impression sides and then so when they actually look in the mailbox, they?ll be like, ?This looks familiar? instead of going, ?Who the heck are these people?? and then chucking it.

Joy Gendusa: You got it. You so fast, girl.

Jaime Masters: Because back in the day especially before you integrate the approaches, it?s like we have to send three to five postcards. We have to really keep hitting over and over and over again. Do you guys still do that or is the one piece of mail much better use wise because you?re hitting them online?

Joy Gendusa: We look at it this way. We still adhere to mailing postcards over and over and over again. And I?m not just saying that because I?m primarily a postcard printing company. I personally mail out an 180,000 postcards to promote my own company every single solitary week.

Jaime Masters: Wow, that?s a lot.

Joy Gendusa: So, I practice what I preach and my chief marketing officer, she?ll come back to me with ? I mean the analytics we do are ridic. I mean it?s crazy. So, she?ll say, ?Look but PPC, but PPC? and twice in my history, I listened to her analytics and I cut my mail and I literally cut my revenue. And it happened twice and it will never, ever happen again and even I look at the data and I think ? but what happens is postcards make you real and it?s a tangible thing. And it?s not just ? anybody can throw up a website and throw up ads online very fast and you see these great products on Instagram. You ever see the eyebrow thing that is from China and it makes them all in one fell swoop you have hairs?

And you buy it and you?re like, ?What the heck is this?? It?s not credible. I?ve seen people post things on Facebook, ?Remind me never to buy anything off Facebook again.? So, anyway. A postcard makes it real, makes it more real.

Jaime Masters: Does it matter the industry? So, in business to business, you have that but on your website, you have a whole bunch of industries. It?s really impressive to see the list. There?s a humongous list. Landscapers, and dental, and it goes down and a lot of them are local service providers. Do you feel like it works better for local service providers versus a national type of company? Give me some of the industries that it really works best with?

Joy Gendusa: Oh my gosh. We have property management companies. We have weird industries too that aren?t listed there because there aren?t a zillion of them, just people that find us on Google. All kinds of software and anything niche. Any B to B niche business, anything niche at all is great because if you have something weird; postcards are the best way to enlighten people about it because it?s not like they?re searching for it because they don?t even know it exists.

So, for instance, a chess school. They kill it because parents are trying to improve the minds and get the children off the electronics and it?s like, ?Oh, let?s teach them chess so they can play chess on the IPad.? But those kinds of things do very well. Any kind of school, any kind of school with tuition is great because once you get that customer, student; they?re going to pay over and over again. They?re going to pay for a full year of tuition monthly or whatever it is. So whether it?s nursery school or private school or jujitsu or guitar lessons or whatever kinds of schools.

We do really really well with those. Anything in the real estate and mortgage industries we do great with. Any of the home improvement industries. Heating, ventilation, air conditioning, plumbing, roofing, tile work, flooring, kitchen remodeling, roofers.

Jaime Masters: In those sort of industries that you?re saying; what kind of conversion rates are we looking at too? Because that?s the other piece. As an integrated whole, are we going oh, every thousand postcards we send, we get 1 person that we can retarget? What are some of the standardized numbers so that way they can start expecting, ?I?ll put in this much money and hopefully I?ll get this much return.??

Joy Gendusa: You will never get me to give you those kinds of numbers.

Jaime Masters: Darn.

Joy Gendusa: I know. The reason why and let me explain why because even some of my staff, I mean we record all our calls for training purposes and they?re pushed into a corner. ?What?s my response rate going to be? What?s my response rate going to be?? And I say to you, anyone, whether it?s my staff or anyone else who answers that question is lying. And the reason why is because yes, there are averages but not only is every industry different; it depends on how many people in that industry are competing with each other in the same localized area. Are you in an urban area? A rural area? A suburban area? What?s the competition like and how well are they marketing to the people that you?re marketing to?

So, there?s so many nuances before you can see that. A funny thing happened. We messed up on something. I was so embarrassed. I just found out about it today. I was so embarrassed. So, it?s the day spa that I go to. I go to constantly and just for my manicures and eyebrow stuff and whatever. And she said, ?Would you barter with me? Would you barter with me? I don?t think I can afford postage and blah, blah, blah.? This whole thing.

So, I said, ?Sure, little tiny girl. I will barter with you. No problem. I live here so I might as well barter with you.? So, I do this order and she?s so excited. She?s going to sell gift cards for Christmas time and she?s going to target men who are married in a certain income range, blah, blah, blah and she wants them to hit a week before Christmas because she said that?s when all the men come in. We never mailed her cards. I know. Terrible. Terrible. I found out about it today. I thought I was going to die. I was like, ?Are you kidding??

So, of course basically, I told her I would do a Valentine?s special for her and I wouldn?t charge her anything, not even postage and she was so excited. She was so happy that I missed her mailing because I was taking so much responsibility. But the point of the story is we wound up doing the everywhere small business product and she got all the online ads and she wound up slaying it anyway for Christmas so she?s super, super stoked. But I forgot why I was telling you this. It was for a particular reason. I don?t usually go online and go, ?Look at postcard mania. We screwed up.?

Jaime Masters: Well, I was asking for conversions and it sounds like even without sending out the postcard, you can still get good conversions from it.

Joy Gendusa: Yeah. She?s been around for 20 years so she?s been there a long time and she did get really good conversions. But the point is is that I don?t get any day spa cards in my mailbox. We just don?t have that many in my local area so just seeing them online ? I mean there?s none unless you?re going to the hotel. I live in Clearwater so Clearwater Beach has hotels and they have spas in them, but it?s not that personalized service like your local day spa that?s been around for 20 years.

So, anyway my point is is that she did fantastic and was happy as a little clam that we messed up and that she?s getting a free Valentine?s Day promotion from us.

Jaime Masters: So, in regards to that and this is the thing that I get asked all the time especially how much do I put in upfront? What would be the upfront thing? So, for her, how many postcards did she decide that she wanted to sell especially when she?s like, ?I don?t have a lot of money for postage.? So, what sort of numbers as far as testing numbers upfront do we need to start going after to know that we?re going to get at least something that?s data worthy for a response instead of zero response back?

Joy Gendusa: Exactly. I would say honestly that you shouldn?t mail less ? if you?re a business to consumer product, you really want to mail about 5,000 pieces a few times to really, really get a good response. You want return on investment. What?s my response rate? That?s the wrong question. It?s really what?s my return on investment going to be? And I can help a business figure that out. I don?t mind talking about that because if I understand what your average ticket is, what is your average invoice going to be, how often does somebody buy from you, then I can help you figure out okay, what?s your margins and what kind of budget can you work with?

And honestly, there are standard things out there about what kind of budget you should use. For instance, a brand new business should use 30 percent of revenue towards marketing. If you?re brand new in business; you need to put a lot of money into marketing. Once you?re really established, you can get it down ? we spend 18 percent on marketing of our revenue. So, I used to only spend 15 percent but things changed. When I started doing postcard marketing, there wasn?t anybody else doing it but now they?re everywhere. So, I had to up my marketing and I did just to make sure that I could keep growing.

So, there?s always that amount to keep you growing or an amount to keep you even.

Jaime Masters: That makes sense. So, can you walk me through either a testimonial or something because I would love to know from the beginning to the end of okay, in the B to B space, they sent out this many postcards. Then we did retargeting and then we were able to get this. If you have any of those numbers because ?

Joy Gendusa: I said I wish. I?m not in my office. I?m in New York. I?m in New York and usually, Jessica gives me a stack for podcasts of case studies and nobody asks me.

Jaime Masters: Of course.

Joy Gendusa: But I do know a lot off the top of my head I do know a lot about dental. Let?s see if I can think of one story. Let me just think if I can think of a story. Let me just think. Here?s an odd industry. How about an odd industry, B to B? This is a cute story. Okay. We do this growth summit twice a year at postcard mania. We can only fit a hundred people so it gets filled up every time. And I do a day and a half of marketing education and this amazing speaker who?s just to die for does half a day of sales training and he?s amazing. Anyway, so this guy came and he was the marketing person for a company up in Boston that sells art to corporations. Like healthcare, hospitals, all kinds of corporations that require art. Very B to B.

They?re looking at designers, developers, healthcare. Anyway, so he comes and he was a client because this is just for clients but we didn?t see any crazy increase or anything and then a couple of years later he finally got the owner of the company to come to the growth summit. Because he?s a marketing guy. He can run back all excited, ?This is what I learned. We got to do this. We got to do that.? And they?re like, ?Yeah, yeah. Great. I?m glad you had a good time.?

Jaime Masters: Yes, exactly.

Joy Gendusa: So, she came and at the end of the summit, she looked at me and she said, ?Okay. I?m going to do whatever you tell me to do. Whatever you say.? And I just go, ?Oh my goodness.? I love when I get a client like that because I know I can help them. So, she started out, she decided that 5,000 pieces a week was going to be her amount that she was going to mail out.

Jaime Masters: Great. And about how much does that cost on average?

Joy Gendusa: That?s a really, really good question. I could probably say you?re probably looking at with all in 40 cents a piece with the postage and everything I?m guessing. I?m guessing about that. Yeah. So, she started doing it and I lose track. I help set up what I think the campaign should be especially when someone says that to me and I know they?re going to wind up spending a lot of money with me; I want to be part of the planning of that campaign. I want to see the design.

Jaime Masters: Really?

Joy Gendusa: Yes.

Jaime Masters: Even with 200 and something employees, you were the one doing some of this?

Joy Gendusa: Yes. No, no. If somebody?s going to spend a lot of money with my company ? a lot of people, they buy postcards. They send us art and they buy postcards and they spend $389. I mean I think our average order size is fifteen to eighteen hundred dollars not with postage. But when somebody?s mailing out 5,000 a week; I want to know about that order and I want to see the design and I want to make sure the list is right. I want to look at everything and make sure we?re not steering them in the wrong direction or something.

Jaime Masters: That?s awesome.

Joy Gendusa: I?m not really even a control freak. I?m not.

Jaime Masters: You care about results. Right?

Joy Gendusa: I really, really care about results. So, I kept my hand in the pot a little bit with this one and I kept looking at it and looking at it. And I said to her, ?Look, you might have to tweak the list. You might have to tweak all kinds of things. Just work with me. Trust me.? And thank goodness she just trusted me and they?ve just grown so much. She was doing nine million in revenue when I met her and she said they grew ? oh gosh. There?s a poster in my elevator. We made a poster about it. Usually, I?m in my office and I?ve got Jessica sitting across the desk from me and she?ll hold up notes. Here?s the answer to this question, Joy.

Jaime Masters: I love how you outsource that but you?re still in the client campaigns. You?re like, ?How many were the numbers? Okay, great.? But I have no idea.

Joy Gendusa: But it was huge. It was huge. I think they grew 50 percent in a year and she was stagnated. She was not growing. She was just kind of flat. Or was it 45 percent? It was some crazy number. Because it?s easy to double when you?re tiny but when you get to big numbers in the millions; it?s harder and harder to have that kind of growth.

Jaime Masters: That?s huge.

Joy Gendusa: Anyway, I was like, ?Thank you.? Her name is Ann Strickland. I love her to pieces. She became my girlfriend. I love her so much. I mean she lives in Boston so it?s not like we hang out. When somebody listens to me and they do what I say and then they have the wins; I just get so excited. I mean it just doesn?t get any more exciting than that.

Jaime Masters: So, think of the small business owner that?s maybe making $500,000 a year that?s like, ?I?ve tried Facebook ads. They start tanking. I?ve tried so many online things? because there?s a million online things and that?s what all these online entrepreneurs are being told all the time. How can you get them to run a test and what sort of size of a test? Because that?s? the other piece it?s like, okay, if this marketing stuff isn?t working so well, we do have to do something different but it?s tough for them to make the decision on what we do different. What would you say to someone like that?

Joy Gendusa: Well, I would have to do an entire analysis of what they were currently doing, what they?re unique selling proposition is. Here?s the thing. If you?re doing $500,000 a year in business; you should be spending $75,000 a year in marketing. So, that?s 15 percent. That?s bare minimum. Honestly, if you want to get to the higher numbers ? let me tell you the biggest problem with small business owners and marketing. They don?t have a grasp of the correct estimation of effort, the quantity that it takes to get the inflow, the influx that they want or that they need to grow. So, I always tell people ?Whatever amount you?re thinking of in your mind right now that?s a lot of outflow; 10x it. 10x that amount and maybe you?re getting close to the kind of quantity.?

I mean I started my company 20 years ago now but no investors, no capital, nothing. I had a credit card with a crappy limit on it and you don?t get to 60 million by cutting corners on marketing. And you know what?s different about me now that I?ve worked with over 80,000 businesses, what?s different about me personally as a CEO and a business owner is if I lose money on marketing like if I do a stupid campaign and it doesn?t work; I don?t care. I?ll just try something different. It?s just money. Oh, my husband hates that I have that attitude about money. He can?t stand it.

Jaime Masters: I love it though. So, my mentor does a million a month in traffic, a million dollars a month and his level of forethought versus somebody doing 500,000 is so big but then the problem with that is that the 500,000 people; they?re speed of implementation is so slow, they don?t get the data back and then they?re limping along.

Joy Gendusa: Bingo. Bingo. Bingo. One of my mantras is speed of particle flow alone determines power. And that comes from the Harvard Management System which is the management system that I use at postcard mania. But it?s a genius, genius, thing. You?ve got speed, speed, speed. Speed and quantity. Quantity and then quality and then viability. So, you go big on your quantity, and then you tweak it for quality but you keep the quantity super high and then viable.

Jaime Masters: How do you get people to do this? You know what I mean? Because it?s scary. So, what happens is they?re scared. They?re in this shock in marketing approach anyway where they?re like, ?I?m going to try and do this and then I?m going to try and do this.? And they?ve spent money in random spots and didn?t track anything so, therefore, they think marketing doesn?t work. So, in that case, it?s difficult to go, ?Oh, now I have to spend a lot more and in bigger quantities, than I ever have before and hope that I can change the quality enough so that way I?m just not leaking money like a crazy person.?

Joy Gendusa: Right. And I understand that and I don?t mean to sound like I don?t understand because my company makes so much money. But I was them and the difference between me and them is that ? and it was tight. My first time I sent out 5,000 postcards in a week; the postage was $800. This was 20 years ago for the small postcards and I was freaking out but I said I was going to give it six weeks at that quantity before I made a decision about it. I wasn?t going to come to any conclusions because I know in my business it takes four to six weeks to close somebody on the sale because you know small business owners that are listening to this, you just don?t make a decision super-fast.

You?re like, ?Maybe I?ll do it. Let me talk to my wife. Let me talk to my husband, my partner, my employees, my dog. Let me see what they all think and then maybe I?ll do it.? Anyway. So, it takes four to six weeks to close so I thought I better do the 5,000 pieces every single week for four to six weeks so I decided on six weeks. And I shit you not ? I said a bad word.

Jaime Masters: You can say it. Feel free.

Joy Gendusa: But week five, we went from 2,500 pieces to 5,000 pieces a week and week five we doubled our revenue. Doubled. Doubled. And I was doing about 22,000 a week back then and so we broke 50 and we were flipping out. Flipping out. It was like, ?Oh, it works.? So, therefore I just kept increasing my quantity and of course, you have to juggle the rest of the business to do that, but you have to know your math. You have to know what your sweet spot is. You have to know what your margins are, your profit margins. You have to understand what you?re willing to invest. What?s the lifetime value of a customer?

Because if you know if okay, out of every customer, my average lifetime value is $3,000 or something like that; how much am I willing to spend to get one new customer? And then you can sort of play with the numbers that way. You have to be brave you business owners. You have to be brave. It?s tough. It?s scary but that?s the big difference between me and other business owners. Why was I able to make it? Because I just didn?t sweat it. I went, ?I?ll make more money. I?ll figure it out. Never say die.? You know that kind of thing.

Jaime Masters: I appreciate that because you hear all the time, ?Get out of your comfort zone.? And then when I talk to owners, it?s literally like getting out of your comfort zone is tweaking a little thing, not doing big risks because I know a lot of people think that business owners are very risky. They?re quite risk-averse actually. Most of them to a fault sometimes. They don?t want to make the wrong decision. Yeah, go ahead.

Joy Gendusa: Yeah, yeah. I mean I?m much riskier than a lot of people I would say thus the growth. I mean I was going to say I?m a lot riskier than my husband. He has his own business and his business does great but it?s not as big as mine and it?s just not. He does great but he is more conservative than I am. He?s just more conservative.

Jaime Masters: What goes through your mind in something like that though? So, you take a risk ? were you just born with the way that you can handle risk better than most people or do you have any tips for us on handling ? especially when you pull the trigger and you go, ?Oh, crap. This better work.? What do you do?

Joy Gendusa: I don?t know what to say. I?m not a super-introverted person. I don?t know what to say. I think I was born this way. I mean I don?t know what to say. Tips? Always look out; don?t look in if you know what I mean. Look, it?s so pretty out there. Don?t think too much. Don?t overthink everything. Worrying. There is no product that comes from worrying. Worrying doesn?t actually create any product. All it does is make you crazy.

So, I don?t worry. Just don?t worry. It?s pointless. Sort of be able to experience anything.

Jaime Masters: That?s awesome.

Joy Gendusa: Be willing to experience anything. You might screw up. I can?t count. I wish I did have a stat of how much money I blew on crappy marketing and bad ideas. A zillion dollars. I mean I have lost so much money. Who freaking cares? Tomorrow?s another day. Life is in you today, you make your tomorrow. Why regret yesterday? You know what I mean?

Jaime Masters: That?s such a great attitude about it all and especially because it sounds like you have faith in being able to produce something and make it better no matter what. Even if you lose a whole bunch, sunshine always comes out tomorrow and it will all be okay and you?ll figure it out.

Joy Gendusa: I am one of those annoying people that see the bright side of things. My girlfriend, she used to be a writer for us. This girl who worked for me as a writer and she moved onto another company. We?re really good friends and social still and she posted something about how she woke up and she had the worst dream and she woke up in the worst mood. And I was like, ?I hate to be that person but decide to be in a good mood and you?ll be in a good mood. It?s all up to you. Sorry.?

Jaime Masters: And she?s like, ?I hate you.?

Joy Gendusa: She actually gave me a heart and said, ?I love you.? Which was sweet because she could have been like ignore.

Jaime Masters: Well, it?s always an interesting thing to be an entrepreneur and with a different brain. And this is what I always tell my clients. I?m like, ?If you could just download the brain of Joy, let?s download the brain of Joy. What would she do in your place?? Because we hold ourselves back in so many ways that sometimes we don?t even realize. When I ask you questions, it?s so different than interviewing someone else that?s like, ?No, no, no. I don?t do it like that.?

Joy Gendusa: I know. I?ve got to listen to more of your interviews. You should send me links to the best ones that I would like.

Jaime Masters: It?s really eye-opening because there?s so many different ways to be able to do it but I love interviewing people like you who are like, ?Just freaking do it? and then going out. Because we make it such a big deal.

Joy Gendusa: Yeah, we do. We make it way too big and you don?t get as much done if you?re overthinking everything anyway.

Jaime Masters: A million times over. So, with 240 something people on your team; what roles are you actually playing within it? Apparently, still working with clients that you really care about which is awesome, but what other roles do you do?

Joy Gendusa: Okay. So, I am the chief fun officer.

Jaime Masters: That?s awesome.

Joy Gendusa: I have a president who runs my whole company and she?s here and she?s been with me for 20 years and she?s absolutely gorgeous and she Skyped with me from Whole Foods to make sure that this was all set up. Anyway. So, of course, I work with her. Her husband our chief revenue officer so she doesn?t run him. I do because we?re not going to do that to them.

Jaime Masters: That?s very nice of you by the way in advance.

Joy Gendusa: Yeah, so she basically as president she runs HR, platform development because we have a lot of in-house tech that we?ve developed, and she runs my COO and all of delivery and she runs quality control. So, she?s over all of those people. And there?s a lot of them. And then, I am over her, my chief marketing officer. Obviously, I?m going to be over the chief marketing officer who?s also been with us a super-long time and her husband who?s my chief revenue officer. So, I?m right now which he was my senior VP sales for years and we just made him chief revenue officer ? is it 2019? Yes, he just got that promotion so I am the one who goes, ?Oh, we should do this? and everybody kind of looks at me like, ?We don?t have time to do that, Joy.?

And I go, ?Yeah, but it?s going to make us so much money if we do it.? That?s what I do. And then they go, ?Okay.? And then I start kind of running it and then they don?t want me to run it. They want to do it themselves. I have the most amazing people that work for me by the way. Amazing. The most amazing people on planet Earth work for me. I am so blessed. I won?t tell the story. Forget it. But anyway. The people who report to me are freaking amazing. They never say no. They never say it can?t get done. So, really hiring really good people ? any business owners out there. You need a second. You need a right arm. You need that person who believes in your vision who will back you up no matter what. Pay them well.

Give them a future. Make sure they?re part of the big picture. Nobody owns shares in my company except for me but they all know that the more I make, the more they make and they?re all very well taken care of. So, that is another piece of advice that I can give you is have that person. For me it was Melissa. She started here when she was 19. She just turned 40 in November.

Jaime Masters: Wow.

Joy Gendusa: Yeah, she?s stunning and beautiful inside and out and competent like you can?t believe. And when she came on her job interview, she wanted $11 an hour twenty years ago and I was like, ?No, I?ll pay you $9? And two weeks later I gave her the $11 even though I couldn?t afford it because I could just tell. This girl is on fire. She?s smart. She?s willing and she?ll do anything. She?ll just take responsibility for everything.

Jaime Masters: Your role is what every entrepreneur listening really wants. Like, ?Let?s do this. This sounds fun.? The visionary that goes, ?Yay.? And then your team actually goes and does it. How did you find those people? Because that?s the other piece; paying them well is great and how do you actually find the people that are that core to you that you want to bring into your company and be family?

Joy Gendusa: Okay. So, for me, a lot of it was just because I?m so happy and bursting with love that I just pull those things in. But we do know ? I can?t do all the hiring myself obviously so we use Hire Box if your listeners want to write that down. Hirebox.com. There?s a test on there that you can give. There?s a whole system of how to hire and it?s a very complex system but it weeds out people who put on interview face so that you don?t wind up hiring people that are one way in an interview and another way. It really gets to the core.

The questions that you ask in the interview process really get to the core of the person so you know who is in front of you and we get a lot of young inexperienced but super-willing, super-bright. I have this girl right now. She?s one of my account managers. She has about six account managers under her. She came to us two years ago? Maybe it was three? She was making $11 an hour for five years before that.

Jaime Masters: Wow.

Joy Gendusa: And she?s making really good money now working for me and she is a superstar. She?s a super freaking star. She?s a superstar. I?m talking about you, Andrea Howie. She gets really red if you call her out at staff meeting. Like super-duper red. She?s just amazing and she?s so responsible and smart and fast and she can multitask and handle people really well. So, when you get someone like that ? and not every single person we hire is that great. But we have a lot of them. We have a lot of these really really good people because there?s a hiring system that we use and when you spot them and at this strategy meeting that I?m in New York about to do for 2019, we will sit down and we will go through every name on the roster.

And we will write down all the little superstars or superstar potentials to make sure that we take care of those people that we interview those people personally from the top of the organizing board to make sure that they stay.

Jaime Masters: That is amazing advice. And it was hirebox.com?

Joy Gendusa: Hirebox. Yeah, hirebox.

Jaime Masters: Oh, I?m so excited. So, I wrote that down and I?m going to check that out too. We?re going to have to wrap up because I didn?t realize how much time went by and it?s actually getting dark where you are in New York.

Joy Gendusa: It is.

Jaime Masters: That?s crazy. So, I?m going to ask the last question. What is one action listeners can take this week to help move them forward towards their goal of a million?

Joy Gendusa: They should market more than they ever have ever in their lives. They should take the amount of marketing they think is a lot and they should ten times it in their mind and do that over and over again in your mind so that you can confront to actually doing it in real life. Write down every single thing that you?re doing to bring in new leads and new business and then how can I 10x that? How can I 10 times that in quantity? Quantity, quantity, quantity. That is what it takes. Yes, deliver terrific product. Take really good care of your customers.

I?m sure you?re all doing that and the thing you?re not doing is the marketing in the correct quantity.

Jaime Masters: I love this. Let?s make 2019 better for everyone. So, listen to what Joy says, please and check out postcardmania.com. I know you have offers and stuff like that on a piece of paper for the people that I?m supposed to remind you about.

Joy Gendusa: I do. Thank you. Thank you, thank you. Okay. So, if you?re listening to this and you want a free copy of my book, Postcard Marketing in an Online World: Success Simplified. That?s the name of my book. You can get that at postcardmania.com/podcast. And we also have a huge offer. For people who ? and I love this offer that my team came up with. But basically, we reward people who don?t just do this guerilla crazy one shot here, one shot there type of marketing where they stick to a campaign. So, if you sign up for a six-month campaign at my company; we will give you 25 percent off.

Jaime Masters: That?s awesome.

Joy Gendusa: And you have to go to ? nope, that?s the wrong link. Postcardmania.com/ -- what is the name of your program? Because she wrote it down wrong here. Eventual Millionaire, right?

Jaime Masters: Yes, it is.

Joy Gendusa: Right. So, it?s probably postcardmania.com/eventualmillionaire but I think if you just call. I?m going to give you a phone number. This is the best way to get that 25 percent off. I?m going to give you a special call tracking phone number so we know that it came from Jaime?s podcast so please use this phone number. 844-573-8085 and just say, ?I listened to Eventual Millionaire and I want a six-month campaign so give me my discount.?

Jaime Masters: I love it and we?ll make sure we add that to the notes so if people are driving right now, they don?t have to write anything down. Exactly. Exactly. Thank you so much, Joy. I love your energy. It?s so awesome to be able to have you back on the show.

Joy Gendusa: It was my pleasure and you are gorgeous and have so much energy as well so it was very fun doing it this way instead of just on a telephone.

Jaime Masters: Like last time. Yes, thank you so much. I appreciate it. Have an amazing day.

Joy Gendusa: Thank you. You too. Bye.

Tags: business podcast, Entrepreneurship, how to create a marketing team, jaime masters, Joy Gendusa, post card business, postcardmania, startup entrepreneur

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