Overview

On this episode of Build Your Network, Host Travis Chappell interviews Jesse Cole, the owner of Fans First Entertainment, in-demand speaker and author of Find Your Yellow Tux.

Topics Discussed

• About Jesse Cole
  • Featured on MSNBC, CNN and ESPN
  • Most excited to be expecting his first baby any minute!
• How did you get into sports team owner ship?
  • Went to college playing baseball.
  • Tore his shoulder his junior year.
  • Got an opportunity to work for a team as an intern selling sponsorships.
  • The owner offered him a job as a general manager at 23 years old.
  • He found out that the finances of the team were a train wreck.
  • He turned the ballgame into a circus instead of a game because the game wasn’t filling the seats.
• When you became a general manager and realized the team was a mess, how did you feel?
  • He was excited about the challenge.
  • He learned the power of dramatically being different.
  • When they came to Savannah it really took off.
• What’s next now that you’re the owner of two different franchises?
  • They turned baseball on its head.
    • All their tickets are all you can eat.
    • They have the Banana-nana’s – grandmas who dance to pop music.
  • A production company has reached out about potentially doing a documentary.
  • Just a few years ago he and his wife had major challenges before success.
• What happened in the last two years that allowed you to go from near failure to success?
  • He believes everything in business is belief.
  • Avoiding struggle is not necessarily the way to a better life.
  • Most people don’t develop grit because they want to stay comfortable.
• You can’t be successful if you’re not standing out, that’s why he wears the yellow tuxedo.
• Do you believe that what you now or who you know is more important, and why?
  • It’s who you know.
  • Before he came up he just read books and focused on what he knew.
  • In the last two years his trajectory and how much he knows has tripled because of who he knows.
  • Most people when they leave college are focused on themselves, when you shift to focusing on others, that’s when success happens.
• What are some ways you can add value to others?
  • Everything changed in 2016 when he started “the thank you experiment.”
  • In 2016 he chose to care more.
    • Every day he wrote a thank you letter to someone in his life.
    • The relationships he built in this experiment has caused him to develop amazing relationships.
  • People underestimate how much work it takes to actually get a result.
• Would you say that you’re in introvert or extrovert?
  • He’s an extrovert and networking comes easily to him.
• How has being an extrovert impacted your ability to build relationships?
  • His yellow tuxedo probably puts some people off, but you should do something to make yourself stand out.
• Do you think being an extrovert has made it more difficult to build deeper relationships?
  • As soon as you see someone who you want to talk to, go and talk to them immediately.
    • Don’t worry about what the other person is thinking.
  • If you could break it down to one networking tip, what would it be?
    • Be a connector and introduce people to other people.

The Random Round

• What profession other than your own do you think it would be fun to attempt?
  • The Cruise Director on the biggest cruise trip in the world.
• If you could sit on a park bench with anyone for an hour who would it be, and why?
  • Walt Disney
  • His vision is still standing 50 years after his death
• How do you like to consume content best, books, blogs, podcasts, or videos?
  • Books, followed by podcasts
• What is a book you’ve read that you’d highly recommend?
  • Carpenter by John Gordon
  • Everybody Matters by Bob Chapman
• What is a podcast you’d highly recommend?
  • EntreLeadership
  • The Learning Leader
• Give us a glimpse of your morning routine
  • Read
  • Write
  • Run and listen to a podcast
  • Gratitude
• What is your go-to pump up song?
  • The Greatest Showman theme song
• What are you not very good at?
  • Operations, manual labor
• What is one place where we can find you online?
  • com
  • He posts every day on LinkedIn and Facebook

Tweetable Quotes

• Once it gets easy, that’s when you have to work harder.
• You can’t be successful if you’re not standing out.
• If you win the morning, you win the day.

Resources Mentioned

Buildyournetwork.com – Podcast website

BYN.media/fb – Facebook Group

Findyouryellowtux.com – Jesse’s website

Business Done Differently – Jesse’s podcast

Findyouryellowtux.com/byn – get your free download