Brief Overview

I could tell something wasn’t right when my wife joined me on stage. But I didn’t find out what was happening until we got backstage. It’s a GREAT example of how amazing a community of people can be.

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Backstory

In episode 75 of the Marketing Your Business Podcast, I gave you a behind the scenes look at a huge risk that we took as a company. But a huge risk that had a huge return. So, we invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in crafting this amazing experience at out live event and it returned nearly two million dollars back.

But here’s what I didn’t tell you about that event. After the first day, my wife came up on stage and we did a fundraiser for our charity. It was amazing and we raised a ton of money for our non profit Village Impact. But when I brought my wife up on stage, I could tell something was off.

After the fundraiser, we went backstage and I noticed two of Amy’s friends were there. And then all of a sudden, I see another friend of ours, Susan Garrett, along with her friend Linda—who were both frantically looking at their phones. And then my wife Amy sat down on the couch and started to cry.

I was like “What’s going on?!” She said, “I couldn’t tell you beforehand, but right before I went on stage I found out that Kelly ran away.” Kelly was our brand new dog that we had literally got at the beginning of that week.

Amy and I were at this event and the person who was house sitting for us, they opened the door and the dog just bolted. It was a total fluke accident but the dog was loose in a neighbourhood that she’s only known for a few days – so as you can imagine, she was quite scared. And so my wife was just a ball of emotions and tears.

In the end, here’s what ended up happening. Susan Garrett (the lady backstage at our event) is a world renowned dog trainer. She has an audience of tens of thousands of people and they are tremendously loyal to her because what she teaches just works. So many people have just benefited from all of the great information that Susan shares and she’s just incredibly generous with her community. She just loves her people and they love her back. And so she makes a post to her community and she said, “This dog is lost. If anybody is in this area and is open and willing to help try and find the dog, please let me know. We’re going to put a unit together and we’re going to search and find the dog.”

And literally within minutes that Susan had made this post, it had 200+ shares from within her community. And then this group of people, strangers I had never met, who were in Susan’s community, came together and offered their help. So we had this team of people who are open and willing to go and help search for the dog.

Four hours later, I got a text message that read “We found Kelly!”

Big Ideas

Show Up For Them and They’ll Show Up For You [08:45]

Oftentimes when we think of building an amazing community, we think about it from a business perspective. But you just never know when that community will step up and in this case, it wasn’t necessarily our community. It was Susan Garrett’s community that stepped up. And the lesson for all of us… When you show up for them, they’ll show up for you!

When You Need Help, Ask For Help [09:50]

When help is offered, accept the help. Sometimes it’s so easy for us as entrepreneurs and driven people to put our head down and convince ourselves that we can figure it out on our own. But sometimes, the best thing that you can do is to ask you community for help – and when it’s offered accept it!

The Power of Building Community [10:48]

Thank you in a huge way to Susan Garrett and Linda Orton-Hill who were instrumental in coordinating Susan’s community to help us track down Kelly. It had a happy ending in the end and we’re so grateful for it. But this story just demonstrates the power of building community.

So, when we’re thinking about our products and services, the reality of it is that community forms not just because of the products or services we offer. Yes, it’s a common bond, but at the end of the day, we’re people. We’re people who are helping people.

I want you to think bigger about you and your business and the people that you serve. And think about this as a community of people. Think about this as your own tribe. Because a tribe shows up for each other. You show up for them, and they will show up for you. And this is exactly what happened in our case when our little puppy Kelly decided to go for a stroll through the neighborhood. That stroll turned into a terrifying dash around town, but we found her. All is good and it’s a happy ending – but it demonstrates the power of an amazing community.

Memorable Quote

“When you show up for them, they’ll show up for you.” – Stu McLaren

Resources

MYB 075: Huge Risk, But HUGE Return
SusanGarrett.com

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