Ep. #826 - How to Measure Customer Experience

00:00.96
Andrew Morgans
What’s up hustlers welcome back. This is Andrew Morgans founder of Marknology here is today’s host of Startup Hustle covering all things e-commerce Amazon startups you name it today. We’re gonna be talking about how to measure customer experience before I introduce you to today’s guests love to give a shout out to our sponsor that made this entire thing possible today’s episode of Startup Hustle is sponsored by canva where you go to collaborate and create amazing graphic design for free whether it’s a presentation to share an idea a video to launch your business or a social post to start a conversation. With canva you can design anything discover the magic of visual communication and how canva helps you create a lasting impact today visit http://canva.com to learn more must see if I get this name right? just because the spelling looks crazy John De Pipo welcome to the show.

00:48.56
John
Okay, thanks a lot Andrew it’s I’m happy to be here and you set up perfectly. You nailed it.

00:52.32
Andrew Morgans
Got it and thank you. You could be surprised how in 1 minute you can just forget a pronunciation you see it again and you’re like oh my god so I always like to nail that. So. Thanks. Um, super excited to have you on the show. We’ve waited a long time to get you on here I know you said this is. Um, you know, not something you normally do so I’m super thankful to have you on the show and get your story today. Um in in normal startup puzzle fashion I love just starting. You know, getting to know you getting to know kind of your origins like how you got into entrepreneurship.

01:11.30
John
Yeah, sure.

01:23.29
Andrew Morgans
You know, ah you know your company loyalty loop I know that that’s not your first and it’s not the first you know the first thing that you started or been involved in so let’s go as far back as you want. Um, when did you first think about being an entrepreneur or even know what that was.

01:36.73
John
Yeah, it’s a great question when I think about that I think back to when I was a kid I was blessed by the fact that my grandfather actually had a business he had a car dealership and he was an entrepreneur back in the 30 s selling used cars when that was a big thing.

01:44.64
Andrew Morgans
Okay.

01:53.40
John
And then eventually he became a pontiac dealer for those of us who remember the brand pontiac and so I grew up. Yeah perfect I had plenty of them because I grew up kind of on that car lot and being around that business I think that’s where I got my first passion for business and watching what my grandfather did and how he did it that sort of set the stage.

01:55.96
Andrew Morgans
I Do add a grand am.

02:12.76
John
And that stuck with me. There were a lot of lessons that I learned from him just watching that business operate. Um when I went to school so actually let me tell you that there was that point when he came to me when I was probably about 14 years old. He said hey John do you want to be involved in the business and. To this day I regret what I said because I probably want to be an astronaut or a doctor or whatever it was but I didn’t want to be involved in the car business and I said no and so at that point he sold to his partner and you know we kept being involved in the business but I never personally got into it after college you know I worked throughout college.

02:42.57
Andrew Morgans
Okay.

02:46.10
John
But you know I think there’s something magical there about working in a family business and so I regret that decision but I went Yeah, it’s it’s.

02:49.85
Andrew Morgans
Do you I don’t know if you know but Marinology is a family business. So um, um, a lot of people don’t you know that’s not something I guess growing up that the people would recommend that you would hear like oh working with business family is amazing. Um, but I feel like what we have here is awesome and it’s incredible. So.

03:06.13
John
Yeah, something special right? because if you’re if you’re stepping into a business that had gone through all the pains that we know businesses go through and you’re able to benefit from that effort. You know, standing on the shoulders of Giants basically right others have been able to do something with a business now to your turn. That’s an amazing thing most entrepreneurs don’t get that.

03:08.29
Andrew Morgans
I connected with that.

03:24.19
Andrew Morgans
A.

03:26.90
John
Right? You’re really starting from scratch. Um, but that’s I think where the roots of my interest in business and entrepreneurship came from is from my grandfather but then it really got honed I guess when I came out of college I came out of school with a computer science degree.

03:31.14
Andrew Morgans
Okay.

03:40.90
Andrew Morgans
Okay, cool.

03:43.34
John
And I literally went into computer science I’m an older guy so I came out of college in 87 ah so you can do the math on that I’m in my fifty s but when I came out of school ah, the computer industry was still very very young, the personal computer industry was really young and the reason I went into computer science.

03:46.43
Andrew Morgans
Okay.

04:00.83
John
Is I wanted to have an understanding of the underlying technology of what’s involved in doing programming and technology because I had a hunch like everybody did at that time that this personal computer thing was going to be big and so I put myself in a position where I got it active out of school in a sales role and my goal was to find my way to an oem.

04:10.98
Andrew Morgans
Yeah.

04:21.70
John
Electronics Manufacture and I did I Yes sure. Yeah.

04:21.27
Andrew Morgans
Can we so can we can I ask a question right? there like so I’m a computer science major I’m now in ecommerce I don’t use that but I feel like it really helped me as far as like reverse engineering and thinking you know, problematic auditing and editing and you know programs stuff like that. Um. There weren’t a lot of options even when I was in school when I started you know two thousand I won’t say like I got out I graduated high school in oh four. So I think I started college in o five ah 6 um, there still weren’t options there like it was security tech. Like programming very broad. You know, very broad strokes. You’re learning a little bit about everything. Um I happened to grow up on computers like really young, my dad was like ah we didn’t have a lot we were missionaries we did all kinds of stuff but my dad was super interested in computers and so he had 1 at home. You know, um.

04:56.28
John
Yep.

05:09.37
John
O o.

05:14.82
Andrew Morgans
What was like I guess when I’m saying whenever you got it out of school. What was a computer was there like at home computers at that time could people afford it.

05:19.53
John
So the state. Yeah, the state of the market was people probably didn’t have the personal computer yet they had earlier computers like when I was a younger guy I remember you know early computers like the commodore 64 and you know those really early variations. But what happened when I was in school. Is the pc took root and the entire um notion of open computing you know industry standard architectures back in the day and that gave birth to all the peripheral companies and it just caught on fire right? And as that market developed when I was first selling computers.

05:38.99
Andrew Morgans
Um, okay.

05:56.94
John
The a t was just introduced and they were selling at I don’t know four or $5000 apiece so not everybody was buying them but in a very short amount of time as we all have now learned the price of computers dropped rapidly and became widely available to anybody. But the point is that I had a.

06:00.51
Andrew Morgans
Me.

06:15.68
John
Ah, feeling that that was a good place to position myself for a career and so I got involved and then ah ironically there was this electronics manufacturer right in my backyard here in Rhode Island and and the company was still very young, but it was growing quickly.

06:23.85
Andrew Morgans
Okay.

06:31.58
John
And it was an electronics manufacturer we were actually building electronics in Rhode Island during the 80 s which was unheard of and highly profitable. Ah, the company was called american power conversion or Apc and if you look under your desk or go into a closet someplace where you have technology gear.

06:42.31
Andrew Morgans
Okay. Power Supply I’ve seen it.

06:50.19
John
Most likely you’re going to find 1 of our products in our brand apc and ah so I was very blessed by the fact that I was involved in that company early on they had just come off their ipo but they were like 20000000 in sales and so I cut my teeth there and it was a very entrepreneurial organization. We had a really great Ceo who had instilled entrepreneurial spirit all throughout the company and we just operated even as we became a billion-dollar company. We still operated largely like an entrepreneurial an entrepreneurial place. You know with that kind of thinking and mentality. Um, so it was a lot of fun. That’s where I cut my teeth and then eventually I went on did my own startups.

07:26.16
Andrew Morgans
So what did what did you do There were you in sales were you.

07:27.28
John
Some that did well some that did not do well at Apc I had a lot of different roles I started off in a sales capacity ah sales role and then I started opening up new markets for the company looking at new areas to distribute our products biz dev stuff. Yeah, exactly.

07:40.77
Andrew Morgans
Biz Dev bidsev. Okay, so.

07:44.14
John
Then I started opening up channels of distribution. So I took the company into what we called the Mass Consumer channels because in the early computer days. They were sold through dealers and distributors. But there was a point in time where the large box guys were coming back online large box companies like the best buys.

07:53.38
Andrew Morgans
1

08:03.47
John
The Comp Usa’s that are no, you know places like that that became circuit City right? All those guys including catalog Now this is all pre-internet days right? So I opened up. Ah yeah, it’s good stuff.

08:04.26
Andrew Morgans
Like Circuit city.

08:10.23
Andrew Morgans
I Used to get the micro center like catalog with my dad we built them because we couldn’t afford it get it done. You know So we’d go through those catalogs and kind of like build out our ideal Pc you know? yeah.

08:22.64
John
Yeah, totally nerdy stuff and I love it. Yeah I love that stuff and so yeah I ended up helping to open up those channels. We had to conceive new products to bring through those channels so we opened up big box. We opened up the the warehouse clubs we opened up the computer. Ah, large format computer places like the softwarehouse comp usa’s and then catalogs it was. It was a really interesting time and eventually I ended up getting promoted into the Vp of marketing overseeing our product and product development I was an office of the corporation for a while and then um in.

08:50.85
Andrew Morgans
Wow.

08:58.84
Andrew Morgans
Stop here.

08:58.89
John
Then this thing happened called the internet and I remember vividly being in a leadership meeting where our Ceo at the time he pulled out an article from the wall street journal and read it to us because we were all amazed that a company was going to sell books online I think you could probably guess who that company is right.

09:12.90
Andrew Morgans
Um, and yes, let’s.

09:17.96
John
And so it was really fascinating and that caught my attention and so I ended up getting involved in starting up I left the company and I started up a software company that was focused on building embedded systems to enable non-computer devices to access the internet today. It’s all commonplace right tablets and phones. Ah, and so we were building software like that that was one of my startups that I did that one unfortunately was not a success. Um, it was a first one and there was I tell this story because it’s a very painful one. But when you’re when at least when I’m looking at businesses. You always try to have a lot of different outs.

09:42.57
Andrew Morgans
That’s the first one.

09:53.20
Andrew Morgans
The.

09:54.19
John
If you will right? So you have your trajectory you know the path you’re on but you always have backup paths and I had a number of backup paths with what our services were doing and what we were selling. The 1 thing I did not anticipate was nine eleven so when Nine eleven occurred it essentially shut down. The roadmap that I was operating on right? Every business was looking at deploying non-computer technologies at the time right? We’re talking about a point in time where you’re in the late 90 s early 2000 s right and we’re we’re selling to oems that are trying to figure out how to deploy noncomputers tablets.

10:23.37
Andrew Morgans
To that.

10:31.73
John
Point up, you know with very specific devices and it’s at a point in time where Broadband was still not broadly available. Flash technology was not very affordable. Embedded systems were not the easiest right? So all that stuff is what we were developing and building. It was pretty impressive. We had a complete stack of software I I believe it fit.

10:37.10
Andrew Morgans
Me is why.

10:51.50
John
I want to say under under sixteen megabytes everything with browser all the middleware. Not even small in that but we will work with these oems that were operating on their future of their roadmap right? that section of their roadmap for future devices when Nine Eleven hit

11:07.11
Andrew Morgans
Me.

11:10.54
John
It just wiped out that entire part of the roadmap. Everybody retreated went back to their core and that essentially put me in turmoil and so I ended up having to put that business down and it’s one of those incredible lessons that you learn from doing startups that you’re not going to have a home run every single time.

11:11.90
Andrew Morgans
Yeah, but.

11:26.10
Andrew Morgans
You haven’t.

11:28.80
John
You’re going to have some failures you’re going to strike out sometimes at the plate and so from my point of view being involved in startups and advice that I give to other entrepreneurs. It’s really about that batting average.

11:34.90
Andrew Morgans
Yeah let’s stop there for a second because I just have like 1 you just shared a ton and that’s fire 1 of it being like oh my god the experience you get as a young employee or or an older employee. Whatever working on a startup you went from sales to proc development to. Biz dev to Vp of marketing to creating new channels like if you take that to your startup the next one. That’s yours ready to go because you were so you know trading hours for revenue at that startup you know where but you were getting so much experience you know and I know you can’t plan that but to like people that are listening is like.

12:08.60
John
Yeah.

12:13.71
Andrew Morgans
You can choose where you work even if you are working in 9 to 5 to put you in a position to be at a place where they’ll allow you to grow and you just can’t get that at these you know I see a lot of people go to Amazon so that they can leave and it’s the stepping like Amazon corporate go there amazonians they become amazonians once they leave and so people are like oh my god I want someone that used to work there. But Amazon Amazon they’re a silo I mean you know so you can go to a startup in ecommerce and get way more information than you’d ever get about ecommerce and working at Amazon for example, so completely different there um to your thing I had that kind of fear. Ah.

12:40.79
John
Totally yeah.

12:49.93
Andrew Morgans
Marnology is my first startup if you don’t count my mowing business if you don’t count ah like my band days and I was all in as being a professional musician and those those count but like marknology was my one I went all in um, you know and now.

12:56.10
John
You got to count those Andrew those are important ones right.

13:07.85
Andrew Morgans
Tons of failures within markology don’t get me wrong just like failing forward more so and and that was early in an industry before everyone caught up in regards to like even getting paid for what we do and things like that. Well the pandemic. Okay so the pandemic similar to 9 9 11 um, in that everyone pulled back. So yeah, now we’re in 2022 but you know I was growing growing growing and then in you know 2020 hit and we went from like signing new brands and people pushing into e-commerce and feeling confident about it to like everyone that was doing it holding holding back some companies went under some stopped. You know if this was an investment phase for them versus like ah a making money phase in e-commerce because there’s an investment phase at the beginning they were pulling back and you know in my head I’m just like am I going to be okay if I lose my identity that’s tied to this business. You know I wanted to make sure I was going to be okay like it mentally you know I was already preparing like like what if they stop paying me like what if.

13:46.53
John
E.

14:03.25
Andrew Morgans
You know the clients ah can’t get in revenue they slow to pay or it’s not that I’m losing them but they’re slow to pay or people weren’t signing up. Um now on the other side of it e-commerce is blown up and I’m busier than ever. But there is this probably like nine months of time where everyone really pulled back and um, you know, thinking about pivots.

14:21.67
John
A.

14:22.43
Andrew Morgans
They’re working a lot for me. There was you know there is but like it’s all kind of around the same space so it could have been out of my hands right? It could have been something that I’m doing everything right? or I’m like on the right industry at the right time with the right team building. Great stuff and then still it’s just entrepreneurship and you just get hit.

14:39.49
John
Yeah I’m a hundred percent and

14:40.60
Andrew Morgans
You know? So it’s a um testament to like you know to anyone that’s gone through that and to come come out of it like you know on the other side and be like okay I’m ready to go again another at bat.

14:49.42
John
I Think that’s the point I think that is the point is that while we always sit down and build the plan for success like you said stuff can happen and stuff that you can predict and plan for but then they’re the things you can’t predict and plan for. But ultimately you got to learn from it. And I think that’s a message for every entrepreneur would be entrepreneurs that you know to some degree I Always think of the entrepreneur standing on the edge looking into the abyss and they have to jump at some point you’ve got to jump if you’re going to make the commitment because you’re all in like you said and you hopefully have done enough planning to know what’s going to happen when you jump.

15:06.68
Andrew Morgans
Yep.

15:26.11
John
But some things will happen that you just can’t anticipate but as long as you’re learning from it which kind of gets back to you know what loyalty loop does to help businesses figure out feedback as long as you’re learning from the business then you’re going to come up with something valuable that hopefully let you keep going in that business or apply it to the next one.

15:29.30
Andrew Morgans
Yep.

15:40.77
Andrew Morgans
You have so you have no idea how many businesses like I’ve worked with through the years where it’s just like so surprising to me owners or founders or people very involved in their business. Whoever I’m talking to and there’s just this like lack of desire to be better. In their business where you know whether it’s reviews and we’re like hey guys like we keep getting bottles that are breaking on their way to Amazon or and it’s leaking into other people’s packages or we’re getting feedback on this or you know we’re getting insights. This could be better or like can we can we like our photos need to be better. We’ve only spent five bucks and someone’s cousin did them or something you know it’s like. And there’s just not this desire to invest into their brand or their product or their company to make it better like you know like I’m not trying to exit marknology. Even though there’s a lot of people pursuing because to me it’s like I haven’t been building this to exit. It’s not I’ve been investing back into the things to make it better. Not positioning it for exit right in that regard. Um.

16:35.65
John
Ah, but I think that well that’s that’s you’re you’re doing the right thing right? If you’re building a business for exit then you’re probably building it for the wrong reasons you build a business to solve customer problems and be great at what you do and then the exit happens. Automatically, if you’re building a great business. But if you’re.

16:37.59
Andrew Morgans
Because I want to be better.

16:46.15
Andrew Morgans
So.

16:53.71
John
Building a business purely for exit. You’re probably approaching it incorrectly at least in my opinion.

16:57.00
Andrew Morgans
Yeah, will you’d be surprised in the Amazon space at least the e-commerce space. There’s a lot of that happening or at least a lot of that mindset towards that and and I understand that level I understand there can be like a million sides to to anything but for me. It’s been. You know we’ve invested in areas to make things better that don’t necessarily ah you know draw a straight line to revenue or to roi or to you know Kpis these are things that we’re doing because it’s the right thing to do for the product or for the people or whatever. So um, yeah.

17:18.41
John
Yeah.

17:29.31
John
You’re on the right path I mean that granted everything you do you have to put some quantification around you. You got to look at the math and and the finances but you know from my point of view in in the business that I’m in which is helping other businesses. Deliver. Great customer experiences by measuring and understanding what they’re doing and learning from that feedback. End of the day you’ve got to do right by the customer right? You’ve got to create a Wow factor. It’s not good enough just to satisfy a customer. You’ve got to really wow them. You got to they got to feel like there’s a reason why I’m going to do business with you right? and so to your point if a business is not thinking about how to improve.

17:59.88
Andrew Morgans
Yep.

18:06.47
John
A good chance. They’re going to be in trouble at some point now. The cool thing is an entrepreneur or a business owner. They get to make those decisions if if they want to do status quo nothing wrong with it but understand the consequence of status quo right? There’s probably another business. That’s not status quo that’s trying to be the best and they’re going to Wow customers.

18:11.92
Andrew Morgans
Thank yeah, if they that.

18:25.94
John
And you might lose share because of that.

18:26.64
Andrew Morgans
And for anyone listening if you don’t care and you want to be status quo. We’re not a good fit I’ll just get that out there. You know like it’s just we’re gonna be frustrated you know and I think you just got to find that flow. You know you gotta find like that’s something I’m in is just like.

18:30.66
John
Um, yeah I think yeah.

18:43.20
Andrew Morgans
You know we’re busy, we’re growing. We’re doing our thing for me. It’s all about dialing in who our exact customer is the ones that are you know pursuing that that loyalty loop that are pursuing that you know customer customer retention that want to be with partners long term that are um. It’s just what what I enjoy building I’m a brand builder and brands aren’t something that you like you approach half hazard. You know it’s something you go all in on with your belief with your culture. Um I want to take you to the next one because I can talk about that all day I’m a firm believer but like we’re talking about so that one blew up Nine Eleven happened

19:15.10
John
E.

19:17.35
Andrew Morgans
And you’re like okay so what was what was happening then when that happened.

19:19.71
John
Yeah, we just you keep going. You look for the next opportunity and at that point in my personal life I had 2 daughters. We’ve got at the time the girls were young and so I got very involved in their education and both of my girls went to a montessori school.

19:33.30
Andrew Morgans
Okay, but.

19:38.82
John
And if anybody knows what a montessori school is. It’s nothing funky or weird. It’s just a different methodology. That’s really about ah the child centered on the child and how that child learns and my wife who’s a ph d in computer science. She’s the chairperson at the university of Rhode Island for computer science. She and I being nerds. We got actively involved in this kind of stuff so I had time and I threw myself at their schooling and their school was it. It didn’t go any further than third grade and there were a few other colleagues of mine from apc 1 in particular who she decided.

20:06.20
Andrew Morgans
So.

20:14.22
John
Her child was in the school as well and she wouldn’t it be great for us to start a school that goes beyond third grade and so she initiated she was the entrepreneur that started the whole thing but then she drew others in like me and other you know entrepreneurly minded people and we got a school started out in the middle of the woods because we had to go find a location and.

20:29.56
Andrew Morgans
3

20:32.21
John
Both of my girls were sort of founding students and I volunteered to help and run the school for a couple first few years and cut the grass and do all those things and now the school is highly successful. it’s ah yeah it’s it’s a great montessori school called Quest Montessori school it’s a narragans Rhode Island

20:44.76
Andrew Morgans
That’s incredible.

20:50.41
John
And I think they’ve got a waitlist in the 150 kids or whatever the number but it’s ah it’s a wonderful story. So I threw myself at that. Ah, and.

20:55.80
Andrew Morgans
The best things are made the best things are made by people solving a problem for like people. They love It. Doesn’t have to be people. They love right? but I work with a lot of products and brands and whatever and a lot of them come from someone trying to help themselves like let’s say it’s a dietary a food thing or a supplement or ah, a vitamin Or. Um, let’s say here in Kans City We have Mobility designed I’ll give them a shout-out, but it was made by a son for his dad to help him move around and have a better quality of life and or like your kids to get a better education. You know I’m one of those kids that like ah maybe on paper in an American school I don’t test out that well you know I was raised in Africafka ti.

21:18.77
John
E eight.

21:33.51
Andrew Morgans
2001 um but my mom cared a lot and she homeschooled me and she taught me how I needed to learn right? and now later in life is it really? So it’s really served me um, but you know I was reading at 3 years old but like didn’t fit in well a kindergarten mainly because I was african.

21:48.95
John
Chip.

21:52.55
Andrew Morgans
And then ah you know different times in life like testing out and even the acts or sats because I came back as a junior in high school I Just like based on the American the Western system I didn’t look that smart or test out that smart or you know get those opportunities. Well it wasn’t until almost after college because computer science I could even like blink and not even try and.

22:02.49
John
A.

22:12.38
Andrew Morgans
Pass those courses to be honest with you? Um, but after college I found out Wow I am and um, I’m an amazing student if it’s something if it’s taught to me in a way or I’m learning I’m um, able to learn it in a way that I can obtain the information and like I’m amazing and if it’s something that interests me I’m Obsessive. You know? so you know I know that that means like certain things. But for me if I hadn’t had a mom that tailored school towards me, you know and to solve that problem for me I don’t think I’d be here today. So I mean as a father that’s that’s amazing. Um, what you did for your kids.

22:43.34
John
That’s a great story. Yeah.

22:47.44
Andrew Morgans
And like I just I wanted to hammer that like when you’re solving a problem because it seems like the right thing to do like those are the best businesses right? still lasting today right? It’s still here today. So.

22:52.91
John
Yeah I mean that’s I think I’m probably similar to you and how I learn and but I was taught by the factory I was in public school and you know rose and you know trying to fidget and stay attention. You know pay attention was not easy when you’re young and.

23:08.19
Andrew Morgans
Made me a troublemaker you know and said.

23:11.40
John
Yeah, and but you you find your way but and I really I think what happened for me is eventually I became what the the Montessori program talks about which is you become a lifelong learner and I think that’s what I do in business if you’re not learning every day you’re probably again doing something wrong in business and so in my life. It’s always nice to learn new things and.

23:19.16
Andrew Morgans
Okay, yep. Yeah.

23:31.16
John
Discover new things. You never have all the answers. No one does and so you got to keep learning and I think you know that comes from probably watching my kids and learning about the program. But I think it’s innate. You’ve got it innate inside of you and I probably have it in me and I would imagine just but everybody does but you got to unlock it somehow.

23:46.61
Andrew Morgans
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

23:48.63
John
You know you have your store you figured out how to unlock it. But that lifelong learning really matters particularly in business and entrepreneurship.

23:55.37
Andrew Morgans
That’s why e-commerce has been so great for me is because it’s an industry and ah a thing that constantly is requiring like me to level up not the business aspect too like building markology in the agency side but ecommerce is constantly changing and it’s cut me interested for Eleven plus years you know.

24:03.39
John
Yeah, it’s always changing right? It’s It’s always evolving.

24:12.67
Andrew Morgans
Um, trying to figure it out trying to understand what some of these awesome creators made with you know the amazon marketplace or you know how those things work. Um, before we go into the next step after school I’m gonna give a shout out to our sponsor for today’s episode with canva you can design your ideas with ease get inspired with 500000 free templates.

24:18.17
John
Jeff.

24:31.16
Andrew Morgans
And a rich content library that helps you and your team achieve your goals sign up and start designing for free at http://canva.com I was listening to the canva episode actually on how I built this. It’s like a girl and her boyfriend I think and they were in like in high school and that was companies a billion dollars in just a couple of years but she just had this idea to solve. Um.

24:46.20
John
It’s awesome.

24:49.34
Andrew Morgans
Ah, like the Adobe suite and editing software is so complicated and confusing and she wanted to make it like attainable for just like anyone that wants to be a creator and can just quickly do some things on their phone and now she has a billion dollar business but her story very similar in that she was just like I want to just you know like make this attainable. She was like a school editor at high school. Think and for the yearbook it was like I want to make something that’s super easy for for people to do so. Canva. Great great sponsor for this episode and a topic we’re talking about. Um okay so school’s successful, hundred and fifty student waiting list. What’s next yeah.

25:20.12
John
Yeah, so let’s see I ended up doing a second tour of duty at Apc that’s what I like to say because the Ceo was trying to move the company into the data center space. So we made mostly power protection devices for the personal computer and networking market and the whole movement was. Heading toward consolidation to data centers. So he what he did is battery backups. You got to have it? Yeah yeah, yep.

25:40.13
Andrew Morgans
I grew up on Apc just so you know like in Africa you have to have ah the power surges. Yeah, you have to because of the power problems so we had them everywhere.

25:52.48
John
That’s one of my favorite things I’m I’m still very proud of what we did at Apc so wherever I go I always look under desks and look in closets and I always see the logo It’s it’s fun. Um, but the thing that he had pitched me on was back to entrepreneurship is kind of interesting in that he identified that the company itself. Had moved from being an entrepreneurial organization to being more process-minded and that just sort of happens naturally as ah as a business grows and gets more mature and when you try to go do the next thing the next new thing. It’s really hard to get the organization.

26:22.70
Andrew Morgans
You lose your creativity.

26:26.63
John
And so he basically explained how we lost all the entrepreneur-minded people or a lot of them and the pitch was come back and help us to make this turn and so I did I came back in and I was doing our m and a work ah for a while and I was running some divisions I had to do. We had a business that was was floundering over in Europe that I had to go fix and and get it back. Ah, you know back profitable that was an interesting one that was a manufacturer in Switzerland it’s a great company. Um, and then eventually we ended up getting acquired ourselves by a large french conglomerate.

26:57.60
Andrew Morgans
Entire.

27:01.78
John
Called Schneider Electric and I stayed with the company for a while and then I decided it was time to move on and I ended up going and running another software company that was brought in to essentially fix or Rebrand and fix the company and get an exit for its owners it. It was a great little company here in Rhode Island

27:14.93
Andrew Morgans
Okay.

27:19.99
John
In fact, well it was a great little company and there were owners involved in the company that just had been in it for like 20 years and it was a time in attendance company. Its company called adi time. Ah, and I positioned the company. You know, found ways to reposition the company. Gave it sort of a new lease on life. Um, one of the things that I did early on which relates to loyalty loop to some degree actually to a very specific degree is that I had a friend who was running a survey company at the time and I hired him to come in and help me to survey both my channel partners and my end customers. So I could get real world data to understand what was happening in the business. So I could figure out what are the appropriate moves to make based on real data and so I did that and developed some methodologies and implemented them and eventually we sold the business in a couple years to a publicly traded company and it moves on and everybody was happy. Um, the.

28:01.48
Andrew Morgans
Oh.

28:16.98
John
The interesting connection. There is my friend who had that survey software company at one point had a change in his life and he called me because he knew I had sold this other software company and he wanted me to take a look at his business an