Effective Leadership for Entrepreneurs: Empathy, SOPs, and Growth with Yoon Cannon

Ever found yourself burning out as a business owner, struggling to maintain balance while pushing your company forward? In this episode, I sit down with Yoon Cannon, founder of Trustbook Media, who shares her journey navigating burnout and preserving a nurturing workplace culture. We delve into the crucial strategies she used to lead with empathy and sustain her business through challenging times.

Yoon opens up about the emotional rollercoaster of selling multiple businesses while fostering a family-like environment. We explore actionable insights into combating burnout, including effective time auditing, crafting detailed Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), and refining marketing strategies to build sustainable growth.

Additionally, we uncover the secrets to effective sales enablement in enterprise environments, discussing tailored lead magnets and continuous learning in digital marketing. This episode is a must-listen for any entrepreneur looking to enhance their leadership skills, achieve operational success, and foster personal well-being. Join us to discover transformative leadership principles that will empower you to thrive in today's competitive business landscape.


Books Mentioned: 

• The E-Myth by Michael E. Gerber
  
  

Visit Yoon Cannon's website at trustbookmedia.com/apply to schedule a free assessment and strategy call. Gain valuable insights into your business's strengths and challenges, and receive a personalized roadmap for growth and overcoming obstacles.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

I want to invite you to check out the Committed Mastermind, a community I help lead along with world-class leaders like JC and Karen Hite, Vinnie Fisher, and Jonathan Mast, plus incredible mentors like Dr. Gary Chapman, author of The 5 Love Languages, and many others.

This is for entrepreneurs who want to build a thriving business without sacrificing their faith, their family, or their health.

Check out the Committed Mastermind at https://committedmastermind.com/

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Transcript

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Introducing Yoon Cannon

Dr. William Attaway 1:21

It is an honor today to have Yoon Cannon with us . Yoon is the founder at Trustbook Media , a full-service digital marketing agency and paramount business coach . For the past 17 years , she's been helping seven-figure CEOs to scale their sales growth . Yoon's a faith-driven and seasoned entrepreneur . Since 1992 , she launched , turnkeyed and sold three other businesses . Her advice has been featured in Entrepreneur Magazine , fortune , money Magazine , cnn , the Wall Street Journal and the Philadelphia Business Journal . Yoon lives outside Philadelphia with her husband and three adult children , and she enjoys problem solving and rocking out to live music . Yoon , I'm so glad you're here . Thanks for being on the show .

Yoon Cannon 2:10

Oh , thanks for having me , William .

Intro / Outro 2:14

Welcome to Catalytic Leadership , the podcast designed to help leaders intentionally grow and thrive . Here is your host author and leadership and executive coach , dr William Attaway .

Dr. William Attaway 2:32

I would love for you to share some of your story with our listeners , particularly around your journey and your development as a leader . How did all this get started ?

Yoon Cannon 2:42

My development as a leader .

Yoon Cannon 2:44

Well , I would say I mean my early on really dial in your leadership style and what your values and beliefs are that are going to want people to want to work hard for you . You know and what your , your vision , you're creating . And it's really then that you know when you're trying to work with a sales team and they're largely my pay is impacted by how much I can get them to sell , but also their earning potential is certainly a large portion was commission-based when you're trying to bring out the best in your people , it is about leadership . It's not a dictator style , fear-based hey , if you don't do this , you know shape up or ship out . I mean that doesn't really work that well for the long term , but people will work hard and and have that tenacity you know going , getting getting through the , the , the challenging . You know actions of , of their role , if they really feel like they've got a leader who is caring , who cares about them and who's mentoring them , who is really there to have their back and and help bring out the best in them .

Dr. William Attaway 4:22

So that was my first experience in leadership how do you get to that point , because I see a lot of leaders struggle with what you just said , this idea of leaning into their team and seeing them as more than just what they do . Are there ideas or suggestions or tips from your journey that you would say , hey , this was something that really made a difference as I was trying to develop that skill ?

Yoon Cannon 4:44

Yeah , Well for me , because I was green and I didn't . This isn't something I studied in college per se , so I was just so open to learning and I was a voracious learner . I got my hands on , you know , every kind of leadership book and back then it was , like you know , tape cassettes . I hate to date myself .

Dr. William Attaway 5:08

I'm with you . I remember I had a bunch of tape cassettes .

Yoon Cannon 5:12

No , and just investing in . And even then , like my uncles , tape cassettes were whatever , I don't know $300 or $500 . And as a young professional , that was you know that was an investment for me . But making those investments over and over and over again to seek out learning , to invest in paying for conferences , to learn from other people needed to learn . But the good news is it's a learned skill , you can learn it and it just stays . It's a lifelong skill , I think , because it's not just for leadership in the workplace . You carry that through really in your personal life as well , whether you're a parent or you volunteer with something like a Big Brothers , big Sisters program . Your leadership skills are going to stay with you and help

The Process of Launching and Selling Businesses

Yoon Cannon 6:09

you make a bigger impact on other people's lives , workplace and personal .

Dr. William Attaway 6:14

You know , in the last 30 years you have launched and sold three businesses . Yes , that's kind of the dream of every entrepreneur right To launch something , build it and then exit and sell it . What was that process like , for you to walk through this not just once , but three times ?

Yoon Cannon 6:36

Well , the process was actually kind of agonizing , to tell you the truth , because I didn't set out to build a business that I would sell . That was really never the goal . The goal I thought was to build something I would see myself doing for 20 and 30 years . But , you know , my goals shifted . I was a mom and that shifted a lot of my goals . So the reason why I was agonizing is because I love my people .

Yoon Cannon 7:07

You know the people who worked with me , and there was a lot of tears when I had to finally share the news that hey guys , gals , by the way , I sold the business and here's the new owner .

Yoon Cannon 7:22

Let me introduce you . But there's a lot of tears from both sides because they really , you know my , one of my , I guess my leadership , the way I see I view leadership with my people , is I've always wanted to create a family culture that it's not just this cold , clinical sort of a place where , oh my gosh , you've got to be buttoned up or you can't breathe because you might be losing your job . That was never something I wanted to create . I wanted to create that family culture and because I did that's the part that made it really agonizing was that I didn't want them to feel like I was leaving them , abandoning them , and they truly are people who were , you know , are and still are near and dear to my heart . In fact , I still keep in touch with many of those folks . I can just think of a guy you know going to both his weddings and just being there for life events . So these are still relationships that have continued , you know , years past the work relationship .

Dr. William Attaway 8:32

You know our regular listeners are going to pick up on two things . You've already keyed in on that . We

Seeing People as More Than What They Do

Dr. William Attaway 8:36

talk about a lot . The first is the importance of if you really want to be catalytic as a leader , to keep and develop and maintain a teachable spirit and you've already keyed in on that this importance of understanding you don't know it all and walking into every day and every situation with open hands . What can I learn here ? How can I grow , how can I develop ? And the other thing is to see people as you're building people in teams , to see them as more than just what they do , to see them as actual 3D human beings . That sounds like something that you do intuitively . Is that true ? Or is that something you had to learn and develop ?

Yoon Cannon 9:13

It was a little bit of both . One of the things I learned early on that stayed with me consistently is that people don't care how much you know until they know how much you care , and that caring part it's sort of ingrained in my DNA anyway . So I do things . What motivates me is because I want to make a difference in people's lives . So when you want to make that difference , you've got to care about what they care about , which means you've got to find out what they care about , which means you got to find out what they care about .

Yoon Cannon 11:03

That's right . What are they into ? Who are they as people ? You've got to be able to see them , to see what makes them tick , see what their goals are . What do they want in their life ? What are the fears that they struggle with ? You know what's difficult for them . What are their sort of emotional and mental struggles that they go through ? That's what you can help them about , because work is really never just about the mechanical human condition of wanting to be purposeful and find our purpose , what we're truly designed for , finding out what those talents and skill sets are , of wanting to feel the thrill of excelling and being excellent at what you do and having someone be pushing you , constantly pushing you , to be at your best . Those are the you know . You've got to get to know your people in order to yeah , in order to bring out the best in them . Really .

Dr. William Attaway 12:19

So true . How can you bring out the best in somebody if you don't know them well ? And that's one of the advantages that we have as leaders we can invest in them , we can pour into them as we get to know them . We've talked previously and we both share that we were people of faith . That's who we are , and I read earlier that you're a faith-driven entrepreneur . How does your faith impact what you do as an entrepreneur , as a business leader ?

Yoon Cannon 12:46

How does my faith impact ? Well , I think one . It's the sense of being a servant leader , right the way you see your role , and it's not so much that , hey , they're working for me .

Yoon Cannon 13:01

I mean , yes , they are , but I'm actually working for them , and it's a tricky balance because I see it split in two different areas , whereas it's too heavy on the one and too heavy on the other . For example , I had a client who was struggling to scale his sales . He just couldn't quite get over that . He was so close , you know , to that million dollar milestone . And when I did a 360 , it wasn't just about looking at his profit and loss sheet , it wasn't just about looking at his marketing , it wasn't just about looking at his job costing , right , but it was looking at his whole organization and actually sitting in and all that . So this was an example where maybe he , he , I don't know if the servant leadership was on his mind , but this was a case where it was like , no , that's not what I mean by servant leadership . He was being too accommodating . It was really that essentially , what came across was he had . He was coming across where he needed them more than they needed him .

Yoon Cannon 14:06

So when I talk about , when I'm referencing , servant leadership , I'm working for them . It's not in that sort of tone , right ? So that's not what I mean . And it's also not the other side , where I had another company that I've worked with and worked with their sales team and the culture there was what was also hurting their sales growth . It was such a hard line on hey , you could be the top sales guy this year , but next year if you have a difficult quarter and you're not hitting your numbers , you're out Like that's just doesn't matter . If you worked here 15 years , so that part , you know that's . That's where it's like way too over on that side .

Yoon Cannon 14:53

So servant leadership to me is really getting that right in the middle . Where I'm working for them in a sense of I'm trying to . My job is to bring out the best in them and I'm working for them in a sense of that . My , my goal is to figure out you know , I the only way I succeed is by helping them succeed . Right , um , what did they need ? You know , what are they missing ? So sometimes they do need tough love . They do need a kick in the pants , that's right . Sometimes they do need warnings , performance warnings . You know that , hey , this is unacceptable and you know , maybe there's that effort . So sometimes they do need those things . So it's thinking about what do they need , what would benefit them that can help them get from where they are to where they want to be . So I hope that explains and gives some more context into how servant leadership plays out .

Dr. William Attaway 15:57

Yeah , it really does , and I love that you warn against the extremes , because I've seen that as well . And it can be so incredibly dangerous when you abdicate your leadership role , when you abdicate the responsibility that you have as the owner , as the point leader , and it's also incredibly dangerous when you micromanage and power up on everybody and everything . Neither of those is healthy . True servant leadership is a whole different ballgame . As a business coach , you work with a lot of different businesses and business leaders and owners . What are the types of business owners that you work with these days ?

Yoon Cannon 16:37

Yes , they're all privately held companies . As far as verticals , the most common verticals may fall under professional services , like law firms , market research firms . I also work with SaaS founders , tech founders and companies that have multi-locations , so those are the popular verticals .

Dr. William Attaway 17:00

Are there threads of specific challenges or pain points that you see with the people , that you work with things , that you help them navigate through ?

Yoon Cannon 17:11

Yes , well , really the number one . The only thing that they hire me for is growth . That's the goal . Growth is always the goal . And as far as challenges yes , the business challenges typically , you know for what gets in the way of growth there's

Types of Business Owners Yoon Works With

Yoon Cannon 17:27

three core challenges . We need to generate more leads . Second challenge we need to convert more of those leads into customers . And then the third challenge would be okay , now we've got that , but now we've got to scale . So how can we expand our sales team ? Those are basically the three main challenges that I see and I deal with . As far as pain points because of those challenges that flow of leads and sales and a sales team that expands .

Yoon Cannon 17:55

How it impacts them is well , they're working too many hours . They are missing out on their family . That's where it's really hitting them right . They're spread too thin because the business operations is relying too heavily on them , and so you know that's gonna , that's gonna stir up a lot of emotional struggles because they get super frustrated . Naturally , this is just a normal thing . They're frustrated because they're stuck struggling to hit their growth goals . You know , on their own , like that . So that's really the common story .

Yoon Cannon 18:45

And where , again , my heart comes in is what I see and the change and the transformation that motivates me . It's not just about numbers on an Excel sheet of oh yeah , we helped you boost sales by $6 million . It's really not about sales by $6 million . It's really not about I am results-driven . Of course , I have to keep my eye on the numbers and there's got to be an ROI . I get it . That's what I'm driven by data . But really what ? What motivates me is the story of again changing the opportunity to change their lives , because it does change their lives .

Yoon Cannon 19:25

I have a CEO , for example . When he came to me , he just hit a ceiling . He's a tech company owner and he hit a ceiling at 3 million . He just struggled and struggled and struggled to get past that . So he's feeling like the business operations . He's the main person who makes business happen . He tried to hire three sales guys and they just could . The three of them together couldn't match what he was doing .

Yoon Cannon 19:52

It was his home life . He had three young daughters a wife who felt neglected . She felt like she was a single mom felt neglected . She felt like she was a single mom . His girls kind of looked at him as the absent dad . He was missing out on their school activities . He gets home barely enough time to kiss them good night and that's it . So what kind of life is that ?

Yoon Cannon 20:15

That's what I get excited about making a difference , because when we fix the components of your lead gen , your sales acquisition , your sales team , and then thereby getting the business to stop relying , you know , so heavily on you , having to be there 50 , 60 , 70 hours a week , that trickles over , you know , into your , your home life , home life , your family life .

Yoon Cannon 20:42

I hope that paints a picture and it's just common , right ? I find it's a similar story time and time again . Now I also have clients where they're not raising young families , but they want to be able to sell their company , right , because they spent 30 plus years growing this organization and now they're ready to retire , but they're going . Oh my gosh , I want to have a nest egg to retire , and how can I get someone to buy this company ? And right now , before I get brought in , it might be not quite ready , the valuation might not be as appealing to be able to do the type of exit that they want to do . But again , it's still about how that impacts their life , and that's what I care about helping them achieve .

Dr. William Attaway 21:33

I think there's so many connect points between the things that you've talked about . Some of the listeners may not be connecting directly , but when you are the center of the spider web as the owner , where every decision has to come to you , where everybody you're the answer person , right , everybody has to come get their answers from you and you have to be involved in everything and have your hands on everything , it demands those 50 , 60 , 70 hour weeks because you're in it all the time and when that is true , you do not have a sellable asset in your company . Because you are the center of the spider web and it sounds like that , you help people to remove and extricate themselves from that position , building the systems in place that then will move this into the space of being something that is sellable , and I think that's so healthy and so needed .

Yoon Cannon 22:23

Thank you , I do too .

Dr. William Attaway 22:28

I'm curious . I know a lot of people listening are thinking , wow , okay , so I can recognize a couple of these things in my life . Maybe it's the the overwork , maybe it's the challenges at home , maybe it's . Yeah , everybody does come to me all the time wanting answers all the time and my Slack is blowing up , my texts are blowing up . How do I begin to troubleshoot this ? How can they begin to troubleshoot their own business ?

Yoon Cannon 22:56

Yeah , I mean one of the first things I do when I work with a client who's overwhelmed with too many things everything screams . Now I have them just audit their time . I give them a template that I created that really helps them itemize where their time is going . And if you had to write yourself a job description , what are you actually spending your time doing ? And then evaluating each week which of this really belongs on a CEO job description and what are the low level activities . I'm doing that really I could hire somebody , um , at $50 an hour , $30 an hour , $10 an hour even . You'd be surprised how many $10 an hourly kind of a thing is on um the to-do list . But outside of that , I mean , really it's about okay . Well , I don't know how to teach them how to do what I do , great . So then we create SOPs . Let's break it down and reduce it to the ridiculous .

Yoon Cannon 23:48

So what's challenging for the founder would be there's a lot of things that just come in neatly to them , you know , and they don't have to think about it . It's like somebody who can dance . They can't really figure out . How do I teach somebody how to dance when I can't ? It's hard to break that down . Well , we have to break it down , um , so I'll I help them be able to reduce it to like an , a checklist for dummies . You know , if you had to just itemize step by step by step how to do something and it , and we create that together , right ? Uh , so we do the SOPs and a lot of times , you know they'll create the SOPs and then I'll just look at it and most of the time I look at their SOPs and it's just not as granular , right , that it needs to be to be able to train somebody . So then the next big constraint and angst would be oh , but you know , right now we just don't have the cash flow to be able to hire , you know , for that role . If I want to higher level talent , where I'm not going to sit there and be that granular , well , okay , great . So if you want somebody who can do their own critical thinking and they show up with those skills that you need to take over and manage and that sort of thing , yes , you need to be able to have the salary for that . So where do you get the cash flow ? Well , if they don't want to fundraise , if they don't want to take out you know , business loans , then you need to generate more business right .

Yoon Cannon 25:07

Generating more business , then the first thing to dial in is your marketing and that's why I ended up evolving from you know the past 17 years working so closely inside companies and organizations on their sales . It also evolved in recent years to then just launching our digital marketing agency . The conversation time and time again was okay . Here's the solution we need more marketing . We need marketing that works 24-7 behind the scenes to be able to generate a steady flow of leads and it's predictable scenes to be able to generate a steady flow of leads and it's predictable .

Yoon Cannon 25:43

So what I was finding was my clients would be outsourcing it to agencies or sometimes hiring in-house , sometimes doing both , and then we would spend a lot of time . They would be bringing their marketing campaigns to me saying let me get your eye on that , and the trend constantly was I was surprised . I didn't expect to see this trend . We were spending more time because I was spending more time with them picking apart missed opportunities , sloppy mistakes , not the best strategy , doing things the long way in marketing and the wrong way sometimes . So all of that and I'm going . Oh my gosh , it's kind of like revising an essay . Sometimes it takes more work to revise it than just write a new one , right ?

Effective Marketing in Generating Leads and Scaling

Yoon Cannon 26:31

So that's what birthed to be able to give them an option . Hey guys , you could pay me to spend half my time with you picking apart and fixing the marketing that the other agencies are doing . Or , if you want to , you know what , you could just leverage my team to get the marketing done for you and I'll just design it from scratch , customize for you any you know factors that's going to hurt your conversions . So that's what birthed it . So now you know it's really holistic where , hey , they don't have to do both . It's just if they want to utilize us for getting the marketing done for them and they also want to work on focusing out there , you know , building out a sales team or taking their current sales team and really just optimizing their results . But they have both now , and that's what I feel good about , where before I felt like I was kind of leaving them hanging of , you know , sending them out to just look for whoever , and if they choose to still continue with other agencies , that's great too . But I find it boomerangs back to our conversations and we take a look at it and and then just find missed opportunities , like I .

Yoon Cannon 27:52

I have a another tech client where , before he hired me anyway to to work together , he was already using another agency , which was fine . But again he was so worried because when he hired his sales team , they have to self-generate leads and it's a long sales cycle and of course he's holding his breath going oh my gosh , I have to wait a year to find out if the base salary that I'm paying these three people I'm taking a huge financial hit and I got to wait a year to find out if they're going to be any good at not only generating their own leads but closing these deals and negotiating , landing these accounts and retaining them . So this is where we had to focus on OK , well , how do we remove that fear ? How do we mitigate some of that risk ? And it was well , let's focus on corporate leads as far as there's self-generated leads that they have to do , but then there's also company-generated leads . So we worked out the sales incentive was that they got like a lesser commission rate for company-generated leads , but it was also a better safe plan , a safety net for the new sales hires , because they felt like I I'm still going to be able to get business coming in the door from company generated leads Great .

Yoon Cannon 29:09

So we took , took a look at what his previous agency was doing and , just you know , finding finding missed opportunities , you know , like there was nothing to give . I said , okay , well , if I'm the SDR and I'm going to go out and do some account-based marketing and I want to reach out and get somebody's attention , the message that no longer works is right off the bat . Hey , my name is , I work for this company and can we get on a calendar to chat ? That is , you're going to have to do so much volume around that and then get this reputation of being a spammer , maybe , but anyway , I said , well , why don't they have specific lead magnets for the customer personas ? And he said , oh yeah , the agency already did that . Well , what we looked at was

Building Trust and Authority in Marketing, Sales, and Leadership

Yoon Cannon 29:57

and I'm not here to bash and I apologize , I don't want to , certainly don't want to come across . That was and I'm not here to bash and I apologize , I don't want to uh , certainly don't want to come across that they had two lead magnets , except I wouldn't call them a lead magnet , because it was .

Yoon Cannon 30:07

They offered a PDF , but there was no exchange of email or permission to contact me . Right , it was just click on this and then they did Google , you know , um , pixels , to , to , to just follow them around with ads , which is fine , you can do that . But it's got good , better , best , you know , it's better if we can get the person , the potential lead , to give us their email address . So I don't have to go to zoom info and pay zoom info to go get that information . And we can do speed to lead . Following them around and showing ads is fine , but it's also just not speed to lead . So we have a speed to lead program now where I even work out their whole tech stack .

Yoon Cannon 30:53

So they have a CRM system that as soon as somebody opts in , they give them their email address . But we also say get their cell phone right To text them additional information . And then speed to lead means they got the download in . They give them their email address , but we also say , um , get their cell phone right To text them , uh , additional information . And then speed to lead means they got the download . They get the email right away . They get an email autoresponder series right away to follow up and do a trust nurture sequence , not a cell um sequence . And then they get a cell , they get a text and as soon as the SDR knows that , he gets notified or she gets notified when they open up something you can get on the phone while that person's brain is thinking about your company , they can get on the phone and call them and they're going to answer because 90% let's say 80% , 90% , majority answer because their brain is already thinking about your company . So now we incorporate speed lead and we did a huge optimization boost because we went from good , better to best , and that's the difference between converting a lead into a customer . I mean , the stats are crazy , william . There's different stats , of course , for each protocol , but specifically , for instance , hubspot last year came out with a stat On average , only 7% of leads convert into customers for SaaS as a vertical right Right , seven percent conversion . And so that's why you need to do all of these extra additional strategies and playbooks to be able to help optimize .

Yoon Cannon 32:28

So then it was personas . I'm going back , I know I'm talking fast and I have a lot to share , but I wanted to just highlight some common mistake . I guess , highlight some common mistakes , I guess right . So

The Power of Personalized Lead Magnets for Effective Lead Generation

Yoon Cannon 32:46

that mistake number one was they just offered it as a PDF and there was no opt-in , there was no cell phone email and all that , but at the same time , there was only two , right ? So if I'm looking at my sales team and I go , all right , each of each of you guys are going to niche . What are your niches ? Now , even within a niche OK , like , for instance , I worked with a team of 11 executive regionals sales team as in 11 people , right , each of these 11 people had their own niches , Even one niche . Each person might even have three niches .

Yoon Cannon 33:22

So now you want something for sales enablement . You want something for not only for each niche , but then when you're selling enterprise this is a complex sale you want multiple . You know there's multiple decision makers , so you want something that's relevant and going to be compelling to the CTO . You might be selling to the CEO . I have a SaaS founder and his buyer is the HR manager . Well , that's great . She's the user , but she's not the only decision maker . She's greatly influenced by the CTO and the IT guy , because the IT guy is the integrator for his product , and so we've got to win him over .

Yoon Cannon 34:04

My point is you can't expect . Even if you do have one lead magnet , you can't expect . Expect for one if you're trying to sell to enterprise organizations , you can't expect one lead magnet to do all the heavy lifting , you know , for your sdr team to be able to to uh , you know , get the conversations going , get booked appointments , because before you get a booked appointment you've got to get their attention to identify a need or a goal that they're interested in , and you need to be tightly related to who you're reaching out to . If you're going to do account-based marketing , it's usually times three , right , so this is how you really want to think .

Yoon Cannon 34:46

So I was seeing so many other marketing agencies that they were being outsourced to so many other marketing agencies that they were being outsourced to where it's probably because the agency owner might , you know , that person's area of expertise might only be in one skill set . Like , maybe that person's expertise is in design . You know , like , they're great at website design and they thought they would throw in I can design a lead magnet . But they're not thinking strategically , they're not thinking holistically , because it's just not where they came from , right . They just want to design pretty stuff , which is great . That's a nice skillset , it's important skillset . It's just not , it's an incomplete skillset . If you're trying to hit the end goal right , what is the end goal ? And you want to understand the nuances of what your sales team needs . And that's just one example of many stories that's so good .

Dr. William Attaway 35:43

How do you stay on top of your game ? How do you level up with the new leadership skills that your team and your clients are going to need you to have to lead at the higher levels you're going to need in a year , two years , five years ?

Yoon Cannon 35:59

Well , part of leadership is being a subject matter expertise , you know , or a subject matter expert , I should say . So yeah , william , I spend a lot of time . There's so much to learn . I mean , william , I spend a lot of time , there's so much to learn . I mean with digital marketing , lead generation , sales enablement , sales tech stack . I mean , our world is changing so fast , especially in the last five , 10 years , even right . So keeping up , I'm still a voracious learner . I'm constantly listening and staying on top of what's working , what's not working .

Yoon Cannon 36:37

Digital marketing strategies kind of change anyway . It's like sort of faddish , right . So different ways to do the playbook as well , you know . Then I mean because you've got to respond to how the social channels are changing as well . That's an ever changing thing . Google's an ever changing thing . They change their mind every year on what the rules of the game is . So you got to know what the rules of the game , how they change in order to win right Within the rules of the game .

Yoon Cannon 37:08

So that's a big part of leadership is working at your subject matter platform understanding , because leadership would be leaning on me to redirect and give them course correction and shifting that all right to what they need to do . Need to do . It's diagnosing , it's guiding and it's saying , yeah , that's a great plan , but kind of like your ladder , it's going to take a long time to get climbed to the top of that ladder and then you realize you're at the ladders up against the wrong house and so , before they take a long time to implement and execute this multi-channel marketing campaign , so their sales team has leads that they're going to be fed , they want to make sure that that strategy is not going up against the wrong , like it's outdated , right , and really even a year is outdated Sometimes . Sometimes it depends on what you're talking about , right . So , yeah , but I mean as far as leadership , I think there's components of leadership like relationship building , how you treat your people . Those are just evergreen concepts . Yeah , motivate people and help people .

Yoon Cannon 38:31

I love that about leadership . I love that it doesn't change . I love that it's evergreen , but you still have to learn . You still have to learn as to a how am I doing ? Have there's a lot of things you know , we can all forget . So it's refreshing information that you used to know . It's listening and being inspired by other influencers or other leadership , development , thought leadership to inspire you . People say things in a different way , and so it's just . It's about staying motivated

Continuous Learning in the Ever-Changing Digital Marketing Landscape

Yoon Cannon 39:08

to yourself to constantly get better , because you want to keep growing as a person and as a leader . You want to constantly get better Because you want to keep growing as a person and as a leader . You want to keep getting better , yeah that's true .

Dr. William Attaway 39:19

Yeah , you know , as a voracious learner , I'm curious is there a book that has made a really big difference in your journey that you would recommend that every leader listening pick up and read if they haven't ?

Yoon Cannon 39:35

pick up and read if they haven't Gosh , I have a bunch of books . I listen to my books on Audible and I'm trying to think I've been through so many books lately on it . But sometimes it's like just a longstanding book the E-Myth is such a great , important read because it brings you back to the basics . It brings you back to do you yeah , do you have the foundations built ? So I would recommend a read . Some people still haven't read it , but if you have , reread it .

Dr. William Attaway 40:09

It's true the when you read it again , so often you pick up things that you didn't see the first time because you weren't ready for those things yet . And now you're at a different spot than when you read it the first time , and so often I find myself picking up so many new things as I reread classics like that . Yes , you know , you have shared so much incredibly valuable information today and I'm so grateful for that . If people walk away with one big idea , what would you like that one big idea to be ?

Yoon Cannon 40:39

Well , I think what encompasses both leadership , sales , marketing , growth it's really built on the premise building trust and authority is truly the key and your growth goals . So that's what inspired for me to name the marketing , the digital marketing agency side , trustbook Media , because it all is just centered around building that trust . You've got to build trust in your marketing . You've got to build to generate the leads and sales . You've got to build trust in your marketing . You've got to build to generate the leads and sales . You've got to build trust with your people to build that sales team that retains and trust with your customers so the churn rate isn't so high . You don't have that high turnover , both with customers and your people .

Dr. William Attaway 41:31

That's good . I know people are going to want to stay connected to you and continue to learn from you and about what you do . What is the best way for them to do that ?

Yoon Cannon 41:40

Yes , I'd say , go to my website , trustbookmedia . com/apply . And I would really greatly encourage everybody to get a free assessment , a free strategy call , because awareness is the first step to change and you're going to learn so much People are going to learn so much just from the results of that to get the discoveries of I had no idea . It's so common where I have clients who think they're going to you know they want to hire me to come in and work on sales , but actually they don't have a sales problem . They have . They might have a marketing problem where they might have a culture problem , you know . So I just want to invite people , just take me up on a free assessment . You know I'm to help . Again , awareness is the first step to change , to growth . So if the only thing you do is leave with a roadmap because that's what all my people leave with they leave with a roadmap identifying their strengths . What do they need to do to get from where they are to where they want to go ? What do they need to do to overcome their challenges ? I actually give them a road plan . So if they want to go and do it themselves , they have that . If they want my help great .

Dr. William Attaway 43:04

Thank you so much for your generosity today and sharing so much of what you've learned so far in your journey . This has been so helpful . Well , thank you so much for having me , william , this has been so helpful . g a i

Yoon Cannon 43:11

Well , thank you so much for having me , William . I had a great time .

Dr. William Attaway 43:15

Thanks for joining me for this episode today . As we wrap up , I'd love for you to do two things . First , subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss an episode , and if you find value here , I'd love it if you would rate it and review it . That really does make a difference in helping other people to discover this podcast . Second , if you don't have a copy of my newest book , catalytic Leadership , I'd love to put a copy in your hands . If you go to catalyticleadershipbookcom , you can get a copy for free . Just pay the shipping so I can get it to you and we'll get one right out .

Dr. William Attaway 43:52

My goal is to put this into the hands of as many leaders as possible . This book captures principles that I've learned in 20 plus years of coaching leaders in the entrepreneurial space , in business , government , nonprofits , education and the local church . You can also connect with me on LinkedIn to keep up with what I'm currently learning and thinking about . And if you're ready to take a next step with a coach to help you intentionally grow and thrive as a leader , I'd be honored to help you . Just go to catalyticleadershipnet to book a call with me . Stay tuned for our next episode next week . Until then , as always , leaders choose to be catalytic .