Growing Your Business Mindset with Ruben Resendez, President of adHere, Inc

Transcript:

Alan Olsen

Hi, this is Alan Olsen and welcome to American Dreams. My guest today is Ruben Resendez. Ruben. Welcome to the show.

Ruben Resendez

A thank you so much, Alan, so Good seeing you again.

Alan Olsen

So Ruben, you have a very unique background and one that you’ve accomplished a lot within a short period of time. And so for the listeners, can you can you give us your let’s start in the after high school timeframe where you went to school and now you are you decide to launch your your career?

Ruben Resendez

Absolutely. I love that Alan too. And I like how you started that as well. Because what I really believe is that a lot of people always see the success after the success, but they didn’t see the work that was put in and the process that was followed beforehand. Because what I firmly believe my mentors have always told me, you know, diligence is doing a little thing for a long period of time until something big happens.

So the little things started, you know, when I graduated high school, I grew up on the east side of San Jose, California, northern California, many people would say it’s the wrong side of the tracks on the east side of San Jose. And just to give you an idea behind my high school, there was an actual daycare center in the my high school on campus on high school because all the kids were having so many kids. So statistics galore. And part of my high school and not the statistics that are positive was statistics that were negative.

So I didn’t grow up an entrepreneur, family, nobody my family were ever business owners or anything of that sort never saw anyone know what the word entrepreneur even meant and growing up. So it’s interesting environment and I in where I grew up, but I firmly believe that every everything happens for you instead of to you and so grateful that I grew up in that environment.

Because I can relate to so many different types of people these days where I can relate to people who grew up in those situations like also relate to people now being in the business world, in different areas in different executives and being in there.

So that’s kind of how I grew up. You know, I grew up in high school wasn’t like the kid that was selling lemonade, and on lemonade stands on the corner or anything like that. But went to college, I went to DeAnza College for a while Community College. And then when he eventually transferred on over to San Jose State University where I studied management info systems, and then I ran into a financial services company, where all my friends who were you know, like 22 years old at that time, they were making great money. This is before the 2008 crash.

So I said man do I want my professors life or do I want my friends life who are buying three storey homes and everything at 22 years old, I want my friend’s life instead. So I decided I was going to drop out of college and go full time into financial services where I was selling financial services, mortgages, loans, refinancing a little bit of life insurance and such to living on 100% Commission and eventually 2008 hits. And everybody knows what happens in 2008, or what happened in 2008. And all my clients dried up. And I had about $300 in my pocket.

And that’s when I learned that I was going to be a first time dad was like, great, so I got $300 in my pocket, don’t know where my next checks gonna come from. I’m gonna be about to be a first time Dad, I need to go get a job as soon as possible. So I went looking on Craigslist, and found this internet marketing company, I don’t even know what it was, at that time didn’t even know it existed. But it was a $30,000 salary. And I knew I need a paycheck right away because I got a kid on the way. So I go and interview get the job at the internet marketing company.

And, you know, it opened me up to a whole nother world that I didn’t even know existed there is you know, these 19 year old 20 year old kids that were making websites, and they’re doing lead generation, I didn’t even know what it was they were implementing links, and we’re sending them quarter million dollar checks every month and all that good stuff. They’re always traveling all the time. There’s 1000s of them that were there. And I said, I didn’t know I don’t know what this is. But wow, I became obsessed about it.

I said I want to know everything there is to know about this business. I want to know everything there is to know about this industry. And that’s where a lot of my journey really started right there in the very beginning to and I’ll pause right there. Alan, because I know you’ve probably got questions Do

Alan Olsen

ask anything is is where the the neighborhood you grew up in. And you know it was assaulted, you’re just getting through life and then I’ll see you started into a pathway that really changed your mindset that you went from the $30,000 year job into a very, very successful career.

Ruben Resendez

Yes,

Alan Olsen

What helped you to make that transition. Not everyone does that so successfully. you,

Ruben Resendez

I’m so glad that you mentioned that to Alan. Because when I did financial services, I was introduced to the world of entrepreneurship, I was introduced to all these personal development books I didn’t know existed, I didn’t know there was books on, like thinking Grow Rich, by Napoleon Hill, I didn’t know that there was people that started like me and grew up in environments like me that actually went and started some of the biggest businesses that we know that are out there in the industry.

I always thought that, because I grew up in this area, nobody my family were ever business owners, all those other business owners, those entrepreneurs that build things and never successful. That’s because they probably it’s because their last name or they came from money, or they came from family. Well, that’s what I always thought in my mind.

And I think that mindset actually still permeates on the east side of San Jose. And in some areas, still, to this day that kids think that that you know, wherever you grew up in, that’s where you’re going to be later on to that there’s no way to get out.

But I got introduced to personal development, and started reading all these books, Jhansi Maxwell’s books about leadership, How to Win Friends and Influence People, all these various different books that just fed my mind over and over. And still, even to this day, I believe in a process called constant and never ending improvement, that it’s no consequence where you are right now. But what is of consequence is whether or not you’re going to do daily and practice daily, of getting better every single day.

And that’s what I try to do every single day is getting better reading the right books being about around the right people. And that’s why I’ve learned so much of what I’ve learned. So, you know, I learned that in the financial services industry. And then when I got that job, it never really left me, I was still listening to the audios and audio CDs on my way into work and still listening to books like good from good degree by Jim Collins, and like, all these different books that filling my mind up with these things that, you know.

Eventually I said, You know what, I see all these guys that are in internet marketing doing this thing, why not me, I should be doing these things to you. So you know, when my son would go to bed at 9pm, I would work on this business that I have started called add here for all the way until about two o’clock in the morning.

So he would go to sleep at about 9pm put him to sleep now right now it’s time to work on this business, teach myself how to build websites, teach myself coding and teach myself Photoshop and doing this constantly, every single day would sleep for about four hours, wake up the next day and do it all over again every single day, just because I was so obsessed about it. And what I wanted to do right here. So yeah, it’s interesting how it kind of transition there. And I think, also, you know, Alan, some things happen for you, not to you.

And sometimes when they happen for you, it’s not always the happiest experience. So I eventually got fired from that job. And, you know, when and didn’t get take the severance package was like $1,000, or something like that, that they were offering me at that job. And I said, You know what, I’m not going to take the severance package, and now that I don’t have a job, and I’ve been fired, me, I live on unemployment for about a good six months, so lived on unemployment, you know, and obviously, unemployment doesn’t pay very much.

So let my house go move myself back in with my parents in my early 30s, some of the most embarrassing moments of my life that because move back in where my old room was, with my old posters still on the wall, and all that good stuff back on the east side of San Jose. And it wasn’t just me, it was also my son too.

So being a father, not being able to provide a roof over my own son’s head was some of the most embarrassing moments and it went even lower from there too, because as soon as unemployment ran out, that’s when I went on food stamps, I wasn’t going to ask my parents for money because they weren’t doing the best either.

So that was a situation that really I got put into, but I’m so thankful I did get put into it. Because once the business started taking off and started to fund it enough where it could pay me a salary and pay for some employees and such, too. I treated that so so sensitively because I knew what it was like to be broke and to be on, you know, food stamps that I respected.

It’s so much more compared to if we just gotten venture capital money and, you know, some bank loans and it if it just came easy, I probably would have spent it my mindset wouldn’t have been ready for it at that point.

Alan Olsen

So what was the pivotal point in your career where you really saw your business take off or so we’re moving from food stamps into a very successful, prosperous business. What was that turning

Ruben Resendez

point about? You know, it was really interesting because, you know, what, I always heard a lot of like, you know, Stanford MBAs and a lot of you know, I live here in Silicon Valley. So we have Stanford, we have Berkeley, great scholars all around us, which is amazing. Array College is great university. He’s worldwide and recognized worldwide and such. And I would always hear these things of like, have a mission statement have vision statement and have core values. It’s like, okay, that sounds cool.

But you know what, I’m all about work ethic, let’s just make a business that’s profitable.  And let’s outwork every single person that’s out there. So I would do that constantly. And the business wasn’t moving, like how I thought it should be moving, I was out working everybody, you know, sleeping, maybe only four hours a night for about two, three years straight. And I wasn’t seeing the business move, like how I wanted to see it move.

So I really sat down and started really collecting myself in saying, you know, what, I’m gonna get my core values in place, I’m gonna give this thing a shot, I’ve have a vision for my life, and get clear and concise on exactly how I want my life to be.

But I also have to get core values into place. So I started putting my core values into place, which are what I call the five Beth’s which is faith, family, finances, fitness, and fun. And it’s in those priorities in that order. So I started practicing that every single day.

And I wrote that down faith, family, finances, fitness, and fun. And that’s what I started focusing on. So once I started getting my faith into place, then the finances started to fall into place, too. And I started to become a little bit more fit too, because I realized that if I’m going to enjoy the finances, I’ve got to be healthy as well.

So I started putting all these things into place and practice seeing them every single day. And all of a sudden, I started seeing some things happen into my business, I started seeing new clients come on board, bigger clients come on board, my thinking started getting bigger, and all of a sudden, the clients started getting bigger, started attracting some of the right people into the business that started transitioning the business and to getting a bigger and bigger and bigger. So once I started putting my faith really into place that, hey, I have faith that this is going to happen.

And I think that’s one of the biggest things that entrepreneurs really need is just a strong faith, because you never know what’s going to happen the next day. But if you have a strong faith, and you put your life into that fate, then you know that you’re going to be taken care of that next day, no matter if it goes good or bad. It all happens for you instead of to you.

Alan Olsen

What, what impact did your family have on the direction of your career?

Ruben Resendez

Yeah, you know, my family is everything, and especially my son, every time I look at my son, and especially during those moments where I was on food stamps, and really hitting the lowest of lows. I look, every time I looked at my son, I said, Man, this kid was born for a reason to point me in this direction.

And every time I looked at him, it just gave me that energy to know that I was being guided to be pointed in the right direction, that if it weren’t for my son being born, I would have never found that job which reduced me to the industry of internet marketing and lead generation.

And I would never have got this idea to go and start my own internet marketing and lead generation business like how I did. So every time I look at my son now, you know, he’s about to be 15 years old. Still, even to this day, I feel that he was a godsend, and pointing me in the right direction that without him being born.

I may have quit many, many years ago. And when times got hard, I may have quit. So he’s the one who really has fueled me to persevere through all the challenges I went through. And even still to this day, he’s that person that really guides me in the right direction.

Alan Olsen

So how did you go about picking your mentors in business?

Ruben Resendez

Yeah, that’s a good question. So picking mentors in business is so important. And I think one of the biggest ways is, you know, I used to look for mentors that were just doing better than me financially. And then when I realized some of the people that were doing better than me financially, some of the people that I was looking for mentorship with their family lives were, you know, horrible. And their faith lives weren’t very strong either.

So when I went back to my core values, they said, when I want to mentor, I want a mentor that’s not just great financially, and much better than I am financially and where I want to be financially. But I also want them to have a strong area of faith. I want them to have a strong marriage and strong relationships. I want them to have strong family lives as well. And that’s been such a game changer. Because now every time that I talk to my mentors, it’s always a How is your family doing? It’s not just how’s your finances doing? How’s your family doing?

How’s your relationship with your partner right now, you know, how will your relationship with your kids, because that’s the foundational aspect that businesses great, but it will only be great to the point that your home life is great, too. So as long as the foundation is great, then it becomes even great. So that’s how I started going about and picking my mentors because I made the initial mistake of just looking for mentors that were financially where I wanted to be. And then I realized being around some of the ones that didn’t have their core values in place.

My core values started to sidetrack I started getting involved into things I shouldn’t have gotten involved into. And that’s why I said okay, I’ve got a Go and find mentors that have the right core values in place that map to my core values. And let me tell you on it’s been such a huge difference in my life, and everybody that’s around me. And it’s been so fulfilling at the same time.

Alan Olsen

When you look at bay, how does that help you in your life?

Ruben Resendez

Oh, it’s the foundational aspect of everything that I do. You know, I start my day, every single day with prayer, in gratitude of thank you for all the great things that are happening in my life. Thank you for all the great people that are coming into my life. And thank you for all the bad people that are filtering out of my life. And the more that I put my faith into everything happening for me instead of to me, my mindset is completely different, that I get hit with challenges every single day. And it seems that with every new opportunity comes greater adversity.

But when my faith is in place, I have faith that that adversity is leading me to even a better opportunity and strengthened me for something greater and a greater blessing that’s about to come. So when I have that faith in place, and I know that there’s something greater that is working for me, not against me, then everything becomes an opportunity. Even the challenge has become an opportunity. And that has led me in such a great direction made me a lot happier, made me know that, hey, doesn’t matter what can happen, I’ll still have a smile on my face.

Because I know that something good is about to happen. Every time I get hit with something, something good is about to happen. So been pivotal for my life.

Alan Olsen

So Ruben, what is an ideal client for you? As I want to work with Ruben, what is your criteria of people that you work with versus they don’t make a good fit for you?

Ruben Resendez

It’s a good question right there. So some of the people that we work with are those that no performance marketing. And they are looking to acquire prospective students like universities and colleges that are our main niche, right. There are universities and colleges that have online programs, but also have campuses. But some of the main criteria we look for is that they understand what their goals are and what their KPIs are.

So like they understand what their cost per enrollment is, what their cost per start is, what their cost per application is. And they know what their goals are and what they’re looking to achieve. So as long as they know what their goals are, we can help them achieve those goals and reach those goals. If they don’t know what their goals are, then it becomes a little bit of a longer conversation to help them.

But if they have great programs, and they have a great online program to they just need some help in achieving their goals and defining their goals. We can help them out there as well.

But our niche where we do extremely well is where a university and college knows exactly their numbers and exactly their KPIs that they’re looking for.

Alan Olsen

So Ruben, how does someone go about reaching you contacting for more information?

Ruben Resendez

Yeah, so you can reach me at Ruben@adherellc.com. You can find me on Instagram at Ruben Resendez. I’m very active on LinkedIn as well. So you can find me on LinkedIn, Ruben Resendez, as well. And you could always contact me there.

Alan Olsen

All right room is hey, it’s been a pleasure having you on today’s show the American Dreams.

Ruben Resendez

A thank you so much, Alan, we’ll talk to you soon.

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