Marg Lange – Part 2

Description: We unravel Marg’s journey, her unique abilities, and the significance of building genuine connections with customers.

Short summary: In this episode, we delve into the fascinating life of Mac, exploring his background, childhood, personality traits, and abilities. We also discuss the importance of community, learning from experiences, the need for human connection, and missed opportunities in business. Additionally, we cover topics such as building a community and business development strategy, podcasting and connection with the audience, and the aha moment in working with clients. Lastly, we emphasize the significance of building a genuine connection with customers.

TRANSCRIPT

hope you’ve had a chance to listen to part one of this interview on Biz Bites.

Stay tuned now for Part 2.

Welcome to Biz Bites, brought to you by CommTogether, helping businesses like yours build their brand through telling amazing stories to engage and grow audiences on multiple platforms.

Marg, I wanted to ask you a little bit about your background because we’ve talked where we, where we’ve sort of got to and where we’re going to in some respects.

But but tell me about, you know, you back in your childhood.

What was, what is it that you wanted to be back then?

Well, when I was 16 I wanted to be an interior decorator.

But if I think about it when I was in the year 7, we’ve got all this form one.

Then because I am a bit older than most of probably all this thing.

Audience had this good Form 1 back then.

I was very passionate about being on stage put put me in front of a microphone.

It’s really hard for me to get off.

I love being on stage, whether it’s even when I was six, I used to get all these little blankets, you know, and and then have to do the quick change because I wanted to be every character in the in the play.

And I get really ****** *** when I was going to the church, the church services and I was owning a donkey or something really insignificant.

I was like, why can’t I be

Mary.

Yeah.

Make a good Mary and no.

You’ll be a shepherd.

No.

You know, I was really happy.

So I think in some respects I was always wanting to, you know perform to some extent.

And it’s funny because even when Mum said you know you’ve got to be a school teacher because they look at the holidays they get.

And I hated I didn’t want to be a school teacher.

I want to be an interior designer and yet I became a very good teacher and I think I have an ENFJ which is 49 percent, 151% the other some sort of split personality.

But to be to be fair if you look at that app they say they’re people people they’re very good with people.

They are good nurses, they’re good teachers and you know you’ll probably find them you know organising parties and on stage and da da, da da, so, so I guess in some in my DNA there is, there is a bit of that in me because when my we had a 40th high school reunion in 2019 Washington High School and everyone was laughing about how I was the organiser.

I was organising everybody to get together, connecting everybody, making sure that it was, you know, that it was the talent quest.

Because we talent quest, we had back in form one.

We came second because I organised the costumes, organised the mothers to do the hair, organised everybody to get a ride with the mothers.

I organised the mothers to make sure all the other mothers voted for us.

It’s just sounds a marketing and event management all rolled into one.

I don’t know.

Yes, 12 and where?

Does that where does that come from though?

Is is that is that was that mum and dad or where does that?

Where did that sort of intuition come from?

Given the fact that I was born into domestic violence and and and dad’s drinking went from bad to worse, it certainly didn’t come from my childhood because my childhood was spent, was spent just surviving and trying to, you know, you know, I never really got to sleep on my bed.

We never had a birthday party or Christmas because we don’t know where dad was going, how he was going to be.

So there was no bringing friends home.

Home wasn’t safe.

And So what happened was in 2000, I think it was 2000.

In 17 or 2018, I came across a book called The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell.

He’s one of the best selling authors in the States, and he came up with his theory about there are these people, 3 rare personality types that can really bring major change in influence to the world through the spreading of either ideas or people or some other influence, right?

And he said the three people are salespeople, Mavens and Connectors and they can bring about change that can make big things happen.

So in the connectors, you can actually connect, actually break it down into 3 categories and I’m, I’m a blend of all three.

There is what we call a connector enabler.

They’re the people who assemble.

But like let’s say you’re launching a business and you need an audience or you need a market or you need people to come on board and buy.

Well, connectors just are very naturally good with people and they know people and they remember people, they remember conversations and what they were wearing.

And don’t you remember when we were they had good memories and people like them for that, right?

And they make people feel instantly comfortable.

So the connection enabler is good for galvanising the troops, bringing, making big things happen.

That’s the enabler.

Then there’s also the executor.

So they you can have an idea, but someone’s got to execute it.

So we have someone who brings the people together, but we’ve got to have someone who can take the project.

And this is what I do a lot is I do a lot of business development, strategy, implementation, open doors, make it happen.

That’s the executor.

And the other one is the connector.

I’m going to call it information broker because that’s the only way I can explain it.

But it’s like they have they can sit down and workshop an idea with you but they also know people you need to meet that would be able to take that idea and sort of unpack it in so so a way that it’s going to work because we have ideas, we don’t, we don’t know we normally test them.

We don’t do our market research.

But I need a connector is someone who goes, you need to speak to such and such because he knows, but first of all he knows people that you need to meet to open doors.

And they also seem to know sort of information because the the great thing about connectors as opposed to network, because they’re all about themselves, we’re not going to talk about them.

But the thing about connectors is because they’re great listeners and they like to be out and about, they have a really good understanding and information about the world.

So when someone comes to me and says, oh, I hate networking, I couldn’t think of anything worse.

Like we were having this conversation and I don’t think Keith would mind me saying it was Keith because he talks about all the time that he doesn’t.

He hates.

He says I wouldn’t want to go to Shepherd and couldn’t think of anything worse than going to Shepherd and staying every night with my wife’s friends and because he’s a mad what, you know if I was going to Shepherd and what would be the point.

OK.

Do you know all the things that you see on the way you see things that oh how come there’s not enough traffic.

Oh, doesn’t seem like there’s the shops are what am I?

Why is the shops guys?

It’s it’s it’s the, you know, the other day I was going out, right out to walk, walk to McLeod.

Never been to McLeod to an appointment.

I’d never been through past Northeast Link.

So my perception of Melbourne is limited if I stay in my area, but if I go out I I see and I learn and I absorb and I feel the energy on the mood.

That’s the other thing about the domestic violence, Anthony, is that given the fact that, you know, Dad would come home sometimes and you’d be sitting there and you’re just a bit nervous because you don’t know if he’s going to switch into Jekyll or Hyde.

And Mum had these sort of little winks she would give us time to, to exit left, just pretend to normal and run out the back.

Yet the back into the dark and made it across the highway and made it there because you have to run to safety, right?

But what they taught me is how to read a room, how to read people.

And I’m very, very good at that from that experience.

And you know all the things that you miss when you’re too plugged into computers and just not really understanding that it is so much your missing of your life when you are logged in.

I think it’s interesting with all those things that you you say I I sitting there thinking to myself that it’s no surprise that you were so organised as well.

Because in that sort of environment you you needed to know, have strategies on where to go.

So you were organised, being organised and having that and having the foresight to be able to do that.

But also comes the the balance of those two things is also it’s not just reading the room and having that but it’s choosing the rights the right stories in order to feed into whatever environment it is And that’s truly the part of connecting which I think is is absolutely huge And and I was thinking as as you were talking as well that you know recently I was on a on a lucky enough to be having had a holiday and I was in part of that holiday I was in Scotland and kind of went to the Isle of Skye which I’ve I’ve I’ve mentioned it before on the podcast but anyone that’s ever thinking of somewhere to go it is one of the most beautiful places on earth.

Absolutely must go place and we were there and and and one of the great things about being around there was there’s lots of these little cottage industry places that the truth is they’re not really making much money and they’re not really there to make much money.

They’re there because they love being there and there’s some things that they can do along the way.

And the connections you make with those people that own those businesses.

And I think we can all recall stories where we’ve been on holidays somewhere and you have a connection with someone in that way and it and it is because they know how to reach out to you and to engage and it’s not a sales pitch.

It is truly from an engagement point of view.

But that sort of circles back to everything that you’ve been talking about.

And I wanted to ask you about this is the the importance of community because I’ve long been talking about this prior to COVID that I think that there’s been this pulled back towards what truly community means.

And I think COVID probably exacerbated that need in some respects.

And I think in this as you talk about this plugged in environment in which we’re living at the moment, that the need to unplug and to truly connect with people, that’s a human instinct and that’s something that there’s more and more a need for.

And why if you can actually achieve that in your business.

Because I’ve long said that businesses operate within a community.

That community is not necessarily a geographic location, but it’s a community of people who are potentially interested in what it is that you offer.

And if you can establish a true connection within that community, then you have gone a long way to winning that battle.

And yet that is something that is left these days to oh, we’ve just got sit and forget emails that go out to people automatically.

We’ve got this and that, that’s go, it’s all automatic and we’ll grab a certain small percentage of people.

I I fight with that all the time.

So I’m interested in your take on on community and where you see that going.

Unfortunately, I think that people talk about it and I don’t know how to build it unfortunately.

You know we we talk about it takes a village to raise a child.

We talk about we really need to get a following.

And you know, well then we have this conversation around is he following your real community and what is community like?

The definition of real community and real community is actually looking at for one another is is my sense of community.

So when I think about community like in my apartment block, obviously I moved in during lockdown and as soon as lockdown was announced that it was, we were open forever.

I was the one who had the first Melbourne Cup BBQ, followed by the Christmas party, followed by my 60th birthday and then the monthly drinks.

And they’re not taking that one step further to a recent I was down in a storage cage in the basement and I I found some books.

I thought, what are you doing in the storage cage?

I don’t, I’m not going to read them again.

So I took them out and I put them in the foyer of the of the apartment block and started the community library.

And people were just really excited about that because now we’re going to just bring me books that share sharing is hearing.

And then went one step further because I had an encounter with his Iranian couple that were moving in and the lift wasn’t working.

And so when I found out that he was a FIFO worker and she was had no car, didn’t speak much English, I just felt I had to look after her.

Right.

So what you’re looking at today can and and it’s P your your your viewers can’t see my beautiful eyes because she has done a eye tattoo free of charge for Mark because I’m just a good person.

And my eyelashes she did there and that was two hours last night.

I saved myself about $500.00.

But the fact is that I don’t do it for that reason.

That’s just what comes back as a sense of community.

Now let’s take this to.

So that’s that’s in, you know, in in in my apartment block And each time that I’m sitting there in my apartment block when there’s some sort of, you know, gathering that we have the drinks, whatever, you know, there’s people in the in the apartment block that got police people who’ve got people who are headdresses.

She’s dating someone who’s a very bad, you know, from the zoo.

You know this is where you do business in in your apartment block or if you knew your neighbours, well you know that’s what business people don’t understand.

They they’re not necessarily you don’t have to go over, just do the e-mail campaign and let’s just see how many low hanging fruit we get.

This is where you’re missing, missing the opportunity to really get to know your neighbours who must have found out what they’re doing.

They really want to help you, right?

And they might know someone or themselves.

Like example was when I launched the Wealth and Well-being for Women for Jack Anderson, which is addressing the over 50 homelessness of of Australian women that you can’t see.

Well, of course I put out to my apartment what come along Now that’s a business event.

But that doesn’t mean that they’re that they’re not interested.

So when I look at community in terms of and this is where I go back to business strategy, I was explaining about this to someone I met for the first time in a cafe in Brighton this morning.

I said when I am working on a business development strategy with a new client, I have to get to know who they are and connect with them first, not what they do, who they are, right?

Because then you get to their why and their purpose and you get to know all about them.

Then you are laying over top of that what it is they do and what they’re trying to achieve, right?

That’s the second clue about what I would say.

If I’m going to do a strategy with them, it’s the second clue.

So when it was Jack, I just wanted to know about Jack.

So when Jack Henderson was launching of Mobang for Women, he’d have been sitting on the shelf since 2008.

And then I was sitting there going and he was talking passionately about this woman from India who he had helped because she was playing domestic violence.

Oh, Bing, up goes my radar and how he helped turn her life around.

And now she owns her own home.

She’s working the top manager in NAB and ** *** said, he said I did that through the ability to help her out by, you know, the fact that I’ve been a property advisor, I know about money.

La La, la, la, la, la.

And then I’m sitting there and I’m thinking to myself and I’m talking to her and I’m thinking what’s going on out there in the world right now?

Oh, we’ve got a housing crisis.

Step three, the clue of relevance.

So now when I’m doing a business development strategy, I said you want to get more business because you’re a property advisor, buyers agent, I get that.

But if you go out and say I’m here and I know a lot about properties, so does everybody else.

But what if we were to launch wealth and well-being for women and we just get the community together to discuss this issue?

And you can give your perspective.

You can tell your story about the friend you helped from India, but you just keep your perspective on how you could help this situation.

You’re not pitching, you’re not prospecting, and people are coming to your event as your community for something other than what you sell your product or service.

And so now you’re not prospecting and now you’re elevating yourself above every other property buyers, advocate or advisor in the industry.

So that’s sort of how you can take and build a a community and you’re bringing them into you like an attraction marketing magnet because you’re the leader, you’re the thought leader, you’re the action taker.

It’s.

Really interesting.

It’s really interesting.

To.

Say that I I I love it.

And I know we’re so much on the same page as as far as this stuff is concerned.

And it’s interesting as well that I’ve found myself more recently, as I mentioned to you earlier that I am helping people publish their own podcasts, doing my podcast here.

But I’m helping lots of other people publish their podcast.

And that has happened because people heard what I was doing and said, hey, I’d love to do the same thing.

Can you help?

And I wasn’t actually pitching to do that at at that point.

And it’s now become its own little business that that’s happening there.

But it’s really about that.

It’s about, you know, inviting people in, in this case, to listen and enjoy the conversation.

And if they think they want to be part of this conversation or they want to have their own and lead their own, we can help make that happen.

But it happens because of that connection, and it’s what I’ve always loved about this medium.

You know, my background as as listeners would know, is in radio originally.

And my fascination with radio started, you know, back when I was quite young.

And it is that ability not only to paint pictures, but to connect with people and to make you feel like you are there.

But you’re either a family in the wall of this wonderful conversation and I hope that’s what people have got from this one that we’re having today, or it’s that the person on the other end could be you.

And whether that’s me or the guest that that you’re feeling that connection with, it doesn’t really matter if you feel as though you’re talking to that.

And I think that is the best way.

I mean, I I, you know, the best way to engage with an audience is not to try and talk to everybody.

It’s to try and talk to one person and if you can make a difference to that one person and truly connect with that one person.

Whether you are doing it directly because you are actually literally talking to them, or whether you’re using a medium like this and you’re talking to them indirectly, that connection can lead to real change, can lead to all sorts of things.

And whether it’s buying from you or some from someone else, if it makes a positive difference to someone’s life and then how cool is that?

And I hope that that’s what people have got out of this conversation that we’ve we’ve been having about connection that for some people sitting there now and even if it’s just one person, the lights have come on and gone.

I I can do this then great.

And we we’d love to hear from it by the way, if it has.

If that has happened, do write in and let us and let us know and we can maybe talk about it in a future episode.

Well, we’ve we have to cut things off in a in a moment or two.

But I did want to finish up by asking you a question that I do try and ask all of my guests on the podcast.

It’s when someone comes to work with you, they invariably have an aha kind of moment.

What is that sort of aha moment that people have that you wish that people would know in advance so that they’re flocking to you now?

The aha moment happens when, you know, we just get that sort of workshopping, the idea, you know, business idea together and then we just get excited like two of the kids in the candy store, OK Oh my God, this would be good.

We’ve got to do this.

We’ve got to do this, We’ve got to do this together and oh, and I can do this and you can do that.

And that’s the that’s the beauty of it.

It’s the excitement and creativity and the vision that comes together, the collaboration that comes and and it’s usually I go OK, but you know, I I don’t.

It’s not like everybody wants to work with me.

And as you said right at the beginning, I don’t know if we had any other recording or this recording, but you were saying you were saying they they didn’t want to work with you now.

But that isn’t to say that they won’t come back and seek you out in the future.

So yes, I can get excited.

Yes, I go, Oh my God, this would be great.

We could work together.

How much is that?

Right.

And then and then you go, well, this is my face, you know, blah, blah, blah.

And then you go, I can’t afford that.

But what can you afford?

Let’s get a little bit of mark, let’s just get a little bit of me.

Let’s just get you started.

Right.

So it’s it’s adding infectiousness I think is the aha moment that people have when they actually got someone that they go, she gets me, She actually gets me because the way that she’s been asking questions, the way she’s been listening through the the the responses are on point.

That is the aha moment that people go right.

She’s the one.

And you know the best thing about that?

It’s not selling.

It’s positioning yourself.

It’s position yourself, the natural choice of the people.

Because everybody’s got the Internet, they can check everybody out, but when they go, you know what?

That person is cheaper.

But that person’s got my back, right?

You know, it’s it’s funny how it works.

You are so spot on and it’s it’s something that I’ve been sort of talking about as well for for the longest time.

It’s why we do the podcast and why we’ve done lots of other things in terms of putting stuff out there.

Because if you’re foolish enough to think that people aren’t looking you up beforehand, then you’re wrong.

You never, and I’ve all been fond of saying you never know what you’re missing by having poor communication.

If you don’t allow people the opportunity to get to know you beforehand, they might never engage and you’ll never know you’ve missed that opportunity.

It’s the people that put themselves out there that allow you to get to know them, that you think I actually really want to work with this person.

I need to find an excuse to work with this person and that is the ultimate is that people are you know that that that actually cancels out the sales process.

A lot of it because people are coming to you because they want to have something to do with you.

It’s a question of what they will buy, not whether they will buy.

And that is a huge differentiator.

And I think if you can create that true, true connection with your audience that allows you that opportunity.

So, Mark, thank you so much for being an amazing guest.

I we’ve talked through lots of different things here and I hope that people listening in genuinely have made a connection.

And we will of course include all of the information how to connect with you or at least start a connection with you and where to find you through various things.

We’ll include that in our show notes as we as we always do.

Mark, thank you so much for being an amazing guest on Biz Bites.

And for people who can’t see, because it’s a podcast, Anthony and I have just screen from ear to ear and it’s such a lovely, you know, because we can see each other on this on this zoom we’re doing.

But it’s so lovely to be able to connect and smile, always get the smile back.

Thanks so much for having me, Anthony.

And everyone stay tuned of course for the next episode of Biz Bytes.

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