LFTE 28: Ken Block Business Lessons...

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Learning From The Experts

Business


What's going on guys. Hey, this is Colton woods and you are listening to another episode of learning from the experts. And today I want to actually walk you through or talk about some of the things that I learned from the legendary Rallycross driver Ken block. Hey, what's going on guys? So a couple of weekends ago, I actually got the opportunity to be one of Ken block's guests at the rally cross, um, for red bull, which is a super huge event. Travis was drawn, if you don't know who he is, he's like, he's like the biggest man in the that sport, like in those sports, I mean period and uh, motors or dirt bikes, everything. Like he is crazy into those kinds of sports rally cross, um, especially to you. Um, he, yeah. Anyway, so he puts on the event, um, called nitro world games and I actually got to attend it and be able to kind of meet, uh, Ken block and be with his crew and see how they all work and how they do it. And not only that, I got to see a lot of like the insides of how they operate and, uh, the different issues that we're having and also like their tactics, which I thought was really interesting, really cool. Um, so, uh, the guy who actually hooked me up, that was a follower of Steve Larson, um, ended up meeting or talking to me and we kind of got acquainted and then he's like, Hey dude, I work for these guys name, uh, Ken block and Travis [inaudible]. He, I dunno if you know who they are. And I'm like, dude, heck yes. I know who they are. They're freaking legendary. Um, and so we, yeah, we got acquainted there and I'm like, that's crazy. You work with them. Like that's super awesome. Those guys, I've watched their, their stuff for years now. Um, really respect them a ton and they had both put out a ton of content, so they, both marketers as well, which is really cool. Um, so we were talking, he's like, Hey man, we're going to be racing at the natural world games and um, we'd love to have you there as a guest. And you can kind of hang out, meet the crew, uh, check out how we do it and do this different things. And I'm like, Oh man, this is like a dream come true right there. That's like stuff I dreamed of as a kid, uh, which is, which is a pretty cool, um, anyway, so, uh, his name is, uh, David Mansfield and he, he's he, yeah. So he totally hooked me up. Um, and he's like, dude, it's really cool to see because it's, it really relates to business, um, on how like we run it. It's only like a hundred times faster than it, which is pretty cool. So he actually is like, like the coach, like he kind of coaches can block through his driving as he's driving, which means he has to be super fast at it, make really quick decisions and help, can make the quickest decisions and the best decisions that's gonna make him the best time. So it was really interesting watching all of this. Um, they would get out there, they start racing and David Mansfield would be up on this stand, kind of watching everybody race around. And he had a headset on and he would talk to Ken as he's driving. And so I'm watching this and literally it's like split second decisions, um, and like, okay, like this is what's coming on up. This is going to be the best way to take that turn or so-and-so's on your outside. You need to push them out and cut into the turn here. Like you do this, Oh, you need to take this path on the next one and you get around them here, I've noticed that these people are doing this. And so it's just really interesting to watch. Um, and then what was actually also very interesting was just to see how well they were able to race. But then when like the, we're having the worst time with, uh, with tires and blowing out, like these are brand new tires, like really expensive, nice tires and they're just shredding them. I guess that that's what happens when you have 700 horsepower in a tiny little car and you are on the gas, but all the time. So it makes sense I guess. Um, but it was interesting to see how they kind of got through it and what I also, okay, so here's the kicker. Here's the biggest takeaway that I got from this. Um, besides all the little things like the coaching through the going, um, you know, going around like pushing people through this corner and cutting them here and doing all this like cool, like tactical stuff. Um, there was one, there was one spot or one time, I guess one thing in the event that really stood out to me and what is, what makes Ken block the man. He who he is. I feel like, um, so on, I think, I believe he's like the second race of the day. Now let me pre-frame this a little bit. This, this is so rally cross is there in these cars, like there, a lot of them are Subarus. Uh, Ken block drives this Ford Fiesta, which is literally not a Fiesta anymore. Like there literally is no stock parts left on it. Um, these cars cost $750,000 a piece. Yes. You heard that right? $750,000. Three quarters of a million dollars per car and they have three of them. Um, so that's, yeah, these cars are nuts. It's not a little Ford Fiesta. You would go buy at the dealership for $14,000. Um, definitely highly, insanely modified. And yeah, so they drive these cars around and it's typically, it's on a pavement track and they're burning tires everywhere. Like they're sliding sideways. All four tires are burning and they have to come around the corner sliding and make it through it as quick as they can and then come around another quarter corner as a pivot and slide the other way. It's crazy stuff. If you want to see an example of what I'm talking about. Um, the Jim Canna, um, videos on YouTube is literally like what made them big ins, kind of what he just started for fun and then became a franchise. Um, and Jim Conner being J a, G Y M K H, a, N. a, um, I believe that's how you spell it. I could totally be wrong. Anyway. Um, Jim [inaudible] like, so the latest one, they just came out with Jim [inaudible], which is completely Epic by the way. And really they just do these crazy stunts and these crazy driving around in like cities like Chicago and uh, LA, different places that are just Epic deceive and they, so they, they record these and they come out with the best as they can and then it's just, it's super entertaining for that, that area. Well this track was at the nitrile world games was mostly dirt, which is highly way different than most of them since they're all mostly pavement. This is a lot different because it's all dirt. Um, there was a payment section in there, but it really wasn't much and I don't know. Super cool. And then the jump is like a world record jump. Now this is, they're in a car and there's 110 foot jump on the track. 110 feet in a car. And by the time they actually get off the jump and land, it's usually about 120 feet or more. That's, that's like a massive jump. Like, I don't even know if you can picture that. It's huge. Um, let alone in a car, like that's, that's massive on a dirt bike, um, in a car. That's insane. So they have to hit this jump at like 75 miles an hour at least. And you don't want to be going over 80 or like 78. You want to be between like 75 and 80 or 75 and 78 or something like that. Um, he was telling me, and I forget the exact numbers, um, but he's like, yeah, if you, if I hit that jump at like 85, I'm like toast because I'll land on this flat part and probably break my back in the process, you know, because all hit so hard. Um, which he actually ended up hitting the last race of the day. He actually ended up hitting the jump like 82 and he was definitely hurting from it. He's like, man, those, it was not good anyway, so they have to hit this jump super fast. Well on the second race of the day, they're Ryan round and he's in first. And like for the first two laps he's in first. What I didn't realize at first was that he actually blew his back, right tire in the first lap, literally shredded in the first lap. Well then he kept it in first place, the second lap, and then he kind of fell behind a little bit on the third lap. Well I knew his tire was shredded for sure in the second lap. And what's crazy is like I'm watching him and he's driving around this tire and he's still just going crazy with it. Just making it happen. And I see him coming around and there's a part where you can hit the 110 foot jump or you can go to the right or you can go to the left. There's like three different ways. And typically if you have a broken tire, a shredded tire, you're going to go to the right of the left. Right. And so I see him coming up to that spot and I'm like, kind of looks like he's going for the jump in the middle. And I'm like, there's no way. Like how would he, like why? How would he ever just, yeah. Anyway, so I'm like, there's no way he's actually going for it. Probably just looks like he's going in the middle, which kind of looks similar to when they go to the right. No, sure enough he hits his jump with a flat tire and totally clears it. It makes it, and I think he hit it again after that, but I know he hit it at least once, but that one time I remember just watching it like, Holy cow, this is, this is blowing my mind right now that he is literally hitting this jump with a flat tire. Nobody does that. Nobody does that. Everybody's like, Oh, you know, I got a flat tire. I gotta make it, you know, get, take it easy. I'm going to go the right. I'm going to keep it safe, whatever it may be. Well, it's interesting to me because so many Rallycross drivers, you don't actually really know who many of them are. Literally, you don't know who many of them are. And what's interesting about that is none of them publish or get out and talk or have any videos about them or stunts that they do or rally, crest driving at all. What's really interesting is Ken block is, I would say arguably the most well known drift like Rallycross person out there besides maybe Travis was Serrano, but he had, you know, some other stuff. Anyway, um, as far as Rallycross, I almost think Ken blocks probably the most well known and known as like the best Rallycross driver out there. What's really interesting, I know I've said that like five times, um, is even though he's known for that, he's actually never won like first place in a podium on like championships. I mean he's, he's won races and he's, he's gotten like second or third and plenty of them, but he's not actually like the number one driver in the world, you know, but he's known more than any other driver out there in the world. And therefore he's associated as one of the best drivers in the world. I don't know if that maybe lights up a few light bulbs or not, but to me it did. And as I saw him take this jump with a flat tire, um, I mean I already knew this, but I, it reaffirmed to me that he knows what he's doing. He is, he's very much different. Um, and it's funny, I was actually just reading this book niche down, um, and niche down as amazing book by the way. So I was reading niche down and it talks about how being better will get you nowhere literally in business, but being different is huge. Um, any category King out there, any business that is like the number one, the top business out there, it's because they were different. They did something differently. Um, an example that I was actually walking through and I was talking to my wife about it, which is kind of funny. Um, Pepsi spent billions of dollars on ads that were just a complete flop really because the ad was, Pepsi is better than co like Coke. And so they would have these taste tests like tasty for yourself, Pepsi, you know, it's better than Coke. And what's really funny about that as the, the totally just shot themselves in the foot because now they're trying to argue that they're better, which is a race to the bottom. Really. Like it's, if you do that in any business, that you're just going to start competing on price at that point and people aren't going to really care who you are unless you're the cheapest, which sucks to be that person essentially. Um, and so it, Pepsi's doing this and the problem was is they were pitching themselves as better than Coke. Whoa. In reality, they just set Coke up to be the best because they're pushing more of their focus towards Coke. And so now people are seeing Pepsi ads for Coke, which is not what you want to do because that's your number one competition. And yet you're like showing everybody that they're better than you. That's not a very good idea. This is not a very good thing to do. You know, like that doesn't make a lot of sense because now everybody's going to see or associate that Coke is better than Pepsi because you're, you're essentially saying that subconsciously. Um, so there was another example though that I've always kind of thought about. Now you can always pit yourself against another company that you're different from. If Pepsi would have done this, it would've been a whole lot better for them. But Pepsi did not pit themselves as different from Coke. They pitted themselves as better than Coke. And that's where they got a wrong one. Good example is Apple. So Apple actually used to have these Mac versus PC commercials. And I mean, unlike Pepsi, they weren't talking about how they were better per se. It was more of how we're different. And that actually kind of separated the two. And what's was really cool about that is winter PC was bigger than Mac at the time, right? So they're, they're definitely like, they were a smaller company, um, or PCs a lot bigger than max. So what's cool about that is you can pit yourself against, so Matt can pit themselves against PC. And say that they're different now, if they would've said, Hey, we're better, they would have, that would've been actually pretty bad campaign. It could have helped them a little bit cause they were, they were a bit smaller at the time. But um, because they put in themselves as different, well it does two things. It shows that they're not trying to take the PC, um, customers essentially they're not, they're just trying to show people that we do things differently. And if you want to be different, if you want to see something different, who you want to use a different product that is more fitted to you. This, that's us. This is what we do. Um, and there's a whole lot anyway. Um, and then the second thing is since Mac was smaller than PC by a bit at that time by, so shading themselves with, with PC, by pity, the throwing rocks against PC at the time, they kind of almost brought themselves up to kind of the same area because now they're associating with PC, the biggest person out there. Um, and then once you get to about the same level, so once Mac and PC are kind of close, you can't, you can't be throwing rocks anymore cause then you'll, you'll take PC with you. Um, Mac would take them with them because now they're still associated with them and so is going to grow with them because now they're there. They're showing they're putting focus on them. Um, same thing with Pepsi. Pepsi was thrown focus on Coke and Coke still number one. You know, obviously that didn't work for them and they spent billions of dollars. Mack did a little bit differently and said, Hey, this is why we're different than them not [inaudible]. And they were definitely thrown rocks, that's for sure. But not all of the time. It was more of like, Hey, this is why we, we, we aren't the same thing. So don't categorize us as the same thing. We can do things differently in this way. And people are like, Oh, I like that. So they go there and then as peace or as Apple got to be as big as PC, they stopped talking about PC. It's the same thing with click funnels. Click funnels with thrown rocks at a few different companies. Infusion soft, which they called them Confusionsoft and a couple other ones, but they would throw rocks at them as they were smaller. Well then the got to be about the same size and that's when you stop talking about anybody that's your size or lower because you'll, you'll bring them with you, you'll add attention to them. So you always go for the bigger and then once you get to that spot you cut it. So, huh. I feel like I probably just barbed a bunch of stuff all over you guys right there. So hopefully that was good. Hopefully I helped you understand a few different things there guys. Don't create a better product. Oh, that drove me nuts. In college, people were always building a product that was better than the other one. That is a horrible idea is a horrible way to go. You're just setting yourself up for failure. Category Kings on average own about 75% of the market and the other 25% is literally left to the other hundreds of companies that try to say they're different. Don't be that person. If there's a category King out there and you want to be better than them, you're already screwed. Don't even think about it during try make yourself different, then you can create your own niche and create your own category there. So hopefully I helped you guys today. I'm sorry. It's been awhile since I've been on. Yeah, I've had lots of other distractions and things going on around me and offer mind is coming up. I am. Yeah. I feel like I've just, I've talked about way too many things but offer, mine is coming up this weekend actually, which I'm really excited about. Um, we've, we've been going kind of nuts with that and so freaking stoked about how much is going into and how awesome was going to be. Oh, for all of you that are listening that are coming off from mine or that went off for mind, you will know. It's just been, it's amazing. Um, it's an, it's a yearly event though. And if you missed out, I'm telling you, good off. remind.com check it out. You will not miss out if you do marketing. If you need to create your offer and differentiate or position yourself the way you need or differently or the way you should. Definitely want to hit hit up an offer mine. So anyway, full circle, Ken block. The reason he is the man and the reason he is bigger than the rest is because he's different. He does things differently. While like when he was, um, when he would be racing on a rally cross race, um, and that he knew he was going to lose, he would literally just drive like way different than everybody else and show off or like not show off, but like jump way higher than the rest. And people would talk about him more than the winner. That's another golden nugget. There be different people talk about you more than those who are just good at what they do. Yeah. Anyway, hopefully that's cool guys. Um, thank you so much for being on here, and we will talk to y'all later.