Free Enterprise in Three Minutes with Ray Keating – Episode #68: Key Players Fail to Understand the Entrepreneur

Ray Keating talks about the fact that economists and educators don’t fully understand entrepreneurship. Tune in here! 

Free Enterprise in Three Minutes with Ray Keating – Episode #67: The Central Role of the Entrepreneur

Ray Keating discusses the central role that entrepreneurship – that the entrepreneur – plays in the economy. Tune in now!

PRESS CLUB C Podcast with Ray Keating – Episode #12: Gaining Insights on Becoming an Entrepreneur from Chris Ullman

If you’re thinking about diving into the entrepreneurial waters, you need to listen to the conversation Ray has with Chris Ullman. Based on his own experience as an entrepreneur and his expertise in advising business executives, Chris offers great insights on a wide array of topics central to becoming and working as an entrepreneur. And by the way, Chris makes clear that entrepreneurship is not limited by age, as he hung out his own shingle at the age of 55. Tune in now!

Interview with Entrepreneurship and Disney Expert Lou Mongello

In the seventh episode of the PRESS CLUB C Podcast, Ray Keating interviews Lou Mongello - leading expert on entrepreneurship and Disney!

Need some positive stuff right now? Ray did, so he turned to Lou Mongello for an interview about entrepreneurship, opportunity and more, including Disney! Lou and Ray talk about assorted aspects of becoming and being an entrepreneur in tough times and beyond. It’s a positive chat largely focused on opportunity. 

For good measure, Lou and Ray have a bit too much fun talking about Disney, and playing “Tell Me Your Favorites.” To paraphrase what Lou says on his own fabulous WDW Radio Podcast: Sit back, relax, enjoy the conversation, and find out why Lou Mongello has inspired so many.

Throwback Thursday: Creators, Conspirators and Monopolists, Oh My!

by Ray Keating

Prominent businessmen don’t always understand how the economy actually works. That’s been evident on the presidential campaign trail this year, with Donald Trump leading the Republican field and Michael Bloomberg’s brief flirtation with jumping into the race as an independent. Trump and Bloomberg clearly are clueless on a host of issues – such as Trump on trade – regarding how the economy functions and how policy impacts the economy. But, of course, there are many business leaders who understand how the economy works, and even offer some rather unique insights. That’s the case with Peter Thiel and his book “Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future.” The following review ran as a Long Island Business News column of mine in October 2014 …

I recently headed west to Silicon Valley for a gathering focused on technology policies. At the start of that journey, standing in an airport bookstore, I decided to get the full Silicon Valley techie experience, and picked up Peter Thiel’s new book “Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future.”

It’s a valuable, quick read that provides fascinating insights on thinking about entrepreneurship and the economy, and what’s needed to start up a business.

Thiel was a co-founder of PayPal, and has been an investor in a variety of startups, including Facebook. His perspectives on how businesses function in the economy are drenched in a refreshing economic reality.

The central theme of Thiel’s message is the need to create new things. He points out, “Doing what we already know how to do takes the world from 1 to n, adding more of something familiar. But every time we create something new, we go from 0 to 1.” He warns, “Unless they invest in the difficult task of creating new things, American companies will fail in the future no matter how big their profits remain today.”

One would expect Thiel to declare that the word for “0 to 1 progress is technology.” However, he quickly adds that it’s not all about computers: “Properly understood, any new and better way of doing things is technology.” Another word for that is innovation.

For Thiel, building the future and creating new things is accomplished by monopolies. What? How can that be? Well, he has a better grasp on how the economy actually works than many economists. Thiel correctly rejects the concept of “perfect competition” that is taught in all Economics 101 classes, whereby undifferentiated firms and homogeneous products sell at the market price, and economic profits are competed away. That’s not how the economy works, nor quite frankly, does it help students to understand the market process.

But what about this monopoly thing? Thiel writes: “To an economist, every monopoly looks the same, whether it deviously eliminates its rivals, secures a license from the state, or innovates its way to the top. In this book, we’re not interested in illegal bullies or government favorites; by ‘monopoly,’ we mean the kind of company that’s so good at what it does that no other firm can offer a close substitute.”

While he does not put it exactly this way, what entrepreneurs and businesses are doing within a competitive environment is investing and innovating to create what effectively are temporary monopolies that allow profits to be maximized. And the longer a firm excels at providing something that consumers cannot get elsewhere, the longer the business can maintain that temporary monopoly. That’s quite different from the government-protected or created monopoly, for example, that grows fat, lazy and rips off consumers.

As Thiel proclaims, “Creative monopolists give customers more choices by adding entirely new categories of abundance to the world.”

Thiel’s subsequent advise and ideas for those looking to start up new businesses spring from this basic understanding of what entrepreneurs and businesses need to do – that is, to create something new and better – if they seek bold success. And he offers many valuable insights on that process. But among my favorite bits of wisdom tie in to how to think about business and career – one has to do with chance and the other secrets.

On business success being all about chance, Thiel counters that if that were the case, we would not see the successful serial entrepreneurs that we obviously do. He adds: “Learning about startups is worthless if you’re just reading stories about people who won the lottery.”

And on creative secrets, he provocatively but accurately writes, “The best entrepreneurs know this: every great business is built around a secret that’s hidden from the outside. A great company is a conspiracy to change the world; when you share your secret, the recipient becomes a fellow conspirator.”

So, here’s to those creative, conspiratorial monopolists who change the world.

______________

Mr. Keating is an economist and novelist who writes on a wide range of topics. His Pastor Stephen Grant novels have received considerable acclaim, including The River: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel being a finalist for KFUO radio’s Book of the Year 2014, and Murderer’s Row: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel winning Book of the Year 2015.

The Pastor Stephen Grant Novels are available at Amazon…

Murderer’s Row: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel

The River: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel

An Advent for Religious Liberty: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel

Root of All Evil? A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel

Warrior Monk: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel

Throwback Thursday: Following the Entrepreneurial Dream to Walt Disney World, and Beyond

by Ray Keating

I work with entrepreneurs, teach about entrepreneurship, and am an entrepreneur. So, I enjoy interviewing interesting entrepreneurs. One entrepreneur I interviewed not too long ago was Lou Mongello. The interview turned into a two-part series for my old Long Island Business News column (running in late summer 2014). I enjoyed the interview and writing about it, as Lou is the definition of the optimistic, enthusiastic entrepreneur. Here are the articles…

First in a Two-Part Series on Following Entrepreneurial Dream

It’s not unusual to hear about people moving from the northeast – particularly from New York and New Jersey – to Florida. In fact, it’s been a river of humanity heading south for some time, especially when it comes to retirees.

It’s also pretty common to come across people with dreams of turning passions into businesses, but they fail to take the entrepreneurial plunge.

Then there are those who take their shots at entrepreneurial success. Consider a guy from New Jersey with a family, a home and a solid career. He quits his job, sells the house, and heads to Florida to follow his entrepreneurial dreams built on a lifetime love of Walt Disney World?

That’s what Lou Mongello did. For those dreaming of transforming a passion into an entrepreneurial reality, Mongello is a role model.

As he said in an interview, “I get to talk about Walt Disney World for a living.” Since 2005, he has done an audio podcast on his WDWRadio.com website, along with videos, blog posts, live events and broadcasts, and assorted special events… Mongello’s latest book is 102 Ways to Save Money For and At Walt Disney World, and he has written two Walt Disney World trivia books, and is working on a third.

Bottom line: If you want to know anything about Walt Disney World, or Disney in general, Lou Mongello is the man. How he became that man is a fascinating and inspirational story for current and aspiring entrepreneurs.

His passion for Disney goes back to childhood days, with his family going to Disney World every year – “at least once a year” – since November 1971. Mongello said, “My parents were Disney fans, and made us Disney fans. I became fascinated… I learned everything I could about this place that I was so very much in love with.”

When he eventually told his wife that he wanted to write a book, her response was: “Well, all you know about is Disney World.” Mongello reported, “I went downstairs and started writing, and haven’t come out of the basement since.”

As he tells it, he was doing well as a lawyer in New Jersey, with an IT consulting business on the side. But a book on Disney World led to the website to articles to podcasts. It “snowballed.” He was flying back and forth to Florida, and then the realization hit: “I think I can make a business out of this hobby. I sold the house I thought I was going to own forever. I brought money to my closing, which, as you know, is not the way it’s supposed to work. And I packed up the Honda Odyssey, and I moved to Florida.”

He went full-time talking and covering Disney in 2007. He called it “a very big, very scary leap of faith.” Unlike those who talk about following their entrepreneurial dreams but never really pull the trigger, Mongello decided “to go all in.”

What’s Mongello’s advice when looking to start up a business? He states in straightforward fashion, “You need to find out what your passion is .., define your goals,” and “start taking action however small.”

He also warned: “Prepare yourself and the people around you for the sacrifices that you need to make. There are going to be sacrifices. For most people, it doesn’t happen overnight.” Mongello noted “an incredible support system” in his own journey, including “my wife and my parents.” It’s that support system that gets “you through tough times with business,” adding that’s “one of the most important aspects that people really need to keep in mind.”

Next week’s column will touch on some of Mongello’s insights regarding brands, customers, social media and podcasts. For now, let’s close with a Lou Mongello inspirational note for entrepreneurial dreamers: “You can do what you love and do it full time.” He certainly has.

Second in a Two-Part Series on Following Entrepreneurial Dream

How do you turn a passion into a business? That’s a question I often work through with the MBA students that I teach at Dowling College.

The best lessons, as those students will tell you, often come from the real-world experiences of entrepreneurs, rather than from a textbook.

Lou Mongello is just such an entrepreneur. As explained in last week’s column, Mongello gave up being a lawyer in New Jersey and moved to Florida to become one of the foremost experts on Walt Disney World, and all things Disney. He does podcasts, videos, live broadcasts, hosts events, and writes books on Disney World. Consider that Podcast Awards voted his WDWRadio.com podcasts the best travel podcast for every year from 2006 through 2013.

Mongello’s entrepreneurial ventures also include speaking to businesses, schools and conferences on ways of achieving business dreams, and advising podcasters on how to make their ventures profitable.

When I asked Mongello about what he had learned from the Disney company for his own enterprise, he spoke about one’s brand: “You hear the name Disney and there is a level of expectation in that brand that I think is so much higher than anyone else, which is why I think the Disney brand has such incredible brand loyalty.” He noted that “you have an expectation visiting” Walt Disney World, and “99.9% of time it is going to be magical.” (Yes, he used the word “magical.”) For his own business, he explained, “Everything that I put out had to rise to that same level. Because it was associated with the Disney brand, but more importantly because my name was on it.”

And what about his customers, that is, his listeners? Mongello said, “I hate the word fans. I believe, and the way I treat the people that listen, is they’re not fans, they’re my friends because that’s how they look at me. They hear your voice every week. They watch you. They trust you. They know you better than I know them.” This perspective on customers has allowed Mongello to build an “incredible community.” He boils it down: “Treat them as friends, they become incredibly loyal. They also become the most passionate evangelists. They are the marketing team for me.”

That’s very much the case in the online, social media universe. Technology has allowed businesses to reach people in powerful ways. At the same time, consumers have heightened expectations when it comes to social media interaction. Treat customers as friends, and that’s very good business.

For Mongello, “All my social media stuff, all of my email get answered by me. I will not hand it off to somebody else because if you are going to write to me or tweet to me, you better believe that I will give the courtesy of a personal response.” He added that many big brands are catching on and “humanizing that experience.”

But what about his bread and butter – the podcast? Mongello predicts big things, and it’s hard to argue against his reasoning. He said, “I think the next 12 to 18 months there is going to be this incredible explosion of podcasting and this business of on-demand delivery of content… The podcasting medium is so incredibly personal. I’m inside your ears. You may be driving, you may be on the treadmill, but you’re focused on one thing… It is an incredibly intimate thing. There is incredible power there. There is incredible opportunity. So, businesses need to realize that they need to start getting on this platform.” Again, he points to popular podcasts on iTunes, highlighting that some larger firms are getting it on podcasts.

Finally, on a more general level regarding entrepreneurship, Mongello’s optimism cannot be restrained. He said, “I really am focused on helping other entrepreneurs. As a ‘solepreneur,’ I get how tough it is to be in a room by yourself struggling with an idea.” Then he adds, “There’s room for us all to succeed.”

(Visit Lou Mongello’s website, the WDW Radio website, and get his books, audio tours of Walt Disney World and more.)

______________

Mr. Keating is an economist and novelist who writes on a wide range of topics. His Pastor Stephen Grant novels have received considerable acclaim, including The River: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel being a finalist for KFUO radio’s Book of the Year 2014, and Murderer’s Row: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel nominated for Book of the Year 2015.

The Pastor Stephen Grant Novels are available at Amazon…

Murderer’s Row: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel

The River: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel

An Advent for Religious Liberty: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel

Root of All Evil? A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel

Warrior Monk: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel