Business

How to Position Your Small Business to Grow Sales During and After COVID-19 [Podcast]

Published

5 years ago

September 28, 2020

The pandemic has changed customers and their buying habits. That’s without question. So how do you talk to them now and in the next normal time? Open Window Marketing founder Lisa McGuire joins Karl Barham and Rico Figliolini to discuss brand positioning and more.

Social Media
LinkedIn
Instagram @iamlisamcguire

Marketing Tips for Small Business Owners to end 2020 strong.

The 3 Customer Profiles of 2020 – how your customer has changed
Customers have shifted from pre-pandemic to the pandemic to the next normal. How can you possibly know what to say?
Why traditional marketing no longer works and how to move forward.
Traditional marketing talks about the features of the product and why they are the best choice. In our noisy world, you need a new approach.
Why your personal brand is even more important to help you drive more revenue

Timestamp, where to find it in the podcast:
[00:00:30] – Intro
[00:03:10] – About Lisa
[00:04:01] – Marketing Mistakes
[00:05:43] – Changing Clientele
[00:09:33] – Importance of an Online Presence
[00:16:14] – Clarifying Your Message
[00:21:14] – Traditional Marketing
[00:23:57] – Spending and Personal Branding
[00:30:17] – Marketing Done Correctly
[00:31:52] – Closing

“And the big idea to take away from this is the customers that you’ve had no longer exist.
They are now pandemic customers. They have new problems, they have new priorities. So what
do you need to do in your business to shift your product line and offerings? To meet these new
problems, or if you still connect with their problem, how do you need to shift your message?”
Lisa Mcguire

Karl: [00:00:30] Welcome to the Capitalist Sage Podcast. We’re here to bring you advice and

tips from seasoned pros and experts to help you improve your business. I’m Karl Barham with

Transworld Business Advisors, and my cohost is Rico Figliolini with Mighty Rockets Digital

Marketing and the publisher of Peachtree Corners Magazine. Hey Rico, how are you doing?

Rico: [00:00:47] Good Karl. It’s a beautiful day considering how much rain we had the other day.

Karl: [00:00:53] I know, I know. This storm has gone past and now we’ll hopefully get some

better days going ahead. Things are getting cooler for the fall. Why don’t you introduce our

Sponsors?

Rico: [00:01:04] Yes. Our lead sponsor is Hargray Fiber. Hargray Fiber is a Southeast based

company that does internet connectivity. They handle fiber optics, which is the main drive of any

internet home or office, right? So they’re in the communities that they serve as well. So they’re

not your cable guy, right? They’re not a company that just has an office there. They’re involved

in the communities that they’re in, whether they’re involved with local companies. So for

example, in Peachtree Corners, they’re involved with Curiosity Lab at Peachtree Corners with

the city. They’re providing internet connectivity to a lot of companies in the area. So if you are

interested in Fiber optics in a company that’s local that has a local presence, and that can give

you the tools you need, like smart office tools to be able to operate your employees at home or

in the office, reach out to HargrayFiber.com or you could go to Hargray.com/Business. And they

have a promotion going on, a thousand dollars visa gift card for those companies that qualify

becoming a client of theirs, so check them out.

Karl: [00:02:10] Oh, that’s fabulous. Everyone needs more internet, more speed and I’m glad to

have good businesses like Hargray in our community to help business owners with that. Today,

I am honored and pleased to have a great guest. In this fourth quarter as we’re coming in,

rounding out 2020, most business owners have seen all sorts of impacts. Some have grown,

some have stayed the same. Some have actually seen some reduction in their customer. What I

know for sure if you’re going to have a great fourth quarter and start off 2021 well, you’ve got to

focus on growth. And today we have Lisa McGuire here to talk about how small business

owners can really focus their marketing and sales efforts in concert. To help them really have a

springboard to their growth in 2020 through 2021. Hi Lisa, how’re you doing today?

Lisa: [00:03:07] I’m doing great Karl. Thank you so much for having me.

Karl: [00:03:10] Oh, pleasure. Well, Lisa McGuire is a business growth and adviser. And a

marketing consultant with Open Window Marketing. And I’d love for her to introduce herself and

tell a little bit of how she helps people in business.

Lisa: [00:03:25] So, one thing we know is when business owners started their business, they

wanted to do the work they love. They didn’t necessarily want to wear all the hats that a

business owner has to wear when running a business. So what I do is I come in and help them

determine how to figure out who their ideal client is, how do they connect with that client, what

message does that client need to hear, to be able to engage with them, and then how to grow

their business through marketing that works. And then it filters into the other areas, productivity,

the mission of their company, the culture of their workforce too.

Karl: [00:04:01] Wow. Well, I’ll tell you, I look at a lot of P&Ls for business owners. And one of

the things that really becomes apparent, I look at how one business owner spends on marketing

and ask some questions about that. And then I look at another one who may not do a lot of

marketing. You’ll hear a lot of, I grew my business through referrals and so on. And I realized

there’s a big difference when you look at the performance of growth, those that focus on that

marketing versus those that don’t. But when they start business, they didn’t really think about

that. What are some of those mistakes you see business owners making when it comes to

marketing their business in general?

Lisa: [00:04:45] Yeah, just kinda marketing their business in general. What they’re looking at,

they’re looking at, okay, what is it that I have to sell and how can I push it out to get as many

people to buy it as possible? They’re not looking at it from the customer perspective of what do

they need to hear. All they know is I’ve got this many widgets to sell, or I’ve got to book this

many billable hours, and what can I do to make people buy from me. And so what they end up

doing is they’ve got this message they repeat over and over that isn’t connecting with their

clients. They put a lot of money into tactical things. They’ll do Facebook ads, they’ll pay a lot of

money for SEO to get people to come to their website. But what happens is the message that

they’re using either to get people there, or once they are on the site, it’s not converting because

it doesn’t matter to the customer. They talk about features. They forget about them.

Karl: [00:05:43] Wow. Well this year, has gotta be really interesting. For many businesses

because of the pandemic, their customers might have change. Either new customers are

coming through or what their existing customer needs have changed. How would you walk

someone through looking at a situation like that?

Lisa: [00:06:04] Yes, this has been a year that was unthinkable. We never could have imagined

it. And so if you think about back to January, February, we had pre-pandemic customers. Things

for going along, if you remember just a couple months before that we were celebrating a new

decade, there were all kinds of analogies, the 2020 vision, we’re going to make this the decade

that really makes the difference. And then the unthinkable happens. We have this global

pandemic. And really the whole world, as far as the business world in the United States, just

kind of came to a standstill. You know, we were in a period, if you remember back think when

they said, if you just quarantine for a couple of weeks, we’ll get through this. And so it was

uncharted territory. So here’s what we found with businesses. They did one of three things.

They either continued with their marketing as usual. They used a different message and pivoted

their message. Or they said nothing at all. So if we look at those three things, continuing

marketing business as usual would tell their customers you’re insensitive to what’s happening in

my life. Why are you going on acting like this world has not changed? The ones that went quiet,

what happened is they made a space for other businesses to come in and take their place. But

the businesses that won, the businesses that did well, were businesses who first of all

acknowledged what was happening and became very empathetic to your customers. You know,

there was and continues to be, but initially a lot of fear. A lot of anxiety, anxious, you know,

what’s going to happen to my business? What’s happening with my family? Am I in danger with

my health? So making sure that you really understand that customer and who they are was

really critical. So we heard a lot of messages, we’re in this together. You know, we’ve heard the

new normal, we heard all of those things to really unify our market place to be able to reach

them. But now we’re what, six months into the seven months into this, I guess, because it’s six.

Now you’ve got a third type of customer. You’ve got the customer that is realizing, okay, this is

our new way of life for now. You know we’re moving forward, so what can we do? Our whole

world has been disrupted. If you think about it or work lives, our home lives, how we consume

media, how we purchase, what we value up, like everything has been shifted. So what can we

look at what the customers, what they need now? And what the big idea to take away from this

is, the customers that you’ve had no longer exist. They are now pandemic customers. They

have new problems, they have new priorities. So what do you need to do in your business to

shift your product line and offerings? To meet these new problems, or if you still connect with

their problem, how do you need to shift your message? And that is the advice I would give

business owners heading into 2021. If you’re using a pre pandemic message, you’re talking to a

client who is no longer existing.

Rico: [00:09:33] Lisa, do you, what do you find from the clients that you talk to from the

companies you talked to more effective? You know, as far as business goes, what tools are

they implementing? What are they changing that they weren’t doing before the pandemic?

Lisa: [00:09:51] Well, I think the thing that has become very apparent to business owners is if

you did not have an online presence, you need to have one. You know, I’m very active in

networking and in those first couple of weeks, people were trying to figure out how do we

network if we can’t go to coffee? How we will reach people? How are people going to find me?

And you know, if you look even at restaurants, they had to do a quick of it. How do we get

people to consume our food? How do we make them feel like they’re safe? So being online and

making sure that your customer experience online is seamless. That has been the big shift that

I’ve seen with most people is figuring out, okay, how do I go online and switch my products.

Rico: [00:10:38] You know, what’s interesting. I think in the restaurant business especially, it

was easier, right? Because you had Yelp, you had Door Dash, you had Grub Hub, you had all

these businesses. If you wanted food, you could, you would go out and you’d find it. You know,

where you could go. The problem is with, you know, with a place like a yoga place or a soap

maker type of store, it’s difficult, right? Because people aren’t quite looking for that and they may

want it, but they just don’t know. So there’s that two-sided edge to that right? You do, but I agree

with you. You have to be online, but it’s way more difficult for some businesses than others.

Lisa: [00:11:17] Yes, it definitely is. So we saw a lot of people in the health and fitness space go

online and start having virtual yoga classes, things such as that. We found brick and mortar

stores suddenly had to have an eCommerce site. But the other thing too, we have this

opportunity of where we may have been marketing within a geographical area, is now we could

extend our services, you know, you can network nationally or internationally. I’m working with a

couple of clients who did work with local Atlanta businesses or local Atlanta clients. And now

their clients are all across the United States. So how do they find them? How do they reach

them? How do they connect with them?

Karl: [00:12:01] It’s easy to understand the power of being online. And I visit businesses and I

look at their websites all the time and it’s a pandemic in itself how bad some of these websites

are. People don’t put a lot of attention. When you look at a website, someone doing it right, what

are some of the things? Maybe not technical, but what are some of the things that you find helps

business owners be more reachable and successful online?

Lisa: [00:12:33] Yeah. So the first thing, you know, as we talk about websites, Karl the thing I

would invite people to do is if you think you have a great website, look at two or three of your

competitors and go to their websites. And what you’re going to find, it’s very likely you’re all

saying the same thing. So what you have to do is figure out how am I going to stand out?

There’s a couple of different ways to do that. So the immediate piece of advice I can give all

your listeners today, you can go and do this and start making money tomorrow. Make sure you

have clear call to action buttons. And you want them all over your homepage. So you want one

in the upper right hand corner. In that hero shot area. You want one in the middle of that hero

shot area and make sure those call to action buttons are a different color than the rest of your

website. Make sure they’re the same color throughout as you cascade down the page. As you

scroll down the page make sure there’s always a call to action button in the screen as well as in

the upper right hand corner. Because here’s what happens, the visitor may not be ready to

purchase from you or maybe ready to take the next step with you initially, but as they scroll

down the page and start learning more about you, Oh, now I want to know more. And so you

want to make it convenient. We call that call to action button, your cash register. So why would

you hide your cash register in the back ladies room? You want to make sure they’re all over the

place, right? So that’s something you can do to start making money today. So that’s one thing, if

that’s helpful to you.

Karl: [00:14:13] Yeah, that’s great advice. The other thing is, there’s this thinking around Google

pay-per-clicks and Facebook ads and so on. How do they, how do business owners use those

to integrate with their website?

Lisa: [00:14:28] Yeah. So there certainly is a place for paid ads. And you know, the thing is, is

you start with your website. You want to make sure that Google recognizes your website as a

quality website. So I’m going to answer your question, Karl, but I’m going to kind of connect

these two. First of all, Google’s going to try and watch and monitor to see, are people when

they’re on your website, are they staying on it long? If they can register that they’re staying on it

long, that signals to Google, there is quality content on there. So again, your message is so

important. So when you go to a website, you should be able to immediately know what the

business does. It is astounding, the number of business websites I see, I can’t tell what they do.

I have to know what you sell. What do you do for me? Making sure that you are updating

content. And so that would be having a blog on your website, talking about topics that people

have questions about. And, you know, people say, I don’t know what to write in a blog. Think

about this, what are the top five questions people ask you about your business? Those will be

your first five blog topics. And so putting those on there, that’s going to give you some organic

reach with SEO in that. But then when you get to ads, paid ads, that’s when you can drive

people to your website whether it’s Facebook ads or Google ads. And I recommend not trying to

do it yourself, work with a digital marketing specialist who knows what they’re doing. I believe in

paying experts for what they know so well.

Karl: [00:16:14] There’s a subset of business owners that I know struggle in this space. And it’s

in the professional services. Lawyers, accountants, etc. Very smart, very talented in their

profession. But when it comes to marketing themselves, maybe not as strong. And their content

can be confusing to the layman. Finding the intricacies of tax law for how to get out of speeding

tickets or whatever that might be. For those types of businesses, how can their messaging on

their website help them? What would be something they can do to guide people in?

Lisa: [00:16:54] Yeah, so a really great way to do that because, you know, here’s the thing we

want those experts. And when you need someone like that, you want someone who knows what

they’re doing, who knows all the intricacies and you know, the ins and outs of how to practice

their profession very well. But what happens is when you speak with them, because they are so

educated and they’re so good at what they do. You’ll find a lot of times they tend to use what we

call insider language. So they’ll use industry terms. And when they start using those, the person

reading the website or the person listening to the message, what goes on in their mind is they

say, I don’t know what that means. So they either get stuck trying to figure it out, what are they

talking about? Or they just stopped listening because it’s too much work to try and keep up with

the person communicating the message. So that is one thing I would advise for those folks, is to

stop using insider language. To make your language, make your website as if a 10 year old

could read it and understand it. You want the language to be that simple. You’ll be able to bring

in your credibility and authority the longer people stay on your website, but that would be the

first thing I would suggest. The second thing I would suggest is make sure that you really get to

the problem that your customer has. And here’s the thing, traditional marketing was talking

about the business. Today, great marketing is being known for the problem that you solve. So I’ll

use a tire store for an example. This one I use quite frequently. So if I sell tires, I am not selling

tires. That’s not the problem I solve when somebody needs tires. The problem I’m solving is

someone needs to have a vehicle that is safe on the road because they have quality tires. The

problem I’m solving is someone has to turn in their car for a lease and they’ve got to update their

tires so it meets qualifications. So look at for the customer, what is that pain they are

experiencing? How is it making them feel? And being known for solving that problem, that is the

way that you go in as a professional service provider and speak to them.

Karl: [00:19:20] It’s interesting, as you’re saying that, it made me think of this concept around

demand generation and leading the customer to discover or clarify the problem they have and if

you’re the person that helps them do that. And a lot of professional services, I talked to

someone the other day, a client the other day, and they were concerned about, they took out

PPP loans and EIDL loans this year. And so as they’re going through, I mentioned to them, they

have to process or apply for forgiveness. They looked at me kind of shocked. You mean it

doesn’t happen automatically? And so I know lots of financial advisors and CPAs and

accountants and folks that help in that area. No one’s talking about that problem that’s out there

that people may not know. And is that an example of some blog and/or content around that

particular problem that would help someone find a professional service site?

Lisa: [00:20:25] That is a very timely and perfect example, Karl. Because, so these people

walked into these situations, you know, okay, this is great. You’re telling me I can get this

money. How does this work? They were very good about leading them to it, but now is the next

step of now you’ve got to apply for forgiveness. Well, these people don’t know how to do it.

What does that look like? How do I? Is there a way I could do it and mess it up? Please help me

figure that out. So that is the next step of when the bank says okay, now it’s time, wherever you

were able to secure. It says, okay, now it’s time to start moving it along. We have no idea of

what that means. So you’ve got to spell that out as well. Yeah. Great example.

Karl: [00:21:14] Well, if I can ask a little about some of the more traditional forms of marketing.

This year, I don’t know how many movies were released between March and September, but no

one’s watching ads between movies anymore. What did the role of these other different

vehicles, whether it’s ads and papers and magazines and those types of direct marketing. What

role does that play in marketing today? And should people still be investing in those?

Lisa: [00:21:47] So, yes, there’s a lot of different types of marketing. And that’s the thing when

you talk to someone that has a marketing company that can mean a dozen different things, a

dozen different directions. And people are always looking for quick fixes, but I really, you know,

the way I describe marketing is imagine you were going on a cross country trip, you know, you

know, your goal is to get the other side of the country. You would not think of getting in your car

and just starting to drive without putting gas in the tank and making sure you have snacks. You

might, you know, plug in your GPS where you’re going, or, you know, you’ve got your Google

maps, you make a plan. You don’t just start getting, you don’t get in your car and just start

driving wherever you want. Well, that’s what people do with their marketing. So, okay I need to

market. Maybe I’ll try direct mail. Oh no, no, we don’t do direct mail because you know, I don’t

use direct mail. So why would anybody else use that? But even here’s a really great rate or

maybe I’ll try these Facebook ads and I’ll boost the post myself. Well, maybe so they’re all over

the place. So the first thing I would recommend for any business owner is to just sit down with

someone who knows what they’re talking about in marketing and develop a strategy. You know,

come up with a 12 month plan, a six month plan, a three month plan. Allocate some budget to it

because your business will grow in one of two ways. Your business is either going to grow by

innovating. So that’s changing up, pivoting, doing something better. Or it’s going to grow by

marketing. So you’ve got to make that investment one way or the other. And when you start

seeing traction, that’s when you’ll have, you know, more to be able to boost from. But you’re not

going to have that traction. You’re going to be wasting your money if you start going into

different areas that don’t apply to you. And I think what happens a lot of business owners,

they’ve got their buddy that did this, or they know of this other company, their competitors doing

this. They think they need to do it too. And that’s probably the worst thing they can do.

Karl: [00:23:57] I’ll offer up, if I could add to that, for business owners out there. There’s three

numbers I’ll share, 4, 8 and 12%. When I look at a P&L for a business and I’m looking at trend

over time, I notice how much percentage of their revenue to spending on marketing and I look at

their growth rate. And what’s often, if you want to benchmark for mature business, that’s been

around and known for a while. Some of those can get away with between 4 to 8% spend on

marketing. If they want to grow. If they want to stay flat. They don’t have to spend on marketing,

but if they want to grow their top line revenue, 4 to 8% is what your competitors, what other

people are spending normally grow. If you’re a new business or you’re a business that needs

some explaining or new to an area you’re talking about 8 to 12%, range depending. If your

product is known, but you’re a new company offering something that’s known, you might be

able to get away with 8%. If you’re offering something new and no one else is offering it and you

want them to build awareness. You’re talking close to 12%. I offer those numbers because it is

extremely consistent looking at the spend on marketing correlating to how people grow their

business. Now, the ones you’ll always have a family friend that says I spend nothing on

marketing and my business keeps growing. That is the anomalies. They’re innovating, they’re

doing something different, or there’s something that’s giving them a competitive advantage. Or

they are marketing without spending. So talking about personal branding, talking about other

ways to gain audience without spending for it. Can you comment a little bit on that?

Lisa: [00:25:48] Yes, sure. This is one thing that as we have been in this situation, we’re seeing

a lot more people on LinkedIn. I don’t know if you’re active on LinkedIn or not, but we’re seeing

a lot more of that. And there’s a lot of people that don’t know how to use LinkedIn and how they

can really leverage it. So, you know, here’s the thing that I tell people, particularly when you’re in

an industry that there’s a lot of other people that do what you do. People don’t want to do

business with business. They want to do business with people. And so what makes your

business different from every other business out there is you. And so being able to feature your

zone of genius, being able to show your authority, your expertise, your credibility. One way to do

that is to really work through a personal branding process. Now, personal branding is not all

about saying, Hey, look at me. It’s not about becoming an Instagram influencer. It’s not about

being any of those. It’s really being very strategic about understanding. How do you show up

online? Is that how you want to show up online? What do you need to do to shift that if it’s not

where you want it to be and how can you position yourself as a credible expert that people

would trust to do business with you? So that is something that I really encourage people to do.

Whether you work for a company or whether you own your own business. The only thing you

own when you leave your business is your personal brand. So it’s well worth the investment to

spend the time to do that.

Karl: [00:27:19] I love that you mentioned that. I’m curious about your thoughts on integrating

your personal brand or your personas, if you want to call it, professionally and personally.

LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, all of these, Tic Tok. They have different use cases for

different application. But I’ve seen more people, especially in 2020, there’s a lot of issues out

there that people are commenting on. Whether it’s social justice or gender or race or other

political items, things about climate change, and others. People are voicing their opinions across

spectrums that’s interweaved with their expertise in their business. Any thoughts on how to

manage that. And is that a good idea or? Well, what do you, what would you advise people to

do with that?

Lisa: [00:28:13] You know, it’s what I advise business owners is what I’ve always told my

children. Anything that you’ve put out there online will follow you and could be found. And if it’s

something that you aren’t willing to put on a billboard and have your grandmothers see, then

don’t put out there. If it’s not something that you’re not willing to share in your next job interview,

don’t put it out there. There are filters, but still there are way to, you know, there are ways to get

through those. And you just always have to be conscious of whatever you are putting out there

represents who you are, and it does follow you. So there are appropriate channels. And then

there are ones that maybe you need to just have a conversation with a friend.

Karl: [00:29:00] I’m curious about, there’s a professional sphere, but there’s all these businesses

that are coming up in this entertainment mixed with business. So you could take the example of

a local ice cream shop or fitness business, where it is a business and they have customers, but

it’s also a culture and a group and a community that they’re building that reflect certain beliefs

and their personal. How can those types of businesses leverage both social media and how

they brand themselves?

Lisa: [00:29:35] Right. So it’s a great opportunity and I don’t want to, you know, imply that you

always have to stay buttoned up. I think you have to really look at who is your ideal client. Who

are you trying to attract? If you are on LinkedIn, you’re trying to attract a different crowd than

what you’ll probably find on Instagram, or Pinterest, or Tic Tok, or Facebook. Those all have a

different feel to it and different clientele. So if you are an ice cream shop and you’ve got music

going on, you’ve got certain culture or whatever, they’re trying to attract the audience. They

need to be who they are. They need to be authentic. They need to be transparent. But they also

need to be respectful of their audience.

Karl: [00:30:17] I’m also curious, just comment and maybe Rico as well. When you interact with

people online in a lot of your publications, in your content out there, have you found examples of

people doing it really well? Can you give us an example where you saw people blend those

different personas well online?

Lisa: [00:30:42] I can’t think of one person that comes to mind right now, but here’s what I see

as a trend. It’s people who are sharing their expertise. They’re generous and they’re humble. So

they’re out there, they’re being servant leaders. They understand what their customers need.

They’re very generous with it because they believe in the law of reciprocity. You know, if I give

to you and I’m giving freely, and it’s this valuable, imagine what you’re going to get if you pay to

work with me. I mean, that’s the message that they’re sending. So I think that is a great lesson

for all of us, is we are here to serve in our businesses. We’re here to serve our clients and one

way to attract clients is to let them see what you’re about. Let them experience you before they

pay you anything. I think that would be a good model to follow.

Karl: [00:31:41] That would probably be about 1% of politicians by my guess.

Lisa: [00:31:45] Yes. They don’t fall into that trend very easily.

Karl: [00:31:52] That’s fabulous advice. Well, I’d like to, if folks wanted to get in touch with you

and learn more about just marketing and ways that they could improve for themselves, what are

some ways folks can get in touch with you?

Lisa: [00:32:06] Yeah, absolutely. So I am on LinkedIn. It’s Lisa McGuire. I’m also

Lisa@LisaMcGuire.com. And they can also call 678-520-7660.

Karl: [00:32:26] Well, as we’re getting into fall and you’re starting to get busy with helping clients

grow. Are there anything you have coming up or what do you have coming up over the next

quarter? What are your plans?

Lisa: [00:32:36] Yeah, so I’m really excited. I am a StoryBrand certified guide, so I’m affiliated

with the StoryBrand company and they have a sector of their business called Business Made

Simple, BusinessMadeSimple.com. And so, it is a series of online courses. They really propose

it’s the same thing as an MBA only we’re going to save you $50,000 from that MBA. It’s a one

year subscription or when you’re licensed for $275. And they have courses on creating your

mission, marketing message, productivity, communication, scaling your business. So I am being

certified as one of their Business Made Simple coaches. So right now I’m in the process of

clients, coaching clients, or really business growth advising is what I do. I think there’s a lot of

coaches out there. And a lot of coaches end up being cheerleaders. This is not the case. I really

believe on providing frameworks and valuable tools that we can help make a difference in your

business grow. Whether it’s in revenue, whether it’s in culture, whether it’s just the business

owner growing as a business leader and becoming more proficient in what they do.

Karl: [00:33:50] Oh, that’s fabulous. As you mentioned when we started, a lot of people get into

business to do what they love and that’s their operational expertise and they started making

money there. I think the lesson is to transform or to grow into becoming a true sustainable

long-lasting business, you’ve got to evolve. And so the other pieces in the tool belt that you’ve

got to build is some financial smarts, some marketing smarts, how to recruit people, some HR

smart to really become a fully well-rounded business leader. And if there’s a way for them to get

it without spending $50,000 and taking a year or two off to get an MBA. I think that’s a good ROI

on investment. So thank you for sharing that.

Lisa: [00:34:36] Absolutely, yeah. Thank you so much.

Karl: [00:34:41] I want to thank Lisa McGuire, who is a business growth advisor and a marketing

consultant with Open Window Marketing. Thank you for your insights for sharing your

experience and to help every business owner figuring out little nuggets of things they can do to

improve their business. I’m Karl Barham with Transworld Business Advisors of Atlanta

Peachtree, and we are going to continue to help business owners post this shutdown period of

the pandemic. Figure out their best way to grow their business, improve. We can do that by

helping them to franchise their business. We can do that by helping them to acquire their

business. And for those that are ready to relax on a beach somewhere, we can help them find a

buyer and help them get their business sold. So you can reach me at KBarham@TWorld.com

or you can visit us on our website at www.TWorld.com/AtlantaPeachtree. Hey Rico, why don’t

you tell us what you’ve got coming up.

Rico: [00:35:39] Sure. First, I want to tell people that I totally enjoy talking to Karl off-camera

because I learn a lot from Karl, okay? I own my own business or businesses and, invaluable

insight from Karl and along with our other guests. I mean, Lisa has some good, great, valuable

insight here. And you know, we’ve done what, 40 of these?

Karl: [00:36:00] We’re up to 47. We’re going to hit 50 soon.

Rico: [00:36:06] There’s a ton of sage advice out there that we’ve learned. So I’m always happy

to be on a show like this, where we get more because I’m constantly learning. I own my own

business marketing, MightyRockets.com and everyone that watches this show knows that. We

publish Peachtree Corners Magazine which is coming out again every six weeks we sort of wrap

ourselves around the next issue and we put this out six times a year. So the next issue is

coming out around the first week of October. And we’re going to have great backyard retreats.

We’re profiling five local backyards that we feel are exceptional for a variety of reasons. So

we’re doing that. We’re doing a pets and their people give away, and that’s going to be a pull out

in the next issue as well. And we’re going to have probably get 4 or 5,000 pictures of people and

their pets that have been submitting. So we have this contest going right now. So if you haven’t

entered, go to our Facebook page or to our website, enter it. All you have to do is submit a

picture of you and your pet. And, you know, tell us a little bit about you all. And then we’re going

to pick three winners at the end of that. So we’re doing that. We’re doing a bunch of other

stories within that publication. It’s going to be chock-full things as it usually is. And you know, I’m

still working with clients as well, doing some of their marketing online content and stuff. So if you

need to reach me and you want to be able to do some of that work and you need someone to

do it, MightyRockets.com is the place to go. LivingInPeachtreeCorners.com is the place to find

the magazine and our family of podcasts. And I just launched the CapitalistSage.com website

just to begin exhibits. So it’s shallow on content right now. We’re adding all the podcasts that

we’re doing, that we’ve done. So you’ll find some of that there. We’re going to be adding over

the next few weeks. So check that out, leave your name and email address. And certainly you’ll

be reached back out to it again.

Karl: [00:38:09] And if I can, I want to spark an idea in honor of the theme of today, marketing. I

think you’re still accepting ads. If somebody would like to do ads for the magazine, you can

reach out for that? So for people in Peachtree Corners surrounding area, if you want to increase

your visibility, traditional marketing methods also still work. But you can reach out to Lisa to help

you with your messaging and Rico, if you’d like to have an ad added.

Rico: [00:38:38] So if you do, our deadline is, well our deadline is September 22nd for the print

magazine for the October, November issue. But you know, we come out six times a year. Plus, I

mean, it’s not just print. You get exposure in a variety of places, you know, online on our

Facebook page on Instagram, on Twitter, on LinkedIn. So if you’re an advertiser with us and

you have that type of package, we’re providing some of that online as well.

Karl: [00:39:05] So if you didn’t get the message, post pandemic, your customers have changed.

You need to talk to them. So take advantage. Thank you everybody for joining us today on the

Capitalist Sage podcast, you’ll find us on all of your streaming channels. iTunes, Spreaker,

iHeartRadio, on YouTube, on Facebook. Just go and explore Capitalist Sage. And, you know,

pick up something, apply it, and we’ll be happy to continue to give you great episodes. Thank

you.

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Peachtree Corners Magazine staff

Business

The City and PCBA Welcome Ride Lounge with Ribbon Cutting Ceremony

Published

1 month ago

June 4, 2025

Peachtree Corners Magazine staff

A group of people at an indoor ribbon cutting ceremony for Ride Lounge

The Peachtree Corners Business Association and the City of Peachtree Corners officially welcomed Ride Lounge, one of the city’s newest businesses, with a morning ribbon cutting ceremony on May 29.

From 9 a.m. to 10:30 a.m., members of the city and PCBA, along with members of the community, enjoyed mingling, getting to know the Ride Lounge staff and learning more about the unique company.

A group of men at an indoor ribbon cutting ceremony for Ride Lounge

Guests also enjoyed a light breakfast spread of bagels, fresh fruit, coffee and juice and brief speeches from featured guests.

Welcoming the business

Lisa Procter from the PCBA spoke first and thanked Ride Lounge for being part of the PCBA and the Peachtree Corners community. She also recognized the collaboration between the organization and Ride Lounge in hosting the ribbon cutting.

“The PCBA was proud to coordinate with Ride Lounge and the community to make this event a success,” Procter shared.

Mayor Mike Mason followed Procter in addressing the crowd and talked about the state of business in Peachtree Corners and how companies like Ride Lounge help make the city a great place to live and work.

Dave Codrea and Josh Friedensohn, founders of Ride Lounge, then thanked everyone for coming and shared a little about the company and their vision.

The cutting of the ribbon and photos followed the brief speeches. Afterwards, the crowd was invited to tour the space and spend more time chatting and networking.

About Ride Lounge

The Ride Lounge is more than a car storage facility, it’s a place that celebrates car culture; where car enthusiasts can meet to discuss their passion and show off their vehicles.

Founders Dave and Josh wanted to create a welcoming community that people would trust to store their vehicles, but that would also offer a club-like atmosphere and host fun, car-centered events that the whole family could enjoy.

Ride Lounge’s 20,300-square-foot facility is comprised of 58 parking spaces with the potential to include car lifts in certain areas. There are cozy seating areas, a meeting space and kitchen area so members can hang out, relax and talk cars.

Designed for cars that are driven and enjoyed by families, Ride Lounge has room to hold up to 400 people for special events and activities.

To learn more about Ride Lounge, visit ride-lounge.com.

For more about the PCBA, visit peachtreecornersba.com.

Business

Music Matters Productions Expands Peachtree Corners Headquarters

Published

2 months ago

May 21, 2025

Peachtree Corners Magazine staff

Interior of a spacious, clean and well-organized music production warehouse. There are tall ceilings with rows of lights, metal shelves full of audio/visual equipment and larger pieces of equipment grouped on the floor throughout the space.

Company adds 20,000 square feet to meet growing demand

Music Matters Productions (MMP), a premier provider of audio, lighting, video, staging and rigging solutions, has expanded its metro Atlanta headquarters, increasing the total warehouse footprint from 40,000 to 60,000 square feet.

In addition, MMP has opened a second 10,000-square-foot building directly across the street to house its growing corporate production division.

The expansion comes in response to increased demand across touring, festival and corporate markets, as well as the continued growth of MMP’s high-end gear inventory. With a fully dedicated shop for each department, including audio, lighting, video, rigging and staging, the new layout provides more space for show prep, pre-rigging and crew coordination, allowing for even more efficient load-ins and streamlined execution.

New features

The rigging department now features a new mobile motor hoist test stand, allowing for in-house motor certification, a service that’s now available to external clients in the production community.

Large warehouse space full of audio/visual equipment — Photo courtesy of Music Matters Productions

Five new truck bays were added in the process, as well, bringing the total number of bays to 17 — an important upgrade for MMP’s fleet and the increasing number of shows moving through the warehouse each week.

“This growth is a direct reflection of the work our team puts in and the trust our clients place in us,” said Aaron Soriero, owner of Music Matters Productions. “We didn’t expand for the sake of being bigger, we expanded because we needed the space to do the job right. More room means tighter prep, faster turns and better support for our clients.”

Expanding operations

The expanded warehouse and building across the street include additional offices, mixed-use areas and a dedicated repairs department, giving the team more capacity to prep, collaborate, QC and scale for increasingly complex events — both corporate and entertainment.

With a reputation built on reliable gear, experienced crews and an enhanced client experience, MMP continues to solidify its role as a go-to production partner for events of every size and setting — whether it’s a beachside festival, a stadium tour, brand activation or a high-stakes corporate show.

About Music Matters Productions

Music Matters Productions is a full-service live event production company based in Peachtree Corners, Georgia, providing industry-leading audio, lighting, video, rigging and staging solutions for tours, festivals, brand activations and corporate events across the country.

Known for its high-end inventory, seasoned crew and deep dedication to doing the job right, MMP supports hundreds of productions each year and is trusted by clients nationwide.

For more information, visit mmp-atl.com.

Business

From Boardrooms to the Himalayas: Vandana’s Journey to Purpose and Growing with Intention [Podcast]

Published

2 months ago

May 19, 2025

Peachtree Corners Magazine staff

How one family blends operational clarity, conscious leadership, and community-driven values to grow their business — together.

In this episode of UrbanEbb, host Rico Figliolini chats with Vandana Aggarwal, VP of Operations at Aggarwal Real Estate, about the winding road from global consulting to family-run commercial real estate in Norcross, Georgia. With honesty, warmth and insight, V shares how she went from working 80-hour weeks in corporate strategy to rediscovering clarity in the mountains of India — ultimately helping transform her family’s business into a community-driven real estate firm managing over 50 shopping centers.

The conversation weaves together themes of leadership, legacy, operational excellence and the transformative power of both AI and yoga. It’s a story about clarity, courage and conscious growth — both in business and in life. This is another episode you won’t want to miss.

Episode Highlights

Why Vandana left a high-powered consulting career to join her family business
How hiking Kilimanjaro and studying yoga in the Himalayas changed her leadership mindset
The operational overhaul she brought to Aggarwal Real Estate to support growth
What it’s like working side-by-side with your dad, siblings, and 700+ tenants
How the company rebranded with intention and built a mission around “building communities as a community”
Where AI is reshaping real estate—from lease drafting to property management—and where it still can’t compete with people
Leadership succession planning with siblings at the helm
The importance of clarity, calm, and conscious growth in both business and life

About Vandana Aggarwal

Vandana Aggarwal is the Vice President of Operations at Aggarwal Real Estate, her family’s commercial real estate investment and management firm. She brings a unique blend of strategic insight and operational excellence, shaped by her early career as a consultant at A.T. Kearney, where she advised Fortune 100 to 500 companies. A graduate of Georgia Tech, she also took a transformative detour from the corporate world to spend a year in India teaching yoga—an experience that continues to influence her leadership style today. At the core of her work is a deep commitment to family and a passion for building strong, connected communities.

Timestamp:

00:00:00 – Introduction and sponsors: Vox Pop Uli & EV Remodeling
00:03:12 – From Georgia Tech to global consulting
00:04:23 – Leading strategy for Fortune 500 companies
00:06:11 – The role of vision alignment at the C-suite
00:08:01 – Sabbatical becomes family business overhaul
00:09:35 – Bringing operational excellence to a growing real estate firm
00:12:02 – A year of yoga, nature, and healing in India
00:17:03 – Hiking Kilimanjaro, testing limits, and expanding self-trust
00:18:52 – Navigating family dynamics inside a business
00:21:56 – Planning for leadership transition: siblings, strategy, succession
00:24:06 – Rebranding the business: from American Management to Aggarwal Real Estate
00:26:33 – Where AI fits (and doesn’t) in real estate operations
00:30:04 – Legal, leasing, HR, and marketing efficiency with tech
00:31:01 – Community-focused retail and experiential shopping centers
00:32:00 – Reflections on AI, journalism, and digital trust
00:32:57 – Closing thoughts

Podcast Transcript

00:00:00 – Rico Figliolini

Hi, everyone. This is Rico Figliolini, host of UrbanEbb. This podcast comes out of the city of Peachtree Corners, and we have a special guest today. And if I don’t mess up the name, it’s Vandana Aggarwal.

00:00:15 – Vandana Aggarwal

Absolutely. You can call me V, Rico.

00:00:15 – Rico Figliolini

I’m going to call you V, trust me. And I’m Rico Figliolini, so a bit of a long name there. But V is VP of Operations of Aggarwal Real Estate here, based in Peachtree Corners? No, Norcross.

00:00:30 – Vandana Aggarwal

In Norcross, yeah. Norcross, Georgia.

00:00:32 – Rico Figliolini

Yeah, yeah. Just off 85, and?

00:00:34 – Vandana Aggarwal

Jimmy Carter.

00:00:35 – Rico Figliolini

And Jimmy Carter.

00:00:36 – Vandana Aggarwal

We’re completing each other’s sentences already.

00:00:39 – Rico Figliolini

But where are we doing this? We’re doing this from one of our great sponsors, one of our two great sponsors, Vox Pop Uli. Was this tastefully obnoxious? Let me tell you, I asked them to do a corner cut for us, and this is perfect. So they have the Moxie logo and stuff. So they’re branding, right? Same way they can brand your stuff. They’ll put your logo on anything. They’ve done, I think, 6,000 vehicle wraps. They’ve done garments, obviously. They could do one-offs or they could do 1,000. They do trade show booths, wraps, everything. So anything you need a logo on, think of what object you want it on. They’ll figure it out for you. And if you’re doing, let’s say, 5,000 mailers and you want that database customized for each postcard, they could do that also. It’s called data. I forget what it’s called, but they can do that. They can work the data into the printing as well. So all customizable. Check them out, voxpopuli.com. Now, getting to something we were talking about, hands-on stuff, which is this also. This can’t just be done by machines, right? Although machines, you still need people. But EV Remodeling Inc., they are a remodeling company. They can do design to build. They can do whole house renovation. They can create your deck, your backyard gazebo. They can put a bathroom, kitchen, anything you want. EV Remodeling Inc. is owned by Eli and his family. Lives in Peachtree Corners. It’s based out of our city. They’ve done, I think, over 250 homes recently. So check them out, evremodelinginc.com. And I want to thank both of them for being great sponsors of ours. So, it’s always a long stretch doing that, but I’m glad to have you, V.

00:02:22 – Vandana Aggarwal

I’m happy to be here. Thank you for inviting me onto your podcast. Excited to chat with you.

00:02:25 – Rico Figliolini

Yeah, no, this is cool. Well, you know, I met you, where did I meet you at? I think it was the chamber.

00:02:30 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah, the Southwest Gwinnett Chamber event.

00:02:32 – Rico Figliolini

Yeah, and we were talking a bit, and I was like, damn, you know, I had my father owned a business, and he wanted his kids to be in it. None of us, none of us could go into that business. It’s a little difficult, different industry. It was a hard industry, plus my father was very patriarchal, very over-demanding. God bless him. He mellowed in age. But when you were telling me about your family, I mean, your father, your mother, your sister, your brother, and you, I mean, all in it. It’s amazing.

00:02:55 – Vandana Aggarwal

We’re all together. We’re the modern-day Brady Bunch.

00:03:03 – Rico Figliolini

I love it. Yes, that’s exactly it. But, let’s start a little bit. I mean, you were telling me, I mean, you came from a consulting world. You came where you were actually being paid a lot more than you’re being paid right now, actually.

00:03:12 – Vandana Aggarwal

I told my father he couldn’t afford me when he recruited me out. So I graduated from Georgia Tech in 2007. I actually did join his company right out of college for two years, learned a lot about the company. He actually had me go through a rotation in every department of the company to learn more about what we did, how we operated. And I think very quickly, it was also 2008-9 with a recession. But I was also very interested to learn how big companies operate. How can you take a small company at that time? We were much smaller than we are today and really understand how do you go from this, which is where everyone starts, right? As a new company to get to be one of the largest in the nation, in the world and see how they operate, how they grew it from, you know, a mom and pop business to this global enterprise. Consulting was a natural transition to learn about multiple companies, multiple industries. So transitioned into AT Kearney, which has now been rebranded as Kearney, and out of their Chicago office. So I was there for seven to eight years, almost eight years.

00:04:23 – Rico Figliolini

Entry-level position you got in?

00:04:24 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah, I went in as an analyst. The good thing with that experience was by the time I left, I was a senior manager with Kearney. I worked across 17 different companies in those eight years. So I got to experience how CPG companies, retail companies, transportation, IT, you name it, I’ve done it. In terms of the different types of industries I got to work with, worked with a lot of Fortune 100 to 500 companies at the C-suite level. So we were coming up with all kinds of strategy projects such as new market entries, mergers and acquisitions. A lot of what I ended up specializing in in those seven years was operational efficiency and growth strategy. So it was an amazing, I’m grateful for that learning experience, the you know the caliber of minds that you work with. You also get to experience what the C-suite looks like. How does the very top operate and then it goes from the top down right? So it is very much led at this very top leadership and you see how companies change in their culture the way they operate based on how the top is designed.

00:05:38 – Rico Figliolini

So did you see good and bad at the top?

00:05:41 – Vandana Aggarwal

Absolutely. And I’m not going to name names. But you learn a lot when you see how your CEO and your C-suite right below them, the culture they’re bringing into a company and their vision and their goals if they’re aligned, unaligned. Anyone that at the very top have different viewpoints of where the company has had it is where companies start to break apart, lose revenue, lose their you know people, which is very important.

00:06:11 – Rico Figliolini

Where did you see the pain point then? What was the common denominator I guess of those?

00:06:18 – Vandana Aggarwal

There’s no one common denominator, but if I had to kind of narrow in, it comes down to what is our five-year, ten-year trajectory? Where are we headed? As large companies grow, you’re not just in one industry. You’re not just doing retail shopping centers. You’re investing in all kinds of properties just to bring it back to our company. Similarly, a CPG company can make all kinds of products, so they have to decide what it is because you have to be concentrated on the right places. If you have a leadership team that is in alignment of what that ultimate goal is, right, then you have clear strategies and, you know, metrics you’re measuring your success against. So that was a big thing that I learned. Also just, you know, seeing how great leaders operate, right? Some of the best in the nation today, I got to be in the room with them and just to see how they lead is very important.

00:07:14 – Rico Figliolini

Did you see any family dynamics in any of those businesses?

00:07:20 – Vandana Aggarwal

No. You know, there may have been like a father-son duo, but when you’re looking at the very top, I won’t say it was like all in the family, right? You know, and it also becomes the size of a company, right? You know, when you get to an international scale, you’re not always blessed that every person in your family has the right skill set and experience to fill each role on that C-suite.

00:07:46 – Rico Figliolini

I’m just thinking Trump for some reason. Every kid has a job.

00:07:51 – Vandana Aggarwal

Every kid has a job.

00:07:52 – Vandana Aggarwal

You had the accent, right?

00:07:54 – Rico Figliolini

Pretty much, I guess. So after the C-suite or expansion, you traveled a lot too, I think, right?

00:08:01 – Vandana Aggarwal

I did, yeah. So after my seven, eight years in consulting, I was reaching 30. And Shiv, my father, came to me and he said, you know, you’re doing this for a lot of outside companies. Why don’t you help us grow and bring your expertise home? And I said, look, I’ll take a sabbatical. Let me assess the company. And after that period where I took a short sabbatical to come look at how we were operating, I said, I can give you three years. I said, you can’t afford me, but I’ll give you three years of my time. And I said, I think it’ll be the right, it was the right time in the company. We were investing very heavily. We were bringing in a lot of new square footage into the company, and we weren’t designed to manage it. So we as a company, as you know, we are the investors. We have an in-house management company, an in-house leasing company. So as we acquire new properties, our team does the management for those properties in-house. We don’t provide third-party services today. And we do the leasing in-house. But at that time, when he, you know Shiv started we had one or two and now we’re at 50 shopping centers plus and other investments that we have. And there’s a very different way you operate you know and how do you how does the CEO go from being an operator to where he’s overseeing it, but he’s not into the weeds right? So he has create a system for that to happen right? You have to have standard operating processes for your property managers, your accounting team, your marketing team.

00:09:35 – Rico Figliolini

And you quite didn’t have that before.

00:09:37 – Vandana Aggarwal

We didn’t, no. And, you know, and I think that’s why he wanted to bring me in is because my strength is operations and I love it. I love going into messy places and cleaning them up.

00:09:49 – Rico Figliolini

Is that what you did when you were a consultant?

00:09:51 – Vandana Aggarwal

A lot of what I was concentrating on at the end of my consulting career, yes. So I did a lot of operational efficiency work. So we’d go in, assess the way companies were designed. And we’d interview hundreds of team members to understand what their role is. You know, what are they responsible for? How are they delivering? What are they measuring for success? And then we’d redesign the way they did that based on, again, bottom line, what are your ultimate goals for the company?

00:10:21 – Rico Figliolini

So you had to understand that before you got to that point. And you’re not making the decisions, the C-level.

00:10:29 – Vandana Aggarwal

Present, right? And similarly even with Shiv, when I first joined, I said, look, this is how I think we need to redesign the company from a bottoms-up perspective based on ultimately our goal of growth, doubling, tripling in size over the next ten years. And I think this is where the father dynamic came in. I guess he trusted me. And he said, do it. He just said, do it. And it was beautiful because right when you’re with large companies, it’s a lot of time before you get. Those decisions made and that trust, right? And so it was great. And he said, yeah, just put it into place.

00:11:07 – Rico Figliolini

See, that’s a great dad, actually. Some dads would be like, I don’t know about that daughter or son or whatever.

00:11:16 – Vandana Aggarwal

It did take time, though, like to ultimately, he was in the operation so heavily. And, you know, until today, I’m still like, step up, step up. Like, I need you to not get into the weeds. Like I think at that time we had tenants calling him, maintenance guys calling him. Like every little and big problem would go through his cell phone. I said, you’re too smart and you’re such a good investor. This is not your skill set. You shouldn’t be managing this. You need to bring people on who are expertise in this area. And I said, you need to be focused on like the larger plan.

00:11:51 – Rico Figliolini

This way you can grow it better.

00:11:51 – Vandana Aggarwal

Which I think has been very successful over the last eight years I’ve been with him now.

00:11:57 – Rico Figliolini

So before you got to him, though, you were traveling a bit internationally as well?

00:12:02 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah, yeah. So this is an amazing year. I was very burnt out. By the time I left consulting, I was working 70 to 80-hour weeks, traveling Monday through Thursday, if not more than that, of the week. So I told Shiv, I was like, I’m going to take a month. I’m going to go to India, get my yoga certification. No intention to teach at the time. I just said it’d be a great one-month retreat. And I was up in the mountains like Himalayas and India in a city called Dharamshala. Beautiful place. One of my favorites in the world. And I just, I think I needed it for myself emotionally, mentally to take that break. So I turned one month into one year. I didn’t know it was going to be a year.

00:12:49 – Rico Figliolini

In that same city? In that same town?

00:12:50 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah, so I ended up the school that I had gotten my certification with. I asked them, I was like, do you mind if I hang around for a little while? Like very casually, I’m like, you know, I’ll pay for my room and board, but I just want to be around this group and this energy. And they said, well, if you’re going to be here, why don’t you intern? And they’re like, room and board is free if you intern. I was like, sure. You know, not thinking what it was leading to. This is like that beauty of the universe coming into play. Yeah, so I started teaching, ended up loving teaching. So then I ended up teaching the 200-hour yoga training course. And I was in Dharamshala for four months. And then I moved down to Goa, their Goa campus for another six.

00:13:30 – Rico Figliolini

Where is that? Goa?

00:13:32 – Vandana Aggarwal

Goa? It’s in southern India on their west coast. It’s a beach town. Yeah. So I had the mountains and the beach. But I’m a mountain girl. I’m a hiker. But no, it was a beautiful experience. Very different from anything I’ve done with my career, right? But I became a yoga teacher for a year.

00:13:52 – Rico Figliolini

Did that clear your head? Yoga, they say, can do that, right?

00:13:53 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah, it’s all the tools of yoga, right? The meditation, the breath work, really getting internal, going in, right? Just going inwards, being quiet, which we don’t have. We have a lot of noise in our life today, you know? And naturally, right? Between family life, work life, social, and then just all of the noise from everything else right? Like we’re sitting here and I can hear the cars right? So you know that difference was when I was sitting there, I could hear the ocean waves and so there’s something very healing in nature naturally. So it was the tools mixed with nature and I still think nature has a very strong healing power on us. So whenever I can, I try to get out on a mountain and by the ocean. But yeah no it was it was a beautiful experience but it did bring a level of calmness into the way I approach things. It changes your perspective of you know at the end everything’s okay. No matter what you’re going through it’s temporary you’re, and everything that’s happening to us is happening to us for the good. We don’t know it, sometimes it seems like a bad situation in the moment, but ultimately you know, universe, God, whatever you believe in is at play to bring you something better in your life. And you just have to step back to understand what is it delivering us.

00:15:19 – Rico Figliolini

I like the way you think. My wife every once in a while would say, aren’t you upset about that? I’m like, I think come tomorrow, it won’t mean anything. There’s no point in, just relax. Not everything, two days later, it’s not as important as it seemed at that moment.

00:15:37 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah. And it’s not just that it’s not as important. It’s also like…

00:15:41 – Rico Figliolini

In perspective?

00:15:42 – Vandana Aggarwal

It’s, what am I gaining from this? Like, what can I gain from this? Oftentimes when, you know, a lot of things happen, yeah, like you get hurt or, you know, it’s like in relationships, right? Or if you have a bad business deal, right? It’s like, hey, how am I growing, right? And I think that’s what makes life very exciting, right? Otherwise, if you’re always living on a high, is it a high?

00:16:06 – Rico Figliolini

Yes. So I’m thinking you were a consultant for seven or eight years. 80 hours a week. And all of a sudden you’re doing yoga on the mountains of India. It’s just like, it’s almost like a movie. It’s almost like…

00:16:18 – Vandana Aggarwal

Eat, pray, love?

00:16:19 – Rico Figliolini

Yes.

00:16:20 – Vandana Aggarwal

It was my eat, pray, love moment for a year.

00:16:23 – Rico Figliolini

That’s amazing.

00:16:24 – Vandana Aggarwal

No, you meet amazing people, but I think we were meant to meet everyone that we come in interaction with on a daily basis. You naturally have a connection. There’s a universe at play, and we were meant to cross paths and learn something from each other, gain something from one another, give to the other person. And I think you just have to look at life that way.

00:16:48 – Rico Figliolini

I definitely think along that way. I mean, I definitely think each of us nudges each other in a crowd a little bit. That one nudge can set you off going in a different direction. So I totally believe in that. So you joined your dad. Yes. And you’re, so actually, even before we get there, so yoga, but what other interests have you been?

00:17:03 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah. So, I mean, I’m an avid hiker. I’ve done recently in the last few years, I’ve climbed Kilimanjaro. I did the Machu Picchu trail. I’ve done a few 14ers out in Colorado, but I like to test myself physically. You know, just, again, it comes down to how do we find that push within us past our comfort zone? So is this a physical inability or is it a mental constraint? So to get past that mental constraint of discomfort and then really push yourself to the next level and say, I can achieve something. It’s not going to be easy. So to me, if I’m on a hike and it’s not hard, I’m like, well, was it a hike? Like it didn’t test me, but no I think, you know.

00:17:55 – Rico Figliolini

You should do the Appalachian Trail. That’s like 2000 plus miles.

00:18:03 – Vandana Aggarwal

I know. And it is, you know, it’s not just like the hiking part. It is like living out in nature and, you know, sleeping in uncomfortable conditions. Yeah. Walking in the rain. It’s cold. I think the last day of our Kilimanjaro hike, it was negative 20 degrees up in the mountain and my eyelashes were frozen and I couldn’t feel any part of my body. And, you know, and it tested my breathing. And there is that element of push yourself to the point that it’s not your ego anymore. Like if your body’s saying stop, you have to stop as well and respect your body. But yeah, to really test yourself.

00:18:38 – Rico Figliolini

To circle all that back now, you’re back home. You’re working with your father and your family. A lot of businesses grow or die because of family. If it’s a family business, right?

00:18:52 – Vandana Aggarwal

Absolutely, yeah.

00:18:53 – Rico Figliolini

So you have your highs, your lows, your, sometimes you don’t get along. Sometimes decisions are split. People get upset with each other. So you’ve been at your highs and lows physically and mentally doing other things. Has that helped you in some ways? Not that you’re having a bad time with family. Because it sounds like you all fit just fine, like the Brady Bunch.

00:19:15 – Vandana Aggarwal

Let’s keep it that way. No, I mean, there’s multiple dynamics at play. It is a family business. My father is also my boss. My siblings are also my friends and my coworkers. And it’s about no matter how hard you try, you cannot separate those relationships. There is an interplay of all of it when you spend eight to nine hours a day together. But we all have, again, a common goal for the company. And then a common goal for our personal relationship. So when we sit down, we keep in mind that we like each other and we want to keep it that way. Like very simply put, that’s first and foremost for me especially. Even when Shiv had brought me in, he said, oh, can you manage everyone? And I said, I’ll manage everyone but my brother and sister. I said, you know, like I won’t jeopardize the relationship I have with them as a sibling by being their manager. Especially because I said that’s your job like good luck. But not just that it’s you know we all have different skill sets so I said how do I manage my brother who is a genius he’s a CPA by trade you know like I can’t tell him how to run the financials of this company like he’s supposed to teach me that right? And same way I teach him that. My sister has a master’s in marketing right? She is by far the most social, likable person you’re going to meet, and she knows how to work with people. I said, she needs to teach us that. So I think we’re lucky that each of us, and this is, I think, rare, where you have three kids and each one of them has their own skill set. That, I think, helps us stay in business and we see ourselves foreseeably into the long-term future being in business together is because we each bring something very unique to the table. Ultimately we value the relationships that we have on a personal level as a family above all else right? And then you know the element of like, how does the yoga experience a hiking experience teach us. That’s, it’s not specific to anyone’s situation, I think it’s a baseline of who you become right? The foundation. Like it teaches you patience, it teaches you again, everything is temporary so let’s not get overly attached emotionally or get upset or too joyful, even like, let’s just stay neutralized on any situation because it will end. And then the next one will come up and kind of flow with the ebbs and flows of the ocean. You, you flow with everything that comes with you, comes your way at work, at home. But yeah, I mean, we do sit down as a leadership team. I, my father and my siblings and I, and we talk about, hey, we separately do the exercise. Where are we going to be in five years? What role do we play in that journey? And thankfully, all of ours are very similar in what our goals are. And then we have different skill sets that we bring. So even as we design the future of the company in a moment where my father is not at the head of the table, we’re working on that redesign work. But it’s very conscious. It’s very intentional. Again, we all step back and say, hey, look, how do we maintain, how do we solve problems? Because like, you know, we were talking about how tomorrow we may not agree on something, a big decision. What are we investing in? Come back to, you know, right now Shiv gets to make an ultimate decision because he’s the one leader at the top. Tomorrow it’s going to be three people at the top. How do you deal?

00:23:04 – Rico Figliolini

So is there an exit plan for your dad? Well, not an exit plan.

00:23:09 – Vandana Aggarwal

Not an exit plan. He already has. I think he, you know, he’s gone from, he’s the hardest working person I know. I get that from him. We’re addicted to work.

00:23:18 – Rico Figliolini

80 hours a week.

00:23:21 – Vandana Aggarwal

We love working. You know, this company is his baby. I think I’ve adopted it at this point and we all have. But, to stay mentally sharp, to stay alive, you have to keep working. You have to keep doing something. You have to be working towards something that brings you joy and purpose. And I think, you know, he stepped back to take time towards a lot of his nonprofit work, community work that he’s very much engaged with. But he’s still at the top. He’s still running, you know, his, you know, he’s, you know, not slowing down. You know, we’re constantly growing. We’re growing this year in a large scale, which is amazing, and he’s leading that charge.

00:23:59 – Rico Figliolini

How many properties do you own?

00:24:02 – Vandana Aggarwall

Today we have 50 shopping centers and then a few other assets.

00:24:06 – Rico Figliolini

Is that like 3 million square feet or something? 4 million?

00:24:10 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah, over 700 tenants. But, you know, when we sat down a few years ago, we rebranded. Aggarwal Real Estate didn’t exist until two years ago. It was American Management Services. And we had a rebranding effort because we said we want the company’s name and the brand to represent who we are.

00:24:33 – Rico Figliolini

I like that, by the way.

00:24:35 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah, it needs to mean something. And we were also proud of what our father has achieved, right? He’s given us this beautiful life that we get to help grow upon. So we said it needs to pay homage to him. So we said, let’s make it Aggarwal Real Estate, ARE. And then as we were deciding what that vision is, we’re a family. In the company, we are a family, not just the four of us, but all of our staff, our team. We don’t, you know, we don’t look at them separate from who we are. And so we said our mission as a company is building communities as a community. And it talks about, hey, in all of the real estate work we’re doing, we try to make sure all of our properties are beautiful. Our tenants are happy. They have direct access to each of us in the company. And on top of that, as a company, we are a community within ourselves because we can’t create them until we are one. So it was very intentional to who we already were, but putting it into brand terms.

00:25:37 – Rico Figliolini

It’s amazing. All that property, tenants. Can’t imagine father tech can send text messages on all their problems, if they have any.

00:25:45 – Vandana Aggarwal

He’s a brilliant man.

00:25:45 – Rico Figliolini

You could be too possessed on that stuff. We want to be cognizant of our time together.

00:25:55 – Vandana Aggarwal

Absolutely.

00:25:57 – Rico Figliolini

So the next subject really was going to be about also AI, because everyone’s talking about AI. We were talking about that before the show started, before we started recording, which was kind of funny because V was asking me if we edit anything. And I was like, no, straight through.

00:26:11 – Vandana Aggarwal

I wanted to see if I could say a few things and then have it taken out of this conversation.

00:26:13 – Rico Figliolini

Nope. Nope. Doesn’t work that way. So, but ChatGPT, AI, that’s all. I mean, you know, could I create a bot to edit this? Probably. But there’s so many things we use in our lives. And you’ve been talking about how it would affect your business. Nevermind the consulting work you did.

00:26:33 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah. I mean, the consulting world is, I mean, it depends on the industry, the type of work you’re doing. In real estate, I’ve put a lot of thought behind this. There’s a lot of conversations happening across every industry, every sector, whether it’s education, automotives, real estate, et cetera. Everything’s being discussed. How is that changing the future? How do we incorporate it to be more efficient, right? Be the best in the industry that we can be or operate better. And so for me it’s again comes down to that operations element that I think about like, how do I incorporate it for a company that’s a medium-sized real estate firm today as we become a large company, a bigger player in the market. And people are very important in real estate right?

00:27:17 – Rico Figliolini

Talk about editing?

00:27:20 – Vandana Aggarwal

I was telling you, we should bring them into the podcast.

00:27:27 – Rico Figliolini

We’re going to run a little longer on this.

00:27:36 – Vandana Aggarwal

But let’s take retail shopping centers. This is brick and mortar. I did a paper actually for a large mall retailer back in my consulting days on how the title of the paper was, is brick and mortar dead? And, you know, full circle, I am fully dedicated to brick and mortar, retail, office, multifamily now. But you still need people to clean up your properties, fix your maintenance issues. We were talking about roofing, plumbing, electrical. That is hands-on work. You know, today there is, it’s going to be a long time before there’s a robot that comes in to do that. There will be. I don’t know. I do not see that in 10 years to say we’ve got roofers that are robotic drones that are going to come fix my roof problems.

00:28:24 – Rico Figliolini

Zumbas, they’re going to run around the roof or something.

00:28:26 – Vandana Aggarwal

That’s actually genius. A Zumba for my roof.

00:28:31 – Rico Figliolini

Why not? Attach it to the right thing.

00:28:33 – Vandana Aggarwal

But so those are very people-oriented roles today. Technology will advance how quickly it’s done or how well it’s done. But you’ll still need someone to operate the machinery of it and everything.

00:28:49 – Rico Figliolini

Just not as many.

00:28:50 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah. Construction, similarly, right?

00:28:54 – Rico Figliolini

Unless you 3D print a house. I’m sorry.

00:28:56 – Vandana Aggarwal

No, it’s true. It’s true. There’s so many options. I’m thinking 10 years now. I’m not going to have a 3D printer making the metal framing for my new construction project. You know, or installing the sheetrock, it does probably speed up the process, right? There will be machinery to help with that, a lot of AI development in that way. It’s a lot at an office administrative level, right? The speed in which you’re processing invoices, the speed in which you are, you know, getting payments taken in. Today, I would say as far back as right before COVID, we were still accepting checks for money. Now it’s all online. Like we do not accept money coming into the office, or it’s very limited to what we do, right? So that’s AI, if you think about it, right? The ability to pay online.

00:29:42 – Rico Figliolini

QuickBooks Online uses AI now, you can enable it.

00:29:47 – Vandana Aggarwal

So we’ve been using it for many years. The advancement of it has been a little bit slower, and now it’s sped up. Marketing, we were just talking about how you created a flyer on ChatGPT, was it?

00:30:00 – Rico Figliolini

I won’t talk about the student that’s helping us out here and how they use AI.

00:30:04 – Vandana Aggarwal

No, AI in school, right? But yeah, it’s an AI processor for my HR roles, right? Instead of reading 100 resumes, it’s going through the system to filter them out. Whether it’s writing contracts, I won’t lie. Legal jargon is coming out of ChatGPT today. And so it’s speeding up the way we’re doing work. But my legal team probably, and they won’t say it, should be using AI if they’re not. To help create some of this work right? So it’s like these companies are still going to be needed, but the way that they’re able to respond to us at a quicker, everything would just happen faster right? From typewriters to computers, everything.

00:30:49 – Rico Figliolini

Especially if they know that they just did a lease from you for this property in Texas, that we need three more leases done for three other places, it’s not going to be that much different, right? It’s a template.

00:31:01 – Vandana Aggarwal

It’s coming out a lot faster. Yeah, I mean the negotiations, that’s a people-to-people thing right? So I think thankfully in the real estate world we’re still going to need people. We’re still going to need buildings right? The way built, we were just talking about how a retail shopping center is no longer just for shopping. It has to be for entertainment. It has to be for bringing families in and giving them more than just, hey, go into a TJ Maxx and buy something, right? It’s like, what else are you getting when you’re at that center? Whether it’s a play space or events, we’re starting to do more events at our shopping centers. So it’s, again, serving the community.

00:31:39 – Rico Figliolini

We’re seeing that more. More of that happening. We could go on and on here.

00:31:46 – Vandana Aggarwal

Chatting with you.

00:31:46 – Rico Figliolini

Yeah, and we should probably do one on either AI in the marketplace. Or maybe a panel discussion on something similar.

00:31:51 – Vandana Aggarwal

Yeah, overall, yeah. That would be exciting.

00:31:55 – Rico Figliolini

Yeah, I think that would be cool.

00:31:56 – Vandana Aggarwal

I think it’s interesting to learn about kind of where every industry is heading. It impacts all of us.

00:32:00 – Rico Figliolini

For sure. I mean, the magazine business, I mean, it’s all like we have certain, we have AI rules. But, you know, AI is still being used to degree to research things. And to do certain things like that. You know, hopefully journalism isn’t just handed over. They do say 40% of the internet is AI written. So, which is kind of incestuous almost because it’ll just feed on itself at some point.

00:32:27 – Vandana Aggarwal

There’s a whole discussion about the validity and the trust behind digital content. In the next few years. I think it’s going to diminish.

00:32:35 – Rico Figliolini

Oh, yeah. I mean, I’m seeing videos now and it’s just like, it just looks so real. And you could not tell the difference, even voice-wise.

00:32:42 – Vandana Aggarwal

And that’s scary to think. It’s like, how do you trust what you see?

00:32:47 – Rico Figliolini

So on that note, and since this is not edited, so this is right from the beginning. So this is all true. But I want to thank everyone. I want to thank you, V, for being with me.

00:32:57 – Vandana Aggarwal

Thank you so much for having me. This was a great conversation.

00:33:01 – Rico Figliolini

It went by way faster than some of these go. So this is a great discussion. Thank you, everyone. I appreciate you for joining us. Thank you for Vox Pop Uli for the studio look and for letting us do it here, for being a sponsor and for EV Remodeling. Also, I want to thank Jeremy Pruitt behind the camera who has taken care. He’s a Paul Duke student. And it wasn’t him that I was talking about before, by the way. But all the work he’s done on the back end on this. So thank you, Jeremy. So thank you all. Thanks for being with us.