Today on the show we're talking with Dave DePula. Dave is a second-time guest on More Cheese, Less Whiskers. You may remember we spoke back on episode 26 about the golf training method he had developed.
On that show, and in our Email Mastery program, we figured out a really great way to get people to come to his website and leave their name and email address by asking for his 21 Days to Golfing Freedom book. We then created an engaging dialog method to engage those people and offer the program he created to help them improve their golf game.
Well, fast forward over a year now, and he has a new method that's even better than the previous one, so now he’s wondering… how does he make that transition?
This is a great conversation talking about the results he had, and about how and what exactly we need to change about the approach he's taking now.
I think you might be surprised.
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Transcript - More Cheese Less Whiskers 084
Dean: Dave DaPula.
Dave: Dean Jackson, good morning.
Dean: Take two.
Dave: Take two, Dean.
Dean: Wow. How do you feel? You're a second time guest on More Cheese, Less Whiskers. What do you think of that?
Dave: I felt privileged.
Dean: Oh boy. Well, you're a doer and that makes a lot of ... that goes a long way.
Dave: Well, I appreciate the time that you put into all that you give and your stuff is amazing and it gets results. So here I am.
Dean: So tell me what's going on today? What are we going to talk about?
Dave: Okay. So, as I sort of explained to you on the email mastery call that the system that I put together for golf and helping golfers get better wasn't producing the results that I was anticipating and found a new method, new approach that was absolutely amazing and it's Tathata golf and so I'm here to find out how do I get this to as many people as possible so we can help them end their frustration.
Dean: Okay. So let's talk about how do you say that ... what is it again?
Dave: It's Tathata golf. And what they basically have done. They've combined with the greatest golfers of all time have done throughout the ages, like Niklaus and Bobby Jones and Logan, what the greatest athletes of all time have done and still do and then also martial arts.
So in a traditional golf instruction sense, it sort of turns everything on its head and it really resonated with me because I was always an athlete and once I was trained how to play baseball, practice was never how to do it, it was just doing it. Make sense?
Dean: Right.
Dave: So, for example, when I was playing baseball and then eventually softball when I got older, I would go to my day job, which was real estate, and that's where we met and then I'd go home, have dinner, go to the field a half hour ahead of time to loosen up and warm up so I wouldn't hurt myself, but not to try to figure out how to catch a ball or how to hit a baseball.
And then if we were the home team, I would go to short stop. I knew that I was going to get every ball. Now did I get every ball? No, but I just knew that I could. And then if I was the lead off batter or when I was the lead off batter and I'd get up to the plate, I knew I was going to get a hit, Dean. I was 100% trained and golf instruction ... and part of the problem was that, which is we're always searching, always searching, always trying to figure it out, how to get better, better, better, but ultimately it isn't about you're either trained or you're not. So one of the things that we say in the program, you're either trained or you're not and once trained, always trained.
So my new business name is Out In Front Golf. So we're looking out in front. So if I'm going to ... what days do you guys go to the movies?
Dean: Friday. We're going today.
Dave: Yeah, so, when you guys go to the movies on Friday, it's like you're anxious to get to the movie, you're not trying to figure out how the car ... how you're moving your body to get the car to go where you want it to go. You're looking out in front. So one of the things that, again, we say in our program is that we're going to look out in front. Like, where are we going?
We're going to go make a birdie. We're not going to try to figure out how to swing the golf club. And this program is structured and it's systematic so it's step by step and the best thing that I like about it or love about it is, is we do it away from the driving range and the golf course. It can be done at home. It can be done with somebody in Toronto when it's cold. It's done. All the training is done at home or in some yoga studio or wherever.
Now that's not to say that you can't hit golf balls every day, but we don't train while we're hitting a golf ball. It takes the attention away from the result of trying to hit a golf ball so that's pretty much it in a nutshell. So the first thing that I need to do is get people introduced to the Tathata program. They have a 60-day program as part of a yearly membership, which costs $199 and then from that point I will take them and walk them through whether in a group or one-on-one through that program based on their structure. So I don't have to reinvent any wheel. I just have to get people A) introduced to Tathata and B) the local people ... and actually, even do it remotely so I can have a whole bunch of remote students and we all get on Facebook or that's actually another program or whatever program for you to help them through the program.
So that's where we are as far as the product is concerned and now I don't know what to do.
Dean: Okay, well, I mean, you've got a great story. I mean, that whole ... I look at it that athletics is athletics. I think that there's a lot of cross over things in any of the sports that require hand/eye coordination and fine motor skills.
Like, I look at Tathata cross over skills between golf and tennis and baseball and hockey players often tend to be really good golfers, as well, right? It's all in that same kind of anything that involves swinging and hitting something. Where the goal is to make contact with a ball with an instrument at some level, whether it's a hockey stick or a baseball bat or a tennis racket and the interesting thing that golf has when you really kind of look at what's involved in it, compared to baseball where you're trying to hit a round ball with a round bat that the ball's coming at you 100 miles an hour and you have no idea where it's actually going to be compared to putting a golf ball on a tee, right there at the same ... you can control everything about it. You know, it's so funny how we make it so difficult and get caught up in the mechanics of it.
You've kind of hit on my kind of secret to golf has always been just using my athleticism or whatever. I started playing golf very young and then when I started playing tennis I gave up golf mostly, but then came back to it, but I had already learned that I had an advantage in that I'd already learned the moves. Learned the big ... the basic swing moves and I had honed my hand/eye coordination and fine motor skills through tennis and I think there's a lot of parallel there that you can build in the story.
It's like you mentioned being a short stop and when you get in the ready position and you're ready to go wherever the ball comes, your body can react and your glove is going to be in just the right place to intercept the ball, whether it's on ... it's your brain is already calculating the angles and the speed and the trajectory to get your glove in the right place and then while you're running to take that ball out of your hand and throw it to first base with accuracy you're not lining up things and you're not sort of worried about your mechanics, but you're never in the same position twice when you're throwing the ball from somewhere between second and third base to first. Right?
And so your body, your brain knows how to calculate that.
Dave: Absolutely.
Dean: I saw Aaron Battley one time on playing lessons with the pros or something on the Golf Channel describing his approach to putting as ... especially the longer putt. Right? Like the lag putt is just like that. Like baseball. It doesn't really take a lot of time to line them up and painstakingly do a lot of mental calculations. He basically keeps his eye on the hole visually takes in the environment to see that roughly this is going to break to the right. It's heart breaking. I'd better go up here. His brain does all of that calculation for him and he just lets it go. I think there's a lot to that.
Dave: There is and in our program ... in the Tathata program we talk about how Niklaus stalked every single shot. If you're going to kick a soccer ball, you wouldn't stand directly behind it. Standing up totally erect and walking into it like that. If I took five people who even never kicked a soccer ball and we had five soccer balls and I said, "Stand directly behind it." And I said, "Get ready to kick it."
Most people are going to move to their left or right depending on if they are left-footed or right-footed and then they are going to bend over and pretty much stalk it and get ready to just kick the crap out of it. And that's what we're basically teaching in the Tathata program, which is you're stalking every shot. Every shot is different. There's no one plane. Although, there are movements ... there are body movements that we learn and we master, but there's not one swing because every shot is different. Every putt is different.
Dean: Okay. So how is this different than the conversation we had about the grass whip method, for instance?
Dave: Okay.
Dean: I know it's different because the way you described that and if people remember the first episode, you were one of the early episodes, actually, of the podcasts where the grass whip method, the idea was that if you give somebody a grass whip they naturally know what to do with it and how to swing it and it's taking that same thing then and applying it to your golf swing. So it sounds like a very similar sort of natural approach or complimentary anyway, but tell me what's the difference?
Dave: Yeah, the difference is, is that the body moves differently in the Tathata program. More in line with what a martial artist would do. So we're striking ... so even though we want to project the ball and if we're a right-handed golfer to the left of us towards our target, we're thinking that all the things have to go that way; the club goes that way, the hands go that way. We just talked about the club goes down the line and the hand goes down the line.
Dean: Yeah.
Dave: Nothing could be farther from the truth. What's actually happening is we're striking something in front of us. So we have to create leverage first. So we create leverage to strike something. So I was not into martial arts, but just imagine that you have some concrete or a cinder block or some wood directly in front of you, you would create leverage going back and then smash straight down in front of you. That's pretty much what we're doing in the golf swing and then there's certain movements that project the ball forward and to the left, again if we're a right-handed golfer and it's absolutely totally different than the grass whip, which disconnects the arm from the body.
So what we found in the grass whip method is that there was not a lot of power in it.
Dean: Okay.
Dave: So, again, if you were going to strike something in front of you, you would connect your arms back down to your body. So all the greatest golfers; Tiger before 2000, Hogan, Niklaus, Gary Player, Greg Norman, they re-connected their arms to their body as they struck the ball in front of them.
So imagine that again ... imagine that you have some weights or you have a pulley weight where your arms go up and you want to bring it down, you wouldn't do it away from your body. You need to bring it right back in front of you. So major things is how we strike something in front of us and not just swing our arms freely with no power whatsoever. So the power and accuracy in this method is just amazing.
I played the back nine at the Palms the other day. I shot four under. I hit eight greens and just missed out four birdie putts. Could have shot literally eight under without even trying. I never felt as a player, as a golfer, and as an instructor that I was 100% trained. Never even thought about it. Like, I'm just trained. I know I can do this. I know I can drive my car to the supermarket without hitting anything, as long as no one hits me. That kind of thing.
Dean: That's the secret. I think that's it. I think that's my approach to golf, right? For me, I play ... I don't play as much as I used to it seems like, but I would say that 80% of the rounds that I play, I'm going to shoot between 78 and 82. That's right in my zone there.
If I take it out to 90% are going to be between 75 and 85 and then I may have 10% I'm not really going to go below 75, but then I may. The wheels may fall off and I may shoot 87 or something like that, right? More likely to have an outlier on the high side than the low side, but it's really that sort of thing that my game is very simple in that I hit a lot of fairways. I don't hit a ton, but I hit a lot of fairways. I don't hit a lot of greens, just on some of them we're playing. Some of the longer courses I just don't have the long approach game.
And so consequently I have a really good short game because I get a lot of practice at it and I've got that fine motor skills and hand/eye coordination and touch from playing tennis, but it was funny because somebody asked me how come ... how did you get such a good short game. I said, "Well, I miss a lot of greens." And that's the secret right there.
Dave: Absolutely. So, I mean, I was a single digit handicap five, six, seven and I hit two, three greens a round. I mean, and they talked about how Phil Mickelson does all these crazy shots and I'm maybe not at that level, but I could too because, like you said, you're missing 14 greens, 15 greens a round, you're going to get pretty good at your short game.
Dean: Exactly.
Dave: So now imagine that you have ... you've done out most of your golfing life, but now you're starting to hit 10, 12, 14 greens. Scores down dramatically.
Dean: Yeah.
Dave: But the biggest thing about the program is ... well, a couple of things ... one is, you do the work outside of the range. You don't have to do it there. Matter of fact, we don't want you to do it there, number one. And number two, is we want to get you to the point where you are so trained and you have confidence because you have confidence, not because you're trying to have affirmations or you're saying affirmations, I'm going to hit today. You know because you have skill that you developed and you have the confidence and you're trained. Once trained, always trained.
Imagine a golfer a year from now ... so if a golfer's listening, imagine that a year from now, you never ever have to practice again. You can go to the range and hit golf balls if you want, but it's absolutely not necessary. You go to the driving range.
So, Dean, I figure I'm about 70% trained and I'm still having great results. It's going to be a couple months from now where I literally, if you to the golf course, 10, 15, 20 minutes, half hour depending on your schedule, you loosen up. You don't practice. You're not trying to figure anything out. You go to the first tee. Imagine being the first tee and this is how I know that this is the method that really works for me and others as well is when I was playing baseball, I wanted as many people watching me as possible. Watching me hit this next ball. Watching me go from first to third on a single. Watching me tag out from second to score. Watch this. But I know that I could do it, right?
Versus being on the first tee at my club saying, "I hope nobody's watching me." As a matter of fact, even looking around making sure nobody is watching them swing.
Dean: Right.
Dave: Versus watching me hit this drive.
Dean: Yeah.
Dave: Watch me make this 18-footer and it comes from being trained. So that's it, Dean.
Dean: Okay. So tell me how long does it take for someone to be trained as you say it?
Dave: So it all depends on how much they value lower scores and playing better golf.
Dean: Okay.
Dave: Now for me, I went through the 60-day program in 24 days.
Dean: Okay. So when I look at this as like, so what?
Dave: You can go at your own pace.
Dean: Yeah, so we're comparing though, like so if I look at my ... the landscape of golf improvement opportunities. That's who we're looking out. We've got the big total universe of everybody who plays golf. Then a subset of that ... the subset of that who are interested in improving their game. And this was a metaphor for anybody. We've got any market. We've got the whole of the market. We've got the subset of the market that wants to improve their golf game or whatever somebody's market is and then we've got the different mechanisms or choices that people have within that.
Like, so, a lot of times people think, "Okay, equipment change is the way that we can make a difference, right?" When you look at it that the ... I can get a new driver and that'll solve it for me or I can get these new wedges that are going to make it easier for me to hit it out of the sand and off tight lives and out of the rough. I can these utility clubs that are going to make those approach shots better, especially out of the rough or out of bad lives or anything like that.
So you look at those as kind of specialty clubs that are going to make that change and it's instant in their mind. I don't have to change anything else about my game and for most players, like higher handicapped players, if you give somebody an alien wedge or you give somebody one of these easy play wedges, they are going to have a better outcome just using the swing that they already have, right? Without having to really change anything.
So it makes them feel like they're ... it gives them that confidence. Makes them feel like a better player without any investment of changing anything that I'm doing, right?
Dave: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dean: Then you've got the people that like to practice. Now these are things that are off the course opportunities that they have, which could be these training aids that they have like the clubs the Medicus or the swing training clubs that have ... get your hands in the right positions or that the club is in the right position or you're staying on plane for doing those things to help people groove that on plane swing or for some people it's the first time they've ever felt what it feels like to have an on plane swing and those are popular among the things.
And then we get down to changing your actual swing. Which, can be through instruction or adopting somebody's particular approach to it, right? Whether, it's taking a Moe Norman approach like the ... what do they call that-?
Dave: Natural golf, yeah, the natural golf.
Dean: Natural golf. Moe Norman.
Dave: Natural golf.
Dean: Learning and perfecting a swing that makes it easy for people. Natural golf or what would be some of the other popular approaches.
Dave: Hardy had the One Plane, Two plane swing. He has rotary golf out there. There's a lot of great methods out there.
Dean: Yeah, all that stuff, which ... yeah, so that falls into the thing and then here we go now ... you're talking about something that is now even ... we're not even going to go on the golf course. This is something that we're going to do off the course with ... is it ... are you doing it with a golf club or are you learning moves and stuff outside of that? What does the protocol look like if I'm going to adopt this Tathata method?
Dave: Yeah, so there are seven chapters in the 60-day program. The first chapter is about energy and how to get the energy right. Again, like stalking something like you're going to just pounce on it versus what am I going to do here? What am I going to do here?
The second chapter's is body movements where there is no club. You just move the body like you would in a yoga program. And the third chapter, you put a club in your hand. Then there's a club routine. So Chapter One is energy. Chapter Two is body routine. Chapter Three is club routine. When you put a club in your hand and you swing it, okay, you swing it, and then Chapter Four is about speed and uneven lives. Chapter Five is short game. Six is putting. And Chapter Seven is taking it to the course because after all if you can't take it to the course, what good is it?
But it's all done systematically. Step-by-step. How long would it take? Well, to go through the 60-day program, it all depends on how much time someone can and is willing to put into it and when once done the program, it never has to be done again. So it could take someone months, 60 days, 90 days, even a whole year depending.
I mean, I have certain people who purchased it a month and a half ago and they're only on Day Nine and then I have someone who purchased it two weeks ago and is on Day 22, I think. So it all depends on how quickly they want to do it, but again, once one gets through the program, is their swing going to be perfect? No, but they'll have the wherewithal to go back if they needed to, to do this routine.
Dean: How many hours would it take to go through the whole program? What's the protocol here?
Dave: Each day is about 45 minutes, 50 minutes.
Dean: Okay.
Dave: And ... what I was going to say just popped out of my head ... going through the program is ... just popped out of my head...
Dean: What does somebody have to do?
Dave: Yeah, so they're going to watch the video. This is going this way. So Brian and he has two of his assistants there as well on these videos. So he'll go through them ... he'll do the movements. So they demonstrate the movement. Then they explain the movement in great detail. Then they have you sample or do it a couple of times and then over the course of the coming days, there's a routine done.
So it's not just, "Okay, do this, do this with your body." It's explained and then it's just a routine where there's no more explanation. You're just doing it over and over and over and over and over and over again and what you said about the club that's going to make you a little bit better and then the training aids that are going to make you a little bit better, that's okay, but it doesn't change the habit. So we have to replace or displace the habit that doesn't serve us on the golf course or striking a golf ball. And this program does just that because it's the same thing over and over and over and over and over and over again and at one point you're like, "Okay, now I can just do it without thinking about it. This is done."
Dean: Okay.
Dave: Like you're driving a car so that's how it works.
Dean: Okay. That I think ... there's a lot of ... you'd have to get somebody who's very serious about making these changes to invest that kind of time off the course.
When you think about if there's something that somebody can watch a video and then try it on the range a little bit before their regular Saturday round. I think if you look at that as probably you look at the how often do people get to play golf, you know?
Dave: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dean: Unless you kind of position it looking at it as something maybe in the off season, that it would be something that somebody could do over the winter too or leading up to the big thaw in the Northern areas where they're going to get to do this and come out with a big improvement. You know, ready for the start to the season.
Dave: This is the perfect time for the people up North in Canada and in the East Coast and Minnesota. This is the perfect time for those people to ... so, what is it? Mid-January, if they did it February, March, and even some of April, they're going to hit the ground running and really ... it's basically transformational, but like you said, it's for the person who seriously wants to do the work, because not everybody's going to do it.
There's a person and there's no criticism of it, hey look, let me get an alien wedge. It looks kind of weird. It looks alien, but if helps me understand then I can shave two and three strokes a round, hell I want to do it. I'm not willing to do that program for 60 days or 90 days. I'm not willing to do it and that's perfectly fine for that person.
Dean: Right. You've just got to find the right person. Now when you look at it then, how is it delivered? How are you involved in this? What's the relationship that you have with somebody?
Dave: Okay, so, I'm a certified movement specialist for Tathata. So then if Dean Jackson purchased the program through my link I would get the 30% referral fee.
Dean: Okay.
Dave: And then-
Dean: And then?
Dave: Then I would offer my services to Dean Jackson and say, "Would you like help through these chapters?" Okay?
Dean: Okay.
Dave: And then offer my services either on a 60 day basis or a monthly basis or just as needed. Dean calls me up and says, "Hey Dave, can we do a little follow up?" And we'll do a little face time and then I charge what I charge. That kind of thing.
Dean: Yeah.
Dave: So ultimately and I have one I just started. So I have one person now who paid $1,000 a month and I let them come unlimited and we have three days in the yoga studio and two days actually on the driving range and we don't really hit golf balls and try to figure out our swing, but we do our movements and then we see how it translates to striking golf balls.
Dean: Okay.
Dave: And he is basically on a monthly ... he's on a monthly retainer.
Dean: Okay.
Dave: That's how that works. So Step One is to introduce them to the Tathata program. They sign up. Step Two is help them along the program.
Dean: Could you facilitate this in a group?
Dave: Absolutely. It's even probably better in the group.
Dean: Yeah. And so I'm wondering if that might be a good way to approach it, you know? To start to think about that as a six week program or 60 day program or something that they could go through kind of leading up to the season. Where are you now? Are you in San Diego?
Dave: No I'm in La Quinta in the desert.
Dean: Okay. So, but they're all playing right now. So you're playing year round. So it's not ... there's a lot of snow birds there, I bet.
Dave: Yeah, so right now ... so basically it's topsy-turvy here. So when the winds are at East and North everyone's playing here, okay? And then when it gets really hot here, like in June, then we can go indoors, but I still ... like I'm right now ... like I said, I have access to a yoga studio three days a week, so we do Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and yeah, to have ... it'd be cool to have 10, 12 golfers there and we're not hitting golf balls and we just do our work and then go play.
And by the way, speaking of that, we do the work away from the golf course. So if a person wanted to hit golf balls every single day, that's their business. And there's nothing wrong with that.
Dean: Yeah. And then what's the outcome? Like, so, you look at it because it's so sort of fundamental stuff, right? It's not ... is it ... what's the promise of it? Of me doing this? Is there-
Dave: The promise is you hit the ball longer. So I'm about a club and a quarter longer now and more accurate so my average greens and I always kept my stats was basically eight and I was a one handicap hitting any greens and now I'm hitting 12, 12 a round.
Dean: Okay.
Dave: And I'll probably have that up to 16 by the end of this-
Dean: Well, that's a 50% improvement.
Dave: Absolutely. Yes. But most importantly it's the feeling of being so trained that there's no thought. To leave thought behind and just go have some fun. So what's it really all about? It's fun. Like, what's more fun? Trying to figure out your golf swing on a golf course or going out there and shooting a low score and even when you miss a shot, you know that there's nothing to fix. It's just like, "Okay, go get it." Do I hit a ball in the trees? Of course. Now I'm just going to go do it and put it on the green from there.
Dean: Would this be something then that ... I'm wondering if this would maybe lend itself to like high school or college golf teams?
Dave: Oh definitely.
Dean: Mm-hmm (affirmative). So I wonder if you can add some statistical backup to what's happening here. I think anytime that there's anything like this, what you have to set up is the quantifiable improvement versus just the qualitative, feels better and it's more fun kind of thing. You know? Of course, you need both.
Dave: You need both, absolutely.
Dean: You need both, absolutely because why ... and who does it matter to? You know? Like, if you look at it that ... let's say you take an elite high school golfer or junior golfer who is going into their senior year and is looking for a golf scholarship, that could make a big difference if you look at the ... if they had an improvement in the stats like you're talking about of improving your ... if you improved greens from eight to 12 and you've got ... and the distance is improving and everything, that would make a big difference for them.
Dave: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dean: You know, it's really interesting. I started a podcast, a new podcast for my realtors called Listing Agent Lifestyle and one of the things that I talked about was ... because this year, 2018, this is ... I got my real estate license in 1988. So 30 years now this marks of my real estate career. And I was looking back and seeing what has changed and what hasn't changed in those 30 years.
And if I look back, use golf as an example, that if you look back in 1990 was when I went back, so 28 years ago, the leading driving distance on the PGA tour was 279 yards. And in 2017 the leading driving distance was 317 yards. So an improvement of 56 yards or whatever more than that, right? 317, 56, 57, 58 yards improvement on driving distance, but and that's all driven by technology, right? And advancements in the golf ball and the golf club and that the players are more athletic now, right? Like certainly they have more athletic swing. All of them are more aggressive. Their more muscular.
Those kinds of things all matter to hit the ball further, but when I looked at the thing that really matters, scoring average, the leading scoring average has improved by less than one quarter of one stroke in that same period of time. And so you look at that, that there's the fundamental things and I think that's where I was saying my lesson about that for the realtors was very similar in that you can't digitize the last 100 feet of a golf hole, right? Or you can't technologically improve the last 100 feet of a golf hole. It comes down to you being able to get the ball on the green and in the hole. That's the end of it, you know? That these kinds of things, that this makes the difference in the fundamental things, then it should make a difference in the qualitative things. Or the quantitative things as well, you know?
Dave: Absolutely and one of the things that we didn't talk about how that when we move our body. We move it from our minds and not to get really technical with regards to martial arts or our center. All movements come from the center and we actually, we work with our center so that we're always in balance and we're never out of balance.
So most golf swings ... most missed golf shots are out of balance. So we keep ourselves in balance. We leverage ourselves on the way back. We level out on the way through, impact and then we thrust up through a beautiful finish. Always in balance. Always coming from our center and we can hit the ball definitely longer and definitely straighter and you will absolutely ... if you took your stats, you'll see a dramatic improvement. But as you said, Dean, only a certain amount of people are willing to go through it.
So if somebody said to me, "Dave, I can't do that." Well, you just hit the nail on the head. What's the quickest way to lower my handicap. We work 100 yards and in.
Dean: Yes. Right.
Dave: Because the guys that are winning on tour, the guys in the Top Ten are the guys that are making the most putts and getting up and down. So how many times have you watched a golf tournament where they say, "Okay, Don Smith is 11 out of 11 and up and down this tournament" or "They are six out of six." Or "Five out of six in the sand says." And the guy's who's hitting the ball just as far or farther, is one out of five and they are not even on the leaderboard.
Dean: Yeah. Right. That's it. Because a lot of times the guys who hit the ball the farthest have the touch and ... one of the greatest things I ever heard a caddy say in Scotland to one of my playing companions, he said, "You've got the hands of a sheet metal worker."
Dave: Nice, nice.
Dean: And so that's ... they're not the most delicate, but they can hit the ball a long way. So how-
Dave: Hey Dean, can I-
Dean: Go ahead, sure. Sounds like, can you ask me a question.
Dave: Yeah, I was going to ask you a question, so I wrote 21 Days to Golfing Freedom. We did the page. We did the E-book. So there was 113 views, 276 opt-ins, conversion rate was 25%. I started a dialogue. I think it was 48% of the 276 dialogued with me. And I sold nine programs, but I sort of lost interest when I realized that it wasn't really helping and I haven't even sent an email to any of these 276. These are just the people who got the book and it came from one podcast. So there was no advertising whatsoever. And like I said, I have another 400 people or more who were far more…
Dean: Interested in the mechanics of this. The mechanics of this are the same. When you look at it that you don't have to ... it's the same mechanics in that you can have the book ... you know, it was a great ... and literally you can have the same title even, right? 21 Days to Golfing Freedom or whatever the ... if you can through Module, the first portion of it or Phase One or whatever you can make this to be.
It's the same thing. Because at that point you've hit a nerve on them that they want that book and they leave their name and their email address to get it. They don't have any clue what you're talking about until you start communicating with them, right? But nothing on that front end needs to change really.
Dave: Yeah, I would just change the 21. There's a 60 day. Again, it's a 60 day program and then I'll have to go into the book and I've started doing it already and I'll just make the changes. I'll just change what I say to correlate to what I'm teaching now and just do it all over again, right Dean?
Dean: That's it.
Dave: Perfect.
Dean: That's what I'm saying. Is you've got ... now you know the mechanics, right? Like, you know how this works. It's just that you've changed your protocol. You changed what you do, but you tapped into the motivation. You tapped into what people wanted and whatever you did to get people to leave their name and email address, that worked. What you did to engage with people is the same thing. What was your engagement dialogue? I remember we worked on some different things in email mastery with you on how to engage with the people.
Dave: So it was the ... the first thing was a great read. I should grab a cup of coffee. It's a great read. And then the next day was, what's your handicap? And like I said, 48% of the people said ... some people just said that my handicap is 17 or some people wrote me three paragraphs. And that just started a dialogue.
Dean: Mm-hmm (affirmative). So that's you know, you're all the way down to ... you've gotten ... you got profit activator one dialed in. We know who we're talking to. It's the same people. We've got profit activator two, a way to get people to raise their hand using the book.
Now, as soon as they ask for it, they're automatically in profit activator three. You'd ask the same question, right? You're still going to say the same thing when they download. Here's a copy of the book, grab a cup of coffee, it's a great read. And then the next morning, "Hey, welcome aboard, what's your handicap?" Everything ... now you've got somebody who's willing to engage in a dialogue and they're on their way through a conversation with you.
Now that you know differently, now you've got a different destination for the conversation, but the mechanics are still the same. You're just going to engage with them. Find out what their need is or what their desire or their frustration and then you're going to tell your story. I imagine you've got some videos or some things to share with them that introduced your methodology.
Dave: Absolutely. So now the next question is, the 276 people that opted in to the 21 Days to Golfing Freedom, how do I introduce the new thing without looking like a jerk.
Dean: "Hey, I got a new thing." I mean, this is the thing. I just discovered and you start telling that story. It's not like forget everything you've ever heard kind of thing, you know?
Dave: Okay, good. Say again, Dean.
Dean: Just kind of tell the story. Of your discovery, you know?
Dave: Yeah, I love it. That's really good. And then my target ... and then now I have access to a couple of country clubs that have lots of houses where I'd say 65% of the people are golfers there. What kind of direct mail do I ... do I do a direct mail to get them to the landing page?
Dean: You could direct mail for the book.
Dave: That's what I'm saying, yes. Direct mail for the book.
Dean: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, you can't ... you've got to compel people first and then you convince. You know?
Dave: Right. So direct mail right to the book?
Dean: Yeah.
Dave: Perfect.
Dean: Yeah, I think that's the thing. So whatever you were doing to get people to download the book before. That's what you can do now.
Dave: Well, actually I didn't do anything. It was just a matter of-
Dean: My podcast.
Dave: I just did one podcast and I got 1,113 people from that one podcast.
Dean: Could you do that again?
Dave: I could definitely do that again. Now can I ... how do you do your Facebook ads?
Dean: Well, you go to this website called Google and you type in the words "How do I do Facebook ads?"
Dave: Nobody likes a wise guy, Dean.
Dean: No, I'm just saying. That's the- Any question that starts with "how" the answer is Google, but the more important question is who not how. Who can help me with Google with Facebook ads? That's a better question, you know?
Dave: I'm thinking Dean Jackson.
Dean: Hmm. Well that's the ... you know, I can help you with the what to say on them, but not the mechanics of doing them, you know?
Dave: Right, right, right.
Dean: There's lots of people that can help you run Facebook ads. You can find a VA who can do that kind of thing, you know?
Dave: And again, it's to get them to go to the landing page for the E-book.
Dean: Yes, mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dave: Perfect, perfect.
Dean: All we've got to do ... yeah, nothing happens until you turned an invisible prospect into a visible prospect, you know?
Dave: Yes.
Dean: That's really the thing. And now you've got all of these ... what have you been doing to communicate with these people over the amount of time that you've had them on your radar here in your list?
Dave: I'm not consistent. I wasn't consistent at all.
Dean: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dave: And like I said, as I was doing it I realized that the method wasn't what it cracked up to be and I just stopped everything. Then I found Tathata and then over the past four months I had to go through the training myself and I'm validated for myself and then my small group of friends and then one student. We made sure that it actually worked, which it does, now I'm ready to roll it out. So I haven't really done anything.
So like I said, I have 276 people who got the original E-book who I never ... I mean, I just basically dropped the ball with them and then all of the other people in my database. What I love about what you do is I'm always getting an email from you. I can't wait to get it too. It's all different stuff. Here's Dave not sending anything out to anyone.
Dean: Right. Exactly. So I think that's an important thing when you start now communicating. That's part of it. Is that your flagship ... I think it would be ... because you're an enthusiastic user of this method, right? So when you look at it that your ... if you're sharing your stuff, you know, like, listen I've been keeping track and show your picture of your notebook, where you're keeping your stats on the round or how you keep your stats on your scorecard, but I used to keep my separate scorecard. I'd have my score and then I'd have did I hit the fairway? Did I hit the green? How many-
Dave: That's how I do it.
Dean: Yeah, but I would use the whole line for that, right? Like I would use ... if there's four lines on the scorecard, for four players.
Dave: That's exactly how I do it, Dean. Yep.
Dean: And I have an X in that one if I got it, right? So that way you're showing stuff there where you're showing the improvement that and maybe breaking it down that people are voyeur-ing in through seeing your enthusiastic improvement. You know? And then tell them that whole thing, but you've just got to become engaged in that dialogue.
It's just like you're there living vicariously through you. You are kind of the canary in the coal mine in a way. Right? You're going through and doing it first and saying, "Hey, look at this." You know? And then you say, "Hey, I'm getting together with some people to talk about this, would you like to join us?" And that way then you can invite people to take part in your program or you can do it as a case study.
Dave: I also started ... I did a couple of free workshops just for one or two persons, but what I basically do is I demonstrate first. Excuse me, I have them ... I watch them hit golf balls. Don't say anything. No critiquing and then I explain where I was and where I am now and then I give them like just a sample of the program.
Like, there's 12 body movements in Chapter Two and I give them the first six and how to address the ball and so and so forth. And then I say you ... I don't know how much of Joe is you and you is Joe. You guys are both great. The thing where you have three options. So what I said in the beginning. So you have three options. Option one, you're not going to like anything we're doing here and I'll never see you again. I'm okay with that. Option two is you're going to love what we're doing here and you're going to get the online program and option three is you're going to get the online program and you're going to have me help you through it.
So then I'll say, "Okay, what is it? One, two, three?" So, yeah, that's what I want to do. So I want to fill up the free workshops and, again, like you said is, it's all a numbers game. So doing a free workshop on Saturday, would you like to do- No, you don't even say that, right? You just say, "We're doing a free workshop, would you like to join us?" And then you give them the details, right?
Dean: Right, yep, that's it.
Dave: It's details after they're interested.
Dean: Yeah.
Dave: Okay, good. Good.
Dean: Yes. That's the thing, right? It's like you can't ... it doesn't ... whenever they are ... once they're interested then we tell them about what you're doing.
Dave: Got it.
Dean: And ask them to decide, you know, that's the thing.
Dave: Good.
Dean: Yeah, I think you've ... there's a lot of equity that you've built up in the ... you're trained now in direct response. In a way. You're trained how to get people to go to a landing page and leave their name and email. You can apply that to anything now, you know?
Dave: Good.
Dean: Now you're just picking up where that conversation is, but I think that's the thing. Is that you've got to ... I think using your own ... almost like your own narrative, your own sort of travel log or diary or whatever, every time you're playing, you've had insights or you've had some result or something that you can share or content-imonial some result of somebody that you've been working with, but you definitely every time you start with somebody, you've got to get out the ... you've got to create your own set of metrics that you're looking at.
So you set up the scoreboard to be able to prove the difference. To be able to prove what it is and figure out and celebrate what's that magic moment. What's the thing that is going to have somebody excited that they're seeing a result happen now? Like before, we talked about a 60 day program, but hopefully it doesn't take 60 days before they see a result. What's the most immediate result that you can get for somebody, you know?
Dave: Perfect. And the simple metrics are fairways, greens, and ultimately your score. Like you said, just because they hit the ball 58 yards farther, but if the score never goes down, how much good is it?
Dean: And that's part of the thing that Nike, when they came out with their golf balls in a world where every golf ball was screaming length, distance, Nike came out as the first company ever to come out with accuracy as their attribute.
Dave: That's great. I mean, without accuracy you'd have nothing.
Dean: Right. And so remember they came out with those things with straight. That was the thing and that's kind of an interesting ... because that was different than the distance balls and then they parlayed into the distance balls. Right? But even that at a primal level ... I think Nike did such a great job of entering into the golf world. I mean, now they're out of it now, but into the golf world with their tour accuracy. I mean, that's a great set of words that nobody else was touting, but everybody realized they needed it. You know?
Dave: Yeah, I mean, Dean, and ultimately it's so simple. Golf is a simple game. Not necessarily easy because you need to make birdies to lower your score. You can't make birdies ... it's easier to make birdies if you hit the fairway, excuse me, if you hit the green in regulation obviously.
It's chip and a birdie and every once in a while it's going to happen, but you don't want to make a living on that. And then also, it's going to be easier to hit greens if you're on a fairway. And if you have a little bit more distance, if you have a shorter iron, you haven't hit a green. So if we have those metrics and someone says, "Hey, I went from an eight handicap, excuse me, a 15 handicap to a 9.2 and here's my metrics." Yeah, now we have something.
Dean: That's exactly it.
Dave: Perfect.
Dean: And if you're showing it overwhelming than that's happening for everybody that goes through, then that becomes now this is where you're going. Now I see what I'm buying for my exchange with Dave. I'm buying more of this. So it translates into winning more money from their friends on the golf course.
Dave: All right. What's the movie tonight?
Dean: Today the movie is The Post.
Dave: Oh, dude, I saw it yesterday.
Dean: And? What's your review?
Dave: My review is it’s excellent.
Dean: Okay. Well, I'll see if we agree. So I'll have to watch Facebook to see the consensus here.
Dave: Sounds good.
Dean: All right. Well, Dave, keep us posted.
Dave: Thanks, Dean Jackson.
Dean: Okay, thanks Dave. We'll talk to you soon. Bye.
And there we have it. Another great episode. Isn't it interesting that ... and we have a lot of great conversations there about fundamentally how the marketing systems work because when we got down to it, nothing really had to change about what he was doing up until the point where he starts introducing the program that he has. The desires, the audience, the mechanism that he's using as a book to get people to raise their hand and the dialogue method that he's using to get engaged with them, all happen prior to when he describes the method that he has to help them improve their golf game.
So really all of that, none of that initial approach for the first two and three profit activators has to fundamentally change. He can do more and more of that and then just introduce in profit activator four, the offer that is going to fit with what he's doing right now. So it shows again how transferrable these processes are if you figure out how to get people ... how to select your target audience. How to get people to raise their hand, how to engage in the dialogue with the percentage of people that are willing to engage in the dialogue and then introduce your transformational process to them, you're on your way. That's the fundamental underlying thing that we're looking for here.
So hope you got a lot out of that one. If you'd like to continue the conversation here, you can go to MoreCheeseLessWhiskers.com. You can download a copy of the More Cheese, Less Whiskers book and if you'd like to be a guest on the show, just click on the Be A Guest link. Great place for you if you're a long time listener to start the process of applying the eight profit activators that we talk about to your business is go to ProfitActivatorScore.com and try our profit activator scorecard. It will give you an immediate insight into how the eight profit activators are either growing or slowing your business right now. Remember, they are universally present. They're there whether you're actively or architecting a way to apply them or whether they're being applied to your business right now.
So that's it for this week. Enjoy your week. And I will talk to you next time.