Unveil the Intersection of Psychology, Marketing, and Entrepreneurship.

Hello everyone. Welcome to this episode of E-Coffee with Experts. I’m your host, Matt Fraser, and on today’s show, I have with me a very special guest, Donald A. Myers iii, affectionately known as DA. DA is the co-founder of Myers Marketing Management, where he has spent the last 11 years working closely with the business and its partners manning various apartments and overseeing multiple projects with his diverse set of skills and expertise.

DA has proven to be an invaluable asset to the company, wearing many hats, including account management, social media advertisements, web design, and cross-department training. On top of all that, he also runs his own business as a licensed counsellor, where he uses his education and training to help clients achieve their goals.

He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and a Master of Science and Counseling Psychology from Southern Nazarene University in Bethany, Oklahoma. And when he is not busy running his businesses, he loves spending quality time with his family, travelling and indulging in his passion for learning by reading.

With his extensive experience and knowledge, he’s sure to provide our listeners with valuable insights and advice on entrepreneurship, marketing, and counselling. We can’t wait to hear his story and learn from his expertise in this upcoming episode. Thank you so much for being on the show. It’s a pleasure to have you here.

thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it to be in here.

Right on. Hey, how would your university de your university professors describe you as a student?

It depends on which ones you ask. Undergrad, it was not a pretty picture. I did not do well in my undergrad too. It was too diverse.

I wasn’t enjoying some of the subjects. And so I actually, I do remember failing a class. It was not great. And then I got into my doctoral program or my master’s program, And I aced every single one of my classes except for one. It was a subject that I was just supremely passionate about and so that very, different experiences, I’m sure.

that’s so interesting. So what motivated you to like, go into psychology and become a professional counselor?

so I actually, my original major in college, I was going to be, I was gonna be a pastor.

So it was religion, theology. Got into that. And got pretty burnt out. And so I took a semester off, and I went home. Yeah. Had some very hard conversations with my father and basically boiled it down to the fact that I love people. And, maybe my job should revolve around that.

And so I switched over to psychology, not expecting that was really gonna be the route that I was gonna go. But once I got out of my bachelor’s program, a couple of years passed, and I was doing a sales job I’m, horrible at sales and And another couple of conversations with my wife and we made that decision to jump into counseling.

I love the field, and I’m just really passionate about what makes people tick.

I share that same passion and interest. What inspired you to transition from a career as a psychologist to marketing?

That’s actually all my wife. So, we were, we had been married not too long and I, remember this as clear as day, my wife came up to me, I was in the shower, and she came up to the door and said I, think I want to open my own agency.

She had just exited a sales position at another company. And we were in that in-between phase. And she said I wanna start this. And a year later, after she had started the agency, it was at that tipping point where it was either just gonna be what it was.

She had a couple of clients and she was doing stuff solo. Or I could quit my job and join and we could push it over the edge. And so it started out being this just, I wanted to support my wife. I wanted to see where this went. And it’s turned into something absolutely fantastic and something that I’ve learned to absolutely love.

That’s amazing. What were some of the challenges you faced during this transition?

Man, working from the kitchen table. That was, no I think when it came to, because obviously we started very early on in our marriage and, so we were probably 26, 27 years old whenever my wife started the company.

And so right about that point, We’re still getting to know each other and we’re starting this business together and figuring out, what’s my place? And, that’s really I think the biggest struggle that we ran up against. She started this company and not to say that I was tagging along and I was like that needy little kid that’s just following you around trying to figure out what I need to do.

But, the biggest struggle was for me to find what is my piece in this and take ownership. Because my wife knew exactly what her role was, that was her passion. That’s why she started in the first place. And Me, like kind of that divide and conquer, so we’re not stepping on each other’s toes.

We’re getting the most possible that we can get done while still having time for our kids.

My wife and I went and sold cars together for a brief period, and I’ll tell you right now, it’s not easy. We would’ve been good at it, but there were challenges that we had in regards to she’d never selling before. She hates sales, but she thought she’d give it a try. And I think she underestimates herself. In fact, I know you say you hate sales and you suck at it, but I sucked at sales one day too. And Tom Hopkins at one time in his story, his book had a Master The Art of Selling and his book Sales for Dummies.

He talks about how he was the worst salesperson ever, and he tells the story, and I won’t get into it right now, it’s a phenomenal story. And he’s and he’s become one of the best salespeople in the world and he was terrible. So I think that people can learn to sell. I think that some people have a better acumen for it than others, but we sell people all the time.

Like when we’re when you wanna convince your wife to go to a certain movie or influence. Perhaps or, some other way. It’s, interesting how people view sales and how most people’s view of sales is the sleazy used car salesperson, which I used to be, not sleazy. I used to sell cars. And everybody who listens to the podcast knows that. And that’s not my, view of sales. But anyway, that being said, there are, some difficult things that, how did you establish those roles, for instance? I’m not sure if you’re familiar with him or not Michael Gerber. He wrote a book called EMI Three.

EMI three visited and he talked about how when you’re gonna start a business, you should have the duties and responsibilities of each and every role right before the company has even started like the organizational structure and everything that everybody does should be determined. Now, that’s hard to do.

It was before the days of ChatGPT. Now you can all those things can be done now. No problem. Trust me, I’ve done it. But we don’t go with that right now. But, the point I’m trying to make is that how did you decide what this is your area of responsibility, of your responsible for, and this is my area of responsibility for, and I’m responsible for. How, did you determine that? Cause I imagine there would be fights and arguments that would happen just like that. For instance, when I was at the car dealership doing marketing, I was the marketing director and the damn salespeople and sales managers were always trying to stick their noses in my business, which wasn’t their I responsibility or expertise, if you will.

So it’s even without being married, those things can occur. So I’m just trying to say, how did you guys navigate that difficult difficulty in the business?

Are you familiar with Jordan Peterson? rule number four, I think is it’s something to the effect of Opportunity where responsibility is laid down or something along those lines.

And, basically what happened is, that I would sit back and I would watch my wife watch what she would do. She would be out on a sales call and then she’d come back to the house and, be writing up the follow-up emails and doing all of this stuff and, What I was trying to look at was where are the gaps?

Where are the things that aren’t being picked up? What are the things that aren’t being, either aren’t being done or. Are being done, but are keeping her from, doing what she needs to do and, what she’s phenomenal at, which are sales and account management and, long-term strategy.

And so once you see those things where you can pick up that responsibility, it becomes that opportunity for yourself. And you’re really trying to just make sure that. This is the thing that I know that I can do or I can learn to do rather. Because of all of this, as you said, my background is in psychology.

I don’t, I was not formally trained in building websites or social media marketing or anything like that. Everything I got the Google Education and so everything that we’ve done up to this point has just been, there’s a need, there’s an opportunity, there’s a space. Let’s go ahead and just fill that.

Here, this brings to me my next question as far as I like this. This is amazing because I’m not sure if you’re familiar with Dan Kennedy or not. Dan Kennedy, direct response Marketing. It’s all about psychology and direct response marketing. And as far as I’m concerned, marketing is all about psychology.

People don’t get that, but it is. So I wanted to know, how has your experience in psychology and counselling helped you in your role as a marketing consultant and agency co-founder? Particularly when it comes to working with clients and building strong relationships, as well as any other ways you wanna speak to them.

I think it every single day, every single interaction that I have is Viewed through that lens of, the therapist. Even, though we try as both business people, and therapists, we try to shut off and, have boundaries around, this is work and this is personal.

It’s hard to do. It’s not impossible.

I disagree that we shouldn’t want to do that in, some ways, shapes and forms. Your experience as, a car salesman influences the way that we speak to other people and for sure. We try to say, my goodness I, don’t want to bring that home.

But the fact is, that we learn how to talk to people. We learn how to how to be with other people. Why wouldn’t we want to bring that over bring over the good and leave the stresses or, bad parts? But anyways, so what I would say is this, that obviously when it comes to personas, when it comes to the mindset that people are in, that has helped a tremendous amount.

But really The biggest part that I can see the influence of my counseling work is in account relations. Anytime that you find yourself face-to-face with another business owner. So particularly if this other business owner is something that you’re doing some, like a project for significant work. It’s going to you, has to know what kind of state of mind are they in. What are the things that I can say that are gonna ease their mind? What are the things that I’m gonna say that are gonna challenge them? It’s all this, it’s a dance. And, if you dance well you can really get far.

And, so I feel like And obviously, it branches out into employee relations, what happens when you have someone come in and they’re just having a bad day? Do you send them home? Do you try to? Have them push through or you. Bring ’em aside and talk to ’em.

All of these are valid options, but it depends on what state of mind they’re in. What have they gone through in the last two months? What have they gone through in their entire life? All of these questions are questions that I try to ask myself because of my counselling background. I think it influences every aspect of what I do.

that’s unbelievable. And there are so many it’s amazing how those skills are transferable. I’m not sure if you’re familiar with Kyle Roof or not, but he’s a lawyer turned agency owner. And he told me he would rather chew glass than be a lawyer again in practice law.

And he’s become very successful. But the skills were transferable because he’s an SEO guy and the critical analysis of data. And all of those things.

And language in, being a lawyer. That’s everything.

He started a law marketing firm.

The perfect thing for a guy who doesn’t wanna be a lawyer. Let’s offer marketing services to lawyers cuz I’m one of them.

He knows the industry and inside out, I’m sure.

Exactly. So, the point I was trying to make in that is you have transferable skills that may obviously have helped you in, regards to all of those things that you said.

I don’t think it hurts for anybody to take at least some kind of psychology in order to, or training to, to be able to just be a, understand people better and navigate relationships better in, in that regard.

No, I think it goes both ways because being, in marketing You look at how that’s affected my practice as a counselor. That’s undeniable. You don’t, especially in the counselling world, you don’t get to the place where you build your own website.

you run ads for your counselling work at it, that’s not something that you do as a counsellor. You hire someone else to do that once you get big enough. And if you can’t get big enough, you never get to that point. and that’s something from day one that I’ve been able to do because of my work in the marketing world.

There was a question that I had, that I was trying to hold onto. What is your favourite aspect of marketing? For instance, some people love SEO, some people love copywriting. Some people are analytics people, and some people are, Whatever Google ads. Some people are Facebook, some people are Facebook ads, and some people are social media. Do you have a favourite aspect of the industry that you really gravitate towards?

I do, but it’s not a typical one. If I can say that. And I love problem-solving.

Problem-solving, eh?

That’s my biggest passion is you, bring me a problem, whether it’s with PPC or whether it’s with a website, or whether it’s with social media. I just love every, all of those different aspects. But really I love coming up against just a rock-hard problem and trying to figure out a way around it, a way through it, under it.

However, we can manoeuvre, whatever’s going on, to get to the other side.

That’s amazing cuz most people hate problems and I love them. Run away from problems. Yet as far as I’m concerned life is about problems that need to be solved.

Cause you’re trying to solve a problem in the marketplace. And the bigger the problem I think was, I was watching Kevin O’Leary say this on shark tanker, whatever it was the bigger the problem, the more money you stand to make. Like Google solved the huge problem of people not being able to find things on the internet.

And they created a, they solved a huge problem. Elon Musk disrupted the marketplace and solved a huge problem with the acceleration of EV vehicles. Now we all, I think everybody would know, I don’t have any data to back this up, so I just don’t want to claim this as gospel, but I don’t think the car dealerships were very mo the car manufacturers were very motivated to transition, and I know there’s a whole thing behind all of this.

I’m, right now the grid doesn’t even, won’t even support the, if everybody got an EV in North America. Wouldn’t even support it, but I don’t wanna go down their road. It’s but, I’m just saying that he, solved a problem or, the SpaceX he saw, he re-reinvigorated the NASA program and that’s why he’s one of the richest people in the world.

If you look at all of the problems in life that he has solved in the world, that’s why he’s the richest person in the world. It’s absolutely amazing problems he’s solving or at least proposing solutions for and coming up with them. But anyway. , like you said, problems. That’s, very interesting.

So what approach do you take to problem-solving?

So when typically whenever we come up against a problem, and this is where a little bit of the counsellor side of me is gonna come out more than other places, but when we come up against a problem, we have something that, that we don’t have control over.

All right? So you’re gonna get a short spiel and, I’m gonna try not to take up too much of the time, but out of every experience in our life. There are three different categories that we can classify things into that we experience so and we are in control of exactly one and a half of those.

So behaviour. I’m in full control of my behaviour. Nobody can make me do whatever I don’t want to do. We are in partial control of our thoughts. I can’t always control what pops in there, but I can generally control what I hold onto. Some of them just, we have zero control over our emotions.

Did you say it was zero control over our emotions?

Zero, none. Come on, make yourself jealous real quick. Make yourself, I can’t do that. Make in a rage.

No. I can’t make myself in a rage, but somebody else can.

But we can think something or we can do something that will get us to a point where we can feel something.

This is why when we work out in the mornings, I know that I feel better throughout the day. But that’s behavior leading to emotion. And so when we come up against a problem immediately, we are going to have, regardless of what it is, we are going to have an emotional reaction.

And so typically we’re either taken aback or we feel like we’re backed into a corner as soon as that problem rears its ugly head. And, As the animals that we are. What is, what happens when you back an animal into a corner? They lash out every single time.

And the only reason that we’re able to do something else is that we have this thing called weather, you call it free will, whether you call it the choice to go against our analyst behaviours, whatever. But we can choose to do something other than what our nature tells us to do.

and so automatically the first thing that we have to do is we have to recognize what that emotion is. So let’s say, alright, you come up with you come up against a problem in your business, let’s say. Alright, there’s a competitor that has stolen one of your unique pieces.

They’ve copied it, they’re not even trying to hide it. And all of a sudden it’s disrupting your world. What’s that initial reaction that you have as a business owner? You’re just like, number one, I’m probably pretty angry. , you’re probably pretty angry. I’m taken aback.

I’m, feeling vulnerable. All of these different things are going on and if I behave based on the emotion, then I’m not in control of my behaviour because I’m not in control of my emotion. And so I have to act, I have to do the behaviour thing and say, I’m gonna acknowledge the emotion, but I’m gonna choose a different direction.

And so we have to acknowledge it because if we just try to ignore the emotions, that’s the equivalent of just bottling and shaking up a can of Coke.

It’s gonna even there explode. It’s even to explode. I heard that analogy from a. Psychologist once it was, and that stuck with me ever since.

But anyway, perfect analogy. Perfect analogy. . . But we, acknowledge those emotions and say, I’m feeling those, I’m most definitely feeling those. Let me take a step to the side and let’s just see if I can rationally look at this. They saw that I had something amazing. And they’re copying that outright.

What other ideas can I get? What other ideas can I come up with that they’re gonna wanna steal? And all of a sudden rather than being backed into a corner, we’ve pivoted over to the side. Because now I’m thinking rationally, I’m not thinking emotionally. Wow. It’s those, two, one and half things that we are actually in control of behaviour and thoughts that.

Truly. Get us through whatever problem we’re gonna be going through.

That is unbelievable. There is so much we can unpack. I would love to we’re coming to the top of our time though. I would love to have you back. What’s one takeaway that you would like our, listeners to get from this episode?

So I think the biggest thing about being in business, being a counsellor, being a co-owner with my wife and, doing business in this marketing world where everything is changing very quickly, the landscape, the different verticals, everything is just going on. The biggest thing that you can do as either a business owner or a person working at an agency or anything that know yourself.

Because if you don’t know yourself, you’re going to, the wind’s gonna take you wherever. You’re, just gonna be blowing around. It’s the same thing that we tell our clients that we need to define who we are before we can. Try to sell you to everyone else in the world.

Why can’t we do the same thing as individuals? If I don’t know who I am, what are my core values? Let’s use some of that agency language. What are my core values? What are my KPIs, if you will have that on lockdown, and then whatever comes, whether it’s a change in the market, whether it’s somebody else trying to take on what, you’re doing you’re gonna be just fine because you’ve self-identified you before you’ve interacted with the rest of the world.

It’s so important to do that. And yet so many businesses don’t as I’ve learned, but I’ll leave it there and I would like to invite you back to come for another episode where can our audience connect with you online if they choose to do.

I personally it’s funny because I am in marketing and advertising.

My social media is very sparse. I think the last time I posted on Facebook or Instagram it’s way back there. But Myers Marketing Management is all over the place which is our business myersmm.com, on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok all over the place,

and you’re on LinkedIn as well.

Yes, I Am. I am sure.

Right on. I’ll get people we’ll make sure to put, that information in the show notes. And again, absolutely a pleasure to have you here. Thank you so much for being on the show.

Thank you. Right on.