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A
Hey, guys, what's going on? Andy Elliott. Okay, so this is going to be super cool, by the way. I'm gonna tell you. So I'm here with Rise USA right now.
B
Boss, let's go.
A
This is going to be awesome. And they're going to talk to you guys real quickly. But I want to intro this. Just like total transparency. I've built a really big business really fast. A lot of people like, man, how did you do that? We've been able to do what most people couldn't do in 30 lifetimes, and we've done it in about three years. I would tell you, if you listen closely, I think that you could probably do it in a year. Imagine that one, one year totally transformed, change everything in your life. These guys are dangerous and deadly in the martial arts space. Okay? And I'm gonna let them explain that because they're the experts in that field. I'm not. But if you take how to grow a great business, how to dominate social media, how to build a brand, literally, how to scale, how to have purpose, their purpose is martial arts industry. And then you take how to build a business which is like making money, purpose and money. Oh, my gosh, heaven on earth. We are doing an event at the Lion's Den in February that I would love all of you to attend. But I want to tell you about it, by the way, when they start talking and I want to say this, and they start talking about the martial arts, like, what this is going to be? Who's this for? What this will do for you? And obviously tell them about your story. Some of you have been waiting to meet me. You're like, dude, I want to meet you. I want to roll with you. This, this is the time. Come during the martial arts stuff. Come when you're with me. Like, let's just do all of it together. Even if you're like, dude, I sell real estate, come to the martial arts, still, come meet me. Come spend time with us. I promise you, you'll leave away with a million dollars in ideas. But if you're in the martial arts space, or if you love martial arts, MMA or anything, one day you're like, dude, I should open my own deal. Listen up. They're going to tell you how to do it. That's what this event is about, is that if you're already in the space, how to blow it up. And then number two, if you've always wanted to get in, how to get in and what to do first.
C
Yeah.
A
So I'm going to let you kick it off a little bit with us. Tell us who is Rise Up USA and and let's rip.
B
All right, so I'm Aaron Hensley. I'm a seventh degree black belt under Chuck Norris. This is Cameron Smith. He's the Black Bolt multi time school teacher of the year, manager of the year and started martial arts when I was 2 years old. Didn't have a choice.
A
Crazy.
B
Didn't have a choice. My dad was like this is what we're doing. My dad started martial arts when I was 13, when it was Bruce Lee movies. Doing it literally in the backyard. And he knew when he's gonna have kids. That was gonna be the communication. Some people are baseball families. We were gonna be a karate family. So had no choice to do it. I didn't really love it, to be honest with you. I loved what it made me feel like. So when I was in school, I grew up in an area that was mostly black. I was in South Carolina, Georgia area and I used to have red hair. Had more hair back in the day. And so I ginger. I was a ginger. So I got picked on for being, you know, for being white and for being redhead and for being overweight when I was younger and for doing karate because it wasn't the cool thing at the time.
A
Right.
B
When I stepped in the martial arts school, I transformed it. Literally. I became a superhero. And what I learned was I could use my mind. I wasn't an athlete, my dad was but I could use my mind to manipulate myself when I was a young kid so I could out train anybody. So most kids there wasn't like kids doing martial arts back in the time. But most kids would do an hour class. I do four hours, five hours because I knew I was going to have to outwork anybody and that I didn't know about Malcolm Gladwell's 10,000 hour rule. But I was doing that work then.
D
Yeah.
B
And so I've resonated with that was real younger because I was able to keep manifesting that in my life. And Cameron, who's been training since he was 9 years old, same thing. You know, Cameron kind of was a misfit kid. And martial arts does attract a lot of kids who maybe weren't the star athlete and so got started stills discipline. Yeah, yeah. And particularly because a lot of times. But performance space.
A
Yeah.
B
Right. Like you're not trying to hurry and win to a game.
A
Right.
B
You have this ability, you can do something lifelong. You know, I'm 43 years old, so I've been doing it 41 years it's amazing. I've been in Black bolt now for 31 years. So yeah, you can, you can do this. And got started and eventually graduate high school at 15, started college young. Did not want to do this as a career. I wouldn't do anything but that honestly, because that was my dad was doing. And I wanted to prove a man type thing.
D
Yeah.
B
And while I was in college, the person I was engaged to, you talking about having the right woman in your life, told me is like, hey, you're not gonna ever make enough money. You're not gonna make enough money. Provide the life we want doing martial arts. I was in love. I gave up martial arts six months later. I'm angry all the time, quick to snap. I lost my trap. And I was like, you know what? This, I'm in the wrong relationship if you're trying to pull the one thing. By the way, guess how we met. Yeah, guess how we met, Right? So went back home, left that relationship, went back home, had apologized to my family because I pushed everyone away during this time. And I was like, you know what? It was harder growing up 100. And what I recognized during that time was what I loved about martial arts is, wasn't just the physical doing it. It's the tribe, the people. I felt home. And when I was helping people through martial arts, it's my church. It was. I was like, this is what I want to do the rest of my life. And. And so then it was time to be intentional about it. And so went from helping my dad run a school, fast forward several years later, opened my own, became very successful, did about a million dollars in business in annual first, second year in business. Only employee in my company. Wow. The town was 30,000 people. Average family income is 50,000. I was doing pretty well. Did what most people think is the next progression is, well, I gotta open another one.
D
Yeah.
B
I was not a business owner. I owned a job. And so I had three schools, made less money. Was not good at managing people. I was just a bad manager, bad business owner. I was, I was good as my employee, my own company, but I didn't know how to operate people that way. And then I took some time and I basically said, you know what? I can't keep doing this because I'm gonna lose my marriage, I'm gonna lose my kids, I'm lose my business. And so I sold off two of those schools, got back down to one and said, I'm with intent. With intent. I'm going to learn how to be a business owner. And I won't open another store again until I figure that out.
A
That's great.
B
And Fast forward to two years ago. Sold my company with 24 locations, six different states. Camera's my. He's right now to my left. But he's my right hand man.
D
Yeah.
B
And been with me for what, 17 years. I guess now I'll do this whole course.
A
That's crazy, dude.
B
And so, and, and so.
A
So you sold them and now you're back on the hunt.
B
100.
A
This new journey.
B
Yes.
A
What's going on?
B
Yeah. So you saw how quick you can get some. You said three years. You built this. Now you can do it probably in a year.
D
Yeah.
B
What I love about the event we're doing here is not only am I going to be teaching people how I did what I've done, but how I'm going to do it even better and faster this time. It's not going to take me 15 years to get where I was at. I'm going to do it in 12 months.
D
Yeah.
A
Hey guys, sorry to interrupt the podcast as you're hearing us talk about this daily. I was going to say actually two day event that's going to be life changing. If you're in the martial arts space, you want to get in, crush it and kill it. Or you're already in and you're just like, man, I want to, I want to create this to be a greatest business ever. Heaven on earth, super profitable and have a massive purpose. Guys, there's going to be a link below if you go down to the description box. Okay. Down on the bottom of this YouTube video there's going to be a little link. Just fill out your information, make sure it's correct and we'll send you over all the details. I think there's some different kind of tickets you can get. Like General, you can go CEO, go vip. Guys, I'm going to be there. Like I said, I built a nine figure business in a few years. He's been, they've been crushing it in the martial arts space. This is all coming together in one. It's dangerous. Nothing's ever been done like this before. This is an event. I don't even care if I was in martial arts or in business. Just the fact to be around two great winners. I'd buy the ticket anyways. Okay. But if you guys go down and you fill out the information below, just click on that little link in the description box, fill out your information, we'll send you over all the details. I can't wait to personally meet you and I know Rise usa can't wait to meet you guys. Let's get back to the video.
B
And so I told someone the other day, hey, we're opening up 12 schools in about 18 months.
A
That's amazing.
B
And. And this person I was talking to has one. He's been open for 30 years. Been trying to do the second one for 30 years. Can't figure it out.
D
Yeah.
B
So how are you going to do that? Once you have the formula.
D
Yeah.
B
And the passion behind it and you know your mission is. It's literally just about go.
D
Yeah.
B
Right. It's even fact of meeting you.
D
Yeah.
B
Which is a couple days ago.
A
Yeah.
B
I've already been here twice now.
D
Yeah.
B
In that period of time. And most people just won't take the action towards it. So not only are going to be teaching people and I don't believe in theory teaching.
D
Yeah.
B
Right. Like I don't want to teach you how to defend yourself against a theory. I want something that's been proven.
D
Yeah.
B
I don't want you on your business that way.
A
Right.
B
Exactly.
A
Yeah. I always say applicant teachers like you've done it. So you're the person who's immensely qualified to teach that specialized skill because you did it. And most people are out telling people how to do it and they haven't done themselves.
D
Yeah.
A
If you never sold your business, you shouldn't be out telling people how to sell business. You know what I'm saying? But I want to say something. This is super important. Who's this for?
B
That's a great question.
A
If they're watching this.
B
Yeah. So this, this is for people that.
A
We'Re doing here at the Lions.
B
Thousand percent. This is for people who are martial artists right now who are teaching somewhere or want to teach doing a part time. Maybe you're doing it full time for someone else and you want to run your own business. You already run a martial arts school. You want scale. You might want to sell your business one day. You don't even have to build it for that because you have a job. Not really a business. So it's for the people who already operate martial arts schools that want to go to the next level. You want. You want to be able to actually have the things that you thought you were gonna have when you own a. Is freedom of time. Right. Have a little bit extra money in the bank. You want to go on that vacation. You actually want to go on. So like how do you actually build that as a business? It's for the people who maybe you actually have success Already. And you're just like, what is my next thing? Right? What is the next thing? And it's really for the people who've been dreaming about doing this, you know, My dad, I remember I was in Virginia beach with my aunt and uncle. They're a military family. I was staying there for a summer and I get a call from my dad. It's before cell phone sir. I get a call from my dad on a landline, right? And I'm 11 years old. My dad's like, hey, I just bought a martial arts School. It's 1991. I guess at the time my dad borrowed $10,000 to buy his first martial arts school and he was going to stop doing his day job and go do this full time. And I remember that call. I'm like, it's kind of a crazy thing. If my dad would have had someone like me in his life at the time, it wouldn't have taken as long as a day to get there. So we're going to, we're going to speed. Look, I've made so many freaking wrong problems, mistakes in business. And you gotta think about it. When you're running 24 schools and 3,500 kids in your program, the average person has 200 people. They takes them two decades to catch me. So they're taking all the experience and they're being here for two days. They're getting all that poured into them.
A
Yeah. Just compressing time frame 100%. What are the questions that a lot of people have? Like how much capital does it take? Where do you get the money? How to start it, where should you do it? Maybe cover just a 10,000 foot view of like let's go inside. Not all the way, but just a little bit. Right? I know, like teaching like how to build it. Right? Teaching like how you build it to sell. Right, right, right. But like, you know, talk about, you know, a couple common mistakes that people may make when they do it and how you're going to show them how to do it. Right. And then you know, some things that you're really going to, you know, maybe a couple tactical things because we talked about like you also showing how you instruct inside your deal which makes sure that the retention stays super high and there's not a churn rate.
B
Well, your product's got to be good, right? Or and it's got to keep getting better. I'm like, I'm sure your stuff keeps getting better.
A
Yeah. You're not the same thing for three years ago product. No, it has to constantly Keep evolving daily.
B
And I think that's one mistake is people think they have a good product but they haven't evaluated it in a year.
A
And if the cash isn't going up, products not getting better 100. Because the market will tell you when you have a good product.
B
And so some mistakes of this. Most people haven't figured how to make money doing the thing they love, which is teaching martial arts.
A
Huge.
B
So they add something new, which is the last thing you should do, not the first thing. So they add aftercare because they can bus kids to them and that's how they're making the money. Guess what? They hate their life because they're daycare now. They wanted to be a martial arts teacher, now they're babysitting. We didn't, we didn't. We didn't have that. Right. So a lot of people who say they make all these millions of dollars running martial arts programs, they're daycare centers now, hey, you're making money great. But you're telling people you do martial arts. And it's not the program I put my kids in because it's not real. It's a camp, not a program. Right.
A
I love it.
B
So we ran martial arts schools and we're passionate about impacting kids lives through that.
A
Yeah.
B
And so that is one thing I think is people don't know how to make the money. So then they add things, they add gimmicks.
D
Yeah.
B
Gimmicks don't give you sustainability. Right.
A
Give them the play on how to set it up 100. If they run it this way, they'll kill it. Now what? Now Yalls relationship. Let's talk about that for a minute.
C
Yeah. So I started. My name is Cameron Smith, but I started martial arts when I was 9 years old with Aaron here. Actually, what got me started in martial arts was the Karate Kid movie, the remake of it with Smith in it and Jackie Chan. And you know, I thought originally when I was gonna start it was gonna be, you know, just a after school activity to do. Just something to kind of keep me busy, keep me out of trouble, that kind of stuff. But ended up really kind of discovering more of who I am and, you.
A
Know, built an identity.
C
Yeah, built an identity through it. Like you said, I was a misfit. I was a band kid. I was a music nerd. So I was.
B
Got these big glasses.
C
He didn't have big glasses. He keeps selling everybody.
B
That's what he was. Yeah.
C
But yeah, I was in music. So I did, you know, band, choir, all throughout middle School, high school. I was actually going to go to college to go into music education originally. And I was already teaching at the martial arts school with Aaron here. And we went to a trip to. I think it was Houston, right? Yeah, it was my. It was my first trip that I've gone to, first plane. And I remember standing in the airport and me and him are having a conversation, and he just asked me, like, hey, what are my goals? Like, what do I want to do? Is this something that I want to pursue? And we just kind of like, talked about it back and forth. I'd never really thought about martial arts being a career for me, just like anybody, like, can you really make money doing karate? Right. So we had a conversation about it. And, you know, ultimately, obviously I already trusted him because I've been with him for so many years at that point. And, you know, what was the comment you made? You said something about, you know, he's gonna push me to be my best, and he's gonna constantly look for people that can be better, that can, you know, go above and beyond, provide the best for our customers. But my job is to be irreplaceable, be so good at what I do that nobody can take my spot and I can be the number one guy.
D
Yeah.
C
Still, till this day, that still sticks with me. And we're talking almost 10 years later that we've had that conversation, and that still stuck with me. So that became my thing is, you know, be irreplaceable. Be irreplaceable. So not only I committed to being the best instructor that could be on the floor. I wanted to learn every aspect of the business that I could, short of actually being the owner itself. So I wanted to know sales, I wanted to know marketing. I wanted to know how to manage a team, how to manage people.
A
To treat it like it's your own business.
C
Yeah, treat it like it's my own business At a young age, too.
B
Fast forward those 10 years. I have about $2 million in education invested in him. People think how college is expensive. He met his wife actually at a. A event we went to. Being in the right environment. Okay, so they've been married two years now. Right. He's moved five times now. Following me, chasing the stream with me.
C
Five times in the last two years.
B
And everybody's like, everybody works. You know, people. People that I coach in the space of martial arts are like, oh, how do I find a Cameron? How do I find a Travis? How do I find these people I like? You build them.
D
Yeah, you build them.
A
You be a great leader, right?
D
Yeah.
A
But you build them. That's what you build them.
B
Right. And he has to do his part, he has to lean into, he has to want it. But the reality is, is like everyone can do this. And the. I think the biggest thing is I see this in sports. They talk about, I want to be the head coach of a team. The head coach becomes a manager of people. You're not coaching the team. And as far as like nuts and bolts of the place, you're, you're coaching the people. As far as being high level achievers, that's what you're doing here all the time, Right. Like you're attracting people here. But your job is to push these people not just on the tactical, but also like their big vision and dreams. And if you stop dreaming, they're going to stop.
D
Yeah.
B
You know, you're pushing every single day, right. You're getting up, you're making guys or you know, make them. I'm sure they want to do it. Maybe, I don't know. The cold plunge thing in the morning, I was hearing the guys talk about it today. Right.
A
I mean, that's just what we do, right? You know, it's a culture, it's a.
B
Tribe, and that's what great martial arts business does, you know?
D
Yeah.
A
Nobody has to say, you know, hey, do you want to, you know, come on man, you know, follow the core values?
C
Yeah.
A
It's like they signed up because they always wanted to be around people that had core values.
C
Yeah.
A
And most of these people in the beginning, they were just like me. They didn't. But we always wanted this life. And so I think that's a big thing. I think anybody watching this, you know, some of the. Again, you're a coach, right? You're a coach. You guys are coaches. Everybody watching this is a coach. Some of you are wanting to build something and you want to be ambitious and you want to be innovative. I will tell you, the self development industry right now, the. For the specialized skill space is a billion dollar a day industry.
B
Yes.
A
I want to tell everybody watching this right now, if you love martial arts, you know jiu jitsu, grappling, I mean there's all kinds of, there's a lot.
B
Of them out there for sure, different.
A
Types of fighting styles. You know, I would tell you, and even if you don't and you're like, I'd like to get involved in something like that one day. Totally makes the greatest people ever. Totally. It's just the most amazing thing. It's a very Humbling thing, you know what I mean? But also it's a thing you feel very proud of yourself in. What if, what if you could fall in love with something? Or what if you love something that you're currently doing it and you were just like, how do I do what I love and make money? Yeah, I said the same thing. I love sales. How could I do what I love and make really good money in sales, but live by the core values of standards of things that I wanted? And you know, I went, built my own business and honestly, I never imagined I can have the life that I have today. I'm so glad I went to that first training, that seminar, that event. I was around the right people. If you've been going to events, if you've been around the right people, that's great. If you're not where you want to be at in life, you're one speaker away. I always tell people you're one speaker away. You're one 1000, one conversation away, one event away from everything, totally transforming in your Life. So, guys, 2025, it's going to be such an incredible year. I would tell you, if you're looking to transform, to change, to learn about business, I mean, honestly, I'm sure whatever you're going to teach from A to Z on how to build these martial art businesses and crush and kill, I'm pretty sure that that information, even if I was in a real estate space, I could probably take and apply 80% of it to real estate. It's the truth. Okay, but he did it his way. They exited their company, they did really well, and he's about to attack and do it again on a whole nother level. He's going to give you the plat, the strategies, the plays. We're going to be here together. Everything that I've done in my company internally, I mean, we generate 1500 leads a day organically. You know, I don't just paid media and all these different things, all that stuff. I'm going to be teaching also how to build the infrastructure to scale quick. I love fast wins. I'm just addicted to it. You know, it's maybe my ADD or whatever. I just want fast wins. I want them now. And you know, I know whole world wants them now, but yet I keep seeing people and they just stay the same. I want to grow. I want to make 2025 the most greatest year of my life. I have a really good feeling that some of you right now, this is going to be your greatest year ever. But not by hope. And not by accident, but because you decided to take action and make a decision to come to this event. So, guys, there's a link down in the description box below. It's very simple. You just click on it, fill out the information, and then we'll send you over all the details, the date, the time when it'll be. You'll be here in Scottsdale, Arizona with us. It is going to be amazing. It'll be transformational, be life changing. Okay? So whether you're directly like, oh, man, like, you know, dang, I'm not in martial arts, you know, so maybe this isn't the event for me. Come. Okay, fill out the information below. Get your ticket, come here with us. Bring your team. If you're in this space, oh, my gosh, you'll be a threat to the industry. You'll scale, you'll grow quick. When you leave here, I always say, there's the day you're born, the day you die, and the day your life changes forever. You'll literally be like, okay, all right, I get it now. Let's go. And then, boom, you have the biggest year of your life. And all because you made the decision to come to one event. And, dude, I still remember the event that my whole life changed. It changed everything in my life, every one of them. I had a good roi. Every training I've ever had a good roi. Yeah, but there was that one chance.
B
I was gonna say something real fast on that. You just made a comment. Here's. Here's the key differentiator. All right, so my last year in business, we did $7 million in revenue just teaching martial arts. Right. One of the secrets that I did is I didn't go to the events by myself. A lot of the owners are going these events, and they're not in the conference. They're out and playing. I brought my entire. I had 54 full time staff members. I take my whole team.
D
Y.
C
Okay.
B
And they're like, how can you afford it? How can you afford not to? And they want to know, how does Aaron do all this stuff? Because the best train the most. And we're trained on getting better at not just karate. We're getting better at teaching, we're getting better at how to sell. We're getting better at communicating, we're getting better at service. Right. And because. Yes. So don't bring yourself to hang out because you want to meet the man right here, which. That's exciting. That's one of the reasons. But bring everybody. Bring your whole people. And if this is A small business. You got your kids working with you. Bring everybody. My son's going to be here. I can't wait for him to meet you. Yes, right.
A
And I want to follow that, too. I'm glad he said that because at the end of the day, an individual can be beat, but a team can't be beat. And I went to, like this example this last. I went to the vault and we trained for three days of Patrick Bet David. I shut my company down. My company does three to 500 grand a day. Shut it down for three days. You got to understand, like, shutting a company down for three days, you know, it's, it's a tough decision when you think small. But because I have the abundance mindset, I shut it down. I brought 140 people for my company.
B
That's amazing.
A
To the vault. We spent a half a million dollars. And, you know, and small thinker is.
B
Going to see the money you're missing. Right. That's what they're like, oh, you didn't make this much money. They're, they're calculating that because they're small.
A
Thinking, dude, you're, you're, you're adding and you have no idea how to multiply.
C
Yeah.
A
And what I did is that I had my team listen to the same message that Patrick by David delivered. Right. And they all heard it. So when I come home, I didn't have to resell it to anybody or explain it. Everybody was on the same page. It was like as we entered the lion's den and came back home, there was a hundred of us that came into the company and immediately it was like it was over. There was no meeting to even be had. Guys, we heard the information. Everybody get it? Any questions? Let's go.
B
Love.
A
That would have taken me a year, one on one, and you would have forgotten things, articulate words and explain it. But they were there. They got to. They got to be in the emotion. They got to be in the excitement. They get to feel it. And dude, for a couple grand, they went home and just destroyed it. So I just want to tell every, every single one of you, I love you guys. Come be with us. And Rise usa. It's going to be held in Scottsdale, Arizona, which is a beautiful place, warm weather. It's going to be in February, so we have warm weather. It's going to be a great time to get away. Scottsdale is a gorgeous place. It's going to be held in the lion's den, which is the Elliott army facility. We're going to make it super special. We're going to do it here. I believe it's gonna be set up as a two day event. One day all teaching on the business aspects. And number two, like, like role play, stuff like that. Like you're gonna teach like what you're.
B
Doing Inside of these we have a lineup. Lineup. That's crazy. Yeah, we got awesome people.
A
It's gonna be nuts. So, so most importantly, fill out the information below, guys. We'll send you over all the details and the rest will be history. We love you guys. We'll see you in Arizona.
B
Let's do it.
A
You guys, thank you so much. This event's going to be crazy. It's going to be a smaller couple hundred people intimate. I love that. Where we can ask questions, answer any questions and honestly you'll leave and you'll never be the same again. So love you guys. We'll see you at the event and have a blessed day. Make sure you fill out your information, name, phone number, email and we'll send you all the details. Let's go.
E
Hey guys. Looks like you made it to the end of the video. You're the true 0001 percenters. Look, I know 1 percenters it make it halfway through the video, but make it all the way through. You guys are the best. Now here's what I'd like to do. Number one, I want to get closer to you. The fact that you made it all the way through the video, you're like man, dude, I want to roll with this guy.
A
Okay?
E
So I need to connect with you down below. There's a description box on this YouTube video. There's a link, it says coach with me one on one.
A
OK?
E
If you'll go and you'll enter your information, I'll reach out to you in the next 24 hours. You can tell me what you need help with, what your goals are and we will crush it together. I would love to help you guys go to the next level in life. You can tell I'm changing my life really fast and I know that you guys want the same thing. I love to go with you on that journey. So right now, if you'd like to partner with me, team with me, if you want me to help coach you and push you, Everybody needs a coach, a higher level of accountability to go to the next level. Go to the description box below. Click on the link, fill out your information. I'll talk to you in the next 24 hours.
A
Let's kill it.
Release Date: February 24, 2025
Host: Andy Elliott
Guest Speakers:
In the episode titled "How A Black Belt Became a Multi-Millionaire Business Owner," host Andy Elliott delves into the inspiring journey of Aaron Hensley and Cameron Smith, two martial arts experts who have successfully transformed their passion into thriving businesses. The episode not only highlights their personal stories but also serves as a promotional platform for an upcoming event aimed at empowering martial arts enthusiasts to scale their businesses effectively.
Aaron Hensley (B) shares his deep-rooted connection to martial arts, tracing back to his childhood. As a seventh-degree black belt under Chuck Norris, Aaron’s commitment to martial arts began at an early age, influenced by his father’s dedication.
Aaron discusses the challenges he faced growing up, being a misfit who used martial arts to build confidence and become a “superhero” in his community. His relentless work ethic, training four to five hours daily, exemplifies his dedication long before Malcolm Gladwell's famous 10,000-hour rule gained popularity.
Cameron Smith (C) complements Aaron’s journey, having started martial arts at the age of nine. Cameron’s initial foray into martial arts was influenced by the "Karate Kid" movie, which ignited his passion and helped him build his identity as a martial artist despite being a band enthusiast and a music nerd.
Cameron emphasizes the importance of becoming an indispensable team member, learning every facet of the business from sales to marketing, and treating the business as his own from a young age.
Aaron narrates his entrepreneurial journey, highlighting the rapid growth of his martial arts schools. From assisting his father with one school, Aaron expanded to 24 locations across six states, achieving impressive revenues.
However, Aaron also candidly discusses the challenges of scaling without proper business management skills, leading to the sale of multiple schools to refocus on intentional growth. This pivotal decision underscores the importance of strategic planning and effective management in sustaining business growth.
Cameron adds that the success of their business intertwines with their personal growth and relationships, emphasizing the synergy between personal development and business excellence.
The discussion delves into common pitfalls faced by martial arts school owners:
Misaligned Business Practices:
Lack of Sustainable Revenue Models:
Continuous Improvement:
Team Building and Leadership:
A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to promoting an upcoming event at The Lion's Den in Scottsdale, Arizona, scheduled for February. This two-day event aims to provide comprehensive training on scaling martial arts businesses, led by Aaron and Cameron.
Key Highlights of the Event:
Notable Quotes:
Andy Elliott passionately encourages listeners to attend, highlighting the transformational potential of the event.
Aaron discusses the strategic decision to involve his entire team in the event, underscoring the belief that a united team can exponentially enhance business growth.
He shares a success story where he brought 140 team members to a training session, resulting in immediate and impactful implementation of the learned strategies without the need for lengthy re-training.
This approach highlights the importance of collective training and shared vision in scaling businesses efficiently.
In "How A Black Belt Became a Multi-Millionaire Business Owner," Andy Elliott effectively showcases the transformative journeys of Aaron Hensley and Cameron Smith. Their experiences provide invaluable insights into building and scaling a martial arts business, emphasizing the importance of intentional growth, team unity, and continuous improvement. The episode serves as both an inspirational narrative and a compelling invitation to their upcoming event, promising attendees the knowledge and strategies to achieve unprecedented business success.
For martial arts instructors, business owners, or anyone passionate about turning their expertise into a lucrative and impactful business, this episode offers both inspiration and practical strategies. Aaron and Cameron’s stories illustrate that with the right mindset, strategic planning, and a committed team, achieving multi-million dollar success is entirely attainable.
Join the Event: Don't miss the opportunity to transform your business and life. Visit the description box below the podcast to secure your ticket for the Lion's Den event in Scottsdale, Arizona. Whether you're a seasoned martial artist or aspiring to enter the field, this event promises to equip you with the tools and knowledge to scale your business to new heights.
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