Resources in this Episode

Christine Schlonski [0:02]
Hi Gorgeous. This is episode number 097. And today we have Cindy Ertman back on the show.

Cindy Ertman [0:08]
Hi this is, Cindy Ertman. You are listening to Heart Sells! Podcast with Christine Schlonski. Enjoy.

Christine Schlonski [0:14]
I’m so excited to have Cindy Ertman back on the show today, I can’t wait to dive in deeper into the amazing content and value she has to share so that you can create your defining difference, and that you can be the defining difference for other people. And we are going to talk about the right people, the right environment, the right setup so that you can thrive in your business. Before we do that, make sure you hop on over to https://christineschlonski.com/ Find the podcast tab, sign into the empowerment notes, these are empowerment right into your inbox once a week. We share amazing content and all the updates on Heart Sells! Podcast. So it’s all at your fingertips and all you need to do is go to your inbox. Right now, we are back with Cindy. Cindy is the CEO and founder of the Defining Difference and Mortgage Master Pro, success based coaching and training companies devoted to helping people master the power of intentional choice to create a defining difference in their own life. She has been acknowledged as one of the Top 100 Most Influential Mortgage Executives in America by Mortgage Executive Magazine for five years in a row, what an achievement. And being named in the Top 100 Mortgage Loan Originators in the US by Mortgage Originator Magazine for more than a decade. Cindy has now dedicated her life to empowering the growth of others. I’m so excited that she is here and can share more of the amazing content she’s got with you today. Well, I am so super excited to have Cindy back on the show today. Welcome.

Cindy Ertman [2:12]
So great to be here with you again, Christine. Thanks for having me.

Christine Schlonski [2:15]
Yeah, what a pleasure. You shared so many amazing golden nuggets last time. I love your 7 Instant Skills, which can be found at http://7instantskills.com/ as a free download because truly, you charge for that. So I’m very honored that you give that to our audience for free. One thing that really stuck with me was, she said something around making good choices and who you let into your life. Especially in sales when we sell a service, one of my blocks at the beginning when I started in my business was that I thought, “Well, I have to work with everybody”, and then I also notice, that was one way. The other way was that, when I grew, I have more and more people who didn’t get what I was doing and who were questioning what I was doing and trying to keep me where they were. I thought, “That would be really great topic to start with, to get your advice on how to choose.”

Cindy Ertman [3:27]
I think you bring up such a valid point and question here about who do you work with because there’s no question when we’re starting out. We feel like we have to work with everybody and let’s face it, we might have to for a period of time to get our business going. But one of the things that I love, and this is just a matter of developing the confidence to utilize the strategy is, they don’t know that you need to work with everybody, right? I think so much of it is, make a choice as to who you want to work with, I really think there is something to identify the perfect avatar of your perfect client. What is that person really look like or one person that you serve, that was your ideal client? A lot of times when I’m developing marketing and strategies around building my business, I focus on that one avatar, that perfect client, because obviously we’re going to get other types of clients, but speak to that one person, because if we’re speaking to that one person, we’re going to attract more of those type of clients. But in addition, one of the things that I love to do. If I’m meeting with a new potential client, or a new potential referral partner, or someone that’s going to enhance potentially my business, I let them know that I’m very, very particular about the people that I work with. I really want to surround myself with like-minded people, with inspirational people, that I’ve just made a choice in my business, in my life, to work with a certain kind of person, I’m very particular about who I work with. Now, the minute you tell somebody that, as human beings, we want to be that person you want to work with. We just do. You’ve sort of set up this limitation almost now. They’re asking themselves the question, “Well, am I the kind of person that Cindy wants to work with?” So I think to be clear, who you want to work with, and speak to it when you’re meeting with people. Look, Christine, I don’t work with everybody. I don’t want to work with everybody, I’m not about working with the masses, I’m more out of, I’m about working with the right person, that’s the right fit, that’s a value match. .I want to work with people that were value alignment, so I bring value to you, and you bring value to me and it makes business so much more fun, working with people that we love, right? It’s such a big deal. So I’m so thrilled that we’re meeting because I’ve wanted the opportunity to meet with you. But I just am so clear that I don’t want to work with everybody. I want to work with the right people. In meeting with you today, I love being able to drill down to see if we’re fit if we’re a match. I love having that kind of a conversation because you change the energy now. They’re kind of like, “Ha, am I the right fit? Am I the right energetic match?” You better sort of this filter that they want to get through and it’s actually a very powerful strategy.

Christine Schlonski [6:24]
Yeah, it’s a powerful strategy. I call it working with my soul mate clients.

Cindy Ertman [6:30]
Love it.

Christine Schlonski [6:31]
Especially when we work one on one. You do spend more time with them than anybody else in your programs. For me, it’s so important that I, when I see that appointment popping up on my calendar, I want to be happy, right? I want to have a big smile on my face and I want to look forward to this next session. And so I did find that if I would not hang out with them, like if I wouldn’t want them over for dinner. They are not my ideal client. They are not my soulmate client. They might be an ideal for courses or group coaching or something. But for that very special attention. It needs to be the soul mate client.

Cindy Ertman [7:15]
There’s no question when I started my, I started with one on one coaching when I launched my coaching company five years ago. I set up my program for a six-month program instead of a 12-month program and some people thought I was crazy, I’m like, “Well, no, but if I don’t want to work with them after six months, I don’t want to have to continue.” And so usually the people that were aligned with just continue. I’ve got clients that have now been coach for four and five years because we have this beautiful alignment. But there’s others that I just, I encourage them, that they’re probably be a coach, that would be a better fit for them at the end of the six-month contract because it does need to be an alignment for both parties without question.

Christine Schlonski [7:50]
Yeah. And I think if you send them to somewhere else to another resource, you are still serving.

Cindy Ertman [7:59]
Without question, you know, without question. One of the things that you and I were speaking about to, was about the things that sometimes it’s about what we let go of, not piling more things on. I think that’s a really important thing in business to think about because I find so much that people are spending so much time on activities that actually do not serve them. There’s a simple exercise that I do with clients called, the passion, purpose and prosperity exercise. It’s such an easy thing to do. I mean, it does take a little bit of time but for two business days, I have my clients, mark an 15-minute increments, everything they do. They write down every single thing they do for two normal business days. From the time they get up in the morning, if they’re brushing their teeth, if they’re taking out the trash, they’re walking the dog, on social media, whatever it is that they do, log every single thing that they do over two days. Then you go through and you put a plus and a minus next to every activity. Does it fuel you, put a plus. If it depletes you or it’s not an activity you enjoy, put a minus. Then I encourage you to put all the minutes on one sheet and really look at what those activities are. Those to me are low energetic activities. Those are the things I like to help my clients create solutions for. Sometimes for me, when I did this exercise, I hired a personal assistant, I kept thinking I needed another business assistant, and I realized I needed a personal assistant to help me manage my life and it was life-altering. So it’s a such a simple exercise to help people get clear and maybe it’s realigning. I hire, I used to hire other people’s kids to do small tasks, or there’s lots of ways we can do things inexpensively or share resources with friends. But I think it’s a really valuable exercise on looking at what you need to let go of, and there’s a training I do called eliminating your energy trainers, and just helping people get clear on the areas of our life that drain our energy. And the four that I have people look at is, is your mindset, like, we’ve talked about how important mindset is to how we manage a leader day. Looking at your own self, limiting beliefs. Statistics or research says we have 60,000 thoughts a day and 30,000 of those for most people are negative their negative self-talk. We beat ourselves up on things and we have these recycle challenges that run through our brain each and every day. Finances, if we’re in financial trouble is one of them that plays a big thing. So negative mind chatter, defeating language, kind of reframing that voice using affirmations, there’s lots of things we can do to improve our mindset piece. The next category is your surroundings. Looking at your surroundings is look around your desk, look around your master bedroom, your space. Is it messy? Do you have clutter everywhere? Is there part of your house that is in complete and utter disarray and it’s white noise that you every day you see it and you know, you need to address it, but you haven’t.? So really looking at you need to clean out your closet. You know, I cleaned out all my closets in the last six months and it’s a really freeing feeling to create that space physically and emotionally. Declutter is a big thing. Making sure in a pleasing environment. I, last year took out like, I had a treadmill on my master bedroom, I had a lot of work stuff, and I moved it. I moved it into another room in the house, I decided I wanted my bedroom to be a sanctuary. So it was a peaceful place for me to be able to do my meditation, and I did some redecorating and now I wake up and it fuels me instead of reminds me of my job and that I need to get on the treadmill, which then if I didn’t get on the treadmill that I feel guilty. Thirdly is situations and look at your relationships like we’re speaking about, it’s really important to look at all of your relationships, pick the top 20 people in your life and again, put a plus or a negative. Do they fuel you or do they deplete you? Think about, are there people that maybe you have unresolved anger with, that you haven’t picked up the phone and called. You know there’s somebody that you need to address or your situation or challenge. For some people, it’s years that they leave unresolved relational issues, and it really does deplete our energy and a big level. One of my clients two weeks ago, I did an all-day session with him. He texts me on that Sunday and he picked up the phone and resolved three relationship challenges that he hadn’t resolved in years. Said his wife cried all weekend, and it was one of the most empowering weekends of his life. He finally just decided to take those steps. So that’s very freeing for people to really look at what’s fueling that. Are you not dealing with your financial challenges? You keep sweeping it under the rug, really looking at. What can you do to address that? Is it time to focus on one credit card and pay it off and cut it up and start? Start to lean into addressing and acknowledging some of the challenges you have in your life. And then technology, we know, technology is a biggie, run cell phones, we’re on Facebook, we’re on Instagram, we’re on LinkedIn, this communication, email, having some parameters around what that really looks like. For me, with Facebook and Instagram, I give myself 15 minutes in the morning, and 15 minutes at night. That’s when I choose to play, and it’s fun, and it helps me with my business, but it doesn’t overtake my life. So, just really thinking about those areas of our life that we might need to eliminate and having people pick five areas of your life that you need to change, that you reduce to resolve that. What kind of impact would it make on your life. I just like to help people get intentional about what they need to let go of, that allows them to create time for really what matters most.

Christine Schlonski [14:08]
Yeah. I love that, that you go so deep into the power of the intentional choice, to create the defining difference in life. That settles it.

Cindy Ertman [14:20]
And that’s the beauty, right? Because we know if we make a bad choice today, and we all do it, and we go, “Gosh, I wish I hadn’t done that, or that didn’t work out so well.” Then to wake up tomorrow and say, “I have the beauty as a human being in this physical form to wake up tomorrow, and make a new choice and maybe realize, okay, that wasn’t the best choice.” But to beat ourselves up and definitely doesn’t serve anyone. So to really allow yourself to, sometimes I just envision it, like a stream running off my back just to allow that to run off my back and start fresh today and make a new choice. And so it is about intentionality of our life. And we have that ability to choose. Some people feel like, “I can’t make any change. Oh, this is happening to me.” When I trained with Jack Canfield for a year in 2009, my greatest lesson with Jack was his E + R = O (Events + Responses = Outcome). We can’t always control the events of our life and we know that. Things happen, there’s illness, there’s financial tragedy, we lose jobs, there’s all kinds of things that happen. People get a divorce that are tragic. How we respond, we have the ability to control we really do and, and how we respond creates the outcome we create. A lot of people react and I have trained myself over the years. I really adopted this E + R = O and how can I respond differently in a way that not only serves me, that serves others in a meaningful way. My greatest accomplishment, Christine was my divorce. Because I chose, that R factor became everything, and I did not have that training, I’m not sure how it would have turned out. But I chose to respond to my divorce and the steps of my divorce in a way that would support the outcome to keep my children and my family intact and whole. It was my greatest accomplishment. We have a whole family, have a great relationship with my ex and I realize it takes two people. It’s not easy, it was not easy for me. But those choices created this outcome that’s really beautiful. I know that not everybody can do it. But sometimes we don’t even know it’s possible that we can make a difference. Choose to respond differently to the events of our life to create the outcome we desire.

Christine Schlonski [16:48]
Love it, so much gold right in there. Let me ask you to finish off, because I always asked my guests. What was the very first thing in your life that you sold?

Cindy Ertman [17:02]
Well, the very first thing in my life that I sold, were closed and the juniors department at Harris’s department store. I came from a family with really very, very little money. My friends in high school all look so cute, and I just didn’t have any clothes. I thought to get a job in the juniors department. At that time, I got 50% off of clothes, it was very self-serving because I wanted to look cute. Once I sort of identified that boys were something I liked. I did it for a very specific reason. That was the first thing I sold. I was very motivated salesperson.

Christine Schlonski [17:36]
Yeah, that’s amazing. Did you have any fear around sales or did you just go for it because your “Why”, was so much bigger?

Cindy Ertman [17:46]
Well, I think honestly, I was selling something I really liked. I really liked clothes,I really did like clothes in a meaningful way. The summer between high school and college, I worked for some friends that have this little shop down in Laguna Beach across from the Laguna art festival. It was my first sign of entrepreneurship because there was a guy in the building that had created rainbow sandals, which were kind of the rubber sandals with the different colors and them. He had this little manufacturing plant in the strip center where we were working. All these people were coming every day to go to the fair. So he said, “Why don’t you make a stand, and I’ll give them to you on consignment, and you can sell them to the people going by?” I’m 18 years old, and I’m out in my shorts and a T-shirt on the sidewalk, selling rainbow sandals to strangers. I had no idea what I was doing. Suddenly, I was making $500 a day selling these sandals to people walking by the beach. I thought, “Oh my goodness. I worked a year to make that kind of money. More time in the juniors department.” I think this light bulb went off on, maybe there’s something to this, maybe there’s something to entrepreneurship.

Christine Schlonski [19:07]
Maybe there’s more.

Cindy Ertman [19:10]
There’s more than rainbow sandals in my future.

Christine Schlonski [19:13]
Beautiful. Well, thank you so so much for sharing, for going deep with those processes. Because I do believe that everything is a choice and you described it in such a beautiful way so that no matter where the person listening in right now is in their life, they can get something out of it and and really reflect like, “Is there more? Can I make a new choice? Can I just have a leg run down my back?” Like, when you take a shower at night, just everything that went wrong, let it go into the drain.

Cindy Ertman [19:45]
Let it go down the drain.

Christine Schlonski [19:49]
So thank you so so much. And I want to send people to your gift again because it’s so generous of you to give that for free. The 7 Instance Skills at the http://7instantskills.com/ and I definitely put those resources into the show notes that people have what they need to start off because you are such a shining example of how success can look like. I would love for people to take the right action to get their life to a path that they really love.

Cindy Ertman [20:24]
That’s fantastic. I love it. You are amazing. You helped so many people. Thank you, Christine.

Christine Schlonski [20:30]
Well, thank you, Cindy. It was such a pleasure. Have an amazing, amazing day. I’m going to cheer you on here from Germany.

Cindy Ertman [20:38]
Wonderful. Stay connected.

Christine Schlonski [20:40]
Thank you so so much.

Cindy Ertman [20:42]
You’re so welcome. Thank you so much.

Christine Schlonski [20:44]
Well, I loved every second that I got to spend with Cindy. And I hope all the content she shared in the conversation we had is leaving you absolutely inspired and ready to take the right action to create the defining difference in your life, to move forward in your business, to create a lifestyle that you just love. It all starts with being able to sell from your heart. That’s why you are here at Heart Sells! Podcast. Thank you so much. You find the transcript, the resources we are mentioning, the show notes at https://christineschlonski.com/ Just find the podcast tab and they have it all at your fingertips. Make sure you connect with Cindy, you follow her on social media, because you need like a whole team behind you, backing you up and having your back. You can do that if you connect with those people here interviewed because they have amazing stories to share. They’re so successful, inspirational, that I want you to have that success team on your side. Because we are creating a movement with Heart Sells! Podcast, of people who truly care when they are selling, who want to give their gifts to the world, who want to shine, who want to go out and you don’t just want to serve a handful of people. I’m quite sure your mission is so much bigger. Thank you, everybody, for listening, for tuning in. Heart Sells! Podcast is listened to in over 30 countries worldwide and growing. So if you have friends, if you have family, if you have a business partner who you think can really get something out of this podcast, please make sure and invite them to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, Facebook, wherever you can think of. All the information are at https://christineschlonski.com/ and find the podcast tab and there it is right at your fingertips. So thank you so so much, sending you lots of sunshine from beautiful Germany. Have a wonderful day wherever you are in this wonderful world and bye for now.