Teri Holland [00:00:00]:
Hey, John. Welcome to the show. Hey.
John Jonas [00:00:03]:
Thanks for having me.
Teri Holland [00:00:04]:
Thank you. I have to tell you, I have to be fully candid with you before we dive in that when you came across my desk I, I knew I had to have you on the show because I am someone who's terrified of outsourcing. I don't do it and I know I need to do it, so you are speaking to you're speaking to someone who needs to be your client right now.
John Jonas [00:00:25]:
Dude, let's get on it then. This is gonna be good. This is gonna be good. Alright.
Teri Holland [00:00:30]:
So, you know, one of the things that really fascinated me is I I saw it in your bio that you work a 17 hour work week. Is that is that correct?
John Jonas [00:00:40]:
And how? It's a little bit high right now.
Teri Holland [00:00:44]:
Okay.
John Jonas [00:00:44]:
I'm not I I'm only getting, like, 10 hours a week for, like, the last year or so. Amazing. So, yeah, I mean, I've been doing that since my let's see. My daughter just my daughter's 16 now and she was the She was the cause of that, when she was born and so, yeah, I mean, it's probably been 15, 16 years.
Teri Holland [00:01:05]:
Amazing. Yeah. So how is that possible and how did you how did you get into outsourcing? How did you find yourself in this world?
John Jonas [00:01:16]:
So it's possible because I'm I'm super driven by, like, time freedom. So, I mean, I'm driven by freedom, financial freedom financial freedom is is financial freedom is easy to accomplish. I mean, it's not easy to accomplish, obviously, but but financial freedom is something that a lot of people accomplish. Time freedom Is something way, way fewer people accomplish until they retire or whatever, you know? And so I've been super driven by that. And so One of the things that I have always done in business is I've been very purposeful with what we will pursue and what we won't pursue. And so if something if an opportunity requires me and my time to, Like, are people gonna want me in this thing? Do they want my time? Then I just say no. I won't do it. And so we have we always have the opportunity to To do things, I mean, specifically, like, people want us to recruit for them or want me to recruit for them.
John Jonas [00:02:16]:
And I just say no. Like, I don't it doesn't matter how much I charge for that. It's just my time in selling time, and I don't want to ever sell time for money. So, I mean, just from the beginning, I've always made choices like that, and then having having a workforce that I could easily find any Skill that I want and they're super affordable also changes changes the ability to get things done where I'm not the one doing the work. So that's how I've done it. It it wasn't an overnight thing. Well, for me, it kinda was. But, but for most people and and for me too, It takes time to get your time back.
John Jonas [00:02:56]:
Like it takes effort, it takes practice and it takes, You you have to start with something small and get a few hours back. Mhmm. And then you do it again and you do it again and then you figure out, oh, wait a minute, I keep doing this other thing that I I don't need to do, and so let me see if I can pass that off. Oh, crap. That didn't work. Let me try it a different way. Oh, that worked kind of. Let's modify it.
John Jonas [00:03:19]:
So that that's how I work what I work.
Teri Holland [00:03:24]:
Nice. Nice. And How do we know in our businesses when it's time to start outsourcing?
John Jonas [00:03:31]:
Oh, that's such an easy answer. So alright. I'm going to I'm gonna tell you the opposite of what most people will tell you.
Teri Holland [00:03:40]:
Okay.
John Jonas [00:03:41]:
Most people will say, Stick with what you're good at and outsource the rest. And I think that is terrible advice. I'm a programmer. Should I stick with being a programmer and outsource the rest? No. That doesn't like, that caps my income at, like, A $150,000 a year, right, as a programmer.
Teri Holland [00:04:02]:
Right.
John Jonas [00:04:03]:
No. You should learn to be the CEO of your business And outsource the things that you know how to do and that you're good at. Because if you're good at it and you know how to do it, you could teach someone else to do it. Well, Then you're gonna teach them to do it the way that you would do it. And then you have 2 of you. And then you can focus on other things because you're the one who really understands the business You're the one who has to give the direction and make corrections and make decisions. And that's the really hard stuff. Like, Writing code is easy.
John Jonas [00:04:36]:
Creating social media posts like you're really good at social media marketing? Mhmm. K. That's dumb. So are, like, 4,000,000,000 people on this point. Right? It's just so hard. So should you be doing social media marketing? No. You shouldn't. Someone else should be doing that for you and you should be guiding and directing.
John Jonas [00:04:54]:
Right? So when do you know how do you know when you're ready to hire someone? If you have something in your business that you know works and you could teach it to someone else, maybe it's not super easy to teach to someone else, But if you could teach it to someone else, you're ready to hire a you're ready to hire someone. As soon as as soon as you have any process that could be done by someone else, You're ready to hire someone.
Teri Holland [00:05:20]:
Okay. And what if how do you know if you have enough work? Because that's always on my mind is I don't know if I have enough to keep someone else busy enough.
John Jonas [00:05:28]:
That was totally one of my hesitations. When I first found out about hiring people in the Philippines, first of all, I had no idea. I I had no clue That it was better or different than anywhere else in the world. And I and I had tried multiple other things. Right?
Teri Holland [00:05:41]:
Right.
John Jonas [00:05:42]:
And my My 3 hesitations were I don't know if they can actually do good work, I don't know if I can keep someone busy full time, And I don't know if I can afford it. So I don't know if I can keep someone busy full time. What what I found initially well, I mean, because my only option was to hire someone full time. No. You can hire part time. You can hire hourly. You can do whatever you want. Although, I recommend you hire full time.
John Jonas [00:06:05]:
Okay. What I found was I didn't know how much work there was that could be done if until I had someone full time because We're so overwhelmed and overworked that I always just can't I can't handle That thing oh, that thing looks cool. I cannot handle that. Mentally, there's no bandwidth for it, you know? And so I just pass on all these things that I feel like I should be doing, but there there's no way for me to implement that, so there's no way there's no reason for me to even look at it. And as soon as you get someone else who Could be the implementer there. Now you'd be you're you're able to start looking at things like that and and then passing them off to that person. And so could Could you keep someone busy full time? Well, you know, if you're doing exactly what you're doing right now, maybe not. But as soon as you have someone else, You start to find other things that, oh, this would grow the business.
John Jonas [00:07:01]:
Oh, that would generate more leads. Oh, this would create more More products. We could find more things. We could do more research. We the whole thing, you start to find all kinds of other stuff. So Could you keep someone busy? Yeah. Do you have to keep someone busy? No.
Teri Holland [00:07:19]:
Okay.
John Jonas [00:07:20]:
Because you could hire someone part time. But Here's, like, one of the secrets that I found that I I just had no I had no clue, no no concept of this. But someone full time was one of the best things I ever did for me for for me and my business. It's such a commitment, and I didn't want that. But that commitment is exactly what most entrepreneurs need. It's a commitment to yourself that you're gonna grow your business. And it's a commitment to that other person That you're gonna have stuff for them to do. And and what that really does is it forces you to transition from Being the person who does everything to being the thinker, to being the CEO.
John Jonas [00:08:07]:
And that transition right there was something that I had no clue That that was part of this. But when I when I hired someone full time, I realized all of a sudden, oh, he's done with this. I thought it would take him 4 days. It only took him Hours. Wow. And now I have to find something for him to do, which means I have to step away from, Like the you know, you're, like, super down in your email. Like, I gotta answer all these emails. Like, this is such garbage.
John Jonas [00:08:36]:
And I have to find something firm to do and I have to create some training and all of a sudden you're forced to work on your business instead of in your business, and that was Super duper amazing for me.
Teri Holland [00:08:46]:
Yeah. I bet. So what are what are some of the things that we should look at outsourcing? Because Now you have my mind working of what is it I'm doing in my business that I can be outsourcing that maybe I haven't even thought of yet.
John Jonas [00:08:59]:
Yeah. So, I mean, realistically, so I we've had hundreds of thousands of customers, Employers who are hiring people in the Philippines to do anything you can imagine and more they're doing. Right? So What are the things that you should be outsourcing? I don't know. I mean, I don't know your business, but I would say if you're doing a podcast, You should be outsourcing your scheduling. You should be out no. And this isn't k. Let me rephrase this. You said, what should I be outsourcing? You shouldn't be outsourcing any of this.
John Jonas [00:09:32]:
You should be insourcing it. You should have someone who works for you consistently and reliably. They work for you and they're gonna work for you for the next However many years. As long as you run your business, they're gonna work for you. I mean, like, the 1st person I hired in 2005 still works for me today.
Teri Holland [00:09:49]:
Wow.
John Jonas [00:09:50]:
And that's a that's a function of the Philippines. So what should you be insourcing? Mhmm. You're scheduling. You're looking for guests. You're coordinating with guests. You're, editing. You're Your audio editing, your video editing, your publishing, your marketing, those are all things that Those are all things that I do with my podcast. So for my podcast, the only thing I do is sit in front of a microphone and a camera and I record, And then I upload.
John Jonas [00:10:24]:
I upload the episodes. Nice. I don't I don't write the episodes, But it's just me. I don't have any guests. And then I upload it, and it gets edited, both Audio and video and gets published on YouTube and wherever we host it, I don't know where we host it. And then blog posts get written and published and linked, and they link to our website, and, I don't know what marketing happens. It gets it gets published as a newsletter, like, so many things that I don't do. Nice.
John Jonas [00:11:04]:
So what else should you be outsourcing? Content creation. Mhmm. Content writing is so easy. Any sort of web work That you're doing for your business shouldn't you should never ever touch WordPress again or Shopify or whatever whatever you're using for your website. So much of marketing, online marketing can be outsourced. So so so much of it. All your social media stuff, your SEO, it's just so reasonable to to outsource that stuff. Design work? Super, super easy.
John Jonas [00:11:42]:
What else do you think you might Outsourced.
Teri Holland [00:11:46]:
Yeah. Well, that's I mean, everything you've listed, especially all the podcast stuff because I do it all myself and I know I shouldn't be doing it all myself right now.
John Jonas [00:11:55]:
There so at onlinejobs.ph, there are probably thousands Of people experience with podcast tasks. Like, you can hire someone part time because you don't need someone full time to manage Mhmm. The the thing I mean, certainly not to manage guests and scheduling. That's not a full time thing. Right? But maybe that person Overlaps into something else in your business, some other part of your business. But it's so easy to find find someone to do that And and then to hire them for a couple hours a week. And they're probably working for 3 other people a couple hours a week doing the same thing. So they're really good at it, and they're learning from them, and they're learning from you, and Putting that stuff together, and then they'll tell you like, oh, yeah.
John Jonas [00:12:39]:
Hey. What if we what if we did this? What if we do that? What if we what if we publish this as a blog post? I'll write the blog post From the from the podcast, and then I'll publish it, and then I'll link to it, and I'll link to your website, and you get all this SEO benefit. And that's how it works for me.
Teri Holland [00:12:55]:
Cool. That sounds amazing. That sounds absolutely amazing. What's, what would you say is the difference between, like, if we're hiring a VA versus just going on Fiverr and getting a job done.
John Jonas [00:13:08]:
Like,
Teri Holland [00:13:08]:
when you talk about graphics sort of social media design or posts.
John Jonas [00:13:13]:
Yeah. So there's a place for Fiverr. So for most small businesses, turnover is a disaster. I mean, big businesses talk about the cost of of replacing an employee is, like, two and a half times their annual salary. Right? It's just so, so expensive. For small businesses, it's worse than that. It's not it's not the cost of the annual salary, it's the mental capacity that it takes to replace someone. And so With Fiverr, I mean, you you're you're you're purposefully guaranteeing a 100% turnover.
John Jonas [00:13:51]:
Right? I mean, that's how Fiverr works. You Hire someone for a single thing and then you pay them and they're gone. And and that they have to be gone to get another job so they can get a feedback, so they can get a review, and and get another job so can get a review and get another job. Right? So that's how they make more money. And Upwork is the same way. It's just guaranteeing turnover, which is fine On a single graphic on your logo. Right? But when you're doing social media all the time, going to Fiverr and saying, let's create a let's create a social media graphic. Why do you need another social media graphic? Let's go back and see if that same person oh, they're not available.
John Jonas [00:14:28]:
Well, now you have to go find them again. Right? Or find someone else. Oh, you're oh, this person who did it, I I don't like what you did and you can't correct that. That's not right? Because now they're working for someone else. So that's there's a place for Fiverr and Upwork. For most small business owners, they would benefit So much more by having a stable person that they turn to every single week or every single day, And that relationship continues for years years years. And the 1st time they do something, they don't do it right, and then You correct it, and then you work on the next. You work at you get it better the next time, and you get better the next time, you get better the next time.
John Jonas [00:15:10]:
And then finally, you're like, Oh, yeah. I don't even have to look at this anymore. I know it's gonna be great when it comes to me. Mhmm. And that comes from working with someone Like insourcing, like I said, from Okay. And and not insourcing is, There's there's maybe a maybe a an employee stigma there We're like nobody wants employees.
Teri Holland [00:15:38]:
Right.
John Jonas [00:15:39]:
But I have 40 employees in the Philippines, and there's no way possible that you could classify them as employees. They are independent contractors, period, end of story. The Philippines government will not let you classify them as an employee Unless you have a presence in the Philippines, which you don't and I don't. Right. So you get all the benefits of employee without The hassle of employee. Right?
Teri Holland [00:16:06]:
Nice. So I have to ask, why the Philippines?
John Jonas [00:16:11]:
Yeah. Such an interesting question. And when I started, I had no clue. I just had Mhmm. I had someone that told me make sure you go to the Philippines when you really start outsourcing some of this stuff. I was like, wow. That's super different. There's there's a specific set of cultural characteristics that Make the Philippines different than anywhere else in the world.
John Jonas [00:16:30]:
You can find good people anywhere. Your chances are just much, much higher in the Philippines. They're honest and loyal and hardworking. That's I mean, those are 3 really, really big ones that you'll find with with most people in the Philippines. They're all college educated. They're very, very westernized, so their English is very western English. Yeah. They have an accent, but You'll never have a communication problem with them, like, they will always understand you, you will always understand them.
John Jonas [00:16:59]:
That's not an issue. They are not entrepreneurial. They don't want to steal your business or your idea. You don't have to worry about that. That I mean, that for a lot of people, like, I mean, I have I I've had quite a few people say, hey. I just tried this with this company in India. What do you think? Their first question is, well, what's your business model with this? I'm like, well, I'm trying to get them to write articles. What does my business model have to do with it? Right.
John Jonas [00:17:25]:
Because they wanna know if they can steal your business. And And that's not how the Philippines is. You know, that's how other other cultures are, and the Philippines is just super, super reliable. So why the Philippines? Yeah. There's a whole bunch of cultural reasons that make it different. And like I said, you can find great people anywhere in the world. Your chances are just higher in the Philippines.
Teri Holland [00:17:48]:
Okay. And then how do we how do we know that we're hiring the right person? Because I know that that's always that's always my fear is that I'm gonna get the wrong person or it's gonna be a big headache. So how do we how
John Jonas [00:18:00]:
do we find good people? Yeah. So that was my fear for a long, long time. So A couple months ago, I realized as I was inter I was interviewing someone else, and he was describing his his process for finding great people. And, like, a light bulb turned on to me, everybody that I've ever interviewed about their success with hiring people in the Philippines, which have been dozens of people that I've interviewed, they all talk about their process. They have a process for finding people. And And that process is not always the same. It can vary from person to person, but they all still have a they have a method. Starting from, like, the job post To or the role defining the role to the job post to how they're interviewing to how they select or how they test.
John Jonas [00:18:52]:
So how do you know? Well, I mean, I can briefly describe how I do it. Because when I when I recruit now, I know I'm gonna find someone good every time. I don't. It's not a question for me anymore. Okay. So I start by going to onlinejobs.ph and searching the skill that I'm looking for, and I would recommend you do this, go just go look and see, does this exist? You know, whatever it is, video editing, Graphic design. What kind of things am I seeing at online jobs? What are the prices? Because then you know 2 things. You know, like the combinations of skills that that people have.
John Jonas [00:19:29]:
And number 2, you know how much you should be paying because you'll see how much people are asking to make.
Teri Holland [00:19:35]:
Mhmm.
John Jonas [00:19:35]:
And then you post a job. And if it hopefully, this is something that you know how to do, like we've talked You're outsourcing something that you are doing, something that you know how to do rather than something you don't know how to do. If you also have something you do know how to do, then You know exactly what to put in the job post, and then you know what questions to ask when you're interviewing. You know what the outcome looks like because you know Exactly how to do it. You know how to give feedback. You know how to give training. You you you the whole process is so much easier when the first thing you outsource is something you know how to do. So you post your job.
John Jonas [00:20:08]:
You get a bunch of applicants. Hopefully, in that job post, you put a weed out question in it, like, Make the subject of your application graphic designer dash your name. Right? That's what I always do. Okay. Then I don't ever do a video interview with people. Uh-huh. The yeah. The Philippines, they don't wanna do that video interview.
John Jonas [00:20:32]:
They're scared. That's one of the cultural things of the Philippines. They're scared of being embarrassed, and if they get on a video interview with a foreign boss Speaking English, even though they may speak perfect fluent English, they're scared.
Teri Holland [00:20:45]:
Wow.
John Jonas [00:20:45]:
And so I don't ever do a video interview. Plus, video interviews just take time. Like, it takes time to schedule it. And in the Philippines, they're there's only 1 time zone there. They've never dealt with another time zone. In a lot of places in the Philippines, they don't even deal with time. Like, they Wow. They only deal with, like, oh, the sun's up.
John Jonas [00:21:05]:
It's time to get up, and it's time to work. It's really hot, so it's time to take a nap. The sun's down. Time to go to bed. Like, they they don't so when you try and schedule time with them, that's really intimidating often to them. And not everywhere. Like, if you're hiring someone in a big city, that's not an issue.
Teri Holland [00:21:21]:
Okay.
John Jonas [00:21:23]:
But also then it takes it's It's a half an hour where, like, an email is 30 seconds. So I can ask 3 questions in 30 seconds and send it to them, and then I I get to see a whole bunch of things, and I'll do this 3, 4, 5, 10 times. I'll ask
Teri Holland [00:21:38]:
Oh, wow.
John Jonas [00:21:38]:
2, 3, 4 questions across 10 emails. And the there's a bunch of things with this. Because number 1, I'm not gonna talk with them every day. I'm certainly not gonna do a phone call with them every day. I'm gonna communicate with them through email. And so interviewing them through email makes a lot more sense than, like, a video and then just digital communication. Right?
Teri Holland [00:21:58]:
Like a
John Jonas [00:21:58]:
video call and then Changing that doesn't make any sense. I get to see their attention to detail. Like, if I ask 4 questions, they only answer 3 of them, Well, then I know. Your attention to detail's just not there. Mhmm. I get to see how quickly they respond because this is a virtual working relationship. And If it takes you 3 days to respond during the interview, well, then it's probably gonna take you 3 days to respond after I've hired you, and that doesn't work for me. I get to see their personality in a digital virtual relationship.
John Jonas [00:22:30]:
I get to see Their use of English. It's easy to have a friend or AI help you with writing your profile or writing your job application. It's not easy to do that When you're responding to email over and over and over and over again. Right? And especially if we're doing it pretty quickly, like if I send them an email, they respond quickly, Then I send them another email and they respond quickly. Like, you you can't have your friend help you with that. Right? Mhmm. I get to see are there I get to compare, like, what are your responses saying versus what does your profile say? Are there any red flags here? Or, I just get a really good idea of here's what our working relationship would be like, and that matters. Like, you're not just hiring a skill, you're hiring a personality, and I See their digital virtual personality, does that match with me and mine? And then What you'll find is people will drop themselves out of the recruiting process because they don't want to answer more emails.
John Jonas [00:23:31]:
And usually that is anybody who would be lazy is gonna drop out because they don't wanna do it. Any sort of scammer, which we see very little scam, but any sort of thing would drop out. It's I don't wanna they don't wanna jump through hoops. Right.
Teri Holland [00:23:48]:
Okay.
John Jonas [00:23:50]:
And And then you'll find people drop themselves out, you'll drop people out. Like, oh, yeah. This person's better than this person. I don't like I I like I'm cringing when I get a response from this 1 person. Right? Mhmm. Well, that's a pretty good indicator later on when when if you start working with that person, you're gonna cringe every time you get an email.
Teri Holland [00:24:05]:
Right.
John Jonas [00:24:06]:
That sucks. You don't want that. So then you get a good idea. Like, people drop themselves out. You'll drop people out. You'll narrow it down to 2 to 3. I'll give a test, and I'll pay them for this test. Okay.
John Jonas [00:24:16]:
I want you to do this thing, edit this video. I'm gonna pay you for this here's I'm gonna pay you $30, edit this video. And I'll see not only who does it the best, but how do I like the process of working with them through this edit of not only The 1st draft, but the 2nd draft, and how how does that process go? Do I like what they're doing and what they're saying? From there, once I've done that, I have a pretty dang good idea I hired a good person. Like, I mean, Like 95% that this is a really good person that I've come up with. And so then if we have problems down the road, I know already I recruited someone really good. Yeah. Is this problem my fault? Because it probably is. Where have I failed? So that that initial recruiting process is a really is a really big deal.
John Jonas [00:25:10]:
And just, like, to give people an option, Years ago, I realized I was really good at this and I could teach it, and so that's that I go into detail in this process at onevaoa.com, Well, it's $99 and I guarantee you find someone great if you use it. So Perfect. And you you pay for it once and you could use it. I mean, once you understand the process, you don't need to watch any videos ever again, and you'll and you'll know how to recruit people for the rest of your life.
Teri Holland [00:25:40]:
Great. Great. I'll definitely put that in the show notes for for everyone to check out. Is there anything that we shouldn't outsource?
John Jonas [00:25:51]:
Yeah. Okay. So I often find people that I I just wanna hire a team, like, I and I don't wanna do it. I wanna hire a project manager and I want them to hire the other people. That's the wrong way to do this. Oh. You can have a project manager. That's cool.
John Jonas [00:26:07]:
And I have quite a few on my team, but the Philippines, they There's a big trust thing there. Like, we go into it thinking, I don't know if I can trust this person. Right? Well, they have that same feeling, but their feeling is stronger than yours of They don't know if they can trust you. So if you just hire a project manager to, like, do a whole bunch of stuff and you're hands off, well, they don't know What your expectations are, what you're looking for. They don't know how the outcome looks like. They don't know if you're gonna like this person that they hire. They just don't know. And when they don't know and when they don't trust, When they don't trust you, they are not willing to go above and beyond.
John Jonas [00:26:45]:
They're not willing to do everything, to give it a 100%.
Teri Holland [00:26:48]:
Okay.
John Jonas [00:26:49]:
When they trust you, they're willing to give everything. So the first thing to outsource is not your project management. Hire someone to do a task, and then later give them more and more. So there's one thing. I I often see people wanting to build a team all at once, and that's a that's another wrong way to do this. Like, hire 1 person to do one thing and then then get them doing a second thing and a third thing and then hire another person and then hire another person. I have 40 people working for me full time in the Philippines And I hired every single one of them 1 at a time, and it was a natural process. Mhmm.
John Jonas [00:27:29]:
I used to say that You would have a hard time outsourcing sales copywriting stuff, but I've done that pretty successfully with the Philippines. So Oh. Yeah. You can definitely hire that. I have someone right now in the Philippines writing ads. Like, she writes the ads and then someone else creates graphics or records videos or whatever. That's all done in the Philippines. So like marketing stuff you can certainly done.
John Jonas [00:27:56]:
Sales you can do. You can find people to do cold call sales or appointment setters or closers. You can find all these people. Yeah. You should outsource everything realistically. I mean, we I I run an 8 figure business. Eight figures annually. We hit that last year, and I don't have any US employees.
John Jonas [00:28:22]:
Mhmm. Everything is done in the Philippines.
Teri Holland [00:28:27]:
Amazing. That's amazing. When we're hiring someone and, you know, what should we expect the time investment be when you're training them and you're, you know, when you're onboarding, what would that look like?
John Jonas [00:28:44]:
Yeah. So first of all, the hiring the actual hiring, if you spent more than 2 hours total, total, total across the board, Start to finish, you're probably doing this wrong. Oh. It should not take a long time. Then the initial thing, here's one of the Alright. So a lot of years ago, I read the E Myth Revisited. Right? Michael Gerber's E Myth. SOPs, you have to have them.
John Jonas [00:29:13]:
I suck at creating SOPs, and I don't like it. And and I think this is this is, like, super common to small business owners creating these processes like a bay the bane of your existence. And So I don't do it. I just don't do it because I don't wanna do it and I don't like it and it drives me crazy. So when I hire someone new, My onboarding is very fast. It's 1 email. Here's how we work as a company. Here are my policies and procedures, blah blah.
John Jonas [00:29:46]:
I mean, this is like a 1 page email that I write. Here's our paid time off. Here's how we'll pay you. Here's how much we'll pay if you have questions, ask. And I always say, hey, look, there's gonna come a point where you are Where you're scared and you don't know what to do and you don't want to ask me a question because you're worried that I'm gonna say you're dumb or something, and I don't care, Ask the question anyway. You have to ask. And that's a cultural thing in the Philippines. They don't wanna ask.
John Jonas [00:30:15]:
They're scared. What you can't do is disappear. Don't disappear. That's part of my initial thing. Okay. So then my next step is to create training for that person, and some of the sometimes that training is not actually training. Like, I just brought someone in to run our AdWords because the previous I got suckered in by someone in Australia who was made a whole bunch of promises That they would do our AdWords better than my person in the Philippines was doing it. They didn't do a better job than my person in the Philippines was doing it.
John Jonas [00:30:44]:
It took me a year to realize that. And so but that other person, I let them go already, and they're gone, and so I brought someone new in. So For the Adwords, I explained our business. I recorded a video of me talking through things. It's just a Snagit video. You could use Loom or TinyTake or Screencast O Matic. There are probably 50 of these softwares that record your screen and your voice and your mouse, or you can record yourself With it. Right.
John Jonas [00:31:11]:
I recorded a video just talking through. Here's the business. Here's the overall. Here's our Target market. Here's what we want. Here are here's how I want to approach this this time. Here's what I want you to do. I recorded this video.
John Jonas [00:31:24]:
I sent it to her, and that's it. There's no SOP. There's no here's our policies and procedures of Google AdWords. You know? Like, she knows what she's doing, And then she's gonna make mistakes and I'm gonna correct her, which I've done. I mean, this has been a month now. Her and I have communicated basically every day And I spend 30 seconds to 5 minutes a day. Not even every day. Like, every
Teri Holland [00:31:49]:
Right.
John Jonas [00:31:50]:
3 times a week. And I just course correct. And over time, she learns exactly how I want things done. Right? And she's good at it, and she's bringing her own stuff. And she sends me the spreadsheet of 36 tabs of Keyword filled ad groups for Google AdWords separated by by keyword topic, by industry. Here are the here are the keywords that we're gonna target. Here's how we're gonna target them. Here are the then then there's ads.
John Jonas [00:32:22]:
Here are the ads that we're gonna run. Are you okay with this? Right. So we're gonna put all that in. And and I'm just gonna go through and record a video, and I'm gonna say, hey. Like, this these these specific keywords and this ad group should be in this other ad group because of this and this right. I just do something simple. So that's how my onboarding is and my training. I don't go through and create this big full blown thing.
John Jonas [00:32:45]:
I just make small corrections over time. And one of the one of the big reasons you can do that is because people in the Philippines are super loyal, like, I expect her to work for me for a lot of years now.
Teri Holland [00:32:57]:
Yeah.
John Jonas [00:32:58]:
In fact I've had very, very little turnover over the years. I mean, my 1st person was in 2005. They still work for me. So is the person I hired in 2006 and 7 and 9 and 10, 11 and 12, and All those people still work for me. And that means you can do things differently than what Michael Gerber suggests. Mhmm. You don't have to have exact Define processes for when your key person quits because well, I've never had them quit, but, so
Teri Holland [00:33:27]:
yeah. Great.
John Jonas [00:33:29]:
Does that make sense on, like
Teri Holland [00:33:30]:
That totally makes sense.
John Jonas [00:33:32]:
My time commitment when I bring someone in is, like, 20 minutes.
Teri Holland [00:33:35]:
Amazing. And then
John Jonas [00:33:37]:
the next day, there's 5 more minutes.
Teri Holland [00:33:39]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's you know? And and to me Hearing that, that's so freeing because I had in my mind that I'd have to create this whole training process, and then I'm thinking, well, that's just now I'm just creating more work, so then where's the benefit in in hiring. Right? So that Yeah. That is very freeing to hear.
John Jonas [00:34:00]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So what what's that first thing that you what's that first thing for you? What is what is that that you're gonna that you should be giving away?
Teri Holland [00:34:09]:
Oh, it's, all the post show work on my podcast.
John Jonas [00:34:14]:
Okay.
Teri Holland [00:34:15]:
So all the the editing, video, all of that.
John Jonas [00:34:18]:
So here's how that works for me. Like, you you've recruited someone with podcast with with podcast editing video experience. Right?
Teri Holland [00:34:26]:
Mhmm.
John Jonas [00:34:26]:
And maybe it's not even podcast. Maybe it's just video editing. And and to me for that k. So this is something that that I do differently than a lot of people. I don't always hire the best person. I hire someone who's eager and smart And often they're young and cheap. Right. And not that I'm cheap or not that I'm I'm gonna underpay them Mhmm.
John Jonas [00:34:52]:
But if they understand video editing, well, it's really easy to just make course corrections. I watch the video that they did. I watch 3 minutes of a podcast that they have edited of me and I'll I'll just open it up and record the podcast. Like, I'm playing the video on my screen while recording my screen and recording me talking, and and I'll just pause. I did this 2 days ago. Hey. This this cut right here just didn't work for me because of this. Hey.
John Jonas [00:35:17]:
This is not great because I don't like the way that this worked, or there's too much distraction going on here. Let's lessen that. You do that I mean, once they see that once, then they're like, oh, okay. That's not how she wants things done. Right? Mhmm. So it doesn't you don't have to get everything done correctly the first time. For that video editor person, I'm gonna bring them in and say, here's some past podcasts. The reason we do this is because of this and this and this.
John Jonas [00:35:42]:
I want you to edit this one, and I don't want a whole bunch of extra added. Edit it and and tell me what you think, and then I'm gonna give you feedback because they love feedback in the Philippines. I'm gonna give you feedback, And we'll just go from there. And there's a 5 minute video for you as the first like Here's how this here's the onboarding, 5 minutes. Nice. And then they're gonna send you a video back and you're gonna be like, oh my gosh, this is amazing. But Fix this and this and this. And there's a key difference between Fiverr.
John Jonas [00:36:16]:
Like, Fiverr, you have a defined price for it, and they don't wanna fix this and this and this. That's not That's not included. Right? Now that you have someone who works for you, it doesn't matter. Right? It doesn't matter how many times you go back over this. It's their job. Their job is to fix it.
Teri Holland [00:36:33]:
Good. And can you tell us about onlinejobs.ph and how like, what what will we find when we go there and how does that work?
John Jonas [00:36:43]:
So it is OnlineJobs is a job board for Virtual workers in the Philippines. Any sort of talent that you want, you can find it at OnlineJobs. From, like, A data entry person who is super, super beginner to, like, an investment banking analyst or, high power CFO or programmers design anything. Right? So Nice. How it works is you go on and, like I said before, search. That's the first thing to do is search the skill that you're looking for And start looking at some profiles. And what this is usually the most eye opening piece to most people is The second you realize, oh my gosh, within 30 seconds, I can find thousands of people who have the skill that I want for Any skill that I will ever need.
Teri Holland [00:37:36]:
Wow.
John Jonas [00:37:37]:
I can find these people. And I know they're affordable and I can definitely find talent. So that's the first thing because that's that's the really, like, life changing moment. Mhmm. From there, it so we're not we don't recruit for you. We don't mark up salaries. We don't have a contract. There's no commitment.
John Jonas [00:37:59]:
You don't pay us. You pay us to access the database. So you post your job, which is free. You get applicants, which is free. You can see their applications. The only thing you don't get is contact information for that person. You can't respond to their application until you've upgraded your account. That's $69 or $99 is 2 2 tiers.
John Jonas [00:38:20]:
Okay. From there, once you've upgraded, you can contact any of the people who responded to you, or you can contact a whole bunch of people If, like, you search their profiles and you've bookmarked them or pinned them, then you can press contact on their profile and send them a message. Hey. Are you interested in work? I really like your profile. I have this job. Do you wanna do it? Super, super simple. And then when you're done recruiting, you cancel that payment to us so it doesn't rebill. It's it's a monthly payment and you can cancel it And you hire that person, whatever, or those people and they work for you outside of us.
John Jonas [00:38:59]:
Nice. You can pay them through us or not. We have a payment system called EasyPay and that's built into your onlinejobs. Ph account and it works When you have a free account, it doesn't matter. You could pay them through PayPal. You could pay them through Wise.com. I I don't I I really don't recommend PayPal, but you can do it. Okay.
John Jonas [00:39:19]:
So then that person works from home. We don't have an office in the Philippines.
Teri Holland [00:39:23]:
Nice.
John Jonas [00:39:24]:
They have their own internet, their own computer. You just Hired yourself someone on the other side of the world who, had a hard time finding a job Mhmm. And now works for you, and they are Super duper interested in keeping the job. Usually. Not not every time, but Yeah. They'll go above and beyond what you ask as soon as they trust you To to keep the job.
Teri Holland [00:39:48]:
Right. I have 1 more question because I'm just curious. So with all your time freedom that you've built yourself. What do you do in your free time?
John Jonas [00:40:00]:
Yeah. So I have always There there's a quote that has always driven my life and that quote is no other success in life compensates for failure in the home. So my number one priority is my wife and my kids. And so I I really like to trail run and mountain bike and ski, backcountry ski. So Every day I do one of those things and I usually do it with my wife or my kids. So, I will backcountry ski with my kids as they get out of school each not each day, but a couple times a week. I'll mountain bike with them. They're on the mountain bike team In high school and we'll ride together, a couple, 2, 3, 5, 6 times a week depending on when.
John Jonas [00:40:56]:
Yeah. I just got like I told you, I just finished trail running Yeah. Right before this interview, and that's what I did this morning until 2 o'clock. Nice. And so that that's what I do with my time. I spend it with my wife and my kids for the most part.
Teri Holland [00:41:11]:
That sounds amazing. Well
John Jonas [00:41:13]:
Thank you. Yeah. It is. It is.
Teri Holland [00:41:15]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I bet. Thank you so much for coming on today and sharing your knowledge, your expertise with us. I really Appreciate it.
John Jonas [00:41:24]:
Yeah. Thanks for having me. This has been really fun. I'm I'm glad to be able to share.
