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Transcript
(upbeat music)
Speaker:Welcome to the Atlanta Tennis Podcast.
Speaker:Every episode is titled,
Speaker:It Starts with Tennis and Goes From There.
Speaker:We talk with coaches, club managers,
Speaker:industry business professionals,
Speaker:technology experts, and anyone else we find interesting.
Speaker:We wanna have a conversation as long as it starts with tennis.
Speaker:(upbeat music)
Speaker:- Hey, hey, this is Shaun with the Atlanta Tennis Podcast,
Speaker:powered by GoTennis!
Speaker:Today's conversation is with Ian Westermann,
Speaker:of Essential Tennis.
Speaker:Ian is a passionate lifelong tennis coach
Speaker:with over 20 years of experience,
Speaker:helping club players reach their goals.
Speaker:A pioneer in online tennis learning,
Speaker:Ian launched the first ever tennis instruction podcast
Speaker:in 2008 and began his YouTube channel in 2009,
Speaker:which has almost 300,000 subscribers.
Speaker:Ian joins us in this conversation
Speaker:to talk about how we got to where he is
Speaker:and possibly even what's next.
Speaker:Have a listen and let us know what you think.
Speaker:(upbeat music)
Speaker:- Who is Ian Westermann and why do we care?
Speaker:- Yeah, so I started online content in 2008,
Speaker:is when I started the podcast.
Speaker:I started the YouTube channel in 2009.
Speaker:And back then I was just a lowly staff,
Speaker:teaching professional, I was on the court 40, 45 hours a week.
Speaker:And I honestly thought that was gonna be my career
Speaker:for the rest of my life.
Speaker:And I started that in 2004,
Speaker:after graduating from Ferris State University's
Speaker:Professional Tennis Management Program.
Speaker:So since I was 14, 15,
Speaker:I knew tennis was gonna be what I did the rest of my life.
Speaker:I thought it was gonna be as a traditional coach,
Speaker:but as I got through more and more repetition in years
Speaker:and like a club environment,
Speaker:honestly I just got more and more frustrated
Speaker:with the friction that I felt between my passion for teaching
Speaker:and student's passion for learning,
Speaker:didn't just didn't seem to be on the same level.
Speaker:And of course I had percentage of my clients
Speaker:that totally matched with me and it was fantastic.
Speaker:I was probably 15 or 20% of my hours,
Speaker:which in hindsight I was very fortunate to have that many.
Speaker:But the other 80% felt like they were showing up
Speaker:for some reason other than stepping outside their comfort zone,
Speaker:learning new skills and actually doing something different
Speaker:than what they were used to doing.
Speaker:And that's really what motivated me
Speaker:to start publishing content.
Speaker:And I have been doing it full-time now since 2011.
Speaker:- Bobby, he just, he speaks to us, right?
Speaker:I mean, having been at the Country Club
Speaker:and having run a small club and then,
Speaker:I mean, we know all those thoughts and then you think back
Speaker:and you think, and those times on court
Speaker:and you think sometimes like, okay, am I just,
Speaker:am I just taking the money?
Speaker:You're not really here to learn,
Speaker:you're not really interested in being here for the coaching.
Speaker:Why are you even here?
Speaker:But then, hey, this is my job and you're a client.
Speaker:So we find that balance in and it sounds like you get that.
Speaker:And you moved from, I've got to go back and say,
Speaker:okay, you graduated in 2004 from Ferris State, that's correct?
Speaker:- Yep.
Speaker:- So you move into online instruction
Speaker:and that's most of what, I would guess,
Speaker:most people know you that way.
Speaker:Meaning, we go through a few hundred clients a year
Speaker:as tennis coaches, but you've got hundreds of thousands
Speaker:of subscribers online.
Speaker:What was that like in the beginning where you say,
Speaker:okay, you were one of the first to start doing this online
Speaker:instruction.
Speaker:If you started a podcast in 2008,
Speaker:we basically had Adam Curry and then you.
Speaker:It sounds like from a podcasting schedule point of view.
Speaker:But online instruction, how did you think even that was going
Speaker:to work?
Speaker:Did you know you were going to do the courses and the packages?
Speaker:But how did you figure out how to do it well?
Speaker:Maybe that's the question.
Speaker:- Yeah, I mean, in hindsight, my biggest blessing
Speaker:is that I started so early in the whole content game.
Speaker:I got the idea, I was at the time,
Speaker:I was teaching at a private club in DC.
Speaker:And I had about a 45 minute best-case scenario commute
Speaker:in each direction.
Speaker:I got six of the radio, I started listening to podcasts.
Speaker:And they revolved around topics like personal finance
Speaker:and how to live your dream job, tech and like tech news
Speaker:and gadgets and stuff like that.
Speaker:And so as I was listening to these podcasts,
Speaker:it occurred to me that, well, these people have a passion
Speaker:around some kind of topic.
Speaker:They are putting out regular content,
Speaker:they're growing in audience.
Speaker:And then sometimes it was through advertisers,
Speaker:sometimes it was through merchandise,
Speaker:sometimes it was through courses
Speaker:in the case of the internet marketing podcast
Speaker:that I listened to.
Speaker:And when I looked on iTunes for a tennis podcast,
Speaker:I couldn't find one in 2005, six, seven while I was commuting.
Speaker:And so eventually the thought just popped into my head,
Speaker:well, why is nobody doing this in tennis?
Speaker:And B, why don't I give it a shot?
Speaker:I started with the podcast, which is very easy
Speaker:compared to video, got the wheels rolling there.
Speaker:And honestly, it was just crickets early on.
Speaker:The bad news is there was no path to follow.
Speaker:The good news is there was no competition.
Speaker:And so it was kind of just a wide open space,
Speaker:kind of wild west still on those content platforms.
Speaker:And so just the fact that I put anything out
Speaker:with some kind of regularity, with some kind of energy
Speaker:and like passion behind it meant that I got traction
Speaker:and I grew an audience.
Speaker:And so the business model part of it took three and a half years.
Speaker:Between when I first started publishing stuff
Speaker:and when I actually figured out how to monetize,
Speaker:took a little bit over three years.
Speaker:And during that period of time,
Speaker:I was just putting out as much pre-stuff as I could
Speaker:while I was still on the court 40, 45 hours a week.
Speaker:Bobby, why didn't we start our podcast in 2008?
Speaker:What were we even doing then?
Speaker:I had just gotten married so that was a big mistake.
Speaker:(laughing)
Speaker:And there went the podcast time.
Speaker:There went the podcast.
Speaker:I had a baby girl and a new wife.
Speaker:So I started late and yeah, that's right or two.
Speaker:She was just, I began to be the chauffeur right around the end.
Speaker:So yeah.
Speaker:And you still are.
Speaker:So no.
Speaker:(laughing)
Speaker:You mean, and I'm still chauffuring around.
Speaker:So yeah.
Speaker:So 2008, that starts, you figure all this out.
Speaker:You say, okay, you take that, somebody else's business model
Speaker:and you bring it into tennis.
Speaker:Is that essentially, you say, okay,
Speaker:these other people are doing it this way.
Speaker:You bring it into tennis, which means,
Speaker:you're the type maybe like us that can say,
Speaker:hey, just because tennis does it one way,
Speaker:doesn't mean we shouldn't do it like these other guys
Speaker:who are actually good at it.
Speaker:- Yeah, that's correct in a nutshell.
Speaker:The guy that, so Will Hamilton, who runs Fuzzy Eleballs,
Speaker:he was the first one to go really hard
Speaker:into the internet marketing space
Speaker:and start borrowing from the business models
Speaker:and the tactics and the strategies that they were using
Speaker:over in like the how to make money online space.
Speaker:And the original guy that he started following
Speaker:and then very shortly after I started following
Speaker:his name, Jeff Walker, and his product was called
Speaker:the Product Launch Formula, which is kind of funny to think about.
Speaker:His product is about how to launch products
Speaker:and he would launch that product
Speaker:and just make tons and tons of money.
Speaker:And so Will and I were going to his conferences,
Speaker:we were consuming his product
Speaker:and it was kind of through that internet marketing style
Speaker:of packaging content and selling it
Speaker:through a specific marketing process
Speaker:where we were finally able to start creating
Speaker:some significant revenue.
Speaker:Until up until that point, I tried advertisers,
Speaker:I tried T-shirts, I tried donation model,
Speaker:I tried, every other kind of monetization I could think of,
Speaker:but nothing really got a whole lot of traction
Speaker:or brought in a substantial amount of revenue
Speaker:until courses started taking off.
Speaker:And for me, that was in 2010 that I created my first course,
Speaker:the second version of my first course,
Speaker:I launched an early 2011.
Speaker:And when that result came in,
Speaker:that's when I quit my job and said,
Speaker:I'm just going to give it a shot and see what happens.
Speaker:And when in full time and said,
Speaker:this is going to be my thing.
Speaker:Yep, yeah, I told myself if this promotion brings in $20,000,
Speaker:then I'm going to quit and just give it a shot.
Speaker:And it ended up bringing in 80.
Speaker:And so I was like, all right, I know I can go back
Speaker:and get another teaching job.
Speaker:I felt very confident about my ability to interview
Speaker:and provide value to a club and a program.
Speaker:So I was like, worst case scenario.
Speaker:And by the way, I had a one year old at the time
Speaker:when I quit my job.
Speaker:So it wasn't a non-pressure decision,
Speaker:but I felt like I had enough confidence in my ability
Speaker:to go back and get a normal job that,
Speaker:and I also knew that 10 years down the road,
Speaker:if I didn't give it a shot,
Speaker:I would really, really be kicking myself.
Speaker:So I decided to just give it a try and see what happens.
Speaker:- Yeah, I think that's a lot of the pressure that says,
Speaker:okay, which one do I want?
Speaker:Do I want the regret of having never tried?
Speaker:Or am I going to put my family at risk?
Speaker:Because I think back to my father and he tells us a few stories.
Speaker:He said, they were two or three times
Speaker:that I thought about just jumping into certain things
Speaker:and I just couldn't do it.
Speaker:I had two kids and they were just certain things
Speaker:he just chose not to do.
Speaker:And we talked about that a lot, Bobby,
Speaker:where Bobby and I and my wife are the managing team.
Speaker:And we say, you know, what are the things
Speaker:we're going to jump into?
Speaker:How much time can we decide we're going to do this?
Speaker:'Cause we all have our jobs, we all have our kids,
Speaker:we have our families.
Speaker:But how much can we put in good content?
Speaker:How much can we help people?
Speaker:And you had a heyday of 2018, 2019,
Speaker:where you were just full staff and how did that work?
Speaker:That was your drone, NSCort.
Speaker:I mean, you were killing it at one point, right?
Speaker:Yeah, I reached a certain point where...
Speaker:So the first three years after I quit my job,
Speaker:I would call just kind of coasting,
Speaker:where it was just trying to figure out,
Speaker:is this model actually going to work long-term?
Speaker:It was kind of figuring out the business model,
Speaker:is this sustainable?
Speaker:Like, is this even going to work?
Speaker:And with just myself working on the business,
Speaker:we reached, I reached a plateau,
Speaker:like revenue-wise pretty quickly,
Speaker:and then it leveled out from there.
Speaker:And I started having a thought kind of similar, like mindset,
Speaker:well, I could probably just keep doing this by myself,
Speaker:like in a spare bedroom, and make it work.
Speaker:And like, I see like the model is here,
Speaker:and I'm gaining traction in terms of building
Speaker:like a loyal following that appreciates what I'm doing,
Speaker:they're supporting me consistently, you know, financially.
Speaker:Or I could start building things bigger than myself,
Speaker:and create a team around what I'm doing,
Speaker:hire people that are better at editing,
Speaker:that are better at customer service,
Speaker:that are better than web development,
Speaker:that are better at the graphics,
Speaker:and like all that other sort of stuff.
Speaker:And see if we can make this significantly better,
Speaker:bigger than what I can do by myself.
Speaker:So that started in 2014.
Speaker:I hired my first full-time video editor,
Speaker:and we were kind of off to the races from there,
Speaker:after getting a couple of people on board
Speaker:on the video side of things, I started thinking,
Speaker:well, I can only make so much content.
Speaker:So if I can bring on other coaches,
Speaker:and maybe kind of try to clone myself in terms of the presentation
Speaker:and the content creation and the course creation,
Speaker:then why can't we just keep making this bigger and bigger
Speaker:and build the brand of essential tennis,
Speaker:as opposed to it being just like the Ian show,
Speaker:having all of us be unified under one roof
Speaker:in terms of our methodology and our approach to content,
Speaker:or approach to coaching.
Speaker:And so for solid like six years, that worked,
Speaker:and we kept growing and we kept scaling,
Speaker:and then that bubble kind of popped,
Speaker:I would say in like mid 2020.
Speaker:- I was gonna say, let me guess, somewhere summer 2020.
Speaker:- Yeah, I can't quite put my finger on it,
Speaker:but I feel like something happened right around there
Speaker:that kind of disrupted a bunch of stuff,
Speaker:and then things started to decline.
Speaker:And it definitely wasn't a COVID thing,
Speaker:like at first that actually gave us a boost,
Speaker:'cause tennis was kind of the official socially distanced
Speaker:like activity that people could go out and do.
Speaker:So we actually saw a big uptick in our organic views
Speaker:and traffic in the summer of 2020.
Speaker:And I think it was,
Speaker:B, there was a lot of coaches that were trying to figure out
Speaker:what the hell do I do, sitting at home
Speaker:because our clubs were closed,
Speaker:they're even their outdoor municipal courts
Speaker:were shut down and locked.
Speaker:And so I think there was a big entry for coaches
Speaker:coming into content around that time,
Speaker:and the audience of kind of eyeball started spreading out
Speaker:a little bit more, and then things started winding down for us.
Speaker:And I feel like our spot towards the top of the mountain
Speaker:in terms of like the keyword search results
Speaker:and stuff like that started slowly kind of winding down
Speaker:around that time.
Speaker:- All right, Bobby, I've been monopolizing the time.
Speaker:I know you wanna talk to Ian too.
Speaker:So what you got, I've gotten us up to Ian's A day,
Speaker:and then the time I want, also I'll eventually ask,
Speaker:like what's next for Ian, but I wanna let you jump in
Speaker:'cause I've been monopolizing the conversation so far.
Speaker:- Oh, no problem.
Speaker:I've enjoyed it and the proof I've been listening,
Speaker:I'm gonna go backwards a little bit.
Speaker:Firstly, were you Ferris with Tom Dackels?
Speaker:- Yeah.
Speaker:So I'm gonna share that for you.
Speaker:- That's another question.
Speaker:- Well, I was there.
Speaker:You share that with Sean, that's Sean and I,
Speaker:Tom was our tester, our used to be.
Speaker:- Yes, yes.
Speaker:- So I thought that right around the time that Tom was at Ferris.
Speaker:So we have another person that we share.
Speaker:When you started, your podcast was focusing on coaching.
Speaker:That was the focus of where you were going with it.
Speaker:- Yeah, so my core itch that I was trying to scratch
Speaker:was my dissatisfaction with the passion that my students
Speaker:had to want to learn.
Speaker:So from my selfish perspective,
Speaker:I just wanted to spend time making stuff,
Speaker:spending time with people that valued insight
Speaker:like beneath the surface, I would say.
Speaker:Everybody, everybody that all of us work with,
Speaker:like on the court, they've all heard the bender knees
Speaker:and over your shoulder and keep your eye on the ball.
Speaker:Sadly, those things, those cliche phrases,
Speaker:continue to be like a large staple in our industry.
Speaker:But I wanted to spend time with people that were tired of that
Speaker:and wanted something completely different
Speaker:that took them out of their comfort zone
Speaker:and got them growing like as a player.
Speaker:And so that was kind of my main motivation was,
Speaker:I wanted to attract more people
Speaker:that valued that thought process,
Speaker:like essentially a growth mentality as a tennis student.
Speaker:And so that's what really kind of litifier under my ass was,
Speaker:I need to build like this community of people
Speaker:that value what I value so that we can kind of nerd out
Speaker:together on how to get better at tennis.
Speaker:Now, I might be jumping a little bit here,
Speaker:but because you do use a lot of familiar words,
Speaker:you're looking to change, and I love the out of the box.
Speaker:And that's one of the things I tell my student,
Speaker:you're never gonna get better until you're willing to fail
Speaker:and go out of your comfort zone.
Speaker:So are we really talking about human nature
Speaker:and trying to get them to embrace a little bit different
Speaker:or perspective on life?
Speaker:- Yes, it's rare.
Speaker:And that's maybe the thing that I'm most grateful,
Speaker:like the fact that it ever worked at all blows my mind.
Speaker:Like you're looking back, I really didn't know.
Speaker:I really had no idea if it was gonna lead
Speaker:to any kind of business that actually could support my family.
Speaker:Just the fact, like I remember incredibly clearly,
Speaker:the first listener submitted question that came in
Speaker:from the podcast, and it blew my mind
Speaker:that somebody listened to the episode, got to the end of it,
Speaker:wrote down the email address and sent me a question
Speaker:so that I could help them with their tennis.
Speaker:That motivated me and inspired me so much
Speaker:that somebody else out there, not only,
Speaker:and I'm sure you guys have been through this same experience
Speaker:like many times, when you put content out there,
Speaker:it's kind of like an echo signal like going out,
Speaker:and a certain percentage of your energy
Speaker:that you throw out there is gonna come back to you again.
Speaker:And the fact that anybody out there
Speaker:listened to what I had to say and was like,
Speaker:yeah, I'll take some more of that.
Speaker:Like I want more discomfort, I want more challenge,
Speaker:I want more growth in my life.
Speaker:There's no question that's a small subset
Speaker:of the general human population.
Speaker:And I think that's a large reason why we have such
Speaker:a generic surface level, like echo chamber
Speaker:of tennis coaching because the students
Speaker:only want to be challenged so much.
Speaker:The coaches get good at providing
Speaker:that kind of surface level service.
Speaker:The students are like, thank you very much.
Speaker:Here's my money.
Speaker:And then there's this vicious cycle of mediocrity
Speaker:that feeds back on itself, like year after year after year.
Speaker:- And I appreciate the fact your courage is enough
Speaker:to say all this out loud.
Speaker:I watch one of your videos when you were telling the people
Speaker:about the different stages of learning.
Speaker:And I was like, I love it.
Speaker:And I completely get it.
Speaker:But boy, oh boy, you're gonna hit a few people
Speaker:a little close to home because you're talking
Speaker:about their behavior.
Speaker:And that's the fault of the line we walk, really.
Speaker:But like you said, I'm looking for the person
Speaker:who wants to learn, like you, it's like,
Speaker:hey, I want to be as excited as you are to learn.
Speaker:So I get that way to code.
Speaker:So I completely get it.
Speaker:As I said, always loved what you did.
Speaker:And I will say from Justin Observer,
Speaker:when Sean told me he made contact with you,
Speaker:I was excited because I was like,
Speaker:out of all the guys that are doing this,
Speaker:I've always appreciated you.
Speaker:And I felt like it was an ego trip.
Speaker:It was a sincerity.
Speaker:And I think that comes across.
Speaker:So taking that, when you said,
Speaker:when you started to get successful,
Speaker:that's what we always talk about.
Speaker:Where are we gonna find the secret sauce?
Speaker:Was it consistency?
Speaker:You know, just being it there and through,
Speaker:just being there every week and saying the things
Speaker:that people start to realize,
Speaker:hey, this is coming from the heart.
Speaker:This is what this guy's all about.
Speaker:I want to hear what else he has to say.
Speaker:And is there anything that you can look at,
Speaker:hindsight and say, outside of COVID and just changing,
Speaker:was there something that happened that we said
Speaker:that it's an, that might have been a misstep.
Speaker:There could, you know, there could have been avoided.
Speaker:- In terms of my content strategy or business strategy?
Speaker:- You're just continuing on.
Speaker:How do you keep it fresh?
Speaker:You know, and how do you anticipate where,
Speaker:and this is the difficult part about any business
Speaker:when you start to scale it?
Speaker:Like you said, no matter what you were talking about
Speaker:in video, I go through,
Speaker:and I had a tennis management company
Speaker:where we tried to run different facilities.
Speaker:And like you said, how do we clone ourselves?
Speaker:It's a labor-intensive business.
Speaker:They would hire PTM or ERS tennis,
Speaker:and they thought they were getting me.
Speaker:And somebody else would go in and say,
Speaker:well, we know you hired the company.
Speaker:You know, I'll be there.
Speaker:You're gonna see me, but so, you know,
Speaker:stuff that is obviously on both sides of our business.
Speaker:You know, but like you guys did a fantastic job
Speaker:of always presenting a course or instruction
Speaker:that was sincere and it said,
Speaker:we're doing this as much,
Speaker:and I don't think it's a bad thing to say
Speaker:because we enjoy it and we enjoy teaching.
Speaker:And hopefully we will, you know,
Speaker:you get the same effect by watching.
Speaker:- Yeah, so first of all, I wanna just reflect back
Speaker:the respect towards you guys.
Speaker:It's one thing for me.
Speaker:I've been outside the machine.
Speaker:Like I've been outside the system for 15 years now.
Speaker:And so I can say whatever I want,
Speaker:without worrying about a director of tennis
Speaker:or a tennis committee like chairperson
Speaker:or, you know, members like being offended.
Speaker:The fact that you guys are sitting here
Speaker:and you can't be fully transparent.
Speaker:And but the fact that you're being,
Speaker:at least partially transparent, you can say whatever you want.
Speaker:Obviously because you have to go back to your clubs
Speaker:and stay employed.
Speaker:The fact that you are pushing the envelope,
Speaker:like in this platform, I really respect a lot
Speaker:while being inside the industry.
Speaker:So I wish more people would do the type of thing
Speaker:that you're doing here.
Speaker:Secondly, going back to your question,
Speaker:having done it so long,
Speaker:there's over 2,000 free videos on our YouTube channel.
Speaker:And there is a cycle of burnout
Speaker:that I've been through a couple of times now
Speaker:where I chase the words, the titles, the search terms
Speaker:that I know will give views.
Speaker:And that's what grows like our audience.
Speaker:And there's a Venn diagram, like overlap between what
Speaker:people want to watch and what's sexy and very click worthy
Speaker:and what I want to talk about, which is much more growth
Speaker:oriented and more nerdy and much more beneath the surface.
Speaker:And also counter-cultural, it kind of goes against the words
Speaker:and the phrases and the methodology of a normal tennis
Speaker:lesson, which, as we've already discussed,
Speaker:isn't necessarily for growth.
Speaker:It's for entertainment or exercise or socialization
Speaker:or something else.
Speaker:So in that Venn diagram, overlap between what's
Speaker:very clickable and what makes me feel fulfilled
Speaker:and happy and satisfied that I spent time
Speaker:talking about that.
Speaker:I kind of used up that little sliver over the years
Speaker:a couple of times and retreated back into what
Speaker:just what I want to talk about even though it doesn't get
Speaker:the clicks.
Speaker:And I went through one of those cycles right
Speaker:about at that peak in 2020, where I got tired of chasing
Speaker:the views and the clicks.
Speaker:And I started just making videos that I wanted to make
Speaker:and on topics that I wanted to talk about.
Speaker:And it was bad timing.
Speaker:I feel like that was right about when we hit kind of a new level
Speaker:of saturation in terms of number of coaches, uploading
Speaker:numbers, hundreds and thousands of more uploads
Speaker:per day of coaching instruction.
Speaker:And I think to keep the machine rolling in the positive
Speaker:direction it was going in, we would have had to stick hard
Speaker:to the core to the greatest hits.
Speaker:When Neil Diamond, the sweet Caroline for the 10 million
Speaker:time, I respect that so much that he's
Speaker:able to just stick to what everybody wants to hear instead
Speaker:of-- I'm sure at some point, he's
Speaker:wanted to sing something else.
Speaker:And I've kind of gone through that cycle of topic burnout
Speaker:several times.
Speaker:Just to be able to stick with the game and keep clicking
Speaker:upload, but balancing that with how do I cash flow a business
Speaker:is a tricky kind of tightrope to walk.
Speaker:So with your clientele, where would you
Speaker:say, across the board, level player was
Speaker:an higher level player, was the recreational player
Speaker:looking for a pill?
Speaker:Where did you find your--
Speaker:what did you see your audience as?
Speaker:Yeah, I have a very narrow avatar that I'm targeting.
Speaker:And thankfully, I've stuck to my guns enough in terms
Speaker:of what I want to talk about that I almost never
Speaker:get a student that shows up.
Speaker:I mean, it's been years, honestly.
Speaker:Since I've had a student that showed up looking for a pill.
Speaker:And I thank God for that.
Speaker:Every time I go out onto the court,
Speaker:and it's another person who's there for the same reason
Speaker:that I'm there that's such a huge blessing.
Speaker:But in a nutshell, my core follower
Speaker:is somebody who is--
Speaker:I would say average age is probably around 50--
Speaker:50/55.
Speaker:It's not our average viewer age, but average person
Speaker:who actually invests in time to come work with me
Speaker:and buys courses and stuff like that.
Speaker:If somebody who's been in the sport for usually
Speaker:a couple of decades probably started
Speaker:when they were in their teens or 20s,
Speaker:played for a while, took a break because of career and family,
Speaker:picked it back up again.
Speaker:And now they've been playing for five years,
Speaker:they've been back maybe 10 years,
Speaker:and they've been stuck and plateaued for at least two or three.
Speaker:They've taken lessons from every coach in their local area
Speaker:that's available to them at every local club.
Speaker:And nobody can give them the answer that satisfies them
Speaker:about why they're not improving anymore.
Speaker:And that's the person who comes to work with me.
Speaker:So in a nutshell, they've been around the block
Speaker:a bunch of times.
Speaker:They've tried all their local resources
Speaker:and service providers.
Speaker:They're not improving.
Speaker:And they want to know the answer, why am I still a 35?
Speaker:So you're not giving yourself nearly enough credit.
Speaker:They're coming to see you.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Tennis is the situation you guys share.
Speaker:But it's about what you're saying,
Speaker:and the way you're saying it, especially being an older person
Speaker:who not going to get sold this easily.
Speaker:They're appreciating the sincerity you're bringing to it.
Speaker:And using taboo words like, oh, effort means something,
Speaker:not who's on the other side of the court.
Speaker:It's about how much you want to put into it
Speaker:is going to determine how good you get.
Speaker:And those are tough words.
Speaker:Like you said, there's--
Speaker:everybody's out there for a different reason.
Speaker:And you've got to find it, obviously,
Speaker:strike the chord that hits the most.
Speaker:But you wanted to resonate with one or two.
Speaker:And it isn't a good business model, frankly.
Speaker:And I think you go through ups and downs,
Speaker:but I'd be shocked.
Speaker:I believe that your core followers are extraordinarily loyal.
Speaker:Yeah, they are.
Speaker:And I try to pinch myself and remind myself
Speaker:on a regular basis exactly what you just said.
Speaker:I try very hard to keep reminding myself.
Speaker:So I don't take it for granted that we
Speaker:do share in that passion for challenge and discomfort
Speaker:and growth and whatever other word you want to put to it.
Speaker:They want to know the truth.
Speaker:And in a nutshell, I think the core service that I provide
Speaker:is I provide the truth.
Speaker:When they go take a one hour lesson
Speaker:from the staff professional down the road,
Speaker:as I described before, that coach
Speaker:is used to providing a particular type of service.
Speaker:That's wrapped in a particular way
Speaker:designed to give a particular person
Speaker:certain number of steps, a certain level of heart rate,
Speaker:and a certain number of tips per hour,
Speaker:where they feel like they got a lot of value out of it.
Speaker:And what I provide is, in a lot of ways,
Speaker:the exact opposite of that.
Speaker:And so anytime somebody goes to the trouble of coming out
Speaker:to the middle of nowhere, aka Wisconsin,
Speaker:and they want to really know what's behind the curtain
Speaker:and find out what's really holding the back.
Speaker:Even if it's really bad news, even if it's like, dude,
Speaker:and it usually is, by the way, your habits
Speaker:are way worse than you think.
Speaker:Because they haven't seen themselves on video before.
Speaker:They haven't seen themselves slowed down before.
Speaker:And so I respect anybody who puts themselves
Speaker:in that position tremendously, especially,
Speaker:there's cameras all around the court,
Speaker:and they know they're being recorded,
Speaker:and they still come out and put themselves in that position.
Speaker:And so I need to, I try hard to keep reminding
Speaker:myself of that, but I need to do it more, frankly.
Speaker:- And I like, sorry, Bobby.
Speaker:I like that he says, "I provide the truth,
Speaker:but it's an interesting struggle from a business point of view."
Speaker:Because he also said, "When he started talking about
Speaker:what he really wanted to talk about,
Speaker:the whole thing stopped working."
Speaker:I still need to, it's like in Atlanta, Bobby, what we do.
Speaker:You gotta teach the ladies out to teams
Speaker:where you're going out of business,
Speaker:whether you love it or not.
Speaker:Maybe we all want to do this one thing.
Speaker:I specialize in what I specialize in,
Speaker:but I gotta go do the thing that pays the bills.
Speaker:And I think that's interesting that sometimes we get
Speaker:to do what we want, but the rest of the time,
Speaker:we do what we have to.
Speaker:So I'm curious, Bobby, if you're gonna ask
Speaker:because that kind of that last step of saying,
Speaker:"Okay, already," and I did watch your most recent video,
Speaker:and that dates this podcast specifically.
Speaker:But I did watch your most recent video,
Speaker:and I'm curious if you know what's next for you,
Speaker:because as you said, the online space got really saturated.
Speaker:That's why Bobby and I said,
Speaker:"We're not worried about creating content
Speaker:because the content's already there."
Speaker:Our question is, can we help aggregate the content
Speaker:for those that are audience and say,
Speaker:"Okay, Ian's got, we think Ian's here, right?"
Speaker:And we got these other people that are creating content.
Speaker:And it's already there.
Speaker:Like you said, 2,300 videos at least
Speaker:on your YouTube channel just as an example.
Speaker:But what's next for essential tenants?
Speaker:What do you think happens?
Speaker:I don't want you to give away any secret
Speaker:that you've figured out for your online content
Speaker:providing competitors, but I'm just curious.
Speaker:What do you see in the future?
Speaker:Because you've been in this space, so to speak,
Speaker:as long as Will Hamilton, and that's a long time.
Speaker:- Yeah, I guess we're both getting kind of old now.
Speaker:And it has been a long time.
Speaker:- So first of all, it's an objective perspective
Speaker:for you real quick.
Speaker:You graduated in 2004.
Speaker:I graduated a few years earlier than that.
Speaker:So, no, you still got plenty of time.
Speaker:You're hitting your second strut.
Speaker:- I had that, I had that comment.
Speaker:Thank you, thank you for the reminder.
Speaker:I appreciate that.
Speaker:So, A, don't sell yourselves short.
Speaker:Like the two of you, it feels like everything
Speaker:that could possibly be said about tenants has already been said.
Speaker:And to a certain degree, that's true, and that's accurate.
Speaker:Like you can only make so many videos
Speaker:about forehand power and like the kinetic chain
Speaker:before you start going a little bit nuts.
Speaker:I'm just speaking from personal experience.
Speaker:So, but that being said,
Speaker:you to have a particular life experience,
Speaker:like set of experiences that has kind of brought you
Speaker:to where you are now as a human being.
Speaker:And there are certain people out there
Speaker:that will resonate very strongly,
Speaker:not because you necessarily tell them anything new
Speaker:or different or even necessarily insightful,
Speaker:but because you go about it a particular way,
Speaker:communicate in a certain style
Speaker:that resonates with a certain type of person.
Speaker:And so, I want you to, and everybody else listening
Speaker:to hear loud and clear that while it is very crowded
Speaker:and it is very saturated,
Speaker:there will always be room for individual voices
Speaker:as long as they're consistent and they're clear
Speaker:about their values and what is important to them
Speaker:and what lights them up and what kind of fulfills them
Speaker:as a creator and as a coach and as a service provider.
Speaker:There will always be little niche, like sub audiences.
Speaker:That can be grown that still provide a lot of value
Speaker:back and forth, value coming from the creator
Speaker:and value bouncing back from the audience.
Speaker:So it's much harder now than it was 15 years ago
Speaker:to grow an audience, but that doesn't mean that it's not worthwhile.
Speaker:And so I respect you guys a lot for doing this
Speaker:even though you see that how much competition there is,
Speaker:but I just hope people who feel like they provide
Speaker:a unique perspective don't get too discouraged
Speaker:from just making an effort because it is, in my experience,
Speaker:it's very, very much worth it.
Speaker:Not just from a scratching the itch perspective
Speaker:and just feeling good to get certain things off your chest,
Speaker:but when you can have those things get off your chest
Speaker:and then resonates strongly with and improve the lives
Speaker:and the games of other people around the world,
Speaker:that's just such an incredible opportunity
Speaker:that I wouldn't want anybody to miss out on
Speaker:just because they feel like it's too late.
Speaker:So anyway, sorry, a little bit of a side rant there.
Speaker:In terms of like moving forwards,
Speaker:what I'm personally kind of settling back into is,
Speaker:I guess I would say in the last 12 months,
Speaker:it's been a process for me coming to terms
Speaker:with letting that growth dream kind of die.
Speaker:And I don't mean that necessarily a morbid sense
Speaker:where it's like, who knows?
Speaker:I hopefully I'm doing this for another 10, 20 years
Speaker:on the internet and hopefully I fully understand
Speaker:that we might have another wave.
Speaker:I know things are cyclical in business in general
Speaker:and they're cyclical on the internet.
Speaker:So I'm not trying to make it sound like it's like,
Speaker:woe is me or like pessimistic or anything like that.
Speaker:But the reality is a lot has unwound for my business
Speaker:in the last like three years
Speaker:and it's taken some time for me to process through that
Speaker:and just sit and be okay with looking back
Speaker:and letting go of like the picture I had in my mind
Speaker:three, four or five years ago is for the time being,
Speaker:it's on the shelf.
Speaker:And so that's been a process.
Speaker:Letting go of that and then figuring out
Speaker:what do I really want to do?
Speaker:Has been a kind of a journey for me
Speaker:and I would say just in the last two, three months,
Speaker:I've settled back into being comfortable with the idea
Speaker:that I like making things.
Speaker:I like providing resources that are helpful
Speaker:and valuable for other people.
Speaker:I love the reciprocity of like putting those things
Speaker:out there into the open and then receiving back appreciation
Speaker:and money from other people that like value it
Speaker:and want to purchase other resources or like my time.
Speaker:That feedback loop of creation and publishing
Speaker:and reciprocity really brings me a lot of happiness
Speaker:and a lot of fulfillment and more and more
Speaker:on a day to day basis.
Speaker:I'm trying to just remind myself of that very simple
Speaker:basic idea and get back on the horse again
Speaker:in terms of just putting in the reps
Speaker:and putting out the content.
Speaker:And it's hard when all the graphs are like going down
Speaker:into the right to get back on the horse
Speaker:but I'm just making the conscious decision to do that
Speaker:and just go back to basics
Speaker:and start clicking upload as often as possible,
Speaker:trying new things and see what happens
Speaker:just on a day to day basis.
Speaker:- You can't be responsible
Speaker:but the world is going to batch it crazy as well.
Speaker:(laughing)
Speaker:- Yeah, you're talking about it.
Speaker:I mean, we're in a completely kuku.
Speaker:And again, in that's a fine line that you said about clicks
Speaker:and everything.
Speaker:Listen, I'm back in the day.
Speaker:I was a polypsi guy.
Speaker:That was my major communications.
Speaker:I was going to write for a guy that ultimately became vice
Speaker:president of the United States.
Speaker:I'd bite my lip on a daily basis on what I see.
Speaker:And this is for everybody.
Speaker:I'm not particular about who I support.
Speaker:I just think the whole process is down to 80s
Speaker:and a hand basket.
Speaker:And like you said, I'm not good at extrapolating.
Speaker:I won't speak for Sean,
Speaker:the easy part for me about doing this
Speaker:is I drive great enjoyment.
Speaker:We have a good time for Sean's a friend.
Speaker:I'm fairly ignorant.
Speaker:So I don't look at the big picture.
Speaker:Maybe that's why we're not going to quote,
Speaker:as successful as we want to be.
Speaker:But we do it for sincerity.
Speaker:And hopefully it translates into something.
Speaker:But again, listening to your talk,
Speaker:it just makes me sound like,
Speaker:"Part of it, we gotta shake the people a little bit."
Speaker:And that's the fine line.
Speaker:Like you said, what we try to do,
Speaker:we try to poke the bear a little bit.
Speaker:To me, there's tennis is just reflective
Speaker:of any big bureaucracy where it's gone.
Speaker:So you can take tennis and substitute it for something else
Speaker:and we're not that far off.
Speaker:Okay?
Speaker:The amount of money might be different.
Speaker:The amount of power might be different.
Speaker:But the outcomes are not that different.
Speaker:So we're talking about life.
Speaker:And it's tough when you do it.
Speaker:And one of the things that's helpful for us
Speaker:is we have each other and we have other people involved.
Speaker:And again, I thought that was great.
Speaker:What you did that you brought more people in
Speaker:to your videos rather than you see so many people.
Speaker:So I'm the star I'm doing this.
Speaker:Then the clock is ticking.
Speaker:If you're the only reason people are coming,
Speaker:it's just human nature.
Speaker:We're eventually gonna get bored
Speaker:and feel like we heard everything.
Speaker:And you shared the spotlight wonderfully.
Speaker:You gave everybody their opportunity.
Speaker:And you know, that shows, again,
Speaker:speaks to me the person you are
Speaker:as well as the message you're trying to get out.
Speaker:And I think EBS and Flows, unfortunately,
Speaker:in this world right now,
Speaker:they're just gonna be part of the game.
Speaker:We're all gonna have them.
Speaker:So yeah, I think I'm working located in Wisconsin.
Speaker:Halfway between Milwaukee and Madison.
Speaker:So it's cold there.
Speaker:Have you thought about a warm weather climate?
Speaker:Yeah, you know, over the years,
Speaker:I've made a lot of life decisions.
Speaker:And at the end of the day,
Speaker:family's kind of the most important thing.
Speaker:And I grew up here, my wife grew up here.
Speaker:So we went out to DC
Speaker:'cause we were tired of the Midwest.
Speaker:We both went to college in the midway.
Speaker:We both grew up in the Milwaukee area.
Speaker:And yeah, coming back here was like,
Speaker:not logical at all in terms of building like a tennis company.
Speaker:Thankfully, it's almost all completely like remote.
Speaker:So like the values that I create
Speaker:and the value I'm able to deliver
Speaker:without the internet, there would be no business.
Speaker:And the content is still distributed widely enough
Speaker:that I'm coaching as much as I wanna coach.
Speaker:I don't wanna coach anymore than I do.
Speaker:And frankly, that's about the only reason why we would need
Speaker:to move to like a more conducive climate
Speaker:is if my business was built on the back
Speaker:of like me being on the courts,
Speaker:then we would need more like immediately available,
Speaker:you know, humans like to step on the court with me.
Speaker:But that's just not the case for me, thankfully,
Speaker:because of the content.
Speaker:All right, Bobby, I'm gonna hit it with King and tennis
Speaker:if you're good.
Speaker:Oh, this could go on, I will also get this.
Speaker:I know, that's what I'm saying now.
Speaker:I feel like we could just keep going,
Speaker:but it's just good.
Speaker:Let's go for it.
Speaker:Yeah, go for it.
Speaker:Let's do it.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So Ian, my favorite question, I love it
Speaker:because we get some of the best ideas
Speaker:from some of the best people out there.
Speaker:My question to you is, if you were King of tennis,
Speaker:whatever it takes, if it's just in Wisconsin,
Speaker:if it's the entire world,
Speaker:if you're King of tennis,
Speaker:is there anything you would do or change?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I'm sure you probably get a lot of answers
Speaker:to that question that are related to
Speaker:like the growth of the game.
Speaker:And my answer is not gonna be as,
Speaker:is not gonna be so altruistic.
Speaker:It is altruistic.
Speaker:Like I personally believe it would be
Speaker:for the dramatic benefit of the sport.
Speaker:I'm not smart enough and I'm not anywhere near close
Speaker:to the top enough to have any understanding
Speaker:of how to fix our like participation problem
Speaker:or people going to pick a ball or anything like that.
Speaker:But just based on my little corner of the sports
Speaker:and my little corner of media in our sports
Speaker:and my little corner of like instructional methodology,
Speaker:I feel like if I could snap my fingers
Speaker:and change one thing about the game,
Speaker:it would be the universal acceptance
Speaker:and even excitement of video being involved
Speaker:with the amateur game of tennis.
Speaker:There for whatever reason, I really can't explain it.
Speaker:You guys are probably, your tennis pros.
Speaker:So you've probably been around golf at least a little bit.
Speaker:Video was adopted in the game of golf
Speaker:as far as being a training aid, a teaching aid,
Speaker:a learning aid like 20 years ago.
Speaker:And it blows my mind that my students still get
Speaker:looked at sideways for setting up their phone
Speaker:on a tripod to record themselves
Speaker:so that they can find out what the hell
Speaker:they're actually doing on the court.
Speaker:And because there's so much resistance
Speaker:and friction and I don't know if it's like an ego thing
Speaker:or like a part of it is like,
Speaker:are you better, like the nuts, you know, kind of thing.
Speaker:There's so much and even coaches, like same thing.
Speaker:There's, we could talk about this for like two, three hours
Speaker:easily.
Speaker:It blows my mind that video is not a normal part
Speaker:of a tennis lesson.
Speaker:And it blows my mind that video is not a normal part
Speaker:of playing tennis for tennis players.
Speaker:There's only upside in finding out
Speaker:like what is actually happening out there on the courts.
Speaker:The revelations that are available
Speaker:by being able to have a third party perspective
Speaker:besides your coach saying like, no, you didn't follow through,
Speaker:it's a whole other layer and level of understanding
Speaker:and insight when you actually see yourself move.
Speaker:And as a coach, it's a whole other layer of insight
Speaker:and understanding when you see your student
Speaker:and 200 frames a second.
Speaker:And you realize that, oh, that weird jerky thing
Speaker:they're doing with their arm isn't happening
Speaker:until after they've actually hit the ball,
Speaker:this has nothing to do with like their follow through.
Speaker:There's like something going on there
Speaker:that doesn't make sense.
Speaker:And the ability to explain that
Speaker:and actually target the right elements at the right times
Speaker:is severely limited when coaches don't even know
Speaker:what's happening on the other side of the courts.
Speaker:So if I, yeah, if I was king of tennis,
Speaker:I would snap my fingers
Speaker:and I would make video normal for the entire game
Speaker:on the instructional side, on the player side.
Speaker:And it would open the eyes.
Speaker:There was like so much condescension
Speaker:and like, I keep losing to like worse players.
Speaker:There's like a game style like shaming around like pushers
Speaker:and like people think there's so much better than they are.
Speaker:And they just have this like layer of,
Speaker:this like separation between themselves and reality
Speaker:that makes it so hard for coaches to communicate with students
Speaker:and makes it so student, so hard for students
Speaker:to receive messages from coaches.
Speaker:And if we can just wipe all that out
Speaker:and just all be on the same page,
Speaker:I feel like the game would be more accessible,
Speaker:it would be more friendly.
Speaker:People would be less judgmental.
Speaker:They'd be more accepting of other levels
Speaker:and other playing styles.
Speaker:And lessons would be more valuable.
Speaker:Students would learn faster.
Speaker:Why are we not doing this?
Speaker:- It is, it was fear.
Speaker:Are we talking about tennis?
Speaker:We talked about life.
Speaker:- Oh, geez, I have my--
Speaker:- It's not suspicious.
Speaker:- It's suspiciously like life to me.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:- I found Bobby's theme for the conversation.
Speaker:He's like this.
Speaker:- Oh, I don't know.
Speaker:- And plus he opened up Pandora's Box again.
Speaker:Okay, I'm with you.
Speaker:Where does it start?
Speaker:Where did tennis go?
Speaker:So like you said, using golf is the role model.
Speaker:The things that happen in golf that don't happen in tennis.
Speaker:Just this year, and we spoke about this a thousand times,
Speaker:the worth of a PGA card as opposed to a USPTA,
Speaker:USPTR sponsorship, or a certification.
Speaker:Sorry.
Speaker:That is the problems are inherent in our industry.
Speaker:That our industry from the top down did not support us enough.
Speaker:Came up with the formula, as you said,
Speaker:and that they propagate and technology.
Speaker:Let's just say technology across the board was so not a part of it.
Speaker:I remember, and again, let's go back.
Speaker:I'll update myself on this.
Speaker:As you said about video, I was in a program,
Speaker:the first serious program I started to play when I was 12.
Speaker:They offered video with eight millimeter cameras.
Speaker:Excuse me, to the table.
Speaker:- That's incredible.
Speaker:Dude, that's so exciting.
Speaker:- If anybody knows what the next time you're in a camera is.
Speaker:And it was.
Speaker:It was unbelievably exciting.
Speaker:And like you said, the worth of seeing yourself,
Speaker:and I say this to my students all the time,
Speaker:as a player who starts off older,
Speaker:one of the things you miss out on so much
Speaker:is not just watching yourself watching other people
Speaker:and saying, do I look like that?
Speaker:Because you don't have the time.
Speaker:So you're trying to rush.
Speaker:Adults want to be told.
Speaker:They're trying to catch up.
Speaker:Man, I started late.
Speaker:What do I do?
Speaker:And so much, somebody at the time,
Speaker:is the simplest things.
Speaker:Go watch.
Speaker:Go watch yourself.
Speaker:Like you said, my favorite line from the Rocky Horror Picture Show,
Speaker:again, dating myself, I'll remove the cause, not the symptom.
Speaker:We all diagnose the symptom.
Speaker:What's the cause?
Speaker:And you're right.
Speaker:And it makes it interesting.
Speaker:But like you said, this is, we can go on.
Speaker:So let's schedule them again next week, Sean.
Speaker:- We'll see you again tomorrow.
Speaker:- We'll see you tomorrow.
Speaker:- We'll see you tomorrow.
Speaker:And again, I don't know if you've heard
Speaker:there's 80,000 recreational tennis players here in Metro Atlanta.
Speaker:If you ever want to come down and spend a week,
Speaker:let's see if we can't do an e-in tour.
Speaker:And I'm always into having other people
Speaker:hear different opinions.
Speaker:Because if you agree or it can't hurt,
Speaker:being they're gonna agree with you,
Speaker:agree with what you're believing in
Speaker:or they're gonna go someplace else.
Speaker:Any of those three options makes your life easier.
Speaker:So I'm all for them.
Speaker:- Well, I love what you guys are doing.
Speaker:Really respected a lot, especially as people
Speaker:actually working from inside the industry.
Speaker:Again, I really respect you guys a lot
Speaker:for giving people a look on the inside.
Speaker:What coaches are actually thinking,
Speaker:what they're actually feeling,
Speaker:what they're actually going through.
Speaker:Peek behind the curtain.
Speaker:I think it's important for club members,
Speaker:people who are participating in the game.
Speaker:They need to be educated about how hard it is
Speaker:to do the job that you guys are doing day to day
Speaker:and the challenges that are just inherent in that career.
Speaker:So thank you guys for doing what you're doing.
Speaker:And like I said before,
Speaker:I don't have any answers as far as like
Speaker:the big, big, big picture in tennis,
Speaker:but I'm always happy to shoot the breeze
Speaker:and talk about what we're passionate about.
Speaker:So thank you for having me on that episode.
Speaker:I hope your listeners really enjoy it.
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Speaker:- Well, there you have it.
Speaker:We wanna thank Rejoven8.com for use of the studio.
Speaker:And be sure to hit that follow button.
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Speaker:you can go to AtlantaTennisPodcast.com.
Speaker:And while you're there,
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Speaker:to the Atlanta Tennis World.
Speaker:And with that, we're out.
Speaker:See you next time.
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