003: Rock Out Strong Marketing with Chris Mulvaney

All right Ladies and Gents, welcome to our third episode of the LIVETHEFUEL show. Part of my goal is for us to be truthful and transparency while we balance health, business, and lifestyle. Please note that a couple of F-Bomb explicit’s do appear during this episode. I’m doing my best to keep this clean, but will not edit out real life passion that arises. So today my co-host is the man, the myth, the strong legend himself, Chris Mulvaney.

This is a great insightful conversation, packed with great ideas you can translate into your life to FUEL your internal fire on fitness, rock and roll, and/or marketing. So tune in and enjoy your dose of LIVETHEFUEL today.

Todays Strong Co-host

Chris Mulvaney is a strong business developer, community activist, entrepreneur, and an award-winning creative marketing strategist. He also studied music at Monmouth University and has rocked out in some big band life along the way. More importantly he chooses balance through staying fit with CrossFit and Olympic Weightlifting.

He is the founder and CEO of CMDS; a NJ-based marketing and design agency that provides integrated marketing strategies and tactics. CMDS has been around the integrated marketing block by helping businesses. They realize the power of the internet as a tool for building brands, engaging customers, and driving revenue. Some of the services that CMDS offers include Brand Strategy, Logo Design, Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Website Development, Social Media Marketing and Paid Search Marketing.

Chris is also the founder and CEO of Post Café; a company that helps individuals and businesses to build an ongoing conversation with their clients that extends beyond the sale. They post strategically written, on-trend content on various social media platforms. This content helps businesses stay top of mind for repeat business and qualified referrals.

Besides CMDS and Post Café, Chris is also the founder of ProTasker. This is a project management software that helps individuals and businesses that need to keep an eye on production, quality control, and your bottom line. This software was redeveloped in 2011 for distribution to the public and has had astonishing success.

His extensive professional background includes working with some of the world’s leading brands. Personally dedicated to helping clients refine their corporate vision and generate the kind of eye-popping, strong revenue that many companies dream about. Chris also serves on the boards for several local businesses and charities, lending a creative and strategic eye to marketing and operational best practices.

In this show, Chris reveals how he has managed to balance his health, business, and lifestyle.

In this episode you’ll hear

[01: 02] Everything you need to know about Chris Mulvaney. What he is doing and how we both came to know each other.

[03: 11] What does CMDS do. Who are the company’s clients?

[04: 15] When did CMDS start?

[10: 11] Working hours at CMDS is only four days a week. Is this a lifestyle goal?

[14: 35] We are personally and collectively accountable for results.

[10: 11] Does having a bigger foosball table trigger smaller productivity?

[15: 00] What is CMDS’s business lifestyle like?

[19: 00] The importance of networking

[21: 50] If you are not willing to take risks and risk the power of failure you are not going to learn.

 

And Much, Much More

I ran into Chris a few months ago now. We are both are in the CrossFit world, and he came up for an Olympic Weightlifting competition at our facility in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. At our first meeting he had only just started his focus on getting strong through weightlifting in the past 7 months. Chris is still into Olympic Weightlifting training six days a week. Lifting is like his hobby and stress release from all the other stuff that he is involved in from his businesses, to family, to the charity work and more.

Chris explains that CMDS is a creative marketing agency. The company’s clients range from a smaller $10 million dollar kind of entities up to a Fortune 500 company. He helps them establish a presence in their marketplace from helping them determine the voices for their brand. They’ll also help them define the vision of their company by building out the creative piece and the identity of that company.

Thanks to doubling their income success in 2015 they’ve achieved the Inc 5000 award! Inc. magazine ranked CMDS, a leading NJ full service marketing and web design agency. They are weighing in at number 1989 on its 35th annual Inc. 5000. This is an exclusive ranking of the nation’s fastest-growing private companies. The list represents the most comprehensive look at the most important segment of the economy: America’s independent entrepreneurs. Companies such as Yelp, Pandora, Dell, LinkedIn, Zillow and many others gained early exposure as members of the Inc. 5000.

Chris reveals that they work from Monday through Thursday from 8 to 6. So what does this mean? This is kind of cool because they are starting to see a few more companies that do that nowadays too. Smart CEO’s take on this supposedly risky expense by investing in ensuring their employees have better vacations and life balance. Chris is always trying to find ways to make his team strong and moree productive. This is the exact reason they officially have only four days required in the office.

Giving his employees three days off in a week; is it a lifestyle goal? He replies, a definite YES. Chris says that he is trying to figure out how his companies can attract and retain employees for life. He is looking for ways to keep employees happy. He says that clients can come and go over a few year period, but top talent employees are tough to find. So it’s important to build ways to retain their value.

We also discussed the importance of accountability. One thing you have to keep in mind is a quote I learned years ago: “We are personally and collectively accountable for our results.” It’s important to be personally responsible for what you’re doing but also think about it from a collective capacity for the greater good of the company.

Chris continued to reveal more about the strong CMDS business lifestyle. He says they’ve paid to have chiropractors on site in the past and they are planning to bring in a yoga instructor to give his teams more healthy options. This is a great practice to consider whether it be for the physical and/or the mental benefits. This will definitely FUEL their health, business and lifestyle success!

We talked about the importance of networking to ensure long term growth through connectivity. This goes for personal or professional network growth. You never know what’s going to happen down the road in your life or business for that matter. Keeping in mind that we truly are the product of the five people we spend the most time with. If you want to grow, you must be ready to increase your network and your circle of influence.

We also discussed the value of taking risks in whatever you do in life. If you are not willing to take risks, you are missing out on the powerful learning’s that come from failure. Failure leads to eventual succeed. You didn’t just start walking from child birth. Each of us crawled and failed at walking a few times along the way. Now who is the strong one?!

Links and resources

• Connect with Chris Mulvaney on LinkedIn
• Connect with Chris Mulvaney on Facebook
• Connect with Chris Mulvaney on Twitter
• Chris’ CMDS business
• Connect with CMDS on LinkedIn
• Connect with CMDS on Facebook
• Connect with CMDS on Twitter
• Chris’ Post Café business
• Chris’ task management software proTasker.com
• Chris favorite book: Psycho-Cybernetics
• Inc 5000 companies include Yelp, Pandora, Dell, LinkedIn, Zillow

 

People Mentioned:

• John G. Giacalone (MobilityDoc.com)
• Karyn Marshall (Karyn Marshall on Team USA)
• Gary Vaynerchuk (AskGaryVee)

 

Finally, I have a small request:

Since this is my brand new show, I’ve got zero clout in the world right now. It takes a lot of work to bring something like this to fruition. Currently, my biggest asset is reviews and ratings on iTunes. When iTunes sees that this show is getting good reviews and ratings, it moves us up in importance to the “New & Noteworthy” section. A brand new show can get lots of traction from this!

So, if you wouldn’t mind, I will welcome positive reviews and ratings from you guys, love the 5 stars! Also, if you think it’s valuable; kindly share this page on Facebook or Twitter. It would mean a ton of gratitude to me as well.

If you want to be part of the growing community, please join the The FUEL Tank group on Facebook where we Fuel Your Health, Business and Lifestyle as a community.

Thanks so much, and I’m looking forward to hearing your comments about this show below.

Scott

LIVETHEFUEL is an online audio podcast hosted by myself of course. Part of my goal(s) is to help share the stories, lessons, and knowledge attained from the struggles and life successes of my co-hosts aka guests. These are highly active people from all walks of life, including the people from the fitness profession like coaches and gym owners. We’ll also be focusing on startups, entrepreneurs, Internet marketers, along with all of our diverse health professionals and some fellow adrenaline junkies along the way. These people not only standout in their professions, they also have the confidence to live life with more adventure and take the necessary risks with rewards to build an epic lifestyle!

The primary goal of these episodes is to FUEL your internal fire while helping you realize that LIFE IS SHORT! I also share practical steps and tools, including strategies, smartphone apps, audiobooks, websites, stories and training courses that will support you in every step you make to improve your life. So go after your dreams and conquer that next, supposedly, unattainable goal!