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June 21, 2022

How to Get a Return on Life, Not Just Money with Justin Krane Ep. 75

Justin Krane, a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER (TM) professional, is the founder of Krane Financial Solutions. Known for his savvy, holistic approach to financial planning, he advises his clients on how to unite their business and personal money with their lives.

Justin works with his clients to create purpose driven financial plans – aiming for a “return on life.”  He manages his clients’ investment portfolios for their long term goals such as retirement.

Justin is the author of the book, Money. You Got This.  It’s a book about everyday crazy funny life experiences that we all have – with lessons for all of us.

Justin received his Certified Investment Management Analyst SM (CIMA®) designation from Investment Management Consultants Association and in conjunction with The Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

He is married and lives with his wife and three children in Calabasas, California. Justin is an accomplished athlete and was a former junior ranked tennis player in Los Angeles. He loves to cook, travel, speak Italian, and spend time with his family.

Where to Find Justin Krane

Website: kranefinancialsolutions.com


SPONSOR

This episode is sponsored by Entire Productions- Creating events (both in-person and virtual) that don't suck! and Entire Productions Marketing- carefully curated premium gifting and branded promo items. 

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Transcript
Justin Krane:

You wanna spend two months in Italy and live on a Villa, but then all of a sudden you wanna be philanthropic and you wanna donate some money each year. Can you do that? I don't know. These variables and these conversations, they need to go on a spreadsheet with software. Yeah. Period. End of story. Right? Iterate it. Look at scenarios. Get your head out of the sand, get a little bit more clarity, have that glass of wine and figure it out.

Natasha Miller:

Welcome to FASCINATING ENTREPRENEURS. How do people end up becoming an entrepreneur? How do they scale and grow their businesses? How do they plan for profit? Are they in it for life or are they building to exit these and a myriad of other topics will be discussed to pull back the veil on the wizardry of successful and FASCINATING ENTREPRENEURS. My book relentless is now available, everywhere books can be bought online, including Amazon and BarnesandNoble.com. Try your local indie bookstore too. And if they don't have it, they can order it. Just ask them the reviews are streaming in. And I'm so thankful for the positive feedback, as well as hearing from people that my memoir has impacted them positively. It is not enough to be resilient. You have to be relentless. You can go to theRelentlessBook.com for more information. Thank you so much. Justin Krane is a certified financial planner in the Los Angeles area. And is the founder of Krane Financial Solutions. He's known for his savvy holistic approach to financial planning and advises his clients on how to unite their business and personal money with their lives. We talk about the number one mistake he sees entrepreneurs make in their planning. If he's focused on cryptocurrency and his unique strategy for growth, now let's get right into it.

Justin Krane:

I always knew that I'd be an entrepreneur. I didn't always know that I'd be a financial advisor. I knew I would be in with investments doing something, but I didn't know that I'd be managing other people's money.

Natasha Miller:

Interesting, how do you feel about managing other people's money?

Justin Krane:

Fine. I love it. It takes the burden off of them, puts a little bit of the responsibility on me and it allows me to be their rock. You know, just someone who can hold the space of financial responsibility and also accountability.

Natasha Miller:

How many clients does your firm have this year?

Justin Krane:

1 million dollars.

Natasha Miller:

More like 1 billion. I hope.

Justin Krane:

Yeah. No, no. 175 households.

Natasha Miller:

Okay. Interesting.

Justin Krane:

Yes.

Natasha Miller:

I don't know much about your world. I have a wealth advisor. You can tell me, you can tell the audience, they have 75 families at a billion dollars.

Justin Krane:

Wow.

Natasha Miller:

Is that that okay?

Justin Krane:

That's great. That's amazing.

Natasha Miller:

That's all what I need to know.

Justin Krane:

Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

This is in the San Francisco bay area, so. What do you think is the number one mistake you see for entrepreneurs? What are they making a mistake in planning for their finances and retirement? I know it's all tied up. Yeah, but what do you go? "Ugh."

Justin Krane:

I think it's a combination of being reactive, not proactive with money and they don't have the clarity. And they're guessing with money both on their personal and business side. So if you don't have clarity, how can you be proactive if you don't even know what you're looking. You're more putting out fires and dealing with a tax payment or a retirement contribution or some mortgage you have to pay or payroll, then you're guessing. But if you kinda knew more about what was going on and were committed to looking forward and being like, Hmm, where do I wanna be in a year? And what am I gonna do to make that happen? That's I think the hardest thing for entrepreneurs, because we don't get paid every two weeks, like someone who works at GE.

Natasha Miller:

Well, I mean, I get paid every two weeks.

Justin Krane:

Yes. But a lot of entrepreneurs, they might take a salary from their business, but primarily. A lot of entrepreneurs, income isn't streamlined and smooth. It could be lumpy or all over the place or up or down, or who knows what?

Natasha Miller:

And do you suggest to entrepreneurs to take a very consistent high paying salary? Like they are a CEO of another company so that all these things are remedied the lump?

Justin Krane:

Yeah. I think a salary is important because it changes the narrative that the business is serving your financial life. Your personal financial life is not serving the business. So if you're on payroll, that's a good thing. You're paying yourself first and you need to set aside the money to do that. And then you're operating with what's left. Rather than hoping you have enough to pay yourself?

Natasha Miller:

What would you say to the entrepreneur who pays themselves? Let's say $50,000 a year because they don't want to put the rest of what they could be making. Let's say they really should be making 150 or 200,000. They don't want it to go into social security and all that stuff.

Justin Krane:

So the question is like for someone who's running a business, if they're not paying themselves a high enough salary and they're playing the game of, oh, I don't wanna pay payroll taxes and stuff like that. That's, okay so, I'm gonna say, I don't know, but I'm gonna say what I really think they should do. Because it's a question that really a CPA should answer because a lot of entrepreneurs will pay themselves a large payroll and do the tax withholding from that payroll to satisfy the withholding for the entire year. Cause if you do payroll, it says if you paid it streamlined throughout the whole year, but if you do estimated tax payments with a small payroll, you have to make sure that you're committed to making those estimated tax payments. But generally entrepreneurs. If you're running an established business, you need to get the payroll high enough. So you can maximize your retirement contributions.

Natasha Miller:

Right.

Justin Krane:

And not have to give it all to, I don't wanna say not to your employees, but you want it to be a fair mix and you wanna be able to benefit from that. And if you have a small salary, you can't.

Natasha Miller:

Do you work with your clients on both their business? Finances and planning and holding back and investments and their personal are really just on their personal.

Justin Krane:

Yeah. So I'd say about 70% of my clients, I will just do their personal 30%. I will do business and personal, the reason why is, is I'm sure you've hit this with someone on your show. And just as an entrepreneur, you have to have a scalable business. If your business isn't scalable, then it's gonna be very, very hard to have a good work life balance to be able to put money away for yourself. So if I was involved in a hundred people's business and money, finances, I I mean, I could do that. There's not enough time of the day. So I go a third,

Natasha Miller:

You have a team, correct? Or

Justin Krane:

So I have people, I have people that work for me, but I've made the decision and it's always a decision I think about and talk about both with people that coach me and advise me and my staff is what kind of business model do I want to have? You know, like a law firm can have 20 partners and 50 paralegals and the partners manage the paralegals and they play that game of what do they bill out and what do they pay? And blah, blah, blah. I've made the decision that I don't want, that I don't want to have to manage three other financial advisors. I just don't so more the work falls onto my plate. I'm okay with it. But what my challenge is, is how can I create the right support and structure for me so that I can continue to grow.

Natasha Miller:

Right.

Justin Krane:

And that's like, I'm an open book. I mean, like, that's my thing right now. That's what I'm working on.

Natasha Miller:

Yeah.

Justin Krane:

Creating a better support system.

Natasha Miller:

That's something to consider because we are in EO together. And there's a lot of talk about scaling and growth. And I was just at a program where they're trying to get all of us to a billion dollars in that's what the MIT is for. I don't want a billion dollar business necessarily, 99% sure. I don't want that, but I wanna know how to get it. Because I like the information, but there's that other side is that you can have a lifestyle business and nothing's wrong with that. You can have something between a lifestyle business and a scaling and growing almost billion dollar business. And there's, I mean, there's probably some things wrong with that. No, I'm kidding. And I just wanna kind of reframe that as entrepreneurs. Yes. We're hungry. We have a lot of energy. We love shiny objects and there is a lot of talk about scale and growth and like, that is the ultimate, but there's also that life family side of things.

Justin Krane:

Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

Right. Yeah. So I wanna go back to entrepreneurs and what their number one mistake is, what should we be looking at? How can we figure out, I mean, like crystal ball, we just have, we've got 10% now inflation. So when I retire in 15 years, do you know how much money I'll really need to make based on what I'm living on now? How do you figure that out?

Justin Krane:

Yeah. Okay. So I've got two parts that really, what you're asking me is like, based on this problem of clarity and guessing and being reactive and not proactive. How do you deal with that? And it's like, if you ever, I don't know about you, but like, I've thought about running a marathon and I run like 2, 3, 4 miles a day. And now if you're like, "Hey, you need to run a marathon tomorrow." That's like insane. So you have to work up to it. And even if you go from four miles to five miles, That's still a win. It doesn't have to be all on you. You can hire nutritionist, you can hire a running coach or whatever. So I'm all about progress and momentum. I think that's what people need. So how should you go about doing that? If you're like, what do I need to live and blah, blah, blah. First, I think you have to understand how do you like to learn. and where do you get overwhelmed and where are you gonna just shut down? When people give you information, you're gonna be like, this is too much for me. Do you need to have a glass of wine on a couch? If you like to look at charts and pie graphs, if you like to talk on the phone and not do zoom, like, what is it that you like to do and how, and who can teach that to you in a way that's not gonna paralyze you and make you feel like you actually can run five miles instead of running four. So I would say just chip away at one. Like a simple thing for an entrepreneur and then I'll hit the retirement part is just how much cash did your business generate in a year? And that's on January 1st, you have this amount of money in the bank, December 31st, you had this amount of money in the bank. Where did the money go? And any financial advisor? That focuses on business money or a CFO, or maybe a bookkeeper, probably a CPA too. They can tell that to you. So that's that you have any comments on that? Or you want me to go to the other part of your question?

Natasha Miller:

No, I mean, I'm right there with you. And then as far as the cash is, and I learned this last week, you know, as entrepreneurs, we're looking at profit and loss, we're looking at what is our net income.

Justin Krane:

Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

But we really need to be looking at, of course, that. What is the cash? How much out of all accounts do we have? We could have a profit and no cash.

Justin Krane:

Yes.

Natasha Miller:

That work. Let's not talk about it now.

Justin Krane:

Yes.

Natasha Miller:

Go ahead with your next one.

Justin Krane:

Yes. So the second part is it's about clarity and I'm sure this has happened to you. Should I? Buy those shoes, there are 400 bucks, but if I buy those shoes and I'm going on vacation and I'm spending 500 a night over here, but then am I gonna be able to pay business class over here for that ticket? I probably don't know if I should be doing all that. I need to put more money away for retirement. I really wanted to pay my mortgage down and I saw my friend on Facebook working three days a week and making all this money and living the best. What am I supposed to do? And how do I get there? So we have 9 million mental conversations with ourselves a day around money. Now I'm making that up. Of course you.

Natasha Miller:

Certainly are because that would kill us all.

Justin Krane:

But yeah, but what I'm talking about is, is soon as you introduce maybe three variables around money in your head, you can't compute and have any clarity on what that would look like in five years or 10 years. So let's role play with me. You're gonna need $20,000 a month to live on. No, you're gonna need $10,000 a month to live on. If you save $40,000 a year and you sell your business for X, can you get that? Oh, but wait a minute. You wanna spend two months in Italy and live on a Villa, but then all of a sudden you wanna be philanthropic and you wanna donate some money each year. Can you do that? I don't know. These variables and these conversations, they need to go on a spreadsheet with software.

Natasha Miller:

Yeah.

Justin Krane:

Period. End of story. Right. Iterate it. Look at scenarios, get your head out of the sand, get a little bit more clarity, have that glass of wine and figure it out.

Natasha Miller:

So there's no one number for any of us. I think some people think, oh, I have a million dollars in my retirement, funder savings or whatever. And that should do it for me for a lot of people, you know, that would work. Depends on how old, old, I mean, somebody just told me their father's almost turning a hundred.

Justin Krane:

Yeah. Life expectancy.

Natasha Miller:

Yeah. Like, okay. That's who knows? Maybe just depends on the style of living. Okay. We're gonna switch gears here.

Justin Krane:

Okay, cool.

Natasha Miller:

How do you feel about investing in crypto?

Justin Krane:

I have no idea. No clue. I don't even get. I have no opinion. I don't invest in it for my clients. I'm not even going down that path because I don't feel like I completely understand it. And I know I can Google it and understand it that way, but until it's really regulated more, I'm not gonna go down that path. I'm gonna say do that on your own.

Natasha Miller:

Yeah. Funny money, play money, right?

Justin Krane:

Yeah. Yeah. It's also like, it's a good lesson for all of us. It's okay to say no, and to really not know everything.

Natasha Miller:

Right. Well, okay. Along those lines, I'm going to make the assumption and you can correct me that you are not dabbling in the world of NFTs.

Justin Krane:

No, I kind of know what it is, but like, I don't want to go down the rabbit hole of getting into that. Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

So if I were your client and I would say, "Hey, I'm interested in crypto." I mean, there are major financial institutions that are taking this on as a-

Justin Krane:

Yeah. Yeah. I would refer it out. I have referred it out.

Natasha Miller:

Yeah. And so that's what you do. Totally. You say, absolutely. Do not do that. It's too risky. It's not mature enough. It's not stabilized. You would say, "Hmm. I'm not the expert on that specific thing, here's somebody."

Justin Krane:

Yeah. Yeah. Until the SCC re really regulates it and gets it more just way more regulation. Like my Eno insurance. I don't really think it covers that. I doubt if it.

Natasha Miller:

Right. Gotta protect yourself and your advice, right?

Justin Krane:

Yeah. How about you? What do you think?

Natasha Miller:

Yeah, I've invested a little bit to experience it, not certainly on a whim to make money. I'm not saying, "oh my God, this is incredible, I'm gonna be rich." Same with NFTs. I've invested in one, I own NFT and I have some coins from Gary Vaynerchuk. Who's really leading a bunch of entrepreneurs on the NFT trail. Yeah. I mean, at one point when I was starting to learn about this and ETH was affordable to me, right. One Ethereum, it's not something that I would go for. You know, I wouldn't invest in one whole Ethereum.

Justin Krane:

Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

Right now, but there are people that I know from EO, even that have bought like a $200,000 crypto punk or whatever, and that's also their life and their lifestyle. They're gamers and their risk takers in a different way than I am. But I'm the kind of person who wants to delve in and learn as much about things that are interesting to me. But they don't have to sync my whole life savings and everything that I'm interested in.

Justin Krane:

Totally.

Natasha Miller:

Yeah. So let's talk about what is your definition? This was interesting that I read that you noted return on life.

Justin Krane:

So I think what it is is, so at the end of the day, we're gonna look back on our life and we're probably gonna, from what I hear that people do is is they look at their experiences. And they evaluate their life that way. And, and maybe a little bit about legacy. And I think if you use your money, that's congruent with what your values are and kind of like grow on that with experiences. You're gonna have a return on your life. And I think people that are just looking at just a return on investment, without it being put in the context of what they want to make them happy and what drives them. It's like you're living in a world of a vacuum and it's a much better way to go about where you feel good about the decisions that you make. You feel good about how you spend your money and how you save it. And it's a great ride. It's a good experience rather than like, just looking at how much money you make or just how much you spend. I think it's about return on life, totally.

Natasha Miller:

I like that thought process. And, and I met someone recently. Who's quite young, younger than I am. And he was just hell bent on making 20 or 30 million in the market. Like speculating.

Justin Krane:

Yeah, yeah.

Natasha Miller:

Trading and I looked and he was just so like wrenched with, I don't know, fear and I'm thinking, well, what the heck are you gonna do with that much money? What is that about?

Justin Krane:

And if you make 30 versus 25, like, does it change you?

Natasha Miller:

Right. So in your walk of life, I'm wondering, do you work with a lot of entrepreneurs that have the sense that you were just talking about that life and experiences Trump? Oh God. Why did I use that word? Overpower the ROI. And are those people happier in your van from your vantage point?

Justin Krane:

So, let me ask you this. You're now my guest on your show. Fine enough. Do you think it's easy to change people's way that they think, or do you think they need to come to their own conclusion on themselves by themselves based on their own experiences?

Natasha Miller:

I'm personally shaped by the ones of my own experience with the help at the right time, right place of the prompting of other people in their thought leadership.

Justin Krane:

Yeah. Let's say that you have a really, really good friend and they have breast cancer and they had a serious, serious scare where it's your cousin. And you're like, "oh my God, that could be me." All of a sudden, it's a game changer for you because you realize that life is fragile. Maybe you do wanna take that vacation. Maybe you do wanna donate to charity. Maybe you do wanna. Just go for a walk on the beach and not work one day or whatever, but it's gonna be that much more real to you because you have an experience that you can identify with.

Natasha Miller:

Right.

Justin Krane:

Versus just telling someone that they need return on life. It's like, what does that mean? Right. But as soon as they see a friend, it becomes that much more real to them. They can internalize it and make financial decisions that they feel are good for them. And look at themselves in the mirror and say, I'm doing.

Natasha Miller:

Yeah, that's a good way to frame it. Okay. So it's unfortunate. The next question I wanna talk about actually has to do with money, but it's okay. That's no bring it on. Right. But compounding of interest, I didn't-

Justin Krane:

Love that.

Natasha Miller:

Anything about it.

Justin Krane:

Love that!

Natasha Miller:

Anything about it. And I mean, nothing about it until maybe when my daughter was in elementary school. I may have just started getting, I think I was being educated by Susie Orman actually at that point.

Justin Krane:

Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

Still had very little money myself. And I remember trying to tell my daughter about investing and why she shouldn't. Specifically run up bills on credit cards and to pay them off. So she doesn't have to pay like that thing that cost a hundred dollars that you put on your credit card ends up costing 126, right. That kind of a thing. And then started talking to her about compound interest and she's like, Yeah, mom. I know about that. "I'm like, Ugh."

Justin Krane:

Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

Okay. So bring it on.

Justin Krane:

What do you wanna talk about? So my daughter, so she's 17. Yeah. And the whole compounding of interest is like you invest a hundred dollars a month in 40 years. You'll have 4 billion. Right? All of that. So you tell someone who's 17 about a 40 year compounding of interest. And they're not about 40 years. They're about how many Snapchat likes do I have right now? And like, where am I going to dinner? So we now live in a world of everything right now. like, everything is right now. And the whole thing with compounding of interest is lots and lots of time in being patient and not reacting to the BS of the media on panicking people about anything. It's about just investing really for the long term. I know that's so hokey, but that. I mean, Warren buffet. I listened to this podcast interview by his first name is Morgan. He wrote a book called the psychology of money. He was on Tim Ferris's show and he talked about, and I bought his book and I read it. It's about Warren buffet. Like Warren Buffet's it's the wrong percentage, but like 60% of Warren Buffet's net worth happened after he was age 65. In his eighties now I think he's 90, I think, because what happened was he had invested for so long and the compounding kicked in, I'm making this in years 30 to 40 and that's where, but people nowadays it's like, they want everything right now. And I think the world needs a little bit more perspective and long term structure and compounding on a lot. I mean, did you become successful over. No, it's the Picasso napkin, $50,000 cartoon drawing spiel.

Natasha Miller:

Right? Right.

Justin Krane:

I love compounding of interest. Love. Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

Okay. I see that. I love that, but I will tell you, I understand it. And I'm older than my daughter. Who's 26 and you're older than your daughter. That's 17. Clearly of course you have to be, but I still want things in the moment and I still have to talk myself down. I guess I'm old enough to have that. I want it in the moment, but then there is a voice that eventually kicks in at some point. Yeah. The voice of reason, right? Yeah. But younger people. I remember when I was working in my early twenties and had a 401k, I, I couldn't fathom why I would put something in an account that I wouldn't be able to get out until way longer. And of course, you know, a little bit about my background. That was not how I was.

Justin Krane:

Yeah, no for sure. Absolutely. I mean, you want your. How am I gonna survive today? Right. But I think as you age, and this really happened to me after my father passed away, is that you see that you're mortal and you're not going to live forever. And as you get older, you see that. And the thing that I tell people is the fact, I never really realize this, but I've bridged the gap for them. So if you're 20 years old, and you're thinking about, I don't know where I'm gonna be when I'm 65. That's crazy. But here's something that I think a lot of the millennials can grasp. At some point you're gonna be married. You might have a house and you might have kids, they'll get that. They're like, okay. Yeah. And I'm like, okay, well, when you're married with kids and you're changing diapers and you're 30 years old or 40, you're gonna have a busier life with more obligations and it's gonna be harder to save, cuz you're gonna be spending money on other things as well. So imagine being 45 and having had put money away and got that compounding for 20 years and then I just would make it up like instead of putting away $20,000 for your retirement. What if you only had to put away 13,000 and you could take that 7,000 and go buy shoes with it, or a vacation or like relentless books, whatever it is. right. And they're like, oh, that's cool. You may not. Won't be so stressed out when I'm 35 and married with two little takes. Yeah, they get that. And that's what gets them going?

Natasha Miller:

You bring it a little closer to where they're now. Yeah, I love that. Okay. Here's a hard question. It might be super easy, but do you take your own advice?

Justin Krane:

Most of the time, yes, I did this one, this return on life three years ago. So my daughter. I was taking her to Italy and the trip got canceled because my dad passed away around that time. So we put it on hold and then I knew that one of our best friends' kids was gonna be bar Mitz fit in Israel. And I'm like, I gotta do it. Like, it's my,

Natasha Miller:

By the way, it's a four hour flight from Israel to Italy. Yeah. But I'll let you.

Justin Krane:

They were separate trips. My wife's like, you're flying with us. You're not going with our daughter and coming home and all, you know, like you're coming home and we're gonna go as a family. So it was really, really hard for me to spend the money, to take my daughter to Italy, to come back, to take our whole family, to Israel and London. It was very, very hard for me to spend the money. It just got hard, but I knew I was doing something that I could live with. And now looking back with three years of COVID and, or two, whatever, not people traveling I'm like, that was a great decision. So I had to make a decision that was right for me. Mm-hmm even though it was a little bit painful, it was a good thing. So do I follow my advice most of the time? Yes. Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

Are you set for retirement?

Justin Krane:

Am I set for retirement? So I got divorced when I was 40. So when you get divorced, I don't care how wealthy you are. It's a reset. So am I set for retirement a hundred percent? No. Am I on my way? Totally. You have your plan. I have a plan. I know how much I need to put away. I have a business, it produces income. I've got a plan on saving, I'm diversified, and I know that I'm gonna be okay. But I had to get right in the beginning at age 40 of like, okay, you can do this, go again. but you gotta persevere and you gotta stick to.

Natasha Miller:

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So about your business, you have a couple of people on your team, is that correct?

Justin Krane:

Yeah. Yep.

Natasha Miller:

How big is your team? It's three.

Justin Krane:

So I have one VA and two staff members.

Natasha Miller:

Okay. What do you do with the small team for culture and core values and stickiness and yeah. Making sure that they're with you, like for as long as you can keep them.

Justin Krane:

Yeah. I think it's about learning and grow. And finding out what it is that they want to do to learn and grow. I also think financial is important in some respect, so that they're happy with that. But look with COVID. It's been hard. I mean, they're now still remote and we're working on bringing them back into the office, but how do you encourage growth in community and culture in a COVID world where you're not together every day and where you can't even get together? So my way is to be real and to share with them what I'm doing and ask them what's important to them. And give some of that to them.

Natasha Miller:

Cause what's important to, you may not have any bearing on what's important to them and they vice versa. They may not understand. So that's great that you're able to really ask the question and not just make the assumption.

Justin Krane:

For sure. Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

And then lastly, I wanna talk about your strategy within your business to grow, to attract new, better, bigger clients or whatever you're doing. Is there one thing you're really just focused on learn the middle of the year for the rest of the year?

Justin Krane:

Yeah, I think the biggest thing that I come back to and it's a total work in progress for us is the client's experience. Every single way that we touch them. What's happening, period. How does the email look when they read an email from us?

Natasha Miller:

Good for you. Yeah. I just wanna stop for applause because I haven't really heard that from. I mean, I think I've interviewed over 70 episodes have aired.

Justin Krane:

Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

And no one has responded with that. And I very much appreciate that.

Justin Krane:

Thank you.

Natasha Miller:

And I'm all about experience design and it is important to me. So you're like talking.

Justin Krane:

Yeah. So here's an example. We spend a week on this and if my clients are listening great. We don't know yet if we're gonna pull it off but I'm gonna say it anyways, cuz it'll be after the fact. So we got father's day coming up.

Natasha Miller:

Yes.

Justin Krane:

So we have everyone's FA and we did for mother's day, we sent one of those face masks in a card. Everyone loved it. I'm like, they're not gonna like that. And my two staff,

Natasha Miller:

What do you mean face masks? You mean like the snail gooey ones that-

Justin Krane:

The thing you put on your face and you, and like, and they're like, no, everyone's gonna love it. Everyone's gonna love it. So, we sent it and I, everyone was like, thank you. This was great. And I'm like, so first of all, I kind of, I kind of asked my staff about that. And now for the dads, we're trying to get this chocolate bar to be able to go in an envelope with a really cool dad image and like funny saying to go in the card. But we've tested it out and the thing breaks, it of might melt and we're like, oh my God, what are we doing?

Natasha Miller:

Should order a lot of them.

Justin Krane:

Right. Well, so we first we tested it and we got one, but it broken the mail. And then we just went and we bought a Hershey bar and we tried to put it in and we tested that and it melted. So we're like, we're not doing that. So we got another one which we're working on. I also have a very, very curated getting to know you process with interview questions. And we're now really working on managing the data. So it's decline experience that, and we're like a four outta a 10 on this. Like, we gotta get to like a six and then a seven and then an eight, but that's-

Natasha Miller:

Are you following anybody's guidelines? Are you making this up as you go?

Justin Krane:

Totally making it up as I go.

Natasha Miller:

Interesting. You probably know of this person. I think he's an EO or was, I think he is John Ruen.

Justin Krane:

Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

Giftology.

Justin Krane:

Giftology, yeah. That's a book that I have to read.

Natasha Miller:

Yeah. It's an interesting idea. Like I just hired a business development manager for the first time ever for ENTIRE PRODUCTIONS and she was talking about. What she did in her past job. And for some reason it got too gifting and how you gift. And I was like, listen, we're not giving gifts at Christmas and on birthdays. Yeah. And as a thank you for business, I learned that through John Ruen.

Justin Krane:

Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

And you know, it is part of that experience design and that authentic connection to clients. Not the other thing is mistake. No client is getting a happy birthday wish from me, but

Justin Krane:

Yeah, like, and also I'm in a regulated industry. I can't like go send a gift card for $400 to someone.

Natasha Miller:

Can you send a cut code knife?

Justin Krane:

Yeah, exactly. Like I can't there's limits on what you can do in ways, you know, that you have to be on the up and up and play by the rules, which we do. But I also think like it's important to be clever. That's the word that I like, like, oh my God, how did they think of that? What do they get that? Like, if I get a bottle of wine from someone I don't drink white, I don't drink,

Natasha Miller:

I don't drink at all. I get a lot of wine.

Justin Krane:

Yeah. But when they send me, I'm like, did they take the time to look? So we get a lot of people knocking our doors to promote whatever it is. For on their, their stuff on our clients. And I probably turned down most of it because it's not well thought out. Yeah.

Natasha Miller:

Justin, is there anything else that you wanna talk about that we did not approach during this time together?

Justin Krane:

I just wanna say I had so much fun watching you sing and read your book. And I was in the back. But I felt like, and I don't know why I was in the back. Maybe it's just cause I was sitting in the back or maybe I went to the bathroom and then you came on stage and I'm like, I don't wanna interrupt you. But I felt like I was literally right in front of you and your music and your voice, even the guy playing with you that just, everything was great. And you know, sometimes connecting with people happens in a different way than you're expecting.

Natasha Miller:

We didn't have a one on one, really, those two days.

Justin Krane:

No. Yeah, no, no. But,

Natasha Miller:

And look at us now.

Justin Krane:

And I also think sometimes things happen for a reason and sometimes I don't know, there's more to that. Like relentless to me, it's a deep word.

Natasha Miller:

For more information, go to the show notes where you're listening to this podcast. Wanna know more about me go to my website, OfficialNatashaMiller.com. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you loved the show. If you did, please subscribe also, if you haven't done so yet, please leave a review where you're listening to this podcast now. I'm Natasha Miller and you've been listening to FASCINATING ENTREPRENEURS.

Justin KraneProfile Photo

Justin Krane

MR

Justin Krane, a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER (TM) professional, is the founder of Krane Financial Solutions. Known for his savvy, holistic approach to financial planning, he advises his clients on how to unite their business and personal money with their lives.

Justin works with his clients to create purpose driven financial plans – aiming for a “return on life.” He manages his clients’ investment portfolios for their long term goals such as retirement.

Justin is the author of the book, Money. You Got This. It’s a book about everyday crazy funny life experiences that we all have – with lessons for all of us.

Justin received his Certified Investment Management Analyst SM (CIMA®) designation from Investment Management Consultants Association and in conjunction with The Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

He is married and lives with his wife and three children in Calabasas, California. Justin is an accomplished athlete and was a former junior ranked tennis player in Los Angeles. He loves to cook, travel, speak Italian, and spend time with his family.