Alfred Poor is a keynote speaker and a virtual event technology expert. He is the founder of The 75% Solution where he guides executives and business leaders to be their best in video meetings and online presentations. He helps them an impression that is coherent with their company brand and messaging. He is also the Chief Technology Information Officer for VEG: The Virtual Events Group. A graduate of Harvard College, he is the author or co-author of 15 books and is widely quoted in major media outlets. He brings energy and humor to his presentations and tailors his programs to match the technical levels and interests of his audience.

Key Moments

[05:17] Helped with TV changes, bought health website.

[07:15] Remote work makes online meetings essential.

[11:11] Balancing work and family for personal fulfillment.

[12:57] Maintain cash for long-term financial stability.

Find Alfred Online

https://the75percent.com

https://alfredpoor.com

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/alfredpoor/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/AlfredPoor

Facebook: https://facebook.com/alfred.poor

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Transcript Provided By CastMagic.io

Seth [00:00:00]:
Entrepreneur’s Enigma is a podcast for the ups and downs of entrepreneurship, so the wins and the fails that we all face being entrepreneurs, how we learn from adversity. Every week, I talk to a different entrepreneur with a story to tell. I’m Seth Goldstein. Come with me on the journey. This is Entrepreneur’s Enigma. Let’s get started. Hey, everybody. Welcome to another edition of the Entrepreneurs in Lima podcast.

Seth [00:00:34]:
I am as always your host With the mostest, Seth, I haven’t done this for 200 plus episodes, so you should know me by now. But if you don’t, I am the founder of Goldstein Media. I am the host, of course, of Entrepreneurs Enigma. And I bring people on this show that are interesting and have entrepreneurial journeys that are much more interesting than mine. Today, I have Alfred Poor, who I know through the founders institutes in, at least, the Philadelphia chapter. He’s a keynote speaker, a virtual event technology expert. He’s the founder of the 75% solution where he guides executives and business leaders to be the best in their video meetings and online presentations. As you can see, you know, when we bring him in here, he has a nice background.

Seth [00:01:20]:
He’s a little bit he’s in a corporate office, and he’s really probably in his spare bedroom. He won’t admit it. Hey, maybe you will. He is a graduate of Harvard College, which I think is part of Harvard University. You can correct me if I’m wrong on that. He is a co author and author of more than 15 books. That’s, that’s a ridiculous amount of books. So he’s prolific, and is widely quoted at main major media outlets.

Seth [00:01:47]:
And he is a very energetic guy, which I can vouch for. So So let’s bring Alfred in here. How’s it going, buddy?

Alfred [00:01:55]:
Going very, very well. Glad to be here.

Seth [00:01:57]:
Harvard College. Is that part of Harvard University or is that

Alfred [00:02:00]:
I I have a PhD. And so and so I say college so that people don’t think that I got my doctorate from Harvard. Yeah. I got my I got my bachelor’s at Harvard and Got my PhD elsewhere. So Where do you where do you That’s why I specify the college.

Seth [00:02:15]:
Oh, where do you get PhD from?

Alfred [00:02:19]:
From a program called it was Union Graduate School. It’s now got a, a a different name, but, it was, an experimental degree program that I was involved in.

Seth [00:02:29]:
That makes that’s right up your alley. It’s literally right up your alley. Let’s do something nontraditional and, like, techie, and let’s try it out and all that stuff. Hey. It’s doctor Alfred Poor. There you go. That’s a nice rental. I like that.

Alfred [00:02:42]:
That’s my son.

Seth [00:02:43]:
Oh, is he is he a PhD too?

Alfred [00:02:46]:
He no. He’s an MD.

Seth [00:02:47]:
Oh, he’s a medical doctor.

Alfred [00:02:48]:
So you’re a he’s a doctor who can fix you. I can just talk to you real.

Seth [00:02:52]:
You’re just a you’re just a thinking doctor.

Alfred [00:02:53]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Seth [00:02:55]:
Awesome. So how did have you always been entrepreneur? Have you been in the

Alfred [00:02:58]:
corporate world at all before? Like, I

Seth [00:03:01]:
I how did this all get started? I mean, like, I

Alfred [00:03:02]:
was gonna I I have not held a job in probably 40 years. So

Seth [00:03:08]:
How many years?

Alfred [00:03:10]:
40, probably.

Seth [00:03:11]:
Oh, wow.

Alfred [00:03:12]:
Yeah. Yeah. No. Yeah. 40 years. Well, almost 42. But anyway, Yeah. I started straight out of college as a as a classroom teacher.

Seth [00:03:23]:
Okay.

Alfred [00:03:23]:
Teaching middle school science. And I discovered that I was a really good teacher and I really enjoyed it, but I was not good in 45 minute segments.

Seth [00:03:31]:
Oh, too verbose?

Alfred [00:03:34]:
Well, not too verbose. I just wasn’t organized well enough and I wasn’t Yeah. But what got to me was, Yeah. I would say to 7th 8th graders whose minds were like sponges, and they’re so exciting and great to teach.

Seth [00:03:47]:
Yeah.

Alfred [00:03:49]:
But every time the bell rang, you know, another class would come in and, you know, at least 1 of those kids, that was their day. That was when they were ready. That’s when I could Could reach them. And I wasn’t always always prepared to do that. Yeah.

Seth [00:04:01]:
It was constant restart, restart, restart, restart. Yeah.

Alfred [00:04:04]:
I just be ready for them and be able to to deliver for them When they’re ready. And and I’m just not that consistent. I’m the kind of guy who might get more work done in a week than most people, but it could happen Tuesday morning and Part of Thursday, and it’s not Yeah.

Seth [00:04:18]:
You’re more of entrepreneur mindset. Get it done when you get it done. Less structure is better for you.

Alfred [00:04:23]:
Exactly. And and Things also percolate. I’ve wandered around a bit, ended up riding for PC Magazine for over 20 years.

Seth [00:04:29]:
Oh, wow. That’s a good magazine. Yeah.

Alfred [00:04:32]:
And, after that, I like to say when when the, computer you want cost $3,000, people care which one’s best. But when it costs $300, they don’t care?

Seth [00:04:45]:
Yeah. That’s pretty much the truth. Yeah.

Alfred [00:04:47]:
So I stopped what writing for PC Magazine. I had been their display expert. So, that was about the time that the analog to digital transition was coming on, and and so people were confused. What’s HD? What’s a flat Screen, what’s, you know, what are the television?

Seth [00:05:03]:
Yeah. I wrote the article for my local newspaper on the digital transition. Yep. Yeah.

Alfred [00:05:07]:
So when People, you know, when the TV you want costs $5,000, people care.

Seth [00:05:13]:
And now it doesn’t matter. Now if it’s $200 for the same thing, it’s even better. Yeah.

Alfred [00:05:17]:
And they don’t care. But so I had about a Good 5, 6 year run helping people understand the the changes in television and the technologies and all. And then casting about, I was looking to see what came was was coming next and I thought it was gonna be wearables. And so a friend of mine was starting a bunch of websites, and I took the one on health and medical applications. Oh. And He ended up having enough fun after a year or 2, so I bought it from him.

Seth [00:05:43]:
Oh, that’s fun. Yeah.

Alfred [00:05:44]:
And so I I ran that for, It was active for for 9 years. We stopped publishing new content last spring, but that was after 9 years and over 35 100 articles.

Seth [00:05:55]:
Oh, wow. That’s a lot of articles. Yeah.

Alfred [00:05:57]:
It’s a lot of articles. And I wrote I wrote about half of them, but I signed and edited all of them. So

Seth [00:06:03]:
Oh, jeez. You’re busy. You’re busy.

Alfred [00:06:04]:
So I was I was I was pretty busy with that. So I I know a bit about health technology. You know, a little bit.

Seth [00:06:10]:
A little bit.

Alfred [00:06:11]:
That’s some of the stuff that I, talk about in my keynote speeches. But, the the the 75% solution project Is the thing I’ve been working on for a couple years.

Seth [00:06:21]:
Yes. So why is the 75 per 75% solution?

Alfred [00:06:25]:
So that comes from A report from Gartner, which is the big industry analyst group.

Seth [00:06:32]:
We’re gonna take a quick break, hear from our sponsors, and get right back to the show. Yeah. They know when those what they actually do. Yeah.

Alfred [00:06:38]:
Yeah. And they, they came out with this, a study, and they said 75% Of all business meetings, that’s internal and external, 75% of all business meetings will be held online In by 2024, by next year.

Seth [00:06:55]:
When did this come out again?

Alfred [00:06:57]:
The the the report came out last year, I guess.

Seth [00:07:00]:
Oh, so it was after the pandemic. So they they they saw the brighten law.

Alfred [00:07:03]:
Pandemic. Yeah. This is definitely post pandemic. And looking ahead, saying one of the things I would point out is we wouldn’t be doing this if one of us had to travel travel to the other person’s studio.

Seth [00:07:12]:
No. It would be I wouldn’t be a 200 episodes. I could tell you that much.

Alfred [00:07:15]:
Yeah. Exactly. So It’s too convenient. It’s too efficient. It’s too effective, for us to not use it. And so and now with working from home and hybrid Teams and all that, even the internal meetings are gonna be a lot more online. So What I’ve discovered, and you may have noticed this, that, a lot of people who are very intentional about how they Are gonna appear if they’re gonna be meeting in a boardroom or if they’re gonna be on stage. You know, they’ve got that all put together and you You take them to a zoom meeting or something like that.

Seth [00:07:55]:
And it

Alfred [00:07:56]:
looks like, and it looks like they’ve joined witness protection. Right?

Seth [00:08:00]:
Yeah.

Alfred [00:08:01]:
So so my point is that isn’t intentional. That probably isn’t the image that they want to project.

Seth [00:08:09]:
No. You just don’t think I know better. Yeah.

Alfred [00:08:11]:
For their brand. Mhmm. And and so part of the the 75% solution is about is helping Industry leaders, executives, and especially founders of new startups, help them be more intentional about how they come across, about That’s

Seth [00:08:29]:
very important. Yeah.

Alfred [00:08:30]:
Whether it’s on brand, on message for their company. And also, importantly, whether it’s on Target for for them personally and professionally, is that the image that they wanna project? Mhmm. Yeah. And the the problem is that the the pandemic taught us that With these meetings, you just open up your laptop wherever you are by the pool, in the kitchen, in your in your hotel bedroom, and and and go, you know, go ahead with it.

Seth [00:08:56]:
But that was during the pandemic. We’re we’re now, post pandemic or now endemic. And it’s like, now you come on, let’s get let’s get our act together now.

Alfred [00:09:04]:
Let’s Get get your act together. Let’s be intentional about it. And, basically working with my clients, I have I have worked on improvements that meet what I call the the three i’s. I help clients make improvements that are incremental, intentional, And impactful.

Seth [00:09:23]:
Love it.

Alfred [00:09:23]:
So and and if this holds true for any kind of change you wanna make, but it’s especially true for this. You wanna make incremental changes. Don’t try to fix everything at once. Intentional. Don’t accept the defaults. Whatever you’re doing, do it on purpose. Whether it’s Yeah. The clothes you’re wearing or, you know, where you are or whatever.

Alfred [00:09:41]:
Mhmm. And then impactful. Choose the things that are gonna make the biggest difference, And do those 1st. Get the biggest return on your investment of time and money. And then and and a lot of the changes you make won’t cost you anything in terms of money. And then once you have that working, then go on and do the next thing.

Seth [00:09:59]:
Love that, dude. Love that. So Alfred, What in your mind is the best thing about being an entrepreneur? Because you said you’ve been doing this, like, 40 some years. You tried the teaching thing. You’re like, well, it’s a little too structured. What’s the best thing in your mind about being entrepreneur?

Alfred [00:10:15]:
So to back that up just one little step, I think Yeah. What I’ve learned And and built my career on is my superpower is being able to explain things to people in ways that they can use.

Seth [00:10:27]:
I love that. Yeah.

Alfred [00:10:29]:
Okay. And being an entrepreneur has given me the opportunity to do that.

Seth [00:10:35]:
Love it.

Alfred [00:10:35]:
There you go. It’s to me, it when I was working at PC Magazine, one of the, project leaders in PC Magazine Labs announced that he was leaving And moving out of New York, he was moving to to Seattle.

Seth [00:10:52]:
Yeah.

Alfred [00:10:53]:
And he was gonna work for this guy who was gonna start selling books on the Internet.

Seth [00:10:57]:
Oh, I wonder who that could be.

Alfred [00:11:01]:
I think he was his employee number 17.

Seth [00:11:04]:
Oh, wow.

Alfred [00:11:05]:
Yeah. He’s not working anymore. He he hasn’t been working for a long time. He he

Seth [00:11:09]:
guy and he made the right choice. Yeah.

Alfred [00:11:11]:
But but For me, it’s not it it hasn’t been about the money first. It’s been about have am I making enough money that I can Provide for my family, but then also be there for my family. Yeah. So, you know, doing what I’ve been able to do, I’ve been able to go to the wrestling matches and the dance recitals. You know, I’ve been able to do a lot of the things that a lot of parents don’t have the opportunity to do. And there you know, there’s a trade off there, but it’s one that I’m I’m very happy to have made.

Seth [00:11:41]:
So Absolutely.

Alfred [00:11:42]:
I for me, I think it’s first of all, a a life without a salary Is not a lot of people It’s

Seth [00:11:50]:
not for everybody. Yeah.

Alfred [00:11:51]:
I’m built for that. But if you can handle the uncertainty And and ride out the highs and lows. It gives you a lot of freedom. And

Seth [00:12:01]:
It does. It does.

Alfred [00:12:03]:
And and A lot of opportunity to shape your, your work life balance. Obviously some people get sucked into it and lose themselves in their work or whatever, but, You know, it just does give you more of an opportunity to make some of those choices.

Seth [00:12:18]:
That’s fantastic. So then on the flip side, what keeps you up at night being an entrepreneur?

Alfred [00:12:23]:
These days not much. I’ve been at a long run, but not not much shakes me up. But yeah. I think one of the big things I have told over the years with mentor, you know, with with Freelancers and and and entrepreneurs who I’ve I’ve helped mentor. One of the problems is as your revenue goes along, You have the tendency to think, well, that’s just a dip. It’s gonna come right back. But then on the other hand, if it goes like this, oh, that’s a trend. Yeah.

Alfred [00:12:57]:
Now we’re done. Right? And the fact is neither of those are necessarily true. The debt could last a long time. So You wanna keep enough cash, enough liquidity, so you can ride those out and not Absolutely. Yeah. Desperately. And then on, you know, Don’t get too high. Don’t get too low.

Alfred [00:13:14]:
Things look like they’re picking up. Be happy about that. Put some more weight there. Don’t take your foot off the pedal.

Seth [00:13:20]:
Absolutely. It’s awesome. So then what is the most important thing we carry with you all the time?

Alfred [00:13:27]:
Business cards. What’s that? Business cards.

Seth [00:13:31]:
Oh, that’s key. Yeah. Because you never know who you need.

Alfred [00:13:34]:
Because this is old school and, you know, and now everybody says, oh, here, just tap your phone to mine and, you know,

Seth [00:13:40]:
Yeah. Which

Alfred [00:13:41]:
is which is which is cool and and maybe better, but, you’d never know who you’re gonna run into. Mhmm. Right. And you’re gonna be in a conversation at a bus stop, you know, at, at Somebody else’s meeting and you’re at a at a family gathering in the backyard or neighbors.

Seth [00:14:00]:
Always have a card with you. Yeah.

Alfred [00:14:02]:
If you have a card with you, Whether they’ve got the phone or whatever, with a card, you always can handle hand that out. And, I mean, literally, I live it. This, my my business card holder lives in my pants pocket.

Seth [00:14:17]:
How many times has that been washed?

Alfred [00:14:19]:
The yeah. Take it out for the wash. But the one, concession that I’ve made to being modern is I put a QR code on the back of it.

Seth [00:14:30]:
Love it. Love

Alfred [00:14:30]:
it. Easy for for them to get the

Seth [00:14:32]:
scan it. And then, also, if you only have 1, you can say, just scan it, please. I need that Well,

Alfred [00:14:36]:
not. Yeah. Well, I’ve got the whole you know, always have a whole stack with me, and

Seth [00:14:41]:
it’s You never know when you have any other one. You never know, buddy. You never know. So where can people find you? So, Alfred, where can people find you online if they wanna learn more about the 75% solution?

Alfred [00:14:51]:
Really simple. Just go to the 75%. So the t h e seven five, the digits, seven five and then percent .com.

Seth [00:15:01]:
Spelled out. Yes.

Alfred [00:15:02]:
And if you can’t remember that alfredpoor.com always

Seth [00:15:05]:
works. That and Alfred Poor on LinkedIn, I’m sure.

Alfred [00:15:08]:
Yeah. Alfred Poor. What does what does somebody called me an OG, which I thought meant old guy. I

Seth [00:15:18]:
think he’s original gangster, but like Yeah.

Alfred [00:15:21]:
Yeah. He had to explain it to me. But what are what are the advantages of being an OG, whether Whether it’s old guy or original gangster, I’m not sure which, but it means you get to have your name on all the social media because you got there first.

Seth [00:15:33]:
I think I’m one spot. I’m not no. 2 spots. I’m Seth m Goldstein. But other than that, I’m Seth Goldstein everywhere. Yeah. If I if I choose today.

Alfred [00:15:43]:
Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn. Got

Seth [00:15:46]:
it all, buddy. That’s okay. Well, Alfred has been so great to get a chat and all that.

Alfred [00:15:51]:
It’s been fun.

Seth [00:15:52]:
And And, and if anyone wants to find find you online, check him out. He’s he’s accessible. He likes to chat. He’s out there. And, which is

Alfred [00:16:00]:
If you’re in the Philadelphia area, I’ve been attending a lot of the a lot of the meetups.

Seth [00:16:05]:
Yes. It’s really startup leaders. He’s there every time on the vocal wagons. Yep. Literally, he pops, you know, you turn your head and then, hey, there’s Alfred.

Alfred [00:16:14]:
And you’ll probably recognize me because, Again,

Seth [00:16:17]:
branding always wear the vest

Alfred [00:16:19]:
and the wisdom. This is the brand. So

Seth [00:16:21]:
He’s got a brand. It’s awesome. Alright, Alfred. We will see you and everyone else, next time.

Alfred [00:16:28]:
Thanks so much.

Seth [00:16:29]:
That was a great show. If you’re enjoying Entrepreneur’s Enigma, please view us in the podcast directory of your choice. Every review helps other podcast listeners find our show. If you’re looking for other podcasts in the marketing space, look no further than the Marketing Podcast Network at marketing podcasts.net. Goldstein hopes you have enjoyed this episode.