Bill Hibbler: I’m doing great Ralph. How about you?
Ralph Zuranski: I’m doing great too. I was wondering if you could sort of tell us what you’re doing now.
Bill Hibbler: I do a couple of different things, Ralph. The way I started out in internet marketing was kind of becoming like the consumer watch dog for the internet marketing crowd. Basically reviewing products and basically just sharing my experiences. You know, “I bought this. It’s great.” There are a lot of people doing, “I bought this and it’s great.” So I’ll just come out and say, “I bought this and it’s really not so great. Avoid this” A lot of people come in and they pull out their credit cards and they start buying tons of things, a lot of which isn’t that great and not necessarily what they need. Then I also teach people to create their own information products. It’s the most profitable thing that you can sell online. I am just basically enabling people to live the same kind of lifestyle I’ve been able to do.
Ralph Zuranski: Weren’t you a DJ for a while? And also, did you travel with the band that you represented? A famous rock group?
Bill Hibbler: I started out in selling guitars, vintage guitars, to rock stars when I was 15. If you’ve ever seen the movie Almost Famous, it’s kind of similar to my story. I would go backstage every time a band came to town and find out what equipment they needed and take vintage guitars up for them to look at. It was great for me. I was just trying to meet my heroes, my rock and roll heroes.
That evolved into me eventually becoming a behind-the-scenes person in the music business. I worked with the British brand Humble Pie in the early eighties. I managed Glenn Hughes from Deep Purple in the nineties. I got to meet almost every big band on the circuit in the seventies and eighties.
Ralph Zuranski: Wow. Well, would you say that the rock stars were heroes to you? Or, some of them weren’t very heroic?
Bill Hibbler: They were heroes to me and some of them still are. But, we’ll probably get into this a little bit more later on. The problem with that is, nothing against any of those people, but it’s like a lot of people here are like “rock and roll heroes” or “athlete heroes”. Their whole career, especially for rock stars, is designed so where you really only see a slice of the pie. You don’t see the whole person. You see this person on stage and they’re holding a guitar and they’re singing a song. Your mind kind of fills in the rest, then everything else you’re fed about that person comes from the publicity machine where a lot of it’s fabricated. I mean that’s just part of the deal there.
If you try to model yourself after that person, unless you’re also trying to be a rock star, it can be disastrous, because a lot of times, as we know, those people’s lives aren’t together at all.
Bill Hibbler: How many rock stars have we seen overdose on drugs and die?
Bill Hibbler: So, they’re not the best role models. But those were my heroes at that time.
Ralph Zuranski: Well, I know that you’ve been through some pretty low times in your life. When was the lowest point in your life and how did you change your path to win a victory over all obstacles?
Bill Hibbler: Well, I started out at 15. I was doing the guitar thing. What I saw then is in order to do my job; I had to get backstage. I had to get through security. It’s kind of like a salesman that has to get past the secretary or the receptionist. You know… the gatekeepers. It was really kind of similar. I would walk up at first and I would try to explain, “Well, I’m here and I’ve got these guitars.”
A lot of times I was asked by the band to be there. But somebody would mess up. My name wouldn’t be on the guest list. The security guys could care less. It was like, “Whatever. Your name is not on the list.” So I observed that that wasn’t working. I was just going up trying to explain my situation. Going to all these shows, I would watch the stage door. I would see a road manager or someone come along and sometimes these people would have their backstage pass on and sometimes they wouldn’t.
I saw many people without a pass. Some guy with a briefcase covered in backstage passes from other shows would come walking in and he wouldn’t stop and try to explain. He would just walk in the door like he owns the place. It’s his production. He belongs there.
Those people were usually British. If the security guard questioned them, they were just kind of like, “What are you talking about?” They just looked at them like, “Of course I belong here.”
I wasn’t consciously aware of it but I began to model those people. I went out and got my briefcase and I covered it with stickers. I didn’t have a bunch of backstage passes yet so I covered it with guitar manufacturers stickers. And I was a good mimic. I could do the British accent as well as the Brits could.
That became the deal. I remember the first time I tried it. I just walked up and walked in the door. Nobody asked me anything. If they would ask, “Hey. Hello. Where do you think you’re going?”
“I’m going to the dressing room.”
“Well, where’s your pass?”
“I don’t know. I left it on the bus.”
And I would just keep walking and they would sort of shrug and say, “Okay,” and let me go.
I’ve even had arguments with them. It was like, “Alright mate. I’m going to leave. When the band comes and they’re looking for their guitars, then you tell them that you didn’t let the guitars come in because I didn’t have a pass, alright?”
Then you start to walk away and they’re like, “Oh, wait, wait, wait. Hold on. Go ahead, go inside. You’re okay.”
That was my early experience with learning to model other people.
Ralph Zuranski: Was that your lowest point in your life?
Bill Hibbler: That was not the lowest point in my life. That’s how I began to overcome obstacles.
What happened when I went backstage to those shows is I saw this guy, the road manager. I was fascinated. He’s like the manager of the band on tour. He’s running the show. That’s what I wanted to be. But, I had no idea how to do that. There was no internet or anything then. It was hard to find any kind of role models.
I realized what I really needed to be doing is working with local bands and just getting more experience and working my way up. I was afraid to do that. I dropped out of college after six weeks. I was an accounting major. That would have been a horrible mistake.
I was managing a stereo store and I was good at it. I had accumulated a lot of stuff. I had two big stereos and I had a Betamax, which was a big deal then and all this “stuff”. The idea of going to work for a local band.. you don’t make any money.
So I couldn’t do that and pay my bills and keep all my “stuff”. What happened is, I don’t want to go through the whole story but I ended up with a really nasty drug habit. This was late seventies up to about 1980. I’d discovered cocaine.
Bill Hibbler: That just knocked me on my butt. I ended up pawning everything I owned.
It was all gone. I used to have like seven or eight vintage guitars.. gone. Stereos…all that stuff gone. I had this huge stack of pawn slips. That was all I had left. I came to the point where I had been served an eviction notice from my apartment. The power was turned off. I was about to be homeless.
Bill Hibbler: A friend of mine that was a drummer in a band came by. I’d worked for his band when I was in high school. He offered me a job going on the road with his new band. Up until that point, I wouldn’t have taken it. I would have wanted to but I couldn’t afford to do that.
So, I had to learn the hard way. And I had nothing to lose at this point.
Bill Hibbler: I just had my clothes. I put some things in storage and I eventually lost that because I couldn’t pay the storage bill. But I became willing. That was the key, becoming willing.
I didn’t have to worry about cocaine right then because if you don’t have any money, you don’t have any cocaine.
Ralph Zuranski: Boy, that’s true.
Bill Hibbler: That was definitely the lowest point. I was physically in bad shape. I had lost everything. I was really beaten down. But suddenly an opportunity presented itself. Within probably a year of that happening, I was road managing Humble Pie.
Bill Hibbler: I had met the guys when I was doing the guitar thing before. I just became fearless. I went to every show and I just made myself known. I didn’t really know exactly what I was doing but I was just everywhere. So I just increased the odds.
You could listen to the whole story and say, “Well, I was in the right place at the right time.”
It was like I was everywhere and I was willing to do whatever it took. Whatever I needed to do, “Okay, fine.”
Bill Hibbler: I ended up doing that and basically living out a dream. Now the alcohol and drug thing continued to interfere, especially alcohol which I wasn’t drinking before then. I discovered alcohol. It took me until 1989 to finally get sober. I discovered AA. I discovered that there was a group of people that had been there.
Again, I was just learning from their experience. I haven’t had a drink or done any drugs since then, 1989.
Bill Hibbler: Again, that was when I discovered that you can’t always do it yourself. There’s strength in numbers. It wasn’t people preaching to you “Don’t drink.” It was just people saying, “Well, this is what I did.” I’ve tried to teach people to model what’s worked for me. I don’t want to preach to people what to do. I am just, “Here’s my experience.” And that carries over to business and everything else too.
Ralph Zuranski: Well, how important was it to have a dream or a vision to set the course of your life to help you overcome those obstacles?
Bill Hibbler: Well, the music business thing, it was all about adventure. We were like sailors on a pirate ship or something; just having this great adventure. I eventually just got tired of that because you’re dealing with people that are still drinking and drugging sometimes and they’ve got huge egos.
So, I decided I wanted freedom. I wanted to do my own thing. I don’t want to be in a position to have my lifestyle disappear because this rock star goes over the edge or says something stupid. I want to be more self-reliant.
I wanted freedom. Freedom has always been my number one value. But not just freedom, because homeless people have a lot of freedom. They’re free to come and go as they please but little else. I wanted freedom on my terms.
I wanted to make enough money to live whatever lifestyle that I chose to live. That could be material things, travel and the ability to help other people do the same thing. I wanted to use my experience to save others the hassle of making the same mistakes I did.
Ralph Zuranski: Yeah. I can relate to that. How important was it that you believed in the dreams that you had that they’d eventually become reality?
Bill Hibbler: It’s everything, Ralph. I had my doubts at times but I did have the early experiences in the music business where I knew what the possibilities were. I had that dream and accomplished it. When I got there, it turned out to be not exactly what I wanted. Basically, I grew up.
You get to a point where you’re like, “Okay. This was fun when I was in my twenties. I’m about to turn forty and I don’t think I want to do this anymore.”
Having the belief… I think whatever you believe, you can manifest. Sometimes you have to kind of get that in stages, if you know what I mean.
I did a thing with Joe Vitale. He has a book called The Attractor Factor. He has a thing where he was talking about attracting a car. I decided I was going to experiment with this. I probably wanted a brand new Mercedes. I didn’t believe that was possible for me. But I was willing to believe that I could generate something less expensive like… I love the old, late eighties model Mercedes.
I believed that I could do that. It was, “Okay. This is going to cost $5,000 or $6,000 and there’s maintenance. But I believed I could do that. Once I believed, ten days later I drove home in the Mercedes.I just recently got a BMW Z3 convertible which I’ve always wanted. You know, it was a much more expensive car but I just believed I could do it.
Once I believed, then in a couple of days I had it. I think if I’d of believed in a Bentley or whatever, that’s what I would have gotten. It’s kind of like you’ve got to take it in stages. If you can believe it, really internally believe it, you can make it happen.
Ralph Zuranski: You know, one of the things that make it hard to believe, there are doubts and fears. The doubts that people put in our minds that are around us and just fears that we create on our own. How did you overcome your doubts and fears?
Bill Hibbler: Really the same way that I’m helping other people. It was seeing someone else do it. Here’s something. And I know you were there. The Big Seminar One was a big turning point for me. Even before the seminar.. the calls.
Bill Hibbler: The preview calls that Armand Morin did where Armand was basically introducing all these speakers and he said, “Look. Anybody that speaks at the Big Seminar has to be making at least five figures a month and has to have been doing so for at least a year.”
I trusted Armand to give us those kinds of people. As I listened to each of those speakers, Carl Galletti, Frank Garon, Alex Mandossian, you know all the great people that were there.
I’d hear them talk. They’d tell a little bit of their story and they’d say, “Well, you know. I remember I’d been doing this for about a year and I was making $1,000 a month at that point.”
And I’d be thinking, “I’ve been doing this a year and I’m making $2,000.”
I heard these people. For the most they weren’t smarter than me. They had more experience but it wasn’t anything that I couldn’t do. So I’d say, “Okay. This guy was there. He’s making, and I say guy because it just happens that all the speakers on Big Seminar One were guys, not that women can’t do it too…”
Ralph Zuranski: That’s true.
Bill Hibbler: These people were making five figures [monthly] and they had taken the same path. So I thought, “All I’ve got to do is model what they did.” You know, with my own unique twist. I couldn’t be Armand Morin II [laughs].
Bill Hibbler: But that was it. And that was just really encouraging to me, hearing those stories.
The other thing that was the key for me was forming a mastermind group. I’d done that when I was in the music business and I have a mastermind group today here in Wimberly, Texas. A group of people like Joe Vitale, Craig Perrine, Cindy Cashman, Pat O’Bryan..a lot of people that you know.
Bill Hibbler: There are six of us at the core. We meet once a week and it’s all about support and encouragement. You don’t have to have someone like a Joe Vitale in your group. Sure, it’s been really beneficial to have Joe there.
But in my music business group, and Pat O’Brian was in that one, too, it was all unknown musicians in Houston. One guy wanted a record deal and he went out and got a record deal and was the opening act for Kiss on their ’96 tour. Everybody accomplished their goals.
So just forming a group of people so that you’re not around the people that… you know the type of people that say, “You can’t do that. You’ll never make money doing that. You’ll never succeed at that.”
Having that kind of support group is just critical.
Ralph Zuranski: Boy, that’s true. You know, we’ve been on the internet circuit for about three years now. How important is it to maintain a sense of humor in the face of serious problems?
Bill Hibbler: You have to keep your sense of humor. I don’t always succeed every time. But you’ve got to be able to laugh at yourself at times. I think many people take themselves way, way too seriously. Life is full of humor. Even at your lowest point, you can laugh. I think that that’s essential.
Ralph Zuranski: Yeah. Who are the heroes in your life now?
Bill Hibbler: I’d say my Grandfather, who is no longer with us. But my Grandfather was probably my number one hero. I thought my Grandfather was rich. He was probably more middle class, but he lived in a small town. So he didn’t have high overhead and he ran a restaurant. Everyone in town knew him. He was a hero to me.
My first exposure to entrepreneurs, too. And my wife is my hero.
Ralph Zuranski: Is that Lena?
Bill Hibbler: Yes, Lena. She’s here in this little town. yet she raises a fortune for Russian orphans. She’s originally from Russia. This is her cause. She first started doing bake sales and different things. I thought, “Well, okay. She’s going to raise a few hundred dollars.”
I think the first year she raised $15,000 for orphans. The money goes a long way over there too. She’s just really devoted to that. So I really admire her.
Joe Vitale is another hero. Besides his internet marketing and writing stuff, I just watch the guy. At age 50, he’s lost over 70 pounds and he’s competing in fitness contests. So that’s pretty inspirational to me.
Finally, my buddy Pat O’Brian, who I’ve watched go from a basically broke musician to… I think he’s got like 40 or 50 different products on the market and he’s done that in less than two years.
Ralph Zuranski: Wow. That’s amazing. Well, how did they make a positive difference in your life?
Bill Hibbler: My Grandfather, I would say the big impact that he had, I never got hooked on a paycheck. I never had to have that security blanket. I didn’t even realize that until I started seeing other people that did. They would ask, “How do you do that? Aren’t you afraid?”
The lifestyle just came naturally to me. I grew up around it. I was so used to the up and down thing that comes with being in your own business.
With Lena it was really the power of giving. I’ll tell you a quick story. We were in Germany together. This was probably a few months before we got married. She had told me about a woman at her church named Little Nina. Nina was probably in her late 70’s. She was raising her daughter, Natasha, a 50 year old woman with Down’s syndrome. Usually they don’t live that long.
She was in this fifth floor walk-up apartment taking care of her all by herself and living on this extremely meager pension. Yet, she had all this gratitude in her life. She had been saving up to build this… she wanted to enclose the porch in her apartment building to make a sunroom so that Natasha could actually see the outside. But sometimes Russia would be very cold.
Bill Hibbler: She wanted to enclose it. I was really touched by their story. I was getting ready to get on the plane back to the States and had about 80 euros in my pocket. I could have exchanged it but instead I told Lena, “Give this to Nina.”
It wasn’t that much money, Ralph. $80? Later when I went to Russia I met Nina and I walked in and I saw this sunroom that she had been saving for 15 years to build.
Bill Hibbler: I went in and I saw the sun room and I met them. Little Natasha has since passed on and Nina is on her own now. She was so grateful to me. It was like I was the biggest hero on the planet.
I could actually see the impact of what I’d done which to me was nothing but it meant everything to her.
Bill Hibbler: You compare that to my concept of giving before which is you write a check to the American Cancer Society or something like that. I have nothing against them, but you give and it’s like, “Okay. The money I gave them just goes to pay for them mailing me again.” I don’t really see the positive impact of that. I paid for 1 1/100 of a machine or something. I don’t know but I liked seeing where the money goes. So that’s something that I got from Lena. And It’s really helped me help her with the orphans.
Then with Joe, it was the opportunity to see the possibilities first-hand for the internet marketing lifestyle. It’s like if you go hear these people speak at a seminar. I remember the rock star thing. It’s like seeing them on stage is one thing but is that real?
Well with Joe, I see him all the time. He’s doing it. There’s no stretching the truth there. I see it. That’s inspirational to me.
With Pat, it’s a little different. For me it’s because I could see… I don’t take credit for Pat’s success but I could see that I could help someone else. He started out by just listening to me rattle on about internet marketing.
You know how internet marketers are. We talk about autoresponders and products and websites.
Bill Hibbler: I introduced Pat to Joe and one thing led to another. But just pointing the way and setting an example was enough. Pat’s probably the first person I’ve really seen be really successful doing that. So that’s inspirational to me.
Ralph Zuranski: Well, why are heroes so important in the lives of young people?
Bill Hibbler: Kids want heroes. And if they don’t have them, if they don’t have real heroes, they’ll go with imaginary heroes, like rock stars that we talked about. Or, athletes and other celebrities, movie stars and they really aren’t the best role models because like I said, you don’t see the whole person. You see a carefully managed image for the most part. I think real heroes, if you look can be seen close up, warts and all.
So that they’re not someone that’s on a pedestal. They’re real people. It’s got to be someone that’s real.
Ralph Zuranski: Yep. Boy that makes a difference doesn’t it? Not, do what I say but do as I do make such a big difference in the lives of kids.
Bill Hibbler: Walk your talk.
Ralph Zuranski: Yeah. Well, how are you making the world a better place?
Bill Hibbler: Well, my thing is, again, it’s trying to show people that want freedom in the way that I do, how to get there without being taken for a ride. And really kind of giving them… Pat’s kind of helping me see this…
Give them a peak backstage. At first I thought that people don’t want to hear about stories about me going to San Antonio for the weekend. But actually, I did a promotion recently where that’s exactly what I did.
I did a product promotion at the same time. I said, “I’m doing an experiment. I want to see if I can go on this trip and pay for it and make money while going out and having fun just to show people it could be done.”
I documented the whole thing. I was kind of afraid, “People are going to think I’m talking about myself which is not what we’re supposed to do.”
But it worked. And people saw the possibilities. I should have realized that from the beginning. It wasn’t like me bragging. It was me showing them what works. That’s the kind of thing I try to do.
You and I have talked about this before. I just got back from this seminar in Atlanta where I saw a lot of people that were into MLM and network marketing. They were really, really getting pumped up and they were writing big checks to get more pumped up.
I overheard two ladies waiting to get some coffee. I heard these ladies say, “You know what.” She was really excited. She was like, “I’ve only got $200 left in my savings account but I’ve got to find a way because you’ve got to do it.”
Bill Hibbler: Man, I didn’t feel good about it because I knew what she was buying into.
This isn’t the way to go. Now, Armand Morin was there, Stephen Pierce. T. Harv Eker was there. They were giving people reality. But I think that the problem is… and this is what I try to help people avoid in a nutshell…
People want to buy magic beans, you know? They want to buy three beans and plant them and climb the bean stalk. They always ignore the part of the story about the giant. [laughs]
Bill Hibbler: But that’s what people want. They get so hooked. You know, “You can get a web site. It’s ready-made and we do all the work for you and all you have to do is put it up and you don’t have to do anything and it’s going to be great.” And it’s like, “Oh. I don’t have to do anything except write the check.” So they write the check and that’s the mistake that they make. I try to create tools that are really useful. I try to evaluate other products and services so that people don’t get ripped off and they don’t try to buy magic beans and I try to warn them about magic beans.
Beyond that, as far as making the world a better place, I kind of look at it as like I try to go with the micro view of ‘help one person at a time’.
Ralph Zuranski: Yeah. Boy that is so true. That makes a big difference. Do you have any good solutions to problems facing society, racism, child/spousal abuse, bouts among young people?
Bill Hibbler: Child abuse I think that a lot of us have experienced that in one form or another.
Bill Hibbler: I think what most people tend to do is play the blame game. Everybody, including me, does that or has done it. Instead, I think that playing the blame game is useless. You can’t go back and fix what happened X number of years ago.
Bill Hibbler: But what you can do is decide that it’s going to stop with you. If you have children, you decide that it stops here. Abuse always goes from generation to generation. That’s the one thing that you can do is just decide it stops here.
Ralph Zuranski: That’s true.
Bill Hibbler: Spousal abuse, I’ve witnessed this first hand. There’s physical and there’s mental abuse. I think the physical abuse is usually what we pay the most attention to. If you’re getting physically abused, you’ve got to get out.
Bill Hibbler: There’s usually denial and all these things. You’ve just got to get out. A lot of people overlook the mental abuse. I’ve had people that have experienced both. The mental is so much worse.
Bill Hibbler: If you’re in that situation, you’ve got to get some counseling or you’ve just got to get out. It’s scary. But it’s not going to change. You can’t sit around and think that this is going to go away because it’s not. It’s just going to continue. You’ve got to either fix it or get out.
Violence, I’ve got kind of a unique, well it’s not really a unique take on it but a new twist. How many years have we heard about violence on TV and violence in movies? For most of my life I’ve said, “Oh, come on. I think people understand the difference between real life and what’s going on, on TV and what’s happening in movies.”
Something happened recently that’s kind of changed my mind about that.
Ralph Zuranski: Really?
Bill Hibbler: That’s due to my wife Lena. Lena grew up in Russia but it’s not just because of Russia. She never watched a lot of the kind of action/adventure movies that we watch. I’m not talking about slasher flicks. I don’t like those.
But if you think about it…I’m 45 years old and I wonder how many people I’ve seen killed on screen since I was a kid?
Ralph Zuranski: Probably a lot.
Bill Hibbler: You don’t realize how desensitized that you are to it. There were a lot of movies that I turned Lena on to when she first got here like some older films, like Spartacus and Ben Hur and the big epics. You see some of these battle scenes where some guy gets an arm hacked off or something. To us. you don’t even think about it. It’s like it’s nothing compared to how real they’ve been able to make it look in today’s movies.
But Lena was watching the chariot scene in Ben Hur and the slave revolt in Spartacus. She was screaming in the living room like it was happening to me.
Bill Hibbler: If someone had walked in the room and say hacked off my arm with a sword, her reaction would not have been any stronger. At first I was saying, “What is wrong with you?”
She was just horrified.
Bill Hibbler: I realized it’s not something weird about my wife. It’s something weird about me and us. We’ve seen it so many times, we don’t even think about it.
Ralph Zuranski: Boy, you know that’s an amazing point.
Bill Hibbler: It’s also, I think, when I grew up I knew what right and wrong was from my parents and from my grandparents. I think a lot of kids growing up now in single family households where someone’s working and they just see those movies just as much as I did if not more so, video games and stuff like that.
Bill Hibbler: They don’t have the other foundation. It’s like we just saw what happened in New Orleans. I was watching Fox News and Sean Hannity was talking about it. He was asking, “Why would these people be shooting at rescue helicopters?”
Bill Hibbler: And I was thinking I knew the answer. There’s a video game out called Grand Theft Auto.
Ralph Zuranski: Yeah, I’ve heard of it.
Bill Hibbler: Someone told me about it and they were telling me about how amazing the visuals were. You could just get in this little car and drive all over this island city or you could go on the beach. It was amazing from a computer technology standpoint.
So, I bought it. It’s like you’re basically running around stealing cars and shooting people and there’s a scene where the police are after you and they come in a helicopter. You’ve got these big guns and at some point you’re shooting at the helicopter.
Bill Hibbler: The game is really kind of addictive.
Ralph Zuranski: Really?
Bill Hibbler: You’re sitting there playing this game. Then you’re like, “I just wasted three hours of my life that I’ll never get back.”
But you think about kids playing this every day and when I heard that in Louisiana, I immediately thought of that video game. I wondered if maybe some people are just going, “I’ve been shooting at helicopters in the game. Let’s see what it’s like to shoot at the real thing.”
Bill Hibbler: That might be as good of an explanation as any. I don’t know what the solution is to that. I don’t think you say, “The government should enforce stricter standards.”
I don’t think that works at all. That’s just going to make it more attractive.
Bill Hibbler: But I think what we have to do to counter it is be good role models.
Ralph Zuranski: Boy isn’t that true.
Bill Hibbler: My Dad tried to preach to me all the time. As you said a minute ago, actions speak louder than words, seeing is believing. I think with our own kids, walk the talk. If you don’t have kids, join an organization like Big Brothers or Big Sisters where you go in and provide that role model. It doesn’t have to be on a grand scale. It’s not preaching. It’s just showing people so that it’s attraction rather than promotion.
Ralph Zuranski: So you think that’s the most important things parents can do to help their children realize that they too could be heroes and make a positive impact on the lives of others by walking the walk road and then just talking the talk?
Bill Hibbler: Yeah and go on and pursue your dreams. Make kids aware of the possibilities. I don’t know if everybody has to change their life entirely but do what you love and the money will follow. To me that’s the best thing you could teach.
Parents too often try to force kids to live their dreams.
Ralph Zuranski: Boy, that’s so true.
Bill Hibbler: I say you encourage them to live their own dreams. Don’t put down their dreams. I dealt with that with the rock and roll thing for years and it had a huge impact. My dad, you know we would argue over hair length and things like that. Like this is really an important issue in the scheme of things. But what happened because of my family constantly putting down the rock and roll thing is that when I needed advice, I wouldn’t go to my parents.
Bill Hibbler: Because I knew if I went to my parents and said, “You know, I’m really kind of worried because this band is doing this and this and I’m not sure if this is really the right thing for me to do.”
They wouldn’t help me make the right decision. Instead, they would just view that as an opening to come in, “Well, see. You need to quit all that and go get a real job.”
Ralph Zuranski: That’s what my parent’s told me too.
Bill Hibbler: What is a real job, Ralph? What is a “real job”? Get a real job. So I can be miserable.
Ralph Zuranski: Yeah. It’s something you hate 40 hours a week and then you come home and drink at night just to bury your sorrow because you’re doing something that you dislike so much.
Bill Hibbler: Yeah. There’s no joy. People ask me what I do for fun. I probably could do more things but what I do for fun is my job. My business, to me that’s fun, I’m doing it. It’s like people talk about retirement. I don’t want to retire. Why would I want to quit doing this? What would I do?
Bill Hibbler: Go fishing? But that’s the key is just encourage your kids to live their dreams and support them.
Ralph Zuranski: You know that’s funny. So many of the heroes I’ve interviewed, that has been their message is that be an entrepreneur. They’re the real heroes to society because they’re pursuing their dream with every ounce of ability that they have and faith that it is going to come true and overcoming every objection in their way, just learning how their dream doesn’t work that way but finally finding out how they can produce the quality product and service that is so valuable that they will attain their dreams.
Bill Hibbler: I agree with that, absolutely, 100%.
Ralph Zuranski: Well Bill, I really appreciate your time and I thank you for sharing the most difficult time in your life. I know there are quite a few people that have been there. I know I’ve been there and done that. My situation is either kill myself or choose the fee gift of salvation. Luckily I made the right choice. That’s quite a rebuilding process. That’s for sure.
Bill Hibbler: It is but I think it’s probably, now that we’ve gone through it, part of the bricks in that foundation.
Ralph Zuranski: Yeah. Well you never realize how many blessings there are around you until you get to the point where you don’t see any blessings at all and you’re ready to kill yourself.
Bill Hibbler: Yeah.
Ralph Zuranski: Well, again, I really appreciate your time, Bill. Thank you so much.
Bill Hibbler: Glad to do it Ralph. I enjoyed it.
Ralph Zuranski: Okay. Have a good day.
Bill Hibbler: You too.
Bill Hibbler helps entrepreneurs and entertainers grow their audience and build better relationships on and offline.
A former successful artist manager & tour manager in the music industry (Humble Pie, Deep Purple’s Glenn Hughes and many others), Bill turned to the web to market a music business seminar and eventually made the transition from the music industry into Internet Marketing.
Bill’s best-selling book is “Meet & Grow Rich: How to Easily Create and Operate Your Own “Mastermind” Group For Health Wealth, and More” (J. Wiley & Sons), co-authored with Dr. Joe Vitale. Bill & Joe previously collaborated on “The Ultimate Guide to Creating Moneymaking Ebooks”.Bill’s first ebook, The Rudl Report, was a big hit with readers that learn how to save money on Internet marketing products and services and enjoy Bill’s honest, unbiased reviews.
He also helps small to medium-sized businesses and professionals improve their websites with his extensive website critiques and build better relationships with their prospects and customers via social media video.
He currently runs his company, Gigtime Media, out of his home office in Austin, TX.