From Crisis to Innovation: Dr. Gerard Ibarra's Journey Creating Keep It Saved

In this episode of the Starter Girlz Podcast, host Jennifer Loehding speaks with Dr. Gerard Ibarra about his journey in entrepreneurship and the creation of his platform, Keep It Saved. The conversation explores the importance of centralized information in times of crisis, the challenges faced in building a startup, and the power of networking in securing funding. Dr. Ibarra shares personal stories that inspired his venture and highlights the features of Keep It Saved that aim to help families manage essential information during difficult times.

In this engaging conversation, the speakers dive into the transformative power of podcasting, the essential qualities of effective leadership, and the critical importance of market research for entrepreneurs. They share personal anecdotes and insights on overcoming adversity, the significance of emotional marketing, and daily habits that contribute to success. The discussion emphasizes the need for self-awareness, servant leadership, and understanding the emotional drivers behind consumer behavior, providing valuable takeaways for aspiring leaders and entrepreneurs.

To learn more about Dr. Ibarra and Keep it Saved visit www.https://app.keepitsaved.com/

Takeaways

• Dr. Gerard Ibarra's personal experiences with family crises directly inspired the creation of Keep It Saved, demonstrating how adversity can lead to innovative solutions.
• Centralized information management through platforms like Keep It Saved significantly reduces stress and financial loss during times of crisis or family emergency.
• Effective networking strategies were essential to Dr. Ibarra securing funding for Keep It Saved, highlighting the importance of relationship-building for entrepreneurs.
• Market research and understanding competitor offerings proved crucial to the development and differentiation of the Keep It Saved platform.
• The Keep It Saved platform incorporates advanced features for funeral planning, communication, and information storage that help families stay organized during difficult times.
• Dr. Ibarra's approach to servant leadership emphasizes placing others' needs first, creating solutions that truly serve family needs during difficult situations.
• Emotional marketing that connects with consumers' deeper motivations has been key to communicating the value of Keep It Saved to potential users.
• Daily habits focused on gratitude and purpose drive Dr. Ibarra's continued motivation to develop solutions for families facing difficult circumstances.

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to the Starter Girlz Podcast
• 3:08 The Birth of Keep It Saved
• 10:14 The Importance of Centralized Information
• 15:09 Features of Keep It Saved
• 18:34 Challenges in Entrepreneurship
• 24:14 Challenges in Entrepreneurship
• 28:25 The Power of Podcasting for Personal Growth
• 29:55 Leadership Lessons from Adversity
• 34:52 The Importance of Market Research
• 37:35 Understanding Emotional Marketing
• 44:37 Daily Habits for Success

Transcript

Jennifer Loehding (00:00)
Welcome to the Starter Girlz podcast, your ultimate source of inspiration and empowerment. We're here to help women succeed in every area of their lives, career, money, relationships, and health and well-being while celebrating the remarkable journeys of individuals from all walks of life who've achieved amazing things. Whether you're looking to supercharge your career, build financial independence, nurture meaningful relationships, or enhance your overall well-being.

the Starter Girlz podcast is here to guide you. Join us as we explore the journeys of those who dare to dream big and achieve greatness. I'm your host, Jennifer Loehding and welcome to this episode.

Welcome to another episode of the Starter Girlz podcast. Wherever you are tuning in today, we are so thrilled to have you. I am your host, Jennifer Loehding And so I want to open up with this today. I'm so excited about my guest. Life has a way of reminding us just how unpredictable it can be. In moments of crisis, we often find ourselves searching not just for answers, but for the tools that could have made things easier. My guest today understands this all too well.

With a background in leadership, entrepreneurship, and strategic problem solving, he has spent years helping businesses and individuals navigate complex challenges. But it was a personal experience that led him to his latest venture, one designed to bring peace of mind when it matters most. So you guys are gonna get to hear from him in just a few minutes. And this is kind of a special episode because he has been a previous guest on Behind the Dreamers. And so really excited to get him here. But before I can bring him on.

I do want to do a quick shout out to our sponsor.

With a background deeply rooted in entertainment and promotion, Walt Mills leverages years of skills to give you the spotlight you deserve. Want to learn more about Walt and his work? Head on over to waltmillsproductions.net and let your content shine. All right, and with that, one more thing I want to mention, be sure you head on over to startergirls.com. There, you can pick up all and any missed episodes. You can keep up with the current episodes. You can sign up for our community news.

And if you are a business owner, we've got something new for you. You can actually determine and find out what your number one success block is that may be impacting your business. So head on over there and you can take the success block quiz. It's kind of fun. It lets you know some fun stuff and keep up with what's all going on. Again, that's startergirls.com. Make sure you do the Z, not the S. All right. And so my guest, this can be so much fun. Dr. Gerard Ibarra

is an entrepreneur, author, speaker, and consultant with over 35 years of leadership experience. He has co-founded multiple software companies and held executive roles ranging from director to CEO. Notably, he led the sales of Jaguar Logistics, the largest on-demand medical transport in Texas. Specializing in startups, decision-making, and strategic planning, he also shares his expertise as an educator.

having taught at SMU, the University of Dallas, and Dallas College. His latest venture, Keep It Saved, was inspired by a deeply personal experience that revealed a critical gap in how we organize and access essential information, a problem he is now dedicated to solving. So, Gerard, welcome to the show. I'm so excited to have you here today.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (03:55)
Good to be here, Jennifer. Thank you so much for having me on your show. Really excited about today.

Jennifer Loehding (04:00)
Yeah, it's gonna be so much fun. And I can't remember when we did the last episode, you came on behind the dreamers and I think you were in the stages of building out this new project, but now we've got it out. It's really, I'm really excited to hear what's happening with this. And I kind of want to back our audience up because I think there are probably a lot of listeners that have been on both shows, but there's going to be some new people on here that really don't know who you are at this point and what all this is about. So I kind of want to back it up.

and talk a little bit about what led you to this new venture that you've got going on.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (04:35)
Sure, sure. So it happened back in 2020, right in the midst of COVID. And my brother-in-law, my sister's brother, unexpectedly got sick and passed away immediately. So what happened is that he went to the hospital, he got an emergency appendix removed, and then he ended up going back two days later, not two days, two weeks later, only to find out that he had pancreatic cancer.

And they gave him about six months, but unfortunately he passed away within about five weeks. And of course there was a lot of sorrow on both ends, on everybody's ends, especially the wife. But one of the things that took place is that his wife had a very hard time accessing accounts, getting the insurance, being able to pay bills, because he took care of all that. He kept up with the bill payments, the water, the utilities, the subscriptions that they have.

And she was just really, really devastated, not only having to think about him, but trying to remember, okay, how do you do this? How do you pay these bills? And when she finally found his passwords sitting on top of a desk, just a piece of paper, she says, great, I have the passwords, but unfortunately the passwords didn't have what accounts they were to. So of course what she had ended up doing a senior trial in there and says, great, I found an account.

get ready to get into the bank and then it says just send us your code that we want to send to your two-factor authentication. She's like okay I have this phone right here in front of me but I can't get the PIN number to get in there to get the code. So all these things that were taking place my wife just said wouldn't it be great if there was a way of having all this information stored in an essential location where it's easy to find they have access to it and that's where the idea was born and keep it saved.

And it was took my sister-in-law almost a year later to get all the data that she needed, all the account information. And today we just saw her a month ago. She still doesn't have access to one account and it's a bank account that pays for her subscription to cable. But she says, you know, I don't want to deal with that. It's just too much headache. Just leave it as it is. So that's how the idea was born. And, you know, I mean,

It happened to my sister-in-law, but it happened to me as well. When my dad passed away in 2009, my mom said that he had a $15,000 insurance, and that's a lot of money for my mom. And I spent about eight hours looking for that information, and I called people, I called the insurance companies, looked through tons of paper.

And finally I told her it doesn't exist. doesn't, there's no way there. And if you want to find it, you go ahead and find it yourself because you know, we're pretty, I guess we're hot headed sometimes. So she calls me a couple of weeks later and she says, yeah, I found the $15,000. I'm like, okay, so I had a crow and I asked her, well, how did you find it? Well, I called his friend, one of his best friends wife who he passed away and they were both in the army. And she told me how she got it.

So she was able to get it within an hour. So I'm like, why didn't you tell me that to begin with? But I don't think she knew to tell me that at that time, because she was under a lot of stress. She just needed that money to help pay for some of the bills that were coming up. So it happened there as well, but I didn't think about it. My wife's the one that came up with the idea. this is her idea, not mine. I'm just holding a coattail of her.

Jennifer Loehding (08:15)
Yeah, no, I think it's great. It's, you know, it's interesting. So many points to all of this, but it's making me think about how many times, like when you talk about getting information, like my email, because when my husband and I first got married, I set up all the bank accounts and I put them in my email, right? But then I transferred everything to him. So now he has all the passwords and the access. So I don't have them and I can't. So every time he gets locked out, guess what happens? They send me the code and we have to play the

He's like, so I am, listening to this and I'm thinking about just the dumb, dumbery of this. Like that's not even a word, but what we go through on this, because I'm like, can you just change the email? So they will stop sending me the codes. But then I think here we are, we're talking about this very issue right now where when you have something that really cataclysmic happens here, right? Like the death of somebody and now you can't get access to the information. You can't get in the phone and you're trying to get the third factor off the, you know, or the two factor authentication.

all of those things and you don't have that information. How much of a pain it is. And I've even said that to my husband, like, dude, I can't even get into our accounts. I don't know any of the information. You need to put that somewhere so I know where it is, you know, because you just never know. And this is good that you have this very thing just because of that.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (09:34)
You know, and it's also not only because of a death, but it could be the fire, a tornado, a flood. You know, think of the fires up in California, all the information that was lost or the tornadoes that we're going to probably see here in a couple of months.

I you can lose all that data. And if you don't have it centrally located, if you don't have all those critical documents, passwords and what have you, it could create a lot of havoc on Iran. Or even in one of the things also, and it's unfortunate this happened on my side of the family, someone gets dementia and slowly are starting to forget things. So are you able to keep up with those accounts?

It's just a family continuity. It's a digital family playbook that keep everybody on the same page.

Jennifer Loehding (10:21)
Yeah, yeah, no, I like this and and even you know, I had another guest on this show. I don't know if I mentioned to you you to her while back her. She kind of went through something similar. She has a little bit of a different platform. Hers is a little bit more about keeping like the medical records with the hospitals like the doctors and stuff kind of congruent so that a client has all access to all of their information in one place for the doctors because she had a situation where her mother went into the hospital and I want to say.

I don't think it was pancreatic cancer, but it had to deal with the pancreas and she was misdiagnosed because they didn't have all the records together. And so she lost her mother and that kind of spawned the business that the platform that she put together as well. And so when I think of what you, your story, and then I kind of think of her as a little bit different, but similar in some ways.

It brought about this need because, which I think a lot of entrepreneurs, you know, when they think about business, they have this pain point that comes about that creates this idea for a business. So yay for your wife for thinking of that, right? And you acting on it.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (11:27)
Yeah, she comes up with all these great ideas. It's the acting that's a little bit harder sometimes. you know, and think and talking about what you're saying there. mean, you know, just here's the here's the statistic. The average individual after someone passes away, the family loses about two thousand dollars because it's accounts that they don't know they had, maybe insurance or whatever it is. The average person loses about two thousand dollars.

So even just having this at least gives you that opportunity to make sure you don't lose out on the $2,000. There are some people that are up in the tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of unclaimed funds all over the US. So it's a big thing. And also if you don't have, I guess, things in place, access to the accounts, and it's much more than accounts, by the way, it's a whole slew of things.

digital aspect of your life put together into this box. But the average funeral cost is 15 to $47,000. It's a big range depending on what you have. And it might be paid for, but you have to put that money up front because you don't have access to their accounts until you can get access to their accounts. So a lot of things go up on the back end there.

Jennifer Loehding (12:46)
Yeah, and when you're in the middle, mean, thankfully, I haven't been through all that like that. But I know even when I've been in like little small crisis, right? Like you're not thinking clearly in that moment, you're dealing with a crisis. And so when you're talking about money that's being wasted, people get into these these crisis most, they don't know what to do because they don't have enough information, right? In this case, they don't have access to the things that they need. So they're just trying to solve things in there. And then you've got

to worry about other people coming into the picture, they're telling you to do this and you're not really, it's nice that what you're doing is you're putting this in a place where it gives people the ability to get into their, to their stuff and make better informed decisions so they're not acting out in irrational ways they can think more clearly in that process.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (13:34)
Absolutely. The platform also allows you to do your funeral planning. So one of the things that we have in there is once someone passes away, has a checklist of the government entities you need to contact, your passport, driver's license, social security. It's a checkoff list. It also has in there accounts that you need to close, your credit cards, your banking, and it also has in there contact information.

You could actually write up a eulogy or a message to your entire family or to all your workers. And when you pass away, your representative could push one button and that email goes out to everybody in your group. So it could be very specific to your family, to your work group. It could be a generic and it could be something like, you're reading this message, I'm no longer here. So it gives you that opportunity to put those people in there because

My brother, my older brother passed away just about a year and a half ago and I was having to communicate via text. We didn't have the full product completed yet. I wish we did. But I was having the text people, okay, here's where the funeral is going to be at. Here's the location. I was creating groups and I missed a couple of people and they got upset. Well, with this, you could actually have everybody in communication and say, okay, the funeral is going to be at this location at this time. And it just allows the bottom line is it helps you

honor your loved one's farewell wishes and not have to deal with the logistics behind the funeral and everything that comes after that.

Jennifer Loehding (15:09)
I it's in my mind, I think of it kind of like it's sort of an accessory to have in like your will right? Like you're having now you're setting every you're kind of doing that extension of getting everything in one place where it's not just about where we allocate the the phones and everything in the end. But now you also have like your communication, all your records, everything kind of in that one place and making it easy for you to come in and take over at that point.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (15:31)
One of the things that financial planners look for, I guess, is when someone passes away, if they don't have access to it, is the insurance. So with this product, with this platform, you could actually give access to very specific people, your CPA, your lawyer, your insurance person, just access to those folders or those files. So it just makes things a whole lot easier for everybody. So we put a lot of thought into it. And what we wanted to do is make sure that

The bottom line is we want to help individuals not have to go through the things that we went through that we, my family just recently went through. And one of the things that we offer with our platform is the thing that's the most important, which is the account section. That's for free and there's no credit card required. So that's what we're trying to do to give back to the communities. You you could get this, you don't have to get the full platform, but at least let people know.

where your 401s, your banks, your insurance, those critical documents that help you get through the humps.

Jennifer Loehding (16:34)
Love that jarred I love that it's awesome well and guys for our audience so know, Gerard's a local friend here in the Dallas area. So we've been keeping up kind of been in touch for a while. So it's fun to get to see him kind of navigate through this and work through this, which which kind of leads me to first of all, let's say tell them tell them real quick because I'm going to have you mention this again, but tell them the name of the company again to remind them where this is.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (16:57)
Certainly, it's called Keep It Saved. Keep It Saved. So that's the name of the company. You can find out more information by going to our website and you'll see all kinds of points there about what our product does. You know, one of the other things about the product, before I forget, because if you're traveling abroad and you happen to lose your driver's license or passport, our platform allows you to keep that secured as long as you have access to the internet.

or a phone or something, you could pull up a digital copy of your passport or license. That helps tremendously if you didn't have it available with you. So if you lose your phone, at least you could go to a computer, log on and get that access.

Jennifer Loehding (17:39)
Yeah, no, that's good. That's good. Thanks for sharing that, Gerard. So this is awesome. And I wanted you to talk about this, but I want to talk about some other stuff with you too, because I want to talk about some of the other things that, you know, that because you've done a lot of really amazing things in your career. And I think it's awesome. You've started different companies. educate, you're an educator. You've done all these things. I do want to ask you, because I think people listening to this, you know, like they see all this and they go, wow, like I think.

A lot of us entrepreneurs are like this, we got our hands in a lot of different things and they're just like, how do do all this stuff, right? That's not an easy thing. We're just motivated and we like doing things, right? But I would love for you to share a little bit of maybe some of the challenges you had in getting this thing, like getting this pulled together, this business, this keep it safe because I think for entrepreneurs, this is a good thing for them to understand that, hey, it took work and time and diligence and passion and persistence, all those things we talk about in the entrepreneur space.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (18:34)
yeah, my gosh, you're going down a road there that brings tears to my eyes sometimes.

Jennifer Loehding (18:41)
We don't

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (18:43)
No,

it's tears of joy, tears of joy. So it does come down to perseverance. So we started this company back in roughly in 2020, and it wasn't until 2021 before we incorporated. we were, you know, was raising funds was really difficult because the way that we're going about building this company is that we felt that was too much critical.

data, too much expertise required for a entrepreneur who has maybe a CEO and a CTO. That's typically the model if you're doing some kind of software or SaaS. But in this case, we were thinking that it was just, hey, we need too much expertise in various areas. So we hired a company to help build the product. We designed it. We put all the flows through it. But it was trying to find the money.

And there was a point there where it was like, my gosh, what am I doing here? I spent about a year and a half. We got it all designed. We've got the, I guess what they call it, the skeleton, the mockups of the platform. And we still couldn't get that. And it all came through networking. It came through keeping a positive attitude. And one day we met this individual, my wife and I.

It was for some financial planning. was, we're going to get into some bonds. And we were in that meeting and he was giving us a little bit of background about what he did. And he said, yeah, so, uh, you know, I used to do this for banks. was raised money. I think I'm not talking little money. I'm talking hundreds of millions to billions of dollars for companies. And that's very hard. And I just said, well, yeah, I know what you mean. I'm trying to raise money myself. And then it's like, what do mean?

So the entire conversation at that point for the next 15 minutes turned into what I was doing. And he was really, really intrigued by it because I believe that he felt the need. He had his dad that passed away and he was telling me the things that they had to go through. And at that point he was saying, okay, you know, I know you came here to talk about the bonds, but let's you and I take this off offline. And, you know, here's my personal email address. So says, let's, let's catch up again. So I call my

my business partner said, hey, we might have some funding here. And he was like, how much money? I I don't know. He's just thinking he likes it. 50,000. I said, no, we don't have anything. He just wants to know something about us. He's trying to see who we are. He says, well, OK, how much do think we could get from him? said, OK, if he likes it at the most, I'm thinking maybe 20, 25. So I sent him an email. He didn't reply back.

And then I sent him a follow-up email about two weeks later and he didn't reply back. Then I was going to send him a third email and I told my business partner, look, I think this is dead. We're going to have to continue going. And then he actually replies to that email and he says, Hey, Gerard, sorry, I've been very busy. I will go into the company here. Let's get on a call here in this date here. And I've got a couple of questions. It's all about financing.

I was like, told my business partner, was really excited. So I spent hours and hours looking at my financials. How did I get this number? What's our TAM? How do I back into it? And then we got on the call and we were talking, I gave him an update and then I was ready for the questions. He says, okay, so how much money do you need? I'm like, what? Yeah, tell me how much money you need. So we told him, he says, okay, well, I think I could do maybe this much. And I'm like, oh my gosh, that was a.

hell of a lot more than what we talked about. And he says, you know, and he says, I know this is difficult. I know this is hard and I may lose this money. I don't want to lose this money, but I know I'm an angel investor and I'm taking this risk with you guys. So, and then at the end, he convinced himself to put more money into it. I'm like, oh my gosh. And then he says, I don't want to be on any board. I just want to be here, support you any way I can.

And then everything after that just really fell in place and we were really fortunate. He's a true angel investor. He helped get us a couple of more rounds of funding so we could keep this product. And that was the biggest challenge at first is trying to get the funds so we could finish the product. I mean, we could have gone and done it ourselves, but it would have taken longer and we would have been maybe a little bit more exposed and having a company that's done things like this in security. So now the biggest challenge is

you know, trying to get the product out to the market is let people know that something like this exists. And that's, that's a huge challenge when we, by the way, there is competition out there. And when we first started this, if you don't know what to look for, you don't know what you're looking for. And that was one of the problems. So what we're trying to do now is bring this to the market, let them know that there is something like this that could help you. So that was a big challenge.

I'd ask myself during these times, why am I doing this? My wife didn't want me to do this, by the way. That's where the biggest challenges came. Why are you doing this? We need to retire. Let's go do things. And I just couldn't let this go. And that was difficult. So there was lot of difficulties, but it was perseverance and just keeping focus and staying positive. And that's really what helped us here.

Jennifer Loehding (24:14)
Yeah, no, this is really good. And it's interesting because I've had other people not a whole lot, but I have had some other tech people that have started some SaaS companies, startup type things. And I had a young girl on here that was that created an app, a smarty app, which is like an AI planner type app. And she was an MIT grad. And she talked a lot about that, the funding, getting the investments for that. And you're right. I think, you know, any time you're doing

I personally have not had to do that in the work that I have, but I know a lot of people that have. And I think there are always different types of challenges, but I think there's so many takeaways from what you said here, really even just about, I keep wanting to hone in on like the networking piece to this, had you not had that conversation. I met that person, that door would have never been opened, right? And so the power of getting out and actually sitting down and talking to people and not necessarily pitching.

but sitting down and having conversations with people and getting to know people and how it spawns those different conversations that open those doors.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (25:12)
Exactly. Exactly. You know, and that's funny because the first company that we started, we sold it through networking. And it was, it was, you know, and I'll just briefly go into that. There was a company that we started called BuildWave Technologies. It was log management. It's about all the, all the logs that your computer log. And so anyway, to make a long story short, we were at the point of where we had a close up shop because we ran out of money. This happened in 2008.

During the financial crisis, our target market was who? The financial institutions. anyway, so what I ended up doing is I went to this networking event and it was a concert. like, OK, you know, I've always believed getting out there networking. And I met this individual that was there. We were just talking and he asked me, what do I do? And I started telling him and he started listening, says and tell me more and says, OK, he gave me his car says I'm the lawyer. I sit on this board, call the president, tell him that I told.

you to tell him that you guys got to consider buying this company. And that's how we ended up selling that company. I won't go into the whole story, but it was through networking. I went to a concert and there I found someone just through conversation. It's like, wow. six months later, we ended up selling the company. Not for the customers that we had because we had zero, but it was for the technology.

Jennifer Loehding (26:32)
Yeah, yeah. Well, I guess you're then you're a true testament of power of networking because, know, I think that's a that is a an interesting thing. And you and I network in a lot of the same circles here. And it's just a very interesting thing because, you know, sometimes I always go into networking with probably the idea like you do. I don't know what that conversation is going to lead to. I don't know if it's going to lead to anything. It may just be a great person that I know.

Or it may be somebody that I end up referring. It may be a business partner. It may be a customer. I never know, but I just sort of always go in the door thinking that I'm really there to get to try to understand somebody and know who they are. It's really why I love doing the podcast, because it's almost like I get to network. I get to learn about people without having to leave my door to do it. You know what I mean? Like I know you and I network outside, but a lot of the people that come on here.

I learn a lot about their businesses and what they do through these conversations, right? And I think that's how the relationships are formed. And I think that's how you get these success stories like yours that come into play.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (27:31)
Well, you're such a great interviewer. know when we met last time or the first time I was on your podcast, we were talking about the book I wrote and then somehow we got into the Keep It Saved. I'm like, how did we get and it was all secret stuff and it's okay. It's being announced here on your podcast. So that was really good. What should I be saying these things? Okay, let's go ahead and say it.

Jennifer Loehding (27:59)
I've had people say stuff, something like, can't be saying this. Okay, well, don't tell us that. But it's funny because, Gerard, know, the podcast, like I think I've done so many of these and I'm getting it finally figured out because I was never really a good question asker. Like I didn't really learn to do that. You know, so when I would first go network, I would be like the typical sit down, let me tell you everything I do kind of thing. Right. And then I'd get out and I'd be like, that went awful. You know what? Cause I didn't know.

And then, so I always say, I think the podcast for me personally, I'm like, everybody should start a podcast if you're not good at talking, because it forced me to have to get good at asking people questions about themselves, right? And people love to share their story and their knowledge and stuff. So I'm all, I'm all for however you need to learn to ask questions, but that's what you got to get good at.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (28:48)
don't ask me some other very personal questions.

Jennifer Loehding (28:52)
I I will, I will. No, what I would love to talk about is like your leadership because you've done so many things. I know you teach at SMU and some of the other universities and stuff. And so going through this process, because you've been in leadership for a very long time, you've been an entrepreneur, you've worked in corporate, you've done all these leadership roles. And so maybe, you know, for somebody listening to this, any advice you could lend them.

You know, as far as in the leadership space, but maybe if they're wanting to even go in and start something like what you do, like maybe it's not your particular thing, obviously, but maybe in that space where they want to start a tech company or any type of company, really.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (29:31)
So a couple of things, in terms of leadership, I could share with you some of the things that I've went through in really trying to get across that adversity. And it's not because of people, it's because of what's in you. just to give you an idea, so when I worked at Jaguar Logistics, it's the...

on demand for specimens. if you went and drew blood anywhere in the state of Texas, there was a 60 % chance that our company was picking it up and taking it to the lab. And I remember that the owner, the board and the owner, they were looking for a new CEO. And I thought I was in for the spot there, but out of nowhere, he brings on someone from outside. And, you know, at that point,

And he was pretty much telling me, know, I hope you stay with us, but it's your decision. And I had to really think about it said, well, you know, I could either, you know, start crying and not literally, but you get upset and say, well, you know, you know, forget that I'm going to leave, or I could help the CEO really built this company. So I took the ladder and what I did was, and I told myself is that whatever the CEO needs, I'm going to become his right-hand man.

I will do what he needs and I will allow him to use me in the way he wants to. And sure enough, mean, we got along really, really well. I knew that he was the CEO and I wasn't going to try to there, you know, what is it? Hit my chest and try to say, I'm the big dog here. And then after a little while, eventually that CEO left.

And I went ahead and got into the position and really helped the board get to where they were at. So that was, that was, you know, I really had to look at all my books and training, but, you know, I had to say, look, this is not about me. This is about the company. And am I going to, am I going to be a twerp and try to keep them from succeeding or am I going to do everything I can to help them succeed? And that's what I did. So that's a takeaway there. So if you don't get promoted.

If you feel like you were passed up, just don't worry about it. Work even harder and let them know that, this is who you are. So it'll get you there.

Jennifer Loehding (31:56)
Yeah, I'll say something about that because you gave me chills when you were telling that story because that takes a really inward like focus, you know what I mean, on looking at the bigger picture because I think it's making me think kind of a Stephen Covey, Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. I love that book because he always talks about the win-win, right?

That's like the I will tell you the whole book, but that is my favorite chapters about the win win. if you guys I've said this on the show, if you haven't seen the video where he does the arm wrestle with the guy, it's such a great like, I don't know what you want to call it. So it was whatever for that message where he does this arm wrestle with the guy and he lets the guy win and the guy's like what and then he goes back, the guy pushes back and they end up doing this back and forth, right? The whole idea is the win win, right? Like when you give you both win. And so

Like you're telling this story and the whole time I'm getting chills because I'm thinking about this. How many times somebody would have gone into that position and be like, I got overlooked and they would have gotten mad. Right. And then they would have maybe become defiant or maybe they left or they just became like what the Mickey and the five dysfunctions of a team, but the, know what I mean? Like the person who is the great worker, but a pain in the butt to work with. And you decided to look at that and go inward and say, look, you know what, this is about the company.

This is about servant hood, right? Like being a servant leader and taking myself out of the equation and how can I help the greater good here? And then look, it paid it forward. It came back to you in the end. That is like the ultimate like 360 circle. You know what I mean? So like you just totally gave me chills when you said that. Cause I'm like that is so hard for a lot. I don't know.

I don't know if I would have always been able to do it. I maybe now I could think a little bit more in that space, but I don't, that's a hard thing to be able to do.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (33:42)
Yeah, it's very hard, especially, well, I guess a lot of people, but I'm a type A personality. So that was very hard. And maybe 20 years ago, I would have not done it.

But after reading all these books, and yes, I read the Seven Habits of Effective People and Marcus Aurelius, a lot of books, and yes, I was able to do it. And in terms of if you want to start a company, so I teach an entrepreneurship class at Dallas College about being an entrepreneur. And I would say the most important thing of anything that you do is market research.

and what is it that you're trying to build. Do not go into it saying, I've got this idea and it's going to become the biggest idea since sliced bread, because it doesn't work that way. And what I've done is when I started this company, I was telling one of my business partners and I was giving them a description. said, I've done the interviews. Nobody knows about this. And while we were on the phone, he found my three competitors.

That's because he knew what to look for. So market research is very important. That and your financials. So when you do your market research, I'm really talking about, you know, maybe at minimum, at minimum 120 hours at minimum of market research. And you have to write down what is that they have? What is that you're trying to build? What's your competition? Is there even a need for this? And that would be the first thing. Is there a need for something that you're doing?

A lot of people, well, not a lot, but at least the people that were in the classes that I had was they had these ideas and they wanted to start it. in the end, if you don't know what you're trying to push, if you can't communicate it effectively, then you're not going to be able to succeed unless of course you cure cancer. You don't need much of a marketing research for that here. got cured of cancer, but no. marketing research is very, very important because when I was teaching the class,

I asked him, you're doing this lawn maintenance. What makes you different? Service. I don't know how many times I hear service and customer support. I'm like, that ain't going to cut it. You've got to tell me what is it? is your, the way, and I can't coin this, when my business partner and I had the first company that build wave technologies, he said, no, the second startup, I'm sorry, the second startup, says, hey, are we building a

Do we have a band-aid here or do we have morphine? I said, what do you mean? says, well, imagine that you get your arm cut and you're bleeding profusely. I could put a band-aid on it, maybe stop the bleeding. Or would you rather have morphine to kill the pain? So that's my message is when you're creating something, look for that morphine. Don't look for a band-aid. And then the financials, very important as well. When it comes to the financials, you got to do a five-year plan of

what it's going to cost you, how much money you're going to need, what's your anticipated revenue, and be very, very conservative in revenue. You say, oh yeah, I'm going to have $10,000 in the first year, cut that down by, oh, I don't know, 80%. So you're only going have $2,000. And do that. Marketing is very important, knowing your competition, knowing what you're going to do, knowing how to communicate it, being able to say it very succinctly and effectively, and be able to

tie into the emotions of the people you're trying to sell it to or the companies. Very, very important. I wouldn't do anything. I wouldn't spend a dime until you do all your market research. And that's going to take you. Again, if you don't do a minimum of 120 hours, that's what a month, then don't bother doing anything.

Jennifer Loehding (37:35)
That's so good, Gerard. I really like the band-aid morphine comparison. I think that's so good. And it's interesting because all these things you're talking about, this is really good. I've heard all these different things. Like I had a guy that came on a while back by the name of James Bond. He wrote a book. I just mentioned it for my newsletter this month. It's Brain Glue and it's How to Make Things Sticky. He competed against the, or was in a competition with the guy that did the fried egg. This is your brain and this is your brain on drugs thing.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (38:03)
Yeah,

right.

Jennifer Loehding (38:04)
So he wrote a book about, you know, making things be sticky and what sets people apart. Like if you think about like Richard Branson, everything's like Virgin Records, Virgin Hotels, like they have certain things, Madonna, there's certain things that these people have, right? Making it sticky. But to your point also on the market research, the importance of that, I worked with a mentor, one of the many mentors, I'm sure like you, I've had a lot of different coaching things and people in my space, but I had a mentor that I worked with for two years.

That built a very completely different, but it was a very successful. He had a in person coaching business and then he moved to the online space, which I'm still trying to figure all that out. But he a big part of the program that we went through when we worked with him was on the market research part. It was a part that it's hard. Everybody hates it right? But he had us go through and decide who was our avatar. We, know, and.

Who are the people that are doing what we're doing? And what are these, these are avatar? What are these people? What are they buying? Like, what do they need? What are they, you know, and you're so right about all of that. And you're also right about these ideas because I even think in our space, in my world where we're creators, we all have these ideas that we want to put out there, right? And then we're like, we like the idea, but does it resonate with everybody else? And I'll give you a point when I talk about my podcast, when we created Starter Girlz,

That brand was unique. was where we were. was two ex-Mary Kay sales directors. We were starting a movement. That's what it was all about. It was this movement we were trying to create. This positive, influencing, inspiring women kind of thing. Well then in the interim of that, when we started making changes, she left. I brought another host on and then we kind of did some changes. We spawned the Behind the Dreamers. Love the podcast, great platform. I love all the guests that were on it. But I was never sold on the title or the logo. It just didn't...

It wasn't my thing because it for me, just wasn't starter girls was my thing. And so when I brought that back in, I brought it back with a little part of the core, the core mission, but I expanded it. And because I started figuring out like what it was that I was trying to do, the pain points that I was trying to address, where the problems were and what I was trying to solve. And so now the starter girls isn't just be about the podcast. It started now becoming this brand that I'm trying to create where there's stuff like there's I've now created this digital

program that's in there that's actually addressing pain points that female entrepreneurs are dealing with. Not to say men are dealing with them too, I just think women admit them more. So it's targeting them, you know? But it's starting to become this like brand now and not just an idea that I had crafted out. So I agree with you when you talk about figuring out your market research and, you know, figuring out those pain points, all of those things you said, I just wanted to like.

hone in on that and say, yes, that's all true. You need to be listening to this if you right now are wanting to start a business.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (40:56)
Yeah, very, very important. You know, in terms of marketing, one of the books that I read, and you might have read it yourself, is Thinking Fast and Slow by Dr. Daniel Kahneman. Brilliant book. Yes, a brilliant book. It's 400 plus pages. For me, it was a little hard to read because every page I turned, was highlighting, marking, because there was so much information. But he passed away just recently, within the last year.

Jennifer Loehding (41:07)
don't think I've read that.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (41:23)
But it was him and his partner Atmos, both from Israel and both passed away. But they came up with, they got their Nobel Prize in economics because even though they were both psychologists, they came up with what's called that theory, my gosh, it, prospect theory. And in a nutshell, what they're saying is that an individual would much rather not

lose than win. And what do I mean by that? What they meant by that was that if you used to have stock A that made $100 and stock B that lost 50, your net is $50, right? You should be happy. But your mind focuses on that lost. Oh, I lost this money. I lost this. That's all your mind stays on. But if you had stock C that made $25 and stock D that made 25, your net is still 50, right? And you were like, wow, this is the greatest thing. You feel so much more happier.

So in terms of marketing and how you position your product and how you're doing your messaging, what can you tell individuals that if you don't listen to me, at least listen to someone else because this information will help you tremendously. Make them feel like they can't, they're going to lose out if they don't listen to you. So it's hard to do, but a lot of good information in that book, how a person thinks, how people think, would highly recommend it if you're in the marketing or in psychology.

Jennifer Loehding (42:52)
Yeah, I need to read that when definitely because there is a lot of psychology to marketing and selling and I learned some of that in that program when I worked with that mentor, just the psychology of everything's an emotional client. We joke about I had a lady come on here one time. I can't remember her name, but she's in an episode lover, but I might not why I'm not thinking of her name, but she was talking about that. And one of the things we talked about in there was.

Emotional selling because a lot of times we think we're being logical and everything's on emotions. Even if we say it, we're being logical. We're still working on emotion. There's never logic to it. We may not be freaking out and jumping up in car sales, but it's still an emotional purchase. And so our job as marketers is to tap into that and, and, and figure out what our clients and that they need. And so you've got a great product for that because it is really tapping into a pain point.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (43:41)
You know, in fact, in that book, Thinking Fast and Slow, Dr. Daniel Kahneman talks about emotions and he said, and I'm paraphrasing it, everybody makes decisions based on emotions. The only way you make a decision without the emotions is if you're autistic. Otherwise, you're making a decision based on emotions, whether you believe it or not. So, I just jogged my memory when you said that.

Jennifer Loehding (44:08)
Yeah, I need to get that book for sure. Thanks for recommending it. I love this. It's fun when we get book titles in here because sometimes I get stuck and I'm like, I don't have a book right now. And I like, then somebody else say something like there's a book I need to check out. So thank you. And I know all my people that are reading them are probably good books, right? So it's fun. So I have some fun questions I want to ask you. Some of these we might've kind of touched upon, but they're a little bit more specific. They're not anything crazy. They're totally fine. So what's one belief that has shaped this?

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (44:37)
What's one belief that what?

Jennifer Loehding (44:39)
has shaped your success.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (44:43)
So for me, believe it or not, it's being able to wake up every morning and thank God that I have another day to try to make something of myself and this product to give back to people. So that keeps me going every day. I wake up and I thank Him for that. It's His grace that gives me this opportunity to do what I'm

Jennifer Loehding (45:05)
I love that. I love that Gerard. You gave me chills again. Another time and I always like it when it happens. That's a good answer. I like it. All right. Best piece of advice you ever got. Anything you can think of?

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (45:19)
Don't do it. I've had so many accidents. I've had so many accidents and recently I... I'm sorry.

Jennifer Loehding (45:31)
was gonna say you have to those though, you know?

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (45:35)
Well, I had too many. I ended up, I went to the gym and I ended up hitting myself in the face with a medicine ball accidentally. And I had to have stitches across my top of my nose there. And I remember the lady, I was lying down because I thought I was just bleeding from my nose. And she comes over, hon, are you okay? Like, yeah, yeah, I'm fine. Well, I'm an ER nurse and

I see blood coming from your eyes. I what? Yeah, move that towel from your face. So I moved it and said, oh yeah, honey, you're have to get some stitches. okay. Do you want me to call the ER? said, no, no, no, I can make it. I can drive. Do you want me to call your wife? Hell no. Do not, let me die here. Do not call my wife there. Do not call her.

So, you know, of course I went and got stitches. You shouldn't be doing that anymore. So I got off the medicine balls and I went for a bike ride three months later and I ended up falling down as well. Had stitches all over again. Got my nose fractured and gosh, so she says don't ever do any of stuff again. So I'm not doing it anymore. I'm just... Yeah. Bike ride? No.

Jennifer Loehding (46:50)
Yeah, it happens sometimes right like I'm telling you got over I like the part where you said don't I can see my husband doing that like whatever you do don't cock I'm like what were you doing that you did that? But it happens. Right now it's crazy because my son has been he's traveling right now for work and so he's been he has a rod in his chest because he had a caved-in chest and so they put this rod in his chest and so he's got a band on his arm that says

He has to wear a medical alert so that if he needs it, if the way he tells me the job that he's going to, cause he's working at this restaurant, it's about maybe a mile away, he's rollerblading to and from the location every day. I'm just thinking, please do not crash on those rollerblades. And then one day he comes in and shows me the side of his leg. He FaceTimes me, shows me, says, I crashed. And he shows me the side of his leg. And I'm like, ow, like, you do, do not catch yourself with your hands.

fall on your butt, I don't know, whatever you gotta do, but don't catch yourself with your hands. So, but you know, it's life. You gotta live and learn, you know?

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (47:57)
Well, you gotta tell them the don't do it, huh? Don't do it.

Jennifer Loehding (48:02)
Yeah, I do. He doesn't listen to me because he's young still. So anyways, well, thank you, Gerard. One more thing I want to ask you, and this is a fun one. What is one thing you do every morning? Like one habit or something that makes your day?

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (48:16)
One habit, gosh, I think for me is just waking up and enjoying the day saying that this might be my last day, so I better make the best of it. That's what I do. Just making sure that I've got this day, so what am I going to do about it and how am I going to make other people successful and my life successful? So yes, that keeps me going.

Jennifer Loehding (48:41)
love that Gerard. I kind of feel that way too. I sort of feel like that's how I get up every day. know, I'm like, I feel like I say the word crap's going on. I feel like every day I try to wake up with this idea of like, what am I going to do today? Like, what am I going to make happen? Who am I going to meet? Like, who's life, who's going to change my life? Who's going to, who's life am I going to change? Like I sort of kind of have that idea every day. So I love that. I think that's a great place to be because you're just enjoying the moment.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (49:05)
You know, I got that from a driver when I worked at UPS and I remember saying, hey, are you having a great day? And his reply to me was, every day is a good day. And it made me think and he was being, know, hey, every day that's your life is a great day. So ever since that, about 25 years ago, I try to live that every day.

Jennifer Loehding (49:26)
Awesome. Well, thank you for sharing. You've been amazing and I'm glad that we got to catch up today and talk about what you're doing. So if our audience wants to get in touch with you, maybe they want to learn more about Keep It Safe. Maybe they're ready after listening to this. So like, my gosh, I need to jump on this right now. Or maybe they want to get in touch with you. Where would you like us to send them?

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (49:44)
Yeah, yeah, they could send me directly an email to Gerard, G E R A R D at keep it saved S A B E D dot com and just tell them that they heard me on your podcast. And as a matter of fact, they'll get 30 % off their first year subscription. How about that? They have to tell me they heard you on your podcast to get that.

Jennifer Loehding (50:03)
Yeah, thank you for that.

We'll make sure to, well, when we do the show notes, we'll put that in there so they know for those people who read the stuff.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (50:15)
You see, there you got me talking about things. Should I have done that? I don't know. That's what you bring out.

Jennifer Loehding (50:22)
Hey, it's all good. Hey, listen. Yeah, if it draws people there because it's a good service and if it draws people there and they see value in it, then it's worth it, you know.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (50:34)
Great, great.

Jennifer Loehding (50:35)
Awesome. And then what's the website again, Gerard?

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (50:39)
It's a keep it safe key. Keep it saved K E E P I T S A V E D. think there for a second.

Jennifer Loehding (50:50)
No, I got it. just want to make sure our listeners are getting it because some people, you know, they're just listening to this and we want to make sure we get them. And that's why I always say that even though my title says starter girls with the Z, I always say the Z because I will tell you somebody will go in and put an S in there and be like, why am I not finding you? Because it's a Z. Right. So I spell it out. You know, we'll make sure that all this. Yeah, we'll make sure all this gets in the show notes that way. Everybody has they know how to catch you.

I want to say thank you for everything. Thank you for coming on here and being authentic and real and sharing your journey with us and updating us obviously. And for the listeners, you know, of course they can go back and listen to the episode on Behind the Dreamers. That show is still accessible. Those episodes are still out there. I keep them. They're all great. So they can go back and get kind of the previous to your story and then catch up here if either way, you know, wherever they come from, they go from there to here, here to there. So thank you for your time and your wisdom and all the good stuff today.

Dr. Gerard Ibarra (51:44)
Well, thank you for having me on your podcast. really, really enjoyed speaking with you. I think you did a fabulous job. I really enjoyed speaking with you.

Jennifer Loehding (51:51)
Thank you, appreciate it. All right, and to our audience, of course, we appreciate you. We hope you found this episode both informative and inspiring. And of course, you know what to do. Do all the things, hit subscribe, like, share, comment, so we can keep sharing all this fabulous content. And as I always say, in order to live the extraordinary, you must start, and every start begins with a decision. You guys take care, be safe, be kind to one another, and we will see you next time.