Welcome to another episode of “Spark & Ignite Your Marketing,” where we dive deep into the compelling intersection of music, marketing, and the unique journey of a seasoned commercial real estate broker. Our guest for this episode is Benji Rosenzweig, a Detroit-based commercial real estate expert with a vast international reach through Colliers. Benji isn’t just about closing deals; he’s about creating connections, fostering community, and leveraging music as a powerful tool for communication and connection.
Benji Rosenzweig: A Multifaceted Professional
Known for his significant contributions to Detroit’s vibrant restaurant and retail scenes, Benji brings a wealth of experience and a unique approach to the commercial real estate world. Beyond his impressive resume in real estate, Benji hosts the Much Obliged podcast, a yellow balloon experience, and has shared his insights on nonverbal communication in a captivating TEDx talk in Detroit.
A Journey Through Commercial Real Estate
Benji’s foray into commercial real estate wasn’t a straight path. Transitioning from the insurance and financial sector after the 2008 crash, Benji found his calling in commercial real estate despite the steep learning curve and the challenging economic climate of Detroit at the time. His story is one of resilience, adaptability, and the relentless pursuit of excellence, underscored by his commitment to building meaningful relationships.
The Much Obliged Podcast: A Yellow Balloon Experience
The episode also highlights Benji’s podcast, an innovative platform that explores the intersection of music, recovery, and personal stories of transformation. The podcast is a testament to Benji’s commitment to using his interests to create a positive impact, providing a space for honest discussions about addiction, recovery, and the healing power of music. His story is a reminder that success isn’t just about achieving business goals; it’s about how we connect with others, share our authentic selves, and find harmony in the various aspects of our lives.
Read Benji’s Favorite Book
Raving Fans: A Revolutionary Approach To Customer Service – Ken Blanchard
Follow Benji Rosenzweig
https://www.linkedin.com/in/brosenzweig/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zf13TSlYc4
https://www.colliers.com/en/experts/ben-rosenzweig
Watch on YouTube!
Transcript:
Beverly:
Get ready for an episode that tunes into the transformative power of music. Did you know that music has the incredible ability to reduce stress by up to 66%, boost cognitive performance, improve mood by 9%, and even increase productivity by 15%. Prepare for an enlightening episode as we delve into the power of music alongside our guest, Benji Rosensweig benji isn’t your average commercial real estate broker. He’s a seasoned expert in fostering deals by confirming the qualifications of landlords, tenants, buyers, and sellers. He’s based in Detroit. He plays a pivotal role in numerous notable deals within the city and the vibrant restaurants and retail scenes. But Benji’s expertise extends far beyond Southeast Michigan. He also operates internationally through Colliers, working on deals in various global locations. But that’s not all there is to Benji, beyond his impressive real estate career, Benji is a true music enthusiast who doesn’t just appreciate melodies. He hosts the podcast, the Much Obliged podcast, a yellow balloon experience In fact, Benji’s passion goes beyond. He’s shared his insights on nonverbal communication in a captivating TEDx talk in Detroit back in 2022 where he discussed how he and his daughter Ella used music to build collections collections, build connections and actual language. But the inspiration doesn’t stop there. Benji finds solace and motivation in morning mantras shared with his daughter. Naama, embodying his commitment to personal growth and connection. Join us as we delve into Benji’s multifaceted world where real estate meets music and where connections are built. One melody at a time. Welcome, Benji.
Benji:
Wow. You make me sound a lot cooler than I am.
Beverly:
Oh, you’re one of the coolest people I know. We’ve known each other now. How long has it been?
Benji:
It’s just shy of 20 years. I dunno if it’s 17 or 18, but it’s in that. It’s in that ballpark.
Beverly:
I met you on your birthday. What birthday was it?
Benji:
Probably 24th or 20 something like that. I was in my let’s put it this way, I’ve been married for 17 years, so it was before that.’cause you weren’t married and I knew you before then. So 18, 19 years, we’ve known each other.
Beverly:
It seems like a blink of an eye.
Benji:
Yeah, actually in June it’ll be 18 years. So
Beverly:
that’s crazy. That much time has passed. Yeah. We were so young and innocent and naive to the world back then.
Benji:
It’s wild to think about like. When I was a kid, hearing my parents talk about people that they’ve known for 20 years. And I was like, it’s impossible. I’m only nine years old. How could you have known somebody for 20 years? And now I,
Beverly:
and we’re in such different places. I feel like we’ve grown and done some amazing things. And I think it’s so fun to have you in this space with me on the podcast. So thank you so much for allowing me to interview you on the podcast.
Benji:
My pleasure.}
Beverly:
I wanna dive into your fascinating journey and how you began. Let’s explore how you started with commercial real estate and some of your family background and how music plays a role in all of it, I feel like. Can you share a little bit about how you got into the commercial real estate space and how that journey began?
Benji:
Yeah. It’s a goofy story of falling ass backwards into something that I’m competent in. I I was in sales, I was in the insurance and financial business. The market crashed in 2007. And was having dinner with a group of people who I had helped with some projects on and was terrified because of the company that I had helped build, was falling apart. I say help build, I helped grow. I didn’t help build it. The market crash and we saw the writing on the wall and that was going away. And the guy said I trust you. I like you. Why don’t you help me in my residential real estate business? And that was a Friday night dinner. And on Monday morning I started with them. And I worked in that business for almost two years before I came to the realization that I absolutely, I. Hate residential real estate. It’s just not for me. And that’s okay. There are people who are really good at residential real estate. And I just, I did not enjoy it, but I was again, having dinner with somebody and said, I was trying to figure out what I was gonna do next, and he said, that he had a friend who was in the commercial real estate business, and maybe I could take some of those skills and reuse them. And so I went and met with a guy in the commercial real estate business, and he said, I like your mo. But none of the skills that you have will be helpful in the commercial real estate business. So you have to forget everything that you know and learn a whole new set of skills. And I was like, oh, no problem. It was not that easy. I got into the commercial real estate business in 2009, which was a tough time to get in, especially in Detroit. It’s worked out well. I’m really grateful for the things that I’ve built and now that I’m saying that out loud, I realized that was 15 years ago and I’m really grateful for that.
Beverly:
How did you make that transition? Was it through on the job training? Was it reading? How did you transfer that?
Benji:
I had a couple of really great mentors who worked with me to learn how to be a commercial real estate broker. One of the things that they said was that my biggest problem is that I’m a nice guy and I think that people should do business with me because they like me, and that’s just not reality. And that sounds like a Sandler training thing. My sales methodology very much comes from Sandler, and that is figure out what the problem is and whether or not you can solve it and them liking you is a bonus. And you having a good relationship is a product of them believing that you can solve the problem. It has nothing to do with whether or not we like the same music and often we get to do some really good, relationship building around music or around lack of sports or around, goofy stuff or humor or movies or whatever. Nobody’s investing tens of millions of dollars into a project because I’m a nice guy. They’re investing tens of millions of dollars into a project because. They believe that this will a problem they trust to
Beverly:
make the right decision for their, in their best interests
Benji:
the second half of the answer, that’s not a sales pitch for Sandler so I was taught that there’s three buckets of information that everything that I do in my day must feed these three buckets. And that is deal knowledge, market knowledge and contacts. Market knowledge is when a guy in my office says,, I was introduced to a guy who owns this building. Do you know anything about this? And I can say, he bought the building in 2016 for X amount. He bought it from so and who bought it for that? This is what used to be it. And did you know that the movie this movie was filmed in the basement of that’s market knowledge.. And there’s a lot of value to market knowledge. Deal knowledge is the idea that when somebody says, I wanna sell my building for$15 million, or whatever number, knowing what is an actual. Transaction look like, and when this problem comes up, how do I solve this problem? And then when the next problem comes up, how do I solve that problem? And all the minefield of, getting a deal from cradle to grave, how to navigate that minefield. That’s deal knowledge and context is, when a client says to me, I have this problem, and I say, call this person, or somebody says, I don’t know how to get ahold of this person at this company. And I can say I don’t know anybody at that company, but I know Beverly and she knows somebody at that company. Having the ability to pick up the phone and get through to the right person or get through to person who can introduce me to the right person. If I can focus on those three areas I. The deals will come and the deals will close, it’s a gross simplification. Everything that needs to happen within a deal I’ve got a sign right over here that says, prospecting is my business. Everything that has to happen to make a deal work there’s a million things, but but they all fall into those three buckets for me.
Beverly:
But you also need the person it wasn’t like two days ago, somebody asked about commercial real estate on Facebook, and I was like, tag Benji. Like who’s also knows, like I have a network and if I see somebody ask, but she’s the first person I think of with commercial real estate. So being that, being known in the space as the commercial real estate guy I’ve known you for a long time and over the time you had changed careers, but how do you do that? How do you become known as that commercial real estate guy in Detroit?
Benji:
So that’s a great question. I probably have to like, acknowledge some privilege to answer that question and say most people just have to do what I did, which is grind and work 80 hours and, figure it out and just, like the Romans burn the ships behind them and just, not have a safety net and do all do what my grandfather did, right? Which is, don’t worry about being happy, just do the work and get paid and feed your family. And I did a lot of that. But the privilege that I am acknowledging is I also happen to find some stuff along the way that I really enjoy doing and that I’m really like, is fun for me and I get pleasure out of seeing the success of the people that I’ve worked with. And I’m grateful that I don’t wake up every morning miserable. That I’m in a business that is unsatisfying, right? I wake up every morning and I think about the people that I’m working with. There’s a guy who I’m currently doing some work for, and he is in his mid fifties and he’s, worked for 25, 30 years and saved money and put it together. And his son is now in college and is doing some business on Amazon and he said that in 2023, his son made almost as much money as he did. And in 2024, if his son’s business trends, he, his son’s gonna make more money than him in college. And he’s I need to become an entrepreneur and burn my W2 this is his midlife crisis. And the idea that I can help, he chose a franchise, he paid his franchise fees and we’re gonna roll out five locations and, over a couple of years. And, the idea that he puts that trust in me and I get to help him see his dream and build a business for his kids to inherit. There’s a lot of, there’s a lot of beauty in that. And there’s a lot of life affirming ability to grow a small empire, that his kids and grandchildren can inherit. That’s a beautiful thing. And I’m really grateful for that. Then, that’s like the human side of the commercial real estate business. When I help a coffee shop owner buy a building so he can expand the bakery side of his business, that’s not, feeding some corporate machine. That’s, there’s a real human element to that. And that’s, I’m really grateful for that. It’s
Beverly:
the American dream, right? You’re making dreams happen.
Benji:
One of my favorite deals that I ever did was a small restaurant called Bangkok 96 in the Detroit Shipping Company. And the. Daughter of the chef came to the closing and was like, Hey, I came here for two reasons. Number one, I wanted to make sure that your paperwork that you sent was the signature copy, was the paperwork that you put in front of my mother. Not because I don’t trust you, but because I don’t trust anybody. I’m like, okay, I got no problem with that. Making sure I did write is fine. She goes, but I also wanted you to know that my mother was trying to find a space for two years, and people would, landlords and brokers would answer the phone. She’d start talking, they’d hear her accent and they’d hang up on her. And you were the first person who took the phone call, set the meeting, had the showing, worked on a letter of intent, worked through the lease, and got the deal done. And I just wanted to say thank you for that, because as a, as an immigrant, that means a lot to me. And I appreciate you saying that, but essentially what you just said was, thank you for not being a jerk and doing your job and showing up. And she was like yeah, because other people didn’t, and she got a James Beard nomination for the food that she made out of that restaurant. And I’m really grateful that I was like a little, spoke in the wheel of that story. And I just, I played a little part and literally all I did was my job. I didn’t go above and beyond. I didn’t do anything special. I just showed up. But, that’s the type of stuff where I’m fond of that.
Beverly:
When I can help a brand go to the next level, a small business, hit the next level, hit their next goal, help them grow their customer base, grow to a second location,. It’s as small as sometimes some of my clients just wanna send their kid to college off that money, right? So you’re literally building a legacy of education and opportunity for people and it’s really a it’s like an honor to be on that journey with them in some small way and be part of their success. So I completely agree with you, Benji, that is, it brings immense amount of joy. Not only do I love marketing, but I love that little human element as well in the process. That’s extraordinarily special. So how does music play a role in all of this commercial real estate stuff? Like how you, you talk a lot about music. You play your music during covid, like literally you were one of the bright lights for me.’cause you’d play your guitar and your daughter Ella would be with you. And it was just some joy in a rather sad and scary situation. How does music play a role in all of this for you?
Benji:
Yeah. First of all, thank you for the kind words. I just wish you, you had set the bar a little bit higher because if my music was joyful to you, the bar is low.
Beverly:
I’ll just say it was Ella more than you. Okay? Okay. Okay
Benji:
fine. In which case you can’t set the Barney higher I’m a music lover. I remember as a kid, like listening to blues and anticipating where the music was gonna go, and I thought that, I was like, I thought that I was a genius because I could sense. And it’s dude, no, it’s because it’s 12 bar blues. It’s basic, 1, 3, 5 stuff. The fact that I just, I heard the pattern in my head and I knew where the pattern was going was just because I understood the basics of music. I’ve always been a fan and all, everything I just said sounds completely pretentious, and please delete all of that, but taste, it’s all salmon and veggies. I’ve I remember as a kid listening to, metallica tapes on my boombox on tapes, the lowest volume set. Setting tapes, you’re aging yourself tapes, right? So I’d set up my boombox next to my bed and I’d play the tapes on the lowest volume setting. So if I put my ear next to it, I could hear it. But my mom couldn’t hear it, so she,’cause, lights were out already. And I would fall asleep listening to Metallica as ridiculous, ride the lightning and bed music. That was the best time. Bedtime music was ride, ride the lightning. And they’re really, and master puppets music. Relax. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, dude rush was bedtime music and led Zeppelin was bedtime music. These were, this is what I was listening to at night.
Beverly:
Iconic, they’re. Legends.
Benji:
Yeah. And then I found grunge. And then the nineties showed up and I was like, this is amazing. And
Beverly:
Kurt Cobain,
Benji:
just like the Smashing Pumpkin Si Me Dream is one of the greatest albums that was ever written. Pearl Jam 10 is one of the greatest albums that was ever written. I can go on and on the sort of late stage punk into early grunge into middle grunge. And somehow we ended up with Matchbox 20. How did the nineties turn into that? I don’t know the answer to I don’t know how nineties alternative, this is a tangent.
Beverly:
Oh, there was like, you go from like the twenties of the flapper into the forties of like big band to
Benji:
yeah, but that’s 20, that’s a 20 year evolution. We went from the Foo fighters to, smooth with Carlos Santana.
Beverly:
What happened? I like him.
Benji:
Me too, but him with Match, the whole thing doesn’t, it’s a
Beverly:
very interesting,
Benji:
the late nineties were strange. The late nineties were strange. And then that evolved somehow into boy bands. So I don’t know what happened. The long and the short of it is I got into music. Music spoke to me. It was a way that I could escape and, put on earphones, and just be somewhere else. Somewhere along the line I found. Bands like Dave Matthews and then The Grateful Dead and Phish Every show is different and the music is unique and special and, I have this sort of. Dichotomy. I hate when people say I listen to everything. No, you don’t give me five genres that you listen to. You don’t listen to everything. There’s a lot of stuff out there. And I love that sort of prog rock, jam, super intricate stuff that I am nowhere near talented enough to ever attempt to play. But you do play it.
Beverly:
I’ve heard you play it
Benji:
not well. But on the other side, I love the singer songwriter, the Neil Young. That’s the Bob Dylan, the Daniel Johnson, the Tyler Childers, like that sort of like dude with a guitar who’s telling a story and making you feel
Beverly:
Cat Stevens those are my favorite.
Benji:
I love that stuff. And, those serve very different purposes for me. And I’m grateful to be able to appreciate different versions of that and different genres. And so I can’t tell you that I listen to everything, but there are multiple genres that I really like nineties gangster rap. It’s wild. It’s humorous. Like they, they’re ripping on each other. They’re saying some stuff that like, it is great on paper, but I could never get away with. And that’s okay. And and the beets are fun, and I genuinely enjoy that.
Beverly:
I just whipped out a salt and pepper supersonic with Zeke the other day, and he was like. Who are you? You could tell. I was like, rap was a thing when I was a kid. You did not invent that. Let’s just be really clear. And he was just in shock that I knew all the lyrics and all the things. And sometimes you gotta surprise your children with something that they just don’t expect to come out of your mouth.
Benji:
So during Covid, you mentioned playing music. I was posting videos of playing songs. And some of it went in goofy directions, right? Like I did, like the slow lounge version of metal I did I did like tool covers on the ukulele, right? Which is,
Beverly:
I was fan drilling the whole time,
Benji:
right? Ridiculous.
Beverly:
I was fan drilling the whole time.
Benji:
But somebody asked me to do, what was the FI think the first one was salt and pepper, salt. And on the acoustic guitar. I just got the Facebook notification a couple days ago that was like, four years ago you did this. But I did some Wu Tang songs. I did Biggie and Snoop Dogg and Eminem and just,
Beverly:
on the ukulele. I don’t remember that.
Benji:
This, it wasn’t the ukulele, it was the acoustic guitar. It was like the folk, it was the folk version of a lot of these songs. But I, listen I’m. Really good at laughing at myself. So I
Beverly:
think you don’t take yourself very seriously and you don’t at all. At all. And I think you do spread joy and you do have a fan club.’cause people make requests. You do what the request you’ve raised money for the friendship circle through your singing. Like you have done quite a bit you’ve taken this passion of yours and you have had a lot of fun with it. And I think you’re showing I think your connection with your daughter Ella has really connected through this music and so much so you gave us amazing talk where I literally bawled my eyes out pretty much through the entire process. And it wasn’t you, it was Ella on stage. She’s just magical and I I mean you’re a magical too, but Ella’s really magical and. You are an awesome girl dad. I’ve told you this, I’ve told Sarah this. I just love to, I’ve just seen you come and flourish into your own in this way. And it’s just beautiful to watch morning mantras with your daughter. Whoever I’m listening right now, you have to check out the morning mantras. They’re just so powerful. And she’s just right on. And I can just see as she’s growing up and evolving, the more she says it, the more she’s yeah, I’m now, this is who I am. Yep. This is amazing. So I just think it’s a it’s super special to see that and be a witness to that. And thank you for letting me be into that, peek into that little world of yours. But music has turned into this really strong connection for you and Ella. Talk a little bit about Ella and her. Is it condition or what, how would you, okay. I’m not sure I’ve heard it called worse things to say that. Okay. Talk a little bit about her condition and how music has really evolved. I know that’s probably a whole 40 minute chat too, so to summarize it in a couple sentences might be difficult, but
Benji:
happy to do that. Before I do, I just wanna mention two things real quick. So you mentioned raising money. The Friendship Circle is an organization that is near and dear to our hearts. They’ve done really wonderful things for our family and every year we raise money for their annual campaign for the Walk for Friendship. And what we started doing was, as this music. Thing was happening people would say, would you play this song? Would you do that song? We were doing goofy voices, like a dude songs in Kermit’s voice, or in Mickey’s voice, or, Neil Young’s voice. It got ridiculous. And I said, sure. For a hundred dollars donation, you can request anything and I will give it an honest shot. I had women showing up and asking for like old Yiddish Broadway songs. And then my sister’s friends were requesting like Britney Spears and like trying to stump me. And I’m like no, I will. I actually, the person who said asked me to do Britney Spears, I said, for two 50, we’ll dress up like Britney Spears. And I put on pigtails and did the white shirt. I remember that. We went all out for that. Again, with the idea that like. It’s for a good cause and I’m not taking myself too seriously. So Ella has a genetic mutation called Coffin Cyrus syndrome. It’s very rare. When we found out about this there was about 350 known cases. Today there’s about 650 or 700 known cases. My wife and I are founding board members of the Coffin Cyrus Syndrome Foundation. We’ve since rotated off and are still supportive. Obviously we’re involved in the foundation. That genetic mutation every single person who has it is different. There’s a kind of a Chinese menu of 20 different things that happen if you have this mutation. And kids have anywhere from two to 25 of them, and I know the contradiction. I said there’s 20 things and you could have 25 of them, but that’s how some people go. The, the common thread is that coffin Cyrus syndrome causes structural defects in the body. And so things are grown incorrectly or missing or with damage. And so she’s got a few things in her body that are that, that are structurally defective I guess the best way to say it. So she was born with something called Agenesis of the Corpus Callum. And the corpus callum is the bridge that connects the right and the left side of the brain. You actually have 12 bridges in your brain connecting front and back, top and bottom, right and left. And the hokey pokey and but the corpus Callum is the main bridge. Now imagine if you had to get from Detroit to Windsor and the Ambassador Bridge was down. There are other ways, whether you take the tunnel or you go up to Port Huron and go through Sarnia and come back down. There are ways around. The same thing is true with the Bain, the brain. The brain finds other pathways, and so her brain has found other pathways to do most of what it needs to do. The one thing where she struggles is vocabulary. So she is non-verbal. She doesn’t use words. But she’s a really good communicator. And the Ted talk that we did in 2022 was talking about how we used music. And I say we, it’s really Ella, but how we used music to build and enhance a set of communication skills a language for Ella. And it started off I’ll give you the 32nd version. But it started off with Ella just understanding music. She was doing air drums, and I was like, oh my God, she gets it right. There was like this moment of wonder. So that was, that was like the first aha moment. And we noticed that she would take Jenga pieces or dominoes and click them together for syllables, similar to the way that Muppets don’t move their mouths more than just clicking syllables, right? There’s no enunciation, there’s no moving of a tongue or any of the things that. Takes to make words just open and close. And she would do that with Jenga pieces. And we realized that she was clicking through syllables. And then came very crude sign language, which turned into fairly sophisticated sign language. That’s not a SL. It’s her annunciations, it’s her tone. It’s her expressive use of body language that she gets through watching music videos. And so Aretha Franklin and the the Braxton Sisters and her current favorite is Sugar House, which is country music. Like all these different artists who. Make music and express that music. In the intro you were talking about how much better you can get you, 66% boost in cognitive performance by listening to music. The, I talk about the communication wheel. Only 7% of communication is the words. So the rest of it is the way that we’re saying it and the things that we’re doing while we’re saying it tone the body language and the tone and the volume and all these other things. And so she has all those other things. She just doesn’t have the words. And so she’s able to communicate with you. It’s essentially in mime and also very entertaining. Yes,
Beverly:
she is. She’s very expressive. With the music, has that helped your connection with her? I had imagine that’s just, it just opened up a whole world of opportunity with her in a different way.
Benji:
Helped my connection with her is I don’t know if that’s the right way to say it. It helped me communicate. It helped me understand. Often you see people who have special needs who are or are not verbal, and you wonder do they get it? Do they understand what’s going on?
Beverly:
And I think there’s maybe a misperception that they’re not as smart or something like not
Benji:
as smart or not as cognitive. Cognition and smarts are not the same thing. You see somebody in a wheelchair, who’s, sitting there and just, eating something and not air quotes not normal. And you assume that they don’t understand. And the answer is they know often what is going on, and there’s one of the things I mentioned in the TED talk is presume competence. You see this a lot with people who speak a different language. You, somebody speaks, somebody doesn’t speak English and all of a sudden you are talking really slowly. I don’t speak English. I’m not an idiot. Like what? And so the, that the idea that somebody who doesn’t communicate the same way that you do. Now as somebody who’s speaks Hebrew, I can tell you that people speak other languages a lot faster than I can understand another language. So actually do appreciate when people speak a little bit slower, but don’t talk to me like I’m an idiot. I think that Ella, that this has brought out a lot more of my ability to empathize with Ella and my ability to know that she knows exactly what’s going on. And she’s listening too and I’ll be on the couch having a conversation about something and mention something that’s, somebody’s coming to visit next week, and all of a sudden she runs into the room and takes off her headphones and is what? How did you hear that? She’s very observant. I’m sure she’s very, she knows exactly what’s happening. And when I can acknowledge that she knows exactly what’s happening when we go out to the world and talk to other people, oh, they know exactly what’s happening too. You have to prove to me that you don’t know what’s going on before I will treat you like you don’t know what’s going on.
Beverly:
So you have presumed competency now as opposed to
Benji:
I presume competence because Ella, prove to me that’s the kiss.
Beverly:
It’s an amazing story and I really appreciate taking the time to explain it. Now let’s tune back into our conversation with Benji and uncover the secrets of igniting his marketing and business success. I love marketing. Marketing’s my world. I work with small business owners, so I like to geek out at some of these things. So what are some of the marketing strategies you’ve used to help with your commercial success and even some of your music success to help? I think you even use marketing to help with the friendship circle, right? So there’s marketing and branding going on all the time and every connection I think we make as humans where they’re marketing ourselves marketing or cause marketing our business. So talk about some of those tactics that you use that you think are super effective for you.
Benji:
It’s a great question. I think that the number one marketing idea for me, and I think that this should be true for everybody, is 100% unapologetically. Be yourself. And when you are the authentic version of who you are going to attract the people who are attracted to people like you. You’re also going to turn away people who don’t like that. And I think that me and my business partner do a really good job of this. So I don’t take myself too seriously. I’m a bit of a goofball. I love music. I’m, I’m I would wear jeans and a t-shirt and maybe a, an open plaid shirt, like a nineties grunge style, right? If I could wear that to work every single day, if I could wear a plaid shirt with a T-shirt underneath it every day. I would
Beverly:
it’s funny because I met you in a full on suit like
Benji:
you Yeah. And I was not myself, and it didn’t work. I wasn’t like, I felt like I, I felt ridiculous. Every time I put a tie on, I felt ridiculous because it’s just like I was pretending to be an adult, and I’m not my business partner is the exact opposite. And we lean into the differences of who we are and we lean into our personality types very strongly for the purpose of the idea of divide and conquer. So when we meet with a new client. I tell them he’s the smart and good looking one, and I’m the one who’s going to tell the story because that’s what I’m good at. And he’s gonna pay attention to the details and make sure that the spreadsheet is put together properly. And we tag team and we make it happen together. You walk into our office and there’s a picture of Tiger Woods and there’s a picture of Jerry Garcia. Yeah. And my partner’s a really avid golfer and a huge fan of golf. And there’s a lot of people who love that in our world and. I couldn’t tell you the first thing about golf. Like my, the most important thing I know about golf is what a mulligan is, right? That I, I don’t, I’m just, it’s not my world. But somebody else could walk in and be like, is that a picture of Jerry Garcia? Or at least say, who’s the dude with the guitar? And we can have the music conversation. And so him being authentically into golf is just as important as me being authentically into the Grateful Dead because you wouldn’t believe how many conversations we’ve had with prospects. And they’re like, oh, you know the thing in Boston. And I was like, oh yeah, I had a good time in Boston at this show. And and they’re like, oh my God, I was at that show. And we just dive right into it. And my partner’s like, how did he do that? How did he draw out of this guy that they were at the same show? And the answer is, I didn’t draw out. I was just being me and I connected with that person and I. Many times that conversation doesn’t happen. But what does happen is they say I was in Florida and I went to this golf course, and my partner says I played that golf course. What’d you think of, the eighth hole where it’s really, the sand trap and blah, blah, blah. Be good at what you’re good at and love the hobbies that you’re good at because you will attract the people who are into that. And yeah, and when we can overlap, solving their problem, being good at, having the deal knowledge, the market knowledge, and the context. Oh, and by the way, you’re a pleasant person to do business with. We have similar hobbies. That’s how I that’s the marketing, don’t hire me because don’t hire me because you think that I spell things well.
Beverly:
Do you spell things wrong? French? No.
Benji:
I yes. I spell things wrong.
Beverly:
You should totally get Grammarly
Benji:
Pro on your computer. And the problem with Grammarly is that sometimes a word is spelled right, but it’s not the right word and it doesn’t catch it. Is that the right? Yes. So I get into yes. Oh, what’s a wear? Like I spelled warehouse it. That is a word. It’s just not what I’m talking about.
Beverly:
So the one thing that I think you do really well, and maybe it’s intentional, maybe it’s not, it’s just authentically you, but you’re also vulnerable. You share a pretty important part of your life, very publicly. Very bravely and very proudly. And I don’t think. In my experience, there’s a lot of men that are doing that, and I really value that there’s a lot of moms talking about their kids and, some of the challenges and all of that. But I see you doing that. And I just think first of all, it’s to be commended, but also I think it’s just a learning opportunity for so many. So I think not only are you authentic, but you are also vulnerable. And I think that’s a really wonderful combination in a person. You are letting pulling out the curtain a little bit to let us see into your personal life very publicly through Covid and some of that I just think that took a lot of courage and not taking yourself too, so too seriously. And having fun with it just showed so much about who you are in the process, so I think people got to know you in a whole different level. When you did that, and I think you connected with people in a different way when you did that, so much so that you were able to do this amazing talk on TEDx about your experience. How did that come about? Like how did you get onto to do the TEDx talk?
Benji:
The answer to that comes from the answer to your last statement. So first of all, thank you for the compliment. I appreciate it. There are two very important things that happened after Ella was born that sort of paved the way for this number one when Sarah was 20 weeks pregnant and they told us that, that Ella was gonna have this condition called a Genesis, the corpus Callum. I was like, it was like a fog. And the doctor said, whatever you don’t Google it. And I said, why not? And he said,’cause there’s not a lot of good information out there. And all you’re gonna find is, ugly stuff. And it’s not worth Googling. So what did I do as soon as I got home? I Googled it, I found ugly stuff. It scared the hell outta me, and I said, I’m never gonna Google this again. And it was, I think four years later when through a series of strange conversations, I find out about the. The N-O-D-C-C, the National Organization for Disorders of the Corpus Callum, and I find out that there’s multiple Facebook groups and there’s a foundation for people who have this condition. I said, what do you mean we’re not alone? I was under the impression that we’re alone. I was under the impression that nobody else was dealing with this, that this is so rare that it, there can’t be other people in Michigan who have this, let alone somebody that I know who lives three quarters of a mile away from me and. I was mad, I was really upset. And I said it’s unreasonable that the things that come up on Google are this and not good information. I went on a campaign to fill the first page of Google with good information so that if somebody googles this, they’ll find good information. And I’m very happy to say that we were successful. Now things have been replaced because other people are doing that as well. But I did a lot of blogging for the Friendship Circle and I did a number of other things specifically for the purpose of filling up the first page of Google with resources so that when somebody googles a genesis of the Corpus Close they would find good information. Additionally, I read a book that many people who are listening to this may have read called Think and Grow Rich. Where he talks about if you want something, you have to put it out there. And he talks about his son who had hearing damage who was deaf, and he would put it out there that his son is one day gonna hear. And people told him that he had bad expectations. And he said, listen, I don’t know what the solution is. And that’s part of the problem. I’m putting it out there so that one day when somebody says that there is a solution or that they’re working on a solution, they’re gonna come to me. And his doctor contacted him when I believe his son was 19 years old. And said, Hey, we’re working on this experimental hearing device. And his son got what later was called a cochlear implant. Yes. And he was the first person to get it and he had 70% of his hearing. And the reason why they knew to contact him was because for 19 years he was putting it out there that his son was going to learn to hear. So I take that and I say, okay, number one, I want people to have good resources. I don’t want them to find scary information. Number two, I don’t know if there’s any solution for Ella. She’s perfect the way she is. Great. I don’t know if there’s anything that can make Ella’s life better. Yeah. But if somebody thinks of something or invents something, or is trying something and is looking for somebody to see if it’ll work, call me. I’m really easy to get a hold of. So much of the reason why I put that stuff out there, aside from being helpful to other people is so that if somebody wants to try something, call me. And we’ll talk about it. And that’s not for everybody. There’s plenty of people who are like, leave me alone. Let me get through my IEP. Let me get through day camp. Let get through school and, we’ll figure it out. And there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s just not what I was looking for. So how do I get to the TED Talk? The folks from TEDx reached out to me and said, Hey, you have been doing this stuff through Covid and posting these videos and we want to hear about how that worked and how this evolved and what this story looked like. And I said, great. I could fill an hour. And they said you’ve got nine minutes. I was like, had nine minutes. I can’t tell you how to pronounce my name properly in nine minutes. I wrote an outline. I practiced it was like 28 minutes. I whittled it down to 11. They ended up giving me, I think it’s, I think start to finish. 11 and a half minutes, something like that. And then they said what song are you playing? And I was like, what? I’m like, I’m not a good musician and I’m even less of a good singer. I’m a goofball. I’m not playing anything for TEDx. And they’re like no. That’s part of the we want you to play a song. And I’m like. Oh my God, this is so scary. Panic. Set it. And yeah, so I had to add like a minute because again, if I wanna play a song, it’s gonna be a 14 minute version of something. I I added a minute of music at the beginning and I think it went well. I’m grateful for the, some of the great feedback that we’ve gotten about it. I’ll tell you what, man, she really did. There are days when she’s up for participating and there’s days that she’s not she saw the audience and was like, I am here for this. And she played along. And I’ll tell you what. She made jokes during the TED talk. She told jokes and everybody got them. The response and it wasn’t like, oh, that’s a kid with special needs and that’s cute. They laughed.
Beverly:
She was playing off of you. Yes,
Benji:
a hundred percent. They got the jokes and it was I don’t know what the right word is. Gratifying is not the right word. It was so vindicating to say, if you pay attention, you can hear and speak this language. Understand. And then she made a gesture. And the room burst out laughing. This is it. And I couldn’t have prepped her for that because it’s when she wants to do what she doesn’t and when she doesn’t wanna do what she doesn’t. Yes.
Beverly:
Yeah. So I’ll put the link to the TEDx talk in the show notes. So if those who are listening are interested in seeing more of veggie’s, daughter Ella and the TED talk, they will be able to explore that further. Benji, I know that you have music also permeates other parts of your life, but in a unique way. You also have a podcast, I feel like this is a thing, right? Doing podcasts and do you wanna talk a little bit about
Benji:
all the cool kids are doing it?
Beverly:
All the cool kids are doing it. I did it when it was not cool. 2007, but
Benji:
pre Cool. You’re the podcast hipster.
Beverly:
You have this podcast called The Much Obliged podcast, A Yellow Balloon Experience. It is a very unique take on a subject. Do you wanna talk just a little bit about that before we move on to the lightning round?
Benji:
Yes. Yes. Thank you. Little bit of background. The Yellow Balloon Experience. So the, in the eighties, a group of recovering addicts were traveling around following the Grateful Dead and wanted to be able to connect and create fellowship. And so they started a group called the War Frats, and they identify each other by holding up yellow balloons at concerts. And if you see a yellow balloon at a great dead concert, that’s somebody who’s sober, who’s connecting with his friends. In 2009 my favorite band, Umphrey’s McGee some fans started a group called Much Obliged. And we have concerts at every every Umphrey’s McGee show. In fact, tomorrow night I’ll be at the Fillmore in Detroit for Umphrey’s McGee their annual Fillmore show. And I’ll be taking my 14-year-old Namal. Oh, that’s lovely. And we’re gonna, we’re gonna go hang out with a bunch of yellow balloon freaks at the show, and we’re gonna have a blast. When Covid hit, people weren’t able to go to meetings and we started having meetings online and we started a Friday night speaker meeting. And so every Friday night somebody tells their story of. Addiction and recovery and music and how all those things interchange. And about a year and a half ago, somebody said to me, Hey, I can’t make the meeting tonight. Can you record it and send it to me? And I was like, yeah, sure, no problem. I got everybody’s permission recorded and sent it to them. And a couple weeks later somebody was like, Hey I wasn’t able to, I heard that one. Can you do that? People were asking me to record it and as a joke we’re like now that we’re recording these, it’s essentially a podcast. And they we’re, it was like this eureka moment of, oh, we should do that. And memorial Day of 2023, we started and we’ve released an episode every week. Every Monday morning, we release a new episode of the Much Obliged podcast, the Yellow Balloon experience. It’s about a 15 to 20 minute interview with this person. We’ve, there’s three hosts, me, my friend Lauren, and my friend Matt, and we talk to’em about their recovery, their music, whatever else they have going on. And and then we hear their shares. So their shares anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour. And it’s really fascinating to hear how people’s lives hit rock bottom. There are some wild stories. Beverly, I think we would make you blush with some of these stories.
Beverly:
Me? No.
Benji:
Clutching your pearls. Then we hear, the good stuff, which is what the recovery looks like and what the, what their lives are like now. And so it’s pretty amazing. I’m very grateful. We’ve had some purely music fans. We’ve had some band members from various bands. We’ve had some cool people participate. Yeah that’s the podcast.
Beverly:
Your life is so rich and complex between, real estate and making the American dream happen and music and this I bet you that those stories are very inspiring and help keep you grounded in that, in your recovery, right? But it’s so rich and just layered and beautiful and complex. I really am appreciative that you’ve shared so much of your story today. I have a couple more segments. One is called our lightning round. Are you ready for that? Let’s do it. Okay. Seven questions. Here we go. Let’s do it. What’s your favorite way to, to connect and network,
Benji:
talking about music?
Beverly:
What’s your favorite business or marketing book?
Benji:
Raving fans. What’s your
Beverly:
favorite podcast?
Benji:
Smartless.
Beverly:
What’s your favorite business tool or app?
Benji:
My favorite business tool or app?
Beverly:
Your go-to like your favorite one. You’re like, I love this helps me. Whatever.
Benji:
Excel. I don’t really use business tool or app. What do you excel? What do you mean? Okay.
Beverly:
Business. What’s your favorite business tools? Rapid Fire. We’re not talking about it. What’s your favorite marketing tactic?
Benji:
My favorite marketing. TII wanna change my answer to the last one. My, repeat the
Beverly:
question. Which one? The tool or the tactic? The tactic. What’s your favorite marketing tactic or approach?
Benji:
Making fun of myself.
Beverly:
What’s your favorite source of inspiration?
Benji:
I. My favorite source of in inspiration is seeing small businesses succeed and grow.
Beverly:
Who’s your favorite entrepreneur to follow?
Benji:
Gary Vayner. Chip.
Beverly:
Oh, I love Gary V. Well, that was fun. You survived the lightning round, Benji. Yeah,
Benji:
so I just wanna say on the lightning round, my favorite business app is actually a there’s a title company who put out an app where you can look at lot lines and ownership and mortgage information, and I actually use that all time.
Beverly:
What’s the name of the app?
Benji:
So it’s called My First am, but they just changed the name and, okay. I don’t remember the name of the,
Beverly:
okay. That’s a much better answer than Excel.
Benji:
Oh, Jesus Christ.
Beverly:
It’s firing. I’m, it’s hard to think of something, right? Oh, I love it. So the next segment that we go into is called the Blaze Forward Segment. So if there are aspiring entrepreneurs or entrepreneurs who feel stuck and don’t feel inspired, they need a little umph, something to do today, to move their business forward, to create some action. What would be one actionable step or one thing they could do today to spark a unique opportunity for themselves or create some marketing ignition,
Benji:
if you’re in a small business today and you’re trying to figure out how to get to the next level I think and this is something that I’m in the middle of doing started for New Years before making the plan of where we’re going to launch identifying the holes that are currently in the ship. What is, where are there leaks and what needs to be patched? Because it is a lot more difficult to patch those holes when you’re going a thousand miles an hour or when you’ve scaled or when you have a big ship, right? That’s or when you have a big ship. Make sure that those foundations are secure and those foundations have run deep and that is not fun. Like that inventory, what are my assets and what are my liabilities? And focusing on those liabilities for the purpose of fixing them, not for the purpose of beating myself up. Once I can identify those liabilities there are some liabilities that. I can’t change, right? I’m dyslexic. I can’t change the fact that I’m dyslexic, but I can change the fact that when I write an email and then press send, and then my business partner sends me back a list of the things that I spelled wrong. What I can change is slowing down rereading and then pressing send. And so instead of getting 15 of those a day, since I made this commitment January 1st, I think I’ve gotten six of those emails. That doesn’t mean that I’m better. It means that I’m better at doing this, right? I’m not cured. I’m getting better at it. And so once I’ve identified those liabilities and knowing which liabilities can I erase. Which can I abilities, can I improve on? And which liabilities are there because they’re there. I can’t grow a new arm if I’m missing same arm. Yeah. I can’t be taller, like I can’t there’s nothing I can do to be taller. At the same time, the same, that same exercise is true for my assets. So the fact that I am okay being in front of a camera and talking about something as you said that’s uncomfortable or difficult or vulnerable I don’t let perfection get in the way of good when it comes to posting social media content. So I’m okay with posting that content where other people freak out in front of the ca the camera. And so identifying those assets and saying, these are the things that I can hitch my wagon to, and Yep. And focus on. That exercise is not fun. That inventory is not fun. But once you’ve got an identification of, these are my, these are real weak points that I need to fix, these are strong points that I can focus on. Spend the rest of your time focusing on the good stuff. Spend the rest of your time appreciating and working on the things that you can control in a positive way, because you’ll attract the people who want to deal with that type of person, right? There are people who don’t want to deal with goofballs, who talk about music.
Beverly:
I think you made a really interesting point when you first started talking about this particular action step. Scaling up isn’t just getting bigger. Scaling up is looking at your processes, looking at your, it’s looking at the whole system and how the system can be better. But any minor step towards that improvement is a game. And it’s filling in those gaps. So the book that I keep thinking of is Gap in the Game and it’s one of my favorites. And it’s looking at all those games and not, yes, you recognize your gaps, but you also see all the gains you’re making. So those little moments of maybe I slowed down that one time, that’s a game.
Benji:
Dan Gilbert has his book of isms. Oh yeah I’ve heard that. And one of his is. A penny saved is just a penny saved. And people think, oh, a penny saved is a penny earned. Nope. Nope. A penny saved is just a penny saved. So if you didn’t spend money stupidly you didn’t earn extra money. But if you diverted stupid money to smart money, that’s money earned. And the understanding of I can stop wasting money on that and start investing money on this. Yes. And all of a sudden that’s money earned. That’s. Same with your time,
Beverly:
time spent. Oh yeah, time. That’s time is probably the most precious resource we have. And how you spend your time and energy and what you focus on is that earning part of it. Like doing it more, doing it smart, smarter, necessarily harder, but smarter.
Benji:
Do you remember Barry Demp? Yeah. We’re friends. Yeah, for sure. Okay. So Barry one time told me that I should stop focusing on time management and start focusing on energy management.
Beverly:
Ah, that’s a really good piece of advice. He’s a mech for sure. Like he’s
Benji:
a mech for sure. Yeah. He’s a something can take you, something can take you two hours and you didn’t do anything. You wasted two hours, somebody could take you 15 minutes and you got it done. That doesn’t mean that the energy expenditure what are equal Yeah. In those things. And so I think about that a lot. It’s not time management, it’s energy management. I’m actually gonna ask, and that’s where I got the time blocking.
Beverly:
So yes, I have focused time. I have, I’m very careful about my time right now. That is the most precious resource I have. And as I’ve gotten more wise in the business world, that is who I give time to and who what I give my energy to. It matters. And it has to be something that I feel is positive. Yeah. As Marie Condo says it, Bri has to bring me joy in some way, shape or form. So yeah,
Benji:
it’s got
Beverly:
spark some joy. It’s got spark some joy.
Benji:
The time blocking for me makes the energy management possible. So saying, I’m gonna give 30 minutes to this activity. And then I’m gonna take a 10 minute break, and then I’m gonna give an hour to this other activity, and then I’m gonna take a short break, and then I’m gonna give three hours to this other activity, and then a half an hour to the following activity that time blocking. Otherwise, everything gets an hour. Not all things are equal. Not everything deserves an hour and something deserves more than an hour.
Beverly:
I deserved more than an hour today.
Benji:
Yeah, you did.
Beverly:
This has been so incredibly fun. And as we wrap up this enlightening conversation with you, Benji, I just wanna encourage all of our listeners to really think about and explore the power of music for themselves. Because I think music has been transformative for you. How can music play a role in your journey? And then also how you turn your passions into these incredible projects that can have a transformative effect, whether that is music or, I just talked, I actually interviewed a clown this morning and how she’s turning joy into a movement, which is, that’s extraordinary. So I am so glad.
Benji:
Was she in full costume when you interviewed her?
Beverly:
She started off with the nose. So there was a nose. Yeah. Yeah, it was fun. Okay. Can’t wait to listen. So I am going to thank you for your time today, Benji. Before we wrap up. How can people find you, Benji, if they wanna learn more about the TED Talk. They wanna learn more about your podcast and they wanna learn more about Colliers, the real estate that you work, that you do. What are some, where are some ways that people can find you and connect with you?
Benji:
I’m really easy to find online. I don’t use any fancy monikers or nicknames or anything like that. It’s just Benji Rosensweig, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram all that fun stuff. All the places all the places. And if you connect with me on LinkedIn or Facebook or Instagram and you found out about me from this, send me a direct message and say, Hey, Beverly sent me.
Beverly:
I love it. This is a wrap of this episode of Spark and Ignite your marketing podcast featuring Benji Rosen swag. Remember the transformative power of music enhance your life, and thank you for tuning in. And until next time, keep jamming and spreading positivity wherever you go.
