Community at Large: Small biz voices, partnerships, real talk beyond Medicare—We Medi CARE!

0:01 This program is designed to provide general information with regards to the subject matters covered. This information is given with the understanding that neither the hosts, guests, sponsors, or station are engaged in rendering any specific and personal medical, financial, legal, counseling, professional service, or any advice. You should seek the services of competent professionals before applying or trying any suggested ideas. Attention individuals, families and caregivers. It's Medicare Hour and More with Peter right here on k for HD Radio. This is the podcast for all types of insurance solutions while specializing in Medicare because we Medicare. Here's your host, Peter R.

0:49 Joseph Heay, good morning, good morning, good morning. Glad to have you guys with us. Back here a third episode. We're excited. We're starting to get some viewers, so I appreciate all our audience and clients that have been tuning in. So we've got a unique show today. We've got some guests that are actually going to be not live. They're actually recorded. They couldn't come on live, but they've got some great nuggets of information. I think you'll enjoy those interviews. But before we start into those. I just want to share about why we bring on small businesses. Obviously we talk about all things insurance, especially Medicare, but we also want to have this, you know, to our listeners. We support local businesses. It's not just about buying a product, it's about investing in our community. So Joseph Insurance Broker, we're proud to work with and highlight businesses we believe in and inherently trust. We've done work with a lot of the businesses we're bringing on as guests, either you know, personally or business wise. We've also seen them work well in the community and help other businesses grow as well, and so we want to spotlight them make sure that those businesses are resources for you guys as well. So I just want to recap what we've basically covered last couple of episodes. You know, we covered Medicare Parts A, B, C,

2:22 and D. We haven't got into depth in parts C yet, but we will do that. We also talked about. Enrollment periods for Medicare. Those are really important, especially when it comes to turning sixty five. We will have some nuggets for you guys at the end of this show to talk about how you actually d roll into medicare. That's really important information for you guys to understand and process as well, So we will share that information with you guys at the end of this episode. All right, So, our first video is going to be an interview with Zeb Wellborn, president of the Chino Vallet Chamber of Commerce here in Chino and Chino Hills in southern California. We've worked together quite immensely for the past five six years.

3:12 I've actually been an ambassador for the Chino Valley Chamber of Commerce, helping small businesses locally grow and connect with each other. So enjoy this clip with Zeb and we'll come back and talk about it. All right, Jebb, welcome to our show. Appreciate you making the time for us. For those of you who don't know, Zeb is the president of the Chino Valley Chamber of Commerce. Is Zeb Can you just tell us a little bit about yourself. Yeah, So, my name is EEV Welborne Presidence, you know, the Chino Valley Chamber of Commerce. I am turning forty five tomorrow. I live Happy birthday, Thank you. I live in Ontario and work at the Chino Valley Chamber of Commerce, and I also have a digital marketing business called well Born Media, so we help businesses with their digital presence.

3:58 Awesome. So what I originally drew you into working with local businesses in the chamber of commerce. So I started a tutoring business. My first business was a tutoring business, and I was working with this one kid in this one on one capacity, and when I was learning about becoming a business owner myself, I was kind of like sharing all the stuff that I was learning, and I was really excited about the work that I was doing and the students I was working with, Like he wasn't doing that great in school, but I could just see through my enthusiasm how enthusiastic he was. Getting in the work that he was doing. And then when I started connecting with business owners, I just found them to be a lot like they're enthusiastic, they were excited about what they were doing. And so when I got involved in a chamber, I did meet lots of very excited, passionate people who are working towards a goal, and that just drew me to those. So one of the things that I set for a goal for myself is I just want to help passionate business owners be successful because I feel like when they have that vision and purpose to fulfill something that it makes the.

5:00 World a better place. So that's what drew me to the chamber, and I was working with the chamber through my business, my digital marketing business. I was there probably for about seven or eight years running my business, and then they asked me to take it over in twenty eighteen. So I've been running the Chino Valley Chamber of Commerce since the summer of twenty eighteen. Awesome, awesome, So what does your life look like outside of business and leadership? What kind of things do you enjoy doing? Yeah, So one of the things I set up when I was working with the chamber was I said, these five pillars, right, so these are the things that I like to do. So one of those, I mean so one of them is helping passionate business owners be successful, So that's one of the things. One of the other things is my family. So I do have three children, they are ten, seven, and five, and a wonderful wife, so we have that. I like to be of service, so I am a member of our local rotary club.

5:53 We like to do things to help better the community and better other people. I like education, and learning. So I like to read a lot. I like to listen to podcasts, I like to listen to audio books. And then I like to teach others about the stuff that I'm learning. I like to do activities, so this includes golf and soccer. I play soccer every Sunday. I play golf as often as I can. I wrote a book about how to do social media marketing for golf courses. So that's the list of the five things. I think I covered them all. That's awesome. That's awesome. Man, you're a busy guy, all right. So a lot of people here a chamber of commerce, they don't fully understand it. What does the Chino Valley Chamber actually do?

6:34 So we're a business organization. We have over four hundred members here in Chino and Chino Hills. So we represent those four hundred businesses in whatever ways that we can to make them grow. So whenever I do a ribbon cutting, I say we do three things. I say we're a catalyst for business growth, which means that we're here to help businesses grow, whether it be through educational trainings, through opportunities, through resources, through marketing. There's a whole bunch of different ways that we help businesses and help make them grow. Number two is we're a convener. So one of the things that's great that I really enjoy about the job, and what makes it different from kind of like running your own business versus being involved in the chamber, is you build up this strong ecosystem of people that are kind of doing the same thing.

7:19 Right. So the thing that I feel like is the most valuable is when I'm growing my business, I want to grow it alongside people who are also dedicated, passionate, working towards growing their business because that makes all of us better. So we conven we have people. Like our city elected to fills states, we have staff agencies are involved, which is the bookable when things come up or things arise to help make the community better.

8:00 That's number one. That we are a champion. Community. So communities I have, we have. Strong, successful communities in the Chamber of com. Oh well, I think we lost you here. Okay, Okay, let's let's rewind that part. I'm gonna stop. No, No, that's my fault. I think we're not strong on our end. Okay, So let's the last thing we heard was the three things, So can you back up and share those three things again.

8:48 Can you hear me? Okay, perfect and everything's good right now? Yes, yep, everything's perfect now, yep. Okay, all right. So whenever I do a ribbon cutting, we say that we are three things. We say that we are catalysts for business growth. So our goal is to help businesses grow. We provide lots of opportunities and resources for local businesses to be successful. So we provide trainings, we do marketing, we help connect them with folks, We do all sorts of things to help build their business and give them opportunities to grow. The next thing I say is we're conveniers of leaders and influencers. So one of the things that I enjoy most about being in this role is we have the opportunity to bring a lot of stakeholders together. Then most organizations don't have the ability to do so.

9:30 If you want to get connected with your elected officials, you're having issues with staff at local cities. You want to get connected to police and fire department, You want to get connected with other business owners. You want to get connected with your community groups and your nonprofit organizations. The Chamber is connected to all of those and so we help bring those people together to make a bigger difference. So if you want to be a part of some kind of organization that is in the know, that has the opportunity for those resources that can get you connected to people, there's no better place in the Chamber. And then the last thing is I they were champions for a stronger community. So all the work that we do is our goal is to help build a stronger community. Businesses are the backbone of communities and what makes communities successful. So the Chamber of Commerce, our goal is to help encourage businesses to be invested and involved in the work that we do because you can't run a successful business in an ecosystem by yourself. If you have partners, you have other people doing it together. You're going to be more successful if we're all working together to achieve kind of common goals.

10:26 Very cool, Very cool. All right, So I don't want to put you on the spot, but can you if you can recollect over the years, can you share a success story of a local business that benefited from being a part of the chamber. Yeah, I have hundreds of stories of those. I mean the ones that I always point to are the ones that where We've done something very successful for them, and then I'll get feedback that says that we didn't help that business, and then when I'm looking at it from the outside or from the inside out, I know we did. So one of those businesses was we have this program. The Sabergino County had this on the job training program where they had about it's fifty they pay fifty percent of the wages for any person that they hire for an organization.

11:07 So we did a training on that. We invited a bunch of businesses, and then this business that we got connected. Took advantage of that program. So that program that they did not know about because they weren't connected in the chamber, but they learned about it through the chamber. They hired ten people with that, which is about five thousand dollars a piece, so they saved fifty thousand dollars. We also got them connected with another program that gave them about ten. Thousand dollars worth of stuff. So all of a sudden, told like I know that we delivered about sixty thousand dollars worth of funds to this business that didn't have that opportunity, and then they canceled their membership when the time was running because they couldn't attend the meetings. But at the same time, we still helped them deliver on that sixty thousand dollars worth of funds. And so that's one of those things where the cost of membership is only a few hundred bucks, but you get all this value from it and you've been able to grow because of the work that you've done through the chamber. We have so many businesses that kind of fit that category. We had one where it was The Taste of Chino, but it was during COVID, so all of these restaurants were shut down. We helped get a ten thousand dollars gift card for one of those restaurants that was struggling. It was on the verge of closing because they didn't know. They're open with actually providing lunch at our board meeting. That's happening later today.

12:22 There's another another one that just happened recently was trans Tech Engineers. They're an engineering firm, so they went through our leadership program. We do a ten month long leadership program. He was in that program. He got connected with the China Valley fire. They were looking to build a new station. They just got to talking about what that new station was going to look like. They ended up hiring that firm. So we have opportunities to do business with each other. And I have hundreds of stories like that, but those are the ones that come to mind right now. Awesome, Okay, So let's say someone I mean, because I can fark back to my experience, but someone is just brand new starting their business. Why do you think it's important for them to maybe start getting involved with the chamber right off the bat.

13:09 Yeah, and I'll just use my personal example, right, Like, when I joined the chamber, this is what I was looking for. I was looking for mentorship. I had no clue how to run a business. I did not know anybody in town. I was trying to grow my business, so twofold one, right, I'm trying to get customers and clients so that I can grow my business. But honestly, what I was looking for most was learning from other people who had been successful in business. So when I joined a chamber like I didn't I was. I remember thinking there's a few entities in town that really like epitomized business for me. And I grew up working at lostaun so lils Tron's Country Club was one of those. I grew up with. What's the other one?

13:50 The Champion Newspapers was another one. So those two businesses, and I looked at those leaders of those because I knew who they were and they were kind of prominent people in our community, and I was like, I would love to learn from those people because they've built these really successful businesses. So getting a chance to network and engage with people who are also looking to grow their business, Number one is super exciting because you're working with very like minded people. They're all in the same space. You're all trying to grow together, and you're willing to help and support each other. But at the same time, you have these other people who have been around for a long time that are also connected with the Chamber that you can reach out to because you have this chamber relationship to get that feedback and advice on how to grow your business. And I think a lot of people look at. The Chamber like we're doing a lot of deals, are trying to do a lot of selling from people like I think that's the perception that most people come in.

14:38 They're looking to sell their stuff, and that's why they join the Chamber. I think the Chamber provides so much more value if you're looking at as a growth opportunity, because there are so many ways to get connected that you would never think of if you're just trying to sell your stuff versus trying to leverage the whole opportunities that the Chamber brings, which is how to build a better business. And that's what you can do with the Chamber by connecting with people who are doing it, getting the resources and tools that are available, and then connecting with the people that make make the difference. Yeah, for sure. And I and just from my experience as you've been a great mentor to me over the years. And I know when I first started out, I was with New York Life and I didn't know really if that was the place for me. And the Chamber really opened my eyes to just other opportunities. And that's where we created our own business, Joseph Insurance Broker, and we started like right before COVID hit. So having the Chamber and those relationships was really key and important and we're just so glad to have that support system. You know. Obviously, our business grew and grew and grew, and so we got into a place where time was a factor and it was hard to make that time weekly. But we we're excited to be able to come back to the chamber at this point and you know, Zeb and I are going to be meeting about how to to be more active in that in that capacity. But it's all about relationship building, it's all about mentorship, and uh, you know, anyone listening into this interview, I highly recommend that you

16:08 get involved with your local Chamber of Commerce. So I see Zeb froze a little bit again, but I think you're back. Hey, Zeb, are you there? I'm here? Yeah, all right, did. All that come come across? I hope? Okay, awesome, awesome. So I you know, there was just different grants that the Chamber made me aware of that was able to fund us to get me going. And uh, I don't think I would have grown as a business if I wasn't a part of the chamber. So thank you, Zeb for for all the support that you've given me over the years. Really appreciate that. Yeah, I know, I'm happy to do it. And one of the things that I want to like stress from our business community in general, right is like we have these opportunities for growth. I think people think that they have to attend chamber stuff to reap the benefits from it.

16:57 It's just not true. There are so many resources that you can leverage to the chamber being connected against that way, and then when you do have the opportunity to kind of grow from those, it's important to help uplift others because by being a part and connected with the chamber, because you have the opportunity to influence those folks, Like, just like you got those opportunities, you have the opportunity to kind of do that for others too. It's been honestly, like one of the things that I enjoy most is watching businesses grow and be successful, and then I'm hoping that you know, as they do that, it's kind of it's an opportunity to build that bigger community and think a little bit bigger about how you can you leverage kind of that success in that realm into making a more of a positive impact from a community standpoint, and how do we uplift all boats together. So I want to encourage our businesses, you know, as they get involved. It's not just attending events, it's like the whole ecosystem of that community convener and catalyst, which you can everybody can play a role in.

17:55 Yeah, for sure. So I know you're already touched on this a little bit, But as president, how would you describe your leadership style? So I feel like i'm you know, I've learned a lot on leadership. I did a podcast myself. It was called The Defining Success Podcasts, and I interviewed about one hundred and twenty or one hundred and thirty people on like success and what does success look like? I think my leadership style is I like to absorb a lot of information. I like to ask a lot of questions, and then I like to try to take the action that makes that makes the most sense that it's kind of facilitating and supporting as many people as possible. So I get a lot of feedback, I get a lot of buy in, I'll get a lot of input, and then I take the action based off of that feedback and input to help make things better. So I wrote a book called The Social Golf Course, and the main concept of the book was was that people are using social media as a way to build kind of like social cues and getting feedback. But when you're but a lot of people look at social is just a marketing tool, and that's where the Chamber, social Media, all of these other entries, they're not just a marketing tool or they're not just a sales platform. It's how you leverage that to grow the whole ecosystem of things. And so I guess when you say my leadership style is is I like to get a lot of I test a lot of things, I take action on a lot of things.

19:24 I get feedback, and then I work on improving from there. So it's kind of like constant iteration and constant improvement is what I try to do. Awesome, awesome, all right, So we're going to end things just with a rapid fire, just something fun and relatable for our audience. So they'll just be and or questions, you just answer them. You don't have to say why if you don't want to. So the first one coffee or energy drink. Coffee, all right, early mornings or late nights, o late nights all right? All right? A favorite local restaurant in Chino. Oh man, I go to Los Portales a lot. I go to Casadillas a lot. Canato's is delivering us food today.

20:07 So all of those are. Great, awesome, awesome. All right, you already talked about this, but if you could just say one word that described your leadership style, Oh, gosh, impact, okay, awesome, and then last one, go to way to unwind after a long week. What's your go to way? Well? I love playing soccer's on Sunday, so that's like the one thing that I reserved for myself to do. I love running around, I love chasing a ball, and I love scoring some goals every now and then. Sweet Sweet, Do you coach too? Do you coach like your kids? I did the lead playing in kind of folded, so I'm not doing that anymore. But I did coach them the last few years and it just folded last year, so we're not doing that. But I did coach for seven years of high school before I had kids, which for probably three or four years as they're growing up.

21:04 Okay, all right, So final takeaways. If someone listening today wants to get more involved in the community or grow their business, what's the first step they should take. Yeah. I mean, honestly, I feel like chambers of commerce are just the way that I'll look at chambers of commerce is it's really made up of the business community themselves. So if you want to grow your business and you want to think big, you can't just focus just on your own business. The best businesses that I've seen that get involved are the ones that get involved and then have that feedback loop, right, you get working with a lot of other people who are like minded, who are all trying to grow their business. They're all doing really innovative, cool things. If you're working in a silo, you're not going to be able to get that kind of purview and assessment. You're also not able to help support and uplift and build a better community. Getting involved in the chamber helps you get the foundation of starting your business.

21:56 Once you've kind of built that established, you then move into a second phase, which is, hey, I want to be a leader in this community. How do I get engaged and connected? And then the third phase is how do I make this even bigger? How do we. Build a stronger community and relationship together. So I think that there's a lot of different ways to get involved and connected, and the more that businesses do it, the more impact we're going to have for ourselves but also for our communities. For sure. For sure, well zeb Wellborn, president of the Chino Valley Chamber of Commerce. Thank you for everything you're doing to support local businesses and strengthen our community. To our listeners, whether you're a business owner or just someone who wants to stay connected locally here in Chino Chino Hills, getting involved makes a difference. Zeb Is there a website that people can go to?

22:39 Yeah? Yeah, I go to Chino Valley Chamber dot com. And Peter, I just want to say, you know, you've been connected for a while. I know you said really great things about the work that we do when the Chamber does, and I just want to say that it's nice to see you and your business grow and I'm excited for all that you're doing and wishing you the best. Thank you man. This is Medicare Hour and More with Peter where we talk business, community, everything that impacts your future. Thanks for listening, guys. All right, Well hope you guys appreciated that interview with DEEV Welborn. You know, we just want to emphasize that we you know, why should you become a client of ours? Well, you could see that we make a community impact. We actually get involved in our community. We get involved with other local businesses, and we try to help them grow and put the spotlight on them as well. So it's not just all about me, me, me or sss. It's also about other people as well, so that's important to keep in mind. Our second interview is going to be with Mercedes Ecker. She is the CEO of Eyeshop. It's a mystery shopping company. So for those of you who don't know, I actually was in mystery shopping before I created my own business. It was kind of my stop gap or intermediary job between the nonprofit sector and and the insurance industry, and it actually was a blast. I had a lot of fun doing it.

24:06 So we're gonna learn a little bit about more about this industry, So enjoy this clip with Mercedes Ecker. Hey, good morning everyone. Welcome to our show. Medicare Alan Moore with myself, Peter Mercedes. We want to welcome you to our show. We're especially excited for this one because I known Michelle I'm Michelle Mercedes for quite a while I think probably what five six years at least now, So if for those of you who don't know, I actually was in mystery shopping for quite a while before I got into this industry, and I was actually doing it full time. So we're gonna get to know a little bit more about Mercedes and her company and what she's all about, and hopefully a little bit about her personal life as well. So this is Mercedes Ecker. She is the ce OH and president of Eyeshop. So, Mercedes, why don't you just give us a little bit of personal background of your business, what it's all about, how you got involved with it, and we'll go from there.

25:13 Yeah. Absolutely, well, thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here. Yeah, just a little bit about me and about the company. I started Mystery Shopping in twenty thirteen, so it's been it's been. Well over a decade. And started the company in twenty fifteen after just falling in love with mystery shopping on a personal level and seeing how amazing and how helpful it was for our family when it comes to income. And twenty fifteen I started, you know, teaching classes to people that also wanted to get into the industry, and one thing led to another, and I mean now we're looking at a little over ten year years of being in business with over twenty four thousand shoppers that we've trained and a lot of lives touched, a lot of income made, and so I spend a lot of my working hours, you know, doing that.

26:16 And I live in Indiana with my husband. We have two daughters. One is sophomore in college and the other one graduates in like less than sixty days from her. Oh my gosh, I remember when they were a lot younger. Wow, I know, it's I mean, time flew by. So we're kind of like in this new season of life and we're excited about what comes next. Awesome, awesome. Well, what keeps you passionate about this business today? Honestly, it is seeing people's lives changed. That's the best part of it. Right. So when someone tells me, oh my gosh, this brung purpose to my life, which we've had multiple people. I never expected that to be a result, but we've had multiple people that have told me, you know, I was battling depression, didn't want to get up out of bed, and this got me up out of bed. We've had, I know, specifically, one lady she couldn't conceive, she was having fertility issues, and she was able to use her mystery shopping money to pay for IVF treatments and she is now on her second child, and so she always credits that to the money she was able to bring in with mystery shopping. So just so many awesome stories, and I think, like that is that's what keeps me going, Right.

27:38 That's awesome. That's a great story. I'm glad you shared that. So for those of you who are listening in, you're probably wondering what exactly is mystery shopping? Can you kind of give synopsis of what a day to day would look like as somebody who's mystery shopping. Yeah, so here's how I describe mystery shopping. It is a. Job where people like you and me go into businesses undercover. We pretend to be a regular customer. The employees have no idea, but we're actually there to evaluate them, to evaluate our customer experience. And so in exchange for that evaluation, we as mystery shoppers, are paid. So mystery shoppers get paid to do this in just about every industry you know, airlines, casinos, movie theaters, hotels, restaurants, grocery stores, I mean, you name it.

28:33 Shoppers mystery shoppers get to go into these places and get paid to evaluate them. So it's a pretty cool job, right, and so the day to day for a mystery shopper, it really varies by person and their own schedule. So the cool thing about mystery shopping it's completely flexible and you can kind of bend it which way to match your lifestyle. We have shoppers that do this as a side hustle, so they've got their main jobs and then they're doing this, you know, after work or on the weekends when they're off. And then you have. People that do this full time. They are waking up in the morning, they're hitting the road and doing shops all day. This is their full time job.

29:14 And you know that looks a little bit different from somebody who would do it as a side hustle. But either way, it's very flexible and you kind of work on your own terms. Wow, that's very cool. So is it like a W two or ten ninety nine? I like, how how did people work that? Yeah? So ten ninety nine unless you live in Nevada. So yeah, so with Nevada you've got to get your PILB, your private investigator's license, But everywhere else you're a ten ninety nine independent contractor. And I think most people are familiar with that kind of work. Whether they've done door Dash or Instacart or sold Mary Kay. At some point, I think we all tried a ten ninety nine gig job.

29:56 So it's really no different in that sense, especially when it comes to reporting your taxes and things like that. So obviously with the rise of the gig economy, you know, especially after COVID, how does this actually fit into someone's life as a side hustle, Like, how would they be able to do this? Are there like requirements recommendations on how to get started? What would you say? Yeah? Absolutely so I always tell people there are a few requirements, right, You need to be at least eighteen years old. You really do need transportation. While there are shops that you can do on the phone or the internet, the bulk of shops is going to come from you actually getting inside of the business, the brick and mortar. So you need transportation, you need internet access, good writing and grammar, and you need to be able to follow instructions. So that's very important, right because you are given a set of instructions to follow on what they want you to evaluate, So good reading, comprehension skills. But as long as you have the I mean ideally you can mystery shop. Just about anybody can do it. So yeah, those are the requirements that I tell everybody.

31:10 Yeah, okay, so I mean, speaking from my experience, I never thought you could do this full time. So just for those listening and following me, I actually was in the nonprofit sector for twenty some years. Our family was burnt out by the politics of the nonprofit sector, so we decided to kind of transition and bumped into Pamela. I don't even know how I bumped. I think it was on a social media site and she kind of told me about it, and then we I just decided, okay, let's try this out. And I was making good money. I was really surprised at first. I was just doing that as a side hustle, doing some other jobs here and there, and then all of a sudden, money started pouring in from jobs that I loved doing, and I would actually bring gifts back to my kids of the fact that I was mystery shopping as well. And there's some high tech jobs. I mean, there's there's a camera that you could buy that goes under your clothes and that actually you actually would actually turn that video into the mystery shopping company. You work with and then do some narration and editing as well. That I was fully blown away by some of the jobs that are out there for mystery shopping. So, you know, for viewers out there listening right now, what's a realistic income that people can make from the you know, the bare minimum all the way up to you know, sky's the limit, right,

32:41 So what have you seen? Yeah, so this is a great question because I have data to back this up. So we've been in business, you know, ten years, we have been collecting that data. And so what our records indicate is that, for one, most mystery shoppers they do this as a side hustle. So most people do this as a side hustle. And so the side hustlers, they're earning on average two to five hundred a week just doing this on the side. And then our full time shoppers, which, as you said, a lot of people don't realize they can do this full time. But when they do, you know, they kind of weigh the pros and cons of if they have like a job already, like hey, if I can make more money, or this fits better with my family situation, I'm going to do full time. So we do have shoppers that full time mystery shop and on average they're bringing in a thousand plus a week, so it is lucrative.

33:34 Yeah, that is awesome. That is awesome. So what should people watch out for our look into in terms of mystery shopping opportunities? Is there like a website that people go to. Are there people that they need to connect with, like yourself? How do people get started? Yeah? Well, first off, I answer the one question like what to look out for are scams? Because there are scams out there unfortunately, and I you know, the thing that people don't realize is that mystery shopping has been around since the nineteen forties. I mean it's almost one hundred years old, so it's been around a very long time. But I think it got such. A bad rep but you had a lot of scammers coming in and so when somebody heard mystery shopper or secret shopper, they automatically thought, oh, this doesn't exist, or this is a scam. So you really want to watch out four scams and how you recognize those. Honestly, they're easy to recognize for the most part because you're like, Okay, something's fishy. You know, if you get a random check in the mail for twenty five hundred dollars of work you haven't.

34:34 Yeah, and I've got one of those. I mean that's yeah, it's crazy. It's crazy, and there are people who fall for it, but I think, you know, they're just like they're like, oh my gosh, I really need this money, so they want to believe it. But I think everybody would have a big red flag that's going off, like, no reputable company is going to pay you upfront for money that for a job that you have not completed, right, So that is a red flag that would be a scam. And then on the flip if you're wanting to get it started. So what we do is we have a free training. We bring everybody in through this free training that you can get on our website, which I'm sure you'll share. Yeah, that'll be on our podcast website as well as it'll be streaming too. So underneath mercedes name is going to be a banner that says her name or phone number the website that you can go to.

35:24 Yes, so we would just send you there. It's literally a free training. It's only thirty five minutes. We go over you know what mystery shopping is. How it works how to avoid scams, the basics. So if you're interested, that's where we would tell. You to get stored. Awesome, awesome, And then I, yeah, I've got a story where I actually fell for one of those scams unfortunately, and you know, I didn't get a check for that big I think it was like eight nine hundred dollars and they tell you have to go to the gas stations and do this mystery shop. It looked totally legit, and then you find out the check bounces. It's yeah, it's it's a whole scheme. So unfortunately, you know, don't I'm a pretty smart person and I fell for it, So it can happen to anyone. But yeah, there is, unfortunately scams in every industry, so you guys just be watching out for that and those red flags. So one thing we're passionate about here at Joseph Insurance Broker is giving a voice to small businesses, especially ones that we've worked with in the past. I've got a history obviously with you guys, So whether it's through insurance, financial security, even side income streams, I think it's important to give a voice to these businesses. These businesses are businesses that we trust inherently. Mercedes, like I said, has been around for quite a while. She knows the ins and outs of this industry, so she would be the perfect person to go to to consult about mystery shopping. Are there

36:55 any other red flags that you would share just in your experience of people go now mystery shopping? Has there been? Because I know I've run into situations. You know, you brought up a great point about editing and your grammar needs to be really good, and I've gotten some situations where I thought I've narrated it pretty well and then it got turned back to me saying, you know, you don't have enough information. So what would you say to folks like that? Yeah? Absolutely, So there's so many like nowadays as compared to when I first started, There's so many tools out there to help you. So one of the things that we recommend is like grammarly, which is like a free website can help you with your grammar and things like that.

37:39 And then as far as like when you fill out the reports, every report is different. We go over this, you know in training and things like that. But you know, some companies do want. A lot of detail. Others of them could care less. Right, I've kind of the opposite with you, Like I've gotten too where I've submitted a report and they said, oh, you don't even have to say that. You know, you can delete some. Of this and I'm like, oh, I didn't know it was that easy. So you get both ends of the spectrum. And so really it's just paying attention to the report and then also checking out the survey before you fill it out, so you're able to look at what questions they're going to ask you before you even go in to do the mystery shop, which is very helpful. And I've been seeing a lot more where they're also adding in, here's how we want you to write this out if there's a narrative.

38:31 So that's pretty helpful too. Okay, awesome, awesome. So as a CEO, we're going to talk about you personally. What's one lesson you've learned about leadership and building a company at this point? Oh my gosh, that's that's that's a whole episode. That is a whole episode. Right, Well, I get a little little, just a tiny bit a sliver of information if you can. Yeah, absolutely, well. I would say one of the things that is important to me is creating a great environment and culture among your team. And so you have to make sure you have the right people on your team. And so that really is a big deal. And when I say the right people, it has to be a good combination. It can't be Okay, this person can do the task, but they're they're not nice, they're not loyal, or you have people that are loyal and are nice that they repeatedly cannot meet the standard of the quality of work output. Right, So you need a good combination of people that meet the two right. Deciding what your company culture is like, your company values, your motto, all those things, and then start building from there, because once you know what you want your team to look like in terms of the values, then you're able to accurately assess who fits in with those company values. And when you have everybody on one accord,

40:02 that synergy will be created and you're gonna get stuff done and you're gonna be successful. Very good. That's great advice, Mercedie. Thank you for sharing that. So we're gonna have a little fun segment to end our session. It's gonna be like rapid fire, so you don't have to say why, but it's gonna be an and or type of question. So I'm gonna shoot them out to you and then you decide if you want to, you know, tell us why. If not, you just keep it short, all right, okay? First question? Coffee or tea? All right? All right? Are you an early bird or a night owl? Early bird? Okay? Okay? What's your favorite way to spend the weekend.

40:46 Watching? Go into the movie theaters? Yeah? Have you seen any good movies lately? Solo Mea with Kevin James? Oh, I actually wanted to see that. Okay? And then one word that describes your leadership style? Fine, awesome, I love it. I love it well, Mercedes, you do guys have Medicare Medicare Mystery shopping conferences as well? Right, how how often do those occur? We have one every single year, so it's an annual event. New there's a new place, you know, a new city and state every year. Okay, And we are actually looking forward to coming out to one of those out in Vegas this next fall.

41:30 So if you guys are listening, especially if you're one of my clients and you are retired and you're looking for extra income, this is actually the perfect way to do a side hustle. Trust me, the money will be there and that's a lot of fun, right, so you got nothing to lose. But yeah, and then if you're a mystery shopper listening in, I will be at that conference. You know. We do everything with Medicare retirement health insurance, so I'm your person for that knowledge and that process. So Mercedes, I appreciate you inviting me out for that. I really do. Are there any last words you have for anyone listening, any bits of advice?

42:14 I would say, when an opportunity comes your way, you know, think about it and act on it if it makes sense. And that's not just mystery shopping, that's anything. You know. There's so many opportunities that come our. Way on a daily basis, and I think that sometimes we can get overwhelmed with them and so we just shut it all off. But sometimes the answer to what we've been seeking are in those opportunities, or at least one of them. So never just brush something off. Always give it a little bit of thought. Hi, one hundred percent agree. That's great advice. Mercedes. I appreciate your time. I thank you so much for coming on our show. This has been Medica Hour and more with Peter. Please join us next week. We're live every Tuesday at nine Banks a Lot. Thank you, all right.

43:06 So that was our second interview with Mercedes. I really appreciated her time and her efforts in that industry. You know, obviously we are a community connector. We're a trusted advisor to small businesses. That's kind of why we're showing these kind of clips and spotlighting these small businesses. As I shared in the interview, we're actually going to be at the conference in Vegas in October, and the reason being is that, you know, she was saying that these people are ten ninety nine employees. But when you're an independent contractor, you need to have health insurance, right and you can only do that through you know, Obamacare or direct to private insurance companies, and that's where we come in. We also want to provide liability insurance as they're traveling travel insurance, we do offer that, and life insurance as well in case anything happens, God forbid and their families are well taken care of. So those are the things that we're offering, and that's why we're going to be stationed at that conference this next year. But we're so happy to have both zeb and Mercedes on our show today, and we just want to quickly go over our sponsors again that make this show possible. Mercedes is one of them. I Shop there are a great sponsor of ours. Rosa say, local florist here in Chino Hills and Chamber of Commerce is a great supporter of our business. And then we're

44:40 going to have an interview with Christian Brindle, the president of Everything Senior Insurance. They're what's called an FMO in the medicare industry. And then Glenn Shelton, his partner, who is an owner of what's called Lead Heroes. They're both going to be on throughout the year being interviewed and we welcome them immensely because they are huge sponsors of our show, so we thank them so much for that. So I want to quickly touch on enrollment and how to enroll into Medicare before we actually finish off our show. You've got a couple of minutes left. Thank you for those hanging in. Remember we are live on Facebook and we are also live on YouTube at Medicare at Minute with Peter. That's our channel for YouTube, and then our Facebook is Joseph Insurance Broker LLC. You can also look for my personal profile. We're live on there as Peter R. Joseph, So just the heads up on that. So for enrollment, you know when you're turning sixty five or you're coming off an employer plan. There's a few ways to enroll into Part B of Medicare. The first thing is, yes, you can call Social Security. I don't don't recommend that.

46:01 They are so short staffed right now. The wait time on that is hours and hours and hours, and so you don't want to be on the phone that long. And so the second way to do this is actually to drop into local Social Security office. A lot of them now are open because of after COVID they did open their facilities now, so you can walk in, hop in there. Yeah, sometimes there's a wait in line, but you can drop off a form that's called CMS forty B. You can find that on our website. You can actually email me as well for that information, but you just it's a one page application, You fill it out and then you drop it off with this local Social Security office that will get you into the system. The last way is if you are tech savvy, you can actually create an account on SSA dot gov. That's s SA, s as in SAMs is in SAMA is in Apple dot gov, g O V as in victor. You go on there, you're going to create hopefully if you already created an account with Social Security but you haven't, that's the way to do it. And then there's a blue button that says sign up for Medicare. You just follow the steps on there. The hard part about that is, you know, with the two factor authentication now with everything, you do have to have an email address and a cell phone because they're gonna send you digits to that cell phone number and then they're going to send you

47:32 a code to your email address, and so you want to make sure that you have both of those set up, otherwise you're not gonna be able to set up an account. So and then they're going to have you create an account through what's called i D dot gov. It just verifies your identity. So, you know, a lot of my clients find it hard to walk through that. I will walk that through with you guys, though, if you are a client of ours or prospect, will hop on the phone and I will zoom in and go on the website with you, or I'll go into person with you at your home and walk you through the website so that we can get you set up for that. So I just wanted to end here. Well, just a couple of thoughts. Again, this is Medicare Hour and more. So we don't just focus on Medicare. We focus on all things insurance. We also focus on a lot of small businesses that we inherently trust and that we work with directly or indirectly, and so we want those small businesses to be resources for you guys. Again, you can go to Chino Valley Chamber dot com for Zeb's information. You can go to I shop a g as in Good P'sanpaul dot com, I SHOPAGP dot com for Mercedes information and become a mystery shopper. I highly recommend that it's a lot of fun. If you've got time and I have a side hustle, that's the way to do it.

49:00 So again, this is Medicare Hour and more repeater where we bring you more than just Medicare. We bring you to people in businesses shaping our community. We are a company that supports local economic growth and we are conveners about and so we appreciate the time that zeb and Mercedes gave us and we medicare. Thanks for listening. Tune into Medicare Hour and More with Peter every Tuesday at nine am Pacific time right here on KFOURHD Radio at kfourhd dot com for more real life stories from experts who medicare about you and protecting your health, your finances, and your future. See you next week