Preview:

We’ve talked about it some already on the show, but the South Carolina Coaches for Charity event has become a passion of ours. The money raised goes to help some outstanding charities, including the Fisher DeBerry Foundation started by Ryan’s former head coach.

 

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More About This Episode:

Our goal for the 2023 event was to pour our time and effort into helping the organizers continue to grow the event and build on the success they’ve already seen. To help us do that, we brought in Steve Sharp of Sharp Digital Marketing. He’s the man behind everything we do at The Pilot’s Advisor and his expertise made a huge impact on results for this year’s Coaches for Charity event.

We spent a little time with Steve after the event to talk more about what we were able to do and what we thought about the way everything turned out. Plus, we wanted to introduce him so you could learn more about someone who has been a big part of our growth here on the show.

 

Sky Snippets:

0:00 – Intro
3:11 – Background on South Carolina Coaches for Charity
8:08 – Feeling of being a part of a team again
13:26 – The kids meeting Steve
17:01 – The work Steve did with the coaches’ event
21:40 – The Community MVP we honored
24:45 – An emotional night for Coach DeBerry

 

Learn more about Steve: https://sharpdigitalmarketing.com/

Learn more about Coaches for Charity: https://southcarolinacoaches.com/

 

Audio Version:

Resources:

Retire Pilots – https://retirepilots.com

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Pilot Tax – https://pilot-tax.com/

The Pilot’s Advisor Podcast is also on video. Watch & Subscribe on YouTube: https://bit.ly/3EIEBW2

 

Episode Transcription:

(Note, this is an automated transcription. Please forgive any errors.)

Ryan Fleming 01:11
Welcome to another edition of the pilots advisor podcast we have a very, very special show today. Today we have a cast member from the Sons of Anarchy with us. He’s going to talk about the show and the background behind it. Steve sharp Welcome to the show. How are you doing today?

Steve Sharp 01:29
I’m doing great. Thanks for having me, Ryan.

Ryan Fleming 01:31
And I joke and I kid, I talked about him being a cast member of Sons of Anarchy or that he has a Harley just by his his look. Many of you guys probably know this guy. If you see anything that the pilot’s advisor does, this is the guy behind the scenes, Steve sharp from Sharp digital marketing. And as you can tell from his setup, he’s he’s way more advanced than I am.

Steve Sharp 01:56
Well, yeah, I recently, you know, I spent so much time in this office. So, you know, I might as well enjoy it. Right? So recently, we kind of redid the the office and pretty happy with how it turned out.

Ryan Fleming 02:11
It’s awesome. And I realized, if you look behind me, I need to up my podcast game, that’s one of the things we’re looking to do is, is rather than just having recorded podcasts, have video podcasting, like this, and I need to up my game and have a better environment for all of you guys. But we wanted to bring Steve to the forefront here and show what it’s supposed to look like. What a what a professional looks like. So anyway, Steve, thanks for doing the podcast with us.

Steve Sharp 02:38
Oh, absolutely, man. Absolutely. I mean, we do so much together. And, you know, we’ve been working together for a couple of years now. And more than that, though, you know, consider you a great friend and your whole family. So I just appreciate you having me on. And, you know, today I kind of wanted to talk about what we recently did for coaches for charity. i It was such an awesome event. And I think we did some amazing things. And I think we should share it.

Ryan Fleming 03:11
Well, I think when you say we You mean you. So for the for those of you guys. For the for those of you guys that don’t know. So coaches for charity, the South Carolina coaches for charity, Carrie and I recently have moved back to South Carolina for hopefully our final spot in life with my retirement from the the Air Force and she’s retiring finally. And one of the things I wanted to do was I wanted to get involved in the community. And no better way than my old coach, Coach Fisher to Barry gone, he asked his foundation, and they they do this charity event. So I called up coach and I let him know I said, Coach, I want to be a presenting sponsor for this, I want to pilots advisor to be involved. And that’s my plan going forward because I was never really able to dig in and give back while I was traveling around the world. And Carrie was getting PCs to different locations, and it just wasn’t in the cards. And so once I decided to do that, I reached out to Steve and I said, Steve, here’s what I want to do. I want your help, but I want to take it to the next level. I want it to be bigger and better than they’ve ever done it. And then of course Steve with coaches foundation you found a little bit that meant a lot to us. Well, can you talk about that?

Steve Sharp 04:24
Yeah, absolutely. Well, and and honestly, man, you know, it wouldn’t matter what it was at, you know, when you asked me to help I help and but then as I started to dig in to what the charity does, and for those of you that don’t know, coaches for charity, and the Fisher diberi Foundation, they help single parents with athletic costs for their their kids to participate. And that could be equipment that could be attending various athletic camps, football camps, stuff like that. I mean, me personally Well, you know, I was raised by my, you know, by a single parent, you know, unfortunately, my, my dad kind of took off when I was five and, you know, never really saw him again. And, and so it meant a lot. I mean, it definitely hit home for me. And it was, it was really awesome to hear so much about your time at the academy and your experiences with coach. And, you know, like, by the time the event came around, I kind of felt like I knew coach, you know, and I’ve never personally met. So

Ryan Fleming 05:37
I wish I wish we could get you to pull up the design you did with a turtle on the fence posts. That’d be some of you will will show it in post or something. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And and no coach is amazing. And how he touches people in a lot of those camps are for like, Fellowship of Christian athlete weekend camps are week long camps that that single parents maybe couldn’t afford for those athletes to go to. And I feel like I’m a product of what sports can do for you. Because it’s not about the game, it’s about the life lessons that you learn and learning to be a part of a team, learning to be a teammate being a part of something bigger than yourself. Sacrificing, or what I think is one of the most valuable ones is, is getting knocked down in life, are you going to get back up? Or are you going to sit there and whine and go do something else. And, and life’s tough. And I think sports really teach you that? That failures, okay, it’s about the persistence that the power you gain from never giving up. Right? And, and how to test that to see if you have a very, very successful digital marketing business. Because you’re constantly getting better, you’re challenging each other and are challenging yourself. And I think that’s how we’ve really gotten close is just by pushing each other a little bit. And we definitely, we definitely bring different things to the table. But I think it’s really been kind of cool to get to know you. And because like I said, like Steve brought up. I mean, we talk all the time and it’s become really, really good friends.

Steve Sharp 07:00
Absolutely. And and, you know, it’s to go back to kind of like the importance of of just the sports background and, and whatnot. I mean, over the last several weeks, you know, I’ve seen a fire in you. That that’s kind of new to me. Right? And I think it’s just because you were kind of dumped back into probe right that that team world that football world, getting a rub elbows with some of those those big names in South Carolina football world. I think that’s it’s pretty awesome to see that fire in you to get back to, you know, I think you you call it your tribe. That’s pretty important, man. I mean, and everybody’s got to have some kind of tribe, right? Like, whether it’s your co workers, it’s, you know, friends you grew up with, it’s whatever. And it’s important to stay connected to that tribe. And, and, you know, let it do its thing for you.

Ryan Fleming 08:07
So well, and I can definitely agree with that. I mean, I feel like at the Air Force Academy, the football team, I mean, you know, being a part of that was amazing. And I didn’t really find that in the Air Force until I was flying airplanes. Once I was flying airplanes again, I was like, oh, okay, now I’m back back on that team. And, you know, you’re going downrange, and you’re fighting the war and doing things for the troops and, and hanging out afterwards. I mean, I’ve always been a work hard play hard type guy, and I love I love FedEx, too. I love I love the people I fly with there. But it’s a little bit different camaraderie than some of the things I’ve done in the past. And any advisor out there would be the first one to tell you that this is a very tough, very lonely business. You can’t control the market, you can only control you know, clients exposure to the market, and a lot of it is talking them through behavioral issues, so they don’t hurt themselves and right, but it’s a very, very lonely business. And, you know, I think you’ve helped out a lot with that. But, but what Steve’s talking about is, after the South Carolina charity event, I got to see all my old coaches and a lot of them came in town and we’ll and we’ll talk more about it. It was a Charleston It was an awesome event. But since then, I live 10 minutes from Clemson University. And and you could see what my face I was out of practice yesterday and I got fried I need to take my hat next time, which I forgot to yesterday, but but I’ve been lucky enough to hang out with Clemson’s football team to get to spend time with Dabo Sweeney and get to spend time with his brother Tracy and hear them give these messages to these young players and oh my god, like I forgot how much I loved it and just love being around it. I mean, I was more fired up and half the guys in the room he’s he’s calling me

Steve Sharp 09:51
Yeah, I could tell when you were telling me you know send me pics and and and tell him out week you know that you were spending with the team? And luckily, you’ve kind of grown relationships there too, and, and stuff, but man, that’s what I’m saying. Like, I’ve never, I haven’t seen that fire fire in you before. It’s a different kind of fire. Right? Like, you’re always, you’re always excited and and you know what I call intense, right? But But you were you were like it’s a different type of fired up. And what I liked about that was it just kind of Invigor you know what I mean? And it’s it’s Comcast and life, right? Like, everybody needs that contrast between work, play family, whatever, you you have to have that balance. And it was just, it was just so awesome to see your eyes light up and, and how excited you were when you were telling me about, you know, some of the stuff you experienced. And what

Ryan Fleming 10:54
it was it was definitely powerful. And I agree with you. I think it was a different level of passion. I mean, I love I love college football, for sure. And I love just the, the energy and you know, we’re about to be, you know, it’s September, it’s about to be September. Yeah, it’s coming up, man. It’s gonna clear and there’s gonna be stadiums at 80,000 Plus, and it’s going to be wild and crazy. And look at me, I’m sitting here, I’m wearing a Clemson shirt right now I got a Clemson football family bracelet. But that’s just because I’m excited to be a part of something bigger than myself right here down the road. And if I can mentor and help out some of these young kids, I mean, it’s exciting. And, and no, it’s it’s been pretty awesome. It has and, and Steve challenge me to do a better job of telling you guys a little bit more about my life. Because the more you know about my life and the things that did make me run and that I get excited about the better advisor I can be for you. And so I’m going to try to do that. I hate you. Why don’t you tell them? How much I hate being on camera? Oh, man.

Steve Sharp 11:55
Yeah, I mean, guys, I mean, you do have to understand that when he does put these videos out and stuff he is putting out there. He’s not a big fan of it, to say the least. But he pushes through anyways. And and he’s he’s done a great job. And I know you guys want to see him and want to hear you know, hear what’s going on in the markets, what’s going on in the airline industry. You know, stuff like that, his insights, things like that. So I am just so you know, I’m pushing him in, and we’re gonna get a lot more out there. So bear with us, for sure.

Ryan Fleming 12:37
What I didn’t mind it so much when I was in my 20s. But now like, I’ll get on an elevator that has like a mirror in it. And I look around on who’s that fat bald guy and then realize it’s me, you know, like, where you see the big old bald spot in the back. And you see this gonna be like, the side profile maybe? And you’re like, like,

Steve Sharp 12:55
I know, well, I get it too, man. I mean, I, you know, you see me walking down the street. And you probably don’t, you know, think I’m a successful business owner with a team of, you know, eight employees and all this good stuff. But, you know, you turn the other way. Right, you’re probably thinking I’m walking out of the Virginia woods, you know, like, Hunt squirrel or something. So,

Ryan Fleming 13:22
we’re eating that squirrel for sure. Is that Well, for sure.

Steve Sharp 13:25
Absolutely.

Ryan Fleming 13:26
So, my, my daughter had a, we travel a lot for soccer. And she’s had a couple of events where Steve is in Iowa in Des Moines. And so we got to go meet Steve in person a couple of times. And it was so funny, because I think the first time Steve came around the corner, my daughter actually got to meet like, she was like, Oh my God, it was funny, because I’ve never seen somebody have such a way which is talking to my kids where my kids think you’re the coolest thing since sliced bread. Wow. They’re

Steve Sharp 13:57
I mean, they’re, they’re good kids, man. They’re good kids. And honestly, people in my opinion, people don’t talk to kids like they’re like their people. Like they talk to them like their kids. And I think if you just you know, have a conversation with them as a peer in a sense, it you know, it helps and you’re both your kids are awesome races great, you know, as well and we’ve spent some time with him and all you can’t see it but I’m a big Star Wars fan. So I’ll bust out my my Mandalorian helmet and and some of that, yeah, you do have you have evidence? For sure. But now your whole family is great. And I can’t wait to meet Carrie in person. I mean, we’ve done some video and stuff like that, but eventually we’ll we’ll make that happen. So

Ryan Fleming 14:53
yeah, it’s funny because a lot of my friends call her the general she’s a she’s a full bird colonel in the Air Force, but she’s fun only about to call it quits but yeah, a lot of the guys I fly with it at FedEx is kind of a general.

Steve Sharp 15:06
Yeah, she well, and it’s funny because when we do communicate she she’s just you can tell she’s, you know, she’s military. She’s, she’s conditioned. She’s very formal, you know, and I love to give her a little, a little grief about that every now and then.

Ryan Fleming 15:25
Yeah, what, sir? Yes, you know, but yeah, she takes control though. I mean, if you ever been meeting with her she takes control. So it’s, it’s kind of funny.

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Ryan Fleming 17:01
But no, back back to the South Carolina coaches for charity event. I know we got sidetracked here, but Steve took it on to redesign their whole website to help modernize how we were doing things. Another opportunity was they decided to move it from Greenville to Charleston. Okay, so it was in Charleston, which for me was amazing, because then I tapped into the whole Air Force community there, and all those amazing mentors that I had that helped, you know, teach me how to fly the C 17. And, and, you know, I was flying in the reserves out of there for over 20 years. And all those people came to the event. I mean, it was awesome. And what it turned into was the biggest event they’ve ever had, and I don’t think we’re going to stop there. I think it’s going to get better and better every year. And I’m just so happy that that you’re you’ve done what you’ve done, because I missed you guys don’t realize what Steve does things. It’s just absolutely amazing. I mean, I don’t know, I don’t know, half the stuff that he does, and nobody knows how to do. I just put a vision of something that I want to do, and he somehow makes it happen. I mean, I’ve been blown away too many times now.

Steve Sharp 18:07
I’m I’m a implementer and you know, you, you have an idea and we will make it reality. And we did with this. I mean, like you said it was their biggest event ever. And I think it was by leaps and bounds. You know, and, and honestly, I’d like to say, you know, to your clients and stuff, thank you, because there was a lot of you that anteed up and and help the charity and got engaged as well. And we can’t thank you enough. It’s, it’s such a such an amazing charity ran by some amazing people and doing some amazing things. So thank you to all your clients. That helped as well.

Ryan Fleming 18:49
Yeah, absolutely. That goes without saying and I think it’s a lot easier to be passionate about a charity when you know, how it’s going to affect those in the community and you know, it’s going to affect children and, and maybe change some lives. I mean, I really think it’s it’s about finding and helping the youth when they’re young and have letting them have that experience of that vision that hey, I can be whatever I want to be with hard work like nobody nobody else can affect my life except me and if I don’t quit and if I keep working hard I can do anything.

Steve Sharp 19:22
Absolutely and I mean I think I remember one of the stats when you know working on this and stuff and I think it was like one out of three kids today are are raised by a single parent so there’s a lot of kids out there that you know for whatever reason not have their own doing they are in some difficult you know situations and anytime you can you can help them have some normality right and and take advantage of that. What sports brings right that team up A mindset and hard work and, and physical, you know, I mean, it’s it’s, there’s so many benefits. So

Ryan Fleming 20:08
absolutely. And I don’t even think that was the number off to dig it up because it wasn’t one out of three, it was higher than that. And, and the trend was that it was getting higher, like the trends not going in the right direction. That’s right, more and more people are having children not getting married and not living together and not having that positive mother and father influence which, you know, is unfortunate. I mean, I’m from a broken home, my parents got divorced when I was 12. And I even talked to my kids about that. I was like, hey, when I was your age, here’s what I was dealing with, like, just to let them know that they’re lucky but to take care of each other because I tried to make race No, or actually, it’s more letting Jada know that, that her best friend is her brother, and he’s gonna be there forever. Right? Maybe you should treat them a little bit better. Right? No. And without, without friends and family, it’s pretty hard to navigate this life we go through. Right.

Steve Sharp 21:04
Well, and and you know, you mentioned it a little bit earlier, too. But, you know, I think that’s what I love so much about what I’ve learned about the pilot community is, I mean, I’ve heard so many stories, not just from you, but you know, I’ve got I’ve got a couple other clients that are pilots too. And just stories about other pilots in need, and, and things they’ve done. I mean, you know, talk a little bit about Mike, who you were able to honor it was Mike, right?

Ryan Fleming 21:36
Yeah. Yeah, it was know for sure. Well, we take care of our own for sure. And, and, you know, we try to in that community is pretty tight. And I think what Steve’s referring to is, every year, one of the coaches, whether it’s Dabo, Sweeney, whether you know, whether it’s the South Carolina head coach, I mean, whoever it might be, they pick somebody in their community as a community MVP, that’s given back and coach, the very coach that the Air Force Academy for many, many years, and we came up with the idea that, hey, there’s so many of my Air Force mentors, that we’re going to be there people that have taken care of me, and, you know, of course, I’m sure, Coach felt a lot better when he finally saw me graduate, you know, got that one out. But, but all I did was pass me on to, you know, the guys in Charleston, and they had an even bigger fee, then to, you know, keep me in the Air Force and out of jail, you know, for 20 some years. And so anyway, one of those people that has had to pick one, right, and this is a guy that has been amazing around the Charleston community and the Air Force, reserve units are there for years and years and years. And he also helped me get on at FedEx, and that was Mike Speier. And so we honored Mike at that event, he’s around a lot of his peers. And honestly, what we did was embarrassing, you know, like he was so, you know, because anybody that deserves that award, thinks somebody else should be getting it and not them. And that’s, that tells you right there that it was the right person. And you know, of course, he’s, he’s embarrassed and you know, didn’t want to get up on stage. And we made him do all that. And it was great. Everything about it was fantastic. And I’m lucky enough to be around him, even in a community where we moved to because we live in live just down the street from each other. And, and he’s one of those people, the way he treats people the way he opens doors and talks to everyone and writes handwritten notes. I mean, it’s, he’s one of those guys that I want to be, I want to be like that I want to be better. And in many, in many ways, he reminds me of coach to Barry, where he sits down at night and writes handwritten notes to people, like individuals used to do that are so powerful, and, and I don’t want to say emotional, but they’re just more personal. Yeah, it’s that

Steve Sharp 23:52
something you would you would never, you rarely throw away a handwritten note to you, you know what I mean? It’s, it’s something that

Ryan Fleming 23:59
Well, that depends on what it says to you. Right? That’s true. That’s

Steve Sharp 24:03
a nice handwritten note you’re gonna tend to hang on to and you know, I mean, I’ll get that from clients from time to time and I hang on to every single one of them and you know, it’s kind of neat to every now and then kind of go back through those and reread them and that sort of thing. But But anyways, I mean that Yeah, I think it was just so amazing what you were able to do for Mike and everything you’ve told me about him and the the guys he’s helped, you know, fellow pilots and and airline pilots and servicemen and you know alike, but he definitely deserved it. And that was pretty awesome that you were able to do it and I know one of your other goals was to bring a little tear to Coach’s Eye. And I think you accomplished that as well.

Ryan Fleming 24:56
Yeah, for sure. It was a powerful night. I wish we had more or former players there, because what I really wanted was coach to turn around and see like, half the teams he’s ever coached. But we didn’t get that many players there. Like we did have foreign players, but I know we’re gonna do better. I know that the event was so powerful that I know next year, there’s gonna be more and more and it’s going to what we want to do is just take this and run with it. And I know I couldn’t, couldn’t do any of the things we did without your help. Steve, you’re instrumental. And and I appreciate you being on the podcast today. Yeah, I as always, I tried to keep it under 30 minutes, because I know everybody’s busy. And I want you guys to still listen. So this was a little bit different. But uh, like I said, we had a cast member from Sons of Anarchy here today, and he’s going to show us his motorcycle next time.

Steve Sharp 25:46
But next time you’re in, I’ll take you for a little ride.

Ryan Fleming 25:49
Yeah. So Steve sharp, sharp digital, marking one of the one of the most amazing businesses that you can partner with in this industry. And, Steve, thanks for everything you’ve done. Thanks for your friendship. Thank you for taking this South Carolina charity event and, and running with it and making it better and providing us with tools that we never thought we could even get to, to help change kids lives.

Steve Sharp 26:13
Well, I thank you for involving me and thank you for just, you know, for your friendship and and, you know, onward and upward. So,

Ryan Fleming 26:26
was that Japanese phrase? Kaizen and what does that what does that mean?

Steve Sharp 26:31
continuously getting better or improving? And that’s that’s our mantra man. You and me. That’s our mantras were never, never rest, right. Never be satisfied. Just keep doing better. Better better.

Ryan Fleming 26:43
Steve. Have a wonderful day. Thank you for your time. We’re gonna have definitely have to have you on the podcast again.

Steve Sharp 26:49
It was my pleasure, right?

Ryan Fleming 26:50
All right. Take care. You too.