Today we’d like to introduce you to Chuck Peters.
Hi Chuck, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
2011- I was working with God’s Place Church, a homeless ministry in South Knoxville at the time. I ran one of the 2 half way houses, and some of the small businesses that we used to fund the ministry. We were touching 6000 people a month through various outreach programs, mostly bussing people in from low income housing, homeless shelters, etc. We also had a fair number of shut-ins and others who wanted to come to church but had no means to do so. We brought them in, held a service, then did a community meal, and opened the doors to the food bank and the clothing bank, before loading everyone back up on the busses and returning them to where we found them.
I loved this adventure, but it paid almost nothing, and my wife was getting more and more pregnant by the day, due in October, with twins. She’s a social worker, and she was going to have to go on bed rest at some point, so that July I found myself looking for a way to bring in some extra income. I had always done digital marketing as a hobby. I studied it, played around with it, and made websites for fun. I made one for my wedding as an example. So, one brave day I decided I would offer my services to the public.
3 years later I ended up hiring team members to help me handle the overflow of work. I was won a bid on a contract with a local restaurant business, which led to 8 website projects, and that led to the wonderful experience of working with the Paula Deen crew. We still manage several Paula Deen websites, in conjuction with Paula’s team, including her Family Kitchen Restaurant website and her E-commerce store.
4 years later I found a mentor and joined a coaching program to help me learn what I didn’t know I needed to know, which turned out to be allot. I learned all about how to overcome the basic mistakes that many entrepreneurs make, like hiring mistakes, sales mistakes, etc. I overhauled the way I ran my business, called 714WEB, and I did it in such a way that I was able to scale my business. And scale we did. Implementing strategies and concepts fro my mentor and various other coaches, I found myself running a business that I owned, instead of working in a business that ran me. Growth had always meant more stress, more hours, less time off, and an overall lower quality of life. I had finally found a way to scale that actually gave me freedom. Thank God!
After a few years of experiencing and navigating a business at scale that was managed well, I decided to devote some time to helping others, who like myself, had experienced the stranglehold of a business that required too much time, too much money, too much stress. I started a small business owner coaching business, and it has been the joy of my work life to coach others into business success in terms of personal freedom, financial freedom, and so much more.
We all sign up for the hard work as business owners, we know that. What we think is; Someday. Someday I’ll be able to work less, and make more. The reality is, that won’t happen unless you engineer it that way, and you can’t engineer something without a blueprint. So, I get to share a blueprint.
Making mistakes is inevitable. Feeling the pain of regret over huge mistakes that could have been avoided – that’s just part of business. But now, when I take the lessons I learned, through pain, sweat and tears, and I pass them on to someone else, it feels like my time, energy, effort, and struggle, has been redeemed somehow. Somehow my past pain finds a purpose, and that is a priceless feeling. My struggle was NOT in vain. It meant something, it helped someone, it is a living beacon for others to learn from, so they can avoid going through what I went through.
I spend time with my 3 kids, I’m a coach on my Daughter’s softball team, I’m one of my Son’s golf coaches, we attend games and tournaments as a family. My older Daughter, one of those twins I mentioned before, She’s an artist, and supporting her in her work has been a joy as well.
My wife has plans to go back to UT in the fall as part of a Ph D program so She can further her goals and dream as well. My life is full of goodness, love, and peace, and so much of that is due to a handful of people who came into my life and said “Listen, Chuck, I know a better way… follow me…”, and I did. And here I am.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
January 2018 – My blood pressure was discovered to be sky high, stroke risk. I was referred to a specialist, who immediately scheduled a procedure to administer a dye test to look for blockages. It was discovered that there were no blockages. The conclusion was that my lifestyle of working 16+ hours a day, 7 days a week, was going to kill me. I didn’t exercise, I was mildly depressed, I had adrenal fatigue, and a poor diet. My doctor said “Make a lifestyle change, or you’ll continue to be a huge liability to your family”.
That was it. I decided then and there that I wasn’t going to have a stroke with 3 kids under 6 and no money in the bank.
I changed my diet (including cutting out caffeine altogether), started exercising, and cut my workload significantly. This ended a 12 year streak of working literally all day every day. I prayed like it was up to God, and I took action like it was up to me. I heard a wise man say “God moves in the ‘just so happens’…”, and He did. I picked up a client that required our team’s full attention, and fulfilled our financial obligations, for the next 3 months. I was able to spend 3 hours a day on his project, and restructure my entire life. It was during that restructuring that I was honored to meet with an experienced and highly successful local business man for 4 hours one evening, and soak up so much, learn so much, and expand my vision for my business, and for my life. It was the beginning of a path…
Within 18 months I had quadrupled my business’s average annual revenue, hired several dozen team members, and settled into a pattern or delegation, which lead to vacation. I started taking vacations and spending time with my family. I got to start over. I was able to reengage with the most precious relationships in my life, in meaningful ways.
I learned to put my phone down, put my computer away, unplug with “them”, and plug in to “us”. As a family.
All this started because 1 man took some time to talk to me, and I took the time to listen.
We’ve been impressed with Chuck Peters Coaching, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
I’ve made every mistake in business that a person can make. I’ve learned the hard way that I’m really good at certain things, and terrible at others. I’ve learned that communicating with people can be difficult, but it is entirely impossible to succeed without communication. I’ve learned how to do things better, because now I know better.
The first step was to realize I didn’t have to re-invent the wheel. I could learn form others, and STILL be myself.
Now I specialize in transforming business owners and leaders’ lives by transforming how they approach business. Systems and processes, the right tools for the right job, hiring systems, branding, how money is viewed; budgeting, generating, saving, spending.
The business I started in 2011, I’ve started or been a partner in several over the years, but specifically the one I started and grew to the top 1% in my industry, a Digital Marketing Agency called 714WEB, has spent 2025 integrating AI into it’s day to day operations. We’re not done yet, but we’ve come a long way. Understanding how AI works, what it does, more importantly wht it doesn’t do, and how to harness it’s power, has transformed our business.
AI doesn’t eliminate good people, it helps them. However It does eliminate waste, which can mean eliminating team members that don’t fit, because of their own choices.
My coaching business has become an AI Transformation Partner business. I partner with leaders to integrate with AI, reduce costs (sometimes significantly) and increase margins.
In order to transform your business with AI, you need a solid foundation. I help leaders uncover that foundation, define it, and then build on top of it with AI solutions that make sense. Not ‘technology for the sake of technology’.
714WEB builds custom AI solutions, and uses off the shelf AI products as well. As a business coach, I’ve found that working smarter might mean something different than what one would expect, sometimes a small tool is the exact right tool for the job.
I use a Discovery/Interview method to determine what’s right for my clients. I leave them with a blueprint for success, and sometimes I get to be a aprt of building that blueprint, but either way, I’m able to pass on what took me years to learn, in a meaningful way. I also get to use the web based tools that I’ve had a passion for since they existed, as a part of my tool belt, which I love.
Is there anyone you’d like to thank or give credit to?
Tracy and Kris King have played a role in my life that can never be measured. Ray Heath has been a friend and mentor for many years and brings so much to my life. Bryan Zevotek is a Coach, Pastor, and friend that has known me and supported me since I was 17. We meet monthly and my life is better for it.
No one deserves more credit for anything that I have achieved than my late Father. He was a father like no other, and instilled in me the value of loving deeply, working hard, and believing in myself. He knew me, my personality, my type of intelligence, my strengths, and he instilled in me as a young man that the internet was the future. He gave me every opportunity he could to put my entrepreneurial spirit and my web based technology aptitude to work in real life experiences. I was dialing in to chat rooms at 12 years old, I was learning about internet search engines as they were being invented, because he made a way for me to do that, he guided me into what he knew I would become. A true father.
My wife encouraged me to take concrete steps toward my dreams in real and practical ways. From the very beginning she saw something in me that I didn’t see. She has inspired me and supported me in every way possible, all the while being patient with me as I learned and grew into a husband worth his wife.
Pricing:
- $0 introductory call to see if we would be a good fit for engaging in discovery
- hourly consulting
- ongoing coaching
Contact Info:
- Website: https://ChuckPeters.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chuckpeterscoaching/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/charleslukepeters
