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Matt McWilliams: Turning Your Passion Into a Business · The Daily Writer

• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the weekend edition of the Daily Rider.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: Each weekday we bring you a short lesson that helps you live out the four practices of a great writer.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: Creativity, consistency, courage, and connection.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: Here on the weekend edition, we take a deeper dive into those topics through conversations with writers and teaching that helps us apply what we're learning.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: For more, you can visit us at dailyriderlife.com.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I am super excited to feature a conversation with my friend Matt McWilliams on today's episode.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: Matt helps online business owners and brands, both large and small, to leverage the power of partners to grow their businesses.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: He teaches you how to make money as an affiliate and how to work better with affiliates.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: Matt has worked with some of the best of the best in the online, entrepreneur, and leadership spaces, including people like Ray Edwards, Brian Tracy, Lewis Howes, Shutterfly, Jeff Goines, and many more.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Now, Matt is not only a cool guy with a killer business sense, he is also working on a new book about turning your passion into a business.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: So I have asked Matt to come and share his insights about creating a business and what he's learned from some of the truly amazing people that he's worked with.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: Once you're finished listening, I encourage you to check out Matt's website, which is mattmcwilliams.com, and there will be a link in the show notes as well.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: So here's my conversation with the amazing Matt McWilliams.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the Daily Writer Podcast.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: Good to have you, my friend.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, thanks for having me, Kent.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: So we are here to talk about turning your passion into a business.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: And there's so many directions that we could go with this topic, but I I've got a few questions kind of prepared here.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but as with all these podcast conversations, they they go lots of different directions.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, the first thing question that I want want to throw out there is is this.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_01: So your upcoming book is on the topic of turning your passion into a business.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: So give us some background about this book and what you would like to accomplish with it.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, the the background is it's the book I wish I'd had um 16 years ago when I started my online business, Kent.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's the book that uh, you know, it's the it's it's the playbook.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it really is.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: It walks you through, you know, step by step how to take your message, your your passion, your idea, and turn it into a profitable business.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: And and so the genesis of this came from the fact that we saw kind of these two, and I write about this in the in the book where I go into detail about um the you know, the two types of entrepreneurs, right?
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: There's the entrepreneur type number one, where they are they they they are they're doing well with their money, like their business is profitable.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um they're you know, they're whatever, they're doing great with sales, but they're not passionate about what they're doing.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: They kind of they they hate their work.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so every day just becomes this, you know, this another mundane money-driven mess, right?
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: The other side, like the complete flip side of that, is oh my gosh, I love what I do, I'm super passionate, I'm helping people.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: I wake up every day and I love my business.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, how much money are you making?
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: None, but I still love my business.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: And then 30 days later, it's like boom, they hit the wall.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: Either side burns out quickly because you're either burnt out because you're not passionate about what you're doing, or you're burned out because you're just not making money.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: And in it, like I was in that second boat where I was like, I'm gonna wake up and blog at 5 30, 5 30.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: You know, do you have any idea when you're not like a morning person and you work a full-time, you know, I had a full-time business at that time.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: I was still an entrepreneur, but I was full-time from eight to six every day with my quote unquote real business.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have any idea how early 530 is when you're waking up to write at the card table?
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it is like the butt crack.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: It is dark.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Even in summer, it's dark at 5:30.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: And yet I'm waking up then just like just to get to work to writing.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I was tired all the time and I had no energy and I had nothing to show for it financially.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, wait, that's a stupid, that's not a business model.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's like a really expensive, exhausting hobby.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: You know, right.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: So those are the two extremes.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: So the book came from this place of saying, I'm seeing this over and over.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'm seeing 99% of business owners, 99% of people who say, I'm gonna start a blog, I'm gonna start a podcast, I'm gonna start a video channel, I'm gonna do an online business.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: And 99 out of 100 of them are in one of those two extremes.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: And you only have like the one out of a hundred, or maybe even one out of 200, who are what we call entrepreneur night number three, where it's like they are passionate.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: They they do wake up a little early because they're just excited to get to work.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of like I was writing this book.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I woke up early every day because I was just like, I want to write the book.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: Like I couldn't wait till the next day.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: I had to stop, I had to set a timer and I had to be disciplined to stop writing at 8 15 every day because I I had work to do, you know, and and they're super excited about and they're making money, which means they get to keep doing it for the long term.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: And so the problem that we were seeing was no matter whether you burned out because you just hate what you're doing, or you burned out because you're not making money, the world misses out on your message.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: And and everyone, I have a wholehearted belief, I don't care what that message is.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: It could be helping over people overcome PTSD, it could be overcoming depression, addiction, marital issues, parenting issues, overcoming pornography.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: It could be helping people grow organic vegetables in their garden, you know, it could be helping people just to get in better shape, to to to start a business.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it doesn't matter what the message is.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: Start a blog, start a podcast, start a video channel.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: It could be anything.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's important, you know, because there are people out there who are are dying for that message.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: And um, so that's really where the book kind of the genesis of the book came was like, okay, how do I how do I walk people through these 10 steps?
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and it's very sequential.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: How do I walk them through the 10 steps to go from okay, I have a passion, I have an idea.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: I think maybe it could be a viable business, even, to actually creating on the very you know far side of the book all the way to how do I create uh a profitable business, you know, that can can sustain for the long term.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: One of the one of the difficulties that writers often have, and and I lump writers into a class of people I call creatives, and I'm obviously self-identified with one of those people.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: But one thing that a lot of creative types struggle with is that they're multi-passionate, they're they're excited about a lot of different things.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, I talked to somebody literally just yesterday, a friend of mine who's really been struggling uh financially.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: His passion is for a certain area, but the the area that he's passionate about doesn't pay very well.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: So I've encouraged him to take his writing gifts and use those in an industry such as ghostwriting, which is what I do, that can be very uh a lot more, a lot better compensated because that skill is a lot more valued in the marketplace than his other line of work that he's doing now.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: So for somebody who has a variety of passions, how do they, I know you're gonna talk about all this in the book in in depth.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, how do they decide which passion to pursue if if you have a variety of passions?
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: So in the book, I cover kind of two separate sides of this.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we'll dive into the specific one that you asked about, but I talk about multiple distinct passions.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: So this is like, um, you know, gosh, I I either I want to start a blog about organic farming or a blog about um, you know, how to how to do like endurance, you know, sports.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: Or I wanna, I'm not sure if I want to teach people how to start a blog, or you know, do I want to teach them how to be better parents?
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like there's no connection whatsoever to either one of those, you know, niches.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: The other side is like there's multiple avatars within a single passion.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, that's a completely different thing.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: So um I wrote I wrote about this in the book.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: If you've got, if you're in that first one, like you've got multiple distinct passions.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I I talk about one of our coaching clients and I gave him a fake name, and I couldn't tell you what the fake name is in the book.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's like Kevin or Ken or Joe or something, you know, um, but it's not his real name, just so everybody knows.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so he's like, he's he was an extreme case because he had five very distinct passions.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: He's like, okay, which niche do I enter?
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, okay, let me give you um, let me give you a very um very simple exercise.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I walk, I walk people through this in the book where it's like you take 20 minutes, you set a timer, you play some um, you know, some like music that kind of like helps you focus or whatever, just something where you're not gonna be distracted by shiny objects or kids or whatever.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: If you need to go to a hotel room for an hour, you know, you can't go for a walk.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you well, it probably doesn't work if you're on a walk.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: You'll you'll see why in a second.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: And here's what I want you to do.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: And in this guy's case, he was starting a podcast.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: So I said, I just want you to write down podcast topics.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: I I don't care if it, if you know, if it's um like it doesn't, they can be short episodes, solo episodes, guest episodes, um, you know, series.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: Doesn't matter.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: Just write down podcast topics.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: So if I were to do this, for instance, I you like, yeah, I want to do, I wanted to do leadership and personal development.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: I am passionate about that for my business.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: Then there's affiliate marketing, and then there's grow, you know, there's all these things, right?
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: I teaching people how to start an online business or go from passion to profit, right?
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: And so write down all the topics that you can think of.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: Not titles, we're not trying to wordsmith these.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's just write down topics like super, super fast.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: And so I would write down things like monetizing a blog, monetizing a podcast, uh, building an email list, creating a lead magnet, uh, you know, uh nailing down your avatar, right?
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: Those are things that I would write down.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I just named five things in my niche in like two seconds.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: When it's leadership and personal development, it's like, okay, um, okay, delegation.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yep, delegation.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, let me think.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry, uh time management, you know, uh productivity, hiring, firing.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: Right there, you can even just tell without even like I wasn't faking that.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: It took me about twice as long to name five things as it did, you know, on the online business side.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: If I sat there for 20 minutes writing down my list of things for an online, you know, an online business uh platform, which is what I have, I could probably write down 150 to 250 topics in 20 minutes.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: If I were doing leadership and personal development, which again, something that I'm passionate about, I could probably write down 50.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe not even 50.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: I could, I probably start really tapping out around the 40 mark.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: I might get to 50, but those that la it would be like it would take me five minutes just to do the last 10.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: And so every time I've ever walked somebody through this exercise, um, they've had one that had 120 to 200, you know, upwards of 250.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: And then another one that was like less than half.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: When when this client, who again, I gave him a fake name in the book, I wish I could remember what it was.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like it was Ken.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, and uh when he did it, I mean, it was like literally, it was like one of them had like 140, and the next closest one was like 72.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, so it was a pretty, pretty dramatic, you know, difference, I think double basically.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so that one exercise you just go through right down to that's it.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's your that's your niche.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: That's your that's your topic, right?
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and often what we find is that's the one where they can also think of the most product ideas, the most like creative ways to to monetize.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, we've even seen people uh do this exercise.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: I remember one lady, I had her do it, and um I was like, listen, you know, I don't need to be on this call for you to do this.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: So here's what I'm gonna do we're gonna we're gonna reconnect in an hour.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I just want you to do this.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like seven minutes later, she texts me and she says, I'm done.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, You're done?
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: Question mark?
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Like, how how are you done with this exercise?
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: She's like, I got seven minutes in and realized on this one topic, I've no.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: She's like, she's like, or no, she said she got like four minutes in on the one topic and was like, This is terrible.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: I've only written down like five seven things.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: She said, in three minutes, I wrote down 30 for the other.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: I realized that this made it easy.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how you do it if you've got multiple passions, that's how you do it.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: So is if you're excited about something, is it is it possible to turn anything into a business, any kind of passion, as long as you are excited about it?
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: There are certainly, I would never suggest that anything you're passionate about, any business could be turned into the next Amazon or or even the next um, you know, Tony Robbins type business.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not suggesting that every single passion, every single idea, every single message can be turned into a uh a nine-figure, you know, just for the that's a hundred million dollar plus business.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not even suggesting that every one of it could be turned into an eight-figure, you know, ten million dollar plus business.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: I believe every one, every single passion within levels of reason, you know, if yeah, I guess that's what I'm asking about.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: If your passion is is helping, you know, it is helping people, uh, I'm trying to think of like a just absolutely obscure example.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: Like if your entire passion is helping people translate um English into Klingon, you know, to think of something really nerdy.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know, I don't know how how many people want to do that.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know that you're necessarily passionate about that.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: Is that like the thing you you wake up in the morning and go, oh my gosh, I've got to, you know, it's like I gotta help people do this.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: Do you really wake up thinking that, like, or is that like fantasy football where it's like, you know, this is fun and I wanna do it, but I'm not, it's not the thing that drives me to get out of bed.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I'm talking about when I talk about passion.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, I'm like, for instance, I'm really passionate about playing soccer with my kids, but I don't wake up in the morning going, oh, I just gotta teach the world how to play soccer with their kids.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's not, I don't know, that's not my thing.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: Like, that's what I do for fun.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: But I am passionate because I believe I have been called to help the world, to help people who are out there going, I have a passion and I can't like I don't know how to turn it into a business.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'm that that is the thing that wakes me up in the morning.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: The thing like when I look in our Slack channel, we have a Slack channel called Testimonials.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: And when I just see people after person after person after person, screenshot after screenshot after screenshot of people saying, I made my first dollar, you know, I made my first, like I I got a$42 affiliate commission.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: It's the first dime I've ever made as an entrepreneur.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I see those, not to mention the ones you're like, I made my first$10,000, but you know, the whatever it is, they get excited about that.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: That that's what drives me.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, within reason, uh, I think when there's an audience, it certainly could can every business be a$10 million plus business?
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: But I believe every one of them could very well be a seven-figure, you know, or mid-six-figure, you know, business for you.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: So there is a point though at which uh, and I'd love for you to speak on this as well, where you look at your passion, but that has to be connected then to something people are willing to pay for.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: So is there at what point do you you kind of lay out the things that you're passionate about, but then you look in the marketplace and see, okay, somebody is already developing something that's related to this, or people are already paying for this kind of thing.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's it's not so competition is actually a really good thing.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's proof of concept.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I mean, if you think about it, if there's no competition, there's only one of two reasons.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: Truly, nobody has ever thought of this idea before.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: And that's that is possible.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: Or but pretty uh pretty rare.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: You know, um, and that doesn't mean that if there's no competition, that you don't.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I think when there's when there's already competition, here are the benefits that I see just off the top of my head that I that I share with our clients.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like, um, number one, it's proof that people are willing to pay.
• 16:28
  unknown: Yeah.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: So you don't even have to do that.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: You have to remember that just because there is competition doesn't mean that you can't stand.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: I go in the book, I I don't know, there's like 20 pages about how to stand out, you know, in a crowded marketplace, right?
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I go into super depth and I don't have time to get into that here, but like you can stand out.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: You also have to remember that maybe there's only one choice in the market.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_00: And let's just say that that one choice is I'm gonna just go with me, right?
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, first of all, I'm male.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: So by nature, 50% of the population doesn't relate to me.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm male, I'm white, I grew up in the south, and I live in the Midwest, I live in the United States.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_00: So let's just say, okay, male and white from the United States makes up what half a percent of the entire world's population, roughly.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just guessing on it.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: Could be a third of a percent, a three-quarters of a percent, but it is a fraction of a fraction of a percent.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: Not to mention, like, I'm pretty high energy and I'm like go, go, go.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_00: And and I I sometimes go off on rabbit trails.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so some people aren't attracted to my style and and my personality.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're on my email list, you know that I can be a little bit like um weird, you know, I have my own unique personality.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: I am attracting the type of person that I want to attract.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the good news for anyone who wants to come compete with me.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: If if somebody is, they might already even be in my audience, but you come along and you are more attractive to them, they'll leave me because maybe I'm the only option and go to you.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: Cool.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome for you.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe there's only one person out there who's in your niche, serving that niche.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: And they, I don't know, I'm just gonna make up a few things.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they cuss.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: Well, then everybody who doesn't cuss or doesn't want somebody who cusses, uh, you can attract all those people, right?
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they're male and you're female.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: Boom.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: They are uh an ex-CEO and you are an ex-stay-at-home mom.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: They have a PhD from Harvard and you got your GED, or vice versa.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like you can stand out and attract people based on even perceived um disadvantages.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: We got into this in the book where I talk about like uh the Boston Red Sox in 2004.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if if you're a baseball fan, you remember like they they went up against the Yankees in the American League Championship series.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: They're down three games to none.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: And the Red Sox lovingly called themselves the idiots.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't know any better.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like, and they came back to win the series and they go on to win the World Series.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I talk about like turning your disadvantages into your, you know, into these advantages, like you know, Sylvester Stallone uh is one of the examples I talk about in the book where it's like if you think about the way he talks and the way his mouth moves, you would look at that and go, that's a disadvantage.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_00: In in corporate America, that's a disadvantage.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: But why do we remember Adrian?
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we don't if he had sounded quote unquote normal, we would never remember that.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Arnold Schwarzenegger, you know, he he even says if it hadn't been for his crazy accent, he'd still be back on the Austrian Alps jodeling right now.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if if it is if if it had been like me being like, I'll be back, how is that a memorable movie line?
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: No, I'll be back.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's what made it.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, what's the guy that played Columbo, Peter Falk?
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: He had like the weird eye thing going on.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: It became he squinted all the time.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: Like that was his trademark thing.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: Those are all disadvantages that they turned into advantages.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: And so the competition thing is is the same way.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: You you think of ways where you can stand out and serve your audience in a way that the people who are already in your like already out there just aren't serving them.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: Same thing is true for ghostwriting, which is what I do.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's there's lots of ghostwriters out there, but it doesn't mean that you can't have a viable career in it because you have a you have a unique personality, unique approach to doing things, and and that's a good thing.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_01: That's a really, really good thing.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: And and you're the you're the expert on that, but I can tell you that if like somebody came to me and um you know and wanted to to ghostwrite a book, um, and they and their thing was that they're gonna they they're gonna we're gonna go to a cabin and sit in front of a fire for three days while they interview me.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: And that was like the unique angle that they use.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um I may I'm making this up because I've never been in that business.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: And that was like that was their thing.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: Well that kind of sounds cool.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like you got like a special right, like cabin, you know, man, or you might be kidnapping me.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't know, that may be your way of like, I don't know, you may be a cannibal or something, but you know, like it that's something like you you you find the ways where you can stand just because there's a hundred ghostwriters out there.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that ghostwriter does Zoom meetings for one hour and then they take your blog content and turn it into a book.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what would he do?
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: That's a dime a dozen, you know.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't know.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: Is there some way that you can just like uh that you can stand?
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: I stand out.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: Like I have a friend of mine that is a ghostwriter, and um, you know, his his approach is a little bit different.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of cool, you know, it's not like cabin in the woods with a fire going, but it's you know, it's a little bit uh little bit different.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: It c it sounds kind of fun, is what I'm saying.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: And so there's all kinds of ways, like I said, style, personality, your background.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I mentioned um if you are a PhD.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: In an industry full of people who tend to not be, use the PhD.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: You will repel.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: I don't give a flying crap if you're a PhD.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: You might even repel me, but you'll attract the people who are like, well, I guess a PhD, you know.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um, if you used to work, um, I think of Amy Porterfield, for the first few years of her online business, she talked about how she used to work for Tony Robbins all the time.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: Because nobody else in this industry had ever worked for Tony Robbins.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: It was her her her resume stood out.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: Your background, like I, I, I talk a lot about, you know, in my uh, you know, my business.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: I I you know, I talk about like growing up, I was exposed to both sides of the socioeconomic, you know, spectrum.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up with a single mom living on barely on the right side of the tracks, but I could see the tracks from you know from my bedroom window because my mom worked three jobs, you know, and just enough to keep us in a two-bedroom apartment.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that like I knew that.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then all of a sudden, at the age of nine, I moved to live with my dad out about a year before his career took off, and he was suddenly making about a quarter million dollars a year, which to me might as well have been like a billion, you know.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: And all of a sudden I'm like, oh, I get to play golf and I get to do all these things, and I'm hanging out with like music stars and you know, and famous people and eating in like, you know, but then a few years I thought it was just normal that I was 13 years old eating at Roots Christ twice a week, you know.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I know both sides.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's a very unique background.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: Most people don't experience that dichotomy in their life.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: And so I'm able to talk about that.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there's always something in your story, in your resume, in your background.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, even if it's, you know, you're the guy, you're the guy who has the mohawk, or you're the lady with purple hair, you know, you're the guy who always wears a three-piece suit on camera, or you're the guy who's whatever, you know, it's like there's always ways to to stand out and differentiate yourself from the quote unquote competition.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: One of the things that I want to want to ask you about, of course, you are the affiliate guy, literally.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's you call yourself the affiliate guy.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: And um, you do stand out because you are the only affiliate person that I know.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, if somebody asks me who can I get to run an affiliate program, you are literally the only person that comes to mind.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_00: I like that.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: So, first of all, good job distinguishing yourself.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: I know there are other people who do that, at least I assume there are, but I don't know any parts.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: So, first of all, good job on that.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: But second of all, I'm curious because this is a podcast for writers and authors.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: You've worked with a lot of really, really successful people.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_01: How have the people that you have run affiliate programs for, how do those people tend to use books to promote their business?
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like what role does a book play in helping their platform or their business?
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, number one, it's the best business card you can have.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, I I love, you know, this is like full disclosure, right?
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: This is a safe place to talk about this.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, I'm writing the book to serve people.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, I'm writing the book to solve all the problems I talked about.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I gotta be honest, I wouldn't write the book if I didn't think it would make me money.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_00: Because it goes, it addressed, I mean, it's the same thing we talked about, right?
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_00: Entrepreneur type number one, you know, there, and two, and entrepreneur type number two is there, I'm loving this, I'm helping so many people, but I'm not making any money, so I can't keep doing it.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: I can't invest.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we've I I told you earlier, I just finished the manuscript this morning, right?
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: The first draft, right?
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: So so far to date, I've spent about 140 hours working on this book, uh, is my best estimate.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: I've got another 140 to go.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm through the hard part, but not the least time-consuming part.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna do that and make nothing.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: I that's just not me, you know.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: I'm because I can go play with my kids and make nothing, you know.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: So I'd rather do that, right?
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: And so um, it's a business card.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's number one.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: Number two, it's it's often uh, you know, especially in online business, and this is what we're gonna be doing.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's used as a funnel.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's it's uh it's an entry point into my ecosystem, it's a paid entry point, so it's not a free opt-in where uh they're qualified, say at a level, you know, two out of ten, three out of ten, because they raise their hand and said, I'm kind of interested in that subject, but I'm not willing to give you any money.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there's a financial transaction.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_00: But it's low.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's low.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: But it's low.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: But the biggest jump you will ever see, and we know this uh, you know, gosh, I'll tell you a little study we did at Shutterfly a while back.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_00: The biggest jump you will ever see in terms of finances is not from 10 to 100, it's not from 100 to 1,000, it's not from a thousand to a hundred thousand, it's from zero to anything.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's cool.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: To give you an example, you know, when we at Shutterfly years ago, we did you can get one free card.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: One, one free card.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_00: We had 250,000 of people take us up on it.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: This is through our affiliates and through our network, right?
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: Or you can get unlimited cards.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: These are$2.50 cards.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_00: You can get one for free or no, not unlimited, sorry, 10 cards for 99 cents.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: We had 6,000 people or 250,000 or six.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: So the cost of 10 cards was either going to be let me do some quick math nine times 250.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: So 2250 or 99 cents.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: And then when we took those 6,000 people, this is mind-blowing, those 6,000 people up against the 250,000 people, the one year uh revenue, uh total revenue, not revenue per customer, clearly it would be higher with the 6,000 people.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_00: But the re the total revenue from the 6,000 people versus the quarter of a million people was almost identical.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: I think the 6,000 people lost by like a couple thousand dollars.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, 6,000 people who had paid something made almost as much as 250,000 people who'd paid nothing.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: Both groups had to enter their credit card, by the way.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: That's the fascinating thing.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't the taken out of the credit card.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: You had to enter your credit card to get the free card to verify that you weren't a duplicate.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_00: That was the reason.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: That was why we required them to enter the credit card.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: The presenting reason.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, yeah.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_00: The underlying reason was actually so they create a profile and it would be there if they ever wanted to buy anything.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so the biggest leap is from zero to anything, and so it's a cheap, it's a ten dollar qualifier.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: You pay ten dollars for um, let me just pick one of our clients, Ray Ray Edward's book, How to Write Copy That Sells, right?
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: Love that book.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, great book.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you pay 10 bucks for that book, 15 bucks for the book, whatever.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_00: You are now infinitely more qualified to become a potential qualified copywriter that costs$10,000,$15,000, to buy his course, which costs$2,000, to hire him as a coach, which costs you know tens of thousands of dollars.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_00: If you buy my book, you are infinitely more qualified to purchase one of our courses, become a coaching client, um, you know, all these things that you might do than somebody who's never paid me anything.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so um it's a great qualifier of customers.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_00: Do we expect if I offered a free lead magnet essentially teaching the same thing, I might get 100,000 subscribers versus the book I might sell 7,000.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: But those 7,000 people will make me more money than 100,000.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so it's also thirdly, it's it's a way for affiliates to promote something on a on a very low, you know, it's a very low entry point.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, my friend Matt wrote a book, go buy it.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: But then we have you know things in the funnel um to upsell them, you know, as they go, because there are people who are just hyperactive buyers and we want to address those things.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: And so I'll just I'll share with you, Kent.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: Like our process is um, you know, it's a free plus shipping book.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: And so shipping right now on books is right around eight bucks.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's what we probably charge$799.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: If shipping goes up and we think it might, we'll we'll raise it a dollar or two.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so we're breaking about even because we pay a little bit less than that in basically east of the Mississippi, a little bit more west of the Mississippi.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: The books are gonna cost us about um$385 a piece from from our publisher, roughly.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: So we'll we'll lose a like a dollar and 25 cents per book on on free plus shipping.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: Immediately, there'll be an order bump to add the uh the audiobook for$27.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, right after that, there will be um an offer to get uh what amounts to a live presentation, a live teaching of of the principles in the book that's got some more in-depth you know stories and uh some graphics and things like that.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_00: That'll be$197.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: And then from there, if they're they're still going, then we have an offer to get our our list building program for$997.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: Well,$997, but we'll discount it to$497 in the funnel.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then from there, you know, like they now they're a customer.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: So of course they're over time, those people who have gone through, you know, 10, 27, you know, 90 or 197 and 497.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just roughly, we'll call it 750 bucks.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure on the exact math.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: They spent$750 with me.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: They are infinitely more likely to become a coaching client, yeah.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and so um that's how we use that's how we've used them with our clients and and how we'll be using them uh, you know, in our book launch.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: Man, I love it.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_01: Matt, this is genius stuff.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_01: I am so thankful we've had to had the chance to connect over the years, and it's been so much fun to see your success and all the cool things that you're doing now.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: And you have somehow done something that is really, really rare, which is in a lot of people's minds, at least kind of in my circle of entrepreneurs and ghostwriters and those kind of authors, like literally a lot of us don't know anybody else who does what you do.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_01: So you are the the go-to person to do affiliate stuff.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: So the money, the money I say is in the dark arts.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's in it's in the thing that people know is there, but don't really understand it.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: I know I think that's that's true to any profession, you know.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: It is well, it's hard to get my head around the systems in what you do.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I think I have a pretty decent understanding of it, but still that there are so many levers and triggers and web stuff, and all there's all kinds of stuff that goes into what you do specifically that from the outside seems very complicated.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but you've been doing this a long time too.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, the things that seem easy to us oftentimes seem complex to other people.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yep, it's those dark arts, man.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's the it's the things, um, you know, as long as you don't fall fall prey to the the curse of knowledge, you know, like everybody knows this stuff.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: I I just teach the same stuff over and over and over again.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_00: Like I haven't said anything new in years.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but every time I say it, people that hear it are like, oh yeah.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and I'm like, wow.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: And and everybody has those things.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like, like, you know, I don't understand Facebook ads.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know the first thing about really, I mean, I understand the I could I could write a half a page document about Facebook ads, right?
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's about it.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: The intricacies, I my friend Clark Cooper is like, I mean, that stuff's so easy to him, you know.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_00: I I don't, I don't understand so much.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_00: And then I, you know, like I go to somebody and they're like, you you mean you don't know how to you don't you don't know how to do that?
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_00: Like, oh, um, no, you know, and they're like, oh, I just thought everybody knew how to do that.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, no, not everybody knows how to do that, you know.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: You have the curse of knowledge, but if you can get past that curse of knowledge and realize that most of the stuff that you say in your in your thing, like in your wheelhouse, right?
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_00: That thing that everybody says is interesting about you, um, you're gonna blow people's minds.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: And so just don't fall prey to the curse of knowledge.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_00: I thought I could like tell anybody one thing, that would be it.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like just remember that what is basic to you and playbook to you, like we we we say that a lot, right?
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what are we doing tomorrow?
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: Playbook.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: What does that mean?
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: It means it's the you know, the carts open uh on the on the you know, we're running a product launch, it's day three, it's the day before you know enrollment ends, and we're looking at the playbook and just running the playbook.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_00: That's all we're doing.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_00: There's no we're not even we're not innovating anything tomorrow, and I could do that in my sleep, and then we do it, and the affiliates are like, oh, oh my gosh, that was mind blowing.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_00: What a great idea! I've never seen anybody do that.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, dude, you promoted the last thing where we did the same thing.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we have that all the time.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what a great tip! Nobody's ever told me that before.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, I've been telling you that for four years, but you know, they're busy and they forget, and um, yeah, it's long as you don't fall victim to that, you'll you'll be good.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_01: Man, that is that is such this is where worth a whole nother podcast.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_01: I had never really done that.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, yeah, I mean, but you've identified something, and I'll I'll kind of wind it down with this because I know you're a really busy guy, but it's the idea that so many people they confuse the exciting part of growing your business and building your thing with the effective part of it.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we the exciting part is the first couple of years when you're discovering things, you have some early success.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_01: Then once you learn what you're doing, you it can really snowball from there because now you've got your your feet wet, you know what you're doing.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: But then it's it's not as exciting in terms of you're not discovering all these new things.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_01: Now it's a matter of putting those things into process and networking and really serving people and perfecting your processes.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_01: And that's when a lot of people stop it and they're like, Oh, this doesn't feel exciting anymore.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe I should jump over to this thing, and they're starting all over.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and and that's that is very typical of um there's a study done by a guy we used to work with named Lewis Schiff, and he talked about the difference between like middle class and um and upper class entrepreneurs.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_00: And the biggest one that they found was like when an upper class entrepreneur failed, they went back to the thing they failed at.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: Because they're starting at a level five.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: The middle class starts keeps starting at zero and zero and zero until they never get to level 10.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_00: They always they like if they they're lucky, they'll get to a level seven.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_00: The other thing is, and I'll I'll end with this.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, like for me, can't the the big revelation I had about six years ago was I realized I was telling the same stories over and over and over and over and over again.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I was getting bored.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_00: Like this story that I'm telling right now, I've told over and over and over and over again.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I hope, sure as heck, hope I don't sound like I'm bored about telling it.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I was, I was like, I realized that.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, but everybody's heard this.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_00: And then I was like, one of the guy, my mastermind is like, who do you think you are that everybody's heard that?
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you're on Kent's podcast.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_00: I guarantee you, you have a few listeners that have my podcast.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_00: You have a few listeners that have attended one of my webinars, you have a few listeners um who follow me on Facebook, right?
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_00: Most of most of your listeners have never heard anything I've shared today before.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_01: It's brand new to them.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: And like I could tell the same stories.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember one day I had like back to back to back, and it's gonna be this way with the book, right?
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna have like back to back to back to back when we do the book launch, and I'm gonna say the exact same thing over and over again.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I got to pretend like it's the first time I've ever shared it.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_00: And so I realized that number one, nobody's ever heard it before.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_00: Most people haven't.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: Number two, the people who have heard it before, one of they only have one of two reactions.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_00: They go, I think I've heard that before.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember liking or, oh, he's gonna say that, you know.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_00: Like we listen, right?
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: We listen to our favorite comedians.
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_00: I can quote every Mitch Pit album and every Jim Gaffigan album I've ever listened to.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, oh, is he gonna talk about Hot Pocket?
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: Is he gonna say hot pockets?
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_00: Is he gonna talk about him?
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then when he does it, I'm like, ah, I've heard it a hundred times.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_00: Why is it still funny?
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_00: What song do you like more?
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_00: The one that you heard for the first time on the radio today, or free bird, or any gosh, name a song that you know every word to.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because what's more fun?
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_00: Singing along at the top of your lungs with the windows rolled up or down, you know, and pretending like you're in the band.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you can't pretend like you're in the band when you've never heard the song before.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so that was like a huge thing.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so I came up with this concept called the 10 core stories, and it was basically okay, what are my what are my 10 core stories?
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_00: These are the stories that I could tell.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_00: You ask me a question and I can I can tell the story.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_00: I did it earlier, right?
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_00: I talked about growing up on you know the wrong, the right side of the tracks, but I could see the bedroom, you know, the right side of the track, the wrong side of the track.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_00: You think I've told this 25,000 times because that's what I was about to say.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: Apparently, I've never told this before, right?
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_00: But I grew up with a single mom who worked three jobs and I lived on the right side of the tracks, but I could see the wrong side from my bedroom window.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_00: I've told that story a thousand times and I applied it to a completely different angle today.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I could apply that to about seven different things.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_00: So each of those 10 core stories could apply to dozens of different things, but they're the same stories over and over and over again.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_00: If you, if you, if any of your listeners have ever um, you know, if they've ever listened to somebody like a Joel Osteen or um same thing, you know, um, I'm trying to think of Joel Osteen, another one, um uh uh gosh, I'm trying to think of uh or Michael Hyatt, you know.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_00: If you listen to Joel Osteen, he's got like eight stories, it's the same stories over and over again, but he will apply them to pretty much any situation in life.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_00: And there are times where I'm like, I'm listening, I'm like, oh my gosh, dude, get you a new story.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_00: But here's the thing I've listened to probably like 900 of his sermons.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_00: Most people haven't listened to 900 of his sermons.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_00: They're hearing the story about when they acquired the former Compact Center for the first time, and they think it's mind-blowing.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_00: And so we just have to remember that.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_00: Like, don't be afraid to be repetitive.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_00: The most one of the most successful bands in all of creation, as much as I hate them and am almost ashamed to even bring this up.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_00: I write about this in the book, is nickelback.
• 40:02
  SPEAKER_01: I knew you were gonna say nickelback somehow.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_00: If if you if you play you can take one of their songs and play it over another one of their songs, it's the same chord progression, it's the same beat.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, both songs last three minutes and 34 seconds.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_00: But their fans know what to expect.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_00: One of the other examples I write about in the book is George W.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_00: Bush and the two no 1994 gubernatorial campaign in Texas.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_00: He ran on four things.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_00: I think it was education reform, tort reform, juvenile justice reform, and something else.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_00: I don't even remember what it was.
• 40:37
  SPEAKER_00: I write about in this book.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_00: Sorry, I wrote about the other for the fourth one, but I just can't remember what it is.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_00: Juvenile justice, tort reform, education reform.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_00: And shoot, I wish I could.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_00: He said the same four things over and over again.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_00: When they finally got tired and they said, What's your fifth?
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_00: He said to pass the first four.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_00: If you ask anybody who actually lived in Texas in 1994 of voting age who voted in that election, they can probably tell you what the fourth one was.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_00: Because he repeated it over and over and over and over.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_00: And he's like a nickelback song.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_00: And it could be frustrating to his opponents because they knew they were gonna lose.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_00: It's you knew where he stood on those four things.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_00: And and that's that's what's important is that your audience is there's like an element of predictability that's actually comforting to people.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I feel like I'm gonna break out in the full house song here, right?
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know, whatever happened to predictability, right?
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_00: The milkman, the paperboy, and evening TV.
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, um, yeah.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_00: In with that.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_01: I can't wait to read your book, Matt.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_01: I'm full house and spoken word.
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_01: Full house, man.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_01: We we have integrated Leonard Skinner, we've integrated uh Full House into this.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_01: We've brought pretty much everything except uh Star Wars into this.
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_00: No, I I I did Star Trek earlier.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, Star Trek, close enough.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I thought about doing I was trying to come up with a Yoda reference earlier, believe it or not.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_00: I just couldn't.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_00: So um couldn't I wait?
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, I can't I can't do Yoda.
• 42:01
  SPEAKER_00: No, could not you, yeah.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_00: Could not I um the worst Yoda ever.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's all right, that's all right, it's forgivable.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_00: So I mean it's been an A guy, not the Star Wars guy.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_01: This has been a blast.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh appreciate you, and I just want to take a second to just to affirm you're doing really, really important work.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, appreciate that.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_01: Not just helping other entrepreneurs and business leaders succeed financially, but in so many other ways.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_01: Like just your your energy level and your positivity and the goodness you're adding to people's lives, it's amazing.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_01: And it's an honor to be among your friends and um business associates.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh for some reason, whenever I say business associates, I always think of the godfather.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_01: Like do you ever say have you ever seen the godfather?
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_00: I I always think of Ron Swanson on Workplace Proximity Associate.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_00: So another good one.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, we have we have a guest.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, so we might as well finish it up with a guest.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, you say hi to hi, hi there.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we got to go to soccer, don't we?
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_01: Cool.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, bud.
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_01: I love it.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_01: Matt, thanks so much.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_01: This has been an absolute blast.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Kent.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_00: All right, see ya.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_00: Take care, buddy.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_00: Bye-bye.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Matt.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't he fun?
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_01: He has so much energy and enthusiasm.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_01: I just love chatting with him.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_01: I would say my biggest takeaway from this conversation is simply this a book is the best business card you could possibly ever have.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, one of the most interesting things, if you look at the people who Matt has worked with, most of his clients, if not all of them, have books, sometimes many books, like Brian Tracy has tons of dozens and dozens of books.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_01: And the bottom line is that if you want to be taken seriously in the business world, you've got to have a book.
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I really don't know any other way to say it because it's absolutely true.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_01: Um, a book can help you increase your speaking fees, it gives you more credibility and authority.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_01: It's a really convenient way to get your message out there to people.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_01: You can share your stories with people and um through a book.
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, you can do it through other ways as well, but there's something still quite magical about having a book with your name on it.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_01: So I want that to be your takeaway for today.
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_01: Is if you have not gotten busy writing your book, then you got to do it.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's really, really important.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_01: One way that you can do this uh and get some help is by signing up for the Daily Writer community to help you finish your book and to get motivated to do it.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_01: Or if you want to, I can also write your book for you.
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I am a ghostwriter after all.
• 44:39
  SPEAKER_01: That's actually my main business, and I do write books for people.
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_01: I don't talk, I don't really ever promote my ghostwriting business on the podcast because this show is for writers, but I'm just gonna throw that out there.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: If you have a book that you'd love to write and you don't have time to write it or don't have the desire to do it, shoot me an email, Kent at KentSanders.net.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_01: I would love to chat with you about it.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_01: Now back to kind of the main point of this episode, Matt McWilliams and all his amazing insights.
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_01: I again would encourage you to check out his website, mattmcwilliams.com, and you can find some info about becoming an affiliate and all the cool things that he's doing.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_01: Lots and lots of cool stuff you're gonna find on his site, and I hope that you've taken away some great insights from this episode.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks so much for listening.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks so much for listening to today's episode.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_01: I want to take a moment to let you know about our daily writer membership community.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, one of the very best ways to develop better habits and impact more people's lives with your writing is to spend time around other successful writers.
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_01: So if you're tired of feeling isolated and chasing success on your own, then I know you're gonna love the Daily Writer community.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_01: For years, I searched for the kind of writing community that I would want to join.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_01: But I can never find what I wanted, so I created my own.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_01: Some of the features include weekly writing sprints, monthly community calls, book discussions, calls with guest experts, and much more.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_01: For more info, you can visit dailywriterlife.comslash community.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks, and I'll see you tomorrow.