Latest / Success Story with Scott Clary / Gary Lipovetsky - Creator Economy & Influencer Expert | How to Build and Monetize an Audience

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Gary Lipovetsky - Creator Economy & Influencer Expert | How to Build and Monetize an Audience · Success Story with Scott Clary

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  that's vant.com slash Scott for $1,000 off.
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  My first job was a future shop.
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  After that, I got like a corporate job from there.
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  I eventually started something called menupalus.com.
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  It took me 10 years to build that to a business doing like maybe $3 million
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  and then in 2012, in one year, we raised $32 million.
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  So that was my first real like understanding of a business really well.
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  Gary Lipovetsky's journey began with his parents leaving the USSR for Canada,
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  carrying little but determination.
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  Growing up in Toronto, Gary embraced the resilience,
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  funding his education at the University of Western Ontario
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  by selling toys on street corners.
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  And then in 2012, I had deal find which was a competitor
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  to group on.
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  In one year, we raised $32 million.
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  $100 million valuation on that business after 12 months.
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  So that was my first real like understanding of a business really well.
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  1999, he co-founded menupalus.com.
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  This grew into dealfind.com.
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  North America's third largest group buying site,
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  which they successfully exited in 2012.
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  Gary didn't stop.
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  He launched bestie.com and co-founded Valeria Inc with his wife,
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  building a global influencer media company.
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  Gary's success stems from hard work, humility, and partnership.
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  His story is about turning adversity into opportunity,
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  dreaming big, and staying grounded.
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  If you have the motivation that there's no quitting,
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  then you'll find a way.
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  I believe anybody can achieve anything if they put in the effort.
• 2:58
  That's it.
• 3:02
  Welcome to success story.
• 3:03
  I'm your host, Scott Clary.
• 3:04
  The success story podcast is part of the HubSpot podcast network.
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  HubSpot not only supports this show,
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  but they support entrepreneurs.
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  That's why it's such a huge fan of HubSpot.
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  I'm very grateful for HubSpot for supporting the show
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  because they help entrepreneurs.
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  And as a fellow entrepreneur,
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  I know it takes a lot to grow your business.
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  A lot of leads for it.
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  A lot of channel management.
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  A lot of content.
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  A lot of long days.
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  Late nights.
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  So I was telling you about my face.
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  So I did this treatment called NeoGen,
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  a center wellness.
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  And I did it the first time.
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  And they put it at what they called,
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  they think, 0.7.
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  Setting.
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  It wasn't that bad.
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  And I was read the next day.
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  And now they went and they crank it up to,
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  instead of 0.7, they cranked it up to 1.
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  So significantly, you went,
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  what does it do?
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  So it's this laser.
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  And it apparently like injects
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  plasma or some kind of energy into your skin.
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  And so the owner of the spa,
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  the owner of the wellness center is Laila Center.
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  And Laila Center is also the owner of the school
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  that our kids go to.
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  That's down the street.
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  That's down the street.
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  Yeah, now from where you live.
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  Yeah, that's correct.
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  So I see the gym that you go to every morning.
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  Yeah, it's all the down this street.
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  Yeah, you're going to meet me there on Saturday at 7am.
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  We're going to train.
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  Yeah, you're going to walk over.
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  I walk from my house.
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  You can walk from here.
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  You could have walked here, actually.
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  I could have walked here.
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  It's like an hour.
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  An hour to walk from your place,
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  starts 10 minutes to walk.
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  To yeah, 15 maybe.
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  I walked to, I walked to the gym.
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  It takes me 20 minutes.
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  I thought it was like a little bit of a track.
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  No, I just took my motorcycle because I needed a,
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  I needed a little break.
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  I needed to ride my motorcycle.
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  I love my motorcycle.
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  Anyway, so I did this facial thing.
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  And so yesterday, my face was a complete mess.
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  Now it's not as bad.
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  But Vleria has me on all kinds of oils and creams
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  and everything just to heal me up.
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  You've been on a health care too.
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  I haven't tried, man, because I'm getting old.
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  I'm getting old.
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  And if I don't take care of my health,
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  then unfortunately, my family will have to take care of me
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  when I'm sick.
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  So at my age, it's not that I'm getting old,
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  but at my age, I have to take that into consideration.
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  And I love my family.
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  As you know, I have three sons.
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  I have a young wife.
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  I just don't want to, I don't want to be a burden on them.
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  I don't want them to see me in bad shape or like sick,
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  when I'm in my like 60, 70s and 80s.
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  I don't want that burden on them, because that,
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  that fucking sucks.
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  When did you, um, when did you, you know,
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  something that I noticed a lot, because there's exited entrepreneurs
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  that come on the show a lot.
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  And they're always trying to figure out like, what's next in life?
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  And what do I do after I sell my company?
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  And one thing that comes up again and again, and actually,
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  I didn't expect Shane to bring it up,
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  but Shane brought it up.
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  Um, a good friend of mine.
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  Oh, you know, you know, Yosef?
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  Maybe.
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  Yosef, he sold boxy charm.
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  He lives, he has a good friend in Fort Lauderdale.
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  So he also is like on a massive health kick.
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  They're trying like peptides and they're like red lights on and everything.
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  So it's interesting how
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  all the people I know that have been very successful now
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  at a later stage in life are taking this very, very seriously.
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  But it's, it, I think that even like, you know, you're not in bad shape.
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  When you start a dis journey and neither were any of them,
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  but I think that's a big thing that entrepreneurs deal with.
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  They so they focus all in on their business.
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  And they almost push everything else to the side.
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  I think you can afford to do that when you're young.
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  I think when you're in your 20s and 30s and probably early 40s,
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  you can afford to do that.
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  But then one day it's like hitting a brick wall.
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  What's going to happen is when you push yourself that hard as an entrepreneur,
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  especially guys who have had exits, which means that they either got extremely lucky
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  or they worked really hard.
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  Most of the times they worked really hard and luck is a component of it.
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  What ends up happening is that they neglect their health to such a degree.
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  There's a lot of alcohol sometimes.
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  There's drug abuse, not enough sleep, not enough exercise, terrible diets.
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  And so what happens is eventually you just hit a wall
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  and you don't even notice it.
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  One day just hit you like a ton of bricks.
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  I'll do you?
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  I'm 34.
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  Yeah, you're, dude, you're so young.
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  You're super young.
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  When you're super young in the like when we're talking about health overall,
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  real problems start happening in like mid-40s.
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  There's apparently like 66 of some age for men where there's a lot of complications
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  start happening.
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  But if you prepare yourself beforehand, then the probability goes down.
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  So what do you, I mean, if you were going to go back to when you were 25, 30,
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  what would be the things that you wish you would start it earlier?
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  From a health perspective, I mean, you can always talk about mindset and life lessons,
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  but because I think this is most interesting because I think this is something that
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  there's there's sort of like circles of content like entrepreneurs always talk about
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  like how to make money, how to raise money, how to sell, how to market.
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  You know, have like these health influencers, but then there's now there's a lot more crossover.
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  So people care about like Brian Johnson, people care about like Dave Aspery and like people
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  care about all these health because they want to they realize that they're on this journey.
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  They don't want to be at a shape and broken and overweight and barely able to run up a hill
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  with their kids at 50.
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  So now they're trying to figure out more stuff that they can do.
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  So what are the things that you think people should start to care about?
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  Besides the lifting, running gym.
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  What are the honestly, man?
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  Like in terms of like what to do, like the option to do, what do you think actually makes it so
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  basic, man? Just don't eat shit.
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  Just eat the right things, go high protein, cut out gluten, go like cut out processed carbs,
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  replace it, like replace processed carbs with vegetables.
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  If you can, maybe a little bit of white rice that has zero nutritional value,
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  but I mean, if you just want to get that fix, no bread, no nothing like that.
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  I don't eat shit, don't like look at the like actually look at what you're eating,
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  look at what you're ingesting.
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  Super high protein, you know, I'm big and thread meat.
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  I think red meat is great.
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  A lot of people, I think the old kind of school of thought was that it's bad for you if there's
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  too much of it. I don't believe that.
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  I can eat steak every day, steak, eggs.
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  So look, it's diet, it's lifestyle.
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  I would say literally zero alcohol, zero alcohol.
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  I was never a big drinker, but if I could go back, I would just completely say no to it,
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  even the casual drink, even like the drink that be polite, just complete zero,
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  just complete zero and just like concentrate on sleep, like sleep is a huge component of it.
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  I just feel like I'm in decent shape now, but if I would have really taken it as seriously as I've
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  taken it in the last like six years, then I would be a beast right now.
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  I think the biggest issue that I have is I was never somebody who looks for off alcohol.
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  I never really cared. I would use to drink a lot in college, university when you're having fun,
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  and then you start to drink casually on the weekends, but now I find I notice.
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  And maybe I didn't notice before because I didn't feel like my day-to-day was such a cognitive
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  stress. Like when I jump into a conversation, if I had a drink before, I noticed that I can't
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  pull facts as quick. I noticed that I'm not as sharp. I noticed that my ideas just aren't as
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  well-thought-through, but if I get good sleep, no drinking, I can go into conversations with people
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  that have lived in their field for the past 30 years, and I can have a semi-intelligent conversation
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  with us. But I notice a big difference, and it's actually scary when you try and show up as
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  your best self after drinking, it's almost impossible. And if you pay attention to the, if you pay
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  attention to that, it's actually quite scary what it does to you. So I've almost sworn about it.
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  Drinking is one thing, but again, it almost seems trivial and it almost seems like it's
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  common knowledge, but you have to sleep. Like sleep is a huge component of it. Sleep eating. Look,
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  to me, the things that when I felt, so the biggest shift that I felt in my health when I started
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  doing, it wasn't even lifting weights. It was really two things. It was the combination of
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  coal plunge and sauna. When I started doing that on a daily basis, I felt more alert. I just felt
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  better overall. And then the other thing that I was, that I did was when I cut out gluten,
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  that had a big shift just in terms of cognition, just overall health, positivity,
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  less stress. I mean, look, we went through, we went through pretty, I guess, pretty stressful period,
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  like recently, in moving from Canada to America. And that has to do with moving the business,
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  immigration, moving the kids, different school, different countries. So there's a lot of complexity
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  and moving more complexity than I thought there would be. And that was a very stressful time,
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  because I did it with kids. Yeah, you did it at the site. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So,
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  yeah. So I mean, it's complex, like selling a house there, buying a house here. Like it's,
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  there's a lot of complexity just learning about what the house going on in America versus in Canada.
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  Like all just there's a lot of nuances, both culturally, legally, like,
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  socially, there's just a lot of things. So yeah, it was a very stressful time. And I felt that
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  stress. But once I started doing sauna and coal plunge on a daily basis, it really shifted.
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  Like it took, it took maybe a month or two. And then I felt a real shift that I was just
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  calmer. And I don't react to like things that would potentially trigger me like a challenge of
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  work, right? Something comes up. And I don't go into like fighter flight, a more common even,
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  because you, I think it's because you're resetting your cortisol levels, right? Like your cortisol
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  would spike when you do a coal plunge. I'm not an expert at this stuff, but I've heard this before.
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  So now when you deal with all these semi stressful things throughout the day,
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  like your baseline has been reset to a degree. So if somebody
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  sends you an email, you know, something stressful is happening, you just don't react the same way.
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  You just, you just feel like you just feel like it's not as big of a stress or not.
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  It's not as big of a deal. It definitely is not as big of a deal as it used to be.
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  So that's a, that's a big, that's a big plus. But just going back to your,
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  see that? Those are knee pads. Those are like armor in my knees, but it's weird. I know that
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  boots are intense too. Yeah, the boots were pretty crazy, but I have to do it. I have to do it
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  because if I fall off that bike, oh man, that's my, I think like if you ask me what my biggest
• 13:08
  fear, I mean, there's sharks. I'm pretty scared of sharks. I don't know why it's just like you're
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  in their element. It's that I, I think one of my biggest fear is not, it's not the ocean so much,
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  but it's when you jump into a lake and like something touches your feet and you don't know what
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  it is. That's resting. Yeah. That was trust me out too. I'd be less concerned about a lake because
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  I feel like a lake is contained to the immediate wildlife. What's, there's nothing in a lake I
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  feel that could really kill you. Whereas, you know, in the ocean, there's probably a thousand different
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  animals that could fuck you up. I was with, I was with, they had a boat day with the kids and we
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  stopped in this little like, they call it a lake, but it's not a lake. It's like part of the ocean,
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  but it's like a little enclave. And my boys wanted to jump in the water. And I said to the boat
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  captain, I said, hey, there's no sharks here. He goes, well, they're haven't been any for like a
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  really long time. I said, okay, so are they okay to jump in? Yeah, they can jump in. So for sure,
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  there's no sharks. Well, I mean, not for sure. Well, not right. It's funny. I was in my neighbor's house
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  and he has a house on the water like on the, on the ocean and my house. He goes, yeah, like,
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  it's really nice living on the water. It's a good thing. I don't have small kids anymore. I'm like,
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  why? He goes all because there was an alligator. He came out of the water. I like,
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  came out of the water. And you know, if you have little kids and Floridians are just so cool,
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  they're like, yeah, you just got to be careful about to leave your kids around outside because
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  the crocodile might come and take them. That's fucked up. And it's fucked up. I mean, that's actually,
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  you know, outside of the fact that the homes on the water are starting at $10 million and up
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  the nice ones. I think, so I, I, I use that as an excuse not to get a home on the water. Exactly.
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  Because the $10 million is the crocodile. Yeah, I don't want the crocodile. That makes sense to me.
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  Gina is scared of someone, like, like a home invader coming in on a on a ski do or something
• 14:55
  pulling up behind the on a sea do on a sea on a sea, do whatever it is. Yeah, I say, do
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  us all the other stuff. Yeah, on a sea, do you wouldn't get too far out that water on the water?
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  And and and breaking into your home through the, you know, I met, I met a billionaire recently.
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  I met a billionaire recently who lives on one in Miami Beach, not too far from here.
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  And he lives on the water and he's like on this row of other billionaires and other homes are like
• 15:18
  $50, $80 million and they're all lined up and this and that. And he keeps talking to me. Yeah,
• 15:22
  so many like robberies and this and that because it's guarded from the front. He's got his gates
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  and everything, but from the back, yeah, it's like late at night, you, you can swim up to his house
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  and go out there and rob him, right? And I'm just like, why wouldn't like, why wouldn't there be a boat
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  in the water with like a security guard? He was going to, he was going to pay for it. I'm like,
• 15:42
  I don't know. Like get together with your other billionaire friends. Like there's 10 of you guys
• 15:46
  here. Just put a couple of guys in the water and like don't worry about it. He's like, he said,
• 15:50
  no one's going to pay. Can you believe it? That's how safe people feel. I think parts of Florida
• 15:55
  are. No, that's how cheap billionaires are. That's like think about it. Like you have so much money
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  through to find that kind of money. And I had a house on the water. I wouldn't like even bother
• 16:04
  asking my neighbors. I would just put a dude in a chair on the dog. He'd be sitting there all night.
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  I wouldn't care. And I'd pay him whatever it took. That's so funny. No, I would do.
• 16:14
  Maybe that's why they're rich because they don't like they're, you know, they're kind of cheap.
• 16:16
  There's probably a couple other reasons, but it's all a lot. Yeah. By the way, they also don't buy
• 16:23
  Starbucks every day. That's the other thing. Oh, that's the key. That's the key to well. If you
• 16:27
  stop buying Starbucks, you'll become a billionaire in three days. Are you going to tell me your story?
• 16:32
  We have to go into your story, your story, your life. I need your origin. That's all right. Yeah,
• 16:36
  that's a part of it too. So this is what happens. This is what happens. When you know the people that
• 16:41
  you bring onto the podcast, but I think it's better. I think it's more fun. I mean, it's probably not
• 16:46
  the usual format of your podcast. Because guys come on here and be like, listen, this is how it,
• 16:50
  let's just have a lot of guys that come on here. Just wrote a book and that's it. I haven't written
• 16:53
  a book. I haven't written a book, but I'm talking to a literary agent to get a book written for
• 16:57
  Valeria. She should. I'm trying to figure out one right now. I've been trying to figure out for
• 17:02
  myself. The process is a lot. It's difficult to get an advance or a decent advance. And then after
• 17:10
  you get an advance, I mean, it doesn't matter who you go with. It could be Harper Collins leadership.
• 17:14
  It could be Simon Schuzer. It could be Penguin Random. It could be somebody who's not like a household
• 17:17
  name, but they don't really do anything to sell the book. It's still all on you. Well, that's why
• 17:22
  they prioritize people like yourself who has an audience. People like creators, influencers
• 17:26
  who have audience because they know you're going to sell the book. But still, like, I mean,
• 17:28
  there's still a strategy to become Wall Street Journal or New York Times best seller or get on
• 17:35
  Amazon best seller list. So it's not easy. It's just not easy to do. It's a lot of work. And I don't
• 17:41
  and so let me let me add context while I'm saying it's not easy because easy is subjective based on
• 17:45
  the return. Like if it made a lot of money, then it would make a lot of sense for me to put a lot
• 17:49
  of energy into it. But I don't think it makes a lot of money. So I think that for an author,
• 17:54
  outside of James Clear, Atomic Habits, Malcolm Gladwell, Seth Godin, whatever, some of these
• 17:59
  really prolific authors, they make money. But for the average person, the right to book,
• 18:02
  I don't think you make a lot of money on that process. So you have to have a product on the back
• 18:07
  end of it or you're going to use it to get on more stages. That's what it is. You have to know why
• 18:11
  you're, you know, you have to know why you're doing it. And I don't think that I have a clear
• 18:14
  reason for me is to why I'm doing it right now because there's no product on the back. And you
• 18:18
  have to build an ecosystem around it. I think it's credibility. So I have a theory about you doing
• 18:22
  a book. Okay, let's go. What's the theory? My theory is if you do a book, first of all,
• 18:26
  I actually think you will get a deal. I think you will get prepaid because the my understanding is
• 18:30
  that the publishers are prioritizing people with audience because their speculation is that
• 18:35
  you're going to sell through whatever you need to sell through to justify the advance.
• 18:39
  So I don't think you've, maybe you've tried, but it's very recent that I'm doing that. Okay,
• 18:43
  so I don't think you've had a literary agent actually go and pitch you. So my understanding
• 18:47
  of the process is they'll put together a literary agent will work with you to put together
• 18:52
  like a pitch. So you don't have to write the book at first. It's just it's a really brief pitch.
• 18:56
  And they'll actually pair you with somebody who's experienced at writing these pitches, right?
• 19:00
  So you write the pitch, the literary agent goals, they go to like between five and seven big publishing
• 19:05
  houses and they pitch you and then they get responses. Sometimes you'll have to meet with them,
• 19:08
  sometimes not, but between getting a really good pitch written and getting and showing your
• 19:14
  audience and the engagement of your audience, I actually think you will get a deal. And I think
• 19:18
  the literary is going to get a deal. But beyond the financial benefit that you would get from
• 19:24
  getting a deal, and you and I both know someone who has a deal. I'm not going to say their name,
• 19:28
  but you and I both know somebody who makes money on an ongoing basis with this book.
• 19:32
  I actually spoke with them recently and he, you know, and I hear a smaller audience than you
• 19:36
  and he got an advance and he was at decent advance. Furthermore, I just met somebody else
• 19:40
  with the fraction of the audience that you have. So they have an audience on Instagram and the
• 19:44
  hundreds of thousands and they just did a multiple six figure book, the old paid in advance. So I
• 19:49
  think you're, I think you're discounting it. But beyond the financial, whether or not I can get
• 19:53
  the advance, you still have to think about what's, what's the ROI outside of the initial $100,000
• 19:59
  you're going to get? That's great. So the ROI is the credibility. So I think the keyword is
• 20:04
  credibility, the credibility that you will get having a book, having an actual physical manifestation
• 20:09
  of your knowledge, of your thoughts, of your philosophies, I believe that that is the key.
• 20:15
  And that's probably one of the big, you know, that's one of the motivating factors that
• 20:18
  why we would do it for Valeria. I think with Valeria, first of all, I think she has an amazing
• 20:22
  story to tell. She rarely talks about her origin story, but like she was born in like very
• 20:27
  difficult situation and she grew up in a very difficult family on it. But it's interesting.
• 20:31
  It's yeah, and it's like we're not holding it back on purpose. She's just not ready yet.
• 20:34
  She's not ready to talk about it. So I don't even know if this book of her book would be like
• 20:38
  biographical in nature or something else. I don't know. It's she's playing with a few ideas.
• 20:42
  But just getting back, getting back like to you and Valeria, it's like that book is credibility.
• 20:48
  People do book tours. You're just look that differently when you're an author. And the thing is
• 20:51
  if you hit like a New York Times best seller or any best seller list, it just even boosts it
• 20:55
  even further. So what's the utility for you? The utility for you is that as much as you have amazing
• 21:01
  guests, all of a sudden you're an author will now the caliber of your guest club. And I'm not
• 21:06
  suggesting that they're low. I'm just saying they'll be even higher. You'll get even more,
• 21:11
  you know, and then with bigger guests, you get bigger numbers with bigger numbers, you get a
• 21:16
  podcast, you know, deals, you get this. So I think it just lifts everything. And I think that if
• 21:21
  you can do it where even if you don't get a cash advance, even if it's a wash between like.
• 21:27
  Well, the thing I was thinking about because again, I have spoken to a literary agent. And when I'm
• 21:32
  talking about recent development, this is like he was texting me two days ago that he was pitching
• 21:39
  Harper Collins leadership. So they write the, do they write the picture? Oh, okay. So you already
• 21:42
  have all actually, I wonder for you this. No, but it's still it's, it's good information because I
• 21:45
  also want to understand. I mean, this is sort of my first exposure to it. So I'm just, I'm just
• 21:50
  taking what she's telling me face value and just running with it. So it's good to know that this
• 21:54
  is sort of the process. But what was I going to say? Yeah, no, even if I get an advance, that money
• 22:03
  is going to go right back into the marketing of the book. Cause I think that well, then my mind,
• 22:07
  you don't need to market the book. You have a platform. Yeah, I don't know. I have no idea. Yeah,
• 22:11
  the book is going to be right here. You're going to have it right here and all your podcasts.
• 22:14
  100% and everything that's going to be here, all your shelves will just be the book.
• 22:18
  Right now, Tony Robbins is getting free advertising fan. I got James Clear over there.
• 22:22
  Okay, but you need to have, you need to have your book over here. Yeah. So that's that's next.
• 22:28
  But I do want to find a way to market it strategically. So whether or not it's going to be like a
• 22:34
  podcast tour or of course, yeah, I think look, I think it's a, I think it's a big plus. I definitely
• 22:39
  think you should do very right. So she comes on to my show and we'll talk about her show.
• 22:43
  I know. Yeah, all that shit, man. Yeah, of course. That's the way it works. That's what this
• 22:47
  business is, man. It's, it's this constant, like flow, constant movement. Yeah. But it's,
• 22:53
  it's a lot of work to write. And then I know people get ghost writers and whatnot. But I like,
• 22:57
  I actually want to put some energy and effort into it. Or maybe you just write the first draft
• 23:01
  and get an editor. Again, I have to figure out all this stuff out. Scott, but what's not a lot of
• 23:04
  work? I don't know anything anymore. That's not a lot of work. You know what's not a lot of work?
• 23:08
  Like getting money for nothing, like inheriting money. That's not a lot of work. Anything that's,
• 23:12
  anything that's worth doing, anything that will result in, you know, whether it's financial success
• 23:17
  or what other successes there? I don't know. Other kinds of success, fulfillment, you know,
• 23:24
  speaking of other kinds of success, you know, this trend that I keep seeing is that people who
• 23:29
  have had exits, they want notoriety. They want to be famous. They want to become creators.
• 23:34
  You and I have talked about that. Yeah, because a lot of people come under the show. They come
• 23:37
  out of the show. Yeah, it's people that come under the show. Outside of people that I know
• 23:42
  personally, I'd say there's like three main reasons. I'd say one, they wrote a book,
• 23:47
  yeah, two, they had an exit and they want to accomplish the next thing and the next thing and
• 23:53
  most people's minds after an exit is notoriety or fame or influence. Or it's people that have
• 23:59
  listened to the show and they're like, how do my interviews? Those would be the three avatars
• 24:03
  people to come on. Yeah, they do want fame. It's interesting how people want fame after they have
• 24:07
  so much money. But to me, to, okay, so to me, the only logical play for the fame post exit,
• 24:16
  I guess it depends on the size of the exit. If the exit is such that they can literally do nothing
• 24:20
  in the rest of their lives and just like live off of the interest, then the only then at that point,
• 24:28
  they just want more. They want to accomplish more. They want to stay in the game. And so the only
• 24:32
  reason I would see that they would want or need fame is to be able to become either like a
• 24:37
  BC or a P venture capital. You don't even need fame to do that. You don't, so you don't put it
• 24:42
  helps because it makes the, first of all, you get deal flow. You get much more deal flow,
• 24:46
  like way more deal flow. Because then like when you look at the, you know, Kevin O'Leary's of
• 24:51
  the world, he gets unlimited deal flow and he can pick and choose the deals he wants. So without
• 24:55
  that fame, you don't really get that. But then, you know, but then, okay, so I agree with you
• 25:03
  until I would agree with you until I found out the Kim Kardashian's private equity firm had
• 25:09
  trouble raising capital. Yeah. I know that story very well, which I think is interesting because,
• 25:15
  okay, so now you have deal flow. But then what, what's the missing link? So there has to be,
• 25:19
  there has to be fame, but there has to be competence too. There has to be, I know, but there's a
• 25:24
  difference because Kim herself is not a specialist in this field. Kevin himself is an entrepreneur. He
• 25:32
  is a, he is, he is an investor. So he is already that thing. And the audience amplifies it.
• 25:39
  Entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs who have built and sold companies, they're already in that world.
• 25:45
  So the fame will help the, the fame in that realm will magnify that and will help them get deals.
• 25:52
  Whereas if you're a Kim Kardashian, if you're an actor or an entertainer of some kind,
• 25:58
  and you have that fame that does not make you a good investor, of course, which is interesting
• 26:03
  because I know that she hired an incredible team behind her, but because she is the, the figure
• 26:08
  head for it, I think she's having trouble because people equate the success, the potential
• 26:14
  success of that private equity firm with her level of competence in the field. Well, they
• 26:17
  sheet her firm their investment into a trough that hot sauce, which is good. I think it did, okay.
• 26:22
  I don't know. I have no idea. I have absolutely no idea. I just want to take a second and thank
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  of these amazing gummies. Why do people want to become famous? You built an entire community around
• 27:38
  people wanting to build audiences. So what is the average? What is the average person? You're talking
• 27:43
  about creator method. Looking to achieve when they want to become famous. So there's three buckets.
• 27:50
  I just talked about this with our community. I have weekly calls with them, and I do someone
• 27:53
  on ones with them. So there's three buckets. One is a hobbyist, and typically it's a hobbyist who
• 28:00
  has who's just independently financially stable. They may have a spouse who's wealthy or they may
• 28:06
  come from a wealthy, you know multi generation wealthy family. They want to create a outlet,
• 28:10
  and money is no longer like a currency for them because they have money. Their family has money.
• 28:16
  They don't need for anything. So for them, it's just like they they want to contribute to the world.
• 28:22
  They want to create a outlet. They want to build a community. It's pretty like it's a pretty
• 28:25
  virtuous pursuit because they really have no intention to make money. They don't care if they do.
• 28:30
  If they do in this, you know, the people kind of in this first bucket. If they do it so bonus
• 28:34
  to be able to go show their family. Hey, look, I just kind of like the same avatar as somebody who sold
• 28:38
  a company. No, because somebody who sold a company went through a real hard trip to get that done.
• 28:43
  I'm talking about like somebody who married well, and they just want to build an audience. Yeah,
• 28:48
  they just want to it's a hobby. They just want to have a hobby. They don't even have anything to
• 28:52
  prove. They just want to build a community. They want to have I see it all the time. Like I see
• 28:57
  it. People who join us. They and I like I don't say it in a negative way. I mean, they they're
• 29:02
  financially sound. They have no need for money, but they want to make a difference in the world.
• 29:06
  They want to have a voice. They want to they want to help. They have a cause. They have an art
• 29:12
  that they want to share with the world. So that's kind of one group. A second group are people who
• 29:17
  want to replace traditional employment income. So somebody who can make, let's say, I don't know,
• 29:25
  like on a very basic level, let's say an esthetician who would make $60,000 a year wants to make
• 29:32
  $100,000 a year being a creator who can set her own hours. I was going to say his own hours,
• 29:37
  but I don't know any male estheticians, but you know, she could set her own hours and she could
• 29:41
  have the independence of being an entrepreneur, being a creator, doing brand deals while creating
• 29:45
  community and, you know, having the benefits of the experiences that she's going to get.
• 29:50
  The fame. It's nice. It's pleasant, right? So that's kind of the second people who are just trying
• 29:53
  to replace employment income. And also how and that's more stable than employment income,
• 29:57
  because you don't know when you're going to get fired. It's so funny to you say that is so
• 30:01
  casually. Like in your mind, because you live in this world, you just said creator income,
• 30:08
  which is really just solo-pronership in my mind. I think being a creator is a solo-proner.
• 30:13
  You just said that creator income is more steady, more reliable than employment income,
• 30:18
  but that is such a flip from what most people believe. I mean, like most people will leave that
• 30:24
  they're in their nine to five and they haven't brushed out into solo-pronership,
• 30:27
  creating, trying to monetize what they know, trying to monetize a brand because they feel like
• 30:31
  I can tell you why, but remember that I have to tell you about bucket three. Yeah,
• 30:34
  because otherwise I'll forget about bucket three. Okay, do bucket three, but that's just telling you
• 30:37
  that first. Yes, no bucket two. Yes. So in bucket three are the people who want to hit the
• 30:42
  grand slams. Those are the people who want like they it's they want fame, but they want the money
• 30:49
  that comes with it. They want to make millions of dollars a year. They want to have they want to be
• 30:54
  celebrities. They want the experiences. They want the cloud. They want the respect. They want the
• 30:59
  fans. They want it all. They want they want to build generational wealth becoming a creator or
• 31:07
  an influencer or a celebrity, whatever you want to call it. So those are the three buckets,
• 31:11
  right? The hobbyist who is already financially sound and they don't need the money, but they want
• 31:15
  to share their love of whatever with the world. Okay, and that's great. Number two are people who
• 31:20
  want to replace employment income with to your point solar entrepreneurship. And then there's
• 31:26
  bucket three, which are people who they want to go for it. They want it all, right? And it's a lot
• 31:31
  of the times when I have my like, so what we do with like with creator method, we also have like
• 31:36
  consulting clients. So they come to us and they kind of go aside and we do consulting with them.
• 31:41
  And I start the conversation like these are the three buckets. Which one are you? Tell me which one
• 31:45
  you are because the advice that I'm going to be giving you and the processes and the mindset that
• 31:50
  I'm going to build in you is going to be based on your desired outcome. It needs to so your actions
• 31:55
  need to map your desired outcome. Otherwise, it makes no sense. So if you want to go if you're in
• 32:00
  bucket three, okay, then here's your strategy. I have a question just between the I understand that.
• 32:04
  But does bucket. People going to bucket three. Most of them do not feel like they should just
• 32:10
  reevaluate their north star and actually end up in bucket two. Like do you feel like it's actually
• 32:16
  viable for most creators to say I want to build a hundred million dollar creator brand.
• 32:22
  I believe that anyone can get to bucket two. Yes, that's bucket, but the hundred million dollar
• 32:28
  is bucket three bucket three requires. It requires. I want to say talent, but it just requires
• 32:36
  like a lot of sacrifice, a lot of sacrifice. It really does. It requires like endless amounts of
• 32:43
  dedication being able to sacrifice being able to say, you know what? I love my kids and it hurts
• 32:48
  my heart every time I have to like be away from them. But in order to achieve it, I want to achieve
• 32:53
  that I have to do it. And that's like a constant struggle that Valeria has where it's like
• 32:58
  Valeria could literally be gone all the time. If she said yes to the things that she could say,
• 33:03
  you know, she could potentially say yes to that would drive her career even further. But she has
• 33:08
  to say no to most things because she doesn't want to be away from the kids. And so it's this
• 33:12
  constant Valeria, you should go to this me telling her and she says no, I want to be at home with
• 33:16
  the kids because at the end of the day, she's still just a mom. She's a normal mom. Not when I say
• 33:20
  just a mom, I don't mean that in a derogatory way. I mean, she's a mom. That's a priority. Yeah,
• 33:24
  she's done as a priority. And I always have this like debate with her and I say to her Valeria,
• 33:30
  you will do more for our children by continuing to achieve and setting the example for them.
• 33:37
  Then you will by sitting home with them. But then she's like, I'm going to miss it. I'm going to
• 33:42
  miss. They're going to be older. I'm going to miss it. And she's right to a certain degree. So
• 33:46
  it's a matter of finding a balance. But like going back to this whole bucket three thing is I believe
• 33:51
  people can achieve it. But the amount of sacrifice they need to to to to make is is off the charts.
• 33:59
  But I think bucket two is very very attainable. You said something about how you thought I
• 34:03
  said it casually how it's like I said that you know, creator income is more stable than employment
• 34:07
  income. Because with employment income, you're relying on essentially your one client, right?
• 34:12
  You're your employer. But with creator income, you are you're essentially you you have multiple
• 34:20
  sources of revenue, whether it's, you know, brand deals, whether you have a subscription plan,
• 34:23
  like a subscription that you offer, whether you have a book, whether you have there are there
• 34:29
  podcasts, a podcast. There are a number of ways that open a podcast is still it's still advertisers,
• 34:34
  right? It's just a different kind of medium and a different cohort. But yeah, I mean,
• 34:41
  so yeah, so like bucket two, I believe that it is it is more stable. I believe the income is far
• 34:47
  more stable because it just takes a little bit of time like to become an employee, you don't have
• 34:56
  to build the asset of a personal brand, you don't have to build a community and audience.
• 35:00
  So you can go directly from whatever it is you've learned how to do into being an employee and
• 35:05
  the the distance between knowledge acquisition, right? And employment, it's fairly small. You get
• 35:11
  your diploma or degree, you get a little bit of experience, you can go and monetize that in the
• 35:15
  form of employment right away, which is great. And I'm not knocking that. But then in order to get
• 35:20
  the equivalent of employment income, you have to go through this period of time where you're being
• 35:24
  both an employee and in the evenings, you're trying to get scale as a creator until you hit that
• 35:29
  inflection point where you can say, okay, now I can switch over into being a full-time creator.
• 35:34
  It's that pain that people don't want. And so that's what stops a lot of people. It's that pain.
• 35:40
  The other thing that stops a lot of people from pursuing this is their own uncertainty.
• 35:44
  One of the reasons that Valeria succeeded and I don't like taking credit for my wife's accomplishments.
• 35:49
  But I'll take credit in this case because when she started, I told her you're a star. I told her
• 35:56
  that your bucket three, I hadn't established buckets in my mind yet at the time, but I said,
• 36:01
  there, you are going to be a household name. You have the ability to do it. You have the talent to do
• 36:06
  it. And you know, you're, I said there, I said, your life documenting your life will be your art.
• 36:12
  And she, she calls me on that. Every now and then she reminds me, remember you said that,
• 36:15
  that shit to me. Yeah. And so like that. And I said to her, you don't have to do it.
• 36:21
  You don't have to do it. But when I saw that first $10,000 check come in and then I were kind of,
• 36:25
  I'm weaving, right? I know you're weaving. That first $10,000 check came in. That was unexpected.
• 36:31
  And I can get that story in a second. But when that first brand deal came in and it woke me up to
• 36:35
  what she was doing and I looked into it and I was like, listen, if you want to do this as a business,
• 36:43
  we can do this. And you can go all the way. And I'm here for you. And I'm going to support you.
• 36:47
  And we're going to build a business. And you know, I said, or you don't have to. You really don't
• 36:52
  have to. Because when I met Valeria, it never crossed my mind what she would do for a living.
• 36:58
  Like it, I didn't even think about it. Like looking back now, it's probably a responsible
• 37:01
  with me. I just, I met a, I met a girl. She was amazing. And you'd already, when you met her,
• 37:06
  you'd already had a ton of career success. You would, I wasn't sitting out of deal find by that time.
• 37:11
  Yeah. It was right. It was, I met her at the same time. I literally, on our first date,
• 37:18
  I was taking calls with the buyer, with the buyers, the people who bought the equity in that
• 37:22
  company. Yeah. On our first date. So I had to step away and deal with that. So it was like,
• 37:27
  happening right at the same time. But yeah, like I basically told her, I said, like, you don't
• 37:31
  have to do this. You don't, like you don't. But if you do this, like you, you know, I just,
• 37:37
  I gave her that confidence. And what I'm seeing right now is that a lot of people who are,
• 37:40
  a lot of people want this, more people want this now than they did back in 2017 when Vlaire
• 37:44
  started. I mean, it's really exploded. But you know, I tell it, I can see that what's holding
• 37:50
  people back is the fact that they don't have that support. They don't have that person or a group
• 37:55
  of people or pure group telling them, no, no, no. Well, because most people, I mean, like if we're
• 37:59
  going to be candid, most people that are, are looking to be creators, can not just not worry about
• 38:05
  income, like they have to worry about it. Vlaire had that advantage. She didn't have to worry about
• 38:09
  so that I think that's that is a huge factor. So I'm just curious if you could, if you could even
• 38:16
  help a creator set benchmarks in their journey so that when they start to create and they start
• 38:23
  to see some traction, what should they look for as like a positive KPI that they're on the right
• 38:28
  track to eventually quit? So because they'll be doing this, you know, from five to nine after the
• 38:35
  trial, they'll be doing it on the weekends. And I think that the biggest question mark that they'll
• 38:39
  have, like you mentioned this is and the biggest pain that they'll have is I don't know when I should
• 38:47
  make the jump into full-time creator because I still have to pay rent or my mortgage or feed my
• 38:52
  family at the end of the month. Okay, so okay, remind me, what's the first question I want to
• 38:55
  answer the first question? The first question is what markers or KPI's should a creator look for
• 39:01
  that they're on the right track? So when they're first starting, their KPI is creating content and
• 39:07
  posting it. So here's what happens, they go in, they'll do three posts and then let's start analyzing
• 39:12
  data. Well, the algorithm didn't like this one or this didn't perform as well, so I shouldn't do
• 39:16
  this for a minute. No, no, no, none of that. If you haven't started yet, first thing you need to do,
• 39:22
  okay, the first thing you need to do is you need to establish what am I interested in? What am I
• 39:27
  good at? And what is there a demand for? And then you take those three things, okay, you
• 39:35
  you figure out what your content buckets are, you do research, you figure out what your formats
• 39:39
  are going to be, okay, we could be one format, it could be two or three to begin with, you look at
• 39:44
  other successful creators and again, once you've done the cross, once you've done the cross
• 39:49
  reference analysis of what you're good at, what you're interested in and what there's market
• 39:54
  demand for, you then go, you set up your content plan, you start executing it, executing on it,
• 40:00
  the KPI to look for is the creation of the content, make 300 posts because you have to do the reps,
• 40:06
  you have to build a muscle, you have to get confident in front of the camera, whatever format
• 40:10
  you're doing, if you're doing fashion, you have to be comfortable showing what you're wearing,
• 40:13
  you have to be comfortable talking, you have to be comfortable if you're making food content,
• 40:17
  making your food doing whatever, whatever it is you're doing, really the achievement is the
• 40:23
  creation and deployment of the content and that's what a lot of creators they don't do, it's like
• 40:27
  going to university and on day one, sitting in class after an hour, saying where's my degree,
• 40:32
  well I don't have a degree, you haven't done the work, so that's really what it is, the first
• 40:38
  thing is like your first several hundred pieces, so what do they do instead, because that to me is
• 40:41
  like when you're saying that it makes so much sense because this is what I did with the show,
• 40:44
  yeah, so now I have a nice little set, I'm recording with nice little cameras, this took me six years
• 40:50
  and about almost now I was looking, we're almost at 700, they published podcasts, I'm short
• 40:56
  short ones, some interviews, but yeah, but so, so a lot of people that make the mistake of
• 41:01
  expecting what you have in a month after making 10 reels, so I've never seen, I've never seen
• 41:10
  any other industry like that where people are looking at it and saying, you know, I've had creators
• 41:14
  tell me I've been doing this for two weeks, you laugh as somebody who does this yourself, yeah,
• 41:20
  but that's, but that's to a novice at the beginning who's never done this, that's their expectation
• 41:25
  because they're looking at your day 5,000 or whatever, day 3,000, you know, that's what they're looking at.
• 41:31
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  stay dreams, get started today with Taylor Brands. I had somebody this morning,
• 42:30
  text me and he started a podcast and he's a great interviewer and he started a podcast,
• 42:34
  they did a partnership, so he's the one doing the interviewing, and his business partners
• 42:39
  won't do any editing and the thumbnails and the posting and whatnot, and he said,
• 42:44
  Scott, I need some advice, we've been doing this for about six months, and I'm not seeing the
• 42:48
  traction that I want on YouTube, and my business partner is about to, like, throw in the towel,
• 42:55
  and yeah, there's some things that you can tweak, but he's like, well, when I look at
• 43:03
  Tom Billiou or Tim Ferris or Simon Steven Bart, Steven Bartlett, I'm like, well, how do I get there?
• 43:10
  And I'm like, well, there's two things that you have to take into consideration. First of all,
• 43:14
  all those people you just mentioned, Steven Bartlett was worth a couple hundred million dollars
• 43:18
  when he started to show. Did he really? Yeah, because he had a massive, massive Instagram,
• 43:23
  I think, marketing company called Social Chain, and I think he their sold it, or it was doing
• 43:28
  like over a hundred million dollars in revenue. Tim Ferris had been an angel investor in like
• 43:33
  Facebook and a whole bunch of other early companies. He's had a ton of capital to burn, and I know
• 43:38
  Tom Billiou sold Quest for over a billion dollars. So these are all guys you just reference that
• 43:43
  have unlimited, virtually unlimited resources to spend on growing this show, and also, simultaneously,
• 43:50
  Tom Billiou and Tim Ferris have been doing it for well over 10 years. So they not only have
• 43:55
  way more capital and resources than you. They also have a time advantage as well.
• 43:58
  Right, but the way you're explaining it almost makes it seem like it's impossible for somebody
• 44:01
  without those resources. The way I'm explaining it is don't benchmark yourself against people
• 44:07
  that have had billion dollar edges than start a podcast. Benchmark yourself against somebody.
• 44:12
  Actually, the example that I like for a personal professional development is Mel Robbins.
• 44:16
  So Mel did not have a big exit, and she built a coaching, consulting, personal brand and podcast,
• 44:23
  basically from just hard work and putting in reps, which I think is there's no there's no
• 44:29
  wrong way to do this. But if you have a billion dollar exit, that's not how I would measure success
• 44:32
  against that person. I agree, but the layer is the same way, right? We started from nothing.
• 44:37
  Same as you, right? So yeah, and that's the big disconnect, I think, with a lot of creators,
• 44:42
  to your point, I can't give him good advice because a good advice is staying the game longer.
• 44:46
  That's the only thing. And I stay in the game, and it's it's not only create the content,
• 44:50
  whether it's in podcasts or kind of more of the short form creators that I work with, it's it's
• 44:55
  get better at your craft. So it's yeah, it's stay in the game, put in the reps, put out the content,
• 45:02
  but you have to you have to be kind of introspective, look at each piece of content, watch
• 45:06
  your own piece of content and ask how can you get better? Join a community like mine, join whatever,
• 45:11
  you know what I mean? Like do whatever, take the steps you need to do, but constantly always,
• 45:16
  try to improve, you know, watching Valeria, and I look, I really admire her work, I think
• 45:22
  watching Valeria do this over the years, she's always trying to improve herself. This girl
• 45:27
  in hails books like two a week, where she's always trying to get more information and she's constantly
• 45:33
  trying to figure out what can I do to what actions can I take to provide more value to the audience,
• 45:41
  to my audience, to my community, what actions can I take? And so that's the thing. So it's in
• 45:46
  addition to putting in the work and making the content and putting it out on the platform,
• 45:50
  hundreds of pieces of content, whether the long form or short form, it's also how do I get better at
• 45:55
  it? What are the actions I need to take to get better at it? Because if you're just putting out
• 46:00
  like people are complimented like I've done my 300 posts and I'm not getting any traction,
• 46:05
  okay? So then you got to do things to improve your output. I think that more people have the issue
• 46:10
  with doing the 300 pieces than doing the 300 pieces and then seeing and testing and looking at
• 46:16
  data points as to what's working and what's not. I think that that I think that after you've done
• 46:20
  the 300 pieces, it's pretty easy to convince somebody, okay? So if it's not working yet, then why
• 46:24
  don't we understand, you know, retention on your long form YouTube videos or what's getting retweeted
• 46:31
  the most or look for signals because there's going to be signals after they're going to be data and
• 46:35
  there is, but I've gone away from like sheer data and analytics, which I used to, I still am.
• 46:43
  I'm very keen on data analytics, but I'm more about this, the qualitative aspect of connecting
• 46:50
  with audience, right? So now when I look at like a piece of content that Valeria does, I'll look at it
• 46:55
  and as opposed to like, I'll look at still at the retention graphs and click through eights,
• 46:59
  like let's say on long form YouTube videos, on short form, I'll look at whatever data is on the
• 47:03
  sites, but I kind of look at it, I try to look at it more artistically and I ask myself, did you
• 47:12
  connect? Like did you connect? If it's long form was the conversation interesting? Like was it
• 47:17
  interesting? Was it a genuine, how do we gauge that? Because that's from your gut. You know how I
• 47:21
  gauge it? Yeah. So all of Valeria's podcasts, here's what I do. When I'm in the gym, I listen to her
• 47:26
  podcasts on my headphones, right? I don't now I used to do it when I trained alone, but now I have
• 47:31
  a trainer, so I don't do it, but at some point I listen to Valeria's podcast. If I find myself
• 47:38
  turning it backing out of it, turning it off, because it's not interesting to me, then I feel like
• 47:42
  I'm a pretty good judge, even though I'm not the target demographic of millennial females,
• 47:46
  but if something keeps me engaged, I think it will keep a lot of other people engaged.
• 47:51
  Have you noticed? Have you noticed the correlation between you being able to pay attention to it and
• 47:56
  for me, again, there was a bit of a disconnect because I'm not on the millennial female,
• 48:03
  so there are some topics that I'll like I'll turn off early, but it'll still it'll still hit
• 48:10
  it'll still like over index roll area, but most of the time I know like most of the time I'll listen
• 48:17
  to it like before I know how it's performed and I'll guess it. Yeah. And you feel like there's like
• 48:22
  do you feel there's certain strategies or topics that are discussed that wouldn't just work in
• 48:28
  podcast format, but to transcend short form video tweets, blogs, newsletters, like other certain
• 48:34
  things that are sort of universal content rules. I don't think there's any universal content rules.
• 48:38
  I think content is based on the individual. So for example, what makes a good podcast for Valeria?
• 48:44
  for Valeria when she goes when she just when she stops trying, when she stops trying,
• 48:53
  when she basically just sits and like she has good chemistry and it's just like two women just
• 49:00
  talking and just having fun. When she's having fun, I can see I can watch the podcast podcast
• 49:06
  and I can see if she's enjoying herself. If Valeria is enjoying herself, the podcast does better
• 49:11
  because that energy translates. That's why when you and I started this, I'm like, hey, what's up?
• 49:15
  Like I'm casual about it because people want this authenticity. They want to see fun conversation.
• 49:21
  That's so funny and scary for a creator because everybody, I mean, this is like probably a left
• 49:26
  brain, right brain thing. I'm sure some creators are cool just feeling the audience. For me,
• 49:31
  that's a horrifying thing. Like I want, I want the perfect formula. I want the what's the first
• 49:37
  question I ask and then how do I open it up and then how do I and I always prep a first question.
• 49:42
  And I know that there's other creators out there like me because I'm not the only person that
• 49:45
  you're very you're very analytical. You're treating it like a business which you should.
• 49:49
  But at the same time, it's like you got to remember that there's isn't an art more than it is a
• 49:53
  business. The business of this whole thing is things like brand deals, you know, analysis of
• 50:05
  the technology, understanding algorithms. That's the business side of it. But it's the art
• 50:10
  that people buy. It's the art that people want to consume. People don't necessarily want to consume
• 50:16
  if we're talking about a podcast episode. This heavily scripted perfect that they want to they want
• 50:23
  to connect, right? So it's it's the product is the artistic value of your content, right? The
• 50:32
  distribution and monetization. That's the business. But what I'm suggesting is don't bring the
• 50:36
  business into the content. Leave the business where it needs to be behind the scenes running things.
• 50:42
  And that's why Valeria and I I feel continue to we had success and continue because I'm always
• 50:47
  telling her like stay in the content. Stay in that zone. Connect with your guests. Connect with
• 50:52
  your audience. Like let me deal with the shit that's and some of that stuff. It's not all shit.
• 50:56
  Like, but it's stuff that has to be dealt with, right? It's it's the mixing of the two that that's
• 51:01
  such a tough it's a so for somebody who again does these interviews where yet it's completely
• 51:05
  dependent on the relationship and how well you measure the person you're interviewing.
• 51:11
  It it's still too ambiguous for somebody to to listen to this and to take home and to include
• 51:16
  into their own content. It is I think it is too ambiguous of an idea. I think there has to be
• 51:21
  because I'll give you an example how to make a less ambiguous. So a very easy way to make podcasts
• 51:26
  a more real and more authentic is you move them from zoom and riverside and virtual to in person.
• 51:32
  Sure. Very very easy, but I mean that's a that's a big thing that creates a much a much deeper
• 51:37
  conversation. But like I don't know how to just how to shoot the shit with somebody I've never
• 51:42
  met before. I mean Joe Rogan is a conversationalist. He's good at it. But Joe Rogan speaks about every
• 51:49
  topic under the sun for three hours. So I'm trying to and this is a different kind of format. So
• 51:54
  does that law of of being a creator first in a business person second apply to a format of
• 52:01
  podcasts where I'm trying to deliver the most value to the audience in the most concise period of
• 52:05
  time or should there be some guardrails on it? Look, I'm not a big fan of guardrails, but maybe
• 52:12
  the type of content that I'm close to, which was various content. It's not as
• 52:17
  clinical, I think, as the content you have, but that you create. But here's the thing.
• 52:23
  Your podcast you're trying to get out from people the value of how they did it. You're trying
• 52:28
  to understand the character traits that people have that led them to success, right? But here's the
• 52:33
  thing. And I'm curious to see your opinion on this to hear your opinion on this. The traits that
• 52:40
  make entrepreneurs wildly successful. I don't believe is their ability to analyze data. I don't
• 52:47
  believe it's their ability to be really good at accounting and to know how to deal with lawyers
• 52:52
  and to know how to deal with the IRS. Yes, those are all very important things, but it's their
• 52:59
  ability to motivate people. It's their ability to, it's their charisma, right? And so when you have
• 53:05
  a conversation with me, if I'm one of those guys who has that kind of charisma, then
• 53:11
  your audience, like, let's say in this episode, for example, they may not be getting not yet.
• 53:15
  We can get into like technical things, but learning about the human being and what it takes
• 53:22
  and the type of charm and charisma and how to motivate people. The really big huge entrepreneurs,
• 53:31
  right? And even the ones who have a lot of sex, as it doesn't matter, it's their personalities that
• 53:37
  did it. And so when someone's watching this and they're trying to say, if they look at me as a
• 53:41
  successful person, if they consider me a successful person, then they may take from this as like
• 53:47
  maybe it's his charm. Maybe it's his charisma. If they feel that that's what they're getting from
• 53:50
  me. But if you look at guys like, you know, if you look at guys like Steve Jobs, like Steve Jobs,
• 53:57
  he was skilled in many things, but probably his biggest skill was getting on that stage and
• 54:00
  announcing products. It's getting people excited. It's getting people excited about the future.
• 54:05
  I don't disagree with you. I don't disagree with you. I actually think the charisma is a huge part
• 54:09
  of this and being genuine and authentic, which I mean, those are kind of buzzwords that everybody
• 54:14
  uses now. And you can say you're out there, even if you really aren't. But truly just sort of letting
• 54:21
  letting your guard down and just having a conversation, I do agree that that will create the
• 54:28
  best content that will motivate the most people. I think that I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm just
• 54:33
  saying that it's very hard for people to architect that environment where somebody who they just
• 54:39
  met, especially in a podcast format, is going to be comfortable being themselves. Have you ever
• 54:45
  like hung out with new people where when you meet, like let's say it's a guy, right? You need to
• 54:50
  do it. You hang out and you guys just click every, yeah, 100%. Right. So do you think that, okay,
• 54:57
  so when you and I met, you and I had that. Yeah, I know. You know, we went out, we met for a
• 55:01
  launch, we started chatting because there wasn't motives, motives, fuck up everything. So the reason
• 55:07
  why this podcast is a content, that's what we do here. Okay. So this is really applicable to me.
• 55:14
  And there's going to be people in the audience that also want to create great, great podcasts and
• 55:17
  great interviews style podcasts. By the way, I'm not thinking about the audience. You said, you
• 55:20
  said, I know right now when I'm talking to you. Oh, no, and I don't I ignore the fact that this
• 55:26
  will be seen by other people. So that's yes. But the issue is most people come on here, don't ignore
• 55:32
  that fact because they have an agenda. They have an agenda and they have motives because they want
• 55:36
  to promote something a course or a book or so the best conversations I have actually are with people
• 55:42
  that don't have an agenda. Yeah. See, I don't have an agenda. I know, I just want to hang out
• 55:47
  with you and you do your show. Yeah, yeah. No, so that's it. But that's that's something to be said
• 55:51
  for like how you structure your show and the guests that you bring on and whatnot, because if you do
• 55:54
  bring on somebody that has a book launch in three months from now, like they will have talking points,
• 56:00
  which is not it's not an issue. There's going to be no, there's a lot wrong in sight, full of
• 56:03
  something wrong with it. But know that it's going to be harder for them to just be super candid and
• 56:09
  be themselves. So I want to I want to make a comparison to this. So when I met Valeria, she very
• 56:14
  politely turned me down. She very politely turned me down. Okay. And I thought that was really nice
• 56:22
  of her. I thought that, you know, a young, beautiful woman, such as Valeria at the time, a lot of
• 56:29
  women would be far less kind, you know, when turning a man down. What did she say? She was just very
• 56:35
  nice about it. She was just very polite about it. I invited her on a date. And instead of saying,
• 56:39
  no, I'm not interested. She said, Oh, well, you know what? We have a lot of mutual friends. Why don't
• 56:43
  we all go together? That was her way of saying like I'm not romantically interested, you know? And
• 56:49
  she was just really polite about it. And so at that point, I saw how nice she was about it. And
• 56:53
  quite honest, I thought, you know what? She's a great person. She probably knows other women. I was
• 56:58
  38 years old. And that's thinking, I'm gonna, I'll just be friends with her. So here's the point
• 57:02
  of trying to make I dropped everything. I dropped my agenda of trying to date her. And we were
• 57:09
  talking through BBM at the time. If you remember BBM, we were chatting through BBM. And it just
• 57:14
  happened because I completely dropped the agenda and the intention of trying to date her.
• 57:20
  I dropped all romantic pursuit. And I was just cool and friends with her. My point is is that
• 57:27
  I still got to the objective that I initially had after I dropped it. So I feel that and I don't
• 57:32
  want to, I don't know, like, you know, with your podcasts, it's like when people come with an
• 57:36
  agenda, I feel if people dropped the agenda and they just behaved like they would when they're
• 57:42
  meeting a buddy because the way you and I are talking right now, it's the same way, bro. If you
• 57:46
  remember, the same way we talked and we met that first time like a year and a half ago. And so
• 57:51
  if now I thought to myself, what would I achieve by being on the show and having people see
• 57:57
  is that is just that. It's like, I don't have an agenda. And therefore, you know, you,
• 58:02
  you eventually gain favor with people because they're like, this guy doesn't want anything of
• 58:06
  this guy just being himself. But that's, so I've just adopted that completely across the board.
• 58:10
  Well, if I could only, if I could only give, you know, I could make people spend 30 minutes in a room
• 58:15
  with you telling them how to conduct themselves on podcasts where they come on. That would be good.
• 58:19
  But that's not the real, so I'll tell you what I do to try and accomplish this.
• 58:22
  To try to calm people down is all the like, you know, yeah, it's just not pitching you. Yeah,
• 58:25
  basically it's, it's, it's not easy to get in the calm down right away. But if you, if you bring up
• 58:32
  the stuff that they care about in the first 20 minutes, they're like, check. I've gotten like,
• 58:38
  the audience knows the name of the book. The audience knows when it's coming out. Now we can just
• 58:42
  have a conversation. So I know what you're saying. So it's funny because Valeria had this one guest.
• 58:46
  I don't want to say her name. People know who she is. No, I'm never going to say these people's names,
• 58:50
  but some people are just, of course, I'm just, I'm just saying like to your point, Valeria had a
• 58:54
  guest on a show on her, on her podcast. And she said, it was basically like an hour long
• 58:59
  pitch about this person's whatever the person was selling. And she goes, it goes so bad. And the
• 59:03
  thing is is that what that person did, first of all, the episode, yeah, it's a problem person.
• 59:09
  We're not going to like, we're not going to not publish an episode because like try to get out of
• 59:12
  that, right? And so we published the episode and completely underperformed, which we knew it would
• 59:16
  or cool, whatever. But even worse than that, what that person did was make it so that Valeria has
• 59:22
  no intention of inviting that person back. Valeria, people, other people who have podcasts will
• 59:27
  look at that and be like, that person as all they care about is pitching their stuff. So I'm not
• 59:32
  going to have them on my podcast. So people are so short term thinking when they come on a show
• 59:37
  like yours, whether it's like I just like people don't understand that every time they're in front
• 59:42
  of an audience, it's their opportunity to build their personal brand. Instead, what they do is they
• 59:47
  go straight into monetization mode. I want to monetize this opportunity. I want to tell you that I
• 59:52
  have creator method and it costs this much and you go to creator method.com. And that's where you
• 59:55
  enroll. And if you enroll, you get this and this and this and this. And you know, but I'm not
• 59:59
  sitting here doing that because it's like I would rather take this opportunity to connect with you
• 1:00:07
  to show like who I am as a person and just be be normal and just have a normal conversation
• 1:00:14
  because it's your it's the building blocks. And I can tell you that when people do come on to
• 1:00:19
  creator method, because Valeria is really the celebrity on this. If I feel like think about who's
• 1:00:22
  a celebrity, it's Valeria. And God bless her. I'm happy. But what I'm saying when people come in
• 1:00:28
  to when they come in and they actually become members and they meet me for the first time on our
• 1:00:32
  first group call, they're not sitting there being like, you know, I want to Gary's like, I want him
• 1:00:41
  to tell me how to be a creator. They're just so happy because they've now seen me over the years
• 1:00:46
  enough times just being normal and being in my element. Anyways, the whole point is that
• 1:00:51
  whether you're a creator, whether you're a publisher or an author, if you're coming on a show,
• 1:00:56
  that's your opportunity to connect with people. You're never going to sell more
• 1:01:02
  by just going in and doing hard pitches, go buy my shit immediately versus just establishing
• 1:01:06
  rapport and just being normal. So the whole point I said about with Valeria is that it's when I
• 1:01:11
  dropped that that was the lesson that I got is like when I dropped that pitch of like we should
• 1:01:15
  date, you should, you know, when I dropped that. And I was just me. I was mean without the agenda
• 1:01:20
  of trying to make her my girlfriend or my wife. And that was it. And then magic happened because
• 1:01:24
  as soon as that happened, if you equate her to like some, you know, when someone's trying to sell
• 1:01:29
  something here to a buyer, that's it. Your guard is down and you're like, you're actually, you know,
• 1:01:35
  anyways, I could go on and on. I think I feel like I'm getting a little, you know, I'm going
• 1:01:39
  in circles here, but you get my point. It happens to me a lot. I just see that and I don't think
• 1:01:44
  it's always the person's fault. I think that they get bad advice. I think that PR companies do
• 1:01:51
  give a lot of bad advice to people that are trying to put their name out there. I don't think that
• 1:01:55
  I'll give you another example since we're on it. We're going to sort of like, you know,
• 1:01:59
  kill some golden calves around PR and personal rent. So when people write a book and their PR
• 1:02:08
  company says, you don't want to do any PR before this date. And then between this date and this date,
• 1:02:13
  you're going to do 20 podcasts. And then the books to the launch on like, you know, the day after
• 1:02:17
  you do those 20 podcasts. Keep in mind that what's happening is all of your fans that are going to
• 1:02:24
  find these podcasts on YouTube are going to listen to one of the 20 because they're not going to
• 1:02:28
  listen to 20 of the 20 and they're going to get one of your podcasts at one point in time. Maybe
• 1:02:32
  they do go by the book, but then they're going to forget about you for the next three years.
• 1:02:36
  And that's I think that that's a stupid way to build buzz around a book. I think what actually
• 1:02:40
  makes sense is to be omnipresent, be always putting out a little bit of content. Don't block off
• 1:02:46
  all those YouTube videos and all the podcasts that are going to come out into like one, two to four
• 1:02:50
  week period and always be just, do you know why PR PR firms suggest this to their clients?
• 1:02:56
  I have no idea. Really? I have no idea. Well, I mean, because when you engage with them,
• 1:03:01
  when you, I'll tell you why, because when you engage with them, let's say I'm an author and I pay
• 1:03:05
  a PR company and I give them, let's say, $50,000, right? Modest PR budget to help me promote my book.
• 1:03:10
  I give them, let's say, 50k, okay? I give them 50k. They're like, okay, here's your advice. You're
• 1:03:14
  going to do this. All of the stuff that you just described to me, the PR company tells the author,
• 1:03:19
  this is what you have to do when you're going on these different shows and podcasts and all this
• 1:03:22
  because how is the author measuring their success? They're measuring success because they're also
• 1:03:28
  short term thinking the author and they're saying, I paid these guys 50 grand. They gave me the
• 1:03:31
  right. She only put me on in here, here, here and here. And what did I get on the back end of it? What
• 1:03:35
  did I get immediately on the back end of it? Right? How many books did I sell as a result of
• 1:03:40
  following their guidance? So they're paying something, they're paying, let's say, $50,000 and then
• 1:03:45
  they expect to sell certain amount of books as a result. So the PR company is giving them short term
• 1:03:49
  advice to go straight to conversion to get in front of audiences and try to convert as soon as
• 1:03:55
  possible to get them to buy your book, right? What would PR companies, if you engage the PR company
• 1:04:01
  and said my long term goal is from three to five years, I want to build a personal brand that
• 1:04:05
  anything I do or almost anything I do, anything applicable that I do, I can present to a large
• 1:04:11
  group of loyal people who trust and believe in me. That's a different game. If Valeria right now
• 1:04:18
  after doing this for eight years, you know what I mean? There's a reason why I know there's a reason
• 1:04:23
  why I would even do hundreds of brand deals a year is because the brands understand that if you
• 1:04:27
  Valeria wears a certain thing, it's it's these are people who have been with her for four or five
• 1:04:33
  eight years, right? Yeah, but I would even make the argument that if if I was writing a book
• 1:04:40
  and I went on a major podcast once a month for 12 months before the launch of the book,
• 1:04:47
  my audience who and I spoke about a different topic on every single podcast,
• 1:04:54
  I would have I would tap into 12 unique different audiences, those podcasters audiences,
• 1:04:59
  and I would sell books from each of those 12 podcasters and I would have a net increase
• 1:05:05
  the sales, I would have like more sales doing it over the full year, being one podcast a month
• 1:05:10
  on a different topic, just being a thought leader, then doing 15 podcasts in one month,
• 1:05:15
  because you get and you're not going to watch 15 podcasts in one month, but you could hear me speak
• 1:05:20
  about well, different topics. I hear what you're saying. Look, I think you have to build the asset,
• 1:05:23
  which is the personal brand, not create a sales funnel. If every time you're trying to create a
• 1:05:28
  short term sales funnel to pitch whether it's a book or a pair of sneakers, when you're creating
• 1:05:33
  short term sales funnels, they're very they're like they're just they're too short-sighted. They're
• 1:05:38
  they're not going to be that profitable because the cost of the media rarely is less than the profit
• 1:05:44
  that's achieved from creating a short term sales funnel, whereas when you create a long term
• 1:05:48
  brand, whether it's a personal brand or a consumer brand of any kind, whether it's a product or
• 1:05:52
  a service, then you're creating like look at Louis Vuitton. They don't even need to advertise.
• 1:05:57
  Everybody knows them. Everybody kind of understands the brand messaging and they understand what
• 1:06:01
  they get when they buy it or Nike like, but look how long they've been doing it. People are people are
• 1:06:07
  what's happened in society is because of the internet and because of social media,
• 1:06:11
  everything is short term short term short term short term short term, but I think the true
• 1:06:15
  success comes from leveraging the technology that everyone's trying to get short term success
• 1:06:21
  through. They're trying to get short term success on and leveraging it to create long term
• 1:06:26
  brand value, whether it's personal brand or consumer brand. Okay, so this is actually a good
• 1:06:29
  full circle moment because I think about 45 minutes ago, I asked a question about when should
• 1:06:34
  people leave their job and become full-time creators? People should leave their job and become a
• 1:06:38
  full-time creator when they're making enough money to do that. I mean, that's a pretty simple. So
• 1:06:43
  what is that? Do you think that's going to be three years? I think that's going to be five years?
• 1:06:46
  One, I mean realistically because I think a lot of people want to create and then they burn out
• 1:06:51
  before they have any significant monetization. It's not a time thing. It's, it's, what?
• 1:06:59
  If you have the motivation that there's no quitting, then you'll find a way. Right?
• 1:07:06
  You know, when we moved to the United States as an example, I just like to burn bridges on my way.
• 1:07:10
  I like all the bridges in the back. I like to burn them. When we came here three weeks into it,
• 1:07:15
  we said, okay, we're staying. We're going to move to the United States. And a couple of months after
• 1:07:18
  that, I sold the house where he goes, why do you sell the house? What if we go back? I said,
• 1:07:21
  there's no going back. When my family left Ukraine, when they left Communist Ukraine,
• 1:07:25
  and we moved here when I was three, and we moved to Canada when I was three years old,
• 1:07:29
  the circumstances were such that there was no way back. There was no way back because you can't
• 1:07:35
  go back as a Jew leaving a Jew leaving Ukraine. In the 70s, can't go back. That's the whole point.
• 1:07:41
  And because of that, my family had no choice but to push until they survived, until they thrived.
• 1:07:47
  Right. And so if you're asking me the analogy going back to being a creator, if you are,
• 1:07:52
  if you've put it in your mind that there's no way back, you have to succeed in becoming a creator,
• 1:07:57
  then you're going to become a creator. That's it. That's the bottom line. This all comes down to
• 1:08:01
  fortitude. It comes down to how badly people wanted and what they're willing to sacrifice.
• 1:08:05
  And how much work they're getting put there willing to put into it. I firmly believe that anybody
• 1:08:09
  who puts in enough effort will at least become financially stable. The only thing that might limit
• 1:08:15
  them, if they're putting in all the work and they're doing all the it, like they're putting in
• 1:08:18
  the effort and they're sacrificing, the only thing might be just their natural talent,
• 1:08:23
  their natural ability. But I still believe everybody can develop that. I believe that too.
• 1:08:28
  I believe if you're like a complete dud in front of the camera, you can't be on the camera more.
• 1:08:33
  I'm not like when I started my podcast, which I do now, not like you, I do it as an amateur,
• 1:08:38
  I do it very rarely. I do episodes. It's only when I meet cool people, which by the way,
• 1:08:41
  you're going to be on my podcast. It's when when I meet people, I like words before I was doing it
• 1:08:45
  once a week. To me, I hated getting in front of the camera. And it still makes me nervous when
• 1:08:50
  I get in front of the camera, though, well, you've been doing it for years now. My podcast,
• 1:08:54
  my own, not your podcast. You've been on, yeah. And every time I don't like it, but every time I
• 1:08:59
  force myself to do it, because then the next time I do it, it's a little easier. And every time
• 1:09:03
  it's a little easier, but I still get nervous every time. And that's the thing is like anybody can
• 1:09:07
  develop talent if they just put in the work, just like anything else. I don't believe, I believe
• 1:09:12
  everybody is inherently like talented. I believe anybody can achieve anything if they put in the
• 1:09:18
  effort. That's it. That's my, that's just my belief. And that's why when I'm talking to my kids,
• 1:09:23
  and they say, I can't do something. I always tell them, I don't even, what is that word? That's a
• 1:09:28
  stupid word. Can't, what a dumb word. No, there is no can't. There's only try try. You have to keep
• 1:09:34
  pushing. Anyways, that's my thing. You wanted to talk about my origin story. I did. Yeah. And
• 1:09:38
  I mean, like, this is like a completely, I don't even know if you'll publish this episode. It's
• 1:09:42
  so out of a box. It's not that out of the box. Is it not though? So it like started out of the
• 1:09:46
  box because normally how I, so I have this like framework that, listen, so I have a framework that
• 1:09:51
  I always test with podcasts. And I try different things. And I learned from people that are sort of,
• 1:09:55
  you know, two years, three years ahead of me. And I bring some of those learnings into my own show.
• 1:09:59
  But then I also, I end is a great, a really great creator lesson. I also, every once in a while,
• 1:10:07
  I'll try something completely random and out of the blue and just see how the audience reacts to it.
• 1:10:11
  And I think that's important. And I don't even think this is that like left feel. It's still an
• 1:10:15
  interview style podcast, nerding out about creator economy. This is not so left feel,
• 1:10:19
  but I'll try different things all the time. And I think that's actually very important. And it won't
• 1:10:22
  be like, it's a small test. It'll be a small test. So I've tested doing like some solo episodes.
• 1:10:29
  I've tested doing some solo episodes on like productivity and mindset. And then some solo
• 1:10:35
  episodes on a success stories of really famous entrepreneurs, just me reading kind of like through
• 1:10:40
  their life and what they've done. Just testing. But people like overthink tests. They get so blocked
• 1:10:46
  into this one kind of content. And actually, Larry did this very well. She, she moved from vlogs
• 1:10:51
  to podcasts. And that was a major shift. It was a major shift, but it was very intentional.
• 1:10:55
  It was very intentional. But I test with like very little emotional commitment to that test.
• 1:11:01
  And I just want to see if it is any. So you know what mistake I see creators make when they're
• 1:11:05
  testing new formats. They'll do it once. And they'll say it didn't work. Don finished test over.
• 1:11:12
  Well, I think that's just that's incorrect. Because I'll give you an example. And so,
• 1:11:17
  Valeria, for the longest time on her short form content in Reels, once she started creating
• 1:11:21
  Reels, she was doing her fashion. She was doing like a, you know, she had a handful of formats.
• 1:11:25
  And then we started her podcast. And we started taking clips from her podcast and putting them as
• 1:11:29
  Reels on her Instagram. And they did really poorly. And so Valeria's response and our CEO,
• 1:11:35
  we have a CEO who runs Valeria Inc. The media company who manages Valeria's career. Thank God,
• 1:11:40
  it's not me. But I get in there every now and then with my two cents. But when we started putting
• 1:11:46
  those clips in, which was like very different than the fashion and the other stuff that Valeria
• 1:11:50
  did and continues to do today, they would fail. So if her average video would get 800,000 views,
• 1:11:55
  these were getting 100,000 views, 150,000 views. So, you know, internally people were like, okay,
• 1:12:01
  well, you know, it doesn't work. I'm like, no, no, no, no, you have to condition the audience to it.
• 1:12:05
  Just because it doesn't work now doesn't mean it's not going to work. You have to keep going.
• 1:12:08
  And the reason for that I insisted that we keep going with it because I said, we're going to have
• 1:12:13
  a supplier is going to have a successful podcast no matter what. So it doesn't matter. Even if it's
• 1:12:18
  failing, that format is failing in her Instagram, I don't care. We have to keep going. You've got to
• 1:12:23
  keep pushing you through because to me, her podcast was a non-negotiable. She had to have a podcast.
• 1:12:28
  And her and I agreed that she's going to have a podcast and you have to promote it through
• 1:12:31
  short form on social. I just want to take a quick break and thank the Havspot podcast network for
• 1:12:36
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• 1:13:24
  So I have a question because I also agree that it's with any type of content or any type of format.
• 1:13:28
  It's never a will it work. It's sort of like a when will it work. So I do think you have to put
• 1:13:33
  in the reps with anything. Yeah, but I think that's the point. Yeah, but I don't know too many people
• 1:13:38
  that have done things for 10 years that the 10 year. Yes, you have to iterate and you have to
• 1:13:42
  improve and you have to get better at it. But like anybody who's listening to this, anybody who's
• 1:13:48
  seen any your content in your community, they want to start a podcast and they do it for 10 years.
• 1:13:54
  They'll find a way to become one of the biggest podcasts in the world. It's really not that
• 1:13:57
  complicated. So, but the question they have to ask themselves is do you enjoy this format?
• 1:14:02
  Like do you enjoy podcasting? Do you enjoy sitting down with people and chatting with people? Do you
• 1:14:07
  enjoy long-form video, long-form conversations? Whatever. Like do you enjoy it? Fine. Great.
• 1:14:12
  Check. Go do it. If you don't, do you enjoy writing? Go on sub-stack and then write a newsletter
• 1:14:18
  every week. Fine. Do that for 10 years and it'll be a successful writer. So I'm curious why you
• 1:14:23
  you were so bullish on podcasting because you could have just done anything in the world and
• 1:14:27
  for me or for Valeria. For Valeria. Yeah, for Valeria. Mine is a hobby. Yes, I know. Mine is a hobby.
• 1:14:32
  One day I won't be. Well, I like mine because it's kind of like a hobby with a purpose and it's
• 1:14:37
  just a very effective business card because there are people that I meet and I'll meet them once for
• 1:14:44
  dinner like people who potentially that there may be opportunities to explore and then I'll see them
• 1:14:49
  again two weeks later and I see the ship and you see it too. I'm sure you see the complete shift
• 1:14:54
  because now they've gone and consumed my content and now they know who I am and now there's like a
• 1:14:59
  there's a there's a rapport at least from their side because I'm still trying to get to know them.
• 1:15:02
  It's actually it's actually it's funny now when I jump on a call when somebody has consumed my
• 1:15:06
  content because they feel like they know you already even though you haven't met these people
• 1:15:10
  before. Oh, I see it in their eyes. I have I probably am on four or five different Zoom calls
• 1:15:14
  a day with various people and I already know as soon as the camera turns on if they you know if
• 1:15:20
  they've you know but if they're already on a call with me they already have it means they've
• 1:15:23
  consumed a lot of Valeria's content and therefore mine but sorry you were asking about podcasts
• 1:15:28
  so so the the whole point was whatever type of content you do you can be successful at it. I'm
• 1:15:32
  curious why you wanted Valeria and Valeria wanted Valeria to go into podcast. I'll tell you why
• 1:15:38
  because a couple of years ago before she started the podcast I initiated it and I looked at the
• 1:15:45
  kind of the environment and I looked at the landscape and I set the Valeria so listen you're
• 1:15:53
  doing great the reality though even though I think you're the best at this but the reality is
• 1:16:00
  it was we were doing vlogs a lot of short from content photography video is very strong on you
• 1:16:06
  know visuals and aesthetic and I said the hurt listen a couple of things there are a lot of beautiful
• 1:16:13
  women creating similar content that's number one number two because I know her as well as I do
• 1:16:22
  I said to her you're brilliant and she could she really is like she's a Savav she's one of these
• 1:16:26
  genius people and I firmly believe that and I said to her I said Valeria for you not to sit down
• 1:16:33
  in a foreign for you not to create content in a format where people can now see who you are not
• 1:16:39
  just what you look like and in order for you to connect with audience and to take your career
• 1:16:46
  to the kind of the next level and the next level the next level you have to sit down and have long
• 1:16:51
  form conversations whether it's monologues or dialogues or whatever it is conversations with me
• 1:16:57
  whatever it is people need to connect with you on a much deeper level you can't do that with short
• 1:17:02
  form alone that plus the competition from other women who are making aesthetic fashion content or
• 1:17:07
  whatever content you know I said this is the it's a must you know and that's why but vlog could do
• 1:17:14
  that um the vlog's not really sustainable family vlogging it's a it's a it's a difficult animal
• 1:17:21
  you guys tried doing that for a bit right we're doubly yeah we're that it's just it's a hard thing
• 1:17:25
  because well no what I'm trying to do like what I'm really trying to do is like I have my own
• 1:17:29
  content I own platform Gina has her own thing yeah what we're trying to do with the vlog is
• 1:17:33
  creates that together so maybe it's a couple spot cast maybe it's a couple spot cast yeah
• 1:17:38
  the vlogging the vlogging um there was a lot of dynamic elements of the vlog when the kids were
• 1:17:44
  coming up like when they were growing up and getting big and other cute and funny moments um
• 1:17:49
  and it's all still out there and it's great I I just yesterday I was watching a vlog of when
• 1:17:54
  Valeria told our two older boys that they were having another brother um but I just it's you
• 1:18:00
  know it's tough like when I when I look at guys like ace family and some of these other people
• 1:18:04
  like it's just a hard time to keep going and I and I feel it's just I don't know it's just like
• 1:18:09
  limited I know the Kardashians did it well because essentially they're they're episodes of vlogs
• 1:18:14
  right I don't know it just doesn't it just uh you gotta do also you gotta not only kind of
• 1:18:21
  from a content format perspective go to where the market is and like where there was market
• 1:18:26
  demand but it has to be genuine to you as well and just like family vlogging became kind of
• 1:18:30
  not genuine the forced ones well I was going to say that I feel like a lot of family vlogs that
• 1:18:35
  I've seen and it's not type of content I consume so I mean there's probably a whole bunch of
• 1:18:39
  of content there that I don't watch but the the vlogs that I've watched I feel that they really
• 1:18:44
  push the content to the edge it's it's almost like they're architecting it would have at least
• 1:18:48
  situations it has to be sensational yeah Kardashians is all sensationalism it has to be sensational
• 1:18:54
  the thing is that's just not us we're not those people not I'm not saying anything bad about
• 1:18:59
  people who are like theatrical and sensational that's a different type of business it's just not
• 1:19:03
  it's just for we would have to become actors eventually and so we just feel like Valeria
• 1:19:07
  feels that there's far more value that she can create for audiences and for community by sitting
• 1:19:13
  down or having a conversation she just had this woman her name is Sasha she's a fitness influencer
• 1:19:17
  she's massive in the uh kind of Spanish speaking world uh and she had her on the show and like they
• 1:19:22
  had a great talk and I just don't know that Valeria and I and our kids can deliver that kind of
• 1:19:29
  value anymore um but that being said when we go on of like we did a special trip we rented in RV
• 1:19:36
  a few months ago uh at the beginning of the summer and we hit the road and that was cool so that's
• 1:19:40
  an experience we just don't want to manufacture them anymore we just don't want to be like let's
• 1:19:44
  do something fun so we can make a vlog it's like if we're doing something fun then we'll make a
• 1:19:48
  vlog it whatever yeah if if we're doing something interesting but like tomorrow we're going to like
• 1:19:52
  our bodies you know five-year-olds birthday party like it's just our life it's not that we don't
• 1:19:57
  want to do it but when Valeria went to uh Paris for fashion week like that's interesting so that
• 1:20:07
  she that she blocked yeah okay so I still want to give back to until where you came from as you
• 1:20:14
  still had a really interesting career pre Valeria Inc um there was in Austin Powers uh
• 1:20:21
  well the doctor you have by the way you haven't done a lot of podcasts because I listened to podcasts
• 1:20:26
  you've done your own podcast but you're on money by his happiness yeah as listening to that one um
• 1:20:33
  there haven't been a time you should do more yeah I just again like if they're not like it's not like
• 1:20:38
  I'm not on uh I'm not on this path of like hey come take me on your podcast was somebody invites me
• 1:20:43
  I say yeah okay I'll come on your podcast um so in Austin Powers Dr. Evil once said the
• 1:20:51
  something the the story of my origin is quite inconsequential and then he went in talking about
• 1:20:57
  how his father was a womanizer and his wife was a French prostitute with webbed feet um that was
• 1:21:04
  just an obscure reference like you did you see the movies you had to like yeah I just thought that
• 1:21:07
  was funny I remember I actually I remember the first time I watched Austin Powers um I went to a
• 1:21:12
  tennis camp when I was a kid and it was raining one day and obviously you can't play tennis when
• 1:21:17
  it's raining and we were like a whole bunch of like eight year olds and like the counselors just
• 1:21:21
  put on Austin Powers we watched and I think it was like probably really inappropriate for a whole
• 1:21:24
  bunch of kids to watch Austin Powers but that was like the only VHS they had in like the club
• 1:21:29
  VHS via I thought Austin Powers I thought Mike Myers was so brilliant with that whole thing I
• 1:21:33
  thought it was incredible um you know what I did I did a really you know I'm not trying to avoid
• 1:21:38
  my original story we're gonna get to it in a second I did a super inappropriate thing and I'm
• 1:21:42
  admit it um so our nine year old Ben I watched Borat with him and I know I think I'm gonna get all
• 1:21:48
  yeah that's a little yeah I think I'm gonna get criticized someone's gonna call the police now
• 1:21:53
  that but yeah nine's young he was howling he's a very mature nine year old so he he gets the adult
• 1:22:00
  he gets the adult humor my my other two I wouldn't do it with Max is too little and Jake
• 1:22:04
  who would have influenced them in in the wrong way but like I feel I have this bonding thing it's
• 1:22:09
  sometimes like Ben and I will do like Borat jokes maybe you and Ben are like friends you're like yeah
• 1:22:14
  I mean like yeah like we're more their kid but like it's yeah yeah yeah he's you're like he runs
• 1:22:18
  yeah he's my dude he's gonna be late to chill yeah yeah like I'm much more it's funny because he
• 1:22:23
  knows when it's time for me to be like authority dad and friend dad so he knows a line but
• 1:22:28
  anyways okay let's talk about me um yeah so I mean I was born in I was born in Ukraine I was
• 1:22:35
  born in Kiev I was born in you know post-World War II Soviet Union in 1973 my parents were both
• 1:22:45
  Holocaust survivors but like they were never in camps right they were never in a concentration camp
• 1:22:50
  they had I don't really know my dad's side of the story like my dad's side of the family but my
• 1:22:55
  mom on her side of the family they escaped they crossed the Russian border from Ukraine
• 1:23:00
  they crossed the Russian border and there's like there's a whole long story there it's a fascinating
• 1:23:06
  story one day one that you have to write a book too oh by the way like like like you sure like
• 1:23:12
  true like dealing with absolute bullshit coming from a country that is I mean like post-World War II
• 1:23:20
  Soviet Union is not like a great spot either and then coming to a new country sort of burning the
• 1:23:25
  bridges starting a new life I think they're fabulous fucking stories yeah but you know what I mean
• 1:23:31
  it's my parents story I'm more of an observer there because as a child you don't
• 1:23:36
  I indirectly grew up with the stress of that situation but I wasn't living that situation because
• 1:23:41
  I was a kid right now I was shielded by my parents but yeah I mean look we came to Canada in 1976
• 1:23:46
  I was three years old my parents were in their mid-30s they had left the only thing they ever knew
• 1:23:51
  and it's not like they left the country after traveling the world and being worldly like they
• 1:23:54
  were like in a prison like Soviet Union at the time it was it was the iron curtain they had
• 1:23:59
  never left the country and they went straight from post-World War II Ukraine and just understand
• 1:24:04
  post-World War II Ukraine was probably the most anti-Semitic place on earth because what happened
• 1:24:10
  was after World War II people don't understand but millions of Soviets died as well so it wasn't
• 1:24:15
  just Jews who were killed in the Holocaust to the Soviets and so people like the Soviets because
• 1:24:20
  was also a Soviet so Ukrainian for essentially Soviets that's why I only speak Russian I don't
• 1:24:23
  speak Ukrainian because my parents only spoke to me in Russian because in their lifetime it was
• 1:24:28
  also a Soviet Union and everything was Russian that Ukrainian and so the way that it was explained
• 1:24:34
  to me is that when they came back after the Holocaust and they came back in in in the 40s of 46 47
• 1:24:43
  yeah 47 I think maybe 48 when they came back to their homes in Ukraine when their families came
• 1:24:49
  back into Kiev they were hated by the by the non Jews because the non Jews blamed them for
• 1:24:55
  Hitler attacking and decimating the whole country and killing all their families too so you know
• 1:24:59
  and it was like when we talk about anti-Semitism it's like there it was truly like institutional
• 1:25:06
  meaning the institutions would tell like my mom hey thanks for applying to go to university but
• 1:25:12
  you're a Jew so we're not taking you like it was just straight up like and like you documented
• 1:25:17
  you know right so so and that's what it was you know and that's just a part of history right and that's
• 1:25:24
  why a lot of people went to Israel and you know we know kind of what's going on there now that's a
• 1:25:29
  whole other conversation but so we ended up going to to Canada and you know we ended up in Canada
• 1:25:34
  because my father didn't I don't know he had this thing about the United States and he didn't
• 1:25:38
  want to go and he didn't want to go to Israel which was we had left the Soviet Union under the
• 1:25:42
  premise that like the Jews can go to Israel we don't want you here but you can go to Israel and so
• 1:25:47
  we were in Rome for six months and during that period of time um my dad did the paperwork and he
• 1:25:52
  got us into Canada so yeah I mean my origin like yeah it's like you know I grew up in a household
• 1:25:58
  where it was always this like you know my parents came they didn't speak English they had no money
• 1:26:02
  they had no contacts and so yeah it was it was rough but like I'm not I'm not sitting here like
• 1:26:06
  saying that this was a unique situation because millions of people went through this I'm we're not
• 1:26:10
  the only ones right this was a very common and it still is a common thing with with migrants who
• 1:26:15
  are fleeing that kind of tough situations in coming to Canada or the US you still adopted like
• 1:26:19
  a no going back burn the bridges attitude from them well I was a kid I think yeah but I think
• 1:26:24
  it's yes I know you were a kid but I think that some of your attitude came from their ability to
• 1:26:31
  just leave everything behind maybe I just I'm just not a big believer in plan b's I think plan
• 1:26:36
  b's are just like plan b's are but that the role of the personality trait yeah I didn't experience
• 1:26:42
  growing up I never experienced this growing up no plan b I had to architect in my head the ability
• 1:26:48
  to to not have 10 plan b's and just try and go in on the thing that I'm you know plan a that that
• 1:26:55
  is not something that I grew up with I grew up with like the the most risk adverse parents ever
• 1:27:00
  right but your parents were also like they're Canadian they're multi-generation Canadian but that's
• 1:27:06
  we were we were like the the the Mayflower of Canadians we were going back yeah but they're the
• 1:27:11
  product of that society yes Canada there's a saying in Russia the translates to stable like in
• 1:27:17
  Canada a big thank you to indeed for supporting success story because hiring people is one of the
• 1:27:22
  hardest things you're ever going to do as an entrepreneur as a founder as somebody's trying to
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  build a business because it's important to hire well it's important to hire and find the right
• 1:27:32
  person but it takes so much time it's so labor intensive because like most entrepreneurs you
• 1:27:37
  have a thousand things going on and there's a good chance that you just realized your business
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  needed to hire someone yesterday how can you find that great amazing right fit candidate fast
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• 1:28:58
  really literally I have no doubt it's a thing no question for everything but also I'll say
• 1:29:01
  that Russian the beat in the cuck for canadia it's literally like that's the saying and it's stable
• 1:29:06
  like in Canada so I understand I understand but no for us it was different because we were in
• 1:29:11
  a group of immigrants who everybody was scared coming to Canada we lived the first city we lived
• 1:29:16
  in Canada was Calgary Alberta and I got there when I was three and we left there when I was 11 and
• 1:29:21
  it was like my mom told me it was like landing on the moon it was so different you know again no
• 1:29:26
  money no contacts no English you know under a social programmer my mother would my mother and
• 1:29:32
  father they would clean offices during the day in the mornings they would drop me off into like
• 1:29:37
  the government daycare my mom told me I would like cry my eyes out and then at the end of the day
• 1:29:43
  she would scoop me up that was three years old anyways so yeah I kind of just growing up where
• 1:29:47
  they ever entrepreneurial your parents yes and though they were the failed entrepreneurs they
• 1:29:54
  they never they never made any kind of meaningful headway unfortunately I believe that the trauma of
• 1:30:01
  their kind of Soviet upbringing and that transition from Soviet Union to Canada it was it was
• 1:30:07
  too much room so they never really and then you know my parents got divorced I was in my early 20s
• 1:30:12
  I had a I don't talk about it a lot but I had a challenging like early life I you know I did
• 1:30:18
  and it's not something I talk about because I just don't want anybody sympathy um and there's like
• 1:30:22
  a lot of stories but it was difficult um one of the things was we were just like in this constant
• 1:30:28
  my dad was like constantly we're gonna be in the streets we're gonna be in the streets we're gonna
• 1:30:31
  be in the streets so I kind of grew up with that thing of like we're always on the edge of disaster
• 1:30:38
  you know so growing up with that yeah like it's it kind of messes with your mind as a kid and then
• 1:30:43
  you know the other thing is like culturally I grew up as a Canadian kid so kind of you know
• 1:30:48
  westernized being raised by very like you should know like communist block parents right so it was
• 1:30:55
  this always this like this polarity in my in my life but you know between the two but you know
• 1:31:03
  fortunately unfortunately whatever that whatever that polarity was it created like a perfect
• 1:31:08
  environment you are super entrepreneurial so I don't know how I don't know how you were the
• 1:31:12
  output of this or what what the but it's by necessity sky it's by necessity no it's not by
• 1:31:17
  necessity what do you mean you could have gotten a job I did I got fired you could have got no
• 1:31:21
  they fired me again these fuckers just kept firing me because I was just a terrible employee I just
• 1:31:27
  sucked at it I sucked at it until until I got into my first I got into my first kind of entrepreneurial
• 1:31:34
  thing well my very first entrepreneurial thing was I sold I sold stuffed animals on street corners
• 1:31:42
  yeah yeah so what would happen is a friend of mine when I was in so my first year of college
• 1:31:49
  after my first year of college I think my first year of university I was 19 and I had a buddy of
• 1:31:54
  mine who would he would do is he would go and he would go to Canada's Wonderland never Canada's
• 1:31:59
  Wonderland is like a theme to the Americans it's like a theme park it's like a six flags kind of
• 1:32:03
  situation and he would win stuffed animals like he would win them he would get really good at the
• 1:32:07
  games and he would win them and then he'd go outside and set them up in the parking lot and sell
• 1:32:12
  them that's so funny and so then he eventually got into it where he would like he would win so many
• 1:32:18
  of them that he would hire his friends to sit on the corners selling these animals so I was one
• 1:32:22
  of those friends and he would pay me like a salary you know you pay me like a little commission
• 1:32:26
  and so during the summer of my first year after college part of my time I would spend
• 1:32:32
  pumping gas for a five dollars an hour back then Canadian maybe less and then the other times I
• 1:32:39
  would be on the street corners on the weekends the weekends were the big times for the selling
• 1:32:43
  stuff the animals and I would work for my friend and in the summer after that I decided to go
• 1:32:47
  off on my own I didn't want to compete with him because I felt bad you know he's my friend
• 1:32:51
  and then I want to compete with him and it's set up like in the in the same city as him so I did
• 1:32:55
  it in London Ontario where I was going to school but instead of winning the stuffed animals I looked
• 1:32:59
  at the tags I went to Canada's Wonderland and I looked at the tag of the stuffed animal and I saw
• 1:33:03
  who the manufacturer was so I just went to I called the manufacturer is it hey I want to buy some
• 1:33:08
  stuffed animals and I'm a 19 year old kid and they would sell to like the conclins of the world
• 1:33:13
  and all these big you know and you would have like 18 meal trucks pull up to the back of these
• 1:33:17
  warehouses and Toronto and load up with stuffed animals right and I'm just sitting there I'm like
• 1:33:22
  yeah I want to buy some stuffed animals so yeah I just bought stuffed animals I got like this
• 1:33:26
  crappy little van this like van for 500 bucks my dad lamb but I'm not I love I love these like super
• 1:33:33
  scrappy entrepreneurs stories is actually very fun what's super scrappy I was making 10k a month
• 1:33:38
  I mean 10k a month and that's after the first summer after I worked with my friend that
• 1:33:42
  guys yeah yeah yeah 10k Canadian a month this these many cash cash back in like back in like the
• 1:33:53
  early 90s yeah it's crazy you're pulling 120 on your first no but I only did it in the summers
• 1:34:00
  but I was the man like I was the guy like in college fast do you forget that there's there's
• 1:34:04
  winters in the rest of the world the second you right right right right no so yeah so what
• 1:34:10
  happened was I would buy stuffed animals I haven't talked about this shit in years I would buy
• 1:34:15
  stuffed animals from the same people who would supply all the theme parks all over the all over the
• 1:34:21
  all over actually Canada and the United States these were like manufacturers there were two
• 1:34:25
  manufacturers and at first they didn't want to give me an account and then I just I drove my van
• 1:34:30
  to the back and there was a dude there like hey what's up he's like what's up my hey can I buy
• 1:34:34
  some stuffed animals he's like I fuck it and so he just sold me stuffed animals um did he tell
• 1:34:41
  anybody else that he was selling this stuffed animals that's none of my business that's not
• 1:34:45
  my business fucking amazing but I had a van and when I told you I loaded up that van there was no
• 1:34:50
  more air in the van I had so many stuffed animals each stuffed animal was in its own little plastic
• 1:34:54
  bag and each stuffed animal like I just like if you can imagine the back of a cargo van right
• 1:35:00
  it was just air there was no sorry there was no air it was just stuffed animals stuffed animals
• 1:35:05
  and then what I would do is I would dry back to London because the the suppliers in Toronto
• 1:35:09
  I would dry back to London Ontario and then I would just because it was on one year lease on all
• 1:35:14
  of the student housing over there and I wasn't going to pay the two months for the student housing
• 1:35:19
  like for my apartment in London and then go back to Toronto because in Toronto all my friends came
• 1:35:23
  back to Toronto and so that's where everybody was socializing my I fuck I'm gonna stay in London
• 1:35:27
  so I stayed in London I was a kid in my early early like early 20s and that was my time to party
• 1:35:32
  in the summers but instead of parting in the summers I didn't take any money from my parents
• 1:35:36
  to go to school it was all stuffed animal money and oh sap oh sap oh sap I ran due to a student loans
• 1:35:42
  yeah yeah and so and so yeah I piled the stuffed animals I went back to London I set up on street
• 1:35:52
  corners and I would just saw stuff animals every theft animal arbitrage oh dude I would buy like
• 1:35:57
  no but that's where I developed like sale skills so for example I had what you buy the stuffed animal
• 1:36:02
  on the street corner dude I had all kinds of clients so what would happen is I just if you can
• 1:36:06
  imagine it wasn't like I just opened the back of the van and there were stuffed animals I took
• 1:36:09
  them all out and so if you can imagine a full van full of stuffed animals and then I just laid
• 1:36:15
  them all out on the plastic bags so they don't get dirty but it was like I can't even describe
• 1:36:19
  you how big it was it looked like it looked like a toy store it looked like Barney vomited all over
• 1:36:24
  the looking and I did it with gas station so I would go to the gas station and I'd go to the gas
• 1:36:29
  station attendant right just some random guy at the gas station in the minimum wage guy at the gas
• 1:36:33
  station I'm like hey I'm gonna set up the thing he goes no no the owner no no you can't do it you can't
• 1:36:37
  do it am I giving you kids you see I have a kid oh yeah boys girls we got was I have a boy and they
• 1:36:43
  took out like the little gorilla whatever I'm like why don't you give this to your kid is like
• 1:36:47
  okay and then he just left me alone and I just set up and I just set up I just set up at the gas
• 1:36:52
  station so I had I it was it intersections so I traffic coming in from all sides and people would
• 1:36:57
  stop and it was always an impulse buy because they would see it so I had the advertising in the
• 1:37:01
  marketing was done by the display they would pull in I have parking they would come out and they
• 1:37:07
  would negotiate with me I learned my initial negotiation skills there when somebody would say how
• 1:37:10
  much for this teddy bear and I'd say it's 30 bucks teddy bear's 30 bucks he goes give me for 20
• 1:37:16
  I go look I'm not gonna do it for 20 I go but for 30 bucks why don't you pay me 30 and I'm
• 1:37:19
  gonna give you this other teddy bear here this teddy bear I sell for 10 the meanwhile that teddy bear cost
• 1:37:24
  me a dollar so instead of knocking it down to 20 bucks I basically added another teddy bear that
• 1:37:30
  cost me a dollar so in reality I got my you know I only give him a dollar off do you know what I mean
• 1:37:35
  and I put more product in his hand and so now he would send his friends and he would come back as
• 1:37:40
  he'd come with more animals so I learned kind of basic negotiation basic like honestly like
• 1:37:45
  marketing merchandising like it but this is like the the most important skill for an entrepreneur
• 1:37:50
  to think I mean there's a lot of important skills I know but I think this is one of the most
• 1:37:53
  important but the negotiations were the most fun part the those were the best those were the best
• 1:37:57
  I'll tell you I dude comes in he's in his BMW you know he's looking at me like I'm poor you're
• 1:38:04
  like and I get it cool I'm the guy on the street corner selling stuff to animals he's coming in
• 1:38:08
  you know he's a young kid he's like in his early 20s he's got his girlfriend with him
• 1:38:12
  they come out of his BMW and I already know I already look at this kid it's like okay he lives at
• 1:38:16
  home it's his dad's car or he leases it and all his money goes to the car because he's not
• 1:38:21
  paying rent like I already sized the guy up as he's walking over I see his girlfriend she's looking
• 1:38:25
  around and she's like oh my god I love this one I love this one I love and he comes and goes
• 1:38:30
  hey give me a deal I'm like and so I already kind of a night so a cup I developed that kind of
• 1:38:36
  instinct and I understood yeah I just understood negotiations I understood like you know kind of
• 1:38:41
  what motivates clients I understood how to create value right I understood how to create value in
• 1:38:46
  you know if somebody comes and like they have a child and I'd be like oh okay like what are you
• 1:38:50
  into like I understood how to I learned how to qualify a customer and then provide them with
• 1:38:56
  the best value possible in order to satisfy them and for them to leave that street corner after
• 1:39:03
  buying an animal for me and send their friends over so then what would happen is I would like
• 1:39:07
  people would keep coming back and saying oh my friend was just here and he bought this in this
• 1:39:11
  monkey you know the monkey like yeah do you have any more of those monkeys I'm okay I got more
• 1:39:15
  so and that's where you start learning those skills so yeah that's kind of where I picked it
• 1:39:19
  up from do you think that entrepreneurship is is something you're born with I believe anything
• 1:39:24
  can be developed I became an entrepreneur out of necessity because pumping gas at five bucks
• 1:39:29
  on our wasn't an option I just want to take a second and thank fresh books for supporting today's
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  would apply to a thousand jobs then go find some stuffed animals you just got me thinking about
• 1:41:01
  that kind of that that turning point that inflection point in my life when I said okay I'm gonna
• 1:41:06
  go sell these stuffed animals I never thought of myself as an entrepreneur you know I never did
• 1:41:12
  back then I it never crossed my mind you know what I don't even think I consider myself an entrepreneur
• 1:41:17
  now people ask me what do you do I don't even know what I do the reality is when people ask me what
• 1:41:22
  do you do the real answer is whatever it takes and so I believe that my entrepreneurial journey
• 1:41:31
  me as an entrepreneur it's just it's it's out of necessity it's port out of necessity and it's
• 1:41:35
  port out of just it's constantly wanting more it's wanting more it's this constant I have a constant
• 1:41:42
  need for progress and improvement and so when I look back as you've got me kind of you know
• 1:41:50
  reflecting when I think back as to why what maybe an entrepreneur it's this constant need for
• 1:41:57
  progress and improvement that's it that's what it comes down to for me do I want to be super rich
• 1:42:03
  I mean I like money but but now that I'm I have a couple of bucks it's not what makes me happy
• 1:42:13
  it's not it truly isn't and I truly understand that I don't get bent out of shape like I used to
• 1:42:19
  about not closing the deal I still try as like how I still push everywhere I can
• 1:42:28
  and if I can save a deal I'll save a deal but I don't get bent out of shape if it doesn't happen
• 1:42:33
  anymore I'm okay with it because when I when I assess what truly makes me happy and I I've come
• 1:42:40
  to that point of self-realization it's it's not the amount of money in my bank account it's not my
• 1:42:46
  stuff it's such a hard it's such a hard idea to to put in someone's head when they're just starting
• 1:42:51
  out though but it's it's the right it's the right idea I don't know man I just think things come
• 1:42:56
  when you're not trying to get it it's like the strangest thing it's the same way when like
• 1:43:00
  Valeria turned me down and I stopped trying to get her I got her you know what I mean same thing
• 1:43:05
  same thing like I'd love it if a million people come in off of this podcast and sign up to my
• 1:43:10
  creator method course but I'm okay if they don't like it's you know what I mean like it's not my
• 1:43:15
  intention but then you get into the clichés like you're supposed to enjoy the journey and like it but
• 1:43:19
  it's it is true you can enjoy the journey I just enjoy I just enjoy the shit that matters sure I
• 1:43:24
  can enjoy the journey cool yeah I enjoy the journey but I enjoy the shit that matters you know I
• 1:43:28
  enjoy watching Borat with Ben like I enjoyed that shit you know if you ask me like what's your
• 1:43:33
  most memorable thing it wasn't the X amount of millions of dollars we made in the last whatever
• 1:43:37
  it's the fucking like sitting in watching Borat with Ben and getting laughs with him and like you
• 1:43:42
  know doing like doing shit with with them I don't know man it's it's or like my time with my wife
• 1:43:51
  like I truly love my wife like and I'm truly still in love with my wife we've been together
• 1:43:54
  13 years like to me she's still my girlfriend it's truly that's how I feel like I don't feel
• 1:44:00
  I'm going home to my wife I know I don't even look at her as my wife yeah just going back to my
• 1:44:04
  origin story sorry I started on the stuffed animals and then yeah like so after that you know after
• 1:44:08
  the stuffed animals I ended up like I finished the university I have a degree in geology do you
• 1:44:15
  actually I do I didn't know that yes that is the the most surprising thing I think I'll ever
• 1:44:20
  learn about you do you have a degree in geology I do I have a degree I have a Bachelor of Science
• 1:44:23
  in Geology yeah I'm actually surprised that you wanted to do it for where your degree you know
• 1:44:28
  what I know I didn't I mean my my first motivation to go to university was because two things I
• 1:44:32
  wanted to get out of my house because it wasn't the best situation and everybody was going to
• 1:44:38
  university at the time and I didn't want to be like the loser you didn't go to university so
• 1:44:41
  those are my two motivations and I got accepted to and I was a terrible shit student and by the way
• 1:44:47
  in my final year of university I had failed a course that would make it so I couldn't get my degree
• 1:44:54
  yeah and it was a three-year degree that it took me four years to get I was the four-year degrees
• 1:44:59
  of me five years to get so that's fine okay there you go there you go so but not only did my
• 1:45:04
  three-year degree take me four years to get the like I had failed a course that basically that's it
• 1:45:11
  you can't get your degree so what did I do I went to the I had a friend this girl Rosa lovely girl
• 1:45:19
  she's great she still lives in London I knew that her friend was the daughter of the Dean of Geology
• 1:45:26
  like the geology school had like a dean had a head dude you know so I'm like hey listen can you
• 1:45:31
  tell her I want to talk to her dad like like you know like would you mind I'm meeting I leverage my
• 1:45:36
  network you know and so Rosa's like okay whatever she's got me a meeting I came in there I'm like
• 1:45:41
  hey what's up I go look here's a situation like you gotta give me a passing you just gotta give me a
• 1:45:46
  passing mark on that one course so I can get my degree he goes but not what you failed and I'm like
• 1:45:51
  I don't have any more money I can't come back here for another year like this is a three-year
• 1:45:56
  degree in four years like I'm not exactly like a star student like I've already you know I'm up to
• 1:46:01
  my eyeballs in debt you gotta help me out and you gotta just give me like boost that one grade give
• 1:46:07
  me a passing grade on that one class and just get me like literally pass the goal post so I can
• 1:46:13
  just get my degree and get the fuck out of here and he was like he liked me you know like a you know
• 1:46:19
  I spent some time with him I really told him I sold him you know and uh and he and he and he
• 1:46:23
  passed me and I remember dude I haven't talked about this shit in years I remember I got a job
• 1:46:28
  after that my first job was at a future shop number usually yeah to those who don't know it's like
• 1:46:35
  a circuit city circuit city actually I'm gonna buy them and well no I mean it's like it's like a
• 1:46:39
  best buy sorry like a best yeah yeah it still exists yeah a future shop doesn't exist don't
• 1:46:43
  best buy that that's by bought them and yeah and I remember honestly one of the proudest moments of
• 1:46:48
  my life to date when I after I worked at future shop for a while I would see all these like that
• 1:46:54
  was the first time I touched the computer so I was selling computers at future shop to people and
• 1:46:58
  I didn't know because all my in university all my shit was written by hand I'm a little older than
• 1:47:02
  I know I know we didn't have we didn't have computers in university so the first time I touched
• 1:47:06
  the computer was I was selling them for the first time at future shop and they trained me on what
• 1:47:09
  the CPU is and their RAM and all this shit and so I was selling them and um after that I got
• 1:47:16
  like a corporate job which they eventually fired me from after like less than a year I was selling
• 1:47:20
  like computer hardware to an insurance company and they gave me a laptop and to me that was more
• 1:47:26
  satisfying than like I bought a Rolls Royce after my exit you know and I got this laptop and I was
• 1:47:31
  so proud of my laptop I got into my 1986 Chevy which was half blue and half rust and I drove to
• 1:47:36
  London Ontario and I knocked on the Dean's door and I was so proud I'm like Dean I just want you
• 1:47:41
  to know because you gave me that passing grade and you got me my degree I was able to get a job
• 1:47:46
  look what they gave me I showed him I have a laptop dude I remember this shit it was so funny like
• 1:47:51
  looking at back at it now he was like home so proud I just wanted to show him that his effort
• 1:47:56
  wasn't wasted like the fact that he gave me a break it wasn't wasted like I made something
• 1:48:01
  to myself somebody gave me a laptop yeah do my job then it wasn't my laptop they just gave it to
• 1:48:05
  me so I can work it's a worklaught I know but I was so proud of this work laptop that somebody
• 1:48:10
  actually that's you have me thinking about I haven't thought of this shit in years but like yeah
• 1:48:14
  man that's so look so just fast forward I mean you know from there I I eventually started something
• 1:48:20
  called menu palace dot comwood in late 1999 with a partner with my partner Mike I was like that was
• 1:48:25
  like dot com that was like the beginning of kind of the whole dot com thing so it was an online
• 1:48:29
  restaurant directory and it took me 10 years not not 10 years like eight years to build that
• 1:48:37
  to a business doing like maybe three million dollars or even sales eight years yeah yeah that's a
• 1:48:41
  lot that's a good amount of time well considering I had zero business background I was in my late 20s
• 1:48:46
  at the time when I started that company like 27 and I started that company and we it was just like
• 1:48:52
  grinding it was like my first time I sold to an ad for $59 for the year to a pizza pizza by the
• 1:48:58
  slice place and then one once I got him I went to all of his neighbors and I said this guy's
• 1:49:02
  advertising on my website you should you should do this shit too and so I did it so we built that
• 1:49:06
  up and I was making decent money there what I thought was decent money and I thought that was it
• 1:49:10
  and I was I thought I had crossed the finish line and then in 2012 I had deal find which
• 1:49:17
  was a competitor to group on because you had leveraged the the audience I had leveraged there
• 1:49:22
  was no audience there was a database with maybe 20,000 email addresses there was nothing but I had
• 1:49:26
  relationships with a lot of the restaurants so the daily deal business I saw was going on a
• 1:49:31
  blue group on and we started deal find which is a competitor to group on battle industry kind of
• 1:49:36
  caught fire and in one year we raised 32 million dollars that was and part of that was my exit
• 1:49:44
  because it was a part of it was a secondary that went off the table we raised 32 million dollars
• 1:49:49
  and on a hundred billion dollar valuation on that business after 12 months that's wild so that
• 1:49:54
  was my first real like understanding of what business really was that that was for somebody that
• 1:50:00
  built something for eight years and then the next business goes from zero to a hundred million
• 1:50:06
  dollar valuation to 12 months that can I mean if you don't if you don't deploy that capital gracefully
• 1:50:15
  like you can fuck up a lot personally or both oh I was a complete fuck up I have no I've not
• 1:50:20
  I have no doubt I was gonna say I have no doubt but I was gonna say like just like the the velocity
• 1:50:24
  and the speed that that business moved that would screw up most people well I had I had more money
• 1:50:29
  than I had ever even via I realized that my life that's uh it sounds great oh I bought a
• 1:50:35
  rolls Roy I bought a convertible rolls Roy sounds great when you when you hear the story but when
• 1:50:40
  you're living it it's I made a lot of mistakes yeah I made a lot of mistakes and um yeah I mean
• 1:50:47
  you learn you learn your lessons a lot of money real quick it's it is like the thing is is how did
• 1:50:51
  you get 32 million like you're just because it was you were in a hot category same way I sold
• 1:50:55
  the stuff to animals bro like I don't know like they just like the VCs came to raise for a first
• 1:51:00
  your one company that was like a back in there there was no raise before that that was 32 million
• 1:51:05
  back in 2012 yeah so that was yeah the whole space was on fire and we had probably five or six
• 1:51:11
  different VCs um competing to make this investment and I even dictated like it's funny because it's
• 1:51:16
  not funny it's not funny to the guy who's not my buddy who was my competitor at the time um he
• 1:51:21
  was so bullish he didn't take any secondary like a large piece of that 32 million went to me and um
• 1:51:29
  yeah I just ice like I thank god I had the so you like money off the table in the first
• 1:51:34
  year yeah yeah you know who does this who did this and from from solid core she took money off
• 1:51:40
  the table every single round and I think the more entrepreneurship I think they should too but I
• 1:51:45
  mean that's kind of a young entrepreneur's mistake because you know um so my the my competitor at
• 1:51:51
  the time he uh he didn't and so he had a competing company also in Toronto and he didn't take it
• 1:51:57
  and uh the whole thing ended up kind of imploding on itself and the investors lost their money
• 1:52:01
  unfortunately but um but yeah that's just the way it is and so yeah I negotiated that deal
• 1:52:09
  for myself and my partner um so yeah I was pretty happy with that deal but yeah and then after
• 1:52:14
  that it was like it was a series of different things I had uh I had um that's a stressful that's a
• 1:52:20
  stressful like implosion it was a very stressful implosion yeah nobody nobody asked me about that
• 1:52:26
  actually but yeah that was really stressful because a year after that um we left the company um and
• 1:52:32
  yeah it was like we had 400 employees so we had 400 employees and it was as fast as it was going
• 1:52:39
  up it started going down because there was just really how did it blow up like how did it go
• 1:52:44
  up or down no no no how did it blow up like how did it not work so quickly like you have 32
• 1:52:49
  million dollars yeah 400 dollars is a significant I 400 employees is a significant burn but I mean
• 1:52:55
  you could have you could have kept that going for a couple of years with 32 million there was
• 1:53:00
  complete consumer fatigue because the barrier to entry on that business and the daily deal space
• 1:53:05
  was so low that anybody got into it anybody and everybody got into it I'm still friends with
• 1:53:10
  the some of the competitors like we're still we're still friends Michelle Michelle Romano Romano
• 1:53:14
  Romano from I'm a clear co yeah she was one of our competitors that's how I met her I met her
• 1:53:19
  back then she had a she had a company called bytopia dot c a minus called deal find dot com um
• 1:53:25
  and uh yeah and now she's great I talked to her every now and then um yeah it's like yeah that
• 1:53:31
  whole thing there was just extreme consumer fatigue like what would happen is there was this
• 1:53:34
  one butcher and we would do like $50 for like $200 worth of meat um and he would sell like in one
• 1:53:42
  day we sold a million dollars right and then he got his portion of that million dollars and then he
• 1:53:47
  just fucked up so when that starts happening and it's like for us we're trying to control it and
• 1:53:52
  we were trying to put in systems like checks and balances to control this kind of fraudulent behavior
• 1:53:57
  on the part of our um of our kind of merchant partners but it was just like it was such wildfire
• 1:54:04
  it was impossible to do and then once they're at group on still around but they are like a shell of
• 1:54:08
  what they were yeah they were valued I don't use them they were offered billions by I think it was
• 1:54:14
  Google and they turned it down they turned it then now they're like not they're not nothing they're not
• 1:54:20
  they're not billions right but it was just like the concept of buying a credit in a restaurant for
• 1:54:27
  $20 for ten bucks people went nuts for it people went nuts for it to the point whereas the first
• 1:54:32
  day that I ran my first daily deal it was uh one of the restaurant owners there was my client
• 1:54:37
  the menu palace that I knew and we ran it and in one day we did like $10,000 in revenue which
• 1:54:42
  was very meaningful I was like whoa that's like in one day boom and like easy 10 maybe higher maybe
• 1:54:47
  20,000 and so then while that deal was running I was trying to manage the tech and then I was
• 1:54:51
  running to the car wash to talk to the car wash guy to say hey listen do a car wash that's 50 bucks
• 1:54:56
  do it for 20 bucks and the reason why we were successful is because of my incremental little deal
• 1:55:01
  making right whereas my competitor would go in and do like you know $25 for a $50 credit
• 1:55:09
  and I would say do 20 for 50 right and so then we would run similar deals and I was always
• 1:55:14
  like a little bit better because it was always me at the end going to the merchant doing that
• 1:55:18
  final little that little you know that little push at the end yeah it was very stressful white
• 1:55:23
  quite the roller coaster because I'm sure there's very 32 million obviously VCs have expectations
• 1:55:30
  and I'm sure that was stressful when that whole thing imploded it was stressed but it is it was like
• 1:55:34
  a it was like they were experienced VCs yeah so these are guys with billion hum yeah 32 millions
• 1:55:40
  around the air for them yeah but I can tell you even if it is as as the entrepreneur it doesn't
• 1:55:46
  matter because that's more money than you've ever dealt with in your life and it's still like it
• 1:55:49
  fucks with you that to me you may as well have called it a bajillion like it was just an endless
• 1:55:53
  amount of money for me back then like the fact that somebody trusted me with 32 million I gotta say
• 1:55:59
  like I gotta tell you like to me it just hurt me that I lost their money and it was funny because
• 1:56:04
  I was talking to other like other because when that deal happened I then started gaining access
• 1:56:12
  to people who had a much bigger entrepreneurs right and when I did that and when I told them like
• 1:56:18
  oh like I feel so bad about this they're like we feel bad about I'm like well I feel bad like
• 1:56:22
  I lost their money they come sure like some of them have like families and so that he's like Gary
• 1:56:27
  dude like that month they deployed another $500 million and on the like a 10 other deals failed and
• 1:56:34
  one other one deal in public and made them back all their money and like another $2 billion don't
• 1:56:38
  worry about it you you're good but that's also why I think the like entrepreneurs should raise
• 1:56:42
  from people that are used to investing you know I agree look that to me yeah I would never do a
• 1:56:48
  friends and by the way I never took money before that day and I never took money after that day
• 1:56:53
  I've never raised money from anyone I've never the most I did and this was like a few years ago
• 1:57:00
  one of my bodies he said you should get a line of credit at the bank I'm like I don't want it
• 1:57:04
  and so finally I broke down I got a line of credit that I don't use you know but I have a line of
• 1:57:09
  credit so it's that yeah that that I have to say and like it so let me tell you something really
• 1:57:16
  quick about my wife and I don't think I've told this story publicly before I said to my wife
• 1:57:25
  when I met her it was when I made that first deal for that 32 million and I took my piece of that
• 1:57:30
  and after that when and we got together at that time and so I was under the assumption that there's
• 1:57:37
  another 50 to 100 coming because I still owned a massive piece of the company you raised it at
• 1:57:42
  a hundred million dollar valuation yeah do the calculation pretty money post money right I still
• 1:57:47
  owned a lot of the company and the way that the VCs were telling me like I was this whiz kid we're
• 1:57:53
  gonna sell it I'm gonna make hundreds of millions they're like we already know where you're gonna
• 1:57:56
  invest that you're gonna put it back in our fund we're gonna quadruple that money I was like living
• 1:58:00
  in this dream and everybody was pumping me up and I was like the toast of the town for a little bit
• 1:58:03
  I'd walk into a restaurant I have like ten like you know money managers coming to me like talk
• 1:58:08
  trying to get so I had this like inflated you know sense of like my own accomplishments and I'm
• 1:58:13
  really happy I lived through that because like I feel it's really grounded me now but I said something
• 1:58:18
  to Valeria and I even the Fush would say this but it's kind of too late now I said to Valeria because
• 1:58:24
  it was under the premise that there's all this more money coming and I said to her between us like
• 1:58:28
  I sat down and I'm like you know what that other money's not coming so yeah we did well like I did
• 1:58:34
  well and I have this money this was before we got married before the wedding I said but I still
• 1:58:41
  have to work so it's not gonna be enough for the rest of our lives not not for the way that I
• 1:58:46
  want to live it's not gonna be enough meaning it's not gonna be the easy ride that I thought it would
• 1:58:51
  be from here on in I was 38 years old at the time which was 20 right and I said if you want to back
• 1:58:59
  out of this wedding because I don't want you to feel like that I came to you and like I brought
• 1:59:07
  like I proposed to you under the premise that it's gonna be this other scenario if you want out
• 1:59:14
  I will be like I understand and I'll never tell a soul that that was the case and so your
• 1:59:21
  reputation will not be like the fact that at all she looked at me she goes you were so stupid
• 1:59:28
  she goes I don't care I don't care about the money never say that dumb shit to me again
• 1:59:33
  and that's it and that conversation never happened again and that was it so to me Valeria's like
• 1:59:39
  she's the one like she's real bro like she's I can't even describe to you know I have a picture
• 1:59:45
  I have a photo that's so funny I have a photo when I came to her
• 1:59:49
  and like the first time I told her that it's not happening we're not getting that money and
• 1:59:53
  she hugged me and somebody happened to take a picture so there's a picture of her
• 1:59:58
  it's like my back and I'm hugging her and you can see her long hair and everything
• 2:00:03
  and it's that moment that I told her and I have that picture somewhere so yeah so to me like
• 2:00:08
  that really that just tells you who Valeria is so all of her success and everything it's it's
• 2:00:13
  it's very well-deserved I think that but I think that like that's you know we're talking
• 2:00:17
  about like your entrepreneurship story but I think that the most important thing that most people can
• 2:00:25
  the X factor in a lot of people's successes who they spend their life with
• 2:00:29
  it's the most important decision you're gonna make period hands down there's nothing more important
• 2:00:34
  not who your business partner will be not what business you go into not where you live
• 2:00:38
  not your neighborhood but anything it's who you marry it's totally when you marry
• 2:00:43
  bar none bro but it's it makes or breaks people makes or breaks really not stressed out when
• 2:00:51
  you started working with Valeria that it was gonna put stress no not even like a not even a
• 2:01:00
  a doubt like at all that it would be stressful yeah on your on your marriage and your relationship
• 2:01:07
  so what you know what I mean like so what yeah it'll be stressful having kids is stressful
• 2:01:11
  everything is stressful now you're putting everything into one like all these days going to one
• 2:01:16
  basket all bet on us every day of the week I'll bet on us every single time I'll bet that working
• 2:01:23
  with my wife the person who I love the most in this world will always be more successful
• 2:01:33
  working with her partnering with her teaming up with her than any other scenario I will always
• 2:01:41
  trust that before anything else because think about it I got together with her under the premise
• 2:01:46
  that I'm gonna share a life with her I'm gonna build a life with her I'm gonna make other people
• 2:01:49
  with her I'm gonna we have kids so to me the business is like it's nothing compared to the other
• 2:01:55
  stuff that we do together you don't have kids yet you're not you know right you don't have kids yet
• 2:02:00
  I know but you will and you're gonna understand you can understand that once you have children with
• 2:02:05
  somebody that everything else it's like it's easy man it's it's easy because as much as
• 2:02:12
  valerious career is important and our business is important and all the kind of stuff that we do
• 2:02:17
  as a result of valerious notoriety is important all of it is nothing compared to like our children
• 2:02:25
  so if we can correctly raise our children together or whatever there's our children together
• 2:02:31
  this shit is easy the business is easy because it's so much less important you say I'm saying
• 2:02:37
  I do see what you're saying it takes a certain type of beast though it takes a certain type of
• 2:02:42
  person because I can tell you like well you know what I you know I asked because not only like I
• 2:02:47
  mean if something doesn't work there's stress and you're you can't escape that work stress when
• 2:02:52
  it's literally in the person you share a home with but also now Valeria is like the brand and
• 2:03:00
  before that you were building everything and it was your company and it was your thing but I
• 2:03:05
  had to but I I played ahead in building Valeria's brand too I know I know you did I know you did
• 2:03:11
  but notice how I say I played a hand in it because the last thing I would want is anybody to
• 2:03:16
  think that it was me who created Valeria Valeria was already fully formed I would just happen to be
• 2:03:22
  kind of like I happen to help her I happen to be maybe the vessel to carry who she is but she is
• 2:03:28
  I'm telling you she's brilliant like it's I I I like to be you see what I'm saying right because
• 2:03:33
  like people like want to something like at least for me I have always wanted to do my own thing
• 2:03:38
  and build my own thing but like Gina has her own company too when we come back and forth like should
• 2:03:42
  I spend more time working with her or should I build my own thing and I don't know what the right
• 2:03:46
  answer is you made a decision and I don't know what the right like maybe I should spend less time
• 2:03:51
  dicking around on this show and more time spending it's been more time building MTS it's tough it's
• 2:03:57
  a very tough way the way the way that I look at it is I look at where's the biggest opportunity
• 2:04:02
  right where's the biggest opportunity right and I just go after the biggest opportunity and if that
• 2:04:07
  biggest if for you the biggest opportunity is not whatever you're doing now and it's something
• 2:04:11
  to do with Gina then I would just go and do whatever the biggest opportunity is to me it's not I
• 2:04:15
  don't I don't look at it like is it with my wife not with my where's the biggest opportunity you go
• 2:04:19
  to the biggest opportunity and if you know what I mean like and there's other opportunities opening
• 2:04:24
  up to us right now really like interesting ones but it all is stemming from Valeria I recently
• 2:04:33
  put out a real when I interviewed Valeria and a lot of people don't know this is that when we had
• 2:04:40
  I had a company I had a media company I was reaching like 200 million people a month through a
• 2:04:44
  viral news website that I had isn't like a kind of a partnership with Facebook and then Zuck got
• 2:04:48
  called to Capitol Hill and it was the whole Cambridge Analytica scandal and we had 20% of Facebook
• 2:04:52
  was coming through my domain so yeah that's wild yeah that's a whole other story and so Facebook
• 2:04:58
  called to stop we were working with one of their departments we were living in Toronto they were
• 2:05:03
  in New York they called us they go that's me to talk I'm a door so me and my partner at the time
• 2:05:07
  we went to New York like we have to stop I'm like what do you mean they're like 20% of our
• 2:05:13
  audio 20% of Facebook goes through your fucking domain we have to stop you guys have to stop I'm
• 2:05:17
  like okay we'll tone it down give us 5% they're like no no no you have to turn it off so unfortunately
• 2:05:22
  that business went down but the point I'm trying to make is that when that happened I had
• 2:05:28
  income coming in off of that and I had just put a deposit on we had just veleery and I put a
• 2:05:32
  deposit on a brand new house and even though from a net worth perspective we were good but we had
• 2:05:39
  money tied up here and there and we were we got a mortgage on house oh yeah it's also not fun
• 2:05:44
  one overnight like yeah mine is gone that's never far my my my legitimate salary I took a salary
• 2:05:50
  of normal salary right and that salary was mortgages aren't given against your house your
• 2:05:57
  house is uses collateral mortgages are given on your income right and so and so that dried up in
• 2:06:05
  between when we put a deposit on and when we have the clothes so now we're like I don't know
• 2:06:10
  eight months away from clothes and I have to come up with in the banks like oh you don't show
• 2:06:14
  income you're not getting the mortgage and veleery literally saved their asses again from a
• 2:06:19
  net worth perspective we were fine but we had to show income and so veleery's brand deals were
• 2:06:24
  coming in and we were able to then take income as a result like put her through the corporation
• 2:06:28
  and take a salary for both veleery and I veleery saved the day and so anybody who kind of thinks
• 2:06:33
  loud veleery you know Gary because he was an entrepreneur before he did all this
• 2:06:36
  that's bullshit veleery took the initiative veleery puts in the work you know so I just I
• 2:06:42
  when I talk so enthusiastically about veleery I feel that sometimes it could be misconstrued
• 2:06:48
  that I'm taking like credit whereas I'm a partner but it is veleery I just like it's important
• 2:06:55
  I don't think that I mean just I know you so it's a little bit I'm a little bit biased but I never
• 2:06:59
  got the vibe that you were ever taking credit the question was really like what was the the
• 2:07:04
  reason that made you want to go all in on on her and her brand when you could have easily just
• 2:07:09
  turned around and built something new yourself because you've done it but she's the for you for
• 2:07:13
  she's the fucking best I love that she's in as that I don't know because I couldn't again I go to
• 2:07:18
  where the opportunity was and when I saw her initial traction and I saw the quality of her content
• 2:07:23
  and I saw that first check up in for 10 grand from a sponsor right when she had only tens of
• 2:07:28
  thousands of followers and I looked at this and I'm just like fuck your soul talented and I'm like
• 2:07:32
  this is the biggest opportunity and we have to do this and I asked her about it I said are you in
• 2:07:37
  you don't have to if you don't want to you don't have to go back to being a house I don't care
• 2:07:40
  like I care but do what you got to do what do you want to do like I'm in let's do it and then I
• 2:07:44
  went and that's it and we're like we're doing it and I said you're going to be a household name
• 2:07:48
  and I won't stop until you are like we won't stop and and we're not we're not stopping we're just
• 2:07:53
  we keep going bro you know how much I love what I do I don't think you're nice there I'm I
• 2:07:57
  fucking love you I love seeing her in the spotlight I love seeing her actulate I love when she gets
• 2:08:03
  like an article about her I love it I just I love it I love it because I see what she's built
• 2:08:11
  more than just the money more than just the fame I see the person she's become as a result
• 2:08:17
  from when she started from when she was 26 to where she is now when she's at 34
• 2:08:23
  if you don't understand like I think a lot of people they don't necessarily
• 2:08:28
  have the benefit that I do or have the experience that I do have seen someone as talented as my wife
• 2:08:34
  from when she started in doing something so meaningful to where she is now witnessing that and
• 2:08:40
  being a part of it and helping her through it it's the most rewarding experience I've ever had
• 2:08:44
  that's why you have a beautiful relationship and that's why you have a beautiful family and that's
• 2:08:48
  I mean like this is like I think most people so we have her fucking challenges too I don't want to
• 2:08:54
  be here sitting like you know but I think that most people just want their partner to to be the
• 2:08:58
  be their best I actually think that it causes more stress and a relationship when they don't
• 2:09:03
  feel like their partner is living up to their potential you're right you know it's funny because
• 2:09:06
  but that's a certain personality so I think we're very much the same personality like I love when
• 2:09:11
  G wins like I absolutely love when she wins like I'm trying like every time I get invited on stage
• 2:09:15
  I'm like I'm not speaking unless she's like sitting across from me able to do a panel together I
• 2:09:19
  fucking love it but that's the kind of personality that we are and I think that I think that's a very
• 2:09:24
  healthy way to you're absolutely right listen partners need to support each other I don't understand
• 2:09:28
  and I want to talk about the men you know the men I think are a little fucked up when they don't
• 2:09:32
  support their wives because of their own insecurities and it's interesting because in creator method
• 2:09:36
  like about maybe two or three months ago we do these weekly calls or like the members all come on
• 2:09:40
  and I get on the call Valeria comes from time to time and then we have like you know our other kind
• 2:09:46
  of our CEO and other members of our team mentoring them and it gets personal in there you know it's
• 2:09:51
  it's a group it's like a you know it's like a good container you know and one of the women said
• 2:09:57
  Gary can you help me because you've been such a supportive role like we've seen over the years
• 2:10:01
  through Valeria's content you've been so supportive how do I get my husband on board I'm like what do
• 2:10:05
  you mean she was well my husband's not supportive of this like you know this woman had some
• 2:10:09
  followers whatever and she was making a little bit of money and she was like I really want to blow
• 2:10:13
  up but I can't I don't have a support I go I want to see because it's on the video I go I want to
• 2:10:17
  see a show of hands who else feels that they're husband because it's all women in the you know who's
• 2:10:22
  who else who else is husband or boyfriend is not supporting them in this endeavor and I see like
• 2:10:29
  70% of the screen goes up that's why like it to me that's crazy crazy so you know what I did
• 2:10:34
  you know I said okay I said we're doing a call I want you to invite all of your husbands
• 2:10:41
  on the next call we're doing a separate call from our regular Friday calls
• 2:10:46
  I want I want to invite your husbands who aren't supporting you and I want them on the screen with
• 2:10:52
  you sitting with you and on the next call I want them all here and I want to talk to them with you
• 2:10:56
  there as well I want to have this conversation with them and what I told the women before their
• 2:11:00
  husbands go on the call in that moment I said I want you to know that they probably it's not
• 2:11:08
  because they don't want to I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt that they just don't
• 2:11:12
  know how to support you through this they don't have the emotional intelligence perhaps they don't
• 2:11:18
  have the confidence of putting you in the spotlight and so they're not bad guys please don't
• 2:11:23
  vilify your husbands but get them on a call with me and let me discuss this with them and we go
• 2:11:27
  on a call and I and I just broke it down and I said to them guys here's the size of the opportunity
• 2:11:32
  here's an idea of how much revenue we're generating here's an idea of what like the size of the
• 2:11:37
  creator economy and the hundreds of billions of dollars here's an idea of all of these things
• 2:11:41
  and these are the reasons why you should support your wife or girlfriend whatever
• 2:11:45
  but the main reason you should support this person is because that's your partner
• 2:11:49
  that's why you should support them right and so yeah I'm a big I'm just a big proponent of it
• 2:11:54
  I mean you gave me the benefit of the doubt why do you after you had that call why do you think
• 2:11:58
  that people why do you need to live and felt they weren't supported because I happen to be an
• 2:12:02
  online media so I kind of understood the size of the opportunity um I just feel like I have more
• 2:12:11
  no no no I'm not talking about the size of the webcam talking about why a partner wouldn't support
• 2:12:15
  another partner in their career ambitions I don't understand that but obviously I'm in the
• 2:12:21
  minority if 70% said they weren't being supported it's mostly um happens men don't support women
• 2:12:30
  because I think men have this notion that the woman should a lot of men that have this notion
• 2:12:34
  that women aren't that talented in business unfortunately I think it's disgusting um a lot of
• 2:12:40
  them want their women to just stay at home and take care of the kids while they go off and do
• 2:12:43
  the manly thing um yeah I think that's I think a lot of it is that and a lot of them are just like
• 2:12:48
  they're listen a lot of them are a lot of them are challenged by it a lot of them feel threatened by
• 2:12:56
  yeah right I mean yeah they don't have confidence they don't yeah Valeria is on the front of all
• 2:13:01
  everything yeah I'm in the back and the only reason by the way the only reason I'm even doing
• 2:13:06
  anything right now number one because I just enjoy it but I would be happy being like completely
• 2:13:11
  obscure and hidden and you know and and and running shit I don't need I don't need this I don't
• 2:13:16
  have that I don't feel threatened by it I don't feel threatened by Valeria being the face on the face
• 2:13:21
  of success and I don't feel threatened by it again the only reason I do it is because now we're
• 2:13:24
  developing creator method and creator method is being built largely because we feel that there's like
• 2:13:28
  a massive need for it but as a business um for us we need to do something that's not all on Valeria
• 2:13:35
  so like I you know Valeria comms and she's part of it but it's mostly my time and the
• 2:13:40
  the and we have a now a separate staff for creator but it's just interesting to me it's interesting how
• 2:13:44
  we're so similar I think and how we look at like supporting our partners but when the hell wouldn't
• 2:13:49
  we like what's the point getting married I don't fucking get I don't fucking get like I don't
• 2:13:53
  do hair if G doesn't want to build a business yeah but I want her to enjoy life and have some
• 2:13:58
  meaning and if the meaning the meaning is kids fine if the meaning is go and do uh charitable
• 2:14:04
  nonprofits of fine the meaning is go build a business fine but like I want you to enjoy your life
• 2:14:09
  so if if and also if you are so fucking my op it there's seasons to people's lives too like there
• 2:14:15
  are seasons to people's lives so just because your wife took care of the kids for the past 20 years
• 2:14:21
  doesn't mean that's all she's ever gonna be like you can have others in your life too you're
• 2:14:26
  absolutely right you know sorry I don't mean to interrupt you but like so I have this thing where
• 2:14:32
  I do sometimes I do like one-on-one calls I do like case studies with our members and
• 2:14:39
  so often I see women who have just had kids and who are trying to get back to doing something
• 2:14:46
  so they can feel sane so they can feel like you know or let's say their kids are like now in an
• 2:14:51
  age where they're about to go off the daycare and so they can now they have time and they want to
• 2:14:54
  go back into the workforce and they feel so like um scared and underappreciated trying to go
• 2:15:06
  back and rediscover who they are and they're like scared to create content and they're scared
• 2:15:10
  and they're and they're just they I don't know like it's it's and I have to tell them say you just
• 2:15:15
  spent the last few years having kids raising kids yes your husband was at work nothing much
• 2:15:22
  changed for him meaning he continued to get up in the morning go to work make money come home yeah
• 2:15:29
  there's been big changes for him but for you you have to stop your life because you're the one
• 2:15:34
  who carry the children you're the one who births the children you're the one who has to stay home
• 2:15:37
  and feed the kids and and so why should you feel any kind of because a lot of them feel guilty that
• 2:15:42
  they haven't been contributing financially it's just like weird psychological thing you know
• 2:15:46
  they feel they feel guilty because they haven't been contributing financially and so they're
• 2:15:51
  trying to get back into it and they don't have confidence when they're in front of the camera
• 2:15:53
  and I see it in their content and I'm like I see you're not and then she's like and then
• 2:15:57
  the truth comes out and they start telling me I feel like useless because I've been at home like
• 2:16:01
  useless but they should be having that conversation with their husband and they probably are
• 2:16:05
  you know but I don't think the husbands are the culprits here I just think no I'm just wondering
• 2:16:09
  because they feel that so that that thought is coming from somewhere and that that impostor syndrome
• 2:16:13
  whether or not it because you have you have a cohort of women because of that I mean they'll
• 2:16:18
  come into Valeria's audience right most of them do a creator method now that's what audience but
• 2:16:22
  yeah but it comes from Valeria but I mean that impost it's gonna manifest in every creator in some
• 2:16:27
  way this just happens to be a similar type of impostor syndrome so people have to find a way
• 2:16:32
  like this is why the the person you're with at home is so important the environment the people
• 2:16:35
  the friends that you keep the people that you know you feel comfortable being candid and talking
• 2:16:40
  about like your own psychological shit that you that it's stopping you from putting out content
• 2:16:45
  building a business doing whatever the fuck you want like I think it's very important to put
• 2:16:49
  that stuff out there but if you can't do it in your own home I think that's a huge issue and I
• 2:16:54
  think that partner should check themselves if they don't feel I agree I agree you know it's
• 2:16:57
  interesting like your podcast is all about success at someone building businesses and in your
• 2:17:03
  content you get into the case studies of the businesses you get into like what happens but this
• 2:17:08
  part is largely more I know it is right so just an idea for your content is when your guests allow
• 2:17:16
  it I'm very open because I just happen to be that's just the way I am and that our content is very
• 2:17:20
  like you know open um but I believe that investigating the personal side of business success
• 2:17:29
  and what had to happen in order for the person to be mentally prepared and to
• 2:17:36
  be the mental strength the stability they needed at home the way that they looked at their
• 2:17:43
  situation at home and how they used that in order to succeed like Anne from solid core because
• 2:17:49
  she was on my podcast too and she had the situation the negative situation with her dad and you know
• 2:17:54
  and and so she went on and she used that that experience that negative experience much like I've
• 2:18:00
  used the negative experience of my early life to create something different like you know
• 2:18:07
  the way that like I'll look at the way my father would try to be an entrepreneur where
• 2:18:13
  he was too scared to do certain things he was very risk averse and so I as a result became very
• 2:18:19
  like risk friendly and I'm like oh hey let's do it let's do it let's burn the bridges let's do
• 2:18:23
  and so I used you know I did I didn't even do it consciously I just naturally kind of my reaction
• 2:18:28
  to the way he did things you know and like and so I think that when you're talking to your guests
• 2:18:35
  if I may make a suggestion I humbly is that try to get into these these stories yeah I try to
• 2:18:41
  try to get into it because try to find out because like on my podcast when I interview I also
• 2:18:45
  like I interview successful people um and I get into it there's this one guy me how bursky
• 2:18:51
  you know me how no me how bursky sold his he hit a shampoo for curly hair oh no you mentioned
• 2:18:56
  his I know this yeah yeah I sold it for 150 million to hell enough Troy um this guy
• 2:19:03
  he was he was born and grew up in communist Poland yeah and he was telling me how he was hustling
• 2:19:10
  collecting bottles empty bottles and like caching them in for like pennies and that's how we fed
• 2:19:15
  himself because his family was so broke and so getting into that story into that those hardships
• 2:19:21
  and understanding what he had to do and following that path in his life to take him to his success
• 2:19:27
  it's fucking wild man it's just wild to understand how the mind works to take you and the other
• 2:19:33
  thing I want to say is that what I find with entrepreneurs uh with successful people as a whole
• 2:19:39
  is that and I find it across the board the more difficult the circumstances that they came from
• 2:19:46
  or had to endure the more successful they are later the more successful they are later I know
• 2:19:53
  somebody who did time real time and one of the most successful guys I know he got out of that
• 2:20:00
  and he just built something beautiful like and he did really well and and you know people who
• 2:20:05
  like like me how who was like trading bottles for nickel stuff eat himself like so you know there's
• 2:20:11
  and this I don't want to I don't want to beat this topic to death there is like an art to bring
• 2:20:15
  these stories out of people I think I think the whole goal of podcasting well is to create an
• 2:20:20
  environment where people feel safe talking about this stuff yeah but that is with you and I just
• 2:20:25
  we know each other yeah would I have opened up like this yeah you know with a stranger maybe maybe
• 2:20:29
  not I don't think so though but sometimes when you listen if if you if you open up yourself to as
• 2:20:35
  an interviewer and you speak about your own like I didn't really speak about a lot of my own stories
• 2:20:38
  here but if I didn't know you and I have them as before so some people if you listen to some of the
• 2:20:44
  past interviews I had some people go deep and some people talk about very personal things but a lot
• 2:20:49
  of it a lot of it is when I like to for me to get that out of somebody I have to open up and tell
• 2:20:56
  like some really personal stories too so that they feel like it's a safe space yeah that's a
• 2:21:00
  strat is that's the art right and that's the thing is like you've done this so many times like
• 2:21:04
  you're good you know you're you're good at it then but it's just being a conversationless and
• 2:21:09
  genuinely caring that half of it too yeah at that half of it I think that absolutely now I
• 2:21:14
  enjoyed this this is a lot of fun this was a long time coming so you're gonna come on my podcast
• 2:21:19
  that I'm gonna go I'm gonna go you know we could you know I I think that we could actually do
• 2:21:24
  another one like if you want to come back and do like a part two seriously I'm flattered by the
• 2:21:29
  way thank you no serious I'm just curious what do you feel we missed I was I think that what I
• 2:21:34
  wanted to pull out from you that we danced around but didn't really get into is lessons from
• 2:21:42
  growing Valerius brand and like why her content did so well because she did exceptionally well
• 2:21:49
  and we talked about authenticity and whatnot but I think like some more tactical stuff that worked
• 2:21:53
  really well for her tactical stuff we can definitely get into yeah a lot yeah yeah we can get
• 2:21:58
  into it there there is some tactical stuff yeah so we can definitely get into that but if I may
• 2:22:03
  make a suggestion not to put you on the spot you shouldn't invite Valeria here too believe me she's
• 2:22:07
  far more interesting than I am I'll have Valeria at any time okay seriously I time I'll let her know
• 2:22:12
  I'm gonna see her right now okay I see her all the time people can find you on Instagram all
• 2:22:18
  of your handles are gonna be in the show nois is there anything else you you wanted to leave people
• 2:22:21
  with some logic words of wisdom words of wisdom I don't know man I'm still seeking for mine like
• 2:22:27
  you know it's it look at the end of the day it's it's never ending I used to romanticize the
• 2:22:32
  finish line you know the I to me the finish line was like to have so much money that you can do
• 2:22:39
  nothing and live off the interest and I know a lot of people who have achieved that but they're
• 2:22:43
  you know I used to romanticize that but the more people I know who have achieved that and to
• 2:22:49
  a certain degree I guess I've achieved the tube but it's just it wouldn't be the way I'd
• 2:22:54
  want to live it wouldn't be enough the interest off of my network you have a number it's not a
• 2:23:02
  number it's a scale of lies because some people have numbers like I'm talking that so Vivian too
• 2:23:09
  she's she oh you had her I think Valeria had her yeah it feels great she's like her numbers 20
• 2:23:13
  million yeah because if you do the math her fuck you number yeah fucking numbers like four to five
• 2:23:17
  percent interest so you're making a million bucks yeah yeah so the problem with the number
• 2:23:25
  especially the number that's required to be able to like live off of let's say like a
• 2:23:30
  treasury bond at 5% yeah if that was you know the problem is is that the top gets higher the more
• 2:23:36
  that you climb which is something the little Wayne said in one of his one of his records but
• 2:23:41
  I think that's the case I don't I don't I don't contemplate this I don't contemplate it because
• 2:23:46
  it's irrelevant it's nothing it's a fugasi fugasi whatever it's like you know from the movie from
• 2:23:51
  Donnie Brasca it's meaningless it's meaningless at the end of the day it's like the people that I know
• 2:23:57
  that have that number that they can live like they're not happy I recently spoke with a body of mine
• 2:24:03
  who hangs out with like like senior billionaires there's billionaires and there's senior billionaires
• 2:24:11
  and he told me he's like dude they're all unhappy they're all unhappy
• 2:24:14
  because now they're at a point that's like they have to keep going and they don't even want to
• 2:24:18
  they have to it's political it's this it's that I don't know I just I measure my life
• 2:24:23
  differently now than I used to I just I just measure it differently I saw I mean the words of
• 2:24:28
  wisdom is like I don't know everything so cliche right now just you gotta you gotta just keep going
• 2:24:36
  and enjoy yourself man I just prioritize different shit now I prioritize my son and my cold
• 2:24:40
  punch you know my kids my wife your bike my bike is the best fucking thing man I told you I'm
• 2:24:47
  gonna about to get a second one yeah you know you know you know I know my wife's the one why
• 2:24:52
  she's awesome why because I said to her I'm gonna go to motorcycles she's like all right
• 2:24:58
  you know why she said that because she knows she can either argue with me and I was gonna say
• 2:25:03
  she gave up she gave them on arguing she didn't give up because she knows that she can either
• 2:25:07
  argue with me and I'll get the motorcycle or she can just say okay and I'll get the motorcycle
• 2:25:11
  listen I think when it comes to motorcycles all she wants is it for you to stay alive
• 2:25:15
  clearly the she asked me try to try not to buy yeah so I did my I'm doing my best I got all the
• 2:25:20
  safety gear I got all this kinds you go to war with what you're wearing dude I got you know the
• 2:25:25
  only thing I'm not wearing is my airbag best because I'm only like 10 minutes right away so I'm
• 2:25:28
  like I won't when you followed it it uh well I'm not not now I'm not wearing it I don't I don't
• 2:25:33
  wear it here but yeah when you fall it's got a sense or it it blows up it yeah it's great it's great
• 2:25:38
  it's great I'm not gonna invite you to get your motorcycle license I think those you know I think
• 2:25:42
  Gina has to get over that I'm just scared of Gina if I wasn't so fearful of Gina because she like
• 2:25:48
  I you know I've seen her and the same same part of the world I know I'm aware of who who you're
• 2:25:52
  who your girl is bro so I'm I'm staying cool I'm like the last thing I want to do is like you know
• 2:25:57
  have you say to her listen I'm gonna get my motorcycle license as soon as you say that you only
• 2:26:01
  don't have to mention my name she's gonna be at my door we know she knows I don't pull this
• 2:26:04
  game from some kind of a blunt weapon lesson though you know everything else she's fine with she's
• 2:26:09
  okay with getting a beautiful mage and David from David German he's okay with cold plunge and
• 2:26:17
  sauna she's okay with getting some nice guns and going shooting she's okay with kids she's okay
• 2:26:23
  with nice house like she's okay with all that the motorcycle is the one thing I don't blame her
• 2:26:27
  I don't blame her but I'm I'm old but but as a as a couple friend you are a net positive influence
• 2:26:33
  on us because in Miami there's a lot of great people that are not good influences that's
• 2:26:39
  apparently that's so you're good you're I'm a good influence because I like I rarely leave my
• 2:26:43
  house because I'm with I'm with our kid that is again I'm in a sauna in a courtroom and you're
• 2:26:47
  overdue by the way I just you know I just set the temperature I'm actually getting a second cold
• 2:26:52
  why for women in short what do you mean this one kills the average woman child what it
• 2:26:58
  no no because mine's at 40 degrees yeah and that's just difficult that's like oh that's hard
• 2:27:03
  it's hard for me when I did that cold plunge where we were what I did the selfie video at your house
• 2:27:08
  yeah but when I put the ice in there and then I looked at the temperature that's that is far
• 2:27:13
  below what a cold plunge is supposed to be yeah I know I'm just I didn't realize it was so cold
• 2:27:18
  why would you do it if you're not being extreme about it I don't know I don't know the
• 2:27:23
  science of cold plunge I don't know but who cares about the science it's it's more than a science
• 2:27:26
  the health benefits I think once if it's cold in the like 50 degrees it's it's there's no
• 2:27:31
  additional health benefit yeah but if you're good if you if it's a a degree difference when you
• 2:27:35
  being able to skate on it and dive in you have to wonder if it's like a little bit too cold
• 2:27:40
  but what's too cold that's just that's in your mind it's not real past that I know this is great
• 2:27:45
  but what's the point in doing something if you don't go hard you know do they agree what's
• 2:27:49
  they point if these little sissy cold plunge is it like with all respect like I don't want to be
• 2:27:53
  that guy but like you know 50 degrees that's why I said I'm gonna get a cold plunge for women
• 2:27:57
  and children because what happens is Valeria can't use the cold plunge because it's too cold
• 2:28:02
  and my kids won't get into it he's also like like a tenth of your size yeah so what I mean but
• 2:28:07
  like like there's there's less distance to travel from the cold so like you can stay in for
• 2:28:12
  shorter periods of time that's her prerogative but she doesn't want to do it on I respect that's
• 2:28:15
  where we're getting a second cold plunge and I'm gonna have it at like 50 55 degrees so my family
• 2:28:20
  and my friends hopefully you won't be in the camp who use the kids the kids go women in kids cold
• 2:28:25
  plunge and you'll use the man's cold plunge and you and I can take turns in the man's cold plunge
• 2:28:30
  but yeah that's that's what it is