Shaan's Apology To MrBeast, The Answer to 'What Startup Should I Start?', and Steven Bartlett Explained
I have to formally and humbly apologize to MrBeast. So here's the situation. All right, let's jump in. I have a bunch of topics here. Um, I gotta start with an apology. I have to formally and humbly apologize to MrBeast. So here's the situation. We've talked about it a little bit before. Uh, back when we did Camp MFM, we invited MrBeast. Um, and I should say invited, meaning, uh, we invited ourselves to his house, uh, basically in order to do it. We were like, oh yeah, we're gonna do this. He's like, yeah, that'd be cool. But you know, schedule's a little crazy. I'm interested, but you know, not in LA because I'm in North Carolina. We're like, oh, coincidence. What town do you live in? That's where we're doing it. And so we went out there, had a good time. One of the things that happened was I made him the, I, we were touring Duke's campus and we were on, on their basketball court and I made him a bet that I could, I could make a half-court shot before he did for $10,000.
Very stupid bet. He, he, he stood to gain nothing and you stood to gain everything.
Well, he could get $10,000 also.
Oh, I didn't know that you had to pay him $10,000.
All right. Yeah. Yeah. It was whoever made it first. Um, so, so put 10 grand up. He's like, I had learned this over the course of a few days. He's like me. He's a, he's a bit of a degenerate gambler. Like, uh, I think his company, they have like a separate bank account where it's like, yeah, Beast, you could gamble this, but don't, don't touch the main stuff. Uh, and that's all money he already won from gambling. So they're like, look, that's your house money to play with.
Petty cash.
Petty cash. Um, I think, although I think the petty cash was like 7 figures if I was correct. So anyways. Bet him this amount, hit the shot, glorious moment. And then it's like, we're so busy there, we just go back to doing the camp. And it's like, yeah, cool. You know, I'll pay you. And I was like, great. Yo, baby, that's what he does. And so he didn't right away. And so I was like, and everybody, all the other people on the trip were like, yo, that was awesome. Awesome moment. Did he pay you? And I had to just be like, no, no, not yet, but he's good for it for sure. Right. He's good for it.. And, and so that became the running joke was like, no, no, he didn't pay yet, but, but he will. And, and I brought it up on the podcast because I talked about this on the, on our end of year awards as like a highlight moment was saying, dude, I bet you I can make the shot in half court of Cameron Indoor Stadium, this hallowed college basketball stadium, and just having the balls to make that bet and then having the, the, the, the luck of hitting it. Was a high moment. And I said the low moment was following up like 3 weeks later and be like, hey man, hey, hey, um, you got that? But yeah, no, no rush, but you got that money? Yeah, this wasn't a fake bet, this was a real bet, bro. Like, you know, first said it in a joking way, like, ah, bitch, you better pay my money. Then 3 weeks later, like, hey, did you pay? And so then I was like, oh man, low moment was being the— like, having to follow up and being like, basically begging for the cash. So did he pay? He was cool the whole time. He was just like, oh yeah, my bad. I'll have my assistant pay. And I was like, yeah, no problem. Cool. And so that joke, I said that joke on the podcast and then people have been referencing it like, like later, like people will, I don't know why listeners reference it. They tweet about it every once in a while. And so I guess he saw this tweet recently and this is now like many months, it was like 6 months later. Yeah. And he was like,, somebody was, somebody tweeted out this whole story, this whole thread. They go, you know, I, I realize why the MrBeast not paying you stories like didn't sit right with me. And it's because you, Sean, also stood me up. You said you wanted to invest in my thing and that we should talk. And then I followed up 3 times over email asking, be like, hey, you said you wanted to invest and like, let's talk, let's talk. And you haven't replied to 3 of my emails and like, you're ghosting me just like he's ghosted you., not cool. And if you want to, you know, make things right, you should take that call and you should invest in my company. And so he kind of put this out there as a bit of a ballsy tweet thread. And, um, MrBeast saw it and he DM'd me. He's like, what are you talking about? Like, I paid you like a while back. What do you mean? And I was like, what? Oh, and I went and I checked. Oh dude, you dog. So I had given him a Bitcoin, like a fresh Bitcoin wallet. Cause he's like, I'll pay you in Bitcoin. And I was like, all right, no problem. And I'd given him a Bitcoin wallet and I never checked this thing. 'Cause like, you know, who checks like a random Bitcoin wallet you created? He paid me back in November. And so for months I've been like telling this joke about the like, hey, you know, just, I know you probably meant to do it, but you didn't do it yet. Just when you get a chance, no, no rush. When you get a chance, just would love to—
You think he's pissed at you?
No, I don't think, I don't think he gives a shit in the same way that I didn't actually give a shit. I just thought it was funny. Like, like, um, the other thing we learned at, at that camp with, from that guy Hasan Minhaj, the, the, the comedian, he goes, comedy is all about low status. And I remember that and I took that. I was like, oh, my comedy is usually trying to be cocky funny. Like somebody says something and I say, how do not, like, you know, like you were like, you don't know about pop culture. And I was like, bro, I am pop culture. Right? Like it's more cocky. But actually what I learned from Hasan was that low status is actually a more, a funnier, more endearing way to, to, to, you know, sort of win people over. So telling this story about like, yeah, then I had to follow up and it turned from this cool moment to this incredibly lame moment. That was a low— it's a, it's trying to do a low status comedy thing. But then I realized I had been wrong the whole time. He, he paid me in November. So, so, uh, yeah.
Whoops. Damn, dude. That, that's a nice, that's a pretty big mess up. You're just disparaging this guy.
Yeah, I was slandering the dude left and right, just saying, uh, you know, at least I pay my debts, uh, right? Like, you know, I was, I was joking around like that, but, uh, but incorrect. He paid.
All right, well, we have an end.
Happy ending. Happy ending for all involved.
Yeah, I, I was shocked that you were saying that on air, by the way. I chose— yeah, that he didn't pay. I was like, I'm— this is gonna make it play to him.
I didn't just say it randomly. People asked, they go, did he pay? And then I'm like, oh, what am I gonna say? Yes. No. If I didn't think he paid, I was gonna say no. I wasn't just like proactively being like, by the way, call out, you know, that, that's not how it was.
I appreciate, you know who I, uh, sometimes, you know, it's just the people listening. It's just Sean and I basically in a Zoom right now. We're on a riverside. So just us talking. And it's very easy to forget that there's other people who will hear this. I found myself saying stuff all the time. Yeah.
You get real comfortable.
You get very comfortable. And I admire Joe Rogan. I don't listen to a ton of Joe Rogan, but I do watch some of his clips. And he does a really good job of— he rarely disrespects people. He'll say like, oh, they just have a difference of opinion. It's all good. Or he'll say— someone will bring up, hey, did you hear how this person was talking trash? And he'll just say, oh, you know, that's funny. That's funny. He does a really good job of not picking fights. And I saw in your thing on your list, you have this kind of fight that started. And it looks like I started it. I, and I don't want it to come off that way, but basically, um, on this pod, I try never to like pick fights, or if I do pick a fight, it's like, I'm actually gonna go to battle with this. And you have this, uh, what's the guy's name? Stephen Bartlett thing on there.
Yeah. Yeah.
Let's talk. You wanna bring that up? Yeah.
By the way, I, I, I actually wanna say this, uh, you're right that when it's me and you just talking like this and there's nobody else here, it's really easy to get comfortable. You forget, oh cool, 150,000 people are listening, right? If I was in front of an audience, if I could see 150,000 people, there's no way I would feel as comfortable and as loose making jokes or, or saying something or like, I'll do this often. It's gotten me in a lot of trouble actually.
Yeah. You say shit, it's bad.
And I decided as long as I'll, as long as I'm saying something that I actually think, Um, I'm going to carry on in that way because, uh, I don't usually think negative things about people.
Well, the way that I do it nowadays, and the pod actually taught me this, which was if I'm going to talk negatively about someone behind their back, I better be ready to say it to their face. And so I work really hard to only say things privately that I'm okay saying to that person or even publicly sometimes. And that's the takeaway. I think it was, have you heard the story of like Abe Lincoln? Basically he like talked trash about some guy and they're like, I challenge you to a duel. And he's like, shit, I don't wanna go to a duel. And so he's like, dude, I'm sorry, I'm afraid. I don't wanna fight you. And then he's like, that's it. I'm never talking trash about people. And I remember reading that and I'm like, that's a good sign. And talking trash is easy. I do it every once in a while just 'cause I'm human. But if you're gonna do it, you gotta, we gotta be able to say it to their face. And so that's kind of my rule that I try to live by, but it's very hard to, to follow. But all right, you want to talk about the Bartlett thing?
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So you tee it up because I think you tweeted it out. So what's on your mind?
There's— well, nothing. I was just curious. But basically there's a guy named Steven Bartlett. He's got a pod that's quite good. It's mostly a YouTube thing, I think, but pretty good. He's interviewed interesting people. Background is he had a company called Social Chain, which there's a long story about it that we've talked about before, where he basically owned, among other things, a bunch of Twitter handles and he could help make a make a product popular or a TV show popular by sharing it amongst all the Twitter handles, whatever. It's an agency. It was relatively successful. It was definitely successful. He was like kind of a prodigy. It, uh, ends up getting acquired and the company that acquired it did like some type of reverse merger. It goes public at its peak, hundreds of millions of dollars. An article came out on Thursday, and by the way, this guy Steven, he worked for Sean as an intern when he was 21 years old. And we've said fun stories about that. Uh, an article came out that said this thing was sold for $8 million, and I shared, I go, whoa, this thing was only sold for $8 million? I thought this was like a publicly traded company for hundreds of millions. I'm a little confused. What's the story here? And people got pissed. Not at me. They got pissed at him saying, um, this guy's saying he's built up a $300 million company and they listed tons of evidence saying otherwise. And I didn't actually look into the evidence. I don't know the truth, but people were really angry at that. And, uh, it was, it was, it was pretty wild to see.
Yeah, I think the— so you, uh, I think you framed it well. There's basically two things going on here. One, as somebody gets really famous, the target on their back gets bigger. And so he's become more and more famous. He, uh, has a very big kind of social media presence. I think he's got like a million followers on Instagram or Twitter or something like that. Um, LinkedIn, he's big as well.
He's on the Shark Tank of England.
Yeah, he's on Dragon's Den, which is like Shark Tank in, um, in Europe. So he's like well known there. He, uh, wrote a book. He, you know, he's like doing things. He goes on, he has this podcast. He goes on these like tours basically where he like speaks. He's a guy, I call him the black Gary Vee. Uh, he's like very much like Gary Vee in my opinion. And in the same way that some people knock Gary Vee of like, bro, you didn't build your, you know, you didn't build a business, your, that was your dad's business that you were just the marketing guy for. And he's like, Well, actually, like the business was really small and then I started Wine Library TV and it grew much bigger. You know, there's people who come out and say, oh, you're not as you represent yourself. And so when you see this headline that, oh, his agency sold for $7 million, you're like, bro, what? $7 million? Like what? Why are you representing yourself as much bigger than you are? And, um, the explanation I think is kind of simple. So here's the explanation. His agency was called Social Chain. When they got acquired, they renamed the larger company, which didn't have as much of a public-facing brand, Social Chain Group. And so Social Chain Group was a bigger business that did many things, had many agencies underneath, um, had some, you know, uh, had some other things that there's an e-commerce, there's a big e-commerce business that was with it. They sold, they had like a mattress company basically. And most of the revenue like comes, came from the e-commerce side and a smaller slice of the revenue came from the agency size and even a smaller size came from his specific agency called Social Chain. I think when he sold, when, when Social Chain got acquired or whatever by the larger group, I think they were at roughly $9 million a year in revenue, something like that. And that was maybe 2 years in and it was like a great upstart story. It's a, it was like 20 employees all under the age of 25 doing this cool disruptive social media, you know, marketing at the time. And, uh, this is a, you know, 2014, 2015, and then, you know, got acquired by this bigger thing. Those guys had an e-commerce business and so naturally they're like, oh great, this marketing agency is a good business to have. It'll help our businesses. Plus it brings in, you know, revenue alone from its, uh, service business. Um, and I think where he went, so I think the, the simple explanation is yeah, his business got acquired. Um, The overall business did a bunch of revenue. His agency did not. Uh, but you know, he was a key player in that overall group. I think he was co-CEO of the group, of the group. The group was, you know, one of 4 or 5 divisions. So he was kind of like a division head at, uh, of, uh, of a larger company. Okay, great. Where I think he went wrong is there's like a clip of him on Dragon's Den and the other guy's like, do you even know anything about business? And he goes, know anything about business. I built a $300 million company by the age of 28. Um, and that's like the clip that the guy, you know, some people on Twitter circulating being like, ah, okay, I didn't see that. You're full of shit, dude. You didn't build a $300 million business. There was a $300 million business that acquired your small agency. To that I say, they are correct. He did get, yeah, I, I mean, to me that's like a very, maybe it's just relatable because I've been in those situations where I kind of like, I feel insecure in a moment, and I can imagine being a young guy on TV and then the other investor says, what do you know about business? I could see your insecurity flaring up in a moment there and try to say, try to puff your chest out and say the biggest thing you can, even though it's not technically true. It'd be like when we got acquired by Twitch, it's like, and you know, I, and then I ran a division at Twitch. It'd be like me saying I ran, you know, I built or ran a $5 billion company, right? That would not be true, that would just be like, you know, um, puffing my chest out in a way that's misleading.
So I think— you got the ER. I was, uh, a builder on a $3 billion company. You were, you were a builder, right?
I was a part of a company that, that was— I joined a company 13 years after it was founded. And, uh, you know, I was early. So, but, but I've, I've felt that, for example, I've, I, I feel silly about this now, which is that when we got acquired, the deal was set, the deal was a no, uh, was no, like, no PR, like, no, no disclosure of the terms. Um, but somehow it got leaked to TechCrunch and I think a couple others that we, we got acquired. And, um, they put a price in there of $25 million, and the price was not $25 million, it was less than that.
Um, but the answer's got to be no comment.
But I was like, I could have corrected it. So I could have gone and said, no, it wasn't that. I didn't even have to say what it was. I could have just, in retrospect, I could have just said it's lower than that, but I can't disclose. Instead, I just said, hey, I can't say anything about it. I'm not, I'm not allowed to say anything. And Twitch also said that I'm not allowed to say anything. And so it just sat out there and a bunch of people were like, wow, great exit, $25 million. And I'm like, yeah, that would have been a great exit. Uh, it's still good, but less good than that. So that's not the accurate number. And that's still just what sits out there today is that people think that that's what the number was. And it kind of benefited me. I remember in some ways, and every time it benefited me, I felt guilty and just like, it was also a weak move to like, uh, take a representation that makes something you did seem greater than it actually was. Um, So I didn't like that. And, but I can under— I can relate to this moment where you like the ego part of you or the insecure part of you wants to feel like something is— wants to say, no, I did a great thing. Um, so, you know, I, I understand where he's coming from in that, in that point of view, but I don't really see what the controversy is besides that. I think it's just like, is the dude more famous than what he did with his agency? Yeah, probably. But he's famous because he's amazing at creating content and he's a great, like, he's, he's a great brand builder. He's built his own brand.
How old is he? He's only 28, maybe.
Yeah, he's like, yeah, mid to late 20s, something like that.
So, I mean, I'd say you're doing all right, dude. Yeah, he's, he's pulled it. He's pulled it off.
I think, I think the haters have a point. Yeah, he did overrepresent. He did overrepresent in some ways. Yes, that's true. Every time he says, I built a company worth hundreds of millions of dollars, it's not really true. Um, you know, and then he probably knows that.
He's a very hateable guy. Not because I dislike him. I actually like his content, but I think he's hateable because he's young. He's good looking. He's successful. He's pretty cocky. Nah, I don't know, cocky, but like confident. I mean, you know, it's easy to hate people. Uh, so yeah, he's, he's a, he's in some regards a very hateable guy.
Yeah. When you have everything that people want, uh, that's what I mean.
Yeah.
Okay. You've got money, fame. Looks, charisma, whatever body, what else is there? I'm not sure. I'm not sure he is really missing anything. So yeah, there's a natural visceral reaction some people have to that, which is like either A, it can't be all good. There's gotta be something wrong and I'm gonna find it. Or B, fuck that guy. I'm tired of seeing him on my Instagram feed.
What's this financial freedom thing? That you wanted to talk about?
Let me do, let me do two. Okay. So I want to, uh, I want to do this story about this, uh, this woman I met who I think has a really cool, cool business. So, um, a couple podcast episodes ago I said, hey, I got this idea for a D2C business. It would be best run, I think, by a woman who's like got it because it's a, it's a product for women. Um, and uses my, my, my joke, which is like, uh, I don't know how to pitch it exactly. So I'm just, it's like a normal thing, but beautifully done. Like just imagine like, you know, pens, but just beautifully done. Right? Like, and it's true. Like that's part of the shtick of this product is it's just like, it's well packaged and well made, uh, beautifully done. And so anyways, I got a bunch of inbound and I, I joked about it. I was like, oh, to our 4 female listeners, If you're out there, this could be an idea for you. Um, and a bunch of people replied, maybe 20, 30, 40 people said, hey, what's the idea? I wanna hear about it. Uh, here's my background. And one woman had a really interesting background. So her name, I think is, what is this? Sarah Michelle, something like that. Um, she started this business. I'll pull up her, her name. Yeah. Sarah Michelle. So she, she built this business called NP Reviews. I'm guessing you've never heard of this, but no, here's why it's interesting. She basically built a course prep business and sold it for more than $10 million in 2 years. And I just think that's kind of a badass move to pull off. You don't hear of a lot of course-based businesses that sell at all, uh, let alone sell for 8 figures in 2 years. And what she did was basically she built like Cap— like Kaplan, like the test prep thing for nurse practitioners.
So it's called, um, It's called NP Reviews, as in Nurse Practitioner Reviews. Pass your nurse practitioner exam the first time. Stop stressing and start studying smarter with our proven exam review courses.
Awesome. Exactly. So she basically says, yo, you're in school to become a nurse practitioner. You have a, the, the, the big test is coming up. It's like your version of MCATs or LSATs if you're a lawyer. Um, the nurse practitioners have that same thing and it's like, Great. Take, you know, work with us and you'll pass. They have a 99% pass rate amongst their students. So they're like, you know, don't worry. She's like, don't worry, I was in your shoes. Wow. This is awesome. I was stressed about this and I passed. And if I could pass, you could pass. I've helped so many people pass since then. Um, and what she does is it's basically a funnel where she's got ads about this and content about, uh, about, you know, this exam or, or becoming a nurse practitioner, which leads you to this landing page, which says, Don't stress, we got you. 99% pass rate. Um, we help you pass your upcoming exam. And then she funnels you into a Facebook group. So basically it's like, join the group of 25,000 other people who have passed this exam. And, um, you join the Facebook group and you buy one of the courses. So you can buy this like $300 a month one, $130 a month one, $100 a month one, whichever one you want, uh, that fits like whichever test you're planning to take. Built this thing up, sold it to a company called Blueprint that basically is rolling up these test prep things. And, um, I just thought that's an amazing exit and I'm, uh, I'm super impressed.
And here's why it's awesome. If you go to the bottom right, it says powered by Kajabi. That's a $100 a month software that anyone can get. They have a 30—
the president of Kajabi listens.
He, uh, messages me. Oh, I know. Yeah. He DM'd, he DM'd me as well. So it's a $100 a month software and they have like a 30-day trial. So you could even like not pay and just like, get your, get courses like spinning up and then making some money. So the website, it, it's fine looking, but it's not like you could make this without a designer. Uh, the copy is pretty solid, very clear problem.
Copy is very good. Copy is very good.
Like, yeah, I haven't read it all, but it looks decent.
Look at the, like the, just the headline, just a quick copy thing. So put this up on the screen on YouTube. So go to MPReviews.com. Just wanna point this out. So The headline says, pass your nurse practitioner's exam the first time. So what is it? It, you know, leading with a, the outcome or the benefit you want versus talking about yourself. She could have said, we are a test prep, uh, you know, a 6-week test prep program, get with, uh, live online classes and a community, blah, blah, blah. That's how most people pitch their products. They talk about themselves. She talked about the outcome. Then the second thing, stop stressing and stop stu— start studying smarter. With our proven ANCC and AANP exam review courses. Okay, great. Stop stressing. So hits the emotional, like the emotional state you're in and tells you, you know, the emotion, the better emotional state you're gonna be in. And then after that, she basically is like, I did it. You could do it. I've helped these 500 people do it. Here's some testimonials from them. Here's some pictures of their faces. And they're holding up their like certificate that says I passed. And they're like, thank you, Sarah. You helped me pass my exam. And then she's like, there's, there's like a founder letter. I've been in your shoes, feeling anxiety as you prepare for your nurse practitioner boards. You're not alone. The stakes are high and these tests aren't easy. You need a review course to help you master this. I get it because I've been there. I remember how I felt studying for this. That's why after passing both of my exams, I decided to create a review thing to help others too. Uh, since these launched, I've helped thousands of people, 98% pass rate., here's, you know, how it works, blah, blah, blah. Join our Facebook group and check it out. Um, just a really well done, really simple product, really simple idea. And I think this, by the way, this idea could be done with any like trade that has certification. So personal trainers get certified for their like health, uh, you know, stuff. And they take this, these programs that, uh, they have to get certifications for whether you're a, you know, dental hygienist, a speech therapist, there's ongoing architect, it could be anything ongoing professional education and anything that there's a, you know, a finishing school for. So like med school, nurse, nursing school, whatever, cosmetology school, whatever it is, being the test prep for that. And obviously she's not the biggest one. Like Kaplan makes a few billion dollars. They offer, they offer prep for MCATs and offer prep for nursing, nursing school. But you just carve out your niche and you're the more trusted face. You're the more human brand. And it's beautifully done.
Our software's the worst.
See, most CRMs are a cobbled together together mess, but HubSpot is easy to adopt and actually looks gorgeous.
I think I love our new CRM.
Our software is the best.
Dude, this is why I hate that question when people ask me, if you could start over again with nothing, what would you do? And I say, I would do the same thing. And they go, does that still work? And I would always say, of course it does. Now we have an example. Milk Road did the exact same thing within the last 12 months. And I have, uh, another friend named Ben Tossel. Do you know Ben? Uh, he, um, he's doing a company called Milk Road now. Yeah. He had a— oh, that's what we're doing. We're calling it Milk Road now.
It's the Milk Road of, of like the hustle was sort of like the Milk Road for general business. It just happened to precede it by 5 years.
Yeah. Andre the Giant was just the Sam Parr of wrestling. Uh, yeah. That's what we're gonna do now. I like that. He's a big buff guy. He's pretty much the same. Play a part of wrestling. Um, triggered. Yeah. Uh, well anyway, like I say, we, I would do the exact same thing and now you're an example. You did the exact same thing. And then, um, uh, now there's Ben and Ben goes, well, I'm just following. I, I heard, he goes, I heard in the pod that Sean said he just copied you. So I'm gonna copy Sean copying you. And you know what? It's working. It's working. He's got this AI newsletter and it's working. And there's a handful of businesses, there's a bunch of businesses where it's basically the same thing all the time, but a little bit different. And maybe not even better, just a little bit different or in a particular niche. This course business, this is another one of those where it's just the same thing. Her website is, I think it's only like 8 or 9 or 10 pages. She's got the webinar. She's got like the different offerings, the Facebook group. It's the same thing that you can do in any case. And in some cases this could be a home run. I bet, you know, like, I sold a little bit early, but Morning Brew is doing, I think they said $70 million in revenue. Industry Dive sold for $500 million. Those are all home runs. Same with the course business. I think there's a world where you could do the exact same thing. It could be quite huge, although $10 million is awesome. So that's why I think that whenever people ask that question, it's stupid or I hate it because you're just looking for an easy answer and you're looking for permission to not to do something because you want me to say it's outdated or doesn't work anymore. And my answer to that is no, no, no, it works. It, it works. Don't ask permission, just do it.
Right? Yeah. There's a, there's a better version of that question. Uh, that question is sort of like the question when somebody asked Elon Musk, they're like, and Elon, you're a great inspiration to many entrepreneurs out there. What words of advice do you have to somebody, uh, to encourage them to start a business? And he goes, if you need words of encouragement to start a business, don't do it. And that's how I feel about like, if you're really clueless about what ideas should I do, um, first of all, this whole podcast has hundreds of ideas of, and examples of ideas you could do. Um, don't overthink it. You could just do any of those. Secondly, you should have a running list of irritations and problems that you experience in your professional and personal life that you're like, God, if somebody made a way that made this better or made this easier or made this faster or made this cheaper. I would buy it. That's a great source of startup inspiration. If you're just like, I don't know, maybe Sam will tell me how to be a successful person. That's not what successful people do. Now, having said all that, I'm doing it again. I have a little example of this.
Okay.
So I've talked on here about my, uh, my personal trainer and my personal trainer, uh, is, uh, my buddy JA. You, you've met him before. Awesome guy has, uh, become a great friend and has delivered a ton of value in my life. As you know, I basically was not working out and was like, you know, on this steady climb of like, yo, I'm gonna gain 15 pounds a year for the last 5 years.
What was your peak weight? 250, 220?
Not 250, probably like 230 was my peak weight. And not like, oh, I'm bulking. It wasn't muscle mass, let's put it that way. And so anyways, I get in touch with Jay and I'm like, hey, I wanna make a change. He's like, awesome. How often are you working out right now? I'm like, zero times a month. And he's like, cool. Okay, let's, let's start there. And so he came over and took me from like zero to now working out 5 days a week, eating better, you know, seeing a bunch of, you know, great gains and results, getting stronger, fitter, healthier, more mobile, all those things. I'm playing basketball again. My life has gotten a lot better. And so I'm like, dude, you helped me with this one area I really wanted help in, in my life. How can I return the favor? Okay, I know I'm paying you, but, but how can I help you even beyond that? And so he's basically always wanted to have his own successful business and he's like, he's like, I see what you do. I think that's awesome. I want kind of the same. I'm thinking about e-commerce or this or that.
He goes, I want that. I want that.
And I go, all right, dude, I got it for you. I have an idea that I think will work. That I think will make, uh, it'll be successful, which is great cuz that's what we want. We don't wanna fail. The second thing is it will lead to a lifestyle that I think you enjoy. It's not a ton of like front work, doesn't take a ton of capital upfront. And so I'm basically, uh, check this out, I'm gonna create, I'm helping him create a Milk Road for personal trainers. And so basically it's gonna be a newsletter that goes out every morning to other, like it could be fitness enthusiasts, but I think start, starting market is just other trainers. So train the trainers is the thing I keep saying.. And cuz I'm like, dude, you are awesome with workouts. You're awesome with mindset stuff. You find all these interesting, like, I don't know, links to like cool, like, oh, Andrew Huberman said this thing about the supplement and check this out, you know, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, dude, I feel like if you just kind of published your daily, you know, your daily, what's, what's going on in your day-to-day as a trainer, that would just be an awesome email to receive if I was another trainer. So we created this format and we created this brand. And what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna help—
you have the URL?
Uh, yeah. So the URL, there's no signup yet, but I just got the domain. Uh, it's, it's, so the, the email's called The Daily Pump. And so it's mydailypump.com is gonna be the email. So go, go register for this cuz I want feedback on it. Um, but I'm gonna build this whole thing in public. So Milk Road, I didn't build in public. I was like, oh, this is a good idea. I'm gonna sprint on this. And basically one year, built the thing up into the largest crypto newsletter in the world, uh, and sold it. And so, you know, had a, had an awesome outcome there. And now that I did that, I know how I would do this in like 10 other spaces. I don't really want to go do that cuz it feels like I'd be just doing, I'd be on the hamster wheel just playing the same level of the video game, even though it's probably smart. I have the, the knowledge now of how to do it. It'd be too boring. I don't want to do it. But this has a different like meaning, right? If I could help him build up this business, I think that will be, you know, like just helping my friend out with something that I know would really, uh, be helpful to be impactful to them. And so, uh, so that's what I wanna do. And I'm gonna share how we build this thing up, you know, sort of step by step. And my, it's been a really interesting process because he's not from the startup or business world. And so a lot of times at, at the beginning I was like, oh yeah, we should do this.. And he's like, yeah, yeah, dope. And then he wouldn't do it. And I'm like, I got frustrated. And I, I, this happens to me with a bunch of people who I'm like, dude, you, I meet somebody, they're like, oh, I want to improve my situation. I'm like, oh yeah, you just gotta do this. Or I'd, I'd back you if you could find something, I'll bring the capital, you do the work. And they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then 3 weeks later I don't hear from 'em. And I used to think, oh, it's cuz they're lazy. And I actually realized it's not cuz they're lazy. They're not lazy people. In fact, Usually the person I'm trying to help, they're working 10 times harder than me at their day job, right? One guy was a plumber and, uh, you know, it's like, okay, this, this guy's doing much harder work. It's not that he's lazy, it's that they're afraid and they're confused. So they're afraid to fail and they're afraid to look dumb if they do the wrong thing or saying the wrong thing to me. And they're also just confused. They don't know where to start. They just never started something like this from scratch. And for me and you, we've spent now 15 years doing this. It's very easy to think, oh dude, I just spin up a landing page. I would set this up on Beehive and then I would go over here and I would do this. And then I would, I would not focus on that other stuff. And I wouldn't care about advertisers till I get to 20,000 subscribers. And like, I would scrape this email list. I would do this ad and I would, and they're like, dude, I don't, I've never run a Facebook ad. I've never done a landing page. I've never done any of this stuff.
I don't want to talk about that stuff publicly. I kind of regret it a little bit because like you had this at Milk Road. I didn't, I had it a little bit as well where like people in South America or other countries were just like, Copying it. Copying. They would like translate it and then just send the email like 30 minutes later. And in one regard it's flattering, but in another I'm like, um, and sometimes it's harmful, but other times it just pisses me off. Um, most of the time it just pisses me off. It's not harmful, but I don't, I've changed. Once we got audiences, I was like, I don't want to talk about this stuff. And so I get nervous about that. Now, I don't think you have like, whether this thing succeeds or not, it doesn't impact you other than you want to help your friend. So I want to help.
I think if I talk about it publicly, it's going to keep me invested in it. It's going to keep me engaged because I'm going to have to like keep reporting the story. And I also think it's easier for me to justify the time because this takes time for me to help. And I already had a pretty busy plate, but if I could say, well, you know what, I'm able to use this for stories as content that, that then, then I don't have to separately make other content. So that's my selfish justification. I also think, uh, if somebody was going to copy this blueprint, I wouldn't do it in personal trainers. That's only because he is a personal trainer. There's 30 other niches where this would work better than for personal trainers. Um, and I think that because it's specific to him and it's, it actually fits his, it's authentic and it fits his, his actual, like where he is a master. Like in the same way, I'm like, dude, I don't get it. Why don't you just blah, blah, blah. What I realized was he probably looks at me and says the same thing. He's like, dude, I told you to increase your protein intake and just eat these macros. You'll get the body you want in 6 months. But here I am at your house and there's a Chick-fil-A wrapper. What's going on here? Right? Like that's the equivalent, right? Like, or he'd be like, oh, you should wake up and do this morning cardio thing. Fast, fasted cardio. It'll only take you 10 minutes. Sounds so easy. Sure enough, I, he shows up. I got some excuse as to why I didn't do it. I'm like, oh, I just forgot that like a beginner is always going to go through these stages and I just gotta stay patient with him the way he's been patient with me. Now I do those things when he says them much better than I did at the beginning.
You gotta get this page up though. You gotta get this page up by tomorrow or I'm gonna get it up before this, before this thing is done.
But the cool thing that I've been doing, by the way, is I've been posting, I've been texting him one thing every day. I'm like, yo, you gotta just do, I'm like, the way you get, like, you give me a workout of the day. It's like, sit down for, it's like, go to the gym for an hour and you're gonna do this workout. And I just gotta listen to you, follow your blueprint, and it's gonna get the result I want because you've done this, you've mastered this, this, you're a black belt in this. I was like, I'm gonna do the same thing on the business side. I'm not gonna hope you get, hope you figure it out. I'm not gonna leave it to you to, to figure it out. I'm gonna give you one thing a day to do. It'll probably take you about an hour. I'm gonna give you your daily workout each day. And, um, and so that's how I've been doing it. One day, one little text message at a time. And I'm like his business trainer the way he's my personal trainer. So it's been kind of interesting to see how that's, that's worked. And that's been pretty effective, to be honest.
I'm eager to see if you regret this or not. He'll pull it off. It's gonna be at least mildly successful cuz he's got a massive head start because we're gonna be talking about it.
But I told him, I was like, dude, I'm not gonna give up on you. I was like, if I was like, you would've, you could've given up on me and been like, dude, this guy's not, this guy's bad.
Are you paying him still?
Yeah, I pay him. But like, you know, So there's obviously a little difference there, but like, there's a difference between you show up and do the job or you go the extra mile. He goes way the extra mile with me. So like, you know, uh, my kids are raging out. He'll be holding one of my kids so I can get the workout in while he's training me. Or like, he'll come in on an off day and just make the gym better. Just, just a surprise and be like, look, I want your environment to be dope cuz you're gonna just get that extra 5 to 10% juice enjoying your environment. And, you know, a trainer doesn't have to do all that. They don't have to come and rearrange your gym and, and take, help you with your kids or show up, you know, stay for 2 hours extra cuz whatever, you know, that sort of stuff.
He's the, uh, party guy.
So Nick Gray is my good friend. He, yeah, he started a thing called Museum Hack where he took pe— he had another company that like made parts for private planes or something like that that he sold. And then he started a thing called Museum Hack, which was private tours and museums. He sold that. Now he's got a new thing called The Two Hour Cocktail Party. It's a book on cocktail parties and how to host the perfect cocktail party. It's honestly quite good. I use his techniques. He's doing this new thing that he just showed me where whenever he goes to a bar or a restaurant or a museum or anything, he takes a picture of the food or the, the front of the building. And he reviews it. But can you see the— go to the MDB link I have in there. Look at what he does. So he posts a review of the place, but he puts his book in the picture and he's been— and he's been testing this. And over the past couple of months, his photos, there's like analytics on it. They have 2 million views on his pictures. And this guy, Nick, he's crazy. So he just tweeted out this thing. He goes, I'm going to host a conference for all my ex-girlfriends. He's got a lot of ex-girlfriends because he dates a lot and he's very charming. And so girls love him, but he's really nice. And so he stays friends with all of his ex-girlfriends. One time, this guy, for his 40th birthday party, he rented out a water park and there was like 30 of us. And I swear to God, I'm not exaggerating, 4 of the guests were his ex-girlfriends and they were all hanging out together. And he's like, I'm going to— so this guy's crazy. But look at this. Can you see the link to his Google?
So he has a blog post.
Do you think this is effective? I would never do something like this.
He's got this blog post coming out tomorrow or the next day and it's, I, I think if you just Google Nick Gray, G-R-A-Y, you'll see the blog post. I, I don't know the name of his website. It's probably just nickgray.com. Uh, and he's gonna like reveal the results. But I, he was showing me this. I was like, Nick, why you, I, I was just out to eat with him the other day and he was, and he had his book with him. He pulled it outta his bag and he was taking a picture. I go, what are you doing? He goes, check this out. And he showed me his Google reviews. He goes, they have analytics on this that my vid— my, uh, photos in the last couple months have gotten 2— 1.8 million views, 1.9 million views. Is this hilarious or what?
That's so funny. That's— this is such a funny— and it's— it reminds me of somebody. The story is better than the actual growth hack. So somebody told— said this about, um, Pinterest too. They go, yeah, Pinterest, man, they were such grinders. I remember they used to go into the Apple stores and change all the default default homepages to pinterest.com on the Macs that are sitting on the table.
Yeah. And who knows if that works or not?
I'm like, dude, this guy's spending hours driving to Apple stores to try to get like 5 impressions on his website and think that somebody's gonna be like, huh, you know, I went there for an iPhone, but you know what I really wanna do? What was that website I saw on the demo computer? I'm gonna go sign up and make an account and become a daily active user. That, like, that doesn't happen. But the story, the hustle story, is— makes it worth it. And I've done, I've done several of those where the hustle story makes it sound like you were going to the nth degree, even though it made zero sense to do so.
He has reviews of everything. There's one of Panda Express, of Lululemon, of Charlie's Subs, Vans, the store. Any store that he goes to, he's taking this really good picture of like the front. Like there's a Great American Cookies. It looks like it's just like an Auntie Anne's in the mall. He takes a picture of the front and just has his book in his hand. There's this guy on Yelp that Sarah and I follow because he has his, he like tests all the good food places in New York and San Francisco. And he had a newborn when he started doing it. And all the pictures were of his newborn eating the food. And then it was like, you see the baby get like 1-year-old, 2-year-old, 3-year-old. And you, I start like getting to know this kid and we're always like, look, that guy's been there. And it's actually an interesting hack that I think could actually, I don't know if it, this one will work. But there's like these weird personalities that I've seen on Yelp and on Google reviews where I start to get to know them and I trust the reviews. And it's actually a really fascinating platform to hack. And I wanted to bring that up because I've never really seen, uh, like insights like this. And I think it's incredibly fascinating.
Yeah, that's super cool.
Do you know what I'm doing right after the top of the hour?
Yeah, you have, uh, can you talk a little? You wanna announce it? What, what you're doing?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So, uh, how did you do this by the way? How'd you pull this off?
All right. So we have this guy named Michael Harris, nicknamed Harry O. I don't know. I'm going to interview him and find out his story. So I don't want to, like, reveal his whole story because I don't know the whole thing. But basically, he's one of the co-founders of Death Row Records. And when I— sometimes Sarah and I, my wife, we volunteer in prisons and we work with this thing called The Last Mile. I've told you about The Last Mile. My friend Chris, he's a tech guy, started it. It basically helps teach inmates how to do tech stuff so hopefully they can get a job once they let out. Well, a lot of those people are like convicted murderers. It's wild. And through that, I met Michael and he basically went to prison for 30 years at the age in his 20s. And before that, he made up to $1 million a day selling crack and cocaine, I think, and helped discovered Denzel Washington and sponsored or funded, uh, Broadway plays and things like that and parlayed that into music and thus created Death Row Records with Suge Knight. And he has all these stories about Snoop, Dre, Tupac. So we're going to talk to him, uh, uh, and figure out his story.
Are you a little bit intimidated to have this conversation?
Incredibly, because I don't know, you're not like the big— a big pop culture guy, but like basically like there's You know, he's a girl. Me?
I am pop culture.
Dude, you didn't know who Dolly Parton was. But basically, like, I— there's a lot of like, I read a book about Eazy-E and Eazy-E and Dre and Death Row had a beef. And I don't know, like, where that stands. Like, if I can say who I'm a fan of and who I'm not a fan of. So I'm a little nervous because this guy, it's not like our friends or our enemies on Twitter where we're just going to argue. Of course this guy will never do anything bad, but like, you know, like that's, it's a little bit more real.
He's more capable for sure. Don't make the mistake of, um, don't make the mistake of like referencing somebody by first name if you don't know them. They'll be like, yeah, I was reading about Eaze and, uh, is it Eaze? Yeah. Eazy-E. But, uh, I don't know him. I'm just trying to seem cool here. It's like when people, they say they're coming to visit the Bay Area and they go, Hey, I'm going to be in San Fran this week. And I just have to tell him, I say, hey man, listen, just as a friend, nobody says San Fran here. So you're just outing yourself as a tourist as soon as you say that.
That's how I feel. So I feel I want to be respectful. Um, and I, but I also want to like let them know that like, you know, I've listened to all this music. I've read a lot of books about it, but purely from an academic standpoint, you know what I'm saying?
We're like brothers from two worlds. Way different mothers.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
So like, that's, yeah. So it feels like a little funky, but like I was talking to him the other day, cuz the reason I got in touch with him is he, he wants to like launch some podcast or, or he's just brainstorming and he asked to talk to me and I said, yeah. And he starts talking and I'm like, hey, you realize that like when you're talking to me about this drug trade and things like that, like you talk about delegation and empowering your coworkers and things like that. Like, right. This is business stuff. Do you wanna come on the pod? And so I thought it'd be cool.
Yeah. We've had people who've made the, you know, originally this podcast called My First Million, because it was, let's interview people who've made a million bucks in many different ways. So I interviewed, you know, a business person, then I interviewed a poker player and then somebody who made it through selling, um, you know, weighted blankets online and somebody who made it doing, you know, deodorant and somebody made it doing 1-800-GOT-JUNK and like a whole bunch of different things. Well, now we have somebody who did it in, uh, in some other, some new ways selling crack cocaine., record label and who knows what else. That's, I think it's going to be amazing. I'm joking around just because I know if I was in your position, I would feel a little squirmy, uh, going into it. Like, just like, how do I not say something stupid? Like, I know this could be great. This is when things are tough. It's when you know it could be great, but you also know it could easily go not great if you don't build rapport or you don't really know how to guide the conversation properly. Cause it's not your standard interview, right? Like if we brought somebody on, who built a SaaS company to, you know, $20 million would be like, cool, I know the same— I know 20 questions to ask you that are all safe. You're going to give me 20 answers that are all safe. And, um, I know exactly how the conversation is going to go. And it really can't go anywhere that's out of my comfort zone in terms of a question or a topic to talk about. Whereas this one's going to be, you know, the zip code is out of your comfort zone. So you're, you're not going to— I know how I would feel going into that interview.
That's why I, I wanted you to come because I thought it'd be fun since you are— you're even a few more zip codes away than I am. Are you sure? Are you sure you can't make it? You should.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Death Row Records. Name's a bit crude, don't you think? Do you ever think of something softer like Milk Road, for example? No. Yeah, unfortunately I got another thing scheduled at that time, but Um, all right, that's the pod.
By the way, the gentleman's agreement is working. By the way, I went to a party with a bunch of 23-year-olds. Sounds a lot worse than it is. A friend turned 23. He asked me to go.
I went. Jeffrey's party, uh, on an island somewhere?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Was that like the Lolita, like, taco, uh, taco place? No, uh, he— I had so many people come up to me and said, hey, by the way, I honored the gentleman's agreement. That's because the show, we have this thing called the gentleman's agreement. We make this content for free and, um, But it's not actually free to listen. In exchange, you gotta go subscribe to our YouTube and it's working. We're getting like 800 to 1,000 new YouTube subscribers a day.
So yeah, this basically 3x the number of daily subscribers we were getting on our YouTube channel. Who would have thought? That's the—
everyone told us to do this the whole time and we were like, you're an idiot. No one follows that.
Yeah. We also, we, we kind of, yeah, we say it a lot now, but for like 2 years we never told anybody to do anything. So we're just kind of, we're due.
Yeah. We're due.