The Writing Secrets That Create Billionaires | David Perell

0:00All right, Marketing School listeners. This is a 20 to 30 minute segment of a full interview I've done with an amazing founder, entrepreneur, creative, visionary. You're going to get a ton of insights from this. And if you want to listen to the entire thing, go search for Leveling Up with Eric Su. That's the entire podcast that you're going to find. So you get 20 to 30 minutes here. And if you want the whole thing, you can just search for Leveling Up with Eric Su. And without further ado, enjoy the episode. Dave, welcome to the pod. How you doing? I'm doing well. Welcome to Austin. Thank you. Thank you.

0:34Here for one day and then I'm out. But Dave, for those that, I mean, I know you as the writer, right? You've got a lot of followers on Twitter. I think it's like 400, 500K plus or whatever. But for those that don't know you, can you tell us what you're known for? Yeah. So I have a podcast called How I Write where I interview writers who I'm really inspired by about their process. I think there's a lot of shows that talk about what people write, but this is really about the writing process, the creative process, and using that as a wedge to talk about the human condition. I'm known for teaching writing.

1:09That is something that I'm really excited about. Not just teaching writing, but I think showing people how to excavate parts of themselves that they didn't know that they knew, how to clarify their thinking, structure their ideas. And then once you do that, once you get stuff on paper, how to actually share and distribute your ideas. And then I think I'm increasingly known for being a Christian and being a Jesus follower. That is the core of my identity. That's the thing that I spend the most time thinking about. So I think I'm known for those three things. Okay. We're going to touch on all three of those things.

1:39But how do you think people can achieve their dreams through writing?

1:49Well, what happens is the way that we're taught to think about networking and meeting people and building a career is that you're going to work super hard. Maybe you're going to meet people by going to conferences, going to a prestigious college, and there's good things about that. But what you're doing is you're going to the others, and the inverse of that is to let the others find you. Rather than going out, you attract people to you, and you do that by writing, by putting ideas out into the world, which basically act as a magnet, where you're putting out a unique band of frequency into the world.

2:23And people, as they're scrolling their social media feeds, they're in group text, they come across a bunch of different things. And every now and then, you find what somebody else has written, and you say, whoa, I resonate with that. I really vibe with that. I vibe with that person. I vibe with that idea. And if that happens multiple times, those people reach out to you and a lot of them become friends. They'll offer you jobs. And fundamentally, that is what is so life transforming is you have these intellectual assets that are out in the world and they're working for you 24-7. Yeah. And how long did it take for you to build your following on Twitter?

3:02Because it's not super, like, you made it, I was listening to one of your podcasts this morning, and you made a good comment. I'm paraphrasing here. But the comment is more so around, you can grow, there's people that grow fast, but they're just gaming the algorithm. And there's people that grow slow. And those are ones that are doing it right. And I felt like, I feel like you're the second one. And so what did you do exactly? Yeah, I think I'd cut it a little bit differently. I'd cut it as sticky and not sticky. And you want to think about building an audience as an equation of trust. Sean Puri taught this to me that you want to think along three different vectors, which is how big is your audience?

3:39And how much do they trust you? And then how often are they seeing what you're sharing? And if you can increase all three of those, then you really end up building an audience that is not just a lot of people know your name, but actually is having a relationship. What is an audience? An audience isn't a bunch of people who know your name. An audience isn't being famous. An audience is relationships at scale. And we know from our personal life that relationships can either be, there can either be distance between two people or they can really come close together and they can be unified. Now, that unification doesn't need to be about, oh, my goodness, I'm being so vulnerable and you know everything about me, right?

4:17This isn't about the relationship that you have with you and your best friend. But it's a relationship that's really built on trust and admiration. And I do think that the people who tend to build their audience the fastest don't usually have stickiness because generally what they do is they focus on politics. They focus on things like celebrity gossip. And what ends up happening is that there's no there. there. And you see examples of this when certain Instagram influencers who pull their bikinis up to their belly button or something, they try to sell a product and no one buys it. And then I see other people who don't have a particularly large audience and they try to sell something or they try to host an event and the people come out in spades.

4:57They're a unique kind of person. And that to me is what our audience is really about. Got it. And you know what's interesting? So everyone should listen to your How I Write podcast because the guests that you've had on are best-selling authors. We're talking about billionaires. We're talking about top podcasters. What are some of the patterns that you've gotten from listening to all these conversations or having these conversations? Yeah, the biggest lesson has actually been the lack of patterns. And my number one lesson is that you can write however you want. You just need to be really, really really good at whatever it is that you choose you can be like james clear or you can be like hunter s thompson they are totally different james clear spent five six years working on a book he wrote two articles a week for four years or so hunter s thompson would wake up at who knows what time he'd take a bump of cocaine in the morning when he woke up he was throwing back all sorts of drugs and different white substances who knows and he was an outstanding writer who had a really unique voice and is one of a kind.

6:06You can be on both sides of the spectrum, but what matters is that whatever you pick, you have to be exceptional at it. And the only way to be exceptional is to be true to who you are. One of the stories that stands out is Morgan Housel. When he was on the show, he was talking about writing his first book, The Psychology of Money. And now it's gone on to sell so many copies. But there was a moment, he was about nine months into the book and he was really struggling. And as he told the story, he's going on a drive with his wife. He's in total despair. He's like, what do I do? What do I do? And he has this epiphany that rather than what he was trying to do was write these like 8 ,000 word chapters, sort of like what you see in like a traditional book.

6:48You know, this is like what you're supposed to do. But he said, no way. That's not what I'm going to do. I'm going to write something like the blog posts that I'm used to writing. They're going to be a lot shorter. They're going to be based on stories. And I'm basically going to write like 20 different blog posts. And I'm going to turn that into a book. They're not going to be totally connected. They're gonna be a little bit fragmented, different themes. And it worked out really well for him because he's so good at that format. And I think that where we struggle as writers, as creatives, is when we try to be somebody who we're not.

7:14And the problem is that there's so much attention out there. There's so much competition out there. And so many people competing for attention that unless you are super indexed on the axes of distinctiveness and quality, you just don't have a chance. Yeah. This actually, I think, relates to the quote that you gave pre-show, which is, it takes a long time to learn how to play like yourself. Yeah. Does this tie together? I'll let you get your sip first. Yeah, Miles Davis said this. Yeah. And he said, sometimes it takes a long time to be able to play like yourself. And you see this all the time with writing.

7:51You know, how often, maybe it's you, maybe it's other people, you're at work, and you work with Jimmy. Jimmy works three cubicles next door or Jimmy works remotely and he sends you a memo. And you're just talking to Jimmy, having a good conversation in the boardroom. You're like, ideas are flying around. You're like, yeah, you're really thinking well about this. Hey, why don't you turn this into a memo? And Jimmy goes, yeah, I'd love to do that. So Jimmy goes away for two days. He comes back and he gives you a Google Doc with all the ideas. You can't wait to get in because thinking was so good.

8:23You're now saying, OK, you've had 48 hours to really let those ideas brew and fester. And then you read it. Like, what is this? Your writing sounds nothing like how you talk. And why are you writing like this? And the lesson in that story is that Jimmy does not write like that. What Jimmy has to do is he needs to find his own voice. He needs to find his own style. But he hasn't been able to find it. And this is what happens whenever we embark on some sort of creative process. It happens in music. It happens in writing. It happens in film where you start off and what you're making is actually you trying to be somebody else, but you're not really being yourself.

9:03So then you think that the answer is, oh, just be yourself and everything will be okay. The problem is it's very hard to know what parts of yourself you really want to express and also that your selfness is very primitive. It doesn't have that sort of maturity. And it's actually through the process of imitating others that we pick up new skills and we learn what things in the process of imitation we actually want to keep. You know, we're talking about Hunter S. Thompson earlier. He hand wrote every single word of The Great Gatsby so that he could feel what it was like to write a successful novel.

9:38And so what's going on there? Hunter S. Thompson is uniquely himself. But the paradox here is that often the road to originality is paved with the imitation of others. I'm curious. You mentioned James Clear. So James Clear is known for habits, right? Everyone's known for something. And you're known for writing, in my opinion, right? And so why is that so important to you? Obviously, there's so many amazing people you've talked to. Why is it so important to you?

10:08writing is crawling through the labyrinth of your own mind that's what it is and what you're doing is you're basically a cartographer of yourself and the world at large so when we write what we're doing is we're putting words to reality and we're structuring reality and we can do that in a few ways so sometimes there's unmapped territory so now you're sort of like the settlers who are like traveling across america and what you're doing is like you ever look at those old maps of like North America and they got certain things right, but certain things really wrong, right? It's like the East Coast is like perfect, right?

10:41They have all the inlets and the bays and it's just spot on. But then you look at the West Coast and it's like, what? There's no big bump there. Or like you look at the Southeast, it's like, that's not how it happens at all, right? Louisiana looks very different than that. And this is our model of reality where we have certain things that we've mapped very well. We have other things where there's like some big bulge there or we're like totally missing. war in these strategy games. Exactly, right? So what writing does is it helps us put shape to what's going on. Then there's obviously writers who write about things that other people have written about.

11:16So James Clear, we're talking about him earlier. So now what you have is you have the map of habits and it is fairly occupied with books by Charles Dewey and all these books about history about habits. But now what he's doing is he's saying, this is fairly well mapped, but what I'm going to do is I'm going to build a new road through here and I'm going to pave that road really well. And I think of writing, good writing is good pavement. So it's nice and smooth. And then there's nice signage and then maybe good style could be like, Hey, we're also going to make this really pretty. And so that's what we're doing when we're writing.

11:50We are either making the map more concrete and truthful, or what we're doing is we're giving people new roads to sort of drive down so that there could be a more enjoyable, memorable way to drive through the world. All right. So I wanted to take a second to tell you about leveling up founders. This is an event slash mastermind for people doing seven, eight, nine figures. These are founders that are doing that amount. And we've been doing this event for a couple of years now. We've had amazing speakers, but more than anything, it's about the people. And what I mean by that is like-minded people wanna hang out with like-minded people.

12:30And this is the best spot to connect with people of a certain caliber. And we vet every single person that comes through. So if people are, even though they make a lot of money, but their character, we don't really align with that. We're not necessarily going to let them in. We did this event in Beverly Hills and it's happening in the beginning of August. All you have to do to learn more about it is just go to levelingup.com slash founders. Again, it's levelingup.com slash founders. If you want to hang out with amazing people, Neil, my podcast co-host is going to be there. I'm going to be there.

13:02People like Syed Balki, he will be there as well. And again, it's going to be a great time. Levelingup.com slash founders to learn more and we'll see you inside. And so I think, you know, for you, it's very concrete, right? There's, it's, you've thought about this a lot clearly and there's a level of focus to it versus you see other people on Twitter, X, whatever you want to call it. They're just trying to go viral. Right. So I guess my question would be, what is your creative process? Cause you know, there's, I heard you talk about on a pod how you're just like, you know, you heard of a guy growing quickly on Twitter and like they wanted to do a newsletter, right?

13:36You're like, don't do a newsletter, right? Just focus on Twitter. So I'm just curious, like what other nuances tie in with your creative process?

13:46yeah so i think that trying to go viral on twitter is both very underrated and very overrated the overrated ideas are fairly obvious it's like you have empty language and you're just adding all of these little tips and tricks and that's not very inspiring but let's defend it I think that that'll lead us to a really interesting place. So many years ago, two years ago now, not many, two years ago, I was scrolling Twitter and I came across this guy called the Cultural Tudor. And he was writing about Western culture, talking about 18th century English architecture, talking about Van Gogh's paintings, all those sorts of things.

14:34But there was something really distinct about what he was doing. It was actually getting engagement. And I really like those topics. I'm a huge fan of art history and design. And this is when he was like sub 100K. Yeah. And what happened was he had just started and I had found him early on. So I'm reading his stuff and all of a sudden I see 10 ,000 subscribers, 20 ,000 subscribers, 40 ,000 subscribers. He's getting tens of thousands of new followers per week on Twitter. I was like, what is going on? This is crazy. So I start following him and it's a Thursday morning and I'm talking to a guy who I work with and I said, have you seen this cultural tutor guy?

15:14I don't know who he is. Statue account, who knows what his name is, but his writing is incredible. Like an hour and a half later, he posts, hey, Twitter, I've just hit 100 ,000 followers. And to commemorate my 100 ,000 follower milestone, I am now going to launch a subscription email newsletter. And I'm like, that is a terrible idea. And not just that, but I said, I need to get in touch with this guy. I need to get in touch with him. So how do I do it? Well, I scroll to the bottom of that thread and there's a photo from this guy named Harry Dry, who I had had dinner with in London earlier that year.

16:00And it says, proud of you, brother. And I go, zing, zing, zing, zing, zing. Harry must know CT. So I instantly WhatsApp Harry. And I'm like, I need you to put me in touch with him right now. I have to talk to him. Who is he? I don't care. Just put me in touch. So he reaches out, we get on the phone and I say, who are you? He's like, well, I'm 25 years old. I'm living with my parents, sort of a rough situation right now. I was working at McDonald's, he calls it. McDonald's. McDonald's. And he was like cleaning out the McFlurry machine. He was like sweeping the windows and all that jazz. And he had no sense of direction in his life.

16:39He was just sort of trying to build an audience so that maybe he could make some money being a cultural tutor, tutoring people in culture. And I said, I got an idea. What if I just pay you and you can write about whatever you want, but send a Twitter or publish a Twitter thread every single day and then work on your email newsletter? And he said, okay. I said, well, how much do you need? He said, well, like 2000 pounds a month. And I said, that's it? He goes, yeah, that's all I need i said well i'll give you a little bit more than that and we've been working together now for two years he has 1.6 million followers and has absolutely crushed it that story is so good and i have to ask you too i i think well what's in it for you when you put in the seed round we'll just call it that the seed money i just get to tell the story and i really believed in him and you don't get a percentage of profits or anything?

17:36I have nothing from it. Wow, you're amazing. I mean, I just really like seeing people like that succeed. I mean, I now call him one of my really good friends. Yeah, yeah. And life is long. Good things will come from it. By the way, Neil and I have an agency owners group called the Agency Owners Association. All you have to do, just go to marketingschool.io slash agency. Once again, it's marketingschool.io slash agency to learn more. And now back to the show. You know what's funny? So you mentioned Harry Dry. So years ago, I think in 2020, maybe 2019 or so, I saw him coming up, right? So similarly, I was like, dude, this guy's writing so good.

18:12And he's marketing examples, right? So I reached out to him and I was trying to work out a deal. Funny enough, another guy that lives in Austin, Ryan Dice from Digital Marketer, had reached out to him prior to me. But we'll talk about this in in a second, but this all comes back to talent spotting at the end of the day. How about, so the podcast that you have, you know, again, amazing people that you've had, what's your long-term goal with that pod? I mean, it's like the thumbnails are amazing. The guests are amazing. What's the five-year vision with it? I don't really have one. So I want to get this quote.

18:53It's from T.S. Elliot. And he says, here or there does not matter. We must be still and still moving. Here or there does not matter. We must be still and still moving. And you ask about my goal for the podcast. And fundamentally, I would just begin there, where one of the things I like to ask is, where can I feel like I'm here and there? Neither here or there. Kind of both of them at the same time still and still moving. And the essence of that is your means and your end totally overlap. And I think that this is when you found the right work, that when you're asking, hey, what is the place that I want to get to?

19:40And that thing is fundamentally different. Well, then you are here, but you're not there. And fundamentally, the podcast is the work that I feel like I'm to be doing. It is a total victory to just be doing that podcast. And I feel like it's going to take me somewhere. And so just the act of recording every weekend and week out, that to me is the victory. Now, at the same time, what I would really like that podcast to become is sort of like the Paris Review interview series. So the Paris Review is a literary magazine that was founded probably post-war, probably 50s or 60s. And what they've had is they've done these two interviews in every single edition going back 70 years or so.

20:31And if you want to read the canonical interview about writing and the creative process about your favorite late 20th century writers, you'll find it in the Paris Review. Ezra Pound, Aldous Huxley, Marshall McLuhan, Robert Caro, David McCullough, they're all there. and it's this beautiful repository of conversations that you won't find anywhere else and I would really like to do that. And now if we're successful there, the money's gonna show up. If we're successful there, the thing is gonna grow. Right now it's just a little mustard seed and that thing will grow and expand. But the core thing with the podcast to me is less about what is the vision and more about that T.S.

21:14Eliot quote. We want to be neither here or there, still or still moving. Yeah. You know, as we continue to talk more, there's a certain vibe I have about you where you're very present. You know, it's, it sounds like you're playing an infinite game. There's no need to rush anything. And I remember listening to Jason Freed recently. He's just like, you know, you just want to make profit every year. That's it. And just keep going. Right. Cause this is, you're not playing this game for a year or five years, not even a decade. It sounds like you could have played for the rest of your life. When I first started my business, the overwhelm was real.

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24:33It's those questions and those things that really drive me much more than some sort of vision or outcome. Well, yeah, I think I can parse this out a little bit. So you speaking with Howard Marks, you speaking with Chamath Polyhepatea and Mark Andreessen, I mean, these are pretty heavy hitter investors. They're all different in their own way. What are some interesting things that you learned from them? Because I didn't get a chance to see every single one. So. I think that one thing I learned from Howard Marks is how deep you can take an idea. That when an idea can really marinate in your mind, not just for months or years, but for decades, and you can really see the way that that idea is contoured, and you can watch that idea play out over time, there's a real subtlety to the geography.