196. It's Brutal, But It'll Skyrocket Your Personal Brand in 2026 ft. Matt Gray

31:11You need a system made? Just talk to it for a sec. Put on the mic and just talk. Hey, I need a system made that is better than Jeff Bezos, Charlie Munger, and Elon would make. Here's what I got to kind of do. I don't know. I got to figure out like, you know, I'm trying to make content on YouTube. I have an editor. I have a thumbnail guy. I have a title guy. How do these people interact? What are the core systems you need to set this up? Help me out here. If you have any questions before making the system, just let me know. it's like no good to go bam and then just copy that to google doc share it with your team members you know give it a quick edit obviously don't just trust it like verbatim and then and then rip it you know and and again everything too it's like we're not seeking perfection here right we're just seeking to go from chaos and messiness to like clean and tidy like 80 and that's kind of how I see it too.

32:03Like if you think about your company, like a home, right? Like I'm not a clean freak, right? I'm just more like, yeah, I like to keep it clean and tidy almost. Cause it's kind of like a spiritual thing. You know, like I want to come home and just feel like breathe and feel like things are generally organized, but yeah, like I'm guilty of putting a wet towel on the floor sometimes, or I'm guilty of like, my bathroom's not like the tidiest thing, but generally it's an order. And if you ask me like, where's the peanut butter? I'm like there, you know systems you know i like that i like that peanut butter os so i just more say like your your business is like a home yeah right and like we're just talking about keeping it tidy right and like yeah you have a cleaner come by one once a week you have you know meals you make daily whatever right like just keep a tidy home because sure enough when you're building a company it starts to become a bit of a house party right and the question is like are people respectful is it good is the vibe like cool are people all getting along or is it like chaotic and when your parents come home you're like kicked out of the house you know so yeah i like that do you do you feel like personal branding is optional anymore like if you were a founder right now and you weren't on social do you feel like you really need to be you need to be there to be successful or do you think it is still optional like what is your perspective on that i think personal branding is personal, right?

33:25So everyone should make their own decision as to whether it's right for them or not, right? But I do think in terms of like where the puck is going for the Canadian reference here, I think the puck is going towards people trust people and then they trust brands. And so I think it certainly is beneficial for founders to be open to putting themselves on video if that's something that they vibe with or being not afraid just to write a essay or an X article or on LinkedIn posts or whatever vibes with them, right? Like I think you should first find the thing that excites you that also will help you get in front of your customers and that you can see yourself doing for a couple years, right?

34:05And inevitably then, you know, you're not just, you know, building some brand, right? You're putting more of a face to it, a personality and something that people can trust. And so is it mandatory? I think it's moving that direction. And I think that those that are scared to get on it should just for a second kind of consider is there like a minimum viable starting point where they feel comfortable because i think all of us if we look at our own like consumption habits right like you look at on instagram you're not following more brands than people you're following humans right on linkedin you're following humans on youtube you're following humans right so there's no reason why it's not going to benefit any business to have the founder who's like the core energy center of the company, just putting out a little bit of like what they believe in, why it was started, where they see the future going, a crucible of leadership they had to overcome to create what it is, why they're obsessed with the customers that they have, and why they even wake up every morning to do the dang thing.

35:01Have you had to pivot anything in regards to information being so accessible now with some of your other products? Like something that we do, right, is we do a cohort that's live. So it's six weeks. It's us in there. We're helping people with their direct problems. I don't feel as impacted with chat GBT or with any of these things like becoming very accessible to people. And I'm wondering for like info things, has that impacted your guys's bottom line at all? Slash what have you done to maybe shift where that's going? I think it's important with any business these days. I think this has always been true.

35:33And I think it's as true today, if not more true. It's like you kind of got to disrupt yourself every year. Right. And so I like to think of it like, you know, it's February right now. I'll probably go and go in sync with a few core team members on my team I'm with you know memo on my guy here behind the camera in LA I'll go and meet up with another team member in Miami I'm going to fly to Australia to meet up with another guy and then back to Bali where I live and we'll kind of go and look to basically kind of tear down founder OS and then build it back up again and by the end of it it's almost like imagine right now the business instead of it being 100 % it's like no it's actually at 70 and we got to kind of disrupt it and get it to 100 so that means adding things deleting things making the offer more irresistible the founder success better the content better like really analyze the shit out of it and think from the founder's perspective like what do we wish was here talk to them understand what they want let's do an audit of everything and let's make this thing 10 times stronger than it is now and we do that every single year right so um i think that to me in terms of right now and with ai and all these things it's kind of just another day at the office honestly because of that rhythm that we have and yeah it's just another thing on the kind of table that has is changing and you got to adapt to um that said i think people it's an opportunity more than anything right for guys like us for entrepreneurs like us for builders like us that are high agency move fast are smart give a fuck and are willing to go the distance to build something impactful and are doing this for the right reasons and view it as i'm not trying to make a quick buck for a year i want to build an enduring brand for a hundred years this is like what you fucking live for right it's like the game is changing things are adapting things are moving and this is like an exciting time to like get on these waves start using open claw start being really adaptive with gbt using clawed code and finding ways to maybe integrate this into your workflows to make your company more profitable to have a higher margin to serve your customers better to open source it for them in different ways and be at the forefront of that stuff and what an amazing day and age we get to be in where guys like us can use that agency we have to be at the forefront of that versus being some passenger or some victim or some backseat driver and just whining about it you know have you used open claw a little bit yeah i've got like mac minnie's ripping and no you don't how many do you got you're like timmy jimmy and ripley they're working right now dude two of them alfredo and evito that's amazing my italian little mob that is amazing we're like debating yeah we're gonna go we were gonna go and then brayden's friend kind of convinced us not to wait a day or two we're doing like a day or two because of like security weird because so what we had learned one of our buddies had downloaded a fucking one of the things from their store and it had gotten like a crazy virus on the thing like you know how it has like that marketplace or whatever you downloaded something it had like a bad piece of code in it so i'm wondering i know it's so early like has it been like just a few weeks that you've been on or has it been a few months a few weeks what have you learned personally from it that you could share with our group well i think that these things i i view myself as i've gotten older as more of also like an artist than a ceo and so if you actually think about open claw and like what it was even created behind the founder i think his name is peter would say that it was an art project right and it was like him playing around with like the potential of these things just to see like what they could do and how it could help his everyday life it was very much like a passion kind of wormhole project right and so I think for me and I've watched interviews with him and I started looking at it and I saw kind of the waves happening around it and it just felt like an interesting little thing just to play around with right and so in terms of what I've learned so far yeah obviously security and all that's important but like anything right like you can adapt and you can also be careful as to what you give it right I'm not giving it my credit card yeah and I'm not letting it just like unleash right i'm not looking for that even right i want to kind of let's take some baby steps with this thing let's let it start helping me with some content stuff let's start kind of looking at things i do all the time let's look at my to-do list that was the first thing i did and i just started putting little crabs emojis beside things that i was like let's try claw for that let's try so now my whole you know i got my to-do list is a bunch of crabs um and uh i'm like okay let's start playing around with some of these things you know and i think um i'm still learning it and playing with it but it's like um yeah it's like those baby steps and so you know have it in telegram have it kind of playing around with some stuff and yeah i think it's interesting and i think that we're in a moment right now uh that you know 2025 was about these kind of chat interfaces right and now 2026 is the year of like a gentick ai right and we know that's where it's going and whether it's, you know, Claude that then goes and starts their own more secure one in two months and launches it, or it's GBT now they've acquired OpenClaw has their new thing.

40:54I think it's more than just getting on the specific, you know, implementation of it right now. It's just being able to kind of play and learn this new way. I know, and I'm sure a lot of us have like, I've gone from like Gemini to GBT to Claude to GBT now is what I'm mostly using. that way all along the way though i don't regret going from one to the other i learned each way and form i got better at systemizing my shit and getting better at prompting and using it for different tasks and what i shouldn't shouldn't use it for and how to prompt it properly so i think it's the same thing with this right you just kind of get in this mode of it you start to learn the ways and the you know the thinking behind it and the mental models behind it and then sure enough maybe open claw isn't the thing and open ai has got their own new thing that they've built in collaboration and at least you can take those skills and move it on, you know?

41:45I want to go back to personal brand a little bit. But before I ask you that, I got to ask, are you a minimalist at heart? If you're stationed in Bali, but you're traveling so much and it's not just like, I'm going to pack a suitcase for a week and then I'll be back home. Like you're up and you're kind of living a nomadic lifestyle. And so I'm just curious, like, do you have a lot of stuff? No. no yeah i didn't figure i live out of two suitcases and i have one backpack yeah and so it's all very minimalist um and uh a little bit no and yeah i think um i don't know really why that is but like and why i'm that way but um i've had i think over time i've honestly just learned for me it's experiences that give me joy and experience like and like i love that and that's what I remember most and it's not things I actually to some extent have like purchase anxiety when I just buy I don't know just crazy things I'm like oh man like I mean how much weight is this in my suitcase and what do I and at this point it's like one thing in one thing out you know so it's like you got to be careful you know there's like a nice combination there's a system to this like so um yeah and to me you know whether in I read a lot of like you know spiritual philosophy all these kind of books right and it's like yeah to me i kind of know what i'm gonna be grateful of you know in my 30s 40s etc and the kind of things i would regret and to me it's like travel and relationships and epic core memories with people that's really what it's about um going and having some you know ferrari or some crazy clothing from laura piana is not going to do anything for me i like that so you brought up that you started building your personal brand around four years ago, you said, correct?

43:36What happened at that moment four years ago where you were like, I've had success building businesses, but I now want to start creating content, share my story and be more forward facing as a founder. So about six years ago, back in Apkin, I was smoking around 14 joints a day, drinking around three, four times a week, and struggled with kicking those addictions. And I broke up with a girlfriend. My ass got dumped. And I basically started rethinking my life, right? I was like, what am I doing? Like, what's going on? This relationship I thought was going somewhere. And one of the reasons it ended was because her father didn't approve of cannabis.

44:25and here I was smoking it all the time and I just hit 30 years old and I was like man is this what you've worked so hard for your whole life like what's going on and I had to look myself in the mirror and go like okay I got to make a change and so I was on Instagram and I hit up in a voice note to Andrew Huberman randomly and I was like I'm just going to send him a voice note as to what I'm going through and he got back to me in a voice note and was like hey like thanks for the message mat um yeah i think one thing you can look at is you know first off um cannabis breaks the chain between dhea being converted into testosterone which is the chemical in humans that makes effort feel good um i'd recommend you go and see this dr gillette who's a functional health doctor to help you out get you some blood work and help you you know yada yada so sure enough i got some blood work done with gillette uh this doctor and your testosterone level at 30 as a man should be around 800 and mine was at like 200 um so we had like grandpa level testosterone here um and so i found that to me in my own nerdy brain it helped me kind of gamify sobriety um because i was like okay whoa like this isn't just like stop smoking weed or whatever it's like no no like this is literally chemically affecting you like you have no balls um and so um so and i'm being ridiculous for you know whatever so i was like okay let's gamify this let's get that testosterone back to where it needs to go here so quit smoking quit drinking started lifting started writing read a book um that was uh recommended to me by kind of like a sobriety coach um called the artist's way by julia cameron good book um great book life-changing and um in that book um as you may know there's all these different exercises to discover yourself and tap Part of it and one of the core habits is three pages of flow, just writing pen and paper every single morning, your morning pages.

46:19And so that's what I did for about 90 days. I was just there writing my morning pages, random shit was coming out of me. And what I started to discover was that there was like 99 % of me that I wasn't like paying attention to when I was on these like substances that essentially I had this aspect of me that like wanted to be more creative, wanted to put myself out there, wanted to build shit, create shit. I didn't really know what, but just there was something there I wasn't tapping into. And when I was doing my pages and when I started to tap into those elements, I was like, there's something here.

46:50And so the next logical step that just felt like that little next stair was to then just start sharing some of those core ideas onto Twitter at the time. I was like, oh, like I'll just share some of this stuff. I don't know where it's going to go. And it was messy and it was all over the place, but sure enough, it started to catch on over time. Um, and people were enjoying it, right. This mix of kind of system, sure, but also just like the soulful journey of building a company. Um, and some things I was going through and just some of the new habits I was developing to kick these bad habits and become sober.

47:20And so that was kind of honestly, like my messy entrance into building a personal brand. It wasn't really to build a personal brand, to be honest, it was just to start sharing, more of my story, some more of my writing, and just to see how it may resonate and help other people. I love that. Yeah. On the way over here, actually, I threw on, I wasn't watching it. I just listened to it while I was driving, but it was your video about storytelling and how important that is to personal brand. And I'd love to have you talk a little bit about the importance of when building a personal brand, sharing your story and why that actually is such a superpower and what, how, or why sharing your story is really gonna allow you to stand out from other people and really scale your personal brand and also a business.

48:08Yeah, so I like to think of this like, I'm an avid book reader and probably read a few books a month and I've done that for the last decade or so. And for me, and I think a lot of people I speak with, when they're going in about to pick up a book and they start reading it, there's kind of like two kinds of books, right? There's like the kind of book that we may go and pick up that's like a self-help book that's just like do this and do this and do this and do this and you're like oh man like i mean some of those are useful but at a certain point i'm like ugh like just enough like i don't want to read that before bed when i'm reading i i on the other hand there's those kind of books with like they could even have some advice in and all that right but there's like a narrative and you learn someone's struggle right now as an example i'm reading the book open by andre agassi it's his autobiography and there's no advice in this book it's him talking about how he actually hated tennis and he dreaded it and he was just doing it because his father made him do it.

49:03And all the struggles and trials and tribulations he's gone through and he's basically broke up until 23. And it's like such an inspiring story of this guy's kind of delusional self-belief in himself combined with just this absolute struggle for years and years and years that then make me kind of attracted in a way to this guy's like character and who he is and these kind of core traits, right? So I think that storytelling has the power to more importantly, like connect us emotionally with other people. And as much as say you're building a business and a brand to maybe go attract leads as an example.

49:38So you think that you need to give like tactics to then get people to convince to then work with you. What we lose sight of is that people are emotional beings, right? And as much as we think that they're going to make some rational decision to enjoy you as a human and your brand and products. It's actually more of like the emotional connection that matters. And there's no better way to build like real resonance than stories, right? So then the question becomes, okay, well, what story should I tell? You know, I like to be private in my life. I don't want to just share everything, but you don't have to share everything, right?

50:10I don't share everything and you guys don't share everything. It's about, you know, what are some of those different, you know, it's the origin story of why you got started. Maybe some crucibles of leadership that you've been through. maybe it's some big wins you've had why you got into it and you know the kind of people that you are looking to serve and why they matter to you like you can keep it simple out the gate right and just gradually start to step into some of those kind of stories right but i think it's a worthwhile thing because inevitably people want more meat on the bone right they want to understand actually who you are and in any of our spaces you know in any industry you know most people aren't doing anything new, right?

50:47Like I'm not even doing anything new, right? Like there's people that do this kind of stuff, right? But hopefully what makes you different, right? Is, you know, why you got into it, your values, your vision, your mission, what you're about, where you've been that allows people to go, you know what, I actually want to be around this human. I want to learn from this human. You know, this human is different because I can tell more than anything that they genuinely care. And as I go about just, you know, being out in the world, I'm an introvert, so I'm not all the time, you know, out there at dinner parties or conferences or networking events, I'm kind of just doing my thing.

51:20But the thing that strikes me that we do different than a lot of people is that the depth that which in my business is like, we just care. And I think for a lot of people, when they tell their story, people can start to understand that depth of like, maybe how much you love the space, how much you care for the customer, or, you know, the real why you're doing this, And suddenly now like they can really trust you. And in a day and age where it's so hard for humans to trust like a friend or some new stranger, it's that story that can help teach people a lot of micro lessons along the way as to why you versus the next guy.

51:55Yeah, that's something we learned from this last group that we had in our paid to be you cohort. We were surveying them like why us basically. And that was what all they said. They're like, your guy's a story and you guys just care. Like that's why we joined this thing. Like there is 20 other people they could go with that are talking about a similar thing. So it's so interesting that you bring that up. Same thing on my side. Yeah. When we've surveyed people at founder OS, like why founder OS versus whatever? It's like, you know, Matt's energy was 60%. 60 % of people say it's Matt's energy. It's its vibe, you know?

52:23And so it's just like, yeah, there's something there. And I think it's giving yourself the permission to start like tapping into that aspect. And it can feel really weird at first, right? You're like, so you just want me to talk about why I started this? It's like, yeah, just why'd you start it? You know, but like suddenly people start to open up there and it actually kind of leads to like some interesting random stuff that's different. Right. And I think that's the challenge these days is you don't need to just be better. Right. Like that's that's easy. It's can you be different? Right. And the cool thing is everyone's story is different.

52:59So there's a lot of, you know, magic and just telling your story. So why did you start FounderOS? Also, you brought up that every year you try to restructure it. And so why did you start it and like how much has it changed since you first did start it? So the reason that I started Founder OS was actually when I started building businesses at 19, I remember going to different advisors, mentors and folks, and I would find they would give me some piece of advice. right i needed help say uh growing the business or i needed help um you know getting some partnerships going and they would give me little nuggets but i always felt like you're like 15 years ahead of where i'm at right now and i know that you know how to do what i'm doing right now why are you not just going like a few layers deeper with me here like actually help me the fuck out it always felt like they were just like okay you just got to reach out to some people And it's like, come on, man.

54:01Like you just closed a$20 million partnership. It's more than that. Like there's got to be more like what was the contract? How did you reach out? What did you say? How did the meeting go? Like, was it at your office or theirs? Like, how did this all go down? Right. And it was just always just that surface level thing. And I remember promising myself, like when you finally figure out more of the things that you're going to figure out on this next decade journey. you know you got to give back to people and you got to go and then share these things with folks right and do it in a way that's like not bullshit not fluff like show people the actual way to do stuff and so fast forward you know 10 years later 11 years later from that after building and scaling some you know profitable cash flowing successful companies in an exit um i in sobering up, I realized like, oh, you know, this is what I want to spend my time doing.

54:54And I had done a exercise. I, it was Christmas day. I was driving through Banff national park. And I hit an icy patch while looking at a mountain and skidded into a side of the road and tried to back out of this like snowy bank. And was they not able to move the car. And so there I was Christmas day, like like stranded in the middle of nowhere. Got a car towed to like a recent, a nearby town called Jasper. It was there stuck for two days. And I had a book in my bag, a number of books that I hadn't read and I didn't know if I would ever read. And one of them was called Icky Guy. And I was there with my journal and just started kind of journaling around that, nerding out over it because I literally had nothing to do.

55:37I was bored as hell. And as I started to look at it, it's this exercise around like kind of, what can you be paid for what does the world need what are you great at and what do you love to do and in the center there for me were things like traveling building systems design copywriting viewing entrepreneurship as a soulful journey building distribution day one building teams of a players and so i figured i don't know what i'm going to do as my next like thing but i do want it to be grounded in optimizing and maximizing my icky guy like these things that really set my soul on fire. And so the next step then was to go and start.

56:17I stood up, I got really humble little business called soulful entrepreneur, which sounded like a yoga studio. And, and it was a cohort based kind of little community. And I would run six weeks, six different modules around this kind of those vibes of helping people with those things. and people loved it. And I loved it probably more importantly, like I really enjoyed serving these people. And I felt like finally I was tapping into something that felt really true to my essence. And then honestly, that just started compounding. And I did that a few times, similar to how a comedian tests their bits.

56:57It's like these cohorts gave me an opportunity to test these ideas I had. Some were amazing. And I was like, awesome. Like I'm going to include that in my Netflix special, right? And then some bombed, right? And you're like, all right, let's not do that again. And I surveyed people after every single lesson was like, what did you love? What did you hate? And I use that as an experimentation little lab. And so that then kind of compounded into then realizing this brand sounded like a yoga studio. And so I started surveying different people and asked them what I should call it. I was thinking founder operating systems.

57:28And a friend, Greg got back to me like, what about founder OS? And I was like, that's the one. And so another friend, Alex Lieberman, the founder of Morning Brew, exited that for 70 million, was like, you know what, Matt, I think you should lead more into this systems thing and a little bit less on the woo-woo vibe. And I was like, all right, noted. And so started leaning into more of the systems approach. And so I just explained this journey because, yeah, it was a little bit messy, but at the core of it was understanding, you know, what did I really want to create next? And And that Ikigai exercise was really transformative.

58:02And along the way to just subscribing, just to iterating on this thing, right? There was no like one crazy inflection moment. It was very much this game of just, I'm, you know, making this little sculpture and just chiseling away at it like month by month, year by year. And we're still chiseling away on it, like I was saying. And so when a founder does join Founder OS, do you find that they typically join after having consumed like months of content, getting a couple of different of the lead magnets, getting a few of, you know, less expensive offers that you have and then eventually graduating?

58:44Or do you find that most people are just like, yeah, that's it. Like I'm down to just send it on Founder OS. Yeah. So founder us just for context for people is this community, obviously that now I've built, um, where people can build systemized founder led brands. And then we help them also remove themselves from operations over time. Right. And so when people are coming to me, they've probably heard some of these messaging and it's anywhere from like, yeah, they just saw a post on Instagram that a friend shared with them. And they're like, Oh, this guy's cool. They joined the email list. They find themselves learning more about it.

59:14And they join on the other side. We've had people that it's taken them three years, right. of just like watching youtube binging it and being like you know what finally something clicked i'm ready right and um i would say the average person uh back in apkin is probably having watched my stuff like say for two months right so And yeah, it's all over the place. I think, you know, there's that Google like 7-11-4 rule, right? Like people need to watch seven hours of your content across 11 touch points on four platforms to like really trust you. And so that's what I'm thinking when I'm kind of on the science side of it when I'm making content and why we're doing this too in terms of like just the science behind having a personal brand is like trying to also understand that a lot of humans as I am too are super skeptical, right?

1:00:02I'm not someone that's like some impulse buyer. Like I said, I kind of almost have purchase anxiety. So I want to make sure that I'm making the right decision. I don't want to waste my time. I don't want to waste my money. I got other shit to do. There's an opportunity cost to anything. And so I can appreciate from just people online too, being skeptical and needing to see some different things that I've done and learn different aspects before they would trust me enough to ever join Founder Us. And that seems completely normal and reasonable to me. And so is the reason you teach how to get out of like the everyday operations is because most people who join are looking to exit their business and they're looking at you as someone who has had exits in the past of like, okay, I can understand how to like scale this business, build a personal brand as well, but then also like have that exit.

1:00:51But do you find that that's a common thread throughout people who join Founder OS? Or is it more so people who are like, I just kind of want to get out of like the day to day. I can focus more big picture. I'm looking to do this more long term. Yeah, a great question. So I think it's the latter more, right? Sure. There's some people that want to have exits and all that good stuff, right? But, you know, just a quick kind of like tangent on that, right? for about all my 20s, I was focused on building businesses that would have these massive exits. Okay. And it happened once. It didn't happen many times.

1:01:26And I came to believe also from seeing so many friends doing this too, and family members and whatever, having equity in companies and hoping for an exit, that it's basically a lottery ticket. And when I started building businesses in my 30s, I started building businesses with specific criteria in mind as to which I would build them. Things like they must be able to get to$5 million in revenue a year. They must be cash flowing within three months. I must love the customer, love the problem. You know, there must be founder product fit and some other things like this, right? And I think that at the end of the day, my goal with that too is like, I wanna have an exit every year.

1:02:09Like on a cash flowing basis, I want to build a business so sexy, so good, so, and just be so valuable to other people. And it built so right that every year I'm having an exit. And so I think that why people are coming to founder OS as an example is because they, number one, understand that the ultimate currency in life is your time, right? And so they want to get their time back. They want to do bigger growth things and still be aggressive on the growth side. But along the way, make sure that they're also offloading things and delegating and automating and systemizing things so they can do bigger things in their business and also be able to live their life and, you know, take a week away from their business and be able to have peace of mind that they're going to come back to a business that's stronger than when they left.

1:02:57I think the second aspect is they want to build a cash flowing business. Right. And, you know, the economy is crazy out there and, you know, things are changing, you know, and, you know, one year your margins at 70 and then the next year something changes or, you know, you know, Andromeda comes out on Facebook and now suddenly your ads are off and now your margins at 10 percent like things are nutty, you know. And so we've been doing this and we've helped over 18 ,000 founders in this kind of stuff. So we've just seen a lot of permutations of businesses and a lot of things that do work and a hell of a lot of things that don't work.

1:03:30And I think why people are coming to us and the main thing is like, I'm in the trenches actually doing this stuff. Like I'm making content, I'm building multiple businesses and the struggles and the wins from all of that. Second is we've helped, you know, 18 ,000 founders doing this kind of stuff. and the third is that you know i've had successful exits and i've been doing this for i don't know like 15 16 years now so there's not a lot of people that can kind of check those three boxes and i think that's maybe why they consider us have you totally stopped running ads as of like late or do you not believe in them at all do you think that like organic is the only way for you going forward or would you spend a little bit on ads yeah great question so we actually have a i mean, it's pretty funny.

1:04:15We, for the, I've never run ads up until like three months ago. Um, so I've never run ads. Everything's been built organic. Um, I don't know how to run ads like as of like, uh, you know, November, 2025. Um, and so I'm learning that now to be dead honest with you. Um, so, uh, we're just getting going with it. Um, and my philosophy is I'm not anti anything really like i'm very open-minded i think that the world changes and if anything i think that in terms of paid and organic there's like this symbiotic relationship between the two right like the better your organic is the more fruitful your paid will be the smarter you are with paid the better your organic hooks and such will be and that they're actually not two really different things like the more you can think of them as like one sort of department that's learning from one another the better.

1:05:07So our organic guys are on the call with our paid guys. We're sharing info back and forth. We're using some of our best organic stuff on paid stuff. We're learning from what paid stuff did well and using that in the next organic thing. And yeah, that's kind of my philosophy. So I think in the dream world, you want to be a goat at both of these things, right? I don't think you should be anti either. Are you running workshops to get people into founder OS or do you find that it a lot of the time does trickle just from youtube or instagram yeah so in terms of where we're driving most folks it's uh the rankings probably newsletter slash email um lead magnets but that but then the core platforms are then youtube linkedin x instagram tiktok in that ranking um so youtube linkedin one two and in terms of workshops yeah that would be so to zoom out for a second right uh you know you guys may understand this i don't think everyone listening would it's like i think of building like what is what we call like a content gps right which is a system by which you can go and actually monetize your brand and a lot of people have a couple platforms going on social and they may have an offer that's irresistible but what oftentimes people are missing is this middle layer, right?

1:06:29Like the infrastructure to actually go and drive like an eyeball to a transaction. And so yeah, some of the tactics to do this are things like your newsletter. It's a welcome sequence with a FOMO sequence that can drive people over the first nine days to convert. It's a workshop or a webinar or a masterclass where you provide some value and convert people there. And so yeah, we have all these social platforms set up and are operating a really high degree there. But the area that I often see like 90 % of founders we work with needing a lot of help with is that middle layer, getting workshops going correctly, getting their email list going correctly, the different sequences there, abandon cart sequences and welcome sequences and different email courses that then lead into their thing, right?

1:07:10So that they can actually just enjoy the artistry of making great content and providing a lot of value, knowing that there's the backend infrastructure in place that's going to allow them to monetize it and know that the time they're spending on that content is fruitful versus it's just spinning their tires. They can't afford a team. And now it's just them ripping it, wondering where their next customer is going to come from. That I, that is so true. I think that people can, they have like the content stuff and it's also stuff that me and Brayden are trying to figure out. And we're literally, we talk every single day of like, okay, if we're going to be, if we have this offer and we have the podcast, it's like, do we also need a second YouTube channel?

1:07:53And then like, how often should we be creating new lead magnets? And how often should we be putting out or sending out emails? And like, what is the, what is the funnel or up, like upsell look like from like free lead magnet or newsletter to workshop to another cheaper product to like the bigger offer? And like, do we then take the bigger offer and make it into like a light version that's like$300 instead of whatever. And so it's so many things to think about. I do, I would love to get into kind of the nitty gritty of that kind of stuff. Like how often are you guys making new lead magnets? What do you think?

1:08:33What do you think allows a lead magnet to be something that will then build trust and allow someone to take the next step in the funnel and eventually go to that bigger core offer on the lead magnet side of things essentially there's a lot of different ways to do this okay um i think that what we're currently doing because we're also just constantly learning the newest stuff and then what we're sharing with founders and people in founder us is like the newest game that we're seeing work and so the newest way that i see things working is as follows okay so you want first off in any piece of content the best lead magnet is the most contextually like relevant next step for the person to take that will provide them a benefit and allow them to quickly get that benefit and then take the next step that you need them to take so let's illustrate this like really simply right let's say i have an instagram carousel that's how to start a personal brand in seven days let's say well they go through that they understand their content categories, their content intellectual property, their content waterfall system, then I say, hey, I've gone and provided you with a matrix that you can go and audit your content strategy and lay out the fundamentals of your content waterfall system.

1:09:50Go and comment waterfall. They comment waterfall. Many chat then goes in Instagram and sends them the lead magnet. They open up a Google Doc. In that Google Doc now, let's just say there's a loom video for me and then the lead magnet. And in the Loom video, they watch it for two minutes. They learn how to go and fill it out. And I say, hey, when you're done filling this out, book a call with us below. We'll take what you just did. Don't worry if it's perfect or not. Book a call with us and we'll get on a free call with you where we go and help you understand your audit, what's working, what's not, get you over any blockers you're currently experiencing.

1:10:25And whether or not you work with us or whatever, like we just wanna make sure you're good to go. And if you want some information on Founder Us and how we help folks in your situation, we'd be happy to do that too right and so what has that done well it's contextual to the lead magnet they just got and it's also enough information but not too much that they're going to like work on it for two weeks long and just take forever with it or more importantly just never do it or be like whoa this is insane right it's got to be enough to be helpful and then move them on to the next step and that next step also has to be contextual to the lead magnet right the call that i just brought up is a brand audit call so they've just gone through this audit and now they're getting on a brand audit call so what's happening here right when you do this right it becomes what i call like a slippery slope right in a good way where they're like they don't even realize how they almost got on the call because it was all just so logical and beautiful and really helpful and i think that what allows you to do this well let's just take a step out of all this right and where i think people get tripped up and i think the core value that we have that helps us with this is we are insanely generous right so at any moment i'm not worried about oh did we share too much did we give people too much that they're not going to buy this thing that's all bullshit in my opinion right the reality is is that sure you're right some people will watch that thing and they would have bought something and now they're not going to because you shared that but But you also, because you were so valuable and generous, you widened your overall pie.

1:12:00And so, yeah, now you have, instead of just 100 people that saw it, 10 ,000 people that saw it. Yeah, a bunch of people now are never going to buy your shit. But another 9 ,000 are like kind of interested and 3 ,000 of them are going to book a call. And you just made honestly 10x more cash flow, right? So you won and your brand won because 10 ,000 people saw you be so freaking generous. and back to why I even do any of this stuff, like I was saying, to be of service. And the most powerful force in humanity is reciprocity, right? So just the more generous you are, that shit, what goes around comes around kind of vibe, right?

1:12:37So that's like my overall thinking with lead magnets in a nutshell. And I think, again, the core word there is contextual, where people screw up as they're like, if you like this, you love my newsletter. Like, you know, wrong, you know what I mean? or, hey, you like this newsletter, book a call. Eh, wrong. Like it's too jarring, you know? It's like these, you win or lose online these days in like these micro interactions, right? And any piece of cognitive dissonance, any piece of like, oh, what? Or ugh. Like you get people to do that even just ever so slightly. It's a moment, right? But you do that even for a moment, you lose, right?

1:13:17But if you can think about, okay, they just saw this And what's this, that next logical thing they would do, right? You just want these nice steady steps that people take. And that's how you win. So how many different lead magnets would you recommend someone have? Like if they're just starting out, probably just one. Or do you recommend having like thinking about the different content pillars that you're talking about, thinking about multiple different lead magnets? So how I think about it, I think this is like intermediate and simple and V1. Sure. And for some people, it's going to be like, really, I got to do that.

1:13:53It's like, well, if you want to do this in like a real way, I would recommend this. So it's as follows, right? Let's just say you're building a brand and you have three content categories, right? You're a founder in e-commerce building dog treats. Well, one is going to be like, you know, helping, you know, dog owners have healthy pets. one is going to be like the best routes maybe to go on dog walks and then the next one's all going to be about like health and wellness i don't know right so those are your three categories right what i would recommend then is like okay on those categories what are like the 10 titles that you're going to have say on your instagram content that month let's just say instagram was your core platform so now you've got like your content calendar mapped out based on those three content categories.

1:14:38Then off of that, right, the minimum viable lead magnets is simply just going and saying, okay, on the health and wellness ones that we do this month, what should we lead people to that would more or less be the next logical step when we're talking about health and wellness? And maybe that's like, hey, the hundred trends we're seeing in the dog food space in 2026. I don't know, right? And then you do that with each different category, right? Where you kind of have every month in those three categories, three different lead magnets that map nicely to those different subjects that you have in there, right?

1:15:21So that's like intermediate, in my opinion. Beginner would be that you just have one really badass one that hopefully is a really badass catch-all. and then advanced would be you basically stop thinking about how many and you just start to think more about okay like what's the most badass content strategy this month what's the shit we're putting out and what is required to make sure that in each of those there's a next logical step that's really badass and convincing for someone that watched it and many times that's something you've already made awesome and equally as you know fired up is if you have to make something new and you're like that's what we got to do because we're operating at a really high level and we're going to make the new thing and you should have a system by which you create lead magnets that's not so like oh my god a lead magnet it's like guys come on like you're going to make a hundred over these of these over the next two years maybe how do you do the title page how long is it what are the core ways you do it like you should have a template for it you should have a person on your team that can rip that stuff in an hour and a half or less right and then it's not a thing it's just yeah make a lead magnet around this and then yeah make sure the titles of it are tested because as a david ogilvy says in advertising 80 cents in your dollar are spent by the time someone's gotten past your headline right so your headline your first line your first line of your tweet is the one that matters most the headline of your article is the one that matters the most and the title of your lead magnet matters the most so you know how do you go and nail a title of a lead magnet, there's a lot of ways to go and nail a title of a lead magnet.

1:16:58Look at the best subject lines of your newsletters you've ever sent. Maybe that would make a good title of a lead magnet. Go and use a tool like oneof10.com and go and research really amazing YouTube titles in your niche and then use one of those badass YouTube titles and remix it for a lead magnet title. So there's lots of ways to do this. But that's kind of the 80-20. Yeah. I love that. I mean, I think that's so helpful for us. I have a question. i'll just say quick try and like so i'm jealous of you guys in a way where you you guys are here all the time in venice and you guys live in west hollywood being able to like jam all the time on your business right like my team's all over the place right so i don't get this like just by default facetime right with you guys i'm sure you have this but i'm just putting this out there it's like yeah like the kinds of businesses you know every business but i know the kind of business you guys are building and it's not all that dissimilar from what we're doing um you know there's a lot going on, right?

1:17:52You have your audience on different platforms and your offers and those offers, you have entry ones and core ones and upsell ones. And then you have, how do these things all connect and the lead magnets to it and the content strategy. It's like, there's a lot going on, right? I would have a massive whiteboard and I would map that out like every six weeks, like, okay, the next six weeks of our business, like, let's just go. Hey, it's Sunday. It's that Sunday that six weeks later, we sit down for three hours and we basically map this whole thing and talk about which changes we're going to make along this like core kind of flow we have.

1:18:32Right. So like the core infrastructure of your business is all mapped out. And then each six weeks, you're kind of like, OK, we're going to come up with these new kinds of lead magnets here. We're actually going to try a quiz. We're going to try this new entry level offer this time. We're going to remove that person from our team and add these two. And we're going to increase the price of this thing. That's what we're going to do the next six weeks. And then, okay, that's what we're going to do the next six weeks. And how do we determine the success of each of these things? Okay, that hire needs to get to this cash flow.

1:19:00This lead magnet needs to make us at least 20K. This new offer must have an upsell rate of 20 % for us to keep it. Okay, cool. Now we know the success hurdle of each of these things. These are the six core changes we're making the next six weeks. Let's see how it goes. And we can always just come back to this like core infrastructure drawing you have on that whiteboard. And that core rhythm every six weeks to kind of go back to like the drawing board a bit so that it's not actually that complex. Right. Like you have a map of your business and now it's just a matter of like you're just like plumbers.

1:19:32You know, you're just like fixing a pipe there, screwing with like a little like screw over here and just gradually like tooling it up. I like that. That's how I would look at it. We've been so reactive that that feels so much nicer to just know, OK, this is what we're focusing on with our content for these next six weeks. with the podcast. I'm curious how you would think about this if you were us, right? So we have this show. We grow based on guests. We have found though that people end up buying things from us that listen to our show, even though we are not the authority figure here. We are lobbying you up softball questions to then extract awesome value, right?

1:20:10These are hard hitting questions. Great questions, but you know what I'm saying? Our audience, like we are doing this also, it's selfishly I'm learning a ton right today our audience is then getting this awesome value they're learning a ton from you if you were us do you feel like we should be focusing on another channel in addition to this podcast because people end up getting our products from the show but I personally find that like I'm not here to talk I'm here to extract and learn right and I'm wondering like if you were us would you think we focus a ton on Instagram because we do focus a ton on Instagram.

1:20:43But we're thinking about like really hammering into this second channel and diving more into our learnings and the things that have helped us a ton growing these businesses. And what's also interesting is we had a conversation with someone, I want to say a few weeks ago, and we had just started this second channel. And then they gave us the advice to like, not really focus on that and kind of just keep the main thing, the main thing with the podcast. And then it reminded me of what you said of like, you kind of have to take advice from certain people with a grain of salt. And when we step back after the conversation, we were like, well, his business model is different than ours.

1:21:19So I don't know if the advice that he gave us is maybe the best, but that's why we wanted to ask you. Because I think this is like, in my eyes, Podland is you monetize from sponsorships, you monetize from, you can sell digital products off it. I just don't think the percentages are so much different in terms of if it was our own YouTube channel. Cause again, they're coming for Gary V or they're coming for this other person. They're coming for you. Like, yes, do we have a percentage? Of course, but it's so different than a traditional like YouTube channel. So I like, and I think that a lot of the people find us from Instagram and they're like, Oh, I like this person.

1:21:54And they dive in like, Oh shit, they have a pod. Like, let me go check out their pod. So it's a very interesting business model. It's almost like the number one networking tool ever on top of, you know, it's other stuff. So it's, it's interesting to think through for us so i know um i had originally when i got going on youtube i tried a lot of different things i viewed my youtube as almost like a variety show where i would like try a solo thing try a vlog thing try an interview thing i just kind of follow like just went by the seat of my pants you know like i had no idea what i was doing um and i did quite a bit of interviews interviewing you know uh you know chris doe dan martell sam ovans hormosi layla hormosi yeah yeah right and from more just doing the thing which is really a key here right it's like just trying stuff um i realized that you know i don't really like traveling to these things and it's kind of more about them really than it is about me which is fine but like i'm doing this also to you know I got things to say and I got brands I'm building and I'd rather it be a little tilted in my vibe versus like just traveling to Vegas to go and meet someone and then it all being about them and I leave it going, hmm, I wonder the business impact there.

1:23:11Because again, I really believe in building profitable personal brands because I think that if you're trying to do something for the long term, there has to be like monetization behind it, not just even to fill your pockets a but that you can get a team around you to, again, get your time back. So I say that just to say that that's my background. So I've been through these sort of problems and questions and all that stuff, right? The first principle I would say with this is like Jeff Bezos talks about one-way doors or two-way doors, right? And I think when we approach this question, it's understanding it's a two-way door.

1:23:46One-way doors are things like getting married, right? It's really hard to get out of that, right? you got to kind of make that decision carefully right at least that's what i hear i'm not married but i but apparently scholars say you should be careful so on the other side there's there's things like what you just brought up right oh do we start a second channel or we put it on our main channel and we try this new thing it's like that's a two-way door like and to your friend or the person you were listening to right it's like the thing that yeah i think they're also not indexing is like you seem rather energized around it right and energy is kind of the ultimate like fuel for a founder right like it's not time in your day it's like if i'm fucking fired up over something time's not a thing i will just do the damn thing because i'm so stoked on it and that's so funny you bring that up because one of the things he told us was like dude that's probably even if you are only spending seven or fifteen percent of your week on this second channel it's like that is still time you're allocating this other thing where that you could be focusing on like just the podcast and i'm like yeah but like we're having fun yeah yeah and same with this what does it cost you after this if you got a bunch of insights right okay matt's gone cool sit down for a second what was your main insight yes my main insight was like the psychology of building a personal brand it's like okay rip it for fucking 15 minutes that's not actually your time like he's ordering uber eats he's setting the table you're fucking filming with this guy over here and like there's no time wasted you know and that's again like not to overdo it but like there's like there can be a system to it like they're just like okay so the challenge is like we don't have much time but we want to do this what's just the most simple low weight way we get started with this before over investing and like what i just said was like a way that's like a joke you know the set's already here the lights there the camera guy's there the insights and the brain is firing you got your neuro gum ripping you know what i mean um and so that's kind of that right and so so getting back to then this two-way door idea right it's like you have really then two options with it it's pretty simple one option is that you try doing solo episodes on the main channel right because you're like we do every eight weeks you know great yeah how do those go they go good the viewership is definitely lower but i mean i'd say there's anywhere from like 7 000 people will tune into them across so that's my instinct when i did a lot of research around this um way back like this research is old now but i think it still stands i think you know you look at ali abdahl has a main channel and then deep dive has a second channel sure you know um and there's a lot of other patterns of that right um and so i then kind of made the distinction that it's like one channel is it's not about one format but it's like one core intention someone coming to right so they're coming to the main channel you guys have because they're watching interviews and looking to chill and just watch an authentic conversation that's an hour and a half long right your average watch time on that's 20 minutes long or whatever the heck it is right and that's that channel so yes it makes sense to maybe want to start a second channel which is these more solo ones and i would put its own give it its own like kind of brand its own creative direction doesn't have to be overboard but just like its own thing and then in its own angle and why now is someone going to watch this versus the thousand other youtube channels right like what's your angle right is it you're going to walk down the street out there in you know la and there's a gimbal and it's like It's like a walking 10-minute rip, and that's it, right?

1:27:08And that's the whole kind of like format and channel thing, right? So you get going on this second channel around that sort of intent. And I think, like I was saying earlier, right? Like you give it a hurdle rate both energetically and like business-wise, right? So, okay, we are going to check in. It's, you know, four months from now on June 30th. Number one, are we excited by this, right? Are we having fun? Okay, if we're having like over eight out of 10 fun, that's a good signal. Second thing is, are we driving, like either kind of inadvertently or directly, two sales per month that it's making us 15 grand a month, right?

1:27:50And maybe that's even a sponsor or something else, but if it's making over 15 grand per month, we feel like it effectively diversifies the brand a bit. It lets people know actually who we are versus who just Matt, Gary V, Al Hormozzi, whoever our guests are. So that's good. And the third thing is like, did it hit maybe a subscriber count or a view count or an engagement count? Some sort of maybe thing that's like, yeah, there's enough, like we're doing a good job driving like attention off this thing. And that's how I would look at it. Right. And just also be okay with like, it can be a failed experiment, right?

1:28:25Like you can pull the plug on it who gives a shit right so maybe even the hurdle rate's way shorter it's like let's just try this for 60 days and if we like it and it's a vibe and it kind of moves a little bit we'll do it and if afterwards we're like there's nothing here then just stop and that's no harm no foul right the same way that in two months maybe i stop using open claw that's not a fucking issue that's just like well went down i was just playing around with it because i was playing around with it and just had an instinct that maybe it was worth trying okay yeah i like that i think i think it is worth something that we explore because it was energizing and it was fun and there was solid there were solid numbers behind them yeah i also think that we just didn't do it we haven't done it long enough and i i'm i'm very bullish on me and brayden being able to build a second channel i think we just need um to keep going yeah time and energy i think there's something too like you know a reference would be um colin and samir um who have their main colin and Samir channel, but then they have their creator support channel.

1:29:25I always liked for step one, when I'm doing these things, like on a brand level is like find references, right? Not to steal, not to copy, but like you need, it's good to have references because generally like we're not inventing anything new, right? These things exist. And then you can use the reference to like understand like how they think about like the brand system behind it, how they think about the monetization of these things. Right. And so when you look at their main channel they're interviewing people they're doing that there's very limited um sale of their info product on there it's mostly run by sponsorships at least from my understanding and then maybe they may plug like their biannual conference thing they do there on the creator support one they more push the throttle on their info product and so that's just like an example of a reference um and so you know when you're talking to me then oh we want to start a second channel and you know i'm just kind of like corroborating it with that reference it's like makes sense i could see how that would help i could also see too like over time how it may decrease your dependence from this product having to push the info product from this and be able to have like hey if you want to hang with us and see our strategies on things learn from us and get this thing because it's literally again the logical next step whereas on this yeah it's just a little bit trickier it's not to say it's not a great next step it is a great next step it sounds like right but it's just not as logical right on this the logical next step is really probably no next step other than liking and subscribing coming back and just watching and coming back so that you can get more brand sponsorships and raise the dollar amount there which is subtle and chill and very organic and how people are used to in this format so it doesn't feel jarring or salesy it will increase the growth rate increase the subscriber rate increase the revenue rate of this thing whereas that other channel can be more pure play to the info thing yeah 100 that's it that's the exact way that i think we thought about it so nice to and refreshing to hear that because we got rattled a little bit i was like holy shit dude on the top but that's why i think again it's important to have references yeah because if you know there's other references too right and if you just have some references um i think it helps like tremendously right because then you can have like but i hear you but so we're thinking about being like colin and samir i'm using this as an example right who are you saying we should be like and you can kind of dig in there like oh but i think you should be more like this thing and then you could research that thing sure what's their revenue profit do you like their brand do you like how it exists do you do you want to build that kind of thing and if you're like oh we don't want to build diary of a ceo i don't know right like we don't want to do that though we want this then then you you're talking kind of more i think tactically versus sometimes too in the air.

1:32:15At least that's, that's what I find useful. The other thing too, with this, just on the subject of references, I think these days we also get kind of caught up in like the time and the day and what's going on, you know, what's the newest thing, you know, and these new references also just not losing track of like, what have like trillion dollar folks or billion dollar folks done in different spaces, right? And not being afraid to have like a billion dollar plus reference or two or three right as to like what would they do in your situation how did they build up their thing how did ted turner build his media empire right how did bloomberg build his media empire right and looking at these real titans of industry to then anchor yourself insane insanely high you know not trying to get to our next 3 million here but like even if i fall short of this billion dollar guy i'm still going to make 50 million dollars right and i think having those like references like a con and samir but then also having like a bloomberg reference or a ted turner references or something like that to kind of then also see that and if you need help there too it's like you should have gbt right like going hey what are some like this is our business who should we be looking at in terms of titans of industry that have done something similar and figured this out in their day and age?

1:33:33And what would be some patterns we could map to our business? So that there's, because there's, there's, there's sauce there, right? To these people, there's patterns of these folks that have built multi-billion dollar businesses. And there's things that you can map even to something as like humble as what we're building. Do you think that can at all be maybe detrimental in some way? I remember, I want to say it was close to a year ago, we talked to a guy by the name of Oren and he's incredible at building brand. He said though that if you want to build a clothing company and you look at somebody like George Heaton with represent, it might be not in your best interest to look at what they're doing because George has been doing this for like 15 years.

1:34:15And if you copy their exact playbook, it's like, it might not work as well for you because George has 15 years plus of like running this playbook. And the reason why it works for him is because he's had, you know, a decade plus of like running that playbook. Yeah. Do you see that at all? Like, is there, I think what. Yeah, I think I'm missing maybe specificity. So that's my apologies. What I'm saying with those references to get deeper into it now, that's a great question is, you know, you'd want to look at like the actual journey in their story, right? And learn like, oh, okay. When they were at our stage, you know, um you know they made a conscious decision like not to do 10 product lines but just to do two and to have a media line and a product line and we want to be like that we use that as a reference so that's what we're at right now so i'm not yeah saying to take like the 100 billion dollar apples now making the move to china and we're like we are now you know translating to mandarin you know it's like no no no not that like let's rewind to like yeah apple at reed college steve jobs valuing fonts and handwriting and having that on the apple one like its own font types like we need to have a distinct font for what we do that's got to be a thing and like another thing maybe when you look back to the origin is like this idea of like insane simplicity and so you're not just adding on a product line to add it on you're going to be like okay every move we make must have like insane intention behind it and a business model behind it and revenue behind it and energy behind it or we will not do it we're not just here to like screw around with a thousand things so we're going to learn from steve's simplicity early on yeah and only do the most minimum amount of things possible early in the journey so more that than like the other it reminds me early on i remember it must have been mr beast on joe rogan talking about how he has multiple different channels dubbed oh yeah and so i think we were like less than a year into the podcast we go do we gotta dub this podcast like do we need the 505 podcast in like 70 different languages we're like no maybe we should focus on you know just get english going getting english going and getting some more guests oh gosh on this on the topic of having um like a logical next step and on personal brands because this is something me and brayden have been i think trying to figure out as well.

1:36:40Like for Instagram specifically, ideally every single piece, every piece of content you put out is like potentially talking about or leading to or talking about in some way, shape or form, like your main core offer. But for example, I'm really into travel photography or street photography. It doesn't necessarily lead to our core offer, which is paid to be you, which is teaching how to build and monetize a personal brand. How would you recommend somebody who wants to bring in other things that they're interested in, but maybe it's not like directly tying into the next step or talking about like the core offer, but it's still something they're interested in and it's going to help them build their personal brand.

1:37:28Like what would you recommend to that person or how would you recommend navigating that? Yeah. So I don't quite agree with your approach of like every piece of content needs to map to the core thing. okay um that's on a philosophy that's not my brand philosophy um i would say that back in napkin as an example like imagine a world and screw the numbers here but just to illustrate it specifically imagine a world where 50 of your content maps in some way to the brand ecosystem that includes your offer so say your offer in your case is around uh personal brands and monetization what are the pieces of that right there's um selling something online there is um differentiating yourself online um and there is telling your story online so that's that whole 50 right is that kind of stuff now as an example like just in that 50 one of those that i just mentioned was like telling your story so let's get to the other 50 right which is like you're building a brand right so So it can't just be constant, just like hammering people with like a message constantly.

1:38:38Because people also want to know like who you are, what makes you tick. And even part of your brand, first off, it's personal brand, personal. And second is like, part of it is like telling your story. Let's just say under this example, right? In terms of that was kind of a pillar. So it's like, it would make sense then that you're telling your story and you're getting a bit personal and people understand what you're all about. and I think that's really important you know and you guys had mentioned too that a lot of people come to you because of you know your energy and vibe and I also said that that's something for me too right so it's like that's your opportunity to build the emotional connection to tell the story to be to exemplify what you're talking about and to again differentiate yourself versus the other folks that may be doing this kind of stuff right so that you know maybe yeah you have this weird also kind of side niche of like it's like skateboarders coming to you for that kind of stuff and more the street where stussy type folks are like interested also in like your thing and they understand that you understand that kind of cool world and come from that angle and so like you attract that kind of like psychographic and that's the the thing i'll say is like one individual who um you know really tipped me onto entrepreneurship 20 years ago was tim ferris right Right.

1:39:53I think he's, you know, tipped, you know, millions and millions of people onto it. Right. And so when you look at Tim, right, I think there's like an interesting thing that I think about. Right. Which is like, you know, I don't know, 25 years later, like what's Tim's niche? Like, I don't really think he has a niche. Right. I think that he's built an enduring brand off of his curiosity. And I think that if you were to more dissect it, I think it come, at least for me, comes down to he's attracted a psychographic, which is he talks about all these things he's interested in and these weird guests and these weird things he wants to do and yeah sure maybe it's rooted sometimes in like nutrition performance productivity uh travel i don't know right but the combination of all that attracts like a certain kind of human right and then he serves those humans right and so similarly like you start to do the skateboarding and photography and streetwear and this and then also the personal branding side and it starts to attract a certain psychographic that's kind of weird and odd but the beautiful thing about the internet is like you can find your own little corner of it right and every corner of the internet is an easy 10 million dollar a year business if you do it right and so it's just being okay with like finding your own little corner your own little wedge and then just like you know in attracting that psychographic and it may be kind of really hard to name right like joe rogan's is i would say is more of a psychographic you know huberman is a psychographic like these guys niche is like i don't really know what it is but i know when i'm in a sauna and there's another dude over there like i'm sure in the first five minutes of our conversation somehow huberman's gonna come up yeah it's like that's the that's the niche right it's like people that are into saunas and this and want a human performance and are into like the science of their health and all that.

1:41:39Like, that's how I see it. No. And I think you're so right because the next logical step from for our work week would have been something about business. And it was like the for our body. And you're like, what does this guy know about health? And it was just this super famous book. And I read it and it was amazing. And same thing with our show, right? You're not just going to have on like, we're going to have a guy like Matt on. We're also going to have someone who might be, we're having the CMO of Nike on in a few weeks. Like that's a totally, totally different ballpark of guests and then we'll have another person on that's in this space but they all kind of exist in this ecosystem that someone that's into business entrepreneurship personal brand you're gonna find those combos interesting you know what i mean yeah i think uh it was just like all right if we are teaching about building and monetizing personal brand obviously we're building our personal brands like we have that but it's like man like do we just gotta like i don't like i was just nervous about the personal brand or our brand turning into just teaching about building a brand because i i hate that i hate when it's like someone who too yeah they've only built their brand around teaching someone how to do the thing yeah um so but i i really i really like how you how you uh thought about it's like yeah 50 can be teaching it and you know telling a story while you're teaching it and the other part is just like the fucking stuff i think off what you're saying too just one thing i think about a lot too is like intuition right and like your intuition there's too is like i hate when people do that right and there's something there right like you don't want to build something you hate the next five years that's brutal right um i uh you know maybe it was uh it was about six years ago i was uh building a business uh for five months that i hated um and it was because at the time it was i knew this business was going to be like a 200 300 million dollar business and i had negotiated you know 60 equity in this i could see where it was going it was clear as day right but i hated building this thing um and there was two co-founders in it i don't i hate co-founders not like i just don't build businesses with other people like that i always want to own 97 plus of my businesses just because that's how i do things and so this thing was not fitting the criteria but i could see the money pot and i was like so my mind and my head was like Matt fucking go for it but my heart was like oh I don't know my gut was like come on man don't make us do this and I remember being on a call with my therapist explaining this and she's like so like what are you gonna do I'm like I don't know I'm just gonna build the thing right she's like what do you mean you don't know right I'm like I don't I don't know like I mean I can't say no to this I mean this is like the freaking opportunity you wait for for your whole life, right?

1:44:26She's like, Matt, let me explain something to you. There's this concept called a whole body. Yes. Right. Um, this idea of like paying attention to, um, what your mind is telling you, what your heart is telling you and what your gut is telling you. Right. And when something's right for you as a human, like you'll feel that energy all aligned in your body, right? Your, your heart's like, let's go. So your head's like, let's go. Your heart's just like full and just like fired up and your guts, like let's fucking get it. Right. And it wasn't that. And I didn't know the other thing I was in a build.

1:45:01I just kind of felt like, yeah, this was not a whole body. Yes. And it was scary as hell. Like, like one of the scariest, weirdest things ever, because I'd never done this before, never lived like this. I was like, all right, here's an experimentation and just like trusting this therapist, I guess. And I said no to the thing, gave back the equity, um, told my friend, you know, Hey, just, you know, wishing all the best and I'm here to support you, but I can't do this. Sure enough, fast forward six years later, it is a$100 million plus company. So I was right there. But I look back on it and don't regret it at all because yeah, similar to what you're going through in this, right?

1:45:35It's like, I don't want to build something I hate, right? And so I think it's also just like tuning into that, right? It's like, if you're excited, and that's what we're talking about with the other thing too, if you're excited by something and if you're jazzed up by it, I mean, I'm also not saying to go and find a thousand shiny toys and just rip it. either right like we're trying to be focused but you guys are smart guys right there's these little angles or things you want to try and all that there should be spaciousness also for that playfulness and that experimentation and what you're doing and i even think about it like with matt's brand you know you are using travel you love to travel but then you make this really cool youtube video out of it so like you're crossing something that you love with like something that you like in business and it's so much more of an entertaining piece of content than than someone sitting behind a desk like i love those videos where you're like out in the fucking mountains and you're telling some piece of advice.

1:46:22I'm like, this is just different. And it's a similar format of someone that is sitting behind a desk, but it's much more entertaining. And you're crossing off like something that you love to do. So it's just like, you know what I mean? With the content that we're doing, I think that we need to, we need to like channel that. Cause we do have, you have, we each have 16 things that we enjoy doing. And that's like, that's the fun of it all, you know? Yeah, the videos that you put out, I think there was like one specific one that you put mountain biking and Dolomites. Yeah. I was like, dude, that fucking, that riff.

1:46:53And Dolomites is like number one on my bucket list of places I want to go visit because it's incredible. On the topic of just specific YouTube videos, you just put out one with Sam Coulter. And that was like a big inspiration to us because we first started with cameras and he's the fucking goat. This is like a really technical question. question did you film it and then flip it in post like because i saw so many so many comments of people being like man you learned to write backwards super well i was like how the fuck did they film it is was it like you filmed it regular and then you flipped it in post yeah i mean this is one of those things that you know it's like i have this like value of like always being transparent giving people like what they ask for like always like just being really real and honest but after reading the comments of that video i'm almost tempted just to like leave that mysteriousness no but in all honesty it was in post okay but you know it's like i could just be that backwards handwriting guy for the next decade you know people are like this guy's a savant yeah it's crazy i remember i was i was like is he fucking writing backwards yeah i know and doing it so casually too just like yeah no big deal it's like this guy's literally the most interesting man alive dude yeah man that was so funny and then also another question random did you were you already connected with huberman when you voice memoed him or what did he just see wow and i'll just you know say that that there's thing i've talked about a lot of mistakes and embarrassing things here and um different challenges and you know whatever um one thing though that i've learned and so i've been thinking i had to do a wedding speech at my brother's wedding in calgary just a few weeks ago and it got me thinking about like oh what are like childhood stories for my brother and all this but then it got me even just recounting like my own childhood and all this stuff and when i was younger my dad was super super strict right like of all my friends and friends friends this guy was like a drill sergeant okay and i have it's me and then i have four younger siblings i'm the oldest of five and um every day after school for about four summers my dad or sorry every day you know during the summer um my dad would um we had like a two acre forest in our backyard and he had some weird thing where he didn't want any weeds in this forest so he would just get us out there with a pail each just picking weeds in this forest like the most monotonous by hand oh yeah by hand just picking weeds in a forest right it was the most boring thing ever.

1:49:29And he was like, Oh, there's a little thing there. It's like, Oh my Lord. So it was like some of the, like these kinds of things, these happened all the time. Right. And these were like the hardest things I've ever done in my life. Like just the most monotonous thing. And I was getting paid nothing. So it just sucked. And so fast forward, you know, when I was building my first business bit maker, I didn't know how to go and build a technology school. I didn't know how to go and get people hired by big tech companies. I didn't know any of this. The only thing though I knew that I could probably do is just go and email as many humans as possible and just view it as a numbers game.

1:50:06Like if I can just get in front of a lot of people, some way, somehow, like I'm just going to rely on probability. And even if it's 0.1 % of people that end up working with me or hiring from these things, I'll take those odds any day, right? It's like got to go pluck a thousand weeds well then you got to go send a thousand emails like and as long as you get one of a thousand there's one hiring partner and just keep doing that and i was always able to kind of do that kind of volume um and that level of just like rolling up my sleeves and getting after it it was never it was hard but the hardness was not um unfamiliar to me because of my upbringing and so when it comes like the huberman thing as an example right then from all those messages and those emails from these businesses I've built like Bitmaker and whatever is you start to develop when you're messaging that many people all the time.

1:50:57This idea that you feel the anxiety come up like, oh man, I'm about to go and message the CEO of Shopify and I'm a scrub. Like why the hell would this person, this guy's gonna think I'm an idiot. I know nothing. And then you just listen to that voice and go, screw you. I'm sending it right. And always just like playing with that voice versus letting it actually stop you. So then, yeah, fast forward to like, I'm sober in this out. I'm just thinking, who are like probably the 20 people that could probably help me with sobriety because I'm fucking at the end of my wits here, right? And it's like, Huberman, it's like, screw it.

1:51:29Like, and yeah, same deal. It comes up in my head. You're an idiot. Why would this guy ever respond to you? Why does he care? But inevitably what I've learned too is like, you speak from the heart with people. You're genuine. You're saying like, I have enormous respect for you. I appreciate everything you've done. i've been following your stuff for a while i just have a quick question for you i'm going through this struggle i'm curious if you have any advice i'm just looking to like kind of take the next best step you know i'll take the odds that there's like a one percent chance he responds right but sure enough on this given day he was feeling great and generous i think he's just a generous guy by nature and got back to me and kind of changed my life in that way wow it's amazing who and like who sees your dms because i feel like i mean what gary responded to you seven years later yeah like it's just like yeah like your kind of things right like and i've talked to other folks in your business model and these things right it's like i always like you should have a hit list of your dream 5 000 guests and you should hit up if you want to be serious big league shit you should hit up that list every 60 days right and i mean like even be open to like one by one right like what would that look like like you'd probably in five years create a top 100 global podcasts the question is okay are you willing to do that yeah but like that would do it yeah right because one by one you just be hitting these insane people eventually and people like and maybe it's even becomes a thing too like we lose track of with personal brands or these things like you know if this video gets you know 2 000 views it's like that's a lot of people like we were sitting in front of a room of 2 000 we'd be shaking in our boots right now yeah right but suddenly we get 2000 views and we're like that was shit you know it's like what happened to humanity that suddenly 500 views 300 views 100 views was like garbage you know and we lose track of like there's actually leverage there and so you know i think um with these things too it's like there's opportunities as you do these things it's like i think what you guys have over the next guy is like i'm sure there's a lot of people that are also rooting for your success like people can see themselves in you guys because you have like humble beginnings you're standing this up and you're getting it going and you just graduated it at nine years ago and you're you're you're doing your thing and you're entering your 30s and you're you know getting married starting a family it's like oh like like that's how many people are like that like there's a huge subset of humanity that are in similar positions to you just trying to you know get things from you know 1 million to 10 million or whatever and more importantly like get a brand from you know something to like a household name um i know that's like even a big part of i feel like when i watch george heaton stuff like that kind of like on a mission and sharing it and you're part of this and we're kind of climbing the the thing together and what would be your version of that you know where people feel like oh oh they got this guest now finally got they got number 496 on their list you know yeah like can you involve it and make it a fun challenge where everyone's like rooting for you too around that i love that could be part of the vlog yeah yeah exactly man this has been this has been like one of my favorite conversations we've ever had ladies and gentlemen this has been episode 196 with matt gray if you're still here please hit the subscribe button drop us a comment leave us a like and we'll see you guys all next week peace for a guy who talks about building systems all day i was shocked to hear that he doesn't actually like to build systems not a big systems no dude just out of necessity yeah man you know what i mean you made it guys just so you all know dude welcome to the after party welcome to the after party you're all here appreciate you got the invite.

1:54:56If you're still here, just know that this is a blessed place to be. Parents are out of town. We have the house. We're doing an after party. Yeah. This is going to be amazing. Just the two rocks. Let's talk about this here episode. What'd you think? I really enjoyed it. I thought there was a lot of things that we can break down tactically for the rocks. I think that something that I envy about him that I feel like we aren't there yet, obviously. we have built really cool jobs for ourselves. We can't just stop, you know, and we're not at a place yet, but I think in six months we will be at a place to where we will have this show running in an episodic feature where we will be able to go film 15 pods and then chill for a second.

1:55:43And I think that's a much more sustainable route, obviously. Yeah, if you guys are wondering, we recorded this on Tuesday of this week and today's Thursday. That's because we love you guys. Quick turnaround. We love you guys. We wouldn't let you guys miss a week. We definitely need to create a system for getting guests more. That also reminds us, if you guys listen to this episode or listen to this podcast in general, and you think you have someone or have an idea or a connection to someone who'd be a great guest, DM us. Let me tell you criteria though, okay? I don't want someone random. I'm going to tell you criteria, okay?

1:56:20I either need a forward-facing founder who is creating awesome content and has a brand to back it up, seven-figure brand to back it up. I don't want the little dogs. We're not interested in that. We want people who are building awesome, bigger brands. Or this person is a savage in business. They have crushed it. They've built a huge brand and they are behind the scenes. They're like the CMO or the CEO and they will actually be able to drop game. They didn't just get lucky and this company, you know, pop because of a random, you know, a random thing in their market. Like I want someone who is really in the weeds in the game.

1:56:54So if you know someone like that, please. Yeah. Or who else we got? A creator. Or a creator who's built a business. Built a business off the back of their personal brand. Yes. Ideally, it's YouTube. That is really what we need. If they're a creator, they got to be crushing it on YouTube. Yeah. That's what we need. So if you're listening to that and you think of someone right now, send us a DM with them and I can't wait to chat with you. Dude, quick shout out to Jack. Yeah. Rock at the University of Oregon, best school in America, setting us up with a former Nike CMO, which is so sick. So that is where this idea sprouted from.

1:57:26So shout out to Jack for helping us with that connection because it's just unreal to think about how many of you out there know people in your network that you would love to see on the show. So please help us out there and send this to a friend if you enjoyed this pod with Matt. Now back to Matt. Now back to Matt. Let's keep going. He batches content like crazy. I thought it was so funny where he's like, I don't want to be waking up in the middle of the night with night terrors of like, what do I got to shoot? And oftentimes I think that is how we operate 505. I think that, yeah, if we can incorporate systems, like it got me thinking we need to create some sort of master Google Doc that really has like, right, brand guidelines and everything that we need to do for each episode, pre-production, while we film, post-production, things that need to be going out.

1:58:20Yeah, I think systems are the whole key. Yeah. And again, it's just something that's repeatable. It's like you're doing the same thing over and over. How can you simplify this to then pass it off to someone else to help you be able to do it at the exact same level that you're already doing things at? Another thing that Matt brought up, which I thought was really interesting, is that he's like, anyone can kind of own their own intersection of the internet and create a$10 million business for it. And I think that a lot of people, especially now, because it seems like everybody's making content and it can seem like every niche or every topic is super saturated, but there's always room, you know, for somebody new and someone unique.

1:59:03And he brings up storytelling and how that really is the one thing to separate yourself, which is so true. And whatever you are doing, whether it is you're creating a digital product, a physical product, you're in business entrepreneurship of some sort, you're building your personal brand, like just because there's 10 other people talking about the same things as you or are in the same category of your product doesn't mean that you can't stand out and create a very successful business for yourself. But I think it all comes down to telling your story and sharing why you're unique. I think especially as AI becomes more integrated into our feeds.

1:59:43It's already there, dude. It's already there. You just showed me something. I just showed you something like actually insane. Every single day there's new advancements that makes me question my whole life and it's all good. But where I go with that is I think real true human stories that hit on something that we all go through will win they will rise they will elevate past all of the noise because right now in my opinion instagram has never felt more like uh just the like a all sameness and i pop on and i'm not really seeing tons of things and i'm like that's an awesome piece i'll get them every now and then i'm like oh this is an awesome creator but so much of the stuff that i get is i feels the same yeah it feels the same not not in terms of like oh it's all terrible content.

2:00:28It just feels very similar. And then I'll get hit with a video. Like you shared me this one kid's video the other day. And I've actually, I found him too before you. And I'm like, this is refreshing. It's like, it feels different. It feels elevated. It feels normal. And slower paced. Slower paced. It's not like. So it's very interesting to notice the patterns that we're seeing and what we're engaging with and what we're liking and sending to one another. And same, I'm like, I mean, we are online a lot. We're seeing what's working and we are actively posting. So I think though, that is going to stay.

2:01:02I think great storytelling will stay, but you got to lean into the things that make you unique because your story can't be replicated. And I actually really appreciated how Matt brought up multiple personal stories to back up the stuff that he was talking about. He's like, I'm in the trenches. I've done this or I've gone through it. let me tell you a story about how I fired 23 people in one day and it was the worst day of my life and I you know became like I think he became depressed after for like two months he said and I think that that is um that is refreshing and that's something that I didn't know about him before you you see Matt's content you see the travel and you know all the big wins and you would have I had no idea about that and we stalked him for like a month and a half to prepare for this episode.

2:01:52So it's very interesting. I also really enjoyed what he was talking about embracing messiness early on. I just think back to the show. Even now. Even now, man. Listen, guys. It's hotter than shit in this room because we got humongous lights, these big bright light sources. So, dude, we just paid two grand for an AC unit and that's how much we love you guys. We also want to apologize to Matt. Poor guy was probably just sweating just so hot in here. I'll tell you what you guys. You know. I just didn't think that my dad didn't have AC. Dad does not have central AC. But I think it's because we're close to the ocean.

2:02:34Yeah, for sure. It's also kind of an older house. A lot of those homes that are older, close to the ocean, don't have AC. I mean, we can see the ocean from right outside the house. So anyways, so I was so stoked to move into this room to turn it into a studio. And it's phenomenal. we've just run into audio issues and we've also run into it being super fucking hot in here it's also like not the biggest room so it's like hard to have multiple people in uh in the room but and so we were deciding we were like can we actually keep recording in here because i'm not even kidding you guys like it gets so hot after an hour and a half where like the guest visibly becomes uncomfortable and i i just want to reiterate how sorry i am to matt but like yeah we're getting an ac unit installed in here so that we can keep it cool but we didn't know if we had to get like there's so many different kinds of ac units and then there's ones that are quieter than others and so we had to pay a premium to get like the quietest one we called our guy mark really helped us out yeah got us all got us all set up got us a good deal on our ac unit but if any of you guys know anyone in HVAC to help us set this thing up.

2:03:48I need you to text me ASAP. Something else that he brought up that I thought was really interesting is how he thinks more like an investor. And he kind of takes the emotion. I like that a lot. He takes the emotion out of his decision making. And he's like, okay, we're going to set a revenue goal and a date. And if we don't hit this revenue goal by this date and we're not enjoying it, maybe then we should stop pursuing it or pivot it. And I think that that's a really intelligent way to go about it. And I think that like if you are starting something new or you're debating whether to continue with it, it's like, yeah, give yourself a deadline or a date of like six months down the road by this time.

2:04:37If I'm still feeling this way and we haven't hit our revenue goals and we haven't really seen much traction, maybe it's time to have a discussion of like, is this still going to work for us or we need to completely pivot or is there a way to change the business? I love that he's like, we got to disrupt every year. We got to tear the business down and make it better. He's been doing Founder OS for a minute. And so to think that he's still trying to make it better every single year is incredible. And I think that it's something we'll take away and start implementing into 505 of like, yeah, every six weeks, every eight weeks, let's have a fucking whiteboard session, figure out what's working, what's not working, and how we can better optimize and be more efficient.

2:05:21I think we need to bring that big-ass whiteboard that I have. I was thinking. We got to— I think we have a huge wall. Big wall right there. I feel like that is where we need to whiteboard it up. Yeah. That's what we need. That's the missing piece here. That is the big missing piece. Yeah, we got to whiteboard Max. We're not Maxing the whiteboard, dude. We also got to go to a film fest this last week. Dude, we had a great PPD for Alex. We had a great after party for Acosta. Rocks. And Coastie forgot how to focus the camera, man. And it happens the best of us. Genuinely, I don't know what happened because.

2:06:00You focused it, right? Dude, the intro was focused. Yeah. Ad read was focused. PPD didn't change anything. We didn't change nothing, right? Just recorded a new thing. And for some reason, it was super blurry. Sometimes it's been like slightly out of focus. And I'm like, just sharpen it up. and like, unless you're watching it on TV, you probably can't tell. It was so bad where I was like, no, no, no, we can't do it. But anyways, something we talked about, first of all, Alex Costa podcast was awesome. But something we talked about was going to Sam Newton's Film Fest and how you had a horse dock, which now has passed and you showed it.

2:06:37And you had a really good reaction from it because it was really good. Thanks, man. It was cool to see. I've never seen work on the big screen. So that was exciting to just see a piece like up there. You were nervous. I was very nervous. I blacked out, blacked out the whole time to remember anything of how it went. I was just like taken aback by how it looked wide. And then I couldn't stop thinking like that shot should be a little brighter on the big screen. It looked fine on my phone and it's all good. Stuff like that. Yeah. But I also, it's not a theater the way he shows it. So I don't think that like, it's a, it's a projector.

2:07:09Every, um, everything would be different, huh? Every film, like it's not, it's not the ideal sound and it's not the ideal visual experience but it still is really fucking sick to see it live so i wouldn't i don't think you need to say oh that shot was too dark or okay that's really good to know that's really good to know it was fun it's really a sam issue we should i'm gonna call sam dude love meeting the rocks i would give a quick shout out to a few that we met we met like kade michael justin armand uh another gal named celeste there were so many rocks that were there so it was so cool and if i missed you i'm so sorry but so cool to meet you guys in person and we appreciate you more than you know because none of this shit would happen if you guys don't support our show and watch it and send it to your friends.

2:07:51So very cool to hear more about your stories and everything that you guys are up to in this content space. I thoroughly enjoyed just the experience and it just keeps proving our point that we need to figure out to do something live as soon as possible. Bring the rocks together. Yeah, if you guys are a long time listener of the show. You guys are probably like, stop the cap. Six years in the making, dude. Stop the cap. We're going to do it. We're going to do it for sure. You guys, we've been really busy. It's been really hard to focus on anything else. Today we did have our very last call of pay to be you, little graduation.

2:08:31Very fun. It was funny. You played graduation song. Yeah, man. Fig and I showed up in a cap and gown. Just kidding. But that was really cool. So glad we got that under our belt. Waitlist has opened up. If you guys do want to learn from us and learn how to build and monetize your personal brands, we have a six-week live cohort called Pay2BU that we will be doing again in just a month, which is super exciting. Yeah, a few weeks, which is very cool. So if you've made it to this long in the episode and you're still listening and something you're interested in, hit us a quick DM and just say, yo, what's good with Pay2BU?

2:09:07Boom. Talk more about it. But other stuff that's interesting. Oh, next week, I'm really excited because I'm going to... Where are you going, man? To Sedona. Oh, you're going to Sedona. So I'm really excited. I have gone back and forth about wanting to start a proper hospitality, like short form video and photo for social media for hospitality, like an agency specifically. And I wanted to do it. And then I was like, nah, I don't really want to do it. But now I'm back on the wanting to do it. So I do want to do it. And Chris Motions actually connected me to the guy who works with this hotel called Ambiente.

2:09:52He runs, he's trying to create basically the next version of booking.com, like his own version, which is cool. And he's like really tapped in with the hospitality space in Arizona. Anyways, me and Sarah Catherine are going out there and we're going to, I'm going to be filming. I mean, like it's our first time we're going to be in front of the camera, but I'm also doing, I'm like creating proper social content for this hotel. And I'm really excited because a big, honestly, like the main reason when I first got into making content was seeing the people, the travel influencers. And mainly it was like Sam Culler, Jay Alvarez, Casey Neistat.

2:10:31And I was like, I want to do that. And part of me, this is really funny. Part of me when I was younger or part of me is like really frustrated at myself but you don't you know you don't know what you don't know but part of me now at 30 is frustrated that costas at fucking 22 didn't realize hey you don't have to be like an influencer to travel the world just tap in with the hotels and make content boom because i think we all understand that the hotels are the most expensive thing so expensive and so i've honestly kind of been getting in my head of like what the fuck have you been doing Like, why did you not get on the hotel stuff earlier?

2:11:09But it's never too late. And what's interesting is the guy who's hiring me for this, he told me that he was interested in hiring me out of other creators because he's like, you can do the photo video stuff, but you also are comfortable in front of the camera with your fiance. And he's like, it's nice that you have kind of a built in subject. So definitely going to be using that to my advantage. And I feel like you should do the same with Chloe. Dude, you can start at 40 is what he's trying to tell you. Well, no, I mean, dude, by 40, I'll have like 20 years in the game, dude. So I'll be set up for success.

2:11:43That is so funny. Keep talking shit. You're not going to get invited, dude. Bunch of traveling for Costas, none for Fig. This was, uh, this is one of - Wait, speaking of travel, did you see they're getting rid of TSA pre-check and global entry? Wait, what? They're pausing it. Like it doesn't exist. You got to be shitting. I'm not even kidding you. I saw a video. I think it started this week. What? Dude. Are you serious? Deadass. Lines at the airport? Dude. Hold on. Hold on. Okay. It's actually went into effect. I saw there was a chance or something, but I thought that was like. Oh, okay. Wait.

2:12:23Despite initial threats of suspension due to a partial government shutdown and funding lapses, TSA pre-check remains operational at airports. But something. I saw this. I saw there was a chance. I didn't know that it had gone through. That's insane. DHS, which I don't even know what that is, reverse his decision to suspend TSA pre-check and global entry. Department of Homeland Security. Okay, good. Okay, so we're good for a little bit. But I saw a video where this guy was like, yo, no more TSA pre-check. I was like, what the fuck? Okay, so it is not. It's still good. It's still good. We're still good.

2:12:57Still good. Airport experience would have been. Do you have global entry? Yeah, but I didn't go do the damn interview. I got to go do it. I like did all the online stuff and then try to get an interview. And then I showed up and they're like, I have my ID and they're like, you need a passport. I'm like, awesome. So I drove here for nothing. Yes. You got to bring your passport. So if that's you and you're trying to get it. Hey, that makes sense. Don't forget your passport. It does make sense. Like an international thing. I thought my ID would be chill. Yeah, no. Because we're in LA, California.

2:13:21It's a California DMV thing. I don't know, dude. I went to the DMV not too long ago to get an updated license. And I was like, oh, I get the real ID too. And I needed to print out. You got to print. You gotta print out everything They couldn't have a more back ass word system At the DMV Those guys are all confused All just so unhappy I've never No one's happy at the DMV You can even try to kill them with kindness You shut your mouth and get in the corner Go sit in your seat and wait for your number to be called Epic pod though Seriously episode 196 You guys are still here please go tell a friend about the pod And go let us know if you got a potential guest for us.

2:14:03Help us out. Help us build the systems. Go check out Stan and we'll see you guys all next week. Peace.