Misfit Founders
Misfit Founders
From Public Speaking Fears to LinkedIn Stardom: An Influencer's Journey
Unlock the secrets of the LinkedIn creator economy with our special guest who knows this terrain like the back of their hand. This episode promises to reveal the lucrative opportunities LinkedIn offers that mainstream platforms like Instagram and YouTube miss out on. You’ll hear engaging stories about public speaking, a funny mishap with an event invitation, and a unique perspective on "The Third Door" by Alex Benayan, a book that has changed our guest's approach to success.
We tackle the big question of why LinkedIn isn't making use of its full potential for influencer marketing despite its strong revenue from paid ads. Our discussion ranges from the challenges of building a tech platform tailored for LinkedIn influencers to effective pricing strategies that ensure long-term brand collaborations. Discover how specialized education for both creators and brands may be the key to unlocking LinkedIn's vast opportunities, and why there's a desperate need for features that better support content creators on the platform.
Our AJ’s personal journey is nothing short of inspiring. From overcoming a fear of public speaking to transitioning from a stable job to full-time entrepreneurship, you’ll learn valuable life lessons that go beyond LinkedIn strategies. Hear how meaningful relationships can propel your career, and how surrounding yourself with ambitious individuals can transform your life. Whether you're a budding LinkedIn influencer or an established entrepreneur, this episode is a treasure trove of insights and practical advice. Join us and get ready to rethink how you use LinkedIn!
⭐ Subscribe to this channel 👉 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnH68ixWKdhqD1hPZh3RuzA?sub_confirmation=1
⭐ Join the Misfit Founder community 👉 https://nas.io/misfits
⭐ Connect with Biro 👉 https://www.linkedin.com/in/sir-biro/
⭐ Connect with AJ 👉
https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaron-aj-eckstein?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_app
-------------------------------------------------------
DISCLAIMER
By accessing this Podcast, I acknowledge that Misfit Founders makes no warranty, guarantee, or representation as to the accuracy or sufficiency of the information featured in this Podcast. The information, opinions, and recommendations presented in this Podcast are for general information only and any reliance on the information provided in this Podcast is done at your own risk. This Podcast should not be considered professional advice. Unless specifically stated otherwise, Misfit Founders does not endorse, approve, recommend, or certify any information, product, process, service, or organization presented or mentioned in this Podcast, and information from this Podcast should not be referenced in any way to imply such approval or endorsement. The third party materials or content of any third party site referenced in this Podcast do not necessarily reflect the opinions, standards or policies of Misfit Founders. The Misfit Founders assumes no responsibility or liability for the accuracy or completeness of the content contained in third party materials or on third party sites referenced in this Podcast or the compliance with applicable laws of such materials and/or links referenced herein. Moreover, Misfit Founders makes no warranty that this Podcast, or the server that makes it available, is free of viruses, worms, or other elements or codes that manifest contaminating or destructive properties.
MISFIT FOUNDERS EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL LIABILITY OR RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL OR OTHER DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF ANY INDIVIDUAL'S USE OF, REFERENCE TO, RELIANCE ON, OR INABILITY TO USE, THIS PODCAST OR THE INFORMATION PRESENTED IN THIS
So Instagram, YouTube, but LinkedIn has been kind of like it's a black sheep in the creator economy.
Speaker 2:But why? Why is that? So? I think, a couple of reasons. I think LinkedIn generates $4 to $6 billion a year in paid ads. The best advertisements are the ones that don't feel like an ad. So instead of running you know millions of dollars worth of ads through your company account, why not sponsor a creator in your niche? Funny story. So I applied to probably 20 tests, got rejected by every single one of them. I got an email saying hey, you got accepted. So the event's in six days. Is that okay? You get no teleprompter, you get no cue cards. So I ended up doing it and practiced like crazy on the plane, practiced in my hotel room, just walked up on stage and just gave my speech and it was an absolute blur.
Speaker 2:The book's called the Third Door by Alex Benayan. Let's say, life is a club and most people either go in through general admission and they pay a ticket to get in. The other type of people, the elite people, pay VIP to get in and the third door is you sneak through the kitchen, put on a tuxedo to look like you're you know a bottle person, and you sneak through the kitchen, put on a tuxedo to look like you're you know a bottle person and you sneak into that. And I think in life everyone thinks there's one or two ways to do things, but there's always a third way and we'll try to keep it to um max an hour and a half.
Speaker 1:I know you also need to get to sass city. Yes, and do the stuff there I'm like I really wanted today to go early because the initial plan was to set up at uh, sas talk see the stage and so on. But I'm just so caught up, so busy with all of y'all uh guesting on my podcast, okay, that I don't even have time to go to to sas talk today. Um, I can let you know, yeah, what happened?
Speaker 1:we're supposed to go probably in the afternoon there to set up or tomorrow. Cool, you'll probably see us tomorrow just running around filming.
Speaker 2:Cool, odd stuff with wes and other people. Well, even same, I'm doing that. I'm hosting the first Fireside Chat tomorrow morning, okay, so like I can't even see what the setup is because we're the first one, right, so we'll see Should be cool.
Speaker 1:Well, we met quite recently, right, and we met through this SaaS Talk event, so maybe tell me a bit about what is it that you do?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And also, why are you here, like what? Brings you to.
Speaker 2:Sustok. Yes, I guess I'll start there. So I do live in Austin, texas. I moved here about two years ago from Los Angeles, went to school at USC and it was either New York, san Francisco or Austin and I feel like I've done. I've visited in other places, but Austin is just that one location where you come to visit and you don't want to leave. It's very fun. Everybody is a transplant, so everybody needs to go out and meet people so you don't get the I'm closed off, I don't want to meet you kind of New York vibe.
Speaker 2:You get hey, you just moved here, I moved here as well. Let's chat, let's network, whatever it is. So I think it's an amazing place to live. It's an amazing place to build a company. Given that there's no state income tax, Texas is a great place to live and to build something. And then also my sister lives here as well, so we live in downtown, so local. I live across the street from filming this in Austin. And then for SaaS Talk specifically. So I'll be hosting three fireside chats one with a company leader from Klaviyo, one with GitLab and one with WP Engine. So on top of doing a lot of speaking, I also do a lot of moderating and fireside chats just for fun, kind of through writing for Fast Company, which is kind of a. We can talk about how that happened, but basically cold pitch the staff editor at an event here in Austin two years ago and just said, hey, here's how I can add value to the publication, here's what I want to write about, Did a couple of interviews and got the writing gig for Fast Company.
Speaker 2:But my full-time job as a founder is scaling my company Creator Match. So at the core, we match brands with LinkedIn creators. We're building a LinkedIn creator marketing platform, basically helping these B2B creators on LinkedIn monetize their brands. So I'm a LinkedIn creator myself and I saw all my other friends and all the creator communities and different platforms getting monetized like crazy and having brands interested in them. But we're kind of just this area that nobody cares about us and we're underpaid, underserved and there's no communication either. So we're really trying to service this group of creators that have massive audiences, massive reach and just oftentimes, more domain authority as well. A lot of our creators are also leaders at Google and Microsoft and Facebook, whatever it is, but they also want to do brand deals and they also want to monetize their brand. So building monetization tools for the creators and then helping the brands to attend influencer marketing.
Speaker 1:That is super interesting because I've been thinking about this for quite a while. Yeah, I've met quite a few founders that were doing kind of like connecting influencers with brands for linkedin, for youtube, for this, but I've not really seen anything for linkedin yeah and and um. Did I say linkedin or did the first one you said linkedin I meant, uh, instagram. Yeah, I was about to say yeah, so instagram, uh youtube. But linkedin has been kind of like it's a black sheep in the creator economy.
Speaker 2:But why? Why is that? So? I think a couple of reasons. I think it's been around for 20 years, but the platform hasn't really developed. My hunch is that they have no competition, so there's no pressure to move quickly. Right, you can say that Uber is better off because Lyft right, and vice versa, because they have they're just such fierce competition. Tiktok is better because there's shorts and there's reels, right, but LinkedIn doesn't have to be better because there's really nothing else.
Speaker 2:Like, we're gonna go to a conference in a few minutes and you're gonna meet everybody and they're not gonna ask for your email. They're not gonna ask for your Instagram. They your email. They're not going to ask for your Instagram. I'm not going to ask for your YouTube channel. I'm going to say, oh, let's connect on LinkedIn, right, and I've been to too many conferences this year. I know for a fact that's going to happen. Yeah, right, and that's just where professional networking occurs. I think historically, the content has been very professional, very buttoned up. It's a content deficient platform, meaning that more people consume than they do create. Right, versus TikTok. It's extremely saturated now and everyone's trying to be a creator.
Speaker 2:I think it's a ripe time to become a creator, grow your brand on LinkedIn, but LinkedIn is really never giving the opportunity for creators to monetize. So, like on YouTube, for instance, there are ad products like AdSense where, even without brand deals, if you get enough views right, you can enter the program and actually get ad revenue. But for LinkedIn, there are no ad products. You have to go off platform and oftentimes people monetize with one-on-one coaching, consulting, paid communities, courses, private sponsorships and things like that. And that's what we're focusing on, because brands do I mean think about it this way, right, in terms of, like the total addressable market for influencer marketing on LinkedIn.
Speaker 2:Linkedin generates four to $6 billion a year in paid ads right, and the best advertisements are the ones that don't feel like an ad. So instead of running you know millions of dollars worth of ads through your company account, why not sponsor a creator in your niche? And then also, they just unveiled a new ad product called Thought Leader Ads, where historically it was, let's say, you are Apple, apple's company account could only boost a post from an Apple employee, usually an executive. They just unveiled a change where Apple can boost any creator's profile, which is crazy, because that's whitelisting, which is very popular on Instagram and TikTok and other platforms. So now, if you're Apple, you can boost anybody's piece of content on the platform. So a lot of your feed and a lot of the ads you're gonna see are now gonna be through the creator's profile rather than the brand's profile, and it's gonna come off more authentic, because people trust people, not brands.
Speaker 1:Very true, that is interesting. I didn't know when was this launched.
Speaker 2:So that ad product was launched about a month ago, and what we do at Creator Match is we basically run end-to-end influencer marketing for our brands on LinkedIn and we use the sponsored content to test what essentially creative would work well if there was ad spend behind it. So let's say, we partner with 10 creators with 10 posts. Four of them did super well. Organically. There's a lot more juice you can squeeze out of that piece of content if you put ad spend behind it. So we do both. Both we have a paid ads team. We have someone who's run 300 million dollars in paid ads on linkedin, um, and we're doubling down on this ad type that is but the, the, the aha moment just dropped for me now when you said that.
Speaker 1:Because as a, as an agency, as a service, you are now enabled by linkedin to test the heck out of strategies, because, rather than having your company's um name on the sponsorships, you can have um account like creator accounts yes that talk about a variety of things. You put your money, your dollar signs behind that and test a b test on the things that work, and then you get all of that analytics and all that information and you know exactly what works with what audiences?
Speaker 2:So that's what most brands are saying. The issue is there's tracking limitations, so LinkedIn is notorious for horrible analytics. If you are a creator, the analytics you get individually are extremely minimal. They're very basic and it's just. You can't really do anything with these analytics. So there are actually standalone companies that just give you better analytics but they don't focus on the influencer marketing side. It's you log in through your own account and it's for your own profile.
Speaker 2:What we did is we built a custom tech platform to track all of these campaigns at scale so you can track all of your influencer sponsored content as well as your paid ads. We use LinkedIn's marketing API to pull all of the ads or all of the analytics from the ads campaign manager into our platform, so you get one central dashboard. We're the only platform right now that is focusing on LinkedIn, and it's a funny story, given that this is a founder's podcast and kind of the how I started or even thought about creator match. So obviously I felt the pain myself on LinkedIn creator. It was impossible to monetize.
Speaker 2:I'm with friends who literally are like the Mr Beasts of LinkedIn, like 700,000 followers on LinkedIn, have a massive newsletter like a million impressions per post and has never done a sponsorship. Like, how is that possible, right? So the pain is there. That's a bit crazy. It's crazy. And then I hopped into these product demos with every major influencer marketing platform and I asked why don't you support LinkedIn? And they all said either, it's not an opportunity, right? Which is wild because they're not seeing, like, the massive opportunity in front of us.
Speaker 1:There must be some sort of thinking there, unless they're just completely obliviousious. Why would they say it's not an opportunity when you can clearly see the data of of hundreds of thousands of views? And engagements on some of these influences.
Speaker 2:I'll tell you why. Because I was just asking questions. I said that's not true. I mean, why are you not seeing this opportunity? The reason why is these companies are very successful and they don't want to divert engineering resources away from what works to what doesn't.
Speaker 2:That's the real reason yeah, it's an innovators dilemma where, if they don't innovate right, they I mean, look at these other platforms aren't going anywhere. Maybe tiktok goes somewhere, but you know, instagram, youtube, other platforms are not going anywhere. Um, but why would you lessen the experience and not double down on what works versus kind of going out in this new space? And they all said you would have to build a custom tech platform to support LinkedIn, and every single platform said that. So I said, okay, well, why don't I just build it and focus solely on LinkedIn? Because LinkedIn is such a different platform than other social media platforms. The rates are different, the type of content's different, every part is different. Even these creators haven't even done sponsorship, so they don't even know how to price themselves. The brands don't know how to price right.
Speaker 2:So there's so much education that needs to happen on both sides. I mean, I will reach out to a creator and say, hey, I have X Fortune 500 company that wants to work with you. What are your rates? Send me your media kit. What's a media kit? I've never done a sponsored post before.
Speaker 2:We're educating both sides and how we see a creator match is, we know, a storm is going to come, I think truly, a tidal wave is going to come in terms of demand in this space. We want to be well positioned to survive that storm and have the infrastructure in place, the tech platform in place, and then have the education and all of the different blog content and videos on both the brand side and the creator side, to make that happen when it does come. Because right now it is a lot of education and I get questions from brands like wait, there's a creator on LinkedIn. What does that mean? Can you show me an example? Why aren't other companies doing it? This new ad product it just came out so no one can say they're an expert in it. But we're diving so deep into this that we are becoming domain experts, because this is all we do. If you say you want to do tiktok, I'll say I'll refer you to my friend's agency.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right, and we're doubling down on linkedin and I guess it's also good to be in there early, because the creator, I mean the creative program, has been what? Two, one, two years. So how old is that? I remember enabling. Yes, I was part of the.
Speaker 2:I was part of the linkedin creators program and it was great, um, but I, I don't think not knocking LinkedIn. I don't think that they really are focused on the creator side of the platform, because it's not a billion dollar bet, right? If they're a billion dollar company, they can only make billion dollar bets. And if they can't directly attribute an investment into their creator program to revenue, they're losing right. So they're doubling down on their subscription, doubling down on LinkedIn recruiter, doubling down on the part that makes them money, right, and I do think that there's a huge potential for them to make money through the creator side. However, they're not seeing it and the original vision actually came.
Speaker 2:I was reading an article where YouTube acquired a company called FameBit and rebranded it to YouTube Brand Connect. It's YouTube's in-house talent agency, where they connect YouTubers and brands. I said why doesn't that exist on LinkedIn? And I literally spoke to some people at LinkedIn and they said it's an interesting opportunity, not a billion dollar bet. You should go out and build it and then chat with us. So that's what we're building.
Speaker 1:You know, as you were mentioning this, I was in my in my mind, I was trying to figure out. I was thinking but why doesn't linkedin look at things like channels, like brands, like youtube, right? Well, youtube is quite successful with their, you know, creator program and in basically advertising and incentivizing um creators to create in order to be able to advertise more, um.
Speaker 1:And I was thinking well, surely that's a no-brainer, because, because that's a very successful example that linkedin can follow. But in the same time, do you reckon linkedin considers itself a content platform?
Speaker 2:I mean, I think it has to be a content platform or else there's no real estate to run ads. Yeah, right, so every initiative that they've ever done was around getting you to write more content. Even if you go into your feed today and click create, it's going to spit out some AI generated crap about hey, just like, we want you to post something, right? I think there's going to be a time where the content needs to improve, because a lot of people are using AI generated content, right, so it's very surface level. You need to really get into the weeds of what your community or audience wants.
Speaker 2:So I do think that they are focused on getting more people to create, but for the sole reason so that the more real estate that you have, the more ads you can put in place, right? So if you have three organic, you have one sponsor, three organic, one sponsor, but there's only two organic, then you don't have as much real estate to run ads. Right, and they're an ad platform. So I do think they're a content platform. It's still content deficient, so they're still dying to get more content.
Speaker 1:The reason why I'm asking is because you know we talked about, you know, the billion dollar feature or idea to implement. And you are right, they're very much focused on their subscription. Yep, right, and what is that? That is not a content kind of like circled around. Content type of subscription is connections right, it's like finding the right connections and linking and you know um, making, increasing your network and working with people and finding leads and then on the, the jobs listing and so on. Again, that is listing for jobs, but kind of like organic thought leadership content, video articles, all of these things.
Speaker 1:They have advertising, but if they don't focus that much on the creator part of their platform and they don't take example from something like YouTube and so on and then double down on that, would they ever be able to incentivize creators themselves to continue to grow in post where creator does not have a, let's say, financial incentive to create more content, better content and so on, would they ever reach a point where advertising is a billion dollar side of their business? I mean, it is right You're saying the creators, or on the LinkedIn side, on the LinkedIn side, right? So, like on all of the posts you mentioned, they want to incentivize in order for people to create more, in order for them to be able to put more ads and bits inside. But how do you incentivize someone to create?
Speaker 2:I think you incentivize them by either growth like hey, you come to our platform, you will grow faster than other platforms. So like getting more reach. But for what purpose if you're not?
Speaker 1:willing to pay your creators, that's how we're positioning Creator Match.
Speaker 2:So there are companies out there that help creators on LinkedIn grow. I've always said what's the point of growth if you can't monetize? Not that you have to monetize by day one, but it takes a lot of time to create. So we are positioning ourselves to really help those LinkedIn creators with building monetization tools to help them monetize, because everything to date you monetize off platform Even brand deals are off platform, right, speaking, consulting, paid community courses, et cetera, right.
Speaker 2:So even this ability to whitelist a creator's piece of content and put ad spend behind it, the biggest miss with that ad type is there's no rev share with the creator. So a lot of brands think, oh well, I'm gonna just ask you know, bureau, to say, hey, here's a notification. I love your content on Figma, right, great to see how you use it. We wanna put $10,000 of ad spend behind it. Thank you so much. Just click accept. Why would a creator accept that if they're not getting paid for it? Right? So there's no rev share right now with linkedin and the brands don't have those relationships. But we have those relationships. So, on top of the sponsored content we're doing on the influencer side, we're also bridging that relationship and getting the creator paid for usage rights to whitelist that content for paid ads.
Speaker 2:So again, I think it's a miss on their part, but again it's they don't need to compete with youtube because all youtube is right. There's no subscription. Of course you can get YouTube premium right. But LinkedIn has an entire other revenue stream of their subscription and they're also doubling down on news. So they're also bundling news subscriptions and building partnerships with publications like the Fast Companies of the World to bundle that subscription. So then, one premium subscription you get, you know, unlimited search, you can connect with people, you could use it as a tool for discovery and you get news. But the miss again is the creator side, and I think there's going to be a day whether it's creator match or another company, they're going to acquire somebody to really focus on the creator side and enable you to build your brand and also get sponsorships from brands.
Speaker 1:Right, okay, but you're saying that for the moment they're nothing. Way too busy with their other strategies to do that.
Speaker 2:I mean, I'll give you an example it's almost a meme at this point LinkedIn, out of everything they could have focused on, right, they have you would think they have unlimited development resources. They launched games to compete with Wordle for the New York Times, like games and of every single thing they could have done right. And I will post and say hey, linkedin, I'm a power user, I talk to brands, I talk to LinkedIn creators. Here's exactly what you should improve, right. And some examples are if you want more time spent on the platform, you should improve the direct messaging and inbox side of it. It is a cluster spent on the platform. You should improve the direct messaging and inbox side of it. It is a cluster, it is. It is. It gets messy and if they really made that better, people would actually message more on the platform and actually you'd get more daily active users and more time spent right.
Speaker 2:Or better analytics, like now I can actually create, because I know what's working, what's not right. There's again standalone businesses that just give you better LinkedIn analytics, right, so they launch in games. So to me, it's I don't know what they're trying to prioritize, but they're definitely doubling down on their subscription and creators. They say they're creator first, but they're definitely not creator first yet. I think it will come, but they need to see an opportunity and so I think to get buy in, you need to show traction, right. And that's kind of what we're trying to do and position ourselves to say, hey, well, we have these amount of creators who are dying to get sponsorships and we have these amount of brands who are trying to work with these creators. Imagine if it was integrated on LinkedIn. It'd be so much easier than using another platform. And that's what we're focusing on.
Speaker 1:And is that where, as I said, we're here? Is that where you see as potentially one of the fate of your business is getting acquired by LinkedIn.
Speaker 2:I see two potential acquisitions. One, in like the perfect world, is a LinkedIn acquisition, and they have acquired companies in the past. The second one would be getting acquired by an influencer marketing platform that doesn't support LinkedIn, right, right. So the grins of the world, the impacts, the captivates that I mean, make tens of millions of dollars, have tons of funding and they support every platform except for LinkedIn. I think there, hopefully, we can get to a point of scale where we are serving an audience that they're not serving, yeah, and it's a huge addition in their toolkit. So now more brands want to work with them because they now support LinkedIn.
Speaker 2:But I think for us and I just had this conversation with another friend who's a founder we're talking about exit strategy and this, and that I'm just focused on building right now. And if you know, an acquisition talk comes great, we'll entertain it. But I just want to make the best product to help LinkedIn creators monetize their brands and to help brands crush it on LinkedIn through influencer marketing. That's it. Everything else, to me, is just a distraction. It's a shiny object. Obviously, it's a good dream to have, but we need to get to a point to really demand their attention.
Speaker 1:And that's what I'm focused on and, yeah, it's also a good thought to have in the back of your mind.
Speaker 1:It's like there are very strong options, because both of these are very strong. Linkedin it really depends on a lot of variables, including their long-term strategy and so on, but I think a lot more of these because it's such a common um evolution of an industry where you focus on your craft, you build there's a bunch of companies that build kind of like mini empires of on top of something that is novel, like it was 10 years ago influencer marketing and stuff and then you reach a point where you start acquiring other companies because that is the most effective way for you to expand your reach and your business. So I definitely see that happen and, honestly, I've been thinking about this. I don't have crazy numbers when it comes to audience on LinkedIn. I have almost 10,000 followers, but I've been thinking about this whole thing because most of my content, the where I get the most exposure and the most engagement, is LinkedIn. Yeah, and I was sat there thinking well, you know, on YouTube with my podcast, I can reach kind of like whatever is partner.
Speaker 1:What is it called Partner? No, not partner.
Speaker 2:Partner program.
Speaker 1:Partner program, yes, and there's other means. And on LinkedIn, and I've had a couple of potential sponsors for Misfit Founders sponsors for Misfit founders and they were so excited about the reach that the podcast had in my posts and my short clips on LinkedIn that they wanted to sponsor. And I was sat there thinking, well, there's not much guidance on what do I do here, how do I price?
Speaker 1:Because you said price and that struck me deeply because I was thinking well, yeah, on YouTube you can look up and you'll find tens of videos and calculators and so on on how to price based on your views and so on, but how am I going to price based on my reach and my viewership on LinkedIn?
Speaker 2:And that education part is also what we're doing. So again, we're helping brands go to market on LinkedIn and helping LinkedIn creators monetize and kind of bridging the two. Because what we often see is a brand will dip their toes on LinkedIn and influence their world and way overprice the creator. Or, on the other side, the LinkedIn creator will say some number that they got a calculator like a CPM calculator from YouTube or TikTok, and you know they're both happy. At first the creator just got a nice short-term bag of money, but then they're never gonna work with each other again because it actually was a failure of a campaign, because it never met expectations, right. So it's actually doing yourself a disservice by overpricing yourself early on. You actually wanna price yourself fairly. You wanna crush performance, crush expectations and then say, okay, let's double down, for instead of a one post deal, let's do a 10 post deal over 10 months or five months or whatever it is right. And now LinkedIn creators think, oh, now I'm worth this much. I said no, no, no, let's go back to reality here, and there are some things I mean.
Speaker 2:A really good benchmark is 1% of your audience size, which is a good, just way to ground us at a price initially. So if you have 100,000 followers more or less, you can charge about $1,000 for one post. Of course there's different variables. Is it just that one post? Because usually one-off, a la carte posts are more expensive. You want to incentivize the brand to do multiple posts. Maybe it's a three-post deal. You give a discount. Is it an omni-channel deal? So it's linkedin plus youtube, linkedin plus tiktok? You know, can you structure the deal to where it's half upfront, you know payment, and then the other half is affiliate. If it's affiliate, um, so there's different ways to structure it. I've seen also one dollar per like. So if you get around 500 to a thousand likes, there's a million ways to structure it right.
Speaker 2:Um, but I think it's important again to to set expectations and get you almost want to. I don't want to say undersell yourself, but you want to price yourself fairly in the beginning so that you can actually have leverage to renegotiate. If not, then you way overpriced yourself. The ROI wasn't there. The brand's not going to be happy in there to work with you again, and I think that's the thing that we're trying to educate creators on is just how do you price yourself? The different deal structures, etc. And I do think. One other point the best brands for influencer marketing on LinkedIn are not the brands that have a low customer acquisition cost or the ones that you know think that they can crush it D to C on TikTok. Right, and I will tell brands, hey, like this is not the right place for you. The best brands or niche are B2B, SaaS and high ticket, because you're not going to get the same reach that you do on a TikTok.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:But the one view is going to be more valuable. So, instead of a million views versus 100,000 views, those 100,000 views on LinkedIn are going to be decision makers, ceos, vps, head of product and, again, depending on what you're selling, that actually can be extremely valuable. So maybe the conversions aren't 1,000 signups here to 10 signups here, but maybe one signup is worth five grand, right. Or it's a company and you're selling seats for the subscription, so you like, get a company to say, yes, we want 100 seats. Each seat is $39 a month, right. That's a massive opportunity. So those are the opportunities that I think creators should focus on on LinkedIn first, Well, it sounds like I need to give you a call at one point in the future?
Speaker 1:Because, yeah, like it's, and it's not that question. Please, do you have any sort of, or thinking of doing any sort of like kind of like? Free online education for LinkedIn creators? Because, again, it doesn't exist. No, it's, I couldn't find one. Yeah, and trust me.
Speaker 2:I've searched it as well. It doesn't exist either. I think we're going to start with a blog strategy. Okay, both for the brands and the creators, because, again, it's serving two different people, but the more educated they become, there's a network effect right and then there's way more valuable for both parties. So I think we're going to start with blog. We're also going to do monthly live events interviewing these top LinkedIn creators and sharing strategies, as well as the top brand marketers and sharing strategies on what worked, what didn't work in your influencer campaign.
Speaker 2:I have launched a couple of courses, so I am one of the youngest LinkedIn learning instructors. I've launched two courses with LinkedIn, thank you, one on professional networking and one on strategic problem solving, and it's kind of crazy. I mean, it's been probably close to a year now and we have 100,000 learners across both courses. So they crush at distribution. So they crush it with distribution. That being said, I really want to double down on the build aspect before I focus on the educate with courses. I'm sure you know about how dropshipping worked, where everyone got so excited with dropshipping and some people made money early on and then everyone I don't want to say they sold out with courses, but I don't want to be that guru that just films a course, sells it for a high ticket item uses, maybe creators to sell it being a millionaire and becoming a millionaire by telling others how to become a millionaire, exactly and I think the best value that I can give is not through education, but actually showing you how to do it and actually giving you deals.
Speaker 2:And the best way I chat with these large creators is I don't reach out saying, hey, can we hop on a call, let me show you our platform.
Speaker 2:I say, hey, I think you're perfect for this campaign. Let me get you paid. Let's hop on a product demo, show you how it works and see if you're interested in the campaign. And that's the way that all the creators say yes, of course. And then they see, wow, like AJ might be someone who is an expert in this space and like let's join the newsletter, let's share with our friends, or most of our acquisition of creators is literally with referrals, same with brands. Right, and that's what we're doubling down on just the best experience, the best results for the brand and the best monetization for the creator. So I think, course I don't want to say no and close the door. I want to say maybe, but kicking it down the road because I don't want to sell out just for the course, I want to double down and say we did all of this before we kind of open up the curtain okay, if you do.
Speaker 2:Yes, I'll let you know, I'll produce that we do we do, however, do consulting and advising for brands and creators, so there are a couple select brands that we work with that we hop on monthly calls and kind of walk through to go to market strategy on LinkedIn as well as LinkedIn creators. We do help them individually, kind of not honestly acting as an agent, but as an expert in this space and kind of sharing here's how you should price yourself, here's how you should build your media kit, et cetera.
Speaker 1:Right, that makes sense you mentioned. I had a curiosity. You mentioned you've done two LinkedIn courses, learning courses, learning courses, two LinkedIn courses, learning courses, learning courses. How does? Is that something that you get paid for or is it purely? You know, helps grow your reputation on LinkedIn.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's so it's. It's one of those things where it's a complete enigma. You would never know how it works. There's no education around how to get it. Um, but basically, I saw a friend post on LinkedIn saying that they launched a course, and a great hack in any post even if it's a post about your job is they always thank the people on the bottom. If you're wondering who was the person that helped them, they're tagged in the bottom. So even when I announced my Fast Company article or my gig on becoming a writer, I thanked the staff editor on the bottom. And it saves you time. You just click it and there's the person who helped me get it right. So maybe reach out to them. So do that. Same strategy, same thing for a job. By the way. Hey, thanks so much, so happy that I'm now a product manager at Microsoft and thanking my hiring managers below right. If you're curious about working at Microsoft, just reach out to those people that they tagged in the bottom. And it's the same vein of success leaves breadcrumbs. Those breadcrumbs people miss, but they're wide open to grab and then to use, kind of, for your own journey.
Speaker 2:So I did the same thing with someone who launched a LinkedIn learning course. I reached out to that person asking them for advice and I reached out to the person they tagged. I pitched myself, pitched a couple ideas of what I thought could do super well, as well as where my domain expertise was, and I got rejected for probably every idea that I sent. And then finally one was of interest, got rejected again, wasn't part of their focus for that quarter. And then pitch something different because you know, sitting with a company.
Speaker 2:But I saw another course do super well and it was basically how to think like an attorney for non-attorneys. So I said, okay, I see, this course is crushing it. What if we do the same thing? But how to think like a consultant for non-consultants like? I've been from a consulting background at a Fortune 500 company. So they loved it. It got greenlit and then I was flown out to Santa Barbara, california. They have a professional Disney style movie set. You have a teleprompter, you have a director, you have every massive camera. I was in a makeup room or dressing room getting makeup done. Um, it was the coolest thing ever. That sounds like what we're doing no, literally it was awesome.
Speaker 2:And then, um, you do so, you get a payment up front, like a flat fee kind of like a cost for doing business, and then one of the coolest things about it is it's a truly passive income, uh revenue stream, where every month, depending on how many people take the course, you get a percentage of the money basically. So obviously it's in my best interest to continue to promote the course, but every month you get essentially royalty checks, which is great, okay, that makes sense.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because I wasn't sure whether that's like just, oh, people do it just for the reputation of it, and then LinkedIn, kind of like monetizes on that.
Speaker 2:It's a bit of both, and LinkedIn acquired a company called lyndacom acquired all the course library rebranded it to LinkedIn Learning, and then you do have to. I believe some courses are free, but it is a subscription. They have to pay for the content.
Speaker 1:Okay, that makes sense, and did you enjoy that experience? It?
Speaker 2:was one of the coolest experiences I've ever had. I have a video on on my Instagram, a kind of just like the day in the life of that, of that experience, and it was something I'll never forget. I mean, I truly felt like a movie star for a day and it was. It was awesome. That's funny.
Speaker 1:So you've done, you've done two courses. You're also doing facilitating Conversations and kind of like your side chats a lot of speaking and writing through fast company. How did that all happen? Right, because you live in a world where, yeah, there's a lot of people that are kind of like public facing speakers and so on. There's a lot of also founders and individuals that aren't really that much in the spotlight. But I'm really curious to understand how did you get into this sport? Was it something that you always loved?
Speaker 2:you know, talking to others and talking to crowd uh, you're saying on the writing side or the speaking side, the speaking side, speaking side. Uh, I will say I hate speaking. Um, so I said there's only one way to get better at it and it's to practice. And then I see people who are full-time speakers and I, again, speaking, is another example. I know we're talking about a lot of these areas. That's like how the hell do you become a like a full-time paid speaker? And you see gary, the gary v's of the world, making a quarter of a million dollars for an hour speaking and all these crazy things. So reach out to a ton of friends, um, getting some advice on speaking, and it's one of those things very similar to a job where the hardest job to get is your first actual job because you have no experience, right. Yes, you, yes, you can have a couple internships, but you really have to sell that first employer. So same thing with speaking. If you don't have a speaker's sizzle reel or a speaker's you know footage or photos or like where have you spoken previously? You have no experience, right.
Speaker 2:So it was a lot of just doing free events and you know everyone talks about. You should never do things that are free and even like an internship. You should never do a free internship and you know everyone talks about. You should never do things that are free and even like an internship. You should never do a free internship and you should never do my free events. Bloody podcast yeah, no, it's, it's, but you have to. No one's going to pay you in the early days if you have no experience right and you have nothing to give, no value.
Speaker 2:So I did about a year of free speaking on webinars this is during covid especially, but it was a lot of webinars, speaking to student organizations, doing this that just to experience, to practice and to get feedback, of course, and to get some footage and then use that footage to get to the next thing and the next thing and the next thing. And then you know you don't start at the TED Talks and you work your way up. And then it's been a dream of mine to speak at a TED Talk and then, ironically, three weeks ago, I just came back from speaking at my first TED Talk.
Speaker 1:Right oh wow.
Speaker 2:And so it's just been a journey. I will say, and it's everyone thinks you just kind of get this like this get rich quick overnight scheme, but it's been years in the making and it's using one thing to get to the next. And you know, I've flown out and spent thousands of dollars to stay at a hotel and the airfare and the this and the that to speak for free. And the only question I ask is are you going to film the conference or the event? And if they say yes, great, I'm going. And then I'm going to use that footage.
Speaker 2:And even though it was an expense, I'm going to use that to get the next one. And then you start to kind of get these small payments and you kind of can increase your prices, and then a and a great strategy is if you have an audience, you can also say okay, instead of paying me X amount of dollars for speaking, I'll also create some content for the event, great, promoted it, the price goes up, et cetera. So it's been something that I hated to do, but I wanted to love it, and the only way to do it is to get experience with it. And now I'm actually able to charge for speaking and it's been a fun journey, and whether I'm the one speaking, and it's just me, or getting interviewed, like this, yeah, or interviewing somebody else, like I'll be doing tomorrow and Wednesday, I really do enjoy being on stage because it's always challenging and I like the challenge yeah, I mean, it sounds like it and congrats on your TED.
Speaker 1:Thank you, was it. Was it um TED talk or is it TEDx local?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I flew out to. It was a funny story. So I applied to probably 20 TEDs and got rejected by every single one of them and I don't understand how and I had the perfect ideas for every single one of them and I kept getting rejected. But I do believe that the best stories are the ones that are hardest to get right. And if it was I applied to one and I got accepted, then it wouldn't have been as rewarding, as you know all the work that I did to get to that one. So I got an email saying, hey, you got accepted, but we it was their first event that they were doing in this in Florida, in Tampa, florida. So the events in six days? Is that OK? Keep in mind that for most TED events you have six months to prepare.
Speaker 1:I had six days to prepare okay.
Speaker 2:So I literally I got it and I was chatting with one of my friends and I said I might. I think I'm gonna back out, I don't have enough time to prepare, I'm gonna look like a fool on stage. You keep in mind, you get no teleprompter, you get no cue cards and you just have a shot clock running down from whatever the the number is. For us it was a 10 minute talk and it's filmed and it goes on ted's youtube channel with 30 million people. So if you look like a fool, you're gonna look like a fool. You might get a lot of views, but you're not. So I was like do I even have enough time? This is coming out of a conference uh, creator conference in la, I also take a red eye wild story, um. But then I asked myself and I said I've been dreaming about doing a ted talk for years and I finally get the opportunity to do one and I'm really going to back out at the 11th hour.
Speaker 2:So I ended up doing it and practiced like crazy on the plane, practicing my hotel room, just walked up on stage you walk on that giant red dot, you have the TED letters behind you and just gave my speech and it was an absolute blur. And after I kind of like woke up on basically on the stage I don't remember anything I said hopefully I'd said something well. And then, and it was an absolute blur, and after I kind of like woke up on basically on stage I don't remember anything I said Hopefully I'd said something well. And then everybody out after was clapping and there were people waiting taking selfies with me in the crowd and like, oh my God, I resonated with that so much and it was one of the coolest experiences and just how I got there, how fast the timeline was, the red eye flight as well, like kind of going up on stage with no sleep. And I live for those moments because it's just the best stories to tell.
Speaker 1:But I also see a pattern here. It seems like and probably something for a lot of us to take on board is kind of persevering and continuing to grill at it until until it happens because, it sounds like that was a story with your LinkedIn courses, as well as this TED talk. You've applied, you've applied, you apply, you rejected a rejection. There's a lot of people just either one don't apply because they fear the, they fear the, they sell rejection, they reject themselves.
Speaker 2:You know, I always say if you're gonna get rejected, have somebody else reject you. Don't reject yourself before even applying, because the worst thing in life is the regret, it's never the failure. Right? If you're gonna go talk to somebody at a bar, right? Do you want to go home and say I should have spoken that person? And the regret of not talking to them. Or would you rather walk up to that girl and say hello. Maybe she says hey, sorry, I have a boyfriend, and walks away. You get rejected. But I would rather have that moment because you know what, at least I tried versus the regret. And it's the same thing with applying to a job or applying to a TED Talk, whatever it may be. And the worst feeling on top of regret is seeing somebody else, who you know is less qualified, get the opportunity just because they gave it their shot yeah, and I actually like what you said you're rejecting yourself by not applying because of the fear of rejecting.
Speaker 1:You're actually rejecting yourself. And then there's um the second segment, which is kind of like applying, getting rejected and getting kind of like demoralized by it, by the rejection, um, and never apply again, never try, and I think there's something to be told, and I've seen a lot of successful people that I've um interviewed, that I've talked to, have been had this perseverance, attitude towards and seen rejection as a challenge.
Speaker 2:I always say again in anything, whether it's a job, a podcast, a course, ted talk whatever a no is is a no today, it's not a no forever. So if you get rejected, at least you're on the radar now maybe you can get some feedback you didn't do well and how you can improve.
Speaker 2:Um, and that's just like philosophy I live with is you always have to shoot your shot. You always have to throw your hat in the ring, because if you don't, who's going to do it for you and you're going to miss out on so many opportunities and you're going to learn something about yourself or what you're trying to do.
Speaker 1:Curious. So I've always pictured. Now you have the insider intel. Okay, I always pictured that the TED talks that you know you have the insider intel. I always picture the TED Talks that you have the slides in the back and I always see the presenter kind of like looking down as well on some screens that are at the edge of the stage. Is that thing? And on those screens do you only see your slides or can you also have notes, because you mentioned you had not?
Speaker 2:Yes, so no cue cards, no notes. If your talk has slides, you have a little thing in front of you where you can just see the slide behind you, so you don't look behind you. However, it is very demanding on not having a lot of words or text on your slides. Right, I did not have one word on my slides text on your slides? Right, I did not have one word on my slides. So when I was preparing for this, I basically tried to.
Speaker 2:When I saw a slide, I thought of the bullet points. I saw like a visual slide. I thought of the bullet points, so I was barely even looking down. But I just see, okay, it's on this slide. I know kind of the idea what I want to talk about, but a lot of it is in prompt. Uh, because you don't even want to, you can't even. I mean, I don't know about you, I can't memorize a 10 minute, you know speech. But also you don't even want to memorize it because it doesn't come up. It's authentic. You just want to memorize a couple key points for that slide and then just go off the cuff and is it?
Speaker 1:do you reckon that this happened when two weeks ago you said yeah, two about a couple weeks? Ago in Tampa Florida but I suppose it's this constant gig factory that you created for yourself that helped you get to that point where you know at a short notice you'll be able to do this and smash it and be organic and have you know. Ovation from the audience and so on. Um, if you were, let's say, a year ago and this opportunity would have arrived, do you reckon you would have done the same?
Speaker 1:level of job is is it that aggregation yeah?
Speaker 2:so I'm doing it. So I first off think I don't think it would even happen in the first place a year ago. Right, because I don't think I had the experience, let alone the confidence, to apply period and apply so many times. It wasn't just once Again, it was literally. I can try to make a post about it, about everyone thinks that it's just you apply once, or even that you get invited. 99% of the things are you have to go out and do it. People don't come to you unless you are the heavy hitters in any industry or domain. Yes, people will reach out to you for speaking, even like SaaS stock that we're speaking at this week. They didn't reach out to me. I reached out to them to do my own thing and they said no originally.
Speaker 2:And then it's like what if I moderated a fireside chat? Oh, that's interesting. What can you do? Give me some experience? Oh well, I here's some examples that I've done some speaking footage, I write for fast company, so on and so forth. Oh, that's interesting, and I'm selling myself.
Speaker 2:They didn't reach out to me, right? You have to build those opportunities. So I think, to answer your question, a year ago I don't think I would have even gotten the opportunity and I probably would have said no. But it's just been months, if not years and years, of putting yourself, putting yourself in uncomfortable positions to continue to grow, whether that is with, you know, really demanding hours, whether that is, you know, being uncomfortable on stage, whether that is through fitness and and you know I don't want to work out this morning I was up till 3am working last night and I worked the entire day yesterday, but I knew I had to have a good workout this morning so I could be here and personal on camera and talking to you and this whole show. So I think it's all just a build up and it's building that muscle and then you start to see a lot more opportunities come because you're ready and prepared for them.
Speaker 1:Now you're putting Ovi and I to shame because we were like, yeah, we're going to go to bed and then we're going to go to the gym and then sit up. And yeah, that didn't happen, Maybe later, Later today, You're giving us motivation. Before getting into this whole. You know well, I have to. I'm not good, I don't like public speaking, but I want to get good at it. Where were you? Were you? I suppose you didn't have this company that you're currently having. What was your professional life?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I'll first talk on the more personal side and then we can talk about the work side. So it's funny, people who meet me today think I am someone who is hyper-ambitious, hyper-competitive, have goals so big they scare. I mean I always say they scare the living crap out of me. I mean I dream big. And that was not the person I was years ago I was very timid. I'm timid, I was shy, I didn't shoot my shot at anything, I was always just the more introverted person.
Speaker 2:But I think through that, that transition of Finding yourself is asking, like what is the point of of life? And if you never go out and get those opportunities, like what's what's the point? And I think it's a lot of self-reflecting you have to do. I think it's a lot of self-reflecting you have to do. I think it's also changing who you spend time with.
Speaker 2:I'm very intentional with who I spend my time with and it's very obvious. I mean the people may say that the you know you are an average of your five best friends. Right, All my friends are doing the craziest stuff in the craziest, not even just unless they're on influencer marketing, but just building companies, traveling like crazy, doing talks around the world. I mean just really pushing themselves and pushing each other. So I think before I was hanging out with a group that we're all flat lining, but now the group that I really spend my time with is, you know, we can co-work on a Sunday and we want to build and dream big.
Speaker 2:And I think it's anybody listening to this it's asking yourself the people that you spend time with is that who you want to become? And that's a big fear. I mean, I've heard these quotes, these stories, and it was a great interview with David Goggins, ironically, and he said that the biggest fear I have in life is when I die and I'm walking up on the gates of heaven and God says here's David Goggins. He's listing out all these achievements, all these amazing accolades, everything that you did, and David's like well, that's not me. And he said well, that's who you're supposed to become, right, and for me, I really want to dream big and I realized I was not maximizing my potential.
Speaker 2:And it's very easy to take singles and just keep winning on the small level, but what's the fun and joy of that if your potential is way bigger? So for me, I want to make an impact. I want to build something tangible to actually help people right, especially LinkedIn creators, is like a really big focus of mine. Speaking is great. I love to inspire, love to motivate, and then just the people that I spend time with can we help each other do it? So that's more on the personal side. And then a few years ago, before Creator Match, I was working a nine to five consulting job, consulting for the Googles, facebooks, microsofts of the world. I was there for three years and it was great, but I realized that I was living somebody else's dream and I always say I can leave this interview today and get hit by a bus and that's it right.
Speaker 2:Like looking back on my life. Did I really live the life that I would have lived if I only had a month to live? And it probably wasn't that the case before. So now it's way more stress, way longer hours, way less money, but you know, it's my life and I live on my own terms and it's something that I look forward to.
Speaker 2:Waking up and maybe the lack of sleep, but I look forward to diving into what I want to do and I think it's now. I'm building my own future and I'm doubling down on myself. I think everyone throughout my whole life has said you're going to be so successful. You know, just keep doing it, you're going to be awesome. And I never believed in myself. But now I'm finally taking the dive of true entrepreneurship, where I'm betting on myself and going as a full-time founder. So you know, for people listening, I think you can say that the biggest fear is jumping, but also there's even a bigger fear of not jumping. And what is the actual opportunity cost of not betting on yourself in the early days, especially if you have the means to do it?
Speaker 1:why not start now? Was there a trigger, a very obvious trigger, at one point that made you take that jump right From you know nine to five and so on, and said right, here's my revelation, here's my realization around this, my persona and how, to the full fullest, I live? Was there a moment in time or did it gradually happen? It was build-ups.
Speaker 2:It was a lot of really interesting moments where and I'll give you an example. So, and then maybe it's getting, getting, uh, very personal, but you know, that's what I want the audience to know this.
Speaker 2:but my bonus one year for work, I actually received more money in one paid speaking event and that was like whoa. So I actually can make for one event right Versus living on somebody else's terms. So I think you know, having that inclination also getting some traction already and kind of being really passionate, like I loved, I wanted to finish my work as quickly as possible and do good work on the nine to five side so that when five oh one came or the weekends came, I could double down and start building something. And I had. I mean I have had every side hustle under the sun. I've had a podcast, youtube channel, courses, everything.
Speaker 2:I even sold candy when I was a kid in school, right, I mean, I literally I was just running and gunning as an entrepreneur, you know, ever since I was a kid. So I think it's a lot of moments that build up. I don't think it's one aha moment, but I think all of those create that aha moment. That was just one of them where I did one speaking event that I got paid more than my yearly bonus.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I realized that what if I actually put all my effort, time and energy into my own thing? What is the possibility? And I also think that, yes, obviously, when you go full time on your own thing, you get more hours back to focus on what you want to do, but it's a huge switching cost because I was checking three emails here, three emails there. I was checking Slack and Teams here. I was checking this there.
Speaker 2:And it's like you're constantly so like, yes, even from a time standpoint it's tough, but you're just like your brain is switching on off, on off and you're jumping between these places. Versus now, the only main two things that I do like 90% of my time is creator match and then say 10% is fast company and writing, and then maybe speaking as it comes in. But speaking is very volatile. You have months where you do a ton of speaking. You have months where you do no speaking. So I don't really consider that a focus. It kind of just is more inbound now. But really doubling down on one thing, I mean it's it's funny because like I'll go to lunch with a friend and we'll be talking about the baseball game this weekend and I'll say, great idea, oh my god, that's, that's such a good idea about I'm gonna write that down about creator match. He's like we weren't even talking about creator match. I said sorry, my brain is always thinking about it, but if you have these switching costs, you're never thinking about anything because you're thinking about everything.
Speaker 1:Right versus when you think about one thing.
Speaker 2:You're all in on it and you know I'm seeing content about somebody else's business. I'm like wait, that blog strategy. What if we use that for our stuff? And you're always thinking about it. So yes, it's annoying when I'm out with friends and I'm like yes, how many friends have you lost?
Speaker 2:yeah, I mean a couple, but but again, it's now my, my new, and I want to say I don't, like I don't leave the old friends, but I spend more time with the new friends because guess what they do? I'll be talking to them and they'll say great idea. And do the exact same thing because we're in the trenches together, in the foxhole together, and my friend, who I connected you with, you'll be interviewing later this afternoon, he's staying with me this weekend. We met at a conference in LA, a creator event, a few weeks ago, and we realized we're in the exact same position trying to scale a company. We're young founders, we're young founders, we're trying to make it work and we're just hustlers. We're trying to make this happen.
Speaker 2:So we have a lot in common and I feel at most at home with the people that I resonate with the most. And it's funny because, since we're in the same area but doing different things, we've been able to help each other so much because you know, like I just quit and I things. We've been able to help each other so much because you know, like I just quit and I said what I do about health insurance, and he's like, oh, you should do this. Or he's like, hey, I need help with this pitch deck for an investor. Oh well, we just sent a pitch deck to an investor. Here's this and there's so much you can really help each other and grow together, versus those friends who maybe are working nine to five jobs you have nothing left. That's really in common with one another. It's it's there's not making, they're not making pitch decks, right, yeah, um, it's just very different uh, it's, I can reason.
Speaker 1:Uh can resonate with both of um those feelings. Number one, because you know I've um got acquired. I had a company got acquired, worked for a while at the acquiring company and it was so. It just felt like I wasn't doing much tangible, having the couple of slacks email addresses and focusing my day on on multiple things. It's, it's hard to feel like you're really having an impact you're doing a lot, but you're not doing anything.
Speaker 2:Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it feels like that all the time and it's exhausting without much reward yes and then, uh, the part with friends as well. Like, I don't know, I feel that I'm yeah, I don't have that many friends, mainly because it was too busy. We're just too busy yeah, and it's also the the conversation topics and so on. I had you know I love talking about stuff like this. I love talking about entrepreneurship, I love my topics and it's hard to deeply resonate with someone else if you're talking gibberish to them.
Speaker 2:Yes, right, and I also think it's okay to grow apart from your old friends I mean, it's almost wild to think about the friends that you had as a kid should be the same. And, of course, I'm not saying you can't have lifelong friends, that you should always have lifelong friends, but a majority of your friends should be based on location, should be based on what you're doing, where you spend time, versus just hanging on to something that is non-existent. And it's the same thing with a partner as well, and I think it's. And they can help, you can help each other and you can stay sane in the process, right? Not many people will work on weekends, right? So, grabbing my friends who are also building startups and have to work on weekends, and we grab, we go to a new coffee shop every week and just grind it out for 10 hours and and just have fun and try to stay sane in the process of building yeah, I, I hear you, I hear I've tried to to make a couple after my exit.
Speaker 1:Right, I've tried to. It was like take it slower. I tried to spend more time with a couple of friends that were like nine to five and and such, and I just didn't work out that much like I have. I had people asking me oh well, you, you now, you could retire. Now, right, and I'm like I mean technically, and they're like oh man, if I I would retire, if I would be, I would just be on a night and I'm sat there thinking to myself I think that's the last thing that I would do ever.
Speaker 2:Just like not, it's a different mindset.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly. So I was sat there listening to them and it just, in a way, made me more realize that we don't really see eye to eye, because if I start now talking about, well, you know, but I have this passion and I want to help others and I want to do, I want to create value, and I've sat there and mentioned that it's gibberish, talking right, and I think that, again, it's not that there is a good way or a bad way to do it, because if people want to retire and also there's nothing wrong with a nine-to-five job, right for sure, yeah.
Speaker 2:And I also don't think everyone should be a founder, because it is. I mean, it's hell. I mean it is so challenging and every day you're trying to figure it out and your back's against the wall and you're always. I mean, I'm always always. Even though I'm the best in date with my guy, we have another mountain to climb tomorrow. So I would not say that everyone should be a founder. Also, if everybody was a founder, no business would be successful, because you have to have a number two, number three, number four, have to have employees and consumers and consumers right.
Speaker 2:There's nothing wrong with a nine to five. That you and I are just founders are is I don't think I'll ever retire, right, and I don't think I'll ever. To me, retiring is waving the white flag right? I think it's just going into the next thing. Of course, when I'm older, I'd love to travel the world, maybe on a private jet in a dream reality, but also work on different things, and I'm not working 20 hours a day, but I'm still working. I don't think there's ever going to be a day where I'm like all right, I'm done at 40 years old and I'm fully retired, I'm just living off of checks. No, I want to continue to do something Almost like a Warren Buffett. I mean, he's still running and gunning and he's getting up there, right.
Speaker 1:So it's a different way. And you're right, everyone has their own values and their own interests and so on. But to kind of conclude this conversation conversation, like you were mentioning as well, around friendships and such like it's unrealistic to have expectations to have a deeper connection with someone unless you have a common ground. Let's say you have a hobby, that that keeps you together and so on, but but I find myself like yourself, because when you said that, I'm like, oh jesus, I'm in the same position right now. When I get into a business like I'm starting now, right, I get so obsessed about it, yeah, that other hobbies and interests kind of pale in a in a sense.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I don't know maybe maybe where the socially awkward people were kind of like have that vision of but you're only awkward to the groups that aren't also obsessed.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, because because to the average nine to five person you are, you're crazy, you're obsessive, you're way, you're married to this business. I don't see eye to eye with you, you're crazyive, you're married to this business. I don't see eye to eye with you, you're crazy. But to me, I get it, I'm the same way. So I think it's just finding people who are in, again, that thoughtful with you, whatever it may be.
Speaker 2:Maybe it's the people who are also 9 to 5, you're 9 to 5, find someone else who's 9 to 5 and they get it right. But I think it's again finding those people so that you're crazy together and and crazy or weird is just not like the norm but together you're all the same right, the same mindset, mentality. You want to grow and it's been amazing, I mean, how much we've been able to help each other and we've been able to refer clients over. We've been able to refer investor conversations, best talks, takeaways, best practices, whatever. Um versus. You can't get that from somebody who's not in that same position as you and is that because we were talking earlier.
Speaker 1:Do you find that austin is a great city for your type of your kind of people?
Speaker 2:yeah, I will say that every city has great people. It's up to you to find them. Of course, there there are cities like the New Yorks of the world that are higher concentrated of elite people. That being said, there are still amazing people in Austin. Maybe the average person's not as elite as in New York, but they still live here. You have to just go out of your way to find them. And go out of your way Like we're planning a B2B SaaS dinner with just some of our buddies, who are all founders as well. So I think you have to go out of your way and I think, again, it's going to come to you, but they do exist and I think every year there's more and more attention on Austin and there's more founders coming here and it's a great place to build.
Speaker 1:I wanted to ask about because we talked about the speaking, public speaking and all of this stuff and how you got into it by need, by necessity, rather than pleasure. Is writing a pleasure activity for you?
Speaker 2:So I think I do consider myself a creator, and creator you have to write. Even if you're making video content, you have to script Right. So writing is the core of creating. I do love writing and I love giving people a stage right. So a lot of my articles that I write for fast company actually one just literally launched yesterday and I love interviewing thought leaders. It's something that I enjoy because also we get a hop in a conversation and chat and yes, yes, you're chatting about this topic, but when the conversation is done, then you have a conversation about kind of us two. I used to have a podcast of my own and, yes, we're talking about, you know, this interview right now. When the cameras stop rolling, then we're just shooting the shit talking about it and I love that. But then focus on the writing aspect and grabbing great quotes and putting a story together and also molding what topics are of interest to me, going out and finding the best people to support that topic, getting some key takeaways and kind of sharing it with the masses. So to me it's really fun.
Speaker 2:I hate calls. I don't like I couldn't trust me. I could do enough one-on-one coaching calls, but it doesn't fill my cup. Versus writing. I could be on a beach in Costa Rica, you know in an Airbnb and just looking at the ocean and just kind of writing, and I think it is very soothing. I don't do enough of it and I don't write that many articles about maybe one or two per month just because I'm so busy with Creator Match. But it is something that I do find joy in because it just requires you to just stop and to think and to think about the audience and what value they're going to get from the piece right, and now I'm going to ask you for a piece of advice.
Speaker 1:For those that shall not be named, aka me, that hate, hate, not hate, find writing a bit of a challenge. What would be like? Because you know, I've been in situations, while I was building my business as well where I had to sit down and write blog articles and so on.
Speaker 1:And I very quickly deprioritized that and gave it to our content writer and so on, and in a way I felt guilty, right, because I'm the person that's leading this company and I have thoughts and ideas about the subject, the topic that we're addressing in the market, and so on. But here I am, copping out of writing myself articles. What would be a piece of advice for someone like myself?
Speaker 2:So I actually say there's no reason to feel guilty, because I don't think you are required to to write. I think if you truly I mean I obviously I can give you tips on how to not hate writing. But if you truly hate writing, then outsource it to somebody, because a they're gonna do it better than you, they're gonna be happier, something, a better peace, because they don't hate it like you. But I would give it to somebody else. An example is editing this podcast. Could you edit it? Probably, but is it in your best time and interest to edit it versus giving it to someone who has more experience, who loves editing? And now you can have more time to be here and interview more founders. They have more content for the editor to now get paid and to edit more content. So I will say, like, if you truly hate it, outsource it to somebody who will enjoy it and who does it better. But if you do want to try it, I think a lot of people get stuck with okay, I want to be a creator and I have to post, you know, one time a day for seven days straight over the span of a month and months and years and so on, and they're thinking about the marathon.
Speaker 2:Let's say you hate running, right the thing. I can never run a marathon. But nobody ever starts with a marathon. They start with very running a mile and then the one mile leads to three and then at least to a 5k, 5k, 10k, 10k, half marathon, half marathon, full marathon, marathon, ultra marathon and so on and so forth. And that was actually my journey. I hated running. Austin is a very runner friendly community. You can see the trail around this 10 mile loop around ladybird lake here, um, so that's how I thought about it. I never thought in a million years I would ever run a marathon last year, and three and an ultra marathon. But because I started with baby steps and then also I put myself in communities of runners, so when we're on runs it doesn't feel like a run, we're just chatting. It's a social community, right? So if you truly hate writing that much, can you join a community of other founders who need to write to help each other grow with each other, keep each other sane?
Speaker 1:so the community focus, thinking about it in small chunks and then, if not, outsource it that's a really good advice, especially about starting small and kind of like getting into it, because I think that's one of the things that I've done. Wrong was like I thought that I am supposed to write like lengthy, kind of like masterpieces of thought dumping in a sense. Of course I got you and it never happened for me. But the other thing is do you think that all founders, as well as all creators, should be writing articles?
Speaker 2:No, Not at all. I mean, you could say it's the same. Should every founder make video content? You know, I think if you're a founder who is also a creator, then yeah, you should try to write, but obviously your time is better spent growing the business. You shouldn't be working in the business, you were working on the business. So hire an expert copywriter, right even taking these interviews and chopping them up into blog content and social media posts and whatever it is. So I think if you enjoy it and you have experience with it and it fills your cup, then sure, but if not, just hire somebody on your team to do it for you.
Speaker 2:And I do think that, going back to the running examples and analogies, everybody's so focused on finishing the marathon, but the hardest line to cross is not the finish line, it's the start line, because most people don't even start. They get so lost in their head of oh well, I have to make one post a day and all this 200 or 2000 words and SEO optimized and all these other things, and they never get one word on the page. The hardest thing is getting one word on the page and then one word leads to two, to four, to 10. They have your first paragraph. Two paragraphs and it's done. So I think it's just starting. But if you don't even want to start in the first place, how can you get help for someone to do it better?
Speaker 1:True, ever had, um, let's say, an opportunity or an initiative that you were asked to participate and that required you to have proof of kind of like articles written by for speaking yeah, speaking or creating content like, even though, linkedin learning yeah, so were they like oh well, you need to have articles told, leadership articles written, and so yeah, so I think it's, it's all about how you can sell yourself.
Speaker 2:I mean, you literally can put it's like what, what is an expert in anything? Truly, I'm asking, like, like, if you think that you're a podcast expert, right, like what? What criteria do you need to become an expert?
Speaker 1:I'm asking you oh well, I mean, that's a tough question because it really depends on what kind of industry, and so on.
Speaker 2:Let's say podcasting, though. Okay, podcasting, an expert in podcasting. What defines a podcast?
Speaker 1:expert, I would say the amount of how much you talk.
Speaker 2:Talk about it okay, okay, how much? So define, define. How much is that number of episodes, that the minutes of content in total, is that number of viewers? Is that video content? Is that audio content? I mean again.
Speaker 1:I think that's kind of like to me. It's a bit of a trick question because I can see it in going multiple ways. I could have like two or one TED talk.
Speaker 2:Yeah Right, talking about podcasts, that makes you an expert, or I can have like a million views on YouTube.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so what I'm saying is that it depends, right, and that there is no one perfect way to become an expert. Like you said, you could do one TED Talk you could have one LinkedIn post about. Here are the five steps in podcasting you need to follow and how I launch my podcast and it gets a million views. Now you're an expert, yeah. So I also think that in anything that you're doing whether you're trying to get a brand deal, whether you're trying to close a client, whether you're trying to get a speaking gig it's just how well you can position yourselves and show your value.
Speaker 2:Yes, if you have more speaking footage, that's helpful. If you have more writing content, that's helpful, but 99% of the time, there's no strict criteria that you need to meet, like for the LinkedIn Learning course to become an instructor. They didn't say you have to have these amount of followers and this amount of content For the Fast Company gig. They didn't say you had to write for 20 other publications and be over 40 years old and work in the industry for 20 years, right, because the opportunity didn't even exist. A lot of these opportunities, there's no job application. You're creating the opportunity, so you might as well create the value and show the value.
Speaker 1:That's what I was interested in to see whether there's any like in your experience of having all of these gigs and having these opportunities or knocking at doors, whether there's been a super rigid kind of set of specs that you know I will say there's never a criteria.
Speaker 2:And even even if and I'll give you a great example when I was in college at usc, I applied to an internship program that I was not qualified for. It was to work or to intern at the Walt Disney Company right, disney, we love Disney. And the criteria is you had to have a certain GPA. I did not have a GPA of that criteria, I was not qualified. But I went to a networking event, I met the recruiter and I said exactly, here's how I'm going to add value, here's why I'm different. And yes, maybe I don't meet the criteria, but you're going to overlook it and give me an interview, basically, and I got the interview and I got the internship right. So even if there is a strict criteria which most of the time there isn't, unless it's a maybe an actual job application you can still oftentimes overpass that criteria by filling it with value in other places. Right? So maybe I didn't have that GPA, so maybe I lost, let's say, a point there. But how could I gain a point somewhere else? And it was focused, it was a leadership rotation program. So I said I'm going to beat everybody out because I have more leadership experience than them and I launched my own organization on campus. I had hundreds of members and nobody applying had that experience. So, yes, I lost on the GPA, but I gained maybe one or two points on leadership and doubled down on that right.
Speaker 2:Even for Fast Company I didn't pitch myself as I have the most experience writing. I didn't say that I wrote for 20 other publications. I said that you guys don't focus on Gen Z content, or maybe you speak about it, but your writers are 70 years old. I mean, where's the credibility there? Speak about it, but your writers are 70 years old. I mean, where's the credibility there? Let me be a writer that is Gen Z, that talks about Gen Z, and I will bring a whole new audience that's younger. It's a subscription business. Let's bring this younger demographic in and help you with a Gen Z focus. And they loved it and I showed some examples of stuff that I've done and they ate it up right. So it's finding your own personal competitive advantage and then doubling down on that to give value to the party that you're trying to work with.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I hear another aspect of it just by listening to you speak I'm so passionate which is you have to dare, you have to, kind of like take the step, put the right foot or the left depending on how you want on and just go for it, Because from a lot of your stories it seems like that was your case Just being daring and going and having that guts to ask for certain things.
Speaker 2:Well, also, let's say that Fast Company responds and says AJ, thanks so much for the pitch, we just brought on a writer. However, next quarter we're going to bring in another writer and you'll be the first person I think of If I don't reach out. Reach back out in July. Right Now, you're first in line for the next thing, Versus if you reached out in July when you were qualified, you might be too late, because then they reach out and say, ah, we just hired somebody, right?
Speaker 2:So it's just getting those opportunities early, being on the radar, like I've applied and I'll just share this and maybe I can put this out in the world because hopefully I get it this year but I've applied to the Forbes 30 to 30 program for three years running now and I've gotten rejected by every single year. But every time I do it I learn something new, I get some feedback, I kind of reconnect with some of my mentors, I write my application, my story continues to get stronger and stronger and they also want to see you have experience in applying multiple times, versus when I apply at 29 or 30, when I feel like, okay, I'm officially qualified for this program program. What does qualification even mean? Everything is subjective, so you might as well apply now or reach out now. If it doesn't work out, you can always apply and reach out again. How old are you? I'm 25 25.
Speaker 1:Oh my goodness, what on earth, oh, you make me feel so old. You say say that.
Speaker 2:And then I meet these even younger hustlers and I'm like, oh, I'm 23?. I'm like dang okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so well, okay, well, again, I see some patterns here. I think I have a lot to gain just from our conversation. It just made me think quite deeply that I should be trying to be a bit more persistent with certain things.
Speaker 1:I think that's one of the words that I that I take out of it persistent and, um, building relationships, because it seems like you're building a lot of relationships with this persistence in a sense, this approach of every day you know, going at it and submitting again and applying again and talking to people and and you become part of that journey for other people as well that might be placed on the other side, to make the choice or to get those collaborations and those partnerships going. It's going to be a really big question. Where does it all going to be? A really big question, but where does it all lead to? Right, it seems like you're, you're 25, right?
Speaker 1:You're going like this in terms of the, your public um brand and your um, all of the speaking engagements and I'll call them contributions in general. Right, because you're contributing to others' well-being from a professional perspective and whatnot. I don't know if you've ever done any speakings or anything. That's more on a personal level, but where is it going? What's the aim? Is there a name or is it mainly I? I'm really enjoying the, the ride and I I don't think of it as a point in time in the future so it's a million dollar question today.
Speaker 2:I think how I think about it is. So it's a blessing and a curse of being hyper ambitious. And I was chatting with my friend about this uh recently actually where you're always trying to climb the next mountain, which is fantastic if you are building something, because I would rather work with someone who always wants to climb, climb, climb, than a competitor who is happy with where they're at. They reach 1 million ARR and they're oh my God, we reached a million. Let's stay there, let's celebrate, let's pop champagne. As you're popping champagne, I'm out here building for 2 million, 3 million, 4 million, not that we're at 1 million ARR, but that's a dream, right. So I think for me, I don't know where that trajectory is, but I'm doing everything in my power to just continue to do good things as they build up, and a lot of them kind of combine and again build everything up. So like the TED talk was random, but then maybe got me this SaaS stock gig and so on and so forth. So I don't know exactly where I'm going, but I could tell you that you just have to be flexible, because every day we're changing something, we're pivoting here, there personal stuff, more speaking, more writing? So I don't know, and I just want to keep it interesting, I would say so.
Speaker 2:I think my biggest kind of North Star is doing things that I value, that I enjoy, that I can truly make an impact. Obviously, impact is defined in different ways just continuing to, to inspire, to motivate and connecting people. I would say something that I love to do. So these relationships, I love building them because I can like today, for instance, you're chatting with my friend who's a founder, right, and I'm giving you value. I'm giving him value and it was at no cost to anybody, yeah, and I get value from it because I'm I'm satisfied that I can use my network and help other people. And then maybe I can connect a startup and an investor, a friend and a partner, a job seeker and a recruiter. I love to connect and with these relationships, you have a lot of power in connecting.
Speaker 1:You're saying that you enjoy connecting and helping people, but you are getting something, and what you're getting is the consolidation of those relationships.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Because you know, out of a lot of the not necessarily just here, but also some other impromptu podcast guests that I've had, like I think I've built a lot more of a stronger relationship to people that just decide, hey, the way here's one thing or here's this other person and so on, is you become more memorable, right?
Speaker 1:you become more old, well, aj, well, actually I've interviewed his friend as well that the same day. So you're building, you're hardening those relationships and I'm pretty sure that for, uh, gabriel, um as well, right, because he's, he's gonna be grateful because, hey, well, you brought me this opportunity to be on another podcast. You are getting something which is, um, better relationships because you do stuff selfless 100, right. I have three flash questions for you.
Speaker 2:Yes, one quote that you live by so it's a quote that I have on my phone lock screen and you can check it. I'm not even kidding. If you think about how many times you look at your phone a day, you're staring at the exact same lock screen. So I always try to change it up with different quotes that I live by, and the most recent one that I live by is a quote from a movie, lone Survivor, and it's anything in life worth doing is worth overdoing and moderation's for cowards. I'm sure you kind of see everything that I said.
Speaker 1:Okay, that is the perfect mirror of our entire conversation about you.
Speaker 2:And I also think I know it's flash, but really quickly, I think a lot of kids, even when I was growing up, you're taught mediocrity is a good thing. You never want to be the one sitting in the front row, you never want to be the one at, you know, in physical education, being the first running around the track because, like you're trying too hard, and then when you graduate you're in the real world, it's all about trying hard, right? And if not, then you're just mediocre in everything that you do. So, anything that you do, whatever aspect of your entire life, why would you not give it 110%? If not, what's the point of even doing it at all?
Speaker 1:right, whether it's business, whether it's relationship, whether it's podcast interview, whatever you should give it your absolute best, and if not, then I just I don't know what the Lord did. Perfect Book that changed your life or impacted you.
Speaker 2:I find that often when I tell guests change your life, they're like Ooh, that's a big question you're gonna see a lot of it's all the same themes, I guess, but the books called the third door by Alex Benayan and it is about most people. So let's say life is a club and or a bar. Let's just say a club and most people either go in through general admission and they pay a ticket to get in the other type of people, the elite people, pay vip to get bottle service. And the third door is you sneak through the kitchen, put on a tuxedo to look like you're, you know, a bottle person and you sneak in through the back. And I think in life everyone thinks there's one or two ways to do things, but there's always a third way if you can get strategic on how to go about being creative and getting opportunities perfect and the like.
Speaker 1:That on analogies is really good knife. I find myself as the sneaked in. I'll wait more, more often than I see you in the kitchen jump into the club yeah third question, and I'm gonna give you a rule for this one is a good habit that you advocate for and you cannot say persevering.
Speaker 2:Yes, so I have two. The first one is that a good habit is just consistently throwing your hat in the ring. Even if you're unqualified for the opportunity, you need to continue to put yourself out there. And the second part of that. So I guess it's a two-part thing, because you cheated on the first one.
Speaker 1:You cheated on the first one. No perseverance.
Speaker 2:But when you get those opportunities, to say yes to those opportunities even if you don't know what's going to come. Going back to that TED Talk example that I gave. So I checked off the first one, I threw my hat in the ring and got the TED Talk amazing. But then I was about to back out and I didn't know what was going to happen. But I think those are the best stories to tell yeah, so you have to say yes, especially early on in your career. Obviously now I'm trying to say no more because time is very limited, but you have to say yes.
Speaker 2:And some of the coolest opportunities I've ever had, some of the coolest people that I've ever met, have been from the ones where I said yes, had no idea what was going to come, and it was one of the craziest experiences, whether it was opportunities, relationships, a podcast interview, flying out to speak somewhere, even though it was unpaid. And because I did that and I said yes to that, not only what was going to happen, I met somebody. They helped me get a paid speaking gig for five times the price the next month, and then that led to this and everything is a web. You have to start building that web, and if you say no originally or you never throw your hat in the ring, nothing will ever start.
Speaker 1:Yes, Thank you. I appreciate you suggesting that I'm one of the coolest person Awesome. Thank you so much for this conversation. A lot of good takeaway here. I know you also have to go to SAS City at SAS Talk, looking forward to see all of your um fire chats. Uh, conversation that you're doing. Is that tomorrow?
Speaker 2:I have one. I have two tomorrow, yeah, and then one on wednesday.
Speaker 1:Okay, perfect, yes and uh. We'll share some links to them as well, if they're if they're available, all right, awesome. Thank you so much for um this wealth of um of information and value that you provided to this. I also have absolutely zero doubt that when you hit 30s, you're not going to be informed by 30s. That's impossible, at least from everything that you told me today of your persevering and how fast you've been growing.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Well, it's just just again. It's one of the many things also like you shouldn't just apply to one opportunity, you should apply to 50 opportunities. So I don't, if I don't get that, all good.
Speaker 1:You know we're doing other things and it's all okay, I have something for you. Yeah, hold on a second. I don't know if you ever watched this until the end um, any of the episodes but I usually have a gift for my guests. Wow, you are the 42nd guest on the podcast since I launched last summer and you get this coin. This is so cool. It says you're a misfit. I don't know.
Speaker 2:If you consider yourself a misfit, I do. I totally consider myself a misfit. There you go. I think most people think I'm just crazy. This is awesome. Thank you so much. This is so cool, so you have numbers of every podcast episode. Yeah, yeah, yeah, this is so cool.
Speaker 1:I mean, the trick is that this is engraved right, so it's all engraved in brass, but these are laser here, so it's not that expensive at having to bring everything well, that's so cool. Thank you, so much.
Speaker 2:Look at that. That is awesome for the conversation. I really appreciate it. That was awesome. I love the cameras. Thank you guys so much. That was fun awesome. © transcript Emily.
Speaker 1:Beynon.
