- 2 years ago
Marketing expert Neil Patel shares invaluable insights into the world of marketing, emphasizing the importance of passion, focus, and expertise in achieving success in any niche.
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00:00:00 Do you see AI replacing certain departments of marketing?
00:00:04 Yes, although we're seeing 94% of the content written by humans ranks higher than AI content.
00:00:10 First thing is a lot of them believe that the riches are in the niches.
00:00:13 That's the total opposite.
00:00:15 If you say you want to do something, but you're not passionate about it,
00:00:17 you're not going to last long.
00:00:18 Focus. I think that's the biggest issue because it's much easier to become a millionaire taking
00:00:24 0.01% of a really massive market than it is taking 50% of a $10 million market.
00:00:31 There's tons of opportunities. The real question is what do you want to do and what are you
00:00:34 passionate about? If you're passionate about something, typically it's what you
00:00:37 want to do because you enjoy it because you're good at it.
00:00:40 [Music]
00:01:00 Welcome to the show, Neil.
00:01:02 Thanks for having me.
00:01:03 Thanks for coming down. It's been too long. Went from hanging out all the time,
00:01:07 a couple times a week to barely ever seeing you these days, but it's great to see you, man.
00:01:10 I know. The fault's yours, though. You got busy making money and building businesses
00:01:14 instead of just chilling and not doing anything.
00:01:16 Well, you moved out of the Mandon Oriental. I stopped getting to have butter chicken and
00:01:20 hang out with you and have that beautiful skyline, so I had to go back to work, man.
00:01:24 That's right. Well, congrats on all your success, by the way.
00:01:26 Same to you. Same to you and the family and all the amazing things that are happening.
00:01:30 I'm proud of you. I'm proud of all the things that have happened over the last, what,
00:01:34 12 years now?
00:01:35 Yeah.
00:01:36 Has it been 12 years?
00:01:37 Dude, we've known each other for a long time. Remember the Chefworks days?
00:01:40 Yes.
00:01:40 I still never got my knives. Did you get your knives?
00:01:42 No, and I never, I did get aprons. I got a box of aprons.
00:01:44 I got aprons. Aprons are good.
00:01:46 Do you remember the meeting, the dinner we had where they asked us to go with the
00:01:50 bacon soup and they wanted us to go fly in the helicopter and shoot, what were they?
00:01:54 Not boar. There was something where they had an overpopulation and they're like,
00:02:01 "Yeah, you want to get strapped off the side of a helicopter and just go hunting?"
00:02:04 And I was like, "Uh, no, thank you."
00:02:07 Yeah. Can you imagine you and me in a helicopter shooting wild boar with an assault rifle?
00:02:11 My favorite part.
00:02:12 Was it Gun Broker?
00:02:13 It was at the time when it was Gun Broker and I think Gun Broker and Remington? No, Remington.
00:02:18 Remington.
00:02:19 Remington, the gun company.
00:02:20 Yes.
00:02:21 But I don't, you don't own a gun, right?
00:02:23 No.
00:02:23 Me neither. So then, but it was just like a funny feeling because they were just like,
00:02:27 "Yeah, you guys want to go hunting?" We're just like, "Uh."
00:02:30 Like you're a vegan and they serve, or vegetarian and they served bacon soup.
00:02:35 With bacon bits on top of the bacon.
00:02:37 You're like, "I'm vegetarian." Like, "Oh, we have soup. Bacon soup."
00:02:39 With bacon on top. It was like, "How many kinds of bacon do you need?"
00:02:44 Yeah. What a, what a ride that was.
00:02:46 But anyway, thank you for coming in, man. This is exciting.
00:02:48 And it's exciting to watch how far Neil Patel Digital's gone, Uber Suggest.
00:02:52 I mean, you just kill it at everything you do. And I think for the audience,
00:02:56 a lot of people struggle with success, but also they struggle with how to think about
00:03:00 digital marketing, SEO, the transition with AI and how it's all becoming much more,
00:03:05 much harder if you don't have the right strategy.
00:03:09 Yeah.
00:03:09 And so I guess I want to tee it off with my first question. Where do you see the industry going
00:03:13 with AI and how does marketers like yourself and the ones at home who are watching this,
00:03:17 how will they be able to play in this new evolving space?
00:03:21 So there's a few things to mention. Number one, Danny Sullivan,
00:03:25 who is the search liaison for Google, has mentioned that every year Google's been around,
00:03:30 they've driven more traffic to websites than the previous year, organic traffic.
00:03:35 So even though the click-through rates have declined since Google first came out to now,
00:03:38 more people are using Google, which is causing more traffic to websites.
00:03:42 That's the first thing to keep in mind. Two, the way AI works is it's scraping the web in essence,
00:03:48 taking what it's learning and then feeding out outputs based on what you ask it.
00:03:53 Whenever you do a Google search, there's a good chance you're going to see a result that's
00:03:57 inaccurate. Not all the results, but there's a handful of results that are inaccurate. Maybe
00:04:02 not on the first page, maybe on the second page, maybe on third. And in many cases,
00:04:06 we've seen it on the first page as well. I'm not trying to throw shade at Google.
00:04:10 That is a hard thing to solve because what is really considered inaccurate versus accurate?
00:04:15 And I'll give a prime example of this, and this could be a hot topic,
00:04:19 but people now can resonate with this. Do you remember when COVID first came out,
00:04:23 everyone was like, "You need to get the vaccine. You're an anti-vaxxer, yada, yada, yada." I'm not
00:04:27 saying I'm for the vaccine or against it. Let's set aside opinions. And now ask people who takes
00:04:34 the vaccine, the booster shots. Do you know anyone who actually takes the booster shots anymore?
00:04:38 Outside of my parents or something? My parents' age people? No.
00:04:42 Exactly. But they used to tell you, "You need to take it. You have to get it.
00:04:46 Why don't we have to take it now?" So the articles that came out earlier that say,
00:04:52 "You have to take it. You're silly for not," and people making fun of others and
00:04:56 going to the extreme, are those really accurate? Or are the articles that come out now that say,
00:05:04 "No one really needs a booster anymore. It's not going to do much for you," are those accurate?
00:05:08 So when people ask AI questions about COVID vaccines, you have so many different opinions
00:05:16 and you have so many different signals that show they're right. You have to remember, these are
00:05:21 the robots, machines that are learning. And they're using things like, how many people are
00:05:26 linking to the article? What are the comments saying? What's the sentiment? How many social
00:05:30 shares are they getting? And you have indicators on both sides that are saying, "This is the right
00:05:36 article and this is the right viewpoint." So when Google then provides a result or Bing provides a
00:05:42 result when you search through their AI and it just tells you the answer, it's not always going
00:05:48 to be accurate. They know this. This is why they rely on something called EEAT, Experience,
00:05:55 Expertise, Authority, and Trust, right? EEAT. - EEAT, Experience.
00:06:00 - Expertise, Authority, and Trust. - Okay.
00:06:03 - Because they know if you're a doctor who's studied COVID for 10 years, I know it hasn't
00:06:08 been out for 10 years, you're more likely to give more accurate information than Jeff Fenster or
00:06:14 Neil Patel. You agree with that? - I do. Absolutely.
00:06:16 - There's not much of a bias there. - Right.
00:06:18 - I'm not talking about a doctor studying it for a year, a scientist or a doctor who's been studying
00:06:22 it for 10 years, they have tons of research published, facts and data versus just people
00:06:28 talking about whatever they want to talk about based off of one day's worth of data or six
00:06:33 months worth of data. So all I'm getting at is AI isn't 100% accurate. They know this. They can't
00:06:39 just feed you all AI responses and just expect you to be happy with outcome. And what I always
00:06:47 tell people is, yes, for a lot of informational keywords, you're going to see AI produce a lot
00:06:52 of the results, especially the longer tail, because we're seeing a huge trend of people
00:06:56 searching on Google sentences, not two, three word phrases. I'm talking about an exact sentence,
00:07:02 like, "I commute to bike and it takes me three miles a day. What's the best bike to get? Assuming
00:07:08 I have to go up hills for half the journey." - People are searching that much, that many
00:07:13 words are being typed in? - People are searching longer tail
00:07:15 phrases and they're expecting answers. - Wow.
00:07:18 - That's what's happening with AI. But here's the thing, try shopping through AI, like if you want
00:07:27 a laptop. And a lot of people are like, "Yeah, it's just going to replace everything. Google's
00:07:30 just going to give you the answer and say, 'This is the laptop to buy.' It's not that simple."
00:07:34 Even when you're looking for a bike, they can't just say, "Here's a bike." As a consumer, you want
00:07:39 to know what has different pricing options, what colors they are, what's the look, what's the weight.
00:07:44 And yeah, you can filter through AI with the features that they're releasing,
00:07:47 but still you want options. AI isn't this mind reader where it can just be like, "You know what,
00:07:53 Jeff, you like these Louis Vuitton sneakers. We know you're going to like them even though you
00:07:58 didn't ask for it. Here you go. Let's charge your credit card and send it to your house."
00:08:02 - Sure. - It's too hard. It's not going to
00:08:04 happen. - Today or ever?
00:08:05 - In the next five years. - But do you see AI replacing
00:08:10 certain departments of marketing? - Yes.
00:08:13 - And do you see companies being able to get extremely lean by utilizing these tools
00:08:19 to replace what used to be done by a lot of the people that were doing it pre-technologies?
00:08:26 - Yes. And I think what you'll see is it won't necessarily replace a whole department.
00:08:32 It'll take over certain departments and you may have one-tenth of the humans to help out and the
00:08:38 AI helps with others. Like for a creative, for example, or for content creation. Although we're
00:08:44 seeing 94% of the content written by humans ranks higher than AI content. We did this whole study
00:08:50 on it and literally over 94%, it's 94% and some change of human-written content outrank AI-based
00:08:57 content. - Today.
00:08:57 - Today. - It's going to just
00:08:58 keep getting better though. - I think human content will outrank
00:09:02 AI content for a long time. - Really?
00:09:03 - It feeds their engine. AI content is doing regurgitated information on what they already see
00:09:08 on the web in the past. - But eventually AI is going to be
00:09:11 creating new content. - Sure, but sometimes the content
00:09:14 they create is manufactured and is not even accurate.
00:09:16 - So would you advise a marketer right now to use AI to get the skeleton or the framework of what
00:09:22 they're going to write? - Bingo.
00:09:23 - And then humanize it? - Yes. And then finish off the rest.
00:09:26 So you may end up spending 30, 40% of the time with, or AI may have done 30, 40% of the job and
00:09:32 then you may have done, you know, 60, 70% of the job.
00:09:36 - So when you said it will replace creative, do you mean like words and-
00:09:40 - Oh, images, video production, audio production. - When you say production, you mean the editing?
00:09:49 - Editing, the creation of it. You can just type stuff up and it'll come up with the video
00:09:53 content for you. - So I could just pretend,
00:09:55 I could use AI and create Neil Patel to sit here in this chair and just start using words?
00:09:59 - My team has a version of that. - Are you real?
00:10:01 - I'm real right now. - Hold on.
00:10:04 Just had to make sure. - Yeah, I know I'm real.
00:10:07 But what people don't realize is this is a long journey. People overestimate what AI can do for
00:10:14 them in the short run, because it can't do everything. And it's not a magic box that you
00:10:18 just click a few buttons and it does everything perfectly. But they underestimate what it can do
00:10:23 for them in the long run. In the long run, it's gonna be like I robot and you won't have a maid
00:10:27 in your house, instead you have a robot just cleaning your whole house. - No mama?
00:10:30 - No mama. - I miss mama.
00:10:32 - Yeah, I did too. - Do you have a mama now?
00:10:34 - I have a lot of mamas right now. - Okay. For those who don't know,
00:10:38 mama was the coolest human being ever who lived, didn't live, but came every day to Neil's place.
00:10:44 And she was basically like our secondary mom. - Yeah, she would cook, clean.
00:10:50 - Make sure we did everything we were supposed to, hold us accountable.
00:10:53 - Yeah. - Yell at us when we were being dumbasses.
00:10:56 - Feed us, pack our suitcases whenever I had to travel.
00:10:59 - She was great. Did you ever stay in touch with her?
00:11:02 - I haven't stayed in touch with her too much. She's still in Vegas. And then she started working
00:11:08 in the casinos. - Did she?
00:11:10 - And then started getting new mamas once I got married. My wife picked whatever house crew she
00:11:16 wanted for cooks and nannies and cleaners and all that stuff. - So AI is going to, robots are going
00:11:22 to eventually take these jobs. But you see it, right? Because there's like the Roomba-
00:11:25 - I think so, yes. - Already travels your house.
00:11:27 - But the Roomba's not that good, right? You'll have someone, something that's really good.
00:11:30 - Yeah, it's got to start somewhere. - And the Roomba was a great start.
00:11:34 - So if you were starting over today, because I think-
00:11:37 - One quick thing though. So even though AI is going to make marketing more efficient,
00:11:42 all it's going to do is just cause marketing ad spend to go through the roof because you have
00:11:47 this extra spread. Where are they going to spend that? To get the eyeballs. AI doesn't get you the
00:11:52 eyeballs. You still have to go buy the eyeballs. - And now you have more money to spend.
00:11:56 - On the eyeballs because your margins are now better.
00:11:58 - Which is great for a marketing agency. - Dude, I was doing a podcast episode the
00:12:02 other day. Did you know Airbnb spends around $900 million a year in marketing? Okay?
00:12:11 - Okay. - I was looking at the
00:12:13 Microsoft stat. I couldn't get marketing ad spend, but I got advertising, which was one of the
00:12:16 biggest chunks. I think it was like 1.1 billion. But look at the revenue difference from Airbnb
00:12:23 and Microsoft. - It's enormous.
00:12:25 - Yeah, Microsoft is a two plus trillion dollar company, right?
00:12:28 - They have more cash than Airbnb generates. - Yeah, Microsoft probably does more profit
00:12:33 in a quarter than Airbnb generates in a year. And I don't have the numbers in front of me,
00:12:38 but I think Microsoft does somewhere around $20 billion a quarter, or maybe $17 or $16. Either
00:12:44 way, it's a lot of money per quarter. But look how much less they spend, right? They're just
00:12:49 more efficient with their dollars. All I'm getting at is companies will just start,
00:12:54 if they're more efficient on the labor side, they'll just start plowing it into getting clicks
00:13:00 from Google or Bing or Facebook because now they have more ways to just get more traffic.
00:13:04 - But don't you see a world where we no longer actually need to go to the Google,
00:13:08 Bing's because of these robotics? Where like Siri, people can just talk in their phone and Siri can
00:13:14 answer questions, but eventually you're going to have these new mediums. So it won't be eyeballs
00:13:18 to your website, but it'll be information coming immediately to me. - I think it depends on the
00:13:22 generation. The older generation, no, we're not seeing them adapt chat GPT quick enough.
00:13:27 We're not seeing them adapt voice search quick enough, even when they have Alexa.
00:13:31 Younger generation, they're growing up with it. My kids will actually order stuff from Alexa.
00:13:37 My parents have never ordered anything from Alexa and they don't understand that concept.
00:13:40 I really do believe it's a generation. Kids, when you have them grown up, I know yours are
00:13:46 pretty much grown up. One's off in college and the other one will go soon, sad time.
00:13:50 But my kids versus your kids, big age difference, right? And then the grand scheme, not really so
00:13:58 much, but in technology, big difference. My kids started searching first through voice.
00:14:04 They don't understand the concept that you search through texts and typing, right?
00:14:10 - Wow. So it's almost like cursive, how it's gone for my kids.
00:14:12 - Yes. - Typing might be gone for your kids.
00:14:15 - Bingo. And generationally, you can also optimize for, yes, you can just go to chat GPT and it can
00:14:23 tell you the answer, but you can, companies will start switching up their spend. Did you know you
00:14:28 can optimize for chat GPT and get them to recommend your company when they talk about acai bowls in
00:14:34 places like that? - No, how do I do that?
00:14:36 - So they're using a lot of signals, like what's mentioned out on the web and links. They're using
00:14:40 a lot of signals like traditional SEO, but here's the crazy thing. Chat GPT's index, at least from
00:14:46 its current standpoint, is September, 2021. That'll eventually change. So you can't go and optimize
00:14:52 Everbold today to rank in chat GPT, maybe because you guys have been out longer than 2021, but you've
00:15:01 really taken off in the last few years. Post COVID, you guys saw a big boom, but you agree with me,
00:15:06 pre-2021, you guys weren't that big. - Regionally, we were good,
00:15:10 but not nationally. - Correct. So they're less
00:15:12 likely to recommend you. So if you do a lot of this stuff now, once your index gets up to date,
00:15:16 you're more likely to get mentioned and generate sales from it. Similar with BARD. BARD is Google's
00:15:21 version of chat GPT. If you look at BARD, their index is a few weeks old. It's much easier to
00:15:26 optimize for them to recommend you versus someone else. - There's only a few weeks old?
00:15:30 - Yeah. - How are they so far ahead of chat GPT?
00:15:33 - Google has the world's biggest index. They scrape the web every single day for search results.
00:15:37 They don't have to re-scrape it for BARD. They already have scraped it for many years.
00:15:40 - So is BARD going to be the winner? - I think BARD will be the winner,
00:15:45 but a lot of people look at chat GPT and they're like, "Oh, this is going to be the winner." But
00:15:50 I think BARD in the long run will. - So is it kind of like chat GPT was just
00:15:53 the first mover? It's the MySpace and BARD will be Facebook?
00:15:56 - I really do believe so. If you look at also Google, it wasn't the first search engine.
00:16:02 I do think there'll be a world where there'll be both, like Coke and Pepsi. But once BARD gets
00:16:08 integrated into Google and once they can implement a lot of the technology, people already go to
00:16:11 Google. More people go to Google than chat GPT. Once they realize they can get all those features
00:16:16 from Google, it's on. - Do people actually go to Bing?
00:16:19 - They do. It is one of the top 100 websites in the world the last time I checked on.
00:16:23 - I don't think I know a single human that goes to Bing.
00:16:26 - It's older generation. And you know what? We see higher conversion rates on Bing over Google.
00:16:31 You want to know why? Older generation has more disposable income. More of them are millionaires.
00:16:36 They bought their homes back in the day and their homes have appreciated. They have low
00:16:40 mortgages. Some of them don't even have mortgages. Young generation, screwed. Can't even buy a home.
00:16:45 Dude, I was talking to my buddy Curtis. He has a stock that he has some money in. He didn't work
00:16:51 for a company. They didn't end up paying him because they didn't have the cash, so they gave
00:16:54 him stock. It was a crypto company. He ended up going out there and just holding the stock.
00:17:00 He's up a crap load. I'm talking about he can make like a half a million dollars after taxes.
00:17:07 He's just like, "I can't sell." I'm like, "Why?" He's like, "Can't get me out of the rat race."
00:17:13 I'm like, "Half a million dollars cash won't get you out of the rat race?" He's like, "No,
00:17:17 I'm still going to be in the hamster wheel." I'm like, "Dude, even if I went to a million dollars
00:17:21 after taxes, you're still going to be in the hamster wheel." He's just like, "Well, I need
00:17:25 to get enough so I can at least put a down payment on a house." Think about that. You need almost
00:17:30 half a million to a million dollars to put a down payment on a house. He's like, "Well, if it goes,
00:17:35 when you're doing the math, even at $2 million, if you put 500 down, the mortgage is too expensive."
00:17:41 Now he needs at least a million to put down, if not more, because he can't buy a house for less
00:17:46 than $2 million in Southern California. He's looking for an old home that's like a hundred
00:17:50 years old that needs to be slowly renovated. That's all you can afford. Props to him. I'm not
00:17:55 trying to talk trash on Curtis. It's hard for anyone to survive that's up and coming and younger.
00:18:03 I feel bad for these people. I don't know how they're going to do well. The older people,
00:18:08 like my parents and your parents, I don't know where your parents bought their house from,
00:18:11 but my parents paid 200 grand. - Yeah, so did mine.
00:18:14 - It's worth over $2 million today. - Yeah, and they kept it. They're like,
00:18:17 "Yeah, it's not bad." I'm like, "Did you ever refinance your home?" "Yeah, but I didn't do it
00:18:21 to take money out. Just, you know, reduce my interest rate." I was like, "Oh, what's your
00:18:24 property tax, dad?" "I don't know. It's like a few thousand dollars a year or something like that."
00:18:30 - Property tax is crazy. The cost of ownership, that is what's so hard for this young generation
00:18:36 and even our generation and down is if you finally can get that property to keep it
00:18:43 and pay every year. - All right. You don't know how much I
00:18:46 spend on property tax a year? - I'm afraid to hear, but go ahead.
00:18:49 - Take a guess. - I'm going to guess 800 grand.
00:18:56 - No, that's too much. I'm more than 200, less than 300. I'm somewhere in that range.
00:19:01 - I had to go high. - I think 260, 270,
00:19:04 somewhere around there. A year. - Yes.
00:19:05 - That's expensive. It's like a mortgage every single-
00:19:08 - That's more than two times the average income in America you're paying in
00:19:13 property tax just to keep the house. - But here's the crappy part. I got to make
00:19:18 double, pay taxes, and then I can pay my property tax. That's the world we live in.
00:19:24 My parents, though, doesn't matter what their house is at. They bought it for so cheap. Their
00:19:29 property tax has gone up, but it's so small. I know for a fact they're not paying more than
00:19:34 five grand a year from property tax, if that. My parents are like, "Yeah, it doesn't cost us
00:19:38 more than 1,200, 1,300 a month to live." I'm like, "Yeah, because you don't have a mortgage.
00:19:44 Your property tax is low." My parents don't want to put heating, I mean, air conditioning in their
00:19:49 place because it only gets hot three months out of the year. I'm like, "Yeah, but you've been in
00:19:52 this house for over 30 years." They're like, "Yeah, we're millionaires because of your home."
00:19:57 - Yes, which is how most people become millionaires. - Yes.
00:20:01 - I think I saw a stat, or a friend of mine told me the largest
00:20:04 pool of millionaires in America are teachers. - Wow.
00:20:08 - Yeah. - Really?
00:20:09 - Because they're conservative by nature. They save well. They buy their home. They work,
00:20:15 and they have the pension and the tenure, and they do all this, and they invest, and by the
00:20:18 end of their life, they're the largest pool of millionaires. - Good for them.
00:20:22 - Yeah, it's awesome. It's awesome. This is what I love about this next question I'm going to ask
00:20:28 you for you because you've been so successful at so many businesses, and you have just a
00:20:32 very unique way of seeing opportunity and figuring out how to monetize it.
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00:21:01 Now, let's get after those goals. As an entrepreneur, I know how
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00:21:29 your community. I'm going to take away all the stuff you've ever done.
00:21:39 - All right.
00:21:39 - You're 22 years old.
00:21:41 - Okay.
00:21:42 - It's today.
00:21:43 - You're not going to like the answer. I know what your question is. Go for it.
00:21:46 - I don't want to like or not like. I just want the answer. What are you going to do
00:21:50 to make it in this world?
00:21:51 - I would go to college.
00:21:52 - That's what I said, 22, after college.
00:21:54 - Yeah, I would go to college. And because some people are at 22 still don't go to college.
00:21:59 - I think everyone should go to college, but side topic.
00:22:01 - So if it was today, 20 years from now, I don't know if everyone should go to college.
00:22:08 - Today.
00:22:08 - Yeah, but today I still think, I would try to go to Harvard or Stanford or one of those
00:22:14 good schools. And I would go into private equity, venture capital, hedge fund, iBanking,
00:22:19 one of those financial fields. You may not make five, $10 million a year. Some of them do. Some
00:22:26 of them make way more than that, but there's a really certain path to a few million dollars a
00:22:32 year in income.
00:22:33 - Okay, now I'm going to simplify that because you just went to areas that I was never getting
00:22:38 into Harvard. I was never getting. So let's go to the guy or girl who isn't going to get
00:22:42 into the Harvard's. He's going to go to your regular garden variety college. Have a good
00:22:47 time. Graduate with some degree. Now what?
00:22:50 - I would go work for a private equity office, a hedge fund office, or iBanking office, or
00:22:56 venture capital office. And I'll start working for free and live with my parents.
00:22:59 - And work your way up.
00:23:01 - Work my way up and then be on the track to making one to $2 million a year and not have
00:23:08 to worry and have the stress of being entrepreneur. It's still stressful to work for someone else.
00:23:13 - Sure.
00:23:13 - It's not easy. You still have a ton of pressure, sometimes even more than being entrepreneur,
00:23:18 but it's more of a certain path to making enough money where you can be very comfortable
00:23:22 no matter where you want to live in the world.
00:23:23 - I do agree because I say the same thing. I don't think most people should be entrepreneurs.
00:23:27 - No.
00:23:27 - I think you're wired to be one. You should be one.
00:23:30 - Wait, would you be entrepreneur all over again?
00:23:31 - If I don't want it for my kids.
00:23:33 - Would you be one all over again?
00:23:35 - I mean, I don't, I can't say, I have to say yes, because I don't know what else I would do.
00:23:41 - See, I really would go into one of those financial fields.
00:23:45 - I can't do that though. I would get bored after three years. I want to do something else.
00:23:49 - No, I would just go, I'd be an employee and then I would start my own financial company
00:23:53 and compete with them and then just try to make the cash.
00:23:54 - Okay, now that I would try. I mean, that's what I did at my payroll business.
00:23:57 - Yeah.
00:23:58 - Yeah, learn from them and then do it yourself.
00:23:59 - But that's what I'd do. I would make all the connections with the LPs,
00:24:02 which are limited partners, how you go and get your money, your capital, your
00:24:06 millions, hundreds of millions or billions. And then I would end up,
00:24:10 you know, having my own fund and take my own two and 20.
00:24:14 - Now, outside of just the capital side, do you think that those industries are
00:24:18 not going to get completely overrun and disrupted through technology over the next five, 10,
00:24:23 15 years? Because you're building a career now in this industry.
00:24:25 - Yes.
00:24:26 - You still think that's the avenue to go?
00:24:28 - I don't think they're going to get overrun by, like, I don't see private equity getting
00:24:33 overrun by AI. I think what's going to end up happening is private equity is going to use AI
00:24:39 to buy companies and make them more efficient.
00:24:41 - So you don't need those lower level analysts?
00:24:43 - Not necessarily. You still may want those analysts, but I'm not talking about...
00:24:49 See, the big opportunity isn't saving money on analysts. These guys have high margins.
00:24:54 Where they're going to make the money is not by cutting the analysts. They're going to make the
00:24:59 money by saying, "Hey, your company, forget AI, you're not even on the cloud. You still have all
00:25:04 these servers in this location. We're going to modernize your company and put it on the cloud.
00:25:08 And then we're going to use AI. Oh, and then by the way, we just cut 30% of your staff."
00:25:12 They're going to start doing stuff like that. And that's where the money is going to be made.
00:25:15 Not from cutting the analyst who's getting paid 180 to 200 grand a year.
00:25:19 - The reason I'm asking these questions, and it's for the audience's sake, is I've
00:25:23 found a way to make money by looking at the transition of things over time and saying,
00:25:27 "How can you get in in front run?" Right? Like, kind of like what we did when we used to do
00:25:31 digital marketing together. And it was like, all my previous clients were offline, archaic and old
00:25:36 businesses. And so when I came to you and said, "Look at all these businesses that need help
00:25:40 online," we could digitize their entire ecosystem. Can't do that today. Everyone now understands it.
00:25:45 So what you're saying is these fields can now be front run in the same capacity and get in,
00:25:50 learn how to optimize the technology and help them get from servers to AWS and global.
00:25:57 So that's an opportunity for those listening at home.
00:26:00 - That's right. There's tons of opportunities. The real question is,
00:26:02 what do you want to do and what are you passionate about? And I say they go hand in hand because
00:26:06 if you say you want to do something, but you're not passionate about it, you're not going to last
00:26:09 long. If you're passionate about something, typically it's what you want to do because
00:26:12 you enjoy it because you're good at it. - Yeah, I agree. And on that vein,
00:26:17 what is the Neil Patel recipe for success? - Focus. I think that's the biggest issue
00:26:23 people have. If you look at your success at Everable, your success isn't from your
00:26:29 building company. What is that called again? - WeBuild.
00:26:30 - WeBuild. It's not from that. Your success was, you did, actually, let me actually go back.
00:26:36 Your success is from your wife. Your wife wanted a juice store and you didn't want to do one.
00:26:41 And then you ended up doing one to make her happy. She didn't want to run it. You ran it. And then
00:26:46 it turned into a business that flourished. I'm not saying your wife couldn't make it flourish.
00:26:50 She just chose that she wasn't passionate about a juice store, but she wanted one temporarily.
00:26:54 - Acai Bowl. - Acai Bowl. Yes. I thought
00:26:57 she wanted a juice store. - She liked juice at the time.
00:26:58 I like Acai Bowls. - Yeah, but you transformed it into Acai.
00:27:01 - Yes. She said you need to have juice in there. - Yes. But when she wanted to start,
00:27:05 the original concept came from a juice store, not Acai Bowl. And when you look at your success,
00:27:12 you just did one thing really well. I'm going to make amazing acai, affordable prices,
00:27:18 high quality. And this is all we're going to do. We don't have 20 things. We're just going to do
00:27:22 one thing really well. And you focus on it from everything to the recipe, to the products you're
00:27:28 using, to the spoons, to the logos and color schemes, to the messaging, to making sure that
00:27:34 you can build it in an affordable manner. And you kept going. And then you kept raising money,
00:27:39 kept getting bigger. You also had some liquidity. Congratulations to you.
00:27:43 - Thank you. - And then you're just like,
00:27:46 all right, now conquer this. This business has grown really big. You got in private equity
00:27:50 partners and celebrities like the Drew Brees and stuff like that, and Shaqs and all those kind of
00:27:55 people. And then you're like- - Shaq's not on the Evergold side. He's
00:27:58 on the WeBuild side, but yes. - All right, the same thing.
00:28:00 - I just want to clarify. - Yeah. And then you went into
00:28:03 being like, all right, we now know how to build these things really well. Our private equity
00:28:08 partners also have a lot of other restaurants and chains. Let's actually start building all
00:28:13 their restaurants for them. Because if you look at your return for Everbol, I think your payback
00:28:19 period is less than two years, right? Year and a half?
00:28:20 - On average, cash on cash is pretty strong. - Yeah, which is very strong. Most restaurants,
00:28:25 I believe, is a three-year plus period, correct? And you're roughly half the time. So when you
00:28:30 look at it, you're just like, okay, I already focused on Everbol, figured out how to do things
00:28:34 really affordably, already have my investors and my partners build restaurants throughout the whole
00:28:40 world, and they own tons of these franchises. Oh, wait, we can build them all cheaper now,
00:28:45 right? You already did the Everbol. You're still working on it, but it's evolved. Management team
00:28:49 came in, et cetera, cashed out some chips. And you're like, all right, now let me focus on
00:28:55 building other restaurants in a very economical manner. And the focus is this allows you to do
00:29:04 well. And I think that's the key that most people get wrong in which they try to do too many things
00:29:10 at once. They don't focus. And when you don't focus, you just lose too much money.
00:29:14 - Okay, focus. But what about the people who work really hard? And when I say really hard,
00:29:21 I say the difference between productivity and activity, but they're very active. They're
00:29:24 spending hours and hours. - Yeah, but working really hard
00:29:26 has nothing to do with making money. - Agreed. But I'm saying, so those people
00:29:29 who are saying, you know, I'm working 10, 12, 14 hour days, but I'm not making any traction.
00:29:35 I'm not getting anywhere. - Yeah. Well, the biggest problem
00:29:39 that we see with people trying to make money and not making any money is the first thing is a lot
00:29:44 of them believe that the riches are in the niches. That's the total opposite. The riches are in big,
00:29:51 broad, you know, massive TAM markets. TAM stands for Total Addressable Market.
00:29:55 So the bigger the market, like people drinking water, that is a big market. Everyone in this
00:30:03 world eventually will take a sip of water, right? And I say eventually because babies come out
00:30:08 drinking milk. I don't know what portion of milk is considered water, but they're drinking milk
00:30:12 from their mother. And I'm not a scientist, so I don't know what portion is water, but either way,
00:30:16 they're eventually drinking water. That is a massive TAM. Look at people like Fiji Water,
00:30:23 Aquapana, you know, Evian. These are brands that people take for granted, but make a crap load of
00:30:29 money. - Sure.
00:30:30 - So the first thing that's wrong is they're not focusing on big enough markets. Because it's much
00:30:35 easier to become a millionaire taking 0.01% of a really massive market than it is taking 50% of a
00:30:42 $10 million market. The next thing is, is-- - Well, let me pepper that though.
00:30:47 - Okay. - But it's harder to take
00:30:49 0.001% of that big market when you have those behemoths. - Not necessarily. I don't think so.
00:30:56 I'm talking about taking a fraction or a fraction of a percent. We find it's easier because there's
00:31:02 so many people looking for your products and services, it's not that hard to penetrate the
00:31:05 market. I think it is really hard to take one, two, three, four, 5% of a market, but not a fraction
00:31:11 of a percent and getting some revenue or a million dollars.
00:31:12 - So as long as that fraction has a high enough upside that you can live with, then it's okay.
00:31:16 - If you're in the water industry, which must be a multi-billion dollar industry--
00:31:22 - At least. - It's not hard to make
00:31:25 a million dollars selling water. - Sure.
00:31:27 - I'm not talking about million in profit, I'm just talking about revenue.
00:31:29 The second thing is people focus on the wrong things, right? So they believe like, "Oh,
00:31:35 I just build it and they will come." No, you got to actually market it. You got to have a good
00:31:39 product. You got to have something that's unique. You got to have a value proposition that helps
00:31:45 separate you from the competition. That's going to convince people to give it a try. Think of like a
00:31:50 liquid death. Had a totally different spin on it. Smart model. A lot of them explode. Yeah. They
00:31:56 don't have tons of celebrities or anything like that. They just use a different model.
00:32:00 On the flip side-- - They have some celebrities.
00:32:01 - Yes, but at the early days, I don't think they had any.
00:32:04 - Metallica's also involved with them. - At the early days?
00:32:06 - No, but now I think. - Yeah, but they've blown up now,
00:32:09 right? But if you look at Everbolt, you did well without celebrities and then you got celebrities
00:32:14 eventually involved. But at the beginning, you grew just fine without celebrities. Now,
00:32:18 you have some other companies who have done well purely through celebrities like Beats by Dre
00:32:23 grew by not just using Dre's fame. They use LeBron's fame, the Kardashians' fame, and the
00:32:29 list goes on and on, right? I would see Russell Westbrook come out with Beats by Dre headphones
00:32:34 when he was walking out and his outfit, he always had unique outfits walking into the
00:32:39 arena. And I never always understood why those baseball players wear those fancy clothes or
00:32:45 basketball players because it's like one wear. They never wanna be seen in that outfit again.
00:32:49 I'm like, "You just burned two, three grand on that outfit and you'll never be--"
00:32:52 - Have you seen their salaries? - Yeah, that's true,
00:32:55 but it doesn't mean you should just waste it. - I agree, but have you seen their salaries?
00:32:58 Most of these guys are in their early 20s making hundreds of thousands of dollars for 48 minutes.
00:33:04 - Yes, but now, and also because of the media deals, they're making even bigger killing--
00:33:10 - Did you see that Otani deal? - It's not a good deal.
00:33:13 - For him. - It's a terrible deal.
00:33:14 - I don't know why he's postponing it all. - Yes.
00:33:17 - 700 million, but he gets 2 million, I think, a year for the first seven years?
00:33:20 - Dude, I did the math on compounding interest. If you can just clip 9% like the S&P,
00:33:25 he gets creamed. It's one of the worst sports deals I've ever seen.
00:33:27 - Yeah. You know, by the way, in my book, you're one of the only people who answered
00:33:31 the question of, "Would you rather a million dollars or know a thousand people really well?"
00:33:34 You're one of the only people who said, "I want the million dollars," and you gave me the S&P answer.
00:33:38 - Yeah. It's true, though. Everyone's like, "Oh, I'm gonna make more for this." No, you're not.
00:33:43 Let's just be honest. You probably already know a lot of people. Are they actually giving you money?
00:33:48 Probably not. - Okay. Well, hey, listen--
00:33:50 - Wait, would you take the million dollars or the-- - I'll take the people, because let's be honest,
00:33:54 I made millions of dollars working with you. I didn't have the skill. You did. I had the
00:34:00 relationships with the people who needed your skill, and by us partnering, I was able-- So,
00:34:04 it depends who you are, right? You have the technical skill. I didn't.
00:34:08 - I also am a decent financial investor. - You're all right.
00:34:11 - So, give me the capital, and I'll just go invest it in the stock market.
00:34:14 - So, I'm on the other side of the coin, but it was interesting, because out of all the people I
00:34:17 asked, every chapter I asked somebody, and you're one of the only people that said that, and rightfully
00:34:22 so. For you, it makes more sense, because if I give you a million dollars, you will turn it into
00:34:27 a lot. - No, I think that's the right answer for most people.
00:34:30 - But I don't think most people know-- You give most people-- It's why people who win the lottery,
00:34:34 they lose the money. - No, you don't have to be a
00:34:35 rocket scientist to put the money in the S&P. That's why I also said you had to put the money
00:34:38 in the S&P. - Yeah, but to keep it in the S&P,
00:34:41 because all of a sudden, it's fine. I put a million dollars in the S&P. I'm making some money,
00:34:44 but then I can't pay my bills next month, so I have to pull from it.
00:34:47 - You can. You can live off of around 3% to 4% conservatively. Talk to any wealth manager.
00:34:51 - No. Who do you know, really, out of your social group, that can realistically live off
00:34:56 of 3% to 4% of a million dollars a year? You're talking 30, 40 grand a year.
00:35:00 - Correct, combined with their job. - Okay. Still hard.
00:35:04 - It's doable. Let it compound. - Yeah.
00:35:07 - It'll be their next day. - In a perfect world, you're right.
00:35:09 It's just in practice-- - Don't live in California. Go live
00:35:12 in Missouri or somewhere where the cost of living isn't bad.
00:35:14 - Yes, but anyway, carry on. So, okay. - Okay, so the other problem is they're not
00:35:18 differentiated. The other problem is they're not spending enough time and energy on things like
00:35:24 marketing, building their brand, hearing out their customers, finding out what issues their
00:35:29 customers have with their product or service, and then fixing them, right? But if you do the
00:35:33 basic fundamentals, over time, you'll do better. And one of the things that most people make a
00:35:39 mistake in, they try to figure it out all on their own, so then they believe, "Oh, I need a
00:35:44 business partner. A business partner solves it." Having a business partner is great at the early
00:35:47 stages because you don't have a ton of capital, so they can do the stuff that you can't, especially
00:35:52 if you guys have different skill sets. But more than just a business partner, you need to hire
00:35:57 people from the industry who have done it before, who are successful, who work for you in competition
00:36:01 because they'll help you get there faster. - Yeah.
00:36:04 - That's how you make money. - Seems easy enough.
00:36:08 - But it takes time and persistence. - Thank you.
00:36:10 - Issue is, is most people won't put in the time and persistence.
00:36:13 - And why do you think that is? - They're not passionate about it.
00:36:16 They give up. They want the quick hit. I was with my buddy, Eric, the other day. We have a podcast
00:36:24 together, and he was talking about someone who has 100 million views from all their social channels.
00:36:31 And I was like, "What industry?" I bet you it's mass industry. He's like, "Yeah." He's like,
00:36:35 "It's make money online." And I was like, "Yeah, because everyone wants to get rich quick."
00:36:39 And I'm not saying, I don't know this person. I'm not saying the stuff they're putting out is bad
00:36:42 or good. I have no feedback because I don't know what it is. But I bet you majority of people will
00:36:47 be disappointed. Even if hypothetically, let's assume this person's content is amazing, which
00:36:52 it could be. And let's say it really does help people make more money, which it can. A lot of
00:36:57 the people won't do anything with it because they're lazy and they just want the result right
00:37:00 then and there, which isn't reality. - And it's true because we overcomplicate
00:37:04 stuff. I mean, whether it's health and wellness, it's not complicated to lose weight and get in
00:37:09 shape. It's just hard to have consistency, focus, and dedication to working out and eating right.
00:37:14 - Dude, one of the simplest things, and it's in your slogan, "Unevolve." If you want to lose
00:37:21 weight, stop eating processed food. See what that does to your body after three months. No joke,
00:37:25 just stop eating processed food. - How's your diet these days?
00:37:28 - My diet's terrible. - Is it?
00:37:30 - Yes. Kids. My wife keeps buying so many snacks and then we go to restaurants and the kids don't
00:37:35 finish their plate. So then I just eat their food because I want to save the money. Some things I
00:37:39 want to save money on, some things I don't, but I'm getting back to eating healthy. And when I
00:37:44 say it's bad, it's bad for me because I used to be no sweets, no chocolates, no ice creams,
00:37:50 no nothing. And now I'm eating some of that. - That is true. That's the one thing I hated
00:37:54 about staying at your place. I was like, "There is no snacks in here."
00:37:57 - No snacks. - Nothing.
00:37:59 - So now- - Hummus.
00:38:00 - Yeah. So now I eat a little bit of snacks and I'll eat some unhealthy food. Like yesterday,
00:38:05 someone gave us a gift basket. So I ate the chocolates in there, but normally I wouldn't do
00:38:08 that. That's like maybe a once every two, three week thing. So it's not like I'm that bad, but
00:38:13 for me, that's bad. Still no fried food or no cheese or any of that. I'm trying cheese again,
00:38:19 though. I'm like, "Oh, let me add it to the diet." - And?
00:38:21 - I haven't, but I'm going to start trying. - Oh, you're going to. Did you like cheese before?
00:38:25 - I stopped eating it because it was causing acne when I was a kid.
00:38:29 - But did you like the taste? - I got used to not eating it.
00:38:32 - No, I know, but- - I like nacho cheese. I didn't care for
00:38:35 cheese, but like normal shredded cheese. - Pizza?
00:38:37 - Didn't care for it. I love nacho cheese. - Nacho cheese, which is not- I don't even
00:38:41 think that is real cheese. - Pizza cheese isn't bad. Like,
00:38:45 you know, just- - You're talking about the nacho cheese
00:38:46 that comes out of a little machine at the bowling alley, which is probably the same cheese from when
00:38:50 we were kids. - That's good.
00:38:52 - Yeah. It's processed. - Yeah, I know. But I haven't started,
00:38:57 and I try not to eat that kind of stuff. - Someone should create a healthy version
00:39:01 of that cheese. - There must be.
00:39:02 - I don't think there is. - You'll go add the product to your-
00:39:06 - Somebody please make that and send it to Neil because Neil needs that cheese.
00:39:09 - Yeah, that's good. - Like a truckload. I want a truckload
00:39:11 to be delivered to your house of that cheese. - But I still don't eat- like, I was at Javier's
00:39:15 the other day. I don't eat chips. Like, chips and salsa, I'll skip on that. So, like, my diet's
00:39:19 still probably, for most people, 99.9% of the world, they're probably healthier than them.
00:39:25 - I mean, you look identical to the day I met you. Like, literally.
00:39:28 - Yes. - Maybe a couple gray hairs
00:39:31 in the beard, but otherwise identical. - I'm the same weight since you met me. I
00:39:35 lost weight in between when I was too healthy. My weight dropped down to, like, 117, 119 pounds.
00:39:41 - What do you know? - I'm at 132, 133. So, it's healthy weight
00:39:45 for my size. - For sure.
00:39:46 - It's probably I'm still underweight, but I eat too healthy, and I do intermittent fasting.
00:39:51 Combined with healthy eating- - I do intermittent fasting.
00:39:54 What time do you eat? - Typically from 12 to 6, and that's it.
00:39:59 - Okay. - And now I'm shifting it to
00:40:01 breakfast all the way to, like, lunch, and that's my last meal.
00:40:06 - So, no dinner. How are you going to do that in business?
00:40:08 - Just don't eat. - Yeah, I can't do that.
00:40:11 - Because think about it. You eat lunch, you eat dinner, and then I go to sleep early. So,
00:40:16 you still have a lot of food in your stomach. - Yeah.
00:40:18 - If you eat breakfast, and I eat a big breakfast, and eat lunch, I have six hours
00:40:24 to burn off the food. - I mean, it's true. I just find,
00:40:26 for my lifestyle, I don't eat breakfast, I don't eat lunch. I start eating at two, three o'clock.
00:40:30 I eat until about eight or nine o'clock, and that way I have dinner with the kids, the family,
00:40:34 business, friends. - I'm now doing breakfast with the kids.
00:40:37 - Yeah, okay. My kids are asleep. - Yeah, they're older. They get to pick
00:40:42 their own schedule. - Yes.
00:40:43 - I'm looking forward to those days. - Are you getting sleep?
00:40:45 - I get great sleep. Still eight hours a day. - Do you?
00:40:48 - Yeah, some days nine. - That's great.
00:40:51 So, how would you define marketing today? - I have a great post on this on Twitter.
00:40:59 I'm going to read it. - Okay.
00:41:00 - Okay? And I love this. And in all honesty, my team created this for me, so I didn't even create
00:41:06 this. Don't you just love the transparency? - Yes.
00:41:09 - That's what happens when you have a ton of employees.
00:41:12 - Which, going back to the other question, is why knowing the right people is very valuable.
00:41:16 - Yes. So, this was what is marketing, okay? - Okay.
00:41:21 - Making a poster for a grand play and spreading it, that's advertising.
00:41:27 Actors performing teasers around town, that's promotion. When a scene accidentally leaks to
00:41:33 the public and the news covers it, that's publicity. Convincing the town council that
00:41:38 this adds charm to the community event, that's public relations. When the audience fills a
00:41:44 theater, enjoys a show, asks questions, buys merchandise, and spends more money, that's sales.
00:41:50 And if you plan the whole thing from poster to the final curtain, that's marketing.
00:41:56 - That's a great post. - Yeah, it did well.
00:41:59 - It should have done well. - Yeah.
00:42:01 - So, marketing's the strategy. Marketing's the plan, the overarching thesis of what we're going
00:42:09 to do and how we're going to do it. - Yes.
00:42:10 - So, a lot of people think of marketing and online marketing only for e-com products,
00:42:15 SaaS-based technologies, digital courses and products, where I think a lot of businesses,
00:42:21 which is most businesses in America, struggle is brick and mortar marketing.
00:42:24 Online and getting people from clicks through the door.
00:42:28 - Yes. What they struggle with is a full funnel. That's the easiest way to describe it.
00:42:33 - Okay. - From getting the person
00:42:35 to your website or your storefront, it doesn't matter if it's brick and mortar or online,
00:42:40 and then you have to get them to buy, and then you have to get them to keep coming back and buying
00:42:46 and transacting. That's marketing, the whole life cycle of a user.
00:42:50 - Yeah. - Getting them to buy more
00:42:51 products, promotions, cross-promoting, figuring out how to increase your lifetime value for a
00:42:57 customer, that's the hard part. That's how you make it profitable. Marketing isn't tough from
00:43:03 the aspect of getting someone to your website or storefront. You can buy that traffic from Google
00:43:07 or Facebook. It's not expensive. If you buy it in quantity, sure, it adds up. The part that is
00:43:14 expensive is making it profitable. Unless you can figure out how to get that customer to keep coming
00:43:20 back and buying more or being able to upsell them or downsell them, just like when you go to
00:43:24 McDonald's, they say, "Hey, do you want to supersize that? Do you want fries with that?"
00:43:28 I've ordered chicken nuggets for my kids, although McDonald's is terrible, but every once in a while,
00:43:33 on a road trip, we'll get it for them. If I order chicken nuggets, they'll say, "Do you want a happy
00:43:38 meal instead with chicken nuggets?" These are all examples of upsells, what's helping them generate
00:43:43 more revenue. If you can figure out how to squeeze more revenue out of your customers, and not in an
00:43:49 unethical way, but by providing more value, you're much more likely to really make money and to make
00:43:56 your marketing work well for you. - I'm going to ask you this question.
00:44:00 It's going to be directed towards Everbool, but for those listening, you can apply it to your
00:44:04 brick and mortar. You open an Everbool. How are you going to market this brick and mortar local
00:44:09 store in your region that you live in, where you don't need global audience, but you're fighting in
00:44:16 what's probably a decently competitive industry of smoothies, acai bowls, health food, but it's local.
00:44:22 - I would do something that is really silly, concept-wise, but it'll work really well,
00:44:27 and it's better than buying paid ads. You go around, you hand out flyers to everyone in the
00:44:32 neighborhood. - Actual flyers.
00:44:33 - Yeah, and you let them know what day you're opening, and you tell them that you're going to
00:44:37 end up providing stuff for free. So if your Everbool is, let's say-
00:44:42 - Your Everbool. - Okay, my Everbool, let's say the amount
00:44:47 that it is someone buys, I'm making this up, is like a pint. Instead, what I would do is give them
00:44:55 like a half a cup for free, okay? So you're giving them stuff for free, instead of giving them the
00:45:00 whole big enchilada, you're giving them a sample, but a big enough sample where they're satisfied,
00:45:05 and they know the quality of the product, so then that way, they're more likely to continually come
00:45:11 back. If you actually do the math, in most cases, that's probably going to be cheaper than spending
00:45:15 the money on Google and Facebook. - And then once you're open,
00:45:18 which is a great strategy, because we do friends and family, we actually do that, so I love that.
00:45:21 - Okay, and then once- - Now we're open.
00:45:23 - Then you ask people to leave the reviews and the ratings and all these places, you create your
00:45:28 Google My Business, your Yelp listings, and then once you do all that, boom, you're off into the
00:45:34 races and you'll make more money. - Would you advise to utilize the
00:45:37 Instagrams, the Twitters, the TikToks? - I would, and tell people and give them
00:45:41 the hashtags and come up with cool stickers and signage that they can hold up while they're
00:45:45 eating my Everbool, 'cause it's my store at this point, and get more coverage for it.
00:45:51 - And so it does work. - It does work.
00:45:55 - 'Cause I hear from a lot of brick and mortar, and we do it, but I hear from a lot of brick and
00:45:58 mortar, those things don't actually translate, and I don't know if it's because they don't
00:46:03 have the right recipe. - Dude, you've done how many
00:46:05 Everbools yourself? - 28.
00:46:07 - Yourself, not franchises. - Yes.
00:46:09 - Okay, how many of them did you offer stuff for free?
00:46:12 - 28. - And how many were successful
00:46:14 out of those 28? - Well, actually, 29, 28 of 29
00:46:17 were successful. - Okay, why did the last one not work?
00:46:20 - It was in a location we just missed on the real estate.
00:46:22 - Either way, that's an amazing batting average. - It was pretty good.
00:46:26 - You know, if that Otani, right? - Yeah.
00:46:30 - Otani got a $700 million contract, you were playing baseball, you would have got a $2
00:46:34 billion contract if you were batting 28 out of 29. You agree with this?
00:46:37 - Yes, angels, or Dodgers pay me. - Yes, so the strategy works.
00:46:42 It's just people execute things in a really bad way.
00:46:44 - Okay. - In which maybe they don't hand out
00:46:48 enough flyers. You can't just open a store and be like, "Stuff's free." Well, you didn't tell anyone
00:46:52 that stuff's free, so how do people know? "Oh, I put a sign in front of the store." Well, how many
00:46:56 people are going to drive by out there? Maybe not a lot. Maybe you picked a bad location.
00:47:00 But if you actually take the time and energy weeks before your opening and message people
00:47:05 and go around and keep just telling people, you'll build up the hype and people are like,
00:47:09 "Oh, cool, this is going to happen." - Okay, so I want to end with you talking
00:47:14 to the audience, share with our entrepreneurs, the aspiring entrepreneurs, the entrepreneurs,
00:47:18 the solopreneurs, the people who are fighting just to stay alive. We're heading into rougher
00:47:24 economic times. - Yeah.
00:47:25 - It's 2020. We're filming this right by the end of '23, but this will go live in '24.
00:47:30 Interest rates are high. - I think '24 will be a better year.
00:47:32 - Okay. - I'm not saying it's going to be
00:47:34 an amazing year. They may claim it's a recession or whatnot, but we're already living in a climate
00:47:38 that feels like a recession, so what's the difference? And we did have two quarters of GDP
00:47:42 decline. - Yeah.
00:47:42 - So what's the difference really? - Yeah. So what advice can you give them
00:47:46 right now? They're struggling to basically stay afloat. Marketing, because you're also
00:47:53 a world-class entrepreneur. You do a ton of M&A. People know you as the SEO online marketing guru,
00:48:00 but everyone who really knows you knows you actually crush it in all the different businesses
00:48:03 you own, invest in, and buy. I mean, you're a world-class entrepreneur. You have figured out
00:48:08 entrepreneurship, and I think for a lot of people, they may say, "Okay, but outside of marketing,
00:48:12 there's all these other things." What would you advice can you give them? Best advice. They're
00:48:16 listening. They're struggling, and they need to hear from you, and they get this one opportunity.
00:48:20 - Sure. So I would do a few things, and you're not going to like some of these responses.
00:48:25 Number one, live with your parents or a sibling or somewhere so you can save on rent.
00:48:32 Number two, create a side hustle or more so a job that you may not like that can pay some of the
00:48:40 bills. Either you're working for someone or you're doing Uber or Instacart deliveries or something
00:48:45 that's bringing you cash. Remember, you don't have to pay for rent at this point. And if you do have
00:48:50 to pay for rent, try to live with a lot of other people, even if you have a family. I know some
00:48:54 could say like, "Hey, this is not common. People don't do it. It's not practical." Dude, and I
00:49:00 remember my dad telling me in India, they would have multiple families literally in a two-bedroom
00:49:07 apartment. And when I say multiple families, I'm not talking about two. I'm talking about like
00:49:11 three or four with multiple kids for each family. And it sucks, but sometimes you have to make
00:49:16 sacrifices for long-term gains. Number three, create your side hustle. So now you got some
00:49:22 income coming in, and your side hustle should be on something that you're passionate about. If
00:49:25 you're passionate about something, you're more likely to put in the time, the effort, do better
00:49:29 at it, be consistent, so eventually you can make money from it. If you don't know what you're
00:49:34 passionate about, keep trying new things every day or every week until you find something that
00:49:38 you're naturally good at, which tends to be something you'll also like, and continue to focus
00:49:43 on that. The next one, four, make sure it's in a big TAM. We talked about TAM earlier, Total
00:49:48 Adjustable Market. The bigger the TAM, the easier it is to make some sort of money. And number five,
00:49:54 figure out what you can do in that TAM that separates you or differentiates you from the
00:49:58 competition and just keep grinding away. You don't have to pay for mentorship or anything like that.
00:50:03 You can learn a lot off of YouTube in the early days, going to free networking events and just
00:50:08 talking to people. And make sure you also create all your social platforms like TikTok, Twitter,
00:50:14 Instagram, et cetera. Create content on Twitter. You'll first see what hits and is popular,
00:50:19 then take the stuff that hits and then apply it to Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, YouTube, et cetera.
00:50:25 And now you've got content that'll just start generating way more traffic. And you'll start
00:50:29 generating more sales and you'll build up your brand within that vertical that you created your
00:50:34 business in. And you're off into the races, but it just takes time and you got to be patient.
00:50:38 And you got to make sacrifices that you probably don't want to make, but it's life.
00:50:42 That's great advice. I do have one bonus question because I saw a piece of content you put out and
00:50:47 you just touched on it. You don't believe in business coaching. And I know that that is a
00:50:52 huge market right now. And I have a lot of friends that are business coaches. I've talked about
00:50:57 coaches. I think having coaches is important, but maybe it's not in the term you meant, or maybe it
00:51:02 is. So I, you know, and I put this within my Twitter post, but I think a lot of people tend
00:51:09 not to look at it. A lot of the business coaches out there tell you how they're going to help you
00:51:15 make more money. That's a bunch of bull. That's my problem with most of the coaches. And they want
00:51:22 to get paid an arm and a leg to help you get rich when they themselves got rich from just charging
00:51:29 other people like you and not doing anything really substantial in their life. If they said
00:51:34 they did, show me. Don't tell me that, oh, you know, I did this with this company. Actually show
00:51:40 me not the bull crap of like, I did this because a lot of people, a lot of them make up stuff,
00:51:45 but actually show me like, how do I know your revenue is actually that high? Were you on the
00:51:49 ink list? Was it fast growing? Oh, okay. You know, we took this company public and it did X, Y,
00:51:56 and Z. What's the market cap? Oh, you got delisted because the company didn't perform well. You're
00:52:01 right. There's a lot of people out there that are just selling crap. And a lot of the good business
00:52:07 coaches I know, and I know some, but if they believe in something and they are that successful
00:52:15 themselves, they'll coach you on specific aspects, not how to get rich. They may teach you how to
00:52:21 manage better if you're struggling with management or certain things that you're struggling with,
00:52:25 but they're flexible on how they get their payment. If they really believe in your business,
00:52:29 they'll take equity in it or shares or whatever it may be. The business coaches I have a problem
00:52:36 with are the ones that say they're going to help you make more money. If someone's just a coach
00:52:41 saying like, Hey, you're terrible at managing. You've never been a CEO. I'm going to teach you
00:52:44 how to manage employees and hire, et cetera. Cool. They're just helping you on a specific skill.
00:52:48 There's nothing wrong with that. But if you look at the majority of the business coaches that market
00:52:53 themselves on the web, and I bet you the majority in your friends group, I bet you a lot of them
00:52:58 promise they're going to help you make money. Yeah. I mean, it is a theme of business coaching
00:53:03 for sure. We're going to help you make more money. We're going to help your business grow.
00:53:06 Yes, but they're making, getting lesser customers because they're telling people
00:53:10 we're going to help you make more money. Yeah. I mean, I hear you and I don't disagree.
00:53:14 The only part that I disagree with is I don't think Michael Jordan was coached by Phil Jackson.
00:53:19 Phil Jackson wasn't a great basketball. That's not a business coach. I'm talking about business.
00:53:23 No, I'm just using coaching in general. Like coaches don't have to have done it to be able
00:53:27 to coach. Phil Jackson was a basketball player. Yeah. He just wasn't a great basketball player,
00:53:32 but to me, what a true business coach, the purpose is it kind of more what you've ended on,
00:53:37 which is how are you helping me think and be better at my profession? Not you have some magic
00:53:43 touch that's going to open the door for millions of dollars. And I think you're right. If I'm
00:53:46 sitting there hearing, you're going to promise me, Oh, Neil Patel, the new coach, he's going to make
00:53:50 me millions of dollars. He's not. Can he help me think about marketing better? Can he help me
00:53:54 think about Tam? Can he help me understand how to grow a company? Yes, I agree with that. But the
00:54:00 problem with the coaches is they're promising you or, you know, maybe they're not promising,
00:54:04 but they're implying that you're going to make much more money. Yes. Instead of saying, I'm going
00:54:09 to teach you how to be a better marketer. I'm going to teach you how to be a better manager
00:54:12 indirectly. That should lead to more income and hopefully profit. But the problem with most of
00:54:18 business coaches that you and I know in the industry, they promise I'm going to help you
00:54:22 make more money. Yes. Even if it's coaching on real estate. Oh, yeah. We're going to show you
00:54:27 how to make a killing with all this real estate stuff. Oh, we're going to show you how to make
00:54:31 a killing with getting more leads to your business and closing all this business. And it's going to
00:54:39 double or triple it because you're going to learn how to do sales like we do. Like, no, dude,
00:54:44 it doesn't always work that way. Sure, you may have some success successes, but you're not going
00:54:49 to have a ton of them. A lot of people just won't. It won't end up working out. And my favorite is
00:54:54 I once had lunch with the person that they helped. They were a business coach and they were showing
00:55:02 how they're making a killing like over ten million dollars a year, teaching other people to be
00:55:07 business coaches. Right. Is like, all right, this doesn't really provide any value to the world.
00:55:14 Right. I mean, that's fair. That's fair. And I think that's the people that are doing the
00:55:18 marketing. You want to talk about business coaches that aren't doing any marketing, saying, hey,
00:55:22 you know, those are the business coaches that do really well and have some sort of value to provide
00:55:27 aren't the ones going on Google and doing marketing, saying we're going to help you get
00:55:31 rich and they'll help you with specific aspects. They probably get all their business from
00:55:35 referrals or word of mouth, and they're not here to tell you they're going to make you get rich.
00:55:39 They're going to help you solve specific problems within your business. And my post specifically,
00:55:43 and I mentioned it within my Twitter post, was about the people who are saying we're going to
00:55:47 help you get rich. Well, they made all their money charging people like you. And I'm glad you said
00:55:51 that because I think that distinction is vital. And I wanted to clarify because I don't want
00:55:55 people to hear your Twitter posts and think coaching is bad. And I don't want people to
00:55:59 not hear your Twitter feed and run after thinking someone's going to make them millions of dollars.
00:56:03 You're right. If I promise you I'm going to make you millions of dollars, I'm making my money off
00:56:07 of you. Or imply it and show like, look at what we've done with these results. Here's millions
00:56:11 of dollars here and there. And this is credit five, you know, but for $5,000, I'll do that for
00:56:17 you. Exactly. And that's the problem. And that's a lot of the coaches out there that are doing the
00:56:21 marketing. Yes. But there's reputable people that go out there and can help you with specific
00:56:26 problems within a business. They're not promising you the world on making money. My problem is the
00:56:32 ones that promise you they'll make you more money. They can't. And yes, they can say, well, we don't
00:56:37 promise. Well, you're implying it with your language. Look how many Rolls Royces I have.
00:56:41 Look how many Bugattis I have. Like, OK, who cares? Cool car, bro. Look at my Honda Odyssey
00:56:46 that I take my kids to school in. Whoop-de-doo. Who gives a crap? Yeah, I mean, you're right.
00:56:51 And I want to thank you because I love your perspective on entrepreneurship. Obviously,
00:56:55 our friendship has been phenomenal. The work we've done together, I've learned and become
00:56:59 more of the entrepreneur I am today watching you and how you have such a remarkable way of
00:57:04 simplifying things down to a digestible format. And when you do that in your business, you can
00:57:09 actually execute. When you think it's this super complicated mess, it's really hard to figure out
00:57:13 what to do. But you have a really good way of saying, oh, I need to do this first, then do this,
00:57:19 then do this, then do this. And you've done it across so many different areas and verticals.
00:57:23 Neil Patel Digital's in what, 19 countries now? Yeah. That's amazing. Dude, thank you for having
00:57:29 me. Thank you. And for those watching, if you don't already follow Neil, you have to because
00:57:33 you can learn an absolute ton. If you need marketing services, reach out to Neil Patel Digital.
00:57:38 Yes. They will help you. And one last piece of advice for all of you guys listening. I know we
00:57:42 talked about coaching a little bit and Jeff gives out tons of advice. Follow the people that aren't
00:57:48 flashy talking about what they have. A lot of those people will talk about, oh, we don't buy
00:57:52 homes. They're bad investments and stuff. I agree. If you know what you're doing, typically buying a
00:57:58 home isn't the best ROI. You can make much more money in other things. But at the same time, a lot
00:58:03 of those people will spend money on five Rolls Royces. Well, instead of five Rolls Royces,
00:58:07 you're better off buying a home and using that money as a mortgage payment and owning the home
00:58:12 at the end of the day versus a depreciating asset like five Rolls Royces, which is what a lot of the
00:58:17 people online claim. Yeah, buying a home is bad, but also buying five Rolls Royces is bad.
00:58:22 Yeah. You heard it here. Don't buy Rolls Royces. Potentially buy a home. Reach out to Neil Patel
00:58:27 Digital for your marketing services. Follow Neil because he'll actually be, he doesn't charge you
00:58:32 for coaching and he's going to give you that advice. I learned from him. So I'm sure you
00:58:36 remember we met through a mutual friend, Pat Flynn, because I was looking to figure out how
00:58:40 to do digital marketing and had no idea actually at the time who you were, how to do digital
00:58:44 marketing. And I reached out to Pat and said, Pat, I'm going to pay you a couple hundred grand
00:58:48 to teach me digital marketing. He's like, my business is called Smart Passive Income. You
00:58:52 should talk to Neil Patel. I'm like, who's Neil Patel? And he's like, Google him. So I do. I'm
00:58:55 like, oh yeah, I want to meet him. And so he got us that call and I was trying to be different
00:59:00 with you. So I went and got actually my first client Chefworks before we had ever spoken and
00:59:04 said, me and Neil are going to come in and do all this work for you. And we're going to make
00:59:07 our money on the upside. And we had the call and I remember calling you and saying, hey,
00:59:11 nice to meet you. And you're like, nice to meet you. I'm like, I have a check for 150 grand.
00:59:14 Where do I mail it? And you're like, uh, what? And I'm like, yeah, I have a check ready to go.
00:59:19 And you're like, who are you? Do you remember what you thought of when I did that back then?
00:59:24 I thought you were crazy in a good way. I thought you were ambitious and hungry and you're willing
00:59:31 to do whatever it took in an ethical way to succeed. And what I loved about you is you said
00:59:36 you actually never took the check. You flew to San Diego. You're like, let's go meet this client.
00:59:40 Let me see if I can help them. If I can help them, we can figure this out. And that showed
00:59:44 me that you had the authenticity, the integrity, and the kind of human I wanted to do any kind of
00:59:50 business with. Cause if you had said, yeah, here's my address, mail the check and go tell them. Yes.
00:59:55 I probably would have still written you the check, but it would have made me feel like you
01:00:00 were not really as honest as you were. No, I didn't a care for the money. And be the reason
01:00:05 I came down to San Diego. It wasn't even the client. I didn't care for that either. It was
01:00:08 more so I saw potential in you. And I was like, well, if this person is willing to do whatever
01:00:14 it takes to succeed, this person will eventually do well. And you have, you've proven it, not only
01:00:20 with Everbull, but you've done extremely well now with two companies. Well, thank you. Thank you.
01:00:24 And that's the whole thing about being not only getting the opportunities, cause this is what a
01:00:28 lot of people struggle is like, oh, I don't get the opportunity. But then when you get that
01:00:31 opportunity to talk to a Neil Patel who can help you and you need to differentiate yourself.
01:00:37 But yes. And what was funny is when you created Everbull, you asked me if I wanted to be partners.
01:00:41 I said, no, you offered me shares to advise. And I said, I'll help you out for free. I don't need
01:00:46 the shares. True. And you made a killing. And the way I look at it is I want you to keep making
01:00:50 more. I don't want to take any of your money. I want it to go to you and your own family.
01:00:54 At the end of the day, when you meet great people and you can build friendships,
01:00:58 money isn't everything. And you are, I mean, this is something I've actually never said.
01:01:03 And I've said it to you with all of our clients that we had. I remember saying,
01:01:08 you have to let me pay you for this client. And you're like, all right, this one. Finally,
01:01:13 it was after, I think it was gun broker was the one of the first ones you said,
01:01:16 fine, send me the check. Yeah. And then you started taking checks, but Neil's right. He was,
01:01:20 it was hard to pay you. Like you're that kind of guy. And so I felt bad because we were,
01:01:25 I owed you half the money and I'm like, take the money. At this time. And I don't mean in a bad
01:01:30 way. Look at where you gone. You were starting off. You needed the money. I did. And I felt that
01:01:36 the money was better with you and it helped you create what you have today, your empire.
01:01:42 So I look at it as like, I got to help you accomplish your dreams in a really, really,
01:01:47 really tiny way. And mainly because you had the ambition and drive. And even without me,
01:01:51 I still think you would have figured it out all on your own and you would be where you are today,
01:01:54 maybe even better without me. Impossible. But for me, it was just like, you're just a great person.
01:02:00 We're good values. And I was happy to meet you and lucky to have you as a friend. Well, thank you,
01:02:06 man. I'm proud to have you as a friend, man. I'm thankful that you came and shared your wisdom with
01:02:10 our audience. It's always fun to hang out. Yeah. Thanks for having me. Thank you.
01:02:14 Thank you so much for listening. If you're looking to level up your relationship capital game,
01:02:21 then take a minute and text the word Jeff to 33777 for a free copy of my network to millions
01:02:28 playbook. The link will also be provided in the show notes below. See you guys next time.
01:02:43 [Music]
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