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Digital Social Hour
He Gets 300M Views a Month… Here’s His Exact Strategy | James Dumoulin | DSH #1872
00:42:40
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- [00:00]
A
The number one mistake content creators make when they are starting a channel is they dilute their brands very quickly. I know that where attention goes, revenue flows. Like, I've never, ever gotten to a point where I'm like, oh, man, I'm good. We can just kind of, like, chill or whatever. It's like, no, I'm still filming. You know, you blink. I mean, and, you know, you never know. You know, like, life's too short.
- [00:28]
B
All right, guys, got James here from School of Hard Knocks, one of the most viewed content creators on social media right now. Thanks for joining us today, man.
- [00:34]
A
Very happy to be here, man. Happy we're able to make it happen out in Austin.
- [00:36]
B
Yeah, hometown for you, right?
- [00:38]
A
Yes, sir.
- [00:38]
B
200 million views a month.
- [00:40]
A
200 million.
- [00:41]
B
That's the highest I've heard in quite a while.
- [00:43]
A
That's a bad month, too. I've had a couple months where we've done, you know, 250, 300 million. We've had videos that do 100 million on one platform, which is insane because
- [00:51]
B
you don't even have clippers working on it yet.
- [00:53]
A
No, it's ridiculous.
- [00:54]
B
That's all just your own accounts. Because you got 12 million followers, right?
- [00:57]
A
Yep. 12 million across social media now.
- [00:59]
B
Insane. So imagine you with the Clipper army.
- [01:01]
A
Crazy. Yeah.
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B
You might be able to hit a billion in a month.
- [01:04]
A
Hey, you, you. You said it first. So we're going to check back and make that happen.
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B
Let's go, man. What type of content's popping off for you right now?
- [01:11]
A
Right now? Again, the organic interview. Content people love authenticity, I would say originality, you know, creates attention, but storytelling builds connection with an audience. And so I think that, you know, just keeping it very real and raw, you know, as much as, you know, yourself, myself, it may be great to, like, land a big interview with somebody. I've seen that. My stuff that goes the most viral with people that most people have never seen before, because you're telling a story from somebody who. This Guy exited for 8, 9 figures in this business. How. How did that happen? So I think that that's something that's really interesting. So, I mean, again, like I said, I think something that we've done really well consistently, that I think maybe we do better than anybody else in the world, is that, you know, a lot of my interviews are 20 to 30 minutes long, but I'm able to condense that into the best, most viral prone minute to a minute and a half worth of content. And I think that's something that we've done really well, consistently. And it has enabled us, you know, that consistent growth over the time and that, you know, massive virality.
- [02:06]
B
Have you been able to outsource that part of the business or do you still have to do that?
- [02:10]
A
So this is really interesting. So, you know, one of the first businesses that we started when we realized that, hey, as a content creator, you cannot build a business off of ad revenue. So one of the first things that my partners and I realized that, hey, you know, we are disproportionately better than, I'd say, 99% of people at creating content, but we were only monetizing off ad revenue when we first started to grow the School of Hard Knocks. And so we're like, okay, we know content, we're interviewing wealthy people, we're getting them millions of views, we're getting them exposure. Let's start a content agency to kind of bridge the two of those together. And through that, though, we, we were hiring editors, we're hiring videographers, we're hiring account managers. But one thing that I've never been able to let go, and a lot of people don't believe this. I was just talking on another podcast, somebody about this. I still edit every single one of our videos on the School of Hard Knocks. And they take two hours. I'm posting now, like every other day because I feel like when you get to a point where you have several million followers, it all becomes about quality over quantity. When you're starting out, it's about quantity. But I think as you, as you grow and you really get bigger and traction on social media, it's all about quality. That's why a lot of these big entrepreneurs, they burn out and they, a lot of them haven't grown a thousand, a hundred thousand followers in six months to a year. A lot of people, and I'm telling you, it's because they, they, they're just pouring content. It's like, dude, it becomes all about quality at a certain point, in my opinion. But I've never been able to outsource that. And even though I think editing, I consider like an MWA activity, which is a minimum wage activity, I, I think that because of how consistent our stuff has just been, I'm like, I'm sure at some point, especially as we continue to grow and other business ventures grow and we're just, you know, continuing to film and work on other aspects, I'm gonna have to let it go at some point. You know, they say that you get somebody to do it like 70 to 80% as well as you can, you know, delegate that to them. But it'll be some serious coaching because I kind of got it down to a formula that works really well for us.
- [03:58]
B
Yeah. I, I found out similarly, I can't cheap out on editors.
- [04:02]
A
No.
- [04:02]
B
Because it's one of those things as a business owner, you want to cut costs.
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A
Yeah.
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B
But if you go overseas, they can't find the clips to go viral.
- [04:08]
A
Absolutely. Yeah. I think editors and the other thing, especially if you're in YouTube, get, get a killer thumbnail guy. Thumbnails is, I mean, you obviously know, you hear Mr. Beast, the most successful YouTube creators talk about that. The two most important metrics on YouTube, watch time and click through rate.
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B
Right.
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A
And if your, you know, thumbnail title is not optimized for the viewer, you know, for the viewer experience, kiss that video goodbye. It's not going to do well. So I think, yeah, the two things, as a content creator, you know, especially if you're doing long form, obviously editor, that applies to short form as well. But then also thumbnails, you got to have a crazy thumbnail game. I think that's very important. You got to invest in that because
- [04:42]
B
you got to stop people from scrolling, which is what you do. You have hooks on all your videos.
- [04:45]
A
Yes, 100%. And that's the thing is 70% of people, they lose their audience in the first three second of a video. So, you know, that's the biggest thing is, you know, I work with a lot of big entrepreneurs, help a lot of people go viral on social media. And I say, dude, you got to stop making the assumption that people know who you are. I tell all of my clients, I tell everybody when they're starting out on social media, stop making the assumption that people know who the fuck you are, because they don't. And so that's why, again, those first three to five seconds is everything. It will make or break a video. 100%.
- [05:16]
B
Yeah, I definitely agree with that. Even, like, if you're getting hundreds of millions of views, there's still people you're not reaching. They won't know who you are.
- [05:23]
A
Yes, absolutely.
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B
And it takes years to build that brand recognition, which is what you've done
- [05:27]
A
Now, I think, 100%.
- [05:28]
B
Were you the first to really do those street interviews?
- [05:31]
A
You know, this is a great something that I've thought about a lot. Right. Obviously, street interviews have been around for 20 years. Every major legacy media, you know, news platform, news site, they've been doing street, street interviews ever since microphone and camera was existed. Right. But I think in Terms of this concept, obviously, you know, we started this back in 2021. So I think at the time there were a couple people that were doing somewhat of like, interviews where they'd be approaching people, going up to people, but it wasn't in the sense of like, I think our format. Our format is what made it really unique where it was all business, you know, there's people that, you know, you know, went up to cars and stuff like that. But. But in terms of like, actually, you know, just going cold, approaching, going straight for the business advice, you know, trying to. Our big goal was to kind of have like a mentors at scale type of program. I was blessed growing up with great mentors. A lot of my peers in my hometown in the D.C. area, they didn't have that. So one of the big reasons for wanting to start this channel was not only seeing the immense opportunity in the creator economy, being that media, in my opinion, is one of the best industries to get into in today's world. It's a long game. It's definitely not overnight. No, but, but, but I think again, being able to kind of go find and seek the industry experts that have 10, 20, 30, 40 years of experience and be able to package that to somebody all around the world who may not have a great mentor. Maybe they're, you know, in a third world country, maybe they're growing up in an impoverished environment. I'm sure you've had people from all around the world reach out to you as a creator, as somebody that's making influential content. There's nothing better than somebody reaching out to you from Australia. Talking about, I quit my job because of this podcast or because of this episode that I saw, or, you know, I was in a really low point and your videos kind of got me out of that rut. And so that's a big thing that I think has kept us going kind of to do the mentors at scale, but in terms of being the first to do it, I always say no matter what type of content you go into, you have to be an innovator in whatever niche that you're in. And the more you can continue to do that, the more relevant you'll be, the longer you'll be in the game for.
- [07:30]
B
Absolutely. You got to put your own unique twist on it.
- [07:32]
A
100.
- [07:32]
B
There's a million podcasts right now, and there's probably a million people trying to copy your style.
- [07:36]
A
Absolutely. I see it every day. I see different one pop up every day. I get tagged in video or set a profile and you Know, I mean, you know, some people say like imitation is the greatest form of flattery. I actually, I'm not, I'm not the biggest fan of it, if I'm being honest. Now granted, there's some people that may say that I've tried to copy style or emulate other people's format who maybe were doing it before me. But like I said, I'm a huge believer in, you know, Damon John has the saying that pioneers get slaughtered and settlers prosper. Meaning if you're trying to think about how do I go viral on social media right now, you don't have to reinvent the wheel. Every form of content's been done, every, every type of podcast. Obviously, you know, like you said, you got to be innovative, you got to add your own twist to it. But, but that's essentially what it is in whatever niche that you're in is. Like I said, you don't have to reinvent the wheel. You know, you go study the 10 to 20 accounts that you want to be like, that's popping, see what they're doing, but then just find ways to add your own originality, your own creative twist to make it you. And I think that where I start to kind of get a little bit like, man, I don't like that shit is when I see people literally, exact same hook question everything like that, but it is what it is. Like, you know, you can't do anything about it. At the end of the day, some people are jump starting their career off of it. So, you know, I'm all good with it.
- [08:49]
B
Yeah. But there's no longevity in that.
- [08:50]
A
No, there isn't. You can't copy your way to you, you, you definitely can't. And it's, it's interesting because, you know, I don't know if you're familiar with like the Coke and the Pepsi wars back in like the 1980 were constantly. Coke would do one thing, then Pepsi would do it than that. So maybe to an extent, depending on how, how big you're able to kind of take it. But I do agree, I'm, I, I, I 100% see you saying that there is not longevity in doing that.
- [09:14]
B
Yeah. And it also, you ask really great questions. I think that's what separates you for sure.
- [09:19]
A
And I've seen you talk about it before where that's literally what separates the, the, the best podcast, the best channels in the world is asking those unique questions. And honestly, I'll say this as well, is that I don't think people realize how good the questions like that I ask actually are. And I'm not saying that in like a, in a braggadocious way, but I'm saying because again, we optimize the best minute and a half worth of content out of 20 to 30 minutes. But like in those 20 to 30 minutes, like I'm getting so specific asking them very verbatim, like deep, like specific questions that if more people saw, they'd be like, damn. But sometimes you have to realize that there is something with like virality that like putting a question like that in there may cut up the pacing. It may. So. But yes, question asking is absolutely very important. And I think one of the most interesting things that I've actually, I've always done this and I think because we got our start when we were doing the street interview content where we were literally just going up organically to people, we would have no idea who these people that we were talking to, what their businesses were. Obviously, you know, we called approach, like Mark Cuban. We interviewed him and we knew a little bit about Mark Cuban, but most of these people we didn't. And so that kind of enabled me to realize that, hey, you want to be a good question asker, you have to genuinely listen. You have to genuinely be interested in the person that you're talking to. And so like I give the example, I was just talking the other day that I just interviewed one of the only self made Latina billionaires in the world. Her name's Carolina Runson, she's based out of Miami, Florida. And you know, I had the interview set up in Miami for probably like three weeks. I didn't start doing research on her until 15 minutes before the interview.
- [10:49]
B
Whoa.
- [10:49]
A
But the reason why is because I think you get really raw, organic conversations that way. Because she was telling me stuff in the interview, I had no idea. And I'm like, it's a genuine reaction. I'm surprised, like this is my first time hearing this. Whereas it's like, okay, if I had been doing research on here for a week out or a couple of days out, then it's like, then it's like, it's kind of hard to like not be genuinely. And obviously maybe there's some downsides to that because you're not uncovering maybe a specific part of the story that would be really interested to highlight. But that's why, like I said, I try to get really deep in those, to like get specific moments out, to kind of talk about.
- [11:19]
B
There's a balance, I think, because you can overdo it. I've been on a Show where the guy does 30 hours of research on each guest. Oh, he knew more about me than I knew about me.
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A
Oh, you know what I mean? Just like Nardoire. Yeah.
- [11:29]
B
But at the same time, there's shows that don't do any. And that's actually more impressive to me because to be able to ask good questions with no prep means you're a really skilled interviewer.
- [11:37]
A
It's definitely a skill, but it just comes with a lot of reputation. Like, I've probably interviewed, you know, a thousand people by now. I'm sure you have as well. Yeah. And also, you know, having that ability, there's not many people that, you know will line up 5, 10 interviews in a day. I've. You've done it. I, I've, I, I've. I tell people all the time. It's like, especially if I'm going to the city, you know, and I've got somebody who's, like, sending me people to interview. I'm like, look, let's be clear. I'll do seven to 10 interviews. You know what I mean? Like, I'll. I'll do it. And it's like, I think doing it that much that repetitively, you just get so used to it, to where it's like, I can literally go into cold to talk to anybody, whether they're in venture capital, tech, private equity, real estate, a home service business. Like, Like, I'll. I'll find out something to get, like a cool story out of them or something to, you know, get some real actionable, specific stuff out of them.
- [12:19]
B
And I don't know about you, but I was a huge introvert growing up. So for me to be interviewing people for a living now is like a total 180.
- [12:24]
A
That's interesting. Yeah.
- [12:26]
B
Were you always kind of like this social, you know?
- [12:28]
A
Yeah, so I, I think I've always been a pretty social person. I've always, I think my X factor maybe, you know, my ability to communicate and, you know, conversate with people. But a lot of that was also because I grew up and I really didn't have a choice. You know, we were talking earlier, I lived in South Korea for four years from six to 10. And when I was living over there, my dad was running the largest overseas military base in the entire world in Camp Humphreys in a city called Piontech, South Korea. So it was a military. I was in a military family. But I was growing up, like, watch my dad, who's, you know, one of the most influential people in my life, speak in front of tens of thousands of people he's meeting, you know, leaders of all these foreign countries. And I'm, you know, there a lot with him because a lot of the time, a lot of the events you go to, it's with your family. So when at a young age, when I'm meeting all these people who have a lot of influence overseas and international affairs and US Military, you know, I kind of had to learn, and I observed at an early age, like, how effective communication, strategic communication is extremely important no matter what business or industry that you're in.
- [13:30]
B
Yeah. You mentioned you had good mentors earlier, so I'm assuming your dad was one of them.
- [13:33]
A
Dad was absolutely great mentor. Not. Not. Not a big business guy. But I had other people, you know, in my family that were. And obviously, I think my brother was definitely the most impactful person in terms of me wanting to go the business route and kind of forgo, like the. The traditional 9 to 5 route. Yeah. And especially, you know, I, for the longest time growing up, wanted to go in the military. Like my dad. My dad, you know, had an incredible career in the military. He was a West Pointer. Anybody who knows West Point knows that, like, the military academies are some of the hardest institutions to get into in the. In the world. And so I thought for a long time I was going to follow in his footsteps. But ultimately, again. But, yeah, I had my dad from a, you know, discipline and integrity standpoint, you know, instilling those values in me. You know, my mom, same way, you know, I had great parents. My uncle. My uncle Doug, you know, was part of a healthcare company. He was the number two at a healthcare company that exited for $4 billion. So I had a little bit of, you know, that side as well, to where I kind of got exposed to. And like, you know, they always say you can only grow to what you're exposed to. So, you know, kind of seeing that part of life and just having a great balance of people, it was everything. You know, I would say mentorship is the only shortcut to success. Mentorship is wisdom without the wounds. Yeah.
- [14:40]
B
Because you're paying for all the hours they spent.
- [14:42]
A
Yeah. Wisdom without the wounds. You know what I mean? Because it's. I mean, and I mean, obviously, the. The only other thing is to go through it yourself, but it's like, I mean, when you think about shortening the learning curve, I mean, some conversations I'm sure you've had with some of the people that you're meeting that you're interviewing can literally, you know, shave five minutes of learning off your life. So it's. It's imperative, you know, to. To get around those kinds of people.
- [15:03]
B
I'd say more than five minutes in some cases, sometimes years.
- [15:05]
A
That's what I was saying. Five years. I'm sorry if I don't. But yeah, yeah, absolutely. 100%. 100%.
- [15:11]
B
That's why you launch your community, right? Your mentorship community.
- [15:13]
A
Yeah, absolutely. You know, and the reason why is because. And let's say this, right, the number one. The number one mistake content creators make when they are starting a channel is they dilute their brands very quickly by, you know, selling some bullshit, whatever it may be. But also when they go to figure out, okay, I know, I know that where attention goes, revenue flows. That's why I think media is such a great business to being in today's world. However, how do we actually monetize that? And the mistake that I see a lot of creators make is that they have too much of an emotional attachment or an ego to when they're getting ready to sell some sort of, like, product. They're like, oh, I've always wanted to do a clothing company. I'm gonna start a clothing company. But you haven't asked your audience yet. So why are you gonna sell clothes or why are you gonna sell apparel if you've never even checked to see if your audience wants that. Give you an example. We're two years into building Hard Knocks. At the time, we have a couple hundred thousand followers. Hadn't hit our big break. This last year was when we went crazy, right? I had a million followers on Instagram in February. I hit 2 million followers on Instagram in May, 3 million in July, 4 million in October. And we just hit 5 million followers a couple days ago. And, you know, but we're two years in, right? I'll give you just a quick little story. We're two years in. They're growing. The school of Hard knocks. It's like 2020 to late 2022 at this point. And I'm like, okay, you know, we. We got to find a way to monetize beyond just, like, ad revenue. And I'm like, hey, what if we started to sell, you know, motivational canvases. Motivational canvas art? And my partner's like, hey, yeah, that's actually a really good idea. You know, we're. We're interviewing business people. Like, that makes sense, right? People want that. Wrong. So we've been hired, and we outsourced. We hired an outsourced CMO, paying him $5,000 on, like, a three month thing. So we wasted $15,000. We sold a, like maybe a cup, a handful of canvases. And it was at the time where we, you know, we're literally only making money off of ad revenue. And so we realized from that point on, it's like, you got to talk to your customer, you got to talk to the audience. What do they really want? And so when we decided about the mentorship community, was that, okay, why do people follow us? Well, yes, we are in the media business. Yes, we're creators, but at the end of the day, we are in the bridging business where we are bridging your, you know, your normal consumer, normal person who's just scrolling content. Obviously there's a lot of business people that follow us, people that are just trying to get more financially literate, but we're bridging them to the top 1% of people. So, okay, if that's what our content is doing, what's the number one reason why people reach out to us or DM us? It's how do I get access to this person? How are you coming in contact with these people? Like, you know, how, like, like, what's the secret to this? So there's the answer right there. People want to know how they can get access to these people. So we launched and built, let's become one of the biggest online, you know, entrepreneur communities where every week, you know, we host mentorship calls with the millionaires and billionaires we interview. But that's, again, that makes sense because of our audience. Most creators, they have that attachment where it's like, oh, I'm going to do this because I want to do that. And it's like, but people don't want that, you know, So I think that's extremely important. Where a lot of creators ultimately go wrong and don't make money.
- [18:19]
B
Brilliant. Yeah, I'd say most creators mess up with that, man. I see it all the time, especially the merch one. That one never made sense to me. Because the margins are so bad.
- [18:26]
A
Exactly. Absolutely. And that's the thing is if you have a community, right, where. What does the double R in Rolls Royce stand for? Recurring revenue. So it's like if you can build some sort of, you know, community where, you know, you have residual and obviously it's got to, it's gotta be something that really makes sense. It's like, I look with us as my, my kind of thing. We hired a community manager and his thing is like, dude, for the price of less than four Subway sandwiches, you get to get on Weekly calls with eight, nine figure and even, you know, billion dollar entrepreneurs, people that have, you know, built legit businesses that have sold companies for hundreds of millions of dollars. You know, like, I know if you want to, you know, get on a call with a guy, obviously you're in the relationship business, you have a platform. So it's like, it's different. But I'm saying like, if you're just somebody who's, you know, in, in any other business, right, where you don't necessarily have a value added, that person, it's $10,000aminimum for some of these people to hop on with for an hour. And I'm saying like a minimum of like a thousand dollars if you go on the nect.
- [19:18]
B
I think PBD is like 20k an hour right now.
- [19:20]
A
That's what I'm saying. You know what I mean? And so I think that, you know, that that's why it's like, it's a product that I genuinely believe in. And that's the, one of the biggest hurdles that I've had to overcome over the last year is that our first three, three and a half years, we never sold anything. This is my first ever, like digital product thing. And so I've had that hesitancy. Like, what's going, I don't want to be too salesy. It's like we've gotten this far without doing it. You know, you don't want to do it, but it's like it's genuinely, if it's genuinely a product, that's, I think that's, that's the switch that you have to flip is that you're not selling this person, you're serving them. You're like, you were. This product is genuinely going to change their life. And I think, and Dean Graziosi, who's one of the best, you know, Internet marketers of all time in this realm of business, is actually the one. You know, we had like a, like a kind of like a one on one mastermind. Me and my two co founders went out there to Scott. So he's a great guy and he actually taught us that where it's like you got to, you got to stop looking at like you're selling them and that you're actually serving them.
- [20:13]
B
Wow.
- [20:14]
A
You know, so that changed my perspective a lot on it and it made me a bit less hesitant to, you know, being able to get on the story or get in the YouTube video or get in the camera and just, you know, tell people about your product, you know, because you have to that's the thing is you have to market your business every single day. A lot of people are extremely good at what they do, but no one knows what they do.
- [20:29]
B
Dude, I love that so much. I'm two years in, I haven't sold anything yet.
- [20:32]
A
Yeah, which, honestly though, but it's, it's, that's very smart though. You know what I mean? And you know, when, you know, you're stacking up these incredible guests and stuff like that to where it's like, you know, you're just going to have that reputation and that trust built in with your audience. And I think that, you know, being able to have that is more important than just, you know, selling out early on. Because like I said, media is a long game. It is not overnight. You know, it's a, it's a 10 year, it's a, it's a 10, 12 year thing. You know what I mean? So, but I think there's a lot of value in that because, like, you know, you said that you want to. The goal is to exit for a lot of money, but in doing so, it's like, like the number one thing is just not diluting your brand equity. I think even, like, I would give that advice over how to go viral. How to like, it's literally do not dilute your brand equity. That's very important.
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B
Yeah, that's like my least favorite question. How to go viral. People ask, they probably ask you that all the time, right?
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A
Yeah, absolutely. All the time.
- [21:24]
B
It's like, dude, it's like you can't just go viral.
- [21:26]
A
Like, no. And that's, that's the thing is that, you know, what's interesting about that is that most people, again, they, that's another thing where the biggest reason why content creators fail is because they get discouraged with not going viral instantly. But like, I, I mean, I'm sure you've experienced the same thing, but where the amount of content creators will come and ask you for advice and you can give them the blueprint, you can give them the playbook, you can tell them and, you know, you can check back in after a month. Hey, you know, how's everything going? Well, I posted 10 videos. Nothing really hit. So, you know, my friend called me corny, he threw my post in a group chat and it's like, and it's just like, you know, like, I know for a fact that I have probably plenty of people from Hometown that while we were growing our channel, even to this day, people that still throw me in group chats that, you know what I Mean, but it's just like, just again, what, what are they doing? Absolutely nothing, you know, so that, that's, you know, I think that that's, you know, like, I always love to say one of my favorite sayings of all time is credibility kills all bad attitudes. And so it's like, you know, if you're able to build a platform, you're in the right rooms that a lot of people, like, can't even pay money to get into. With some of these people, you know, it's kind of like, like, who cares? And I, and I think that, I think, I think that again, like I said, what keeps people get discouraged and that will prevent them, you know, more than anything else, you know.
- [22:43]
B
Yeah, seriously, there's always going to be. I mean, I look at the comments in your videos. You're teaching people how to become financially free and there's people hating in the comments.
- [22:50]
A
Right.
- [22:50]
B
It's just mind blowing to me.
- [22:52]
A
It doesn't matter. Doesn't matter what you do. But you always got to remember, though, is that like no successful person hates. You know what I mean? Genuinely, though, like, I was thinking myself the other day, it's like, I don't think I've ever left a hate comment in my entire life. And I can't like any, any, I mean, ultra successful person that I know. I mean, don't get me wrong, I know that there's probably some successful people. Like everybody, you know, I'm gonna be honest, everybody probably has a little bit of like hater in them. You know what I mean? Everybody does. You know, it. But it's also like, it's like, you know, do you, do you, you want to comment that, you know what I mean? Like, you're gonna. I have, I haven't seen it. Like, I've been, I've been, you know, thinking about that recently and maybe, you know, there's some where it is a little bit justified or warranted for certain people or certain styles of videos. But yeah, I mean, it doesn't matter, you know, what you do. There's always going to, you know, be somebody that tries to, like, say something like that.
- [23:40]
B
You know, I love what you're doing internationally because you could get only so many views within the U.S. right? We got 300 million people that live here, but now you're starting to go
- [23:46]
A
to Saudi, Dubai, other countries, big, you know, thing. Why this is very important is so I. One of our calls, we hosted with a gentleman named Neil Patel. I'm sure you're familiar.
- [23:55]
B
Yeah, he's been on the pod.
- [23:56]
A
Great guy.
- [23:57]
B
Yep.
- [23:57]
A
Brilliant guy. Neil Patel is one of the greatest Internet marketers of.
- [24:00]
B
He's the.
- [24:01]
A
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, he owns one of the biggest marketing agencies in North America. And, you know, somebody asked him, hey, what's your best advice to me as a content creator or digital marketer? I think this is applied to any industry or any business. And he said, the next five to 10 years, it's going to be the globalization of content, you know. And so with us, you know, Obviously, we've got 12 million followers, and it's all, like, American, it's all English. Well, it's like, what's stopping us? I mean, like, what. Mr. Beast has done extremely well. He's got Mr. Beast Espanol, he's got all the different languages. So it's like, not only not, but I think it's. It goes way more beyond the dub channels. It's like, look, you know, you want to not fry. You don't. You want to not saturate. You want to not, like, you know, get stagnant in creating content, go to a different market. Like, there's. Think about this, billions of people that live in, you know, I don't know the exact numbers. I don't want to talk out of my ass, but there's billions of people that live in, like, India. Right. Aren't there Asia?
- [24:53]
B
Yeah, yeah. India might have. Or China has a bill, I think.
- [24:56]
A
Yeah. Well, hundreds of millions of people that live in these different countries, and there's business moguls over there as well. Go get different perspectives from them. And I think that that's something, you know, there's only so many trips you can take out to Miami.
- [25:08]
B
Yeah.
- [25:08]
A
You know, I mean. I mean, obviously so many West Watson's out there. Yeah. So. So obviously, you know, there's a, you know, you know, you can take a lot of trips to, like, LA and Miami, and obviously, people are always moving around. There's always people that are coming up, which is. Which is great. And that's the beautiful thing about the journey and about businesses. There's always people coming up that are always going to be, you know, fascinating. That's why I think, you know, just being in the interview game, being in the podcast game is so great because, like, telling new stories, they don't ever get old. But I think that's a big thing as well, is it's like. Like what we've done, right, We've done a lot of stuff out in Dubai and Saudi Arabia, and we want to go all over Australia and Just find all those, you know, different markets because, like you said, you can appeal, like, way bigger audiences over there as well. And I think it also just keeps it interesting. It keeps it fresh for your normal viewers, your. Your retaining viewers. Because again, like I was saying, a lot of these guys get stagnant because they're constantly pulling the same content down everybody's throat. Well, I'm like, okay, what's something that I can do better of? Let's incorporate a lot more interviews with women. Right. And that's one of the biggest complaints that I get is that you never interview women. And it's just like, well, you know, I mean, if you look at the stats, it's like percentages show, you know, I mean, we interview wealthy people. And don't get me wrong, I've. Some of the smartest people I've ever met and interviewed are women, but it's sometimes harder to find them compared to the amount of, you know, men that are the business owners. So it's like, I have nothing against them. I've always said, if you can bring me, you know, a woman with a cool story or talented, you know, beast entrepreneur, we're running that all day. I'd want to run that more than most men just because of, you know, how much more prone that is to. To be a hit and also inspire a lot of people. But, yeah, I think, absolutely, yeah. Getting out of the box in terms of the content. The globalization of content is going to change. Change games.
- [26:38]
B
Yeah. No, that's fact. So intelligent women get the most views on, though, too.
- [26:41]
A
They do, man. They do. And I think it is like, you know, it's just. It comes down to statistics, right? Like, you can't argue with facts, facts over feelings. Like, it is. It is very true.
- [26:51]
B
No, they draw you in with the looks, but then when they talk and they're like, yeah, you know, it's like,
- [26:56]
A
oh, my God, like, there's crazy substance. You know what I mean? So. And that's, like I said, genuinely, some of the smartest people I've ever met and interviewed are 100 have been women. So it's. It's really cool to, you know, again, just appeal to different audiences and get different. Because right now I think we have 70 men that follow us. 30% same.
- [27:11]
B
Wow.
- [27:12]
A
Yeah. Yeah. Which. Which I think is a pretty reasonable demographic, especially if you're, you know, interviewing successful people or business people, because who's primarily consuming that content. Right. Again, but I think even, you know, trying to maybe close the gap a little bit more or do what we can to try and do that.
- [27:26]
B
Yeah. So, yeah, I'm on the same path. I'm playing the long game too, man. I'm learning Spanish now actually, because I want to start going out to Mexico and Spanish speaking countries.
- [27:33]
A
Yeah.
- [27:34]
B
Do interviews in Spanish.
- [27:35]
A
Very smart. Huge market. Under. It's underserved as well. You know, I interviewed a long time ago a gentleman. Like this is before we even had a camera. Like when we started doing interviews, we were on the iPhone. It was a guy downtown Austin, and I said, how can somebody become wealthy in 2022? And he's go, you gotta go. You gotta be bilingual, multilingual. So I think that that's definitely a, an audience to appeal to for sure.
- [27:57]
B
Yeah. I don't know any of the Expanish pods right now, to be honest.
- [27:59]
A
Yeah, I don't either. Yeah.
- [28:01]
B
Instagram just launched a new language feature. Did you see that?
- [28:03]
A
I didn't.
- [28:04]
B
It'll auto translate your. Your clips now.
- [28:05]
A
That's huge.
- [28:06]
B
Yeah, you gotta toggle that on. Instagram's really innovative, man.
- [28:09]
A
Yeah.
- [28:09]
B
Trials has been a game changer for me. I'm not sure if you. Them with Trials.
- [28:12]
A
I haven't, I haven't done it yet. Yeah. Really? I haven't. I mean, I just like, our stuff has just been really consistent with, with how it is. I'm, I'm familiar with the future though, where you. It sends it to trial to see how you perform.
- [28:24]
B
Yeah.
- [28:24]
A
And then, and then you can kind of test whether you want to push that to your audience or keep. Keep the video.
- [28:28]
B
Yeah. So I'm recycling my old content. Because you have years of content, Right. Do you only post it once or do you repost?
- [28:34]
A
I, I do. And, and you know, a lot of the times, you know, my, you know, other co founders would be like, oh, you should repost this one. And I'm like, dude, I've. Every time I've reposted a video, it's never done like the same numbers as it did.
- [28:46]
B
So that's the good thing with Trials. It shows the post to a new audience.
- [28:49]
A
Interesting.
- [28:49]
B
It doesn't show it to your followers.
- [28:51]
A
Wow, I like that.
- [28:51]
B
So the fact that you're getting 250amonth without Trials.
- [28:54]
A
Yeah.
- [28:55]
B
Means to me you could probably get half a million a month.
- [28:57]
A
That's crazy.
- [28:58]
B
With Trials. And you'll also grow a lot more followers.
- [29:00]
A
Interesting.
- [29:00]
B
Yeah.
- [29:01]
A
Yeah, I gotta check that out for sure.
- [29:02]
B
Yeah, check out Trials, man. What's your best platform in terms of views?
- [29:05]
A
Best platform. Well, let's pull it up real quick.
- [29:08]
B
Flexed on him.
- [29:09]
A
Let's see.
- [29:09]
B
I'm gonna guess Tick Tock.
- [29:12]
A
It's Tick Tock or Instagram. I'll show you those two. Obviously Facebook does pretty well as well. So I'll just show you. And just that way people can see as well.
- [29:19]
B
Yeah, we'll throw it up on the screen too, if you want to screenshot and text me.
- [29:23]
A
So this is last 30 days on Instagram. Holy crap. Last 30 days, 115 million. And then also. And again. Yeah, and then I'll show you last 90. I can do that.
- [29:35]
B
That is nuts.
- [29:36]
A
And 90 days, 244 million. That's just Instagram. And then I'll just do one more Tick Tock. I noticed.
- [29:43]
B
I love how you pull out the receipts too, because a lot of people cap with their numbers, bro.
- [29:46]
A
Absolutely. That's with anything. Yeah. And then Tick Tock is. Let's go to talk studio. Last 28 days on tick tock.
- [29:53]
B
Tick tock. Last 28 days, 121.
- [29:55]
A
Wow.
- [29:56]
B
So it's got the slight edge on Instagram.
- [29:57]
A
Yeah, it does a little bit. Yeah. But obviously they fluctuate depending on the videos that are popping. And obviously YouTube across, you know, long form and shorts will do about 15, and then Facebook will do about 50 to. So. So honestly, last month was probably a bit closer to 300.
- [30:10]
B
Wow.
- [30:10]
A
So. But, but again, that's also in result of, you know, every once in a while I'll have a video that does like 30 to 50 million views on both, you know, to the platforms. Because that's the other really interesting thing as well is that it's crazy how aligned. I don't know if you notice this, but, like, if I have a video that's going to go really viral on TikTok, it's going to also go really viral on Instagram usually and oftentimes, you know, like I had a video recently that I did in Scottsdale with Craig Jackson coming out of a Bugatti. It was my first ever, you know, Bugatti video. And it got like 44 million on Instagram and like 43 million on tick tock. And then I think another 30 or 40 on Facebook. So I was. That was a big. That was a big reason for that. Right. So, you know, obviously, you know, but yeah, crazy, crazy to say that. Yeah.
- [30:51]
B
Do you stockpile content? Like, how long's your backlog on content?
- [30:54]
A
Great question. I'm huge on this, man. Probably I've got like 30 to 40 videos right now. Now interviews right now that I'm definitely going to be posting. And, you know, I think another thing that is just very vital and something that has just kept us going and growing is that, like, never getting comfortable or complacent. And I think that's the beautiful thing about also, it's a blessing and a curse, right? Because when you're constantly hanging around people, you're building close friendships, relationships with these guys whose companies are doing, you know, 200 million a year, 300 million a year, they're netting high eight figures. You just, you feel, you feel small. And I even think from like a follower standpoint, right? Like, we've got 12 million followers. I'm like, dude, there's people out there that have 50 on one platform. And that's why, like, I've never ever, you know, gotten to a point where I'm like, oh, man, I'm good. We can just kind of like, chill or whatever. It's like, no, I'm still filming, like, every week or bi weekly. I'm going to the next city, getting on that flight. And I've always had that mentality ever since we started. That's the beautiful thing about having, you know, know two other great co founders is that, hey, I'm able to focus all on the media, the content side of things. It's like, okay, we got 12 million followers. I'm, I'm. All I'm thinking about is how do we get to 15, how do we get to 20 million within the next, you know, year to year and a half, right? And that's why I'm just always thinking about, okay, that next collab, that next viral video. That's all I'm thinking about all the time. You know what I mean? And I think that's, you know, there's a, there's a saying that, hey, pour gas down their throats, you know, because if not, right, there's a million other people that are trying to do what I'm doing. Trying to do what you're doing. Somebody will come up in your space and they'll. And they'll, and they'll take your spot. And so I've just realized that, hey, I gotta, I gotta keep going. It's like, hey, got a lot of love for people, you know, I want to support a lot of people, you know, as much as I can, but if you're in my space, like, I'm gonna, If it's business, I'm gonna. I'm gonna kill you. You know what I mean? Like, like, that's just a mentality that
- [32:44]
B
I, that I Have mamba mentality.
- [32:46]
A
You have to, man. You have to. You. It's all love at the end of the day, but it's also, hey, you know, if you're going to come up and do exactly what I'm doing in this format in the space, it's. It's war.
- [32:55]
B
In the same way, though, when I see viral podcasts, I. I get hyped.
- [32:59]
A
Yeah.
- [32:59]
B
I get so invigorated.
- [33:00]
A
100, man. You get inspired, you get motivated. You're like, okay, I like that. You know what I mean? So it's, it's, it's in a way, you know, kind of like, man, this guy's sick. You know, talking about myself, you know, but it's that obsession. And another great, great point is it's like, that's how you know what you. That's how you know you're doing what you need to be doing. And a lot of people are straight up lost, and a lot of people will ask, how do I figure out what it is for me? Well, it's literally when you have that feeling, you know, in the first, after the first year of the channel and literally over the last three years, because I think April will be our, like, fourth is. Will be officially like four years. But after our first year, I could not go anywhere without thinking about, I wish I had my camera to go walk up and do this, do an interview with this guy. I could have been at Jersey Mike sub shop and I saw this like, old greasy guy who's got a little bit of aura coming out of the sub shop. I could have been at an ice cream place. I could have been on a cruise ship. And like, that's all I could think about constantly. Like, even today, like, or, you know, you know, I'm still staying up till 2, 3am Just like scheming, thinking about, you know, that next thing. But I think that's again, any hyper successful person. That is no doubt one of the most common threads and traits is just that like, like raw obsession that they have.
- [34:08]
B
Yeah. For.
- [34:08]
A
For whatever it is that they're doing.
- [34:09]
B
Has that bled into your personal life?
- [34:11]
A
Yes, unfortunately. Yeah. However. However, what do you mean by personal
- [34:15]
B
life affecting personal friendships, relationships, time with family, for sure.
- [34:19]
A
But I think especially over this last year, I've definitely have come to the realization of just how vital it is to enjoy the journey, celebrate the wins. Because that's the thing. I mean, you know, for our first couple years, even when we hit like 100k on YouTube and, and hit a million followers, like, we never celebrated Anything.
- [34:35]
B
Wow.
- [34:35]
A
And obviously, you know, I'm not saying, like, you know, celebrate. You got to go out for three weeks and then go back to business. No, but take time to, you know, that's. That's what. It's part. That's. That's part of it. You know what I mean? You got to enjoy that and really highlight that. And, and especially now, I'm like, putting a huge emphasis on family time and spending it with them because that's very important. You know, my parents are older, I love them to death, and I don't ever want to look back and say, man, I wish I would have spent more time with them. And honestly, something I just, you know, know, really want to work on and do a better job of is incorporating that aspect into things because, you know, you blink. I mean, and, you know, you never know. You know, like, life's too short. I mean, for any of us.
- [35:15]
B
Yeah.
- [35:16]
A
Even myself. You know, you never know what God has in store. It could be a week, a month. It could be. I mean, who knows?
- [35:21]
B
Who knows?
- [35:22]
A
So.
- [35:22]
B
Yeah, and you actually talk to a lot of people that exit and are super rich and they say the building phase is actually the most fun.
- [35:27]
A
Yeah, absolutely. It's the journey, man. If. And if you don't like that adversity or some of the failures that come along with it, then it probably isn't for you do. But. But I think, you know, my two co founders and I like to call them the. The Trench days. Yeah, and the Trench days, even, you know, in those, that first year or two, we're paying ourselves like $2,000 a month. The business is making, you know, 25 to 30K and we're paying ourselves, you know, and living in Austin, it's a bigger city, it's more expensive. It's not like la, but Austin's still. It's getting pretty expensive.
- [35:52]
B
You can't live about 2k a month in Austin.
- [35:54]
A
No, I mean, but we were. I mean, we were, yeah, probably doing like 2 to 3k a month. Probably had like, our rent was maybe like a thousand K and then the rest was just going to food and. And obviously, you know, like I said, the business was doing 25 to 30. But again, we just, you know, one of the most recurring themes is the importance of reinvesting, putting the money back into the business. And that ultimately was huge for us, especially because, you know, there were some, you know, times of adversity where we felt, where we literally went from making 25 to 30k, like a year and a half. Two years into making like 5k a month. So you definitely, you know that it was vital for us to do that, you know, and it worked out really well.
- [36:27]
B
I reinvest almost everything. I Learned that from Mr. Beast. I mean, if you want to grow, that's the way to do it. I know it's a lot more risky.
- [36:33]
A
Yeah.
- [36:33]
B
But other than my salary, I reinvest almost every single dollar.
- [36:36]
A
Smart man.
- [36:37]
B
But that's why most people don't, though.
- [36:39]
A
Most people don't and most people don't.
- [36:40]
B
I've only been podcasting for two years, but that's because I'm reinvesting. That's like the equivalent of probably 5, 10 years of a podcast.
- [36:47]
A
Yeah, it's, it's extremely smart. And especially because I love the saying that concentration builds wealth, but diversification keeps it. So it's like, hey, you've focused, you made good money doing what you're doing, and if there's opportunities to come your way where you want to make a play, you know, I know that you've been doing business for a long time though, and you obviously, I know, sure have invested a lot. Yeah, like I, up until this last year wasn't a big investor, but because of, you know, we've been very profitable the last like six to eight months. I mean, we've had some crazy months to where like now, like the last couple months, we've been able to put a ton of money into real estate.
- [37:25]
B
Nice.
- [37:25]
A
And you know, know, I'm not thinking about going to buy like a nice car. Like, obviously, you know, at some point for sure I want to do that. But I'm like, hey, you know, this is now like our one year of like making really, really good money. Like, I want to set ourselves up for long term. So it's like, you know, hey, we built so many beautiful relationships, so many great connections of the most successful people in different industries. So now it's like all these people that were telling us, hey, you want to invest in this, you want to do that? Now it's like, hey, we can actually take advantage of those opportunities because of, of how smart we were. And again, everything went back into the business. And so my two other co founders are very like minded in that sense. And we all thought again, long term, that same way that, hey, we're going to be able to make big plays because of how smart we were in those first couple years and building. And then it got to a point where it's like, okay, now we can start to invest a lot and make those Big plays.
- [38:10]
B
That's cool, dude. I'm impressed with how level headed you stay despite your viewership.
- [38:13]
A
Yeah.
- [38:13]
B
You know, a lot of people lose their sense of self with crazy views.
- [38:17]
A
Yeah, I've noticed that a lot. Again, I think the humility aspect is very important and I think it comes down to two things for me ultimately with that is that, you know, number one, I've again meeting hyper successful people, you know, the best of the best in different industries, some extremely famous people. I've seen how those people, I've, I've seen both sides to how, you know, there's people that made tens, hundreds, millions, billions of dollars and they treat people with the utmost respect, dignity, no matter who they are. And then I've also seen the flip side where people are just, just that you treat people like. And so I like to, you know, take a little bit of something from everybody and it's like, okay, those are the kind of people that I want to be like. So I think that's very important. And also again, when you, you know, when you're constantly around these people that are super, it's again, I feel like you do have it inside you where it's like, dude, I'm not like this guy's doing this and that. Like I said, there's a blessing with the curse with that. But then the last thing I think obviously is the, the God factor as well. I think that understanding that like, like at the end of the day, you know, any sort of success, views, money, all of that is, is, is really cool, but it's also temporary. It's a dying dead road. And understanding that there's something way bigger than me out there also, I think it's been very imperative for kind of maintaining that level headedness and being very grounded and just knowing that hey, this is all, this is all temporary.
- [39:38]
B
That's deep, man. Yeah, it's cool that you found the right co founders because that's one of the hardest decisions to make in life. I think it is.
- [39:43]
A
And one of them is my brother and one of them is a childhood friend that I was in the same Boy Scout troop with. With the three of us, we're all on Boy Scouts together and all became Eagle Scouts. And being from the D.C. area where it's a very structured city centered around a lot of government jobs, defense politics, contracting, we were just talking about how DC's federal. Right. It's, you gravitate towards those like minded people and. But I'll say the most important thing in our partnership that really worked out well, because you know people will, A lot of times will warn against going into business with close friends and family. It. But the number one factor that I think the three of us have that have enabled us to really have a great partnership that'll work out is that none of us are yes men. If, if we, if two people disagree, we will butt heads and we will go at it and it will be harsh. Like, I mean genuinely like. It will, it will be, it will be harsh. But you need that. You have to. Because a lot of the times, you know, when you're around close people that you know or you grew up with, it can breed a lot of comfort. And that comfort can ultimately lead to your guys downfall. And so I think that us having that within us that yes, we have a lot of love, we have a lot of great morals that we all share, we have a lot of values that we all share. I. I never have to worry about one of them taking a dollar out of the business behind somebody's back. I know for a fact on my life that I wouldn't do that behind anybody else's back. And I think that's having that is. Is great. But then also despite us having those values and morals, the fact that we are able to hold one another accountable. Call. Call one another out on their. Yeah. Is something that is. Is necessary if you are going to go into business with friends and family. So I'm definitely a proponent of it as long as you do have that instilled where it's like, yes, we love one another. We're boys, we grew up together, we're blood. But you still, we still have to like if we want to keep this thing going, we're gonna have to keep going.
- [41:30]
B
You know, I love that dude when I read Elon Musk's biography. Managed to get in fist fights when he was building PayPal with co founders. Dude, like actually fist fights. They would end up in the hospital.
- [41:39]
A
I mean I did not know that. But that's. That's hilarious. No, I just. Yeah, I just, I think back, I was thinking about this the other day and it's like, yeah man. There's two times where we got. He did not to that point yet, God willing. But.
- [41:50]
B
But that just shows how much you guys care.
- [41:51]
A
Passion, man.
- [41:52]
B
You know what I mean? Like if you guys didn't care that it wouldn't get to that point.
- [41:54]
A
100.
- [41:55]
B
So that's super cool, man. James, it's been awesome. I can't wait to see who you interview next, brother. Where can people learn more about your
- [42:01]
A
community, the school of hard knocks on all platforms and then the school of mentors. It is the number one money, business and and entrepreneur community on the entire world. If you don't believe me go to school.com and look at money. Look at the number one community, the school of mentors right now. So go check it out. Come get mentor from a millionaire billionaire and go watch your life change but like and subscribe to the pod with that man Sean and it was awesome to be here with you today.
- [42:23]
B
Check them out guys. Peace. Thanks for staying all the way to the end guys. It means a lot to me. If you could please leave a review on Apple that helps us climb the charts, it helps us get way more guests and it helps us continue growing the podcast and the team. So it would mean a lot to me if you left a review on Apple or wherever else you're listening. Thanks so much.