B (3:49)

Thanks for having me.

A (3:50)

And what a perfect time as you're creating something so new and incredible in the world.

B (3:56)

Thank you.

A (3:56)

It's amazing. And we'll talk a little bit more about it, but I want to start off with we both come from the professional sports world. Actually, we both come from the professional hockey world. And I'm curious. Wait, do you.

B (4:09)

Wait, wait, wait. What? I didn't know.

A (4:11)

Yeah, I was an ice. A Dallas Stars ice girl. The guy clean the ice.

B (4:15)

Okay. Actually, I think I did know that.

A (4:17)

And then I worked for marketing for them. I was kind of the first person to create personal brand strategies for players.

B (4:25)

Cool.

A (4:26)

And to. I mean, this is like 2012, when social media is becoming a thing for athletes and really starting to create some of the first, like, guidelines, tips, strategies around athlete personal brand.

B (4:39)

So cool. Yeah, I love that.

A (4:41)

It's super cool. Which I'm curious, like, how did that shape your view on personal brand, being an athlete. Yeah.

B (4:48)

So I grew up and I was into three different things. I was into sports, I was into the Internet, and I was into creative works. So, like, I was playing guitar, drums, bass, doing all kinds of music things. And I grew up. I'm 33. I grew up with AWOL Instant messenger. I grew up with MySpace. And that was like, the things that I was, like, having so much fun doing. And so when I left home, I left home at the age of 12. And then I like fully left both. I left my mom when I was 12. I left both of my parents when I was 15 to go start playing hockey. So Internet and creative were the ways that I stayed in touch with my friends back home. And so I just became, like, really enamored with what you could do on the Internet and hockey for me, which you needed. They needed your skills. Hockey is terrible at personal branding. And it's very. It's a very like, keep yourself in line with each other. Don't stand out. Play for the name on the front of the jersey, not the name on the back. And I liked elements of that, but I really kind of like. What do you call it? Rebelled against a lot of that because I like branding myself and like, being again, I was into like all the creative things. So for me, noticing how that was such. Had so much tension with that in hockey, made me, like, lean into all of these other things. And that was what got me curious about social media. That was what got me curious. And then Instagram started coming out and I was like, wait a minute. People are like building businesses through this. People actually like building lives through this. So that was kind of like the aha thing that led me to doing what I'm doing now.

A (6:26)

Why do you feel like hockey has that culture? Do you think it's because it's so many different cultures together?

B (6:31)

I think it's old school mentality. I think that. I think that being humble and I mean, I think that started in way long ago where you couldn't really brand yourself. You needed to go through establishments. There wasn't the Internet. I also think that, like, a lot of the people that still have that frame of mind, they just want to win. They want to win the Stanley Cup. They don't care about tickets and seats and, you know, the brand of the team or the brand of the players. They're like, we just want to win. And so I get it. I understand, like, how from an organizational standpoint, people being outside of that mold can, like, maybe hurt the on ice. Thing for me. I'm like, winning wasn't the only thing for me. So I'm like, I want to brand my. I want to, like, brand myself. Yeah.

A (7:18)

Yeah. When I was helping the stars with personal branding, it actually came from negative things. Like, they didn't know that people could see who you're following. And if you're following someone really problematic or you're following all, like, insta hoes, it doesn't really look great, or if there's some player scandal, it's coming out publicly. People can find a lot of information via what you're commenting on, what you're tagged in, et cetera. And it came more from negative shit than positive shit. So it's really interesting because you were actually seeing it from. Actually, there's a lot of really cool things we can do. This isn't just crisis management. This is branding myself, connecting with people and creating a community really early on, 100%.

B (7:59)

I actually think that before really, before social media, it was like, people had PR strategies and it was a defense strategy rather than a active. Like, we can use this as opportunity building. And so, like, I think that that's kind of where it still is in the world of hockey today. I wish it was more like soccer, football, basketball, where, like, it's active and it builds fandom, which gets more tickets and makes the team better.

A (8:25)

Why do you think so many people struggle to articulate who they are publicly?

B (8:29)

I mean, look, I don't think a lot of people know who they are privately.

A (8:32)

That's true.

B (8:33)

Honest to God. I think that a lot of it is like. A lot of it is like, self discipline for me. Okay, this is what I was. Now I got it. What I was going to say is one of the reasons why I loved social media and still love social media is when I was a player, I was an employee of an organization. And as much as you are a professional athlete, like, I mean, I left professional sports with literally $0 to my name. No college degree, no jobs lined up like, like nothing. And the lifestyle that I lived when I was playing was not glamorous. You think about, like, professional athlete and you think like, oh, my gosh, amazing life, fandom, fame, money, like, all that. I had none of that. And for me, when I was playing, I would be on a team for six, seven months, I would get called into the management's office and they would be like, hey, you know, we need to bring in this guy from this other team and he has this contract that is this size and you're on A smaller contract, and we need to be able to, like, fit him within our team's budget. And so you're getting traded to this team across the country. Nothing to do with you. Like, we loved you, but, like, unfortunately you're going there. And so I never had control over my life. And it would be like the. I would get like, little blips of where I started to feel like I could be stable or have some sort of control. And then it would be like flip on of a switch. And so what I started realizing was, damn, I, like, really need to find a way to take control of my life. And so then I was seeing people on the Internet using social to build audience and then do brand deals and launch businesses and do things like that. And I was like, wait a minute, like, you're telling me that this person can do this from anywhere in the world and can share the things that they actually care about, and they can. In the in the system algorithm will put it in front of people that, like, want to see those things and they can actually, like, share the things that they care about, and people can buy those things from them and they can make money off of it from literally anywhere in the world. I was just like, here I am living in, like, Fargo, and like, I have no. I, like, don't know what tomorrow is gonna show for me. And I just was like, that sounds like a dream. So I became. So I started, like, posting on things and like, testing it out. And when I started realizing that you could have success with it, I was like, I'm going to go all in on this. And being an athlete that I was. I was talking to somebody a couple days ago of like, how has an ATH being an athlete helped me with what I'm doing now? Being an athlete, you learn how to practice, you learn diligence, you learn systems, you learn repetition, you learn falling and getting back up. And I think for me, I just like, applied that same thing to social and was like, I am going to figure out how this works, and I'm going to figure out how branding works and what people are looking for. And. And so a big part of all of what I'm doing is the idea of I want people to be able to create a semblance of control of their life and create something that they truly care about and enjoy their day through doing that. And these kind of things allow you to do that.

A (11:31)

Yeah. I think that, like, you're saying you could be traded at any minute. You didn't have this autonomy over your life. And a lot of our listeners probably feel that way with their jobs. Right. They could be laid off at any point. They don't have security, even though it might feel like it. Maybe they've been at the company for a long time, they could drop them in an instant. So what I'm hearing is that personal brand is really that asset that can stay with you no matter if you lose a client, you lose a job, whatever. Your personal brand is that longevity that,

B (12:01)

that sticks with you 100%. Because there's a. There's there's so many different components of it, but one component of it is people want to be around other people that are influential. So companies, when they're looking to hire people, they're looking at skill sets, they're looking at people that have expertise. They're looking at people that have proven success in that you building a personal brand around your expertise is you publicly showing people what you're capable of doing and what you know. And so all of the opportunities that have come to me have come through social media. That's the first thing. The second part of it is as things start getting more and more automated and things start getting more and more tech through AI, or even not even that. Just. Just like the way that the world has shifted over the last handful of years, we have more and more options to work with people that we want to work with, and owners and, and founders will be able, able to choose the individuals that they want to bring onto their team. And so when you go to pick, who do you want to be around? A lot of that is reputation. It's like, who do I enjoy being around? Who are the people that I feel like would add value to this? Who are the people that I want to spend time with? And when I think about personal brand, really what it is is reputation. It's how are you being memorable to people? And so when I'm trying to help people build their personal brand, it's like this is literally like you going into a coffee shop and going and introducing yourself to every person in there and finding a way to be memorable, having them emotionally connect with you, having them know the things that you're up to. And of course, that gives you a leg up in the world like it. I don't think there's, I don't think there's anything that is as big of a safety net as having a truly reliable and reputable personal brand.

A (13:43)

Yeah, well, yeah, I mean, at some point, if you're creating your personal brand, you're. You're sticking to it you will have unlimited opportunities for life as long as you keep going. Like if you're a graphic designer and you post about your graphic design and your passion and you're building in public, you will never be without a graphic design client. There is always going to be somebody that wants to work with you. It just gives you such incredible consistency. But one thing I think is really interesting about your journey is we have some listeners that are like, well, I have to have this degree and I have to have work at a big four consulting firm and I have to have this and this and this credentials. And you came into this with none of these official credentials. Just a curiosity to learn and you've been so successful. So what would you say? Somebody coming up in a non traditional path, like any advice for them?

B (14:34)

Don't try and be an expert if you're not an expert. So I'll give you an example. I went from doing, I was doing fitness and wellness content when I retired and I became like a personal trainer and I was filming workouts and I was like, I like really want to get into the business world and teach strategy because I feel like I'm good at it. But I have no clients, I have no like examples of this. And Tick Tock was coming out and there was this wave of people doing houses on TikTok, Hype House, Charlie D', Amelio, like people like that. And I saw an opportunity to go and start a house for adults where I was like, let's put 10 people in a house together that are not 18 years old and let's like go anti Hype House and let's try and like build something in that way. I had no experience of this. I had no expertise. There was no like proven this is going to work. But what I did on my, on my personal accounts was say, I'm going to try this. I don't know if it's going to work. I have like a feeling that I might be good at this. But like guys, I like have no idea. And it was. And, and it ended up really working. We ended up going from zero to a million followers in 60 days. And it was me documenting that whole thing of not being an expert that I actually think people were more interested in the project and what was happening. And that one thing was literally the kickoff point for brands to come to me and be like, we want you to teach us organic, social and pay you to do this. And then I was able to be like, okay, cool. Now I have like expertise in this because I've Done it. And I've showed people. And I think. I think if you don't feel like you're an expert and you just genuinely don't, that to me comes from repetitions and proof of, like, you doing what you say that you do. And if you don't have that, you can still go into that category. Just don't try and be an expert. Like, show people that you're learning the process. Because I really think that that's a relatable thing that people want to buy into. And if you're not scared to fail and you're willing to do it in public and you just, like, keep going, I actually think that's an easier way to get people into the interest of you than just coming out and being like, you need to listen to me because of this. You know, I think people want to connect emotionally to you, so I would have no fear doing that.

A (16:44)

Yeah. So you didn't come out the gate being like, look, I'm this expert. You actually included a lot of vulnerability of, hey, I don't know what the fuck I'm doing.

B (16:52)

Totally.

A (16:53)

I'm here. I'm going to figure it out. Like, come along with me while I figure it out. And for a lot of our listeners, they might be like, I had one comment of someone being like, you know, I'm in med school. I'm not an expert. Like, I'm literally not a doctor. I can't give medical advice. I'm like, that's fine, but talk about what you're learning. Talk about the journey. What's it like moving across the country? What's it like studying for, you know, 40 hours a week? What's it like having this insane schedule? What's it like figuring it out along the way? And it sounds like that was your strategy instead of positioning. I'm such an expert, it's. I don't know what the fuck I'm doing. Come along with me while I figure it out.

B (17:29)

A hundred percent. I think that hockey and my career in sports and so much in facing so much trial and error and failing and getting back up in that really taught me to be less scared of failure. Because, like, really, if you're like, the reason people. The reason that most people are scared to fail is because they're scared of what other people think. If you're scared of. If you fail and you learn from it and you keep going, that is how you find success. Like riding a bike, you feel you fall off of it, you get back up, you keep going. If you are. But what most people do is they fall and then they like, for example, things don't work out and you like, look around and you're embarrassed about it and then you never want to do that again because you don't want that feeling of the way that people are perceiving you. But if you actually go through that multiple times, which I was forced to do with hockey, you start realizing like, that doesn't really matter. Like, most of the people are in their own heads not looking at you and not judging your failures. And the people that are, aren't the people that actually really do matter. Nobody that's happy really does judge and point fingers or like call people out or whatever that, whatever it is. And so for me, I feel like now I'm just at a point where I'm really, truly not scared of failing. And so I'm able to go and say the things of, I don't know if this is going to work out, but I'm going to try it because I have a hunch or a feeling and I just want to try it because if it doesn't work out, I will openly, publicly go and say, ah, that didn't work out. And, you know, I learned from it. And here's the things that I learned and you know, this is going to make me a little bit better for the next thing. And I really think if you approach it with that, it just makes everything easy. Like, I, I really believe that most things are not as complicated as we make them, but we just get wrapped up in our own shit. And if you're able to like separate yourself from that or like work through that enough to where you actually move without fear, you move quick.

A (19:14)

That's so, so powerful. Yeah, I, I, I think sharing your failures, sharing your progress, like talking about when you fucked up just establishes a lot of trust too. And that trust leads to way more opportunities, leads people wanting to work with you, buy from you. So how did this journey lead to Creator X and now Core?

B (19:33)

Yeah. Yeah. So I was doing the TikTok house. That went really well. I then got brands hitting me up, asking if I could do organic social consulting for them. The first brand that I consulted for was Poppy the Beverage. So I'd sit with their, their founder, wrote out scripts for her, helped her film her first video. That video ended up going really viral. She ended up selling out more than they had aired on Shark Tank. That video outperformed the data they aired on Shark Tank. She had a crazy moment. She introduced me to a bunch of friends, so I Became like an organic social strategist, going and sitting with people, teaching them organic social. What I noticed from that was when I would go and spend time with those people, I would leave the rooms of their team and it would be like, cmo, it would be brand manager, it would be social media manager, it would be founder, they'd be CEO, whatever. It'd be that kind of core team. And I would leave and they'd be like, hey, no one in this room knows how to film things. None of us are actually creators. We have a. Some of them would even have a creative director, and they'd be like, we know campaigns, we know big, beautiful pieces, but we don't actually. Nobody here actually understands organic social. What's happening on TikTok, what's happening on Instagram? How do you actually get traction? And so for me, they would ask me, do you have anybody that could do that? And I initially was going on because I would be consulting them. I would go onto LinkedIn and try and find people, or I would go on indeed and try and find people or upwork, and it'd be like, you know, people overseas, or it'd be like somebody that was doing all different types of marketing, and they just happened to throw in the keyword of social media. And so there's nobody legit. And so I started making videos, saying to my algorithm, is there anybody out there that would want to do this for a brand? I think that this is going to be a big. A really big role within companies. I would love to help people find these jobs. And I made a video, I attached it to form, and I literally woke up, like, a thousand people. And so I was like, the. That. That then made it clear to me that all of the creators in my network are looking for work. Because brand deals are not easy to live off of.

A (21:34)

Right?

B (21:34)

Because all the people that are in my network of creators are all, like, emerging influencers. So they're not at the level where they're like, you know, an Alex Cooper or an Alex Earl or, like, where they have their own businesses and they're already established and massive. They're, like, on the rise. When you're on the rise, one of the biggest ways that you would get paid is brand deals. But that's really hard to live off of, especially if this is your only thing. And so what I noticed was a lot of those people would be coming to us and say, hey, I want to spend, like, 50% of my time on my influencer account. And I would love to spend 50% of my time with a brand, helping them build their brand channel. Especially if it's a company that I love, like if it's something that I'm already wearing and I'm a fan of and I've been purchasing and I'm an advocate of, I can go and create shit for that really easily. So I started the recruiting firm that's called Creator X now. We just switched the name to Core Access, which we're going to get into, getting, going to get into. But it's a recruiting firm so we staff Organic Social. So companies come to us for the role of social media manager, for the role of in house creator and for the role of now head of Social, which is another role that's becoming a real thing. We go to our network, we onboard them, we do full, like we're a full official recruiting firm.

A (22:48)

And is it, this is full time roles, part time roles, contract.

B (22:52)

Like everything all depends on the brand. I would say probably 60% of them start with 1099. So contract. But it's on a deliverable amount and it's usually, it's usually like between 20 and 30 hours per week of work for the creator. So it'll typically be like you're going to make 10 to 15 videos this month. You don't have to be in the office from 9 to 5. You need to film and do those 10 to 15 videos. So how can you do those the best? And that's what they get paid off of. But the reason why we started doing Head of Social now is we would place creators that the role for them would be they're going to make content. They would be with the brand for six months making content. They would crush that. The founder would then be like, you have built a community for us. You understand if you're making content around the product, you really understand the product. Especially if shit's hitting, that means that you understand it and you understand how to translate it to the audience. And so they'd be like, the founder would be like, you're, you really get it and you really get the culture. We actually want you to move into a higher level position where if you were making 15 videos now we want you to only make four or five videos. We want you to hire other people underneath you that you're gonna oversee, teach them strategy, even help us come up with like what's an event strategy for us? What are influencer strategies for us? So we've had, we've had a lot of people graduate into this head of social role and coincidentally in the last like two months, brands started coming to us saying we want something that's a little bit more high level that can oversee teams that can also create content. So like oh, this like head of social thing is like really becoming a thing. So now we also recruit for that.

A (24:24)

So our listeners that are content creators, they're like, okay, I want to work with you. This sounds like a dream. I'm doing some brand deals here, I'm doing this freelance here. But to have a 20 to 30 hours where I'm completely dedicated to one brand sounds amazing. So I'm just going to pause and let you guys know. We'll put all info in the show notes so so they can apply and see what, what you're hiring for and everything.

B (24:47)

Love it. Really appreciate that. Yeah, it's a really cool role for particularly for the people that already enjoy the product because like it's for, for most people. So I'm again with control with the me going back to hockey and wanting to create a life for yourself. I look at personal brand in four different stages. I look at it as entry level, mid tier, elite and world renowned. And world renowned is the people that are like I was saying, Alex Cooper, Alex Earl. You have built a massive audience. You're making multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars. You can launch products, you have a team. It's all internal, like all that. Most people, even if they start building big audience don't have that entrepreneurial interest to go and build a team and build their own product. And this is a new thing that we started noticing when we were going into this because I am very entrepreneurial. I and I think it's because I played as a hockey player, as an employee, like I was saying. So I have this like anti establishment. I want to be my own boss. I would never go and work for somebody. And so when I first was going through this I'm like, yo, nobody's going to want to do this. No good creators are going to want to go and be in house with a brand because everybody wants to be an entrepreneur. I was so wrong on that. Actually a lot of the people that are in our network that we're placing within brands are massive influencers that even could go and launch their own business because they have the community to. But they come to us and they're like, I don't want to lead a team.

A (26:13)

Yeah.

B (26:14)

I don't want to go through the full process of like building something from scratch. I already love this brand. Like I love. Here's the like 10 brands that I love and I want to go and be part of something that's bigger than me. And it's not like I have to be in charge of everything. And so what we found is like, oh, it's actually not like. It's not. Everybody wants to be an entrepreneur.

A (26:33)

Yeah.

B (26:33)

And this is like such a great opportunity for them to. You still can do the influencer thing on your own with no pressure, because now you're not worried about. All of my money is coming through my own account. So you can, like, really take pressure off of that and you can go in and help a brand that absolutely is desperately needing what you do of understanding culture and content. And you can make really good money with that. Even have people. Brands where they're wanting to have give ownership to those people. Like, give equity to the. To the creators or heads of social. And it's just like a really good opportunity for people that don't want to go and build something on their own.

A (27:09)

That's so super cool. Yeah, I definitely. When I was starting out too, I was like, I don't want to start a business. I do. I did. Now there was a transition where I was like, okay, now I'm going all in. But I did something similar. Like, I worked for a brand three days a week, and it was great. It was a great transition and takes a lot of that pressure off. But some of the brands you work with are so cool. Like, I see your job postings. It's like a really cool, like, fitness brand. It's beauty. It's like health and supplements. It's just like, all these things that are so aligned with so many creators. Okay, so now I want to understand how this leads into core.

B (27:41)

We started changing the name of Creator X because unfortunately I didn't trademark Creator X and somebody else did. Oh, and I had never. All. Everything, every single thing has come through my personal brand. We've never done an ad. We've never paid for a sponsored post. We've never done. We've literally never done any marketing other than my personal brand. And so Creator X was all just getting spread through word of mouth. And so there wasn't really, like a massive brand behind Creator X. So when we started getting emails from people saying, hey, I went to your. I got on a call with Creator X and it wasn't you. I was like, okay, we need, like, look at this and see if this is what we want to do. If we want to, like. Because we would have had to, like, file a cease and desist and, like, it could have been messy, whatever. So then I'm like, all right, we, at the same time as this, have been really thinking about getting closer to our talent, because historically, what we would do is we have a database so people can come and enter their info. They're in our database. We go and keep tabs on how they're doing. And then when we have the right opportunity for them, we reach out to them and we make intros to brand and, like, get them into the role. So we would not be developing those creators. We would just be spending time with them and, like, seeing how they're doing and then pleasing them. But I. Because my entire day is usually spent with creators, all of the conversations that I'm having are strategy. Like, I'm the friend. I'm like a. I'm like a somewhat of, like a creator therapist that. That I'm like. And it's the thing I love the most because, again, I think this all ties into, like, this being so. It's such a passion for me because of me experiencing all of the time in hockey that I didn't have control. So I, like, really impassioned about helping other people get to that place. And so I spend majority of my conversations with creators, helping them understand how to build what they're trying to accomplish, really get clear on where they're going and what matters to them. And I and my team, we were like, we need to do something where we actually spend way more time with these people. And, like, what is that thing? Because a lot of them would ask us to manage them. They'd be like, will you. Will you just, like, be my manager? Like, I have an agent right now. I have a manager. I don't love them. They don't help me with this strategic, strategic stuff. And I just, like, don't want to be a manager. I, like, have no interest in doing that. There's a. I don't. I don't know the reasoning, but there's some sort of, like, weird, like, I feel too responsible if I'm your manager, and I don't want that. And so I was like, that's not it for us, but what could we do that would actually, like, make sense for everybody? And when I started thinking about it and I started thinking about me as a professional athlete. Pro athletes have, like, eight to 10 coaches around them all the time. You have a strength and conditioning coach. You have a nutritionist, you have a masseuse. You have your head coach on your team, your assistant coach, a positional coach, movement coaches. Like, you have real infrastructure. Creators have none of that, especially when you're on the way up and you're not at the tip of the top. And so for us, what we want to do is we want to go and be that resource for people where it's like, we will be your external coach. We will be. And it's going to be like, it's going to start with a lot of events, it'll start with a lot of in person and then it'll move into a digital platform where there'll be like different coaches or different cohorts that you can join, things like that. But it's going to be. It's very heavy on the strategy side. So strategy around you as a human being, what do you want to accomplish and how do you get there in a way that you. That allows you to do it for a long period of time with real enjoyment? And that's what we're doing with core. And now those are two. It's split now. So we call it core Community is the side of the creators and then access is the side of the services. So now creator X is called core access.

A (31:11)

So what type of coaching and strategy are they going to get? It's going to be like, hey, I think you should go in this direction. Is it like, I see that you're not being very authentic in your post. Here's how to reposition it. Like, what is it going to look like?

B (31:24)

I was a player. I trained at a place in the summer that was called Exos. And Exos had four pillars and the things that. And they're like the number one place in the world to train as a professional athlete before going into season. They're incredible. It really, like shaped me as both a, both an athlete, but also as a person. Just going and getting that level of detail into like, who I am and how I perform. And for me, I was like, okay, I want to create the creator version, the personal brand version of that. So Exos has poor four pillars. There's this movement, mindset, nutrition and recovery for us. I'm like, what's the like version of that that I look at whenever, whenever I go and sit with somebody and look at their personal brand or talk about or like, if you were to come to me and be like, I'm brand new to creating content, like, here's what I do in real life. I want to do this. What do I do? There's four kind of steps that I would go through. It's, it's capacity, it's identity, it's execution and it's conversion. So it's those four different things. So when you're asking like what are the ways that we, that we do this? Capacity is like where you actually, how much space do you actually have in you to do this? You know, you talk about this a lot. Like the human well being side of being a creator is so not just like under emphasized but it's so critical because if you actually aren't in a place to learn, to be in the spotlight. There's a girl. Do you know, do you know Whitney?

A (32:50)

Yeah, I just interviewed her like yesterday.

B (32:51)

Oh, okay.

A (32:52)

She's great.

B (32:53)

Yeah, she's amazing. So, so a lot of her content is like why people literally cannot be in the spotlight. Because your nervous system and like you, it's too, it's just too taxing on you. And so when I think about capacity, I'm like, truly, are you actually able to do this right now? Or where or like how slow do you need to take this? Because you can have the best strategy, you can have the best coaches, you can have the best. It's similar to personal training. If you aren't able to actually, if you don't actually have the energy and the space to it, none of that shit matters. You won't retain information, you won't be able to, to express yourself clearly. And so people won't be able to understand what you're doing. So you have to like be in a place where you're able to actually step into it. So the first thing for me is always like, yo, where are we at? Like how are we doing? Do you feel good with this? Do you feel ready with this? And then I can go into these other ones too if you want to. But yeah, okay, okay, so, so that's capacity. Identity is first. Like what is your self identity? How do you actually look at yourself? Where do you want to go? What do you want to accomplish? Why do you care? Why does it matter to you? It's kind of like, it's kind of like your aim and then it's kind of like your fuel. Like what's the motivator? And then it's friction. Like what's the things that would keep you from doing that? And I think it's important for people to know like the resistance that they might have because anybody will face resistance. Even posting shit. Some just not going to work, there's going to be resistance to posting again. How do you go through that? So that's why like the fuel that you have, that's like keeping you going. Your why? Your motivation, your purpose. Behind it is really important. So it's first it's like self identity and then it's like brand identity. So how do you take everything that you're about and where you want to go and translate that into something that the audience that you're going after would receive, understand clearly and want to take action towards? Right, so that's one of the, that's like one of the whole pillars. And then execution is really like, how do you do what you want to accomplish in a very efficient way? So what is that from a content strategy standpoint? What is that in a actual brand identity? What is that in content pillars? What is that in tactically? What's your team, what's your setup, what's the studio, what's the, that's all the like, how are we really doing this? And then conversion isn't just money, it's what do you want to happen and how are you looking at if that's happening? So that could literally be like, I want to meet people. It could be completely non transactional where it's like a, not a dollar amount or anything. It could be energy, it could be I want to feel good. It could be, but it's always there's an outcome that I'm trying to accomplish that I want to happen. And how do I get there and how am I looking at how I get there? Like, what are the, what are the indicators that I'm there or that I'm close to it? I look at creation from the lens of performance. Like when I think of core, I call it a performance center. I don't call it a artist's lab because I'm not creating to express and purely express. I'm creating because I want a result. And that result isn't always money. That result could be freedom. That result could be a feeling. That result could be a connection, whatever it is. But I'm creating with a result. And I think that that's the difference between what I, the way that I look at content and the way that like an artist would look at creating. Because if you're express, if you're just expressing just to express, you don't think about the other person, you're not thinking about the other, other end of it. For example, like when you think about expressing, singing in a car, you're just singing because you want the feeling of expressing the voice, your voice and like the feeling that comes with like that vibe of like listening to something and putting it out there. You're not thinking about somebody hearing you singing and being like I need to do this properly for them to understand something and like resonate with it. Content has to be that if you're actually trying to execute on anything and have something happen, you need to think about who that person is that you want it to happen with and what's going to get them to take action. So the whole thing of Core is like, how do we get that to happen?

A (37:07)

What I think is really cool about that is you're going way beyond just the tactics. And I think this is a massive, massive mistake that new creators make is they just think about the tactics. They think, I need to make a strategy, I need to post, I need to whatever. And then they wonder why they're starting, stopping, starting, stopping, they can't get consistent or they're having flop after flop after flop. And it's because that's such a little part of it. Yes, strategy is important, consistency is important, but it's almost impossible to get there if you don't have the right mindset, if you don't have a vision so strong that even though you're getting mean comments and things are flopping, that you're still connected to that vision. Like, the mindset is such a incredibly powerful part of it that, like, for me, I don't even do a lot of content strategy work. I just do a lot of mindset work and then my content improves. Right? Because that's, that's, that's the majority of it. It's like, what do you believe you can do? But I feel like what you're doing is like, it's really shaping the future of content. And I'm curious so much, it's amazing. I'm curious what you think the future of, of the creator economy world looks like.

B (38:17)

Yeah, I think the reason the tagline for Core right now is the power source for reputation and the reason why it's not the power source for virality is because I think that what people are really looking for is to build a reputation. It's not to get views like, like, I, I am very introspective and so I ask myself, like, why do I care about this? What is this? What am I trying to accomplish? What am I trying to do? And really it's like, I want to help people be able to create their dream life. To do that, you need opportunities. The way you get opportunities is from other people. The way that other people pick those people is by remembering people that can fill in that gap of that opportunity. And so everybody need to set themselves up for opportunities, needs to be memorable to Those people, how do you be memorable? Like you? A. A bit. A bit of it is what you actually do. So a bit of it is like logic, like, oh, this person looks like this, does this for work, lives in this area. It's like the, the like data on what a per. What a. When you meet somebody, they did this, they live there, they do that. Another huge part of that and a bigger part of it in my opinion is how you make them feel. It's. You remember if, if you meet somebody and they're incredible at their work, they're like, maybe they have a reputation of being like a beast in business, but if they make you feel like you are leaving there and if anybody brings them up, you are not getting a good taste, you are not going to highlight them in a great way. You might be quiet, you might even on the worst thing, like say something negative about them, which I don't recommend people do. But like the way that that person made you feel way over indexes the stats on who they are. And so for me, I'm like, everyone should be focusing on their reputation, which is a little bit of what you do, but a lot more of it is like, how do you make people feel? And you don't need to go viral. And I actually think that trying to go viral is. Is actually opposite of like really intentionally trying to connect with somebody because the more viral that you go, the more you're trying to appeal to a wider group of people and it's harder to connect with them because they all have different lives and different interests. And so I think that virality and the where. Where we're going with social is I think that the smart people will start focusing on a very niche, very narrow audience that they really want to impact. And not looking at it as I need to go viral, looking at it as I want these people to see my content and go to. If it's a link in my bio and click the link in my bio and go to my event and click the event and buy a ticket and show up because they want to meet me, that to me is where people should be looking like my KPIs for the like, the things that I'm really focused on is people at events in person. How many people can I actually meet in person that came from content? Because I think it's getting easier and easier to hack algorithms. I think that like, I mean there's so I get a. I probably get 30 dms a day of an AI thing that like is guaranteeing you to go viral. And it's analyzed every single one of everything. And it like. And I think that there's like, good in some of those. But I also think that a lot of people will go into those and get lost in numbers rather than really having a clear goal on. I'm trying to build true connection and reputation with a specific audience. And so I think the people that will win will be doing that.

A (41:47)

I agree. Like all of my viral posts, they're not making me money, they're not getting me connections, they're not creating a bigger impact. It's because people are arguing in the comments.

B (41:59)

Yeah, totally. Yeah.

A (42:00)

That's why things go viral. Yeah. My top performing post, what I would actually consider my top performing post is posts that inspire people to take an action. Whether that be signing up for my, my content club and starting to post for the first time. Whether that be like you're saying coming to an event. Whether that be. I mean, the. I had this post I did years and years ago and I had two people, like two years after I made that post say, hey, I followed your advice. I ended up moving to the States. That was my dream. I got a six figure job, I got my visa sponsored, like two people from a post. I'm like, that. I had that impact. That post had that impact on two people. Even though it's just two, that's way more top performing than some dumb video I made about how like I don't like a certain coffee shop and then like 2 million people see it. Nobody cares. Right.

B (42:50)

And I'll say this, so I'm not, I'm not antiviral. What I am is viral being a byproduct of trying to appeal to my people.

A (42:58)

Correct? Yes.

B (42:59)

Because if you actually, like when you think about how many people in the world could resonate with this message. Like if you're doing the most heartfelt, intentional piece of content I as a strategist want to think about how does this reach every single human being that aligns with this idea? And that could be millions and millions and millions. If that happens, that's fucking incredible. That's the dream. But if you're looking for that number and you're neglecting the intention of it, that's where people get lost. And so going, like having a video that hits and it hits for the right reasons. Sick love that. I will push that all day. And that's what I want for you. But you need to. But the way that you actually get there is by focusing on the principles and the like foundations of the video and who you're trying to go after. Not, let's do this for the algorithm, right?

A (43:51)

Going viral. It's awesome. Woo, woo, woo. We feel great about ourselves. It can make a big impact. And I'm sure you have people in your DMs, brands in your DMs too, being like, my number one goal is to go viral as fast as possible. And you're like, whoa, slow down, let's talk about why. Where is that coming from? Because I mean, some people also think if I go viral, all my problems will be solved for sure. And that's just not necessarily true.

B (44:14)

Not at all.

A (44:15)

Curious. If you had to reduce your personal brand to like three non negotiable that everybody building their personal brand should know, what would they be?

B (44:26)

Do you mean mine or do I think, or what I think for people that they should be looking at someone's

A (44:31)

like, jt, I want to build my personal brand. What are the three non negotiables?

B (44:35)

First is be absolutely clear about what you want to accomplish with this. Where are you actually going to where you will know that I have made it and this is what I want. That's the first one. The second one would be who are the people that you're trying to appeal to. Getting very, very crystal clear on that. Because even if you know what you want to do, if you don't, it's this. Everything is a relationship. Relationship is two way. You have to understand who the person is on the other side of the screen. From a data standpoint, that's the smartest way to go about it, strategy wise, as a human being, that's the smartest way to go about it, strategy wise. And so the second thing would be getting really, really clear on the audience. And the third non negotiable would be you can't listen to other people's opinions, you can't allow the audience or lulls or things not going right. Like the third would probably, I would probably boil the third down to trusting the process. Because ttp, what's. Is that an acronym that you use?

A (45:42)

Trust the process. Ttp.

B (45:44)

Yeah, I love that. Yeah. Third would be ttp because, because like there's probably. I, I mean, I, I genuinely believe that every single human being has interesting stories, could build an audience because there really is an audience for everything. And if you, if you build a system and follow it and you actually stay consistent with it and you're willing to fail and get back up and fail and get back up and keep going. I haven't, I'm yet to See, somebody that hasn't gone through that and found success at some point and that might not be, oh my gosh, you built like a hundreds of thousands of followers and you have million dollar brand now that might be like you found success, meaning it showed you another thing that you were interested in. And now you're in a different creative line of work, but you're thriving and you're stoked. Even if you're not doing social anymore. It like opened up a new door. I'm yet to find somebody that didn't go through the whole process and really stick with it and not have some successful outcome. It's very similar to personal training, which is what I did when I got done with playing hockey. It's very similar to personal training of everybody can get in shape. There is a pretty concrete plan that if you, if you eat healthy and you go to the gym and you lift weights and you move your body, you will get more healthy. That's the way that I feel about content. If you actually stick with it, if you put yourself out there, if you keep showing up, good things will happen. So, yeah, I feel like those would be the three.

A (47:14)

Yeah, I completely agree with that. There's no nobody ever in the history of all of social media that has, let's say, posted every single day for 10 years, continuously improved and reflected on every post, asked for help build connections in relationships and not seen success. There is not a single person like you cannot find me an example. And you're right, it's the same as, as working out, getting in shape. You're not special enough for it to not work for you. Sure, maybe there is like a.0001% of the population that has like a rare genetic disorder that means that they actually can't get in shape. Whatever. There is like tiny obvious exceptions, and I'm sure there's tiny obvious exceptions to content creation, but in general, you are not special enough for it to not work for you. It is a formula. Show up every day doing something and it will work. I also love.

B (48:04)

So true.

A (48:05)

Yes, I love to use the example of learning an instrument. If you go to guitar class three times a week for 10 years, you cannot leave the end of that decade not knowing how to play guitar. As long as you participate in class, you have some small reflections, you take some feedback, you're going to learn to play guitar. There is nobody who has done that. Three guitar lessons a week for 10 years and not learned like it just if you keep putting in the reps, it will work. Of Course maybe you're not going to be the biggest rock star in the world. Maybe you didn't start early enough or whatever. But you're gonna, you're gonna know how to play guitar and you're gonna see results. Like it works for everyone.

B (48:42)

That, that to me exactly is why I think I need the capacity piece when I'm going and spending time with people. Because a lot of the times people, I would say most of the time, I mean think about fitness. Like how many people actually do have a ironed out fitness regimen plan, even like their nutrition plan and all that, but they just don't follow it.

A (49:04)

Yeah.

B (49:04)

And they like can't do it. And to me I'm, I'm just like so curious. Like I think this thing started with me spending time with friends that were so smart, brilliant, like nuanced information and that if they literally just showed up for 90 days in a row and clicked record, they would have a massive brand. And it's like, it is literally you, you can write your strategy on a piece of paper in, in a sentence that this will turn your life 180 degrees up into the right and so much opportunity will happen. Why aren't you doing this? And for me it's always like it's in one of the, it's before execution. So it's not on the execution and it's not on the conversion side. It's on the capacity or the identity. It's either they don't look at themselves that way or there's some sort of limiting belief or there's some sort of like actual in, in like the. The world is challenging right now. People are going through. Finances are really tough for people, environmental safety for people. Like there's real shit that people go through those need to be accounted for. Those things that can put you into a place where you're truly not able to create and like put yourself out there and be in the spotlight or take on new things. That's okay. But you need to be mindful of all of that and actually be able to look at it to see if the plan is there and is concrete and has been proven. What's the reason why I can't follow it?

A (50:28)

Yeah, it's almost always a mindset or identity reason. I find a lot of people say, well I'm just like dipping my toe, I'm testing the waters. Which is fine. I think that there's a lot to be said for testing the waters, making yourself comfortable before you go all in. But I find whenever people like the big shift is when people start to identify as a creator. That's what happened with me. Like, I was like, oh, I'm posting some content. We'll see how this goes. I went to one creator event that, like, a influencer friend invited me to, and I'm like, I'm just gonna introduce myself as a creator at this event. This is, like, years ago. And no joke, like, I went home the next day. Things changed for me because I claimed that identity.

B (51:07)

Yeah. So powerful, 100%. I mean, that. That for me was when I got done playing hockey, I. Because I was so pulled into. I was. I spent so much time in the world of hockey thinking it is bad for me to stand above the pack or put myself out there or look any different or. It was like this belief that I had of I need to fit in, and building on social is quite literally the opposite of that. And so it was like the. I had to. I had to, like, change my own understanding and beliefs and really learn. Like, oh, this isn't actually something I believe. This is actually something that I just learned from teams and coaches in the system that I was in. And, like, the same thing that you're just saying, like, when it. When that changed for me, and I was like, oh, wait a minute. Beliefs can be changed at any second. I can completely change the way that I look at this. No one's controlling that other than me. And that, like, really hit me. It was like almost three says. And that was, like, a real big unlock for me. I will say this, though. There is actual survival for individuals that cannot allow them to step into this kind of work. And for those people, I don't think that they should be going really hard into trying to build a personal brand. I'll give you an example. People that are truly living beneath paycheck to paycheck and are on the verge of getting evicted. To me, I'm like, what you need to be focused on. Because out of a 10 of capacity, in financial capacity, you are at a 2. I actually think your focus should not be going into building a personal brand right now. It should be going into finding something stable.

A (52:44)

Yeah.

B (52:45)

That you actually can create stability and create safety for yourself. Because this career and this, even though it's such an incredible opportunity, is something that, like, you're. You shouldn't be looking at to convert financially on day one.

A (53:01)

Right. Takes a while.

B (53:03)

It takes a while. And so for me, for. I have a lot of sympathy, empathy, compassion for people that actually are going through, like, real life to where it's like, this isn't the right thing for you to do. And people that will come to us that want to do core or come through it and actually are not at that place for us. The thing that we're trying to work on, that we will be trying to work on with them is just building safety in their life. It won't be a content strategy, it won't be a brand strategy, it won't be execution, it won't be let's do a landing page. It'll be yo, get a job.

A (53:33)

Yeah.

B (53:34)

And like let us help. Like what? Like let us help you find work or let us help you like, you know, I think that you should maybe go and start taking care of your physical well being if it's like you literally can't get off the couch or you know, those kind of things. Because the safer that you are in your body environment, like all of your life, the easier step 2, 3 and 4 are going to be.

A (53:56)

Yeah, that's beautiful. Yeah, that's really important distinction.

B (53:59)

Thank you.

A (54:00)

Okay, last thing I want to talk about is community. You've done a really good job of bringing your online community in real life. What is one tip you would give somebody that wants to start activating their followers in real life?

B (54:14)

Start small and start hosting today.

A (54:16)

Okay.

B (54:18)

The hosting right now for me feels like the new. I don't even know how I'd say it. I just feel like it's something that not enough people are doing that I think in two years we'll, we'll be having this conversation and being like micro community. Events that are hosted by people that have even a little bit of influence on social will be like a very serious thing. Just because everybody wants and is craving connection and local places are looking for people to bring individuals into their establishments. And so when you initially think of hosting, you're like, ah, I need to like get an event planner. I need to like pay money. I needed to like do this. It's not true and it's just not known. And so like you can literally walk into like walk into not dm, not even email, walk into places in your community and say to them, hey, I like want to bring 10, 15 people and do an event here. 99% of those people, unless it's an establishment that is absolutely slammed wall to wall every single day, they're looking for more people to come in. So a lot of people will give up space for free for you to host, even give up, you know, if they do products or services or whatever, even include some of those to get more customer potential customers in the building. And so I would say, go think about something that you enjoy, that you think your audience would enjoy. Start small. What's the smallest possible thing that you could do to bring people together? Is that a walk? Is that coffee? Like, I think coffee is such an easy one. Is that going and getting coffee? Is that going and doing a ceramics class? Is it going and doing a run club? Is it going and getting nails done? Is it going and painting? Is it going and doing an education thing? If you're somebody that actually has education, that wants to just sit down and like, teach a little bit, like, what is the small version of that for you to do? I would go start there.

A (56:06)

That's so powerful. Yeah. I've done so many coworking events and it's so easy because you just can bring everyone to a coffee shop, they're all going to buy coffee. So the coffee shop wants to give you the back room or whatever. And you're just like all working together. It's so simple. You don't have to facilitate much. You don't have to do anything crazy or plan anything. People just want to be together, Especially

B (56:27)

new places that don't have the existing customers already. So if you're like, if you like, know your hood, your city, and you're like a community person that, like always loves finding, like the new little places that are popping up, I would be really mindful of when there's new things that are going into that location. And as soon as they open, I would go into those places and be like, hey, I have this group of like 50 friends. This is like, you know, if you, if. If you're not even doing social. I have this group of like 20 people in the location. I would love to, like, bring all them here and show them this place. Can I get this space for an hour on like an off time or can I do it on this day or whatever? That person's gonna be like, duh, yeah, like, you're bringing in 50 people to this. Like, you know, a lot of, especially a lot of small businesses, they're not doing marketing. They don't have a budget for marketing. They, a lot of them have, like, poured all of their time and energy into getting this place open. So like, anybody that's going to bring them customers, they're going to be stoked on. And I just think that these, like, micro hosts are going to continue being bigger and bigger and it's going to ladder up to bigger events.

A (57:30)

Yeah. Also when, whenever you Connect with your audience in real life. Those are the people that are going to be super connectors, super fans, super clients for the rest of your career.

B (57:40)

For sure.

A (57:40)

You just, you might even not connect one on one with someone in person, but they're so much more likely to work with you in the future, to be excited to support you in the future and you to them too. Just the, the depth of relationship that can come out of in person is huge. And you're right, it's such a differentiator. You don't need a massive audience to do it. And for anybody saying like, how can I have a leg up in my personal brand? That's such a solid, easy, first tiny step.

B (58:07)

The reason for that for me is I always, I'm always going back to how do people become memorable? It's so much easier to be memorable in person because of sensory, because of. Again, it's just hard to make somebody feel the same way over a screen than it is in person. And so like you meet somebody in person and that you, you become top of mind for them forever rather than they see one video in a sea of other videos and it just happens to be something that they see. So I'm like a big advocate. That's why I was saying the thing that I'm trying to do this year is how many people can I get in front of and like actually have face to face combos with? Because I think that that'll really stand out.

A (58:45)

Do you have any upcoming in person events?

B (58:48)

I'm gonna try and do something at south by Southwest.

A (58:50)

Okay, cool.

B (58:50)

Will you be there? Yeah, yeah. So I'm gonna try and do something there.

A (58:53)

I'll be there.

B (58:54)

Let's do it.

A (58:54)

I'll show up, I'll promote. I'll do all things that you help.

B (58:58)

I'm, I'm like, I'm really open to do it. Like I want to just do as much as possible and get in front of people. So I'm going to do a light an event at the Lighthouse here. That'll be next month. I've been doing these coffee shop pop ups at my house. I'm lucky that I have like space to like host some people. So I've been like doing a fake coffee shop every weekend, which has been fun. I want to do a lot more. Actually. I will say this publicly because this is the flag in the ground for me this year. The number one thing that I'm trying to do this year is host a night party at Cannes Lions. Did you go there last year?

A (59:31)

No. But I'll be going this year.

B (59:32)

You're going this year. Love it. The number one thing that I'm trying to do is host a midnight to like 3 or 4am party at Cannes. Just because I think it's a little bit different to do that. They're like, I know a bunch of creators that are going. It's also like, will push us as a team to like make that happen somewhat quick and like do it in a fun way. So like I'm just thinking about all these different creative in person things. What can we do for my mind as.

A (59:58)

That's so fun. We'll see you at south by Southwest and cans.

B (60:01)

Yes.

A (60:02)

Okay. Awesome. How can everyone find you, follow you, work with you?

B (60:05)

Yeah. Please send me a message if you listen to this. I really appreciate you listening and would love to meet any of you. So my Instagram and TikTok and everything is just jtbarnett and then core is all under oincore. So that's on Instagram, TikTok everywhere.

A (60:20)

Amazing. Thank you so much.

B (60:22)

Thanks for having me.

A (60:23)

I do have an ask for you guys before we go. If this podcast has benefited you in any way, if you have gotten a tip that you've really loved and you've implemented it, if it's given you some sort of inspiration, if it's given you some sort of motivation or clarity, my ask is that you leave a five star review. I would appreciate it so much. It helps spread the message, it really helps the show grow and it helps more people get access to this information. My deepest desire is on gatekeeping. Shit. I want to un gatekeep information. So anybody that desires to build a personal brand, to build a business, to create this success in their life and to live their dream, I want them to have all of the information. And I don't hold shit back on the show. Okay? We are not holding shit back. So in order to get this message to more people, in order to get these resources and tips to more people, your reviews go a long way. I appreciate you so much. Thank you.