MBA2248 Extended Interview: Bradley T. Morris – How to Build a Business That You Love

Summary

Summary of "The $100 MBA Show" Episode MBA2248: Extended Interview with Bradley T. Morris – How to Build a Business That You Love

Release Date: February 20, 2023
Host: Omar Zenhom
Guest: Bradley T. Morris, Founder of Magic Media

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Introduction: Embracing a Passion-Driven Business

In episode MBA2248 of The $100 MBA Show, host Omar Zenhom engages in an in-depth conversation with Bradley T. Morris, the multifaceted entrepreneur behind Magic Media. Recognized as a “modern-day business renaissance man,” Morris exemplifies how to build a thriving business centered around personal passions and creativity, all while maintaining a balanced and fulfilling lifestyle without relying on social media.

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Early Life and Entrepreneurial Spark

Bradley T. Morris shares insights into his unconventional upbringing and early entrepreneurial ventures. Growing up on Salt Spring Island in British Columbia, Morris describes himself as an “oddball” and a “class clown” who struggled with traditional education but found his calling in entrepreneurship from a young age.

Bradley T. Morris [04:47]: "I was more there for the social atmosphere, but my parents were always supportive of my own spark. I was always scheming up ideas to make some side money to buy the things that I wanted."

At 19, Morris moved from Ontario to British Columbia to pursue pro golf and attended business college under parental pressure. However, his passion for entrepreneurship prevailed, leading him to drop out after two years to fully commit to building his own ventures.

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Building Multiple Business Ventures: A Chapter-Based Approach

Morris employs a unique “chapter book” methodology in his entrepreneurial journey, treating each business venture as a distinct chapter rather than a permanent commitment. This approach allows him to dive deeply into specific projects, complete them, and then move on to new endeavors when the time is right.

Bradley T. Morris [07:35]: "It's like chapters in your life. I will go deep down the rabbit hole doing a very specific thing... It's all about focusing on the things that you're most excited about."

Throughout his career, Morris has founded and grown various businesses, including Magic Media, which produces workshops and training for business owners, and Magic Kids, a children’s publishing company. His ventures span meditations, children's stories, seminars, and more, all created without the aid of social media. This chapter-based strategy emphasizes building long-term assets that can generate passive income through licensing and partnerships.

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Experimentation and Strategic Business Models

Morris likens his business experimentation to that of a scientist, conducting three to six-month trials to validate ideas and assess their potential for enjoyment and profitability. This methodical yet flexible approach allows him to adapt and pivot as necessary, ensuring that each venture aligns with his passions and market demands.

Bradley T. Morris [11:27]: "The way that I coach people in business and stuff is like, if I can see the end goal of where we're going... then that's when I'm like, okay, this is ready."

One significant experiment involved transitioning Magic Media’s online courses to a freemium model, where content was offered for free to gauge engagement and commitment. Although the experiment attracted a large audience of over 2,500 people, Morris found that charging for memberships resulted in higher quality interactions and greater community investment.

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The Power of Licensing and Passive Income

A core strategy in Morris’s business model is licensing his content. By creating valuable products and licensing them to distributors or platforms, he generates residual income and enhances brand awareness without the constant need for active marketing.

Omar Zenhom [46:34]: "He's made a lot of revenue in licensing his content, his products, his work. Licensing is the closest thing to absolute passive income."

This approach not only provides financial stability but also expands the reach of his offerings through established distribution channels, creating an indirect marketing effect that bolsters his overall brand presence.

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Breaking Free from Social Media: A Deliberate Shift

A pivotal moment in Morris’s career was his decision to leave social media six years ago. Observing the negative impacts on mental health and authentic human connections, Morris chose to disconnect entirely, which led to significant personal and professional growth.

Bradley T. Morris [22:20]: "Social media creeps me out. It's hijacking human consciousness... I have built my business sans the social media monster."

Morris emphasizes the advantages of this decision, noting that his business continued to thrive and even generate more revenue post-disconnection. By focusing on quality over quantity in his marketing efforts, he cultivated meaningful partnerships and leveraged alternative strategies such as workshops and direct community engagement.

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Lessons Learned: The Importance of Value and Pricing

Morris recounts early entrepreneurial missteps, including his first business, a T-shirt company with offensive slogans that led to personal downfall. From this experience, he learned the significance of positive branding and aligning business practices with personal values.

Bradley T. Morris [31:16]: "Be mindful of the words that you use... focusing on positive words and positive energy."

Another critical lesson was the failure of the freemium model in his online courses, which taught him the importance of charging for products and services to ensure commitment and quality engagement from customers.

Bradley T. Morris [35:00]: "Charge what feels like the best the people are going to come that are resonant with you, that are up for the journey."

He underscores that pricing not only sustains the business financially but also signals value to customers, fostering a committed and enthusiastic community.

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Balancing Ambition with Personal Well-being

Morris advocates for a business approach that prioritizes personal happiness and lifestyle over relentless hustle. By defining clear work hours and maintaining boundaries, he ensures that his professional pursuits enhance rather than detract from his quality of life.

Bradley T. Morris [16:39]: "Living my desired lifestyle now is really, really important. I want my struggles to be my struggles for something that I believe in and something that I want to see exist in the world."

This balance is achieved through disciplined time management, delegation, and focusing on activities that bring joy and fulfillment, such as creative projects and family time.

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Future Vision: Creative Expansion and Personal Goals

Looking ahead, Morris envisions expanding Magic Media into full-fledged movie production and creating a creative hub where artists and creators can collaborate. Additionally, he plans to pursue professional golf, blending his athletic aspirations with his entrepreneurial endeavors.

Bradley T. Morris [41:36]: "My future will be full time writing, writing stories, writing movies... hosting world-class musicians, artists, teachers, creators."

This forward-thinking mindset illustrates Morris’s commitment to continuous growth and diversification, ensuring that his business remains aligned with his evolving passions and life goals.

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Key Takeaways: Crafting a Business Around Passion and Values

Bradley T. Morris’s interview offers several valuable insights for aspiring entrepreneurs:

1. Chapter-Based Approach: Treat each business venture as a distinct chapter, allowing for focused experimentation and adaptability.
2. Licensing as Passive Income: Develop high-quality products and leverage licensing agreements to generate residual income and expand reach.
3. Value-Driven Pricing: Charge appropriately for products and services to ensure customer commitment and sustain business operations.
4. Mental Well-being Over Social Media: Disconnecting from social media can lead to enhanced focus, creativity, and personal fulfillment.
5. Balancing Work and Life: Define clear boundaries between work and personal time to maintain overall well-being and long-term productivity.
6. Continuous Learning and Adaptation: Embrace lifelong learning and be open to pivoting business strategies in response to personal growth and market changes.

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Conclusion: Building a Sustainable and Enjoyable Business

Bradley T. Morris embodies the philosophy that a successful business does not require sacrificing personal happiness or well-being. By aligning his ventures with his passions, maintaining a balanced lifestyle, and employing strategic business models, Morris has created a sustainable and fulfilling entrepreneurial journey. His experiences and lessons provide a roadmap for others seeking to build businesses they love without the pressures of constant hustle and the constraints of social media.

Omar Zenhom [45:09]: "Bradley forced me to start seeing things a little bit differently, to have a new perspective on how I build out my day, how I build out my business... Make sure that I'm doing it in a way that feeds me and makes me feel fulfilled."

This episode of The $100 MBA Show serves as an inspiring testament to the power of passion-driven entrepreneurship and the potential for creating a business that not only thrives financially but also enriches one’s life.

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Notable Quotes:

• Bradley T. Morris [07:35]: "It's like chapters in your life. I will go deep down the rabbit hole doing a very specific thing... It's all about focusing on the things that you're most excited about."
• Bradley T. Morris [22:20]: "Social media creeps me out. It's hijacking human consciousness... I have built my business sans the social media monster."
• Bradley T. Morris [31:16]: "Be mindful of the words that you use... focusing on positive words and positive energy."
• Bradley T. Morris [41:36]: "My future will be full time writing, writing stories, writing movies... hosting world-class musicians, artists, teachers, creators."
• Omar Zenhom [45:09]: "Bradley forced me to start seeing things a little bit differently, to have a new perspective on how I build out my day, how I build out my business..."

Transcript

[Ryan Reynolds]

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[Jim]

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[Ramp]

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[Omar Zenhom]

See full [e-mail] got a 7am meeting on a Monday expensing breakfast because it's in policy wasting all afternoon submitting an expense report for that breakfast. If your company used Ramp you could submit expenses with just a text.

[Jim]

Yay.

[Ramp]

Free your team from expense reports today. Switch your business to ramp.com.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Hey, welcome.

[Omar Zenhom]

To the Hundred Dollar MBA Show. Making business a little bit easier every single day with our daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher Omar Zenholm. I'm also the co founder of Webinar Ninja, an independent software company I started with my co founder back in 2014 and today's episode is a special extended interview episode with Bradley T. Morris. In our extended interview episodes I get into the mind of a very interesting entrepreneur. I have a very deep conversation and I share with you that conversation on a particular topic that can help you and your business. Today we have Bradley T. Morris, the founder of Magic Media. But Bradley is a lot more than that. He's a modern day business renaissance man. Not only is he the founder of Magic Media where he produces incredible workshops and trainings that help business owners, but he also helps other entrepreneurs earn more revenue by doing things that most people are unaware of that can help them bring in the dollars. Things like distribution, things like licensing products, partnerships and more. He's made a crazy amount of money selling and licensing his meditations. He publishes children's stories, he leads talks and seminars and he does it all without any social media. He's been off social media for the last six years. Bradley struck me as a very unique entrepreneur, so I wanted to sit down with him. Mostly. He seems very happy and the reason being he's built a business he loves that actually helps him live a better life, a life that he enjoys. So I wanted to get into his mind and share some of his learnings, things that he learned along the way that can help you build your own business or pivot Your business to one that you love. Let's get into it. Let's get down to business. In this conversation with Bradley T. Morris, we cover a lot of ground. But the thing I really wanted to find out from him is how does he find his happiness through his business and how he built a business around his life so he can enjoy his business instead of having to hustle through it or grind it out. Some of us think that we have to suffer in order to have a successful business. Bradley is proof you don't. So without further ado, let's jump into that conversation with Bradley T. Morris. But I'll be back to wrap up today's episode, give my takeaways. But for now, let's jump right into that conversation with Bradley T. Morris.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Bradley Morris, great to have you on the show. How you doing today?

[Jim]

I was so good. Life is great in bc. Thanks for having me on the show.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Omar, I know that you live in a unique, beautiful area in bc. Tell us a little bit about that.

[Jim]

Yeah, it's the land of gnomes and fairies. It's this magical little island off the west coast of British Columbia called Salt Spring Island. I feel very grateful to be here.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Awesome. And this is where you live, is where you work out of, correct?

[Jim]

Yeah, yeah. And we've managed to build a quite growing team just from the incredible creative pool of people that are on this island, which is really neat.

[Bradley T. Morris]

That's amazing. That's amazing. Where I like to start a lot of these conversations with our guests is a little bit about, you know, how did you get here in the first place? I really believe that, like, how we. How we grew up, our upbringing, our influences, our expectations, that kind of plays a part. What were you like as a kid? Was entrepreneurship thing on your radar? Do you have any influences like a parent or an uncle? What was, like, what was life for you when you were growing up?

[Jim]

As definitely an oddball, I would say class clown, jock, cheated to get straight C's in school. I just. I couldn't pay attention. Sitting at a desk listening to somebody talk to me was just not the way I learned. And I didn't know how I learned. It wasn't until, you know, my 20s and 30s that I've really discovered who I am, what I love, what I'm curious about, what I want to learn. And so I really struggled with school. I was. I was more there for the social atmosphere, but my parents were always supportive of my own spark. And I wouldn't say that entrepreneurship, with those words, was something I was interested In. But at the age of 12, my buddy and I, we found tons of a barrel full of golf balls hunting for balls in the summer. And we built a driving range on his property and sold balls to the kids. I was always. My mom called it scheming. I call it entrepreneurship. I was always scheming up ideas to make some side money to buy the things that I wanted. So that was always just a part of it. And then that just kind of followed me into my, my late teens and early twenties when I realized I was an entrepreneur.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Wow. Okay. And did you go into university kind of study knowing that this is a possibility or were you just kind of or go through high school or did you just kind of say to yourself, I'm going to figure it out as I go along?

[Jim]

No. So I, I moved to British Columbia from Ontario when I was 19 to pursue pro golf and I went to business college because my, my mom really pressured me into going to college. I would rather just play golf all day. And after two years, I was very, very clear that school was not my jam. I was skipping 90% of the days to go play golf. And it was the second summer after college that I came up with my first business idea and dropped out of college and never looked back. I've been a full time entrepreneur since.

[Bradley T. Morris]

You're somebody that strikes me as keeps themselves busy. You got a lot going on. You know, I remember when I started to learn about you and understand what you offer the world. You know, you do a lot like you publish children books, you teach marketing. You also teach meditation, which like. And just from off the surface it seems like a lot of these things are in different genres in different kind of marketplaces. How do you decide what to do and not to do in your life and business?

[Jim]

Yeah, it's. That's a really good question because I do do a lot of things. And when I look back, it's all kind of happened like a chapter book. So I will go deep down the rabbit hole doing a very specific thing. So like with the meditations they talk about, between 2009 and 2012, I top 500 meditation workshops and retreats around the world. And that was just, that was what I did. And then in 2012, I spent almost a year producing an incredible world class meditation audio library with a buddy of mine. And those have since spread to millions of meditators through a bunch of different app subscriptions and licensing deal deals and stuff like that. So I just went all in on that. And then I've gone all in on like teaching creators to create and online entrepreneurs how to leverage their life's work and do business. And then last year we launched Magic Kids, the kids publishing company where we're doing like the best audio stories and illustrated books, music. We're building an app right now. So for me, it's like, it seems like I'm doing all these things, but what I've found is like, it must have been, I don't know, 15, 20 years ago. I can't remember the context, I can't remember what I. Where I heard it from. All I remember, it was something along the lines of, like, you are the product. If you're living your most activated life, you will become magnetic to the people, the opportunities, the experiences, the ideas. It will all come to you. And so focus on your growth, your development, your learning. Focus on doing the thing that you're most activated and lit up by, and those things will come. And so for me, it's, I've always just been like, well, this makes the most sense, like, let's do this. Because for me it's, it's less about like, we're gonna make millions of dollars doing this thing versus, like, I'm so creatively inspired. I could do this thing every single day until it feels like that chapter is complete. And then it's like, for me, it's, it's. I'm building assets. So like, I have my meditation library. I spent a solid year building that, but that has earned me revenue. And for, for seven or eight years now, I have these, all these new books and audio stories that are sitting behind me here in this app that's, that's also a new pathway for subscriptions and book sales. Like, there's all these different channels that I've been building for the last, I guess, 19 years. And for me, I just try to stay focused on the things that I'm most excited about. And I'm grateful that I'm to a stage where I have a team who can support me to, to keep all of these pieces moving and growing and keep them relevant to the times that we're in.

[Bradley T. Morris]

I want to dive a little bit deeper into this concept that you talked about, chapters in your life. And the reason why is because I know that a lot of the people that I coach, a lot of people that are listening to the show when it comes to entrepreneurship, they might be thinking, I got to go all in. I got to see, like, this is a 10 year journey. I got to make sure I choose the right niche or the right idea or like, I'll be wasting my time. You know, this is a very different approach where it's like, hey, this is not forever. I'm gonna work on this one project for a bit of time, see it to a certain point, have it become a asset, an asset for you to be able to resell or to continue to sell onwards.

[Omar Zenhom]

Tell me a little bit about how.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Did you make that decision or how did you change that mindset where you're just like, you know, this doesn't have to be permanent. I can just work on this for a little bit and then move on to something else.

[Jim]

I. The way that I've worked my business models, my ideas is more from like the scope of a scientist is like, this is an experiment. And I'll typically do three to six month experiments that if I have an idea that I'm kind of obsessed about, I'm like, okay, this is my next experiment that I'm doing. Like the publishing company that we're, that we just finished our first full year, we did 19 audio stories with like 70 voice actors. We hired all like custom scored music. They're like movies for the ears. And so plus we did 18 illustrated books and now the app. And that was an experiment. And for me when we started that it was, we're homeschooling. My son, he's six. He and I co write a bunch of the stories together. He voice acts, he's a creative director. This is a part of his education. So for me one of the things was like, well, I mean this is a risk worth taking because of the life experience he's going to get in understanding the creative process of seeing projects all the way through, of helping have him working with our illustrators, our designers, our, our producers. Like he's getting all of this incredible life experience that won't happen in a classroom. So the same goes for me, like when I'm, when I'm figuring out which project to work on or where to put my focus. It is all experiments because one, it's an experiment of how much am I going to enjoy this? A thousand steps in six months down the road? Like, how much will I still love it and how much will my audience love this? Is this something that they're going to be drawn to or are they going to be really stoked? And for me, it just helps to stop second guessing myself. Now mind you, I am a Taurus. My last name is Morris. I'm bullheaded and stubborn and so when I get my mind fixed on something, there's nothing that's going to stop me that from going forward. Maybe my wife, because she does talk sense into me. But I. For me, it's like, it's just this. An internal feeling of, like, this feels like it's going to light me up. And I. And for me, like, when I. The way that I coach people in business and stuff is like, if I can see the end goal of where we're going, I can see the business model, I can see the marketing opportunities, I can see the partnership opportunities. So for me, I can kind of like, before I start a project, if I don't see the full picture of, like, the landscape and the mountain that we're trying to climb, then I. I won't start until that picture is clear. But once I can see that and I can write it out and kind of organize it into a plan that I can then start to delegate and work and move forward with. Then. Then that's when I'm like, okay, this is. It's ready. Like, it's. It's calling for me. The muse is like, let's do this now.

And we're back, folks. It looks like Jim from sales just got in from his client lunch and he's got receipts.

[Team Member]

His next meeting is in two minutes. The team is asking, can he get through his expenses in that time?

[Jim]

He's going for it.

[Team Member]

Is that his phone?

[Jim]

He's snapping a pick. He's texting around.

[Team Member]

Jim is fast, but this is unheard of.

That's it. He's done it. It's un. Unbelievable.

[Ramp]

On ramp, expenses are faster than ever. Just submit them with a text. Switch your business to ramp.com.

[Bradley T. Morris]

So how much of it is I'm interested in the process versus the outcome because it sounds like you're having a lot of fun. And when you choose these projects, it's like, this sounds like a great thing I could do with my son and all that kind of stuff. So how much of it is like, this is going to be a great experience versus, like, it's going to produce this great asset that I can sell.

[Jim]

It used to be about the end point of how much money can we make on this? I think 39 soon. Been doing this almost 20 years of like, constantly creating new products, new offerings, services, all sorts of things. So it's now it is about the journey. I mean, I'm meeting my needs. There's still stressors because we're investing in things that have no guarantee, but it is about the journey. Like, as we're, you know, we're building all of these assets Here it's like, well, if Magic Kids failed tomorrow, I have the experience in directing a creative team of over 70 people. I have the experience. I have the assets of all these books that I can sell forever. I have the assets of all these audio stories that I could put up on all sorts of different platforms that could then be monetized. So for me, it's like, let's go all in on this and let's see how far we can take it and pivot and adapt as life unfolds. But for me, it's definitely like, I gotta be really excited about it because I learned a long time ago that living my desired lifestyle now is really, really important. Because there's no guarantees that if we're working on a business for the sake of making money, that it's ever going to work out. And I want my struggles to be my struggles for something that I believe in and something that I want to see exist in the world.

[Bradley T. Morris]

I'm glad you brought that up because, you know, I run a software company, Webinar Ninja, and I'm. I'm. I'm friends. I know a lot of different software company founders, and everybody is in that game for the exit. Everybody's in there. So they build this incredible business that is making X amount of revenue that they can sell for X amount of multiple. And the thing that nobody tells us in the process, you kind of learned this over the years is that headline story you see in the news of a company selling for 200 million or whatever. Like that this is like the exception to the rule. Most software companies don't exit. They either survive or grow slowly, or they fizzle out and go out of business. And it's like everybody's, you know, got their chips on the table, betting off of the same horse, trying to make sure that they get that. That chance of exiting. And it's almost like they're convinced themselves, like, this is inevitable, like, I'm going to do this. And in the meantime, they're spending a decade burning the candle on both ends, sacrificing their family, their life, you know, their health, and in hopes that it's going to pay off. And there's no guarantee it is going to pay off. So it's a little bit of a. Yeah, a mirage in a lot of ways. And I want to talk a little bit about, like, how do you balance your ambition for the creative work you want to do in your business with staying healthy, staying sane, being a family guy, you know, and having that balance of. I don't like the word work, life, balance, but, but having that balance of saying, hey, I only have, you know, I'm reading this book, 4,000 weeks, only have 4,000 weeks to live. How am I spending these weeks? How am I spending these hours? How am I spending these days? How do you do that? How do you kind of make sure that, you know that you're enjoying life in the process?

[Jim]

So I'm going to answer that before I do just about the investment piece about people trying to always thinking about the exit. So my fir, I have taken on investment for Magic Media to build magic kids in the last couple years and my first thing that I say in my investment meetings is just so you know, I'm not selling this company. And so that's the entry point into our investor meetings. And so I've had to get creative with how our investors get paid back, which is revenue based equity, which is something people can, can look up. And that's been really game changing and awesome to be building a company that I'm 100% in control of and finding investors that align with our values and what we want to do and to not have the pressure of needing to sell. They're still getting the return on investment based on the growth and the revenue we're generating. So now back to the other question around lifestyle. I mean I've just been really clear for a long time on what makes me happy. And a lot of the things that make me happiest don't cost much money. Island life has taught me this a lot. I mean I, I am a golfer. I play golf six days a week at first light. These days it's dark here in Canada, so I play at 6:30 in the morning in the dark, in the dark. Golf balls and a headlamp in the pouring rain that makes me happy. Swimming in freezing cold water makes me happy. Exercising every day makes me happy. Hanging with my kid and my wife and my friends, having bonfires, learning homesteading, learning to hunt and, and process our own food. Like I, I've just found the majority of the things that I love and cherish most in my life don't cost a ton of money. There's obviously, you know, wanting to go on the occasional trip or, or whatnot. But a lot of like my happiness comes from my creative pursuits like writing stories with my kid or working in the studio with eight voice actors and just giggling our asses off because we're having such a great time or writing songs. Like all of this stuff is just like being a creative human. And I guess where? 19 years of experience of like, staying true to my, my creative true north and mixing that with being an entrepreneur and figuring out how do I make enough money to, to live and to pay my team. And so that's been like my journey and my quest as, as a creator of like, how do I do what I love and how do I make money doing it? And, and here I am and it's happening and I'm, I'm very grateful for that. So the lifestyle thing is, is pretty easy. My work days, especially since I left social media, is I tend to work six and a half hours a day, I mean, obviously, and I take weekends off and I take holidays. But, you know, when I'm off work and my laptop's closed, I have a journal with me. I write down my ideas, but I try not to obsess about it. When I'm off work and when I'm in my, my six to six and a half hour daily sprint, it's. I'm focused and I'm getting a lot of shit done. But you know, for me, it's like the not working time is really important for my quality of life because I have burnt the candle at both ends for plenty of years and I still feel the effects of that on my mind.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Wow. You mentioned getting off social media and this is something I want to dive into. You. When did you decide to do this? What was the catalyst and what has been the results?

[Jim]

So it's been six years. I wanted to get off three years before that because I was just, I was noticing the effects on my mind. I was noticing, I was just seeing in the world how people were changing. The ways in which we hung out, interacted, connected like it was, it was like the seams of how society interrupted or interacted were being interrupted and like dissolving. And there was this weird new way of doing things. And for me, the moment happens where I said enough is enough. As I was sitting up on a mountain on the island here I was watching this sunset and I heard this voice in my head that was already writing the post on Facebook of describing the moment I was in. And in doing that, I left the moment and was missing the magic. And my son was just born. And it was just really clear to me, like, I'm spending so much energy scrolling, I'm spending. And that energy could be with my kid. I'm spending so much time pouring content into the bottomless pit of the wall. And that content wasn't like, it wasn't leading me to the success that I was, I was striving for and so when I left, and I know we're doing a workshop coming up soon and there's a bunch about this story that I won't share here, but I will just say when I left it was both terrifying and incredibly liberating. My brain cells and how I engage in the world truly did grow back. I had to go back from the way of connecting with people on social media to picking up my damn phone and calling friends when I wanted to talk or when I wanted to hang out. I'm grateful for Mighty Networks. I started out of essentially loneliness about five years ago. I started a man venture club on the island here where every Tuesday we would get together and whatever guys show up Tuesday night, choose the adventure, we do the following week. And we've done all sorts of crazy, wonderful, creative, adventurous things over the course of the several year five years. And I've built like true and lasting brotherhood and I built a mighty network app for all of us to be able to stay connected and see what adventures are happening. And I mean it's. I just, I. Social media creeps me out. It's hijacking human consciousness like it's hijacking the way people engage. It diminishes authentic connection. And I'm just, I'm very clear that like social media could work for the betterment, but not with the way the algorithms are set up to keep people addicted to the software and to the apps. And I'm just, I know that we vote with our attention, we vote with our money. And I was really clear I wasn't voting for the world that social media was creating. And so I had to leave. And in the process of having to leave, I've had to basically this is a. An important piece is when I left. Every year on New Year's I choose a word to help me themify my year. And so year one after leaving social media, my word was relationships. And can you guess what year two was? Also relationships. I had to go back to the olden ways of building real relationships. And I can say like my wife and I and my son, like we have built a real village around our family on this island that has nothing to do with the work that I do on the Internet. And I have committed with Magic Kids to build a team of creatives from Salt Spring island so that like earlier today I have my team here at the office and we had a work party every Tuesday. So yeah, it's been life changing. It was terrifying and I had to, I had to Shift things. But my business has generated more revenue every single year since leaving social media. It did not stop me from making money doing what I love. In fact, I've made more money as a result of leaving social media without the need to have a hundred thousand people on my email list, without the need to have 10,000 followers on social media. You know, like, I've built business models that only require a small handful of partnerships that can then pay for me and my whole team to live. So that's a part of what I'll be sharing in that workshop is like, what other ways can we connect and do business without the need to be on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and all the places that you may not necessarily enjoy going?

[Bradley T. Morris]

Yeah, the workshop that Bradley's referring to here is he's coming over to teach our community at Webinar Ninja a little bit about a story about how he's been able to grow his business sans the, you know, social media monster. You brought up a really great point about that. You know that catalyst where you were looking at that beautiful vista and you were thinking about, how am I going to share this, post this, write this up? And a lot of people don't realize that, you know, they think, oh, yeah, social media, I'm in control of it. You know, I only spend about an hour on it. I'm not on, you know, I monitor my time. It's not just about the time that you're on social media on the actual apps. It's also the time it takes and robs from you when you're off the apps, talking about what you saw on social media, thinking about what you're going to post. Like, you mentioned on social media being all bent out of shape about somebody, you know, saying something that you disagree with and harboring those feelings while you're supposed to be working out in the gym. Like, it's taking your time in, even when you're not on there and even it's taking your attention and it's manipulating the way you think. And I know this sounds very kind of like global conspiracy, but. No, it actually does. It actually just the mere fact that you're thinking about things you normally would not think about if you were not exposed to, you know, these, these feeds that are built to grab your attention and get you angry and get you excited to keep you on it. Yeah, I, I took a break of social media. I got to a point where I just, like, I couldn't take it anymore. And it was just really giving me a lot of anxiety and I, I was off for about 18 months in 2017-2019 around. And I, I also did not see any dip in my business. In fact, I was forced to think of other ways to market and to be able to share my journey and build relationships like you said. And it actually cleared up my brain in a lot of ways. Yeah. And then I kind of got back into it because of certain, you know, I was doing a lot of speaking and they would require me to post and I was kind of doing all that kind of stuff. But I'm, I'm around that time again where I have that itch where it's just like, I need to, you know, I'm not even on all the platforms. You know, I'm on, you know, I'm barely on Instagram, but mainly Facebook, Twitter, blah, blah. But it doesn't, it doesn't really matter how many platforms are on. It's all kind of pick your poison kind of situation. I'm looking forward to hearing more about that in the workshop. For those of you who want to join us on that workshop, you can just sign up for our free [e-mail] and you'll become one of our members and you'll get an invite in our community, Ninja Town.

[Jim]

I'm looking forward to it. And I'll be sharing legitimate. Here's a bunch of different alternative marketing strategies that you can start implementing today that can help you grow your business and not keep you on social media. I mean, the question is like, let's just say you spend 10 hours a week on social media posting, scrolling, or thinking about it. If you eliminated that, what could you do with that 10 hours that would be more productive, more enjoyable, more connection inducing, and more revenue generating. And my guess is if you sat with that question for a couple hours, you could come up with probably 100 different ideas that would be more enjoyable than social media.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Yeah, totally. I 100% agree. My next question is usually the hardest question, and I say hard. I mean, it's a little bit of a gut check. What was a failure, a mistake? Maybe something that you did that you learned a huge lesson from in your journey in entrepreneurship that you can share with us.

[Jim]

Okay, well, I'll, I'll do two. Number one, my first business ever when I dropped out of college was T shirt biz called man shirts. Our logo was a little sperm that said man shirts. And we sold really offensive, degrading T shirts. I mean, I was, you know, 19, 20 years old when I launched that business. I spent most of my evenings in the bars. And it seemed like a really good idea at the time. What happened within the year of launching that business is I became an alcoholic and my life hit rock bottom really fast. It was just like an accelerated path to rock bottom, which also led to my own personal awakenings and transformation and realizations of like, what kind of life and path I wanted to live. So I would just say, like, be mindful of the words that you use in your life, of what you're wearing, of what you're speaking, of what you're consuming in your mind. Because I was, I was selling garbage slogans that became my own reality. So that was a big mistake. That became a very powerful life lesson about just like focusing on positive words and positive energy inside of my life and my words. And another would be, and I think this is more relevant to entrepreneurs or equally relevant to entrepreneurs. I've been coaching creators and entrepreneurs for almost a decade now, specifically building online courses, memberships, online marketing, et cetera. I've played with so many business models. One off courses, membership subscriptions, 35amonth, 99amonth. I did this experiment. This was something that I'd thought about almost obsessively for like three years. Because when we create courses at Magic Media, like we might spend three to nine months producing a course and we use entertainment as a vehicle to teach and transform. Like that's one of our shticks. And so we created this amazing library of courses and I was like, what would happen if I just like gave it away? And we did a freemium model of like we give the all these courses away and then we have, you know, some higher end masterminds and stuff. Would more people get the results? And so we announced it as a six month experiment that we were going to open. This was probably five years ago, four years ago. It was a six month experiment to give away our best stuff. And it was done from the best of intentions. But I had some markers of what would make the experiment successful. Would more people complete the courses? Would we see better case studies of people moving through the processes with the community vibe feel better and more connected? Would we get more people in our masterminds and will we get more high end partnerships for Magic media? And four out of five of those boxes failed. What we found when we opened our community and gave the best stuff away is people were less committed, they were less enrolled, they were less grateful, they were less like invested in the overall health of the entire group, of their own commitment to what they were doing to actually Completing the course, it was just like. It was astonishing. And we had, like, we grew the community to over 2000 people. There's about 2500 people during that freemium year. And the quality of communal conversations and connection was like garbage compared to when, like, now we charge. It's between 2,500, 6,000 or $12,000 a year to join our creators club. And what we have now with less people is just, like, way more connection, way more value for everybody, including the team of coaches that we have. And so for me, it was just a really beautiful lesson in, like, charge what feels like the best the people are going to come that are resonant with you, that are up for the journey. And, yeah, it was. It was a hard lesson, I guess the piece I wrote an article in my blog about this, but, like, as an intention, and this comes from living island life, is like, create an online community or membership that feels like a village. And the example I use in this article is like, the old show from the 80s and 90s, Cheers, where all the people are in the bar. There's a lovable character, Norm. And when Norm walks into the room, the whole bar stops what they're doing. They all look and they're. They all call his name, Norm. And if you can just, like, tap into the feeling of how good that would feel to walk into that bar as Norm and imagine creating a membership or a community where when you show up to a live call or when you're posting in the community, that everybody sees you, they hear you, and they celebrate you. And that is one of the lessons that I learned from trying to, like, go big. More, more more is you don't actually need more more more, more followers, more email list people, more. Etc. What you need is just, like, better, higher quality, deeper connections.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Yeah, I love it. I love it. And I love the analogy with the Cheers. And in this fictional story, if they raise the prices of the beers, people would still go into that bar because of the community, because of the way people connect. And at the end of the day, we need friends, you know, we need. Yeah, we need to socialize. We need to feel as a part of a community. We're tribal as a species. I love sharing the story because a lot of people find pricing scary. They feel like, I need to. I don't know how to, you know, charge a lot for my services or my products or maybe I shouldn't charge at all. And my favorite story about this is, you know, a lot of people. Like, I want to get as many people as Possible. So I'm going to make this free.

[Jim]

And we're back folks. It looks like Jim from sales just got in from his client lunch and he's got receipts.

[Team Member]

His next meeting is in two minutes. The team is asking, can he get through his expenses in that time?

[Jim]

He's going for it.

[Team Member]

Is that his phone?

[Jim]

He's snapping a pic. He's texting Ramp.

[Team Member]

Jim is fast, but this is unheard of.

That's it. He's done it. It's unbelievable.

[Ramp]

On ramp expenses are faster than ever. Just submit them with a text. Switch your business to ramp.com.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Tony Robbins mentor is Jim Rohn. Jim Rohn, which is kind of the founder of personal development, Modern Personal Development. And he was running these workshops in his area and he wanted to go to this workshop. He met him, he said, hey, can I, can I attend your workshop? He said, yeah, sure. It's, you know, X amount of money. And he was just like, well, I can't afford that. You know, that's like two weeks salary for me. Can you, can you let me come in for free? And this is Tony Robbins asking this, okay, like if anybody's motivated, if anybody is a poor and is going to make the most out of this situation, it would be Tony Robbins, right? But Jim Rohn told him, no, I can't put you in for free. You won't value it. You won't, you won't actually take this seriously. I need you to feel the pain of paying it so that you can extract every minute, every nugget and, and really value. It's, it's not about me making that extra ticket. It's about you taking it seriously. And Tony kind of grumbled and he was like, oh, okay, whatever, fine. And he scraped together somehow, he's a janitor at the time, living out of his car, right. And scraped together the two week salary, paid the admission, went to the workshop, learned a ton and became a student and worked for Jim Rohn as a salesperson of his programs eventually and became who he is today, Tony Robbins. But that's kind of his start and even Tony Robbins didn't get a pass. You know, like, this is the point I'm trying to make here is that like if you think that you have like these, you know, these poor people that don't, all they just need is the chance and just need your content to, just to make, to be successful and they'll love you forever. This is, this is a fantasy in our head. Like this is not something that is rooted in reality or psychology or facts. Or history or anything.

[Omar Zenhom]

Right?

[Bradley T. Morris]

So I love sharing that story because as entrepreneurs, a lot of us, we're quite generous. We want to give to the world, we want to help the world, and we feel like we're helping them by giving everything for free. It's okay to give some things for free. You know, this podcast is free. But at the same time, if you want somebody to invest and actually take action, and this is the point I try to make, they have to take action because if they don't, they won't get a result. And therefore you don't know if your stuff works. If. How are you going to get a testimony? How are you going to get a case study? How are you going to know to change your program or your content if you can't see an outcome? Right? So in order for them to have an outcome, they have to apply what you do, and they're not going to apply it if they don't take it seriously. So it's, it's a little bit of a win win for you as a business owner. So they can actually, you know, get the outcome, but also a win for them because they're going to value it big time.

[Omar Zenhom]

I.

[Bradley T. Morris]

If you look back at like when you were younger, like, I remember my first overseas trip, I scraped together all my savings so I can go to Spain and I was on a shoe drink budget. But I enjoyed that trip so much because I worked so hard to get to Spain. Right. And it does. So many memories. I have vivid images in my head and I took no pictures, you know, like, I didn't. It was. This is 2000, right. So it wasn't that easy. But I love the fact that you shared these insights and these stories. I have one more question, Bradley, that I want to, I want to ask you as we wrap up moving forward. You know, you're about to enter your 40s. You know, you've been doing this for quite some time. You know, do you have a vision for your business where you start to step back a little bit? Maybe you're thinking about early retirement? Or is it, you know, I want to be fully involved until I croak.

[Omar Zenhom]

Right?

[Bradley T. Morris]

Let me, let me, I want to hear what, what are you thinking about in terms feature?

[Jim]

So what, in my 40th year, I'm gonna qualify for the Canadian Tour for pro golf. And that's right now I'm on the ramp of making myself as obsolete as possible with operations of both magic media and magic kids. With what I'm. So where magic media is growing is like Magic kids like my son's 6 if we have another child and that helps us to stay in the kid genre. But he's already, you know, on the path of outgrowing what we've created. So we'll be moving into preteen and teen. If anybody listens to our audio [e-mail] then you'll see our stories are movies for the ears. They're audio movies. So I'm one step away from writing and producing movies right now. My future will be full time writing, writing stories, writing movies, writing audio movies, writing books and producing, producing music, producing movies, producing audio stories. Like I love the creative process of writing and producing the executive producing stuff that I do. I could live without that. I could definitely, like, I'm good at it. I can, as I said, I can see a full, all the thousand steps to get to a desired destination. I can live without that mental operation in my head. Yeah, yeah. But like I'm already, I'm paving the way for myself to be able to step back and play pro golf, be a full time writer, producer. And I mean I want to, I want to buy a ranch and just convert a barn into production playhouse with like a full green screen space, a full music production space and event space and to be able to like host world class musicians, artists, teachers, creators and people to come like come make your magic here. And so this is a stepping stone where I am right now towards that. That is definitely where my heart is and I imagine that's going to be the, the chapter I get to live when I get into my 40s and I'm definitely like, we're on the, the ramp there. I can see it, I feel it. It's every day I'm taking actions towards that reality.

[Bradley T. Morris]

I love the fact that you are planning to be a pro athlete at 40 and that, you know, you're working towards that. You're making sure that you're on track. A lot of people don't realize that, you know, these are possibilities, these are things that you can do if you want to. You know, it just takes a bit of prep, a bit of planning and, and, and just focus and dedication and you can get a lot more time back if you get off social media as you did, so.

[Jim]

Exactly.

[Bradley T. Morris]

I love it. I love it. Bradley, thank you so much for being on the show. It was great chatting with you, learning about you a little bit more, but also just understanding a different perspective of how to do business that is conducive to your creativity, to the things that you Enjoy to your lifestyle. And I think that we all have the ability to craft a business around things we love, and I think we sometimes forget that. We sometimes forget that this is your choice. And I think you. You gave us a really strong reminder. So thank you so much for that.

[Jim]

Thanks for the fun questions. I mean, I feel like this is. I should be paying you for the therapy of just getting to talk. So I really appreciate just, like, trusting me to come share some stories. And I hope people have gleaned some inspiration or some. Some ideas for an experiment in your own life or business that you've been possibly thinking of, but maybe overthinking and maybe you should just try it for three months and see how it goes.

[Bradley T. Morris]

Yeah, I'm confident they did. Thanks so much, Bradley Morris, for being here.

[Jim]

Thank you.

[Omar Zenhom]

I thoroughly enjoyed this conversation with Bradley because he forced me to start seeing things a little bit differently, to have a new perspective on how I build out my day, how I build out my business, how I build out my role in my business, to make sure that I'm doing it in a way that feeds me and makes me feel fulfilled. If I'm better for it, then the business will be better for it. One of the things that I wanted to highlight is he's made a lot of revenue in licensing his content, his products, his work. Licensing is the closest thing to absolute passive income. This is why I wanted to bring on experts to talk about a little bit more, because we don't cover it so much on this podcast. That's why last Monday, if you want to check out that episode we had Stephen Key talking about how to license your business idea. This is a different iteration where you actually create content and then you license it to a distributor or somebody who actually can use that content. I've done this several times myself in my business, and it's very much like writing a book. You create content, you give it up, you license it to that business, that organization, that app, and you get residual income, you get royalties on that work. But for me, there's another upside to it. It's distribution. It's getting your work out there. They have a big audience that is exposing you to that audience, and they can check you out. Google, you find your other products and services, and it's like indirect marketing. Yeah. You can't track it precisely, but it's definitely a strong tool for brand awareness. Also, if you've been on that edge of wanting to quit social media, Bradley's done it successfully. In fact, I was so intrigued by that part of the conversation we had speak to our community at Webinar Ninja. All our members got to attend that workshop where he walks you through how you can transition out of social media so it's not part of your business and you can earn revenue and market your business in different ways. Things that he has done. And that was really eye open workshop because he made us do an exercise where he said, how many hours are you actually on social media? Whether it's personal business, whatever it is, and most people sit around 10 hours a week. Now that's pretty conservative and it's probably more than that. But let's say it's 10 hours a week. Then he asks, you need to find out how much money you're actually making on social media. How many sales are attributed to social media? Let's say that number is $300 a week. That means your time on social media is earning you $30 an hour. Is that hourly rate good enough for you? If not, maybe it's not worth you trying to be everywhere all the time on social media. It was a really eye opening exercise and I wanted to share it with you here on the podcast that wraps up today's episode. Thank you so much for listening to the Hundred Dollar MBA show. If you love what you hear, don't forget to hit follow on your favorite podcast app. Whether it's Apple podcasts, Stitcher, Radio, Spotify, we're on them all. Go ahead and hit follow so you don't miss an episode. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. I like to meet and be surrounded with different types of people. I don't have to agree with everything they say. I don't have to do exactly what they do. But when I meet interesting people, I become more interesting. I learn new things, I get a fresh perspective, I question my own ideas, I start implementing new ideas. I highly encourage you to make an effort to meet new and interesting people as much as possible. Go to meetups, go to local events, go to conferences. You know somebody online say, hey, let's do a virtual coffee over a video call is not going to happen by itself. You have to make an effort and boy, does that ever pay off. I love it because it allows me to enrich my life, enrich my experiences with fresh ideas. Thanks so much for listening and I'll check you in tomorrow's episode. I'll see you then. Take care.

[Jim]

And we're back, folks. It looks like Jim from sales just got in from his client lunch and he's got receipts.

[Team Member]

His next meeting is in two minutes. The team is asking, can he get through his expenses in that time?

[Jim]

He's going for it.

[Team Member]

Is that his phone?

[Jim]

He's snapping a pic. He's texting around.

[Team Member]

Jim is fast, but this is unheard of.

That's it. He's done it. It's unbelievable.

[Ramp]

On ramp, expenses are faster than ever. Just submit them with a text. Switch your business to ramp.com.