Escaping the Drift with John Gafford - Building Discipline, Leadership, and Business Success – Leo Climaco

Episode Date: March 31, 2026

In this episode, John Gafford sits down with Leo Climaco to discuss the mindset, discipline, and leadership principles required to build success in business and in life.Leo shares his journey, the lessons he’s learned through entrepreneurship, and the standards he holds himself to when it comes to growth, leadership, and personal accountability. From developing a strong work ethic to navigating challenges and setbacks, this conversation highlights what it really takes to build something meaningful over the long term.Together, John and Leo dive into the importance of surrounding yourself with the right people, staying focused on your mission, and maintaining the discipline required to push forward when things get difficult. Leo also shares insights on leadership, personal development, and how entrepreneurs can elevate both their mindset and their daily habits.Whether you're building a business, working to improve your leadership skills, or striving to become a stronger and more disciplined version of yourself, this episode offers valuable insights and real-world perspectives from someone who understands the process.If you're ready to think bigger, execute with more discipline, and grow as a leader, this conversation delivers powerful takeaways you can apply immediately.💬 Did you enjoy this podcast episode? Tell us all about it in the comment section below! ☑️  If you liked this video, consider subscribing to Escaping The Drift with John Gafford *************💯 About John Gafford: After appearing on NBC's "The Apprentice", John relocated to the Las Vegas Valley and founded several successful companies in the real estate space.➡️ The Gafford Group at Simply Vegas, top 1% of all REALTORS nationwide in terms of production. Simply Vegas, a 500 agent brokerage with billions in annual sales Clear Title, a 7-figure full-service title and escrow company.*************✅ Follow John Gafford on social media:Instagram ▶️ / thejohngaffordFacebook ▶️ / gafford2🎧 Stream The Escaping The Drift Podcast with John Gafford Episode here:Listen On Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/7cWN80gtZ4m4wl3DqQoJmK?si=2d60fd72329d44a9Listen On Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/escaping-the-drift-with-john-gafford/id1582927283 *************#EscapingTheDrift #Podcast #LeoClimaco #Entrepreneurship #Leadership #Mindset #BusinessGrowth #PersonalDevelopment #EntrepreneurMindset #SuccessHabits #BusinessPodcast #Motivation #SelfMastery #LeadershipDevelopmentSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

And now, escaping the drift, the show designed to get you from where you are to where you want to be. I'm John Gafford, and I have a knack for getting extraordinary achievers to drop their secrets to help you on a path to greatness. So stop drifting along, escape the drift, and it's time to start right now. Back again, back again for another episode of the podcast, what like it says in the opening man gets you from where you are to where you want to go. and today, live in studio, flown in right all the way from the sunny beaches of Florida, Fort Lauderdale anyway, this is a guy who was an entrepreneur in his own right, but has used the medium that we're on right now podcasting to help other people establish their authority and build their brand.

And I thought it'd be interesting to talk about kind of the mechanics and the inner workings of podcasting because if it's something that you've ever considered doing, man, this is probably a guy you want to talk to. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to this. This is Leo Clamaco. Leo. Hi, John. How are you, buddy? Good, man.

Good to see you. Thanks for coming in. Thank you. Thanks for coming in. So let's talk a little bit about like your background, obviously, because you're an entrepreneur by your own, right? What business did you guys really cut your teeth on and what, where, where is the basis for this starting? So my background background is really in IT.

Okay. I was an IT manager, IT director for a very long time. I used to manage home offices for hedge fund billionaires. I worked for three-demeaners. different home offices. And I consider that really my college education. Okay. Being around those guys, right, taking in like a sponge. Eventually, I got to a place where I'm like, you know what, I want to be these guys. I don't want to be working for them. So at the time, it was 2015. I took a year off in 2016. I was like, honey, you're going to take on the load for a whole year

and I'm going to try to build companies. And let's see how that goes. Let's see what you get. I built two companies, failed miserably, spent a ton of money. Okay, don't run by that. What were the companies you tried to build? So I tried to build an app company called Innovative Apps. This was back in 2016.

And what was the mission of innovative apps? It was to build mobile apps for businesses. Okay. That was the goal. There was a lot of that going around back then. Yes. Why did it fail? Because I had no clue what I was doing.

and I spent too much money on the wrong things. Okay, talk about that. What do you mean you spend too much money? So I was too concerned with actually having a company, actually having a logo, actually having a name, then actually focusing on the product and how I'm going to deliver it. So made the company incorporated, made a logo, made a website,

spent all this money on the, what I think is now on the artificial part of it, but really didn't test the idea. I didn't test if people actually wanted when I was going to sell. Market fit is the most important part. That's the important part of the equation. I tell people all the time, I have a hundred thousand dollar bottle of vitamins sitting on my desk for the same reason. Exactly. You know, if you're, look, if you're listening to this and you're out there and you have some miraculous idea that's going to change the world, maybe throw it out there and see if anybody actually wants to buy it before you get in the business of building a logo and a website for the company.

Sell the idea first. Well, I think that's, you know, that's the best thing that people don't realize that Kickstarter did was it really is this super incubator to see if your idea is a good idea. Correct. Like, if you have a product, you need to start a Kickstarter with a social media campaign to see if anybody wants to pre-order it before it's even made. Right. A lot of people don't realize a lot of those products on Kickstarter, what you're seeing them

run around with in the cool flashy videos is probably held together with duct tape and super glue. and probably doesn't really work. Right. It's just let's see if this is something we should invest all the R&D money into making it work and getting that done. So you try to do an app business because, of course, you go from IT to app, of course. Exactly. That makes sense, right? Nobody wanted to buy it.

So how did you, let's walk through that. And no, I'm not trying to beat you up over your feelings. I just find there's way more education that comes out of people's failures. Yes. I know in my life there is way more education that comes out of your failures than comes out of your successes, right? Right. So how did you, how did you go about trying to market this? Once you get your website up, you got your stuff off. You're like, I'm going to make a gazillion dollars selling apps to companies. And then what happened? So I focused heavy on SEO at the time as Google was big. I don't think, I don't think Facebook ads were a thing back then. I think it was just starting. So I got to a place where I thought that it was too hard. and I didn't want to do it anymore. So I pivoted.

And I completely, so I bought this course. It was a drop shipping course. Okay, a lot of that. A lot of that. So I quickly pivoted into drop shipping. I began drop shipping high-end espresso machines from Italy. Okay. It actually worked.

Well, at least that's interesting, more interesting to just throwing up an Amazon store. Exactly. Give me five grand and I'll put up an Amazon store. and you'll make millions. Right. There was a lot of that. So I built a full Shopify store and I actually made some money. I sold maybe a dozen machines before I ran fully out of money and had to go back to work.

Okay. And got a nine to five again. So when you say you ran out of money, so let's go back because this was a, and believe me, there's some great businesses that are built off pivoting, right? Some unbelievable businesses that off that of my $100,000. bottle of vitamins that I told you about earlier, that wound up in a weird sort of way, because my sister, it was my partner that business, had to take a consulting gig, led to a very successful insurance company in Florida.

Okay. Because just off of a consulting gig should get to try to keep this afloat, it was like, whoa, we need to be doing this. And so hard pivots can work. Yes. They can work. But when you made that pivot from one to the other to drop shipping, so how much one way did you have left? Like, like, how much runway did you give yourself? Because a lot of reason.

Great question. Well, a lot of people fail in business because they don't understand burn rate and they don't understand runway. So. And I didn't. You didn't at that point. I did not understand what that meant. Today I do. So looking back, I gave myself no runway. I gave myself, I don't know, three months, basically like either you make it or you get a job. Or that's what it is. That's what it was. So it's based on time. For those of your listeners that don't know those concepts, hopefully you all do, burn rate is the amount of money that the business is going to go through in any given period, a month, a quarter, whatever it is, without making a nickel. If not one nickel comes in, this is just what it's going to cost to keep the lights on. And then runway is how much cash you have

and how many months of that you have. Correct. We would call it the personal life, moles or months of life in my buck is what I call it. But yeah, you need to understand that intimately and know because a lot of businesses don't make a dollar for a while and how long can you go. And that's kind of the startup math is how long do I have before I run out of money? And what is the Delta comparison between that and how long I think it's going to take to actually start getting sales? Correct. And that is the math that is the make or break on any good startup. Exactly.

And you are used that. No, not at all. Because you didn't know. I had no clue. All right. Because look, hey, man, we take our alums in business. Exactly. We learn and go forward.

So that, you ran out of money. Yeah. Which, hey, man, happens to all of us at one point. I like to say if you don't go broke at least once or twice in your life, you're not entrepreneurial hard enough. I agree. There you go. So you did that and then you went out and you...

Back to IT. Back to IT. Okay. So this is January 2017. Okay. I'm back in IT. I went back to IT for two more years until 2019. In those two years, my wife became a license board certified behavior analyst.

Okay. She has a license from the state of... New York to modify behaviors. So at the time, she worked for now our competitors. And she didn't like how they paired the therapist and there was no caring in how they paired the therapist and the client. It was just you're a body, you're able, go. You're available. There's the need. Exactly. A plus B. We didn't like that. So we came together and we're like, why don't we build the company around everything you hate about the companies that you currently work for? So we did that. So we, you're sitting in a company just like that.

That's where this company was more good. Yeah. So we handhold our clients through the entire process. We take longer to hire, but we hire the right person that's going to stay with your family and build that trust and relationship. So we are currently one of the top rated therapy agencies in New York for autism. And how do you, so how do you go about matching though? You said that was the biggest problem. Correct.

So how do you go about matching? It's a great question. My wife thoroughly, thoroughly, thoroughly interviews. There's a very harsh interview process. You've got to fill out like an exam type. And then there's three rounds of interviews. So we do an interview with a supervisor, then with my wife, then with my wife and the family to make sure that everyone's on the same page. There are times if the therapist has to go in school, we'll do my wife, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the,

the future employee and the school to make sure that everyone's on the same page. I would just think, just in the short time we've been talking, I would think with your tech background and with that idea, why would you guys not build a platform that works similar to likematch.com where you have a very thorough onboarding, onboarding with the clients as far as the needs that they have, and then you have this, and then use AI and algos to match them in a way that makes sense.

It's a great idea. Never thought of it. Well, I'm just saying it's a good. Because now, you know, now you can use that as software as a service that you could trademark. There's somebody out here or somebody listening to this like bang a trademark paperbook on that idea right now. But yeah, now you can go into a software as, you know, software as a service business and scale. I might look into that. Yeah.

So anyway. All right. So we're doing well. We're doing well with autism. Yes. So let me ask you this. And I think this is a poignant question right now because literally today I was watching this. And because you're in the business, obviously your wife is is the brains behind it.

Yeah. No shame there. My wife's about a lot of what I got. Zero shame. So I love it. Yeah, right. It's a great thing. But I was watching today, you know, the hearing with Tim Walts. Yes. In front of the House Judiciary or House Committee, whatever, whatever it was. And they were talking about the math of it where I want to say the U.S. government spent a million dollars in 2017 for kids with autism. It's what they spent on programs. And then through the fraud that's happening there now, I think they spent $320,000. million last year. And then they were talking about what percentage of kids have autism. And they were saying there's 5.6 million people in Minnesota. 1.8 million of those people is below, is below that. And then below that again, you have one in 36 kids that are on the spectrum. So if you figured it out, it was like some insane number they were spending per kid of how it was. So when you're dealing with your services in New York, right? And I'm just curious. is how much of it is privately funded through people and how much is through insurance and how much of it,

how much of it is through grants? I'm just curious. So we, and I'm not at all applying you're doing anything unscrupulous. 100%. Okay. So we only work with the city of New York. We used to do insurance, but insurance is not the best route to help families, unfortunately. They don't want to pay. They don't want to provide the right service, insurances, which sucks. It really does, because most people are only able to get service through insurance. So we made a bold call and we only work with the DOE of New York. So we service the DOE kids of New York City in school and at home. Are you,

I'm paid by the city. Is your business at risk right now with the budget crisis that New York is going through? I don't think so. And I'll tell you why. Because my clients won a lawsuit. So it wasn't. like, oh, let's create this program to fund these kids. No, these parents sued the city and won a lawsuit.

Okay. And now they're getting all this money to help their kid because their kid was being left behind by the system. So this isn't considered an optional program to the city. No. No. Is judiciary, judiciously, they're bound to do it. Correct.

I'd say judiciary. I'm not sure what I just said. But it made sense. I knew what you made. Yeah. For those of you guys are listening. I woke up today feeling a little like I'm getting a cold a little bit. So if I say some random words that don't make anything,

please don't slaughter me in the comments. Yes, I'm running at like 82% today. But my 82% still pretty good. So yeah, I say something crazy. Just to connect everything for you. Yeah. I learned the value of trust and authority through my therapy agency. Fair.

Okay. I saw the mistakes I made with my previous two companies. which was I had no trust. I had no credibility. People didn't know who I was. I wanted to sell you a product before you even knew me or liked me. And it took me a long time to really understand that. But I got it.

And that's where podcasting came in, right? Because, okay, I figured what's the best way for me to introduce myself and get you to know who I am, how I think, how I function? Podcasting was that avenue for me. So it's giving me a lane where I can be in your ear daily 30, 60 minutes, building trust, building authority. That's really where that was born. Yeah, I think, you know, for me, it's funny how this all started was, you know, I have a group of friends. And when I first started doing this, I did it with two other guys.

I did it with my buddy Colt, my buddy Chris. And it kind of was born from, you know, we would be out and just, you know, just goofing around with each other in a bar somewhere where we were. And, you know, people would be like, oh, my God, you guys are so funny. This is hilarious. Blah, blah, blah. And it was like, my sister's in broadcasting has been forever. And it kind of became an excuse to just kind of get together. So I was like, you know, I'll throw a studio together. And obviously, the one you're sitting in today is much different than what we started with. But we threw it up just to kind of get together and have fun. Yeah. And it's kind of how Joe started also. Yeah, we just did it because we just

We just wanted to kind of have a clubhouse and have mics running. We were talking about nonsense. And the early shows, if you ever want to go look back and look at the power move, there were some, there were some interesting things that were talked about on those shows. But what I found was, as those guys, you know, life happens. It's, these are busy guys that have serious careers. And sometimes it's hard to make that commitment to always be in the same place at the same time.

And so we started having guests on. And when I started having guests on, you know, I started learning. much from these people that came through and really learning about them and what they had. And I always seem to start walking away from every podcast. Like, dude, I got to do that. Or that's a really good nugget or this and that. And so I kind of wanted to lean on that, which is why we changed this format, which was really, you know, trying to help people and get information out as much as we can for folks.

But I agree with you on the fact that when you were talking about like getting no, you know, if you want authority in your space, this is a great medium. Because people can find you and they can really kind of get to know what you're all about. Exactly. And there's no better client interaction I ever have, whether it's with an actual real estate client or it's with an agent that's coming to work for us when they walk in and they say, oh, I feel like I know you. That's the greatest feeling.

It's the best. It's the best. So give me your formula for somebody out there that's thinking about starting a podcast. I want to hear what your formulas. It's a good idea. Okay. So the first thing, you got to figure out who you're talking to. I think it's very important.

When I first began, I was very broad. I was just talking to anybody, right? Then I had to like really hone in on one message. Who am I talking to? That's really, step one. Two, you don't need fancy equipment. Grab your phone, buy a light on, on Amazon, and start. Right?

And you haven't really done much until you do at least 50 episodes. Yeah. Okay, I'll agree with that. Keep going. I was going to say 100, but I think 50's a good number. I think, well, okay, so I tell people that ask me when they're like, okay, I want to start a podcast. I'm like, okay, cool. Don't post anything at all until you get 10. Because you probably know the math because this is your business and how people get it started. What's the math on podcast that fell? 12. 12 episodes. If you get past 12, you'll stick with it. If you get 12, if you've done more than 12 episodes, you're at the top 1%. 1%. Right.

So how many people start this and just get border away? The majority. Yeah, the majority. More than the majority. Very, very few, go past 15 episodes. Yeah. I mean, I would say, you know, 99. And like, we're in this room, right?

We're in this podcast studio that's beautiful and it's all state of the art and everything we have here is awesome. We can start that way, but we got this way. Right. But this room is, like, we have 5858 really. study just to work for us. Wow. And this room is free for them to use whenever they want.

Do they? No. You'll have people that will come in, some of them. I don't want to say all of them. The majority of people will come in. Like, they'll shoot market update content. They'll shoot content like that. It's great and it's wonderful.

But I don't feel that they're taking advantage of it in the way that they should because, again, the purpose of this is so people can know, like, and trust you. And I think people get, I think, I think the camera comes on and people get freaked out. And they're just kind of, I don't know what to do with my hands. And they start, you know, I don't know if I look dumb. You know, they judge themselves too harsh. Too harsh. So when somebody comes to you, right, says, I want to do this.

How do you get them over that home? So repetition. It's the only way. I got to put you in front of a camera and ask you questions over and over and over again. So you break that fear. It's the only way, right? So we do camera training where I bring you in. We have a set of questions that we ask you and we go through it to really get you comfortable and get you talking.

Right. The other part of it is forget the camera. Look at me. Yeah. It's just you and me here. Forget the camera. Forget the lights. Yeah.

Right? Just two guys having a conversation. Yep. That's my story. I tell people all the time. And they're like, oh, you know, I get nervous. And I'm like, okay, listen. As somebody that was on a reality TV show many years ago.

Which one? I was on The apprentice. You were on The apprentice. Yeah. but you're living on a television set, right? And there's dudes like with the big cameras. Like this is not like the little handles. There's the big cameras right in front of you

and a boom mic over your head all day long. And that's crazy. When you start that, it was funny because the guy was like, you won't even see these people in three days. Like the first day or two will be weird, but after three days you won't, they'll become a nuisance to you. Like you have to wait for them to get to do what they're doing.

So you can do what you need to do. Right. But you're not even going to think about that as, I'm being filmed. Like, you won't even see it anymore. Yeah. Which is why, if you wonder why people say crazy shit on reality shows, that's why. Because you literally forget the cameras are there.

Right. You forget. You don't care. It's a point where you're like, fuck it. Excuse me. Can you guys right here? No, yeah, you're fine. So somebody's totally in their head about it.

Like, what do you say to him? What do you say? Take a deep breath. Okay. It's not that serious. Okay. Looking at a camera. So we are here to get your clientele to like you and trust you.

If you don't show confidence, you're not going to make money. We're here to make money. I need you to be your best version. Take a deep breath, look at the camera, speak the words. It's really it. You know, I'm able to make people comfortable. I have a stabilizing energy where I'm really able to give you the confidence that you need to execute. I'm really good at that.

Yeah, you know what's really interesting that I didn't, I mean, you would think with all the camera gear, we're always looking at and everything we're looking to buy. You would think I would have seen this before. I'd never seen it until yesterday. But they were saying, I saw a video on Instagram. It was like, do you ever wonder how they get those Netflix style interviews from people? Yes. A random people. Yeah. And have you seen this thing that they use? So like, obviously, if you've ever read from a teleprompter, you understand there's a piece of glass there. Of course. And then there's a reflection. Yes. And you're reading the words, but the camera's behind the glass, so you can't see it. Correct. They have this thing that's like a half circle that goes

in front of the camera. So the interviewer can be off at a 90 degree angle. Interesting. But the person in front of them is seeing the reflection of their face directly behind the camera and reflection. And so the camera's shooting right through the middle of the reflection of their face from the side. And that's how, because I'm always wondering like, you know, I have these people that are used to doing presentations, are used to doing all of these things. And they're like, you put them in front of a camera and it's like, they just get sucked into it and to get lost. And so, you know, my advice is if you're having trouble talking to a camera, put a piece of glass in front of it and talk to yourself,

but something in front of it that's going to cause a reflection that you can see you instead of that. But I was like, man, should we buy one of these things? This thing's got awesome. Very cool. I look into it. Yeah, I'd never seen it before. Yeah. It's really cool. I do think that most people who are ready to really showcase themselves, they'll quickly get through it. Yeah. You know? Well, I think, too, you know, one of the things about doing solo pods is a whole other thing, dude. You see like, you see like Ben Shapiro and those guys. And early on, I would do like a solo pod once a week. That to me was so difficult. Like, it's just so hard because I, like I have a newsletter that goes on. I love writing my newsletter,

but I have time to think about that and time to craft that. And it's succinct and it's to the point. When I'm doing a solo pod or when I was doing them, I like, I would think I'm trying to fill 15 minutes here. and you're trying to stretch thoughts out. And I just felt like I was becoming redundant. Did you script it? Yes and no. I mean, for me, I, I'm better not scripted. I'm better like, like, give me the bullet points of what I want to get to.

Right. And then I'll get through it. And I don't usually have a problem with that. There's certain things that we obviously do that have to be scripted. Yeah. When we're shooting ads and things like that, certain things we have to go to the teleprompter. I don't necessarily like it, though, because I think when people are on a teleprompter, I think it diminishes their personality to me. I think you lose a little bit of

them. And I think it becomes, I think it's for me when I'm watching video, in most cases, it's painfully obvious when people are reading. I agree. It requires practice. It does. Yeah. To not, to not look that way. Correct. And then because the issue becomes, I don't know how, like, I've never had a teleprompter I can get the right, exactly right speed. I've just, you're trying to click and adjust it yourself. And there's always some level at some point, of dragging or speeding. Yeah. You know, like you're like, and today it's simply Vegas.

We're going to talk about this because we, and it's like, there's just random out of nowhere speed. And I think people pick up on that as a subconscious level. I bought these new AI glasses. They're called the G2s. Okay. Okay. They have a lens in each glass where it projects a green screen in front of you.

Okay. There's an app on your phone where you can add a whole script and use the glasses as teleprompter. Oh, wow. Yeah. So I was testing it out. Actually, brought it with me to Vegas, but not to hear. It works very, very well, but the camera can see your eyes moving.

Yeah, that's the problem. That's the issue. Yes. Right? Like, it's got to be, for me, teleprompters have to be just far enough away to where I can kind of lose focus on one spot but still read it. Right. They're too close to you and you're left or right. I hate that.

I know what you mean. But here's the thing, though, but any more, depending on what you're doing. You can use apps like, hey, Jen, or even the captions app or any of those apps. Yeah. And you can steady your eyes. A lot of people don't know that either. So if you're here, if you're hearing this and you're worried about your eyes, you can actually, when you go edit, you can fix your eyes.

They don't move. And they don't look dead or anything. You still blow. Post production, right? Yeah. You can fix that stuff in post. Yeah, for sure. So let me ask you this.

Please. Like you said you don't need a lot of high end equipment on the front end to get going. You don't. How important is the production? I think audio is way more. important the video because you'll watch a bad video with good audio, but you won't watch a bad audio. No, you will never listen to a bad audio.

You will never. We have, okay, so when you do remotes, which I try not to do, we do them because obviously there's good guests we want to get on the company. I rarely ever do it. Yeah, if it's somebody I'm really interested in, I'll do a remote. But I'll have people pop up and we have really good software to do it. But if they pop up and I don't see a mic, we're over. Really?

Oh, we send them a minimum. And we're like, okay, you got to have a real, you need to send us a gear list of what you're using on your end. Because so many people think they're just going to talk into a MacBook. Right. Or AirPods. Or AirPods. And like, think about that.

You're going to have shit quality. Yeah, somebody's going to be driving down the road trying to listen to this. It's going to be terrible. It's like being on a call that's about to drop. Right. You know what I mean? Nobody, nobody wants to do that. So for us, I agree.

You know, the video stuff is fine, but the audio is everything. Correct. You've got to invest money on some good microphones. Yeah. And you can get decent mics for relatively cheap. expensive. No, $300, you buy a microphone. Yeah. So let's say you're starting out, when you coach people, is this, do you handle everything for them end to end? I do. What do you do? Okay. So you guys, you'll hand, if they send you your footage, if you, if you, we bring you to my

studio. We do a two-day intensive. Okay. We'll fly you out as a hotel across the street. We'll put you on a hotel and we do a two-day intensive. I line up eight to 10 interviews for you. Okay. Already. So you leave with 90 days worth of content and 10 podcast interviews. already recorded. Oh, wow. Yeah. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. So we like, you know, we put the rocket chip to you and we, yeah, there's nowhere to hide. No, we're doing this. We're doing this. Exactly. I love that because somebody people just talk about doing stuff and they don't actually do it. You're doing it. We're doing it. Yeah. So if you're far away, we'll try to schedule either,

either you come back every three months or I'll help you set up a podcast in your home, in your office, whatever it may be, so you can continue. And there's plenty of studios you can all Plenty, plenty. But I tried to make it cost effective because that can get expensive as well. So how do you handle the editing for people when they're shooting remote? They will upload it to us through Google Drive

and we'll edit it for them. Okay. Yeah, that's one problem that. It's nice to have an in-house editor, I'll say that. Yes. Because we're shooting 4K, and these are big files.

Oh, they're huge. They're huge. And when you start uploading them to Ice Drive or wherever you go, and then you're trying to get them down, and that's fine. Whatever discovers a solution for this is going to make a whole lot of money.

You know, it's just about the bandwidth, man. It's what it is. I mean, these are big files. Can we try to compress them and you can't compress them down? And when people come in today, like you're going to use a studio today, we're not going to send you out with 4K, we're going to send you out with 1080p, which it would be great. But it'll be all the files there because they're just too big to do them any other way.

It's crazy. But yeah. So editing stuff. A lot of people, you know, get freaked out about editing. So obviously you handle that form or do you teach them how to? No, no, no, we're the whole thing for you. We've been post for you. We'll create thumbnails, captions, post our social media, do the whole thing for you.

Here's a question because I feel like, and I'm watching this a lot because we do, you know, we post a lot of podcast content. And I'm getting ready to shift from posting all of the escaping the drift podcast content. I'm going to build, I'm going to build its own Instagram presence, its own TikTok presence. It just posted all there. Because I think that what's happened with the algorithms. versus on your own page. Holy smokes.

Yeah, because what's happened is I confuse the hell out of our algorithms. Because they're like, is this dude talking about, you know, Afghanistan? Is this dude talking about real estate? What is this guy?

Like, it is this hodgepodge of everything without realizing what we're really trying to do. So it doesn't, like I don't get nearly the mileage pushed out in front of people that I used to. And I think it's because they've really drilled down on nichey type stuff. Right.

So just talking to my strategist, We're like, we probably need to move all of this stuff over to its own channel and let it do its thing. Obviously, YouTube has its own channel. You don't blend it there. Why would you blend it on your social? Makes sense. So I think that's what we're going to try to do. What do you recommend people as far as a strategy for getting the most bang for the buck when they post this stuff?

To start off, if you have a large following, I like to piggyback off of that. Sure. Right? To build that momentum. But eventually, I agree. Build your own Instagram page for your professional. content for your podcast or your business or whatever it is. You have to split it.

Because you can always share it. You can always drive track. You can always collaborate it 100%. Yeah, you can always do that stuff. Yeah. It's just you really can, I've gotten to the point now where I'm confusing the hell out of the algorithms, which is a bad thing to do. The algorithm, now it's really niching down, right?

It wants consistency. Yeah, it does. What do you think makes a good podcast? A good host. What makes a good host? H hoodie. Tall hair, 82% feeling. No, again, that's a no sense.

Yes. No, I would say someone open-minded, someone willing to hold space properly, and someone willing to know when to pull those threads. Yeah. I think that's one of the most important things. And I think a huge problem with kind of society as it sits right now is everybody wants to exist in an echo chamber.

Everybody wants to just listen to the same people that believe the same shit they do and regurgitates the exact... Lower red, left, right. And you're being served it. Your algorithm on your... your phone is like, oh, what does this dude link? You know, this guy wants to live in the woods and go off grid and, you know, they're a tinfoil hat. Well, that's all we're going to give you all day long. And so you reinforce that behavior. I think a good host for me is somebody that's willing to,

like you said, be open to new ideas and question everything. I don't, I don't, I think when you do this and you meet as many people as you do doing this particular form of media, it forces you to open your eyes a little bit and kind of be like, okay, maybe what would it take for me to, what would it take for my in this to not be accurate, right? And you get a little more open to it, which I think is going to and try to book people of all sorts. Now, I have seen a couple of people that I know and like recently, and I'm not going to name names, but they've turned to Jerry Springer behind a microphone. Like, I mean, I saw something, I saw something posted today by one of my friends that was remit, it was somebody essentially, and I never talk smack about anybody in the room.

I don't let people talk smack about it in this room. I just think that's, I think it's lazy. Yeah. But this, this person I know posted a video that was remixed by a person that was the person that was, the person the video was talking shit about them. Got it. And then they took the video and remixed it. Got it. And here's the problem. I think the person originally posted the video probably looks at that as a win. Yeah. And that sucks. Yeah. That, that sucks that you're going to let somebody sit here and defame another person to get clicks and views. That sucks. I mean, that, it really bothered me to the point where I'm probably going to call that person, now that I'm thinking about it out loud, probably going to call them this afternoon and be like,

bro, what are you doing? Like, what are you doing? Just to play devil's advocate, do you think there's any benefit to doing that? No. To tear in somebody? Dude, listen, number one, anybody that wants to tear anybody else down, especially publicly in front of a microphone on a camera, it's because you're not tearing them up. You're tearing them down, which means you perceive them as high.

higher on the social status than you are. You got some eagle problems. So yeah, anytime somebody starts trying to rip somebody else down publicly like that, it's because it ain't about this person. It's about you. They feel challenged. It's about you.

It's about them being a reflection of something you're lacking in your own, in your own self. So, no, I don't think there's ever a place for that. Do I think there's a place to challenge ideas? Do I think there's a place to maybe, um,

do I think there's a place to, you know, obviously challenging ideas in that sort of things. And you can say like, hey, I heard this person say this. and I just, you know, I see it differently. This is maybe I'll see it.

When you start attacking somebody personally, which this was a very personal, like saying this person who's an absolute savage in business was just full of shit. Wow. And I was like, where is this coming from? And they got eviscerated by the actual person. Absolutely viscerated.

But I don't see that as a win, man. I see that is, is that really what we need? Like, I think people get so, like, that's one of the things I'm going to tell people.

And hopefully you're telling people this too. stay the course. Like you said, why do this? Because you want to be known like and trusted. Exactly. Like, I know who Jerry Springer is.

I wouldn't trust that dude to tell my story. I wouldn't trust that dude to be on a mic for him because I know that, you know, that obviously he's gone now. But, you know, the whole format of that show was to exploit you for clicks. Exactly.

That was the whole purpose of that. It's kind of like that, you know, you look at the, the Dr. Phil thing. That was the original. Yeah, he was the original.

doing it. And then Dr. Phil takes a lot of heat because he's like, are you really trying to help people? Or you're just trying to exploit these problems because, you know, I think originally he probably wanted to help people. Right. But then you got a producer that's like, hey, we're going to get canceled. We don't get ratings. So it gets a little more extreme, a little more extreme, a little more extreme. And I think people forget, they lose sight of what they're trying to really do through this media. Yeah. Is it really about helping people? Is about building credibility is about building a network of people or is it about chasing clicks and likes and views. Which is why the first thing I tell a client is that, look, if you're looking to

become a successful podcast influencer, I'm not your guy. It's not what I'm building you for. I am building you to build authority, trust within your audience and your niche. And your niche. Correct. Yeah. If you're the best coin operated vending machine repair guy, we're going to make you worldwide known within the people that are looking for the best vending machine bear guy. Exactly. But you're not going to get, nobody's going to let you cut the line at excess at the wind. Exactly. Right. The door guy's not going to see you. Wonderful. But that's not the goal here. Yeah. Nobody's going to see you and say, hey, we should do a collab to sell my ball deodorant or whatever it is. You're not going to be Joel Rogan. Yeah. You're not going to be

that guy. It's hard. What do you think the biggest mistakes people make are when they do this? that cause them to fail. I think just that, wanting to become an influencer, be popular, right? Wanting the show to do the heavy lifting and not putting in any effort for the show to have that credibility. Yeah, I think one of the most important things for us is really vetting who comes on, right? We get, good Lord. I mean, I don't know how many submissions we get a day, but it's a lot. And now that there's, there's platforms out there that we actually use the other way that we're pitching like pod pitch and some of the other ones.

It's a sea of people. Have you heard of pod match? Podmatch, I have. Yeah. Reason pod pitch. Just to push too much to me out just because it saves time and it's pretty effective and it works good. And again, like anything else, if you package a turd, you're not going to get any calls back. But if you have a good package and you're somebody of value that people can be like, oh, this is an authoritative person that might be interesting.

It's fine. which brings to my next point, which I think a lot of people lose on this. The number one goal of this is I think you've got to be entertaining. Because if you're entertaining, if you're not entertaining people, they're never going to listen to. You're not going to get to the education. Correct. So here's a question, Mr. Podcast coach, and we've all had this person.

How do you get through when you get somebody on and they're just like, what I do for a living is I do this and this is how it goes. I mean, what do you do? You know, those clients are really my favorite because they're so raw, right? They're stuck in their ways, but they don't have any other known mistakes. So I can mold them. Okay. So I start by giving them a base.

Okay. What are you trying to tell people? Let's start there. Okay. Okay. Sit down. let's look at you on camera. Do you like how you sit?

Do you like that position? I start very, very basic. I want to make you feel comfortable. You being comfortable leads to you speaking comfortably and you're lowering your tone and you're having that tonality that allows others to connect with you. I'll do a five-minute recording

and I'll show it to them. Would you watch this? Are you comfortable with this? Would you be okay with this? Yeah. No. What do you think? think we should do different.

I'll let them sit and ponder. Then I'll tell them, look, no, no, no, no. Let's do this different. Let's do that different. Let's do this different. Uncross your legs. Sit up straight, chest out, right? Don't use this word.

Frame it like this. I'll help them on how to frame the idea. Right? I'll script the whole thing out for you and I will guide you through it. If we got to put a teleprompter, I'll put a teleprompter. Just to give them that comfort level at first. I think what you're talking about is becoming a better communicator. So what makes somebody a better communicator?

It's a great question. I would say really understanding what you're trying to say. It starts there, right? But also having the ability to really translate your message into simple language. The reason why I was hired to work for home offices and hedge fund billionaires was because I was very good at translating IT jargon into normal language. The reason I laugh at that is because I also was in the IT world. I was the CEO of a tech firm before getting into real estate.

And we had one standard rule at our tech firm, which was never let the gig pitch. We never let the engineers talk to the class. Correct. Like I always think about that scene from office space. Yes. But he's like, what do you do here? And he's like, well, I take the stuff from the software engineers and I take it to the client. They're like, well, can the engineers just take it directly to the client?

And anybody that's ever worked in IT in any high level understands, no, the software engineers cannot take it directly to the client because the client is going to be super, super angry immediately following that meeting. And the software engineer is going to look at you and go, what? What? So yes, that is a skill set in itself. Yeah. So I was that bridge, right? So I help my clients through the same thing. How can we take your jargon and put it into simple language, simple terms that you can

communicate that properly? Yeah. I think a lot of people don't realize, but you really should try to stay at about a six or seventh grade level. Yeah, 100%. You'll get everybody. Yes, I agree. How important is tonality and what you do and what you teach people?

Huge. And how important is that? Tonality, body language. is everything, right? Because people, they don't only hear what you're saying. They feel what you're saying. And tonality is about feeling. Yeah. One of my biggest issues is I speak very quickly. And I listen very quickly too, which is good, but it's a problem. So, you know, with me, and I tell people this story sometimes, it's like, you know, I was coaching some agents. And one time, and this guy stood up and we were talking about tonality on the phone. And he stood up and he said,

Can I ask you a question? And I said, it was a little bit of an older gentleman. I said, sure. And he said, what do you say when people immediately, even after the first couple of seconds, ask if you can call them later? And I said, well, A, that doesn't happen to me, but I can tell you what happens to you. And he said, why? And I said, do you hear how quickly I speak? He said, yes.

And I said, listening to you at the rate at which you speak. to me is like nails on a chalkboard. I just, I'm screaming in my head, get to the point as you're speaking. Yeah. And I'm doing it right now. And I said, listen, that, that's okay, because here's the flip side of that coin, right? I don't just get to pick on you without picking on myself a little bit to people that speak the rate that you do. If I come at them with the rate at which I speak normally, they're like, eh, like, this guy, whoa, whoa, slow to like, this is too much.

It's like too much for them. So just like I've got to slow down to reach everybody or reach more people, you got to speed up to reach more people. And I think where is that side? Like if you had to pick it, right? If you had to describe that middle, that perfect spot that's going to reach the most people. Because obviously when you're doing this, you can't match a mirror who's listening to this. I have no idea who's watching this.

Where's that like if you had to describe that middle, that perfect spot. As far as tempo, speed, accent, inflection, all of those things, what would that look like? I would say the middle is a combination of both. Okay. Right? For example, when you're telling a story and you're very excited and it's an exciting moment in the story, you can raise your voice, right? You can speed up.

But when I want to captivate you, when I want you to lean in, I'll slow down, right? I'll be a little bit clearer. a little bit more sound. So I think it's a combination, understanding when to raise your voice, when to raise your energy, and when to bring it down, right? And it's an art.

It's not something that comes easy to everyone. But I do believe that the more you do it, the more you get comfortable with it, like anything else in life. You just keep doing it, the more you do, more you get comfortable. Exactly. All right, well, if they want to find you,

how do they get hooked up for your services there, my friend? How do they do it, Leo? So you go to forge studiofel.com. You have all the info about our studio and about our packages. You can follow me on Instagram at Leo Clomaco, at Leo Clomaco podcast for IG and YouTube. Perfect.

Well, Leo, thanks for Kim and Ann, brother. It was great to have you listen. Incredible. And if you listened to that today and you took nothing away, understand this. Everybody's got a voice. You can use it with the most powerful medium we have in the world right now, which is video.

Just turn the camera on your. yourself, get out of your own head, and start building authority in your niche. We'll see you next time. What's up, everybody? Thanks for joining us for another episode of Escaping the Drift. Hope you got a bunch out of it, or at least as much as I did out of it. Anyway, if you want to learn more about the show, you can always go over to escaping the drift.com.

You can join our mailing list. But do me a favor. If you wouldn't mind, throw up that five-star review. Give us a share. Do something, man. We're here for you. hopefully you'll be here for us. But anyway, in the meantime, we will see you at the next episode.