Escaping the Drift with John Gafford - The Art of Copywriting and Consumer Psychology with Perry Belcher

Starting point is 00:00:00 funniest marketing fail you've ever seen live. Oh, gosh. 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 stop drifting along, escape the drift, and it's time to start right now. Back again, back again for another episode of Like It Says in the Opening Man,

Starting point is 00:00:30 the podcast that gets you from where you are to where you wanna be. And today in the studio, people, my guest is, I mean, Marketing Icon is really the only way you can describe this guy. This guy's been shaping digital commerce, online funnels, everything you can imagine when it comes to marketing. For as long as I can even remember, he is a guy that Jeff Bezos used to look to back in the day for advice to ask

Starting point is 00:00:54 him how to get things done. He's now the CEO of AI AI Bot Summit. He's generated over 900 milli in online sales. He's turned decades of copyright mastery, funnel persuasion and generational business building into one of them in one relentless mission, which is staying ahead of the curve. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the program. We are very lucky to have to share knowledge with us today. The one, the only, this is Perry Belcher.

Starting point is 00:01:23 Perry. I need to carry you around with me, man. I do, I'm a hype man. Introduce me, every time I go to a bar, you know, I meet a girl at a bar, I'm like, go ahead, tell her. Yeah, he's gonna tell me, let me tell you who this is.

Starting point is 00:01:32 Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the show. This is Perry Belcher. I need that, I need that. You know what, man? I figure if I start you out at a high note, we'll stay there. I need it. You know, one of the things I like to say about you,

Starting point is 00:01:41 and we are a kindred spirit in this, is you are a local to your own break. And what I mean by that is this, right? If real estate was surfing, I'm the guy that catches every wave, right? I don't, I'm a local on my break. I don't care for the last 15 years. I don't care what's happening in the real estate market. I have caught that wave and I've ridden that wave better than anybody else in the business You do the same thing that the evolution of Perry Belcher has been amazing over the last 15 years because I started back when we did a little bit of research and we're gonna start with this Sure, this was amazing pre AI pre anything else

Starting point is 00:02:18 Yeah, you wrote five books in one year that all had nothing to do with each other with each other at all yeah nothing yeah that was the smartest thing to do to me I look at that and I'm like here's a dude that was a B split testing before that was such a ball with a voice recorder they were all voice recorded that's the way they were all written I could write one in about 12 hours. I've just recording your own voice and having it. Yeah, and then have somebody clean it all up. Cause we were talking about,

Starting point is 00:02:51 you're going from one end of the spectrum, which was like copywriting to the other spectrum, how to start a hot dog business. Oh yeah, we saw, believe it or not, the hot dog book probably so more than the rest did. Okay, so. That was when I did, that was just fun, cause I'd done it. Yeah, I just wanted

Starting point is 00:03:07 to I wanted to test a system out. So most stuff that I do is like, trying something out. And you know, I try a lot. The shit you don't hear about. It's all shit that didn't work. Of course, because for every win, there's there's a handful of failures left on the stack. So I mean, a B split testing was something that you were really sure, a pioneer test was before we made what it was because there was no social media, there was no digital ads didn't exist. So how did you approach

Starting point is 00:03:32 looking at things to try like when you're fishing for how to make money? How did I did I had an old Perry? Yeah, 15 years ago Perry before before all the tools we have a old Perry was a lot longer than 15 years ago Perry 50 years ago Perry was still internet Perry, you know, I, I started out at retail. So I We have a whole period was a lot longer than 15 year ago Perry 50 year ago Perry was still Internet Perry, you know, I I started out at retail So I started out in retail stores at 42 jewelry stores when I was 19 years old 19 and 20 and I then I was broke at 21 right as is that goes and

Starting point is 00:04:03 But you I think a lot of the stuff that got me to where I was you're pretty good at at online and Ecom was coming from retail. Like I grew up in retail, then I went to manufacturing, and then I went to manufacturing, then importing, selling to big box stores, and then internet. So kind of, I think I pulled all that stuff from retail and manufacturing and importing and big box sales.

Starting point is 00:04:29 I took all that experience into online. I find that the people that are Uber successful in a lot of cases have kind of looked at the business and said, what's the layer above this? What's the layer above that? Where does that come from? Is that kind of how this went? I've always been stupid that way. Really? No, I mean, stupid in kind of a good way.

Starting point is 00:04:51 Like if I decided I was gonna sell hot dogs pretty soon, I wanna own a hot dog manufacturing plant. And then I want the cows, then I want the pigs and the cows and slaughter Ramon's slaughterhouse and before long I'm buying land. I don't want the pigs and the cows and slaughter Ramon slaughterhouse. And before long I'm buying land and you know, just stupid. You know, I, I, I love, uh, I'm the king of, I always say I'm the king of insourcing everything. I don't like outsourcing anything. I like owning the whole process is looking at a process like that. And, um,

Starting point is 00:05:21 thinking you can just figure it all out yourself. would you consider that a toxic trait or an advantage? Oh, I consider it incredibly ignorant. You know, it's an arrogant with no, you know, no, an undeserved level of confidence, almost anything. I gotta tell you, that's why I had like, in anticipation of my book coming out, I told, because I'm a member of Ken's Mastermind boardroom, because it's real estate.

Starting point is 00:05:44 Oh yeah, I love Ken. It's real estate, I think. And I said, and I told Kenny, I gotta stop coming. Can't do it. He's like, why? I'm like, cause I come here and I sit in this room and I hear somebody say something that's making money. And my first sensing is, Ooh, Ooh, I could do that squirrel. This whole of like, no, next thing you know, you're writing books about selling hot dogs because you did it at a high level. So how do you control that, that squirrel in you? How do you control it or do you? I don't, I don't do it well. I'm doing it better. Uh, I'll tell you what I help you with the age. You know, your, your amount

Starting point is 00:06:19 of, you know, I don't manage time anymore. I manage energy. It, you, it's really sucks. You know, you get't manage time anymore. I manage energy. It really sucks. You know, as you get older, you get so much smarter, so much wiser, your at-bat percentage is so much higher, right, competence level's very high, and you do learn a lot of things that are transferable to the next thing you do, right? What you lose is energy.

Starting point is 00:06:45 You just don't have the same level of energy. You know, I used to work 18, 20 hour days, craziness. You know, I could run, you know, 10, 15 businesses, you know, that I couldn't function to running one because my attention spans about 25 minutes. So, you know, if I only had one thing to do, you know, I'd have 23 and a quarter hours a day with nothing to do. So I, I always have a lot of different projects,

Starting point is 00:07:18 but I used to be able to do a lot more and you just don't have the energy for it. I mean, does that, do you you find that's just age and health or is that just, like for me, Comfort partially. Well, okay, for me anyway, I think there's this weird correlation between risk and energy.

Starting point is 00:07:39 Oh yeah, the more at risk you are, the higher the risk is, because you're going to fight or flight, man. It brings that awareness. A thousand percent. And I think when you're a younger person, you're going to fight or flight, man. It brings that awareness. And I think when you're a younger person, you're willing to take more risk because, I mean, what happens when you get to zero? You start over, right? When you get comfortable, as you make more money, and comfort, I always say, delivery,

Starting point is 00:07:55 comfort's the opposite of progress. The more comfortable you get, Ryan Dice and I were business partners for a long time, and we sold the business to Blackstone Group. Ryan Rolland and I did business partners for a long time and, and, uh, we, we sold a business to Blackstone group. Uh, Ryan Roll and I did traffic conversion. Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, and a few months later we, we were doing a thing together and, and, uh, he said, how are you doing? I said, man, this is motivated. I can't go on. And I didn't know. And I said, you know, I've got millions and millions of dollars now to invest in anything I ever

Starting point is 00:08:24 wanted to do. And, uh, I'm doing less and less. And he said, I've got millions and millions of dollars now to invest in anything I ever wanted to do. And I'm doing less and less. And he said, you know why? I said, why? He says, it's because you've got millions of dollars. He said, you're comfortable. You're comfortable. And I think you find people like reading the Bill Gates thing

Starting point is 00:08:39 yesterday, that people get into a lot of the ventures. They get into philanthropy, either get into a lot of adventures, they get into philanthropy, something that has no bottom. Yeah. You know, because if you don't, you can be like, yeah, okay, I already done that. I don't do that anymore. Well, you look at, you look at, you know,

Starting point is 00:08:57 epic sports coaches. Yeah. That are dead within two years of retiring. Yeah. Because they just don't have that edge anymore. I mean, you know, there's not a scoreboard anymore. There's not boosters breathing down their neck saying, why aren't we winning?

Starting point is 00:09:09 Well, we're genetically, I mean, caveman, I've talked a lot about caveman behavior, but we're storytelling is interesting cause you were the reason storytelling works is because we're predisposed to figure out the end of the puzzle. A, B, C, dot, dot, dot. You got to know what the next letter is. You got to know what the next number is in the sequence. Pattern recognition is built into us. So we're always trying to

Starting point is 00:09:37 figure out what the next thing is when there's not a next thing. Shit, it's time to lay down and die, I guess. Like the Indian takes a long walk in the woods, right? Yeah, no, no. That's what you do, right? I get it. And it's got to be, you know, one of the reasons I think, especially you're so exceptional, what you do is again, technology is coming for a lot of what you have mastered over these years. And you look at, we're going to talk heavily

Starting point is 00:10:02 about it. More excited about it now than ever though. I know, because you're on the right side of it. You're riding the wave and not being swept up in it. That's the difference. And I think that's the choice you've gotta make when it comes to that. There's a frustrating part when you do have limited energy

Starting point is 00:10:16 and now you get this like, this GPT, which is a general purpose technology that we have now that is artificial intelligence. And all of a sudden I'm like, there's 10,000 things I could be doing now. And I want to do them all. It just, it's exceptional how fast that goes, but let's go back, right? I'm going to go back because I think especially with something like copywriting, I think, and I'll tell you a story before we get into that and why, why I think this is the five, there's, I think there's 5% that is always going gonna be missing in a GPT.

Starting point is 00:10:46 And here's the answer to that. So a really good friend of mine owns a massive online fitness brand, like $1.5 billion valuation. And they are very heavy with VSLs. So video sales letter is very heavy. And he says, we hired this guy. I can just wildly guess who that might be.

Starting point is 00:11:05 Yeah, it's the V Shred guys. I get it. So we're out the route last week and he's telling me, he goes, yeah, you know, we hired this guy. And the closest I can describe him is the dude with the hat and dazing confused. It's just like, you cool man. Like there he goes, this is that guy, right?

Starting point is 00:11:22 But people told me he just writes the best copy, best copy. And he's like, came out and like, he's late, he's late, he's late, he's late. I'm just like, he's like, Oh, God, this guy's killing me. And all sudden, he produces this copy, we just run it. And he goes, and it like six X's anything else we've done. That David Ogilvy said, you copywriters are all crazy. And that's exactly the way you want.

Starting point is 00:11:41 Yeah, right. But here's the thing. Then he said, he goes, so he asked the guy and he gave me his last, like his biggest hitters that have sold like millions and millions of dollars, right? A billion, whatever dollars it is. He gave me like his best scripts. And he goes, I trained a GBT with it. And he goes, it's probably 95% there,

Starting point is 00:12:02 but the magic is that 5%. Yeah. Yeah, it really is. That you can't replicate. That's the magic it really is and that's it So for you, there was a long lead into this question, which is what's your 5% that made you such a good copywriter? What is it? Dude, I don't know, you know, I don't know that any copywriter could tell you that really. It's just life experiences and shit. You know, I grew up dirt poor, a lot of tragedy and everybody has a lot of tragedy, you know.

Starting point is 00:12:33 I don't know. I admired it. I admired the art. And I think that's part of it. You know, you gotta, like, if you wanna be a songwriter, you gotta admire songwriters. You know, if you wanna be a singer, you gotta admire singers.

Starting point is 00:12:44 I admired the art. And I wrote, I'll tell you how I mostly learned to write copy. There's a Gary Halbert who's super famous in our space and he's a crazy man but really he had that magic in a jar, right? When I decided I wanted to learn to write copy, I got the Gary Halbert letters. And you can print them all off. They're still on the garyhalbertletter.com. And it was letters that he wrote to his son when he was in prison. Do you know that?

Starting point is 00:13:11 No. Yeah, there are all these letters he wrote to his kids to teach him everything he knew about life while he was in prison. And then it became a newsletter and there's hundreds of issues of it. If you print it off, it's about 1,000, 1,500 pages. I printed all those and then proceeded

Starting point is 00:13:32 to take an ink pen and a legal pad and write them all longhand. I wrote them as I read them, over 1,000 pages. And by the end, damn if I wasn't almost a copywriter, but just absorbed his yeah You've absorbed the style but the the secret to being a good I'm not a great copywriter to be frank with you if you I think people would argue with you There are a lot that are better a lot I'm getting to be one of the best living copywriters because they're all fucking dying

Starting point is 00:14:00 Yeah, right, you know Clayton make peace with my great friend Clayton could mop the floor with me. So many of these guys could just mop the floor with me. What I've always been really good at, I'm a much better product positioner. So I couldn't, if I'm writing copy for you, I might not do well. I'm building the product. So I'm typically developing the product I'm going to write copy for. So I'm, I'm figuring the hole in the market. I get the privilege that most copywriters don't have. Most copywriters say, you know, people say, here's a widget, sell it. Yeah. I get to figure out what the market is and what widget the market wants. And then I sell it. So my quality copy is much higher because I've developed the product.

Starting point is 00:14:48 Well, let's talk about that, because I think so many times, one of the things that I learned about being an entrepreneur that was the hardest lesson ever was don't fall too much in love with your own ideas. Sure. I've had some things that I've done over the years that I mean, I've got $100,000 bottle of vitamins sitting on my desk.

Starting point is 00:15:03 And you are not your customer. No, no, no, no, no, no. That's no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no for a hole in the market. Walk me through that process. Perry's brain of walking through that. Because I think that's incredibly- Yeah, sure. So I am usually starting by looking at a trend. I find a trend, hear a trend. I subscribed to all these trend hunting things. It's much easier than it used to be. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:15:38 There's a really good one called Exploding Topics. I don't know if you know that one or not. But you can kind of see big macro trends. And kind of my rules are, what problem can I solve in an emerging market? Not just solving a problem that people have. Because if I'm solving a problem people have, and the problem's an older problem,

Starting point is 00:16:02 there have been a lot of people who have attempted to solve that problem, you know, and those solutions may or may not exist. In emerging markets, problems aren't necessarily solved yet. So that gives you a lot of wind to your back. And then I kind of look at if there are competitors as they're trying to solve that problem, how are they going about it, right?

Starting point is 00:16:24 By emerging markets, do you mean products or do you mean locations? No, no, no, no. Products wise. OK, products because we're trying to sell globally. We're doing our very best to sell globally. So, you know, what what products are being created? Well, like right now, for instance, AI has created this enormous gap in technology integration. So we own a company that integrates technology,

Starting point is 00:16:47 integrates AI technology into companies because there's a lot of technology out there, companies know they need it. I don't have the billions of dollars to play in the I'm gonna build an AI platform space, but there'll be a lot more money made, honestly frankly, broadly, broad spectrum wise, in me coming into your business and integrating AI technology into your business. Building AI agents. Yeah, but a lot more. I mean, AI agents, real customized solutions, customized automation solutions, analysis. I think people are still using AI largely the wrong way. Are you using it like Google? Huh? Are you using it like Google? Well, are they using it to complete dumb tasks? Yeah. It's like

Starting point is 00:17:31 having Albert Einstein in your pocket and saying, hey, go clean the toilet. It is so stupid. AI thinks better than we do. Using AI for advisors, many of that get off the topic. But like, so I just try to figure out, you know, what market I want to play in. I'm usually looking at the CARG in the market, the car in the market, which is the combined annual rate of growth. There are markets out there that are growing at 3% a year, and there are markets out there that are growing at 40% a year. I'm trying to be in the 25 ish percent a year range.

Starting point is 00:18:07 I'm not usually chasing the sports car. I'm chasing the luxury sedan. Right. And, but I know that if I get into that market position myself well at all, I'm going to grow 25% a year. If I'm an also, just because the industry, if I'm an also ran, right. So I got that win to my back. And then I try to figure out,

Starting point is 00:18:26 now where do I want to position myself? Am I going to be a luxury brand, a variety brand, a value brand, whatever brand? And you know, that's step one is positioning. And I think that the vast majority of businesses skip it Are you testing and obviously now you are testing positioning before you do any product? Oh hell yeah. Yeah. Yeah you got to see if the if the You got to see if the dogs eat it right you that it's not gonna work if you don't because you can have a clever idea

Starting point is 00:19:00 That you really believe all the all the data says oh, that's gonna work Yeah, you know, you know, that's going to work. There's a lady right now that one of my clients is in the, she's just determined to get in the self-serve real estate space, your space. Because she says, it's just prime. It should be self-serve. It should be automated.

Starting point is 00:19:19 And she may be right, right? But it doesn't matter, oftentimes, whether we're right or wrong. It oftentimes whether we're right or wrong. It matters when we're right or wrong, you know? And it may be that sometime in the future, you want to sell your house, you'll go on, take five pictures, put it on an app and sell the house. Maybe, I don't know.

Starting point is 00:19:38 I don't know your business. Can I tell you why that won't happen? Sure. I'll tell you, and I've said this a hundred times and I'll always say it. When Expedia came out and killed travel agents, for lack of a better phrase, and then they said, oh God, here comes Zillow for real estate agents, right?

Starting point is 00:19:53 They're gonna take over the market, they're gonna do this. This is why it will never happen. Because is there a certain segment of people that have the intestinal fortitude or built that way to make that level of decision on their own? Absolutely there are. Probably two to 5%. The majority of people still need a trusted advisor to stand next to them and say when that's coming to the biggest, largest financial

Starting point is 00:20:13 investment they will ever make, this is okay. Well, nobody wants their own and they'll always need it. Nobody wants, even if they don't need it, nobody wants to be responsible for that. And that's, well, that's number two. They want somebody to blame. And that's number two as somebody that is normally running in the lawsuit department of two to three. Keep in mind we've never done, we don't do anything wrong in these transactions. It's just, you just do enough business. You just do enough business. We do, we do 4,000 transactions a year. I know of one. Yeah. We did yours. I know of one old in law of mine. I think you guys got to, I said match with, you know, they're wrong by the way. I know of one of old in-law of mine. I think you guys got to, I said match with, you know,

Starting point is 00:20:47 they're wrong by the way. I know that. Well, yeah, they're, they're wrong. Well, luck, luckily a mutual friend of ours has helped change some walls to protect me on a couple of things that we kept getting in front of judges over. Yeah. Yep. I'm sure you did. But yeah, because his wife got, they're crazy. People are just crazy. You're going to get, you're going You're gonna hit a, in our businesses, you know, I own 11 businesses now.

Starting point is 00:21:10 And I'd rather have 11 $5 million businesses now than one $55 million. Yes. Because you just, Your target. The bigger you get, the more transactions that you produce, there is a X percent of people who are just bat shit crazy. And there's just no way around it.

Starting point is 00:21:31 You never got satisfied. We've given refunds before to people who didn't buy things from us. They bought things from someone else and thought they bought it from us. And they were just crazy enough. I just give them back money us and they were just crazy enough, I'd just give them back money. Cause they're just crazy.

Starting point is 00:21:49 I went to a construction defect. I did give a depot for a construction defect in a settlement that we were named as a defendant in the settlement. Yeah. There were 20 defendants on this building to talk to defect. I was sitting in the waiting room

Starting point is 00:22:01 with the guy representing the portal at company. Wow. The company that dropped the toilets off was named in the construction. The guy's just like We'll just wait for everybody else to settle and then tell him we're not gonna settle take it strong I'll let us go and that crazy and that's what we end up doing the same thing Yeah, but we had nothing to even do with this remotely a damnness But yeah, people will sue you over anything. So yes, but again, that was my second reason is the transfer of liability you know somebody get one of my agents came to me yesterday and the beautiful thing about our company, the beautiful thing about our brokerage is

Starting point is 00:22:32 we have spawned some other brokerages by agents that come here, they learn what we do. And then they wanna go do their own thing. And I had the same conversation with those people every time I'm like, let me ask you a question. And I want you to answer me, be honest. I said, if you have a burning desire and it's always been your dream

Starting point is 00:22:51 to own a real estate brokerage, absolutely go do it. High five, I will help you with whatever we can do to help you. But if you think- Let me be an investor. If you think this is a- I've invested in a lot of my people's businesses that have went on.

Starting point is 00:23:02 But if you think this is a business decision and it's gonna be incredibly profitable to bootstrap up a real estate brokerage's businesses that have went on. But if you think this is a business decision and it's going to be incredibly profitable to bootstrap up a real estate brokerage right now, you're nuts. You're going to lose your ass. We need to figure something else out and, and quash that. But if it's your dream, I will high five you and I'll support it because I think, you know, it's, it's kind of like restaurants. Why does somebody unfail? People have that dream known a restaurant.

Starting point is 00:23:21 They do this without doing those things like looking at emerging markets and figuring it out. So back to the emerging market. So you figured out your crack in the system. You got what you wanna do. Yeah, you gotta figure your position. Then next, a largely overlooked piece is aesthetics and design.

Starting point is 00:23:39 Right now, I see aesthetics and design more important than copy. And that coming from a copywriter, right? I've never really been that in that position, but there's so much data right now. Stanford and Harvard have both done these huge studies that 50 nanoseconds, when you hit a website, 50 nanoseconds, you've made 60% of judgment whether you're going to buy from

Starting point is 00:24:06 that company or not. Wow. In 50 nanoseconds, you can't read the in the copy. No. But you think about it. How many times have you been on a website, you go to hit a website, a search, and it just looks bobo and you just bounce out. Looks like the PTA website where they're putting up the calendar for the bank sale.

Starting point is 00:24:24 It won't necessarily make sales for you, but will absolutely kill sales for you because the people it's like just being the ugly dude at the bar, right? If the girl looks over the ugly dude, he could have the most stellar personality, he could be the greatest guy in the world and you know, good looking girl, good look, whatever. There has to be a certain level of attractiveness or you're never gonna have a conversation. And in today's world, that used to be important. Today it's paramount because trust has been completely eroded.

Starting point is 00:24:54 We used to, you know, you, I don't know how old you are, but you'd probably- 53. You probably remember. Yeah, okay, you're old enough to remember. You know, you used to, if you wanted to buy a widget, you went to the store and you had a good, better and a best.

Starting point is 00:25:08 Yeah. You had three choices. Now you want to buy a widget. 8,000 choices. 8,000 choices. So there's no way other than some legacy branding that is okay. But you're seeing now these brands pop up, new brands pop up by the thousands, right? And they're eating into legacy brands because a largely design

Starting point is 00:25:34 and aesthetics. You can't get to the message until you get through the aesthetics. So you know that's, I hire design firms now pay a lot of money. I should never do that. And I used to do our, we used to do our own design, we did a pretty good job. It was good enough. It's not good enough anymore. Got to get aesthetics just right. Branding's got to be just right. You got to really think about colors and fonts and, and emotional stirring of the brand and

Starting point is 00:25:59 things like that. Um, I tell people all the time, if you take the McDonald's colors and the McDonald's fonts and you put it on the Tiffany building, how would that look? Like a big McDonald's? If you, if you took the Tiffany fonts and the Tiffany colors and stuck them on a McDonald's, how would that look? Not it would work. Like you're in a, what is it, the place in New Mexico? People don't think, people don't think that way. They're like, Hey, give me a logo. I got it. I got this thing ready. Stick a logo on it, right? So aesthetics have to be good. Then you have to write a message.

Starting point is 00:26:29 So one of the challenges I see people, the biggest mistakes I see people make in business is there's about, we've got a list in our business of 27 or 28 points that we use either when we're founding a new business or we're bought a business or we're gonna retool it We have a list of 28 things that we do and and they're all fundamentals There are nothing fancy about them. But the problem is when you're good at something That's your entry point like me. Oh, I'm gonna start this thing Let me go write some copy for it. And really writing copy should be like step 10 in your process. But I'm going to start with that because that's

Starting point is 00:27:10 where my competency level is. And I'll get back to the other stuff eventually, which you never get back to. And then down the road, the wheels fall off the bus and you don't know why. And it's because you didn't build these fundamentals out. So you get messaging next and messaging today more importantly than ever Is primal You know you got you get this little walnut-sized brain the back of your head Call the reptilian brain and that little brain makes all your decisions it it it is just a pure desire Engine it wants everything What it really wants is to exist and reproduce. That's

Starting point is 00:27:48 its primary function. And that little brain controls your lungs, your heart, your liver, your kidneys, all your eyes blink and all that shit. Balance, upright. And that thing wants everything. And then you got this second brain in your head, call them a mammalian brain in the middle. That's like a hard drive that stores all your memories and things that, you know, well, the last time I did that last time I did a Mexican girl, her boyfriend busted all the windows out of my car. So I don't want to anymore Mexican girls, by the way, true story.

Starting point is 00:28:18 Colton Amidan, if you're listening to this, she's gonna kill you. Hey, I'm an equal opportunity asshole. I eventually, I eventually offend everyone. Um, but you know, then you've got this prefrontal cortex brain, which its job is to protect you. So it just says no, right? Almost everything. This brain wants everything. This brain, this brain is the party girl that goes out at night.

Starting point is 00:28:43 And this brain is the ugly girl. She breaks at night. And this brain is the ugly girl. She breaks with her to make sure she's the fridge, the fridge, the fridge, right. And, and they both serve a purpose, but the problem with this front brain, you know, if you can learn to turn it off, you can learn to turn it off with messaging and good copy. That's what good copy does. Good copy creates something called a temporary suspension of belief.

Starting point is 00:29:05 It turns this off like you're at a movie or a store or like drugs and alcohol do. What happens when the good girl eventually gets horny enough and wants to go to the bar and get laid? She goes out and she gets drunk. So it gives her a bye. And then she sleeps with the guy and she wakes the next day. Oh my God, I can't believe I was so drunk last night I slept with him, you know, it gives her a bye. It gives her an out right we purposely

Starting point is 00:29:33 Try to turn this brain off from time to time. We do it with drugs with alcohol with stories Nostalgia there are certain things that chemically stimulate this brain soup that is dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and nephrodif- in your brain. These chemical, this chemical soup, we can be a good copywriter, a good storyteller, or watching a movie or whatever. It can, it actually creates a drug synthesis in your brain. Do you think it's getting harder to hit those points

Starting point is 00:30:10 with people with the amount of dopamine they're getting slaughtered with constantly? No, I think it's getting easier. It's getting easier. It's so much easier. I'll tell you, the master of it's Donald Trump, right? If you, when you over-stimulate the brain so much, it becomes exhausted and it's far more suggestible.

Starting point is 00:30:29 Yeah, I was watching somebody the other day. I don't know who it was. They were telling a story. They said they went and met him at the country club in New York. And he said, Oh yeah, you got to try the clam chowder. It's the best in the world. So he's like, all right, I have the clam chowder. You order the clam chowder.

Starting point is 00:30:42 And he thought to himself, I mean, it was okay. Wasn't great. And they had to meet him again a couple of weeks later. He goes, Oh, make sure you get the clam chowder. You ordered the clam chowder and he thought to himself, I mean, it was okay, wasn't great. And they had to meet him again a couple of weeks later. He goes, oh, make sure you get that clam chowder against the best in the world. And he goes, okay, I'll order it. And he ate the clam chowder and he's saying, man, this is pretty really good.

Starting point is 00:30:55 Trump goes, that's good clam chowder? He goes, yeah, it's really good. He goes, see if I tell you something's good enough times, you'll believe it. Exactly. It's the truth if you hear it enough times. That's old Roy Cohen. That's it, old Roy Cohen. Yeah. That's it. Or old Roy Cohen. Let's say, yeah.

Starting point is 00:31:05 So you'd, you with the more stimulated people are for the handful of people. And man, I mean, it is a tiny handful of people that understand to talk to that little walnut shaped brain back here. Everybody else is talking to this brain. You just gotta talk to this brain. Cause eventually if you stimulate this brain enough, it's gonna override this brain and do what it wants. So if you had to break it down to like four simple desires,

Starting point is 00:31:36 obviously the need to reproduce whatever else, but the basic four desires. Does the one that you're trying to talk to change based on the product? Or are you just, are you trying to hit the same nerve no matter what it is? Well, you got to figure out what the um You call it peeling the onion Why do people buy a house? Well, that ain't to have a roof over their head

Starting point is 00:31:53 Right. I think it's 70. See the 72 percent or 78 percent. I think it's 78 percent Of new car purchases Every year are made to people who have a perfectly good automobile Oh, sure. If if we were If, if we were in a, if we were in a world where people bought what they needed only, we'd all be broke. Right? So you just, you got to figure out, what is that emotional, what's that emotional signal? And it's usually status it nine times out of 10 there,

Starting point is 00:32:24 there is survival. But once you get's nine times out of 10, there is survival, but once you get past the mausoleum hierarchy, you got a roof over your head, you got food in your belly, and then those things become largely irrelevant. They're back there in the back of the brain. And like you said, fight or flight, we get, if we're threatened, those move to the forefront,

Starting point is 00:32:42 but generally speaking, they're forgotten. you've threatened those moves to the forefront. But generally speaking, they're forgotten. But every equation to me is like, imagine a scale. So imagine a scale, and every buying decision or every action decision you make weighs on that scale. So for instance, like people watching right now, if I said, hey, what's your dream car? I used to be a total car junkie.

Starting point is 00:33:04 I had Rolls-Royce and Ferraris and all kinds of shit. But if I said, you know, Rolls Royce, Rolls Royce is it. And I can be in a room full of people that I know are very successful, well-heeled. And I'll say, who has credit over 700? And a lot of people raise their hands. Why don't you go buy a Rolls Royce then? It will definitely elevate your status.

Starting point is 00:33:25 So why doesn't everybody have one? The reason is because if they can't make their mortgage, the threat of their status lowering is greater than the benefit of their status rising from the purchase. So you've got to be able to explain to people how they can raise their status with a purchase without threat of lowering status. Because really status is the driver of most people and it can be a driver on a $10 purchase right if you believe it or not, because status privately is I'm gonna feel stupid if I buy this thing and it turns out I got hornswoggled. It's gonna lower my mental status, right? Well, that's why people always lie about

Starting point is 00:34:16 what they paid for their house. Because they never wanna look foolish in the eyes of others. Right, nobody does. I mean, one of my clients and former partner of the Gora company, they do a billion six a year. They do a billion six a year selling financial newsletters, newsletters on investing.

Starting point is 00:34:31 Good Lord. Yeah. And the craziness is half the people that buy the financial newsletters don't have a stock trading account. Isn't that crazy? It just makes them feel smarter to get it. So they can sit at the bar with their buddy,

Starting point is 00:34:42 go, well, you know, N is going to do this next year. They just regurgitate that it's kind of like talk radio. Same thing. It, it makes people, people don't have a political position. Uh, they'll listen to talk radio and then they'll parrot those political positions that they hear because they don't have any of their own. But it makes them, but it increases their status in the room. It makes them appear informed, which is crazy.

Starting point is 00:35:11 And for those of you listening to think, God, dude, Rolls Royce won't improve your status. I will say this. When my engagement goes down on the old Instagram and I get in my car and I shoot one of those videos, I don't do the stupid head lean where you could see the logos. I don't do the stupid head lean where you could see the logos. I don't do the head lean, but you can see the headliner.

Starting point is 00:35:29 You know what car I'm in. I did it all. I'll tell you the tilt. You're breaking your neck over here. Neil Dinger and I, what do we call that? Roll, roll, roll, sciosis or scroll, scroll, scrolls, sciosis. That's what your neck is permanently. When I was living out here in anthem, I did that big exit with the clarion. I bought a, it was so ridiculous at that house had a big circle thing on it. And I would, I'd have the roles, the Porsche and the Maserati. Like that poster we all had to, we were like 20 years old.

Starting point is 00:35:59 Yeah. Cause you know, I was a poor kid. I grew up a poor kid. Yeah. It was a poster. So I had all, you know, back then I'm from Kentucky, right? You can live in a trailer as long as you got a hot car. I grew up a poor kid. Yeah, I was a poster. So I had all, you know, back then, I'm from Kentucky, right? You can live in a trailer as long as you got a hot car, you're cool, right?

Starting point is 00:36:08 So I had all these cars. But it's funny how people make buying decisions. If you want to read an amazing book, if you haven't read it, Alchemy by Rory Sutherland. Truly one of my favorite books in the world. And it was funny, you probably know Cole Gordon. Yeah. So Cole had me out to speak at his group

Starting point is 00:36:28 and it's all these young phone banging bros, and they're cool. And he had me and Rory Sutherland. I didn't really have time to go. And he said, can you come? I said, I don't know, man, I don't think I'm doing it. Well, I got Rory Sutherland. I said, okay, I'm there.

Starting point is 00:36:44 So I went out and it was funny. Uh, Rory and I both spoke first day and nobody cared. They, they were listening to, you know, how do I close more deals on the phone? They didn't give a shit about, um, how behavior works. So Rory and I, who I'd never met was a huge fanboy got together at lunch and We spent the next two days together and it was absolutely I Learned more in that 18 hours. I guess than I've ever learned from any other human the guys just a freakin

Starting point is 00:37:21 he's forgotten more about how humans tick than 99% of us will ever learn. It's so funny you say that. And, cause for me, I had a problem, right? Like I couldn't, like if there was an event going on and I wasn't speaking or I wasn't going to be there and whoever was having, it's like, oh, you can come hang out. I'd be like, nah, I'm not going to hang out. Like that might, you go be like, bro,

Starting point is 00:37:42 if I'm not good enough to be on your stage, I'm not going to hang out. And finally I got over that. Cause I'm like, bro, I can go in that green room. Yeah. I can hang out. If you get in the green room, that's awesome. Yeah. Oh dude. Most time you can, right? Yeah. Hang out with these people and learn way more, like get out of the way of your own ego, which is funny. Do you still find people like, have you ever, because you grew up a poor kid in Kentucky. Oh yeah. Have you, did you ever hit a peak where you had like a bunch of ego

Starting point is 00:38:04 in this or have you always been a student of anybody I. Oh yeah. Have you, did you ever hit a peak where you had like a bunch of ego in this? Or have you always been a student of anybody I can get it from? I want to get it from. I don't know if I, you know, if you had ego, you probably don't remember having ego, but I I'm sure that I did, you know, I'm sure that I did. There's always been, uh, uh, there's always been people I looked up to. There's always been people I looked up to in the business.

Starting point is 00:38:30 I've been lucky enough to, I met accidentally two billionaires when I was like in my late 30s, and I got to spend time with both of them. They were both older, and one was not older. He's still around. He still lives in Vegas, actually. But I was lucky enough, I met Kimmins Wilson, who started. All the ends.

Starting point is 00:38:46 Well, don't gloss over that. Let's talk about that because tell me about meeting some billionaires and having them take enough interest in you to share with you because I think that, like so many people want a mentor. They want to be mentored by people. Yeah, nobody's humble enough. But there's an art to it.

Starting point is 00:39:06 So what was it? How did you approach these people? How did these relationships develop? I didn't. I mean, I think that, um, I think show ambition and mentors will appear almost. You know, you, if people don't show enough ambition anymore, um, when I, I get three, three real quick ones, but, uh, when I was a little kid, when I was a teenager, 14, 15 years old, my an interest in me because I could sit and have an intelligent conversation at 15 years old with this guy

Starting point is 00:39:47 who was a retired financial planner. And he taught me how to read the Wall Street. He used to pass me sections of Wall Street Journal when I was 14 years old. And in Paducah, Kentucky, every Sunday, me, the president of the bank, the president of the newspaper got a copy of the New York Times Sunday edition.

Starting point is 00:40:06 Those were the three copies that I dropped off in town. I used to ride my bicycle to read more books, pick up my copy of the New York Times, drive home and read every single page of it. And I read the financial pages, I read Wall Street Journal and that was all because Mr. White showed a little interest in me. What was that saying? It said if you read the New York Times and Wall Street Journal every day for a year,. White showed a little interest in me. What was that saying? They said if you read the New York Times and Wall Street Journal every day for a year, you'd have the equivalent of an MBA.

Starting point is 00:40:29 I heard that. That might be true. I heard that. I know Bill Clinton does the New York Times puzzle every day in ink. Talk about having a vocabulary. But yeah, that was that. Later on, I met this guy, Kimmins Wilson. I wanted to buy an old piece of equipment. I was in the manufacturing business and I was at my label printer and I said, I met this guy, Kimmins Wilson. I wanted to buy an old piece of equipment.

Starting point is 00:40:45 I was in the manufacturing business. And I was at my label printer and I said, I said, man, how much would you sell me that? You sell me that little conveyor, that little label. Said, well, that's Mr. Wilson's, it's not mine. So I said, well, how can I get ahold of him? And they gave me a number and I called this office. And I said, I need to speak to Mr. Wilson.

Starting point is 00:41:02 And crazy. They said, okay, just a minute. Dotty, secretary said, yeah, just a minute, I'll get him. And they put me there and he said, this is Kimmins Wilson. And I'm like, hey, I was down at Leonard Peaks and I want to buy this. What are you going to do with it? And my first inclination was,

Starting point is 00:41:21 it's not your business, you want to sell it or not? Yeah. Right? Well, why don't you come down here and we'll ride down and take a look at it and, and he loved manufacturing. It just turned out he loved manufacturing. I liked to manufacture by the way. And that was Kimmins Wilson, the founder of holiday ends. And for the next two years, every time I ever had a question about business, I

Starting point is 00:41:43 would call Mr. Wilson, he'd be like, yeah, call my man Leonard Peak over here and he'll do this or call my man Jerry and he'll help you with that. And he would call me maybe once a month and say, tell me what's going on. He didn't wanna do anything. He was in his 80s, I guess. But he just loved being around entrepreneurs

Starting point is 00:42:05 and somebody that was- Kept him alive. Ambitious, yeah. And then I met a guy named Robert Wang, who now lives here, who was the biggest mentor in my life. He was a billionaire home decor seller, still one of the biggest in the world.

Starting point is 00:42:21 He owns, I don't know, probably a hundred companies, a lot of them in Asia, really great guy, Chinese guy. And he mentored me along a long way. And haven't met a lot, haven't met anybody. I wish I had another mentor right now. I don't really have one right now. I really wish I did. I think the best place in the world to be

Starting point is 00:42:40 is to have a mentor and be a mentor. Well, I think, well, I think, I think it's interesting because it goes back to the first thing you said, which was, you know, I don't have the energy and be a mentor. Well, I think, well, I think, I think it's interesting cause it goes back to the first thing you said, which was, you know, I don't have the energy I had. Right. And I think you've reached a certain age

Starting point is 00:42:50 where you see that energy in others. You're less attractive to those people looking for it. I'm looking more for those people now. I'm looking for people to groom up. I'm looking for people to bring up. And I just, man, I just, the opportunities I'd be willing to give people today are, I would have slit your throat and buried you behind a bush to get when I was coming up,

Starting point is 00:43:12 but nobody seems to want it now. It is, the world is a strange place. Very strange. And I think, I think COVID really did a number on this country. I think COVID really did a number on this country. I think so. I think the level of apathy that runs through everywhere. When the number one, when one of the biggest apps in the app store is an app

Starting point is 00:43:32 that wiggles your mouse to pretend that you're working. Yeah. Like it says a lot about culture, doesn't it? Well, I mean, it used to be, think about this. It used to be, you know, to have exceptional service in a restaurant 10 years ago. I mean, you it had to be exceptional.

Starting point is 00:43:51 Yeah. And now when I go to a restaurant and they just do a good job, I'm like, man, that was great. Now it seems like anybody that is in a business that interacts with the public is trying to do the bare minimum. And they just can't wait to turn that pad around that says how much how much you're gonna tip me. Oh have you been to have you been in Miami lately? It's been I gotta go next month. Yeah so Miami now here's the standard Miami 22% is tacked on every bill and at the bottom it says would you like to tip an additional 5, 10 or 15% on top

Starting point is 00:44:24 of the 22% we automatically stuck on your bill, good, bad or indifferent. Seriously, so you're looking at 30, 35% premium every time you walk out. If you don't want to feel like an asshole, you're looking at 30, 35% premium. And I'm a guy that will tip 100% easy. If the experience is right. If the experience is great. Sure. But to get the basic or my favorite is the ones where you walk up to a counter, wait into a line,

Starting point is 00:44:55 somebody shoves food in your face and says, how much do you want to tip down? My buddy, Josh Avin, I don't know if you know Josh or not. Josh's a huge ad buyer in LA. We were with him because I've housed in Newport Beach and we were down in the beach not so long ago, but Josh was in the house. And my son went out to buy something.

Starting point is 00:45:12 And he came back and he was like, hey, I just got a sandwich at this place. And I turned the thing around. Cause I said, how is this this much? And he goes, well, I tip 20%. I go, you've worked to grab a sandwich. And he goes, well, I never know what to do. An overpriced sandwich. I don't know what to tip or grab a sandwich. And he goes, well, I never know what an overpriced,

Starting point is 00:45:25 I don't know what to tip or not to tip. And my buddy, Josh had my new definition of when to do it. If you're standing up and it's not a bar, you don't tip. If you're freaking believe that's it. I mean, look, if I'm at a bar and you're making me a drink and I'm standing there, I'm happy to tip you. But if I am standing up, my feet are on the ground and I'm not tipping.

Starting point is 00:45:45 That is my new role. And I love that, because I think that's fair. I think that's right. Because you can be doin' it anywhere. Well, let's talk about this, man. Let's get into AI, because again, so much of what made you who you are, you know, the AI world is coming for it.

Starting point is 00:45:59 And we talked about you can either get in front of it and ride it, or you can get swept up. And I think a lot of people are gonna get swept up I think we're already starting to see all I think I think it's a it's a quiet freight train well and I think I get hit up probably once a week from some VA that I used to use for some process or some procedure that we've now completely automated. At least once a week, do you have any more work? I don't know what countries like India,

Starting point is 00:46:31 Pakistan, the Philippines, I don't know what those countries are gonna do. Cause I think a big part of their economy is based on assisting US business. I was just in the Philippines 10 days ago at my, I got about, I used to have 350 people there. Yeah. And how many now?

Starting point is 00:46:48 I think we're down to 85. And I used to have 85 in the States and now I have five. Yeah. My sales per employee now are stupid, but I've been building AI tools for almost nine years. So how, okay, again, because you're the local, you're the local for your business. I got way ahead of the curve on that.

Starting point is 00:47:12 You saw the surface, you saw it coming. So we use AI a lot now, but we use RPA, MCPs, all the stuff that, you know, most people aren't using still, you know, it's a shock shocker by the way. I speak on AI a lot, right? so I'll go in a room and and I Was at a I was at a AI copywriters conference. I couldn't believe it was an AI copywriters conference in Phoenix There's about 300 people in room. I said how many of you guys, you know, obviously you guys are here You guys are using AI how many of you are using? How many of you chat GPD and everybody's hand goes up how many of you guys, you know, obviously you guys are here, you guys are using AI. How many of you are using, how many of you use chat GPD and everybody's hand goes up?

Starting point is 00:47:48 How many use it every day? How many of you have a paid account? It was like 25% of the room. How do you have a $20? How do you not have a paid account? Paid $20. I have GROC paid account. I have all of them.

Starting point is 00:48:02 All of them. And I'm a $200 account on two or three of them now. You know, all my employees have paid accounts across the board. If one of the things I see people doing is really, really stupid by the way, is learning this stuff yourself and adopting yourself and not tooling your team for it.

Starting point is 00:48:18 Super, super dumb. It's like, I'm gonna hold all this. Ooh, I figured this out. I'm not gonna tell anybody. But what was the question? We get, I don't wanna get away from your question. We talked about the freight train coming. Ooh, I figured this out. I'm not going to tell anybody. But, um, what was the question we get? I don't want to get away from your question. We talked about the freight train coming.

Starting point is 00:48:27 Yeah. Freight trains coming. Um, it clearly, I mean, you're watching companies right now. Uh, well, first time in history, I think, uh, massively laying off while producing massive profits, They're not going, ooh, profits are slipping. We'll use that as a reason to lay off. They're laying off by the thousands. And if you look, I've got some data that's hard to believe,

Starting point is 00:48:57 but if you look at Meta, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, they're averaging over a million dollars a year savings Meta, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, they're averaging over a million dollars a year savings per layoff. Now they weren't paying those people a million dollars. No. What that means is for every person they're replacing, they're replacing with technology. It's 10Xing what they do.

Starting point is 00:49:19 It's 10Xing the output. So those humans, the human in the loop thing, that's going to be the big thing you're going to see in the next 12 months. Humans in the loop are going to be gone. There is no reason to have a human in the loop. If you're the human in the loop, guess what? You're the dumbest link in that chain. There's no shit. There's the dumbest link in the chain. The only area for humans The only area for humans in business today really is like you said that magic part, that part that is art. That part that is art. I can write copy with AI now.

Starting point is 00:49:56 When I write peri copy in AI, it almost always beats peri copy controls. Really? Yeah, almost always. But it can't always, it can't necessarily do the pattern recognition to create hooks. AI still doesn't recognize patterns as well because some patterns are not, they're not textable, right? So AI is still basically reading text, right? So it can't, if you have a grimace or a, or raise your eyebrow that you didn't get something,

Starting point is 00:50:33 I get that as a human, that automatically registers. Yeah, it's not interpreting that. AI can't interpret that. And it can't interpret the sarcasm or subtlety or downward tone when you go, Oh really? You know, it is these, Oh really? It doesn't see, Oh really? It doesn't see that interpretation.

Starting point is 00:50:52 So there's a lot of things that it can't pick up that, that are still there. That being said, 80, 90% of the workforce doesn't rely on that. Right? And the more automated things are, the more we try to semi-automate things, like in a McDonald's or in a whatever,

Starting point is 00:51:17 the closer and closer people are getting to making themselves extinct. And the big mistake I see people making with AI is applying AI lastly in the areas that they should apply it firstly in and maybe not applying it at all. And I think you automate processes for efficiency and productivity, but you really reserve human contact

Starting point is 00:51:46 for service. And everybody's trying to take AI and make service out of it. Why? And like this opposite is, you know, they're not thinking with it. They're thinking humanly and servicing with automation. You should be thinking with AI as a thinking partner and advisor. with AI as a thinking partner and advisor. And then once you've made a sale, these would be a very human process in my opinion at that point.

Starting point is 00:52:13 Cause we were trying to get rid of all forms of service. I bought a Tesla, not to elaborate, but I bought a Tesla and I was about to buy another one cause they're going to the service fully automated in Texas right now. So I was about to buy another one. So're going to the service fully automated in Texas right now so I was about to buy another one so I go in and buy Tesla the other day fifty two thousand dollars or somebody you buy it on a app takes a couple there and and the the the numbers

Starting point is 00:52:37 that they were advertising the numbers that came in the contract were completely different and I just sent a text I said they sent me a thing is oh your car is ready to pick up. And I said, well, the numbers are not right in the contract. I'm not going to do it unless you, you got to get the numbers corrected. Two weeks. Your car is ready to pick up. Where are you at? We're going to cancel your art if you don't pick it up. I said, I've already told you that there's no human contact.

Starting point is 00:53:01 So they didn't get that $52,000, right? That's stupid. That's over automating a process, especially a process where you're taking in money. You don't wanna automate that process. I think one of the issues for companies is, is I think the people that are on the lower end of the socioeconomic ladder. Sure. Let's take fast food for example.

Starting point is 00:53:30 I'm sorry, I worked fast food as a kid. I mean, I did it, we all did it as a kid, ba-ba. My kids couldn't get a job there right now because of course part of that is they wanted to do breakfast and be open 50 million hours a day, right? That's fine, but they want to hire adults now to work those jobs. And then the adults that take those jobs go,

Starting point is 00:53:44 we can't earn a living wage here, but those jobs were not designed to be a living wage job. It was not. So when you get together through unions or whatever else people do, and they try to force these corporations to pay exorbitant prices to what they do, you're putting them in a position where they're like, we have to automate some of this, which is why you see the kiosk. You see the kiosk. Have you seen the one in Fort Worth, the McDonald's in Fort Worth? the kiosk. Have you seen the one in Fort Worth, the McDonald's in Fort Worth? There's nobody there?

Starting point is 00:54:06 One employee. So what are people gonna do? There'll be a universal basic wage. You think we're gonna have to get to that? No, I don't think it. I mean, it's mathematical certainty. You're gonna have an adjustment period where best estimates, and it was by 2030, period Where

Starting point is 00:54:28 Best estimates and it was by 2030 But we were supposed to reach a GI by 2030 and we've already reached a GI so everything is moving at a much This is the only general purpose technologies GPTs are interesting Then that's not what chat GPT is that stands for something terminal something but a GPT is a general purpose technology It's only been eight of them ever in history. If you're generous. And a lot of people say there's only been five, right? Fire. So general purpose technology means a technology that affects every human on earth. Yeah. Fire, the wheel, the engine, electricity, the computer, the internet, and now, and now this, and really you're sitting on two. And how many of the, and you look at AI is one, but you look at the compression

Starting point is 00:55:14 of time, three of those happen in the last hundred years. Exactly. And what you're, yeah, or in the last 30 years, 12,000 years. Right. And, and what you're looking at now is two, because everybody's talking about AI. Nobody's talking about humanoid robotics. And that's where all my, that's where 70% of my time goes right now is how is human. Amazon, I read this article yesterday, Amazon just deployed. Are you ready? It's one millionth robot in a factory, in a warehouse. It has one million robots.

Starting point is 00:55:51 But don't get sick. Do you call out? Do you think that they have a moat that can never be touched by Amazon stock? They can't be, you will never, no one will ever compete with them. No. You just can't.

Starting point is 00:56:03 It's an impossibility. They're so far ahead of the game. But they used to play their millionth robot, right? I was consulting years ago with this company, and I keep following it, Enterprise Battery, car batteries. They bought a machine. They bought a robot.

Starting point is 00:56:18 It was $200,000. And this robot could manufacture as many batteries as a human could today, but they could run it three shifts. So it got, they got more out of it, right? And it had a lower error rate and all that. And but it was $200,000. And they put, they put, I think two or three of them in service. And they eventually scrapped the product because it, while it was more efficient and all those

Starting point is 00:56:40 things, it was, the money didn't work. The math didn't work. It didn't math out, right? It couldn't scale it fast enough, get enough robots. They cost too much money. That robot now is $16,000. And it's faster and it has less error rate. So they're gonna be, you know,

Starting point is 00:57:06 if you're, I live in Austin, Texas now and they built a big Tesla plant there and Austin's up in arms about it because they give all these tax breaks because all the employees that were gonna be hired there. And now, Elon's saying, look, we're probably gonna, this place can be ran by about 40 people. This 10 million square foot place can be ran by 40 or 50 people in a couple of years.

Starting point is 00:57:31 So it's just nutty. I think you're, you know, people are going to be displaced. There's just no way around it. Okay. So I know you don't fancy yourself an economist, but, and I don't either, but I think it's pretty obvious. Like my thought process around the living wage provided by the government to everybody is if you give everybody,

Starting point is 00:57:53 if I give everybody a widget, and you didn't have to pay or work for the widget, isn't the widget worth less? So now, so how do you, I mean, you're either gonna have to do a massive tax and transfer on the wealth wealthy. Oh, a hundred percent. It's gonna happen.

Starting point is 00:58:08 So is there, I mean, is the, is this going to kill the free market? Is capitalism dead because of this? No, it's not a matter. Because how? It won't matter. It just won't matter. You'll make so much more money. You know, people move to Puerto Rico to save taxes.

Starting point is 00:58:24 I giggle at every friend of mine that does that. you know, people move to Puerto Rico to save taxes. I giggle at every friend of mine that does that. As you know, I worked real hard to get rich so I can go live in a shitty third world country and not pay taxes. I mean, come on. You know, why not just make a whole lot more money and pay the damn taxes?

Starting point is 00:58:39 If the, the reason it's going to happen is because if it doesn't happen, you will have total anarchy in the streets. You when people can't eat. Oh, sure. So you're going to have a giant, it can be Mad Max, right? And, and so what'll happen, people will get 30, 40,000 bucks a year. It'll be enough money for them to have a roof over their head and some food on the table and a cell phone. Right. And we're, you know, we're spending, did you know that, that you and I are a little different,

Starting point is 00:59:11 but the average person now, I think under 30, 50% of their discretionary income is spent on things that don't exist. What do you mean? Netflix subscription, app subscription, video game subscriptions, cell phone bills, they're spent on digital goods. 50% of discretionary income people under 30 years old spent on discretion on digital goods. So you're going to see a digital economy and you're going to see the most prosperous economy in the history of mankind. This is some dystopian shit you're talking about.

Starting point is 00:59:48 This is, this is like. But it's true. I mean, if you, let me give you. Cause I lean into human nature. We just talked about apathy, right? We just talked about apathy. When you're sitting there and get $40,000, which is just enough to keep a roof over your head, keep your cell phone on.

Starting point is 01:00:01 I mean, people, you know, you have this, you have this stereotype of the welfare person. Well, now you take half of America and turn them into that. It's gonna be about half. You take half America and turn them into that. Where's their drive? Where's their at? But now they're having kids that have no desire to do anything more.

Starting point is 01:00:17 Plus people are gonna live longer. So you're gonna be storing older people. There's gonna be people that live a lot longer with CRISPR technology and AI. And there's gonna be be a little bit longer with, with CRISPR technology and AI and there's going to be some deep state population control. It's, it's craziness, but we're going to be so prosperous. It's not going to matter.

Starting point is 01:00:32 Why, but how many of us, some of us think here's, here's why I, you know, you said I'm not an economist. I'm sure it's held on an account. No, I call myself a redneck behavioralist. That's the way I usually describe myself. But, but I am a student of the economy. And, and here's, here's one thing that I've come up with Perry's theory of the economy that I can explain in one minute. The economy is productivity

Starting point is 01:01:00 times population, less consumption. That's true in your home, in your company, in a country, or for the globe. If you look at every country, they have a GDP, gross domestic product. This is how much money they produce. Divide that by the amount of people, right? And then subtract consumption. So if you look at the Chinese, for instance,

Starting point is 01:01:31 they save about 40 cents of every dollar they produce. Americans save negative 3%. Well, yeah, because they have the Discover card. Because you have credit. Yeah. As long as you give people credit in America, they're going to overspend just a hundred percent of the time. I saw,

Starting point is 01:01:48 I saw the funniest thing yesterday I was driving down to the strip for my daughter last night and I look on the Raider stadium and I said, I saw they had the official debit card of the Raiders. And I thought that is the, that is the best advertisement I've ever seen. Not credit card, the official debit card of the Raiders. If you know your audience, if you think about robotics and AI, the civil war, this is probably, you know, I told you the equal opportunity asshole, let me offend them all. Yeah. So the civil war everybody thinks was about beliefs and

Starting point is 01:02:21 say slavery had nothing to do with it. It had to do with the fact that the South was kicking the shit out of the North, because it had productivity without consumption. So slaves that were brought here from other countries to work plantations in the South produced, but were not allowed to consume with very limited consumption.

Starting point is 01:02:44 Today, they're estimating that in the next 24 months, the average home will have 2.4 humanoid robots in it. They'll do everything you don't want to do, right? How many factories are going to have humanoid robots in it? Only all of them. So when you, when you can produce a great deal without consumption, right? What do you produce in your business, your business here, if you produce more revenue than you spend in employees and partners, what happens, you create wealth. If you, if you consume more than you produce, you produce debt. If you produce debt long enough, eventually you go bankrupt. If you produce more than you consume,

Starting point is 01:03:34 you throw off profits and eventually profits accumulate to wealth. It's a very simple math. It's very, very simple math, but you're about to have an unlimited amount of productivity for the first time ever in human history. Guess who's building the robots at Tesla? Yeah, but isn't the robots are robots, but isn't, but isn't the consumption going to go around because people won't have the money with their roof over your head and a cell phone and enough to eat. They're not there.

Starting point is 01:04:02 Their consumption is going to go through the floor. Um, cause how can it, how can it maintain because there's consumption going down is a cell phone and enough to eat, consumption is gonna go through the floor. Cause how can it maintain because there's- Consumption going down is good for you and I. I know that. It's a really weird thing. It's good for you and I. I'm not thinking about me. I'm fine.

Starting point is 01:04:16 I'm only thinking about you. Right, we're fine. Yeah, but here's the deal. You know, I have two kids about to head off to college and I'm thinking, you know, you're trying to guide them in the direction of what they need to do. And I've been very clear with my kids since they were little that the number one skill I think they can develop

Starting point is 01:04:33 is the ability to look into another human and connect with them on a one-on-one level. Because all these kids now are just like this. Something will always need to be sold. Yeah, they'll always need that. And there'll always be some human art to that. But I'm also feeling like the, you know, the fuse is lit on me to create generational wealth for those kids, just in case things get crazy.

Starting point is 01:04:54 I think we've all, you know, I can tell you exactly what's gonna happen in the future. This is it. Here it is, you ready? You heard it here first. Here's exactly what's gonna happen in the future. Exactly what's gonna happen. I don't have a fucking clue. Uh, and anybody that tells you that they do is full of shit because,

Starting point is 01:05:11 cause we've never had technology that builds on technology. We don't know what that feels like. We don't know what's going to happen. I got, you can go down a very deep, dark rabbit hole. I got X dollars right now and I don't know if the thing is we've always been able to figure well you know if you got 50 million dollars you're fine you'll never worry about anything again but what's the value of 50 million dollars going to be in however well let's play devil's advocate right and if I'm king and you know god willing one day I will be clearly clearly god you know god willing one day I will be. Um, clearly, clearly God, you know, God willing, one day I will be, but no, wouldn't it be easier to mandate to the corporations to say, listen,

Starting point is 01:05:49 you've got to have X percentage, you know, for every percentage below this, you go of human work, workforce to automated workforce. We're going to raise your tax rate base this much. Wouldn't that be easier than saying everybody gets $40,000? Sure. All we got to do to do that is to get every other country on the globe to do the same thing.

Starting point is 01:06:08 To do the same thing. Otherwise we'll get eliminated by competition. Oh, that sucks. Doesn't it? Damn globe. I know. Right. That's the thing.

Starting point is 01:06:17 If we decide to limit technology in the United States, if we decide to pass laws that limit what AI and robotics can do, and China and Russia and South Korea don't do that, which they're not going to, then we become a victim of, of you poor thickness. So we're never going to do it. Do you think the Chinese have just been taking care of their people on that same level of, of how we're talking about it's going to happen in America for so long. They don't care? Yeah, sort of. They're a communist country. So they, yeah. That's how this works.

Starting point is 01:06:47 But we, and the last thing we should be worried about is China. China is a boogeyman that doesn't matter. It really is. It's a boogeyman that doesn't matter. Well, I had, I had the guy that was- Give me countries China's invaded in its history. None I don't think, right?

Starting point is 01:07:00 None. Yeah. They don't have any interest in it. No. They just won't be left alone. They don't want to be left alone and do their thing. Well, I had Michael Barnard, the guy that was, Tim Carell played in the big short, natural character. He was on a couple months ago. Oh, cool. And I asked him, you know, if in this tariff war, if we settle with everybody

Starting point is 01:07:19 except for China, are we in a trade war? He said, no, absolutely not. Because you settle with everybody else. I don't care about China. Trump's thing of reciprocal tariffs kind of makes sense. If Thailand's gonna tariff us 100% on American cars, why shouldn't we tariff them 100% on American cars? You don't go to Europe and see Fords rolling around. Right, that makes kind of sort of makes sense. There's trade imbalances and and the challenge is all these questions are really

Starting point is 01:07:49 complicated questions that are You know, we try to come up with kindergarten answers for Because they're understandable Trump's great at that by the way. Yeah, we just build a wall Yeah, you know I got bummed from a new segment the other day because I was sitting there waiting to go live on this news segment in New York. And I'm watching the feed as I'm sitting there and I see me and they pops up from the cabinet and you know, big beautiful planes, you know, big this.

Starting point is 01:08:12 And I'm like, I'm gonna get bumped. There's no way this is gonna be shown. Sure, the producer comes on, she's like, yeah, we're gonna have to bump you. I'm like, yeah, I know. Anyway, all right, well, let's finish this off. Sure. I started doing this with Orville McManus.

Starting point is 01:08:23 It is a lightning round of questions. Sure. Written by ChatGBT. I did not prepare these. ChatGBT did. Based on your history, lightning round questions. Here we go, ready? She looked 18.

Starting point is 01:08:34 Here we go. That's the answer to the first one. The thoughts and views of Perry Belcher are not necessarily reflected by the thoughts and views of Skape the Drift. Exactly. Gotta throw the disclaimer on there. Here we go, ready?

Starting point is 01:08:43 Number one, AI or human who writes better copy? AI. Brick and mortar or virtual event? Brick and mortar. Best marketing metric nobody tracks. Oh gosh, best marketing metric nobody tracks. Nobody tracks is hard because a lot of people track a lot of things.

Starting point is 01:09:13 I don't know. I'm gonna lean back into the answer you gave earlier when you were talking about looking for the growth within that sector. I've never heard that. Yeah. Looking for those trends and then analyzing what the potential growth is.

Starting point is 01:09:24 I wouldn't see that as a marketing metric, but. You know, in the overall. Bounce rate for one. People don't pay attention to bounce rate. Bounce rate, okay, there you go. Most overrated marketing tool. Funnel builders, funnel tools. Okay, funnels or traffic volume.

Starting point is 01:09:41 Traffic volume. Free list builders, dead or still alive. Alive. or traffic volume? Traffic volume. Free list builders, dead or still alive? Alive. Spam or squeeze, which tactic still works? Squeeze. Copywriting secret weapon? Go negative. Automation, job or, we already talked about this,

Starting point is 01:10:02 job saver or soul sucker? Oh, automation is a job saver. Yeah. Worst headline mistake you still see every day. Not not telling people what's in it for me. Okay. Email sequence or solo ad. We need a solo ad to get people into the email sequence.

Starting point is 01:10:22 So those are hard. It's a hard one to separate. Okay. Funniest marketing fail you've ever seen live. Oh God. We need a solo ad to get people into the email sequence. So those are hard. It's a hard one to separate Okay, funniest marketing fail you've ever seen live. Oh gosh, I Don't think about the fails so much the marketing fails as much I see Probably Jaguar, okay. Oh god, that was bad. That was that was a Jaguar and Bud Light. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:10:45 Take a pick. That was a pretty bad fail. They should get the turtle word. Yep. One book. Every marketer should throw away. Oh my God. A hundred of them. Think and grow rich. Okay. Fake it till you make it true or false. Yeah. True.

Starting point is 01:11:04 Conversion killers, modals or pop-ups Pop-ups, okay chat bots or live human Chat bots one question people keep asking you on podcasts that you wish they would stop. What's next? Yeah, Perry man, thank you so much. That was a fascinating conversation. Hopefully you got a lot out of that. Look, man, if you listen to that, the biggest takeaways for me are the clock is ticking. The time is now.

Starting point is 01:11:35 You better get on it and go fast because the robots are coming for all of this. Yeah, dude. And you just got to block out some time. Block out a little bit of time. We didn't even get to that. You know what? Block out a little bit of time every day to study. We didn't even get to that.

Starting point is 01:11:51 I wanted to talk about that so much. And you know what? I'm going to bring this back out. We're not going away. All right. We're going to continue going because I really want to talk about something you said in my office earlier, which was you had a little bit of a health scare. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:12:03 And we don't have to get into details about what it was. But you said something about, and I thought this was so clutch and we never got to it. Talk about that, about what you did. Yeah, it is noise. You know, we, number one, I spend a lot of time studying. I feel like my job with my, my students in my group, when I have, for the people that I've mentored to, and it's a small part of my business is mentorship, but I do do it. I'm a researcher. You probably are too. You're researching what's working,

Starting point is 01:12:30 vetting to see what's working, and then passing that along, and also passing along what doesn't work to people. But you gotta invest some time to learn this stuff. And dude, YouTube University will teach you a lot. Don't go out and buy a bunch of shit from gurus and all that. It's usually bullshit, and they're behind the curve lot. Don't go out and buy a bunch of shit from gurus and all that. They're usually, it's usually bullshit

Starting point is 01:12:46 and they're behind the curve anyway. Don't buy books. Anybody buys books on AI right now is just stupid. A book, by the time the book's published, the data's dead. But do buy my book, Escaping the Drift, which is coming out November 11th. Not about AI, not about AI at all, keep going.

Starting point is 01:13:01 But YouTube University is amazing to people. You learn a lot and they're really rising this stuff up that works. But eliminating the noise out of your life, I think is the biggest thing for me. John asked, do you know John Asroth? Sure, he was here three weeks ago. I love John.

Starting point is 01:13:16 And John, during COVID, I didn't do COVID well. I didn't pivot in COVID well. I've always been really ahead of the curve, always been the guy skating to the puck and I didn't do it well. I didn't pivot in COVID well. I've always been really ahead of the curve, always been the guy skating to the puck and I didn't do it well. And John called me one day, asked me for some help on something and he said, you're okay. And I said, yeah, I'm okay. He said, you don't sound like Perry. He said, yeah, maybe I'm depressed a little bit. And he gave me the best piece of advice anybody's ever given me about how to function in life. Because I want you to take a piece of paper when you get the call, set somewhere for two hours.

Starting point is 01:13:48 You don't have to do this, but you can't do anything else. Write on that pad everything, one item on the line that you don't want in your life. Because he's like, what do you want? I'm like, I don't know, I got this, I got money, I got a big house, a car. It's just kind of hollow, right? Do you know there are people that are therapists for exits,

Starting point is 01:14:08 for people who have exits. That's a big industry. Cause people sell it, build a company of 20 years, they sell it, get a big lick of money, and all of a sudden they find themselves depressed. Which is crazy, right? Cause the check is a dopamine head. Right, and then you're like-

Starting point is 01:14:23 And then it fades away. Yeah, so I think I was going through that, but he said, write down everything you don't want in your life. And I swear to God, I did it. And he said, now, when she started drawing lines to the easy stuff, and then you got to start drawing through the lines to the hard stuff. I broke up with a girlfriend and moved to another city. I did, I did a bunch of stuff that, because I, it wasn't about what I wanted. It was about what I didn't want and the reason I think that that works is What you want in life what your goals are Your dreams are it's always very fuzzy

Starting point is 01:14:53 It's almost never crystal and focus. That's the reason they say vision boards work And I think they do that if you can see it you can usually achieve it in your mind's eye or in reality But most people can't see what their idea of success or happiness or whatever is, but they damn sure know crystal clear what they don't want. And if you just start eliminating the noise out of your life, all of a sudden what you want will come into focus. And like I said, I had a little health scare and it was like no imminent anything, but it was like, it made me think. And if you want to do an experiment, it's kind of fun. Look up your average age expectancy, how long you expect to live by mortality chart, subtract

Starting point is 01:15:34 out the amount of days you've already lived. Somebody got left, right? How many you got left and ask yourself this question every single day. What am I willing to trade that day for? What am I willing to trade that day for? What am I willing to trade today for? And I try to do that every single day. And it's really helped me eliminate just, if it's not, you know, I got this cone that's going where I want to go. And if it's outside that cone, it doesn't exist to me. Yeah. If it's not hell yeah, it's hell no. Oh yeah. If you did somebody joked, how many how many hours a day do you think?

Starting point is 01:16:06 Tiger Woods spins practicing his basketball shot It average the answer zero, right? He's concentrated on being the greatest and greatest golfer and why he was anyway But you know what I'm saying you you just concentrate on being great at what you're already great at you'll have far more success from it But get all the other noise and bullshit out of your life you'll have far more success from it, but get all the other noise and bullshit out of your life. Cause we love to get distracted into those things. Cause it gives us the reason, it gives us a buy

Starting point is 01:16:32 from going and doing that thing that may be a little tougher or swallow that frog that we don't necessarily wanna swallow. Yeah, I was watching a clip the other day of somebody that was talking about decision-making and then talking about, you know, if I can't decide the answer is no. And if I have two choices, one of two choices, and they're very similar, I will always choose the one

Starting point is 01:16:52 that is harder in the short term. Because it almost always pays off. It almost always better off, yeah. Same thinking, all right, well dude, if they want to find you, how do they find you, Perry? Go to AI Morning Club. Yeah, that's cool. Go to AImorningclub.com.

Starting point is 01:17:04 Every morning at 30 minutes. I do a little thing on AI talk about what's going on, what's moving there. It doesn't cost a penny. Anybody can show up, wants to show up. It's kind of fun. That's, that's really it right now. I don't really have a lot of stuff for sale or any of that stuff. I don't do, I don't do much of the, uh, cause you're rich teaching stuff.

Starting point is 01:17:22 You know why I keep teaching though? Cause it keeps you young. It keeps me sharp. It does. I know why I keep teaching though? Cause it keeps you young. It keeps me sharp. It does. I have, I'm, I'm responsible. You know, I got a little group of people that, that I'm, and I'm responsible to them if I didn't have anybody to be responsible to. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:17:35 I'd probably be a blubbering idiot sitting somewhere in a rocket chair going, you know, move. It was cool. You know, I don't know about the old days. Yeah. This is the old days. So I love having somebody to be responsible for and I don't really like to charge for that stuff anymore because just so it's just so much fun to I get on that

Starting point is 01:17:50 thing every morning, eight o'clock in the morning and you know, four or five hundred people show up and I'm like, hey, guess what? Guess what I learned yesterday and then other people will say what they learned and then we go on about our day. It's about 30 minutes and it's kind of fun. I love that. All right, dude. Well, man, I appreciate you coming by. You're welcome anytime you're back. Thanks, I appreciate it. I need you to come through. Take care.

Starting point is 01:18:09 So man, if you listen to this again, dude, you better get on it. The time is now, the robots are coming. I would do exactly what he said today. I would start by writing out on that sheet exactly the things you don't want. As soon as we jump off here, I'm gonna do a, I'm gonna go straight in there and make a piece of content

Starting point is 01:18:22 about what he just said. Cause I think that's incredible advice. Because if you're not in charge of your life, you're drifting along with the cards. And that's everything that this show and I and Perry, I'm again, we'll see you next week. What's up everybody. Thanks for joining us for another episode

Starting point is 01:18:42 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 though 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

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Escaping the Drift with John Gafford - The Art of Copywriting and Consumer Psychology with Perry Belcher

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