Founder's Story - From Zero Experience to Media Titans – The Inspiring Story of Chris and William Salvi | S2 Ep. 66

Episode Date: October 5, 2024

In this engaging episode of Founder's Story, host Daniel Robbins welcomes Chris and William Salvi, the dynamic duo behind The CEO Series and Salvi Media Agency. The brothers share their experiences as entrepreneurs, the lessons learned from interviewing high-profile CEOs, and the fascinating journey of building a media agency that focuses on storytelling and content creation for the digital age.The conversation starts with a humorous discussion about ponytails and pop culture references before diving into more profound insights. Chris and William reveal their favorite interview moments, from speaking with global agency owner John Rowady to learning from impactful leaders like David Jones and Oisin Hanrahan. They emphasize the importance of hearing about both the successes and struggles of the CEOs they've met.The Salvis also discuss their passion for entrepreneurship, reflecting on their family's influence and the pivotal moment that sparked their desire to build their own business. They highlight the challenges of working together as siblings and the drive to control their own time, culture, and work environment.The episode offers practical advice for aspiring media creators, emphasizing the importance of perseverance, continuous improvement, and staying true to your audience. Chris and William reflect on their evolution from novices in marketing to seasoned content creators, stressing the need to stay committed, even when starting with low engagement.Finally, the brothers share their vision for the future of content creation and media distribution, predicting that small media agencies and solopreneurs, with the help of artificial intelligence, will continue to make an impact in the digital world. They discuss the growing relevance of content in a digitally native workforce and provide advice for those wanting to launch their own media ventures.Key Topics Discussed:The journey of building The CEO Series and Salvi Media AgencyMemorable interviews with CEOs, including John John Rowady, David Jones, and Oisin HanrahanThe importance of storytelling in business and entrepreneurshipAdvice for aspiring media creators and show hostsInsights on the future of content creation, solopreneurs, and AI's roleThe impact of working together as siblings and navigating the ups and downs of entrepreneurshipMemorable Quotes:"Your friends and family aren’t your audience. Keep creating, and you'll eventually find your true audience." — William Salvi"We wanted to tell stories, connect with people, and distill down human experiences in the business world." — Chris SalviWhere to Watch:The CEO Series is available on YouTube and distributed through platforms like Entrepreneur and Cheddar.You can also catch episodes on Reach TV in airports across 90 locations globally.Get in Touch:salvimedia.com for inquiriesFollow:The CEO Series on YouTubeOur Sponsors:* Check out PrizePicks and use my code FOUNDERS for a great deal: www.prizepicks.com* Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: www.rosettastone.comAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Hey everyone, welcome back to Founders Story. I can't help but laugh because we had a phenomenal conversation a couple minutes before this interview. So we can dive into exactly why we are laughing, ponytails, names, Night of the Roxbury, all these things that people are probably like, what the heck that I don't even understand. But William and Chris Salve, they have two shows. One is the CEO series. They also have Salve Media Agency.

I've watched your shows on Entrepreneur and other places as well. And I love the shows. We're going to do something a little bit different because there's the two of you. I'd like for you to kick it off by telling me a guest that you interviewed that shocked you, or maybe you're like, wow, this was really impactful for me. Yeah, I don't think I've had a moment that has been shocking. All the individuals that we've interviewed have been pretty kind to us and nice, which is easy when you have a camera pointed at them. But there's certainly been some CEOs that have really, like their words have hit home and kind of personally inspired me. We just did one recently with John Rawati. He's an agency owner here in Chicago,

and he has a global agency. It's a really legitimate business. They have Chipotle and Amazon Web Services as clients, and they work with a bunch of different sports teams. But yeah, so they're global. They have in like Singapore and London. And he was just talking about his, his like journey as an entrepreneur and the failure that he's experienced and the hardships. And, you know, Chris and I have been in business together now for six, seven years, and it's, it's a difficult road. It's, it's truly a roller coaster. So when, when I would say when CEOs start to open up more about about the failures and the fears and the hardships versus just talking about the shiny thing in the corner, I always appreciate that. And he was very good at that. I was inspired by Will hosting his show,

the CEO series. And so I launched a show called the Founder CEO Podcast. And I had the opportunity to interview a number of people. One person, I'll just kind of had this moment where I felt very fortunate to be interviewing him. And now it's happened several times where I'm like, wow, these people are really impressive. But it happened when I was interviewing, I'm going to botch his name. He's an Irishman, like a true Irishman

with a good Irish name. It's like Ocean Hanrahan. I, I'm going to botch his name. He's an Irishman, like a true Irishman with a good Irish name. It's like Ocean Hanrahan. I think I'm close on that. But he was just like, he was so impressive. This dude started a business that was a platform that connected like home services, like carpenters and plumbers to people who need those services. And that platform here in America is called Angie. And his company is called Handy.com over in Ireland.

Angie's List bought Handy and then integrated their businesses. He became CEO of Angie, which is a public company. So he goes from being a founder, founder CEO CEO to being the CEO of a public company and just talking to him. And, you know, the knowledge he was spitting and the stories that he had, his business experience stories were really insightful. I just I was just like, wow, I'm so thankful I'm able to be talking to these super impressive people. Another guy named David Jones, he's raised $300 million, $4 billion valuation. He was the global CEO of an advertising company. Now he's a founder. Just so cool. I'm thankful I get to talk to those people.

So let's go back to your stories. And the fact that you work together in a family, I always find fascinating. I think many time guests either love it or hate it? And the fact that you work together in a family, I always find fascinating, right? I think many time guests either love it or hate it. And it seems like you both really enjoy it. But let's go back to your story. So what was the spark in your life where you said, you know what, I want to be an entrepreneur? We've always wanted to be entrepreneurs. I think we still, obviously we still are, but we've always wanted to be business owners. And, you know, I think there's a lot of cool things attached to that where you can do what you want to do with regards to what business you want to run and you control your own time and schedule so you can, you know, control the way you want to work and create the culture that you want to create. So I think we've always been inclined to do that. I know Chris has his own answer, but that was my reasoning. I think we're just hardwired that way. We do come, we come from a family of entrepreneurs, you know, that, that always has an impact on your environment. Yeah, it's who we are.

We're shitty employees. We like to take risks. We can handle fear and failure and rejection fairly well. Don't get me wrong. Sometimes we take receipts, but we don't let them overwhelm us or anything like that. Let it become like a negative energy. But we play to win and we think we're the best and we think we're becoming the best um the spark was just like hey i was finishing a career in athletics my brother was uh well you were just you were just uh you were working at capitol hill and then you were doing sales for a liquor distribution company.

And we're like, hey, we always wanted to do this. You were 25. Shit, you were 25. I was 27. Literally zero experience in marketing, media, content creation. But we thought it was interesting. We saw it was the future. We still think it's the future. Yeah, that's what sparked it. We just we wanted to we wanted to tell stories to distill it down into like what we wanted to be the interviewer than the interviewee but um

yeah that i think that's what i'd boil it down to is that we wanted to do that type of work tell stories and connect with people well i'm honored that you're here and telling your story so i i love that right there's so much to the story hence founder story right we've i feel like it's the most impactful thing sometimes isn't the lessons or the tangible things, it's the story to inspire you. So when it comes to why you built a media agency and why do you see media creation and media distribution as the future? I would say specifically about the future and on the vein of founders, the future of the solopreneur supplemented with artificial intelligence,

content becoming more and more relevant, the younger generation being digital natives coming into the workforce, and then eventually they'll have the money. I mean, think about the people who control essentially budgets now. It's people who are not digital natives. The emphasis of digital connection and content is still, I wouldn't call it in its infancy, but I'd still say it's third or fourth inning. And the people that know how to make content, emphasize content that have a lot of trust in the digital world are just now joining the workforce. And so I just find that inflection point in the economy,

super interesting. And then the future, we just believe the future is more content and a lot of small media agencies chipping away at bigger companies. And then bigger companies will make their play in combating sole earners for keeping their market share or keeping interest with their audiences. So, William, what would you suggest to somebody who is like, you know what, I want to build my own show. I want to be successful like Chris and William or Christopher and William. I want to be like them. What do you suggest to them? Because as we know, it's not easy, right? It takes a lot of energy and effort to do all the interviews and the amount of content that you create that I watch.

It's got to be very energy intensive. It requires, it's just, it requires so much, but what do you tell people if they want to, they want to create a show like yours? To keep creating it. If you are, if you are dead set on creating a show, just keep creating it and keep having improvement in your brain because it takes time. And you know, you, you reached out to me for this show and that took energy and effort for you to research potential guests and you're reaching out to them. And how many people do you both know on this call? The three of us. How many people collectively do we know that has a podcast or wanted to start a podcast or started a little Instagram channel where they post food? And then six months later, they bail on it because it didn't get the traction

they wanted. You know, you have that initial burst of energy from friends and family, and they're all excited for you. But then afterwards, it's like, they don't, you know, they're not your audience. Like, I don't care about food stuff, so I'm not going to follow it anymore. But I was excited for you at the beginning. So I would just say like, your friends and your family aren't your audience. And so just keep creating, dive into it, and you'll eventually keep getting better at it if you are dead set on making a show. I just keep creating it. I think people get discouraged by like, oh, I'm getting five likes on this video. We still get sometimes like low engagement on our videos, but we're like we're getting

better and better guests. You know, Fortune 500 companies, public company CEOs are our guests. Chris, you remember when we first were reaching out to people like I would have never expected some of these people now are reaching out to us to be on our show. And that's like a real treat for us is because now we just get to talk to more people that we really admire and we want to learn from and we want to ask them interesting questions. So it takes time. Like, look at any show in the history of content. The first season of it was shit compared to what you're a fan of now. Most most shows are bad when they first started. That's why when I watch Breaking Bad, I'm like, man, you got to get through the first season. It's like, you know, like you gotta, you gotta go through it and develop it and make it better. Cause it's just the early innings and we still think it's the early innings. So I would

just say, keep creating it. Don't be discouraged. Your friends and family are not your audience. So don't try to get them to be your audience. Your audience is who you're trying to get. They might be the worst people to choose. Don't get me wrong. I want my parents and my brothers and my family and my friends, I want them to watch it, whatever, if they're interested. But that's not who I'm going for. I'm going for people who are interested in learning about business executives, human stories in the business world, learning about leadership, learning about these specific industries that we're talking to. That's my audience, not my parents or my brothers or my friends. And so I think people get discouraged by it sometimes and they shouldn't. Keep going. Just keep creating. I've learned that from my

brother, Chris, because it's like, I've gotten discouraged by it myself. And you just got to keep creating. Just keep making it better and dedicate time to it. No, I love it. Is there somebody who you, I know you've interviewed amazing people, right? Like you just mentioned one before. Is there somebody who you're like, wow, you know what? I really, really want to interview this specific person. I would, I mean, I would interview, Will and I debate this about who we would interview because it sometimes comes down to maybe an ethical

question like should you platform someone that maybe you disagree with i mean i would interview the super interesting his name is escaping me it's kind of it's kind of long too smb or whatever they is acronym for his name but realistically in the in the short term like let's say in 2025 i think i'd want to interview like founder and ceo who um is on like the cusp of something like in medicine and like solving some sort of big deal in medicine that's like truly impactful if the person from whole foods ceo is watching from Whole Foods CEOs watching, please reach out. What is something that you get of value when you interview people besides building a business with this, besides exposure? Is there some sort of intrinsic thing

or something that you get of value? Maybe advice that you've used in your businesses or inspiration you needed. Is there something else that you get? Because I find that sometimes I get something out of these interviews and I don't even always know what it is or why I really enjoy it. But is there something that you get from doing these interviews? Oh, yeah. Well, they're obviously all impressive people. So that's cool to just be talking to them. They all basically have like a very determined view of their life. Like they, when they're in on something, they kind of push through good times, bad times, medium times, and they keep going for whatever that goal is.

They all are like that. I haven't. And the ones, honestly, the ones who aren't, they might not be the CEO anymore. They're all very driven and they're smart. They're super open-minded too. I think CEOs sometimes get a bad rap of money hungry, boardroom, door closed, focused on the stock ticker, which is true for some. But I think for the most part, we've interviewed some high quality people, both as performers and people. And, um, I just admire that too. I think there,

I think the people that we've talked to so far, I think like at least a third of, uh, over, uh, like 75% of them seem like decent people. And it seems like the culture they've created within their company is a positive one for those who work there and those who work with them, which is ultimately what I like about what we do is because we're telling stories about people that we admire. And yeah, we want to talk about those people. These are influential individuals with thousands of employees. They have and they manage hundreds of millions of dollars, billions in a lot of cases. Like they're not insignificant in the quote unquote world order within like their region, you know, within their communities. And so that's really cool. And I'm just interested in them and just learning more about them as always.

It's such a treat after we talk to them. It's such a treat to talk to them. And even off camera too, the little conversations we have, it's just the best. Afterwards, me and Chris always turn to each other and we're like, God, that was awesome. It's so great to do this. And we just continue to, and it's all different types of industries. We talked to a public cannabis company that does a billion dollars in revenue. We're talking to Thomas Reuters in a month and a half. And so now we're talking to a Canadian media multi-informational company. And then we're talking to Xerox, like a legacy product and printing company that's a public.

It's wide ranging. It's just, it's awesome. I'm interested in this stuff. So I tickle myself a little bit when we get some of these guests. Yeah, I can tell the passion, but I know we're rounding out time here. So why don't you start, Chris,

with what is the name of your show? How can they watch? And then I'll hand it to you, Will. I think it's like one of the best things to do. I mean, I think it's an one of the best things to do. I mean, I think it's an element of the predisposition and environment that Will and I grew up in of connecting with people and talking with people and, you know, working with our employees and clients and interviewing people. Like this is all we got in this existence is working with other people. I'm all about technology and that

stuff, but interviewing people, it's just, it's awesome. And we want to be interviewing people that want to tell us the good stuff. Like don't, don't hold back. I'm using this as an opportunity. I want it out in the world for people to know, like, tell us stuff, like quit, quit holding it in, in ways that are like, clearly people are like, why, you know, especially the corporate people. Whether you're starting or scaling your company's security program, demonstrating top-notch security practices and establishing trust is more important than ever. Vanta automates compliance for ISO 27001, SOC, GDPR, and more, saving you time and money while helping you build customer trust. Plus, you can streamline security reviews by automating questionnaires and

demonstrating your security posture with a customer-facing trust center all powered by Vanta AI. Over 8,000 global companies like Atlassian, Flow Health, and Quora use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time. OurA dot com slash founders for $1,000 off. Now back to the show. Yeah, like I don't want to say bullshit. Sometimes it is, but it's like being yourself. Don't get me wrong. If you're a public company, there's things you got to watch you say, but watch what you say. But tell your personal story.

You know, be honest. Be vulnerable. That's humanity right there. We love it. We're going to keep doing it. I think the business model of it's tough, but we're figuring that out. So make sure you shout out, what is the name of your show and how can they get in touch with you? Yeah. The Founder CEO Podcast. You can reach out to me info at salvemedia.com. We're taking queries there to be on the show. It's distributed on Entrepreneur.

I'm a contributor there. I love the founder story like we're having now for a couple of reasons. One, it's an inception. So it's like nothing built into something. And then the second

part is just founders are a little different. So, you know, hearing what they think is always valuable because the spin on it is usually more innovative and maybe a little more risky. But sometimes that's where the true strides are made in whatever type of progress you're going for. William, do you want to, what is the name of the show again? Where can they watch it? And then how can they get in touch with you? CEO series, YouTube, Instagram. It's just the CEO series. You'll find us. It'll be there and you can get in touch with us.

Same thing that info at salveemedia.com. If you have a CEO that you're looking to feature or you think we should and you can get in touch with us. Same thing, that info at salvimedia.com. If you have a CEO that you're looking to feature or you think we should feature, please reach out. We are also distributed on Entrepreneur, but we play on Cheddar, the financial channel, and it's on their linear channel. And then it also plays about 10 episodes of ours play on Reach TV, which is the network in airports, actually.

It's like at airport gates, bars, basically the TV screens at airports. So about 10 episodes in about 90 airports. So it's actually like airing twice a day there. Talking to them today, actually. So yeah, the CEO series, though. YouTube has all of our content, though. So I would recommend everyone goes there, YouTube slash, you know, the CEO series though. YouTube has all of our content though. So I would recommend everyone goes there, YouTube slash the CEO series.

Well, Christopher, William, I don't usually get to have two guests, but this has been great. I've been watching your show. So it's always an honor to have you on here. And thank you so much for joining us on Founder's Story. Thank you. Thanks for having us.