Next Level Pros - #101: Wild Moments from first 100😳

Episode Date: May 20, 2024

Welcome to the 100th episode of the Founder Podcast! In this special episode, we dive deep into a treasure trove of networking wisdom, sharing memorable moments and valuable lessons from past guests. From chance encounters with industry titans to profound personal revelations, join us as we celebrate the connections that have shaped our journey and continue to inspire entrepreneurs everywhere. Don’t miss out on this celebration of community, learning, and growth! Highlights: "You're always only one handshake away from anybody in the world." "I ended up taking over the academia to Galleria... I had a table of six set up at the feet of David... Then, Andrea Bocelli came in and serenaded them." "The two things I cared about from when I was 12 were making people happy and being an awesome dad." Timestamps: 00:00 - The Power of Networking 01:52 - The Value of Podcasting 02:18 - Dinner with David 05:00 - Clint Sparks' Childhood 07:42 - Building Happiness 10:06 - A Moment of Reckoning 15:00 - Lessons in Business Scaling 18:27 - The Human Connection 20:00 - Investment Opportunities 24:22 - Grant Cardone’s Do-Over Advice Looking to scale your business? Want to learn directly from the same team that helped me sell my last business for 9 figures? Click this link below to check out how you can work with us. https://nextlevelhomepros.com/grow-home-service-vsl Join my community - Founder Acceleration ⁠https://www.founderacceleration.com ⁠ Apply for our next Mastermind:h⁠ttps://www.thefoundermastermind.com⁠ Golf with Chris h⁠ttps://www.golfwithchris.com⁠ Watch my latest Podcast Apple- ⁠https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-founder-podcast/id1687030281S ⁠ Spotify- ⁠https://open.spotify.com/show/1e0cL2vI1JAtQrojSOA7D2⁠ YouTube - @thefounderspodcast

You're always only seven connections away from anybody in the world. And I think that's wrong. True with us. Like the world. Every time we go interview with somebody, it gets smaller and smaller. It's wild. I was telling a guy earlier today that we are literally like one handshake away from anyone. Yes.

Right. I mean, example, our boy Sims that we talked about handshake away from Elon Musk. Yeah. Right. Handshake away from elon musk yeah right uh hand handshake away from donald trump right like i mean literally with i mean t-pain or t-pain like literally handshake away from every musician we're talking about like taylor swift he produced a freaking uh song with taylor swift she's the new uh self-made billionaire right Literally, we are one handshake away from pretty much anyone in the world.

Yeah. It's wild. What's up, everyone? Welcome to another episode of the Founder Podcast. Today marks episode 100. Wow. A hundred. We launched this thing June of 2023.

Here we are in May with episode 100. So today we are going to be talking about some of our favorite clips, our highlights from the last 100 episodes. There's a lot to choose from. Through 100 episodes, I think I read podcasts only make it like 90% of podcasts make it to episode 10. Yes. And only like 1% make it to like episode like 70 or something like that. Right, right. We are in like the 10th of a percent.

Here we go. Again, to 100. So first of all, I just want to apologize to any of the guests that we don't feature on this. There are 100 of you. Unfortunately, we can't highlight. You know, there's so many things. I would invite you as a listener, as a watcher of this show, go through.

There are so many gems, so many incredible things. So speaking of 100 podcasts, you got to network into a lot of cool people. Oh, my goodness. Oh, my goodness. I mean, yeah, let's just highlight that real quick, right? So if you're not in the podcast game and you're thinking about it, I would highly encourage you to do so. Because the networking that we have been able to accomplish through this show is just unbelievable. Who would have thought 10, 11 months ago that we'd be sitting down with T-Pain?

I know, dude. That's unreal. T-Pain. So speaking of some of the highlights but let's talk about some of them like steve sims right steve sims has got to be like one of the coolest people i've ever met yes um they literally was called the real life wizard of oz and you know this guy shared an experience with me levi was there he was in the background where where he makes cool crap happen one of those particular events was he literally put on someone said hey i want to try to impress like my in-laws or whatnot he's like i got just the thing

and he was like this was in italy or paris or something but literally put on a dinner at the feet of david and then afterwards you know had like Andre Broccelli or something come and sing or whatnot. Anyways, let's go watch that clip. You know, I would always go above and beyond. And one of the classic ones, and again, it's in the book, was I had people say to me, you know, I want to have this amazing dining experience in Florence. You know, I really want to show off to my future mother-in-law

and father-in-law. Can you make something happen? Absolutely. I ended up taking over the Accademia di Galleria, which is the museum in Florence that houses Michelangelo's David, the most iconic statue in the world. Yes. I took it over from five o'clock in the evening until two o'clock in the morning, nine o'clock at night.

I had a table of six set up at the feet of David and I had the clients brought in to have dinner at the feet of the most iconic I had the clients brought in to have dinner at the feet of the most iconic statue in the world. Now, that's good, yes? That's pretty good. Couldn't stop there, though. So we had a string quartet appearing this day, so I said, look, during the main course,

I'm going to have a local entertainer come in and serenade you while you're digging into your pasta. So when it got time for them to start that main course, I let them know that I wanted to bring in the entertainer. They approved it. They said, certainly, Steve, bring him in. I brought in Andrea Bocelli to serenade and join their pastor. So that's the kind of thing that I did.

Of course, nobody knew that was the level that I played at. And of course, when you do that, they become addicted. They're like, what can you do for Monaco? What can you do for this? What can you do for my barbecue? What can you do for this? What can you do for my barbecue? What can you do for this amazing Sunday? Just because it's a bloody Sunday. So I became that, and I carried that on for like 25 years

until Forbes did, I suppose the word should be beautiful, but they did an eight-page expose on the most connected man in the world, and they called me the real-life Wizard of Oz. You know, you think of another cool person. So when we were in Vegas, we got to meet with David Meltzer. Oh, my goodness. And that was at a dinner that I went to. And that was amazing.

And there were so many other people there. Another guy that I met there at the dinner was Clinton Starks. Oh, yes. Clinton Sparks. Sparks. And then what was the most memorable thing about Clinton Sparks' story? Dude, Clinton Sparks. Oh, yes. Clinton Sparks. Yes. And then what was the most memorable thing about Clinton Sparks story? Dude, Clinton Sparks. Levi was there as well. Yes. Cool, dude. Oh, my goodness. So Clinton, you know, just shared some real raw content from his childhood,

what it was like growing up, having a dysfunctional family, the way that he was able to use that as what not to do in order to become an incredible father. Let's catch a little bit of that episode. I get so many amazing opportunities that happen in my life. And most people get, this is going to change my life forever. Maybe it will. I don't ever look at things like that. And if it doesn't happen, I'm never disappointed because guess what? I didn't have it. So if it doesn't happen, I didn't lose anything. You know what I mean? And like a lot of people don't look at life in this perspective, so they let down a lot. They get bitter.

Yeah, from these opportunities or, you know, look at what's happened to me. And the reason I'm able to do that now is because I put that to practice and put the work in from the trauma I went through as a kid to not allow it to seep into me being an adult, which then turns into how I built my life by design and not by circumstance. So when I'm young and I see all these people around me complaining, adults complaining, about they hate their life or they're drinking,

and you wonder why do they drink? Oh, because they hate their life. Oh, because their dad beat them. Because they're not happy with their marriage. And I'm like, man, this can't their life. Oh, because their dad beat them because they're not happy with their marriage. And I'm like, man, this can't be life. I just went through the biggest you can go through. I'm not going to go now live that life. Right.

So how old are you when you have this realization? About 12. 12. Yeah. OK, so that 12, you're like starting to say, OK, I'm going to live a different life. Yeah. So it was about 10 that I really started recognizing and paying attention to humans and how they psychologically, how they treat each other, how they act, how they respond.

Cause I was around a lot of alcoholism. Yeah. I was around a lot of like, you know, I'm in the hood. Yeah. Right. So where were you at? This was in Boston. Yeah.

In Boston. So yeah, I grew up in the hood. Okay. Yeah. Not the outskirts, the hood. Right. So if you ask someone. We're talking the Compton of Boston? Yeah, in Boston. So yeah, I grew up in the hood. Okay. Yeah, not the outskirts, the hood. Okay. We're talking the Compton of Boston. Yeah, if you ask someone Dorchester, even now it's still bad.

But back then it was worse, right? And the other thing too is it was very segregated. It was very, this is the black side, this is the white side. And I was part of both, right? So like, yeah, it was just a very, I didn't know who I was supposed to be as a kid. Like, am I too white for the black kids, too black for the white kids? Like, I just didn't make any sense. Right.

Right. And I didn't know who I was, who I was supposed to be, what I was supposed to do, how to defend myself, how to talk to a girl. I don't know. And nobody was telling me. And my mom worked too much. She was busy making sure we had a roof over our head and food. So I realized that most people weren't happy and I didn't want to grow up and not be happy. And I always had this dream, the two things at 12 years old that I only cared

about for the rest of my life was it wasn't making a lot of money. It wasn't, you know, most people, I want to be rich. I want to be famous. I want to be, I wanted to make people happy and I wanted to be an awesome dad one day. You brought up David Meltzer. David Meltzer, great guy. And it's funny. I was, I got to be there too and see David in person. David was actually a person I was not looking forward to meeting.

Oh, Levi was a hater. I was, I don't know if I was a hater. Borderline hater. I was a skeptic. Yeah. You know, there's in this space with gurus and business and you guys know, like we meet a lot of these people. There is a lot of ego, you know, involved.

And David, just from the facade that I see on social media is like, I don't know about this guy. But my belief in my perspective of David completely changed meeting him in person. And it was cool. And your guys interview, both of you guys got extremely emotional yeah man it was actually the only time as an interviewer that i teared up and cried yeah like a lot of times when people have me tell my story or whatnot right it hits home very emotional i end up crying sharing like the things that are near and dear to my heart but this is the one time that with a guest

him sharing like i connected so much that it brought tears to my eyes. And let's tune in for that one. I come home at 530 in the morning with a guy named Little John, the rapper. We went to the Grammy Awards together. And I'd lied to my wife about having a business meeting because she had said to me earlier, don't go. You're partying too much. You're not paying attention to the family or your business i'm concerned about you so i lied to her and i went with john to go party at the grammy awards i came home at 5 30 wasted i walked in the door the woman of my dreams who i've known since

the fourth grade who has always just told me the truth as hurtful as the truth is has always just told me the truth, as hurtful as the truth is, has always been the reflection of my insecurity and my strength, told me I'm not happy and I'm leaving you. And you better take stock in who you are and what you want to become or you're going to die. And I can't have me and my girls witness this. You need to change. I went to my wife and said, will you help me would you help me how long did it take from saying i hate you till you said those words

so initially when she was packing up so i had to say something yeah and so i said will you please stay and help me you don't have to stay married to me. You can still file a separation or whatever, but I hear you. Will you help me? I need help with gratitude, forgiveness, accountability, and inspiration. And I can't do it without you. So if you love me, will you stay and help me? I'm not asking you to stay married to me, but will you just stay and help me to save me? And she said yes. And she saved my life. She saved my marriage. And it allows me the greatest thing in faith to know that when outcomes happen in my life, I don't see I don't believe

human beings have the ability to understand or know outcomes that's why faith is so important and wisdom is so important and so take the worst day of my life two years before I went bankrupt I was protected and promoted so when I went bankrupt I was protected and promoted. So when I went bankrupt, I was protected and promoted. And I will tell you today, those two days, here I am 15 years after bankruptcy, 17 years after my wife was going to leave me. To this day, the defining moments of my life, the meaning of my past, of the defining moments of my life are two incidences at the time when they occurred that most people would have felt so punished they would have thought of even taking their own life but instead it has revealed itself as the greatest protection i've ever received the

greatest promotion and the greatest love i've ever received in my life and if i can share that perspective with people that you can't understand what's going on today, the only thing you have is your control of your behaviors. And I will tell everybody out there that your good behavior has an instant result. It's called good progress. And bad behavior has an instant result, bad progress. And so if you focus in on your behaviors and align those to where you want to be or better you're going to progress to where you want to be or better if you're not aligned you're not going to be where you want to be or better so so chris who was your very first obviously you kicked this

thing off last year in june so so we actually kicked it off with i think it was like grant cardone we had a we had a number of different people we had like grant card, we had a number of different people. We had like Grant Cardone, we had Alex Ramosi. Obviously, everybody knows who Alex Ramosi is. I mean, Alex shared some extreme gems. Let's get a little bit from his episode. The more people who are trying to build something, the bigger it can get, right? Like you didn't have 100% circle of your circle. And guess what?

Elon Musk has 20% of Tesla, right? But that still made sense. It made sense for him to give 80% to other people to help him build it. And he can still become the wealthiest man, you know, on the planet. And so like having to shift that belief in someone is really hard. If someone doesn't already come in believing it, like I'm willing to part with a chunk of the business in order to have a 10 times or 100 times more valuable thing, right? Like, if they don't believe that, and then part of it is also unrealistic expectations of valuation. So this is actually a pretty big one. So they hear about your exit, right? They hear

about my exit. And they think, oh, that multiple applies to my $2 million profit, you know, company that is basically me with a couple of helpers running around. And if I die tomorrow, the whole thing dies. Like, no, like, it doesn't apply to that. Because and here's, here's a stat that might astound your audience. For businesses doing less than 10 million in sales and 2 million in bottom line. All right. So those are the two numbers, top line, and 2 million bottom line. The average, like the median trading value is two and a half X on profit. That's the median. All right. So like that's the middle, right? And over 80%, depending on the source, this is SBA. So small business administration is when it comes out with these stats,

have a huge component of seller financing. And so that 2.5x is also not cash. That 2.5x is the total enterprise value. And the person who's bought... So let's say you did a hypothetical deal with somebody doing $1 million a year in profit. So $1 million a year in 12 months. And let's say they got the median valuation. So the person who's buying is adding no value. They're just buying the asset. They're coming in to do nothing, right? Because that's who is buying this, right? If you and I might want to buy something, I would expect to get a discount on something because I'm going to be doing a little work to grow the thing, right? I don't want to pay you to work, right? So the idea is like, okay, let's think through this. A million dollars,

two and a half X is the median. And let's's say 90 of them have seller carry okay well if you're selling half the business then now we're at 1.25 and let's say and you have a seller carry so you you might only get a few hundred thousand dollars for half the business now again the part of it is that people then in that situation and this is where deals don't happen is that they're like i'm worth at least 10 it's like you're not bro like you're not because you can't walk away like you could walk away from business and it still grows like gym launch continues to grow and alex is on a podcast with chris right now right the idea is that you have to build an asset that can grow on its own and that takes time so uh outside of like the highlights obviously going from zero

episodes all the way to 100 it takes a lot of work you don't just do that overnight right chris from us doing all these episodes is there anything that you've learned from doing 100 episodes that maybe you could give advice to people wanting to do podcast so many so many things and i'm actually going to take it away from like what you learn about podcasting. So first of all, I learned to be a better listener, right? Like just really sitting and asking questions and getting deeper. And so that was fantastic. But the other thing that like really has hit home with me that I've already believed with business and running successful business and everything is like, you know, when you put someone out there, like for example, a particular guest, let's call it T-Pain, right? And it's like,

hey, I heard T-Pain is going to be in Vegas. Let's figure out how we can get T-Pain on the show. And you put these like crazy lofty goals and then you do everything possible. You start reaching out to who could potentially be a connection. You follow up, you follow up, you follow up, you do all these different things. Like, dude, the crazy thing is anybody that we put on that list to get on the show we've been able to land yeah right and so like for me that has taught me just that same principle of success that like it when it's big and scary or whatnot you're going to take bigger and scarier actions right things that like make the butterflies go and you're a little nervous you're not sure if it's going to work out like those are way funner problems to work on than like oh let's go and get like just another

internet marketer yeah because i mean those guys are a dime a dozen are way ready and ready to you know get on your show it's cool because there's like a statistic out there that says you're always only seven connections away from anybody in the world. And I think that's wrong true with us. Like the world, every time we go interview with somebody, it gets smaller and smaller. It's wild. I was telling a guy earlier today that we are literally like one handshake

away from anyone. Yes. Right? I mean, example, our boy Sims that we talked about, handshake away from Elon. Yes. Right. I mean, example, our boy Sims that we talked about handshake away from Elon Musk. Yeah. Right. Handshake away from Donald Trump. Right. Like, I mean, literally with, I mean, T-Pain, like literally handshake away from every musician. We're talking about like Taylor Swift. He produced a freaking song with Taylor Swift she's the new self-made billionaire right like literally we are one handshake away from pretty much anyone in the world yeah wow

Daryl what uh what have you learned from like 100 episodes of listening and being a part in some of our best episodes we've ever put out so obviously it's always learning about the people right that you interview and um honestly I have to go back to, you know, meeting people. They're all very genuine. Everyone wants to help. Everyone wants to bring value. And you see that in absolutely every person that we've brought on. I can't think of someone who you've brought on that was not like that.

Yeah. I mean, most people are down to earth. And that's just another reminder to the audience. Like literally everyone puts their underwear on one leg at a time. Everyone's a normal human being, their psychology, the things that they like, that they dislike, their fears, their wants, their needs, like literally everybody functions the same way. And if you can figure out how to appeal to them as a normal person, like you're going to be able to land some of these rock stars, which is pretty awesome.

You know, because of the podcast, you got invited to go to the Dave Meltzer's dinner. Right. I went with you. And what was cool was not meeting Dave Meltzer because he's awesome, but realizing the people that he surrounds himself with. Yeah. That spoke louder of who he was. Yeah. And that was a, that was cool. When I saw that, I was like, that's important to me. And speaking of like cool opportunities that it's putting in front of us, like because of it, we've had multiple opportunities to invest in some of these great businesses that we've interviewed. Clinton Sparks being one of them, like he's going and building this world gaming league that is absolutely cool. And like prior to meeting Clinton, I would have never thought that I would have invested in something like this,

but then meeting Clinton, I'm like, dude, this is a good, genuine dude that I want to go and I want to build with. And so now he's going and building this like a hundred, $200 million empire in the gaming world, bringing on like celebrities and all this different stuff. So there's that. And then on top of that, we have this incredible opportunity with Doug Evans, where we've invested in the sprouting company. He's brought us on as advisors in his business. This is the same Doug Evans. We'll actually break away to one of his clips where he talked about an experience that he had working with Steve Jobs directly, which is pretty crazy. Let's check a little bit from that episode. I went to Barnes & Noble and I'm going through the books

and I discovered this book by this author artist named Paul Rand. And Paul designed IBM, ABC, UPS, Westinghouse, and was the man who was accredited for the transition of commercial art into fine art in the form of graphic design and he taught the master's program at Yale in graphic design and I didn't even know there was such a thing as a master's program right you know in graphic design and so I contacted Paul his name is Paul Rand then the author of this the author of this book yeah and we became friends and I worked for him as for seven years

as an unpaid intern unpaid unpaid how'd you survive for seven I did my other side hustles, but being with him was like being in the presence of Picasso. Like he was such a master. Everything was thoughtful. Everything was brilliant. And he had a new client at the time named Steve Jobs. So at this time, you're still living in New York? Still living in New York. Okay. Still living in New York. So you're working for this author and he's got a client or a partner with Steve Jobs. Yeah, he was designing the logo for Steve's new company, Next. Wow. So I'm in this thing.

And I worked for Paul for seven years until Paul died. And then when Paul died, I went out on my own. And now I gave up the side hustles. I'm all in on the graphic design and computer graphics and obviously learned a lot, you know, from the connection, you know, with Steve Jobs. And you could- So did you keep that connection with Steve Jobs? Of course. Yeah. You could see, if you Google Doug Evans and Steve Jobs, you'll see a video on YouTube from 1993 with, you know, 400,000 views of a young Steve with a full head

of hair like you. So we had a, we had a great relationship. Awesome. And did you keep that for, for as long as, yeah, I mean, Steve became, you know, when, when Steve went back to Apple, right. You know, every millisecond of his time was very focused. Right. Right. But he still had his home number, still connected. But Steve was no small talk. Right.

If you digressed on a conversation, he would interrupt you and say, get to the point. There was no small talk, like just none. Wow. And you can learn a lot from that. Right. And, you know, I'm grateful that Steve lived when he lived and did what he did. Cause in today's like society, he would have been canceled. There would have been lawsuits. I mean, he would not have been able to operate and create what he created in this environment. And so, yeah, with that, like, I mean, investing in his business, getting behind, like growing sprouts, like that has been so cool. There are just so many incredible people. Grant Cardone taught us some amazing things.

You know, some of his experiences. What were like some of the things that you remember from that episode i remember specifically we'll cut to it too like you asked them grant if you could do if you could start over right now what would you do he explains like his thought process of he wouldn't go to college he wouldn't talk to girls and if he were to go to college he would get into college to pretty much network. Like he's like, if I go to college, I'm going to sign up for the golf team so I can be around people who golf because golf clubs are where the money is at. Like that's where business deals go. So let's cut to that clip right now.

If you could do it all over again, Grant, right? So you're 65 years old. If you could do it all over again, what would you do different? I wouldn't go to college. I would never spend one second on drugs, any kind of drugs. From 15 until probably 45, I would have left all women alone. I would not have taken a test about what I'm good at. My mom had me take a test. I think she spent $1,600 on that test that said I should be an accountant. Oh, gosh. And I would study where money's going.

I would study where people are going, where eyeballs are going, where, you know. So those are some things I would not do again. I would avoid all the losers, dude. If I went to college, I would only probably go to three or four or five colleges, and I would only go there for the hookups, like to meet the power players. I would have become a golfer probably. I would have learned how to golf because there's money at golf clubs. Maybe not. I didn't probably need to do the golf thing, but, but yeah.

Are you much of a golfer? Right now? My mom wanted me to play golf when I, she wanted me to take up the sport and I wish I would have, because I would have met, I would have met a different group of people. If you could pay for golf, man. And guys, I mean, as you can see, so many incredible highlights

and we haven't even touched on like a 10th of the incredible things. So if you haven't had an opportunity, go watch some of these previous episodes. They're absolutely fantastic. We're super excited to bring you episode 100 and super look forward to number 150, 200, 250, 300 as we continue to bring you the Founder Podcast.

Thank you so much. Until next time.