REAL AF with Andy Frisella - Self Made, with Andy Frisella - MFCEO126

Episode Date: February 14, 2017

Mike Dillard is a dad, entrepreneur, thought-leader, and freedom fighter who has helped thousands of people build wealth to live the life of their dreams. Also the host of the "Self-Made Man" podcast, Mike joins the MFCEO crew to talk about the keys to success in business and life, with special attention paid to the process of self-development, as well as the finer points of online marketing and sales. Filled with Mike's practical insights and brave transparency, this episode is one of the best ever.

What is up guys you're listening to the MFCEO project I'm Andy I'm your host and I am the motherfucking CEO guys if this is your first time listening welcome this is a podcast for personal development this is the podcast that you're going to listen to and it's going to punch you right in the fucking throat and make you realize that most of the time you're being a total pussy. Okay. It's not just for being a CEO. It's not just for being a business owner. It's not just for entrepreneurs. It's about being the CEO of you. Okay. Because that's what we all are at the end of the day. And you know, what's better than being the CEO of you is okay? Because that's what we all are at the end of the day. And you know what's better than being the CEO of you is being the motherfucking CEO of you, where you go through life kicking ass,

having a good time, full of confidence, and basically making everyone around you better at the same time. As always, guys, I'm here with my co-host, Vaughn Kohler, aka Vaughn the Impaler, the pastor of disaster. What's up, my man? I'm doing great, man. It's a beautiful day in St. Louis. You know what? It is beautiful. It is. We woke up, it was raining, and my cars were supposed to get detailed today, and I was like, fuck. Because that's a big deal for me, man. My car's got to look fresh. It's kind of like your head. Your head's always looking shiny and fresh.

I want my cars to look that fresh. I like to keep it shiny and fresh. Yeah, it looks good, bro. Your head is the inspiration for the paint on my cars. I'm not sure what to say about that. Yeah, you should. It's a compliment. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Can I share something with you? You can always share something with me, man. Okay, well, it has to do with your impact on my life. Okay. So if you accuse me of... Ass kissing? Yeah, ass kissing, yeah. Oh, okay. Oh, see, I said, now I just used the word ass. So I'm going to get all this hate. Yeah, the pastor said ass. No, no, no. No, but I realized, what I realized, and this is pretty huge for me. I realized that for most of my life, well, really for all of my life, I've been a pretty talented guy. Like I have some pretty good gifts. There's nothing like humility, is there, Tyler?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, and this is where it's going, I realized how much of a liability and a disservice that my talent has been. Because it's only been the last two years that i realized it working with you i'm like talent really doesn't get you anywhere hard work gets you places you want to know my criticism discipline my criticism to you is this what's that i will agree you're extremely talented yeah my criticism to you is that you don't always let people see how talented you are. And you hide a little bit. But I'm the co-host.

It's okay. But I like the fact that I saw you getting photos taken yesterday. And I see you working on your personal shit. That makes me feel good. Because I see you coming out of your shell and saying, all right, look, I'm going to be who I am. I'm going to let people know it. That's what this is about. But, man, I mean, I be who I am. I'm going to let people know it. That's what this is about. But man, I mean, I've been getting up and I'm not bragging.

I'm literally telling you thank you. And I know I didn't, but I'm getting up. I can pull my pants straight down and bend over if you want to kiss it. I'm just saying. No, but there is a rush now that I'm getting at 4.30 in the morning. I'm getting up at 4.30 in the morning. Yeah, man. It feels good to be you.

It feels good. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So I'm straightening my Vers.30 in the morning. I'm getting up at 4.30 in the morning. Yeah, man. It feels good to be you. It feels good. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So I'm trading in my Versa any minute now. There you go. You're trading in the Vaginamobile. That's right. Yeah.

So, guys, first of all, that is exactly what this podcast is about. And that's super cool to hear, especially from you. Yeah, yeah. And you guys don't realize how hard von works and tyler by the way just so everybody knows mc salmon is wearing his salmon shorts today i got tired of hearing you bitching yeah so mc salmon is in the house fully dressed with his shorts and that means as you guys know that we're gonna have a killer podcast and i have no fucking doubt about that because we have a super special guest today on the podcast. His name is Mike Dillard. He's an entrepreneur. He's an ass kicker. He's a car guy. He's also the host of the Self-Made Man podcast, which I've been on

and it's an amazing podcast. If you guys aren't subscribing to that podcast, you need to. Welcome, my brother. How are you doing? Thank you, man. It's a bit surreal being here in the office after listening to you for a year now and Vaughn kicking ass. So this is fucking awesome, man. Yeah, yeah. Dude, we just recorded this morning an episode for his series. Why don't you tell everybody about what you do with the podcast and your video series and everything? You know, much like MFCEO, it started about a year and a half ago as a passion project. The goal was basically to provide leaders and mentorship to young men specifically out there, because as I've looked at the world over the last,

I'd say 10 years, you know, in particular. I don't know about you guys. I've seen a massive degradation in the values of American society from the top down, from Washington to companies who are lying, stealing, and et cetera. And it appears to me that what's being taught to young individuals in high school and colleges that get whatever is yours by any means possible, whether there's honesty and integrity behind it or not. And that's not a world I want to live in. No. And it's a short-term look at the whole big picture. It's the exact opposite of what this nation was founded upon and why we've been successful. And so I asked myself, okay, what can I do to possibly have an impact on that?

And if you look back in history, you're basically asking a question of, well, how do you change a society? And there's two options. There's with the barrel of a gun or there's by impacting the value system of the next generation. And so that was the goal. I was like, you know what? I can do a podcast. I can do it for free. It can be disseminated all over the world, and we can put role models back in front of the next generation that will put us back on track.

So that was the inspiration and why we started a year and a half ago. Yeah, very, very similar. If you guys like this podcast, you will love his podcast as well. It's a very, very good, rich content. A little more refined than I would say I am, but that's okay. You know, everybody's got their own style. And people who get what you just said get 100% why Andy wrote a children's book. Right.

100%. Yeah. They understand that that's the long game. Are you plugging the children's book right now? That was a good effort. Well, yeah. That was like a good seamless effort. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So OtisandCharlie.com. Yeah, there you go. There you go. E-Y.lie e-y so yeah so mike is also uh very much into making a difference it's not you know like we talk about on the last episode with gerard being an entrepreneur is is so little about the money it just so happens that when you make a big impact and you make people's lives better and you improve the situation at hand, money comes with those things. And that's why Mike has been a very successful entrepreneur. He's been in the info space,

publisher, copywriter, very successful guy, very jealous of his brand new car. He just got a brand new Ferrari 48 Spyder. And I'm not even a Ferrari guy. And the thing makes me, gives me a little eggplant, if you know what I'm saying. Everybody knows what that means. So tell us a little bit about your entrepreneurial journey. Sure. I knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur in high school because I used to mountain bike race professionally and I'd wait tables at the original Macaroni Grill in Bernie, Texas during my weekends. That's the original, huh? Yeah.

Oh, cool. Before it was, you know, a chain and bought out by Brinker. And so the food was actually good back then. Yeah. I just like the table wine, man. They bring out the table wine. It's total shit wine. But man, I get drunk on it.

It was a riot. You get a two and a half hour wait with people having free jugs of wine in front of them for two and a half hours. It was a party. So I would train during the week and wait tables and bus tables on the weekends while my friends were out partying. Maybe I'd have an event that I'd want to go to and I'd get slammed with a double, you know, for my manager. And I'm like, fuck, I, I can't believe that I'm giving somebody else control over my schedule and my time and my life. And that basically planted the seed that I was not going to let that happen as I got older. So that began my, my venture into entrepreneurship.

I'd come home at one o'clock smelling like food and sweating after 12 hours running on the floor. What do you do when you turn on the television at midnight? At one o'clock, you see infomercials for Tony Robbins and Carlton Sheets and all these guys. So here I was. Carlton Sheets. Exhausted. Dude, I haven't heard that name in 20 fucking years.

Nobody's going to know who that is except you and I because we grew up with that shit. Dude. Yeah. Holy shit, that just brought back a flash of memories, dude. I think he's probably the guy I pictured in my mind, but I'm not sure who it is. Hey, do you remember Brad Richdale? Yeah.

Yeah. So I bought- Nobody remembers that motherfucker. I bought his product. I did too. Yeah. That's how I- seriously, no bullshit. I'm probably like one of the only guys ever that actually bought his shit and learned

something and made a bunch of money from it. I did it. I wrote my- His program was good, dude. Yeah. I wrote my first thing in college based on his course. course. So that's what got me down this track. And, uh, and then after that it, you know, my businesses have always been inspired by my own personal problems or challenges. And so I, you know, am an introvert. I was extremely,

extremely shy growing up in high school, uh, even in college. And if you want to start a business, you learn very quickly that you're going to have to freaking sell something. And talking to an introvert who doesn't like to talk to people, that's a nightmare. So I spent several years doing everything I could to try and figure out how to sell. No matter what I did, I hated every second of it. And I discovered Dan Kennedy years ago in my 20s, who had basically written about the concept of attraction marketing and using direct response. And what I realized from that is, you know what, I can actually write a letter or put up a website with a letter and sell something without actually having to talk to someone. And that changed my life.

I went from waiting tables at a P.F. Chang's in my mid-20s by that point to learning how to write copy. I spent 18 months mastering that skill set, wrote a letter selling an e-book that I had written for a previous skill set, and essentially sold that for $39 a copy. I had it printed at Kinko's every week. I'd go down and have two or three hundred spiral bound books printed for about three bucks a piece. I'd sell them for $39 online with a little letter that I wrote. I bought some traffic on Google AdWords. And within a couple of months, I was selling $40,000 to $60,000 a month of that book. Wow. What year was that? 2007. Okay. Yeah. So that's when I realized a couple of things. First and foremost, if you understand your personality type and you accept that, the sooner that you start to learn skills that are

aligned with your methodology or the way your brain is wired, the better instead of fighting against it. The moment I did that is everything started going really quickly. So that's an important thing to note, man, you know, trying to stick a square peg in a round hole. It's just, you can make it work. You know what I mean? But there's always a way there, especially in entrepreneurship. I do believe there's always a way for all personality types to be successful because I've seen entrepreneurship is it's people who are like aspiring entrepreneurs think they have, like they watch somebody like me or they watch somebody like let's say Tony Robbins or they watch these dudes and they think you got to have this crazy,

like energetic in your face, like charismatic personality. You fucking don't. In fact, a lot of times my personality hurts me because of the way I react and my, and, and, and, and the way I communicate, you know, so, you know, to you guys listening who think that you're missing something by not having that, that's actually a lot of times the opposite, you know, because I can give you a million examples where me being the way that I am with people has hurt me rather than helped me. Well, if I had, if he forced me to build a business based on what Gary Vaynerchuk does every day, I would fail miserably and I could do it, but I would suck at it and I would be miserable. You'd be personally miserable. Yeah. I'd be done in a couple of weeks.

Right. So coming to that conclusion and really realizing how I was, you know, meant to pursue business was, was huge. And, uh, you know, a great place to start for that as your Myers-Briggs, uh, figuring out what personality type, your personality type you have, uh, your Colby test, your strengths finder 2.0, just figuring out how you were freaking wired, uh, is the first thing you need to do. Yeah. Try and develop some develop some real self-awareness on the spot. Yeah. Right. Yeah, man, I think a lot of people go their whole lives

without ever trying to figure out what they're meant to do, right? It's like the example of basketball. The dude's 5'8", 180 pounds, and he thinks he's trying to be Michael Jordan. It's like, bro, what's it fucking meant for you know and that's okay yeah right no that is okay your shit out yeah right exactly man it's just such a and and i feel like um you know with entrepreneurship now you have so many guys out there that are of similar types, you know, they're good salespeople, they're, they're vocal, they're charismatic. They know how to speak to people that everybody out there that thinks if

they don't have that, that they're not going to be able to be successful. Dude, I know so many more entrepreneurs that aren't that way that are far, far more successful than I am. Yeah. You just don't see them. They're not, they're not on Instagram. Right. So, you know, if you're listening and that's you, you're not missing anything. You know, I think that's a big, I get a lot of emails from people that say things like that. They're like, how do you do that? It's like, bro, I'm just working with what I have, you know, and that's a huge deal. So with that project, I mean, was that the first time in your life that you made real money? I guess it sounds like it was. Oh, yeah.

I mean, literally, I was waiting tables at a P.F. Chang's living in my parents' house. Right. And I had a corporate job in Dallas recruiting surgeons. And I think that's kind of a really important part of my story, actually, is after four or five years of utter failure, I moved to Dallas, got a job in corporate America with one single intention, which was to get a job that would provide me with a skillset that I could apply to my business. So I never once stopped working on the business or thinking about it, but I realized what my stopping points were, what my blocks were, and it was selling and being timid. And so I was like, all right, if I've got to get a job, I'm going to freaking learn something from this job and it's going to have a meaningful impact on my business goals.

So how do you get over fear of the phone? You get a job recruiting surgeons that, you know, they sit you down in a desk that's completely empty, drop a five inch binder in front of you that has 10,000 doctor's offices, phone numbers and say, start dialing 300 calls a day. My phone fear was gone within 24 hours. So even, so I, I always like to jump in and point out the points, but like, dude, the best way to get over fear is to fucking go right at it, man. And like, you know, just because something isn't made for you doesn't mean you can't develop a tremendous skill for it, you know? And, and dude, that's, I think that's a big thing that holds people back, right? They, they, they see a, they see something they have to do. They're like, I could never do that. So they never try. What was interesting. I don't remember where I

read it. It might've been Tony Robbins or somewhere, but I read somewhere that there are a lot of things that you won't be willing to do for yourself that you'd be willing to do for someone else like a boss. And I was like, okay, let's give that a shot. And sure enough, you know, I wasn't willing to do this for myself for five years, but you sit me down with, you know, someone who has expectations for what I need to do that day. And I did it. Right. And, uh, I did that for about a year and I was like, okay, well, what's, what's my next fear? And the next one was selling in person. So, uh, quit that job, got another one for a startup in downtown Dallas and outside sales in the telecom industry. And the goal was, here's your territory. You go into this high rise and

you go to the top floor, you sneak past security and you knock on doors until you get kicked out and you're trying to sell the service. And you talk about the worst, scariest thing on the planet for someone like me at the time that was hugely terrifying. Uh, you know, I, I lasted, I think two weeks, but sure enough, I did it. I figured out how to sneak past the guard. I essentially put my cell phone up to my ear and pretend I was on a very important phone call and not make eye contact with the security desk, go straight to the elevator. And I'd make it like five or six doors before they caught on, but mission accomplished. Right, right. That's awesome, man. And another thing too, like that I hear him saying also is like for you guys that have a job right now and it's not your end goal, this is another area where

people fuck up constantly. This isn't what I want to do. So I don't fucking apply myself. Well, first of all, you can learn to be great at a lot of different things by just being great at your job you're at now. And not only that, you develop the habits of working hard and the habits of focusing and the habits of trying to be the best. Those are all habits. They're not character traits. And so whatever your job is right now, you know, you notice that Mike said, if I'm going to have to have a job, I'm going to learn something. Dude, take that mentality with what you're doing now, because you will always carry that with you. You know, nobody wants to, you know, well, most people don't want to fucking shuffle fries.

But you know what? If you're going to shuffle fries, make some good fucking fries. Right. You know what I mean? So it's a great thing to hear that. I think people need to hear that. Yeah, biggest opportunity for someone in their 20s, get a job in the industry that you love, that you want to get involved in and just learn. Whenever I valet one of my cars, right? In Austin, there's these young guys who've been valeting my cars wherever I go for years downtown.

They change locations or whatever. And they're in their 20s, they're smart, they've got a good attitude, and I still see them three years in. And, you know, changed locations or whatever. And they're in their 20s. They're smart. They've got a good attitude. And I still see them three years in. And I'm thinking to myself, what the hell are you doing? You're not learning anything

from this job. Go somewhere else and do anything that's in line with something bigger, you know, that you have in store for yourself.

Right. For sure, man. So I want to state the obvious, but what I see in you, Mike, is that what is true of pretty much every successful person, entrepreneur or otherwise, it's not you don't come to the table with all these assets necessarily, although I'm sure you have them. But you come with a disposition that says, all right, well, I'm going to do what I need to do to learn and I'm going to do what I need to do to add some ingenuity to my plans for life. And so I feel like that's something that people need to realize again and again is that it really isn't about talent, like we were saying earlier. It isn't about having all these natural assets. It's about

having this position that says, I'm going to get it done. I'm going to learn stuff. I'm going to develop myself no matter what I have to do. Yeah. If you have a goal in mind and you know where you want to end up, you simply figure out what you need to do to get there and you just go get it done. I just don't know how any other way to operate. Right. But dude, so many people still, they use that as like, there's so many people listening right now that are saying, well, I need a website, but I don't know how to build a website. Well, fucking Google the motherfucking shit. You know what I mean? Like, oh, I need a website, but I don't know how to build a website. Well, fucking Google the motherfucking shit. You know what I mean?

Like, oh, I need to learn how to sell, but I don't know how to sell. Well, go try to sell and fucking learn as you go. That's what entrepreneurship is. It is not a set path. Nobody grows up with a fucking production team and a graphics department and all this other shit that people have we don't even have that yet no no i got a fucking iphone and i got mc salmon that's right i mean fuck let's let's be let's be honest andy i think i think if someone's asking those questions

or making comments like that yeah they're really not cut out to be an entrepreneur i agree i agree i agree those are not questions that come up with you. No, but entrepreneur is the new rapper. It's the new cool thing. Sure. It's the thing that everybody wants to be now. So everybody thinks that if they don't have a job and they have an idea of a business, that they could put entrepreneur in their fucking profile and they're an entrepreneur.

Like, dude, no. Entrepreneurs take an idea and they figure out how to make it fucking happen and that's that like professional problem solvers yeah 100 all the time that dude that's funny we were talking about this on on your show earlier like that's exactly what it is like people will write in and they'll say well i'm having this issue with this or i'm having this issue with that and i'm having this issue with my team and I'm like they're like is this normal and I'm like yeah dude that's what you do like your job is to fucking make those things go together like it's it's just that's what it is and uh you know so

many people feel like they look at guys who are successful and they say that guy's got it all figured out no I don't have it all figured say that guy's got it all figured out no i don't have it all figured out you don't have it all figured out fucking dude the conversations you and i were just having off off camera and off off microphone about your brand and my brand like dude we're still learning from each other and we're talking like this is not you cannot look at somebody and and pretend that like because they're at a certain point, I'm 18 years in my journey and you think I have it all figured out. I don't have it all figured out, but I learned new shit every fucking day, you know? And that's the thing, you know, you have to be willing to go out.

Dude, when I was playing football, I can remember this specific deal. So one time we were doing this drill and we had to run like 30 yards and we had to like break. One, there was two dudes. One was holding the pad and the other dude was holding the pad. And you had to run as fast as you could and try to break through the fucking pads. And like no matter how fucking hard I ran at the pads, I got fucking knocked on my ass every fucking time. And you know what, what would happen is you would watch other guys and other guys when they got like five yards out from the pad, they would slow down and then try to like weasel their way through the pad.

Not me. I still ran as hard as I could into the fucking pad every fucking time because I thought that one of those times I was going to knock those motherfuckers down. And that's what entrepreneurship is about. Entrepreneurship is about running as hard as you fucking can every fucking time and getting the fuck back up and trying again. That's it. And like, dude, people think that this little obstacle or that little obstacle, this dude, I get knocked on my ass every fucking day, at least once, at least once every day, whether it be from, you know, our retail company or our first form or something, you know, that I'm working on.

There's things that don't go my way every single day. And that's life. That's part of the deal. That's what you're signing up for. Entrepreneurship is the goriest, bloodiest, messiest profession that you could ever fucking be in mentally. You know what I mean? And it's not for everybody. But if you're not going to be willing to get up

when little bitty shit happens, you're sure as fuck not going to be able to get up when you get a $2 million fucking tax bill like I did, like we talked about on your show, and you don't have the money to fucking pay it, you know? Uh, it's well, so like I said, if that's where somebody's at, they're, they're not being honest with themselves. So let's talk about, you know, how we can, we can serve the people who aren't asking those questions and we're like, I'm fucking doing it. Right. What, uh, what is there, the biggest challenges that you hear back from your audience

on, on, you know, guys and gals that are going for it actually i think this i think this is a great question for you to answer because what i get a lot and it's something i don't know a lot about is that a lot of these kids are trying to work with info products and they're learning how to develop an info product like you you did with your book um and and sell that where to sell it how to develop it and what are the options for them how to market an info product like you did with your book and sell that, where to sell it, how to develop it, and what are the options for them, how to market it. And you're much more qualified. That's what you do. So I get literally questions about that all the time and I know very little about it. Sure. Yeah. So I think step one in this process, again, is identifying what is your biggest challenge or problem in life or your passion. Because this is something that you're going to be talking about, writing about,

or dealing with for years to come. So it has to be something that you're unbelievably into, whether it's your job or not. So that's step number one. And the other option for that is, from a transformation perspective, where are you most dissatisfied in your life? So for me, the last business I started was in the financial education space because I had built a multiple eight-figure business in my 20s. And I turned 30 and I had absolutely nothing to show for it except a house, a boat, and some really badass cars and a lot of great memories. As any guy in his 20s who's making millions of dollars and single would have yeah um and then you you hit 30 and you're like oh holy shit you know i'm kind of getting old now and it's time to grow up a little bit and

uh you know fact of the matter is is that my parents are unbelievably hard-working amazing individuals but you know middle class upper middle class. And their financial education was having an advisor in mutual funds. So not necessarily the best teachers when it came to money. This was around 2008. So the world had just blown up financially. And when I went to the bookstore to start to dive into this topic, every book that I found was now irrelevant. Buy your single family home and your diversified portfolio. And like all of that shit had just blown up on every way, right. You know, so I'm like, okay, I know what not to do. I just saw half the world lose, you know,

40% of their portfolios. Uh, but I didn't have an answer yet. So for me, that was my biggest passion at the time. It was figuring out this problem in my life where I was completely weak and I had no expertise or knowledge or experience at all. So that became my business. And so whatever your challenges in life, maybe it's personal fitness, maybe it's parenting, communication. I mean, pick a topic. If that's something you really want to change in your world, turn that into your business. Yeah. Become the expert. That's it. And, you know, for me, I wasn't intending to become an expert. I just wanted to

learn enough to take ownership of that part of my life so that I could make educated decisions. And so, you know, the next question is, well, you know, Mike, if you don't know anything, how can I possibly start a business around this? If'm ignorant on the subject matter? Great. Become a host. And that's essentially what I did. I was like, look, I'm not the expert in this world. I'm just here to learn about it. And if you want to follow in my journey, I'm going to interview people every week and we're going to learn about different types of investing and real estate and gold and things like that. And let's figure this out together. And that turned into a business that did 10 million in revenue in the first 12 months. We did 3.2 million in the first seven days. And the entire premise was me saying, I'm an idiot when it comes to this topic, but I'm

going to figure it out. And if this is an area of your life that you want to improve on as well, then let's go do that together. So you don't have to be an expert. You just have to have a passion for the subject, and you have to see it as a problem you want to solve for yourself and for others. And that was – sorry, I'm a little slow on the uptake. That was specifically what business? It was called the Elevation Group. The Elevation Group. And it's no longer a business, but I sold my interest in that a few years ago.

But as we talked about earlier today, uh, that was my most successful business, you know, in the first year or two and the, and the second year turned into my, my biggest challenge in life. When one of the guys I ended up interviewing turned out to be a con man and, uh, uh, ended up blowing up the business and cost me everything that I ever made. And, and it was a huge, huge learning lesson, but, yeah, that's a whole other subject matter. It's part of entrepreneurship. You're going to get punched in the mouth hard. And sometimes you're going to question, like, what the fuck am I even doing?

And the true entrepreneur is going to get up and say, I can't do anything else. This is just what I am. Yeah, absolutely. There is no other option. So when you say you did $3.2 million in the first seven days, how did you get that much momentum behind it so quickly? So, you know, I can think of less than five or six individuals who've been producing products in the info space or the education space as long as I have for, let's say, 10 years. Right. They come and go. And so what's the difference

between us and everybody else? And the first and most important piece of this entire process is just like first form, it's to produce a quality product. And second, it's to always, always put your relationship with your customers and your audience first, because that's what this entire business is based upon. It's based upon trust. Someone's only going to buy a course or a book from me if they know, like, and trust me. And if I betray that trust and I put money first, or if I put out a shitty product or whatever it may be, that's good. Done, right? Right. So to answer your question, how did we acquire 8,600 customers and $3 million in revenue in a week? Uh, I'd say 70% of that came from my audience

who'd followed me from the previous company. And, uh, it was basically like, Mike, we love your stuff. We've, you know, bought it in the past. If you think this is great, we're in. Right. And so there was no sales pitch required basically for the most of that. That's the value of, of, that's the value of, of giving and contributing and providing real value and never asking for anything in return. The long game, right? It's the long game. It's just doing what you said you're going to do and never, ever selling out your audience for money. Right. Well, it's dude, the alternative is to screw people over, make a little bit of money, and then you ruin your reputation, and then you're toast. And then you're done. Then you're selling fucking snow cones.

Right, right. On the side of the fucking road. Mike, very practical question. We get this question a lot from people that email us all the time. And Andy, we'd love to hear what you have to say on this. In those early moments when you're starting to really kill it and you're making a lot of money, we get this question all the time. What was the first thing you bought? Well, we do that again.

We're going to go down a car rabbit hole. It's going to be at a car show. The question is, is there a guideline for how much you reinvest in your company? Like how much money you enjoy and how much you reinvest back into the company? So that's an interesting question when it comes to the digital product space, because our cost of goods sold is zero. You know, an ebook to sell one copy is the same cost of goods sold as a million copies, right? So the infrastructure that you can run a digital info business on is literally three or 400 bucks a month. It's your shopping cart and,

you know, maybe a little tech guy help and that's about it. So from an investment standpoint, there's not a lot of places to put it unless you start to have a really big vision for your team, of which there have only been a couple of people who've done that. Robert Kiyosaki has done it. Tony Robbins has done it. And then Dean Graziosi has done it. So these are guys in the info space who've put money into staff, built a company, and who now all do $100 to $200 million plus a year in revenue.

And that staff is, I'm assuming, like production staff primarily? All your typical stuff. Fulfillment, service. Marketing and tech and all of that. But it's very easy not to in this space because this is literally a business you can run by yourself from a laptop anywhere in the world. And there's value to that lifestyle.

Like, let's be honest, if you're making 100 grand a month in profit, you can go out and buy anything you want, do anything you want. What's your incentive to go out and build a team and take on all of those, you know, headaches and responsibility. And so no shit, there's a lot of truth to that. Like more is not always better. No. Well, so here's the interesting part, right? So that business, we did build it. We built an amazing office in downtown Austin. We hired 12

people and we did more revenue than I've ever done in my entire life. And my take home, what I netted that year was exactly the same as the year before when I was by myself at my house. You appreciate the choir. Trust me. Like my business,

my business, I made, I've made more money in 2012 and 13 than I make now because I reinvest so much more because I'm building a platform to get to a B. You know, I'm not trying to be in the M's. I'm trying to be in the B's. And so that platform, and I have to explain this to our guys here a lot, costs a lot of fucking money. You know what I mean? And even though we're doing really well, I have to, they, they don't understand that. Like I'm making a big fucking personal sacrifice by investing in what we're doing here because I believe in it, you know? Well, and there's a second side to it. You're

building a sellable asset, right? So here's the other part of the info space. That's a little bit tricky. There's the advantages and disadvantages. One of the disadvantages is that you can't sell the business. It's you. Tony Robbins can't sell Tony Robbins' business and neither can Robert Kiyosaki. And now, yeah, he's got to fucking work his balls off. Yeah, it's a treadmill you can't get off of. Yeah.

And so the incentive to reinvest in the business, if you can't sell it at the end of the day, it's kind of like, eh. Where here in what you guys are building, you're building a sellable asset, so it makes sense there's an incentive for you to do that. I would guess it's... I think the answer to that question

about how much should you expect is it depends. It depends. On what you want, yeah. It depends on your goals. You know, I could very easily, very easily not reinvest money back in my company and make a lot fucking more money and stay exactly where we

are and a lot more money than I make personally. You know what I mean? And I make a lot of money. So, you know, I, you have to find other reasons why you're investing once you get to a certain level. Like I'm not just doing this because of me, because if I was doing it for me, I would fucking stop growing and stay right where we are and make fucking four times as much money and be balling on G six 50 for real. But, and that is my goal. Yeah.

But like, dude, I have guys who have worked here for 10 fucking years with me outside my business partner. Who's been here the whole time. You know, I have guys who have moved here from other states who have given me years and years and years and years of fucking loyalty and great you know service

and learn and build careers and like dude i owe it to them to get this company to a point where they can enjoy some of the fruits of that as well and that's how i look at it so i have you know i'm willing to to and i'm not trying to because i do well i'm not trying to like pity party myself but i'm willing to make a lot of i think a lot of people in my position would say fuck that and take the money that's what i'm trying to say yeah it just depends on what you want right exactly yeah i enjoy coming here i enjoy making fun of tyler's fucking shorts you know what i'm saying like i enjoy busting dave's balls and like making fun of

my brother for showing up at noon. Like that makes my life better. You know what I'm saying? Like, I mean, you've been here for half a day and you understand there's a lot of sarcasm that gets thrown around here. Like how fucking bored would I be without that? It's awesome when your business is in a, in a place of stability to where you're not stressed out worrying about how you're going to pay payroll yeah and you can have fun with it yeah like that's great yeah yeah mike you know this is information products on a very large scale or your livelihood so i have to ask you a really straightforward question there's a lot of people out there making products right so my question is is there is there an end point to this? Is this a limited, like the next five, six years, information products are going to be hot and then boom,

it's gone. Nobody's going to be. It's an interesting question that I actually asked myself this last year in a pretty hard way, because one of the goals for Selfmade is to turn this into a substantial e-learning platform that's not the Mike show and to build it into a sellable asset at some point where I'm just maybe a tiny little thumbnail on the About Us page. And you look at all of the other sites out there like Lynda, like Skillshare, like CreativeLive, like YouTube, frankly, and, uh, information's becoming a commodity, right? So what you're, what I'm selling at the end of the day, what I've realized is not information. I'm selling leadership. I'm selling, uh, my personality, my relationship, and I'm selling leadership.

Uh, when it comes to my audience, that's what you guys are doing here. And so we might all be talking about the same things on 10 different podcasts and shows or whatever it may be. And y'all have your audience. I have my audience. And at the end of the day, people are listening because they like listening to you. Right. So and then from a from an information standpoint, what's the value in that in the future. Well, for me, the goal of the site and what we produce and the lessons is to deliver and empower people to obtain a new skill set. So the biggest transition point in my life was when I stopped looking for success to come from something outside of myself, such as an opportunity, a company or a product or a marketing gimmick, which I chased for five years unsuccessfully. And it's when I realized I needed to become a person who was capable of getting the result that I wanted. And for five years, I was not that person.

And so how do you change? How do you become a more valuable asset to the world so that you can get paid more, essentially? You obtain new skill sets that are rare, that have a lot of value, that have a lot of demand. For me, that skill set was copywriting and Google AdWords. And so obtaining that skill set was the huge inflection point in my life. And so ever since then, my mission has been dedicated to really sharing that message and to providing people with the knowledge and the skills they need to go out and execute something and not just talk about it, but produce a result because that's the moment your life changes. So that's great. I love that you talked about the importance of, you said

people, you know, a lot of us are talking about the same thing. You said what they're listening to is they're listening to you, which goes to what we say all the time, which is your niche is you. Yeah. And the more you're yourself the more you build your biggest competitive advantage is your authentic self yeah because no one else can be that so if you could develop that into a product you know which all like if you listen to personal branding two episodes ago you should be uh you have something no one else can fuck with you know but here's the thing let me answer that question too because here's where i think it's going i think right now you have the early adopters

that understand how to market shit on social media and they're not necessarily the most qualified or edified experts in what they are teaching and i think what you're going to see is you're going to see a separation from the bullshitters from, you know, the guys who are selling info products on shit. They never fucking did like an entrepreneurship versus guys who are selling info products on that have built real companies who have done real things.

And I think you're going to see a separation because right now you have a lot of guys that are just doing it for the fucking money. Well, they've been here and always have been in the come and go yeah and you're gonna see i think what you're gonna see now because like dude when you and i were growing up we're real close to the same age you know you had fucking tony robbins you had uh the carlton sheets and you had these other guys um and you know we didn't know if those guys I mean the only thing we knew is what we saw on fucking TV right but now you get to know about people like you can google them you could see what they really are what the real company and so there's you know while Tony Robbins has made a successful career out of being a motivator and I I, I believe Tony Robbins provides tremendous

amounts of value. Like I would not be who I am without listening to his shit. And that's the truth, but he's not, you know, back in the day, there was no way to qualify him as an expert. When he first started, he's just a dude spitting some motivational shit that he got value from. But now people are looking beyond or going to start looking beyond what that is to find out what people's qualifications are. And I think when that starts to happen, you're going to see a shift from a bunch of dudes I could name right now to a bunch of dudes who have actually done real shit. Right. It's just longevity. Right. The ones who are being authentic and real will be here 10 years from now and the others won't right that's true you know and i think they're always

going to be info products and courses and all this shit but it's it's like mike just said it's going to be there's going to be a separation so like dude gary vaynerchuk comes out with the info course everybody's fucking buying it right you know what I mean? The dude's built real companies. Right. You know? So, and, you know, I wouldn't be surprised if he did that. It's interesting. He talks about why he hasn't, right? Have you heard him discuss why he hasn't monetized his content? Yeah.

Yeah, it makes sense. You know, he's making more by building his audience to get exposure for VaynerMedia and all of his other stuff. So, take. Awesome. Well, that is why you don't see real entrepreneurs doing it because they're making real money doing real shit. Right. You know, like what's your time worth? Right. You know what I'm saying? Right. Absolutely. I only have so many hours in a day. You only have so many hours in a day, but, uh, you know, the more I examine that space and I've talked about

this a couple of times now on the podcast, the more I'm starting to feel an obligation to do something in that space because personally, because I feel like that there's a lot of misinformation or theory as opposed to real shit that people need to know about running a business. Sure. And, uh, you know, it makes me like, I've always been very vocal about not doing those things, but it makes me like, I almost feel obligated at this point because I'm seeing so much bullshit. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, no, I get it. Like, I don't know. It's like my internal struggle lately. Like I've been like, I don't know, should I or should not or should I or should not. I mean, the best motivation that someone like yourself would have for putting the time into developing something like that is the ripple that you get to create. Right.

So I still, to this day, have people come up to me at events and stuff like, hey, I read your book 10 years ago. It changed my life. Right. Absolutely. Dude, that's the thing. Like we were talking about on your show earlier, my biggest thing, the best part about what we do here with the with the mfco project is people who comment or write me an email or message and say look i started putting these principles in play it's changed my fucking life you know it saved my life it you know and i get comments like that dude and

it's it's real shit and like you know i'm only giving people like a tip of you know just a tip of, you know, just a tip, you know, love that game. Yeah. Everybody loves that game. So funny how all of our minds went to there. Yeah. So I don't know. It's cool though. But, um, but yeah, man, uh, it's interesting to see, it's interesting how easy it is to get something going right now. You know, it's never been easier, which is why I don't have a lot of patience for those questions. Oh, yeah. I just don't have a lot of patience for it. That's because you had to do it in the days when it wasn't that easy. Right.

Bro, I was going door to door. Before YouTube or any of this stuff, right? Fucking knocking on doors and bugging the shit out of people. Right. And I hate that shit. I'm not that kind of person. Right. You know, but yeah, man, uh, entrepreneurship

has never, ever, ever been more accessible. And I think that, you know, learning the tools and learning how social works and learning how to impact people is such an important part of what needs to happen. But it's something that so many people look past because they're worried about like trying to make a dollar today, right? You can't impact people in one fucking day. I mean, you can on that chance that you, you have that one extra special piece of content that makes people really think or, but the reality is, is that dude, you gotta, you gotta talk to people and conversate with people and, and make people part of what it is you're doing over time. That's going to build the sort of following that will, will sell a product $3.2 million in eight days or whatever, you know, that's fucking insane. You know what

I mean? Um, I don't know. I love hearing, I love hearing that. I mean, that. I mean, it's built on what we discussed earlier, and I know you talk about it on the show all the time, is that you have to be willing to give without want before you can get. Yeah. And genuinely, genuinely. Yes, that's the key. Like a genuine, I'm genuinely doing this because I want to improve you. It's not, I'm trying to manipulate it.

Well, and it's not, hey, I posted, you know, 10 free videos on YouTube and I haven't made any money. No, you missed the whole point. Yeah. Right. Yeah. You see people say that shit too. They're like, oh, I put out all this content for free and I don't get anything out of it.

It's like, look, man, you know, so buy my shit. Like you're doing it wrong, dude. Like people will reciprocate if you give. Like you don't have to ask. Dude, we're selling the shit out of the children's books, and I haven't asked anybody to buy it. I just presented what it is and put the link up. You know what I mean?

Literally, I think you've posted four times. You had one Facebook Live to announce it. But, I mean, it's cool because I know who's buying it. It's the people listening right now, and the reason who's buying it. It's people listening right now. And the reason they're buying it is because they appreciate what we're doing. And by the way, guys, thank you so much for all that because it's been really, it's, it's, it gives you, it gives you faith in humanity. Like people still, you know, like when they, when you do things for people, they still

feel like they're going to do something back for you it's it's it's amazing like it makes you feel good about especially our audience because i mean clearly they're the most intelligent people on earth listening to our podcast clearly but uh back to your previous point they they say oh i put up seven videos and i and i took all this time to time to provide value and nobody bought it. But if you really... Why don't you put up like 700 videos? Well, not only that. And not say shit.

People have a completely whacked view of how long this takes, right? So they do it for like three weeks and they're like, well, I was really selfless for three weeks. Instead of like a prolonged... I mean, we've been doing this podcast for two years, you know, which is not three weeks. No. And I love it.

Yeah. I look forward to every episode. I do too. But you, cause I love to hear myself talk. I know you do. But, but,

but the point is, is that, you know, people don't under, they don't have a really, a realistic understanding of how the time investment. Yeah. Agreed.

And, and, uh, you know, when I was thinking about starting the self-made man podcast and I called up our, all of our mutual friend, Lewis house. And, um, I listened to his show all the time and I was like, Lewis, what are the pointers, man? Give me the lowdown on building a really successful podcast. And he said, unless you're

going to commit to doing at least one episode a week for two or three years, don't even start. Yeah. And, uh, you know what I like about him too, dude, is that he's very, he's very helpful. Like he's not one of those guys that tries to keep all his secrets. Yeah. Like dude, you call him up, you say, Hey dude, what's the deal with this? And he'll tell you the truth. I think any, anyone is actually successful. I haven't found anyone who's not actually successful that holds stuff close to the vest because we all know what battles we've gone through and the fact that we're all still here and alive like we've gone to war together yeah yeah it's like of course i'm gonna fucking help you yeah yeah yeah absolutely he's just he's been overly overly cool about that with me yeah like i don't know i just think he's a good dude yeah he's great you know he's great

but that's it it's putting it in perspective the amount of time and effort and work that you need to put in to create that foundation you know that was really powerful to me like wow two to three years really and that's how long it took him for his show to gain momentum you know before anybody had really heard about him um and i've seen that to be the case with ours you know we're a year and a half in now and and just now in the last six months starting to see an upward you know curve um curve. Um, and it's a hundred plus episodes, you know, into the project. So, yeah. And that's discouraging when you're putting all your heart and soul into something and you know, you're getting fucking a hundred people

listening or 20 people listening, you know, and people see that and they think that that's just them. Like, Oh, that's just me. just me nobody cares about no man nobody cares about anybody in the beginning like you've got to build that momentum you know it takes time just because you got five fucking likes on your facebook post and four of them was your fucking family that's how everybody starts you know what i mean eventually you get to a point where your family stops liking your shit because you're getting so many from other people i mean i think it took us three maybe four weeks before we hit a million oh yeah yeah but that's i mean that's awesome yeah i know that's different i know but uh mike you guys i think we're talking about this a little bit when i just stepped out but uh oh you stepped out nobody even noticed i did nobody noticed um you we've talked about this before that there's a,

there's a journey that every entrepreneur who really makes it big kind of goes through. They start out being motivated by money and then over time they realize that that's just not going to cut it, you know, as, as an enduring motivation. Right. That's so funny. You brought that up. Yeah. We talked about this. So, so yeah, we'll see. That's why you pay me the big bucks that I anticipate what you're going to want to talk about. But I mean, where are you at right now with your ultimate drive and motivation? And be, I mean, to be real frank, just be, be, be more specific than just the betterment of humanity. Tell me, tell me, tell me what, like, you know, I'll tell you, I'll tell you what Andy and I talked about in person earlier. It's cool you brought this up. I'll be super... Andy, I know you're the same way, but I don't think there's any point in trying to hide your losses from people because I think those are where everybody gets the most education.

No question. So we were talking about this earlier. I'm 39. I'll be 40 in September. And I'm like, man, this has been a tough two years for me because I found myself in a situation at 39 where I am not where I anticipated being considering my previous levels of success. So, you know, four years ago when we ran into this dude who blew everything up, you know, that cost me everything, my house, marriage, my business partner. We were in Aitutake, New Zealand. He's getting married in this beautiful destination wedding. I'm his best man.

And we're taking our best man entourage photos, right, on the island an hour before the ceremony, and his phone rings, and he answers it, and it's his doctor who he'd been to a week before and is like, Hey, I just needed to let you know that we got your blood results back and you have leukemia. And this is an hour before he's getting married, right? Not the news you want to get. And we're both of the belief that that was caused, uh, you know, from the stress from the business crap that we were going through. So, uh, you know, from the stress from the business crap that we were going through.

So, you know, I had achieved all of my goals, had everything I want. And here I have, I've lost it. And I'm in my late 20s. And I'm essentially having to start over. So, you know, now, because I have that foundation, and I have that audience, and I've built relationships with these people for 10 years, it's unbelievably easy for me to start a new business and to see success again, which I have. And I've rebuilt my little mini empire, if you will. But the values and what's important has definitely changed. After going through something that challenging and difficult, I came out of it with an appreciation for everything in life that I had. As long as nobody was bleeding that I love, like bleeding out in front of me and dying, everything's good. Doesn't matter. They don't have a house anymore. Doesn't matter that I don't have this other stuff. Like as long as the people

I love are not in trouble, life is fucking fine. So that was a really huge shift for me where it stopped being about chasing, you know, the hundred million dollar mark, the $500 million mark and, you know, all of the material accomplishment sides of life. And it really put things in perspective. So that was a really big reset, uh, for me. And now at 39, there is a side towards like, okay, I need to get my shit back together. I'm going to be 40. I'm officially going to be an adult. When you hit 40, there's no more excuses, right? The hair is starting to fade and thin and it's like, shit, I have to really build back everything again. And I don't want to lose that. I don't want to go through that a second time. I can't afford to do that, right? So right now the priorities are build something, which has always been the case, that's going to provide the biggest benefit to my fellow humans that I can, that's going to create a legacy for me in that regard of building people up and improving people's lives.

And then to take a much more conservative approach when it comes to finances and money and asset protection, security, and all of those lessons learned that I took away from that event. And then from a giving standpoint, a charity standpoint, I'm one of the biggest contributors to Charity Water and Scott Harrison, who's become a really good personal friend of mine. And so always having that as a built-in part of the business where we give a percentage of profits and revenue every month to that specific group has become a huge priority as well. And when I had the least amount of money in my life in the last two years is when I signed on to my biggest obligation from a charity perspective. It was a $60,000 a year donation,

which I should not be making from a financially sound, you know, approach. Um, but it was just from an abundance mentality and where I wanted to be. And, uh, again, coming through that in event, if, if the money that I'm making can have an impact on 10,000 plus people a day or not a day, a year and give them clean water and like change their lives and fucking awesome. Yeah. You know, so it's just been a, it's been a huge lesson learned and a huge reset for me, but at the same time, I'm not neglecting myself either. And what I am truly passionate about in life is racing cars. Yeah. And, and that's been my biggest passion for many, many years now. And, um, and so I, I still do that. And, uh, you know, I bought the, I bought the Ferrari

that I've, I've had my eye on. And for me, that's about my daily pleasure. You know, Andy and I were talking about earlier, the fact that if you, until you've owned a supercar, you don't really get it. And it's not about showing off. It's not about being seen. It's about the fact that you can make a 10 minute run to a grocery store and scare the shit out of yourself that, you know, just gives you this adrenaline rush. And it's just, it's just awesome. It's the shit out of yourself that, you know, just gives you this adrenaline rush. And it's just, it's just awesome. It's the greatest thing ever. Yeah, it is.

Yeah, it really is. Dude, it's so awesome to hear that about the given the 60,000 when it's not making sense. Cause I am a huge believer that giving is relative, right? Like, you know, a dude who's got a billion dollars and he gives a fucking $50,000 donation, it's like me giving five bucks, you know? So I am a firm believer that, like in the universe or God or whatever you want to say,

that dude, when you give and it means something to you, like it's a sacrifice for you to say that dude when you give and it means something to you like it's a sacrifice for you to do that that's when like you get it back tenfold right you know what i mean and you shouldn't do it to get it back but dude i've given so much money away and like it all i always i don't know it always it comes back tenfold in every way and i I don't have an expectation of that. If it doesn't, it's fine. But it always has. And that's just a fact. Yeah. And I just, I don't know.

Like, dude, it takes a special kind of human to do that when it's, you know, when it's not just an easy thing to do. Like, you know, like, oh, here's 10 bucks or here's 50 bucks. Right. You know what I mean? I don't know. That's fucking cool. It's just an abundance mentality. Dude, it is.

It's a complete belief in myself and the way the world works and I have a 10-year history of a shit ton of success in what I do. So it's not a risk for me in that regard. No, I get it. Yeah. I get it,

but it's just cool to know that like, because that's a testament to your belief in that, like a real testament. So what was that, if we want to give a shout out for that charity that you support? Yeah, charitywater.org. Charitywater.org. They're unbelievable. They're the most high-tech, cutting-edge charity organization in the world.

They're one of, well, they're really the pioneer where they give 100% of every donation. It's deployed to the field in a verifiable, literally satellite photo way. Even your merchant fee from the credit card, the 3%, they reimburse and that goes into the field. And so unlike Red Cross or all this other bullshit stuff that gets eaten away by administration, and you never know what happens to your money, this you get photos from the well that your money went to and of the villagers. And you can look it up on Google Maps. That's fucking cool.

They're amazing. That's awesome. That's super cool. A real charity. No shit, man. Gary Vee is actually part of the group as well and a bunch of Silicon Valley guys are. I didn't know that.

Yeah. It's called The Well. If you're having a degree of success in your life and you want to, you want to participate, um, call them up and email them and ask them how to join the well. And, uh, it's a pretty awesome group. Have you flown over there with them? I have, I attended their grand opening for their New York office a year ago and it literally is run like a Silicon Valley startup. Yeah. It's a bunch of ex Googlers, Apple, Apple employees, Facebook people

who gave up unbelievably lucrative salaries to come in and work for a fraction of what they were making because they just believe in the mission. Right. That's great. So maybe you guys talked about this already. Like I said, I stepped out and no one noticed. But what's on the agenda for the future? I mean, I stepped out, no one noticed, but what's, what's

on the agenda for the future? I mean, like in terms of you, you, you've gone through a couple of things, but you know, what's the grand plan? You know, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're laying on your bed right before you die and your life is flashing before you. And I mean, what's the, what's the hope that what are the scenes that are going to pass? Man, that's a tough, that's a a tough question I wrestle with because I have expectations for myself and the kind of personal goals that I have financially and what I want to provide my family with from a legacy standpoint. And there's a lot of work to be had in that regard right now.

Yet at the same time, I think as you get older, the less important that side of your life becomes, you know, again, on the material side. And so I've been dealing with the juxtaposition there. But at the same time, you know, we've talked about this again today and on Andy's show, if you forget about the money, then you'll actually exceed all of your expectations. Yeah, there's a paradox there. It is. And so I'm having to remind myself is forget about your financial goals, man. Like build this platform and focus on how many emails and letters you get from people thanking you that you've had a positive impact

on their life. And if you just focus on that number, the rest takes care of itself. There's always going to be a way to make the money come. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So this podcast, uh, we straddle a business and success. We're not really a business podcast. We're not really success. We're kind of both. Right. So we've talked a lot about business, which, you know, all of these are overlapping, but I know our listeners are hugely committed to self-development. So why don't you share some of your personal habits? I'm the wrong guy to ask for that, brother. It's interesting. I don't know if you're the same way, Andy, or not, but I am so effing stubborn when it comes to not being told what to do that I don't even let myself tell myself what to do. And the fact that I've tried all of my life to have these daily morning habits, rituals, disciplines, et cetera, routines, and I'll have it for a day and that's it. Because

the next morning I might've had a lot of fun with some friends the night before. I don't want to wake up at 6am and go work out. I just want to sleep in. And I'm like, you know what? I'm going to do what I want to do. So that's never worked out well for me. But at the same time, again, that's a whole nother thing of what we talked about. It's about finding what works for you. Right. And sometimes that works. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I became an entrepreneur because I want to do what I want to do when I want to do it. Right. And with that, with that being in mind, there's one habit that I've, I've taken with me since the beginning of my career, which is unbelievably simple, but it works for me, which is the daily three to five list of the tasks that I need to get done.

There you go. Putting that in Evernote every day. I feel like I've heard that. Yeah, kind of, sort of. It kind of works, doesn't it? Yeah. And the analogy that I use for that is bricks. So if you want to build a mansion, it's going to take you five or six years to build it.

And if you lay three to five bricks a day, you'll eventually end up with a mansion. But that's it. You've got to lay your bricks every day and get it done. And if you take a long enough approach to what you're working on, you will end up with the result that you want. And that's it. That's my one daily discipline that I do. That's great. That's great.

Exactly the same as mine. And if you want to hear that in detail, you can go listen to, uh, when the day podcast, which is episode, Oh gosh, one 17, one 17. Um, but it's called when the day. So we go into that. The whole episode is dedicated to what he just said. Mike, how do people connect with you on social media? What's your, what are your handles? You know, Mike, mikegyller.com is the central hub where I have links to, to everything. I'm not super active on social. I have Facebook and Instagram, but I might post Instagram once every two weeks. But the podcast goes up every week and we have an email list with all of the new stuff that we have coming out. But I wish I was better. I wish I was more of an extrovert on the social media side.

That's it. But yeah, MikeDillard.com is a great place to start. And that's it. So let's close it out with this question, because you asked me this on your show, and I want to ask you the same thing. If you could give one piece of advice to somebody listening right now who is a beginning entrepreneur, what would it be? Master a skill set. That's the key to everything. If you master a skill set, it empowers you to take action and to get a result and to create momentum in your life. And it turns you into a source of value for other individuals. So figure out how your brain is wired. If you're an analytical numbers-based person, go out and master a skill set when it comes to Facebook advertising. If someone did that over the next three to six months, they could start a little Facebook agency and run other people's paid ad clients and make

literally 500 grand to a million dollars a year just by themselves running that agency from home. If you're on the creative side, such as myself, learn copywriting. You know, learning how to sell through the written word, whether that is through webinars or through videos or through website copy or through emails, is literally the golden ticket where you can go out and either sell your own products or services or others. And when I say master a skill set, I really mean master it. Don't watch five videos on YouTube and think that you've got this whole thing figured out. It's going to take you two to three years to do that. The best way that you can get experience is to go offer to do it, you know, for others,

you know, like Andy or like myself for free or at a discount or whatever it may be. Get real world experience, get paid to do it, uh, as an employee, if you need to and go unbelievably deep to where you could literally write the next book on the subject matter and have it be, you know, the, the biggest source of authority in that industry. And if you find yourself in that position, you've already made it like you can just really write your own ticket. Yeah. Amen. I agree.

Well, dude, thank you so much for coming on the show, man. Yeah. Thanks for having me. This is awesome. Really, really cool. I'm super, super, uh, this is one of my favorite episodes we've done just like good one dude i just love talking to you man so i'm so glad to have you thank you well i can't uh i can't wait to have you down to austin for uh f1 this year yeah yeah and get some some time around the track yeah we do need to take a little time to uh share, share some important, uh, links, uh, the

mfceo.com forward slash bad-ass books. It's Andy's reading list guys. If you haven't checked it out, go ahead and check that out. Uh, we've made that available and it's not just a reading list. He shared some, uh, some salient thoughts on each resource. And then Andy's at Andy for Sella Tyler's at my M a I underscore T Y L E R my Tyler. And I'm at V-A-U-G-H-N-K-O-H-L-E-R. So connect with us because Andy's got a lot of videos on Instagram. It's still amazing how many people don't know that. Listeners to the podcast that don't know that there are awesome videos that you post on Instagram and YouTube. And themfco.com, a little mini podcast on a daily basis there. So guys also look, all I ask for this, if you found value in the podcast, please share with a like-minded friend,

you know, let them know about us. That's, that's how we grow. We don't advertise the podcast. We don't sell things on the podcast. If you're interested, if you have a friend who's interested in what we're talking about and you think they'd benefit just share us up we really appreciate it so guys uh we will talk to you next time