Transcript of Episode 547: James Dumoulin: The Kid Who Built an 8-Figure Business By Asking Billionaires How Much They Make New

Hi guys, it's Tony Robbins. You're listening to Habits and Hustle. Crush it.

Welcome to Habits and Hustle with me, Jen Cohen, where we break down the mindsets and strategies behind extraordinary success. And today I'm talking to someone you've definitely seen, even if you don't know him by name. It's James Damoulian. He's the 23-year-old behind School of Hard Knocks. Known for walking up to people in Rolexes and G-Wagons and asking one simple question: How much money do you make? He's interviewed 48 billionaires, built a following of over 22 million, and created an 8-figure business before most people his age even have a career. But what you don't see— going viral almost broke him. In this episode, we get into how he built it, nearly lost it, and what he learned from the world's most successful people, including the one question you should start asking today. So let's dive in. Okay. You guys are super— I'm, I am like a giddy schoolgirl with you. I really, I, it really is like I'm, I could be your mother, but yet I'm so excited to sit here with you because you've done such a phenomenal job at building, uh, just, just building a brand, building a media, or on your way of building a media empire.

I'm sitting here with, uh, the School of Hard Knocks' James Dumoulin.

That's it, right? Yep.

Oh, like sweating. I thought I was gonna get that wrong. Who I really, as you can see, I genuinely love your content. I love what you've done. I'm sure you get stopped a thousand times a day. Do you get stopped a thousand times?

Yeah, we get, it doesn't matter where we are at this point, whether we're here in Los Angeles or we were in London last week, Dubai, all over. It's cool to see like how the international presence has really grown beyond just like locally where we live in Austin, Texas.

It's amazing. Okay, can you please just start off like, let's just get the evolution, right? Because you're 23 years old, right? You went to the University of Austin, you live in Austin, you work with your brother and another partner. You have 3 of you guys, correct? How did this whole concept come to be and how have you like grown it so expedit— like you've grown it like the, the trajectory I feel is just like you're on a rocket ship still. Tell us about it.

100%. Well, we can go back to 6 years old. I was living in South Korea. So from ages 6 to 10, I lived in South Korea, grew up in a military family. My dad ran the largest overseas military base in the entire world. And I like to start there because that was really important for me and my brother, who's also one of my co-founders in the channel, because at an early age, just being exposed to so many different cultures, seeing the world, like I like to say, you can only grow to what you're exposed to. And it kind of just made us think a lot bigger and it gave us such more of like a worldly perspective. And it was instilled in us our entire life growing up. Eventually kind of grew up in the D.C., Virginia area and, you know, high school, worked two jobs. I worked at Chick-fil-A and I worked construction. Those were my two jobs. However, in 2019, pretty much my senior year of high school, right before going to college, I discovered TikTok. And if you can remember 2019 when TikTok really first started to get popular, nobody was taking it seriously at the time.

It was the dancing app. Like, if you were a dude posting on TikTok, people were thinking that there was something wrong with you. But however, I was looking at it way differently than everybody else because With TikTok, you could have 50 followers, you could have 500 followers, and you could put out a piece of content and overnight 4 million people could see that type of content. That didn't exist before TikTok. Like the whole Instagram Reels, Facebook Reels, that's thanks to TikTok. Like TikTok is what engineered and really, you know, brought up short-form content. So I just, I got fascinated with it. That was my entry into content was like learning about TikTok. And I just started a personal brand on TikTok, which I grew from 0 to 800,000 followers in about 10 months, all over 2020. So during COVID when all my peers were at home watching movies, eating snacks, I definitely partook in that as well. But I, I went all in on TikTok. I mean, it didn't matter where I was. I could have been on a train, I could have been on a plane, I could have been on a boat. I posted every day on my personal brand on TikTok.

This was not the School of Hard Knocks. This was not business content. This was me just making a bunch of content for the sake of going viral. And I had built a sizable brand on there, but I learned that one skill in that process of like understanding viral content, understanding the algorithm, what what actually goes viral. So then fast forward to 2021. All right. I was a freshman at the University of Texas. And, you know, the thing about growing up in the DC area, it's a very structured city, right? When you think about DC, you think of politics, you think about government jobs, federal agencies. I like to touch on, you know, growing up overseas and traveling so much growing up. I wanted more for myself than like a $100,000 government contracting job. So I kind of always had instilled in me that I was going to do my own thing. I was kind of meant for more than just kind of being trapped in a cubicle. So my brother and a childhood friend of ours who we were all in the same Boy Scout troop with all became Eagle Scouts together. We're like, let's start a business media channel.

Why? The one common passion we all had was business and the creator economy at the time was a multi-hundred billion dollar industry. So we're like, let's just start a business media channel. And so we initially started out and it was just the three of us making content about business. But there's an important lesson there is because we came to that realization like, why the hell are we making content about business, giving business advice? Nobody gives a shit about 3 young 20-year-old kids giving business advice. We could pivot and really take this thing to the next level if we are the medium to the most successful people across different industries, entrepreneurs, people in finance, tech, real estate. And what if we're the one to extract their knowledge, their insights, and be able to pass that on to our generation? Just pretty much democratize advice from the most successful people in the world, which is exactly what we did. So we ended up pivoting to the interviews. Our first big interview was billionaire Mark Cuban, and since then we've reviewed, uh, 48 billionaires. We've grown it to an 8-figure business. We have 22 million followers now across everything, and we do about 200 to 250 million views a month.

So I know that there's probably a lot to unpack there, but I feel like that was kind of just like the progression. I like to give that backstory so that way people know it just wasn't an overnight thing, 'cause it definitely wasn't.

No, it wasn't. But you're obviously, you're really good at creating viral content. Yeah. You said, you know, what goes viral. So before I unpack all of that, 'cause I have a million questions that I can just jump off of from everything you just said. What does go viral in your, in your opinion? Because you know, you interview people, right? A lot of people interview a lot of successful people. What do you think you do differently that makes it like get traction and stick to then grow to what you've grown to?

Yeah, I think one of the things that we are the best in the world at, at the School of Hard Knocks is taking 20 minutes of content and condensing it down to the most engaging, 1 to 3 minutes worth of content for us to show off to the world. I think the first most important thing that people need to understand is this right here. The only metric on social media that matters, the only thing that the platforms care about, it's not likes, it's not shares, it's not saves, it's not comments, it is watch time. That is the only metric on social media that matters. Why do you think that is? Because Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, They're all doing one thing. They are competing with one— against one another to keep people on their platform longer watching content. So therefore, if you can create content that people watch longer than on average than other videos, they're going to reward you by pushing your content to more people. So that's the number one thing that we optimize our content for. So what makes a viral video? Well, number one, your first 3 to 5 seconds has to be incredibly scroll stopping.

You have to get the people on the other end of that screen I like to say that I make content as if, if a complete stranger were to see the type, the piece of content that I'm posting, they could have no affiliation to me. They could have no idea who I am. They need to feel some sort of emotion. They need to be compelled to potentially share it with a friend. They need to be compelled to potentially save it to watch it again later. Too often people make the mistake of making content with the assumption that people know who they are, right? We've all seen the people that say, as you guys know from my last video. So as you guys know, as I just closed this big— people do not care. They don't care at all. So like, even with 22 million followers, the first thing that I have instilled in me is that I'm still making content as if people have never seen my content before. So I'm still trying my hardest to make sure that the first 3 to 5 seconds are incredibly engaging, whether that's me cold approaching a super wealthy person or asking a person how much money they make.

Like, that is literally like, your hook has to be so strong. It has to be a bold take. It has to be something maybe a little controversial. It has to be a pattern interrupt, something to stop the scroll. And then beyond that, we need to engineer some sort of retention. What's going to keep people watching from start to finish. Because if you have like nothing early on to get people to like want to watch, like that's why in the first 10 to 15 seconds I'm trying to build that person up. You know, they sold a company, they're a billionaire, like whatever it may be to give that person watching some buying. So I always like to think about hook, you know, and retention is the way to really engineer the most optimal amount of watch time when you're creating a piece of content.

Which one has been the most viral? Which person or which clip has been the most viral for you?

Myron Golden. Do you know Myron Golden?

No.

No, he's a, uh, a gentleman from Tampa, Florida. 106 million views on Instagram alone. So that was my most viral video. 100 million views on Instagram alone. I've never, I didn't even know, I didn't even know videos could get 100 million views.

What, who is he?

He's just a business consultant. He was getting out of a Rolls-Royce. You know, he's a, uh, a very sharp gentleman and, uh, it was a, it was, it was a great piece of content.

Well, how, what, what did you say to him? What was your hook? How did you get him? Was it, Was it arranged, uh, like, you know, ahead of time? I wanna know the whole thing.

100%. That one was arranged ahead of time. I was just in Florida for the sake of being in Florida to film content and had been in touch with him for a little while. He's a, he's a business consultant, made $15 million in a year. And so it was just, I think all in all, the whole video itself, you know, we talked about like the faith component, you know, and it, it was, it was just, it was, it was a great video for sure.

Why do you think that went viral though? Like that, to that point, why do you think that video got 106 million and Tom Cruise didn't, for example?

Yeah, it— well, because Tom Cruise, everybody's seen Tom Cruise before. So Tom Cruise still, I mean, got 13 million views on Instagram, which is still a great video, but it's also like, I think that there's some element— a, a, a big reason why I think our stuff honestly goes viral, especially like a lot of the unknown people. Like, we were even talking about somebody before the podcast started that got 40 or 50 million views that like from a like holistic, like countrywide standpoint. Like people probably do not know who that person is unless you're in this specific space.

Exactly.

So it's almost like they're discovering that person for the first time. And so here's this guy getting out of a beautiful Rolls-Royce. He's got a great look to him. He's got some aura and he just had some, some game for people talking about money, talking about what separates middle class from wealthy people. So again, it was kind of something that was a little bit polarizing as well that we talked about. You know, I always like to say that the best personal brands in the world are superheroes because they fundamentally stand for and against something. Anytime people are making you cannot play in the middle. You have to be somewhat like polarizing to people, right? So you're gonna have to understand that you may piss some people off, but ultimately, I mean, look at the most famous people in the world. It's like they have a lot of haters as well.

100%.

So I think that that's really important as well.

What was your hook for him though? I'm curious because it did so well.

Yeah.

You said your 3 to 5 seconds was the most, is the most important for a, for a clip. So what did you say to him in the first 3 to 5 seconds?

I just walked up, I said, excuse me, sir, is this your Rolls-Royce? And he goes, yeah, it's mine. And, and then and, you know, just asking him about kind of how he got a Rolls-Royce. He said he was a consultant, said he made $15 million in a year and went right into it. And that's honestly like really interesting too, because it's like, you know, you, you hear it. And also if you see the video as well, I mean, it's, it is a great piece of content, but like oftentimes, sometimes the videos that you don't necessarily expect to go the most viral often, sometimes very, very well can. Like sometimes like we'll put hours into making like one clip and we expect it to do millions of views, but it doesn't necessarily do that. So I would say we definitely have it down to a formula. And I think something that's like a really cool fun fact is I have not— we're in April, today's April 1st, 2026. The last video that I have posted on Instagram that has under 1 million views was April 2024. So 2 years ago was the last time I've posted a video on Instagram that has under a million views.

So that's like my standard of content now is so damn high. Like I will not put anything out there. Like, I don't care if I'm getting paid to do an interview. Like, if I don't think it— if I don't know it can hit a million views, I'm not going to post it. I don't care.

That's amazing. So you have high standards now.

Extremely high standards.

But like, do you find that what goes viral on Instagram for you doesn't go viral on YouTube and TikTok? Are all the platforms different? Or once you feel one thing is going to hit, it's going to hit everywhere?

It's a really, really good question. I think what we're going to see in the next coming years, next coming months with content, and it's already happened, is that It is no longer about audiences anymore. I can, I can name to you right now the 3 of the biggest personal brands in the business space that have millions of followers across social media. They're getting like 20,000 views on average on their TikTok videos, which is insanity. I'm not going to air people out, but I'll show you after the podcast exactly what I'm talking about. And that is something that people need to be very mindful of. I think that the 2 that I like to compare the most is TikTok and Instagram. Instagram is a lot more about your audience, meaning like our baseline on Instagram, because we have almost 9 million followers, like good chance over time, like the video's going to hit a million views. TikTok is your videos when they get sent out, it goes out to cold audiences initially. So that's the best test in my opinion of somebody creating viral content is them going viral on TikTok because TikTok is not very audience and community focus.

Yeah, it's hard to build a community on TikTok. It genuinely is. Like, people that have like a business and like are selling to their audience, TikTok is definitely the hardest platform to sell on depending on what they're selling. Like, TikTok Shop's great.

I was going to ask you about TikTok Shop.

Excellent. But in terms of like if you've got like a marketing agency or like a subscription business per se for a various other product, like it's a much harder business, much harder platform to sell on for sure.

And also people who are big on TikTok aren't necessarily big on Instagram, I notice, or anything. Like, it doesn't translate all the time. Yeah. So you're saying though, your piece of advice is to see if a piece of content can go viral, start it or try it on TikTok first because it's a cold audience.

My piece of advice is be on every single platform. Content diversification is huge. Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn. I make more money off of Facebook than every other platform combined.

Yeah, everyone says that.

Facebook pays me more money than YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok combined. It's insane. And that's, that's a, that's the beautiful thing about content as well is that you're able to build different audiences in different communities from all different demographics and walks of life on these different platforms. And what happens if TikTok gets shut down? What happens if your Instagram gets banned? Well, then you at least can tap into different audiences on other platforms. Like we have almost 5 million followers on Facebook. We've got 6 million on TikTok, 9 million on Instagram, 2 million on YouTube, like, and different audiences in like all walks of life. Like we were talking earlier about like people stopping us. Like I could be in the streets and somebody who's 14, 15 years old comes up to me or somebody who's 70 years old that watches our content. So I think that's a really fun thing and something that a lot of people don't tap into. It's like they get hooked on just wanting to go all in on 1 or 2 platforms. Be on everything. Content diversification is very big. And to your point about testing one thing on one platform, there's times where I could post a video on TikTok that gets 2 million views, but that video gets 10 million views on Facebook.

So sometimes you just don't even know. That's why I'm just a big advocate that like, hey, if you genuinely love and believe in the content that you're posting, you remove your bias and say, hey, this is actually a good piece of content, put it out there and just see what it performs on ultimately.

But do you think it's also a good idea to do different types of different pieces of content across the platforms or take the same piece of content and just post it on everything?

I am a proponent of taking the same piece of content and posting it on everything. However, it also depends on the type of content you're making. So like, I will say this not in a way of like my interviews, like perform very well on all the platforms. However, if I'm somebody building a personal brand, I would lean into what exactly the platforms are telling you. So that's why, like early on, I like to say quantity breeds quality. The more you post, the more data that you're going to get from the platforms that tell you, hey, you've tried these 5 different types of content, these pillars of content. 3 of them are just not hitting, but these 2 are doing very well. Okay, let's double down. Let's 3x, 5x, 10x that winning type of content. The reason why we're doing interviews now, like, interviews was probably the 7th or 8th type of content that we decided to do when we started School of Hard Knocks. But our first interview we posted got 100,000 views. So we're like, wait a minute. That's telling us something. Okay. And then the next one did well and like just consistently outperformed everything.

And that's how we found our niche and that's how we found the type of content to create. So that's why I think it's very important for people that are trying to build a brand. It's like early on, test different formats, test different content pillars. Don't just do one. Don't just do the talking head, right? Try the day in the life. Try the testimonials with your clients. Like try different types of content and see what like really hits and resonates with people. And that's what you double down on and try and, you know, 10x, which is what we did.

Well, what Also, you said something that's very important about the problem is when you're making content and you can get shut down on Facebook or Instagram and all this. I've been shut down. You, I mean, it happens to people all the time. And I heard you say, and I agree, that if you should not be, you should not be banking on your ad revenue as your only way to make money off of this. Can you talk about that? Because I think this is why, I think this is where influencers or people have a misconception. And I think that's when people get really screwed.

Yes. This is, this is golden right here. Uh, I like to say that great businessmen are terrible content creators. Great content creators are terrible businessmen. It's very, very true. I know so many good business guys that have hundreds of thousands of fake followers. It's, it's, it is ridiculous. It's, it's, it's a pandemic is what it is. Uh, but anyways, true. Yes. Like you cannot build a business off of ad revenue, especially in our case. Like I have two other co-founders. So imagine 3 people like trying to make their living off of just ad revenue. And I'll tell a quick story. So like you said, when you post a piece of content on Facebook or on Instagram or TikTok, you no longer own that content. The platform that you post on, they own that content that you're posting, and therefore they can decide whether they want to pay you or not, or whether they want to give you a content violation or not. And that's what happened to us. About a year into the school of Hard Knocks, this is now like 2022, we were making all of our money off ad revenue. We weren't super business savvy, but the one constant that we had going into Hard Knocks was we were— we knew how to go viral and that's why we were able to grow it, you know, so big is that's what we knew.

So the business savviness came over time, especially when we learned this lesson was that we were making $25,000 to $30,000 a month off of Facebook. Now, why were we making that much off of— why were we making that much money off of Facebook? Because a lot of people don't know this, 2020 was the first year that Facebook stagnated, meaning Facebook stopped growing in 2020 because what came out, what got very popular in 2020? TikTok.

TikTok. Yeah.

So because of that, Facebook—

Zoom.

Yeah. So, so, so Facebook had to get very innovative with how they're going to get big creators to come on their platform. Like, how do they get MrBeast? How do they get other creators that are have massive presences and are taking advantage of the short-form content everywhere, they have to start paying a little bit more money than these other platforms.

Yeah.

So we got into this like Facebook Reels bonuses program and we were making $25,000 to $30,000 a month for 6 months. But again, I, we put out a piece of content and we got like an unoriginal content violation for our own content. Boom. Went from making $30K a month with 2 co-founders to less than $5,000 a month. That's— it's not, not livable off of $5K a month. Now, granted, we understood and we took a lot of the advice that we were getting in building the School of Hard Knocks, which is that, you know, we were not dumb during those first— during those months of making $30K a month. We were probably paying ourselves as co-founders $2,000 a month. The rest of the money was just going back into the business before we even had like actual businesses. We were just at like just paying the company. We were just building a like, like a bank account for our business before we even have like businesses now. But that was a very valuable thing. Was reinvesting. That was a recurring thing that we kept hearing: reinvest back into your business. But the money, when you start making profit, goes back into the business, which is what we did.

And that's why when we went from making $25,000 to $30,000 a month in ad revenue down to less than $5K a month off of like TikTok and the other platforms that were paying us a little bit, like, that's what had kept us afloat, was doing that. But we learned the lesson that it's like, guys, in order for us to really be successful, we have to become businessmen and not just content creators. And so we, we got really savvy with like understanding this idea of probably one of my favorite business concepts in the world is vertical integration. So I remember interviewing a gentleman named Cody Sperber. I don't know if that name rings a bell. Okay. He's based in Scottsdale, Arizona. He's got several, you know, multiple 8-figure businesses. And I remember him talking about that a great businessman looks at their business and looks at number one, who's making money off their efforts and the different ways that they can be making money. So when you take a look at School of Hard Knocks, Our core business is content. We're going viral, recording attention, and we, we understood that that was our skillset. That was our superpower.

So then we decided, well, hey, what is a business that we could launch? Well, who are we spending the most of our time with creating content? It's all these super wealthy entrepreneurs. So let's start a marketing agency where we build their personal brands. Boom. Built that into a multimillion dollar business. Then we're like, okay, why do people follow us? Because we give them access to the top 1% of people on our videos? What if we launch a community where they can ask their questions to them? Boom. Launch that, turn that into a multimillion dollar business. And so that is honestly what I think is very like valuable right there is if you're a content creator, if you're making content, number one, why do you got to get to the root of why people follow you? See, the mistake content creators make though is when they do want to launch a business, they're like, I want to launch a coffee company because it's cool. Or I want to watch— I want to launch a merch company. Talk to your customer. Like this is in any business that you're in, but especially as a content creator, like spend a couple weeks, spend a month, spend more, like, polling your audience exactly what they want.

That's exactly what we did when we launched our subscription community, was get to the exact root of why people follow us and what it is that they want, if we were able to kind of put this community together. And so that's what we did, right? But you have to get savvy at least some degree to, as with, with business as a content creator, or it's worthy to go and find partners or somebody that is very credible and knowledgeable in the space. That can attach your attention to revenue. 'Cause if not, if you're just banking on ad revenue, like, you know, like we said, it is very common that at some point you're gonna get demonetized and you have to be ready for that.

Well, also it's not like ever guaranteed. Like pe— also, like if you are what you were really good at, and I never really know, I, I, I think from what my recollection is, you didn't take easy money though. Like I'm sure a lot of brands and companies like crypto and all these things probably threw a lot of shit at you. And you could have easily taken $100,000, $200,000 and kind of, kind of like, I think made your brand watered down. You would have watered down School of Hard Knocks because you've had, you basically would be a walking billboard for other people. I never saw you do that. Was that intentional too?

1 million percent. The most important decision that we made and any business decision that we make to this day still is nothing can dilute the brand. Your brand equity is the most important thing as a content creator. And we see so often, you know, people will take that sponsorship like, like, like I won't do a sponsorship. You know, what's funny is I ironically, you know, I think I did an integration one time with like PrizePicks for like, like a YouTube integration, right? Because everybody says gambling companies, they pay more than everybody else. And I remember doing— we did an integration with them and I remember like just seeing some of like the feedback and I was like, you know, we're never going to do that again because it's like we're a financial literacy channel and it's like it does not make any sense for us to, to work or promote with those types of businesses. And you have to, you have to understand that. And so the brand equity piece is extremely important. Like the fast, quick, temporary money, even though it may seem great, it's going to dilute where you want to go long term.

Like I— your long-term thinking, you have to prioritize long-term thinking over short-term profits if you want to build something great. If you're in it to get like a quick cash grab, then, you know, I still wouldn't recommend it. But it just— it was a very important decision for us to always, with every decision that we make, to not attach ourselves to something that was going to like dilute our brand equity in any way.

Do you promote any brands? Do you have any brand deals?

Yeah, we do.

We do.

We will do a couple million bucks in brand sponsorships this year. So we've, you know, worked with an array of different companies in the business space.

I don't think I've ever seen one.

Yeah, like we've done like business formation, like entity structure companies. We've done, you know, various investment platforms. Just closed a big one with a really big company. I don't want to say it yet. I'll tell you off the record. I'll tell you out there just, just because like we just closed it and our first integration will be with them this month. But we have definitely done some— we've done like GoHighLevel, you know, so we've done quite a few, you know, different integrations with different companies and stuff like that.

I'm surprised, like Chase or like Bank of America or, you know, I don't know, like one of those companies or Visa, MasterCard, American Express. Those are ones I would think would make a really, it, it would make a smart type of, are you laughing? 'Cause it's one of those, like the ones you're gonna make it do a deal with?

No, I mean, I would say, I would, I would say the one that we are like just closing that we're gonna probably start, uh, doing integrations with this month is, is like a very, very big company. But you know, hey, there's an opportunity for them then if they wanna, you know, kind of come partner with us.

Oh, 'cause those, those make sense. Like that to me makes sense. Would you do something like that?

100%. Absolutely. I'm sure it'll happen eventually as well. Just a matter of, you know, the right brand and right timing for them and also for us as well.

So, okay, so then dilution. So is it— are you saying that most— are you saying that as you're growing, you shouldn't be diluting your brand, but once you're established, it's okay to kind of collaborate and become brand partners with someone at a different level, or depending on what the deal structure is?

I don't think that it's diluting your brand, even if you're bigger, if you're partnering up with companies and having them sponsor your content.

Oh no, that's what I'm saying with Powered by Chase. To do. And that makes sense.

100%. Yeah. If you know what it is, is if it is a brand that is obviously very credible and what they're ultimately, you know, solving, I would also think from a brand standpoint, why would they want to like kind of sponsor somebody where there's not like a, like, like a good brand tie or like, like a good fit for them, right? Like they ultimately know the audiences that make the most sense for them and because of the type of content that you're integrating it in. So like, that's my number one rule. Is like, remember how I told you that, like, even all the sponsorships that I've done in the last, like, 1 to 2 years, I've probably done, you know, 10 to 20, like, short-form integrations for, like, sponsored, like, short-form videos. They've all gotten at least a million views. So, like, I still have to make sure that, like, when I integrate it, like, it can do well. And, like, I can just easily kind of, like, weave it into the content in a way where I'm communicating some of the talking points on behalf of the brand, but it also, like, again, doesn't dilute the content.

So it could be, like, a very smooth— I can ask a business question. In relation to whatever that brand or company is. And I can, you know, have it fit in in like a very efficient way. Yes, absolutely.

So that's why probably I never noticed it because it was like subliminal and subtle.

Yes.

And I never even noticed that you did. That was very clever. Or you can also be putting it on your other channels like the— is it the School of Mentors or the School— what you— and what's it— the School of Mentors. And what's the other one that you do now? You said yes.

So, so School of Hard Knocks is the main channel. School of Mentors is like our subscription community where we host the calls with the millionaires and billionaires. School of Content is like one of our like consulting companies where we work with a lot of entrepreneurs. And so, and then we have Hard Knocks like agency or like our done-for-you sort of business. So, okay.

Where, where I think you're very clever and what I, I, what I really appreciate is that most people are really good, not most, nobody's good at like a very few are really good at like this, the front-facing, but what you done really well, you and your partners. Then you've created businesses and leveraged what you're good at with the content, with the billionaires and millionaires, and utilized them to create money and monetize on that afterwards.

Yeah.

So your execution is really, really strong on that. So two things. Once you're in there, is it your— are your— is your job to be so likable and that they're and that you're gonna go for the ask, like, hey, I'm in this community, will you, you know, lend your time? Like, how did you get all these people to agree to be, you know, involved for free to like talk to your other company? Because you're making money off of it, they're not making money off of it.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, really, like, again, we lead with a ton of value with the relationship. So like, 100%, I mean, all these people that are coming on calls, I've already posted them on our channel and gotten them millions of views. And so in that case, I feel like, well, number one, it's also important to, I feel like, note that, you know, some of the most successful, some of the wealthiest people in the world that I know, they're the most willing to help and give back.

I totally agree with you. You know what I mean? Oh my God. I totally agree with you. 'Cause we, we've interviewed a lot of the same, same people and I'm always blown away that the people who are the most successful are usually the, like the nicest, the most down to earth. Let me just tell you a quick story about Mark, 'cause I don't— well, Mark Cuban was your first big get, you told me. Mark Cuban, and I tell this to everybody, first of all, he came to my interview to, to the podcast in like a beat up Lexus. He wasn't driving some fancy ass car like all these other nobodies who think that, who pretend to be big, who, you know, who show up here with like 97 people in their entourage. He came by himself in a beat up car and I emailed him the, I guess a couple nights prior I met him. I did what you did. I went up to him at an event. I was like, oh my God, blah, blah, blah, come on my podcast. He said he was going to, a month passes, never happened. 2 months passes, never happened.

So finally, like month 3, I emailed him and I said, hey, you know, you, you said you're gonna come on my podcast, when is this happening? And he wrote me back in like 3 seconds and he says, I'll be there tomorrow. You know, what time? And he actually showed up the next day and did my podcast.

What, what, what city was it in?

It was here. He was sitting where you're sitting right now. And I met him in like, I don't know where, somewhere, I don't remember where. And he was, he lives in Dallas. So he was in Dallas. He flew in and he came on the show. But my point is there was no, there was no like 9 layers to get to. It wasn't like I had to go through 77 publicists and 4 gatekeepers. And it was like, let's do it in like 2028.

By the way, that's the worst thing in the world right there.

Once that happens, I'm out. I don't care.

I don't want them anymore.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And this is a valuable lesson.

Lesson as well. You have to cut the middleman. Oh, you have to go— if you can go to the decision maker, go to the decision maker at all costs.

At all costs. Once I see more than one person on that email, I'm like, okay, I'm out. I'm not doing this because it's going to be— it's more headache than it's worth. Usually, you know, the juice— it's not worth the squeeze. The juice is not worth the squeeze. I mean, that's why I find it so interesting when I— when I saw that he was your first get, because And yeah, I cold approached him and just went up to him. Exactly.

And, and, and like, that's the whole thing as well. It's like, like this whole concept of like, don't get me wrong. Like if I have the opportunity to interview like a Tom Cruise or Will Smith or like, like a big person, I will. But like, I will say there's nothing better than people just doing it. And, and it's, it's, you don't have to go through, like you said, the 15 people. Oh, that's not talked about enough, but it's very true. It's the worst thing in the world.

It's the worst because people only see what you put in front of them. They don't know what happens behind the scenes and like, Some of these things are like, like, like you were saying, and I always say there's no such thing as like an overnight anything, right? Everything, even to get to that point, to even have that good experience, you had to put in a lot of hours and work in the, in the backend. But like, you know, the fact that I even heard with Tom Cruise that he came to you. Yeah. You didn't even go to him. Mm-hmm. So what was that process? Like, how did that happen?

Uh, yeah, we got reached out to, uh, by Paramount pretty much, and they were just like, hey, You know, Tom Cruise has a movie coming out and he's doing a couple interviews. They had him doing People magazine, Jimmy Fallon. I think he did Pat McAfee and School of Hard Knocks. So it's, it's pretty damn cool because, you know, you would, you don't really ever see him in a setting like that. Like he doesn't do a lot of like interviews. And so when it came time to do the interview, you know, we were meeting some of the Paramount executives or some of the people that were kind of working on behalf of the interview, setting it up and corresponding with. I just kind of asked them out of curiosity, how did you guys find out about us? Like anytime, like we're reached out to by like a pretty well-known figure, I always like to kind of like know how they found out about us and maybe like why they wanted to do it. And they said, well, it was actually Tom's idea. So I guess Tom had seen quite a bit of our content for quite some time.

I think he maybe had a nephew or something like that that had showed him the channel. I mean, this is what I had heard from them and they reached out and wanted to do it. So it's— that's a great reminder also to people that to never be afraid to post your content because you never know who's watching.

Never.

You never know who's watching. I mean, it's, it's the amount of people that I've like met that are, you know, you know, several billionaires that I had no idea that are just like watching our content and told me that like, hey, they like this clip or whatnot, they like my approach here. It's, it's really cool to, to see that. That's why you can't be afraid to post your content.

Absolutely. So how— okay, so was there a lot of hoopla around the Tom Cruise one, like to get it organized and, and all the things?

Man, I don't— you know, it was definitely, I'm sure that, so I'll never forget this. They asked me to like kind of submit some questions in advance.

Yeah.

And I submitted, you know, 10 questions and they told me that I could only ask him 3. And then when it came time to the day of the interview, they came and said, hey, by the way, we only want you to ask him 2 questions. We want you to ask him these 2. And I'm thinking to myself, because don't get me wrong, like this is an incredible opportunity, but you and I both know 2 questions is not a damn interview.

No.

Okay. And like, don't get me wrong. Like, as much as I understand, like, yes, this is Tom Cruise, we also have a standard of content to uphold as well. And I'm like, 2 questions isn't really going to be a great thing for our channel. Like, we need to be able to find a way to make this thing longer. So it's kind of funny, I told my partners, or, you know, my, uh, you know, business partners who I was there with down in San Antonio, because that's where we did Tom Cruise. I was like, guys, I'm gonna just keep firing questions. I need you to, like, distract the team and, like, just kind of have a conversation to them off to the side. Because I was like, man, I'm gonna just keep firing questions, and hope he just keeps on answering, which is exactly what it was. We only initially had like a couple minutes and I think it ended up being like an 8 or like an 8 or like a 10-minute interview, which is cool. Yeah. Like that's all I need for my, you know, format, right?

Yeah.

So, uh, ended up making it work, but it's kind of one of those things where it's, it's what's that saying? Sarah Blakely, she told me that is, uh, don't ask for permission, ask for forgiveness.

Ask for forgiveness. Exactly.

So when I saw them starting to go, we need to wrap it up, bro. I'm just, I'm just like, man, I'm gonna just keep on going. And it's like, at the end of the day, it's for their benefit. Like, like I'm going to make the best piece of content with what you let me do. So it's kind of just one of those things where you sometimes you just got to just do those little things, you know?

Listen, the ask for forgiveness is my— I live by that motto, by the way. The other thing though was, was he a cool guy?

He was really cool. Yeah, he's got great aura. Like I like to say aura because like there are some people where you see them walk in a room and they just like command like that kind of attention and whatnot. And so he definitely was a super nice guy, really, really cool guy. And then also another one that really stood out to me was, so we did Tom Cruise in San Antonio. The next day, literally a day later, we hopped on like a 5 AM flight from San Antonio to Los Angeles and we interviewed Will Smith. So we did them back-to-back days.

Oh.

And, uh, Will Smith was, I, I mean, I can't say enough, but just great things about him. He was so nice to our team, had the best energy, and gave an incredible interview as well. And that was a completely different dynamic. Like I was—

wait, was it after the Chris Rock thing?

The, the, it was just after the Chris Rock thing.

Right. So he has, he has a reputation now to kind of, uh, fix.

Sure, sure, sure. Definitely. I mean, I'm sure that what—

did they reach out to you also?

I, how did that one come about? I have a great friend out here who is very close with some of the people that are with Will Smith's media company, Westbrook. Westbrook.

Westbrook. Yeah, yeah, I know them.

Uh-huh. So that's kind of how I had got connected to them and they loved the idea of it. And I'm sure that was part of it for sure.

Um, of course.

But I mean, nonetheless, I can't— like, he gave a great interview and was incredible to my entire team when we went out there to go and meet him.

You know what's funny about him, just to kind of stay with him for a second? That's why the whole thing with Chris Rock was so shocking, because everyone's experience with him, and from what everything I've heard, has been really positive. People really like him. He's been— he's such a nice guy. Like, that's— it's shock— I'm not surprised to hear that, that you just said that, that it was like a good interview. How long was the interview?

About 20 minutes.

So is that typically how long it actually is with these interviews with people? 20 minutes?

I would say, yeah, our, like, the short-form street interviews that people see on the Instagram, the TikTok, they're typically anywhere from 5 to 45 minutes.

Um, oh, 45 minutes sometimes.

I typically won't stop the interview until I know that I have a usable piece of, like, short-form content. And we also have a big presence on YouTube as well.

Yeah.

So we post longer iterations of our interviews on YouTube. So I think that, um, I would say it's anywhere from about 5 to 45 minutes on average. I would say 15 to 20 minutes typically is how long they— most of them go, the ones that are set up.

Really?

Yeah.

How much— what's the percentage of videos that are set up versus organic?

It's about 50/50. I would say it's 50/50. Some months it could be 60/40. 60 could be set up, 40 could be not set up. But I would say about 50/50. And I like it that way, honestly, because I you know, yes, we're at the point now with 22 million followers where we're able to set up interviews with incredible billionaires and people that have built amazing companies. I also do love the idea of that. You're never going to beat that raw on-the-street content where you're cold approaching people. And I like sometimes a little bit of a challenge of them trying to kind of be like, I don't want to do it, because people like when you're able to objection handle. I feel like that's been one of my superpowers, is being able to like get people that don't want to talk to talk, you know.

Can I tell you the truth? That's the part I love the most, because like when you— I can tell I'm sure when it's like super organic, when people are like not interested and they really are walking away from you and you have to like kind of, you gotta like cajole them into coming versus when it's more like they're, they, oh yes. Uh, uh, no, I'm busy, but they're obviously not. Like I find that, are those the ones? Have you noticed the organic ones just do better in general?

Yes.

Yeah.

100%.

Yeah.

They're always going to, right? Anytime that there's a little bit of like hesitancy, you know, we talked about kind of like with, with content, whenever there's some sort of like tension, it's almost like you have to like create a challenge for the viewer a little bit.

Yeah.

That especially like we'll shift slightly to talk about like YouTube long-form content. Like we just hit 2 million followers or 2 million subscribers a couple of days ago. And the number one thing I learned about YouTube was that you have to create a challenge. Like, why is MrBeast so successful? Creates a very interesting viewer experience. You take them on a journey, right? So what we started to do with our interviews was showing a ton of rejections whenever we would go to a city. And what you're doing is like, you're making the viewer be like, wait a minute, this is like way harder than it looks. Is he even gonna get one out here?

Yeah.

And then you reward them with showing them that you got the interview. So anytime that you can create some sort of like challenge or tension in your content, it's always gonna perform a lot better on average.

And so you're saying that you still do it organically. What do you mean? You stand, you stand in the middle of a neighborhood and just wait for people to walk by?

Proximity is I go into a city, so what I'll typically do is I'll set up, you know, one huge interview or two huge interviews in a city, right? Like I just, I was just in London for about a week, literally within the last 10 days I was in London for a week. I set up maybe one or two interviews out there.

With who?

I said one with a guy named Richard Harpin. He sold a company called HomeServe for £4.1 billion. And then another guy named Simon Squibb. I don't know if you're familiar with him.

Yeah. How do I know him?

What's his— He's the guy, he does interviews. He does what's your dream? Is kind of like his—

yeah, yeah, yeah, okay.

He's a great creator. He's also got a lot of success in business. He's exited several businesses. And so I had two interviews set up out there, but beyond that, I spent hours every day just going to Mount— which, going to Mayfair, which is like the wealthiest area of London. It's like the Beverly Hills of London. So what I'll do is I'll set up one or two big interviews in a city, and then I'll spend the rest of the time like just going around Beverly Hills. Or if I'm in Miami, I'll go to Palm Beach, and I'll just put myself in the areas where there's like a high concentration, a high volume of wealthy people and I'll just go up to people. And a lot of the people I go up to, I probably— I may not use, but maybe it's like 2 out of every 10 interviews that I do, I post 2 of those. And like, that's worth it to me.

Give me an example of— then is that— give me something that's happened like that recently where you just have like stood at Mayfair or Beverly Hills. Like, you're in LA right now.

Yeah.

Where are you gonna go today?

After this, I'm gonna go out on Rodeo Drive and just camp out there with him for a couple hours.

Like, we're at a coffee shop.

Coffee shop, the stores. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, just try and find some of like the wealthy locals, the people that you know, live there and just organically go up to them.

Will you just go up to everybody who's rich and be like, hey, okay, when had— like, tell me somebody that that's happened with recently where you just kind of like stood around where they didn't know who you were and you just kind of bombarded them with questions.

100%. I'm trying to think about a really good one.

Organic.

Yeah. I mean, we were just in Miami for doing an interview with Jordan Belfort out there down in Miami. And I was, um—

He's good though. I had a great interview with him.

Yeah, he's a cool guy. He's fun.

He's fun.

Yeah. So it's just like one came to the top of my mind. I was— my last day of filming out in Miami was actually after the Belfort interview. I just went to the Miami Design District.

Yeah.

Which is like where all like the shops are kind of like very similar to like a Rodeo Drive feel. And I just went up to this guy in a group of 3 people. He was in a sharp suit and started peppering him with questions. And then as I uncovered, I forgot what company it was that he sold, but he sold like one of the very original, like big, like tech internet companies for several billion dollars. And he also owns the Plaza Hotel in New York City. So it was kind of just cool just how randomly, organically, just going up and meeting people like that because you just really never know sometimes. But I've had that happen so many times where like I'll be in Highland Park in Dallas and I'm interviewing people and, you know, I'm like, are you a business owner? No, I'm the CEO of Frito-Lay. Like, just that's happened so many times. I mean, we've done that with a lot of different people who I didn't even really know that I was interviewing. But come to find out, like, you know, I was in— this is a good one— Houston. River Oaks is like the really wealthy area in Houston.

And I saw this gentleman coming out of a G-Wagon and I go up to him and I go, excuse me, sir, is this your G-Wagon? And he goes, yeah. And I go, I go, you know, what do you do for a living out here in Houston to afford a G-Wagon? And he goes, work hard. And I go, what line of business are you in? And he goes, football. And I go, what do you do? He goes, I own a football team. And I go, what team? Houston Texans. I go, you own the Texans? He goes, H-Town, baby. So it was kind of funny. Like we've had so— and I had no idea who he was because he's not like— his name's Kyle McNair. It's worth probably $10, $15 billion, but I didn't know who he was by his face. It's funny, like all the comments are like, how do you not know who that is? And I'm like, I'm not from Houston.

You know what I'm saying?

Like, I know Jerry Jones, but like, he's not like a known person. So that's happened a lot. You know, I could name countless cities where we've gone up to people and just finding out like these people are worth billions of dollars, you know? So it's pretty crazy.

Who's the one person you have not done that you would really love to interview?

Yeah, there's, there's definitely a list of some people that I'd love to do. President Trump, I think would be dope. Elon Musk would be cool. Kim Kardashian, Conor McGregor, Kanye West.

Um, oh wait, wait, wait, wait, hold on. So Kim Kardashian would seem like a no-brainer. You can probably just contact them at this point and she'd probably show up with—

I hope to, I hope to do her soon for sure. Yeah, I think she would be a, I think she'd be a fun one. I also like, I love the fact that she's like, like literally one of the things that I preach to people is like mastering attention. Like there's not really many better examples than the entire Kardashian family of like how well they've turned attention into revenue and they've built great businesses. Talk to her mom.

Her mom is done a fantastic job.

100%.

Have you not done Kris Jenner?

I haven't.

So these are like, to me, I'm surprised. These are low-hanging fruit people that I thought— Kim Kardashian, Donald Trump, they, they talk to everybody.

Yeah. Yeah.

Why have you not reached out to them?

The middleman. Come on, it's the middleman. But you know what, you know what it is, is that this right here is like, like we've done, you know, Dana White, we've done before. Yes, the UFC president. Of course, that would probably be my best way to go about going to get Trump because I've, I've tried through several times to kind of go— it's, it's the middlemen are just tough, you know, to get to Donald Trump. Yeah.

Are you joking me?

What?

I thought that would be like a no-brainer for you.

I mean, think about it.

When he wanted to run for president, he went on the Full Send podcast, which is guys your age, the bros.

But think about his intros though. He's going straight through Dana White.

He's going through Dana White for that.

He's like a close friend. So, you know.

Or his son. Yeah, very much. Who loves all the— I bet you his son watches you.

He's probably seen it for sure.

Have you ever tried to DM his son?

I don't think he's on Instagram. I don't— he's not on— yeah, he doesn't have a personal page. I've looked. He doesn't have one.

Oh, you have? So. But like you would think, because Donald Trump loves attention and media.

Yeah, yeah, I'm sure. Have you heard?

Have you heard about Mar-a-Lago?

Or— nah, it's definitely a goal for sure. It's cool.

You could get that tomorrow.

What are you talking about? We gotta try for sure.

This is like— I would think that would be like a no-brainer. Come on, James, you're supposed to be like, you know, super aggressive. What's going on?

Definitely.

You and I have to have a conversation after this.

Yeah, for sure.

Okay, so, and then Kanye West, I mean, that would be interesting.

Yeah, I just, I just respect—

he was supposed to be on this podcast. Yeah, and he like literally was, uh, scheduled, all the things. It was recently, or, um, it was after his whole, you know, okay, uh, it was probably 11 months ago, a year ago, and then he just didn't show up. Okay, that's shocking. I know, it's very shocking.

Yeah, I mean, I mean, look, like, the thing, the thing that I really love and respect about Ye is that I just think that, number one, you gotta have some level of respect for the people that that, you know, I mean, granted, I know that he maybe has said some— he's pretty horrible things, pretty, pretty crazy things. Yeah.

And I'm Jewish, and so— but I wanted to hear from the horse's mouth, like, because to me he's like mentally like not well, and— but yet he's very— he's obviously very smart.

Yeah.

And I think I couldn't tell if it was done more for publicity or just he was off his meds or what was going on. I was very curious. That's why I was—

yeah, I think he just— I think he's got a fascinating mind. Like, he thinks just in a very different way. And also like, I mean, he's had so much success in music and then also business. I mean, like what he did with Yeezy and Adidas, like I think it's pretty amazing actually. It is pretty amazing. Yeah. So I think he's definitely somebody that would be, and I love his music too, you know? So I know, I think, I think, I think it'd be a great conversation for sure.

So those are the, anybody else that you haven't done that?

Yeah, definitely. I mean, I talked about Musk, you know, he's, he's in Austin, so gotta get to Musk, gotta get to Bezos.

I don't understand, like you would think these people have not reached out to you or you have not reached out.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, I mean, it's like, again, it's, it's just a matter of time. That's the way I look at it. It's like, even like Tom Brady, for example, who we've done, like I was trying to get him a year before and we weren't able to get through to the gatekeepers, but then finally I had somebody on his team that I knew and was able to put that together. Michael Rubin, same thing.

Alex, who did you go through for Tom?

For, well, I, I just ironically just somebody that does the merch for one of his companies.

Oh.

So it's just like, you never know. Like sometimes you just need like one person who's like a close degree to that person.

A hundred percent. To make it make sense.

It's like, bro, here's this person, they've done this person, they get this many views. Like, it makes, it makes sense.

Do you know how many people that, like, all, like, like a lot of the really great people that I've got, or people are like, how did you get this person? How'd you get— usually it was like random. It was someone who was actually friends with them, or like were—

well, I have a funny, yeah, funny story about that. I was literally, I was just walking around Beverly Hills like a couple weeks ago, or probably like, like 1 or 2 months ago, and this lady had stopped me Yeah. And she goes, hey, you interview all these people, right? She's like, you should do something with my brother. And I was like, I was like, I was like, who's your brother? And she's like, oh, he built this company called Speechify. It's a $3 billion company. And so they connect me over text. I hopped on FaceTime literally minutes after being connected with her brother. And her brother goes, hey, how long you in LA for? And I was like, oh, you know, I actually leave like tomorrow actually. And he goes like, well, would you wanna do Scooter Braun? And so, and sure enough, he connected me to Scooter Braun and we did it just through that, just from a girl, a lady just stopping me on the street. To connecting with her brother to then, you know, him connecting with Scooter Braun, like just like that, you know? And like, these aren't necessarily super easy people to like just get access to like that.

So it just, I know it's the, the unconventional ways of going about getting certain people is like, like really, really fun. Oh, I know.

Honestly, if you have to, that's what we said earlier. If you have to go conventional, you've already lost. Yes. I, I really feel that way because also the dynamic is different. Like I find like then they bring people and then like they give you these qu— like you have, what are you gonna ask? What are you not gonna ask? Yeah. And they sit there and stare at you while you do the interview and all the other things. Like, it was like, hey, you know what, by the way, this would be a great person for you, or hey, I'm friends with so-and-so, and a text in the intro and it's done. That happened to me yesterday, actually. Actually, like, for example, like, I, I did all the Sharks, or, and I really like Rob Hershovitz. Have you? I love him.

He's the best. Okay, he's so great.

By the way, Rob, hi! I really love him. He's Canadian.

He's one of my favorite interviews ever.

Yeah, because he's a real person and he's kind and he's nice, and like, I really like and I literally was like, hey, by the way, you know who I have an interview with? Kevin O'Leary. I'm like, hey, do you know someone I can like reach out to? He's like, oh, I'll just, I'll just introduce you right now. And he just like connected me to Kevin in like 2 seconds, and Kevin responded in 3 seconds, and now Kevin's coming on. You know, I— but that's the thing, like, again, back to the, the original point, is like some of these people who made it really big, they're just— it's not them who, who are, who are affected, it's the people sometimes that are representing them that kind of causes the biggest problem.

Yeah, 100%.

You know?

Absolutely.

So who are some other of your favorite people that you've done?

I love Mike Rapoli. Mike Rapoli, he's the founder of BodyArmor and Smartwater, and he did a total of $12 billion in exits to Coca-Cola.

I know him. Yeah.

He was an incredible interview. That, that's a guy that just does not stop just scheming and thinking. And that's just like a common thread in these people is they're just obsessed with what they do. And I remember, like we had the interview scheduled at like 10 a.m. at his house down in Florida and we got there at 10. The interview didn't start for like 4 hours. We were just talking about business and he was just nonstop, just like question after question and question. That's such a fascinating thing about a lot of these billionaires.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, a lot of people would think and assume that, you know, they have all the answers, they have everything figured out, but they are really lifelong learners. Like they are so inquisitive and they really want to like know, like, hey, what do you— what did you do to kind of get here? And so like, it's really cool to like see that thread because it's like typically it's like, you know, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm a small small fish in, in the scheme of things, right? To them, like, I'm 23, you know, we've got a cool business now, but like, compared to what they've done, it's like, I need to learn from this guy. But it's like, they, they wanna learn from you. And so I think that's like, that was like a, a really something that really surprised me honestly with spending a lot of time with them. But Mike Rapoli, I love, I like that clip by the way.

I remember it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Big takeaway from him was just this idea that I remember, it always repeats in the back of my mind. He says, when, when the big guy, when, when the big entrepreneur on top, the minute he gets comfortable, the starving entrepreneur's gonna come up and eat their lunch. And so I think that that's something that like, I still kind I have to me to this day. It's like, hey, we've got 22 million followers. We're just talking in the car with, I think, him or somebody else that I was having a conversation about how it's like now that there's like a whole bunch of people trying to do the exact same thing. And it's like, to me, I'm like, man, I just have to keep on pouring gas down their throat. So that's why I'd like— you cannot just like— you just can't stop, you know?

So you cannot get comfortable and complacent. That is 100% true because there's always someone behind you ready to take your spot.

Absolutely.

I mean, I was actually going to ask you that part. One of my questions is, I've noticed in the last year a lot of people are doing your style. In fact, I saw you stop on the street with somebody who did the same thing that you do. I don't know, he does like a confidence channel, or maybe, or, or like—

I've done a couple of them.

Yeah, yeah, they're not like you, I have to say. They also don't show themselves on camera, I don't think.

Because some of them do, some of them—

oh really? Not the ones I— what Now, do you see them as like— so you do see them as competition? Like, what do you think of all these new up-and-comers? Like, you're 23, for God's sake. It's like, to me, you know, but when you're seeing other people now emulate you, how does that— what does that— what does that make you feel?

I just want to crush them.

Yeah, you just want to crush them. So you don't lose that competitiveness.

Yeah, no, definitely not. And I don't mean in a way in terms of like, you know, wishing ill will on anybody, like, definitely not. But just from a business standpoint, like, Yeah, you know what it is too? It's not the format. I don't have an issue with the format because I, I, I will say this too, I did not invent street interviews. I, I didn't. Every major cable legacy media news channel has been doing street interviews ever since they started. I did, I did not invent street interviews, and I'm inviting everybody. Like, it's a great format of content. I mean, it works well. Like Damon John, the Shark, says, pioneers get slaughtered and settlers prosper. Like, if it's a winning type of content, like use it. But like when you are taking the exact same question I used at the beginning and like the exact same questions throughout that are like specific unique questions that like I've come up with that I'm just like, then I just like literally it's like, 'cause I don't like that. Like I know that people will say like, oh, imitation is like the greatest form of flattery. I disagree with that.

'Cause it's an art. Like if you have your own art, if you have your own craft and people are just kind of like ripping it per se, like I have no desire to support that and whatnot. So that's kind of how I feel about that ultimately. Again, like the confidence person, like I know what creator you're talking about, he does his own thing. Cool. I have nothing— there's nothing wrong with that at all. He's not, he's not, you know, doing exactly what I'm doing. So I have no problem with that. But it's the people that who I've seen kind of like take the exact same questions that I use and don't even try and get innovative in any type of way. Like that's, that's kind of like what I have an issue with.

But guess what? They're not— they're going to hit a ceiling.

100%. I'm going to keep innovating.

I'm going to keep innovating.

Exactly.

That's the way I look at it. If they're not— if they can't think of a unique unique spin, right, or something that can— that they can call their own, then they're only going to go so far, right? And so I would— I wouldn't even be concerned about them, but I totally understand.

Definitely not.

I totally— but you have to keep that competitive edge for sure. Um, okay, so what— what do— well, first of all, you have those two questions you always ask people. What's the last question you always ask?

If you were to die tomorrow, if me and you died tomorrow and you had one more message to leave with the younger generation, what would that Okay.

Answer your own question.

Ooh, my one question.

Hmm.

You know, I'll give you, I'll give you two answers. I'll say number one, like probably one of my favorite pieces of advice that I ever received was from a guy named Billy Ray Taylor. You know, it's funny, I went to this like business conference in Houston where they had all these great speakers. Daymond John was one of them. Kendra Scott, Marcus Lemonis, like all these big heavy hitters. And I interviewed all them, like all the speakers. But my favorite interview I did that entire day was with just a guy that was in attendance. His name was Billy Ray Taylor. He was an executive at a company, Goodyear Tires, like a $10 billion company. And I'll never forget the advice that his mom gave to him that like I'll kind of, kind of share for this one. He said that if a bird lands on a branch, does the bird trust the branch or does it trust its wings? And the clue, I've seen many birds land on branches, but what I've never seen is the branch break and the bird fall and die. So you trust your wings. Like, that's one that I, I love that has really always like stuck with me ever since hearing that kind of saying right there.

Like, you have to trust your wings, you know, like Will Smith talked about in the interview that we did together. It's just never taking advice from people that you wouldn't trade places with. Like, taking advice from people that have not done the thing that you wanna do is insanity. So those are two that I really like. I also love, um, I interviewed, this was an organic one. He was a, he's a filmmaker. His name's Six King. He's been, you know, done some great stuff in the music and film industry over the years. And I remember him saying that when you're born, you look like your parents, but when you die, you look like your decisions. So I think that one was one that I also loved, right? It's just the end of the day, like when you go to the grave, it's like you can't put the blame on anybody else. It's literally like the decisions that you decided to make, right? You can't be a victim. You know, you have to get out there and get after it for yourself. Nobody's going to come do it for you. So I like those ones a lot.

And then another one, because I could talk all day about these, I love the soundbites.

Yeah, I love the soundbites too.

One that I also live by, and this has probably been one of my favorite ones in growing our channel, is credibility kills all bad attitudes. Credibility kills all bad attitudes. You know, I talked about some of the people that we've interviewed recently that a year ago was either a rejection or we weren't able to get in contact with them or it was a no or just people that were not happening. But then when you get like a big interview, like a Tom Cruise per se, and you start to build that credibility and you start to get those wins, then it's fun. It's, it's funny to see how people kind of like will change and then now all of a sudden they want to do it, but it's the result of like building credibility. So like this idea of just not taking no for an answer, like even when I do my interviews, like I'm so intentional, I'm gonna get that interview. I'm gonna get that interview by any means necessary. And if I don't get it yet, it's like, okay, well, Well, try harder. Like, it's, it's, it's, there's a, there's gonna be a way in for sure.

So credibility kills all bad attitude is one that I really like.

I really love that. I heard you say that before in someone else's, I think, show. And I was like, I, I actually wrote it down. Mm-hmm. Because you're really good at that. Okay, well, I am gonna look at my question because I don't want to leave this and be like, oh shoot, I should, should have asked him that and I didn't. But you also said like, people will take you places money won't. Was that?

Yeah.

Yeah.

People will take you places that money can't.

So that's also, but the proximity thing, you're putting, you're, you're putting yourself in places where opportunity can happen.

Very true.

You know what I mean?

And I think that's really another one, like, get the fuck out of your hometown. Like, I love preaching that message because, like, again, I grew up in the DC area. Yeah, best decision I ever made was moving to Austin, Texas, without a doubt. Um, right, it was so, so important to us to do that at the time because when you're around like-minded people, people who are authentic, people who are wanting to build, people that want more for themselves, it's just going to naturally have an effect on you. So like that idea of again that proximity and like being around like the right people, it will do so much for you.

Also, your, your audience is like all over the place. You have like young people, you have old people. Are you— how about men and women? Do you have 50/50? Is it like—

I think it's probably like 65/35. 65 men, 35 women.

Really? So what's— and what's like, what's the breakdown in terms of young, old, medium, whatever?

Our demographic is 25 to 35. Um, like that's probably 40% is within 25 to 35, and then the rest of it is kind of like all the way down to like, you know, teens up to, you know, 60, 70 years old.

So can I also want, this is what I really think is interesting. Could you have, like we talked about very briefly, two different partners, your brother and another friend of yours, right?

Josh. Yep. Yeah. My brother Jack Doolin and partner Joshua Smith. We met Josh in Boy Scouts together, all became Eagle Scouts. So yeah. Yeah, those are my two partners.

And so are you guys all equal part— like, it's equal?

Yeah, we're all equal partners. Equal partners.

So like, how do you break it down? Because the one thing I think is really important is you can't be good at everything. Obviously you're really good at content, we got that down, you know. Like, your brother, who, who's the one that does like the back end? Like, this is where people get stuck. I know this is how I've got stuck. I get stuck is I'm like you in a lot of ways. Like, I, I'm like I'm very relentless, I have no fear. Rejection is always better than regret in my opinion. I live by that motto. And so I'll just go 'cause no doesn't matter. But then like, doesn't mean I'm good with administrative work, doesn't mean I'm good with like executing on operations. And so if you're not good at all these other things, you kind of like, your stop is in your start, right? You've been really good because you're good at something. Do you, your brother and your partner, are they really good at then taking that extra thing and like, like kind of creating these business ventures and verticals, like how do you guys divide and conquer?

Yeah, great question. And like you said, you have to find your weakness in business, right?

No one's good at everything.

Definitely not. Definitely not. And like there's a lot of stuff with like the product in the backend that I don't even understand. Right. You know, and that's why I do what I do. And you know what, but the thing is, it's like you shouldn't even wanna like, you don't need to learn how to do all this stuff. Right.

But you need to find people who are good at balancing you out.

Like, like continue to become like so great at that one thing that you're phenomenal at and like dominate. That's what's taken us so far is like my brother, he's incredible at like the product. So like building out like the product and the infrastructure for like the different businesses that we have. So for the community, for our like, you know, agency, like all that, he's great at the product. Partner Josh, in terms of like brands, in terms of our newsletter, a lot of the stuff on like the backend marketing for some of the different businesses. So everybody kind of has their like different kind of strengths and whatnot that they focus on throughout them and everybody pulls their weight for sure.

Are you— do you edit your videos? Do you—

this is the one thing that people, they like, they find it so funny to believe. I edit every short-form video.

You do? I knew it. I knew it. It takes hours, so much time, because that's, because that's what you're really good at. So why would you give away the one thing that you— that made you successful?

And I think Dan Martell talks about it in Buy Back Your Time. Like, I've had this conversation with my brother about it, that it's like, you know, I like to call them like MWA activities, which are minimum wage activities.

Yeah.

You know, editing is definitely an MWA activity, 100% is, but the return that we get on editing a video for a couple hours that could potentially get 10, 20 million views, it's like, it's like, you know, it's kind of worth it. And, and I'm such like a psychopath with like editing that like, I feel like if I were to give it to somebody else, I would want to do 30 rounds of revisions. I'm like, no, no, no, you did, you missed this part. You missed this. What he said here doesn't look clean. I'm like, I'm like, I might as well just do that shit myself. Like, it'll, it'll take forever if I try to put that through somebody else.

And also there's a lot of nuance in that, right? Because you are tapping into something that you know is going to work. How do you teach that quality to someone else? And why would you rely on that? Why would you give away that, that job to somebody when that's what your superpower is? Yeah. And that's what made you guys who you are, right? Right. In a lot of ways. Because if these, if these clips are not going viral, then you have nothing, really. Yeah.

No, what I'll say is that it is extremely important as a person, any business, to delegate those tasks that like are genuinely like, again, the minimum wage activities because otherwise like, like you don't want to be the employee entrepreneur that is like bogged down by, you know, just these countless tasks that don't have a crazy high return on your investment. So like that's why like with, with my partners is like we've been great about like hiring like really good people. Like we have 70 employees now across all of the different— 70? Yes, 70.

And what do they all do? Are they not— obviously they're not editing or maybe they're editing something.

Well, so, so just across the different verticals, right? Like we've we've got, you know, managers in our community. We've got editors for our agency. We've got editors for, you know, we've got, uh, account managers for our agency. So we have like all these different people that are kind of in place, you know, videographers. So across the different businesses that are able to alleviate a lot of the time and task, you know, there's just like a ton of different things, right? Like people that are writing copy for our email list, for our newsletter, that are writing copy for promotional posts for our events. And like, because if you, you know, are going to assign yourself 20 different things to do, it just becomes hard, especially like, you know, with different things coming down the pipeline and just trying to focus on those like higher leverage like activities.

Absolutely. I mean, yes, that is 100% true, but I can see why it would be very difficult to kind of give the reins to like those videos.

Yeah.

By the way, I forgot about this line that you said that I love. It's, it's addicted to— people are addicted to education but allergic to execution. Very true. So true.

Yeah. I like to say also another one too is that information can change situations, but only through implementation.

Yes.

It goes right in line with that, that most people are addicted to education. They're allergic to execution. The reason why our businesses, like our companies do over $1.5 million a month, like we're now an 8-figure company, is because we took the lessons, we took all the knowledge that we learned from the conversations we had, and we applied it to the businesses that we were building and creating. And what so many people do is like they hear something, they feel good for a little bit, but then they don't— then they don't do anything about it, right? So it's very important to like take massive action to like actually bring ideas to life.

How do you like do that though? Like, I find— can I be honest with you? A lot of people your age, your generation, they want balance. They want— it's all about like feeling your feelings and not working that— like, you know, environments and kind of triggers and safe spaces, they're out there.

Like, calling us soft is what you're saying?

Yes, you're calling us soft. I don't think you're soft, but I think a lot of people in your generation are fragile.

Absolutely.

Can I say that?

Yeah. Well, that's why, again, a person— I'll mention them again— Dana White talks about, like, there's tremendous opportunity for people in our generation to stand out, and it is by, like, not being one of those people, right? So I definitely do agree with that. Unfortunately, I feel like our generation, there is a big degree and level of entitlement that people have that they feel like they're owed something. And the sooner that people can realize that you are not owed anything, like stop choosing to be a victim. Crazy.

100%.

It's like insanity. And I just will not allow—

Do you see that all the time?

Absolutely. But, you know, again, I choose to, like, I'm a huge advocate in like, again, this idea aside from God, like, nobody's coming to save you. Like, when it comes to you wanting to build a business, when it comes to you, you know, actually like wanting to do something, you know, for yourself.

I guess also thinking about—

and you know what?

Yeah, you know what?

If you want to live that comfortable life and have the balance, like, great. Like, like, then that's great. But just don't expect to be able to create your own schedule. Don't expect to have freedom and expect to work hours for somebody else. And there's— that's— there's nothing wrong with that either. Like, some people genuinely do want that life and they shouldn't be like I'm saying that because it's like, hey, like, if that's what you want, that's, that's fine. I just, again, if you have that seed in you where you genuinely want more for yourself, where you don't ever have to worry about money, where you want to be able to help take care of your family, like you are going to have to sacrifice. There's not going to be a lot of work-life balance. Like I was on 150 flights last year. Like, it's ridiculous. And granted, like, I won't probably be able to go at that pace forever, and I probably wouldn't want to go at that pace forever. But because I love so much what I do and it's brought me so much success from not just a media standpoint, but also from a business standpoint as well.

Else. Like, I'm willing to just keep on going for as long as I am feeling so good and like want to continue to do it. Like, I don't have an issue with it at all. I don't plan on stopping.

No, 100%. I agree. I have another one for you: don't be upset by the results you get by the work you didn't do.

Yes. Hey, most people are rewarded in public for what they practice in private.

100%, right?

Very true.

So then tell me then now about these, these other businesses, because let's say, for example— okay, walk me through. You still haven't really walked me through it. So let's say you meet with whoever, Tom Brady.

Sure.

And then you have a great interview and blah, blah, blah. And then you say, hey, I'm doing this subscription model company where I want to have someone like yourself on every, what, week, biweekly? Will you be okay by it? What is the resp— what, what are you asking? What's the ask to these people? Is it like 10 minutes on a call? What does someone get if I was someone who was going to subscribe? Type, what do I get then from a Tom Brady? Or from— is Tom Brady one of the people that said yes?

We haven't had Tom Brady on, um, not to like discredit Tom Brady at all, but no, no, I would say, um, the primary people that we have on the calls are people I'm just making up. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, hey, if Tom wants to do a call, I'd love to have him on, you know.

Okay, there you go.

Yeah, but, but, uh, but it's again, it's people that have built 8, 9, 10 bigger companies.

Okay, the guy from, uh, Body Armor, whoever it is. Okay. I'm just, yeah, making up whoever.

So if people, if members in our audience, people that like the content, if they want to join, pretty much they get access.

How much is it? Let's say I'm a person who wants to join.

$50 a month.

$50?

Yeah, $49 a month.

And what do I get?

You get access to a call every single week with an 8, 9, or 10-figure entrepreneur where you can ask your questions directly to them. And once a month we host events where we host 3 calls on a day. So it's more like probably 4 to like 7 or 8 calls a month where we bring in just entrepreneurs that have built incredible businesses and you get access to be able to ask your questions directly to them. Now, think about it this way. This is the way I look at it. If you typically, if you want to get around people like that, if you want time from people that have been able to exit a company for 9 or 10 figures, typically you either better find that person in a coffee shop and go ask them a question, or you have to pay thousands of dollars to be a part of like a mastermind or something like that. That, whereas we're giving people access to that for the price of a couple sub sandwiches a month, you know what I mean? So to me, it's, it's like a win-win.

Anyone can— so let's say you have— how many members do you have subscribed?

Uh, close, like 6,000 or so.

So does this person have to sit on the phone and hear 6,000 questions?

No, I mean, I would say that we don't have 6,000 people, people that show up to every single call.

How many people show up?

Oh, anywhere from maybe 300 to 1,000, just kind of depends. And like, like, not everybody necessarily is going to get to ask a question on a all, but just to kind of again like be in the room and be able to like ask their questions and stuff like that. Like a lot of, a lot of people—

it's kind of like a mastermind.

100%.

What do you think of these masterminds that are charging $100,000 a year for people to be involved with, to do these things? Like, what's your take on this whole thing?

It's interesting. I would just say vet the people that are a part of that mastermind and the stuff that they're teaching and what they've done for, you know, themselves. Like, I think that that's the whole problem with the wisdom economy, the people that are selling information, that are selling masterminds, is like, there are a lot of people that are involved that have actually done it for themselves and they've built great businesses. But like anytime, like somebody is selling some sort of like information or like a course per se, it's like, make sure that like they've actually done the thing that it is that they want to do. So the reason why, like, I'm not afraid to like say that like, hey, we have a content consulting company, that we have a content agency, is because I've done 5 billion views for myself. Like, I know this stuff. Of like the back of my head, whereas a lot of people that are pushing a certain product or service, they've never done it before. Yeah, it's like, why would you want to learn from that person? So I think that that's why like a lot of people, like, they just need to be vetted.

Like, I don't have an issue with that because I, I know so many people that have been a part of masterminds and their businesses have genuinely grown exponentially from being able to like even just fix one or two things or get like a couple lessons that, like, if they go to like a paid event and listen to a couple speakers, or they go meet people on a mastermind or something that. I do think that there's a lot of value in that education. Again, it's just a matter of like actually taking action on the things that you learn and making sure that the people that are involved that are teaching that you're learning—

YPO in a way, but absolutely, 100%. But they're much more expensive, and I think that they're not as vetted. That's the problem. And the problem is you have a lot of charlatans. With social media comes a lot of charlatans, and everyone's a coach, and everyone can say that.

It's true though.

I mean, honestly, if you go, if I go through my algorithm, 9 out of 10 people I see are charlatans who are coaches who are telling you to do something that they've never done themselves, who are saying, if you want to be a millionaire or this, this, this, do this and this. Meanwhile, they're living in a studio apartment. Like, to me, that's what's really happening. And you've got to be extremely discerning because you're taking advice most of the time from a bunch of yahoos. That literally is the truth. You can, you know, there's always exceptions to every rule. And that's why even like when people, I'm sure you get tons of pitches. If you do homework, you'll find that most of these people, some of them, not most, a lot, some of them are not who they're, you know, pretending. Like Chris Rock did this really funny thing where he says that like when you date somebody, it's your sales rep who's going out there and talking. It's not really the person. That's really the truth. What's happening with social media, right? So like, I think what I love about what you do especially is you're giving people, legit people that maybe are not known, but they've actually built true businesses.

A lot of the times, like they may not be fancy businesses or things that you know of, but they are actually like, they're alert that they're, you're getting a lot of great nuggets from their, like, like, or their real, their real experience. Mm-hmm.

Very true. I mean, that's my favorite part about the channel, honestly.

Yeah.

Is number one, what we're showing people is there are so many different ways to get rich in today's world. Mm-hmm. I mean, a lot of people, especially with social media, is they think that they have to go out and build the next Google.

Yeah.

And they have to go build this like super sexy company. But I mean, some of the richest people in the world that I've met, yeah, have built the most boring businesses and things that you would have no idea. Like we just interviewed a guy in Las Vegas that has a construction equipment business that sold for $2 billion. I mean, look at Todd Graves.

Yeah.

He's worth $20 billion off selling chicken fingers.

I know.

You know what I mean? Jimmy John's subs. Like, like just, it's crazy.

I love, by the way, those chicken fingers are really good. But yes.

Damn good.

Yeah. They're damn good.

He's good though. It's truly $20 billion.

Like he's like worth the $20 billion. Yeah. No one would ever think that, you know what I mean?

Definitely not.

Okay, you can tell me what a little bit, and then I'll wrap it up, about your content business, because you're now helping businesses or entrepreneurs basically become content creators or create—

just helping them build their personal brand.

I mean, let me ask you a question. If someone has a billion dollars, why do they care about having a personal brand? Didn't they just like— what if you made— once you have $2 billion, are you still going to want to have a personal brand?

100%.

Really? Okay, tell Why?

Because to me, having the personal brand, it's, it's legacy. Like, why would a billionaire do an interview? It's legacy. They're able to give back. They're able to, you know, I mean, I mean, I look at— we're going to see a big trend of this happening as well. I mean, PayPal is currently hiring. Maybe they filled the position. They're currently hiring somebody to be the head of content for the PayPal CEO. And I think we're going to see— I think we're going to see that trend happening with all these companies as well.

Yeah.

I mean, but also think about it this way. Like how many airlines are there?

A lot.

There's a lot.

Yeah.

I only know one airline CEO.

Who do you know?

Virgin.

Virgin.

Richard Branson. He's the only billionaire. So it's like, it's because he has that personal brand.

So that's different. I'm talking about like, so you're saying, I think it's really important for a brand to have, have their, the head of the brand or the head of the company to have to become a thought leader because it just enhances and supports the brand.

What you're saying is the person who's already a billionaire, why do they need to go and get—

They've exited, they have like $3 billion. I think what I'm, why I'm asking this question is I see a lot of these people who are then coming on social media and they're buying a million followers and they're buying a half. I don't get it.

That's terrible. That's terrible. I haven't, although at least from my honest perspective, I haven't seen the credible people that are like legitimate billionaires do that. I've seen a lot of the scammy kind of people where like they're, you know, the internet marketer, digital entrepreneur that has the hundreds. And you can tell easily if somebody has fake followers or not.

Why they're buying their shares, their likes, their following.

It's crazy. I don't understand. It's, it's, it's sad, honestly.

But why are they doing it?

Perception. They— it's perception. Because you and I know, as somebody— as people who create content and have actually done well and have actually gone viral, but to the masses of people, they're like, oh my gosh, this person has 500,000 followers, without going to look and see that their views, they're getting like 3,000 views. And, you know, or, or they're getting botted views and likes, and the comments are all like AI robots just kind of like, you know, saying a bunch of BS.

No matter how much money you make, you can still be insecure, basically.

It is. And And just to kind of go back to kind of what you're saying about like, why would a billionaire want to have like a big following and people know who they are? You're right. Like, I mean, there's definitely a subset, like there's certain billionaires like I would love to do and that I've met and I would know that I would never be able to get them to agree to do an interview. And they just, that's how they want to live their life and be private. And there's nothing wrong with that. I know a lot of them that want to do it for the purposes of giving back and they care about their legacy. And it's like, hey, they know what they want. When they leave, people will be able to know their story. They'll be able to know about their insights. And to that degree, it's like, I think what a lot of people people would ultimately want to do it for. And also, it's like, a billionaire has a lot of money, but like, what are the two of the biggest currencies in today's world? It's, it's your, your money, but then also attention.

And so a lot of people do want attention. Like, a lot of billionaires do want to be famous. A lot of multi-millionaires, they do want to be famous. And so it comes down to the person ultimately. It's like, again, I understand completely if people have made a lot of money, you got to be careful. There's a lot of crazy people in the world. And if people know that you are somebody who's high profile and have a lot money, like you gotta be careful. You have to make sure that you're, you know, somebody that's not gonna get taken out, you know, for whatever reason it may be. So I, I also do understand both sides of wanting to protect yourself and not have like a crazy, like digital footprint and wanting a bunch of people to know who you are. At the same time, you know, I also, you know, will enjoy any kind of experience and chance that I get to meet up with people that have, you know, built great brands or companies and, and done great things in the business world and for themselves.

Yeah. And a lot of the people I know who are legit, like billionaires, they're not interested in social media. Yeah, they're not interested in like building up a brand. You know, they actually— it's the opposite. They want to make— they're like, don't post me, don't put me on the video, don't put me on this thing because they're scared for their kids also a lot of times. Right.

I've had that happen before.

You have a lot.

So I've had to take videos down of people actually.

Me too. Yeah, that's happened to me like 4 or 5 times.

Yeah.

And so I find it— so where is your sweet spot? Like, who is your client? Like, Like if you're talking to a bunch of entrepreneurs, like who is that person that you're looking to really help build their brand? Someone who's like, like who is up and coming, who is a CEO of a company that's really trying to like make, become a thought leader so they can help their company elevate. Like who is your ideal person?

I mean, anybody. I mean, I mean obviously I mean like just because of like how great the product and service is, like you'd probably be like amazing at it. Yeah, yeah, definitely. I mean, I mean we, we've gone viral in our agency, we've gone viral with healthcare CEOs, right? We've gone viral with tanning salon owners. We've gone viral with, you know, finance guys. I mean, any industry, software companies.

How expensive is it? How cheap is it? Or how cost effective? What's the— how much— what's the price?

Well, we have two different businesses. We have a done-for-you content agency that does the content from start to finish, meaning where we come up with all the ideas, all the strategy, we all the hooks for them. We do all the filming, all the editing, all the posting. Top to— so Done For You is that business. Okay. And then we also have like a consulting business where I assembled a team of some of the top content creators, short form and long form, to pretty much do calls weekly, biweekly inside of this kind of, I guess you could call it like a, like a community per se. It's called the School of Content where pretty much people will get access to, you You know, the top minds in content creation. Like, I mentor people in there on how to pretty much crush their brands and stuff like that with content as well.

So, so the first one that you said, how much would that cost someone to do? I know a lot of people who do that.

Yeah, we charge like $10,000 a month for, uh, for the consultation.

Yeah. Okay, that's not terrible.

No, it's not. It's not bad at all.

How many pieces of content do you get a week?

Uh, well, you do a piece of content every single day.

So it's like 5, 7 pieces.

Exactly. Exactly. You do?

Wow. So you're doing 7, you're doing 28, you're doing like at least 28 to 30 pieces of content a day.

30 plus. Yeah, for sure.

For 10 grand.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yep.

Do you have a lot of people who are paying that?

A lot of people. Yep.

Okay. So there you go. You have it. Okay. So have I, what else? Okay. Before I let you off here, cuz I'm not, I wanna make sure, did I forget anything?

No. I mean, I, I mean, if you tell me like, I, I, I wanna make sure that before I let you go, Oh, okay.

Wait, what is the mo— what is the most common theme or thread that you've heard with all the different people that you've interviewed?

Yeah, I like to say billionaires think in decades, not days. So I mean, every single one of them just has such a long-term vision. Like I just interviewed Arthur Blank in Atlanta, who's the owner of the Falcons, co-founder of Home Depot, which is now a $350 billion company.

Oh yeah.

And, uh, he was, I remember Like, you know, he got fired at 36 years old from his job. It was like a, like a hardware store. He was like an executive at, and he started Home Depot. And at the beginning, everybody told him that he was crazy, that Home Depot was going to fail because the margins were so insanely small. But again, it goes back to that concept with brand equity that like you prioritize long-term thinking over short-term profits. He understood that if he could scale Home Depot out to a certain point, that even though they had razor-thin margins, if they could get to a scale, they were doing such consistent volume that they would make a ton of money. So again, I, that idea that billionaires think in decades, not days. I mean, I remember interviewing the founder of LinkedIn and I asked him that if he had to start from zero and he had one year to make a billion dollars and his life depended on it, what would you do? And he go, and he stopped me. He goes, I never play a one-year game. It's at least a 10-year game. And this, all these guys like Todd Graves, like same thing with him.

Like he'll, he talked about it in our interview. He thinks in generations, like it is not like an overnight thing. Right. And it goes in line with probably one of my favorite concepts ever. Like, I love vertical integration, but from a, from like a tactical mindset standpoint, this idea of macro patience and micro urgency. Macro patience but micro urgency. So macro meaning understanding that yes, to build any great business, it is going to take a long time. There's no great business that was built overnight. So you have to have patience. If you have instant gratification, I need it now, I need the car tomorrow, I need this tomorrow, it's like you have to have the patience and understanding to be able to reinvest back in your company for a couple years, right? Stay small enough, long enough, and you'll be big enough soon enough. It's one of my favorite sayings ever. If you can just a couple years of reinvesting back in growing the business, becoming profitable, like that's great. But micro-urgency, meaning every single day just taking like a ton of action, responding quick to people. That's another common thing as well. It's like these billionaires, like the wealthiest people, like, they respond instantly, you know what I mean?

It's, it's crazy. Like, people think that, like, oh my God, like, oh my goodness, that person is, is so— he's, he's so rich, he's so busy. But it's like, no, like, they're quick. Like, if you're— if they, if they are intentional and, like, have something that they, they care about you, they want to do something with you, like, they will respond like that.

Mark Cuban is responding in 4.5 seconds. I didn't even press send, he was at my house already. I mean, this is what I totally agree. And then the people who lag, takes 4.5 years to hear from them. They're like, I'm so busy. You're not busy at all.

Yeah. And being busy is not a flex either.

Exactly. It's not a flex. Exactly.

Yeah. Being busy is not a flex. So yeah, macro patience, micro urgency is one that I, that I really like a lot. But yeah, I mean, and I mean, just again, the, it goes back to like, they're, they're a little bit delusional, like every single one of them. Like, you know, again, I've talked about the LinkedIn founder, like two-thirds of his smart friends told him LinkedIn was going to be a failure and he was part of the PayPal model. Mafia. So if— and those— he had people that were, that were part of, you know, guys like people like Elon Musk that are in there, Peter Thiel, you know, all those people that were, you know, part of that organization that were like telling him pretty much like, dude, you're gonna fail with LinkedIn. But— and he did it. So you have to kind of have some sort of like delusional like self-belief to like understand that despite what anybody else is saying, it has to work or it has to work. There's no other option.

100%. Okay, last question, because I don't even know how to ask I'm gonna, it's gonna sound kind of wacky, but so people who are like my, in my age, like middle, like midlife, right? Like when you guys are young, 20s, whatever, it's super easy to be quick with like digital and like, you know, all the stuff that TikTok and all the tools and just everything's moving fast. If someone's starting over again in their 40s or 50s and they wanna start a business, like, and they're not very, they're not fluid in digital yet, what do you, what kind of, what kind of advice can you give somebody? Hire, besides hiring a 20-year-old, right? What's a real, a really good jumping off point to get somebody to start their, their business.

Well, I mean, look, I, I, I'm a big advocate of like, again, partnering up with people that are like masterminds or like super skilled in that sense. So like, if it isn't just kind of like hiring a random agency that you want to kind of have do that, then I would say it's like, hey, partner up. Exactly.

Yeah.

Partner up, hire up, give some equity to somebody that can, you know, ultimately help out, you know, significantly with whatever it is that they're ultimately trying to if, if the customer and the avatar for whatever it is that they're trying to build is out there in the masses, like on social media, and it would make sense for them to ultimately do that. That's what I would say. If you want to learn it yourself, I mean, there's definitely tons of, you know, resources and knowledge out there for sure. I mean, it may take a while to learn, especially like if somebody's not super like technology, you know, uh, advanced per se. But if not, then I would say definitely you're going to want to end up like partnering up with somebody who does have that skill set and knowledge of how everything works and can ultimately do that way more efficient and easier than you Okay.

What's the next business, the next vertical, the next business that you're gonna be launching?

Yeah, well, it's more so right now I'm very focused on distribution.

Okay.

So I wanna build like one of the biggest media companies in the world. We just launched Hard Knocks Women. I don't know if you've seen that yet.

No.

Oh, you gotta look at it. Look it up. We just launched it.

Oh, I, I did see it on YouTube that you had like a bunch of women. That was where I saw Anastasia. I saw Sarah Blakey. No, no, no, no, no.

I'll show you. We launched a new channel, Hard Knocks Women. We have a, a, a woman host in Los Angeles. She already grew the channel to 15,000 followers in the first month. So we launched a channel called Hard Knocks Women, Hard Knocks Business. We have two new hosts for those channels. Like, I'm— my big focus right now is trying to, like, just grow more channels under the Hard Knocks umbrella and just try and continue to create, like, such, like, a big, like, media, you know, kind of empire, what you were talking about earlier in the episode. So, you know, we've got 22 million followers now, but I want to get to 30. I want to get to 40. I want to get to 50. And like, like I can get there by myself. It may take a little bit of time, but the way you get there faster is like by getting other channels and, you know, probably start to acquire some channels and like just kind of playing, playing the media game long term for sure.

How did I miss that? Okay, I gotta go look at that.

Check it out.

All right. Uh, James, you've been amazing.

Thank you.

This has been like, I'm telling you, this is such a treat to have you here. Can't even believe you have Hard Knocks Women. I have no, I had no idea.

Yeah, check it out. And you ask great questions as well. Like I always, you know, I've done a lot of like podcasts and like, I mean, I don't, I wouldn't say I've done any like bad interviews, but like it was like really, really good questions for sure. Very tactical questions. Like, and I always like to like compliment like other interviewers on that.

Thank you.

Because I mean, there's a lot that just kind of are very broad and whatnot, but like the way that you went very tactical, especially on the social media stuff was like top level. So seriously.

Thank you. That's a huge compliment coming from you.

Definitely.

I'm gonna clip that even though you won't collaborate with me, you said, but Uh, thank you. And hopefully I'll see— I'm gonna ask you some more questions if you don't mind, but next time you're in LA, I would love to see you again.

100%.

If possible.

Yeah, absolutely.

Thank you. And if you guys are living under a rock and don't know who he is, you should follow him at the School of Hard Knocks. He just basically said YouTube, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, on the moon, everywhere you can find this guy and all of his verticals. I cannot believe you have Hard Knocks Women and you didn't even call me to be your host. I'm very offended, but we'll talk about that after. Thank you so much for having me. Bye.