How do you find your passion I Find that many are scared of their passion AKA Their interests their Hobbies Skiing Legos Cooking video games People don't think their interest is a business Dustin's interest in BMX by culture I Don't believe he thought that that was a business that he could make 150k a year being in the BMX business if you didn't understand that he could do a daily podcast or do videos or be a hoodie maker of BMX culture and make 100K a year that is real. My big thing is if you're 18 to 29, try it because you won't have to regret not trying it. All right? So you clearly have many passionate Die Hard Fans that care about you on a really deep emotional level and they're willing to travel across across the country and pay thousand dollars for you. So my question is, what are some practical concrete steps that a content creator or a company can take to have an audience care about, care about them on an emotional level and therefore care about their words, products and services that they offer? It's a great question, brother.

Two things: One I love your shirt two. Um, the answer is the way you get people to love something is by you loving them first. for a human to get love one of the at scale I Think it's predicated on them loving first for me. One of the great reasons I think everything happened was my intent was to provide value like I was like I'm good I know how to be happy without people's money.

Love attention you know I'm good So this allows me to be like remarkably generous emotionally and strategically. I Don't think you can really create something of scale as a content creator without providing outrageous levels of value. Value comes in a lot of different forms, but I think the thing that's been a little bit different about my world is unlike a music artist or an athlete or someone who's like funny or attractive or an actor like I'm on a daily basis trying to give people either emotional or tactical things that bring them value and I did that for a decade before any of you knew who the I was like. I did it every day, every day, every day.

and you know in 2010 it was a couple of hundred people and in 2023 it's a lot more so. I think the answer: it's kind of like parenting and all of you are too young for that at this point, but like they're gonna love you as much as you love them first. and I think the reason a lot of people struggle as content creators is all about them. How many likes am I gonna get? How much money am I gonna make out of this? How many hoodies can I sell to them? How many courses can I sell to them? It's all selfish and the reality is, it's all about being selfless.

And so I think that's the answer to your question. My guy, that hoodie I love it even better. I'll send it to you and clearly it's like it can like it's called yes a lot Yes. So do you still think it's the future? or like are you buying low or are you like out loud I Don't know if you caught this, but most of my summer and fall last year was saying that 99 of them were going to go to zero because I believe in the macro but I saw all the green and the short-term Behavior so I knew it was going to be a problem.

It's kind of like the difference of believing that stuffed animals are going to be something that everyone's gonna be into as Kids versus beanie babies, right? So too much of the behavior was beanie babies and speculation. But I believe in Nfts and Web 3 the most because it's a macro technology I'll give you the comp the way you said that. Gary you believed in Nfts. That would be like you saying Gary you believed in iPhone apps but 99 of the iPhone apps in the first two years have failed and I'll be like yeah, that's exactly right.

But I still think Instagram and Uber and Waze are coming and that's how I think about Nfts, right? I I Know that a lot of projects failed because a lot of people came in with greed. They were selfish like we just talked about, but there will be one percent that are good now and people will learn from this last year and people will build meaningful things going forward. You always say like in your 20s and 30s you gotta like experiment and go explore yes, how to do the same thing I uh you know, came to the states when I was 17, studied really hard as an immigrant like being Korean uh and did a quick Stanford in my grad school for Environmental Studies made my parents really happy but then I realized I never really risked um doing something that I truly felt passionate about because I was afraid of failing it at it but also I was afraid of um, my Paris disappointing parents especially immigrant parents in a U.S environment is is one of the biggest things I focus on because I got so fortunate because I was an immigrant, but my mother gave me the freedom to be myself and it led to so much good, both emotional and professional success. But you know that is just a very rare story to this day.

parents. India Asia Europe I mean Africa I mean it is. It is the great disservice that parents are doing to their children and they don't realize that they think they're helping and so it comes from a good place, but it is created. Oh sure, a lot of Voters I mean they work their ass off and but then when I went to Stanford like I think I did enough for them and then I started following my passion in art and running I love this.

I've been running and I went to Kenya so I could leave it wrong with it was just amazing. Um see if that's kind of my story. it's very similar, you know, similar to mine right? I Yeah I didn't do it through school I did it through I Need I want to give back to my parents by building their business? Yeah and then at 34 went and did my thing. No I love that I love that you did that.

were your. Did your parents struggle in that transition when you were ready to do something for yourself or were they fulfilled the yeah, that's the other thing. It's like the other thing I'm thinking a lot about is like all right I went to the Ivy League school but let me live my life and it's like where do parents They really need to find their you know their way in letting their kids live their lives. which is really interesting because when I speak to the parents which it happens multiple times a year that are doing this to the children, their parents did it to them right? Exactly which is which to me is almost the most inappropriate because you you know that you were so unhappy about this.

Why are you do like it's a it's hypocrisy at its best. You were mad at your parents and now you're doing it to your kids. That's a level of like lack of Consciousness time. Yeah that's the play but they really believe they would work for me I know that for me so like it was very interesting conversation with them.

They would ask me like why would you not work at like Google or Facebook where your friends work at like make six figures and whatnot and I've been making like 20 to 40K a year which is really not much compared to what my friends are making people I'm just so happy and when I made a decision to go into running I was like I'm just gonna live in Kenya I don't I don't remember and and what the world hasn't figured out yet is living within one's means is the only thing one needs to do to eliminate the anxiety associated with their fee. The amount of people I know that make 283 000 a year and stress about money every day is staggering. It's because they live at 413 000 lifestyle If you make 39 000 a year and you live a twenty three thousand dollar lifestyle You've Won especially if you're happy and by the way I say this from a place of knowledge I yeah you know I me I I In every year of my twenties post school did not make a hundred thousand dollars a year and when I was from 45 to 55 to 65 because my dad didn't pay me that much I lived within those means and had savings I Just I got fortunate or unfortunate that I worked every minute I didn't have the weekend to spend money on I Never wanted to impress anyone so I didn't need to buy anything to impress everyone's vulnerabilities. they're trying to impress someone with the things they buy which makes them buy things they don't need I am still doing full-time marketing right now.

Um, two years ago I did like organic social medias when I started I remember last year and I talked to you one client now I have five so I am excited. but um I've been posting more on LinkedIn Tick Tock and I've been sitting out recent probably over like 150 cold emails. like a 30 open rate but like really not that many people says hi, it is good, it's very high. really okay 30 open rate? yeah and then what? Nothing Yeah crickets, what are you emailing them? um just like information that like I saw their stuff I thought they'd be a good fit.

This is my website. You're going in too hard. What you need to do is send an email and say hey, uh I would title it 90 minute Karma 90 minute Karma Driven Free Social Media q a seminar I'll say it again nice and slow because I want to make sure you get it titled 90 Minute Karma Driven Free Seminar q A with me In there you go Hey love your stuff I'm just very good at my craft and social media content. I Like providing people value, no strings attached.

Here's the Google Hangout link April 17th from 4 to 5 30. Please come if you want to come. And I'm just going to talk of the State of the Union of social media as it continues to become important if you have one person show up phenomenal. If you have 23 phenomenal and literally you go there and you give them the best information you can give them pro bono and that will convert into clients.

and if it doesn't, you still created Karma which always is a good thing right? The reason you're getting very good open rates. you're not getting conversions because you're trying to sell. Yeah, right, right right back. Okay, yeah well.

another thing is we've kind of been so right now. like I said, when you do organic social media for my clients um with some other marketing things too I do like I've done like branded photo shoots gotta coordinate for some of them. Um, um I'll do like marketing collateral, just miscellaneous just to add value. I Don't add that into a price right now.

it's just more in their monthly retainer so just show them like I appreciate you. Here's some extra work that you need help with I can do no extra charge. Um, but then like my some clients, even after a year long, they love me. But they also are like where's the true direct return on investment and your answer is I Do Brand brand is not measurable If you want Direct results you need to spend media dollars against ads I Do brand and you do the end and some people believe in I believe in Brand more than anything in the world.

Me too. Yeah, a lot of small businesses and people don't have that patience and don't believe in it. That's okay, yeah you just need to find the ones that do right. The other thing you can do is if you see a high turn rate, you can create a Consulting product instead of a retainer client.

So the good news is you've had six clients from day one. you've lost one and it was just because. It was just because. It was like if that happens friends, yeah that's don't even spend no time thinking about who you lost.

Think about all your time of how to get better and find new people. We interrupt this program to bring you a special report. How do you want your passion? I'm in my Discord right now and this is something people ask me all the time and I find that many are scared of their passion AKA Their interests their Hobbies um skiing Legos Cooking video games people don't think their interest is a business Dustin's interest in BMX by culture I Don't believe he thought that that was a business that he could make 150k a year being in the BMX business. but he didn't understand that he could do a daily podcast or do videos or be a hoodie maker of BMX culture and make 100K a year that is real.

My big thing is, if you're 18 to 29, try it because you won't have to regret not trying it. Someone just asked me what kind of content, what what kind of content do you find does the best? My answer in my Discord was the one that comes from the heart or the one that comes from the brain. You were either winning on emotional truths or intellectual truths things that you really believe in or have real passion for or that you really know so much of. What Garyvee has won on in my opinion is that the I love is the I know and I've got both.

But when I break off into, you know, maybe I'm less passionate about it. but I'm speaking to it or I'm passionate and it's more like sports stuff or blueberries or stuff of that and I don't know as much about it. Those work. So for me, great content comes from the heart or the brain.

Tips for a college student who wants to drop out, the answer to that is to drop out. If you want to drop out, you should drop out. If you're not dropping out because of the stigma that's already gone, Nobody gives a no I don't even know who any I don't know a single employees College If you told me right now, tell me what college Dustin Katie or Nick Anderson went to I would lose I Go for three and so you should drop out because that's where your heart is. That's where your mind is.

But let there be no confusion. Whether you go through college or you drop out to actually win in the real world is going to take real effort. Real work ethic, real talent, really honing your skills like this is all real work out here. A lot of people get confused because they're good at school and that doesn't work and a lot of people get confused of like I'm gonna drop out it I don't need school but your lazy ass is gonna win in the real world either.

You better change that energy if you're lazy as school like I was you better flip that energy when you go into the real world. Yeah, a quick refresher. So I run a company called American Canning where basically a beverage can, an equipment supplier to small and scaling beverage brands. I think last time we talked I we were talking about building our own cane manufacturing plant while last year we actually did that.

Totally different than any other plant here. one is we use the Japanese technology. They've been doing it for 22 years. It's the most environmentally friendly canned plant in the world.

and two, it uses different technology that's basically increasing the shelf life substantially for like products like wine spirits based Rtds cider more acidic stuff. Gallows Started importing and using these cans on all their Dark Horse initially and they use it on everything now. So we built a plant in the U.S First, that's awesome. That's awesome I mean I guess just some insights from you or Hot takes on where's the beverage Market going.

That premiumization trend is happening in categories that are tough to you know, holding cans for long term, but you know, how would you kind of approach getting a word out there. driving, adoption, content platforms, all that good stuff, you know I Think it's it's education comes in the form of communication, right? Like so. unlimited podcasts, unlimited infographics, unlimited um in you interviewing people that actually know the truth? Unlimited you making one two minute hot takes? why? Just unlimited Like again, it's so easy and so hard. Like the things I believe in.

If I own this business, I would do what I did with Wine Library TV I make a video every day for five years and then would start happening right? And you know that's hard to say because people don't have the time they think but it's it's similar to I used to literally think I didn't have time to work out I'm busier than ever and I have time to work out I Prioritized: Most people are not prioritizing content creation without realizing it is the oxygen of their growth. People think social media content is like some nice little nice to have or tier six to my real business. Your real business is to communicate your business for sure. I mean what? what? Because this would be obviously right.

So like I mean platform wise I mean LinkedIn very hot LinkedIn but be for B to C to if you go crazy and do a tick tock thing of like like if you became the guy that says demand your favorite beverage to use this technology and like every time at the end could be like let's all go attack Bud Light Here's the LinkedIn to the Bud Light brand manager on LinkedIn like you could create a whole viral movement. Do you think consumers give a I mean yeah, it's a commodity No no I think consumers give real shits now. I think 10 years ago consumers gave no shits. 20 years ago consumers gave no shits.

Now better whether that's healthier, better for the environment, better for you, better for it to be stable. But go to the consumer side. that then says then you create a website that has like 80 of your if you came out and said 80 of our favorite brands that we would love to see our cans and you have a logo of like whatever brand and then I literally a URL to the LinkedIn oh of the brand manager of Dr Pepper or Corona whatever. You could create a whole swell because at the end of your Tick Tock you're like by the way link to link to the people that can help you make this a reality in our bio.

Okay yeah and you know Corona and Dr Pepper They're too big to maybe give a but if you find some small mid-sized brands that are like would be iconic customers for you if they switched over in that sweet middle that'd be epic. So I Want to ask if you have any advice for starting entrepreneurs? You're just like also reading either time to like develop into their own. That's it. Gonna start their uh, entrepreneurial journey and then probably one of the most difficult environments that they're thin, like they're less ethic right? Yeah, but honestly it's not that difficult.

meaning it's to your point. It's been one of the more difficult ones in the last decade because the last decade's been Fantasyland But the economy right now is much stronger than it was in 2008 and Nine it's much stronger than it was in the late 90s. Like you know, like it's much stronger. So yeah, you don't want to get caught in the delusion of like what's happening which is everyone's lost context of a 50-year window.

Like yes, if you compare it to four years ago, it's harder. But yeah, it's way easier than it was in 2008 and nine it got real bad. Like people are losing job like people are unemployed. Yeah, right now people are just dealing with inflation.

But that's more talk that's almost more. just people aren't capable of managing their own money. Yeah, you know what I mean it's not like you don't have a job, it's just that you continue to have four streaming services when you're living. Paycheck to paycheck and maybe two would be okay.

like Netflix and Hulu is okay, you don't need HBO Max Yeah into perspective. Yeah, so that's the reason that's good is now you're like, okay, wait a minute because now it's like even though you're like I'm up for the challenge. It's like oh, it's tough It's not really tough like it's actually I Would actually argue it's way easier with the way social media is what they weigh. Information is like it's never been easier to be an entrepreneur, even in this softened economy.

Yeah, because the ease of the tools and the costs associated with the opportunity are outpacing the difficultness in the market. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. That what is something that, um, most people in this this day and age is like kind of belong to something like something that you're seeing that's obvious to you, but that other people are just not seeing at the moment that people's entitlement is destroying their happiness. I Just don't understand how we got into this place where everyone thinks everyone owes them something.

That's true. and I when you say it and I also kind of feel guilty about it because I know that I have some of that as well. It's by the way, all of us do. You can't be a human being without expecting things from your parents.

Yeah, but boy oh boy does that lead to unhappiness. What's your take on? Uh, you know how everyone's expecting your crypto crash and just generally the crypto Market What's your take on that? I mean I think it ready corrected in a meaningful way, right? Things are down quite a bit. I Believe you know my take I made very public a year ago and further back of 99 was going to go to zero because I thought there was too much greed. but the macro is very real and I think over the next three to five years, Um, blockchain technology will be a meaningful part of our society.

and how would uh, are we able to see more integration of AI into Nfcs? What's your take on AI and Nfts like combined? I Think AI is going to be a part of everything. It's like an oxygen technology. It's a utility to make things more efficient. So yeah, I mean to me, the creation of Nfts will be AI potentially the scripts that are written for the narrative I mean there's just so much that Ai Ai is like saying computers like we'll we'll do.

You know it's like it's like 1980 and you're asking, do you think uh, computers will integrate with my pavement company I'm like yes and 40 years later we have websites for every pavement company and people process their Billings through a computer like AI is just going to be Omni it's a it's a thing. It's like course you will like, it's like a tractor or like a calculator or like a marker. Anything that makes humans lives more efficient. Um, we will do electricity like we will do it and AI will make a lot of things more efficient in our society.

Perfect Great answer. Thank you. Uh, my last question is since we're a meditation based project, we actually do guided live meditation on all of our social media every weekend. Uh, what's meditation to you and like if you practice is how do you practice it and how would you? how are you mindful of things and how would you ask other people to be mindful I think everything I just heard is full commitment to gratitude I Feel like I meditate every day though I don't actively meditate the way the world speaks about it and the way I do that is by leaning 100 into gratitude by being grateful for what I have versus anxious or unhappy for what I don't have.

It keeps me in a steady state of contentness that I wish for the world. Hey Gary about company culture, the culture advantage. and I look at why culture is so important to Innovation Why companies need to focus on it and that's my message. The question I have is how do I get that message out there? What communities and where do you find people who care about company culture? LinkedIn I Think you should produce unlimited amounts of content on LinkedIn I Do it every day I get feedback from it every day.

The problem is, it's not. Where are they are people disciplined enough to spend a decade making content every day at Scale and building Community every day at Scale to have a big enough audience to find audience? I I Think it is just completely forgotten. What is it 2023 I've made content at Scale and have engaged with people at scale I Went from 2006 to 2011 with not going to sleep until I emailed back every person that emailed me I've been making content on the internet every day at Scale for 17 years. This is not where do you find the audience what should be pumping out This is I don't want to do it for 10 years hard every day to get to a level that seems cool and cool being like financially viable and so I think the answer is LinkedIn The question is does one have the bandwidth, the talent, the conviction and the patience to do it at scale for 10 years to get to a level I Don't know.

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