Ep. #908: Adam Schafer on Business “Secrets,” Scaling, Successes, and Stumbles

Mike: Well, hello and welcome to another episode of Muscle for Life. I am Mike Matthews. Thank you for joining me today to listen to an interview I did with my buddy Adam Schafer from Mind Pump. And we talk about, well, our favorite topic to talk about whenever we talk on podcasts or just on the phone. And that is business, business and marketing, uh, specifically in the fitness industry.

And in this interview, Adam also talks about Mind Pump, his company that he and his partners and buddies have built, which encompasses more than just the top rated podcast, but there is a multimillion dollar business. Behind that, in addition to just the advertising revenue. And in this episode, Adam talks about how they have continued to grow and what it really takes to scale a business like that.

And in case you’re not familiar with Adam and Mind Pump, well, he has been on my podcast a few times. Four. He has had me on mind pump his podcast a few times, and Mind Pump is one of the biggest, if not the biggest fitness podcast in the world at this point. I think it is. I think it’s number one in the world in fitness.

And Adam’s also a coach who has worked with over 1000 people. He has taught other coaches, uh, how to be better leaders and how to better sell their services and satisfy their clients. And Adam has also built multiple successful businesses and he is always fun to talk to. He always has interesting things to say.

And so in this interview, Adam and I talk about various things we talk about. The scarcity mindset and fear of being judged by others, by peers. We talk about the Liver Kings marketing machine. We talk social media strategy and some of the differences between the different platforms, including TikTok. Uh, we talk about finding meaningful work, finding a, a job, or finding work that you won’t dread and more.

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Use the coupon code muscle at checkout and save 20% or get that 10% cash back if you are an existing customer. Try Triumph, risk free and see what you think. Adam, it’s been a bit,

Adam: it’s actually been, that’s probably the, the shortest timeframe I think, in between our discussions. Right. We just had one not that long ago.

Were you on our show?

Mike: It’s been a bit since you’ve been on mine though.

Adam: Yeah, no, it has been a while since you and I just chatted up, which I always enjoy. ’cause uh, what ends up happening with all of our, you know, I would say podcasting friends or people we’ve met through the podcast is you, you typically, uh, connect with one of us and then that, that one guy kind of keeps the relationship going or, you know, they, they continue to, to stay.

You’re probably the one that I think, uh, is, has different things that you connect with us individually on, uh, on a level like that. So I always enjoy our conversations, even though I know, I think you and Sal initially. Geeked out when you guys first met with your politics and, uh, and your economics and everything you guys like talk about, but a as over as times evolved, I think, uh, you and I really enjoy the business conversation.

I really like talking to you and your transparency. I think that’s something that is your honesty and transparency with the business is, um, it’s rare, and I don’t know if people know this or not, but. You, you rarely get to meet people, uh, at your level or, or higher, even lower than where you’re at, that are just an open book about how they got there and what’s working well for them and where they’re struggling.

And just, I really appreciate that. I feel like I’m the same way too. Like I’m very correct if someone asks me a question about the business and, and it’s nothing.

Mike: I think that’s one of the reasons why we, uh, quickly bonded over this type of stuff because you’re echoing my sentiments and as I’ve gotten more into business, I’ve wondered why that isn’t more normal.

Why many people don’t want to, I I understand. If you don’t, let’s say you have something that gives you a big competitive advantage. I understand. If you don’t wanna go on a podcast and tell all of your. Competitors eventually. Like, oh, here’s one thing you’re probably not doing. That’s making a huge difference.

Okay. I understand that. Right. But many people, even in, in private conversations, are very guarded about, um, even numbers and what’s working and what’s not working. And it, and it just seems like many people, they, they want you to think that things are often going better than they actually are. Yeah. Or that nothing, nothing is, is going awry.

And, and so early on I had just thought like, I don’t want to be like that. Just ’cause I think it’s weird. I don’t understand it. But anyways, I cut you off.

Adam: No, I, I you’re, you’re saying exactly what I was gonna say, which is, and I, and I think, to me, I think that, you know, to answer why I think that is, is I think it’s common across all, you know, genres or types of businesses, but I, I think that in the fitness space, it’s, uh, even crazier as far as, or like more dramatic, uh, how people can be with that.

There’s just this scarcity mindset, there’s this idea mm-hmm. That mm-hmm. There’s only so many people out there to help with their health and fitness journey, and there’s so many of us that, and we all kind of have the same, you know, resources as far as science and education around it. So, uh, you know, if, if Mike has a leg up on how to use Amazon better than me, or he’s good at, like, you know, heaven forbid he share that with me.

’cause then I, I might be able to poach some of his people. And, and it hearkens all the way back to when I was a manager running gyms and I had a staff of, you know, 20 or so trainers that would be working for me. They had the same mindset and I think they understandably even more so for them, right?

You’re in a gym, local gym, it gets 2000 workouts a day. There’s only so many members. All 20 of you trainers all are trying to get your clientele from that same pool of people. And so they, and I was just not like that. I was this young, um, wasn’t very knowledgeable. I wasn’t experienced, uh, curious. Trainer who, who liked people, uh, had a thirst for knowledge and learning.

And I also felt so grateful. Anytime, anytime somebody, uh, would share any insight with me that I felt that I felt compelled to do it when I got anything. So I was really early, 20 years old, uh, you know, running a, a team of 20 trainers. And how I got there was even before I was in the management position, as I was learning, I, I would come home and, or I’d come back to the gym and I would, I would teach my peers and not in a way of like telling them how to do things, but like, Hey, I just, I just read this cert, or I just learned this like this is, this will really help your clients.

Or took some sales course and found out a way, a, a more effective way of communicating. And then I’d be like, Hey, next time you’re doing your sales presale, I just read this book and it helped me with this. Maybe try like, and I would just give, I would give it. And honestly, a little bit of it was selfish too, because I quickly learned that.

The more that I, I repeated these things and shared these things, the, the more natural it came from myself, right? So like, it, like solidified it as, as now learned knowledge for me. When you first hear it for the first time, it’s interesting, but it, it’s not like something that you can regurgitate until you’ve practiced it a few times.

And so I felt that

Mike: even, even the act of translating something from somebody else’s words into your own words, uh, that’s a, I think a first step toward, uh, long-term knowledge and, and ultimately understand that you can apply, right? Yeah. I mean, just because you can regurgitate words doesn’t mean that you have a, a deep understanding.

And, and, and even the word deep might seem a little bit, uh, exaggerated, but, um, The point still stands though, that you can highlight something in a book and even remember the words. Yeah. But if somebody were to ask you to explain that concept, in other words, if you can’t do that quickly Yeah. Then there’s obviously a gap there, right?

Adam: Yeah. I think there, the other thing is too, the, or at least I know that if there was ever any hesitancy from me, uh, early on, was the fear of getting it wrong or being judged too, which I think that’s common. Like, so you learn something, it’s, you are, oh wow, it’s interesting. It’s, it’s, it’s new to you. You get it, but you don’t fully maybe grasp it or ma you don’t have the ability to, uh, re you know, regurgitate it as well.

And so you are afraid to say to your peers, this newfound knowledge ’cause oh my God, what if I fuck it up? Or what if someone corrects me or I don’t wanna be, and so there’s this fear and so you kind of hang onto it or you don’t express it and share it. So one, you don’t get good at it. You don’t figure it out for yourself very well, ’cause you’re afraid to share it.

And I think that that is part of the problem. So there’s a scarcity side to it. And then there’s also the fear of. Being judged. And I, I run into this a lot when we’re, you know, mentoring other train trainers, or I’m speaking at some of these events where these trainers come up to me and they’re new and they’re like, oh my God, how do you, you know, don’t you get nervous when you go out there?

I said, you know, originally when I was doing, you know, YouTube videos, my, my first critique of myself was I was the fear of my peers judging me and not me really thinking about the end consumer who I’m trying to help. Like, I would do content. And really what was going through my head was not like, oh, I really hope this gets to Susie and it helps her and change, she changes her life because of this information I’m giving.

It was, I hope I got that right. Did I say, did I, did I pronounce that word correctly or was I explaining that study correctly or did I mix like, and it was really of thinking about my peers and I said, when I, when I learned to let go of a lot of that stuff, Is what really helped me kind of excel in, in presenting and helping other people.

And I just think that it’s, it’s rare to find, and I know this has been a, we’re we’re rambling on about how we like each other. But I mean, that’s something that, that’s something that I, that I saw in you instantly. And I’m just, I’m drawn to people that are, are like this. And I think that it’s a lot of fun to meet somebody like that because, you know, and it’s already proven itself where, you know, one of us will, Hey, have you tried this with your business?

Or, you know, this is working really well for me. And then because of that I go and research it or, or dig into it because I trust you. I know you’re being honest about it. You’re not fluffing your numbers to, you know, to you know, save your ego or whatever like that. Like I know it’s genuine. And then I also know too, if I’m getting ready to go do something and I run it by you and you say, ah, yeah, it really didn’t do shit for me.

I’m, I’m like, okay, cool. I’m not gonna waste too much time on something. ’cause I know Mike has already tested this out. So I just, I really enjoy that. I appreciate that, that part of our relationship. For sure.

Mike: Yeah, same. And, and just to add a comment to that point of communicating or who or, or who you’re communicating for, that’s something that I also focused on really since the beginning is I, I chose deliberately to, um, communicate to consumers and, and, or, or, um, The end users of the information, the people who I’m trying to help.

And when I say consumer doesn’t even necessarily in the beginning, I mean, I had a book, so I guess I was selling something, right? But the information was, and, and all of the, the content that I’ve produced and that I continue to produce is always with the, you, you could look at it in terms of avatars.

There are really a handful of types of people who tend to follow me, and those are the people whose interests I’m trying to serve. And like you, I really don’t care. And, and I don’t say that in an arrogant way, and I know you don’t mean it like that, but let’s just say that I don’t give any thought really to how my peers will judge my work.

It just doesn’t, it’s just not important to me. What’s much more important is how my readers and my listeners will judge my work that matters because, um, I mean the purpose is, is to help those people do better and reach their fitness goals faster. It’s not to impress my peers and some people though it’s different.

Some people, they are much more interested in impressing their peers than they are in even being understood by laypeople, so to speak. Right. And I’ve seen that particularly in, in academia or people who run in academic circles, they are often much more interested in trying to sound really smart in getting approval and acknowledgement from other.

People in academia than they are in, uh, helping, you know, Sally six pack, lose 15 pounds of fat and gain some muscle.

Adam: It’s almost always what keeps the ceiling on these those people is that they are so concerned about the way their peers are gonna jump, that they’re communicating information that appeals mostly to them or nerds that want to be like them.

Yep. And that’s such a small percentage of the population when you talk about the people that need all of our help, and I, I think this is like one of the biggest flaws, uh, of, of new trainers and coaches that are wanting to scale and build a business is they, they look up to these, uh, very intelligent people in academia and they go, they want to emulate what they’re doing, but what they don’t realize is like, Those, those people.

And there there’s always anomalies, right? There’s the, there is the, the academia guy or girl who’s wildly famous and makes a lot of money, but you’re talking about one in a million. Most of them get to a certain place where yeah, they, they’re, uh, appealing to all these other nerds, but that, you know, that’s not the most, the, the population.

And really, when you think about the largest amount of people that need our help the most, it, it is not somebody who knows how to read a study or even knows the difference, uh, between different training modalities or what a macro what a what a protein carb or a fat like. It’s none of those things. This is also why I think we see sometimes, like the, the kid and I, and I know the, some trainers get frustrated with this when they see like a, somebody who’s not very intelligent, but has a ton of people following them and listening to their advice.

But there’s something, you know, there’s something for you to, to learn from that. You know what, those people obviously don’t give a shit about being smart or right so much that they put no energy and effort to it. And, and maybe they lead truly all with their heart and caring and trying to help other people that they completely sacrifice the other.

And I do think there’s some, some balance. With that, um, and integrity and experience, I think that all comes together. But there is something to learn from those people that have got all that attention, that are, people are listening to bad advice and it’s like, well, they’re probably communicating their bad advice better than you are communicating the right advice.

Yep. So instead of,

Mike: I, I’ve talked to people, I won’t mention any names just because I don’t, I don’t want to criticize Yeah, criticize anybody individually. But I’ve tried to explain this to some people in the evidence-based fitness space, uh, particularly around marketing. And that, uh, why, why I have put a lot of importance and a lot of work into marketing and why it, it’s, it’s, it’s actually, it’s incumbent upon.

Them to sell themselves to people. It’s not incumbent upon people to realize how brilliant they are. And they just, I was talking about, they just, they just won’t, they don’t want to face that answer. You know what I mean? A lot of times it’s not, uh, oh, I just can’t come up with the question to ask to, to resolve this problem.

Uh, usually it’s, it’s, I don’t want to face the answer. I just, I don’t like the answer. And that’s one of those things where they just don’t like the answer and

Adam: Oh, and then they, and then they default to building everything around, putting down the people that aren’t

Mike: Exactly, they’re just stupid and they’re just gullible.

Adam: It’s like, bro, you are not winning this war that way at all. First, you’re not learning how to communicate to the all the right people. And then your default is, okay, well, I’m gonna put down the other people that. Are doing a, a terrible job, but at least they’re trying or, or are doing their best to communicate that information.

So, yeah, no, it’s been a,

Mike: it’s, it’s the fable of sour grapes, right? It’s the, you know, Aesop’s fable, the, I think it’s the fox or whatever that is reaching for the grapes. It wants the grapes so much and then it can’t get the grapes. So now all of a sudden the grapes are shit. I don’t want, I didn’t want the grapes anyway.

Adam: It’s so true, dude.

Mike: What are, what are your thoughts, uh, just to segue into some more business and just marketing related stuff, so, so what are your thoughts though, specifically on people who like, take, take this liver King guy, right?

Adam: Oh, it’s so funny. We talked about him just like an hour ago.

Mike: Yeah, so, so, so cute.

Cute, cute marketing. Right? And a a lot of it is of course, nonsense, but the marketing is cute. And so, so what are your thoughts when people look and let’s say these aren’t, um, these aren’t just people who are trying to, um, find their feet in let’s just, let’s say, in in the fitness industry or not, or just in business in general.

People see an example of that, and I, I, I only. Saw him maybe a couple of months ago, and I think at that time on Instagram he was probably at like 700 K. Now he’s probably double that. So he’s growing very quickly, um, clearly making money, getting a lot of attention. There is, there is a, that that’s a formula as well, right?

Adam: And oh, it’s, it’s a, it’s a very valid formula to make money. 100% is, and in fact, it’s so funny you went here because this, we just talked about this. It was my thing to bring up, right? We all have points to bring up and I wanted to have the exact same conversation, so this is great. Um, and I, what I would, what I attribute this to is very basic human psychology.

It’s, it’s funny how we, and we’re all guilty of this, of wanting to be in a camp. We don’t want the complexity of, hey, there could probably be some really good times to eat, like a vegan, Hey, there’s some good times to probably eat like a pelo. Hey, there’s some good times to eat like a carnivore sometimes.

And you know, there’s lots of people where certain ones work better for at certain points in their life. And depending, like, that’s too,

Mike: or maybe there’s a little bit. Of each of those that Right. Make sense. And when you put it all together, well now you just kind of have nutritious omnivorous diet, but Right.

Adam: But this, that, that is just too complex. And that means that like, everybody’s kind of right when we don’t want that, we want to identify with a certain group or a certain, you know, you know, identity around that. And it’s, it’s like identity politics. It’s, it’s no different in, in, in politics as it is I feel like in like the fitness space is.

And it is something that we saw and we wanted to try and disrupt. And I, I, I feel like that it’s, that’s a big part of our mission is to disrupt Exactly that, is to break up these camps. Uh, and you’re, you know, and I don’t wanna just pick on the Liver King because he’s just an example of many examples around fitness like this.

People are just,

Mike: I mean, you mentioned some of them carnivore, That’s essentially the same. We’re talking about the same thing there. Even, even paleo. I know that that maybe is less popular now than it was a few years ago, but, um,

Adam: and you, you, you start to, and I, and I think they, they start drinking their own Kool-Aid because they get validity from some people that it really did help.

Like if, that’s what’s kind of interesting about internet world now, right? Like you, you can reach literally a million people that like the carnivore diet is gonna be amazing for because of their certain, you know, genetics or conditions that they have or lifestyle or whatever. I. And so you just, you get this, you know, confirmation bias from this select group of people that look like almost everybody because it’s, uh, you know, you got a million followers and thousands of them are go cheering you on being like, yes, that changed my life and this is, I can’t, you know, these are, these things are bad and this is so good for you.

And so you, you get, you, you collect all those people and then you, you as a, as a consumer who’s looking to try new things, I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do. Oh my God. You fall on a page like that and look at all the people that are saying, this changed my life and this is so perfect. And this is, you’re so smart.

This is so great. And look how amazing you look and you fall right into it. It’s a, it’s like, it’s a, it’s a very basic formula for gaining attention and then potentially selling them a product. And we knew the way that we were gonna go was gonna be much slower, a lot less money at first. Um, but I think that what we’re doing.

What you are doing, um, is got way more staying power. Like, so one of the things that I’m hearing about the, the way he actually, you know, I found him was, uh, people kept asking us and Yep, same. They kept keep asking me, I was like, liver king, what is this? Yeah. I’m like, who the hell is, I have no idea who this is.

Right? And then eventually I look and then I’m like, okay, whatever. I’m not, I’m not that interested. But then I start getting people saying that, oh my God, I hear that he might be getting sued for this because there’s some people that, you know, took his advice and then they ended up being in the hospital.

And so that’s where it starts to get my attention. Like, oh, okay, like this person is now, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s gonna, and what ends up happening and what will eventually happen is when you’re giving, you know, kind of bad advice for the most part, right? For, for a good portion of people, eventually you’re going to get some, you know, some radical person that’s going to take everything you say, uh, literally, and then start eating raw meat like everywhere you go, because that’s what he sees and that’s what he promotes and what he is showing.

And then you’re gonna fuck somebody up. Then that gets out and then it, you know, so it’s a, it’s a very fast, and I think you, we’ve talked about this before, you and I, uh, that now more than ever is how fast the rises and the falls are. So, you know, I, I think when I see someone like him, I think, okay, well check back with me in five or six years.

I. On where he’s at, what he’s doing, and if he’s not just pivoted to the next, you know, fad or next, you know, shock and awe attention. So, yeah. You know, and

Mike: which, which might not be possible actually because there, there’s always an element of luck in. Well, in any success story, I, I do not believe that that is the driving factor as some people would like to believe.

And that’s something you might want to comment on. I, I know you have thoughts to share on that, but, um, there certainly is something to the right idea at the right time and, and, and it can be hard to time that. Right. So in, if we’re talking again, liver king or there are a lot of these people, as you mentioned, there are, there are people in the past who their star was, uh, ascendant to now you don’t even hear about them anymore.

Right. And, and so oftentimes what, what you’ll find is that there was a. An element of luck. There was an interesting idea at the right time. For whatever reason, the conditions were ripe for a rapid rise, right? Um, but unless the person is very good at, I mean, this is really, again, just marketing, but it’d be like a, like marketing and business.

And unless they could break it down to you in, into first principles and say, here’s how you do it. Here are the key components that, that make something like this go. And if you want to find one for you, it might take some trial and error. Your first one might not go. But if you understand this, um, process, you can iterate until you find something that sticks.

If they can’t explain it to you like that, chances are they’re not gonna be able to repeat it because they, they just got lucky. You know what I mean?

Adam: Well, I mean, you said something that I think is the, the, probably the most. Most important point about talking about business, and there was a great, uh, Ted talk.

I wish I remember the t title of it, but you could probably search it and find it. Uh, and it was titled something around the, like the, the five most important Factors of success in business. And number one is timing. They’ve got plenty of research to support that. And he, he’s a, a classic example of that.

I mean, what has been the agenda the last, you know, 10 years or less with the documentaries, like, what the hell? And, you know, Arnold Schwarzenegger now Game Changers. Yeah, game changers. The, the whole vegan, the, the, you know, cows are killing the fucking planet, like, you know, so yeah.

Mike: The cow farts are, are make, making the weather bad, right?

Adam: So that, that, that has been this huge, and so, and you, you, you kind of have with, when it comes to marketing and you know this, you have like one or two options if this is gonna be your, your wheelhouse. Either one, you can ride the current wave and you become the, the vegan person and you’re, you’re gonna ride the wave of all the people that are jumping on that bike.

Or you can, you know, call yourself the forward thinker or think you’re really smart. I’m gonna counter that message and be the complete opposite of that. There’s lots of power in that also. And so he’s an example of what happens when the market swings one direction really hard. There’s a lot of people that were wa, there’s a lot of people that watch what the health and they now change the vegans because of that.

Then there was a good portion of people that went, shut the fuck up. That’s ridiculous. And I, and then you see someone who’s the complete opposite and you’re like, yeah, that’s right. I’m gonna eat raw meat. I’m gonna eat nothing but raw meat. So, I mean, it is a, it, it is a, a, a, a proven recipe for success in business.

But I, it, it is, it’s, it’s not the long game. It’s, you know, and, and maybe your, your desire is just to make, uh, a lot of money really quick or get a lot of attention and fame. But that was never ours. I mean, I, I, we always knew that we had a greater kind of mission that we wanted to accomplish, and we knew that there was a, a big enough blue ocean there for us.

It just might take a. A lot longer to kind of get there, but we knew that what would happen is as more and more people listen to the message, more and more people would apply that and realize, wow, you know, this really is the, the kind of the right balance or the way I should kind of view health and fitness.

And I know that sounds a bit narcissistic, like I have the answer to like how to view fitness to for other people. But you know, what I do have is 20 years experience of training regular people of all sorts of conditions and issues and food tolerances and goals and, and what I have collected in all those years of training all those people is holy shit.

There’s such an individual variance that there is no one great way to eat. There is no one great way to train. There’s, but there are some, some very solid principles. There’s also another thing that I think the guys and I really liked about the content that you were presenting was you didn’t care about.

Uh, how, and, and we actually joke about this all the time about you. It’s also why we, we love you. We say like, you know, Mike has to have the most boring workouts that he shows on Instagram all the time, but we like it so much because it’s the right shit. It’s like, yeah. Instead of you doing,

Mike: that’s actually one of the reasons why I continue to share training, training footages.

Adam: I know it’s, I know that as you totally do it. I know you don’t think your workouts are fucking super cool. You know? I know you. No, I don’t. I think that’s your point. Your point is, Look at, look at all you have to do. You know, I don’t have to do any crazy exercises that you’ve never seen or have somebody punch me in my abs while I do fucking reverse crunches.

Like, you don’t need to do this weird, you know, abnormally crazy body crushing stuff to get an incredible, well balanced, strong physique. You, you stick to some very fundamental principles and you’d be consistent with it. And then after a certain period of time, you, you slightly modify and manipulate it.

So the body has some sort of novelty, but you kind of stay there. And by staying there, you’ll do the least amount of work and get the most amount of results. And let me tell you,

Mike: that’s, and, and, and not get hurt. Right. I, I care about that too.

Adam: Right, right. And, and, and this is what 99.9% of all my clients were seeking.

They weren’t like, They weren’t like what we think is on Instagram floating around looking for information. They were just average people that had other, other parts of their life that is far more important than the time they spent in the gym. But they valued my, my, my experience and my profession that, okay, I recognize that I’m an engineer and I’ve got kids and I don’t have time to read all the books and learn about training correctly and diet correctly, so I’m gonna hire this guy Adam.

And so they’re, they’re seeking that out for me. And they don’t wanna know the most creative exercise. They don’t wanna know, Hey, could I spend seven days in here and do more work and get less? They don’t want that. They’re like, I. Tell me what I need to know. They don’t need new

Mike: workouts every week. Yes.

Yeah. Simply, simply to feel like their training is more effective. Maybe because, for example, you could make them more sore with that if you gave them new movements every single week. And you also know that, okay, if we load some eccentric, that’ll make even more sore and and trainers. And that’s not to say all trainers, of course, maybe not even most trainers, but some trainers they do and maybe sometimes inadvertently fall into that trap because they notice that their clients, some clients seem to respond better to that.

So then they’re like, well, it really would be better if we just stuck to this more boring kind of training that actually would produce better results in the long run. But my clients seem to be more excited. When I mix things up, uh, every week or every two weeks, and I give them,

Adam: you know, listen, I’m gonna, I’m gonna correct you.

It is not some, it is most, and I can say that because of my experience training trainers for so long, and also being guilty myself, I. And I, I can tell you exactly why that is. It’s because at that time I didn’t have the, the words, the knowledge and experience to communicate what they needed to do effectively.

It was much easier to wow them with creative New ex exercises. I knew that if they came in and I did an exercise or a routine that they had no fucking idea what they were doing, and it was hard and it was challenging, and I was having to correct them and fix it, and they were really, really sore from it.

It, I knew that it would tell them a Joel Seedman special. Yeah, right. It would, it would, it would tell them like, wow, this is, I would’ve never thought this, or, wow, I need my, I need this trainer to help me. Heaven forbid. I teach them a lunge, a squat, a deadlift, a basic shoulder press that they could then go do on their own and then they don’t need me anymore.

So it was, it was like smart business as a young kid who didn’t know how to communicate the right information yet, and it isn’t some trainers, it’s most all trainers, especially in that first five years because in those first five years, You still are learning a lot of this through trial and error yourself or, you know, reading and learning and researching.

And so I think that’s a big a, a big part of it. And then, then what happens is at 1.5 year tenure year, I don’t know where that happens for everybody or most people, but you have this dilemma of knowing what is best for your people. But then, but then also knowing that it’s gonna be more challenging to get them to, to comply.

And it would be much easier to just keep giving them the stuff that, you know, works to sell them and keep them coming. And so I, I do believe that every trainer at one point in their career struggles with that dilemma of, do I do what’s best for my client? Um, or do I just keep doing what works with to keep them coming back and paying for paying for more?

And so there’s a bit of that, uh, that, that happens I think for everybody. And, you know, to, I think, uh, I don’t know to promote you if you’re in, if you’re in that. Position of going the right way is that it may be, again, the, the slower process or you may fail or a couple clients go like, no, I wanted the creative stuff, or No, I wanted this.

Like, you, you might get a little bit at it first, but eventually it will make you a far better and more effective coach and trainer and that you really, truly changing people’s lives and helping them over time. That will compound. And those are always the best clients or referrals from somebody that you fundamentally changed their life forever and gave them and taught them behaviors to go on and do it for themselves, for their rest of their life.

Um, and this is, you know, uh, closing the full circle on kinda the conversation around building a business or scaling to millions of dollars in fitness, like this is part of the secret sauce is knowing that is knowing. What is best for the client, even though it may not be expedient, it may not be the best way for you to make money right now.

It is what’s best for them. And yeah, somebody else may beat you to a million dollars doing it another way by, you know, eating liver and looking jacked all the time. But that’s okay. You know, checking on his business in 10 years and check on my business in 10 years

Mike: and check, check on blood work as well in 10 years.

Adam: So, and, you know, and not, not to pick on the poor guy, ’cause I’m, I’m sure maybe he’s a great guy, this and that, but it, it really is the, the formula for, um, you know, people in this space is to, and it, and it’s unfortunate that. We focus so much energy on just trying to gain attention because we think that that’s, that’s the best way to do it.

I mean, it’s like how many people were bugging me about TikTok for so long? Like we’re finally in investing in TikTok and building that out right now, but you know, millions of dollars later and years later, am I, am I going, okay, let’s go build this Because I didn’t care about just attention that much and that that is such a terrible.

Platform to communicate the message that we need to communicate. So it’s not that I don’t like and, and these are people trying to market and sell me all the time on why I need to do it, right? Like, oh, you, there’s this person who’s got millions of this and they make this much money. It’s like, that’s not my goal.

My goal isn’t just to make millions of dollars and just to get millions of views. Like, it’s not my goal. My goal is to communicate a message that I don’t think is out there or is not the, the predominant message in the space. And TikTok is a fucking terrible platform for me to do it. It’s not that I don’t think that we will use it or I don’t see any importance in it.

It’s just that in the hierarchy of things that I wanna put my energy in, uh, for the business that is gonna give us not only the best return, but also help the most people. I just didn’t see it at that, you know? And so we waited this long. Before we even put any time and effort in that direction.

Mike: Yeah. I haven’t, I haven’t, um, done anything with it yet.

One of the next hires I’m making is, is it’s gonna be somebody to work on my social media with me, because, as you know, to do social media correctly, it, it, there’s a lot of behind the scenes kind of, um, legwork that that needs to be done. And it’s, it’s a more than a full-time job to properly manage. Like I produce a lot of content, written content, spoken content, I can do little videos and stuff Sure.

But to turn all of that into an effective, I. System that there’s just a lot of time that goes into that, and I, it doesn’t really make sense, I think, for me to put my time into that right now. But to your point is, and I totally agree that that’s why I’m not just playing around on TikTok because I don’t care to just get followers for the sake of having followers.

I don’t care to just get attention for the sake of getting attention. Like you, I care to educate people and I care to bring people into my orbit and hopefully get them so Sure. If we can, and I’m sure we’re looking at TikTok in the same way, is that if, if we can get people engaged in the beginning of a conversation, I guess if we can get them to, um, watch a, a, a little video and get interested in what else we have to say, hopefully in something longer than a 62nd video right then.

And if we can do that at scale, then that’s cool, right? Because again, that, that serves, uh, The, the, the deeper purpose of, of what we’re doing. Yeah. And, you know, so, so I, I totally understand where you’re coming from on TikTok.

Adam: Well, and, and as a business operator, you know, this, like, you only have so much time, you only have so much money.

Mike: And so Isn’t it funny when people come to you, so, you know, dude, when they come to you and they have all of their ideas, you know, like, why don’t you just do this and do this? It’s pretty, you should just change this and do this, and, and what they, they just don’t realize exactly what you’re saying right here.

Adam: Oh, no, totally. As you know, it’s great though, is luckily, so my wife works for the company and she’s, she fields a lot of these, these. Questions and people coming, trying to market to or get us to market with them ahead of time. And you know, the TikTok thing recently, this one of these companies was trying to do that and uh, she said, well, let me just, let me just stop you right there.

If you are, if she, he had like his whole presentation. He goes, lemme tell you, if you get in a meeting and you big aha is TikTok for Adam, he’s, he is going to light you up in that. And so I’m just gonna help you out if you really want to convince him or close him on, on working with, uh, with you. Uh, don’t lead with, hey, huge opportunity in TikTok for you guys to do this.

Like, it’s just not a good way to lead because we’ve made that decision a long time ago that it’s just there every, every medium, right? Like TikTok, Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, YouTube, podcasting, uh, blog, Twitter, Twitter email. They all. Um, are are valuable mediums. They all attract, you know, different types of clientele.

They all work better for certain types of content, and they all have a, a, a different, uh, closing percentage and retention from all. And, you know, when I look at things like, uh, Twitter, TikTok, um, Pinterest, the, the conversion on it is just so low in comparison to the longer form mediums. Like if someone reads your whole blog, That is far more powerful than you gaining 10,000 followers on TikTok.

And that’s a lot. It’s a lot of followers. It’s a lot of people. That’s how powerful someone actually reading through an entire blog or somebody who listens

Mike: or somebody subscribing to your email list or to your ss m s list.

Adam: Yes. Yes. Somebody. Because, because think of it from a business perspective, that person, if I, they’re exchanging their email, right, or their time ’cause they read a whole blog or listened to a whole hour and a half, they are, they are literally, virtually telling you, I really want to hear what you have to say.

Somebody who hits a, a fucking a, a, a heart button on a 62nd clip of potentially something that’s just, you know, funny or compelling or like that. They’re not probably when they’re drunk and or high. Yeah. I mean the, the, what that customer is telling you is nowhere near the same as what the customer who is telling you, Hey, I, I gave you two hours of my attention, or here’s my email, please, you know, email me more of your information.

And like, that customer is, and, and that’s a, I want that customer, that is a customer. I don’t, I don’t want to try and convince a million people on TikTok. All this great information I have. Yes, I do see there is some value in that, but it’s, I would way rather reach the people that are already seeking that type of information and they want me to tell them that, and they want to de dedicate an hour and a half or two hours of time to listen or read the content that we have.

It’s such a better customer than somebody who just got duped into buying something in a 60 minute, you know, clip or 62nd clip. And so, yeah, that’s so, and, and honestly last night I was talking to Katrina and she was like, you know, how are you gonna measure the success of TikTok? And I was kind of telling her some of the things and I said, you know, not all of it is just, She’s like, you know, why are we spending time and investing in this at all right now?

I said, well, there’s a, there is a small part for me now that is kind of, uh, protecting real estate for us. We’ve gotten to the size now where we’re so big that other people can take my content and repurpose it on these platforms and are building followings, and there’s not really shit you can do. Like, I can’t, like the

Mike: you you mean like literally taking snippets from Yes.

Your content.

Adam: That was part of, that was part of the motivation behind the TikTok was there was, I think there’s a TikTok page out there that’s pretty much all mind pump clips. We got 10,000 followers and it was somebody else doing it. And so there, there’s a part of me, it, part of the strategy or investment into TikTok right now is just to protect real estate there.

It’s like, hey, okay, I’m, I’m gonna put a little money over here because I know if we do spend some time and effort, I can do it better than some kid is doing it right now. Yeah. And if I become the, the main mind pump TikTok that I don’t gotta worry about it. Three, four or five years from now when everybody’s trying to rip our content and make a big viral page out of it.

And so part of that, and I was explaining to her is just personally, is just to protect our brand a little bit, is like, hey, we, we now are at a size like that where people can take our content and mash it up and repurpose it and gain enough attention, uh, from a, they could actually create a little business off of it.

And so by me making sure that we at least own, you know, some real estate in all those areas and have some somewhat of a falling there, I think is a nice way to hedge that, I guess. Um, and so that is also part of the strategy right now is ’cause I, I, I definitely am not getting my dollar return in what I’m investing in, putting in, like the amount of money we’re spending on the team to put that together.

It’s like, it’s not converting to that much money, uh, back into the, into the business. At least not right now, maybe, you know, months or years down the road when it has enough mass and volume to it. But right now, a lot, a part of the strategy is, is, is just to kind of protect the real estate there. ’cause in social media, you, you, it’s unfortunate, but you don’t really, you don’t own a lot of your content you put out there.

Once you, there’s a lot of stuff that you click and you, you basically give up that, right when you put it on Instagram or you put it on YouTube, you put, you basically say that, you know, YouTube now has the rights to this content and then other people can mash it up and do all this stuff. It’s, it’s kind of, it’s what makes the platform so great.

It’s also one of the things that presents a challenge for a business like us that’s, you know, finally getting some good traction and, and scaling that. I have to think kind of defensively sometimes too, which is unique and different. It’s, you know, different having that conversation right now than something I would’ve thought I was gonna have, you know, you know, say five years ago like that I would have to do that, you know, or I should do that, I should say.

Mike: Yeah. It’s, um, there’s something to be said for, for the brand awareness that comes with it. Uh, especially with where you guys are at right now and whereas. In the beginning of a business, you should be thinking about direct marketing, direct sales. Forget about branding, forget about brand awareness. Um, and now if we’re talking about branding in, in terms of having maybe, uh, products that look nice or ha have, uh, aesthetic, uh, presentation of your, your, uh, business, okay, fine.

But if we’re talking about brand awareness, that that’s really only a viable strategy when you have achieved a lot of success, um, because you’ll spend a lot of money on it for no immediate return, probably similar to ss e o in that regard. And that totally, you can pour a ton of money into ss e o you know, this firsthand, and it could take six to eight months for you to see any results whatsoever.

And so brand awareness can be similar in that regard. Oh, I know how you have to be able to spend and spend and spend and spend

Adam: and wait. That’s such a great point. This was also one of the first hurdles that I had with one of our employees that I’d hired, you know, a few years back. Um, he was hardcore into like the, the brand awareness and like caring about the look of the brand so much like, and just everything that he had read and everything that he’d experienced.

Like this was like, So important that you, that we had this like cool look and vibe around the business so much. It’s like, dude, if nobody is buying our product or using it or we’re not changing any lives through it, I don’t give a shit how cool we look. And it cost a lot

Mike: of, dude, look at, look at Jocko Fuel.

They, they just got a $30 million, uh, that, and that was a minority investment. Go to their website. It looks terrible. It all looks terrible. Yeah, but now are you gonna say that Jocko’s brand is shit? No. Or his branding is shit? Absolutely not. Is his website shit? Yeah, it’s pretty shitty. Um, but I’m, I don’t know the valuation of that business, but I would not be surprised if it was, uh, a hundred million plus.

And that’s just on his supplements and his energy drinks. Yeah. Look,

Adam: apple, Nike, Google, none of them looked the way they look right now. Exactly when they were exactly in somebody’s garage and they were building the, the next, you know, billion dollar company. Uh, their logos look like shit. They’re, uh, they’re, and even,

Mike: even at that time, as, you know, everything kind of looked like shit at one point, right?

Yeah. But, but no, but even by those days,

Adam: standards, yeah. It’s, I mean, it’s such a good point and conversation around, you know, somebody who’s trying to help scale is, is, is looking at that, that, that, that area of focus is just, most people aren’t there yet. And to be worrying and wasting time around that, or money and resources is just a terrible idea.

You are on, uh, at the beginning. You’re, you’re, you’re racing. To figure out what it is that you have to offer and can give to people that will either fundamentally change or improve their lives, that they are willing to come back to you again and again for, for more information or more content or more of whatever you have.

And that isn’t that easy. Like, and everybody thinks they know what it is, and a lot of times you’re, you’re kind of throwing spaghetti on the wall and seeing what sticks, and then you, you do it again. And like that is more important, figuring that out first. Before you care about the way your Instagram looks or you care about the way your website looks like that stuff, uh, you know, it’s, uh, it’s unfortunate, but it’s where a, I think a lot of the, the sexy stuff online that sells you on what you need or invest in my, you know, you know, help you build a, you know, scale from zero to six or seven figures.

You know, marketing guys like Mastermind Yeah, mastermind groups, right? They, they want to, they want to pitch you on all of the sales copy and all the, like, a lot of the sexy stuff. And it’s like, man, if you can’t gain anybody’s attention, if you can’t add enough value to people’s life that they’re willing to give you a free email or get their free time, you know, for an extended period of time to listen to you, then you, you don’t have a business yet.

And it doesn’t matter how good it looks or how much money you spend on ss e o, you first gotta figure that piece out. And, you know, I didn’t, when we were doing the YouTube channel, we weren’t sure of it. Uh, or we, we had an idea of what we wanted to communicate, but how we communicated and what manner like that took a lot of practice.

It took a lot of practice. To refine. We knew we had a good message that would provide a lot of value, but even that needed to be refined. Even that we needed to kind of figure out, well, how do people want to receive that message and how, how is it best for us to deliver that message? And a lot of the, the time and effort and the success of the business today is, is predicated on all the hours that we put into refining that and practicing and trying and like, okay, I, I think we’re starting to figure out that this is what people are gaining the most value from.

And that’s where most of your energy should be focused when you’re, when you’re trying to build something.

Mike: Hey there. If you are hearing this, you are still listening, which is awesome. Thank you. And if you are enjoying this podcast, or if you just like my podcast in general and you are getting at least something out of it, would you mind sharing it with a friend or a loved one or a not so loved one even who might want to learn something new?

Word of mouth helps really bigly in growing the show. So if you think of someone who might like this episode or another one, please do tell them about it. And how did that process actually look for, for you guys? Like how, tell us a little bit about how this, the mind pump, mind pump sausage has been made, so to speak.

Like some, just, just, just to give a little bit of context of why I’m asking that question is, um, you could, you could go about that. In a very deliberate and systematic fashion. Uh, for example, I, I know some, a team of people who are very accomplished in conversion rate optimization. They’ve worked with very big companies, made a lot of people a lot of money, and in their so-called design of experiments phase, there’s a lot of work that goes into coming up with, uh, really what we’re talking about is it’s customer hypotheses, right?

We, we have a, a theory that this might resonate because of this, right? And so there’s a lot of testing that is deliberately, uh, created and, and it’s interlocking in many ways to produce key insights, key pieces of wisdom that will ultimately drive the big increases in conversions. And, um, I. That, that is one end of the spectrum, right?

And then the other end of the spectrum is no pre-planning whatsoever. Getting in there and doing it, and then paying attention to key, um, key key channels of feedback and having good intuitions as well, and, and paying attention to, to the right things. So you start to see, oh, that’s a green flag. We should try to go more in that direction.

Oh, we’re onto something here. How has that process been like for you guys? Yeah, so

Adam: that’s, that’s a good question. And we are very much so the, the latter, right? So we, we were, we’re not systematic a about the process, although there are systems in place and there’s things that I think we were consistent with that I, I think that were maybe non-negotiables, maybe, that we definitely, uh, We’re more the type of like, let’s just, let’s just put a lot of reps and then let’s, let’s use the response that we get as a litmus test.

I mean, that, one of the very cool things, and you know this from being in business as long as you have, that I love about today versus building a business 20 years ago, is, you know, the, the fact that we have YouTube and you can, you capture emails and you can do all these things that give you all kinds of feedback.

I mean, you know this, right? You could put out, uh, an email and literally change the subject line, change the length of it, change a couple final tweaks, and all of a sudden, uh, the open rate on thousands of email goes up by 5% or goes down by 6%. It’s like, and instead of dwelling so much on, uh, the, the percentage of change, it’s just that that’s a feedback for you that’s like, oh, when I say it this way, More people wanna read it when I say it that way, less people.

And the same thing goes for how we created the content around the podcast. We knew at the end of the day, we had good information that could truly help people. So it it starts with that, right? Like you for, and that is, and and really the work in that is all the years before it was, it was the being a trainer for so long, training so many people, the certifications, the education, the study reading like that is, that’s all that.

So that is everything first, right? So, which is also so important when I talk to these people that are interested in masterminds, like, listen, where you should be focusing too on right now before you’re talking about conversion rates, is getting that experience and that knowledge because you want to be able to give something valuable to these people if you just started, it’s really tough.

To have acquired all that. So that’s first, right? And then it’s like, okay, let’s podcast. So let, and you know, initially the strategy or the thought process was let’s get a shock and awe. So we would say off color things and have off color type of titles and just to get attention. And the, the thought process was, or the strategy was okay if we can just get people to click on it because they’re like, what the hell these guys are talking about?

And then they click on it and then they, then we kind of wheel them in with the conver or reel them in with the conversation. And then they find out, oh man, these guys are kind of smart actually. Or, wow, that’s really interesting. I didn’t know that. Like, so the idea was, you know, shock and awe to get the attention and then, You know, and I hate to say bait and switch ’cause we weren’t tricking you with, with the information we were providing, but it was like when you, when you over with kind of our fun humor lightheartedness, but then as you find out more about us, you go, oh wow, there’s some depth to these guys.

They really are smart when it comes to exercise and nutrition knowledge. Like I’m, I’m interested now. So that was kind of the approach at the very beginning. And it somewhat worked. I mean, it, it, it, it definitely got attention. The problem, uh, the, the part that I think was the most challenging about it was, what we didn’t realize, and this didn’t happen till way later, was we were as many people as we were gaining attention by, by that approach, we were also losing probably the same amount of people because we were turning certain people off that weren’t willing to actually stay in tune and listen all the way to the good stuff.

And, you know, and I wouldn’t have known that. We wouldn’t have known that. How we just knock that out. Were, were

Mike: you selecting for the wrong types of people? Do you think that was part of it? Yeah, like, think, think about somebody who would prefer they just, that’s TikTok is where they go for information.

That’s it. That’s their preferred source of information versus somebody who might go to a long form blog article or might even go for a book or mini minimally a book summary. Right. Those are different types of people.

Adam: Yeah. I think what we were doing, we were pigeonholing ourself into a very specific, uh, clientele.

Very specific, which has some benefits, right? I mean, it’s what gave us a, the initial. You know, a few hundred or thousand people that were paying attention to us. You had to be just like us. You had to have a dark sense of humor. You had to be off color. You got it, you, and, and a little edgy, I think

Mike: I have to go back and listen to something.

I might’ve been one of those first 500 if I would’ve

Adam: known. If I would’ve known. Oh yeah. You, and you probably would’ve because we, you have a very similar dark sense of humor, so you would’ve probably a appealed to that. But it, it’s a very specific group of people. And again, when you go back to some of the fundamentals that I was saying before, it’s like, you know, is that truly all of my cl Well, no, I, I trained a lot of people that were nothing like me, you know, that were, didn’t have a dark sense of humor like me, or didn’t think that type of stuff was funny or entertaining.

Like, and they purely were hiring me because they knew that I knew what I was talking about, or I could truly help them. And so, you know, that was one of the, we were breaking one of the rules or fundamentals that I, I was just talking about earlier. And so I think that was really the problem was like, okay.

We, we have to recognize too that, especially now the size we are, that at all times, back then it was probably, you know, 10 or 20 people. Now it’s thousands or tens of thousands of people every day that are listening to us for the very first time. And I, I, I think it took us to get to a, a size relatively to where we’re at now, for me to really start to feel it and notice like, oh shit, we are probably losing a lot of people on the back end because we are gearing ourselves so much into this shock and awe approach that even somebody who might’ve liked us and really enjoyed the information that was coming later, uh, that we lost them right away.

And, you know, you were, you and I were texting the other day and you were asking me, and I actually didn’t even re get back to you ’cause you were talking about the, the growth. Like, you’re like, dude,

Mike: you guys are exploded. I, I, that’s one of my next questions

Adam: for you. So, so this is actually part of like, when we, like we’ve had, there’s been phases, right?

Of. Like how we’ve like figured that out. So one of the first phases that helped this challenge out was, okay, at the, we’re gonna split the show in half front, half of the show is off color, wild, talk about whatever we want. And then we transition to the fitness. So the theory was, okay, people that just want the fitness, they’ll go to that.

People that want the other stuff will listen to that. And then the people that enjoy both will go through it. But the next revision of that was okay. Some people were still complaining and they didn’t realize, oh, there’s a a, a back half that’s totally different. So then Sal began to intro the show where he’d say, Hey, for these, you know, few minutes we talk about yeah, da da da da.

And then we get into whatever. So then the next phase that, which is most recently and what I think is attributed to the one, the biggest explosions was we started to start every single episode. We’ve never done this until just recently, last six months or less. Every single episode starts with a very specific fitness tip.

We open the show now that where we never used to do that before. Every once in a while fitness would enter the show at the beginning, but most often it was just current events and then it would get to fitness and it, I think it made that big of a difference. And you know what really sold me on this? I don’t know.

Are you familiar with the All In Podcast guys? Do you know who they are? I feel like I’ve heard of that. Oh, they’re like one of the top podcasts right now. They’re like everybody on Wall Street listens to them and, and all the politicians listen to them. There are four, uh, well, two of them. One of them’s a billionaire, and then the other three are like a hundred millionaires.

They’re, they’re filthy rich guys or Angel Investing Stock Wall Street guys. Did these

Mike: guys have. Trump on? No.

Adam: Was that, was that No. They

Mike: rarely ever had, did they have somebody on and they recently got like, taken down or was that something? This might have been.

Adam: No, these guys are, are nevermind. Uh, you know, so, and I’ll explain why this matters.

Um, so I hadn’t heard of them at this point. And they, they talk a lot about economic, you definitely would like this podcast, right? So they talk a lot about economics. They get into politics a little bit, obviously they talk about investing and stuff. All things that I’m very interested in. And they have a very mind pump esque vibe.

They’re four. Uh, best friends and they all kind of like jab at each other and, and have a, have great conversation. They’re all very different, you know, even politically there’s like a conservative, there’s a liberal, there’s like a libertarian, like, so, and they’re friends, so it’s great. And, and they’re very intelligent, right?

So someone tells me like, they have all these things that I’m gonna like listen to their show. So I’m like, cool. So I’m starting to, I’m starting to listen to the show and I’m like, 20, 30 minutes in and they’re like, they’re teasing each other. And, and because I don’t have a relationship with them, I haven’t listened to the show long enough.

I don’t know whose voices are whose. I actually started to get annoyed. I’m like, fuck. I thought, I thought I was gonna hear some stuff about economics. I thought they were gonna get political stuff. I thought they were gonna get into investing like, And they had it now, because I, I, I really value the person who recommended it to me and trust their opinion on knowing me really well that I would like it.

I stuck in and I, and eventually they got to some more of the stuff that I liked, and then I got to another episode and I was like, oh, I love these guys and now I’m hooked. I listened to every single episode and I had this kind of like, aha moment, like, fuck, how many times does this happen to mind pump?

Where we literally changed somebody’s life. Like they are like, oh my God, they’re sold on us. They’re selling their ant on it. They are like, You gotta listen to these mind pump guys. They blew my mind about fitness. I’ve lost all this weight. I’m in the best shape of my life, I feel so good about, and they’re selling us.

And then they come over this person who has no idea who we are, but trusts their, you know, sister-in-law or cousin or aunt or whatever, and starts listening. And the first 20 minutes is, you know, Netflix sound talking about, uh, lizard people and, uh, elite pedophiles. Yes. Right. And then, and you hear that for the, and then me jabbing one of ’em and talking shit.

And like, you know, dick jokes in there, like, and it’s like the first 30 minutes is all that. And we don’t touch on any of the one points that this person sold us so hard on. Maybe when we were really small and had a few hundred people listening, it wasn’t that impactful. But now when, you know, and I’m not exaggerating, we probably have at least a thousand to 10,000 new people every day that tune into us for the first time.

Um, I really think making sure that hey, listen, lead with our, our strength and why most people are really, there’s a lot of people, of course, that like our personalities or identify with one of us or en enjoy that banter. But the truth is where we’re professional, where we knew our business was gonna be sent around was our, our fitness knowledge.

And so how dare us not lead with that foot and with our content? And I think really making it a conscious effort to leading it with every single episode with a topic like that. And I even think that we continue to refine it and get better about. How long it is and specifically what types of things we talk about and how do we, do we debate the conversation or is it just sal ranting for two minutes?

Like, so we’re, we’re tweaking those things, uh, right now to get even better. But I think that is a big reason why we saw this huge uptake in the last, you know, six months or so. That combined with, um, I know that Doug had not turned on, on Spotify. The ability for somebody to go back and listen beyond a hundred episodes.

On Spotify, it automatically only downloads. I’m gonna make a note right now because Yeah, yeah. So Spot, and I didn’t, we didn’t know this either. This just kind of like happened and I can’t remember how Doug found out, but, so Spotify will only put like the last a hundred episodes unless you unlink it and allow it to download everything.

And since we have a very large following of people that actually binge every fucking episode, which I think is crazy, and go back when they find us after they like us, they go back and they start from the beginning and come all the way back. Uh, we were

Mike: loose. Does that make you feel a little bit awkward when people, it’s weird.

I mean, I get it. You get it more than I do, but even I get it sometimes and I’m flattered, but I, I, I don’t, I don’t do well with compliments in general. I just don’t, I, I just usually am kind of like, eh, thank you. Like I, you know

Adam: what I mean? But, well, people like you and us didn’t get in this to be popular and famous.

Especially you, right? You know, you, like you, you definitely are even more private than we are, but all of us are like that. None of us wanted the limelight. None of us did it because we wanted to become popular on social media or famous like, you know? And so because of that, I think that, I think, I think people that want that and are seeking that, they love that and they eat that up for me, it’s, and probably you too, like.

It’s like, wow, it is flattering that you, but it’s like, it’s not a tension you’re seeking and so you kind of tend to like shy away from it while, I mean, I always, Katrina used to make fun of me all the time that you’re so, you’re so awkward when people come up to you in public. Like that’s so not you.

Like, you’re like the life of the party. You like, people like gravitate you when you’re at, at, at, at events and things like that. Like you carry a room, she’s like, and then Somebo some fan who like knows you really well. Listen to every one of your reps because of you, you get all weird. I’m like, I’m like, well, it, it’s, it is weird for me.

It’s not, uh, I didn’t want that. I didn’t, I didn’t do this to become a fitness influencer or famous in any matter. It was like I, I saw an opportunity to build a business and provide something that I thought was tremendously valuable and a, and a great life for me and my partners. And that was, that’s the real motivation behind this.

So yeah, when people do that and when I get that kind of attention, I. I’m better. I mean, I think I’m getting better at, at how I handle it, but it was always, it’s always been weird and, and, and different for me for sure. But yeah, that’s, this is all very, uh, new stuff that is, I think helping with the, the, the growth of the business right now.

And that was maybe our, and, and also, you know, hindsight, right? It’s 2020 I I is, is also now become, um, the hook for the YouTube channel, right? So they, they now clip that out. Make a, a, a separate thumbnail and, and hook and, and keep it short to three to 10 minutes long. So that is what’s bringing on a ton of new leads and subscribers on YouTube.

It also gets repurposed and then chopped up even more for now, TikTok and then Instagram reels. So we’re starting to get just now really good at figuring out what pieces of content work really well on each platform, and then how to like maximize our time and effort towards that sense. It would be ridiculous for the four of us to try and make specific content just for YouTube specific content, just for Instagram specific, and I mean, you just.

It’s so difficult to do that. And, and I know like Gary V’s. The one who talks about this all the time and like, and you know, I, and so I, I’ve known that this was the place we need to be. I just didn’t know for sure how to get there without all the practicing and the trying and the, you know, you know, reiterating all the time.

And I, that has been a big part, I think, of the success and the traffic and the, and the revenue this last like six months or so, maybe even a year, is the effort and the, uh, towards all those different platforms and really starting to figure out like what, what works best on each one of those. And, and we’re starting to see the, the kind of residual effect of the growth and all those things ’cause.

It’s, uh, it’s been interesting. It’s been, it’s been a very interesting ride and we’ve had to reiterate so many times and still far from I think, completely figuring it out. But there’s little things that I think that we’ve pieced together that are, are really helping.

Mike: There’s a, there’s a concept in, I think it’s in, in, in chemical manufacturing.

Um, I believe it’s a German word, actually, und, V E R B U N D. But basically the idea is when you, when you’re producing one chemical product, there are usually byproducts and the process of figuring out how to take those byproducts and then make those into products, and then those byproducts that you’re using to make into products, those usually produce by byproducts.

And then figuring out how to take those chemical byproducts and turn them into viable products. So that’s, that’s an iterative process that allows you to start with one primary product that you’re producing, but by the end of this whole, Process, you’re producing 20 different things. And that idea applies, I think, to many different aspects of business, particularly marketing.

Adam: Right. Well, I mean, I, before the podcast, I sent over to you some personal information with the business and all the different revenue streams that we have. What you were saying is exactly what led to each of those was, it wasn’t like we set out, like for example, let’s do, like, let’s talk about the, uh, you know, h r t, uh, you know, business that we have now that’s going, like, that wasn’t like, we didn’t, we never set out and said like, we’re going to build a, you know, partnership with a H R T clinic and that’s gonna be a, a consistent revenue stream for us.

We didn’t, we never set out to that. But what happened through really focusing on, on one major part of the business was, oh wow, man, we, over the last, you know, three years I’ve answered. Hundreds, maybe even thousands now of questions related to hormone therapy. Either somebody’s already got it and their doctor sucks, or I’ve got a 25 year old who just got tested and they’re at 170, you know, free testosterone or, you know, so I’m, and I’m like, I’m not a doctor.

I’m not qualified to do this. So it, it, it, then we, what we did was seek out who we thought were some of the best. We tried somebody, eh, weren’t very happy with them, found Sal, ended up finding somebody else. End up loving the, the doctors that we met with. Then work out a deal with them where we say, Hey, We really, the, again, the, the goal behind this was to service our people, like convincing them that we would drive traffic to them in return if they would actually manage a, a forum for us.

Okay. We’re gonna start a freeform, a hundred percent dedicated to hormone therapy and all the questions around testosterone, estrogen, and everything you could think of and, and everything to, um, uh, oh my god. What’s the word for, not SARMs, but what’s the other one that’s popular right now? I cannot think like, uh, peptides.

Yeah. Thank you. Peptides. Yep. Yep. So, all questions around peptides and all questions around hormones, both men, women, like, and then they, two times a month they actually come on for an entire hour, ask live questions, and then they’re in there managing that forum every single day answering people’s questions.

And it’s, and then, We get a kickback on people that are going through their business and going through therapy. Sure. And it’s now turned into a six figure business for the company. And it wasn’t like we set out to really do that. It was, again, focusing on our main mission, trying to service and help people.

Oh wow. Look at this. We’ve now gotten so big that there’s thousands of people that have questions and need help and support around this. Okay, let’s seek out who are some of the best in doing that. Oh, here’s, let’s build a relationship and a partnership. Okay, here’s an opportunity for, and, and what’s most important for, for me, or not most, but one of the more important things.

For me and the guys now is we’re, we’re always looking at scalability, right? I think that’s really the, the, the difference between a good idea and a bad idea and business, in my opinion, is the scalability of it. And that’s not to say that you can’t build a successful, nice little six figure business for just you and your family and be totally fine on an idea that consumes most of your time for eight to 10 hours a day.

But when we look at business ideas and strategies within the business or outside of the business, the first question that we always ask ourselves is like, okay, how much time is this gonna require? One of us? To build this out or to manage it or to keep it going. And even if it’s a million dollar, ’cause

Mike: you don’t have the luxury that you had in the beginning.

No, I totally understand. I, I mean, I, in a, in some ways I kind of missed that time when I couldn’t, uh, my, my time wasn’t clearly as quote unquote valuable. Yeah. Or at least there, there weren’t very obviously valuable things I can spend my time doing to grow my businesses. So I felt like I had the psychological kind of luxury of just playing with things because it sounded interesting.

But you, if you want to keep moving ahead, like you’re saying, there is a point where you have to learn to start saying no to, to basically everything and very, very, um, deliberately say yes. And, and just to compliment you guys, I think that’s something I’ve seen that you guys have done very well with.

You’ve taken. Yeah. One thing like email marketing, I remember we talked about that years ago. You took that one thing and worked on it until it was really working. Okay, good. Then you move on to something else. Maybe you have a couple things going at, at any given time, but you don’t have 15 going to where then you can’t really execute on any

Adam: of them.

Yep, yep. No, you just said something too that I think, I’m always trying to find little nuggets that we can give to people that are business-minded that are listening to this. That was a hurdle, right? So two years ago, if you asked me like, what’s the biggest challenge with the business, uh, I think my consistent answer was the ability to say no.

That was a real hard challenge for the, the four of us. We, and we used to all get together everything. We made a decision together and we debated. It’s like, and so learning to say, uh, it no is really, really difficult when you get to a certain point and very, very important if you want to continue to scale.

The other thing that is a huge hurdle, and I always tease Doug about this ’cause I think out of the four of us, he’s the most challenged in this area, is Doug is used to being a very successful. You know, solo entrepreneur, he’s had success by himself and he’s very meticulous about things that he is, which has also served us very well with the, the show, of course.

But what, what comes with that, or the challenge or the hurdle with that is the ability to let go of what, like you brought up the email thing. Like, I, what I, what I’m good at is, uh, I’m not great at any one thing. I’m really good at finding an area like email marketing or say anything, TikTok, whatever we’re talking about, bearing myself into it to learn enough about it or what we need to do.

Find the right person who is, you know, really good at it or pretty good at it, that can start to take it, you know, whatever that means. Money, time, whatever. We put all this, I put all this energy and effort into it, and then as soon as I get to a place where I have a, a, a good enough grasp and understanding of what, what’s good, what’s bad, what’s like, you know, what’s par.

Okay, now let me find somebody who can do that. And then the, the hurdle and the hurdle that Doug has is you have to be okay with, maybe this person will never do it as well as you. That is really hard for solo entrepreneurs that have built their businesses and it’s, this is their baby. And it’s, it’s probably the same, not the same, but similar feeling that a mother has sending their child off into the world.

You know, you spend all this time raising this, this kid, this being, they’re 17, 18, now it’s time to set ’em on their own. And you’re like, oh my God. You know, let somebody else take it and do it and, and, and not have my help. And it’s real. And that struggle, I think a lot of entrepreneurs and then you

Mike: see how they do it, and you see all the things that you would fix.

Adam: Oh yeah. And they’re fucking up and you wanna go on and fix it. And so, you know, we, we are, we’re always talking about this. And it’s, it’s also a, another, uh, thing that has attributed to the success of the business is the ability to do exactly what you said is to see an area. That there’s opportunity, that it’s got, there’s scalability there to go, you know, all hands on deck, get it going, build it up, figure it all out, be knowledgeable enough about it that you understand it.

And then as quickly as possible, farm that task out. Give it to somebody else. Which means sometimes you gotta give up all the money that it’s making or maybe sometimes even more, you know, to, to be able to step away and then to prioritize something else. And that has been the nature of this beast that I’ve found is that once we got to a place where we were providing enough value and giving enough free content to people, that we were attracting enough people, then it was really honing in on areas that we can refine, get systems in place, and then then contract or hire out for them to do it and then move on to the next.

And yeah, that’s a, some people can’t do that. Some people have a really hard time. I. My buddy Craig, who was at one point almost in this business, uh, is an example of that. Like he just wants to control everything and that, and they’ve had success in the past by doing that. And so it’s really hard to break somebody from that and to, to say, Hey, listen, like you have to accept that no one is ever gonna probably do it ’cause it’s your baby.

No one’s ever gonna treat it the same way you do or care about it as much as you do. And to, to stress over trying to fit it. All I need them to do is to, to keep it going in a way I, that is, you know, scaling or managing or getting better. And I can come in every once in a while and say, Hey, you know, when you do this, that’s great.

When you don’t, when you do, you do this, that’s not so great. Like, let’s do more of this, less of that and, you know, and coach up like, and then, and then move on to the next thing. So there’s definitely, uh, an, an art and skill to being able to do that. And it is what it, I think keeps a lot of people from, you know, going beyond, you know, the kind of six figure type of range.

And I was notorious for this. Like I, for most of my life, I was really good at. Building a, a, a livelihood for me and probably my, like a good business where I made six figures and I have, but I, what I, what I was terrible at was removing myself from certain things so I could go focus on other things. Like everything required so much of my attention and, and I was so focused on getting good at that, that one business or that one thing that I would find myself, you know, a couple years later and I’d be like, okay, cool, I’m making good money, but I’m also working six days a week, 10 hours a day.

I’m burnt, I’m tired. I’m also starting to not like this as much as I liked it when I first started it, and it’s like if I really wanna scale this when, how, you know, like, and I, I did that with like multiple businesses before this one and that’s been a constant conversation and I love that. I have partners that understand that and grasp that now.

So when we all, because we all get teased with great ideas all the time. Well, you know, guy Justin will walk in one day, oh my God, we gotta do this. There’s huge opportunity here. And Sal, come the next day. I’ll come the next day. But we’ve all learned to say, okay. Let’s what map that out. What is that? What is that going to require, uh, for your time initially?

And then how quickly and effectively can you remove yourself from it? And then also can it continue to scale beyond where it’s at without you being always attached to it? And if the question is, if you, if you don’t have a very hard Yes, we can do that. Yes, I could be out of that. Yes. If it’s not that, then it’s no, you know, I’m always gonna lean towards No.

And if, if it’s not a hard yes, and you

Mike: know, because you have hard yeses. Like, w why take the chance on something that is, is a maybe, I don’t know. You know what I mean? Well then I suppose the, the potential upside better be so big that. You, you’re willing to accept a maybe, you know, but those types of opportunities are, are rare.

Uh, most of them are exactly what you’re saying. Where, um, you, you can clearly answer yes or no. And if you’re answering no to any of those questions, the opportunity is not big enough to to warrant. Pursuing it and that that could be right now, maybe a year from now. Right. And that’s where I wanted to wrap up is hear your thoughts on, um, where, where you go.

What do you see is, is take is gonna take you from where you’re at to the next level and what is the next level for you? Um, but, but if, if you are, um, in a position where maybe you have now the right people, and that’s something that I’ve made this mistake, particularly in marketing with Legion. I should have put a lot more importance on hiring the right people for legion’s marketing.

And that’s not to knock the people who are working in legion’s marketing. It’s actually mostly just to knock myself for understaffing it, for being too personally involved in it because, uh, because I’m good at it. But I should have worked probably a couple of years ago to get a couple of other key positions in place.

Like, you know, um, I. Legion will, we’re, we’re on track to do close to probably 35 million in sales this year. And I don’t have a C M O, I don’t even have a VP marketing, I don’t have a director of marketing dude, that’s just like a hat that I wear, uh, maybe one day a week. Uh, if you were to add up the time.

And that’s, that’s just stupid that, that’s called bad business. That’s a mistake. And, and I could,

Adam: I could give my reader, but I, I, I love that though about you and I also love the honesty to admit that and share that because I, I think it, it continues to highlight that, you know, of all the things that people should be thinking about and focused on, it’s you, you focused on the right things for most of the time.

Now, does that mean that you, you could have been better? Of course. Like I’m the same way too. Like we. We for sure have understaffed for us because we do so much video and audio content. We’ve grossly understaffed our editing aside and videographers, like we easily could have three to four more people on staff to support all the things that we are doing and we could be doing had I had the people there, we’ve ran Lean for so long and you know, gotten by with Steel, still scaling all these departments that we’ve, which is probably exactly what he was saying with you.

You’ve justified it because you’ve continued to scale. Without going out and probably hiring someone for, you know, a quarter million dollars a year, a hundred something thousand dollars a year, you’ve been able

Mike: to, or, or, or, or more in the case of a good C M O, right? I mean, those are some expensive people, right?

Adam: So you, you, and it’s, and actually editing and stuff is very expensive too. That’s part of why, obviously if it was a $20 an hour position, I would’ve done it a long time ago. But hiring like a full-time talented, good editor is a six-figure position. And so we’ve been able to get by without it for so long that we’ve understaffed that ourselves.

So it’s definitely answering your original question. This is kind of what’s going on right now is never have we ever put this much, uh, Effort towards, um, back into the business, meaning like we’ve always ran very lean, uh, with the, with the business. We’ve been very conservative how we’ve paid ourselves.

We’ve invested in a lot of things long-term to protect ourselves. And for the first time, we’re kind of halting in investments and spending money like that to protect us for our, our long-term futures. And more like, okay, let’s see if we actually put that kind of resources and energy and money behind ourselves.

We really have, we, we haven’t done that and we are doubling, tripling down to a point where I’m a little, you know, yesterday, the other day with the guys I was talking, I was just like, man, uh, we got a lot outgoing all of a sudden in the last couple months. And the reality is, They all won’t pan out. I know that Pinterest, TikTok, uh, two new editors, you know, $50,000 in lights, all those things are not going to pay themself completely back.

I know that like, but all I want is one or two of them to really hit for us to help us kind of scale to the next level or accelerate the, the. Continued growth that we’ve already had a little bit to justify all the risk that we did at, uh, at investing, uh, financially back in the business. So that’s exactly where we’re at right now is there’s a lot of things that we’ve said that we’ve wanted to do to potentially help the business.

We’ve ignored it because we didn’t need it because we continue to scale without it. But, you know, we’re kind of like, okay, well let’s, let’s take a chance on ourselves a little bit. Let’s gamble on some of the things that we think could pay us off in the long run, even if it is a, a, a long play. Obviously TikTok is not gonna pay me back tens of thousands of dollars in the first two months, but I mean, maybe in a year or

Mike: two.

Some, some of these TikTok influencers, they, I know they produce a lot of sales. I’ll say that. You might, well,

Adam: you know, you might surprise yourself. I, you’re right. And, you know, and what, and I’m already, uh, they’re, they’re doing great already. I mean, they, they took it over two and a half weeks ago, and it had 5,000 followers.

I think we’re approaching 15 or 20,000 somewhere already, like within a week and a half. So they’ve already done, you know, four or five that have gone pretty viral, quarter million plus, uh, like views and stuff. So it’s definitely getting attention, uh, right away right now, whether it’s really paying the business back yet.

I’m, I’m not too sure about that, but, We are at a place now where brand awareness does start to, to help a little bit. Like it didn’t matter three, four years ago where it kind of does matter now, like now,

Mike: or at least it wouldn’t have been a good investment. Yeah. Three, maybe three or four years. That’s

Adam: probably a better way to say it, right?

It’s not that it didn’t matter, it’s just it wouldn’t be, it wouldn’t be a smart way to allocate. I mean, it’s costing us, uh, we’re spending I think 3,500 or $4,000 a month on a team to do that. Uh, that’s a lot of money for something that is probably not gonna pay us back anytime soon. And even if it does, it’s gonna start a lot slower than that.

And so the things that I’m watch or listening for, so every uh, every Monday I meet with our customer service team and they are fielding the emails. We get anywhere from 50 to a hundred emails a day on people that are going through the programs or have basic questions around mind pump or whatever.

Right. And they, they’ve been trained to ask. All in inbounding questions like, oh, how did you hear about the podcast? Or How did you hear about Mind Pump? And what I’m looking for was the same thing that I was looking for when we started investing time and resources into YouTube, which is, you know, it’s hard for me to measure if somebody, uh, listened to, uh, a YouTube episode or watch the YouTube, uh, exercise video and then read a blog that Sal wrote and then, you know, listened to the podcast and then bought.

So it might look like that was ’cause of the podcast, but it initially got it. They came in on the YouTube channel, like, so it’s hard for me to like, you know, even with the, some of the most sophisticated software that we have to, to attribute that sale. To the work that we put into YouTube. So the best way that I can do it is I’ve done it, done this enough, and asked enough and kind of got an idea of what a lot of inquiries from a platform is or is not, is I’m waiting to hear from the customer service team like, oh, there was another TikTok person, oh, there’s another person that found us on TikTok and that, and part of what promoted the effort that way was we were starting to get people that said they found us on TikTok.

We didn’t have TikTok because other

Mike: people were repurpose. Yeah,

Adam: that’s how you found out about this. Yes. That’s how I found out. I was like, okay, if this other person is repurposing our shit, we’ve actually got a couple, you know, a handful of leads, you know, at this time that it came in, said they found us.

Okay. We ought to have put a little bit of effort here and like I said, at the bare minimum, protect our real estate there so somebody else doesn’t go and build a mind bump business for themselves off of TikTok because we didn’t do it. And so, yeah, a lot of that’s happening right now and you know, we’ll see, you know, we’ll see where we’re at in like six months if it’s really paying itself off or not.

But there’s a lot of things that. You know, the, that we’re, we got our hands in right now that I’m so excited about or that I’m, I, I see like the future of Mind pump, like all those revenue streams that I sent over to you. The only one of them that I would say is close to maxed out at all would be the advertising on the podcast because there’s only so many slots that we sell, and that’s completely booked for the entire year.

So there’s not a lot of room for growth on that side of the business. So that’s like, that’s like done, like that was, that was all that energy for this year was put in at the end of last year and it’s set up for the entire year. Now. A lot of the energy and effort is into all those other, uh, revenue streams and like, where can I spend the least amount of time, uh, to, uh, elicit the most return?

And so that’s kind of how I justify my day and my weeks is, okay, where, where can I do some, you know, subtle tweaks to help that out? And there’s so many of ’em. That’s so fun, man. I just, I’ve never had so much fun in a business. As this one, eight years in, I would, I would already be bored of anything else we’re doing, but there’s, it’s like, there’s so many little things inside of it and it’s very, very rewarding.

So

Mike: yeah, I don’t, I think that that’s one of the secrets. It’s, it’s cliche, but if, if you can find something that genuinely enthuses you that, that you generally have fun with, it’s like working out. You’re not gonna love every workout. We never do. Uh, we always like having worked out. I think that there’s a, a good analogy to business there that it makes it a lot easier.

I wouldn’t say it’s a pro equi a prerequisite to, uh, great success. Uh, I, I, I can think of people who may, uh, probably fairly early on in their journey, they weren’t quite having much fun anymore, but they were good at what they were doing and they made a lot of money and maybe they had to kill their soul a little bit to do it.

Um, but if, if you wanna, I. If you want to increase your chances, I think greatly for success and for not burning out and not just like hating life, is finding something that does make you enthusiastic, that you are having fun with. Would you agree

Adam: with that? Oh, I, I mean, I know you said it’s not necessary and uh, I would say okay, yes.

There’s always exceptions to the rule. Exactly. It’s the rule, but there are exceptions. Yeah. So I, I, I mean, I would agree that there are exceptions to the rule, but I, if I was advising anyone, I would say that is the secret because, and the guarantee at one point of you building what you’ve built, uh, You were making a lot less than minimum wage and, but you weren’t counting because you didn’t care.

You didn’t care that you, that

Mike: was bigger lean or stronger. Dude, I, I wrote it for fun and I published it for 99 cents on Amazon. Like I, I, I thought maybe there’s a chance somebody buys it. I thought it was like 50 50 between selling zero copies and not zero copies. That was it. That was my master plan.

You know, it’s

Adam: a kind of cool, it’s kind of a cool segue into a business conversation too, to, so, because we have all these things, like if you were to ask me of all those revenue streams, wary, am I spending the most time or what am I most excited about? Uh, that to me is the, like one of the most important questions because I, I stay up right now.

The real estate is like where I love to spend most of my time. Um, and it’s, and why I, I would want to focus the most time in the business is for that reason, not necessarily ’cause it’s gonna have the most r o I right up front. It’s because I literally, there’s nights where I lay in bed at 10 o’clock and it’s one in the morning and I’ve been reading articles.

All fucking night long. And I’m not going, like watching my watch going like, okay, I’m putting my time in to learn about real estate. It’s, I’m fucking, I’m, I’m so enthralled by the information that I’m collecting. That, to me, that is the secret to the real success. What will make us successful on the real estate side of the house is my passion for reading all that information and not counting it as work and effort.

And I, I think this is a mistake that, so, so many people are so worried about hacking algorithms or should I spend my time here? This, it’s like, dude, what are you passionate about? What do you love to do? Even when you don’t have to work? And there is, there is your secret, like if you find that, then you don’t count the hours.

’cause the truth is to be really, really successful at, at entrepreneurship or scaling a business, you’ve gotta be willing to do that. And some people, I guess the anomalies, like you were saying, have the ability to fucking just grind and put the work in and hate it while they’re doing it, but still do it because they know it’s necessary to get good at the craft and they’re, they’re gonna work 20 hours a day until they finally figured it all out.

Or or

Mike: until they cash out and they’re, you know, right. I I, I, I’m thinking of somebody that was kind of the story, like right. He didn’t really, he did a good job building a business and it was good business, but it, it did not come from a place of, of passion or deep purpose. It was just an opportunity. And he grinded and I think he cashed out for probably about $50 million.

And now he, he’s into like racing cars and flying planes and he does not that, that that’s it. Like, yeah, he, he ate shit for 10 years and now he doesn’t have to eat shit anymore, so he doesn’t do

Adam: it. And, and you know what, so much respect for somebody who has the vision to see that, to know they’re not gonna like it along the way, but knows the work that needs to be done to get into it.

It absolutely can be done that way. It’s. Probably a lot easier to find something that you’re already extremely passionate about and read about and double and triple down and figure out, which is what I’m always trying to teach some kids that, like if I’m mentoring someone and they’re asking all these questions about, I’m like, stop looking at what I did and trying to emulate it and build that.

Figure out what the things you geek out on. What are the things that when no one is watching, you pick up and you read, or you watch or you learn about. And then from there, look at the opportunities. There’s, there’s blue oceans in every, every space. Figure out where your opportunity is in the thing that you are already bearing yourself in and not counting as work already and make that your work.

And if you can do that, then you, then you’ll easily be able to go months and years without making a lot of money. And then eventually what’ll happen is you’ll make a lot of money. And then when you’re there, then it’s, it’s a, it’s a total, like there’s no desire to cash out. There’s no desire to sell out and leave because you’re truly enjoying every aspect of it because you built something around something you were already passionate about and you weren’t counting the minutes or hours that you were putting effort into it.

I think that. I think that is a, a necessary evil for most people. Um, unless you have the, the, the foresight to be like that guy who knows that he’s just gonna, he’s gonna do it. And I have a buddy who’s like that. I really, so, uh, Juju Fu I think is like that. You know who that is, right? Yeah. The, like the

Mike: stunts and stuff on.

Yeah. He

Adam: stayed years ago before anyone knew who he was. Uh, we had him on the podcast really early and he stayed the night at my house. I get to meet him and hang out with him and, uh, like really liked him. You would like him too. Really smart dude. He comes from a. Is it engineering? Doug? What was Juju before?

He was in a, he’s in a biology. Yeah, like a biological engineer. Like really smart dude. Really, really smart dude. And very calculated. And methodical. And so when you see him on social media, you think of him as this goofy.

Mike: Kind of dork. Yeah, I think I’ve seen him doing like flips with a horse’s head mask or something.

Yeah,

Adam: yeah. Just silly and off the wall. And he doesn’t talk very much. So you wouldn’t think that he’s very intelligent, very methodic. I mean, he, before he quit his job, he, he lived very, very minimalist, saved enough money, so he knew he had capital to go put. And then when he started to generate revenue, didn’t spend any of it.

He lives in the middle of America out, out in the middle of nowhere. And he’s, he’s been so frugal, but I, he’s always had this plan, and I know one day we’re all gonna see this, where he’s just gonna disappear. Like he, you’re gonna, he’s gonna have millions of followers on Instagram making all kinds of money like that.

And I, I believe, and I haven’t talked to him in a while, but I believe that he’s got a number in his head, or maybe he’s got, he’s told himself at one point, when I’m tired of doing this, I’m gonna bounce. But he’s been very methodical about this process, and you would never guess it based off of the type of content he is putting out.

And so there are some people that I think, Have that gene that I, I don’t, you know, I need to find something that I’m kind of a geek about already that I love reading. And then I, I’m, I’m pretty good about, okay, let’s figure out, um, you know, this is why I left marijuana. I left marijuana, the marijuana business.

I was making a ton of money. Uh, but I hated it. You know, I just, I didn’t like the people I worked with. I wasn’t really into the weed thing. I know I have that persona on the, on the show as like the weed guy, but I wasn’t like, that wasn’t like that hardcore into it. I was anti it for most of my life. And so, I mean, I had to leave it.

I had to leave it because I was, I, I didn’t enjoy showing up to work every single day, even though I was making really good money. And so I think to have sustainability for most people, you need to have something that, you know, you’re still passionate about learning and reading about, you know,

Mike: Yeah, people ask me fairly often about writing if I have writing advice, and I could share a lot of writing advice.

But, uh, the, the first bit of advice, and, uh, I’d be curious to hear if you, if you agree for podcasting, is don’t do it unless you enjoy it. That, that’s my first bit of advice. Just do not, if, if you’re trying to, um, Come at it from a purely a commercial, uh, standpoint, it is not a good way to make money. Yeah.

I’ve made a lot of money writing books. The vast majority of people who write books do not make a lot of money. Right. So I’m an exception in that regard. And that’s not to say that other people, other people do do it all the time, but it’s not a good business, so to speak. Right. It’s, uh, it, and, and, and also it just takes way too much work to do.

Well if you don’t actually like it, that’s something that, um, you can grind your way to basic competence, but not much further than that. And if you’re gonna build a business or build a brand around writing, or, or it could be spoken content, any form of content, it takes more than just basic competence.

Right. The, there needs to be a little bit of a. Um, a flare to it to, to get people to listen to you versus somebody else. And that’s not because your information is better necessarily, but you had mentioned this number of times, people only have so much time to read stuff or to listen to stuff. And when they choose to read my stuff or listen to your stuff or read your stuff or listen to my stuff, they are choosing us instead of everything else that they could read or listen to or do at that time.

Right? And so, um, let’s, let’s not kid ourselves about how important that decision is. I mean, time is our most precious resource, and let’s not kid ourselves at what it takes to convince people to give us their

Adam: time. 100%. And this is why I don’t write anything that we have because I’m terrible at it and I recognize that I’m terrible at it, but I also understand that’s a necessary evil.

It’s another example of I have enough knowledge and and awareness around what kind of content we need to write, what needs to be put out there, that I know what’s good, what’s bad, but it, I was quick to farm that out ’cause I recognize that it’s not a strength of mine and so I’m not gonna waste time trying to be good at, even though I know there’s tremendous value in blogs and white papers and all that, you know, we have Sal or we have other people on the staff to do that.

It’s also how I recommend to somebody who was asking me a question like, well Adam, I’m one person right now. I wanna build this type of business. What platform should I start on? Should I start on YouTube? Should I start it on Instagram? Should I start on Twitter? Should I start, should I start a podcast?

Should I start a podcast? Should I start? Which one do you like doing the most? Like really they, they, I can, I can sell you on why every one of them is good or bad or challenging or easy, right? So they all have their, their upside and downside to each of them. The real question is, which one do you gravitate to the most that you like?

Like, do you like making short little videos or do you like posting pictures and writing short captions? Or do you actually like writing, you know, 5,000 word documents that really suck somebody in? Or do you like talking a lot? You’ve been a talker your whole life. People have been telling you you’re a motor mouth forever.

Like, I mean, that’s why we gravitated podcasting, both Sal and I. I’ve been told that our whole lives. It’s like, would you just shut up? All you do is talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. So of course, a medium where we have the opportunity to talk, talk, talk, talk is going to work well for us and not feel like, just, just hard work every single day and more so of practicing and refining and getting better.

That doesn’t mean we, by the way, just ’cause we like to talk doesn’t mean we were good at podcasting. We’re fucking terrible at podcasting when we first started. But I, I enjoyed the process of sucking and getting better at it because I like to do it. Just, just like to your point with writing, like you better like writing if you’re gonna start to move in that direction, because you’re probably not gonna be in the 1% who sells millions of copies of something right out the gates.

So you better enjoy the process of sucking at it for a long period of time, and then the process of getting a little bit better, a little bit better, a little bit better, to where finally, maybe one day you become somebody who sells millions of dollars worth of books online. So you better fucking like doing that or.

You’re already setting yourself up for potential failure

Mike: and let’s, let’s also just acknowledge that content marketing is, is very powerful and it’s something that we do very well with and it drives our businesses, obviously, but it’s not the only way to build a business. And the, I think the, the prerequisite to being a good content marketer of any kind, whether it’s writing, speaking, doing.

Uh, stuff on video, whatever, um, which I guess would be speaking as well. But, but is, is having something to say and wanting to communicate things and if somebody doesn’t feel like they have much to say and doesn’t have the desire to communicate things, I think they’re gonna struggle at any type of content marketing.

But that doesn’t mean they can’t be successful if that were, were, me for example, what I would do is I would look then to a paid acquisition to advertising. I know people who, I know one guy, he just sold a business, uh, he was doing it for two years, in addition to running a digital agency that does millions of dollars a year.

Um, and he just did this thing on the side for fun and he sold it for, it wasn’t a huge amount of money. I wanna say it was 18 million. With an extra, with an earnout of like four to six, which is really just kind of a side payday for him. And he was just selling trinkets on Facebook and no content marketing whatsoever, just Facebook advertising, selling.

I don’t even remember what they were. And, um, the customer lifetime value was trash. It’s not a good business. I was actually surprised that he got the multiple that he got, but he, he, he was like, well, whatever. Yes. So two years and they’re giving me, you know, nine x my. My EBITDA on, on what he knew is kind of just a crappy business that he just did for fun.

Uh, just to, to like, ’cause, ’cause he, he also runs, um, an advertising agency. So he was just using it to like test things and whatever. Um, and that’s, that’s a way to, to build a business and, and make a lot of money that has nothing to do with content marketing. So I also do tell people that, to, to, to understand that they don’t have to do it the way that we are doing it or that other content marketers are doing it.

There are other very viable ways of, of building businesses that don’t require writing anything or saying anything. You can pay people to write your copy and to, you know what I mean? But you don’t have to be the communicator if you don’t

Adam: want to. Oh no. There’s a, there’s a ton of different ways to skin a cow.

There’s a saying that I think Doug says all the time. It’s, uh, say it well. So I’ll say, have something good to say. Say it, well say it often. It’s like, Sales and marketing 1 0 1 right there. And the, the first step to that is have something, is to say, you need to have something to say. You need to be able to communicate well.

And that what’s great is, and that’s really encapsulates the business, right? Like, we knew we had something to say. We knew we had and you wanted to say it. That’s right. And, and we knew that we would have to practice a lot to be able to say it well and then to, and to say it often. And so that to me is like the, the learning curve and the, the kind of, the, uh, trajectory of the business was okay.

We, we knew we had that, but we knew there was gonna be a lot of practice and a lot of failure to get to a place of where we could say it well. And then one, once we learned to say it, well now we’re constantly saying it often. I mean, that’s why we never run outta content. We’re repeating the same shit over and over.

We’re just saying it better and better each time.

Mike: Well, uh, I’ve, I’ve kept you for, for a while. We could keep on going forever. That’s why I was like, I’ll, I, I I don’t wanna I don’t wanna

Adam: monopolize your, your day. I know. Doing the work over here from Doug and, and Sal. ’cause he got, I got that. They got, they got some green.

Doug, you see Doug’s floating around over here. I’m like, he’s uh, kinda giving me the signal. We gotta do some green screen stuff with Sal right now, so. Yeah. Yeah. I, I

Mike: suspected, but, um, this, this was, this was, this was fun as always. Um, and, and I love seeing your guys’ continued success and, um, it’d be fun to offline to stay in touch a little bit more just to, just to share.

I. Business ideas and I’ll, I’ll, I’ll mention that when we’re done recording here. But, um, why don’t we just wrap up quickly with, um, I mean, I’m sure a lot of most people listening, uh, my podcast is, uh, I think a, I don’t even know, maybe a 10th of the size of yours or something. So they probably know about, uh, all of you guys, but why don’t we just tell them where they can find, uh, the Mind Pump crew and, and your work for this, if there’s anything in particular that you want

Adam: to tell them about.

Yeah. You know, if you are hearing me for the very first time, which like you said, is probably rare when it comes to both of our businesses. I think we’ve talked crossed over so many times that most people, but if you haven’t, uh, and you know, Call me on our, our stuff. You know, go, go consume all of our free stuff.

Don’t buy anything from me. Don’t buy anything from me. Go, go consume all of our free content on YouTube. Go, go to mind pump free.com. Go read all the the free white papers that we put out there. Uh, you know, go do that. I mean, that’s, to me, that’s really why we do all this. The business stuff just is happens.

So I’m not, I’m not, I’m at a place now where I’d prefer that if someone hurt us for the first time, is to go consume all the free content that we, we’ve put out there. So do that. Continue to support Legion. We got lots of love for you. I do believe that one day, uh, we’ll both get to a place where we build something together.

I think that’ll happen. So if I say it enough times, I’ll manifest it. So that’s what I’m, I’m doing. So I’m, I’m excited and we’re always excited to see the success that you’re having too, bro. You deserve it.

Mike: Thanks brother. And, uh, yeah, I think that there, there’s a lot of fun stuff we could get into. I just have to, I have to say no to a lot of things right now.

So in the future I can say yes to things that I can, I can gain back that luxury of doing things strictly because I want to do them and hoping they succeed. But, you know,

Adam: I’m working, I’m working on being the hot girl at the dance for you. So it’s, I’m almost pretty soon here. You can’t say no, like, I’d be say no.

So. Alright, brother. 1 1, 1

Mike: last little marketing tip there for people is that, that you is just right in line with what, what you just said is, uh, give your best stuff away for free and don’t withhold your best things and make your free stuff your, your, your most mediocre. Give your best stuff away for free because of course that creates the best impression and people can’t help but wonder how good the paid stuff is, if the free is this good.

Adam: So good. So true and such a great way to wrap that up.

Mike: Thanks again, man. Look forward to the next one.

Adam: Yep. Yep.

Mike: Well, I hope you liked this episode. I hope you found it helpful, and if you did subscribe to the show because it makes sure that you don’t miss new episodes. And it also helps me because it increases the rankings of the show a little bit, which of course then makes it a little bit more easily found by other people who may like it just as much as you.

And if you didn’t like something about this episode or about the show in general, or if you have, uh, ideas or suggestions or just feedback to share, shoot me an email,

[email protected], muscle f o r life.com, and let me know what I could do better or just, uh, what your thoughts are about maybe what you’d like to see me do in the future.

I read everything myself. I’m always looking for new ideas and constructive feedback. So thanks again for listening to this episode, and I hope to hear from you soon.