96. Podcasting as a Business with Phil Better

Hey, how's it going everybody. Welcome back to the Average Joe finances podcast. I'm your host, Mike, Cavaggioni, and today's guest is Phil better. And Phil started podcasting six years ago and he had the goal to be this podcast mogul. He currently runs six podcasts as a host or a co-host and he's an executive producer for a dozen other podcasts for entrepreneurs, business owners and influencers. So I've known Phil for a little while now, and I'm really excited to have this conversation with him. I've been a guest on his show and I am reciprocating and bringing him on my show, because we just, we hit it off. So good. And I just, I really enjoy having conversations with Phil just in general. So Phil, absolutely stoked to have you on the show. My man, welcome.

Thank you so much, Mike, for having me on the show, it is a pleasure. And when we were talking on my show and before, I just love our conversations even like with the five, 10 minutes that we talked before, show, I just got geeked out about, podcasting with you. So thank you for having me on your show and letting the audience hear my geeky out about my love of

podcasting. Yeah, it's all good, man. And I love what you're doing with your podcasts and just as a business in general. So you've been able to take podcasts and turn them into a business. And I'm really excited to talk about that today. So before we get into that, I would like to ask you the same question. I ask everybody that comes on the show, when they first, the first question and that is, I kinda touched a little bit about your background and who you are, but if you could maybe go a little bit deeper for us, tell the audience who is Phil better? How did this start for you? What made you want to become the podcast mogul?

All right. So Phil Better is, is a persona, that I had to create. So my real name is Phil Lemeiux. Six years ago I was working for a financial institution that will name, remain, unnamed. And there was a situation that happened. I got in trouble with some tweets, not major trouble, nothing like, oh my God, you're going to get fired. It's just Hey, the language is inappropriate. You're representing the institution. You need to delete this one or this one. I'm like, all right, no problem. Boom boom. From that point on, I knew I couldn't use my actual name. Because then it would be associated and I would have to play by their rules. But if I create this persona, that's filled better playing on words, like feeling better, every cause I've had my whole life, I'd say, Hey fill it up, please. So I'm like, you know what, I'm going to take control of this and I'm going to use it to the max because I know people are going to say, Hey, you make me Phil Better. I'm like, I know. And I, so already people are going to be associating positivity with me. So that's why I created the that's. How kind of the name popped up and my last name it's like a translates to the best or a mere means better. Your is the better I like better. I just liked the name better. So it also makes me feel pushed myself to be better anyways. That's a whole bunch of long-winded things. So that's how I came up with the name. And the persona was just, I always loved creative people, but I never had the time to be creative. So when podcasts were coming out, I started listening diligently like a T eight years ago, I think. Or even 10 years ago, I started listening to digital, gently to podcasting, like different realms, J Joe Ferrara, bad at business podcasts, the daily planet, the D the weekly planet, sorry for my pop culture news. And then, occasionally Joe Rogan, I wasn't, I'm not a huge Joe Rogan fan, but he does have interesting guests on. So it's it's nice to sometimes get that. You need to be in both, all these different circles, right? Always knowledge is power. So the more you learn from different people, whether you agree with them or not. It's interesting, but, so I was listening to those types of podcasts, bird cast as well. And some of that, and I'm like, I can do this. Like I can do this. It's not that hard, microphone and you just talk, you're like, that's what a podcast is. So I just jumped into it. I try, my first show was like you said, the Phil Better show, which was just pure for movies. Like I just wish we were moving movies, TV, news, pop culture, trying to be like everything. And I call it my biggest success and also my biggest fear. Because it was my first time ever one trying to be a creative, but also trying something being business. And my focus was completely wrong and there was so many mistakes, but also so much learning was done. So it wasn't a complete failure because I learned so much looking back at the time, it was like, ah, this is the biggest failure of my life. Oh my God. I was depressed. It brought me into a dark valley, bring it to 2019 horrible, like 2019 was my best and worst year. So like my podcast, the best and worst, was able to knock off three. Trips in one year that I've never traveled, like traveling out of north America never really happened for me. Like I'm in, based in Montreal, I've been numerous places in the U S I still haven't hit the west coast yet, but it's like in my dreams. But I went to Cuba, Ireland and England in one year and it was like, fantastic. I was like, oh my God, that says that fast. And then also I ended a seven year relation that was in a toxic place where both of us were in horrible places. That's the personal life, and did a 20 in 19, pretty much on the brink of burnout. 2020. I started my burnout. Took two months off, was like I'm going to try and get healed, weekly, therapy sessions that helped me clear my mind, started thinking positive. No, it was like, I'm going to, I can't go back to doing drone work at a nine to five. I was 10 years in this business at this bank, different institutions, different companies. I was like, no, this is not it. I want to be creative, but I D I can't draw. I can't acting is okay. But like drawing music, all that thing, I have a great voice. Like all the time when I was younger. So I was like, okay, podcasting is good, but it's not, there's no way to make money on it. I couldn't see, unless you had like diligently thousands of followers. And it's certain categories takes years to build up. And I'm like, I usually, I don't know. So I started watching like a whole bunch of YouTube channels on how to make, get rich, because the pandemic like just exploded with these contents. So I started following a diligently, trying to figure it out. And I started seeing repeated patterns and because I've always loved learning and I like sciences, like going into the depths of science. It's oh, that's a lot of work. I like the surface knowledge. Of science because it's okay, I can, if something interests me, I'll dive into it. So that's how I go into the deep dive as far as I go. And then I'm I'm like, I'm not interested in this anymore. Cause it's not interesting anymore for me. And then I move on to the next thing and then the next thing, and I try and do deep dive. So I started watching how all these people made money. I'm like, this is fairly simple, how they made money and how I can incorporate it. And podcasting was still in the back and going down. I'm like, okay, but I tried some things I'm like, I'm not good at this. I don't understand. It's not working. And obviously the first things you try, you always fail at because you have no idea. You're not going to be perfect. But school messed you up and said, you have to be perfect the first time you did it because you only get to do a test once. So you got all this anxiety. So every time you try and do something right, the first time and you fail, you're like, ah, I'm never going to do it again because it's not worth it. I failed as like I'd life. So try to whole bunch of things failed and then I'm like, you know what, I'm really good at talking with people and interviewing, and I've made this massive connection from joining different groups and talking with people asking questions. So I'm like, you know what? I'm going to ask entrepreneurs how they made money online. So I created my second show, invest in yourself, the digital entrepreneur podcast, where my goal was just to interview people who have made money online. I don't care if you're from a small little creator that only has a thousand fans on YouTube to, one of the biggest guys I've ever interviewed, a guy who owns a sports team. If you're watching the video, it's up over my left shoulder, right shoulder. I had the interview, a chance to interview him and he sponsored my podcast, my first ever time dealing with a sponsor. It was great. It was like, oh my God. So that was like an amazing event for me. Like I've had this ability to talk with people from all over making millions of dollars to not making that much money, but it's been so interesting because it's been fun because I get to ask them how they are an entrepreneur. I never knew how to be an entrepreneur. I'm learning so much about who I am as a person and how to make money, like getting to chat with you, Mike, and just talk podcasting. Like we jumped on what was supposed to be a 15 minute call like a week ago where we just talked about the, our upcoming, collab that we're doing. And like it devolved into just discussion of like how to grow podcast, different types of monetization, different business ideas, different. Like I'm like, oh I'm showing you how I'm working on this project. And you're like, oh my God. That's like really great. And I'm like, oh my God these are the top. This is the connections I love because I've done this podcast. That's a benefit of podcasting because I got to talk to you and I learn how you're dealing with sponsorship. So you're dealing with sponsorships on your podcast. You have this great, intake form of oh, that's amazing. And so I'm learning that. And when I get someone who comes over to me, I'm like, look, I didn't come up with this. This guy, my buddy, Mike did, he has his podcast. He came up with this. This is how he's dealing with. This is how he found out his worth. You can do the same. And then they're like, oh my God, my clients are like, oh my God, that's amazing. Oh my, I didn't know my podcast was worth that. I'm like, you don't have to charge this. Like you can charge whatever you want. Like the key point. Is that podcast is yours. It's your business. You set the price, unless you're a copy of every other podcast. And there's nothing unique about your podcasts, then yes. But if you have something unique, like I talk with digital entrepreneurs, period. Like I love all digital entrepreneurs. Boom. There's not, there's many entrepreneur podcasts and podcasts directed to entrepreneurs, but not directed straight to my person is looking to get into digital entrepreneurship. They're not sure if they're ready for entrepreneurship. They heard about how money is made online. So I'm going to talk with all different types of creators, how different types of people make money and run businesses. Like I have agency owners, I have freelancers on my podcast. I had YouTube streamers, I had everything on my podcast. Cause they're all in the digital entrepreneurship. I'm like, look, I want to showcase how you can make money. Yeah. That's it. That's all. If you have a course, if you have like a book or anything, that's teaching the things you are free to promote it on my show, because I want my ideal listener. Cause this is how I learned. My ideal listener is someone in his mid thirties wanting to make money online was sold the BS. Of, if you work for a company, they're going to be loyal to you and they're going to take care of you, which is bull and we all know it. So I made this podcast because I want, wanted to learn how to make money online. I'm like the best way to do it is to find people who've made money online. But also I'm like, this is going to be a great resource for people who are in the same situation. I was here you go. This is how you make money. You know it, and learned that it's a long-term game. Cause the guy dumb Einhorn and amazing, brilliant dude, he's been twenty-five years in this and it takes, it took him 25 years to be able to buy his first sports team. And they're doing amazing. They're completely undefeated currently in the season, so they're doing great. But yeah, that's the story of Phil Better.

That's awesome. I'm sitting here so I was taking notes as you're going right. And I want to rewind back to closer to the beginning when you were talking about when you started your first show, you said it was your best success, but also your worst failure, right? Yeah. And you said how you had mentioned that doing anything for the first time, usually winds up in failure. But I think that the key thing is what you do with that failure. Do you learn from it? Do you fail forward or do you fall backwards? If you're going to fail forward, learn from the experience and take that knowledge that you've gained to make it better the next time you do it. And I think that's something that. You, your podcasts, your first one, like you said, you were all over the place. And, I think I get the whole success part is because you started something that you were passionate about and you really enjoyed doing it, and you learned a lot from it. And by learning from it, it became one of your best successes. The failure part was probably, and I'm just going to make an assumption here was probably because you were all over the place, so it was hard to really niche down. And that's just kinda what I'm picking up from that. And then you started that next podcast, the digital entrepreneur podcast, where you really niched it down to where you had a specific target audience. And that was something that you learned from that first show that you did. And, I D I just wanted to point that out, because I think that's huge that you took something that you felt was a failure to you, and you turned it around to, to make yourself better to make yourself Phil Better. You know what I'm saying? Play on words there. All the way around all the way around. That's awesome, dude.

Yeah, no, you're 100%. So you're right on a bit wrong on the failure, but the failure reason is correct. I had this, weird imagination. There's a weird dream that the feel better show would make me like super Uber, like famous. And I put that expectation. You we're going to be the next Joe Rogan from that. I was like, yeah, it's I'm going to be the next Joe Rogan. Like I'm better than Joe Rogan. I'm funnier than Joe Rogan. People love who I am. And then I got that. You get slapped right quick in the face. Let me tell you, Joe Rogan had a lot going for him before, before Spotify paid him a hundred million dollars. But like going back when I started, I was just before serial, dropped. So the, the, the true crime drama blow up and before every white woman in the world was like, I'm going to watch true crime documentaries, because I want to know how to kill people. And it's very scariest as a man right now. And knowing that ladies can watch and learn and listen to how serial killers and how crimes are still unsolved scares the shit out of me and makes me want to be a better man. Just simply because I don't want to. I don't want to disappear. But no, so that's when I was starting. So Cyril happened, I'm like, great. I'm in the wrong niche. No, one's going to listen to this type of podcasts, but I still went at it. I still struggled structure and thinking that I would be the next Joe Rogan, not understanding how to promote, not learning about the podcast world and all this smart things that I should have been doing. I was thinking selfish instead of value giving. So then when I decided the entrepreneur, it was starting in like the first pers first couple people I talked with, like they blew, it, started planting the seed. Like one of them was how to promote, I was blessed. So Ralph Sutton is the co-founder of gas, digital and amazing, podcast network at the time of recording. Over a year ago, it was 2020 at 2020, December, 2020. I talked with Ralph and he told me how he got his first sponsor, how he used to promote his radio show and how he's he's huge. Like he gets over I think I said 3 million or 5 million downloads. Whereas for his network, which is huge, but his show he's been on like queer eye for the straight guy he's been on, hundreds of radio stations. He got his radio, his radio show syndicated within the first week by literally jumping in his car and driving from New Jersey all the way to Miami, stopping at all the alternative rock stations and giving them tapes of his show and badgering them and just went up and down. And by the time you returned back to New Jersey, he was syndicated in like I think he said 20 to 30 markets. Yeah, like it was insane. And then he told us how, like he told me how he got his, for sponsor, which was, he was working at DJ at a strip club and yeah. And he had a strong New Jersey president. And then it was like, okay, it's local. Okay. That's, he's niching down geographically. That's the first thing that ever popped into my head about geographics. So I deal with, I do deal with that with some of my clients in the podcast I had produced and he went to his boss and he's Hey, do I want you to sponsor? He's okay, how much is it? And he's like this amount. And then it was like a small business sponsoring a small, another small business. Like they're working together, I'm buying ad time and okay. And he got like a hundred bucks. So he got four months or something like that. And I'm like, that's freaking genius. So literally. Don, when he was on the podcast, he's he hired me first to teach his team how to do podcasting. And I'm like, how about this in exchange for that? You sponsor my podcast instead. Oh, okay. He's are you guys still going to teach? I'm like, yeah, I'm just, I need the experience. I need to start teaching people. So I need the experience. So he's yeah. Okay. We'll sponsor how much? And I told him the price, he's yeah, sure fine. No problem. Boom boom, dang. Even was gracious enough to send some as you can see over my right and my left, there's like merchandise. I got a whole bunch of stuff. But for his team, Sarlo rugby in France, which is an amazing, and you can actually stream their shows live on Sharla, rugby.tv. I've done my little plug, but that's my sponsors are package is you sponsor my podcast. I'm going to talk about you. And I'm going to pump you all the time because someone sponsoring me, I'm currently in the talks with someone else to sponsor one of my other shows too, so that I can have another sponsor on that. I do affiliate marketing. So I learned about affiliate marketing. Like the digital entrepreneur was like how I first monetize. And it was like, okay, that's how you monetize. That's how you get. Cause I talked with Ralph, then I was able to talk with, Donny Bovin, the genius at network marketing. That's what I've done with my podcast. Like in essence, it's podcasts and groups online, but digital. So he hosts like the successful success champion network. So you go into it and you have a whole bunch of same similar business people. So it's like a mastermind, but it's all digital. And you chat, chat, chat instead of the old fashioned networks really been interesting. I've been in it a few months and it was great for me, but it was like way more advanced than I was. And I was like, I'm not ready for this. I need something else. Cause I'm still like figuring out what my, like my business is like, what is I do consulting for podcasts and that's for sure, but there's something else I want to do there. There's something else that I don't want to deal with people too much. I want to like deal with people on my terms. Not have to go after clients and get leads and like that I want to do something else. So I'm still figuring stuff out and understanding where I am and what my business is going to be, for now it's my living is podcasting. That's my business. And I get paid to teach people, podcasting pay to podcast and yeah. So luckily I had another friend of mine who was like, I'm turning down my podcast. I'm not sure if I want to do it. And I'm like, look, come on my show. I'll do all the heavy lifting. You just have to be the, the co-host, the sidekick, the stick man, whatever you want to be. So boom. And we'd be going straight there Al comes back every once in a while. He was always available. We do guesting, sometimes have guests on sometimes, but it's mainly, me and, me and my buddy, Aaron talking about films. So I never really interviewed people. Like I tried to, I was like, oh my God, I stopped. So I'm not going to do it. And then I'm like, I need to ask these people how to, so I'm like, I'm going to make it like Joe Rogan or like Tim Ferris. I just ask questions that I want to know about this is the point. So I just ask questions. I want to know about, because I know. Colin. Who's my ideal listener but I named Colin after a millennial. But yeah, Colin's a millennial and I have my ideal listener. So I think I'm like, we'll call in like this question. Yes. We'll Collin like this question. No, not going in Colin likes it. Yes. Colin. Won't like it. There's bringing value to Collin's world talking about this subject. Yes, no, maybe but also at the same time, if I'm talking with someone who was like, oh, am I do automation? And I'm like, I'm stuck on automation. Can you, I have a question about automation. So I asked in this way have you ever had this trouble where you did that at dah? What would you suggest? And it's I'm getting the answer to my problem, but, for free.

That's one of the selfish benefits of doing a podcast. You get to ask the questions that you want to ask and get the answers to. I do the same thing with my guests all the time. And it's funny. Cause I think, as you're talking about your friend Colin here, or your ideal listener, right? You're identifying what your listener. You build this profile on them, right? And you figure out what it is that they're looking for, what adds value to them. And that's what you focus on for your niche. Right? And by doing so, you're, the folks that are regulars that are listened to your show will always keep coming back because they know that the content you put out will add value to them. Then they talk to their friends who have similar interests and values and say, Hey, Phil talks about this on his show, come check it out. And that's one of the ways to really like grassroots, grow your show. And, I think that's super important to know like what your listener profile is like, who's the folks that have listened to your show. And even with my show, it's niche down, but it's not like I talk about pretty much anything in the finances where I'm from, investing in the stock market to real estate, to, to where you are in basically had crypto. , you'll many different pieces of it. There's a lot of other shows that will talk specifically multi-family real estate. I talk about that too. Not on every episode,

Stop. Here's the thing. Okay. You're exactly like me. I'm like every other entrepreneur podcast, but I'm focused on digital entrepreneur because I know my ideal listener wants to learn how to do digital. There's another digital entrepreneur podcasts out there. Your, you already know who your ideal listener is. It's an average Joe and everyday schmuck who didn't learn about finances in school. Because we didn't like to be tied in and learn about how to balance a checkbook or, checking and savings and investing in the future. And not at all that, because my parents, unfortunately didn't learn it either because of the previous generation. That's how generational wealth is built. It's the money, knowledge is passed from generation so at a certain point, like I'm breaking the wheel. Cause I want my future kids or. I won't, I have kids who knows most entrepreneurs, like there, their life changes when they have her kid they're like, I have to double down. Whereas like for me, I look, I have my nephew. I'm like, I'm going to pass that knowledge to my nephew. I'm going to teach my nephew. I'm making my legacy is making enough content that if my nephew needs to learn how to do XYZ, I have done it. And I've proven that I've done it and made money so he can copy it. Like here's the blueprint kid. Your life is set now. Or if I can make enough money that his life is set, that I can start teaching him properly. Look, here's how you make money. Like teaching him, like this is a pro, this is why money has caused this, that like really ingraining in those important lessons into him. So that. The next generation, my next generation of family and that my next gene, like my blood, my genes, my, my essence as a man continues down the route, like it's, the family name is continuing and just growing and growing into bigger and bigger things, and they're not like living paycheck to paycheck like I had to, or my father or my mother and stuff like that. But it's you are going after the average, like everyday finance, I'm like, you're teaching them like, look here, you can make money crypto style. And here's a guy that made it. Here's proof of concept. Here's another proof of concept. Here's multiple proof of concepts for multi-dwelling living, investing in how to do it. And here's our three different methods of doing it. Three family members that did it differently, so you're just like me. You're going, look, this is for the average, Joe, this is the average people who have made their wealth using finances. And that's how you do it. That's your niche. The average Joe, Yeah. And you become the dominant person. There's no one else out there talking about Average Joe Finances. You already know the niche, cause it's not, you're not dealing with people who have money or have access to money or don't know how to get that network of money. These are people that started from scratch with a hundred dollars in their pocket. Maybe sometimes with the less I'd have made it to the point where they're financially secure in their life and they're growing at that point then. Yeah. Whereas your, so your ideal listener is someone in that situation, the same situation as your guests.

You have to know why they're listening to your show. What is their, why? I have my why, but what is their, why, for your ideal listener now, because I'm talking to another podcaster, who's actually building his podcast up as a business, which I'm doing the same thing. But you've been able to essentially make podcasting like your full-time gig, which is super dope. Super awesome. I love it because I love podcasting. Talking to people. I love interviewing people. It's just so enjoyable and just learning. I find that every time I have a guest on the show, I learned something new. There hasn't been a time that I've had somebody on that. I didn't learn something. And every time I haven't taught you anything yet. No. Every time I have a conversation with you, I learned something new man. And I want to talk about some of that stuff. Cause we've had some great conversations in the past and I want to provide some of that value that you've given me already, to my audience here. And we've talked about so many different things. So I want to talk about particularly how you've, been able to monetize your podcast because I know we've done similar things, but you have this down to a science man. And you say that, but every time we, you and I have a conversation, I tell you about something I'm thinking about. And you're like, oh, I did something similar and I did it this way and you just map it out for me. I'm like, That is wicked.

That's my super spot. That's my super so like I said I don't, I'm not creative in the sense of, I can draw into image like Picasso, like I'm not that creative for that way. It's not worth me. My work, my brain just works wonderfully because I love learning from different things. Like I'll, like I said, I'll go down the science route for a month. I'll be just watching Neil deGrasse Tyson. I'll be reading about him. I'll be reading Stephen Hawking, all this stuff. Cause it's just oh my God, this is fittingly wonderful. I even went down like the FA it's fascinating to me. And then it's okay, boom, that's born. And then I might go onto, like I said, I jump onto another thing. And because I worked in the business world so much and I saw so many different styles of business. And I like money, like who? Cause I know what money does. Money brings it. Doesn't buy people say money, doesn't buy you happiness. It buys you time. And you know what time gives you happiness because the less time you're worried about spending on money, it's the more time you can spend on your happiness and what makes you happy because I'm finding what makes you happy. So money does buy happiness because it buys your time, right? You can either sell your time for money or you can invest your money to buy time.

To start your own business with what you're doing as a podcaster. And we're seeing this right now, like really started pretty big, when the pandemic started, but between 2021 and now, really it started in 2020. He said the thing that everybody's, they're calling it the great resignation, right? And you have so many people that are living, they're leaving their nine to five jobs to work from home. And they're finding jobs that the guy that worked from home when they're starting their own business, and a lot of people are finding great success because there's a lot of opportunity to do this and work from home as long as you do it the right way. And you're you being one of them, right? You did that yourself. You walked away and you started this business with a podcast. I'm leaving my nine to five job this year. I am getting a pension though from it. Cause I did 20 years in the military, but I'm walking away from that. And I want to focus solely on my business after that. And I don't want to go back to a typical regular job. I want to stick with real estate investing because I enjoy it. I want to do something that brings me joy and. Adds to my bank account as well to build that generational wealth for my family. And, and that's like where I want to go. As I'm talking to you about what you've done with your podcast as a business, throughout time, like you've been podcasting, what now for six years you said

six, six years about, yeah. Yeah.

So now you found something that brings you joy, right? It's something that you enjoy doing, you get to touch into your creative side, so can you share with us a little bit about w when did that switch in your head flip and you decided, you know what, I don't want to live this rat race life anymore, working myself to death in this nine to five, I'm going to go do my own thing and do something that brings me joy. What was it that flip that switch for you that got you to really get this started?

So I've always wanted to be my own boss. I, for years I talked with my brother, oh, we're going to start a business. We're going to start a business. We're going to have private chats dah. So I've always wanted to have my own business or be my own boss because I knew I was never happy working for someone else. Like, why would you want to work for someone else like that? That's always been like why? Like, why? That it makes no sense. But at the same time, I never knew anybody. That would, that could teach me. And I'm looking back. I'm really stupid because I knew a lot of people, I just didn't realize it because they were doing like, I connected with this amazing entrepreneur and he never called himself an entrepreneur because he made multiple businesses online consulting and all that when he was like, like just a bit younger than I am now. And he runs a web webcam. I fricking the web copy. He runs multiple web comics, but he uses his web comic. He uses web comic versus the start of the business. And then he did an advertising and now he's in animation and he's doing, he's working with Robert munchkin, amazing Canadian author. That if you don't know who Robert munches look them up, it's the best books you will ever read as a child he's a national treasure. I saw everything. I saw how backside of a business worked. And then I went into the corporate world. Cause that's what I thought I needed to do. And like the dream of starting my own business. It died. And then. I saw podcasting. I saw oh, some people can get a huge following. Then like YouTube started blowing up and I saw people making series bank and doing this full time. I'm a YouTuber. I'm like, Hey, what do you mean by your YouTube bro? Oh, YouTube literally pays me. Wait, what? YouTube pays you. And then it start learning that I'm like, okay. All right. And then, after my burnout, I went back to working at the, the financial institution, the bank, and I was not happy where I was. I was in the world of fraud. And let me tell you, the world of fraud just sucks because you're always dealing with negativity in that. It's understandable why everybody's so freaking angry and the drop and trying to stay positive. It wasn't good. I was working on being better and then I switched positions and in 2021 switched positions from being in a fraud position. So I was client what we call client in the business. Cause I was in a call center client facing, because I was just dealing with the clients. Anyways, and it's I look back and it's stupidity, but it's not their fault. It's because the government and the education system failed, these people failed to teach them like, it's life lessons, but at the same time, You should know that when you have a credit card, this is what happens, but it, because the educational system didn't have credit cards at the time when the educational system was made, they can't put it in because no one understood it.

Oh no, it's I totally get it, man. Because I actually I've recently had a conversation about this, about, why the education system is set up the way it is. And it's created, our education system is built to create more workers and it was built that way because of the world wars, right? When, a lot of us influence, went out everywhere, up, up to our Northern brethren up there in Canada, over to, Europe as well. And a lot of that stuff was from the war and because it was about, building, a better employee to produce more as we were building these machines for war. And in doing so that, that became the basis behind our education system. It's never changed. If you want to learn business, you got to pay for it and go to college.

Even then in the educational system, it's not necessarily, hands-on, it's all fear radical. And my father used to tell me I would get a guy with an MBA and I would, it would take us six months to reprogram them because people who can't do teach and I always live by I've always done that. It's like, when I, like, when I have a podcast, a client come in, and the I'm like, okay, what do you want to do? I want to have, I want to grow my podcasts. I'm like, okay, cool. What are you currently doing? And they tell me what they're doing. I'm like, okay, it's obviously not working. Cause you're putting like eight hours in and you're only getting a one or two followers and that's pointless. How about we try this? Let's try the Gary V method, which is a dollar 80 it's the it's guaranteed to work. Like I can send you videos on it. This is telling the client what you do is you find your, you choose a platform. And then you choose 10 hashtags, go to 10, those 10 of hashtag follow the first nine follower accounts. Make sure they're somewhat valuable. Look at their pictures, choose nine of them. Leave value based comments like and leave value based comments. Don't be like, Hey, follow me at this click. No screw that. Don't do the follow go. Hey, I really like this about your image or I listened to your video and I really liked about this, whatever it is, bring value and make that person's life. Go, Hey, I really liked this. Where did you learn? Ask a question, generally, ask a question. Where did you learn that technique? Or? That's really dope. Thanks for sharing. Like whenever I go on to someone's I'm pretty sure you've known or when I listened to one of your episodes, I go onto the post. I like, and I go great episode. I really liked it. Because I'm leaving value because it's like your you're giving me knowledge or you're showing me something beautiful and that on the art, cause it's we're talking about Instagram. You like the toy, you like the photo, you leave a valuable, constructive crusade, constructive comment, nothing like, oh my God, you're so beautiful. That's useless. Obviously. She's knows she's beautiful or he knows. He's beautiful.

Thank you. I am beautiful.

You're gorgeous. You're gorgeous, man. You have a beautiful smile. I love it. But. Add something like, oh my God, I really liked how you, the angle really accentuates like something unique about or whatever. Or if it's a tweet like, oh, I never really thought about it. That's thanks for providing that. Be authentic and genuine with them. If you don't resonate with the thing, don't leave a comment. It's as simple as that you don't resonate with it. Jump to the next one, jump to the next one. There's billions of people out there find the one that resonates with you. Follow them, like their stuff, interact with them. And you will see that slowly and surely. Some of them will come over and interact with yours. Some of their friends will come over and interact with you and you're going to.

Yeah. That's huge authenticity, right? It's not just leaving a comment, just leave a comment, like actually go in and actually engage. I think that's, that's very important. And I've seen, a couple of the Gary V videos talking about that method as well. And I probably should get better at doing that. I'm not the best with going in and finding like my specific, I do have specific hashtags that I follow, but like going in and leaving those comments and constructive criticism, it's an hour of criticism, but constructive, like something that construction, I have comments

like something like this is what I also stress do it an hour a day, set aside one hour specifically for today is I like Instagram because I like looking at pretty things. And it's quick content like tick tock. Because I will lose myself and take talk for D

I get those videos all the time that says, Hey, you've been scrolling for a while. Why don't you take a break? I'm like, oh, it's you again? I'll just swipe past it and

keep going now. So I'm like, and then I'd also, Instagram reels are bad too, but so I look at it. Don't give you a warning. No, 12, 12 hours later. You're like, when did it become thirsty? I was only there for one minute. What happened? But that's the thing. Like I like Instagram because I like looking at pretty things pretty much like it's, that's what Instagram is pretty things. It's the billboards. So you have to understand how I look at the world. I have the physical world, and then I have the internet world we were sold because we're millennials that the internet is the superstar, the highway, the information highway. So I look at I'm on a highway, I'm driving whenever I'm on the net, I'm driving. So the Instagram is billboards. I see all the. And they're selling me stuff. Amazon is a mall. Oh, it's the Walmart pretty much. It's the digital version of Walmart. Facebook is the mall because you have Facebook pages, which are storefronts. Cause they're all, either they're all selling you, something, they want you to become part of their community. Either they're going to sell you physical products or they're going to sell you memberships, or they're going to say sell you their friendship. But you're gonna meet people in the mall, right? Just like at Jamal, you go, oh, Hey messengers. Like me and me having me and you having a face to face. Cause we can literally just FaceTime us if we want, like we're doing right now or yeah. And then you have the Facebook group, which is the mall actually going into the store, inside the mall. So that's what Facebook is. To me. It's a mall. Twitter is just a random person yelling on the street or people, you run into people on the street talking about stuff. Yeah, but then while I'm driving, I need to listen to something. What am I going to listen to? Podcasts podcast is the radio of the digital world, but it's on demand. I can choose whatever station I want. I'm like, you know what? I'm going to listen to the apple station. And then I'm going to go through all the apple podcasts or I'm going to listen to the Spotify station and listen to all the Spotify stations. That's how I look at it though. Or Amazon or Google podcasts. Those are radio. That's how I look at the role. That's how so I'm like, if I'm running a podcast, I'm writing in the real world, it's equivalent to running a radio station. So how do I run? How do you run a radio station? Learn about that, learn that structure, and then you can take it to your podcast and boom, you are now. Cause I look at podcasts, you have a media empire. Cause if you have a podcast, you have a radio show. So you're a producer on a radio show. You have a station because you're producing. So you have a radio station. That you can, and your feet is the star of the episodes and it can be 24 hours. It can be whatever you want, and if you're a network, then you have multiple stations onsite your network. And then YouTube for me is the new TV. So when I get home or while I'm driving, because I can drive without worry on the super highway because I can do multiple things. But YouTube is my TV, so I can watch TV. YouTube is ABC. And then I have a, or, is Videotron or your network or your H and T or whoever. Cause they're providing you billions of channels, which is like we have now, if you go to at and T or Warner brothers or wherever, YouTube is one of those are providing a service to you, and then you have your YouTube channel is a channel like ABC. And it's a broadcaster. So look at TV broadcasting, how do they produce their stuff? Look at their model. How do they get sponsorships and stuff? It's like just taking what the real world is doing and putting it into here into the digital world and because of. I love making money. I look at online, it's super stupid, easy to make me money. There's 3 billion or 4 billion people online already. So you went from, the real world where you have a market cap of only like a million people, because it's only in your location, right? Max is a million, depending on where you are, you can have more or less, but I'm going to just use generically. You have about, like at least a hundred thousand people for your store product in your geographical location, you can't reach and making money, or you're competing against a lot of people. Whereas online, you have access to three to 4 billion people. So it's already been proven. All you need is a thousand people paying you $10 a month and you're set

oh it's cool. Because I like how you're tying this. I think we're going to start talking about your stock dirty to me podcast. You said something that I want to touch on. You said something about, over time, you have to invest over time. Otherwise, you can't build anything. It's not going to happen like right away. And I think one of the, a very popular saying you hear all the time is time in the market is more important than timing the market, right? You can't sit here and try to time the market, but the amount of time that you're in the market, the better return you're going to get or at least you're going to start compounding a lot more. Because over that time, your money just continues to grow and grow. When you look at the stock market, you look at the charts and you look at well, I just started investing yesterday and then the stock market drops, and I lost blah, blah. Okay. You don't lose nothing. You don't lose any money you lost value for now, right? Give it a couple of weeks, watch it go back up. It's going to because you always, these big drops and then you see it just builds right back up. But yeah. Yeah. Just go ahead and jump in on that.

All right. Yeah. So the amount of knowledge that I have in the stock market pre starting this podcast and show was buy low, sell high that's. But at the same time, I'm like, that's probably not the wisest information, that's not how Warren buffet made his money. And. And I'm really pissed at my dad. He just, before Marvel became big, right? Was bought out by Disney, all these drop movies. I went to my dad, I'm like, you should buy some Marvel. He's like, why Mike there's potential movies being made and it's worth your wild. He's and it was a cheap thing. And he's okay. So he put some money. And then the first iron man came out and I bounced up and he sold right away. And I'm like, what did you do? Maybe three years later, Disney announces they're buying it. And I'm like, look, you could have Disney's stock look at where it is. Why did you die? He's ah, that's not okay, whatever. So in my head, I'm like, okay, I guess I'm not very good at stocks, which was not true. So I started, I started my podcasting and through networking. I started talking with a buddy named Tony. I can't pronounce his last names. I'm horrible at last names, unless it's like a simple Smith, like if your name is Smith, I'll remember it for the rest of my day and I'll be able to pronounce it, but I can't pronounce last name to save my life. Even my, my own last name. I mess up all the time. So I met my boy, Tony, he's the he has his own podcast called the strockbro podcast where him and his brother talked about the stock market investing. He has a degree in economics. He's super smart. And he works for an aerospace company. Like my level was genius compared to his is but at the same time when it comes to podcasting, but I'm Albert Einstein and he's like annex ish. So I'm helping him out. So we, we started talking and he's you know what? I'm an admin to this group that only has 50,000 members. Like at the time, I think we're like 30,000. And I'm like, he's let me bring you in. Maybe you can help us with a stock show or something like that. I'm like, sure. I'll do what I can. So he brings me in, I meet Dault, I meet Johnny, who we refer to as our CEO of the group. He's rarely there, but he shows up every once in a while, like a CEO. But he started the group and grew it, and he brought us on each one of us on his admins to help out in different points. So I'm there, I'm like, yo, we have so much knowledge here. Like I'm in the group chat and they're dropping bombs on. I'm like, oh my God. So Dault a licensed advisor in Canada for S he runs his own management Corp for finances and that, so stocks, bonds, I don't know what he does. He's just really good with money. And then Johnny is a self-made investor and he's done really well and teaches investing and stuff. And Tony, is self like, like me in five years, like where I want to be in five years with my. ' cause he's doing great. He has his own course on the ABCs of investing because of his economics teaches all that. And so I talked to them, I'm like, you know what? We can do a weekly show where we talk about investing and get groups that the group's opinion. So they're like, yeah, let's test the water. So I test the water and some of the group posts like, yes, we would love it. Boom boom. So I put it into motion. I'm like, okay, I'll take care of this. And I start creating the show and we do our first live. It goes relatively. Okay. We get three or four people watching work. Oh my God. That's amazing. We do it again and we do it again. And then we slowly built up. We slowly get better. I create an intro for us. I create assets. We're building up, I'm doing this thing. We're growing. The show's evolving because we're not, we don't want to stay the same. We don't want to always be the same show. Cause it's like the groups that we were still doing one thing, we started things go up and then it just started declining doing the same thing and we change it and we started going up. So we're always trying to find what is our group want because they're evolving as well. They're not any more beginners. It could be intermediate. So we have to touch on the intermediate stuff as well as get the beginners in as well. And just make this thing that we got a nice core group. We got a good dozen or so. And I know you've been on the show a few times with a posting and we're going to get you on as a, to talk about your investing as well, about a different side of investing. And the knowledge you'll have, but like my knowledge in the stock market has gone up and I know it's you invest in what? If you don't know what Stockton. Thanks. So fractional shares, you can invest in whatever stock you want, like Google and Facebook and apple, which is super smart to invest in because they're fi they make money. They're making money. They made money for the last 20 years. They're smart money to invest in MasterCard visa. Those are smart investment as well, but if you're not sure what company to buy an ETF and an ETF is just a whole bunch of stocks in one company. And you just give them money to buy more stocks. That's what it, and it's like, they will pay you and don't go for these oh, I want this amazing thing that has all there's no screw that go into the ETFs that are the money-making ones, the ones that have been around for at least minimum of five years, my minimum criteria to invest in any company. And I don't invest in any company except for the bank that I worked for because I got shares from them, is they have to be around for a minimum of five years. If you can make it five years, I'm happy. I'm happy to invest my dollars into you. So that's what I generally do. And that's what I preach. I'm pre I'm. Like I don't give a damn about an IPO unless it's my own IPO. I don't care like that. Like this IPO is launching. Congratulations, go lose money because I've never seen an IPO stay at the same level it launchs.

I think that's really neat that, you, you grouped up with these guys. We partnered up with them to start a podcast that the stock dirty to me podcast, to talk about the stock market and just, and bring up these different topics for, others to learn from and just add value. Now you started this as a live event, right? Like you, you would go live in the Facebook group. And, w what's really cool about that as you're able to get like live Q and a, from the audience that was listening. And be able to really focus the show and shift it in a direction that brings value to them. And, in doing so while you're doing this, you're getting to talk about different things and ask questions and learn more, and you were able to learn how to better invest your money just from talking with other people that do it quite well. So I think that's a key thing. That's a key takeaway here is that, you don't have to always be the expert on something, but surround yourself with the people that are, and you even said it to like the, I forget his name. But you said the one guy that's five years, like basically where you want to be in five years, right? Tony, right? Yeah. So that's great. Like you can. Say, Hey that's my goal. That's where I want to be five years from now. And then when you get there and he's even further at that point, you can keep saying, that's where I want to be five years from now, and it's just cool. It's, it's one of the things that I like to talk about as well is put yourself in a room, surround yourself with the people that are doing better than you. And, it's always going to give you something to strive for and to keep, keep you motivated and keep pushing forward on that. Now we're running short on time because you and I can just chat it up all freaking day. But I do have another interview this afternoon. So knock out some of these questions that I ask everybody. And, so the first question I want to ask you on this part is, w what's the biggest mistake you've ever made?

not having, I'll deal with podcasts and fi for podcasts. I'm not having an ideal listener. When I first launched.

Okay, that's fair. And we touched on that a little earlier, and that is super important to find that ideal listener. Okay, cool. Awesome. Now, what tips or tricks would you recommend to somebody who's just getting started now? Let's say they want to start a podcast and they want to use it to grow their business right. And monetize it in the future. What would you recommend to somebody?

So if you want to, start your podcast regarding your business, first of all, niche down until it hurts niched out until it hurts and then niche down once more. So if you're a marketer. And you just do general marketing niche down to a specific goal. I'm going to deal with marketing for real estate agents in Detroit, who are in their first year of business. Be that niche down the, like you were saying, be the smartest. Don't be the smartest person in the room. Always surround yourself with smarter people, but in business, you want to be the biggest fish in the smallest pond, because if you're the biggest fish in the smallest pond, when you move to the next pond, you're still going to be, you're going to be still big and you just slowly keep moving and growing into each bigger pond. So you'll be the number one podcast for real estate agents regarding digital marketing in Detroit. If you're that you can call yourself that because there's probably no one else is specifically going after real estate agents in Detroit. And so you're the best and the worst. And I learned that from John Lee Dumas his book of a common path to uncommon success, he was. There was no one doing a daily entrepreneur podcast until he launched. He was both the worst and the best at the same time, because there was no one else. So he made his knee, she created his niche and that's the most important thing you create your niche, you become the leader in that niche, and everybody else is going to come after you. Other people are going to see you doing a podcast regarding for real estate agents in Detroit. So someone else is going to be like, I can do that. I know more knowledge, but they don't have enough time because they don't have they're running to catch up with. Then that's Usain bolt, right? They don't know that you built your network to get those followers who created that for all those people.

Built that audience and that

following. So once you get super small, then you can go, okay, from Detroit, cause your city, you can go, okay, I'm going to be Michigan now or the tri-state or whatever you want. And then now you're that. And now I'm in the Midwest. And now by the time you go to the Midwest, the number one real estate, you will be the number one in America for digital, for real estate agents, for digital marketing, teaching them, or just straight up digital marketing or straight up whatever you want. Cause you can evolve as you keep growing and you're growing your niche. You can grow into the, like you are now the number one digital marketing podcast for for whatever you want or whatever you need to be. So niche down, don't try and be get everybody because you're not. We can go on for hours, but niche down to the smallest small niche, because once you niche down to that small thing, you know exactly who your ideal listener is, and it's easier to go after them than find them and get them to listen to your podcast.

Absolutely love that. Love that. And it's also how you build that listener profile. You build that ideal listener because you've niched down and you figured out who your audience is and your audience knows you. It's more of a it's a lot more intimate that way. And it's, you get to build, it's almost like building a personal relationship with your audience member and then as you're growing, and like you said, moving into these bigger ponds, they're coming with you, they're following you into that pond. So that ponds is already starting to get pretty full. And then you can just keep taking your audience and moving it, to, to a wider spread.

So how a niche works with an ideal listeners your ideal listener, he's likes you or her likes you like their likes dislikes, you know what they're looking for in life and all that. You also know all their interests, right? But their interests, can you hit a lot of things? So someone else who likes, I'm a 35 year old, I'm a person. So I resonate with this ideal listener will do I resonate with all these other things I do not this, but that boom, whatever, it could be also other digital entrepreneurs are listening to my podcast cause they're like, I need, a marketer and this person sounds perfect because I resonate with this person. They're not my ideal listener, but they're in one of my circles of influence that my ideal listener is in. That's what it is. That's allows you to become a bigger fish in a bigger pond because you have.

You're never going to be perfect for everybody. We're going to be the person

it'd be perfect for one person. That's the only person you want to be. Perfect. That's your ideal listener profile. And I was listening to, jumping off. Okay. Printout, actually name your person, print out a picture of that person. Know that person intimate, your ideal listener created. What's really funny is Joe. Russell Brunson, I believe did this for his ideal customer. And he did a group and he asked certain questions and every single person was there. And one person actually looked like the person who. Ah, so that's how powerful it is. And these people were paying like close to a large, like 50 K to meet him. So like they're shelling out big bucks, but ask your next question and then to keep it rolling.

All right. Awesome, man. Okay. Do you have a favorite business related book or podcast.

So I'll give you two. I just found a Dan Kay. And if you don't know who Dan, Kennedy's this amazing direct marketer, direct sales marketer, or a direct marketer. So those really annoying brochures would get in the mail, spam, what we call spam, but it was like, junk mail. He created that in, he just marketing is a genius. So magnetic marketing by Dan Kennedy, it's being launched by Russell Brunson. Part of the no BS, network has stuff that Russell Brunson just bought. Dan Kennedy's complete. Archive and his business pretty much. But this podcast is amazing. It's teaching me so much about marketing and if you're a podcast or you need to know how to market. So by listening to marketing podcasts, you can start going, oh, I can try and use this, or I can try and do this. And it's free thing, a book I would read if you're an entrepreneur or a podcast, or even if you're an entrepreneur, but specifically more if you're a podcast. Cause this is, the guy who made it by podcasting, John Lee Dumas, his book, the uncommon six, the common path to oncoming uncommon success, amazing book, highly suggested. And, Russell Brunson slash Dan Kennedy's, magnetic marketing, and then stock dirty to me for, learning how to finance it. All

Right on. I love the shameless plug

all day, every day, but

speaking of shameless plugs, that's actually the last question I have for you. And this is the most important one of all. Yeah. So Phil, we've been talking about a variety of things cause you and I could just go on and on. There's usually happens. So for my listeners right now that are interested in doing something similar that wants to build a podcast and turn it into a business or just, starting somewhere from the ground up the same way that you did, where would they be able to find more information about you? Do you have a website and your different social media profiles that you could share with us today?

Yeah. I'll make things super easy. So on my Instagram, it's at podcaster Phil Better, very simple. P H I L B E T E R podcast or PO. P O D Caster, C a S T E R. So podcasts are Phil Better. Right now I'm doing at the time of recording, I'm doing 75 hard, but I usually try and put out a posts about different tips on making podcasts. And if you want to book a free, so I give away, I charge a hundred dollars an hour for my time for podcasting, I should charge more, but about a hundred dollars. I'm happy at that, but I give away, I purchased 15 minute blocks for people and all you have to do is visit my website. Feel better, Inc. And you get the, I will buy 15 minutes of my time and you can talk with me about your podcasts. You will walk away with an actionable action plan. You say, Phil, this is what I want to do. I will tell you exactly what you need to do and specific to you. I will show you where you can find someone who has done the exact same thing. This is what I do for people, because I want you to succeed. I don't believe in the starving artist concept. Money is being made on the internet and you can make it too. If you want to follow me for free go to add podcast or feel better on Instagram, if you want to, have 15 minutes bought for you, complimentary 15 minutes, come to my website, feel better, Inc com and I will be more than happy to give you so much value that you'll be like, God, he's so smart. I never thought it was possible to meet someone so smart.

Thank you for saying that about me. And I appreciate that, but, I do like the way you put that though. I just want to point that out that you will purchase 15 minutes of your time for somebody. Cause I do that as well. I free 15 minute intro consultations for my financial coaching or podcast coaching. But the way that you said that the way that you worded that was brilliant, that you will buy 15 minutes of your time, for them, which is super dope. I love that. I just had to point that out.

So I will tell you, I learned that from Dan Kennedy's podcast. That's awesome. Is he was talking with someone and he goes, yeah. He was talking about the value ladder or the sales funnel, which is important thing that podcasters need to know about. And business owners should know about is if you give something for free to someone, they may not like, oh yeah, you can get a free 15 minutes with me. Okay. Whatever, they don't see the value. I'm like, I charge a hundred dollars for my time. People pay me a hundred dollars an hour to teach them about podcasting. I will. So right there, you're showing like, look, I charge for my time. So like that a hundred, like that 15 minutes means there's value to it. It's I don't like $15. I don't know what, like whatever the conversion is, but I'll buy that time for you to teach you so that you can see that paying me a hundred dollars is going to be worth it. Because if I can give you something in 15 minutes, that's going to either grow your podcast or monetize your podcast. Imagine what I can do with an hour of your time. Yeah. If you pay me a hundred bucks to buy an hour of my time, I come on.

Yeah. Just, just imagine, amen. So fill this has been awesome, dude. Always a pleasure talking with you and just always chatting it up. So we've got some pretty cool things going on by the time this episode airs, we would've already started, one of these projects that Phil and I are collaborating on. We just started. Yeah, we are doing a podcast mastermind, right? Putting together a group of motivated podcasters, including some people who are just starting, that haven't even started their show yet. And we're going to teach them what we've done to grow and monetize our own shows. But at the same time, we're going to be able to learn from them as well because everybody that's part of this mastermind gets to participate and bring value. We're all gonna bring value to each other. And I'm really excited. I'm looking to grow with you Phil together and grow with everybody else that joins us on this mastermind journey. The first group is going to be very small and intimate because we want to make sure we really nail this down. And, after we knock this out, we might expand it a little more. We'll see how it goes. But I'm really excited to do this. And I'm excited for us to all just collaborate together and everybody get together and grow their shows. So it's going to be amazing. It's going to be on. But Phil again, man, this has been a pleasure dude, as always, really appreciate you taking the time to chat with me today and, until next time we'll to knock it out.

I can't wait for your brother. Thank you so much. And everybody just remember the number one thing you have to do is go over to Spotify. Find the podcast Average Joe finance, building your wealth, leave a five star review. That's what I want you to do.

Yeah. Cause you can do that now on Spotify that you can leave reviews now. So right on, appreciate that Phil. And go check out his shows as well. He's got six of them, but we were talking mostly about the Phil Better show in, Stock dirty to me and also the digital entrepreneur podcast. Go check those out. I was a guest on the digital entrepreneur podcast. He has a podcaster version of that and that's the one that I was a guest on it. It was a blast. And just like this, having this conversation was a blast and Aloha from Hawaii. We're out of here.