From Start‑Up Struggles to SaaS Success: Orion Daly’s GoHighLevel Journey & Vision

So, Orion, tell me a little bit more about what prompted you to start the GHL University.

Yeah, great question. It's— I believe in education. Education is the key to my success, right? Obviously coaching and learning from people. And when I observed it amongst our own SaaS clients having, empowering themselves to learn about GoHighLevel, implement the things that maybe they've been a bit shy to touch like AI and automations and websites. And to us it's easy, but to them it's quite difficult. And I've noticed this particularly my father. So my dad is a— he works with us in the Junior University. He's the one who designed the logo and the hat. Yeah. So we, at the start of my GoHighLevel marketing journey, like we He was very against this. He thought, go work a job, get a 9 to 5, and then a couple years later, maybe go start something like this. I was very against that. I said, no, dad, I'm going to start this. I found GoHighLevel. I'm going to learn it. I'm going to try and get clients. Took a year, but it took a year to get to $10K a month. But then after that, he just was like, okay, I will listen to you now. I'll listen to you. And for the last 2 years, we've been working together and We've been teaching him GoHighLevel and he's like, I can build a funnel now. I can build automations. I can make a video sales letter. All right, Dad. Okay, Dad. He's nearly 60, man. And it's very impressive what time, effort, and education can do to someone, whether they're completely fresh, new to all this stuff, or someone who's maybe had some experience in the marketing game but just want to learn a little bit more.

Yeah, sorry, I love that. I think, I think it's great that because like obviously the high-level founders have built the foundation and the building blocks, but people like you who are educating people on how to use the software are the ones who are bringing the best creativity out of the people who don't know much about the software, to people who might not even want to use the software but then getting excited and actually building cool stuff that actually is contributing to more revenue, more services done, more lives impacted. That's pretty cool to even hear that story that, you know, your dad who is in his 60s was excited about HighLevel, you know, indirectly and directly, you know, by working with you. That's a cool story. He's a good designer, by the way. That logo looks cool.

Yeah, he spent 20, 30 years in corporate, Colgate, Coca-Cola. Like, I'm lucky he even wanted to spend the time to work with me on this.

So yeah, I mean, what better way to spend time with your parents, right? Like, that's—

yeah, yeah, right. Yeah.

Yep. Let's, let's get to a different set of questions. Orion, talk us through the average tools you're using on a daily basis. Like, what kind of tools you're using to manage your productivity, your personal self. What's your tool stack look like right now?

A lot of coffee. Does that count? I'm messing with you. Yeah, yeah. No, it's Slack, of course. Slack is the hub of all our communication. We use Google Calendars, email, Zoom, GoHighLevel, obviously, maybe some fancier softwares that people don't know much about. Kixie is one that I spend a lot of time in. So it's a power dialer system that we use. We're pretty good at setting appointments. We've got about 8 commission-based appointment setters. So they work a lot over the week to try and set as many appointments for our sales team. Any other cool stuff that we use? There's a whole host of other stuff. I don't want to bore you guys.

It is a little, yeah, the little secret SaaS list you have. Okay, sure. So walk us through, walk us through your average day. If you have to break your day down for people who are listening and kind of show the path you're following, the pattern, what would that look like?

I'm very fortunate. We're, you know, I know many people who don't get the same time freedom that I get. I have my mornings to myself. I typically work at 9, you know, 9 to 5 is my Well, 9 to 9 is my normal working hours. In the mornings, I tend to go to the gym or do calls with my dad because he's based in Hong Kong. So 9 AM my time in the UK is 5 PM his time. So we get to chat, hang out there, talk about design work. And then I do start a day meetings with my team from 1 o'clock all the way down till 8 meetings. And previously, I used to take a lot of my calls, sales calls myself, but then we hire sales reps and appointment setters, and now it's just about managing the system.

Pretty cool. Okay, awesome. If you could go back, when you're fairly young just like me, if you could go back and talk to the 20-year-old yourself, right, who's probably still in the grad school, you know, excited about the future, what would be the number one suggestion or advice you would give yourself?

Yeah, I wasn't that excited. I was, I was, uh, I was in a tough spot, man. It was, um, throughout my first year, you know, trying to get to $10K per month. I was on government benefits. I was on student loans. My family, I love my family. They helped me with rent and bills and stuff like that whilst I was at school. But I, it was a huge year, a transformative year because I had enough of life telling me how to live. So I got rejected from medical school 2 years in a row. When you're spending a whole year waiting for 3 emails from medical schools, you know, it's just like— and then they say, oh, you're not good enough. So, oh really? Like, I think I'm, I think I'm pretty cool. Like, I think I can contribute to the world. Maybe, maybe this isn't the right fit for me. And maybe, you know, the society, world, whatever, work— maybe they're not the right person to tell you how good you are. Maybe you just got to prove it yourself. So I did. I picked up the phone, I dialed a bunch of people, I tried to set appointments. It was very painful at the start. I have a whiteboard, I'll show it to you. Actually, I don't know if guys listening to this, you won't be able to see it, but I'll get the script.

Sure.

Started up. So I used to be a personal trainer as well whilst I was between my bachelor's and master's. And I was like, I'm buff, I work out, no one can hurt me. And then I thought, why don't I actually try and learn how to fight? So I started doing Muay Thai and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, and I wrote this down. I don't know if you can read it. What's it say, Nick? What's it say?

If you can get punched in the face— your camera is a little blurred because of the recording.

I got it. So it says, if you can get punched in the face and get back up, you can do cold outreach and get back up.

That's a real one right there. Yeah, that's a good one.

But it is, it's like it feels the same, but one is actually getting punched in the face and the other one is, uh, you know, taking a call and they say no, they don't want to work with you. So what? You can get back up.

I love, I love that perspective. I mean, in the end, right, like I look at the world as like very, like it's very objective, but I like to look at it a binary. Like you have your time, okay, you're anxious, you could chill by watching Netflix, or you could use the same time dial 100 people. 70 won't pick up, 30 will pick up, 10 will say F you, 20 will be probably not interested, 3 might say yes. So you wasted 3 hours of your time by watching Netflix, or you at least got 3 people to book appointment for the next day to buy something, right? Like, which one is a better use of time, right? Like, that just analysis gave me like courage to say, okay, I don't want to be old and regret how I lived my life for somebody else. I just want to take the biggest risk possible. Right. That's a wonderful quote, which kind of took me through this tangent. But yeah, that's pretty cool. So can you walk us through your biggest achievements and any big goals you have?

I proposed to my girlfriend of 5 years. That was a big achievement for me personally. She was the first one who believed in me. She was the— when I ran out of money in my first year of trying to make $10K per month, She was the one who helped me buy a course. She's my 50/50 business partner as well. So I took a lot of inspiration from Alex Hormozi. Alex Hormozi does all the marketing and sales, and Leila Hormozi does the rest. So we have the same relationship. I do sales and marketing, she does the rest. And I wouldn't be able to be where I am without her. That's probably my greatest— That's very cool.

Makes sense. What's a big goal you have in the next few years for yourselves?

We want to build the actual GHO University. So we want to build a school in Kenya.

That sounds really cool. Like a real physical school. That sounds exciting. Yeah, more power to you.

Thank you. My fiancée, so my fiancée, she is ethnically Indian, but she's got family in Kenya. So we're getting married in Kenya in September, and, uh, you know, she's got connections and family there that already have charities. And by 2026, maybe this time next year, we'll have a, an actual GHOU.

That's pretty cool. Congratulations on getting married this year. That's—

yeah, thank you.

Yeah, yeah, congratulations and starting a new life. That's pretty cool. If you have to go back and be like, Nick, this is one mistake I've made, don't make this, right? Like, if you have to share that one big mistake, what would that be?

I think, I think it is commitment and focus. I spread myself too thin at times trying to do a lot of things. As entrepreneurs, we get very shiny object syndrome, right? So you want to try this new software, or you want to learn to go HighLevel, or you want to buy this course or this coach or this mentor. Or you want to do SaaS, or you want to do done-for-you, or you're going to do coaching. Like, there's all these options, and there's all these people you should listen to. There's all these opportunities, right, that they sell you on so that you buy their course. I think when I started focusing and thinking for myself and having my own opinion— shocking, right? I know. Oh, critical thinking. But it was so easy back then. You can just watch, you listen to your family and they tell you what to do and you just do it. You listen to your boss or your job, you just follow what they tell you to do. You listen to what's on the news or on YouTube, you just mimic the same thing and all of a sudden it becomes an echo chamber depending on the community that you're in. So focus, thinking for yourself, probably the two biggest things I wish I could tell myself or tell you back a couple of years ago.

Yeah, that's it. That's a big one, actually. Thank you so much for sharing that. Somebody's listening to this part, Orion, and they want to be like, yeah, this guy is cool, I want to do some business. Or maybe they want to learn something from you, they want to join your GHL University and whatnot. What's the best place for them to find and connect you?

I'm on Facebook. My name is Orion Daly, so O-R-I-E-N-D-A-L-Y. Search me up. I'm on YouTube. Not a— not as big of a YouTube channel as you, Nick, but, uh, I'm on Facebook, I'm on Instagram, you can find me. So, and I'm in the, the group on HighLevel as well.

So, okay, awesome, awesome. Any last words to the audience who are listening till the end to conclude the podcast?

Yeah, I think my, my last bit of advice for this whole go HighLevel game is to believe that it's possible. A lot of the clients I work with They're very smart people, but they just, they lose hope and they want things fast and now and quick. Things take time, right? I, I said to myself when I got rejected from med school, just because I got rejected doesn't mean I'm not going to spend the next 5 years working like as if I'm in medical school. So if I have to do 12-hour shifts, if I have to work weekends, if I have to do late nights, right? Last night Yesterday was like 12 hours of meetings. Great.

Whoa.

I love that. I will do it because that's what it takes.

You sound so much like Karamozi. That's, that's pretty cool. He had a big influence on you. Sounds like that's pretty cool. I think as long as it's a positive influence, that's a good influence in my opinion. So yeah, I love that. Thank you so much, Orion, for jumping on and sharing us your wisdom from building a SaaS and the GHL University. And appreciate you giving some great advice. Guys, hopefully you enjoyed the podcast for today, and now you have the little playbook on how you could actually do marketing with no ad spend, which is literally cold call. He gave you this script, and you know how to convert them into high-paying clients already. We kind of talked about that and different offers you could promote and retain them by creating education and coaching aspect to your software. You're not just positioning the software as a software because there's 100,000 people selling the same thing. So you make sure to, you know, add your own flavor to it and, you know, show it differently and position position it differently when you're selling it. And that being said, consider subscribing to the Nikhil Sai Show and share this with any of the friends you know who might be in the HighLevel community. And I'll be back with another amazing guest just like Orion today. Thanks, Orion, once again.

Appreciate you, man. Thank you so much for listening.

Thanks, guys. Bye-bye. Bye.