Episode #568 - Advantages Of Running An Online Business with Ari Meisel

Welcome to this edition of the million dollar Mastermind podcast. This is where we pick the brains of high achievers from all walks of life and get their hard earned real world insights on winning. I'm your host, Larry Wydell.

The 24 hours of the day. It's great to work hard. You got to work hard. But past a certain point, if you're the fastest durable on the treadmill, chances are you're not going to be the longest living durbal on the treadmill. You know what I'm saying?

I like that at Wharton they used to say, like, you don't have to outswim the shark, you just have to outswim your other classmates.

Right? Yeah. And I used to, you know, in training our teams to go into recruiting, training, building, opening offices. It's like, you know, with the 24 hours in the day, most people are. They fall into these rocking chair activities. And I said, the trouble with the rock, you know, it's kind of like, sell, make a sale, spend the money, make a sale, spend the money, make a sale. And then you have a contest. It's like, make a sale. Be spin, make, spin, make, spin, make, spin, make. You're. You're. I said, right? Rocking chair activities give you something to do, but they never take you anywhere. And the idea is, if you're always on this frantic gerbil treadmill, you don't get a chance to think. And I bet when you got shut down, you really evaluated your life and came out of that tunnel with a whole different approach. Would that be fair?

That would be fair.

And it wasn't just build, you know, how many more house, how many more buildings can I restore and build? It's just like, what kind of life can I have? And so how did you evolve and move on the idea to Execution? Because that's really how you get learning how to execute, learning what the priorities are and pinpointing spending your energy on, you know, focused activity. The activity to give you the results you want has everything to do with being able to have less doing. So is that where that book came from? Idea to Execution?

No, Idea to Execution was the. Was the story of the virtual assistant company that we built and sort of what that. Because it was pretty incredible. I mean, we started it overnight with no funding and grew to a million dollars like it was. It grew. It was profitable from day one. There's a lot of things about it that just sort of didn't make sense, but in a lot of ways did because we were using smart.

Why were you what sold you when you heard it to where, boom, you're in. And what were the keys that made it effective that quick?

So, I mean, I. So I had been, I had become a voice in the sort of virtual assistant space at that point already because I just had done so much with it. I'd written so much. There were a lot of companies that I'd worked with, so many different companies at that point. So I knew a lot about the business and the company that went out of business. It was a very sudden thing. I had worked with them, I mean, I'd interacted with them and it's a long convoluted story about them. But basically it was like everything was fine on Sunday and then Monday morning the CEO just shut down the company without any knowledge or awareness. So what happened was I had a whole bunch of clients who had been using the company and I was getting emails all day like, oh my God, what we do? What we do? And I actually had virtual assistants who knew me, contacting me, looking for work. So I was kind of playing matchmaker all day. And then I had dinner with my friend and we were talking about it. He was like, why don't you just start your own virtual assistant company? And I remember my wife was pregnant with our fourth child. So I was like, oh. I was like, we got the baby coming. Things are good with less doing. And you know, I don't know. And he was like, well, what if we do it together? I was like, okay, fine. But we got to do it quickly because I'm going on vacation this weekend with the family. So we had two days basically to start the company. And we did, we actually did it. To me, it was like, this is bullshit. It'll happen or maybe it won't. It's fun. And basically we started the company. We had, I think we had eight assistants within a couple months and like maybe 20 clients. And then we went. I spoke in an event in Arizona that I had spoken at before and it was a very high level event and they asked me to do a workshop on outsourcing. So I gave a half day workshop and I talked about the company and 60 people signed up that day. Yeah, so it's like. And they were, these were like, these were important people, let's just say. So it's like, oh, wow, okay, we got a real business now. I remember like we were flying back, my partner and I, and we had the wifi on the plane and stuff. So it was like he was charging the car like every 10 minutes. It was Pretty amazing. And we were off to the races. And so then like, we started hiring like crazy and growing really fast. But the secrets, you know, the tips kind of a thing, one of them is that we were using all this off the shelf free software. We were automating. The majority of the work that was being done weren't manually tracking people's times. We weren't manually billing credit cards, you know, so. And my, my job, really my focus was people. So I was the one dealing with the team and the clients and my partner was the one doing all the tech stuff and the behind the scenes and the logistics and I don't know, it just worked really well. We were hiring some really amazing people and giving them a lot of freedom to do what they want. Oh, and that was also. We created a system where it was basically a marketplace so a client would put a task in and any assistant who saw it could grab it and do it. Yeah, that's diversity skills. And also no limited bandwidth.

Yeah. And how quick or how far after that did you come to the replaceable founder idea that became a book?

So it's funny, it was actually, we had a. So we had a retreat for the company after the first year. We had like 50 people at this, this farm in upstate New York, I think it was. And it was, it was very emotional in a way. Like, we had, we had a great team. We had a lot of like stay at home moms working for us. We had some, some disabled veterans. Like, we just had people who had felt like they couldn't find a job that was meaningful and interesting for them and now had. And it was really having a great impact. So it was like a very soulful kind of an event. And at the sort of final hour, I gave this talk to the group and I basically, I was like, look, this company has become something bigger than me, bigger than us, and it should continue to be that way. I said, I am replaceable. And I think it's the greatest gift that I could give you guys is that I am replaceable. Now. I didn't realize that. I don't know, six months later I would leave the company, which was, a lot of people took that very hard, very badly. But it worked out quite well in the end. And it's true. It's like I had to make myself more placeable. My partner was single and I think he still is single and didn't have any kids. I had growing family and things. Like, I had other obligations. I didn't want to be working hard or full time. Rather so I had to make myself more advisable.

And then.

And then. And so then once I relaunched my offerings with less doing and the coaching consulting, I knew that I needed to do another book. And we were trying to create this framework and this methodology that was not based on me and whatever. And so Replaceable Founder became the one.

Now, as you. Which is the book that had. You said, it's your next book where you said you sit on your last 47 or something. Boxer messages. And is that the book or is it the next one that's going to come out?

No, it's the last one actually that came out already, which is called On Productivity.

I don't have that here, so that's good. No, on Productivity, yes.

So I don't know if you. There's. There's two really amazing old psychology books. One is called On Killing and it's a really interesting sort of treaties from the 80s, I think, or 70s about basically how the armed services are able to take a normal person and turn them into a killer, essentially. But it's. It's just a. It's sort of like this film of how that happened. So anyway, not the same killing. It's called On Killing. So this is On Productivity. This is supposed to be like the word, my final word. But I don't want to or plan to write any more books on productivity because you said half a dozen. This is actually the 12th book.

Oh, really? 12.

Yeah. So that's the one that was all voxer messages back and forth.

What is your experience for people who. You know, the whole thing. Everybody wants to write a book. You're writing a book can be a big positive. You kept on writing. How did you keep on writing? How has that informed your life as it is today and your outlook on the world?

So, yeah, I feel that content production, content, creating content is like the greatest thing in my. I love it. And the truth of the matter is, is that I expose myself to so many experiences on a regular basis that there's always something that comes up that I think that I can apply to business somehow. And what I'm, you know, what I'm referring to is I do the EMS work. I do a lot of woodworking, which is the hobby I picked up in the pandemic and now has become way more than a hobby. I have. My wife is pregnant with our fifth child right now, by the way.

Congratulations.

Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. And you know, I'm very involved with my kids. They do taekwondo. I also do taekwondo with them. And I compete with them. So I'm actually, I was the, I placed first in the last competition for sparring, like. So I just have a very diverse array of interests and all the different groups that I work with expose me to a lot of stuff. Some of the EMS work that I do is in Trenton, New Jersey, which for people who are not familiar, Trenton is the capital of New Jersey and is essentially a war zone. I don't know how a better way to describe it. It's, it's very, very, very bad. There's a lot of drugs, a lot of gang activity. I wear a bulletproof vest when I do work there. And you know, I mean, I meet people in very bad situations who are in the worst situation of their entire life.

Well, there's a lot of those areas there in Jersey and Pennsylvania. My, my grandfather lived in Camden, my father grew up in Camden. It's, it's gone and it's got way down. It wasn't great when they were there, but it's got way down since then. So there's good people in all those areas too, you know. And so I'm sure you get, I'm sure it's rewarding going in there and taking that risk. So the taekwondo, that's a good use of your time too because it gives you some defense against your own kids. Because I'm sure they're going to get bigger and better as we go and more rebellious. So imagine it is kind of a self defense protection mechanism knowing that dad was first in this last competition. There's a lot.

I also, I boxed for 15 years, so I'm like, I have to keep up with something.

Well, congratulations, Ari. Fantastic content. How can people reach you and how do you want them to reach you? You don't have the podcast anymore, so what are you using for reach other than Voxer for your clients, if people.

Want to find services. So I made a website, voxwithare.com so anybody is welcome to go watch that one minute and a half video or so and you can reach out to me on Voxer and ask me any questions you want. And that's, I mean that it's an open invitation and it will be me answering you, not a virtual assistant, not an automation. And that's, that's the best place if you, if people want to find out more about books and the courses and stuff they can go to less doing.

Yeah. So it is Vox with Ari. That's what it is.

Pretty cool.

Congratulations on all you've accomplished. I tell you, I'm so proud of you and what you're doing. And so grateful that in the country where we hear about so much bad, you know, you got people with the fighting spirit like yourself who goes out there and accomplishes so much good and impacts so many others. And there's a ripple effect, Ari. So stay strong, man. Stay strong. Take care of yourself.

Thank you very much.

Trust between me and you. Trust your darn instincts. Don't let anybody talk you off track, okay?

How long was that?

Call me anytime. Let's stay in touch. Thanks so much. I appreciate it, man.

Thank you.

Thank you for your time. Goodbye.

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