Episode 251: Shawn Anthony: Mastering the Art of Podcasting and Entrepreneurship

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. This is your host, Stacy Lauren. All right, guys. Well, I have a treat in store for you because I recently was introduced to my next guest and I am so excited to share him with you because so many people have been asking me how can they actually keep up with the production of their podcast. And while for some people, especially when you're starting out, I recommend you do no editing. You just quickly publish, get yourself going. By the time you get to 30, 40 episodes, there might be a moment when you say, okay, I've done this and now I'm ready for my next step. And that's what my next guest does. He helps people get to the next step and then be able to exponentially expand what they're doing because he does it for you. So I'm really excited to introduce you to Sean Anthony. Hey, Sean.

Hey, Stacey List. I'm excited to be here with you, your community. I mean, you're 200 plus episodes strong. So excited to pour into the audience today.

Yeah, it's so great. I love meeting people, especially in the podcasting space because I recently helped people start podcasts, hundreds of podcasts, and it was such a rewarding experience to be able to get what's in someone's heart out into the world. And I feel like you have that same level of desire, right, since you're doing what you're doing.

Absolutely. Podcasting for me changed my life. Right. And I think it's important if you're listening to understand what you could be doing by just using your voice. I mean, just two years ago, I was a brand manager at corporate companies like Macy's, Target, and Belk. And now I'm with you. And I've been a podcaster because I've turned my podcasting into a six figure size. So excited to be here and excited to give away all the game on how others can do it.

I'd love you to share just about you. How did you get here? What's your story?

Yeah, I started off as a teenage entrepreneur. At 14 years old, my brother went off to college and I went to a couple of his homecomings. So he went to North Carolina, Auntie. And so at 14, he became a big nightlife party promoter. So I was in the club, Stacy. I was in the club standing on couches with artists like Rick, Ross, Young, Jeezy. But what I did was I understood, hey, there's a lot happening right now. There's marketing, there's things being done to get people to come out. There's things being done to create a buzz. And I took that Skill set at 14 years old and I threw a graduation party at my high school in Rocky Mountain, North Carolina. So imagine a 14 year old trying to throw a party for 18 year olds. Well, I did it and I made over $6,000. And so this created this marketing genius inside of me that really wanted to go to college, but not for the education. I wanted to go get the money. I was chasing the money. And I graduated from Wisconsin State University, became a big nightlife party promoter, which led for me asking myself a question I think everybody listening to this has asked themselves. And that is schools over now. Right. And I created a podcast that changed my Life back in 2018, which later on got me to creating Pod Pro Max.

Amazing. I love that you got the spirit at such a young age and not only just did what a lot of people might do and have these dreams and these goals, you actually took action. I was curious. So how did you do? How did you actually pull the trigger? And just even talking about that first party that you threw.

Yeah, I mean, for me, I've always been an observer, but always realized, hey, there's something that I could be doing to add something to this world. Right. Whether it's value entertainment, whether it is making somebody laugh. And at 14, I knew I wanted to become my own man. I didn't want to be just someone as a little brother. Right. He imagined that. So I went to a college that was not in North Carolina, went to a college that was 30 minutes away, Winston State University, because I wanted to do just that. But I also paid attention to how everybody lit up. Right. Whenever I, you know, I put things together and I said, okay, I can do this. I should be someone that can really make things happen. If you're listening to this right now, you probably have an itch or a feeling. Now, usually that itch and that feeling happens in those teenage years. And sometimes we forget things that we've created that might be the key identicator to where our passions may lie. So as you're listening and thinking about, okay, what was I doing at a young age, it's a high chance you could be doing that right now as an adult.

So for someone listening and they have the itch and fear is stopping them, what would you say to them?

Yeah, I would say you need to get around a new circle of friends. A lot of people right now are around the wrong people and they're seeing the wrong things. I come From Rocky Mount, North Carolina, where eight out of 10, black men are either dead or in jail. But you're talking to the 20%. That's neither one of those things. And I have a track record of what I've done with my life, and I'm able to show it. But if you're listening right now, you have something uniquely different inside of you that needs to be given and needs to be poured out. And I think you have to get around a new set of people. And if you can't get on a train, get on a flight, join your local community thing or event that's happening, you have to see something and put something new in your system to know that there's a possibility.

I love that you said that. I've been actually talking about this a lot because one of the pieces in the do the Thing formula is my people. And basically my people is what you're saying. Right. It's being around people that are doing the same thing as you, that want the same thing, because that's where you get the opportunity to grow. And to me, that is such a high reason why you're able to get into momentum is because you're seeing it constantly. People around you, some that are maybe further down than you, some that are further ahead, but because they're not 5 million steps ahead, they might be just 5 steps ahead. It's almost easier for you to realize that it's possible.

I would 100% agree with that. Right. And I think even when it comes from content creation, I think a lot of us say, okay, I don't want to be the person creating the content. And I think a lot of times what we have to do is we have to reverse engineer, realize, okay, who was I at that specific time in my life? What did I need to hear at that specific time? And just talk to that person. And that person is usually just a younger version of you.

Okay, so let's go back to. You just graduated, you said, now what? And you started the podcast. Was that what happened then?

Yeah. So I graduated from college, and. Right. Right when I graduated from college, I tried to throw parties, at least for like, two more years, and it was successful. But I realized, I looked around me, I'm like, all right, I can't keep doing this rap, right? So I later on was promoted, and I was with Macy's. I was promoted six times in four years. So, Stacy, I took a job that took me, right, about six hours away from my family. So I would drive from North Carolina to Virginia, Virginia back for six months. And that's when I stumbled across podcasting. I started listening to guys like Ed Millette, Chris Pav, a lot of different people. I just kept listening to the information, and I say those names respectfully, Edlin Carmichael, they've all been on my show. But I realized something really quickly is that they didn't look like me, they didn't sound like me. There was an audience that I could reach that they could never reach. And that's probably a lot of your listeners right now. Someone's going to cut the neck with you more than anybody else you can imagine. You just got to put yourself out there. And that's when I created Schools over now what? And it was game on ever since then.

Yeah. And I think that's so true. Especially and I'm thinking, school as you grow. It's like, okay, I did all this. Now what am I supposed to do? I followed this prescribed path, right. And I did what everyone said I was supposed to do, and now what's next for me? And I love that you were able to explore that. So did the podcast help you almost rediscover who you were and what you wanted at this point?

Oh, it was the ultimate cheat code. When I think about Schools over now, what it was created because I felt guilty that here I was living an amazing life, understanding that, all right, I've taken a skill set I had in college, went corporate, amazing salary, and compared to my friends, they didn't know what to do next in life. So I said, okay, I'm not gonna be the guy. And I realized this really quickly. When you're really, really young and you're trying to tell other people what to do, and they're older than you, you haven't had a lot of time and a lot of wisdom and a lot of backing and understanding it. So with schools that we're now with a podcast, when I created it, I knew places like LinkedIn and all those other places, they would not understand or accept it coming from a person who's fresh out of college. Right. So the key there was to bring people that were leaps ahead of me, right. To sit down, that would understand the mission and want to pour into the audience to help them figure out what to do next in life. Because, remember, I had a guilty. You know, I had a guilty conscience of, like, I'm winning and none of my friends are right. So schools that were now what was to help everybody. And I think that was the key game changer for a lot of people.

It's so true. And then the idea of the podcast being this tool to even explore these topics more. Right. And not needing to worry about where the person was. You're actually learning from each person too on top of that.

Oh, absolutely. It's like pulling them into your living room, right? Literally pulling them into your living room and asking them questions that can help not only you, but can help so many other people.

Can you explain? Because I say this a lot with do the thing I feel like by bringing so many people on and you mentioned I've over 200 episodes, right. By getting to interview that many people and starting to notice all these patterns. And I feel like I've gotten 10 PhDs by now just because of the knowledge that I've learned just from bringing people in. Can you explain that part of it? Because I'm imagining you've had a similar experience.

Oh, without a doubt. I think bringing on people to talk about topics that you typically would take you hours to learn or even years to learn with YouTube research or course mind or going to webinars or going to conferences as the ultimate cheat code and hack to excel in your life, but also understanding what's important in life. Some of the most successful people I've spoken to what true success looks like to them might not be what we may have seen or thought was true success by scrolling through social media, right? That success might be establishing family. That success might be establishing legacy, a generational wealth. That success might be a lesson that they learned right in those hard times so that you as the host never have to go down that route.

So did you end up monetizing that podcast or did you use it for oh wow, that's great.

So schools are now what. And became a six figure side hustle within a year. And so here's the thing. You launched the show in 2018 and 2019 became a six figure side hustle. I was actually very close at some point. Not became a full time entrepreneur. Back In August of 2021, I was already exceeding my corporate brand manager salary. Then I started to understand taxes, I started to understand life, right? And look at my phase of life, right? Sold out of college, he gets married, starts having kids. So now when I realized, oh, I want to quit my job, I realized by even doing an interview with somebody that you have to have two years of tax records before you can make monumental purchases like homes and things like that. So now knowing this information, you know, having this information in my toolbox, one of my thought processes was, okay, I'm a utilize this amazing grand manager salary, get all the things I want while I have this side hustle and then make this side hustle my main hustle after having those tax records. And that's what I did.

So what was your way of monetizing?

Yes, great question. So here's the thing. When you start something new, right? When you start something new and nobody understands it, I want to take your audience right now on a time machine. In 2018, if you said the word podcast, they might not know what the app was in 2018, they might not have stumbled across it. I stumbled across the app by clicking that weird purple button at a Dunkin Donuts while driving from North Carolina to Virginia. Right. Because I was almost about to fall asleep. Right. So shout out to the ducky donuts and espresso. But what happens is when you start something new and nobody understands it, after a while, if you're really consistent at what that is and really good at it, people will start asking, how do you do that? So we created ebooks, we created courses, I started to do consultations and sitting down with people. And that's what led it to be a six figure side hustle. And then in the long run, what also was, I started interviewing so many successful people, they became clients.

So you're saying by you interviewing people that were successful that they would want to work with you after the podcast?

Absolutely, 100%. When you're working on something and you created a track record and you're being very consistent with it, that happens. Then it becomes, you know, for us schools that are now, what led to us creating Pot Pro Max.

Okay, good, I want to go there next. So you created Pod Pro Max and you mentioned it a little bit before we started recording and I'm like, oh my gosh, this sounds incredible. So we would love to have you share it.

Yeah, absolutely. Listen, PowerPro Max was created because I said, okay, what gives a potential podcaster the biggest advantage they ever have, but also can see red flags, pitfalls, all the things that could go wrong before you start, because you gotta think about it, think about 90% of podcasts don't make it past the 20th episode. People always say, oh, I wanna be in the top whatever percent, but you just gotta be consistent and then continue to put on a good show and you eventually will get to that particular point. But Power Pro Max was created because I thought about from all the years of consulting and I had very high dollar consultation packages from consulting, from all the years spending of teaching from on stages, and I spoke at a lot of conferences, I've been on a lot of articles all the years spent selling ebooks, how do I create it where it comes seamless? So with popromax, we make podcasting easy. And so in the moment you sign up, we have the ability to edit all of your video, edit all of your audio, put it on all of your audio channels, your hosting site. We also have the ability to create your social media content. And all you have to do is be the talent and just press, record and give it back to us. And that has been an amazing, amazing feature. But then there's also a third element of it I like to call ultimate. When we look at Power Pro Max, where now we represent a client's, we placed them on podcast. Not only replacement on podcasts, we also bring guests to their show. Right. So we've also been around launching a lot of successful shows and bringing high caliber guests to them, as well as looking for speaking opportunities.

Yeah, And a lot of people they asked me about because right now I'm working on, it's an audience accelerator program which helps people basically grow their audience. But not just from a numbers standpoint, it's from an engagement standpoint. And podcasting is one of the biggest levers in that. Right. Not just having your own podcast, but guesting on podcasts. Because I don't think people realize the power. I mean, there's some people that realize that are doing it, but the people that don't, they don't realize the power of being able to share your audience with someone else. But it's not just about doing this interview. Right. It's what happens after the interview by being able to repurpose that content onto all these different ways like what you're saying. And I think there's so much power to what you're doing because you're basically expanding on this one hour that we get to spend together and you're turning it into all these different other things that someone can live on with.

Absolutely. And I think that piece, that micro content creation piece is a big upside. Right. Imagine sitting down with someone having a very good conversation like we're having right now. And now you have what, three to maybe five pieces of content that you can post on social that could lead to people understanding or discovering you, your show, your business and what you have to offer. I think that's a huge upside into that. And one thing I've seen from representing talent to speak even stronger to your point on the back end, the financial backend, the ROI backend of what I've seen for working with talent and placing them on shows and Affiliate partnerships. The numbers are astronomical, right? I think once you identify the importance of that, it beats mainstream media, it beats things that were maybe working five years ago, and it takes it to a whole different level.

I love that. Because when you're doing something and you could get multiplied effort or multiplied results from it, why not do that? Because then when you can save time, then that's everything.

Absolutely.

So do you also help people with the monetization piece as well?

Yes, absolutely. So good thing about Power Promax. I'm so glad you brought that up. The one thing that I thought about, all right, if we're having. We have the ability to edit a show, publish a show, right? We have the ability to create social media content. You still need to have guidance. You still need to have it, right? And I thought about this from, from a price point standpoint, how do we, you know, implement that? Right? So I have people who paid me thousands of dollars for consultations, but I wanted to create Power Promax where it was affordable and made sense, but it also gave you guidance. So with Power Max, you get a one hour coaching consultation each and every single month, where we sit down and we look at your show, we look at what's working, we look at what's not working, we come up with different ideas and ways for you to monetize. I talk a lot about 12 different ways to monetize a lot, right? And that could be from affiliate deals, it could be from speaking opportunities, it could be from course creations, it could be from a lot of different things that you may be overlooking. But then it becomes, okay, well, how do you get this to your audience? Well, there's three different ad slots, right? When you, when you think about as a podcaster, how can you convert or make money? I'm telling you how, right? The very first way is you need your audience to understand that you have a lead magnet of some sort so that you can take them on a journey. So you will offer that lead magnet, typically in the beginning of your show, right? So if you're listening to schools over now, what. We recognize that a lot of people wanted to start podcasts after being listeners of this show. And so we created where you listen to the show, we have a free ebook where it's a starter kit for podcasting. But if you're trying to sell something, if you're interviewing somebody, the next important part for your ad is probably in the middle. So this is where you can either take your audience on a break, you can either insert your own infra commercial, and then the last spot, which is the least when you look at ads, advertising and selling will be at the very end. The outro ad will be in the very answer. That's three different ways where you can do this. And the way that we were able to turn schools over now into a six figure side hustle is we became our own info commercial. Right? So when you're starting a show, you might not have Colgate and Nike and all these guys sponsoring what you're doing. So what do you have as the creator of the show that you can put in front of your audience? You need to do it today.

What do you think about people growing their podcast when they say they want to grow it? Do you have suggestions for that too?

Yes, I think there's different dynamics of understanding growth and how to do it. So I'll give you a couple ways of how I will think about it. Right. Let's say you have a podcast. Your podcast is around cooking recipes and let's say, let's even go more niche. Let's say it's around cooking recipes or cooking recipes that you learned from grandma, right? You can get on the Internet right now and you could find maybe 10 to maybe 20 high caliber grandmas who cook for a living or have cooked a lot of different meals and have them on your show or have, you know, a decent audience. You could call someone, collaborate, invite, collaborate. Having to accept that collaboration to help cross promote your show and what you had to offer, you have to dive deep into your niche to show other people that you exist. Right. Another way behind that is let's say you're, you're about to do an interview, right? And I'm just saying, let's say Stacy's like, hey, you know What? Sean has 45,000 followers on Instagram. I want to kind of let his audience know that I have a show coming up with him. Right? You can probably go over the last maybe 10 social media posts and look through the comments and send them a DM to share. Hey, look, I know you follow Sean. I want to let you know he was just as on do the Thing podcast. You would not believe we just shared with the audience. Here's a link. So these are ways you can really grow your show and kind of be intentional. And obviously there's things that are more common these days, but maybe not done correctly and it could be merch, all those different type of ideas.

I love going to the person's Instagram and then messaging over because you're giving them value, because they're giving them Another resource to be able to follow the person they already like. And then you're exposing your podcast to.

Them too, a hundred percent. So a lot like when schools that were now very first started. I don't want to skip past this part. It's known for high caliber guests and it started in episode seven. I sat down with Ryan Sirhan from New York, Million dollar listing, and I got him on the show early. And he had a new book that he was releasing. His first time being an author. Right. And so when Ryan did this podcast interview, he also was on a vlog. His vlog on YouTube was becoming bigger than the show. So as he's doing the vlog and it's still on YouTube to this day, you can hear my voice. And you can. And this is 2018. Hear my voice. You can see what he's saying. And people were commenting, Stacey, they said, hey, look, who is he giving all this information to? So we left a comment on his page. Ryan pins the actual comment. We wake up the next day and it has over 75,000 downloads.

Oh my gosh.

Talk about out of the box ways of thinking about how to grow the show. And then your show now becomes a revolving door. Now that you have, you know, Ryan Serhant, who else does he know? Right. That led to the mls, the Seth Godins, the Jasmine Stars, the Amy Porterfields, and the list goes on.

Wow, that's incredible. It's amazing when you just have one idea and you get to see that it works. And then you can rinse and repeat it too. With other people.

Absolutely. And then take it up another notch. Right. If you rinse and repeat, any idea that you have that you're seeing success with, you can now write that down and it becomes a standard operating procedure.

Yeah. What else have you noticed with the people that you're getting to work with with your clients at Pod Pro Max? What are they able to do now? Because they're able to have you do the backend stuff for them.

Oh, absolutely. Well, they're able to be the talent. Right. They're able to really focus on having a good show. They're able to really focus on talking to people that they want to talk to. They're able to really focus on putting out the best content. If you ever spent time editing your own podcast video, especially the first 20, you're going to get a headache. You're going to understand very quickly why people don't make it past episode 20 because they're doing it themselves. Right. You didn't start a podcast to Become a world renowned editor. You didn't. You started a podcast to use your voice, to expand your message to reach the masses. And that's what we've seen powerful max allow for so many people to do. And then there's another portion of power max from the talent management perspective where we've seen a lot happen. Huge ROI just from being placed on podcasts. Right. We've placed clients on podcasts who may have a course or may have something that they're offering. Right. Where we actually seeing the host of the podcast. I want you to think about this. The host of the podcast, of the person we place them make over $400,000. That is sink in because that's, that's a 30% affiliate deal. Right. So imagine on the back end with that person who was on the show made. Right. But you get that way by understanding how to attract an audience. You get that way by understanding how to reach the right person. You and being matched correctly for the right benefit.

And what do you think is the best way for someone to promote someone else's podcast after they've been on your show? Because we talked about you even going to that person's social messaging the people and telling them about the podcast episode. Do you have other tricks up your sleeve for that?

Yeah. For to getting the actual person on your show to promote it.

Yeah.

The number one way is you want to create content they want to share. Right. So many people are creating content that people don't even want to share. Right. And so you have to say, okay, I've worked with so many people where we've worked with podcast hosts who have recognized the branding style of some of the people they've had on their show to create pieces of content similar to their style so it doesn't disrupt their page. The reason why people aren't accepting the invite, the reason why people aren't promoting a show, it disrupts their page. It doesn't look like them or it isn't work that they are excited or happy about. Right. So that's where you have to make sure the content that you're creating is to the caliber or to the level of where you would like for someone to share.

Okay. And then when you email the guest about the episode, do you have suggestions for how to word it?

Yeah, well, a couple ways I would look at wording it. You never want to create friction. Right. So I tell people all the time, there's this thing. Do you remember when this might be really good for listeners? Do you remember when Clubhouse was a Big thing. Okay. So we created in Clubhouse Podcast Seekers Reveal when Clubhouse was a big thing, which is a group for podcasters. So over 42,000 podcasters would meet every single Monday. I mean, we did it for two years and said we realized clubhouse ain't it anymore. There was a group that I started, and so one of the biggest things that I understood by having this community of podcasters was all the friction that everyone was creating. So, for example, if you're saying, hey, I want to have this person as a guest on my show and you send them a form to complete out, that's probably going to deter them. They don't want to do that, right? If you send someone a calendar link, depending on who you. If you're talking to a really high caliber person, you just created more friction. Now they have to go look at their schedule and match up schedules and what you want to do from that perspective when reaching out to the guests at the very first time. And this is so crazy you're talking about this because one of the offers we have is a podcast pitch script. People say, how do you get all these amazing people on your show and then get them to share it? And one of the things that we realized was give that potential person two to three dates and times so that when they respond to your email, they say yes. And then it's just you sending out the invite, right? But if you look about from a promotional standpoint, when the episode releases, right, you want to be able to group it all in a folder of some sort, say Dropbox link of the actual content so that they can easily have it. And when you word it from a worded perspective, right, Just say something like, looking forward to seeing you sharing or looking forward to this episode impacting so many people. Right. One of the things I've noticed on a bunch of forms from podcasters from the years I've spent studying this is that so many people on their form, they're right, you will share this podcast and they'd be like a little red asterisk where you have to say, huge deterrent, right? The person wants to sit down, have a good conversation, point to your audience and see that you're. You're engaged with them. But they also don't want to feel like they're required to do anything, right? Think about kids that throw tantrums. Last time I checked, the only kids that accepted that was toddlers, right? So adults are going to be looking at it completely different.

And then what do you do when you send them the shorts and stuff? Are you okay to do your own that are the same or should they have different ones than you're the ones you're promoting?

Yeah. We always think about guests first, right. So you want to make sure you put in front of them the ones that are most important. It depends on what your intentions are. Right. So you don't want to hit collaborate, post. If majority of the clip is you, there's no need for that. Right. You can just post on a girl page, collaborate. Maybe if you have your own podcast page you want to put in front of them content that shows them majority of the time. Right. I'm going to say probably by the thing is 75, 75, 25% rule. 75% of it being the actual guest. Maybe 25% you, which might be you asking the question. It might be, you know, your, your facial expression after your guest says something. Right. You want to make sure it's more than focused.

And then are you sharing the same clip? So the one that you're going to share on your Instagram, are you sending for them to share on theirs or should they get a totally different one?

They could. Right? So, for example, Pomper Max, we, we give you 10 to 50 reels per month. I highly doubt you're going to use all of them on one platform. Right. If I want to spread them out a little bit, I would say in terms of content creating them, they're all packaged. I would make sure that if you were to do something like that, you still sprinkle a little bit of you in there. So that could be your logo, it could be your brand color so they know where to go back to the show. Right. It could be those things.

Well, I'm so excited because you have such a big do the thing story, right? From realizing this entrepreneurial bug at 14 to then doing that big show at your brother's college and getting to see that you could make money doing something that you follow through with. And then after you graduate, creating the podcast, school's over. Now what? And then now you have Pod Pro Max. I mean, there's so many things. So I'm curious for the listeners, what do you think your number one piece of advice would be on doing the thing?

My number one piece of advice would be if you want to do something that nobody else has done. But primarily this is more family based. I think a lot of us are in careers, we're working jobs, we're in different situations because of family. And we were so stuck on. All right, I have to continue my father's business. Or I have to go to this school because my mom went there, or I have to do this type of work because my grandfather was known for this. You have to do your thing by being original and doing what makes you happy. And sometimes in order for you to do your thing, you can't share what you're doing until the thing is done. Because if you start sharing before the thing is done, you'll have all these other people telling you what to do. And then when you've done the thing, it looks nothing like you imagined. You're not proud of it, you're not excited about it, and even if it's successful, you won't sustain it. You have to have that passion, that excitement, and almost being proud of that byproduct of what you created. So I would tell the audience, in order to really do your thing, you have to put yourself first, cut out the noise and don't listen to what anybody else says and follow your dreams and goals.

I'm telling you, Sean, that's huge. So huge. I think it's so easy for people to fall in that trap, right? Because you're doing the thing, but you're scared. And you might not be confident completely, but you're still wanting to do it. And then all of a sudden, other people will come over acting like they know more than you, and then you think you have to listen to them. And I do believe in learning and mentoring and all that stuff. But then what happens is, if you're not confident enough, you might subscribe to whatever they're saying because you don't trust yourself. And so I love what you just said because it's still wanting to be true to you and knowing that it's okay to take feedback if you are going to tell people, but don't let it lose your confidence on what you're doing.

A hundred percent, right? Think about all the things that could be totally different if you didn't listen to somebody else, right? Even with schools over now, where I remember, before I even started it, I had that. That was always. That was always the vein because I. I let me start a podcast or show. It has to resonate with an audience when they truly hear it. It puts them in a situation or environment where they have a feeling, right? So school's over now. What? You've all been asked that question. You immediately start thinking about, oh, man, what am I doing with my life? Do the thing right. You immediately say, oh, man, I need to do that. So you have to have that. When I started schools over now with. Though I do remember mentioning it to one person before I press record, and I said, hey, you might want to look at getting a co host for that and maybe a female for that. And you talk about it with a female, and y' all kind of talk about it each every single week. Well, Stacy, if I had listened to that advice, we would have been one of those podcasts that didn't make it past episode 20, because they might have had the same passion, the drive, the mission, the goal. There's no way we'd be doing it for over five years.

Yeah. It's so true. Or you would have been stopped because you would have had to have someone else in the middle of it with you and then gotten into decision fatigue and then gotten paralyzed and all that stuff. Yeah. Okay. So hearing that, I think this is such a great example, because I think this happened so many times. People then give the idea, and you're still like, well, can I really even do this? Maybe I should just listen to their advice. How did you know to just follow your own intuition?

Yeah. I was blessed enough at 14 years old to realize the power of me, and that's probably the biggest thing of all time. And also, too, if you're listening to this right now and you're probably definitely past 14. So I'm gonna tell you how to get to that point. And realizing the power of you, I started paying attention to what people were saying on job reviews. And after I gave presentations at these corporate companies, I started looking at their faces while I'm talking. I'm like, they looking kind of. They might like this. Or I sat down on a job review and I'm hearing things like, listen, Sean, your communication skills are exceeding expectations. You have the ability to collaborate with anybody. I haven't heard anybody speak like this before. We're excited to have you exceed expectations. So if you're really struggling on unlocking this, I want you to go back to those job interviews. That boss might have just did you the biggest favor of all time by telling you what you're good at. And you know what? They got paid to tell you that. Right. And that's what I paid attention to, which really made me say, you know what? I could definitely do this podcast. I'm flying through these jobs. I'm enjoying what I'm doing, and they're telling me I'm good at stuff that I'm not even trying. I'm just. Just me. Right? And I think that's where talent meets hard work meets the right decision for you. And you attach that with consistency and you're going to win.

Well, this has been amazing. I'd love to have you share where people can keep up with you and then also if they're interested in talking to you about Pod Pro Max, how that can work out.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, you can listen to us on all audio platforms and YouTube. School's over. Now what? Let's do it anywhere. People always say, hey, look, what episode should I start with? I want you to start with episode 42. I sat down with a guy who's worth over $400 million in his house in Laguna Beach, California. His name's Ed Mylett. And Wade told me in that episode off camera, and even on camera changed my life. And I remember when he told me off camera and this is what put the battery in my backpack, he snapped his hands and he said, you look unlike anybody else. You're unique, you're different, and you speak well and you ask the right questions. If you stay committed to this, you stay consistent at this, you're going to win. Right. So I think you guys need to probably look at proximity changes everything. Which way you spoke to me about, because that moment when I sat on this couch and I saw that backdrop of that beach and I remembered all the people that I watched from YouTube that sat there, I realized proximity just changed my life and I wasn't looking back. And if you're wanting thinking about Pod Pro Max, I want you to go to www.podpromax.com and you'll definitely understand the many different ways and we can help you make podcasting easy.

Thank you so much for coming on with me today. This was incredible.

Oh, absolutely. Listen, Stacey, you got an amazing show. First and foremost, to be over 200 plus episodes, to have over 400 plus ratings. You've done a lot of hard work and I hope your audience understands that. Can't wait to see what you do in the next hundred episodes. And it's only the beginning.

And for you guys, thanks for joining. And do the thing. Don't wait for opportunity, create it.