$1 Billion Dollars In Copywriting – Write Better Copy, and Make More Money as a Freelancer in 2021

What's up?

What is up, my friend?

How are you doing?

I'm pretty good, actually. I'm having a good day.

Excellent.

How are you? How are things? Were you in California? In Vegas. Still Vegas.

Probably back in Vegas, yeah. I was in California for, like, the first couple weeks of the lockdown and then kind of decided to head back to Vegas and be at our home and everything.

Cool, man. Cool.

Yeah.

There's Mr. Get off there.

Here we go. You guys hear me?

All right?

Yeah. Everyone's got their cool mics.

Oh, totally. Yeah. I gotta. You know.

Yeah.

This is my old podcasting mic when I used to do my Michael Fury podcast.

Love it, man. A lot of stories. If that mic could talk.

Oh, it's true. It's true. Yes, I could.

Yeah.

How's the. How's your quarantine going? Having a good time?

Mine's pretty good. I mean, I got the bougie complaint of not being able to golf anymore, you know?

Don't you live on a golf course? That the thing. Oh, man. They won't even let you golf on the golf course in your backyard.

You know what the frustrating. What's up, Dan? The frustrating thing is, like, they're like. You can't, like, don't even walk on it. Cause, like, okay, fine. Golfing, no problem. But it's like, with my daughter, like, in the afternoons, like, taking her, and she can walk down the golf course, and there's, like, all the animals. It's like a huge park, and they're like, you know, if you go on the golf course, it's trespassing and, like, the government will, like, revoke our, like, food and beverage license and all this stuff if, like, they see people on the golf course at all, even if you're just using it for, like, jogging or recreation, like, that's the part that really kind of pisses me off.

And yet, in Florida, they have declared that WWE wrestling is essential, and they're allowed to record shows during this.

I mean, it's pretty essential.

No crowd, though, right?

No, no crowd. They're doing it in the, like. They have this thing called the performance center, which is, like, their training area. So I actually looked at some of it, and I watched a little bit of the WrestleMania stuff the other day. And it's weird because there's just, like, nobody in the crowd whatsoever. You can hear them all really loud. Yeah, it's fucking weird.

I wonder if they had any idea, like, how much the fan. I'm sure they did. They understand that business inside and out. But Like, I bet your average person had no idea that like the fans contributed that much to a show.

Oh, it's everything. Yeah, it's everything. For that kind of thing.

It's like taking the music out of a movie or something.

It is, yeah. Yeah. I think if you take out the fans, it's just like, it just looks kind of stupid at that point, right? Because you got these guys who are grunting a lot and going like this in the corner of the ring and there's like, nobody. Could nobody cheer? It's like, why am I doing this alone? One guy said too, I saw an interview and he was like, it hurts a lot more when there's no crowd. Right? When there's a crowd, you get your adrenaline going and it's like, yeah, whatever. You get thrown over your head or whatever, there's no crowd. You're just like, this just fucking sucks. Geez.

It's gotta be so weird too because like wrestling so built on like the good guy in the heel and there's nobody like, boo in the heel.

No, nothing whatsoever. Yeah, classic. Good versus evil. All that fun shit.

It's actually making me really want to watch some wrestling with nobody.

You should. There's some good wrestling. I still watch wrestling sometimes. I like good wrestling. There's a lot of bad wrestling, but if you find the good stuff, it's really cool. Yeah, it's all storytelling, you know, it's all like massive broad stroke kind of storytelling. There's copywriting lessons in there somewhere.

Have you ever been? When I was in Pensacola, Florida, I would like find local things to do. Especially when I was like dating but kind of young and in college and broke and so you find like amateur wrestling. So like the minor leagues of wrestling. I go to that. Which would be really interesting because then you've got people who just are like, some of them are kind of good actually and some of them are really bad and they're like actually hurting themselves because they don't know what they're doing.

Yeah, that's a big thing.

Yeah, it was pretty interesting.

Or the people that are just like really out of shape, but they're wearing the tight outfits and shit and trying to do their gimmick and it's like a 40 year old fat dude from Minnesota. Okay, cool.

You definitely got that. So yeah, I'm thinking with this call, like, obviously I'm recording it and I'm gonna put it on like YouTube after and you can kind of share it with people. And then maybe in, you know, a few weeks after, whenever we can figure something out and do like a more interactive one with an audience. But you know, for this one I just figured like, I just genuinely like you guys, you know and.

Thanks, dude.

Yeah, I don't know, we're feeling.

The feeling is mutual.

Well, thank you.

I secretly hate him, but I decided.

Yeah, you know, Chris just puts up with me I guess. You know, we're four of the better kind of known copywriters out there for our generation. And the fact that we kind of actually like each other and have a lot of cool stuff going on, I figured, you know, doing calls and talking and I think people would get value from it. And mostly I figured we could just have a pretty free flowing conversation. I have like four sort of questions if it gets really awkward and somehow copywriters run out of, you know, things to talk about, which seems unlikely, especially with Chris on this call. But you know, maybe it would help just because it is going to be recorded if each of us kind of did a quick little 10 second who we are and like, you know, a background thing. If you guys are comfortable doing that.

Sure.

It doesn't have to be too crazy.

Why don't you start, why don't you start it off since you're kind of running things.

Yeah, sounds good looking. I'm running like a boss. Yeah. My name is Stefan Georgi. I am a direct response copywriter and entrepreneur. I've been writing since 2012. The number I use is like I've sold like over $700 million worth of client products, my own products, which is actually accurate, maybe more. It's hard to get an actual number that I talked about. Yeah. On top of that I run some different businesses including Copy Accelerator with Justin Goff which is a copywriting and really offer scaling kind of training and mentorship mastermind and yeah, I live in Las Vegas and I'm here locked down with my family lockdown.

I'll go next. Why not? So I'm Chris, Mr. Moneyfingers Haddad, that's my old nickname that Joe Barton gave me. I'm a copywriter. And then mostly for the last decade or so I've been focusing on my own business and the relationship advice niche. I'm actually working on some health related stuff right now. Stefan, look to what you said, I have no idea how much my copy is sold. I mean I wrote that pimsleur approach letter which did some insane amount of money.

And then all nine figures for sure.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then all the other like, you know, various ones. Yeah. And I'm in Seattle, locked down with my wife and our tiny little dog and feeling really badly for my friends who are alone and even more badly for my friends who are waiters and work in the service industry or have brick and mortar businesses and are drowning right now and have no idea how they're going to get through this. I feel incredibly lucky that our business hasn't been really affected yet. Justin.

I'll go. So Justin Goff partners with Stefan on copy accelerator. I've written a ton of copy, grew a direct response supplement company to $23 million in sales. Mostly now though, just focus on funnels and more funnel strategy and scaling offers than specifically on kind of front end copy like I used to. I'm a lot better at actually the strategy aspect and the upsells and kind of scaling offers than the nitty gritty of the front end copy.

All right, my turn.

Yeah, your turn.

My name is Dan Ferrari. I think I've been in this pretty much the exact same time as Stefan. You said 2012. That's kind of when I got my start was late 2012. Most of my writing has been kind of for some of the bigger publishers. I was in house at the Motley fool at the beginning of my career and then left that. Started an agency where we had a bunch of big contracts with Aurora Financial and since then have written pretty much all over the place. Financial health supplements info, products on biz op type money making stuff. Pretty versatile in that regard. And I live here in Hawaii.

There are worse places to be locked down in Hawaii.

Yeah, yeah, it's. It's pretty good. We dodged a bullet in terms of a lot of kind of the cases that we have. We get like two cases a day the last few days. Oh yeah, I can still surf.

Yeah, I'm in Seattle. So we're like a couple of weeks ahead everybody else. So it's kind of interesting. Just like see we were like locked down about a week and a half, two weeks before anybody else started to be. And it was interesting like looking on the Internet and seeing all the people saying, it's a hoax, it's a hoax, it's a hoax, it's a hoax. I'm like a week later, they're like, it's still a hoax, but I'm being forced to stay home.

Yeah, I'm hoping that Venkatesh Rao is.

What's that? Sorry?

Do you know who Venkatesh Rao is?

I do not know.

He's this guy. I don't really know how you'd describe him, he's like a thinker or philosopher, kind of like a celeb type. And he wrote this really interesting thing called Covid Time. For the first time in human history, you're basically having this experience where everyone is experiencing the same thing, but on different timelines. And so there's almost quite literally, like, this future and past dynamic going on between people. And even people in, like, the same geography or the same building might be having a completely different timeline because somebody they know is sick already. Or they were sick and now they're better, and they're like, I just need to get out, while the person next to them is scared, you know?

Well, meanwhile, you also have a large portion of the country who's still in total denial, right? Like, there was a news item the other day about this pastor who a week and a half ago was like, jesus will protect us from COVID Come to the church. Come to the church. He died, like, three days ago, right? Like, it's like, I'm like, sorry, your. Your denial, your denialism and your religion doesn't really affect science or affect a freaking virus. But it's really. I mean, Stefan, you put out something the other day about conspiracy theories and the impact on copy or how you can use that for copywriting. And honestly, conspiracy theories just are copywriting, right? Like, it's like we're looking for the common enemy. We're looking for this, we're looking for that. It's the exact same thing. I was gonna post something the other day because I forget who it was. Somebody in the marketing was, like, ranting and raving about, this is a scam. This is whatever else. And I'm like, guys, the proof that you use in your sales letters is not actual proof, right? In the real world, like, we're all very good at taking things and having correlation, mean causation, and all this other kind of stuff to sell something, but in the real world, it's not actually true. Don't like market to yourself so much that you fall for it. What I find really interesting is that the only real conspiracy around Covid that I've seen so far is the conspiracy to convince people that Covid is caused by 5G or that bill Gates is a pedophile or whatever else. That's the actual conspiracy. It's pretty fascinating.

It's super fascinating. It's been interesting to see because almost going back to Covid time, you've got so many people who are at home all day and they're on the Internet and they're bored and Then they're just. I've been seeing people who were not really that into conspiracy theories, who now are just so deep into it. And just all they're posting on Facebook all day long is about these conspiracy theories, and they're, like, really affected by it. And I. Do you have openly said, like, I like conspiracy theories. And I'm like, I don't know, I'm malleable. You can kind of like, convince me of stuff. Like, if you want to be like, the moon landing wasn't real. I'm like, maybe it wasn't. Like, I'll give you like a 5% chance, 10% chance, right? Like, I'm totally like, that's my personality. But just seeing how people become so, like, wrapped up in it, I think a lot of it just has to do with the fact that there's nothing else for. For them to do, and they've gone down the rabbit hole and aren't stopping. But it's been very interesting, I guess.

Well, it's also like, I was reading something about this the other day about how, like, the appeal of conspiracy theories, honestly, is a sense of control, right? A sense that you kind of know what's going on. Because the alternative is that nobody's in charge, nobody fucking knows what they're doing. And we are living in terrifying chaos, right? So it's actually easier to think, like, hey, Sandy Hook was an inside job because that fucking guy can go kill himself. I hate whatever his name is, than it is to just be like, no, the world is just crazy and chaotic. I mean, this is my general philosophy on life is we're not here for any particular reason. I'm not religious in any way. We're just kind of here. We're here because we're here. And the best thing you can do is try to, I always used to say, worship reality, Right? That's what I do in my copy is I try to get as focused on what is actually happening as possible and then use that to manipulate people's minds into buying things because we're all manipulative fucks. That's what we do. Yeah, it's true.

I'd be curious, like Justin and Dan, like Justin, that you seem like a very rational guy. Have you ever gone down, like, conspiracy theory, like rabbit holes and sort of been moved by them or they'd like, impact influenced you or affected you or anything like that?

I mean, I generally don't trust the government or any, like, big organization as it is. So I definitely tend to be.

I.

Don'T know like with the coronavirus stuff, not as much, but like, I don't know, like, you talk about Jeffrey Epstein, like, that's probably mass conspiracy. That almost isn't really even a conspiracy where like, I was like, yeah, something went on there. There's very powerful people who needed him to be dead. Yeah, I mean, I. I'm one of those people too, though. I'm into a lot. Like, I was spent like one day, like nine hours on YouTube watching videos on the. Who's the big, like Getty that they saw in the woods? Not Getty, the Yeti. The Yeti?

The Bigfoot?

Yeah. The Sasquatch. The Bigfoot, Harry and the Hendersons.

The yeti, yes.

I've literally like, like that stuff. Like, I guess that's. To me, that's like less of a conspiracy theory because it's like, if you think about it from the standpoint, like, okay, in the vast woods of the world that have never been seen, do you think there's like an ape like creature that exists that we haven't discovered yet? So, yeah, it seems pretty reason.

Except for like there's less and less actual places in the world that we haven't seen. Right. Because we're kind of even. The fact that we have this virus is largely because we've been encroaching on. Encroaching on nature. And, you know, other animals are having viruses skip over to us in some areas.

But if you think of like Canada, which is covered by like 60%, nobody lives. Like, it's pretty plausible that there's apes and creatures like that walking around that we've probably never seen.

Did you guys ever read the book Conspiracy? There's a book that came out a few years ago. I forget who wrote it, but it's about Peter Thiel and how he took down Gawker Media, right? So he ended up like, secretly. He decided he got pissed off at Gawker Media because I think they outed him as gay or whatever else it was. And then he actually did this like multi year conspiracy where he spent 10, 15, $20 million, like finding like Hulk Hogan and backing his entire legal case just to take down Gawker. And it's like, yeah, like actual conspiracies do exist, but they're generally kind of small. Like, like there's no way to organize millions of people to have a conspiracy about like, flat Earthers. Right? Like freaking flat Earthers are fascinating to me. But it's like, no, guys, like humans aren't that smart or aren't that organized. Nobody could actually pull that off. It's just shit happens.

The one thing I also think like, like, let's just say like Barack Obama and George Bush and Bill Clinton like sat down. They're like, we're gonna do an eight hour special and tell you everything that goes on the world that you don't know. I bet it would be so fucking scary that you literally would not believe it.

Except for Trump wouldn't be there because he hasn't read any of the reports. So he doesn't actually know. He's like, well, they showed me some pictures, but I don't really know like.

The people who actually know what's going on. I feel like if they told you everything that went on, it would be so shocking that you also wouldn't believe it.

Oh totally.

I agree with that Justin. Like there's a certain amount of sort of protectionism I think behind a lot of this. Whether or not it's mal intent or actual conspiracies, I don't know. But even with the coronavirus, like, I'm sure there's stuff that we don't know about its origins or how it got out of control or how long it's been around that it doesn't really help us to know. Eventually I think it'll all probably come out. I think there's going to be something similar to like a 911 commission on this.

I hope so.

And then we're going to have a lot of insight into how things went.

Really wrong and people will be really.

Angry, feel like shit. Yeah. And then there's just like 9 11. There's going to be a whole overhaul of the system. They're going to spend billions of dollars, hopefully back to normal and we'll leave.

Ourselves completely unprepared for all of the other crises that are the next thing. Because you're always fighting the last war, right? That's what they say. You're always fighting the last war. It's like, oh well, we had horses last time but now they have tanks. Shit. It's a crazy world, man.

It is the one thing I think about too with conspiracy theories and like the really big like kind of like global government, like new world order type things is if you look at people at the top of any sort of organization that's really large, like the egos are so massive and so huge that getting them to all just like get along and agree to go along with something is very unlikely.

Right.

It's like, because then people have competing visions and they're kind of undermining each Other. And, like, that's just sort of human nature in general. So I just don't see a situation where, like, 100 world leaders come together and they're all like, oh, yeah, we all agree with that. It's like, that's just not how humans work.

Right. That's a really good point.

Especially narcissists, who are generally running everything.

Right?

To be a world leader, you have to basically be some. Some level of narcissist. You can't.

I mean, you guys watched. I think it's on Netflix. It's called the Greatest. The Greatest Events of World War II in color or something like that.

Yeah, I saw the World War I one.

That was really interesting.

A lot about the generals making decisions on ego and, you know, how people very high up caused significant shifts in the course of the war because they had certain beliefs that they wouldn't back down from. And I think that proves your point, Stefan. It's just like, there's no way that you can get all these people in power to see the same way. Even when in a case like that they're on the same side, they're fighting for the same country, and they still can't agree, and it ends up backfiring on them.

Yeah. I mean, look at, you know, to tie it to copyright, since we're all copyright. It's like you have, like, a great promotion that goes to really, really warm traffic that all kind of agree to the same thing, but you convince, like, you know, anywhere from 1 to, like, 5% of them that, like, you know, to, like, take action or something like that. Like, it's like, I guess that's different because you're getting them to buy. But, like, the point being, just even with, like, a really warm audience, like, they're not all gonna take the same actions or have the same beliefs. And, like, yeah, to your point, I'd like to like Hitler if he hadn't, like, all his generals were like, don't go into, like, Russia or the Soviet Union. And he's like, nah, I'm gonna go into Soviet Union. And they're like, well, don't go to Stalingrad. And he's like, nah, I'm gonna go to Stalingrad. And then, like, basically, that's why Germany lost, like, World War II. But even then, he had generals who were like. He was like, don't do this in Africa. I'm, like, reading a World War II book right now, and it's like, yeah, just constantly, people in power who are supposed to be on the same team just totally Undermining each other. It's really fascinating.

Well, there's that level of just like, believing they're right. Like, I mean, our president, like, Trump, I don't wanna get into politics. There's. But Trump firmly believes that he is the one person in the world who actually knows the right thing to do and that he's a genius and that everyone should fall behind him. He's not faking it. He actually believes that he's just wrong. But the narcissism and the ego is so inflated that he can't even see outside himself not to see it. It's unfortunate. I mean, what's the old adage, like, anybody that wants the job of president shouldn't have it because we don't want that kind of person to actually be in charge. We want Stefan to be in charge instead. Yeah.

You heard the Bill Burr. Bill Burr, when he talks about you can't make fun or you can't rip on the President, he's like, the guy makes like 500 grand a year.

He works really hard for not that much money, honestly.

Seriously.

You know, I think they get paid in other ways. Weirdly enough. I think it comes back to them eventually, one way or another. Actually, did you hear that, like, Bill Clinton, like, left office $13 million in debt because he wasn't like, rich when he got into office. And then with the impeachment inquiry and everything else, he was like severely fucked when he actually got office. Plus the President has to buy his all his own food.

That's why he had to have Hillary charge a million dollars per speaking fee.

Dude, if you could charge a million dollars per speaking fee, you would too. Come on. I would turn that shit down. I'll go talk it like Brown Brothers or whatever the fuck it is. Give me a million bucks for a two over an hour spee. I'll even talk for two hours. I'll hang out and like, shake hands afterwards. I'll even give you like a massage of some kind of. For that amount of money. It is amazing to me that people get so on their high horse, but it's like, dude, if somebody offered you that, I think you'd take it too.

Yeah, it is interesting.

Like, but I'm not running for office in the future.

Totally.

Yeah, it is interesting how that's like, turned so much where, like, being successful now and charging that kind of money is seen as a bad thing.

Whereas, like, at the Democratic primaries where they're arguing over who's the poorest.

Yeah, it really is crazy. It's like I mean, that's one of the things, though, that Trump did so well. Like, when you compare him to, like, Romney, like, Romney was super ashamed of how rich.

Yeah.

And you could just feel it.

Yep.

Trump is just like, yeah, I'm fucking rich. Like, that's what you want. Like, and I mean, when you take that angle, like, a lot more people buy into your confidence.

Well, people will follow it. Like I discovered years ago. You know, my ex wife asked me at one point, she's like, chris, who made you a relationship expert? You know, when I started up all the Michael Fury stuff, and granted, I was much more narcissistic back then because I wasn't diagnosed for bipolar and all that stuff, but my answer was I did. I made myself a relationship expert. And people like, the thing I figured out in relationship advice and in info products in general is it doesn't really matter what you know or what you teach. It matters more that you're willing to be the leader, because people just want to find somebody who follows to follow who at least seems like they know what they're doing, whether they actually do or not. So, like, projecting that level of confidence is in a lot of ways more.

Powerful than the authority. Yeah.

Yeah, totally. People would just want somebody who is like, as my dad used to say, if you're a tall white guy in a suit, you can take get away with pretty much anything in America. And he was right.

Yeah, he was.

What do you guys think about? Like, I've seen. I noticed a lot. One thing I kind of enjoy about this is that a lot of our Internet marketing friends are not putting pictures of their incredible cars on Facebook anymore. They're being a little bit more humble about it. Or at least now, granted, most of those people are actually broke anyway. The people I know that are actually killing it are usually the ones who think that sports cars are stupid and live in kind of reasonable homes and, you know, all the other stuff. But I was thinking this morning about biz ops stuff and about make money online stuff, and I wonder if there. There's opportunity here to kind of pivot the messaging a little bit. So instead of making it about, you know, you're going to make a million dollars a year at home while, you know, never putting on pants, et cetera, I think there's an opportunity to be even a little bit more straight and honest about things and say, like, hey, guys, are you going to become a millionaire out of this? Like, I did? Probably not. I have no idea. But the last thing you want to do is have to trust somebody else to put food in your, in your family's mouth.

Right.

Like we've seen, we've already seen that cannot happen. So I think there's, I think there's something there from a make money kind of thing where you can do it in a way that isn't so over the top and therefore not as dangerous as far as getting in trouble with the FTC or anything. I just, I kind of wonder about the messaging there. Something I think find fascinating.

Yeah, I actually had a really good conversation with Jordan hall about this when he used to do biz op stuff back in like 2008ish. When downturn happened. He was talking about how his product was completely different. Everybody else's was the become a millionaire kind of Internet type thing. And he had one about how to make like 500 extra bucks a week, like all these little things you could do. And it was called like project Fast Cash or something like that. He was saying, I'll just absolutely out converted everything. And I was like, yeah, it makes sense because like the person who's making 35 grand a year, who's gonna buy that product, has no belief that they could make a million dollars.

It's like the attainable promise thing. Did you guys hear about on pornhub, there was, you know, those ads, I'm assuming all of you guys, pornhub, no.

Idea what you're talking about.

Never ever, ever. But do you know those ads that you see all the time that are up there that are like moms want to fuck or local Moms want to fuck or local whatever. And the guy who ran that, I forget who it is, but a friend of mine knows him, originally was running ads for that which had super duper hot chicks, right? Like model quality chicks, 20 years old, whatever. And then at some point somebody decided to test out putting kind of normal looking women in their 30s and 40s in there instead. And they're freaking conversions went through the roof like overnight. And that kind of makes sense, right? Because most guys who are on pornhub who have no luck with women whatsoever are looking at these hot models and they're like, there's no freaking way I'd have a chance whatsoever. But hey, that girl, you know, the girl with the kind of butter face, I could make that happen. No, we'll turn off the lights, it'll be fine. But I think there's something there about like, you know, not going like, I like hype as much as anybody, probably even a little bit more. But I think there is a Point that you get to pass the point of believability and you're cutting off a huge part of your market. We just can't even drink. When I first became a copywriter, the biggest I could dream was 45 grand a year. That was the biggest I could dream, right?

45 grand a year.

Yeah.

That's the. Yeah. When I first got into, like, doing corporate copy, when I was like 25, 26, the career counselor I went to see, I said this. My speech on your thing said, like, you know, what's the biggest you can dream? And for me, it was like, if I can just make $45,000 a year as a writer, I'll be happy. That was the high. Somebody had told me, chris, you're going to become a millionaire as a writer. I would have told them they were full of shit. I just couldn't even get my brain around the concept at that point.

This would be a good question. Do you guys remember the first dollar you made online?

I do.

I do as well. Yeah. I've been talking a lot, so I'll let somebody else go first.

Go ahead, Dan.

Me talking a lot.

The first thing that I did well, so my story is sort of like, I had no desire to continue my office job and I wanted to move to Hawaii. So I just saved up a bunch of money and moved here and quit the job. And basically had been told, copywriting is a good way to make your own schedule and surf as much as you want. And I was like, okay, I'll do that. And I had no idea what it was or how to do it. So I went on odesk and I applied for a job and it was $15 to write like a SEO, basically like a warrior for a mess. SEO. Not even sales letter. I'd call it more of a brochure, but probably took me four hours. So $15. I was really earning good money back then and living in Hawaii, dude. It was terrible. Like, Chris is talking right now about 45 grand. I remember the first year, like, the first full year I was writing copy. I think I made maybe 25 grand. And I saw a guy on it's probably cold of copy or something. Leave a comment. Like, I've been doing this for a year and I just made 50 grand. And I was like, holy shit. Like, that is a lot of money. I wish I could do that.

Now you're making that off one project?

Nothing Now.

It is funny when you get cynical and like, for a lot of stuff I do, if I'm ever going to Work with a client. I'm like, dude, I'm not getting out of bed for less than 100 grand. I'm sorry. I just can't do it. I can work on my own stuff and then go, like, you know, roll around on my electric unicycle around Seattle all day instead.

I hope you have that, and you can take it out in the room you're in right now.

Oh, I could show it to you. It's pretty great. I know. It's actually. It goes, like, 30 miles an hour, so I'm not gonna put it in here. It's a great way to get yourself killed if you're stupid, but the video.

Just sends a few crashing to a wall.

Totally.

Totally, Stefan.

Who cares?

What was the first dollar you made?

Yeah, I mean, mine was from Warrior form, actually, and it was. Cause I. When I finally kind of had that last corporate job in 2012, like, early on, and it was, like, really a good job, all things considered. Like, I had a Ford Escape, Like, a new Ford Escape. It was an outside sales job. So they gave me a car. They would pay for gas, but they would pay for my gas, even if it wasn't for work. Like, I literally got free gas with this car. And I'm in Florida. I think I was making, like, 40,000 a year, which, up till that point, had always been kind of my goal in life as well. I thought, like, oh, maybe one day I can get to 100,000 a year. But I thought that was when I was, like, in my 40s or 50s. And at the time, I was in my, like, you know, mid-20s type of thing, and. But I just, like, wasn't happy. And Laura, my wife, was like, you're unemployable. And I was like, do you think I can be a copywriter? She said, yeah. So I posted on Warrior Forum under actually her account. So it's basically about her protege. I wrote like, oh, my protege, you know, is ready to, like, write, like, a sales letter for you. And I wrote this whole thing, and I charged $149 for the sales letter. And at the very end, it was like, P.S. if you think this copy is good, My protege actually wrote it, which was kind of like the. Ooh, the big twist. But I woke up the next day, and I had, I guess, $298 in my PayPal account. So Brian Zimmerman hired me, who is, like, the founder of one of the founders of JVZoo and was big on Warrior form back in the day. And I forget who the other person was. Like Wilco de Cresci or however you say his name. He hired me really early on. Mike Buentempo, who's in Copy Accelerator, actually hired me really early on. But yeah, it's kind of interesting. Like, I remember, I think Mike paid me 149 a sales letter back then too. And it's kind of crazy thinking about that from that perspective. But yeah, I Woke up with $298 in my PayPal account and I was like, well, I'm like quitting my job. And I quit my job like pretty much like that same week. I gave him like a, you know, whatever notice. It was like a four week notice. And you know, but honestly kind of stopped going to the job after that because it was like a remote job. So I just stay in my apartment and like write, copy and chill and then just sort of like log in. Like I'd go to a store and then go home and like, that was it. But yeah, it was like, really that feeling of like, I've won the lottery, you know, the greatest feeling in the world. Like all the lies we tell ourselves. Like, I'm gonna go to Europe and be writing like a cafe while I sip coffee or wine.

I don't wanna do that.

Yeah, I don't wanna do either, but the time is so. It sounded so sexy, but now I'm like, yeah, I don't go to Europe. It's good coffee.

Yeah. Yeah.

But yeah, that was mine.

Nice.

Oh, go ahead, Justin.

Yeah, I. Mine's interesting because mine came in like bunch of different waves. Like when I was in high school, I started doing. There was this program, I think it was called like All Advantage, where you got paid to like surf the Internet. This is like back when like everybody was on AOL and you had one dial up in your house. And I remember I like, I started, I started using it and you like installed it on your, on your whatever, your browser. And like you get paid to serve. And like one of my buddies found out there's like this hack you could do where it like surfed for you. So you could just leave the computer on. It would like just move the mouse across the screen for like 10 hours and like you get paid for it. And I remember I did that and I think I made like 70 bucks or something doing that. And like literally we're just clogging up our phone line like nine hours a day for like $70. Nobody could call our house. Like, I still remember my parents like talking about. I was like, oh, why don't we just get a second phone line and, like, we had this big discussion about, like, that's what rich people do. Like, we don't need a second phone line.

Yeah, totally.

$15 a month.

It's way too much, man.

That was like. That was like the first dollar I made online. And then when I did, like, affiliate marketing college, that was probably actually. Sorry. Before that, when I. When I started selling my. My sports picks for gambling stuff in college, that was the first time when I had somebody buy one. After basically about seven months of spamming forums and trying to get people to buy my picks and nobody buying anything, someone bought one $49 pick package from me, and I jumped up and down. I was going crazy.

Such an amazing feeling of, like, power. Were you guys raised, like, I don't know how, like, financially? Where were you guys when you were growing up?

Were you.

Any of you, like, rich? Were you middle class? Was anybody poor? What was the. What was the background?

Super loaded.

Super loaded. Really? I don't know. I don't know your family too. You don't seem like an obnoxious muckyard. Trust fund kid.

Huge trust fund. No, we're. My family's very. My family has, like. It's interesting. There's like, two sides to it because, like, very blue collar, like, I grew up thinking very similar to what you guys talking about. $50,000 would be crazy money to make a year. Very blue collar, like, mentality of, like, work. Like, my dad works in a factory. My mom was like a waitress. When I was younger. We lived in a pretty small, normal house, public school, all that shit.

And then.

But then we had other sides of our family where, like, my great grandpa was a super wealthy, like, entrepreneur. He sold a company to Oscar mayer for like 40 million bucks in the 80s.

Wow.

Holy shit.

Back then that was like.

That was a lot. Yeah, because $40 million right now is nothing.

Really.

$40 million right now is nothing.

I was actually, like, adding that up the other day. I was like, 40 million. I was like, man, if you'd have, like, just stuck that in a Vanguard index fund and passed it down to the family, we'd have, like, half of it.

That's true.

We had. He actually gave it, like, all the way to charity.

That's cool.

Oh, wow. That asshole.

I remember when I was young, actually, like, I didn't understand it, and I was like, why the hell would he do that? Like, he could have, like, gave that to all of us. And I, like, kind of realized it more. And his whole reason was simply like, most people who just inherit money are gonna blow it.

Totally. Yeah. I mean, we've all seen people in Internet marketing who make a fuck ton of money out of nowhere. I like everybody, from what I can tell, who starts making a fuck ton of money. You kind of become an asshole for like a year or two and then maybe you pull yourself out of it. And usually, I mean, I think we all know people that were killing it five, ten years ago who were dead brokenness out of the industry. Now I think it's largely because people start buying their own press and thinking they're smarter than they actually are, when.

Largely you're also just. The evolution of the business in the last 10 years was like 70 years of evolution prior to that. I think there's a lot to be said for that too. Especially.

I was out of it for a few years because I was sick. And then I came back and I'm like, what the fuck changed? Shit, everything's different.

Like, for me personally, I'm. I'm like, thank God that I didn't really start making real money until I like hit like 30. I got, you know, I guess my very, very. In my 20s, I was making good money as a copywriter. Like, but really, I mean, it's 2020 now. Yeah. So maybe like 28, 29. But at least at that point it was like I'd had enough life experiences and been through enough that even as the money was coming in, like, it wasn't. I did some dumb shit. Like I went and bought like a Mercedes AMG55. And then I paid. It was like 70,000. I paid like 40,000 down on it so that the payment would be lower. And it's like, why I literally wasted $40,000 on a fucking. It was the dumbest thing I could ever done. Like, I did some dumb shit when I made money, but like, but yeah, I'm like, but thank God it didn't happen when I was like 21 or 22, because I for sure, like, would have, like, I already had a cocaine problem in 21, a little bit anyway. It's like, I for sure would have killed myself from cocaine. Like, maybe kill myself from drinking. I would have, like, who knows what the fuck. I'd be the biggest, the biggest asshole. And maybe I would have gone through that whole hero's journey and still come out as this wise, kind of grizzled man afterwards. But I'm very fortunate. I feel that I didn't get success until a little bit later.

What was your upbringing like?

It was like, it was middle class to like. I mean, it got more upper middle class as I got older. So it was like very much middle class. My dad was the first employee for a loudspeaker company called like Polk Audio. So they did like home stereo systems and stuff like that. And he had like a small piece of equity in that. So like, I think, I don't know, like 3%, something like that, which they ultimately they sold it in like 28 or 9 for the company. Sold for like $150 million. And he got like a couple million dollars from that, which was awesome. Then he died like two years later. Which is why, you know, nothing's like certain this life, right? But you know, because he was like the first employee, like, it was. We didn't really, like, we didn't want for anything, but we didn't take like elaborate like crazy trips places or fly like first class around the world, you know, I mean, like anything like that. And there were times where when the business would like, struggle during a downturn that then money would get really tight and like, it would be kind of like one of those weird things where, you know, when you're like, but I want to go on like this school, whatever it is, and you know, suddenly your parents like, well too tough shit. Like, we can't, you know, we can't do that right now.

So.

But overall it was, it was definitely middle, like middle class to like eventually getting kind of, I guess, relatively speaking, more like upper middle class. How about you, Dan? I'd be curious about that.

I'd say pretty similar. My dad was an architect and my mother was a nurse. So, you know, both well paying jobs, but sort of the type of job where, you know, you get your 3 to 5% every year and it just sort of compounds. And they both worked those careers for, right, their. Their entire lives, from their 20s to their mid-60s. So, yeah, I think it probably started off relatively middle class, especially because I grew up just outside of Washington, D.C. which is a fairly expensive area to live. So when we were little, right, Like, I never starved or wanted for anything, but we weren't. Our vacations were driving to the Delaware shore as opposed to, you know, going to Europe or something like that. But the thing that I think is, was great about the way my parents raised me around money is they've always believed in the power of making your money work for you. Probably how I wound up, you know, doing stuff like writing to Motley Fool. I bought my first stock probably when I was like 19 years old or Something like that. I've pretty much been managing my money, I think very wisely, since I got out of college and had that first job. And I can really thank my parents and especially my dad for that right now. I was sort of texting Stefan about this a little bit over the past few weeks. Like, being able to just observe what's going on in the economy for me has been, I hesitate to use the word fun, but fascinating.

Entertaining, maybe.

Entertaining to, you know, it's. It's. Stefan just watched the Big Short, so he'll remember this. There's a line in it when they. The two kids close out the huge deal, right? And Brad Pitt gets all pissed off and he's like, you know, every 1% that unemployment goes up, 40,000 people die. And so there's always this weird kind of situation that you have to think about with big market crashes like this. But it is wild to just watch and I've enjoyed seeing it happen. I guess from a intellectual standpoint, a.

Psychological standpoint, it's always interesting. We're all copywriters, right? So all we really do is study human nature and in my case, develop a certain level of cynicism about it. But it is really fascinating just watching how people react to this kind of thing and the psychological defense mechanisms people use and the conspiracies they come up with and the panic buying and the panic selling and all that other kind of shit. It's just, man, we're. We're crazy monkeys.

One interesting question I actually have about something you just said, Chris, about the cynicism is like, I was talking to a member of Copy Accelerator, actually, who's starting to write more, like, more punch in the gut copy. And he was talking about how he's sort of like a secret cynic who, like, hates like, a lot of humanity and humankind. And so he was going to create these, like, sort of stories for these, like, dummies kind of like, right. Not that the props rip off, but he was really kind of like. But. But then I told him, and this is true. I kind of felt the same way and hate your 2014, 2015. I didn't like, hate them, but I did kind of like, think, you know, these, like, people or they're just like, they're dumb and they're. They'll like, I kind of like.

And.

But over time, I've changed. Like, I don't feel that way and I don't write copy to those people. I haven't felt that way for a long time, but I did have that for a period of time. So I'd be curious, I guess, for all of you guys, like, if you really do have a cynicism when you're writing copy, or is it just like a love or, you know, how do you. How do you approach that?

I have a cynicism, human psychology, but not a cynicism for people, if that makes sense. Right. Like, I have a cynicism as far as what human nature is and trying to have as clear and a realistic a view of what we are as animals and how our brains work as possible. But I have a lot of empathy for human beings. Right. And what we're all going through. My ex used to ask me, there's a lot of reasons, my ex is my ex, and here's another one of them. But she would say, who are these women who buy these products from you? What is wrong with them? And I'm like, these are the women that bought our house and you will fucking respect them because they're in pain and they're not stupid people and they're. Nothing wrong with them or bad about them, but they're in pain. They've been sold this bill of goods about what men are supposed to be and what love is supposed to be. And now they're 35 or 40 or 50 and they're desperate and they're looking for somebody to tell them how to.

Get out of it.

I don't think you can actually write good copy if you don't understand it in some ways, like your customer or like the people you're selling to, at least while you're writing it. Right. If I'm writing like copy to hardcore conservatives, I don't go in there with the idea of like, hey, I'm gonna trick these assholes into giving me money while I'm writing it. I think like a conservative nut bar, like right wing nut bar. And then I come back out of it on the other side.

Yeah, makes sense. What about you, Justin?

I don't know.

I mean, for me it's much more temporary. Empathy is definitely something that I've always just struggled with in general because I've always been pretty detached emotionally. So for me it's more like kind of what Chris said of getting into the mindset and then really just I'm in it for the project and then I'm kind of out of it. Whereas I think some people like Chris, who's probably way more empathetic than I am, could be in that mindset a lot more. And he actually really, like, deep down cares about that person. For me, the one thing though, I have realized I didn't have a whole lot of empathy when I was writing like copy for supplements. And I never got to see the customers like with Copy Accelerator and we actually interact with all the people who are in our program. The empathy for me has gone up dramatically doing that because now I really know who it is. I know what their life is like, and I've met them in person three or four times. That for me I've realized made a huge shift because, yeah, like when I was writing stuff for the supplements, it's like I don't, I don't ever see these people. I don't interact with them, I don't talk with them. I have an idea who they are. But it was a lot harder for me to have empathy in that type of situation.

I remember the first time somebody in our industry bought one of my men's relationship advice products. Like I saw it come in, it was my texture wife in the bed products and like three different guys I know in our business all bought it. And I was like, oh wait, now I know my customer really well.

They're like, nah man, I'm just funnel hacking.

What about you, Dan? As far as, like, you don't strike me as a very cynical guy in general, but I'd just be curious about, you know.

Yeah, I'm not very cynical. I tend to, maybe to a fault, give people the benefit of the doubt. But I am smart enough to understand, I guess, the contextualization of everything. Right? So as far as cynicism, I think under normal circumstances, I believe people tend to be pretty good and do good things. But you know, I'm also smart enough or maybe scared enough to understand that when shit hits the fan, people are only self interested. So you're only as, I guess the good, good nature of humanity, in my opinion, only goes as far as like the safety of the people you're dealing with. Once they feel they're not safe, then everything goes out the window as far as how that plays out in copy. I think I was very fortunate at the Motley fool because they have an incredible relationship with their customers and they really care about their products and their quality. And we would see stuff come in where it would be like, you know, my husband died unexpectedly and we didn't have much and your products essentially saved me from domestication. And we would take the time to search those people out. Sometimes we would do more extensive testimonial shoots where we'd fly video teams out there and do Some of these really heart wrenching type things where we'd talk to some of these people who had more or less change their lives or change the direction of sort of the financial chains that are generational for a lot of people. And that really kind of helped me see that because before that, you know, it's like whatever, I'm selling a $49 financial newsletter with a couple stocks picks in it a month. Like, who's this helping? It's helping people who really need it, I guess was kind of the answer to that that I didn't understand before that. And so I think ever since then, regardless of the product, whether the industry or the niche or whatever, I do realize that someone who goes through say a 50 minute video sales letter, there is actually room for them to be helped. Whether it's on an abstract level, you know, if it's more just you're helping them emotionally or feel better or if there really are tangible benefits in the case of money or health or something like that. I mean, as long as that happens, I'm pretty sure, pretty happy to work on the project, to be honest.

You know what's kind of interesting is like back to what Justin said as well about empathy and what you said too, Dan, actually all three of you really, with my first like house supplement company in 2015, which is when I launched it, and we were doing like email drops, right? That's all we were buying, email drops. And you know, and the company wasn't. It lost like money the first year and almost kind of didn't work. Which is so an interesting thing because like what, you know, if that had happened, would I have had the confidence to do all these things that I've done? But, but even early on I remember like I bought, I hired customer service people like really early on and, but they didn't work on the weekends. We had a huge drop and I saw that there was all these people calling and not people weren't answering. So I went into like, we were in a Regis, like we had like a Regis office. And I went in and like just like did the phones one weekend for like, I don't know, maybe eight hours. And this was like before that I'd been a copywriter, but I never done phone support for my products or anything. And it was actually, it was so fascinating because just talking to the people, I did get so many insights and I did actually really feel like I understood them better and it was fun because some of them would be like, well, that video is pretty outrageous. And I know you're kind of just trying to be entertaining. And it was entertaining, and I was bored. But will this product actually help to support my blood sugar? And you're like, well, it's got these ingredients, and I think it could, like, trying to obviously not, you know, to be compliant on the phones and everything like that. But even the fact that, like, a lot of them knew the marketing was kind of over the top, and they were, like, totally cool with that. It wasn't like there were these dumb people who'd been fooled. They're like, I'm bored. I'm, like, 65, bored at home. This video entertained me, and it sounds like a good product. And you're like, oh, shit, that's totally different, right? And then just, like, the ones who maybe weren't as, like, technologically sophisticated, and that gave you insights into, like, how they didn't understand the way your checkout worked. And just. It was really, really cool. So I kept doing that for a while. I stopped, but I did it for, like, a couple months where I would go in on weekends and do the calls. And I think that probably really helped me to be, like, a better, like, marketer and copywriter and probably even, like, a human being. So it's kind of interesting.

Yeah, definitely. I remember on the same note the first time. So when I wrote some of the copy for Alan and them for their survival stuff, they sent me over, there's basically, like, five or six videos they did of testimonials with a couple of their customers who had bought, like, generators and survival food and who had actually gone through, like, hurricanes and storms and stuff, and they had all these testimonials from them. I'd been writing copy for them for a little bit already. And I remember after I watched those videos, my jaw was just on the ground at like, how much I was writing so far above these people's heads. I could just hit me, like, smack in the face. Like, every one of these people is, like, Billy Bob and Billie Jean, like, living in a trailer in Texas. And then, like, this other guy who's like, literally, while they're interviewing him, like, drinking a Budweiser in his, like.

Wearing.

His, like, Oklahoma Suitors hat. Like, I was like, oh, my God. I'm, like, talking, like, at this level, these people, like, just salt of the earth, blue collar. Like, that's who they are. But it really. It changed the way I wrote copy to him because I just started, like, simplifying everything and just talking in much more, just normal language that your buddy who's a Construction worker would talk, like.

Yeah, it's a huge thing. I mean, even. Even now, you know, Justin and I see that in Copy Accelerator, but, like, people will write these, like, long, dense sentences and kind of be really academic. And it sounds, I think, for all of us. I would imagine we all are very conscious of not doing that. But even the kind of like, experienced writers don't always, like, put that together. And so that's a huge thing that's changed. My writing too, is really trying to stay at that, like, seventh grade reading level and like the barstool test. Right. Can I. I imagine I'm sitting at a. On a bar next. At a bar next to somebody, and I'm telling them about some discovery, like, while we're like a couple Budweisers deep. And like, that's the way I try to talk to them. And there's a huge difference versus when you're talking to, like, your professor at college or you're talking to like, your boss or whatever. Did you guys all have. You guys. Do you guys remember, like, kind of when you. Did you guys have a conscious moment? I guess, because I did. Somebody showed me, like, the Flush Kincaid thing and the grade level and that I was writing at like a 17th grade level. And they were like, you should be writing it like a seventh grade. It was like, it was like 14 to 18.

Most of my stuff, they're like, so it's graduate school.

Basically it goes up to like 22%. I don't know, they just kind of. I don't know how they decide what that grade level is. But yeah, basically it was like, really high level. And I started like, basically trying to do everything at like a. Like a, you know, seventh grade or below level. And my copy conversions, it was a complete, you know, kind of direct relationship between. As I simplified, my copy did better and better. So I had an actual time where somebody like, showed that to me. Did you guys just figure that out on your own or did somebody kind of tell you or how.

I've always kind of written that way. I have stuff that I wrote back in, like, college and high school that I still have on my computer. And I've always written that way. I've always been like, I also know, like, nothing about grammar. Do you guys have this happen where you still get people, like, sending an email saying, hey, I got your email, and there's some grammatical issues, And I'm like, I don't fucking care. I don't give a shit about that thing. I'm never gonna use Grammarly for anything. Like, that's not what I'm going for. I'm looking for communication, not for like, what is the right way to do it. Yeah, for me personally, my background is all in like essay writing and theatrical writing and screenwriting and stuff like that. So for me, it's always been about dialogue and how people actually talk. And I just try to write literally when I'm. When I'm writing, I sit here and just talk to myself the entire time. I cannot work at like an open office plan of any kind because I can't actually do what I do unless I can mumble to myself the entire time while I'm doing it.

Dan, what about you?

Yeah, I mean, I don't know if I was ever writing like a super high grade level, but I do remember. So when I was at the Motley Fool, I wrote this package on Social Security. And the real breakthrough I had after that was not only was the writing simple, but just sort of the premise was very simple and it was a very straightforward type of idea. And I remember really thinking like a lot of the stuff that I had worked on prior to that. I had become a victim of trying to make my ideas too big. And so ever since then, I've kind of fallen to this idea where if I can't describe my entire promo in five short sentences, that it goes out the window because there's no way that an uneducated or unaware customer who has no idea what I'm going to talk about can get at it any more than that.

Well, that's really interesting though, because like, going back to our conversation about conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theories are generally really, really complicated and require these mental gymnastics to try to kind of find these patterns and make it work. And those are appealing to people who are not necessarily the best educated as well. So I think it's, it's. I wonder what it is about those that makes it possible to have these like, really, you know, connections all over the place. Really complicated things actually stick for people.

You could sum it up very easily like 911 was an inside job because it benefited the vice president, maybe.

Yeah, that might make sense. Yeah.

And even though they're like elaborate, but there's like, like there's a lot of different dots but that. There's like an elaborate web connecting them. But the dots themselves aren't that complex. Right. It's like 5G is pretty linear. Yeah. Like causes radiation and blah, blah, blah. Like Covid or hurts your immune system. Like COVID 19 happened in Wuhan. Like Wuhan is where 5G started. Like, you know, but it's like, it's like they're like little kind of facts that then they start connecting in weird ways and then making a logical flow. But the actual snippets aren't that bad. It's more the way that it's the leaps that are in the connect, the synapses, the connection.

I think it's also like telling people things they want to believe. Right? Things they're already pre primed to believe or things that you'll never go broke telling people they're right. Right. Like you'll just never, ever go, but people just want to hear the ideas they already have are the right ones and it's going to be confirmed. And really, these people are all against you. Everybody wants to be the victim. Everybody wants to be special.

I mean, the one thing I always think about with, with conspiracy stuff and people who are really into that and who it appeals to. I ran a couple emails about this. Like, they live in a world where they see everything through the lens of mistrust. Like, it's not just government stuff. It's like their insurance company. It's. They're at a restaurant, they think somebody screwing them over there. Like it's, it's everything. Like it's not just one thing. Like everything they see is. There's just this mistrust lines.

It's a tremendous victim mentality too, right? It's just this feeling of like a lack of power or the big guy is trying to screw you in some way. It's interesting how many people want to be victims. Well, it's also like, you know, copy 101. Like it's never your fault, right? Like those are people that are desperately looking for a way for nothing to be their fault at any time because they can't handle it.

Those are really. And like, I think it was in the first season of Game of Thrones and it's hard to find, but basically, I'm assuming, I don't know if you guys have all seen Game of Thrones or at least the first season or anything like that, but part of it, like Littlefinger, who's obviously one of the characters, he's in the whorehouse and he's coaching one of the whores, but she's moaning and faking being all into it. But he's basically like, no, that's not how to do it. And he has this whole monologue about how. It's like he knows that he's paying you, right? He knows that, that. But what he wants is to feel that he's special. It's like, yo, he's like, his cock's bigger than the other men's cocks. He's. You know, he's always been better than other men. Like, he's always known it in his heart. Now you're telling him it's true. He really is better than all these other men. He really is, like, the alpha male. Like, whatever. And it's actually. It's great copywriting monologue. It's not particularly PC and like. But. But. Yeah, I know, but, like, it's just. That's the way it is, right? It's sort of like in copywriting, you're essentially saying, you know, hey, you're right. Your cock always was the best. You know, great news.

That are really into the opposite.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, Exactly. Right? Yeah. Here's. Well, here's the one missing piece you didn't know about your cock.

I have a sales letter I can't write. So, like, I fucked up my back really badly years ago. I got in this car wreck in my 20s, and I've been fixing that over the last few years, doing a lot of yoga, doing a lot of Pilates, doing a lot of all these other things, and slowly, slowly rebuilding my body. And about a year and a half ago, my wife and I are having sex, and she's like, what the fuck is going on? What? And it turns out by, like, fixing my back and my hips and all this other stuff, my dick had actually gotten, like, an inch bigger because it had been, like. Because of the way I was standing and the way, like, it just. Just more of it kind of came out in some way, and I'm like, I don't think I can actually make a product about this. Like, step one, get in a horrible car wreck when you're 25. Step two, spend thousands of hours trying to fix yourself. And then somehow, some way, you get a bigger kick.

Whatever. Yoga. Yoga. Burns.

Yoga.

Yoga.

Cock.

Dot Com.

Yoga. Gross.

Oh, my God.

Hey, man. Pilates makes your penis better. You should try it.

It's great.

Not bigger, but better.

Those niches have always been fascinating to me. To, like, grow your penis or the guy, the. The product about how to grow taller is, like, probably.

Oh, yeah. Well, you know, you have the secret, right? Like, you grew taller than anybody, like, in, like, three years or something.

That one, like, is always just fascinating to me. I've actually never looked at, like, I've always. I'm very curious, like, what they have in the product, because I actually have no idea. Like, is it just a bunch of, like, back bends and stuff? You gotta do that.

You just put a valve in there and then you blow into it and you inflate your dick. Yeah. I don't know. But I find it interesting, though, the. So obviously I work in the niche of, like, relationship advice stuff, and I know women very well, and I talk to women very well. And it's interesting because the guys that are like, I need to be taller or whatever else. It's true that most women do not want to date a guy who is shorter than them, but if you're going to be a guy who shorted them, the way to do that is to be confident about it and to accept that and to own your shortness. Right. It's like, I'm a very hairy guy. It would be relatively easy for me to be like, oh, my God, I'm so ashamed of all this. But instead I'm like, yeah, I got back hair. Fuck you, I'm just gonna own it. And that becomes very powerful and very attractive as opposed to the idea of, like, diminishing yourself in some way. I know guys with some guys with tiny dicks who are really confident. They do really well with women. They're also great at giving head, from what I hear.

No personal experience there?

Yeah, not personally, no. Not in that particular case, no.

Were you guys. Because speaking of confidence, I mean, I wasn't really particularly confident for a lot of my, like, life, you know, like, I was kind of chubby and nerdy, and then I was, like, not nerdy, but still chubby. And then I kind of, like, in high school, hit, like, you know, worked out and kind of, like, I don't know, got like. Wasn't really fat anymore, but I still felt like a fat kid until, like, my, like, mid-20s probably, you know, And I'm, like, a pretty confident guy now, but I think just having lots of success and, you know, all that kind of stuff really turns out helps with your confidence when you, you know, have a bunch of wins. But, you know, it took a long time, I think.

What?

What did you say?

Growing older, I think, helps.

That's part of it. Yeah.

That's a big part of it, too. I remember that. That's actually. I remember talking to a friend who was in his, like, early 40s when I was in my, like, mid-20s, and I forget the context, but basically he was like, the only difference between, like, where I am now, where I'm. When I was your age, is, like, the amount of fucks I give Is like, way less. And I didn't totally get it at the time, but now, even getting into my mid-30s, like, oh, I get it. Because, like, there's all kinds of shit I just don't give a fuck about anymore.

I have a joke about that, which is when you're in your, like, teens and your twenties and you're out and your fly is down, you're like, oh, fuck, my fly is down. You have to, like, you know, you're a little embarrassing. Move over. When you're 42 and your fly is down. Which was what happened to me today when I went to the supermarket. You just. You just pull up your fly. You're just like, well, fly is down. And then you just move on with your life because who fucking cares? Like, I don't give a shit. Yeah, I love getting older. I'm in my 40s now. It's the happiest I've ever been by far because you just stop caring.

Yeah, I'm in a similar spot. Like, I'm 36 now, and actually I'm in better shape now than I was when I was 25. Like, I feel better than when I was 25. I know a lot more about myself than when I was 25. Like, if you offer me to go back to be 25, like, I would have no interest. I guess if you offer me to go back to be 25 and I knew what I know now and that.

Then I might kill it. Yeah.

Yeah, then I'd probably do it because that'd be cool because I get like 10 free years to.

You just go back to the days when you could buy clicks for $0.04 on Google and make a fuck ton of money. I was talking to Mike Geary about that and just the level of sophistication we have to have in our funnels now compared to 10, 15 years ago, when you could just put up a $20 ebook and make a fuck ton of money with no upsells not knowing anything about traffic or any of that shit. And now it's, you got to fucking put a man on the moon to launch an offer. Yeah, it's crazy. Even, like, you know, 10 years ago when I first launched my relationship advice stuff, I got so freaking spoiled because I didn't know anything about traffic. All I did was I'd create an offer. I'd create a vsl, I'd put it on clickbank, I'd send a few emails and post on Facebook, and then money would just show up out of nowhere. And I never really wanted to know it was like a quantum computer. I didn't want to look inside the box and see where the traffic was coming from because some of it was like these Indonesian super affiliates who are hacking Facebook all the time and sending tremendous amounts of stuff. And in recent years, actually, I've actually had to learn how to like get my own traffic and work the numbers and shit. It's annoying. It was more fun before.

It is when I put out my first weight loss offer on Clickbank in 2010. I was making two grand a day profit on Facebook with no upsells and I had no backend. I didn't even email the list. Like, I didn't even collect customers. I thought, I didn't realize that's what you're supposed do to. To do. I thought you were supposed to make all the money on the front end. I didn't understand. You're supposed to get customers that break even and then like make all the money on the back end.

I remember hearing all that stuff 10 years ago, like eight, 10 years ago when people were saying, you should do this, this, this. I'm like, but I'm making so much money anyway. Like I was making millions of dollars anyway by barely ever doing anything.

Yeah. I mean, if you had a funnel that had the sophistication of your Funnel Today, in 2008, we would not be on this call because we'd all be retired.

We'd all be retired.

Yeah.

Right now.

Yeah, I was talking to Gary about that. Gary would be a billionaire by now instead of whatever the fuck he is. Like, yeah, it's nuts.

It's also nice. Think back. Like, I remember at that time it was like my offer took off and there was like, it was me, Gary, Rob Polis, I think John Benson. There was about five offers on ClickBank in the health niche and there wasn't offers a whole thing.

Yeah.

If you wanted to mail for someone's offer, there was like five or six of them. Then you compare that to today. You go in like one Facebook group and it's like, okay, here's 70 different people with health offers that you can mail. Like, there was literally just nobody doing what we were doing.

It's interesting, the relationship advice niche, because when I moved into that niche, I came from working as a copywriter in the make money online niche and the health niche and a bunch of other stuff that was a little more hard nosed. And when I came in there and did like text the romance back and those things, I kind of made everybody in that particular niche up Level, right? They were like, oh, somebody actually knows how to market. I was getting two or three dollars EPCs when they were used to like 45 cent EPCs. And for a few years there as I was putting out offers, there were a ton of new things coming out. And then when I got sick and disappeared, I guess they just didn't know how to do it. But like they're just like no new women's offers came out in our niche for like four years or something. I can't quite figure out what happened there because I was too distracted. But it's interesting how that particular niche contracted while health and such never does.

You're totally right. You totally kind of just own that niche. Because I am thinking back to when, because again, 20, 13, 14, 15 and it was like everyone was like, even as I was starting to get good and hit my own stride. But it was like Krista Dot has a new offer out. Study Chris, whatever. Study your copy and read your letters and you're absolutely one of the, the best writers like ever. It was amazing. And then yeah, you did, you know, you obviously disappeared a bit later on. But then like nobody stepped in to like this niche that you've just been owning. It's kind of crazy. I wonder if it's because they just felt like they couldn't do it.

Too scared?

Yeah, too scared.

It's also like I was willing to be a leader, right? Like I was willing to be the guy especially because I was much more arrogant back then and more narcissistic back then and I was willing to just be that hard nosed. Like I'm just going to, if you put a wall in front of me, I'm just going to go through that goddamn wall and I'm going to sell as hard as I can. And the relationship advice niche in general is besides like Jordan hall is not really marketers, right? It's mostly people who got into it through trying to be a relationship advice person or like a therapist or something like that and then had to learn marketing and generally doesn't really, don't really like marketing. What was that one guy that was at your event after I gave my speech and he was like saying he's in relationship advice world in some way and he saw one of my videos and did a VSL kind of based on it. And then somebody wrote him and said I can't believe you're sending out a hypey Chris Haddad style scam sales letter. And then the guy was like, but on the upside I made a lot more Money and helped a lot more people, which is always kind of how I look at it, which is, like, if you have a good product that's actually going to help people, you need to sell it as hard as you can within ethical and legal boundaries.

Right.

Otherwise you're kind of being a dick because somebody else out there is going to sell them really hard and give them crap instead.

I think you made a good point there. Like, a lot of us, like the four of us on this call are much more marketers who go and find the opportunities. And there's a lot more. I remember a lot of people, like, asking me about that. It's like, I'm in love with the marketing aspect. Like, I consider and shoot the shit on marketing and conversions and psychology all day. The actual thing that it's doing, like, as long as it just kind of appeals to me or I'm somewhat interested in it, like, okay, that's kind of enough for me. So health, like, health has always been kind of a hobby of mine. So I like writing health copy survival stuff I find really interesting and fun because there's all these cool, like, conspiracy stuff you could do and a lot of anger and fear and all kinds of emotion in there. So to me, it, like, I'm not. But yeah, to kind of talk about what you're saying, like, there's a lot of people in this industry who come in and it's like, I'm really good at picking stocks, and I want the world to see how good I am at picking stocks. And now I gotta figure out how to sell this shit so that people can see how good I am at picking stocks.

Well, it's always really funny when, like, back in the day, I would regularly get people who would write me and say, hey, Chris, I know you're really great at marketing and you've got this relationship advice stuff. I have this amazing, like, I've done this and this, and I have this amazing products, and I will give you 10% to market it. And I was like, you've got it backwards. Yeah, you've got it 100% backwards. As far as. Honestly, even 10% might be too much to give you because the marketing makes and breaks everything. But it's interesting how they. They don't understand that when they're first getting into it. I had somebody who I did one of my offers with who, of course, after we were really successful with it and she made some good money, I gave him more than I should have, she went off and tried to do it herself.

Right.

She's like, oh, I don't need him. And she bombed miserably. Like the entire thing just went down in flames. Because the marketing is what's important.

That's like, that's what you run into in the health niche when you try to hire the doctor to be the face of it.

Yeah.

His jaw like hits the ground. You're like, yeah, you're getting like a dollar for every sale. We make like what?

Make a lot of money that way. If you play the game right. It's the same thing with like affiliates, like give them out. You know, Gary was the first guy to give out 75% then I think he was the first guy to give out 90% too. And if you can afford to do that, that's, that's the person that makes all the money. Especially these days when it's so much harder than it used to be.

Right. I was the one thing. Speaking of Gary, like, I've told this to him. I had a big revelation back in the day, learning how when you're growing a company, at some point you kind of have to make, you have to make a decision. You could go the Mike Geary route, which is like hire all freelancers, have a very small, maybe two or three people staff. Everything is like minimal. He's running on Clickbank. He doesn't have his own merchant accounts. Like, or you go the other way where it's like you have a 60 person staff, you have your own office building. But a lot of people don't realize, like you have to make that decision at some point. You can't just like toe the line like. And Mike, it's really cool watching how he does it because it's like every decision has to go through that filter, which is like, this is a lifestyle business for me. I want to make X amount of money a year. I want to ski four times a week, I want to travel. And if this is going to interfere with that, I'm not doing it.

As opposed to people that like just try to grow and grow and grow and are working 90 hours a week and miserable. I just don't like working. If I work more than 20 hours a week, I just get ornery. So I don't want to do it. Luckily, I don't really have to at this point.

I think some people, a couple of things happen too though. People go into their first kind of offer successful and then they kind of think they're building a business when they're not. Right. And so then they feel like they have to hire a bunch of people, because that's what they're supposed to do because they're building the business, and the reality is just build an offer. Yeah, they have an offer. And frankly, building offers is much more profitable than building a business most of the time. Right. Of course, there are exceptions to that, and there's a longevity factor and things of that nature. But it's like, you know, you have to really be clear. They're very different if you want to build a real business. Like, you look at even Mark and Jeff with Natural Health Sherpa, and they spoke at the event. They're like, they're giving up a ton of money today for money tomorrow. And that's totally awesome and cool, and they're brilliant. But that's a very different approach than, like, if you want a dollar today.

It'S also like, what do you want out of your life? Right? Like, I like money, but money isn't what gets me out of bed in the morning. As long as I've got enough to live the lifestyle I've got now, which is nice, but not extravagant in any way, then I'm pretty. If I could just extend what I have now for the next 50 years, 40 years, I'd be a very happy person. I don't really personally have that. I had a friend recently. I was talking to a younger guy in our business, doing really, really well, and he's like, I want to be a billionaire. I'm like, why? He's like, what do you mean, why? I'm like, why do you want to be a billionaire? He's like, because I want to be a billionaire. I'm like, you need to think about this before you commit your life to going down this path, because it will not make you happy to be a billionaire unless you really know why you're doing it and what you're going to get out of it. I think when you're in your 20s, the money matters more. The numbers matter more when you're in your 20s. And the competition and the idea of, like, hey, I make all these zeros, that means that I mean something in some way.

Well, like, if I sold a company for, like, a billion dollars, right? And then I just have that cash cool, that billionaire level. Sure. But most billionaires you look at are like, they're working all the time. They're like, their relationships are terrible. Like, they don't know their kids. Like. Like they're divorced. Like, they're just like. Like that level. Like, being a billionaire seems pretty awful in a lot of like. Plus, you have so many things going on at that point that. Yeah, you're constantly on calls. Like you have all these people in your life like, well, who wants, yeah.

Who wants that target on their head? Right? Like even guys I know who go up on Facebook, I know that part of our business is you have to brag about how much money you make. I'm personally very uncomfortable with it, but it's part of the business. But like if you're going around driving a Ferrari, doing this, doing that, especially now when the world is as fucked as it is and so many millions and billions of people are barely making enough money to get by, you're putting a huge target on your head. I would hate the idea of being world famous and known to be extremely rich. Sounds like the worst thing in the world to me. I like being able to go to the supermarket.

The one thing that's. Yeah, especially on the super famous side. I mean there's something interesting about that because like there is. The one nice thing about being really famous is like, like people will just pay you, give you more money because you're famous and rich. Right. So going back to like the president thing, it's like once you're the president, people will pay you a million dollars to come speak. And even people who are famous in their, like Tim Ferriss can get paid whatever. He gets paid like $50,000 or $100,000 to go speak at some event. And you know, it's kind of, it's nice to have that additional optionality in your life kind of. But like the downside to it is as you said, you do have a huge target. But I get it from like the fact that like if there's ways that as a lazy. I love to work, I actually do love to work, which is like, enjoy working. Happy about that? Yeah. But like. Yeah, I don't know, it's just.

Did you read that, did you read that article that Tim wrote about the downsides of being famous? Oh no, no, it was, it was really interesting. He wrote it probably, I would say about a month ago, maybe three weeks ago. And he just detailed all these things that changed in his life from being famous.

Reasons not to become famous.

Yeah, I mean like certain things that you never think of. Like he's got like fucking stalkers and he had to have like full time security and like crazy people like showing up at his house. And like, Tim isn't that famous.

Like, well, even the Michael Fury stuff. I had a stalker a couple years ago. I had this woman who flew from Atlanta to Seattle who had this completely convinced herself that her and Michael Fury had a relationship and that I had invited her to fly to Seattle and she showed up and was like trying to figure out where I lived and like. And like that's from. I mean, I haven't done any real Michael Fury stuff in any serious way in like six, seven years at this point. But even just that little bit was enough to get the crazies to come out of the woodwork a little bit. Plus I still get death threats through as that character, which is always kind of fun. That's fucked up.

Would you be famous then? Are you afraid of fame? Are you like whatever about it? I feel like you just so go the flow so much, you know, what's your, what's your. What are your feelings about fame?

I just don't really want it. Like there's nothing that I would want. It's like Chris was saying, like, I like being able to leave my house and go to the grocery store and just be on my own and not.

I like being famous at events and then going home, right? It's nice to like go to TNC or go to Copy Accelerator and have people, you know, who know what I've done and who I am, be respectful or whatever. And to have beautiful women looking at you with that special look in their eye because you're famous. And then to go the fuck home and be a regular person again.

You know what's funny too and kind of humbling about that is like it happens in every industry. Like for us, it's our industry. But I remember, you know, Laura and I were on like we were broken up or whatever and I was in Vegas and I went out and I was like playing. I had a dinner and I went. I played craps like by myself. This is like, you know, several years back, obviously. And there was a girl who's there and I was like talking to her and we sort of like just started walking around the casino and like went to play blackjack and she was there for like an insurance like convention or something. But then I remember like talking to her and then it was like, oh, that's like so and so. And it was like the VP of like the regional VP of like, you know, their insurance division or something. This guy was at the bar for good drink and all these people like are around him and like then like one of her co worker comes up and like they're all like looking at him and talking about him and it's like. And it. But it's so funny, right? Because if someone who's outside that road, you're like, I don't give a fuck. Nobody. Why do I care about this insurance? Vb But I'm sure it's the same thing, like, right, with any industry, including ours. But it's just funny when it's your industry, you're like, well, yeah, but I mean, I do a lot of pretty cool shit. But then it's like, you know, any other industry, they're like, yeah, they feel the same way.

Well, I gotta say, like, my. So my friends at home in Seattle, I hang out with a lot of Burning man related people. And I have very few entrepreneurial friends in Seattle. And none of my everyday friends are people from our business whatsoever. They just know me as the crazy guy with the mustache and whatever else. But slowly some of them from, like, Facebook and stuff kind of went down the rabbit hole and started to, like, figure out that in this very small world, I'm a big deal. And they learned about the Michael Fury stuff, and they're just like, what the fuck? What the fuck are you talking about? Why are people treating. They'll see on Facebook. And they're like, chris, why are these people trying to give you a blowjob on Facebook? My God, don't worry about it. Don't worry about it. It's fine. Or they, like, hear my YouTube ads and they're like, why is your voice coming out of the computer? Question for you. So my wife Angie is a fantastic copywriter. Laura, of course, is also in the business. One thing that is tough for Angie occasionally is she came to meet with me to, like, the ClickBank event over the summer in Mexico. And we were talking afterwards and she was saying, like, you know, it's really fucking hard and weird being the person next to the person being asked for their autograph all the time.

Right.

It's a really kind of fucked up thing when you're just kind of being an accessory to that person. And I have a. I wonder about, like, since, you know, Laura was kind of your mentor or like, whatever it was at first, how have you kind of navigated that? Has it been an interesting thing to get through? Has it been hard? I think it's definitely easier for women than for men to be. Not as big of a deal one, but still, it can be a dangerous thing.

Yeah, it's interesting. I think she had so many relationships, like, in the space before me.

Right?

Obviously, because she was already in the space. So that kind of helps. Cause, like, even if she goes to an event, she's Seeing people that she knew before she'd ever met me even. And so she retains some of her identity that way. And then, yeah, she just has done a really good job with it. And she is, you know, she is a brilliant marketer now she has her skincare kind of company, which is doing pretty well. And that's great. So it hasn't been a really big thing. I'm also not as famous as you are, though, and not just, like, because of Michael Fury, but, like, I've really only stepped into the spotlight in the last, like, year and a half since I started doing Copy Accelerator with Justin. Before that, I had good relationships. So I think I'm definitely better known. I mean, not. I think, like, I'm definitely better known now than I was, you know, even more recently. So I do get, like, recognized at events or even random things. It has happened. Like, we went to a dance class lesson in Vegas and the guy there was like, oh, you're Stefan Georgi. And I was like, what the fuck? Like, this is the weirdest thing. We're here to do, like, salsa dancing. And, you know, it turned out he had a mutual friend and. But, yeah, so it hasn't been a huge issue, but it is weird. I do understand, especially for you guys. I can see that being a pretty weird dynamic.

I find it really weird and interesting that I'm still as well known in our business as I am, considering I was really off the radar for like, five or six years. Years or something like that. It's really fascinating to me. I wonder how much of it is that I'm good at what I do and how much it is that I'm a fucking weirdo.

Right?

I'm sure that at least part of it is that.

Yeah, perfect combo.

Yeah, it works. You know, having a big personality can be very profitable.

So it's.

It's funny, just like, as a. For all of you guys. It's funny. I'm thinking about my dynamic with all of you guys as far as when I. Before I knew you. So, like, Chris, like, you know, I studied and I think it's part of the reason why Chris is, yeah, you're a weirdo. But also your copy's just so fucking good. Your offers are so good that, like, people just remember it, right? I remember when I. I was kind of, like, scared of you because you seemed eccentric, and it was like, oh, no, what if. You know, he doesn't for me for a long time, it's just like, what if people don't like me?

Right?

Which is A very human thing in general. And that's kind of like with you, how I remember feeling. And if I'd see you like at an event before I ever met you, with like Justin, he would run this copy mastermind the day before traffic and conversion. And I wouldn't get invited and I could have just asked, hey, I want to go. But instead I'd be really like, I wasn't invited, what the hell? And I'd have an ego thing about it. This was the first time or two happened. And then I got over it. But of course. And then with Dan, it was really just this guy who was writing all this killer mostly financial stuff at the time. People kept bringing it up to me and that I. Dan, I didn't like, know as much from like events, but like, I just kept seeing, hearing about Dan. But then I looked at his copy and I was like, oh, shit, that's really good. And then we only met Dan, like, what, I guess like a couple, like a month or two ago.

A month ago in Vegas?

Yeah, yeah, in Vegas.

Like months ago or years ago by.

Now, but yeah, but it's funny thinking about that and that dynamic. Yeah, that dynamic of how like. And that's the way I've learned as I've gotten older too, right? It's like nobody, like 99% people aren't assholes. And if they're an asshole, like, that's a them problem, not a you problem.

You know what I mean? Yeah.

Also though, maybe it's good I didn't go to you, Chris, when you're in the height of your narcissism, slash off your meds, because maybe you would have been a total asshole and discard me for life.

I would have been, I would have been very jealous of you, honestly, at that point. Because my self esteem was really. If I had met you, like, honestly, even when, like when I met Justin, basically, like, I'll tell you, like right out, I was kind of intimidated to meet you because I had been, had been kicked so firmly in the balls by life and had not really been able to work or put out an offer that really kicked ass in a while. And then I see you and Justin, who are, you know, younger than me and all, like, I didn't know you at all. And then all of a sudden you guys are like big deal copywriters. I was pretty intimidated. It was pretty scary at first. So it's like, it goes. And I've had that same experience with people like David Deutsch, right. Who was like, he was like you know, he had seen my stuff before. I'm like, you're David fucking Deutsch, and you're calling me for advice about something. Like, it just blows your mind. But most people, you know, Dunning Kruger is a thing. None of us actually think we're as big of a deal as. Or as well known as we are, unless we're a profound narcissist who need that to feel ourselves.

Yeah.

Yeah. I think it's refreshing. Every time I've met somebody, you guys included, who I've been like, fuck. Like, that guy's a big deal. And then you just discover they're all human beings and we're all kind of, like, wired relatively similarly. Maybe this goes back to the thing about me not being very cynical, but. But usually, like, immediately, I'm pretty much just like, oh, I really like that person.

I just think it's really important to be friendly and to realize that people are just people. And I always make a point at events and such. Cause I don't know if you get this yet, but you get this weird thing where you're hanging out, talking to people, and people stand like, three feet away from you and their body language is kind of like this, and they don't say anything, and they're just kind of waiting and watching the conversation. I always try to make a point, like, hey, how are you? Nice to meet you, and bring them in in some way, because they won't do it themselves. But I remember being that guy, too. I remember, like, you know, seeing Jeff Walker at an event before I got to know him and being like, oh, my fucking God. Or being in an elevator with Frank Kern, like, not knowing what to say because it was Frank fucking Kern.

It's like being the. You get to feel like the hot girl in high school at the event.

Yeah. For a little while.

You get to, like, you're running the event or you're speaking at it. And then, like, exactly. Like, I had that happen at a couple events or at one back in January. Like, they had a little, like, cocktail party that I spoke up and I.

Spoke at the event.

Then they had a cocktail party at night. I'm, like, out there, like, same thing. Like six or seven people just standing three feet away from me, scared to say hi. But I know that feeling, too. So now. But even me as, like, an introvert now, I know, like, that's what they want. So I'll just, like, go over and say hi to them so that they don't have to get up the balls to actually do it.

As humans, if we see somebody. Oh, go ahead. Sorry.

That's all I had to say.

I just think it's interesting that as human beings, if we see somebody on stage, I don't know where, I mean, I'm sure it has an evolutionary basis about alpha male, alpha female, whatever it is. But we see somebody on stage or we see them on YouTube or whatever else, and they become something different to us, right? They become elevated in this powerful way. Even if there are some random fucking asshole putting up videos on Facebook, right? Like, it's really fascinating to me how that can. How we, for whatever reason, our brains do that, where we elevate people these amazing places and we feel like we're not good enough to even talk to them or we're going to be bothering them when we say hi or something. When nothing could be further from the.

Truth.

You know, Like Dan, back to Dan's optimism. And kind of like one thing I would do, you know, this stopped like a couple years ago. But like, if I didn't know somebody who was successful, I think part of like jealousy and then as like a, like a self preservation mechanism, I would kind of like feel like I didn't like that person and I'd sort of be like, guarded. But what I found is, like, every time that happened and I ended up actually meeting and spending time with the person almost every single time, like, just like Dan, I'd be like, oh, wow, I really like this person and they're cool. And so I realized, like, well, if this is happening like every single time, why don't I just really try to like, stop, like, feeling, you know, this way? Why don't I just assume that I'm gonna like this person if I actually get to know them and stop, like, judging them and making these weird preconceptions about them and just actually talk to them? That helped a lot. It's really. It's weird that I would. It's not weird, but it's weird now to think back that I would do that because I don't really do it today. I bet I would. I bet if I met someone, like, if I was hanging out with a group of people and like, somebody's super famous. I don't know. Tom Cruise, this is a bad example because maybe he is really weird, but, like, somebody's really famous, right? And I was like, hanging out and like, everyone's attention was on them. I bet I probably would still have that instinct to want to like, kind of knock them down in my eyes, you know, until I got to know them at least. I didn't do that.

But I acted like a moron when I met Ed o' Neill from Married With Children years ago because I loved that show so much. When I was growing up, me and my dad. My dad died a long time ago, but me and my dad used to watch it. And I was in LA for something, going to Larry Benet's event, and Ed o' Neill was outside the hotel, like, talking to somebody. I was like, hey, how are you? Nice to meet you, big fan. And then I just ran away. And he's like, what the fuck? I'm like, that was a dick move. I should really shouldn't have done that. The guy was probably like talking to his daughter or something. But yeah, I feel like an asshole.

I had same note. So like, man, this is probably four or five weeks ago, probably about two months ago in Austin, one of my buddies invited me to this house party and I walk in and Vinny Chase from Entourage is there. And I was like, kind of like starstruck. Like when I was in college, I probably watched Entourage like every fucking day. But I was like, shocked. He was like 4 inches shorter than me and I just couldn't get over it. The whole time I'm like, oh, my God, dude. Like, I was like, I thought he just looks like such a badass on the fucking screen on tv. And I'm like, this dude is like four inches shorter than me. Shocking.

He's the height he used to be before the massive growth spurt.

Dude, I was. I was like 5:1 when I graduated high school. I was.

That's insane. Freaking insane. That's crazy. Good for you. You should bottle that stuff and sell it.

Yeah, that's your offer right there.

That would be the best selling offer online.

How to be taller. Yeah, it would suck. I really like being six foot one. It's great. It's the perfect height.

You know, I could use another entry, a 5 11. But I was.

Oh, you could? Yeah, you could use two more inches.

I feel down here.

Six one is the perfect height. It's just. It is any six one is Captain America. That's the height you want to be. Otherwise you end up being like the tall guy in the group and that gets too much. But six one, you're like leader size, basically. You can be the guy in the.

Front that's a good size.

My buddy Alec, who is one of the guys who I talk copy, we were hanging out one time, we're all like talking. Alec is 65 and in a dead Serious sentence. He's like, if I was 6, 6, I'd feel like my life would have been so much different. And we're all just like. Every dude is like five foot five. Just wants to fucking slit your throat.

Right.

Oh, so more hypo problems? Yeah, Yeah.

I was thinking, guys, I know we. I know we said we could do an hour and a half and we're coming up on that. And I do. I know we have some stuff to get to, but so, I mean, I guess like this, you know, this is pretty informal, which is how I want it to be. I'm like, I'm going to. Like I said, I'll put on YouTube, I'll get you guys links you can share with other people. And then we can try and do like maybe an interactive one with people in the next week or two, which I think would be really fun. But is there anything that you guys want to cover before we kind of end this or anything? Great life wisdom to impart.

No, I thought that was cool.

Yeah, that was so too. You know, it's crazy times. It's going to be really interesting to see what happens the next couple of years, not just in our world, but in our industry and how people are going to react, I think. I don't know, save your money, stay humble, see how many chance you've got.

It's good advice.

Just being able to learn from what we're going through right now. I mean, maybe not even in a professional context. Right. But just being able to learn more about yourself emotionally, financially, spiritually, whatever it may be like. I've really kind of tried to tap into a lot of that over the last few weeks and just find all the silver linings that I can. And in some ways it's. It feels weird. Like I think I'm gonna, whatever. Ten years from now, there's gonna be a slight bit of nostalgia about this time period.

It's a valuable. It's a valuable experience. I think it makes us all slow down. People are spending more time with things that matter. I can walk out. I can get like, walk, you know, half a mile from my house and see miles that. I mean, mountains that are miles and miles away that we could never see from the south city before because of the pollution. There's always ups and downs to everything, right? There's always silver linings. There's always horrible things. You get to kind of choose what this experience is for you. Assuming that you can keep the lights on and pay your bills.

Yeah, 100%. And I actually feel like I have so much. So many more things we could talk about. So I'll definitely do another one of these. I have another call to get to. Which it sucks. I mean, I could cancel it, but.

Next time we should drink a bunch of bourbon while we're doing it.

I mean, very different conversation. Like we veered into blowjobs and cock references. Like a little bit. Half a bottle. Yeah. Bourbon and. Yeah, different.

I could just see Dan after like drinking, just talking about the gold standard and how that messed up you're going off of it.

Yeah. For me it would be because it's still morning here. I'd be drinking Bailey's in my coffee.

Awesome. This was great, guys. It was really fun.

Yeah.

Good idea, Stefan.

End.

Cool. Awesome, guys. Yeah. Well, let's all keep in touch for sure.

Cool.

Cool.

See you guys.

Bye, guys.