Inside BIPF: How To Get World-Class Guests On Your Podcast (feat. Danny Miranda)

Hey everybody, welcome to the Building Public podcast. I'm your host KP, and on this show I interview world-class entrepreneurs, ambitious startup founders, creators, and builders on the internet who are boldly building the future in public. This podcast is my excuse to take you all on a curious journey to understand, learn, and hopefully be inspired by the worldviews, insights, and stories of these fabulous people changing the world. So far, I've gotten the rare privilege to sit down with incredible Guests like Gary Vee, Alexis Ohanian, Kat Cole, Sahil Lavingia, and many more leaders. So check out the full podcast listing at buildinpublicpodcast.com. Now buckle up and get ready for our latest episode. My first question for you is not a question, more of a statement, um, which is congratulations on this new launch, artofinterviewing.com. I got in there, bought it as quickly as I could see it and find it. Um, super happy for you, man. You know, this has been such a journey. I remember, folks may not know, some of you guys, if you've been following me for a while, Danny and I go back all the way. You do. I'm sure you remember episode number 34. Of course. I was doing some research.

Unreal.

Episode 34, you had me, Danny. Thank you.

Unreal. Unreal.

And it feels like yesterday, at least in my view.

Absolutely it does. And, um, then I was on your show as well. Yes. And this, you know, you're like— I have such a warmth whenever I see your face online, whenever, you know, we've connected. I— it's always so like so much good energy that you put into the world. And because of that, like, one, I'm so excited to be here, and two, I'm just like I'm, I feel overwhelmed with gratitude, truly. So.

Yeah, same here. And I think, you know, our mutual respect is partly because of our attitude and the way you carry yourself, right? Both of us, but also the craft. I take so much inspiration from watching you, you know, sort of build the podcast as a, as a, as an odyssey, as a journey, right? It's not a quick hack or a gimmick, which is how I see it. And I think there's 3 or 4 of us who are kind of in the same place, right? And there are some of us who are 5 steps ahead. I think David Senra is like 5 steps ahead, but you are there. Jay Clouse puts a lot of onus and love into his craft. Jay is coming, by the way, on Friday to the— to VIP Media. Oh yeah. But everyone's got different personalities too, right? Everyone's kind of doing a different thing, but we all kind of share this appreciation for the art, you know, of interviewing and podcasting. So I love that. I love being in a small group with you and learn and watch and observe. But first thing, first things first, you, I feel like you mentioned this a week ago when you crossed 400 episodes. Was it a week ago or 10 days ago? Something like that. Where are you right now? And give us a sense of looking back, what's the predominant emotion that you get? About the body of work you put, you know, produced in the last few weeks, last few years?

Yeah. So it's remarkable. I think now episode 408 is what I published today, and I feel like incredible levels of content and excitement. Knowing that, God forbid, I die in this moment, I feel like I've left the world with my truth. And I guess previously in my life, there's always been a sense of like, oh, I need to get something accomplished. I need to do something to leave the world with something. I need to be better so that I can— I feel like I've done it. And what's so exciting for me is I have such clear direction and clear focus on where I want to go. and so much excitement about if this is my baseline now, what does that lead to for the next 10 years, 20, 30, 40, 50? And that fills me with so much joy. So, the predominant emotion I feel is gratitude of like, I've left something that I'm really grateful that is just out there in the world forever. And that I'm so excited by what's to come. So, those are what I'm feeling right now.

Yeah. So when, when you brought me on your show, episode number 34, it was maybe 3 years ago. I, I think it was 2020 when I just joined On Deck at the time.

Yeah.

What was, if you look back, what was the big internal struggle that you had during that phase and has it been resolved or are you still working on it?

I would say that the big internal struggle that I had at that time was I feel like I've transformed myself, but the world doesn't know it yet. And so how do I show the world in some sense that I've transformed? And how do I help other people make that transformation as well? I said on my most recent episode with Justin Mayers, one of the central questions of my life is how do I get somebody who's depressed and how do I make them happy? Or just like, how do people go from that journey themselves? Not necessarily that I have to do anything, but to me, that is a central question. And I had done that journey and that internal struggle had happened for me of being really upset with life, not knowing where I wanted to go. And then 3 to 6 months later being like, oh, I found direction. I found purpose. I found clarity. And wanting What I'm doing now is trying to help other people on that journey. And I suspect that I will be pulled to do that at greater and greater levels over the next 50 years. And that to me is what is really exciting and top of mind. And that was the internal struggle at that time.

So let's rewind even further and tell me the first time you ever discovered Or you ever heard somebody say, Danny, you ask great questions. Like it could even be before you started the podcast, because I'm trying to figure out like at what point in your life was podcasting or anything like about interviewing became apparent to you that maybe this is a skill, you know, number one. And if anybody in the audience here heard a similar compliment from one of their friends, what should they do?

Yeah. It's so funny because it never happened to me, but in the past year, it really has. So, it wasn't— it's easy to say looking back, like, oh, you were destined to do this because you asked such great questions. I think I've done it and now I ask great questions as a result of doing it so many times. So, that's been really exciting for me is it's very much a skill I've built. And I hear it all the time now. It's like, It's pretty remarkable, and I'm humbled every time I do because what someone is saying is, that's a new perspective that I've never thought about before, when someone asks a great question.

Yeah.

And so, to me, if someone is hearing that a lot, I'm like, how do you use that? You have a gift there in that sense. So, use that to the best of your abilities, whether that's through creating content around it or just talking to more people. Or like whenever you, you get complimented on anything, it, the question becomes, how do you bring that to more human beings?

And it, it involves action, right? Taking action. Yeah. I think that's the hard part. I feel like when I met you, it was before you brought me on the podcast, but like I had a sense of like this, this, you know, he's got something here, right? And then on the live episode, I felt like, wow, this, this guy has got a lot of depth, you know, compared to so many of the, you know, I guess podcasters that I was listening to, but without the body of work, we all just have potential.

Yeah.

You know, and I feel, I felt the same thing when I was there, right? Like without the body of work. And so sometimes it's almost like you have to prove it to yourself that, you know, you, you are the shit that you think you're gonna be. Right. Like, so just the reps and the action. Now, 400 episodes later, nobody can deny it, right? Like, I'm sure like some random YouTube commenter would be like, Danny, man, whoa, this is like, bro. But, but those of us who knew you from day one or early days, we, we knew that spark was always there. The potential was always there, but it's an act of service you have to do for yourself to kind of put that to test.

Yeah. What's so crazy to me is somebody commenting, or I got a DM maybe in the past week or two. Someone said, hey, I don't know if you remember me, but we went to camp together when you were 12 or 10 years old. And none of— and I just stumbled across your profile, but none of what you're doing surprised me because you always had the spark inside of you. And I was like, whoa, like, that's crazy. I don't know if that's true. I don't remember having that spark inside of me. having that passion for life, that excitement, but it was clearly there if that guy noticed it, if he is being truthful. And that is, to me, that's remarkable. How do you— and that's where all the juice is. How do you nurture that spark in yourself and get back to that place of joy and excitement and love? And then you share. Wrapping this together to Build in Public, the reason why I share so much and why I'm so open with my journey is because I'm so excited by life and I just want to share that journey with other human beings. And to me, that's the most exciting part is like we're in this together. We're going to this place of Madison Square Garden. We could sell out Madison Square Garden, but it's building that together to show you and to show me this is what's possible if you get involved in a journey. And so, the spark to me represents like, okay, if you have the spark, share that energy, that joy, that love. with more human beings.

Yeah, I love that. So let's go back to great questions, right? Um, what do— in your, in your point of view, what do great questions look like, right? When do you, when do you qualify a question as, oh, that's a great question?

To me, great questions are questions that help give somebody a new perspective on themselves. And if you can give someone a new perspective Because like, and sometimes great questions are simple, but it's just a perspective that you haven't thought about. You're like, what is an interview? You know, like now, now you're really forced to sit with that. You're really, what, what does it really mean to build in public? Right? Like you had an idea for what that meant 3 years ago. You had an idea for what that meant 2 years ago. You had an idea for what that meant a year ago. And you have an idea of what that means today. And those might be slightly different, but you might not have considered that In the past year, right? And so I think sometimes we make it more complicated than it needs to be. But to me, great questions are simply questions that help you get new perspective.

So in the same way, and then what are bad questions? How, and how do they look like and how should one avoid them?

Yeah, that's a great question.

'Cause I don't know.

I don't know if I've even answered that.

I didn't think I would get the compliment that I knew I was gonna get that compliment at some point. But I didn't know it was going to be for the bad question question anyway. Yeah. But what do bad questions look like?

I think bad questions are questions that the person has already considered often and maybe are too obvious. I need to sit with that. I don't know. What is a bad question? It's very contextual. To the moment. It's reading someone's energy, right? Because the same thing that could make for a great question in a different environment and different circumstance could make for a bad question. And I think like that's important to note as well. So, I don't know. I'm going to write a note. What are your thoughts on that?

I was going to say, no, I would love for you to kind of sit on it. And then put it out on Twitter as sort of your answer to this. Because I'm sure a lot of your audience now who are buying this out of interviewing.com, the course, wanna avoid— it's a Charlie Munger thing. Like, tell me where I'm gonna die, I'm gonna avoid that pit, right? So tell 'em where not to go. Yeah. Okay. So let's go to the next part, which is walk us through the steps of what Danny Miranda did in terms of research. Or preparation for the first ever episode?

Wow.

Was this what you typically do now?

Yeah. So first episode, um, was with my friend Tej Dosa. Yeah, I love Tej. He's awesome. He's such great energy. He's just an incredible writer and so thoughtful. And he— and I was so comfortable with him, so I wasn't even thinking of it like this is an interview. I was thinking of like, I get to spend time with my friend and I get to record this. And the preparation that I did, I don't remember doing a lot of preparation, but I have to look back and, and see episode—

Did you even write down questions ahead of time or were you mostly just trying to freestyle it like in the moment?

My guess is I was trying to freestyle, but I don't truly remember. I would have to go back to September or August of 2020 was when we recorded it and, and check to see if I have any notes on that. But Today, I mean, the preparation is like at least 2 hours of dedicated focus time of listening to somebody on a previous podcast, going through their social media, understanding them deeply, going through— and I break down all this in the course, but it's just like I'm trying to live in their shoes. Yeah. So, in the beginning, I wasn't really trying to live in their shoes. I was kind of thinking I can wing it, I can do whatever. And for some people, like, they absolutely can and they should, and that's their style. And you figured that out from doing it. But for me, I was like, this is a lot more interesting the more that I put into it, and I can go a lot deeper with someone and connect more with them so that the audience can learn more about them as well, and they could learn about themselves. So,

so let's do an actual real example scenario here where,

yeah,

let's pick a guest, cuz I want the folks who are listening to this to kind of get a sense of how Danny operates today in 2023. Through a real example. So let's pick, let's pick, I don't know, like take a legend, Serena Williams. Did you have her on the show?

Serena Williams?

Yeah.

I have not yet had Serena Williams on. Okay.

Well, that could happen. I definitely think will happen at some point. Okay. So let's walk through the stages and the steps that you would today take if I told you, Daddy, I got a call from Alexis Ohanian and I think Serena is ready for you next Monday. And we're Wednesday today. What are we doing the next 3 days?

Oh my God. I mean, I'm just— so, first of all, I'm filled with so much joy and energy, right? And so, that joy and energy has got to go somewhere. And it's funny that you bring up this as an example to do, generally speaking, because one thing that I'm going to put in the next iteration of my course is someone looking over the shoulder with me. As I record my screen to do this, because I think it'll be very helpful. Yes. So, first thing, I would say I'll probably go to her Twitter account first, and I'll search through her most interesting or insightful tweets that hit me. And I might go to advanced Twitter search where I type her handle in and then do minimum favorites, 50 or 100 or 1,000, because she's very famous, and just see what is resonating with people the most from what she's put out in the world. This might not actually work because she's not Twitter native, right? Like there's a difference between people who are Twitter native versus people who—

Yeah. Like Paul, was this Paul Graham, right? He's like extremely online on Twitter. Yeah.

Exactly. So if that doesn't really come up with interesting results, which I'm sure it would, there might be great points for me to jump off of. But what I'd definitely do is I'm going to YouTube and searching her interviews. I'm seeing what are the most popular interviews? What are interviews that are way back in the day that was when she was young? What about her in her teenage years? Oh, wait. Now I remember that I watched a movie with my grandparents on Serena Williams. Let me call my grandparents. What did I say after that? What were our thoughts about it? I remember it being really impactful. Can I watch that again? Okay. Now I go to the movie and I'll see like, how did this movie come to be? Wow. Who's the director of this? How are people connected? And so, that's in like the first 10 minutes, right? Like, you could see how this gets crazy because— and—

So, as you're discovering, let's say, a nugget or two, are you taking notes on a Google Doc on the side?

Great question. So, I have the notes on— like, they're on Apple Notes so that— the reason for that is so that I can pull them up quickly on my phone if I'm researching or if I'm doing it on the computer. It's transferable like that. And so I'll come up with maybe 20 of these different notes that I find from the interviews, from tweets, from Instagram posts, all of that. And then let's say I have 20 notes and for Serena, it'll probably be like 50 or 100 notes. But in the case that I'm doing a person, I'll have 20 notes for them. And then I'll look at the, what are the common themes in these notes? Okay. Oh, there's one topic on relationships. All right. So her marriage with Alexis, right? That's one topic. Then the next topic I'll have, I'll look at the notes. I'll be like, oh, wow. Her early tennis career. Okay. That's another topic. Okay. Her coaching ability or how she was coached. Okay. That's another. So like, I'll break the different notes that I have into topics and then I can look at that and be like, all right, now I have a a general theme and direction I know we can head down. If she mentions this, I can go here. If she mentions this, I can go there. So that's kind of how I, I do it. That's the overview process.

At this point, let's say, uh, when you're at this notes point, um, have you formulated the questions yet under each note, or do you think the questions are almost irrelevant because based on what she opens up, like, you will ask a spontaneous question?

So after the notes, after I've done the headers for the notes and all that, I'll create a different section where I'll be like, here are 10 questions that I'm interested in of things that I think could come up or just things that I'm curious about. And then I'll have like those as fallbacks. And so I have the different sections and then I have the questions for the person. And then like my final section that I typically have is their words or their notes that don't fit into the first section. And so, you could kind of see how this evolves because I've published my research sheet with Andy Frisella, and then I've done it with Alex Hormozi. And you could see the difference in those is that for Frisella, I just had the topic headers. And now I have the questions and the specific quotes from people. And that's just kind of how my process has evolved. But I think you can get away with it with just the top section if it's not somebody who's like an incredible name that you want to like really like drill down and know this is going to be an impactful interview.

Right. That's fabulous. And I think there's an overlap between how you and I do. You go 3 levels deeper than I do, but It's, there is an overlap in the sense that I start with topics that I'm interested in broadly, you know, and then I go into, sometimes I go into subtopics within the topic. And then if I don't have time, I just stop there. And I pray and hope that I will have enough spontaneity in the live interview, which, you know, tends to, I'm sure you have this too, right? I mean, a lot of podcasters have to have this fallback mechanism where if you don't have a great question, you can just throw a why. And that's always my fallback. If I don't have a great question, my brain is like feeling a little bit nervous and I just, whatever they say, I just say why. And they, I just sound so smart and then they go a little smart. So I'm like, you know, that's always a good fallback. But yeah, I try to like go there. But if I really care, if I really want to go, like if I have some specific things I wanna learn from that person and if it's a high stakes interview, just like you said, then I go into questions for under each subtopic. I don't cover everything, but I have them as a backup. So, okay, this is brilliant. Okay, so tell me a little bit about how do you like this? There's a sense of like discouragement that comes with the territory in terms of being a podcaster because it's not such a viral hack mechanism, I think, compared to like TikTok creators or maybe, you know, even like to an extent Twitter, right? There's a sense of virality here in on those. Yeah. When you're building out your podcast empire, it's very, very slow and it takes a lot of reps and it's a long journey. And not only in terms of years, I'm just saying for each episode, there's many, many steps. How do you not get discouraged? How do you keep that tempo of like excitement from when you found out that you're gonna interview this person to the publish button?

So in the micro, For me, it is just about tuning into the joy. Like, that's just a constant theme that I keep coming back to. It's like, and, but in the macro sense, it's, it's understanding that like you're laying a foundation for yourself. And yeah, it's not like, I always think about Tim Ferriss made all of his money from investing in his relationships 10 years down the line. And I just think about that all the time of like, the real value of what I'm doing has nothing to do with the audience. It has to do with my connection with the person that I'm speaking to. And I really come back to that always. And I also go on my own schedule. Like, I choose to do Monday, Wednesday, Friday, but I've also chose All right. I'm not going to post in January of 2022. Okay. I'm also not going to— like, I took a break for a week in the first or second week of August where I didn't post a single episode. No problem. Back on the horse, right? So, like, I don't get burnt out because I go at my own pace and I don't have outside noise of like, oh, you missed this, or, oh, like, you're going too fast. Like, a lot of people think I'm doing so much and I'm like, yeah, I'm going at the speed that I want to go at. But also, like, that's not stopping me from not posting an episode in August, right? So, or in a week in August. And I think, um, that, that's been really helpful for just helping me think about the lack of instant results. It's like you go at your own speed.

So yeah. Okay. And then I'm gonna ask you the big question, uh, which is something I still am struggling with. And I, I know when we did Uh, the last interview where I interviewed you on my show, which is the Billion Dollar Podcast, you gave me a pretty solid answer. And it's something that I think we continue to struggle with, which is the metrics, right? Mm-hmm. Um, I looked at some of your recent metrics. It's unfair. It's unfair. You have, you, you have bangers as episodes in the last 5, 6, 7 episodes, and they were getting 400, 500 views. And then on the other end of the spectrum, there's like a Douchebag talking about some Boston sports or some other random topic and they get like 4 million views. And I'm like, what the heck is that? Right? It's so unfair. And I, but this, it is what it is. I mean, and I know you've accepted, but I'm just curious, how does one read/interpret/process metrics when they're a podcaster? How should one have a relationship with these? Because they can really make someone give up, you know?

Yeah. My eyes are just on my own paper, you know? And even though I'm watching Flagrant Podcast or whatever, I'm aware of other people getting millions of views for their podcasts. I don't tie any of my self-worth to that. And I don't look at—

Do you feel a sense of conviction that you will eventually get the numbers and that's why you're just patient? Or is it almost like detachment?

It's detachment. If I get them, great. If I don't, also great. The success of my podcast is not based on how many people see it. It's based on the relationships that I'm forming and creating. And the byproduct of that is people get to watch me build this amazing network of amazing people in public. So, it's there forever. That's giving knowledge to the world. And if that is something that people want to watch, great. If it's something people don't want to watch, also great. I mean, it's also confusing because you have the number of people, but you don't have the quality of that person. If 5 billionaires are watching my podcast and it has 600 views, what is the total net worth versus a podcast that has a million views? And it might be greater, the million-view one. But I think that my podcast is for people at a specific point in their life. And a lot of those people are like, okay, how do I handle the wealth that I've been given or that I've gained for myself? How do I build my business? Those are a different type of person than someone who's interested in comedy or being entertained. Yeah. And I love my audience. I love the people who resonate with my stuff. I genuinely want to hang out with those people. So that's exciting to me that those people are resonating with it.

And I mean, I say this all the time about just content in general at the fellowship, within public content, but also especially in podcasting, the 18 people who are listening to your first episode, you never know, one of them could be Danny. I would love to have Danny in my audience, right? In fact, my episode 1 had Danny, episode 25 had Alex Hormozi, episode 40 had like Gary Vee. Like that, the day I remember the day Gary Vee or his team, I don't know who did it, hit follow on my Twitter account. I was like, babe, let's break out the champagne. Like that was like the highest high, right? It's so funny because I had more high when he followed me, even more high that moment than the day I interviewed him. Right? Wow. Because it's like I could, because I went from broke, like no social capital to some social capital. And then I was like, yeah, okay. So I'm curious, this is the last, my, this is my last question. You've had Gary Vee on the show. We both love Gary. You've had, uh, Hormozi. We both love her, Alex. Um, who was the person who really shook you to the core and almost made you take a rebirth? Like it was like such a, like as a listener of your own show, you were like, damn. This really transformed me. And it could be, doesn't have to be a famous guest.

Hmm. The, the honest answer is I'm reborn every time. Like someone I, that, that's the truth of it is like—

It's a hard question though. If you asked me the same thing, I would've struggled too. Yeah. Because I'm like, I don't know if there's one episode I could say that, that transformed me. I think it's A lot of small pieces come together.

Let me go through the Spotify list and I'll give you the one where I was like, oh my God, I can't believe that happened, or this was incredible.

So while you pull that out, we're gonna get ready for our audience Q&A. So folks, if you guys have questions, feel free to raise your hand and I'll bring you on.

I love this. This is like a live call-in show. This is amazing. I honestly, I would say the Andy Frisella episode was was really remarkable.

Really? Why? I mean, I think I knew Andy was special to you because you did the 75 Hard, right?

Yeah, it was just first of all, like the the timing of it was pretty crazy in that episode 46 was when Tej interviewed me. For my show. And then episode 346, 300 episodes later, exactly. This wasn't planned, just the way it fell. That was when he came on. And the thing is, I was so down on my life, on my circumstances, right before I started his program. And then I did the program and it transformed me. So, that to me was like, oh, wow. Now, he respects me in my lane. Yeah. When I was doing the program, like, to me, it was just like a mind bender. And it was really exciting for me. And it was just like, oh my God, this is crazy. Like, I'm able to step into a new version of myself in some way. So, that's my real honest answer. And also, going to his facility, it was insane, KP. Like, it was insane. It was the coolest thing I've— Nice. He had staff who were like cleaning down The bathroom sink, like the people who work there, they don't have no janitor staff. And so, I just saw the level of excellence that everyone there carried themselves with, and it really inspired me to just level up my own life. So, yeah, that's the—

That's brilliant. I got to go watch that episode. I don't think I watched the whole thing. All right. So, let's open up the floor. I see a couple of hands. I see Andrew. Why don't you kick it off and then we'll go to Jesse?

Okay, Danny, so thank you so much for doing this. You know, you mentioned the word joy a lot, and I love that because, well, you don't even have to mention, I can feel it through the screen, the way you smile, I can feel the energy coming through. And I have a 2-part question. One is, you mentioned this joy a lot, and I'm curious, was this joy something you kind of discovered through your journey of podcasting? Did you have that joy going in? It's like from episode 1, you're like, This brings me joy, I'm gonna keep going, right? Was this something that kind of just slowly evolved and emerged? And I guess the second part question is, you know, you, you're someone like KP, you guys are, have such high energy, so joyful, so comfortable with yourself. Have you ever encountered a guest that doesn't match that, you know, frequency that has a different level? And how did you encounter that? Yeah.

Thank you for the questions. Very, very impactful. Yeah. I mean, the joy, it wasn't always that way for me. I mentioned the 75 Hard program, and for me, it was, I constantly asked myself, I was very intentional and asking myself often, what is bringing me joy? Where am I finding the most energy? And how can I do that more? How can I expand that part of my day into more and more? So that I'm living in that. You know, KP mentioned that when he came on the show for episode 34, it was like a deeper look, like it was deeper than most podcasts. The reason for that is because I'd been meditating for the past year every day from anywhere from 20 to 60 minutes, and I just learned so much about myself. So, so it's like because of that. It allowed me to tap into the joy more closely. And you also mentioned like how comfortable it seems like I am with myself, and that's true. But when KP came on, and for the first 38 episodes of the podcast, it was audio only because I was uncomfortable to put myself on camera. So, this is very much a thing that I've built myself into and that has come about through doing the work. Your second question was around if someone else doesn't feel joy, like, how do I handle that? I mean, everyone is coming at it with a different energy and all the guests that come on, like, I don't expect them to have joy. And sometimes I'll bring myself down to meet them wherever they're at so that I can get the most out of them. I feel such joy because I'm I get to speak to a friend right now, and I'm so excited and talk about my course and talk about everything I'm building. But I'm not always joyful. I am a lot of the time. But yeah, that's kind of how I think about it and bringing on guests. It's like, it's okay. Whatever energy they're at is completely fine. So, hope that's helpful.

Well done. Thank you.

That's awesome. Can I ask a follow-up here before we bring Jesse on? You touched on something that I think some of our aspiring podcasters wonder, which is audio only versus audio video together versus when do we start social promotions? I feel like there are stages to it, right? And there's like levels of ease. The audio is easiest, both of you with no camera and so on and so forth. How do you think about that? What would be your advice for folks? Or just at the beginner level?

It depends what your intention is and what you hope to get out of it. For me, I said to myself, if I want to do this, I don't know anything about video. I don't know anything about audio, but I want to figure out if I enjoy doing that, this, this podcast, that, that's what I started with. That was the intention from the beginning. Like, let me see if I like this. Like, I'm not going to commit to something that I don't like. So, for me, I said to myself, how can I make this as low lift as possible so that I can just get in the game? And I love doing it so much that I was like, oh, wow. Like, I was supposed to do 1 episode a week. That was what I set for myself. But then I love doing it so much, I recorded 20 episodes in 30 days. So, I was like, oh, wow. I got to keep doing this. And then when Gary Vaynerchuk came on the podcast or agreed to come on, That's when I said, all right, I have to do video. I have to get over my fear and insecurities and just put myself out there. And it's like, if video was calling to you in this moment, like, just jump into video and try to get better at that skill. But if that seems overwhelming for you, just start with the most basic version of it to see if you even like it. Because a lot of people like to quote the stat of You know, 90% of podcasts don't make it past episode 7, and 90% of those don't make it past episode 20. And that's because running a podcast is difficult to a lot of people. But what if you made it as easy as possible for yourself? And it doesn't have to be an hour. The episodes could be 15 minutes, right? The episodes, it could be 3 questions. Josh Spector runs a great podcast. They're just 3 questions. So I think you have to figure out for yourself. But for me, it's been a constant journey of how can I make this better? And first started with audio, and then when I got a bigger opportunity, I turned it to video, and then I started doing it in person. And like, you just constantly have— I've asked myself, how can I make this better?

Love that. Thank you. Jesse, over to you.

Awesome, Danny. Thanks for coming on and chatting with us. I appreciate you coming, getting over sort of the, let's call it the fear of putting yourself out there on a screen because I actually really only listen to your podcasts on YouTube or watch them on YouTube because the way you edit your reactions real time to the comment across the screen where it's just your facial reactions, I fucking love it. And that's it. I think it adds a lot to it. So, so I appreciate that nuance in your editing for sure. I have 2 questions from, well, plenty of them, but we'll do 2 for timing purposes. One on sort of more of a personal side and one on sort of strategy side. My background, super quickly, had a pretty successful career on Wall Street, ran from that in a dark place to go start a startup with my twin sister, ended up in another dark place there. And here we are now. And I'm exploring a lot of my own personal interests in the same realm of both, let's call it, passion for the environment and passion for learning from really, really thoughtful people. And what I'm working through is realizing that lots of things can be held— diametrically opposed things can be held true at the same time. And so I'm curious, as someone who has brought on, explored your own curiosity with your interviewees and have learned a lot in lots of different capacities with lots of conflicting potential thoughts from a lot of these people you've interviewed, how have you processed that learning process? especially at such mass so quickly? And then how has that changed the way you live your day-to-day, if at all? Has there been a really remarkable sort of, I held this to be true as my North Star and now that's switched? And then I guess the second question, which is I'll leave super low context on it, is I'm curious your thoughts and perspectives on the vernacular of niching down. I kind of stand in the same camp of of Dan Coe, who writes a lot about this and his perspective on it. But I'd be curious your own take on it.

Yes. I'll start with that one first. On niching down, I feel like it depends on the speed in which you need something done. If you want something done faster, like just say what your niche is, devote yourself to it. But if you're playing a longer game, I feel it's helpful to leave yourself open so that you can go down different rabbit holes and different things that explore your interest. I never would've imagined that I'd be known as like someone who does interviews. When I started the podcast, I couldn't have possibly made that my niche or made that the thing that I was gonna focus on, but it's somehow we've gotten here. I find that more organic and authentic as well, but I don't think there's anything wrong with if you need a certain outcome by A certain time, focus on that. In the first question, how have I changed as a result of doing the podcast? How do I process all of it? I live by what Tim Ferriss talks about, which is like the good stuff sticks. That's been really helpful. One thing that I'm working on now that the course is out is I want to do a newsletter that potentially just has 3 of the biggest takeaways or 3 of my favorite takeaways or Quotes or lessons from the episode. So I'll be writing those down, which will help me process and will help other people process it as well. So that's something I'm thinking about. And like the biggest change overall is that people will comment often like, dude, that's such a great question, or that's so thoughtful. Like they— I'm giving someone a new perspective on the world. That's been the biggest change I've noticed, particularly in the last 100, 150 episodes.

Cool. Thanks, man.

Thank you for the questions.

Yeah, great question. Thank you. All right, Rahul's next.

Hey, Danny. Thanks for coming on here, by the way. A lot of insight, a lot of gems. One thing you said that like really resonated with me is you mentioned how like you were down on, like down on yourself, kind of feeling lost, and this is how you started. Like that's kind of been me like in the last 2, 3 years. Luckily I found KP and I've been like loving this whole process of building in public and like trying to figure out what actually like I'm doing and what I want to build and that. And then I re— KP actually told me, dude, you love to talk, like talk more, write more. So I'm like, okay. I'm like, maybe I just do some fun stuff. And one thing I do is I read a lot like founders, David Senra. So I kind of want to do something I wanna call Legends with Rahul Kahani. And, and what I wanna do is like, not more entertaining too, but I eventually wanna do interviews. But right now I kind of wanna focus on those like semi things. Think of it as, um, what Andrew Schultz did during COVID when he had those like just screen-in thing and just pace, pace, pace, like those, uh, bangers. But I wanna do that. video version of founders in a sense, because I have a lot of books, I read a lot of books, I take a lot of notes. So my question is, how would you kind of like analyze how I'm like the growth of it in a sense? Because you're, you're not talking to a person so much, like you said, like the metrics and how your relationships are building, but how would you do it not from the algorithm, but from a personal standpoint?

Yeah. I mean, I would review the 10th episode that you do or the 10th version of this versus the first and ask yourself, is this better? Is this objectively better? And I don't know how long each production would be. I guess that's something you have to uncover for yourself. But that was one of my central questions when I was starting the podcast was like, how do I know I'm improving? Right? It's very hard to figure that out. And it's only in retrospect, but I mean, I can guarantee you that if you do it for 3 years, you're gonna, it, it will 100% improve. Like, so it might not be noticeable in the short term, but the things I'd be looking out for is like, are you more clear with your thoughts? Do you speak, do you Show it to someone, be like, what do you think of this one versus what do you think of the first one? Where could it improve? Um, it are things that I would consider. And what also might be helpful is literally just to watch somebody watch the thing that you produce just over their shoulder. It's remarkable how much you will notice about your own— the things, because you'll be wanting to point out to them like, Oh, I should have done this here. Oh, like, and so it'll give you a deeper sense of critiques that you'll be able to give. So those are some things that come to mind.

Perfect. Thanks. Actually, I just have one more question. It's actually about your editing process. So when you're, say you have like an amazing, say Serena Williams, you're interviewing her, which probably be soon now because you just put it out there and you're interviewing her and during the editing process, And you're about to like post an interview, she says, what I said during this time, I don't like it. I want you to put it out. But your whole viewpoint is this went deep. This brought another side of you. Like, this is a banger. Like, how do you try to manage that?

So I tell, I often, not all the time, but 90% of the time I'll, I'll tell the guest prior, if you want anything edited out, I'm happy to take it out. And the reason for that is because I know the interview that we do is gonna be personal in nature. It could almost be like a therapy session for a lot of people. And if that's the case, I don't want to air out anything you don't want out there in the public. But I mean, that, that's what works for me. I know that many other podcasters that run great shows don't give guests that option, but I just feel it's right based on the types of things we talk about.

Perfect. Thanks. Awesome. Jesse had one more. Jesse, you want to do one more and then we'll, um, pass on to anybody else who might have a question? Jesse, are you still there?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm here. I'm here.

All right, cool. Yeah, sorry. Oh, Suk has one too. All right, right after you.

Oh, good. Um, I'll make this one quick. Um, so I'm, I'm curious, obviously you, you put a lot of your own you bring your natural self to the podcast, conversations, questions, thoughts, curiosities. Is there anything that you still keep behind a wall at this point? And if so, why? And is that something that you do consciously and that you want to bring out into your podcasting medium, or is just kind of off limits for you?

Yeah. So that's a great question. For me, I think that Personal relationships, whether that be like girlfriend or like eventually children, are things that I want to not talk about. And the reason for that is like, I chose this. I chose to put myself out there. And even if they're comfortable with it, it feels wrong to me in some way to like bring them into it. And I don't know, my thoughts on that may change, but that's kind of how I think about it right now. And it's kind of difficult because I ask people about their personal relationships as well so much that it's like funny that I won't go there myself, but that's something I feel currently uncomfortable with.

Well, I think that part's actually really interesting because in most cases, right, the reciprocity of sharing personal depth is what allows people to feel comfortable and bring their guard down. And so You've seemed to have built a way just through thoughtful question asking and like showing the intention ahead of time that it garners the respect to allow the same thing to happen, which is a really interesting skill set. So, but I appreciate the answer.

Yeah, I think it's just showing love to the person and like, you can ask anything as long as your intention is love. And that is my intention.

So, and even through Sorry, I was gonna say, even through you sharing that, the, the blurb around the fact that all the conversation is gonna be, you know, ultimately approved by you is a massive, you know, um, offering of trust, right? And, and love. So.

Yeah, it's all rooted in that intention and making the guest feel like and understand that I care about them more than I care about the views that they're gonna get. From this, or the lack of, as KP has talked about.

And I'm actually— we're going to pass to Souk in a second, but I want to comment on the personal life thing. I have a feeling that I'm curious to see in 5 years, 6 years, 7 years, or maybe even 10, when you ultimately will have your first child, how that'll evolve. Because what happened to me Danny, is that my child, my son is my extension of my joy. Like you must have seen me talk about him all the time in some of the podcasts. And so it's so much fun.

Yeah.

Without revealing or doxxing any of his personal stuff, right? But like just the concept of him existing and like the tantrums and the antics and like the level of joy that, you know, just toddlers have and all those things really allows me to go deeper with some of the people that have the same thing, right? Like with Alexis Ohanian, we spoke 40 minutes on just kids as a topic. I was shocked. I was waiting to go to the next question, but he was just insisting, was talking about Olympia, the pancakes. And, and I was like, wow, you know, he really loves being a dad, you know? And so, yeah, sometimes, you know, you just never know. So I'm curious to see in 5 years, what, what, what are you gonna do? So, Okay, Suk, you got a question?

Yeah, I do. Ready?

Yes.

Yep. By the way, Danny, uh, thank you so much for sharing your insights. My best friend's name is Danny as well, so I already feel a lot closer to you. Um, I have a very tactical question if that's okay. Um, so I am super interested in, uh, doing startup stuff, and so one of the things I want to chat to other people about is how they're building their B2B startups. You just mentioned, by the way, in your chat That you recorded 20 podcasts in 30 days. That's an incredible number. How much time, or how, what's your process look like to doing the cold emailing and reaching out and then doing the podcast? Because they're like, there's multiple steps in between. I, I did try starting one a while ago, and what, what I was running into was I would do one episode and now I have to go back to my paper and then try to book another person, rope 'em in. And then do this episode again and rope another person in, right? So how do you separate those processes, or is that something that's, um, that somebody else kind of like does for you, like an EA or something?

So I do everything myself in terms of booking the guests and having the conversations. I, I have an editor now. I edited my own podcast for the first 300 episodes. But, um, it's funny, like, I— even the term like rope them in, it's just so funny to me. Like, I, I just don't, uh, don't think about it like that. I just about like who is sparking curiosity in me and who am I interested in talking to and how can I reach out to them. So yeah, I mean, I don't really have a system in place. That's the crazy part. I'll just look at the schedule and I'll be like, all right, I have these, I have 6 episodes in the backlog. All right, I have to do 3 episodes a week. And for me, having a schedule was really helpful, right? Like Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I'm like, all right, I just have to fill in these slots now and I can do that by any means necessary. So, I mean, did, did you have a schedule that you followed? How long did you follow it? What, what was that experience like for you?

It wasn't really a schedule. It was, um, I had one episode in the bank, so I was always kind of like looking, cuz that one, the minute it gets posted, now you have like a responsibility to have the next one in. So maybe that was a reason, the problem. But even right now, I would— I feel like the, the cold emailing process and plus like scheduling the meeting could actually take a longer time than your 3 episodes, the bank episodes would take. So that's something I feel a little bit uneasy about, basically putting a gap in the recording and then having to sort of start jumpstart again is, is kind of the problem I'm feeling right now.

What's the What's the— in the entire process, which part of it do you enjoy the least?

The reaching out to people and having to schedule them. Yeah. Um, and going back and forth essentially.

And what, what about that process do you not like?

It feels like it could— it's not in my control. Um, the recording the podcast and editing is in my control. If I don't feel like doing it today, I can wake up 4:00 AM in the morning and get it done. But the other part really is on the other person. It's whenever they're comfortable, whenever they're free. So that's the part I feel uneasy about.

And have you considered doing it with people who— like, part of the reason in the early stages of the podcast, it's like you have to build trust, right? Like, when someone is coming on your show, they're also like lending their credibility to you in some sense. And it might be easier. And part of the reason why it's harder to book in the beginning is because people don't know, like, what is this person going to do with my name, essentially? And so I wonder if you could use friends or connect with friends who you want to talk to. That's what I did in the beginning. Yeah. And trade on their credibility and go through their networks and then see like, all right, because it'll be easier to book with a friend or someone who you enjoy speaking to initially. than someone who's— you're reaching out cold that you have to rope in.

Gotcha. That, that, that actually works because you can have friends and friends of friends and they should be— you have the trust in there built in already so you don't have to have a long cycle to book them on. Yeah, appreciate it.

Of course.

So on that note, this could be a great segue for our last question. You briefly touched on Recruiting guests and how— what are some strategies in recruiting? Um, I mean, I think what I'm curious to hear, because, you know, tomorrow we have a session about, um, the, uh, it's the same topic, right? Pitching guests, uh, from a just a cold email point of view, cold DM point of view, and then some of them like through warm relationships, you know. Um, so we're gonna go deep into some templates and email copy that I use and stuff like that. But What is your sort of tactical advice on that? You know, if somebody were just starting fresh, right? And then maybe they have, they were like, they are in the shoes of Sukh. They have a few warm, friendly connections, but they're not big name, top 1%, high profile guests. Will that dilute if you start with the, you know, like smaller names as opposed to just only focusing on the big names? I know the answer, but I'm just curious to hear what you think.

Yeah, absolutely. No, I think that you just love the place you're at right now, I think is the key insight here. And yeah, I love that.

Wait, fall in love with the place where you're at right now?

Yeah. Like, and if the place you're at is like, oh, I can't get the names that I want on the podcast right now, like fall in love with it. There's a beauty in that. There's a beauty to no one listening. That means you can experiment, you can try different things, and no one cares if you stumble on a word or— right? Like, there's a benefit to that. And I think, you know, someone asked me, my next-door neighbor— I was just doing the first few interviews, and my next-door neighbor was like, dude, what if you get like Joe Rogan or Gary Vaynerchuk on the podcast right now? This is like August of 2020. And I was like—

How many episodes were you in? 5, 6?

I had probably recorded 10 at that point and published zero. And I said, I don't want them on the show right now because I know I love this and I know that I'm going to be better at some point. So, I don't need that and I don't want that right now. And it's funny, like, that happened like 39 episodes in and I look back and I'm like, oh, wow, like, that could have been so much better at my current place. But you live and you learn. Everything happens exactly as it is supposed to. But the tip is like, go interview your friends, talk to the people you love and who love you and you're comfortable with, figure out your tone, ask them at the end of the conversation interview, say like, who do you think would be good for the show that you know? And they'll give you a few names. And I think David Perell did this in 2016, 2017. Yeah. One of his first 20 guests was Neil deGrasse Tyson. Yeah.

Crazy, right?

And he was just going based on his friends. So I think you can be surprised about who knows who. And that's what I've certainly realized is like, you do it enough times, you're basically connected to every person who's living, right? That's a pretty wild— like, if you do it 400 times and like actually try to get better, like you will Be connected to the entire world by virtue of one text away. So yeah, I guess my advice is just be where you're at and love that. And if you're getting 500 views a video, like, love that part of it too, right?

Own it. Like, it's like, it's not gonna feel— it never ends. And also, it's not gonna feel materially different, right? I think both of us, you know, we remember in 2020, I think both of us kind of took Twitter seriously. And I, at the time, I don't know if you remember, at the time I had 3,000 followers and now I have 47,000, right? And I look back and I'm like, I don't feel any materially different. No. I love the day when he crossed 30K or 40K. I was like, for 5 seconds, I thought I was the hot shit. And then I got back to the same baseline happiness and joy that I normally have. But that was lifelong work. Right? Your baseline joy when you turn off the laptops and the phones and the, you know, social media is who you really are is really up to you based on your meditation or whatever you do, right?

Yes.

That cannot be impacted by the external numbers. External numbers are fun. Like they're like, cool, that's great. It's like Monopoly, right? It's great when you're winning, but when you're losing, it doesn't mean like you don't have any worth, right? So it's hard to give the perspective though, because I feel like a lot of the people today in society, are over-indexing on how many TikTok followers do you have and how many views do you have and how many YouTube, you know, I, did you see this MrBeast's 14-year tweet?

So cool.

He made, oh, you saw that, right? Yeah. The first, I think, was it almost 4 years? 4 years. 76.

Less than 76 subscribers.

First 4 years, dude. How unfair is that? And, and the crazy thing is the last 4 years he had $180 million. That's just nuts. $180 million. So unfair. So it's almost like it's unfair at the beginning and at the end in different ways. You just have to make it through the middle.

Yeah.

And the only way you can make it through the middle is if you find joy in the game. That's it.

Yes. That's very well said. And I like to think of it as like, I am 3 years old. Like, imagine a 3-year-old. Like, would you expect a 3-year-old to be a professional at their craft? Would you expect a 3-year-old to have it all figured out? Would you expect a 3-year-old— like, I'm 3 years old. Like, if I actually think about that, and I normally do this for like after college, so I'm like, I'm 5 years old. I graduated college. I'm 5 years old now. So, I think that's worth reframing for people who are new to doing their thing or building a podcast or It's like making a pivot. It doesn't have to be podcast-oriented, but making a pivot in some ways, like, how old are you really? And if you start treating yourself as like, I am this age, so of course I'm going to make mistakes. Of course I'm going to learn. Of course I'm going to experiment. Like, that to me feels just like a lot more sustainable and exciting for what's to come. No one's had a podcast for 20 years. No one is 20 years old in the podcast game. Zero people. That is crazy.

And so you are a great example to say this, where in my head I always run this scenario where I'm thinking, just imagine where Danny is in 3 years in the game, 400 episodes. Imagine 10 years, a decade. But frankly, decade is not a long time. I'm 35 years old, Danny. I'm like old as dirt, like 35. Oh, I've had 3 and a half— I'm just kidding. I'm saying 3 and a half decades I've lived on planet Earth.

Yeah.

Not, I mean, maybe the last 5 years I think I've been intentional, but most of them were like, I wasn't this focused on a craft, on a, you know, particular empire. And so I'm think— always thinking, I'm like, wow, just imagine 10 years doing something. It like, time will pass anyway. You might as well just be in the arena and do the thing.

And the crazy thing is when I started, I said to myself, I'm 25 years old. I will commit to doing this until at least I'm 35. And that was how it started, right? And if you start with that intention, then the first 9 months it not working, you're just like, this is supposed to not work. And then I just know that if I continue doing this until I'm 35, it will work. And it might not be in the way that I expect it to. So that—

And the upside where I feel like the other thing is we just don't even know the upside, frankly. Like we don't

know,

right? Like tomorrow you could have Neil deGrasse Tyson on the show. Literally tomorrow, like 8 days from today, you could have Serena Williams. 40 days from today, you could have, I don't know, like, you know, Joe Biden. Like, you never know. Like, remember we saw— was it Jay Shetty who had him? Which is crazy. I think Jay Shetty had Joe Biden on the show, which is insane, right? Uh, and Harry Stebbings had Rishi Sunak, which is also just as insane.

And that's the thing, these are the early days of of this medium. And I think you'll see this be more and more, and the mainstream media will be podcasts in over a long enough time horizon.

I think so too. With that said, with that optimistic note, we're gonna call it a wrap. Thank you so much for being here. This has been a blast. I cannot tell you, I could do this for another 5 hours and not get tired. Thank you again, Danny. Everybody go check out Danny's new course. I'm gonna drop the link here. It's called artofinterviewing.com. Love the domain, by the way. That was awesome. Um, I'll share this on Slack later, but, um, thanks again, Danny. We'll see you around.

Thank you everyone for such thoughtful questions, and thank you KP for bringing me here. It was a true joy and an honor.

Thank you. That's awesome. See ya. Have a good one, everybody.