In this Business Blast Podcast episode, host Tyler Wagner interviews Alan Howle, a social media influencer, speaker, and founder of Australian Hustle and Social Fire. Alan shares a pivotal personal story about spending $20,000 on a goal‑tracking app that failed due to lack of testing and marketing, highlighting the importance of validation and low‑cost prototyping. He explains how social media can generate client opportunities for any industry, emphasizing warm outreach and the unpredictable value of conversations. Alan stresses the necessity of a crystal‑clear business promise, describing his 8‑week program that guarantees 10 client opportunities per week for coaches and consultants, and how this clarity propelled his scaling and revenue. He discusses his personal philosophy of happiness—gratitude and living in the present—and cites Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich as a key influence, especially the concept of surrounding yourself with higher‑level peers. Alan shares his favorite quote, “The people who matter don’t mind, and the people who do mind don’t matter,” as a mantra for ignoring critics. Finally, he invites listeners to join his global Facebook group, The Australian Hustle, a community for learning social‑media strategies.
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Welcome to the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Wagner. This episode is brought to you by Authors Unite. Authors Unite provides you with the support you need to finish your book. Best part is, after you finish your book, they take care of the entire publishing and marketing process 100% for you. So if you want to become a successful author, make sure to check out authorsunite.com. Now let's jump into the episode.
Alright everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner and today I have Alan Howe with us. He's a social media influencer, speaker and mentor, and founder of the Australian Hustle and Social Fire. So welcome to the show, man.
What's going on?
Pumped to have you here, man. So, Alan, the first one, first question that we ask on this show is, what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?
Wow. Okay, so my big— actually, yep, I've got a good one. So I am— to get to where I am now, I've I've tried a lot of things and I've failed a lot of things. One of those being an app that I tried to produce myself. Now, this app, it was basically like a passion project. I've got a graphic design background and essentially went through the process of getting a concept together, which is basically like an app that you can put all your goals in, all your really big goals, and then set daily tasks towards them, things like that. I set out with no testing, no marketing background, no nothing, delivered this, basically designed the entire thing, paid almost $20,000 to get it developed and coded and all those other good things. And then produced it, like released it to the market, and then I was like, right, so where's your marketing budget? How are you gonna get people to download it? And the biggest, I was young and dumb, whilst it was only what, 4 or 5 years ago, it was one of the biggest lessons for me, not only to test your ideas and things like that, but to also get backing and things like that. Before you go out and do stuff like that. Like, there's so many ways I could have created a prototype, tested it, things like that for less than $100 rather than going and spending the $20K and then having no money to, you know, do updates and make changes based on opinion, like people's feedback and things like that. So that's— I would say to you, that has been one of the biggest wins for me. I know that, you know, going and spending $20,000 on something that's no longer there on the market and things like that may not sound like a win, but it's definitely my biggest win that's taught me the biggest lessons for me anyway.
And then what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?
I would say, so I work with a lot of businesses to create, to generate social media client opportunities. I'd suggest that it doesn't matter what industry you're in or what you do, whether it is a big business to business, whether you're in the corporate world or you're just a local business owner or just trying to, you know, get your next job or get your next position. Social media has so many opportunities and the thing is that it's not always, like like the same principles that apply in real life apply online as well. You know, like reaching out to someone via a friendly message can be one of the most effective things you can possibly do to someone who you don't know to warm, you know, start a conversation. And you just never know where that conversation comes from. Like, to put it straight, it was a conversation that I started between a mutual friend of ours which landed me this podcast interview. So you just never know what's going to happen.
Absolutely, man. And dude, I tell people this all the time with like one of the reasons I love doing the podcast, like one, I love connecting with people, but I interview a lot of people. So it's just like I learn so much from them. And then also I'm building all these connections and like all of them could go in any possible direction. Like it's just like opportunity amongst other opportunities, you know?
Exactly, exactly.
So it's just a great resource for many reasons. So the next one, Alan, is what is your best piece of overall business advice, so not necessarily industry-specific?
I would suggest to get your promise right. So I, with what I do in social media and everything else, I spend a lot of time being busy but being busy for the sake of being busy and things like that. And it was really because my message, what I promised, if you will, to my customers was too wishy-washy. The moment I got fucking clear on, sorry for swearing, I don't know if I'm allowed to swear.
No, no, you're allowed to swear.
I got fucking clear on exactly what it is that I'm delivering. And for me, like I run an 8-week program The promise that I deliver to my clients is that if you hustle, you do the work, and you put all the bits and pieces in place, you'll create 10 client opportunities every week through social media. Now, someone who's a business owner or a coach or consultant, who's my ideal sort of client, will be able to clearly understand 10 client opportunities. There's obviously strategies in place, there's obviously work that's in place, but if I hustle and do the work, I follow the steps, I'll create these opportunities. And the moment that I set my promise right is the moment that the people who I was working with not only had a clearer understanding of what the end goal was or what I could help them with, it also helped put skin in the game for me and give care more to ensure that the people that I am working with are getting the results that I'm promising, if that makes sense. So not when At that point, the moment that I've got clear on my promise, my message, my purpose is the moment that I've really started to scale and increase not only like the amount of people that I'm working with, but obviously the value that I can offer and the end result, my bank account as well. So yes.
Okay. And then in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?
I think, um, is just being grateful and being grateful and just living in the now. You know, it's so easy to get caught up in striving for the next thing, striving for the next goal, or, you know, having something that you're working towards, right? But if you, if you're not grateful for what you have right now and the situation, no matter how shitty it may be, you you'll never love or appreciate whatever it is that you're striving for because it will just never be good enough. The moment you start to understand and appreciate what you have and the circumstances, the life that you're in now is the moment that you'll start to enjoy it more and more and fall in love with life. I guess with your process, with who you really are and what you're all about.
And then what is the best book that you've read and what's the number one thing you learned from that?
Think and Grow Rich. And I think what I've learned about it is not only that— Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. And one of the things that I sort of just take from it is specifically just getting around to people who are going to uplift you. You know, if you haven't got people around you who are, you know, a couple of steps in front of you, then you need to because otherwise you're going to have this, you know, you can sit and you can be the best person in your circle of friends and things like that, but until you step outside of your comfort zone, start hanging around some people who are in front of you and start working to be at that level, then you won't ever get anywhere. And like the old cliché saying, you know, you're the equivalent of the 5 people that you hang out with. I'm a massive, massive fan of that. And Think and Grow Rich talks about masterminds and things like that, being around the right people and having a positive attitude about a lot of things.
And then what is your favorite quote and why?
Okay, I don't know who said this, but a lot— I'll just give some context, just a brief context as to why this is my favorite quote. So the quote is, how does it go? The people who matter don't mind, and the people who do mind don't matter. Okay, now what that means is that I work with a lot of businesses, coaches, consultants, social media strategies, and one of the biggest things that we talk about is getting their brand out there, getting online, doing Facebook Lives, and a whole bunch of other stuff. And a lot of people have this fear of jumping online because of what people say and things like that. And the reason that quote's really important is because if you're going out to do something that you're passionate about and that you love, people, the people who do matter don't mind. Sorry, people who do, I've lost it.
It's all good.
Yeah, but you get what I mean is the fact that like the people who do matter don't mind and the people who are hating on you, because you will get people who are like, what the fuck are you doing? You know, why are you doing this? Why are you always posting on social media? They just don't get it and they don't understand. And so it's okay to have people who don't understand and that don't agree. And sometimes it may be the closest people to you who have those opinions. And Gary Vee talks about this a lot. Sometimes, you know, you need to separate yourself from those people who are holding you back and things like that.
Yes, dude, thank you so much for coming on. I'm a huge Gary Vee fan as well.
Yeah.
And yeah, the last one I have for you before we let you go is where can our audience best find you online?
Yeah, sure. So I do have a Facebook group full of absolute legends, coaches, pardon me, consultants. Things like that. It's called The Australian Hustle, but it's welcome to anyone. Just because it's called The Australian Hustle, it doesn't mean it's just for Australians. It is for anyone who would love to learn social media strategies to attract their ideal client on a regular, consistent basis. I'm always doing bits and pieces here, there, everywhere, and at some point I'd love to have you on for an interview as well, so we'll have to make that happen as well.
Awesome, brother. I look forward to it. Thank you again.
Yeah, no problems. Thank you. Thanks for having me.
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