David Ralph: Podcasters Mastery | The Business Blast Podcast #495

Welcome to the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Wagner. This episode is brought to you by Wags Media. Wags Media provides you with everything you need to generate more customers and grow your brand. Head on over to wagsmedia.com, W-A-G-S-M-E-D-I-A dot com, to enter a contest where you can win a free done-for-you custom website valued at $2,500 for a limited time only. 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. Today I have David Ralph with us. He is the host of the hit podcast Join Up Dots and the founder of Podcasters Mastery. He's also the author of Podcasters Mastery: How to Define Your Celebrity with the Power of Your Voice. So welcome to the show, man.

Thank you very much for having me. It's an absolute delight to be crossing the pond into Trump land once more. I seem to be doing this all the time. I go over there, but I never actually go myself.

I love it. Grateful to have you here as well, man. And we'll jump in, David. The first question I have for you from Trump land is what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?

Well, it's funny when you start getting these kind of questions posed to you, you look back over your own life and you think, you know, I've got a really good story, I've got a really good one. And more often than not, it's the things that just happen that you then look back on 25, 30 years, whatever, later, and you think, that is quite profound. Now I think my one is, if you go back to when I was a 5-year-old, I was in a classroom and the teacher was asking everybody what they wanted to be when they grew up. So I want to be a princess, I want to be a rocket scientist, I want to be an astronaut or a space man, as we always used to say in those days. And apparently it came around to me and they said, you know, David, what do you want to be when you grow up? And I said a jellyfish. And the teacher said, you know, do you think you can be a jellyfish when you grow up? And I apparently said, you can be anything you want when you grow up. And I think that is quite profound. And I look back on it all the time and I think to myself, if I knew that at such an early age, why did it take me so long to decide to take control of my own life and not just go into sort of the pool of the London city offices where I used to work in banking and insurance, doing things that quite frankly weren't me. You can always define yourself. So I think that's my story. Very subtle, very simple little thing, but I think it's quite profound.

Yes, dude, it is. I absolutely love that, man. 5 years old and you already were like seeing that clearly. I love it.

But I think we all do, Tyler, don't we? I think we all know when we're little We never say, you know, what do you want to be, Tyler, when you grow up? Oh, I'd like to be an accountant. You never say that. It's always, I want to be a football player. I want to be something amazing and fun. So we know that, but we forget it.

And yeah, I agree, man. And I don't— yeah, I don't know any 5-year-old that says I want to be an accountant. But if they did, they probably are telling the truth. You know what I mean? If they know at 5 years old, then that's probably really what they do want to be.

And I probably wouldn't like them too much either.

The next one I have for you, man, is what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?

I think it came to me recently, actually, and it's everything's human to human. I think that with people building online businesses, we kind of forget that there's somebody at the end and there's somebody putting their own money into courses or books or whatever your sort of platform is. And once you get that, I think things become a lot easier because you're not thinking about how to get money. You're thinking about how can I make this person as happy as possible so that they give me the money? So it's a win-win because we're all in business. But I think that was something that was once again quite profound to me, that it isn't just about gaining, it's about providing.

Mm, yes, man. And so this next one, I want to keep it kind of like in your expertise. So like, what's your best piece of business advice for somebody that would just be starting out like podcasting? Like, what would be like your first piece of advice? That you would give them, or what would be the first thing you tell them?

I would say that you do not target podcasting success. Podcasting success comes to you. I think when I started it, Tyler, I, you know, I've recorded and released about 1,100 shows now, and my show is going really, really well. But I looked at people and I thought, that's what I want to do, I want to do it like him, I want to do it like them. And I didn't realize that they had teams, they had infrastructure, they had money investment behind the scenes. So I think that if you are going to go into podcasting, you really got to think to yourself, this is just going to be something that I need to do for fun before it kicks in. Because otherwise you just get disappointed when you look at other people and they say, oh, I've got a million downloads a second. It takes time to get going, but all the good things take time to get going as well because you get better. And so many people say to me, you know, oh, I'm not getting any audience. And I always say to them, well, that's good because you don't sound very good at the moment. You know, practice when no one's listening to you. I would much rather have 100,000 people listening to me 3 years down the line than 100,000 people that then turn away because I'm not very good right at the very beginning. So that would be my advice. I think that you've really got to just do your thing. Don't look at what other people are doing because there's— it's corridors of power behind them more often than not, but you just haven't got Yes, dude, I love that advice, man.

And the next one I have for you is, if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?

Walk away from that drunk bird in Spain that weekend. That's, um, yeah, I wouldn't do that. Um, what would I do for my younger self? I think it would just be, just be yourself. As I say, I think I spent so many years trying to be what other people wanted and doing jobs that paid me a lot of money but just gave me stomach ulcers because it wasn't my thing. It wasn't it wasn't enjoyable. I always felt like any moment somebody was gonna grab me on my shoulder and say, "Sorry, you haven't hit your targets for the last 3 months, you're out." So I would think that, I would say to my younger person, just go and do your thing. And if it takes 10 years and you've got all the rest of your life to enjoy yourself, you know, then do it. You know, you don't have to go straight into a job, straight into an office and a career where quite frankly you're not suitable for it.

And in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?

Well, this is something I've been thinking a lot about, Tyler, and it's actually one of the key points of where I am at the moment. I think it's less. I think it's just less. I don't understand why I'm driven to get more and more and more. I was saying to my wife last night, you know, we've got this lovely dinner on the table, we've got this 4-bedroom house, we've got fields overlooking, we can just go out whenever we want, we've got no debts, we've got all this. Why am I just really happy at this? Why am I still striving for more and more and more? And so I think the true happiness is less. And it's been proven that people in fields in India that have got nothing, they've got the lowest suicide rate in the world because they're not looking for more. They're just looking to get through the day and then go to bed and have a roof over their head. So I think that's my key to happiness— less. But I'm not good at that. I'm driven to gain more, and I don't know why.

Yeah, like, thanks for sharing that. Um, what is the best book that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from that?

I think the best book, and you've probably heard this a million times, um, is The 4-Hour Workweek, um, Tim Ferriss. It's— it was probably quite old hat now. I haven't written, um, read it for years, but I actually read it for you, um, 4 times back to back. And it was page 44, and when he actually did a bit of maths And he said, you know, if you are going to be in this job by the end of your working life at 60, you would have done so many hours, you would have done so— is that worth putting your future on hold for, you know, just so that you can get to 60? And I think that was it. Tim Ferriss, he did change my life in that regard. And I looked at that and I thought, I can't do this anymore. I just can't do this. I've got to make the leap. And so I did. I just made the leap and then paddled like furious for a couple of years, really, until it really sort of came together for me.

Yes, dude, I'll chime in there. That's huge. That book actually is what made me drop out of school and pursue what I like to do. So that book changed my life as well. So I agree, man. And what is your favorite quote and why?

I think it's from my wife, actually. And she says, you're not as clever as you think you are. And I think there's a lot of truth in that. No matter how well you think you're doing, there's people that are better. There's, um, and it's, it's a shame that so many people aren't real and honest online and share the walks and all, you know. Um, but I think that's true. When I'm feeling a bit smug and contented, I can always look around and see somebody that is cleverer than me, that's doing bigger results but less work, or it's just, just better. And I said that would be my quote from the wife: you're not as clever as you think you are. And it kind of keeps you humble.

Dude, thank you so much for coming on. Your wife's quote is awesome as well. And the last question I have for you before we let you go is, where is the best place for people to find and/or connect with you online?

Well, there's two places really. You can go over to Google and just look for Join Up Dots, which is my podcast and my platform. Or if you're interested in podcasting, you can go over to podcastersmastery.com and you will find me in both places.

Perfect, man. Thanks again for joining us.

Cheers, mate. Thanks very much.

The podcast you just heard was published with Anchor. Got something you want to say to the creator of this show? Send them a voice message using the Anchor app, free for iOS and Android.