In this Business Blast Podcast episode, host Tyler Wagner interviews personal brand consultant and speaker Venky Kenny Kataria. After brief sponsor messages for Anchor and Authors Unite, Kataria shares his transformative personal story: losing his father during engineering studies, shifting from a top‑performing student to a public speaker, enduring a humiliating international competition, and later returning to win a runner‑up title, illustrating his "win and learn" philosophy. He emphasizes LinkedIn as an underrated platform that has generated major media features, TEDx talks, and book opportunities, positioning it as essential for personal branding. Kataria advises that "your network is your net worth," highlighting the impact of surrounding oneself with the right people. He tells his younger self to "go all in" without waiting for the perfect moment. On happiness, he stresses contentment with what one has while staying hungry for growth. His favorite book, Jonah Berger’s Contagious, introduced the STEPPS framework (Social Currency, Triggers, Emotion, Public, Practical Value, Story) for creating viral word‑of‑mouth. He also shares a favorite quote about not judging a fish by its ability to climb a tree, underscoring respect for individual talents. The episode concludes with Kataria’s online presence: active on LinkedIn and his website www.vikikataria.com.
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Thank you for listening to the Business Blast podcast. So for all my listeners out there that have been wanting to do your own podcast, I'd like to introduce to you Anchor. Anchor is a one-stop shop for recording, hosting, distributing, and monetizing your podcast. So before I found Anchor, I had never actually done a podcast because all the research that I had gathered made it seem very complex. Then I found Anchor, and Anchor makes podcasting extremely simple. So if you want to do your own podcast, go to anchor.fm/start. I can't wait to hear your podcast. 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. Today I have Venky Kenny Kataria. He is a personal brand consultant and speaker featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur, and Huffington Post. He helps people turn into brands. So welcome to the show.
Hello, Tyler. It's an absolute honor to be on your show, man. Really an honor.
Thank you, brother. And it's an honor to have you on. So the first question that we ask on this show, Venky, is what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?
Yeah, that's a great question. I'd like to share my story. When I was doing my engineering, there was the second of my engineering, uh, when I, when I lost my father. Before that, I was complete geek, you know. I loved studies. I was competing in the studies. My attendance in college was over 99%, so I was a really complete nerd. But then after I lost my father, I decided that, you know, life is very short. And in a tribute to him and my entire family, I'll start to do more apart from public, apart from studies. So I started with public speaking, and I initially lost some 6 to 7 local level competitions in which you have just 10 to 15 competitors. Even then I lost all of them. But you know, I kept on learning things, and in 6 to 8 months I represented India at the international level, uh, in the— in about 6 to 8 months. But the thing was, when I represented India the first time in this international competition So this competition was a 10-minute presentation session followed by a 5-minute Q&A session. So after I did my presentation, I was really pumped up and I asked the judges if they had any questions for me as it was a Q&A session. And one judge out of the three, he was really, really, he was really at me. And he said that, you know, I don't have any questions for you. And, you know, he didn't even ask other judges to ask me a single question. Q&A session. So he was really angry at my presentation style, the way I had presented. And in front of hundreds of hundreds of people, I traveled down, you know, by hundreds of hundreds of kilometers to that place. I'd done so much to get to that point, and there I was standing onto the stage, and the judge of the competition asking me no question and humiliating me in front of everyone. And, you know, as he said these things, and he took me as an example and made fun of me and shared things which a presenter shouldn't do. In front of the entire audience, and there were people laughing and smiling, smiling at me. So that was one of the worst moments, I believe, at that moment of time, and really felt bad. So I came back home, and that moment of time I was like, you know, I won't ever come participate in a single competition again in public speaking. I really, really regretted. But then I got over these things, and I, and, and I did a lot of hard work for an entire year I went back into the same competition, again represented India, and this time I did come up as the runner-up in South Asia while I was representing India at the international level. And that competition taught me that, you know, you don't win and lose in life, you win and learn in life. Because after I came back from that devastating competition back last year, I made a list of all the points, all the mistakes I had done, and I made sure that I don't repeat the same mistakes again. And what I also made a list of what things I learned from the other competitors, and I made sure that I, I made sure that I know I did all those things. So I did learn this, that you don't win and lose in life, you win and learn in life.
Ah, yes, I love that. Um, so the next one I got for you is, what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?
Yeah, so this is one of the most underrated things, one of the most underestimated things, and this is called LinkedIn. I mean, I just can't emphasize enough that LinkedIn is really underestimated, and it's a platform which has brought me plenty of opportunities, right from getting featured in major magazines to getting featured in international books and getting TEDx opportunities. So everything has, you know, most of these opportunities have come through LinkedIn. And in my industry where the person himself or herself is the brand, and you know, you don't, it doesn't matter if you want to have a personal brand or not, you have one already. So LinkedIn is the go-to platform for creating a compelling personal brand. I believe people underestimate LinkedIn a lot. Yeah.
And what is your best piece of overall business advice? So not necessarily industry specific.
Yeah, this, I believe it should be your network is your net worth. Networking is networking. And I really believe that, that your network is very crucial and the way you develop connections and maintain them and maintain and build relationships. That's very important. You know, networking is— your network is very important. I also believe that you're the average of 5 people whom you hang out with. That's one quote which I really love. So I believe, you know, the right network you have, right people you have around you, the right environment, you know, that affects a lot to your business. Because, you know, when you're inspired by the people who have the same thought process and they're really inspired by themselves, they want to work harder, they want to take their business to the next level. So even it's natural that you even get inspired and you want to, you know, work more and strive more. So I believe, yeah, networking is very important according to me.
I could not agree with you more. And if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?
Yeah, so this would be that, you know, you should go all in. You should go all in and you shouldn't wait for the right time because, you know, you shouldn't be waiting for tomorrow because who knows, you won't be having a tomorrow. And in today's era, we think about I want to retire at 60 and do things what you want to do after 60, but who knows, like, I won't be even alive after 40. Who knows that? I believe what I would advise myself is that you should go all in, follow your passion, follow what you love, follow what you want, and go all in, man. Don't let it go for tomorrow. Go all in today.
And in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?
Yes, it would be Being content with what you already have, being content with things which your family has provided you, being content with things which, you know, God Almighty has provided you. But always be hungry in what you can do. So if I am running my business, I should always be hungry for more. And, you know, because I love what I'm doing, I'm always enjoying the process. So I really want to love, I really want to do more. So I believe, you know, loving what you do, following your passion, going after your dreams, is very important because even though you may not be earning a million dollars, but you'd be going and following your dream, and it would be really, really awesome because you'd enjoy every moment of it. Because, you know, then life won't become a destination, it will become a journey with treasure. Yeah.
And what is the best book that you've read, and what was the number one thing you learned from that?
Yeah, so I— my favorite book is Contagious: How Things Catch On by Jonah Berger. So this book is really, really very cool, and it talks about word of good mouth and how you can make use of word of good mouth. And this thing is basically— this book basically covers a really cool concept of STEPPS. So what Jarrah Berger says is that if you want more word of good mouth, it depends on these 6 things. STEPPS, which is S is for social currency, T is for triggers, E is for emotions, P is for public, Another piece of practical value. And at last, S is for story. Just one example would be, and S is social currency. So what people think of you, how people think, you know, whether it is cool or not, you know, this is what social currency strives for. So if people think you're doing something cool, if the product is cool and awesome, and so people would share it, and you know, the word of good mouth spreads.
And what is your favorite quote and why?
Yeah, so my favorite quote is, you don't judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. That's my favorite quote because I see a lot of people, you know, trying to judge every student in the same way. I don't believe that should be the case. And you have to, you have to judge everyone, you know, through a different perspective. Everyone has their own talents, their own likings, their own dislikings. So you should make sure that you know that thing, know those things, and accordingly you should judge the other person. Yeah.
Yes, man. I love that. Thank you so much for coming on. The last one I have for you before we let you go is where can our audience best find you online?
The perfect platform would be LinkedIn. I am very active on LinkedIn and love the platform. So LinkedIn will be the best platform to reach out to me. I have my website, www.vikikataria.com.
