Kevin is the CFO, Founder & Co-Host of Next Level University, a Global Top 100 Self-Improvement Podcast with more than 1,000 episodes and 600K+ listens in over 125 countries.
Some people find rock bottom... he found out that rock bottom had a basement.
In his mid 20's... he had it all.
kevin had a beautiful girlfriend, high paying job, sports car, his dream body... but he still ended up sitting on the edge of a bed debating suicide.
After his rock bottom moment, he went all in on holistic self-improvement.
kevin was determined to overcome my anxiety, depression and to finally live the life he'd always dreamed of.
Years later, he is now host a podcast that impacts hundreds of thousands of people in countries all over the world.
At this stage, he helps grow the podcast into a multi six-figure business, and he has recorded well over 1,000 episodes.
kevin has also given hundreds of speeches, trainings and coaching calls with people all over the world.
The main thing that changed was ME. he now focused on learning what I didn't know (unlearning a lot too), and his life started to shift.
kevin loves talking about Consistency, Commitment, Habits, Mindset, Confidence, Fear, Relationships, Limiting Beliefs and everything in between.
he believe in a heart-driven but NO BS approach to holistic self improvement, and kevin look forward to teaching even more people about what it really takes to get to the next level!
if you enjoyed the show be sure to check out my info:
https://app.wingcard.io/ROB3SA64
Kevin is the CFO, Founder & Co-Host of Next Level University, a Global Top 100 Self-Improvement Podcast with more than 1,000 episodes and 600K+ listens in over 125 countries.
Some people find rock bottom... he found out that rock bottom had a basement.
In his mid 20's... he had it all.
kevin had a beautiful girlfriend, high paying job, sports car, his dream body... but he still ended up sitting on the edge of a bed debating suicide.
After his rock bottom moment, he went all in on holistic self-improvement.
kevin was determined to overcome my anxiety, depression and to finally live the life he'd always dreamed of.
Years later, he is now host a podcast that impacts hundreds of thousands of people in countries all over the world.
At this stage, he helps grow the podcast into a multi six-figure business, and he has recorded well over 1,000 episodes.
kevin has also given hundreds of speeches, trainings and coaching calls with people all over the world.
The main thing that changed was ME. he now focused on learning what I didn't know (unlearning a lot too), and his life started to shift.
kevin loves talking about Consistency, Commitment, Habits, Mindset, Confidence, Fear, Relationships, Limiting Beliefs and everything in between.
he believe in a heart-driven but NO BS approach to holistic self improvement, and kevin look forward to teaching even more people about what it really takes to get to the next level!
if you enjoyed the show be sure to check out my info:
https://app.wingcard.io/ROB3SA64
Welcome to the Josh Bolton show where we dive interesting and inspiring conversations. And now your host, Josh Bolton
Unknown:a podcast coach, I have been a podcast coach for probably probably like three years, we got to a certain point where I think we were like, 300 episodes in or something, maybe 400 episodes in. And somebody came to me and said, Hey, can you help me with my podcast? And I was like, Yeah, I can help you with everything. I mean, I've, I've done it at this point. And then somebody said to me why you should really start coaching podcasters. And I was like, interesting. I never really thought of that. And that's been one of the bigger part of our businesses, honestly. Which is surprising, because I never that's not why I started. You don't mean?
Josh Bolton:Right. Same here. That's why I was curious how long you've been doing it? Because a lot of people have lately, a lot of guests even have been like, can you? Can you coach me? And I'm like, sure. Yeah. Like, I'll give you one free you came on my show. I'll give you a free like thing. But yeah, it's so weird. Sitting here going like I've, I've done this, like a year and a half, two years. But I'm like, I wouldn't consider myself like it's professional.
Unknown:Yeah, the interesting thing is, you don't really it depends, right? There's a fine line, especially if you have imposter syndrome, which I've definitely dealt with. You don't have to be at the top of the mountain, you usually only have to be three or four steps ahead of the person you're trying to help. And I think that's an interesting thing to have the, the feelings for, because if you're 100 episodes in and somebody wants to start, I mean, you have 100 times the experience, they do so think that's an interesting thing. Right? Interesting perspective. At least,
Josh Bolton:it is. Yeah. And that was the one client. I didn't I didn't know how to deal with online sales tax in Texas Tech's tax nexuses. So I was like, hey, just I'll set you up a special tear on Patreon. You pay me there kind of thing. And he was like, Is Patreon a write off on my wall? I mean, if they really want to get technical assist coaching, so
Unknown:yeah, yeah, but that in the beginning, that's kind of like, that's par for the course we were doing Venmo. It was like Venmo me Pay Pal me whatever, cash out me. Now it all runs through your CRM thing runs through the business. Now everything's like, it all goes to the one place. We don't accept payments anywhere else. I don't want cash. We don't do checks, like, but in the beginning, you're just kind of figuring it out. And I think that's par for the course.
Josh Bolton:Very true. So I guess what is the CRM you're using for your coaching?
Unknown:So we use, we don't really run a CRM, we use stripe as our financial collection. Okay. And then everything else for us is very one to one. Like, yeah, we have an email list, but we don't really we don't sell on our email list. That's never the goal. Like it's just add value. For us, Josh, it's one on one conversations with the community. That's like, the interesting thing about us is we have like spreadsheets of people who we've worked with, and we have names and emails and stuff like that. But it's more relationship based than anything. It's like, do I think Josh would be a good fit for this? No, not necessarily. Okay, I'll reach out to him if we have something that I think he'd be a good fit for. That's really how we've, we've done it. Because I think at the end of the day, you have to understand, you can only ask so many times without breaking rapport. And the the level of your ask has to be directly connected to the level of the relationship. Imagine if I just meet you now? And I say, Hey, Josh, can you come out to New Hampshire next week? And help me move? It's like, No, there's no way you're gonna do that, even if you're the nicest person in the world. But if if you and I are really good friends, and you're local, and I say, Hey, can you you mind, like, just give me a couple hours of your time on Saturday, I need to move some stuff. If the level of the relationship is there, you're more likely to actually be able to work with that person. So yeah, for us, it's very specific. We don't just like, throw messages out there and hope. That's I think that's a different approach that we have.
Josh Bolton:That's good. I've actually talked to a lot of entrepreneurs and marketers about that. And that's what they said they're like, No, get very intentional about what you say. And people will comment, I'm like, okay, lately, I've noticed that I'm like, Oh, I'm more more specific. When I talk about Yeah, you have to be you have to niche. Yes. Especially in the this whole this new algo world. You got to stay in your lane until you got big enough audience then. Go have fun. Yeah,
Unknown:it's interesting, even today, like so I woke up today, and we track our finances, and we had like, 3600 listens or something, whatever it was. And that's more than we got the first year. So like, we got 1014, I think in the first year. So we had three times our listeners today that we had in the first year. Missed that interesting thing of one of the best things we ever did was niche more, even though it seems like there's a smaller sample size. In the grand scheme of things. I would rather have 1000 people who are talking to directly than 10,000 people who are kind of listening.
Josh Bolton:I agree. Yeah. So I'm curious, then, what did you What were your some of your tactics that you did? I'm just gonna keep all that in, by the way, sure. What were some of your tactics that you did to help grow your show so much?
Unknown:One of them. It's interesting, because to your point early on Instagram and social media were different. So we started the show in 2017. So we've been around for like five and a half years. So in the beginning, somebody would share, say, they would share a steal of our show, you know, we'd say like, this is the podcast I'm listening to, I love these guys, I would send them a message and start a conversation with them. And eventually, I would get on the phone with them for free. Just like to get to know them. So one of my friends calls at scale the unscalable. That's really what we've done really well, is we focus on like, what are the most important touch points? And how do we try to scale them through effort, even though they're not scalable? So number one is we had real authentic conversations with our listeners, in the attempt to add value, not to sell anything. So that's one part two, we built a business based on, we want to help you get from where you are to where you want to go. Even if you don't have money yet, which a lot of businesses aren't doing it's, it's you must exchange me X amount of dollars for X service. For us, half of our business is free. Whether it's the podcast seven times a week, we do a free podcast every week, we do a free virtual event every week. Yeah. So that's the thing is like, we're playing a little bit of a different game long term. Which is that's that's important. And then this is the other thing. I've probably been on two or 300 other shows, which is definitely good for our podcast as well. But it also helps me master right, become a better speaker, have good stories that land. So those are a few high level guests helps. Like we've had some pretty high level guests in our industry, which helps, but it's consistency we don't miss. That's, that's the thing is when my business partner and I partnered up, I think we partnered up like episode number 15. We've never missed an episode in over 1000. Right? We're going to drop our 1111 100th episode tomorrow. So consistency over everything for us. And getting better every time. So I'm just curious for
Josh Bolton:you, do you have seven interviews a day? Or is it like, sorry, several interviews a week? Or is it like two or three, and then you usually throw in your nuggets in between?
Unknown:So we only do solos now. So it's just me and my Yeah, it's just my business partner and I. And what we'll do, like if we do have a guest, because we have some guests coming up that I you know, they're like friends of ours that are higher level, and we're like, Well, this is aligned, we know it's aligned, we'll have them back on, we'll just drop that as a bonus episode. So there will always be seven solos, at least. And then maybe we'll drop a guest as a bonus episode. But in the beginning, you can't really do that, because having guests is going to build your audience. But we're at a place now where I just want to nurture our audience and add more specific value to them. I think that's the play for us now.
Josh Bolton:So do you have them like reach out to you like DMU in Instagram or Twitter like questions to cover or, like, go hardcore. There's a podcast I felt called Vinny Twitter, which is a big keto guy. And he literally gets on Twitter and reply to as many tweets as he can for like an hour span. Yeah, absolutely. No scale the unscalable I had to sit there and I'm like, that must be stressful for like the solid 60 seconds. Yeah.
Unknown:Well, I think it's one of those things like, yeah, we have people that reach out. But one of the things that we have been very, very intentional with is probably the best word is I will not go outside of what I think value is valuable for our audience. So I'm always going from the frame of what is our audience going through? What will resonate with them, and what do they need to hear? And that's like, we just live there. So that's one of the reasons we don't have certain guests on is because yeah, they might be big in they might be somebody who draw eyes to us, but it's not in alignment for us to share the message with our audience.
Josh Bolton:Interesting. Okay. Yeah, it's, it's interesting, uh, you're the guest today, we're chatting about this because I've been really thinking of retooling my show, because what I predominantly started off with guest interviews, it was great and it got a lot of traction, but now, like, I've hit that plateau, I'm not dying, but I'm not growing and safely Okay, I need to change something now. So this is interesting. Because I've been hearing humoring the idea of like me coming on doing like a solo. Like, I'll talk about this kind of thing. I'm very good at business and executive thinking. Or I've I've had a very interesting up and coming story, so might be like okay, nuggets of this, that I've learned.
Unknown:What's the number one problem that your listeners are going through?
Josh Bolton:Um, see, because I have, I'm doing niche down. I'm just kind of like, as long as you have cool story, I want to talk to you. Yeah. My biggest one I keep, like my top performers still to this day, and it's like a year and a half old is understanding women, essentially.
Unknown:So do you have a predominantly male audience? Would you say? Yes. Okay. That makes sense, I would really sit down. I think it's probably time to niche if you're not growing. It's because I call it the Joe Rogan approach, where it's like, I want to talk to everybody about anything all the time. And that's great in the beginning, but eventually it gets to the point where then you're relying on your interview, your pure interview skills, your personality and the caliber of guests you can get on where if you niched, it would be way easier for you to do a solo episode once a week where it's five ways to grow your business five ways to scale your business five ways to be a better leader, whatever your ideal listener is going through, that you got to be the person they come to. So that my thought is always this. What is our show about? What problem do we solve? How do we solve it? And who do we solve it for? Because your your podcast is just a product? Really, at the end of the day? It's just a product with personality. Really? And then so what is the brand? Like? What is the Josh Bolton brand? If I was to walk into the Josh Bolton restaurant, what would it be? And then treat your podcast like that? Like when you come here? This is what you Yeah, this is what's on the menu every time and it's always good.
Josh Bolton:Okay, it's, you've said it more elegantly than I was. I was just thinking that because I'm like, okay. Yes, mine is the go to for business. It's like generally the business guy, but like, one of my many guests I had on was a professional wrestler from the 80s. And it was telling his stories. That was crazy what he went through,
Unknown:which which wrestler was
Josh Bolton:Jeff Bearden, Jeff? I don't know, Jeff beard. And I look him up. I think he grew up by the Iron Giant, and then the Colossus,
Unknown:I'll have to look them up when we write it down.
Josh Bolton:He was telling me all like all his crazy stories were like, he got stabbed like six times, and they tried to kill him with a lead field tire. And then like, he's like, and that was an Indian just trained bomb went off perfectly normal males flying everywhere. But everyone didn't care. And I'm like, Oh, my goodness. The next day, I talked to a publicly traded CEO, like, I did this where I was telling you the same thing. And he's like, dude, like, do you? Do you want your golf at the show?
Unknown:Yeah. Yeah. See, that's the interesting thing is people just have to know what to expect. That's all.
Josh Bolton:So then I will definitely niche down and retool some stuff. So then, Did you are you specifically now just a podcast about podcasting? Essentially,
Unknown:no. So that's the interesting thing is like for us. Our podcast has become a business business where the podcast is completely separate from like, we have a web service business. We have a social media business, we have a podcast production business. And they're not necessarily currently our podcast listeners that are working with us. So it's interesting. For us, our podcast is heart driven, but no BS holistic self improvement for Dream chasers. That's all we talk about is holistic self improvement, leveling up your life, your love, your health and your wealth. I just started another podcast because I needed to do an eighth episode a week on podcasting. So I just started another podcast all about podcasting. That way, I can get that message out there as well. So it's very interesting, like our business is very large. And it's very multifaceted. And that's why it's such a challenge, because there's so many things going on at all times. Like I just got off a meeting before this from the business.
Josh Bolton:Right. So I'm just curious, how did you get into web services and social media?
Unknown:So in the beginning, so this is what happened? Okay. We started the podcast, and it was like, Alright, cool. We have a podcast, and then it was okay, how do we make money? Okay, let's coach people, let's coach our listeners and add more value to their life, thus building our business. Then it got to the point where we said, Okay, well, we need a website. Like we're obviously gonna need a website so people can find us. So I spent two weeks in Wix building a website for like, 12 hours, or 12 hours a day. So I spent, like, a large amount of my time building a website, and it was GARBAGE. It wasn't good. So then we found somebody to build us a website. Then people would ask us how we built our website. So it was like, oh, okay, we can just have a team that builds websites. Then, since we started working with some fairly high level clients, people started asking us like, Hey, do you guys do social media stuff? I don't want to Do my social media. And I'm gonna pay somebody to do it. And since you guys are producing the show, I'd rather pay you to do it. And it was like, oh, so there's definitely a need for this in the market. So what happened was, we just tried to solve all the problems that we had coming up, because we realized that most people are going to have the same problems. That's really what it was.
Josh Bolton:Interesting. So I take it now you outsource a lot of stuff? Or do you MATLAB and do everything yourself?
Unknown:We have a 17 person team,
Josh Bolton:good hosting said that would be a lot to do. Yeah, no, I
Unknown:can't, I can't. And this is the truth. I'm not, I'm not good at building websites. I'm not good at those other things. There are certain things like my genius zone, I try to stay there. My business partner Allen, he tries to stay there. And through building the business, our goal is to make sure that everybody is in the right position when it comes to their shrink. So now we have a large team that we are very, very grateful for. And they help us a ton.
Josh Bolton:That's wonderful. Yeah. So then the marketing aspect of the podcast, was it just mainly word of mouth you recommended? Or was it like the, because of the tagging interactions, they they became like a zombie loyalists kind of thing?
Unknown:Yeah, it's interesting, because we're almost in again, I know this is a dangerous statement and dangerous thought process. We're like anti marketing, in terms of interesting, one of the and this might be just a misbelief. But I've seen this so often, I believe for many people, marketing is making something look better than it really is. And here's my analogy, right? I've never had a Big Mac that looks like the Big Mac on the commercials. And again, I love Big Macs, Josh, I got nothing against it. But usually it looks like it's been ran over by a car and then backed backed up over again, still tastes great. For us, we have worked so hard on our real lives, where I just want our brand to be a reflection of my life. And I think a lot of people are more focused on making the product look good and be good. For us, it's been the opposite, which is why it's taken us longer. Yeah, we're successful, and we have 650,000, listens, or whatever it is at this point. But it would be way more if we went the other route. We're just like, optimized for the future. So for us, the marketing is word of mouth, the marketing is when you add value to somebody, they will talk about you. So if you think about it, between group coaching and all the clients we have, we probably have close to like 80 clients, if each one of those clients tells two people, and each one of those two people tells one person, then you can start to see how the numbers really, really add up. So we're value and impact based when it comes to marketing, and then basing that off word of mouth. And we obviously, you know, we put our stuff on social media, but other than that we don't pay at all for marketing.
Josh Bolton:So yeah, you will I'm assuming you also do like YouTube and all that.
Unknown:Yeah, yep, we do. Every episode goes on YouTube as well.
Josh Bolton:I'm just curious, do you guys use Zoom or like Riverside to record everything stream yard?
Unknown:Stream, stream yard? So we do something, I'll give you a little hack, okay, depends depends on the level of production. But we will record our video and stream yard. And we will natively record our audio to our laptop in Audacity, GarageBand, audition, whatever, sync them in post production, that way you have the best video you can possibly have, as well as the best audio you can possibly have. And then that'll increase the production value a little bit.
Josh Bolton:That's actually a really good hack. Now I've paid for audition the sorry, you had the Adobe Audition. So I would just use that. But it's a good point. Obviously, these for the video, it's not good. The audio, if you record to the computer, it's okay. Enough, with enough background, I can make it sound back to normal. But I've been trying to figure that in like what should I do?
Unknown:What I would do, I would get I would go to stream yard because stream yard you can do 4k. You can do 1080 or 4k, maybe not 4k 1080. But it actually is 1080. When you export it, it doesn't make it garbage. Like Zoom is great. Zoom is a great platform. And it's it's awesome. And it's cheap. But the video is just not the same. It's just not right. It's just not the same. So yeah, I would say that I would say stream yard Riversides fine squad cast, any of those really will do it. But the audio I think a lot of people are thinking, well, the majority of my listeners are going to be audio. So let me get video to what's the easiest way to do it. Just record all in zoom. The problem is you're not getting high quality audio. So the the place where you have the most ears is the lower quality, which in the long run probably will be somewhat negative.
Josh Bolton:Yeah, yeah, that's I've definitely noticed that like I said, it's a plateau it's not dying. It's not greening and that's where I'm like asking how to get interactions because I'm like, I've done this for how long and no one's like, tagged me on social media. And I just remind,
Unknown:it's changed. Like, we don't get that many tags anymore, either. It just means that no, I don't think so I think that I think people are using social media in a different way where I don't necessarily know I mean, even if you think about what's working on social media, it's not necessarily value driven. It's more entertainment than education. Like the reels and tick talks, a lot of them are just like, 15 seconds of, I don't want to say garbage. But it's just entertainment. mind numbing. meinem. Exactly, exactly. So I don't think people are sharing value as much as they used to. And that's just my take. I think the other part of it is, we vastly underestimate the value of one human, if you could, so I think of it like there's three buckets. And this will be good for you. There's three buckets of listeners, we have cold eyes, these are people who don't know us, like us or trust us. So I'm on your show today. Everybody who hears this is cold ice, they don't they have no idea who I am. We have warm eyes slash warming eyes. These are people who are in your system, and they're following what you do. And you're moving them through the business with value. So you're warming them up. You're nurturing them as you go. And then we have what I think might be the biggest bucket that people lose sight of last eyes. These are people who know you, they like you. They trust you, Josh, but they forgot about you. They moved on, they are listening to something else. So at all times every day, I'm focused on how do I get cold eyes to warm? How do I warm somebody up more by adding more value to them? And how do I find somebody who used to listen to the show that doesn't anymore? And why is that? And if you can have one habit under each of those buckets every day? I think that's a hack where everybody's worried about more like, let me get more listeners, more listeners more listeners. My question is always what are you doing with the listeners you have? Because if you actually nurture the listeners you have, you'll get more listens. Which is a weird thing. It same amount of people but more listens, because people are more invested.
Josh Bolton:It's true. Yeah, I would say that that would be what the Vinny guy did. But that was also I was listening back. Back when you started like 1718 was also when like Twitter was at its most brutal, too. But it was okay. There's there's the whole thing going on today. But yeah, I think that's what he was. He was doing it. But he's very entrepreneurial, driven, just like trying to think back. So that would make sense. He's like, Oh, everyone's a lead. But like once cold ones, warmer ones really hot. Just got to make sure we keep pushing everyone down the way. It's interesting. Thank you for that hack. That was really good.
Unknown:Of course, it's value. Like that's the thing is, I mean, our business model has like 25 layers. It's wild. Like there's so much going on. But the half of its free. Like I we will not, I will not ask you for$1 until you've like been with us listening and you've joined our private Facebook group. Because I don't think it's necessarily right for you yet. That's interesting, right? That's an interesting thing. Where it's my job to make sure that I'm adding as much value as I can to you. And I'm putting you in the business where I think you should go. If somebody comes into a car dealership and says my budget is $16,000, you're not going to show him a$95,000 truck. A lot of people are trying to do that, where they're saying like, okay, cool. You're somebody who listens to my podcast, you should work with me, doesn't work that way. Now you can play the numbers game, but it's different. You have to you have to really think about what's best for the client first, which is best for the listener first.
Josh Bolton:Absolutely. So then yeah, it's more the the to give value and all that on the wires reminisce. And I was lifting weights back in like 1819, before the pandemic hit. And I went to this one nutrition shop, I was buying like high protein and all that. And like I never sold, they had this cool weight machine where like it can measure body fat, and muscle ratio and ever, like super detailed. No charge, you just come in scan. And he'd read the chart and be like, Oh, you're having trouble with this. I'd recommend that but you don't have to get it kind of thing. Total hands off. And then it was just one of those after like three or four times. I had to like sat there and I said a lot of like, I feel like a real asshole is using your expensive machine. And I'm not buying anything so you hand on the machine and said, My budgets like 75 bucks. Like what can I get that you would recommend? And he's like, Oh, you could have kept being an asshole. I don't care. I was like, morally I feel like I need to at least buy something you And that's where then, yeah, he just showed me all these different stuff. He gave me a deal. And I was absolute diehard until like pandemic hit. And I'm like, Well, I'm not working out now.
Unknown:That's it's a long term relationship. That's what he did. And maybe that's just the way he that person is or that businesses. But like, that's really I think that's where we're going now is. So alright, we're talking about nutrition, we're talking about fitness supplements. And I'm sure you can remember this. I don't know how into the supplement industry you are, but there are supplements that crush, like their supplement companies, there was a company called shreds. And if you remember shreds, yes. What happened, shreds got super big. Everybody realized that I don't know, I think this is kind of sketchy. I don't know if any of this is legit. I think this might be a fraud. They crashed and burned. And they I think they rebranded to something else and started again, a lot of supplement companies do that. They crush it, they lose all the trust of the people that they build trust with. And then they have to rebuild another company. Because they're they're not thinking long term. They're thinking short term. Now, if you think of the best long term supplement companies, what do they have? They have trust. They're proven, right, they're vetted. They have really good reviews. They're professional. It's it's long term versus short term.
Josh Bolton:Absolutely, yeah. The week, especially with everything, I've done, the supplement stuff that guy wouldn't recommend unless it was like at least eight years old. He's like, if he's like, if you're eight years in the supplement industry, like Winterset, you're good. As long as you don't have some nasty secret in the back. You're good to go. And that's so that's really he would give me and yeah, that's, that's cool. I've like never put the two and two together till now.
Unknown:There's a lot of examples of that. Gary Vee like some people don't like Gary very much, but he's doing it in the right way by just adding value in just being there. A lot of what he does is just, he's playing the long, long, long, long, long game. That's the interesting thing is like, it will look like he is winning. But in a lot of ways. It probably looks like he's losing compared to what he could do, but in the future. It'll be wild for him.
Josh Bolton:You know what's crazy? I haven't really seen him on Tik Tok or YouTube lately.
Unknown:Yeah, he's, I think he's building. He's probably building like multiple other things that will help him it's, it's interesting for
Josh Bolton:him like he has no time to like rest, like, Yeah, I think he's even mentioned like, the only time he really gets to sleep is when he's on the plane flight somewhere.
Unknown:Yeah, that's wild. Oh, right. That's the one thing about virtual that's wonderful is you can if that's, that's something that is going to change the landscape of podcasting, speaking, coaching, training a lot is you and I are literally across the country. And we're having a conversation right now. I did a summit the other day that was in front of however many people, it's all virtual. I was literally here and my pajama pants on like I do right now. And, you know, I just jump on, there's no travel, it doesn't cost me anything. It's, it's truly wonderful. The amount that you can do virtually, like I have a co host, and we don't we record virtually every every time so we don't we got rid of our studio we don't need anymore. It's interesting how that has really shifted over the last few years. Definitely with a pandemic. Yeah,
Josh Bolton:now, especially with different services coming up that you can record better. Honestly, it looks like you have an actual board, like a soundboard.
Unknown:I do. Yeah. So this is my this is an old one I have like up I have a mixer with a bunch of mics and all that happy jazz. So we have we had a full like studio setup with multiple cameras and lights and curtains and multiple TVs and all sorts of different stuff. And then it was like, alright, we're paying 600 bucks a month for this. It's probably not worth it. When I can just take the equipment at home. I have my own studio. There's no point in having to travel anymore.
Josh Bolton:It's true. Yeah. And we'll save whatever is leftover, you can reinvest back into our guests to
Unknown:that 500 bucks a month can go a long way for whatever, you know, services or extra emails or porridge, whatever, whatever it may be.
Josh Bolton:I'm just curious. Just a side note. Where did you find the prism background that you have?
Unknown:Yeah, it's I think it's called. It's 3d wall art. I found it on Amazon. When I when I set up the studio. I was like, alright, we want to optimize for audio, which we're doing. But I want my backdrop to look cool. And it has to have some sort of depth. That's big on YouTube is like lights and depth that usually does really well. So I just looked on Amazon, I think it was like, I don't know, I think I got the whole pack to cover my entire wall for like maybe 120 bucks. That's not bad at all. No, they're just PVC. Like, I don't know if you can hear it. plastic PVC. So it's not sound deadening. It's actually really bad. If you were to like have it in front of you. It would echo sound, but since it's behind me it's not a big Yeah,
Josh Bolton:yeah, I wasn't saying if it was in front, you would really need a whole curtain and everything like this guy here.
Unknown:Yeah, just to trouble. A lot of people say that they're like, Oh, I love your sound deadening. It's like, no, no, no, don't get this if you want to be quiet because it's, this is not good for sound deadening.
Josh Bolton:You would need those like, what? $30 foam things?
Unknown:Yeah, we had those in the studio. And then when we moved, we just tossed them all because we didn't have the $30 ones. We got like a pack of 120 for 100 bucks or something.
Josh Bolton:Okay. Yeah,
Unknown:we weren't. We weren't balling we had no way it was like I cannot afford to get 100 of these it however much it is. Yeah.
Josh Bolton:As some of them I've seen now they have like a hole. It almost looks like a tile. What is it Joe Rogan on his new like, spaceship looking one as those? Yeah, but it was what's his name? Pat Flynn. I don't know why but I randomly watched a video of his and he was unboxing of those. And that's where he like straight up said he's like, and he just looks looks at the camera. Really? My normal viewers don't buy this. Like, please don't do it. And I'm like, why? He's like, it's $100 a panel my cool. Oh, my goodness. I was like wow, that yeah, I can see why he was like emphasizing don't buy this.
Unknown:It's wild. I love Pat Flynn. Huge fan. Huge fan of Pat Flynn. He's He's so knowledgeable on podcasting and just everything marketing building an audience. He is He is one of the best.
Josh Bolton:He is. He's super honorable to he's getting like that super aggressive looking beard too. Now.
Unknown:I'm jealous because I can't I can't grow a beard like that.
Josh Bolton:Yeah, for me either. It's just like mine looks like Wolverine. It gets off intense. And then like right here for some reason won't grow in.
Unknown:We all have that spot that no matter what you do, you doesn't grow in.
Josh Bolton:And it was the part of reason I recently tactic is one of my co workers came up and he's like, I missed one of the Wolverine over there and like Shana, fine, fine. Okay,
Unknown:time to go. It's time to go and you get the comments,
Josh Bolton:right. This is awesome. Well, we've kind of chatted about me, can we go in a little more of like, the different nuances of your show and what you cover?
Unknown:Yeah, yeah, sure. Absolutely. This is yeah, this has been wonderful. It's this is like just been a genuine conversation, which has been a very good, it's been a very slow, it has been, it has been. So me or us in a nutshell is our goal is to bring holistic self improvement to the masses. So we talk about life, love, health and wealth. There's a lot of shows Josh that can talk about, here's how you make more money. But if you don't resonate with, it's like, for a lot of people, how you make more money is not contact more people, it's like you have to change your identity, because you're not the type of person who is good at sales, like so that's what we're about is raising people's awareness and then giving them the tactics that we believe will help them at a deep level, where a lot of other places are just saying like, here's five ways to make more money. Cool. But what if the money block is not something that they're not doing, it's something that they don't believe they are. And then so for us, it's like, it's not with relationships, it's that with health, our goal is really to raise the awareness of our community to help them make more aligned, better decisions in the long run, and then give them the tactics to to be more consistent in the journey. That's really what we do.
Josh Bolton:Okay, so especially like your comment of having to change your personality to get more sales or clips or whatever, is that let's say someone's super introverted and socially awkward, they can barely pull off a zoom call, how would you find your show? How would you help them out?
Unknown:So one of the things is we talk often about your you have your comfort zone, so think of like a bullseye, you have your comfort zone in the middle, you have your learning zone outside of that, and you have your anxiety zone outside of that. For many people, they see, I could never again, listen to the verbiage I could never get on a sales call, or I can never get on a zoom call with somebody. We start by figuring out okay, well what is the next fear chasing thing you can do? So maybe you shouldn't do that yet. If you're afraid of heights, the last thing you should do is just jump out of a plane and get to work on something else get to work your way up, get on a ladder, you know, then get in an elevator and go to the top of the building. What we do is we check in with okay, what part of your identity is stopping you from doing that? And what's one thing we can do to get you outside of your comfort zone? So I had somebody reached out and this person said I want to be a speaker like you that's a cool awesome well, what are you doing to speak she's a nothing yet because I'm too afraid. Awesome. I said on a scale of one to 10 how outside of your comfort zone is it for you to do a Facebook Live right now? She said 12 out of 10 Okay, on a scale of one to 10 how outside of your comfort zone is it for you to record a video on your phone and show nobody? And she said that's probably like a one. Okay, on a scale of one to 10 how outside of your comfort zone is it for you to record a video and send it to meal me? And I'm not going to show anybody and she said five okay. Cool. So think about it. This scale of one to 10, the 12. Is you living the anxiety zone? The one is you in the comfort zone, the five is you in the Learning Zone. So that's, that's the advice I would give is to figure out what is the thing that's in your learning zone, not your anxiety zone. And that's the next decision to make. As you do it, your learning zone will your comfort zone expands. So things that used to be impossible are now somewhat easy. Your Learning Zone expands, and your anxiety zone shrinks, because your learning zone is pushing outward. That really is in a nutshell. Yeah, okay,
Josh Bolton:I can see that. So it would be like if you want to be a coach or like a speaker, the but you're you're not ready for a full on Facebook Live, because you don't want to see that the roasting would be like, make the video and what just like upload a YouTube and make it unlisted. That's a technical you did it. You made the connections, but no. Okay,
Unknown:send it to a friend. Like some people start speaking in the mirror. Like that's what it is like, they just start or they walk down the driveway and give like a speech. I think that we think to ourselves, I could never speak in front of 50,000 people. That's not your first step. Anyway, that's like saying I could never play. You know, I could never throw the game winning touchdown in the Super Bowl. Nobody starts in the Super Bowl, you start when you're five years old, playing peewee football, and you work your way up. Right that I think that level of I could never do that. Now. He's worried a lot of people get stuck, you have to understand the long term potential of what you're doing. When I started podcasting, I never planned on being a speaker. For a speech, I was so scared, I was terrified. But I did it in front of 50 people. And it was like, Okay, that wasn't terrible. Right. And then we get on bigger stages. And it just I think a lot of us see where we are. And we assume we can't get to where we want to go. But you just have to look at like, what's the next available? Opportunity? Not the not the last one. The next one?
Josh Bolton:I agree. Yeah. Especially because I've done the speaking before. And it was for me like, it's interesting. I'm not worried about speaking to like, a lot of people or embarrassing myself. They used to be more self doubt, it would be like, Oh, they're they're not actually going to care about what I say. And then as a certain point, as I've learned and talk to us and people like you, I'm like, boy, they really don't actually care about me unless I involve them kind of thing.
Unknown:Yeah, that is a fact. And it's like, I think a lot of people, I just try to think from the aspect of the person in the audience. I asked myself, Why would they care about what I'm saying? And then go from there, what like why? Because they're only going to care about it. If it if it speaks to them to your point, right? I have to involve them, it has to have something to do with what they're dealing with. If not, then it's not going to it's just going to be noise, they have to say they so there's two, there's two frames that I have. And I talked about this with podcasters all the time, there's two sentences that people will say to say, to want to say to themselves sorry, when they're making a decision. One, that's for me, too. So that's it. So what is I don't care about that, that has nothing to do with me, that's for me is I'm the type of person who would click on that. They just have to make that decision. I call it self identify, they just have to self identify as the type of person who likes your speech, or podcast.
Josh Bolton:So in a meta way you're making content for yourself with but you know, others are gonna see it kind of thing? Or did I interpreted that wrong?
Unknown:I think there's two ways to do it. I think you can make content for yourself. If the person you're trying to attract is your audience. Okay. If the person you're trying to attract is you really, then I think you can cater your content, where it's, if you have me come in to speak Josh, and I'm speaking to a bunch of executives, it's gonna be vastly different than a bunch of high schoolers. It has to be, yeah, have to put myself in the position of the person in the seat. So it depends. I'm trying to make sure that at all times, I am getting a level of depth, but also a level of breath. So breath is how many people can I touch depth is how many, like what's the depth of impact that I can have? I'm trying to think to myself, if I say this, it might help five people at a really deep level, but it might not help the other 95 at all. If I say this, I might get a little bit of a breakthrough in everybody. That's probably what I'm gonna go with. So that whatever whatever that is, I think it's just trying to make sure you're relatable and relevant to everybody in the audience to the degree you can be.
Josh Bolton:Okay, Okay, so then would that be then get back to the skit the niching. Down and making to that that audience? But like I mentioned earlier, I have a concept who my audience is, but I don't. Because I don't get much interactions. I don't know. What if I'm talking to someone completely different? And I just I don't know it? Kind
Unknown:of Yeah. So I would look at your stats, I would literally. So this is what we did. I created, it's an I would say it's an algorithm, it's pretty simple math equation that anybody could figure out. But all it is, is, it's the number of downloads and episode has divided by the amount of days it's been out. That'll spit out a number, go through and see which ones are the highest in comparison to the ones around them. So as an example, the highest hitter you've ever had you said was the one being comfortable talking to women. Okay, that one
Josh Bolton:was just weird in and of itself. So she essentially was a she's a female bodybuilder. And her she was explaining what she does with clients isn't that steamrolled me the whole time, by the way, like, I barely got a word. And then she started a whole argument with me. But the biggest one, essentially, she just kind of like, metaphorically, because she was in Canada, kind of like you just like, virtually slapped me around. So stop being a bitch. If you want a woman, you got to like, grab her and force her to be yours. And I'm like, I see. So may I see so many things going wrong with that? Yeah. And that's where but that was just so amazing. And I'm sitting here going, like, what happened
Unknown:here? It? I think she did. So there's one. That's one piece.
Josh Bolton:But also the name is just kind of weird. So she goes by Heyoka impasse. And she called me Earth boy, like during the whole thing. So I was like, oh, joking, like, Oh, hey, okay. Empaths on Earth boy kind of thing.
Unknown:So that's probably something the importance of a title is way more valuable than people realize, way more, because all you're doing is you're getting people to self identify. Right? Like, if you don't have a group of entrepreneurs listening to your show, five ways to grow your business is a useless not useless episode, but it's not as useful to them.
Josh Bolton:So then, okay, if we were going for a strategy session, you would say make Monday, one type of content Tuesday, completely different. Do that for a month, see what sticks and then optimize to that?
Unknown:First, I would go through your content and get like, what are the patterns? So like, Okay, you use the word consistency. That's something, oh, you used it here, too. And that did well, okay, that's something, it's almost like every problem is the top, it's the canopy of the tree. And then there's a bunch of things that come under that. So consistency is attached to discipline, which is a task attached to productivity, which is attached to perfectionism, which is attached to procrastination. So like that one word covers so many different topics. I go through and look at our data and say, okay, every time we talk about relationships, it works really well. Every time we have this guest on it works really well. Why that? And then I try to take from that, and then I test accordingly. Yes. So I would go through the data you have currently, and then do it that way. Okay.
Josh Bolton:Yeah, I'm just looking. Yeah, it's the the ones that did so well are the ones I didn't think we're gonna actually do. So
Unknown:oftentimes, it is that because maybe your audience isn't who you think
Josh Bolton:that's kind of what I'm coming to you because like the the second one that we had, I mean, it's doing good. It's not doing fantastic. I quit my job good. But it is the title is the popcorn is soggy. And for hay, and I've seen like, it was just what it was the inside joke on the actual podcast, because we were talking about strategies, and he was a linguistic like teacher. And that's where he was trying to make an A metaphor with. Because I was I was eating popcorn off my mic. And he had this where he said, like, Oh, is it soggy with all that butter? And I'm like, actually. And it was just one of those that was like the whole joke. So then he would tie him whatever and jokingly say, popcorn and a soggy yet, but it was the one I did not expect it to do as well as it did. But maybe I have a misconceived notion of who my audience,
Unknown:it's possible, or again, did that person share it? That's where now that's where the guest versus solo is important because at least if you do a solo episode, and it does well, you know, it's not because of a rogue share. That's an interesting thing is you know, it's organic. It leads to you know, it's more organic. And this is the other thing, and maybe this aligns. When I'm thinking of titles, I'm thinking of two words. I want it to create curiosity. but also have certainty. I'm trying to walk the line of where is it? Is it too certain? Or is it too much curiosity? That episode might have piques curiosity, where people are like, Okay, what is this about? I have to hear it. So there's another thing is like, okay, maybe you got 500 clicks. But if you were to look at the overall consumption, what does that look like? Did people stay for 90% of the episode? Or do they just listen to the first five minutes to figure out what soggy popcorn actually means? Right? It's really, at the end of the day, it's like anything else, you got to look at the data. That's the only way to make the most intelligent decisions.
Josh Bolton:So I'm curious for you what host do you use that? Bus bro? Okay, cool. I use that too. So how do you see the duration on the consumption?
Unknown:So this is interesting, because the podcast industry is still very much the Wild West, you have to log on to Apple podcast, connect. That's the old and I think Spotify has their own. But yeah, I would say you it doesn't come through the host profile or the host provider yet. You comes through the other platforms. So Apple podcast, connect is the place for now I
Josh Bolton:would say. Okay, so now I will go check that out. Yeah, most of my downloads still come from Apple. So
Unknown:that's good. Because you can actually look at real data. And you can, you know, that's the important understanding is I think, the number so you have three things that help you with the Apple algorithm. And I think it's just Apple, I don't know if it's the other ones. One is consumption. The second one is amount of plays. Those are really the big two is overall consumption and amount of plays. I thought it
Josh Bolton:was also subscriptions, like getting a consistency, boost, you kind of thing. Yeah.
Unknown:And then people think reviews is reviews is more about social proof than anything. It's that doesn't help quote unquote, the algorithm. It just helps bring certainty to your audience.
Josh Bolton:I was like, Oh, he's gotten like 200 people to say something kind of thing.
Unknown:Yeah. Yeah, just hell. It's like Amazon. I mean, you know, when you go to Amazon, you're gonna buy that microphone. Blue Yeti is a Blue Yeti. We're gonna buy that you were like, Okay, what is what are the reviews? Oh, 95% of people give it a five star review. Yeah. Okay, that's good. For me. That same thing? Okay, cool.
Josh Bolton:So then what would be? Should you ask for subscriptions? I guess because you've been doing this way longer than me. Or like, give a nudge at the end of conversation be like, Okay, if you made it this far, like, Could you do me a solid hit the subscribe kind of thing?
Unknown:Yeah, the interesting thing is, it's very much like YouTube where you just want to say make sure you hit the subscribe button. So every time I drop a new episodes, you get notified. Wherever you want. My rule is always make sure you add value first. That's it, make sure it's not in the first minute. I see a lot of people who do that where they'll be like, Alright, we're gonna record this episode, and they'll do it live with me. Hey, welcome back to another episode, make sure if you're new here, you subscribe. That's not based on value. So most people won't do it. It's almost like, imagine if you had to tip the waiter before the service wouldn't make any sense. It just wouldn't make any sense. Because you don't know how the service is going to be like, I'm not gonna subscribe to the show. Unless I know it's good. So it's the same thing. Make sure you're adding value first. If you're not adding value first, you're not going to really get people to subscribe again. That's just from my experience, in my opinion. It's kind of percent.
Josh Bolton:Hey, I want to be respectful of you and your time to give you a buffer. Is there anything else in specific you want to go over?
Unknown:No, this was wonderful. I didn't. I didn't know where it was gonna go. I didn't have any direction. So I'm glad it went where it went. No, that's that's it for me in a nutshell. I like jammin on podcasting. So I'm happy. That's awesome.
Josh Bolton:Three going out questions for you, please. So other than work, what have you been doing to keep yourself busy during these COVID times?
Unknown:Other than work? i During COVID I wrote a lot more music. So I like rapping I'm a big I'm a big fan of rap. And I do a little writing and rapping on the side. So that was one thing I did for sure. That was a big thing. Cool.
Josh Bolton:Did you hang out with the family more?
Unknown:Not really. I'm not a very family driven human. Interesting. Okay. Yeah, I'm not I require very little human interaction. Which, which is why I think being an entrepreneur is very helpful for me because I can just sit in his office. I mean, I see my wife every night, obviously. But other than that, I'm kind of like, you can just put me in the basement and let me do my thing. I'm happy to be alone. All right.
Josh Bolton:So someone inspired by you, what are some tips, tricks or advice you give them to start down a similar path that you're on? The
Unknown:first thing is tap into your why you'll get way further if you have a real real deep heart driven reason for why why you're doing what you're doing. I would have quit this a long time ago if I didn't have a deep why. When I was broke and I couldn't pay my bills and I couldn't make it Rent, I would have quit. So that's one huge one, to really look in the mirror, the proverbial mirror, and be very honest about your strengths and be as honest about your improvement points. I think a lot of us convince ourselves we're really good at stuff when we're not. And we convince ourselves that we're really bad at stuff when we're not. So you got to have a more accurate view of yourself. I think that's important. And then find find somebody who can help keep you accountable. Consistency is one of the hardest things for humans to have. But if you have people in your life who can help you be more accountable, stay more accountable, create more necessity, you'll definitely get further in life for sure. So those three I'd say
Josh Bolton:perfect, and then where can everyone contact you?
Unknown:So you can listen to the show next level University and my handle on Instagram is at never quit kid please if you have any questions about podcasting, I mean, I hope this is a good example like I will just try to add as much value as I can I don't You don't need to give me any money if you want to. I'm happy to to work with you. But my thing is value first. So if you have any questions, DM me at never quit kid on Instagram. And my Our website is next level universe.com And that has a bunch of our other contact information as well.
Josh Bolton:That's awesome. Thank you so much, you you just came in and dropped so much value and I'm joined What do I do all this now? I
Unknown:appreciate it. Well, I honestly Josh, I appreciate the humility to want to talk about it live in front of other people a lot of people don't want to quote unquote, look like they don't know everything. So I'm very grateful that you took advantage of it and I appreciate it very much genuinely. Thank you