Seasons of Life and How to Ride Them as an Entrepreneur With Iman Gadzhi | TNE062

Tell me, what would it feel like to be a multi millionaire by the age of 21? What kind of temperament do you have to have and what kind of discipline do you have to show? 

Back in 2017, our guest today went viral with an ad on YouTube that started with him saying he dropped out of high school. Today, Iman Gadzhi owns a multi million dollar agency and has students all around the world following in his footsteps, a true rags to riches story. From Iman’s hows, whys, and whens when it comes to business to how he pays it forward through education, the takeaways in this episode is comparable to gold.

[2:20] The humble beginnings of Iman Gadzhi

[17:18] Dealing with Setbacks and toughening it up

[27:10] Monk Mode, an effective way of resetting

[1:05:46] Timeline and Goal setting: 25 by 25

[1:16:10] 1000 Schools; Paying it forward in Nepal

[1:29:50] Advice for entrepreneurs: Good or bad - this, too, shall pass

Iman Ghadzhi Links
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQ4FNww3XoNgqIlkBqEAVCg
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/imangadzhi/?hl=en
Grow Your Agency: https://www.growyouragency.com/iman-gadzhi/

Omar's (Host) Social Media:

Instagram - @nomadables

TikTok - @nomadables

Facebook Group - NOMADABLES - Accountability & Growth Community for Remote Workers- Perfect to meet fellow online entrepreneurs, remote workers, and digital nomads.

YouTube - Omar Mo

LinkedIn - Omar Mo Nomads Cast

Twitter - @nomadables

Pintrest - @nomadables

Clubhouse - @pods

WEBSITE: https://www.nomadables.com/

Transcript

Seasons of Life and How to Ride Them as an Entrepreneur With Iman Gadzhi | TNE062

Omar  

Tell me, what would it feel like to be a multi millionaire by the age of 21? What kind of temperament do you have to have and what kind of discipline do you have to show? 

Back in 2017 Our guest today went viral with an ad on YouTube but that started with him saying he dropped out of high school. Today, Iman Gadzhi owns a multi million dollar agency and has students all around the world following in his footsteps; a true rags to riches story. Entrepreneurs of all shapes and sizes will find inspiration in today's episode of the Nomadic Executive. 

Remember Nomad fan, we've got some incredibly value filled episodes planned out for you. So please hit that subscribe button and leave a review. Your review helps us podcast become more visible and ultimately inspire more people just like you. My name is Omar Mo and this is the Nomadic Executive.

Intro  

You're listening to the Nomadic Executive hosted by Omar from nomadables.com. Join Omar as he sits down and speaks with leading online entrepreneurs, remote workers and digital nomads about everything from business strategy to travel and lifestyle design. Together we're here to help you achieve a life of happiness, health and freedom. And now here's your host, Omar Mo.

Omar  

All right, Iman Gadzhi. Did I pronounce that last name right? Because I can never tell if I'm pronouncing that last name right.

Iman  

Yes, sir. I mean, my real last name is actually Gadzhimagomedov. I just, I didn't think it'd be too convenient for you so I just shorten it down a bit.

Omar  

Cool. So let's just go Iman Gadzhi, welcome to the Nomadic Executive, man. It is an absolute pleasure having you and really, really happy to connect.

Iman  

Well, thank you so much for having me.

Omar  

So let's go ahead. Let's dive right in, for, I'm sure there are a few people definitely that know who you are. Because I have, I know a lot of my audience do have agencies or some sort of online business model, that isn't the agency model. But for those who don't know who you are, give us a small intro about yourself, Iman.

Iman  

Man, it's such an open ended question.

Omar  

It is. 

Iman  

That's a lot. Like, where do you start? You know, quite simply, I started my agency kind of, you know, I think the way that a lot of entrepreneurs do. I think the general consensus around entrepreneurship is you have this idea, and then you execute, and then it either works or doesn't work. When like most of the time, it's actually just like, just by freak coincidence, or chance you stumble upon something. And it's the nucleus to something that would change your life. But you don't realize at the time, and this was kind of my story. 

You know, I started my agency, no, I say agency but it's a glorified contractor back then. But hey, I got my first client back in August of 2016, for 380 pounds a month. And I didn't actually charge monthly, I charged weekly. So it was 95 pounds a week, I was too scared to do 100 a week. So I was making 95 a week. So that was 380 a month. And for that, you know, for the first kind of 2--18 months exclusively, but pretty much around two years of my agency, I was actually a creative agency.

So before this first client I was doing 4 YouTube videos shot, edited, 4 YouTube videos, 30 unique Instagram posts and 30 unique Facebook posts. And once again, I was shooting, editing, captioning and distributing all that content. But man, at the age of 16, like I thought I was, you know, I'd made a decent bit of money.

Prior to that, you know, for a few years that you know, when I was 14, I used to flip Instagram accounts. And I did that for a few months. And then that got super, super saturated. And then when I was 15, I used to hustle my friend's parents at the dinner table. I would convince them to let me personally train them. And I would like send them all packages and stuff like that. See I made decent money here and there. 

But that, you know, this idea of a retainer. Like that was such a foreign concept to me and I was so nuts on that, you know, I had this client, you know, paying monthly. You know, that's kind of how I started my agency. 

And you know, it was really more for the first 18 months, I was a creative agency. And you know, August 20 2016 was when I signed my first client and you know from there, that my entire world just open up to me what it was seven, eight months of like, trying to get clients doing all the things that I laugh-- I tell people not to do these days, sending written proposals, having multiple in person meetings, etc, etc, etc. And you can go on my YouTube channel and I literally have a video like look going back and laughing over some of my old proposals that I sent. And you can see like actual clients, I was pitching in 36 years, it's hilarious. 

But anyways, you know, I did that for seven, eight months and you don't really know, no movement, no activity all the way until March 2017, when I signed my second client ever, a company that was then called GenFlow, now's rebrand to (inaudible 5:09). And they're actually one of my partners for my clothing company, Gadzhi. You know, they're a distribution partner. 

And I remember that client was 1900 pounds a month, or 2500 bucks. And that was like, that changed my entire world. And within the space of a week, I signed 4 clients, you know, I always say, you know, when it rains, it pours. And still to this day, you know, when we sign clients, usually, it's kind of in clumps, like even in a month, which, you know, our trajectory not to grow too quick. 

Because there, as an agency owner, there is an issue with that, you know, we're trying to grow it at a healthy 3 new clients a month. And usually we find those three clients usually signed within what, you know, the same week of the month, you know, and when we've had clients, you know, we'll go months without losing a client, and then in the space of, you know, a week, we'll have three clients tell us, hey, they're going coming, going in house.

Omar  

They drop off the same way they did

Iman  

yeah, exactly. It's very interesting. It's, you know, I'll say when it when it rains, it pours now, positively and negatively. So yeah, long story short, that, you know, that was my, at that point, assigned Athlete back then, and then signed three more clients within the space of a week. 

And, you know, very quickly, I was making $10,000 a month at the age of 17. And, you know, thought was some big shot, and this and that, and, you know, massive scale over the next few months. I had, my biggest month was around like 20, between 20 and $25,000, you know, with this creative agency, and I had a contractor that was also helping deliver some of the video services in this. 

But my main issue with it was, I still felt like, I didn't own my own business, I just felt as though I had like seven bosses, not one. And I had some awesome clients I was working with, you know, clients that I'm still friends with today. But once again, I just feel felt like, I wasn't a respected business owner, I just felt like I was just like, a contractor, which I guess, to be honest, that's pretty much more accurate as to what I actually was. 

And I just realized, you know, I have a very black and white personality, I'm not very, you know, I'm not very, you know, I'm not very good customer facing or client facing. I can be but in general, like, I'm, you know, there's certain people who are just so good with clients and will tend to their every need and this, like, I'm honestly just not over here to that.

Omar  

Yeah, I think the more laid back approach, I get it.

Iman  

Yeah. So um, you know, from there, I saw a need in having, you know, because clients kept telling me, they're like, this is awesome, blah, blah, our social media, your social platforms are growing content looks great, etc, etc. You know, but what's the ROI? 

And I was like, Look, I don't know, bus ads, here in the UK. And it's like, Look, I can't tell you net net, what the ROI is, but I can give you some KPIs to give you an idea, so that you know, our thing, our, you know, month or month, are we doing better or worse. And you can kind of come to your own conclusions. But still, for some reason, it just, you know, it wasn't good enough to satisfy my clients. And it was there was always this friction. 

So, you know, I decided, look, I'm gonna learn Facebook ads. Now, it wasn't a story of like, Hey, you know, I became a Facebook ad expert the next day. No. You know, it took me 6, 7, 8 months of fumbling around, and it was, you know, I think there's a lot better training these days, you know, in the year 2021, for Facebook ads, and there was in 2017, and 2017, there really wasn't no one who would could describe it, you know, could explain it. 

Well, I found, and even after working with some coaches and stuff like that, towards the tail end of 2017, it was like, I was struggling. And the funny thing is, I would sell it on is sort of like an upsell to my clients, like, Hey, you know, I'll give you 50% off what I'm pitching new clients at this Facebook ad service, you know. So I'd bolted on to, you know, 2500 pound a month retainers for an extra 700 pounds. 

And the funny thing is, I would get horrible results. And not only what I lose in for the Facebook ad side of things, I lose them for the creative agency side of things as well. So it's a double whammy, and it kind of went on like that for six months, all the way up until kind of around March of 2018. 

When, you know, I just, you know, I think that was really when it all kind of clicked. And things started working closer towards the back end of 2017. I decided to work exclusively with gyms for paid traffic, did that for six months. And then I decided, look, I was always passionate about fitness but I decided, hey, you know, why don't I start working with other education companies? You know, my bio ever since the beginning of 2017 has read on a mission reform education system. 

Omar  

Right

Iman  

Now when I put that in my bio, I had no idea what that would look like. And you know, it's a multi, multi decade plan that I'm still working on every single day.

Omar  

I'd jump on a little bit more. I think you're doing some incredible things on that side of it.

Iman  

For sure. For sure. And it's, you know, I decided, look, I'm really passionate about education and namely online education as a means to replace formal education. Because I believe 80, 90% of cases of online education are superior in every single way to formal education. 

So yeah, I decided like, Hey, you know, why don't I just go down this route. And that was really when my agency went from, you know, hitting 20k months to hitting our first 100k a month in 2019. And by the end of 2018, you know, we were signing massive clients, you know, so are working with really cool companies, companies like Oura Ring, Iconic.

Omar  

That shift there, right there that when you switch to a specifically started (inaudible 10:38) education company specifically, like and you found, I guess, you could say, your niche, your persona, where you actually stood behind? What was that transition that shifts for you in there that really pushed you from that 20 to 100k. But you because you were niche down before? But before that you were working for gym companies? And now you have like? 

Iman  

Well, that's a great question. You know, I would say, look, there's people in CPA, my high level program who are doing 100k a month profit, working with local businesses. And I think I could have still gotten to that point, I don't think it was necessarily about me changing to the infoproducts space, or the education space, because quite frankly, it's so hard.

Like, we're now in 2021, we've been trying to sound primarily ecommerce clients, because it's just we're so good at education companies, and like, there's so few agencies that can, you know, that can basically, you know, get ridiculous results for info product. You know, it's a much harder skill set than e-commerce agencies. But yeah, you know, having ecom agency is way easier. And like, you know, cash on cash return or cash on time return, you're going to be much doing much better if you have an e commerce agency than an info product agency.

Omar  

I don't think it's going to scale to

Iman  

Yeah, I think the main thing is, and I've said this time and time again, there is this certain certainty that comes to you somewhere around that, like 18-24 month mark, as an agency owner, where you just feel settled. And I, it's really hard to describe, but I've just seen it personally, myself, and time and time again, with other people. 

Because the thing is, the thing about having an agency is I've never personally seen an agency owner who made it made less this year than they did last year. Never, right. Because having an agency, and it's not about having an agency, it's about having a service-based business, there's no lawyer that makes less money at 60, then he makes less money at 50 than he does at 40. Or makes less money at 45 than he does a 40.

Omar  

Great analogy. 

Iman  

Right? There's no, for the most part, personal trainers, you know, the same thing, for the most part, any sort of coach, any sort of (inaudible 12:53) just any sort of service provider, right? Because the thing is, same thing, we're like a tax advisor, right? 

The thing is, when service based businesses, is you get to a point where your reputation, you know, your reputation is basically, all you know, basically all you need. 

And second, you get to a point where you have so many referrals. If you're good at what you do, you have so many referrals, that it just builds this flywheel effect. Now, no agency owner should, you should not be able to sleep at night. And by the way, there's a lot of agency owners who make multiple five figures a month off of annual they do that just through referrals. I personally wouldn't be able to sleep at night, you know, knowing that my business was built on such janky foundations. 

But my point is, you know, as an agency owner a year on year on year, you just get, and I in all fairness, I guess that comes to any sort of business but unlike, you know, I've got this right here, you know, this is a my ecommerce line, Gadzhi, right, this one of our products, the G-One Blue Light Blockers, you know, most of my friends in e commerce. You know what, most of the time actually I've personally seen it where their business gets worse and worse every single year. 

Because there's more and more competition in the market. And I've also seen it with pretty much most of my friends who have education companies and info products. It's they have a great first year. And it gets worse the second year and way worse, the third year and an even worse the fourth year. Because, once again, just ridiculous, ridiculous competition in the market.

Omar  

Right. The agency model.

Iman  

Yeah, it's a little different with the agency model, because here's the thing, people want something new and exciting. So for example, even with courses, right? It's funny, because you'll have someone who's, you know, maybe had a program for five years, right, of course for five years, and they you know, they've obviously made 2.0 and 3.0. But you know, they've been on YouTube for five years, and maybe they've been doing it for 10 years. 

And then you get some new young buck who comes in and people you know, it's like that new product that comes in the market. Right? The challenge is the one that's been there for 10 years, but the one that's been there for 10 years is genuinely the better one. And this new one is just trying to excite the market with interesting new marketing and this and that. 

And the thing is people think very differently around sort of products and courses and  like, don't go for the flash and the allure of like the new thing. Right? People fall prey to that. 

Omar  

Makes more sense, Yeah. 

Iman  

Whereas with service based businesses, like, no one is like picking a lawyer, and they're like, Oh, yeah, I want the new young buck, right? They're just like, no, like, I want someone who's tried and tested. 

And this is very different thinking when it comes to picking a service compared to picking a product or a course or this or that. Right. So as I said, the reason that I say all this is, is really just to say that, as an agency owner, you're on your compounds, and it just gets better and better and better. 

So I found that really, is that two year, you know, that really 18-24 month mark, that thing is just like, I have no other way to put it. It's just like, you know, most agency owners just get a set of balls at that point. But I know how to hold their ground, they're, like you speak to an agency owner, in month one, compared to like, month 24. And they're just grounded. Like, they've got a certain look in their eye. They're composed. 

Because the thing is, you know, I've even had people ask me, like, you know, how do you deal with setbacks when you first start with your agency this and that. And you can do as much meditation as you want, you know, you can do as much internal work as you want, you can be as abundant-minded as you want. But look, when you lose your when you lose a client, and you're seven months in, like it gets to you. 

Whereas these days, like, you know, if I lose a client or client brings it in, you know, that's one thing that took me a long while to kind of like, come to terms with is these days, you know. These days, we lose clients 70% of time, it's because they're bringing it in house and 30% of time, it's because basically, it was a misjudgment on my part, or maybe it was a client that I knew was either gonna be an absolute knock it out the park and our performance fee is phat with a Ph. Or, you know, it was a risk that we tried to take on with the up and coming ecommerce or info parkland. And it just didn't work out.

Omar  

I think it's just mixed between abundance and experience, right? Like, at this point, after 24 months in, I think, not only to the agency model or business in general, or even any skill that you've had long enough that involves other people, like relying on other people to build something up. I think it comes this idea of just having worked enough, having done this enough, long enough to know that hey, like, if I miss out on this one person, statistically speaking, I should already be able to get three more later on this week or this month, you know, in this predictability factor comes in your head. 

And as intangible as the numbers are in the beginning, later on down the road, when you've done this enough, you can work it out in your head, and your brain just tells you Hey, like, losing this one customer isn't losing four customers this month. Next month, I'm going to be back to like six customers. Or talk about girls here on another on another side of the scale. Oh, I just lost this beautiful girl. Oh, well, there's about three other beautiful girls down the street from me that I can talk to right. It's just abundance in general. Right?

Yeah. You know, just because it came to mind. Sorry to cut you off. 

Go ahead.

Iman  

I think it's kind of like that first breakup you go through?

Omar  

That's it. 

Iman  

Like you can you can give someone as much advice as you can, you know, you can you can talk to them and go look, it's, you know, you're young, you got that, but that first breakup, like it is excruciating.

Omar  

Yeah. 

Iman  

Right? And then you get to your second and your third. And, you know, you're like, Look, of course, it's painful, but life goes on this is all a part of the process. And I think that's kind of the same thing with, you know, with the agency journey is you, basically you just get enough reference experiences, right. And the same thing would if you compare someone who's been investing, you know, an investor from 2000,2018, to 2022, right? Compared to someone who's been investing for 40,50 years. And they've seen the booms and busts, and they just have, you know, an investor who has been investing a lot, they're just very grounded, and you can see it in their eyes. And it's a much shorter timeframe to get that sort of certainty, or groundedness as an agency owner. But as I said, I've usually found it to be within those months,

Omar  

I strongly believe there's also this one kind of bleeding effect. And this is just from, like, maybe, and this is something that I've seen in myself, but not only myself and other people as well. Like if you get really good and abundant at one skill, there is a bleeding effect to your other skills in your life as well. So like you being a good business, for example, you kind of carry and I'm sure you can attest to this, carry this abundance that you have in business and other aspects of your life to some certain degree. Maybe not to that degree that you have in business, but definitely to some degree, would you agree on that?

Iman  

100% you know, 100, 100% I mean, what you do outside of the businesses, to me is just as if not more important in business. And it's, look, you try to, if it's a Friday, and you just had a client tell you that, hey, you know, we want to bring this in house or hey, you know, it's just not working for us or, hey, we, as I said, you know, we're thinking about hiring someone full time in house because you know, between your performance and billable between your performance base, you know, at this point, we're just thinking, you know, it might make sense to have someone in house. 

If that entire week you've been on the ball with your nutrition, you've been on with the ball with your sleep, if you've been on the ball with your training, if you've been on the ball with, you know, your meditation, you know, by the time that Friday rolls around, you receive that information. You're like, you know, I'm strong. I'm mentally strong, I'm spiritually strong, emotionally strong. And, you know, I lose one client, who cares, I'll get three more. But you know, if you've been, if that week, you've been off the ball with everything, you don't believe you have the capacity to get a client like that again.

Omar  

No, it'll break you easier. 

Iman  

Yeah, exactly. Right? So 100%, you know, that's why you got to be very, very careful. You know, with y'all be very careful what you do outside the business. Because it will mark your head. I mean, you know, it's telling you off camera, I was like, uhhh probably won't be very sharp on today's call, because, you know, I had a big blowout last night before I do another two months of a monk mode. You know, like I, I woke up this morning, hungover it, you know, I just came back from Cape Town. I did six weeks a monk mode there. So it's like, the first time I've drank in a while, and this and that, and, you know, it's just I feel weak today, right? 

Like, if I got a piece of information, you know, for example, if I had a client tell me, you know, even after almost, I've been in this game for almost five years, you know, I might even be like, a little irked, or like a little, you know. I might have a very scarce mindset around it, right? Whereas if, you know, this is two weeks from now, and I've just, you know, been, everything's been so dialed in for two weeks, and I'm just, you know, at the top of my game, and this and that, you know, you brush it off like it's nothing,

Omar  

Right. Makes a lot of sense. I mean, number one, you could have fooled me, because you seem very well put together right now. So don't consider yourself too weak. But I think it's a good springboard here to kind of talk about what you actually implement into your own life to keep yourself so sturdy and strong, right. 

And before that, a small disclaimer, I think that it definitely affects some more than others. I think there's this resiliency that you can build up in your head and you keep fighting fires, you keep fighting fires, like it doesn't matter. Like take, for example, Gary Vee, right? He didn't start working out till two years ago, maybe a year ago, but the guy's been fighting fires all his life. And he's already got that sturdiness to the point to get him where he is now. Right?

So I think it definitely works to a higher degree for some people rather than others. But it'll always help you and never hurt you. Right? All these incremental changes of sleep tracking, journaling, and meditation and all these different things. 

So I'm always, always open and especially to learn from people that know much better than this than I. To what kind of incremental changes or what kind of small changes and routines have you brought into your own life in mind to make your life better and more sturdy and more strong and be more mentally capable to do the things that you want to do? 

Iman  

Yes, I mean, for me, there's two parts to it. First of all, there are non-negotiables. So there's 365 days a year, non-negotiables, which is at least 10 minutes meditation a day. I don't care how good I feel on the day, you know, 365 days a year, it's meditation. It's for me, I would go crazy if I didn't work out at least four times a week. You know, and then for me, it's, I guess the reason I say this is because it fits into sort of my year view. 

Now, there's some people who like to do and find out whatever works for you. I know, there's some people who like to do, you know, month work from the first to the 26th of every month, and then take the last four or five days off. 

Omar  

Right

Iman  

Right? I know, there's some people that like to do, you know, do in quarters, right? So they do, you know, maybe like a two and a half months and maybe take a two week break. Right? 

I'm a psychopath, I'm totally different. So like, I just have this crazy ability, like up for me. I'm kind of like, all or nothing, right? You know, so for me, I'll go, you know, there's nine months a year where literally, I just don't, just innately I don't really care about anything else, except for work. Like, there's nothing that gives me much more pleasure than work and stuff like that. 

Omar  

Full on Monk Mode.

Iman  

Yeah, yeah. So monk mode is something that I used to, because for me, you know, I always thought there had to be balance. And for me, I thought balance meant like balance on a week view or balance on like, month view. And I realized that balance can be on a year view, and people need to look at differently. 

For me, I've just figured out from a year view works best. So for me, usually from like, January until June, there's really not much else that I care about other than work, right, except for you know. And that doesn't mean that, you know, I won't see anyone or you know, maybe every, you know, once a month or once every two months I'll have a couple of drinks with friends or go to a party or this but it just means like, really, you know, I'm really dialed in and it is I do six days a week. I work six days a week. I take Saturdays off, Friday night and Saturdays off. And you know, for me 12 hours a day of work feels effortless. Right? 

Omar  

Right

Iman  

Now, once it gets to June, July, August, as hard as I try, I cannot manage more than six hours of work. 

Omar  

Why do you think that is so randomly three months?

Iman  

So there's something that changes three months a year where I go from work, just being my number one priority to work being leaving my third priority. I just go into maintenance mode. By the time that June, July, August rolls around, I care more about Rosé and Calamari, I care more about kicking it with my friends, going on holidays, to enjoy and you know, life socializing, doing more networking, maybe just even getting into, you know, just get picking up some new hobbies that I haven't picked up that I've been meaning to pick up. You know, like, Last summer I boxed for six weeks. You know

Omar  

I loved how you laughed at that.

Iman  

And, yeah, you know, I used to be in denial of this. And I think a lot of people are in, I think a lot of people are in denial of, or having don't have enough self awareness as to what works for them. Because it's also like, Look, you know, I always tell people, like, I don't care if you wake up at 4:30am I don't care if you wake up at seven. I don't care if you wake up at nine, like as long as you just don't wake up past 10 I could just because I don't think anyone really should be waking up past or like, yeah, past 10 I don't think anyone should be waking up, honestly. But like you don't figure out what your sleep chronotype is, and don't listen, some motivation. Don't listen to David Goggins and wake up at 5pm if that's genuinely doesn't work for you. Right? 

For me, I'm not really good at balance. Like I figured this out, you know, for me, I'm good at just periods of like, you know, like, for example, as I said, You know, I had a party last night, had a bit of a blowout, because the several weeks before that, I was in Monk Mode in Cape Town. I came back and once again, I was still the Monk Mode. And then you know, did one-night blowout and now I'm going two months a Monk Mode, you know, for me Monk Mode 

Omar  

Work in sprints. I get it. 

Iman  

Yeah, yeah, for me, Monk Mode is something that I like, formalized it, because I was doing these periods of like, intense focus before, by formalizing made it more of a bit more of a game. 

So for me, Monk Mode is no caffeine, no alcohol, no sugar, no gluten. And then now the other thing that, so those are the tangible ones outside of that, it's really more of like a the way that I view that time. So when I'm in Monk Mode, I don't really see any friends. I don't really hang out with anyone, I don't really do anything social. And I'm just super dialed in. The other thing that I added for this time round when I'm doing the eight weeks a monk mode is no YouTube. I don't watch TV or Netflix anyways, unless I'm on a plane, and that's my one opportunity to catch up on Netflix. You know, so no, YouTube, I'll cut out YouTube this time as well. And an hour a day of meditation. 

Omar  

Makes sense.

Iman  

So, yeah, that'll be Monk Mode.

Omar  

That's a long, that's a long meditation session right there.

Iman  

Yeah, I mean, look, you know, usually I do tend

Omar  

Before you dive in, before you do dive into the meditation, though, I have a quick question about that, right. Something that I find that goes along with these sprints and not doing any of this stuff, and then going back to a world where you are doing this stuff, is the constant having to relearn it, you know, like, you go back, and let's say you do this for eight weeks, and then you go into two or three weeks of no Monk Mode, and you go in and you eat gluten and you drink and you do all this, that having to reel yourself back into Monk Mode, how easily can you flip the on and off switch? To me, it always seems like a dimmer and there's like this warmup period. So do you have any tactics on that?

Iman  

Yeah, great, great question. So that's why I preluded by saying, you know, I have non-negotiables. So for example, when I do those, you know, when I have that two-three months, we're just my natural setpoint is like, and you know.

I always tell people, because I've had so many high level entrepreneurs reach out to me, and they're like,  I've had high levels, I mean, even, quote-unquote, competitors of mine in like, the education space, like, reach out to me, and many, many last year, reach out to me, and they were like, yeah, like, I'm thinking of quitting. And like, I'm calling it quits, like, I'm just, you know, I've lost all love for this and passion and bollocks, cetera, et cetera. 

And, you know, what I always tell them is, a lot of people think that when you're, you know, when you're running, or you're like cycling up a hill, you should put more effort while you're going up. Right? But that's not actually the case, you should go as slow as you can, and maintain because, you know, if you put in an extra, you know, if you put in an extra 70% effort, while you're going up the hill, you might add an extra, you know, two miles per hour or something. Right?

Omar  

Right.

Iman  

And most people think they need to pedal super hard up the hill to make up for it. And then when they're going down, and when they're going down the hill, and they have gravity on their side, you know, they can just not pedal and just kind of take it easy because they've got the natural flow momentum. 

No, that makes no sense because when you're going up the hill, if you push it super hard, right, and go against that and go against gravity, you might add an extra two miles per hour. But if you pedal while you're going down, you might add an extra 10 or 15 miles per hour. 

Omar  

Great analogy.

Iman  

That's what I was, right? So that's why I know this nine months a year where I, you know, like those video games, you have that little like turbo charger thing, right? Like I got that turbo charger. So I'm just gonna use it. And I know there's three months a year we're just I for whatever reason, it's just a predisposition, I just know me. I don't have that turbocharger is not there. So I'm not going to fight against I'm just gonna Alright, cool. You know, I now I'm in maintenance mode. 

And for me, you know, those three months a year, usually what that looks like is, once again, my non-negotiables you know, we still wake up, go to the gym, well, I guess you know, now with everything's gone in the world, I can't really go to gym here in the UK. In Cape Town I could when I was there for two months, but you know, wake up, go to the gym, meditate, shower, get to my desk for 9am. Now that as the gyms are closed, I actually get to my desk for eight. But usually, if everything's all normal, get to my desk from nine until one, do my four hours work blocks. And one o'clock is when I'll eat lunch and turn on my phone. Right? So before then, like that's my four hours of deep focus work before the rest of the day where it's team calls, sales calls, you know, other little things have come up other less important, you know, shooting videos, etc, etc.

Omar  

Are you naturally this systemic? Like even the way that it seems like you've got three four months that you just can't, August, June, July, August that you can't roll within you need to do all the networking and socializing then are you naturally this systemic? And do you believe that everyone else is systemic? Is that it as well?

Iman  

No, not really. I don't believe everyone has naturally I just think it's something that you said you develop over time, because you start to figure out what works for you, what doesn't work for you, etc, etc. Right? So I just know that I have these periods. Now, you know, you asked how do you transition? Right?

Omar  

Right. 

Iman  

So I said, it's just, you see this turbocharger, like, kinda ran out of juice. And you're like, Alright, cool, I'm going into different season of my life. And really, that's all it is different seasons of your life. And I'm like, okay, cool, I'm coming into a different season my life. 

Now, in those three months, I'm not just like pieing off the business and then go and getting smashed. And this year, I mean, like,

Omar  

I'm curious about that.

Iman  

It's about, my diet still pretty much stays the same. Because that's one thing that I just, you know, I basically do a keto diet. So you know, that for me, it's just like, carbs, just carbs is like, what having carbs is kind of like having caffeine or alcohol. For me at this point, it's like, you know, it's a once in a while, treat, you know, it's kind of get a few up, but, you know, every once a while, it's worth it. 

But, you know, in that period, as I said, I've still got my non-negotiables. And I've still got, you know, I'm still working, you know, at least until two o'clock, right. And then I said, I'll probably have a couple sales calls, or probably one or two sales calls, probably usually on one on one sales call in the day around, or team calls or, you know, the occasional client checking call that I might need to come to. So that's just kind of a different season in my life. 

Now, there might be something for example, like I celebrated my 21st birthday in Cape Town, had a earlier on in the year, so from like, end of December 2020, up until like the first 10 days of Jan 2021. Right before I go into like, six, seven weeks a monk mode. Now, obviously, that was a little bit of a transitionary period. So for me, I you know, I'm not saying everyone needs to do this, it just is the perfect reset for me. I just crank out a one or two day water fast. And that's it that resets my caffeine sensitivity, you know, because usually, if I'm if I need to recalibrate, it's because I've done a bit of bender and when I party, and when I go hard, I go hard. And when I work I work hard.

Omar  

Yeah, balance, like you said makes sense. Yeah.

Iman  

So, you know, for me, usually I crank out like a two day water fasts, that's resets any caffeine sensitive sensitivity, any alcohol sensitivity, any sort of carb sensitivity. And I just think it's deeply spiritual process. And then usually I'm like, Am I a game again? 

Omar  

You've got this such a deep sense of self awareness that not many people ever really reached a point of, and not only in the sense of your business, but really in your entire life. 

You've learned to work with your ebbs and flows, you've learned to work with what works for you, what doesn't, when you need to work, when he shouldn't, what works for your body, what doesn't do you and at such a young age to you're 21 now, right? And most people don't, I mean, for example, David Goggins is a machine. So he's probably done that at like, 60-70. But how, or even if you had to point somebody in the right direction to kind of, get that deeper, and I know it's intangible, but get that deeper sense of self awareness to try to figure out all these different things so they can control it better. Because really, what it comes down to is systemic control of all these things. Where would you point somebody, what direction?

Iman  

Do you think is first of all, meditation? Like meditation is the number one most important thing. Also, by the way, a lot of people and I'm done, you know, I started meditating when I was 14. And you know, when I was 15, I used to have like a meditation split in the same way you have like a gym split. So you know, Monday might be like, the Vipassana, Tuesday might be like Kundalini, Thursday might be mantra, etc, etc. You know, I've tried all sorts of different meditation, you know.

These days, meditation I look at as quite simply, like, a lot of people think meditation is like having nothing on your mind. But here's the thing, when you sit and you meditate, you naturally start to work through things. And that's not actually an issue in my personal life. Because, you know, one of my, you know, one of my buddies was basically mentioned this, to me the other day, and I was like, that makes so much sense. Like, I don't know why more people don't think like, this is basically, you know, using mantra meditation, or the Vipassana, or all these different modalities, it's like, you're using a distraction to get away from the distraction, if that makes sense. Like your, when your energy goes, when your thoughts wander, you actually put in a distraction, to break to deal with the distraction.

Omar  

I get it.

Iman  

Whereas, you know, he said, Look, if you're sitting down, you're meditating every day, you're naturally going to work through things, you know, let's say, you know, you have 100 units of thought in your mind, you know, the next day, you might come in and you have 70 units, the next day, you might come in, you have 30. And you know, by the end of the week, you've got zero units, it's all because you've worked through everything in your mind. And then that's when you're actually fully present. Right? 

So, you know, meditation, I think, is by far the most important thing. And once you start meditating, and you'll notice the effects very well, you know, I would say very noticeable within 14 to 21 days. 

The other thing after that is, turn off your music. That's the biggest thing. A lot of people listen to music while they while they're in the shower. A lot of people listen to music, like, I mean, there's a lot of people that listen to music, like will play music, off of their phone and walk around their house, like anything to distract themselves.

Omar  

So it's just a distraction, you're saying it's just kind of an escape for them to get out of their head.

Iman  

Yeah, and a lot of people have just like YouTube videos or podcast playing in the background, they're not even really taking it in, they just need something playing. And for me, I think the most important thing is just having clean thinking time. 

Because the other thing that I found is like, for example, I might have an issue in the business that I really need to work through. Or, you know, I'll have something on my mind, for example, like, you know, I've had a lot of stuff on my mind the past few weeks in terms of like, agency, like, how quickly do we want to scale because like, we've been signing on a lot more clients than normal lately. And, you know, Danny, my CMO, has been shouting at me, because I was meant to hire a media buyer, like a week, a month ago, and I still haven't. And, you know, I'm thinking about other positions, potential roles and bring in a full time copywriter, which we technically have right now. But Ciaran, who's my CEO at growyouragency.com and just a lot of things have been on my mind. And, you know, I penciled in an hour to think about it, right. 

And it's like, there's only so much you can do in that hour, most of your insights will come, you know, while you're idle. And, you know, while you're processing things in your subconscious, and you need to give the space to do that you can't, you're not going to get your best ideas or your best thoughts or not even your best ideas, because I don't believe people need ideas to be successful. 

It's just, it's hard to move to plan your next three moves. When either you force it by like, Okay, I'm gonna spend an hour thinking about the right direction to going. Or if you don't give yourself any sort of free just present thinking time, where it can come to you. So I'd say pretty much those two things.

Omar  

So it's basically stop distracting yourself, give yourself some time to actually think through. 

Iman  

Yeah

Omar  

Like, I think that kind of thinking block is different for everybody to and for me, you said you'd go crazy if you didn't go to the gym or something, and you get some thinking time during the gym. I'm guessing you get something under the shower and listen to less music. So you have all these different thinking blocks spread out throughout the day. And it's a really good point to not make these escapes, and not only with music, but I think what will people do it in general with a lot of different things, right? 

I certainly know I used to escape with with partying, for example, like just going out at the end of the night or trying to go somewhere on a Saturday night where I could be spending, building something or doing something more constructive. And of course, that's without judgment, not to judge myself to doing these things, but definitely could have use things more constructively actually stopped escaping and done things that actually build things. 

So that's good. I think you've got some really, really solid advice there. And it's nice to see that you actually build out these systems over time as well. But I'm curious as somebody who's actually been an entrepreneur, since what it sounds like the age of 14, what really pushed you in that direction in the first place to bring it back a little bit to tie it all in, which made you start to become an entrepreneur.

Iman  

So I will see you do things like desperation or inspiration. You know, for me, it wasn't like I can't honestly sit there and be like, yeah, you know, I just had this. Like, there's a lot of people who were you know, you also like the lemonade stand stories and stuff like that, or like people, I'll be outside. I generally didn't have that. Like, you know, I wasn't that at seven or eight years old, like natural born entrepreneur that's at eight years old. I was very shy kid, I was very shy, very reserved, meek. 

You know, so for me, it was a situation of a single mom, financial issues, etc, etc. So, you know, for me at 14, it was like, that was, it had been on linger on my mind for a long time, but 14 a hit me like, okay, I either we do something about the situation or we are ruined. Right? And from the age of 14, I kind of had to support myself financially, from the age of 16, you know, was supporting my mom. So,

Omar  

That was your chip on the shoulder.

Iman  

Yeah, and, you know, so for me, it was that was sort of the main thing that kind of led me you know, that was the reason that while other kids were playing video games of 14, like I was started reading a book a week. Right. 

Another thing was, my mind was so malleable at that point, like, even at this point, you know, I would say I'm very open minded and very open to criticism and coaching and this and that, but I read a book these days, and I'll be like that 50% of that I agree with the other 50% I don't know if I agree with that. And you know, I've done pretty well. 

Omar  

Everything, That's good

Iman  

Right? I've been pretty, I've done pretty well my life so far. But maybe I should have applied that other 50%. Whereas the thing is, when I was 14, I had what's known as like Zen beginner's mind, right? So when I was 14, like, I would read a book that said, Hey, meditate, or a book that said, hey, go to the gym, or a book that said, Hey, you know, do this or do that. And I just like, Okay, cool. Like, I there was no like questioning of like, Oh, is this actually, should I go with this person advice? Or just go? Alright, cool. I got nothing to lose. 

So, yeah, you know, that was really, what pushed me to entrepreneurship was, yeah, I honestly can say I have no chance in hell, in hell, I would be in the position that I was in, or the position that I'm in now, maybe in my early 30s, but not in my early 20s. 

If I came from a family of like, two loving parents, you know, a very comfortable, cushy, etc. Like, I just had a very weird upbringing, where like, I went to private school. But then my mom, you know, was working minimum wage, NHS, which is government health care service in the UK as a receptionist. And there'll be times that she worked in retail, when things got really bad at a point, we were on government benefits. 

So like, I had a really, and that's another 45 minutes 30 how that whole thing came about. But a very weird, weird upbringing. But pretty much the perfect, perfect blend of like, I was around a lot of wealth growing up. But then we were, had so much financial turmoil, that I had that fire under my ass from such a young age. But I also didn't have the like, here's the thing, I don't believe, like, when it's not, I don't believe I had no less opportunity than anyone that grows up in, you know, for example, here in the UK, in a council, in a Council of State, no less at all right, because I'm a high school dropout. I never finished school, I have no credentials whatsoever. But the one big advantage I have, and I would never, ever, the reason I'm so much more fortunate than someone that grew up in councils that is I, well, my mom and I had the same financial means as someone who grew up in a council estate. It's very hard to get out of that circle. Right? undefined. So I had such a lucky experience of having the same financial turmoil as someone who grew up in public housing. Right, we had the same sort of money in our pocket, but I was around a lot of wealth. So I never looked at rich people as like, greedy, or this or that, and I never looked at wealth as something that's, for me, it was a given.

Omar  

It's the perfect storm. You're not judging wealthy people for being wealthy, you're seeing it as a drive and motivation. And at the same time, you were far less wealthy. So it gave you something to strive for. It sounds like it was a perfect storm. It's funny, like I've spoken to a lot of high level entrepreneurs at this point on this podcast, right. And all of them actually rephrase that 99.9% of them, there is one person that sticks out in my mind, that doesn't isn't the case. But 99.9% of them have some sort of chip in the shoulder that kind of drove them to get to where they were. 

And it's never like, it doesn't have to be something really, really dark, like oh, like I got raped as a kid or something like that. But there is always a chip on the shoulder. And I think I can recognize that now. Because up till the age of 27, I never had that chip on my shoulder. I came from a good family with good parents and nothing too messed up or dark or anything like that. But it took me to get that chip on the shoulder. And I got that to travel myself from being so broke during travel of not even being able to afford bread to have dinner that night, to realize that I never wanted to be in that position myself again to get that chip on the shoulder. 

And you were fortunate enough, and many of the highest level entrepreneurs that I've spoken, were fortunate enough at a younger age to get that chip on their shoulder. And you start to realize that really the people that are the most successful and even the happy in life at whether it's 20, or 30, or 40 are the ones that got that chip on the shoulder the drive at a younger age and strive for something rather than we're giving it given everything right at the beginning in the forefront of their life. Does that make sense? 

Iman  

100%. 

Omar  

And you've got that, which is incredible. And you've systematize it in a way, and now you're living a good life. But does that also mean that you're satisfied? Will you ever be fully satisfied? Because this is a conversation I even had with my own father the other day. Do you think you will ever be fully satisfied? Or do you think you'll always keep striving for something more?

Iman  

So here's the other thing that adds the perfect storm. Because I was, as I said, you know, my mom and I had a lot of financial turmoil, but I was also around a lot of wealth, I would go and I would spend time with friends, like family, friends, or friends of mine in their family, who will quite literally, with no exaggeration, billionaires. And I would see the arguments that have gone in that house, and I would come back to my house or and I would see, I would see the emotional setpoint of these people. And then I go back to my house and was exact same emotional setpoint on my mom.

Omar  

Right.

Iman  

My mom was, you know, my mom was an absolute angel, right? Like, she's just one of the biggest bundles of joy. But like, you know, it's hard to maintain positivity and this and that, and just be like, fully present when you know, you've got quite literally no money in your bank account, you're living off government benefits, right? It's going to be tough. But it's funny to go see that, and then spend time in my friend's parents house, and they will, you know, nine figures in their bank account, or nine figures liquid. And you're like, literally money has changed nothing for your emotional setpoint. 

So I think that was another thing for me is, and I think that's another big reason that you know, quite frankly, you know, when I was 18 years old, I made my first million dollars profit, right. And I have a ton of people really go off the rails. And I think if I didn't have that experience growing up, where I was, like, you know, when I made money, like, I never thought it would be the be-all-end-all. And I never thought it would really change that much for me. 

You know, the biggest change in your life, it really is, when you're making 10-15 grand a month, you can move into a nice apartment, you know, you can buy nice stuff for the people you care about, you know, going on holiday here and there. You know, that's honestly that's been the biggest life change is once you get to that point, you know, once you start making 100 grand a month, couple 100 grand a month, you know, a million a month like it just all excess, honestly.

Omar  

I'm like a social structure standpoint where people are treating you the way you're treating people environment, all that. How's that changed for you?

Iman  

Not much. I mean, here's the thing, when you I feel it's different when you grow up. I think you know, a lot of people, people will use other people who have money or for their money, when they come from wealth. Like I usually find it that it's the people that come from wealth that can't swamp people that are using them for money.

Omar  

That's strange to me, but I guess that makes sense.

Iman  

I've personally found that because your thing like I'm pretty attuned to stuff like, you mean, like I work hard for my money.

Omar  

Yeah

Iman  

I work harder shit for my money and I'm not going to blow my money on random ass people when like, I could spend that money on, you know, one of the new schools in a poll, on my mom, on the people that were there for me when I had nothing. 

And that's also the other thing is like, you know, I think this is really toxic culture in entrepreneurship, all of your friends need to be hot, you know. My best friend is still in university, has an agency, right? But you know, he's not making, you know, he's not a millionaire right? Now he's making decent money on the side with his agency, right? You know, good extra pocket money. While in university, that's my best friend. Right? 

My five closest friends, like closest friends, none of them make more than 20 grand a month. Right?

Omar  

Right.

Iman  

I don't give a shit. I literally cannot give less of a shit. Right. And I think that sort of thing is like I, most of my close friends were the ones that used to pay for my lunch. Because they'd be like, hey, you know, come for lunch or this and we're, you know, we're not talking like any Spanish special restaurant and say, like, you know, come with me to Subway, and grab, like, come on, you know, I can't do that. Right? And they're like, that's fine. Y'all spot you for the six pounds, or whatever, right? These people were the ones that I used to literally, you know, take care of me, were there for me when I had nothing. So for me, like, I don't really need to question their intentions. 

So yeah, these days, people that have around me are either one, those close friends of mine that were there for me when I had nothing. Two, people that are you know, just because of where I am, you know, and just kind of the circles that I've associated with is that I had a weird situation growing up where I was around a lot of wealth, but I didn't have any of it myself. So I've always been sort of around wealthy circles in London, like wealth is like real wealth. And, you know, London wealth is something else, you know, let any wealth, wealth excetera etc. 

Omar  

I'm from Houston so i'm pretty aware. 

Iman  

Yeah. So you know that, you know, so it's either people that were there for me when I had nothing or people who come from ultra wealthy families. And it's like, okay, cool, like, just me, like, none of my shit impresses you when you know, you've got like, a mega yacht and you know, a house in Santa Fe, that's 25,000,030 5 million euros, or people who are very similar to me who kind of came from nothing, but they're also you know, millionaires and multimillionaires, etc, etc. So it's a situation where I don't need anything from them and they don't need anything from me. And I don't really need to ever worry about that.

Omar  

It's good. It's a very empathetic and smart approach to but I'm sure at the end of the day, you probably have people that unfairly try to suck, that are value drains pretty much as trying to weasel their way into your life and try to be value drains. Do you just shut it off at that point? Because I think this could give a certain subsect. I know, there are a few millionaires that listen to this podcast, and I think that could give value to them. What are you do? How do you handle that?

Iman  

I mean, for me, it's once again, I just I don't I wouldn't really entertain any of that in my life. And the second thing is, like, you know, I can't really imagine a time when someone's just been, because here's the thing: you can't network with me, it's impossible. Like, even I've had entrepreneurs in the space and stuff like that, and they want to connect, I don't. Like you know, one thing that people have always noticed about me is like, you know, a lot of people like do collabs, and this and that, and they, like, hang out, like, for example, a lot of internet marketers hang out with other internet marketers, and they go to funnel hacking live and right. This, like, I've never been tending an event like that. I don't quite frank, I'm just going outside. 

I mean, I've said this before. So I have no problem saying I don't like most internet entrepreneurs. I don't like most people who have online businesses. Most of them are, it's just all a dick-swinging competition and it comes from a place of inadequacy. And it's like, you'll meet up with them and you're like, you want to talk about their life and like, you know, their mission and their purpose, or you want to talk about like, it was just some have some high level conversations. And it's like, or for example, I guess, maybe I just have the ick around a lot of like online entrepreneurs. Because like, most of the time, when I meet them, we'll just we have a conversation about like, you know, the city they live in, and like, why they love that city so much. And as you know, within like, two minutes, they find a way to tell me about how much money they're making. And I'm like, just

Omar  

If you go on clubhouse right now, that's exactly what's going on, they're really starting to get tiring.

Iman  

I just, I'm just a human who just wants to talk to another human.

Omar  

It's connecting, man. That's what it is.

Iman  

I talk I talked to you the same way, you know, same way that talk to the waiter is the same way that I'll talk to, you know, a very successful like, I'm, I don't quite. This is my downtime, I don't want to talk about visitors. Right, I just want to connect to you and to you. And so, um, yeah, you know, really the reason I say all this is because you can't network with me, it's basically impossible. So for me, it's like, you know, let's say imagine I meet someone at a party, or like, I meet someone through a friend or this or that, and it's like, you're this person is hitting me off to hang out and network in this. 

It's like, I don't respond to my messages ever. Like, you know, it's a running thing that like, my friends always say, like, if they get if my friends get a response from me within like, two weeks, they're like, something's wrong. Right? Like, I'm talking like, my best friend, like

Omar  

Right

Iman  

At least my best friend, three to five day turnaround time. Right? 

Omar  

Right

Iman  

So um, you mean, for me, it's just like, you just got to think once you get to a certain level, you just really got to put fence around your life. And just make it really hard for people to get to you. And you know, and the thing is, I've, of course, I still develop friendships and stuff like that, but it's so organically. And I would like, I would never, I just can't imagine a situation where I build a friendship around someone based on them hitting me up or like, to network, or like to connect through? I don't know. Yeah, maybe I'm just old school.

Omar  

No, I think that's the way that it should be though, right and should always start from a place of genuine stuff. And even if your intention somewhere down the road is to network, you should always be leading from a value-first place. If you're leading from a value-first place, you got to find out what that other person values and if that other person values, social connection, and you're a person that's cool and can offer social connection and enjoys that, to not look at it too systemic here. Because I think human connection really comes from a deep rooted place of empathy and, and enjoyment and actually understanding the other person's company. 

But you got to cultivate that in yourself before you can do anything. Right. And so So, but hypothetically speaking, let's say you and I had just met on the street, and I knew who you were, and sitting knowing what I know about you now, I'd probably say Hey, man, what's up? How you doing? Get to know more about you and your family and stuff. Maybe say, hey, you want to grab a bite to continue the conversation there? Right? I wouldn't say Hey, Iman! Oh, man, that's super cool. So like, you want to hop on a call? I think it can really help you out with your business like obviously wouldn't do that. 

You know, it's just, I think it's an empathetic, centered approach. And like you said about internet marketers. And a lot of these online business owners that I see constantly they just heard me on clubhouse is Oh, like, I'm making this much money and I've got this many followers, oh, did you hear about this new funnel and this is the way that we can go? And this is what you see in in person that we can give end to. So, I'm right there with you, when it comes to that kind of networking, that I did it, I might do it in a quick burst and maybe get a connection of something, but that person, if they're like, that will probably never genuinely be my friend or anyone as someone that I do genuinely business with. People that I feel

Iman  

Also thing is for you, I feel as though you know, your network, and connections and stuff like that are very, very valuable. You know, you remind me a lot of one of my buddies Omar from the Passionate Few.

Omar  

Same name huh

Iman  

Ya know, exactly. You know, so for you I think your network is super, super valuable. Quite frankly, I'll just be honest for me, like, I don't, they will now, probably ever in my career, just with the businesses that I have, I don't need a connection. You know, I mean, like, for me, if I was, you know, an investment banker, if I was a, worked in financial services, if I was a, you know, maybe if I was even an entrepreneur in different space, or restauranteur you know, maybe connections might be valuable for me. 

But I'll be honest, like, I just sit at home, flooring, I sit at home, I do my work, there's just, you know, I know what I need to do and it's just about doing it. And for me, networking, I think the main thing it comes down to is for me, networking never comes from a place that I need it and not to say that, you know, people who network need something. But I said, if I was in a different industry, there would be an actual advantage to me, right. And even if I once again, as you said, If you lead with a value-first approach, that would always be the case for me. 

Omar  

Naturally

Iman  

But still, nonetheless, it'd be a value-first approach. But still, I know that I could give them something and they could give me something. I guess, for me, networking is kind of a, you know, something I do a little of, but when I do it, it's just more because I'm intrigued in the person because quite frankly, at this stage, that there's no one that there's people who would give me advice, and I value that and give me a guidance and stuff like that. But there's no one that could give me anything that would help my business directly. Because it's just because of the nature of it. 

So, you know, kind of the main people that I enjoy networking with, are some of my older buddies who are like in their mid 30s. And we're just like spiritual gangsters. And just like, you know, once again, these guys don't always necessarily make the most amount of money. But, you know, I love talking to them about like, some of them, for example, are married. Right? and that's something I don't plan on doing for a long, long time. But for me, you know, just kind of with my childhood and everything that happened, and just, I mean, just a long lineage of my, you know, my biological father was an alcoholic, abusive, you know, so he was out of the picture before I, you know, I was born. 

So for me, like the idea of like, marriage and like fatherhood is like something that means a lot to me. So even just like talking to them about like, 10 years of marriage, what they've learned is that, Tom's my older buddies about, you know, character building, about union psychology, about a presence, and deep self healing work. Like, to me, that's just when I have extra time, and it's time, you know, I've actually time and, you know, I want to do a bit of networking and just like, really bounce off energy with someone. I find, for me, it's a lot more restorative to do that with someone in a different walk of life than someone in this because then to me, I just get I start, think about work again, and I just get a little bit more drained and this and that. So that's just me personally,

Omar  

That makes a lot of sense. And you're at a point where you're self-sufficient enough to where your network is, your net worth goes out of the window. And it's more about restorativeness, it's more about refreshing yourself, it's more about the genuine connections and the authenticity that you can get from it, rather than the actual opportunities that you can get from it.

And you're at that point, which is pretty freakin awesome. To be honest. But where do you want to take this? Like, you're 21 now you I mean, you're young as all fuck, like, you've got so much time. You know, to put it in context, like, you're just starting your 20s and you're starting it in probably one of the best positions I've seen anyone start their 20s. So where do you want to take it? And I mean, the answer is open, right? Like this is a very one unjudgmental, non-judgmental podcast. And number two, I like no holds barred I like honesty. I like things that Yeah, like I want to have orgies every day and do cocaine off strippers. Like that's fine, too. Like, it's a great five. I don't blame you. You know, just where do you want to take it? 

Iman  

Yes, I mean, you know, for me, I think there's once again the seasons of life, the seasons of life. So I think the way that I've always viewed it is like, you know, I'll be in warrior mode from kind of what I am now up until 25. And then from 25 to 35 it's funny because a lot of guys don't realize that 25 to 35 is kind of your best dating years. Like, when you're 35 as a dude like you're actually a badass and you're, you know your sexual market value is super high, you know as guys, you can go pretty late with it. So, you know, for me 25 or 35 I know are my best dating years, I know are kind of my time to have like crazy. Because here's the thing 25 to 35, you can have your fun, awesome, crazy experiences that you just can't have when you're 45. Right. And I know that, you know, I know that look from until that day from like, 40 until 70. What else would I do except for work and work on, you know, chipping away at a really big mission and goal? 

So there's a couple things that I think I need to do in order to get that point. Now. You know, by the end, the year, my goal is $6 million will be done pretty much. I'm dead certain, you know, I'm on there. Right now I'm going around like $3.3 million personal investment portfolio cleared after tax. So I wanna get that to $6 million.

Omar  

We won't go too deep into that. But I know you've been to Aetherium and all that. But we won't go too deep on that here, keep going. 

Iman  

That'd be another one hour long conversation. So you know, I want to get to like 6 million by the end of the year, by the time I'm 25 get to $25 million investment for portfolio minus any debt. So that's by 25. You know, with that kind of in mind by 25, I can retire, you know, let's say like an 8% yield, you know, I'm making around what, like $2.2 million a year for my investments, and $2 million a year like I don't even spend that now. 

You know, I live I mean, I only live off on like, 10% of my income, I've always been pretty good with money. And I guess that's why I like 21 million, I have the sort of investment portfolio that I do and that's outside of the business. So, you know, I know that if I can get to 25 million by 25, I can retire like comfortably and as I said, live off 2 million a year. And then if I want to for next 40 years just live a life of hedonism and you know, just as you said have orgies and have sex parties and travel the world. And you know, that's always been

Omar  

Before you go on, you've never had that period of pure hidden hedonism have you?

Iman  

No, I have

Omar  

Okay, so I was actually having, then you know what I'm about to say here because I was having this conversation with somebody earlier today on an earlier episode, actually. And we come up with a word controlled hedonism, because when you get too hedonistic and there's no structure or anything that you're working towards, you just-you lose yourself, you know. And you kind of almost become like, without direction without anything. And then at least in our cases, we have to reel it back and realize, like them, we need something to be working towards. 

And I think when you're going to have a hedonistic period, if you're going to have one, or when you're going to have one rather, not if, from 25, to 35, it's going to be more of a controlled period for you. You already have your business and you have your income, and you have your mission, which I will dive into here in a minute. But at the same time, you're going to be hedonistic, which is amazing, you know. I think the reason that I had that chip on my shoulder was because I was uncontrolled hedonism, where I was just going off for three, four years, without any direction, without anything that I was building. And then at the end, I had to realize that I needed something to kind of reel me back. So you're in a very, very good spot with that now do carry on didn't mean to cut you off.

Iman  

Yeah. So, you know, I think that brings up a good point, like, I kind of had that in 2019, you know, I was 19 years old, made a couple 100 grand a month. And the thing is, I've been so disciplined for like, the last two-ish years, two and a half years, and, you know, for falling off prior to that, when I was 16, I just grew up way too quick. And every single Sunday night, I was 16 going to the club every single weekend, once again, I had wealthy friends and I've always usually had older friends. So you know, wealthy 20-21 year old friends, you know, spending, you know, three $4,000 a night on bottle service in this night, because, you know, with their families, they just had unlimited cards, you know. So I experienced some of that but it was never myself, who you actually, I was just there, you know, for some of the fun. Is that, you know, for them, you know, once you see someone like the proper, proper wealth and life like multi billions, like you realize, like how small you are. 

But, uh, but anyways, you know, I kind of had that thing of like, Okay, and then I went into 2-2 1/2 year really solidly building. And then when I was 19, you know, I got to a point where, you know, I ended a relationship that I've been in for two years. And you know, you're kind of in a situation where, like, you know, I only spent the last two years you went from making like, you know, 10,000 a month to, you know, a couple 100 grand a month and you're like, I'm 19 years old, couple 100 grand a month, and you know, there's a solid five months where like, this is towards the second half of 2019. In the first half of 2019, I've been so disciplined. We're going to clubs, you know, a couple times a week, tons of parties, afternoon teas, you know, weekends away and in crazy places, and just like just nuts, nuts experiences. And the thing is like you get bored of it really, really quick. And it was three, four months, and I was like I'm bored of this. 

So you know, when I say 25 to 30, you know, a period of you know, by that I mean I will still be, I'll probably still be following my same work schedule. It will just be an underlying understanding that, hey, look at these, this 10-year period, you're never going to get this back. So if there is a time to decide, are you going to work 12 hours compared to 10 hours? Or, you know, are you going to, you know, if you're, if someone invites you on a trip for five days, and you're like, Oh, no, I'm gonna stay focused, you know, just understanding that within that 25 to 35, period, I only have that, I'll never get that again, right. After that point, you never really get that again. So you know, just being making a conscious decision to just enjoy yourself and create those experiences and those memories that you'll have on your deathbed, between those periods. 

So, and I think the other thing, you know, the reason I mentioned the investment portfolio is for me, I've always wanted to get to 25 million by 25, in terms of in my investment portfolio minus any debt, so that I can kind of mentally retire in my mind. Because the thing is, once I can mentally retire in my mind, I know that I'm gonna take shit to another level, because here's the thing right now, you know, I only spend 10% of my income, but at the end of the day, like, you know, I could retire now off of, you know, probably everything all said and done, you know, 4-4 1/2 million dollars. But like, yeah, that's awesome. You know, I could probably make like 300-400 grand a year yield from that. But that still doesn't like I couldn't, like retire and be like, I can feel like total total freedom. You know, so I know that once I get to that point, I can make the craziest long term decisions. Because money literally literally, literally, literally, literally, is no issue ever, ever again.

Omar  

I want you to think back to me for a second. Okay, hear me out. To think back to this. Think back to just four years ago when you were 16. And you signed that first client, put yourself in your shoes there for a minute and think about you now in this goal that you have for 25 mil? How does that feel?

Iman  

I mean, here's the thing, as I said, I thought I do. I thought I hit these sort of numbers. I just thought it'd be mid early 30s, mid 30s.

Omar  

So you always had that deep-seated understanding.

Iman  

All is new. All is new. 

Omar  

That's good. 

Iman  

Every single night, I used to walk around. I used to walk and I'll be listening to audiobooks. And I would walk to a place called the Bolton's in here in London, and I would, the houses are all ranged from 20 million pounds all the way to 80 million pounds. 

Omar  

Right. 

Iman  

It's like a crescent circle thing. I was looking at, pick out my house. I know exactly where I'm gonna live. It's not that one specific because the house are just too big. It's the house, It's the streets. You know, it's, I always knew, right? It's just I didn't know that there would be a vehicle that could help get me there this quick.

Omar  

You didn't know the vehicle.

Iman  

Right?

Omar  

I get it. 

Iman  

Yeah, right. I always knew I could do I always knew the you know, these four numbers would happen in my early mid 30s. And I said, That's why, you know, I don't think other people can compare themselves to me, and be like, Oh, I don't know why things aren't moving as quick for me or this or that. It's like, everyone has their own timeline and their own journey. 

And as I said, I just had a perfect storm in every single way. You know, some other people would look at my childhood and be like, the amount of trauma this kid went through, you know. Like, biological father, alcoholic, abusive stepdad was like, quite literally a psychopath, like the satanist. You had, like, some, I saw some growing up. You know, a lot of people were like this, do you have childhood? And you know, even some of my friends like, dude, I don't know how you haven't had more like mental breakdowns, like severe trauma. You know, I look at my childhood, I'm like, it was a perfect storm. And it helps me to get to where I am here today. 

So, you know, kind of back to your question, that's, I view that as a season of life, that 25 to 35 period. And then I will install that after that I get really, really into my deep spiritual practice from like, 35 to 45. And then from 45 onwards, just, like, just really cap off my mission and what I want to do and, you know. 

As I said, I've always said, you know, my mission is to reform the education system. Now, obviously, I have my agency, I have my education company. And, you know, when my education company launched, you know, the first year, it was what most people is, which is, of course, business, right? We just out of course, that was it, you know, there wasn't much to and it wasn't very fulfilling, quite frankly, you know, like, a lot of people have courses, they're like, Oh, I do it, because I care about people. So I ended up just like, No, you don't.

Like because here's the thing, I'll be honest, in 2018 of course, I love the fact that I was able to share what got me to a point where I was making 20-30 grand a month that, you know, by the age of early 18, you know, making 20 grand a month at just 17 but it was a super profitable business, you know. I actually made was first right like, dude, the margins were basically 100% right? whereas these days, you know, my expenses for the education company a month are a hundred grand, right? I have seven full, and by the way, my staff costs for the education company $600,000 a year before performance before performance bonuses. Multiple, multiple of my employees make more money than Facebook and Google, partly because some of them were on their way to Facebook and Google.

Omar  

That's hilarious. 

Iman  

So now here's the other thing that I'll say is I can run my education company to make your margins right now we're doing around 25%. I can run it so it's 75%. I could do that. But luckily, I have my agency. Yeah, luckily, I have my agency that is my cash flow business. And, by the way, I will never, like I don't know, I just don't think there's any point in just being dishonest about your intentions to people.

I'll be honest, like my education, or my agency. I'm not passionate about it. Like, I'm not like, No, I'm passionate about business. I'm passionate about like, in the fact that I have an incredible company culture, and we work with awesome clients and we work with. But like, I would be just as passionate about the business aspect of it. If we were like, a software company, and I bet we all work with awesome cut. You mean, I like, I'm passionate about business and making people happy. And there being a set, a baseline standard in the market, and you coming in and just smashing that baseline? Right? 

Because, you know, at the agency, we guarantee whatever a client is currently doing return on spend a month, right, so let's say for example, from 

Omar  

Your risk reversal offer you're talking about here. 

Iman  

Yeah. You know, in terms of their, you know, like, for example, we have a client right now, that literally just came on a week ago, is doing 400 grand a month return on adspend. Right? So if we do any less than 400,000 pounds a month, or sorry, for that month converted to euros 400,000 euros a month return on spend, we don't, we refund our service fee, right. And we will, most of our clients, most of the money we're making right now is on performance. So, you know, like, I love the fact that we work with like such high level clients, and like our clients love us after being traumatized with so many different other agencies. You know, maybe those agencies had gone through some of the gradients, the programs, they know how to actually run an agency that doesn't deliver on, you know, that doesn't deliver on impressions, or doesn't deliver on clicks and actually delivers on money back in a client's pocket. But anyways, I digress. 

My point is, I'm not, my agency is not my dying passion. I'm passionate about business, I'm passionate about making something better in the market. That's, you know, it's better than anything else. But I don't use my pass, so my agency for me, it's my cash flow business. It's like my FU money business. Right? 

Omar  

Right. 

Iman  

And I'm really, very grateful I have that, because as I said, that allows me to make decisions in education company where 2018 isof course, business, I was like, this is really isn't that fulfilling. So 2019, I brought on a product manager, right. And I brought on a team and customer support. And you know, we started we really build out our mission. And, you know, we decided, you know, the other thing that I said in 2019 was, you know, to start doing, you know, taking 10% of profits from the education company, and using that to build schools in underdeveloped countries. Because once again, I wanted this full circle approach where I want to providing

Omar  

Yeah, I want to touch on that yeah

Iman  

The whole idea around is, you know, with the education company, we're providing, you know, 10 times the quality of education, you're gonna get a university for 1/100 of the price. And not only that, every time you buy the program, you can basically imagine your mind that you've basically paid for 15 bricks to be laid in the next school that we're building

Omar  

Is this aside, is your education company aside from just agency incubator, and copy- paste agency? Is there other things that you're doing as well? So

Iman  

In what's, like, what in terms of programs and stuff?

Omar  

In terms of programs, specifically for the education, a company, not what you're doing?

Iman  

So we have a we have two programs for the education companies, just agency incubator and copy-paste agency. Okay, I've had people ask me, you know, would you launch others and this and that, and for me, to make a high quality program, you know, when I made agency incubator, it was six months, it took me six months, six days, it took me six days a week, 12 hours a days, right, like, I think wrecked me. I don't know how there's people who have programmed like, eight different programs. And you know, another thing is, like, my programs are not there to squeeze out as much bottom line out of people. Like I want to give people the entire house when they come in. Right. So um, yeah, you know, those are the two programs.

Omar  

Makes a lot of sense. And then now you're using that education company to actually do great things outside in the world, and the includes what you're doing in Nepal, so let's go ahead and touch on that now. Because what you're doing there, I think, really, you have this education system and you want or education company and you want to reform the education system, which is one half of it, but on the other half, I think a part of your mission is what you're doing out in Nepal as well, right?

Iman  

For sure

Omar  

What is it?

So you know, really the thinking here is, you know, for we have two offerings, I said we have agency incubator, which helps people, you know, there's people in there who are doing multiple, five figures a month actually many, many people, but really this sort of demographics to help people to get to 10-15K month, right? That's agency incubator there. Now copy-paste agency helps people go from 10-15 grand a month, we have some people doing less than that, you're holding up a few clients and just want the best service and that helps people get to 100K a month. 

Iman  

Now, with the agency incubator, the program is $1,000. Right? And $1,000 as you, I'm just being honest, you're gonna get 100 times the education from an agency incubator than you would if you tried to get a marketing degree or business degree. Right? I mean, it should be illegal, what they're doing in university is the fact that someone is allowed to teach you something that they've never done themselves. And you've seen what sort of commotion that causes in the education, which, by the way, rightly so if you teach someone, something you don't do you, like, you have no credentials, you should not be teaching this, right. And rightly so, people in education is trying to teach something, they don't do get outlawed. Yet, in university, it's normal, that your professor who's teaching your business degree has never actually started a successful business himself, or your marketing professor has, like, he doesn't even know what a Facebook ad is. Right? For some reason, that's normal. 

So, you know, my point is, with education company, we're transforming education in that sense. But at the end of the day, not everyone can afford $1,000, you know, and at the end of the day, we want to help people who don't have a seat at the table, we want people who don't have access to internet,  right? Because here's the thing, there's a large, large majority, the world where an agency, I don't recommend starting an agency for them, right. Becoming an engineer in their local community is the best way to go for and, you know, that's a big issue in Nepal, because, you know, Nepal is basically, you know, is dejavu of like, you know, everything gets broken down every few years, there was an earthquake, and then it gets built back up and it's just the same thing again, and again. You know, so, for example, what we want to do is want to help people who, you know, don't have a seat at the table. 

So I decided in 2019, I wanted to take 10% of the profits from education company, in 2019 actually end up being closer to around 30% or 25-30% of the profits and use that to build schools in underdeveloped countries. So each project costs anywhere from like 60 to 120,000 pounds, depending on the size of classes and stuff like that. I fund everything end to end. And yeah, you know, it's been one of the most incredible things that we've done. I took the team late 2019 to visit our first two projects, funded a few more since then. And yeah, the goal is, by the time I die, to have 1000 schools built.

Omar  

This is a tall order. That's a really sick mission, though.

Iman  

My kids aren't getting it. So where would I put all that money?

Omar  

It's got to go somewhere. Right. So you can't take it to the grave with you.

Iman  

I mean, what I want to do is my final side, no, my final goal is to have a trust. In the same way, you know, you have a family trust, if my kids aren't getting any, except my trust is managed by a trust manager. And, you know, I want to have 100, you know, by the time I die at least 100 million in there. So 100 million, let's say at a 6% yield, right? That 6 million a year. 

Sorry at 7:30, all the lights in my house go red.

Omar  

That's very strange. What does that set you up for? Actually, do I even want to know?

Iman  

So it's so funny is I've had people come in and be like, oh, like, Are you trying to like set the mood is and I'm deciding, like, do you want the cool answer? Do you want the real answer? Like the real answer I'm like, well, red is the lowest Kelvin on the light spectrum. So it actually helps with melatonin production before bed. So

Omar  

You really have systematized everything that's not

Iman  

Yeah to the point where it's just automatic all areas in the house

Omar  

That's nice. That's a very high caliber of performance. I'll tell you that.

Iman  

I like Yes, I'm like, I know. It looks like I'm trying to but no, really, I just want to go to bed.

Omar  

It works for both, to be honest, you even got two birds with one stone. Yeah.

Iman  

True. So yeah, you know that really the final goal, the final objective is you don't have 100 million, at least in this trust, let's say at a 6% yield 6 million, that means that around 60 schools a year can be built while on that. And instead, the entire trust will

Omar  

Definitely

Iman  

The entire trust will go towards continuing on the projects that we're working on right now.

Omar  

It's funny, I know you've inspired quite a few people with that mission as well. My own mentor, the one we were speaking about earlier, Michael, he's doing some stuff in India now where he's building schools. Because of that, I'm fairly certain he got that from you. So it's just really cool to see the waves that can be made especially with someone that has a good head on their shoulders like you do and someone that has the empathy to actually do and the humbleness actually take that somewhere. So that's really good. 

Now I do want to wrap this up with a few final questions here, right? And some applicable advice? First of all that my audience can get so, and actually even myself for sure, because I'm right about that 10k range right now in my own agency. So if you had to sum it up in a few words, what would it take for somebody to go from that 10K to 100K mark?

Iman  

So 10K to 100K, so 10k is a very, very exciting point. And it's very exciting, but very dangerous as well. And that's kind of the main reason that people, for example, coming to CPA is because you get to that 10-15K a month mark, and you're , for example, you have a media buyer performance marketer,

Omar  

I actually don't run a Facebook ad agency, I have a podcasting agency.

Iman  

Okay, so, from the service delivery aspect, do you do services for yourself?

Omar  

No, I have a team of seven now. So including me, but I've got about six people running all the systems on the service

Iman  

You'll have no issues. Now, for some reason, we have a lot of people in agreeance, in our come, in our community that have email marketing agencies have, you know, Facebook ad agencies have SEO agencies, and the issue is they're handcuffed by service delivery. So it gets to a point where, you know, they get to 15, you know, 10-20 grand a month, but they literally have no more time for outreach. And you're, everything decays, everything faces entropy, and eventually clients fall off. 

And then you know, they usually what happens is in a space of in a very short space of time to lose 30 or 50% of their retainers, right, because it said when it rains, it pours, usually lose clients in clumps, then they freak out and do some outreach, right, get back to that, you know, 15-20K a month mark

Omar  

I get it

Iman  

And just the cycle repeats and repeats and repeats, right? So, you know, this isn't something you have to deal with. But a lot of people have that 10, 10-15k a month mark is still very dead set and stubborn on doing it themselves. The first thing you need to do once you get to 10-15k a month mark is not only have a contractor, you know a team member to at that point, bring someone full time, right? 

There's two massive things in an entrepreneur's life that changes everything the first time is when you move into your own place. Right? No flatmates. No parents, like you move into your own place. And it's nice, because you look at yourself in the mirror, you wake up every morning, you shower, you look yourself in the mirror, and you carry yourself a certain way.

The second thing is when you hire that first person full time, right, and once again, that can be from anywhere in the world, doesn't matter, but they're full time with you. And they're under your care and your control, right? When you have someone work with you, and you're not, because at the end of the day, if you are an agency owner, and you do the service of yourself, then you still call yourself an agency, but you are technically just a glorified contractor, right? So when you have someone actually working your right-hand man or woman or whatever, you carry yourself a certain way.

And the other thing is, that means that they can shift into your role, do the service delivery. And look, it's not gonna be an overnight thing, you know, it'll take a month or two to fully calibrate, then that means that you can then focus on outreach. Now, this, this is where, once again, a lot of another big pitfall, you know, another big pitfall that people face is, then they'll just keep doing this. And they'll have like, five people working from them. And then one person will communicate with the other they'll communicate with and it's just a tangled mess.

Omar  

That's exactly where I am right now.

Iman  

So what you need is you need a cluster, right? So what Amazon did so well was they have all these different ventures and businesses, but it's all decentralized, they don't talk to each other, they're allowed to work. Basically, they're allowed to work at their own discretion. 

So for example, our agency and you know, basically, we help all CPAs students do is build out these clusters, where you know, you'll have a media buyer that you know, let's say, doesn't matter what you're doing isn't even working. You're just podcasting agency, SEO, whatever. The point is, you have this person that can do end to end service delivery, so you can actually do the entire thing. So some people think the conveyor belt method works better. No, not in the service based industry, because it's, you know, this communication at every one of those steps, right. So you want to end you want someone who can do this service delivery end to end, right, and let's just say, hypothetically, you know, you're paying them $4,000 a month, right? And they're, they're managing seven clients, and that's bringing in, you know, 20,000 a month in revenue, right, then that's one cluster, and that cluster brings in $16,000, a month, right? 

Then what you do is you build out another cluster, and you build out and you keep building on these clusters. Now, at a certain point, you're going to need a general manager to manage these clusters. Now I have Danny, who's my CMO who kind of work as that. And you basically build out in this decentralized approach where you, you know, you almost talks about this a lot as well, as you know, you need to cut out all of these chains of communication. Right. And yeah, that's basically the most important thing you need to do is you need to, first of all, make sure that you know, you're playing a bigger game, you have people full time because there's a big difference between a contractor and by the way, I managed to get to my agency. 

You know, Danny, for the first six months of working for me was a contractor. You know, there was clients that we were working with, they're paying five figures a month, and he was still being charging me per month per client as a contractor. Right? But if they he just went to a totally different level towards the end of 2018 when he came on full time. And thing is you know, a contractor will do their part, they'll do the work but they're not going to think about the business in the shower, because they don't really care. They don't want to have any vested interest in you. They do have a vested interest when it's their company, like, it's the sole company, they work for.

Omar  

For profit sharing, for example.

Iman  

Profit sharing is something that you can go, and that's something that, you know, is I would recommend maybe three years down the line, and that's something that we've implemented, which is not equity. You know, no one in my business has equity. But, you know, basically profit share, which is, once again, it's just another almost level of responsibility when another level of skin in the game. 

Make long story short, most important thing to go from, you know, 10-100k a month is company culture, hiring. Because here's the thing, we're both in the service-based business, our, you know, I'd say 20% of the business is like 20% of business is like systems, operations, you know, the way that you conduct things, and then the 80% of it is just that raw talent you have. How good is your team? Right? And how, how easily Can you attract really good talent? That's honestly 80% of it. 

So yeah, hiring incredible talent, company culture. And I don't care if it's two people, by the way, they're still company culture, even when it's two people. And then basically freeing you up to focus on appointment, basically, outreach, appointment setting, or finding a way to get appointments. So at my agency, we get around 30 demos a month. So that's 30-15 minute demos with Danny.

Omar  

I'm fairly certain we're using the same outreach methods for a company as well.

Iman  

Okay, perfect. So so well, for us, we actually get 80% of our clients to ads.

Omar  

So incorporating ads?

Iman  

Yeah, yeah, so so we get 30% of our clients through ads. And we kind of cracked that beginning of 2019. And that's when things really started to ramp up for us, we launched a case study, now we have our new funnel that we launched the agency, which is a lot more short to the point, we actually have no opt in, and that's been killing it. But anyways, I digress. 

My point is, find whatever works for you. Right, you know, for us, ads works, and we have the margins for it, because our clients to pretty high ticket. And you know, for example, you know, we run up, there been days in the past, before I spent 5-6k, a day of my own money for a 1k webinar funnel for an agency incubator. And to try to make that work is basically impossible, you know, you can do it at a 30% margin, I've never seen anyone be able to do a one or 2k product in our internet marketing industry, and more than a 30% margin. You know, I can spend $700, to acquire a client for a $1,000 product, you know, F that. Was for my agency, you know, we don't really take on clients, unless the billable is 4000 pounds a month, whether that's between base plus performance, just estimated performance, etc, etc. stuff comes out like 5500 bucks. And we only signed clients now for five or six month minimums. So I'm comfortable spending easily $6,000 to acquire a customer to acquire a client for my agency

Omar  

Because the LTV

Iman  

So, yeah, cuz that would equate to their first month on average, not on average, at their minimum. 

Omar  

Yeah

Iman  

You know, and this year, we've only been signing clients on for five or six month minimums, you know, in 2020, and 2021. So that means I can just throw around my weight from an advertising perspective. 

Omar  

Makes much more sense

Iman  

Exactly, so um, yeah, point is, you hire great talent, former company culture, really important company culture, and then dial in whatever outreach, or a way that works best for you to set meetings.

Omar  

Makes a lot of sense. That is some fantastic, fantastic advice. And it gave me some ideas right there actually just talking to you there. So I know what I need to do at least next. The cluster thing actually really helped me out. And I think that's invaluable. For a lot of the people that see maybe about 40% of my listeners are right around that 10k range, so it should be really good for them, too. 

Now, I do want to wrap this up with a question here that I asked every single person that comes on my podcast. And it's going to be interesting to hear what a 21 year old millionaire has to say about this. So if you had a billboard in space, this is a standard Tim Ferriss question, but it's really, it's always interesting the way it's sold. And every single day when the sunrises you see the billboard in space. And every day when the sun sets, the billboard goes away, but every single person on planet Earth can see all seven, 8 billion people that are out there. What would you have written on it? And let's say hypothetically speaking, everybody could read it too.

Iman  

Probably this too shall pass.

Omar  

Lord of the Rings quote, huh. Or you shall not pass, a mix up there. But that's really good. I like it.

Iman  

I mean, it's something that has always been I mean, I've that's always been something close to my heart as a term. I repeat again, again, ever since I was 15. And once again, it's this too shall pass. You know it, it applies when times are good and when times are bad. And I think if a lot of people could disassociate from what's going on in their life and understand that it is all part of the ebbs and flows, the world will be a lot less stressed out a lot, much happier place. 

And I think it would inject a lot more, a lot more spiritual energy into this world. Because I'm like, I just, I don't know, I think every year that goes on, people just want to live more and more in the physical and everything just so visceral. And I just think like, I personally, I you know, those people for example, like it for me, atheism is just the most depressing thing ever. Like, you know, I'm not religious. I do believe in God, I'm still make up my mind about like, the kind of nuances of it I'm, I'm spiritual. But like, I just don't think you can look at anything in life. And I don't think you can, you know, I mean, scientists have been trying for decades to explain everything that's going on in this world, from a scientist, and you just can't. And I think, as I said, I think when you can submit to and by the way, this doesn't need to be God or specific religion, just something higher than yourself,  your life becomes a lot better.

Omar  

Or even just like the higher knowledge of knowing that there is something out there. It's just submitting to the unpredictability and knowing that you're not in full control, or not in control at all of your life. Which is kind of crazy, because I've always found religion and spirituality as a crutch growing up, because my parents are so religious. But as I got older, I realized it's needed to some degree. You know, that's spirituality.

That's fantastic. I love that answer. Thank you. Thank you so much for coming on today, Iman. That was a it was a pleasure having you on.

Thanks so much.

What a great episode that was, and one of the longest ones we've had yet. A mentor of mine once told me, self discipline equals freedom and self discipline at the highest levels will help you truly get what you want out of this life.

The question really is at the end of the day, how far are you willing to go? You're already taking one step in the right direction by just listening to this podcast. So you got this. Remember Nomad fan. We've got some incredibly value filled episodes planned out for you. So please hit that subscribe button and leave a review. Your review helps us podcast become more visible and ultimately inspire more people just like you.

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