[00:00:01] Speaker A: Now why would I do something like that?
[00:00:03] Speaker B: It's a 24 page article and you didn't publish it.
I remember this now.
[00:00:11] Speaker A: This is actually a great jump into the combo. This is a really good lead in what. What was going on? Was I. Was I freaking out or something? What happened?
[00:00:21] Speaker B: I don't know, man.
I. I put this whole thing together and I mean, I felt like it was like, you know, because I remember I just were like. Because I had this whole document. Like we just, we coached for years and I just used that same Google Doc, which I have somewhere, which is, you know, it's like.
[00:00:40] Speaker A: That one that's called Alex McClaffity agendas. I've looked at that one.
[00:00:45] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. There's just like hundreds of pages of notes from these calls and me prepping notes for calls and. And then I just, I just went through that someday and I just highlighted all the key learnings and I turned it into this whole thing. And I think you just didn't want me to publish it for some reason and it never went live. And I'm glad you just found that.
[00:01:03] Speaker A: Dude, that's so weird. I mean, you know this very well about me, which is that I had a lot of trouble self promoting. Like, I was never comfortable self promoting. In fact, I used to make this joke with people where I was like, my marketing team is Jake Jorgevan. So.
[00:01:22] Speaker B: Yeah, because I was all into the thought leadership and the blogging and I didn't really know what I was doing, but I blogged a lot and people thought I knew what I was doing. I was like, no, I just work with Alex and he knows what he's doing. That's. That was kind of the vibe.
[00:01:33] Speaker A: And then I'm like, don't say anything nice about me. It's weird. And I'm like, but you can refer me, but just don't tell people. Anyway, I don't know. All right, so this is a good lead in, man. Let's kick it off because I know that we're going to riff for a bit and we've got a couple of hours, like blocked out here, so I'm joined by Jake Jorgen. Jake Jorgevan is the guy that I think in a lot of ways prompted me and helped me actually become a legitimate coach. So I dabbled and played around for a little bit and used it as a pseudo therapy to share stories and have cathartic moments with people that were trying to build businesses. But then I would talk to Jake and there were things that you would say to me. Like, you actually are quite good at this and this is helpful.
So before you even jump in, Jake, thank you for continually like pointing the mirror back on me. It's a very coachy move.
And welcome to the pod.
For people that don't know who you are, who are you? What's your background, man? Talk to me.
[00:02:31] Speaker B: Yeah, so I'm Jake Jorgevan. You can find
[email protected] which has a bunch of things I would say serial entrepreneur is the best way to describe versus any particular thing.
And yeah, I mean we worked together from pre, like early days I think even before like the first things of lead cookie all the way through into content allies and now it's turned into multiple other businesses and yeah, high level serial entrepreneur. But the way I describe it to my dad when I finally could explain to him what I do for a living is I was like, well dad, you see like when you're in running online businesses, like you can just start a new business overnight. It's pretty easy. You just throw up a new website and a new offer and you can start things. And so the way I described it is like, I've just improved the skill of building online businesses and solving better problems each time I start something because I feel like most of the time I would just start something and I've just not stayed focused on a singular thing because I would just get into it and be like, ah, like kind of screwed up some business model and then I would do a little better the next time and then I would do a little better the next time. And now I'm at a spot where I feel like that momentum has hit and I'm just like, okay, wow, okay, I'm on the path. But that was like five iterations of, you know, digital businesses through those and it's kind of where it's got to where it is today.
[00:03:52] Speaker A: And you, you landed on the radar, I want to say 2014, with guest posting on the WP Curve blog about Squarespace. Is that right?
[00:04:02] Speaker B: Yes. I did a Squarespace Versed WordPress article which was one of your top performing articles.
[00:04:08] Speaker A: We love it.
[00:04:10] Speaker B: My early, back in the day I was doing Squarespace web design and so I had no clue what I was doing on SEO. But you guys did and guided me to that post, which ranked well and yeah, drove some traffic.
[00:04:21] Speaker A: Yeah. And was that, was that, that wasn't your first foray. You'd done some stuff in business land before that, right? Take me, take me from the inception.
[00:04:28] Speaker B: Let's go all the way back Inception Video Agency. When I was in college I started that up doing like video stuff kind of a whole productions for live events and stuff. So we would do like graphics for stage productions at concerts and then that turned into corporate events where we would design, you know like the whole cool animation that goes behind the speaker when they walk on stage. And we did like projection mapping and all this stuff before it kind of became more mainstream and stuff. So that was like the first business did that. It was really cool. I mean we worked with really big customers. Like it was wild. I was really young and kind of hitting success and I had some just good advisors and mentors and I just played the like I'm a young college kid help me vibe and people would just coach the hell out of me basically. So like high level. I've learned throughout my whole life anytime I have a coach, I just accelerate much faster.
But yeah, that one was early. And then I kind of went digital marketing freelance for a period of time and then that eventually started turning into digital businesses which was some various forms of consulting, web design stuff like that Lead gen Lead Cookie was a cold email LinkedIn outbound agency which we got in early when it was good and then it became totally saturated and spammy and everyone was doing it.
And so eventually segued that into Content Allies which is a podcast agency or has been a podcast agency today is growing much more into a full like B2B content and marketing agency and growth agency for B2B companies.
So still running that today.
And then I have some other crazy ventures like a healthcare recruiting company which is getting momentum right now as well and like an HR consultancy. And I'm just taking those marketing skills and applying them to some other industries and professional services is kind of like the high level of where I feel like my focus has become.
And I realized like recruiting is not far fetched from running a marketing firm. It's just different kinds of people you hire and you hire the right people and deploy them and can drive leads and it's great. So that's, that's my high level journey in a nutshell.
[00:06:38] Speaker A: So I looked back at the old, the very old version of my coaching site when I stood it up and there was a testimonial on there from you and I think when we first, first started working together it was like 60 days to 20k mrr or something like that. I think it was, I think it was Content Allies launch maybe.
[00:06:59] Speaker B: I can't, I feel like Lee Cookie hit really fast. Content Allies I think did I think Content allies did pretty well out of the gate quickly as well.
And I credit a lot of that to having an email list and a following.
You know, the one thing I did well along the whole way was just build the personal brand. I leveraged that in ways more in some capacity from like an SEO standpoint, but less in terms of like, the active engagement for me today, but like having that platform of people's attention. I don't know someone. I think this is all the dynamite circle concept of like, spotlight marketing is you have an audience and you can just point them to different offers.
And so I just kept trying stuff and would. Seeing what worked and what's engaged. But when you have an email list of like a few thousand people, you're just like, hey, I'm doing this. And then suddenly people buy and it's pretty fast. So that's. That helps, I think, a lot, accelerate it, and also helps, you know, pretty quickly when you're failing, when you put out an offer and like, no one buys. So that's.
[00:07:58] Speaker A: That's a. That's a heartbreaker that launched to silence. Yeah, but. But at the same time, there is. There's an inverse of that. And we had some of this at WP Curve. Do you remember Content Club? Do you remember this?
So this was in the middle. It didn't have a runaway success, but it had enough people, like a, like a kind of critical mass to do something.
And it tricked us into thinking we were community moderators.
Completely different business model, completely different, like, cadence and rhythm and all of that. And it was enough for us to feel like there was something there. And then I think it probably lasted six months or something. But, you know, those are the wor.
[00:08:38] Speaker B: I had some of those as well. Like, I think we did. We had, like, what it was supposed to be, like a VA service for, like, content marketers to do all their publishing and stuff for them.
I remember that thing we got that you remember that was called Tell Betsy. And it got to like 5 to 6k a month.
And it was just like. And so you're like, okay, cool. Like, there's something here. And then like, it just, like, it just kind of like hovers. You get some churn, you sign some new people, customers are paying. It's not really that profitable. And then it's like. And those are the ones where it's like, it ends up lingering for like four to five months. And you're like, this sucks. Like, but it's not a clear no out of the gate because you make a bunch of sales and you're like, whoa, we got something. And like what I've. I think I, a thing that I realized with launching all these things is it's like it's one thing to get people to sell it, but then you have to deliver it and make sure it's like a business you actually want to be in from the delivery side. And I think especially when you're like what I always, what I found candidly throughout the years is like whenever I try to come up with some new idea like that, like VAs for content publishing, like anytime I try to go something new just like it kind of like sucked. It's like just copy some level of something that exists out there and it's just validation. Like you told me this, it's just like do market research. But it's like every company that I've launched now I'm like, cool, can I find some big players who are succeeding in this space? Because that's like an indicator that it's a good move in general and I will succeed if I just stay focused on it. But when you have some blue sky idea, I don't, I mean none of those really panned out ever. So.
[00:10:11] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, it was something something compound annual growth rate. Something something businesses in market that have customers that.
[00:10:18] Speaker B: You had a whole acronym.
[00:10:22] Speaker A: Rescue. Rescue Rescue.
[00:10:24] Speaker B: The rescue framework. I use that a lot like whenever I was looking at things. Yeah. Like is it recurring? I can't remember what letter store.
[00:10:31] Speaker A: Yeah, I'll dig it out. We'll find it. We'll find a lot of.
[00:10:34] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, you got to republish that. Those things. Like those were like those like frameworks too. And I like started over time like building my own framework and it's like the, the whole Ray Dalio model of just like, okay, would I be happy if I started this business five years ago? Do I think I'll be happy if you know, five years from now if I start it today kind of thing? And it's just all those ways to get through there because like I remember like, like lead cookie whenever we started that one, you were like, hey Jake, I don't know man. There's a lot of platform risk with LinkedIn. Like you might want to be risk careful about putting all your business around this whole LinkedIn platform. And I was like, whatever man. People are buying like crazy and then like LinkedIn changes their whole thing. And like SC like the LinkedIn's. You know, I'm, I'm still friends with the lead cookie guys and it's A great business, but, like, the number of times LinkedIn has changed everything on them and they have to, like, rebuild their whole ops, it's like, yeah, it's massive platform risk in this business, you know, and like, those are things like, you can just ignore or they really do become serious problems down the line.
[00:11:33] Speaker A: I do remember there would be certain things that I would just drone on about with platform risk, especially because I'm like, I'm not going to tell you not to do the business, but I also have to be honest and say, listen, dude, make hay while the sun shines. But you can't bank on it because you're kind of building on this weird Sandy foundation that doesn't really have anything solid underneath it.
One thing I was going to say about the rescue framework, and this is something that's taken me some time to learn, I think the E in the rescue was excitement, which is around, do I actually care about this problem space, that sort of thing. But the one that I'd add to it that, that I'll update it is, which is C, which is conviction. Because I think there's a difference between excitement and conviction. So some of the businesses that I've worked on and been involved with, I just have this, like, intuitive sense of, like, there's something here. Like, this is a real business.
It's like, emotionally I can click it and then logically, it's a matter of, like, following through. So WP Curve was, has. Have a thousand people felt this pain and would they pay 70 bucks a month to have it, you know, taken away? And that was really easy to get to. And the conviction was so strong that it was like a function of time.
But I've also tinkered on other projects where I'm like, kind of fooling myself a little bit and being like, well, if I could just convince someone that this solution would, like, make their life better, then this could be. Whenever you're saying it could be a huge market, maybe, like, slightly off course, yeah, 100%.
[00:13:04] Speaker B: And I think that that's like a huge way that I look at it now. It's like when I look at the decision to start a healthcare recruiting company, it was just like, I don't know hardly anything about this market, you know, But I'm learning and I'm seeing this and I'm seeing the opportunity and it's like, I do research into that and I'm like, look at other companies in the space and it's just like, my God, these companies are huge. Like, these are. These are Massive. And it's like the conviction that I have then is like, I know other people are succeeding at this. I'm talking to some of these people. I don't think they're very savvy. I think if I go into this, I can absolutely crush it. And it's like a probability thing that you kind of like. It's like looking at probably, it's like, okay, chances are if we invest into this, we'll crush this in time. And it's like you're just like. You get to this point where you're just like, you're just gathering data points. Gathering data points. You got to not get delusional about it, like you said.
But it's just like when you just get to a point where I think one of the biggest things I remember you said is like, you get this, like, assuming that you will succeed in whatever it is you do. Why are you choosing this business? That one's like, I still remember that exact quote from like years ago. That was a great one. Because it's like you could do anything and assuming that you can find other people that have done it, you know that it's possible to succeed in that business.
So then it comes like, why are you going to choose that? Of all the things.
[00:14:28] Speaker A: So to current pace, given what you're working on today, and I know there's some action happening that we'll keep private, but what's like, what if you answer that question for yourself today, what is it like? What's the rub? What's the juice behind what you're doing today? Why are you working on what you're working on today?
[00:14:48] Speaker B: I, over the years, learned to solve more expensive problems.
And what I've realized is, I mean, this is like you telling me to go up market. But then again, that's kind of what shifted me out of. Marketing is like its own marketing stuff is annoying.
If I can just go learn another industry and market, use my marketing skills in that industry to solve a way more expensive problem, that's pretty awesome, you know, and so that's kind of one of the things that excites me there is just like, how can you just play business at a bigger level and like, use your. Where can you go use. Where do you have like a competitive advantage or like some sort of like unique skills in that sense there as well?
[00:15:25] Speaker A: Yeah, you've kind of got your quiver of the things that you know you can do, which is like, launch, get traffic, make referrals, relationships, get something moving, set up a process, like run it quick, let's talk about. Okay, this is a good one. Me nagging you to go up market.
I want to preface this by saying. I want to preface this by saying this is a very, very common thing when you're starting out and even a few years in where you deeply understand your customer's pain and your customer is very similar to the position that you're in. So again, when we started WP Curve, the launch note, I think went out in the dynamite circle.
Grabbed a couple of customers from just the interest of people who had websites that were hacking and starting up.
They were awesome because they were the early customers that gave us some validation. But they were also terrible customers because they churned within like two months because they didn't really have a business and couldn't sustain 70 bucks a month.
So when you and I were talking and I think this was, or maybe it was a cross league Cookie and content allies around the positioning. But yeah, let's talk through the positioning and talk through the client profile because this is a good one. I like this one.
[00:16:32] Speaker B: Yeah, so I mean like Lee, Lee Cookie, when I was there, they've definitely gone up market in some capacity high levels. I sold that one over to the guys that are running it. Lee Cookie is still awesome. They do amazing work. I run use them for all the outbound. But we didn't really go up market when I was in that business and Continental is really when we went up market and and you know, it's kind of got lucky from like stumbling into the first one. I remember the first deal we signed was Meta and I like remember the guy at Meta was like, yeah, my manager said we should hire the young and hungry agency and not the big established player. And so we're taking the risk on you. And I was just like awesome and but and then like once you have one of those logos, it's just like the rest of them just come easy and you just rinse and repeat and you got, you got to learn enterprise sales, it is a different world and like how to consistently sell at that level because it's not the same. But the dollar amounts get way bigger and it effectively isn't as much work, but it also is more work because you got to deal with a bunch of crap. So you're really, you're just charging them more for all the stupid overhead and things you do and like presentations to show value and like KPIs and all these like things that you do with small business. But we eventually landed at ultimately like a. This all helped Us just like raise rates, which was just, you know, very important and needed and got us to a much healthier margin, healthier level.
But we still serve a ton of small business and, but not the same small bit. Like I used to serve like independent coaches and stuff, you know, and it's like that was, I'm like, that's not our market anymore. You know, it's like we might do some independent consultants who are like million dollar plus consultants and just want their podcast done easy and right.
But like we for the most part are serving, you know, like small mid market businesses and enterprises and have a good mix of that whole thing there. But yeah, that's, you know, it was a journey and I literally was having a conversation with one of my partners in the other business the other day where I was like, I remember the days when they used to look at agencies that had big logos and I was like, God, that's crazy. Like how do they, how do they have all those logos? And then like eventually like you're just on the other side of that and you're just like, it's, it's not that different. It's just a matter of learning how to market and get those kind of customers and then it's just learning how to kind of manage and what they want and it forces you to grow. But it's well worth it and far more stable too.
It's really nice to get large stable revenue for like an annual contract. Like it helps a ton. Tends to be quite profitable as well.
Hard part is the upmarket stuff swings way heavier with economic than small business does.
Which is why I like a balance of the both.
It's like when the up market stuff is good, it just, it flows and it's beautiful. But you know, we've, I feel like we've gone through so many weird economic swings or fake recessions in the past several years that were like recessionary scares and it's just like, and then it's just like everyone's just like, they just cut budgets so fast on these kind of things and like you're so far, in a lot of cases, so far removed from any sort of real quantifiable value versus like a small business. You can say like, hey, look at, look at them. We're moving the needle for you. With an enterprise it's like cool, like you got views, you know, it's like, it's in like there, there's no, you have no ability to track, you know, with a massive company in most cases, even if you can drive like they can't even like, hey, let's set up a place to do an email capture on like, like something like they can't even like do that. It's like against compliance or like that takes some developer like so you're just, you're totally in like vanity land I think in a lot of them. Which means you can be cut. Like we had one point where there was like a, like a January, like in January of the year we had like, you know, forecasted like almost a 600 and $700,000 swing of revenue of just enterprise churn because of just recessionary fears and I had to do a bunch of layoffs and it's like that sucks. And fortunately we still had a lot of small business stuff. You know, we were good but it's just like, it's just like that's for, you know, three, four enterprise accounts just decide to cancel and that much changes that quickly. And so that's the hard part. I think of it though too.
[00:20:40] Speaker A: So transition from solo consultants slinging websites to all the way up to sitting with the big dogs in the big logos selling big deals. Where are you spending your time now? What does a day in the life of JMFJ look like?
[00:21:01] Speaker B: It's busy.
I effectively split across like three companies and so I'm kind of like leading teams currently running sales, you know, for content allies which I look forward to getting out of. But I made the decision to pull in a really awesome account manager and we did a merger and so I was like, well the size of business we're at, can't really afford an ace account manager and an ace salesperson. So I'm going to run sales because I just was getting drained on doing account management. So that's kind of where I'm sitting at today. And then like in the weeds building up the healthcare recruiting piece and trying to like lead the team there. But it's a lot more leading teams.
I, my goal is hopefully within the year to be out of any doing into full leading but. And I would be if I had one company but I just don't, I don't know, I just don't do that and I end up with multiple and I, I don't know, I, I'm a very operational person and I like to dive in, build a rough system and then get other people's in place to run it with me is like kind of how I attack business. It's just like what I enjoy.
So I'm almost always like in the weeds somewhere and then managing A bunch of teams over other places where I got out of the weeds eventually at some point. So, yeah, it's kind of a rough day. It's like a lot of team calls, a lot of leadership calls. With my team working some larger sales, some deals and stuff like that as well, connecting with partners and some of the other businesses and stuff, and trying to figure out other partnerships or growth avenues. We're even looking at acquisitions and stuff. So it's a full mix of a lot of things these days.
[00:22:35] Speaker A: Yeah. Nice.
Okay, talk to me about leadership, because going from solo to having a team is a pretty big jump. And then going from solo to having multiple teams is. There's a lot of moving parts.
So how did you get into a position where you could be an effective leader? What are some practices? What are some things that you've learned over the years to be able to get the most out of your team?
[00:22:57] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, a lot of that. I feel like I got a lot of that stuff from you early on. And just how to even run those, how to run one on ones, how to dive with that book. One minute Manager was super basic level, simple things to get you into basic management and delegation. But there's so many levels of it, I think, like, yeah, there's.
There's like a kind of the idea that like management is like getting results through people instead of doing them on your own. And I think that that becomes something that is a skill that's just like, it's. It's so soft, but it's like you have to keep leveling it up and learning that.
And oddly, like, some of the biggest leadership things I got was out of like marriage counseling.
Like my, interestingly my errors counselor was like, oh, so you're an autocratic leader? And I was like, what, What. What does that even mean? I don't even know what that word means. And so I like started researching to listen. It's like autocratic. It's like, it's not quite micromanaging, but I like to have control. I like to be like fully into there. And it's like I did this whole thing with chat GPT, like, hey, how do I. This seems like a limiting thing here. How do I. How do I overcome this? And, and so like, and it's like, it's just like levels of that where it's like this self awareness, you know, And I also have like, triggers of, you know, like this whole, like not enough thing or someone criticizes me. And it's like I uncover that stuff through like counseling and stuff like this, and you find these things, and it's like. It's like some level of, like, leading is, like, working on yourself so that your doesn't get in the way of like, actually being able to lead people, because it so easily can, you know, it's like. And. And so it's a lot of that combined with just, like, getting good at understanding and listening and connecting with people. So.
[00:24:45] Speaker A: Yeah, it's a funny one because it is, like, very warm and fuzzy and fluffy and kind of hard to.
Kind of hard to really wrap like, specifics around. However, it's very evident when you've got a leader in a business that knows how to get the best out of their people versus a leader that just, like, wears them down.
Um, out of nowhere, this. No, it was this week, last week, the second WP Curve Dev. His name's Juan Pablo. He popped up on my LinkedIn, and it's been, dude, like, 11 years. And we're still cracking jokes from, like, back in the day.
Do you remember that? What does the Fox say? Song by Yelvis.
[00:25:28] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:25:30] Speaker A: So for whatever reason, man, this song put me into this trance state of productivity, and I just listened to it over and over and over again.
And this is the early days. This is like, I think we hired him about three months in, two months in, something like that, like, when we had enough. Enough clients to bring in a second dev. And we're like, whoa, we're building a team.
And it's. There's something to be said about, like, having a huge gap in time and being able to pick up where you left off, have mutual respect, you know, check in, how's the family? How's life? What's going on? And I think that's sometimes lost because you're just like, oh, I'm under heaps of pressure. I want my team to perform. I've got to push them really hard. If they can't, you know, if they can't get there, then, you know, they're not a good fit.
Have you dealt with conflicts, like, when you've come into difficult conversations or you've mentioned layoffs before?
Talk me through that.
[00:26:30] Speaker B: Yeah, it's never easy. The biggest thing is I'm always just kind of operated from a level of transparency.
It's like, whenever I had to do layoffs or stuff like that, I'm just like, guys, this is where we're at. It's either we do this now or it gets worse down the line and stuff. It's like, this is what we have to do. And just being really transparent. It sucks.
Worst first time you do it is terrible.
It gets easier as you do it, because you will have to do this multiple times in your career as an entrepreneur, guaranteed.
And, yeah, I don't know. I've just learned more how to approach it and not to take it some. Like, I think I took it as like, a person. I remember the first time I laid someone off. I think I just like, literally curled up in the fetal position and felt sick.
Like, it was horrifying. And then you get further into it and you're like, this sucks. But, like, you get through it and it is what it is, and people understand where it is. You do the best you can to try to support them and help them and get them to find other positions or stuff like that. Give them recommendations, like, you do everything you can. And it's just like, this is.
I can't help it. Like, these customers all just churned. Like, we have no choice. Like, this is what we have to do. So it's.
It's not fun, but, yeah, it's. Yeah, it sucks. It's just. You get. You get. It's. I don't say you get more immune to it, but a. And also, then it also, like, candidly, the pain of it makes you also a lot better. So it's like. I mean, like, out of the last one, it was just like.
Because I had. I think. I don't know, I had to do them a couple times, and I was just like, okay, how do we not have to do this anymore? And so we built a structure where we're like, okay, 80% capacity of the company full time. Everyone else is hourly. So we have a flex staff and we can handle a 20% drop in revenue and just ramp down hourly team members and not have to lay people off.
And, like, that structure came out of two rounds of layoffs and being like, this sucks. And, like, the reality is the business will go through up and down trends. How do we build a more resilient company? And so the pain of it forces you to kind of evolve the model in a sense there as well.
[00:28:33] Speaker A: Did you ever feel that sense of personal responsibility where you've got someone hired and you're like, these people are relying on me for their salary. Is that something that ever. Like, did you ever have that kind of framing?
[00:28:46] Speaker B: Yeah, it is rough when you kind of put in that framing, and, like, you just have to realize, like, that you're not fully responsible for them. Like, you know, you are responsible to, like, be a fair employer. And commit to what you said you would and like give them notice or give them severance or stuff like things in here. But it's like you just try to be the best you can. But like, I definitely had that and it's like not a good mental place to be.
And so, yeah, like it's, I don't know, just tried to.
At some point you just like have to just some level, some level of emotional distancing you have to do from it to not wreck yourself when you go through these things.
[00:29:28] Speaker A: Yeah, that's something that I see quite a bit, which is especially if you're early stage, you build a small team, everyone's doing extra, like they're putting their heart and soul into this business that you're building.
And then at some point either like they may not be a fit or the business environment changes and then you've got to make some difficult decisions. It took, it was something that took me a long time to get my head around. Like I had a real sense of ownership and responsibility which when I talk to folks now who have that, I can, I can see it really quickly. Cause it's almost like you're diving right into someone else's world and you're making yourself like so, like, like you put yourself in a position where you're very indispensable to them.
But in the same way you're also hamstringing yourself and them because there's a dependence that comes through there. So it's this kind of nuanced thing, but yeah, it's for sure a trap.
So one of the things that we chatted on when we reconnected after a few years was ukuleles.
[00:30:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:33] Speaker A: I've tried to drop this in a couple of podcasts now just as like a sidebar to completely bring in some flavor to the combo.
Talk to me about ukuleles. I love this. I love this because it's impact. It just screams impact to me.
[00:30:46] Speaker B: So I finally did the trip to visit my team in the Philippines, which you tried to get me to go do for years. And so we did a whole like three day team get together. We all went out to like an island and stuff and hung out.
And while I'm there, the team like gifts me a ukulele. They've all signed it and I'm just going to grab it real quick. Let me just. It's like right here.
[00:31:08] Speaker A: Can you play a bit?
[00:31:18] Speaker B: All right, so here we go.
[00:31:19] Speaker A: Can you, can you play a bit? Is it tuned?
[00:31:21] Speaker B: Is it in tune?
It's Kind of.
Yeah, it's terrible. I'm terrible. And it's out of tune. So I am normally better, but this is also. They. They gave me the tiny one, but the whole team signed it and stuff here.
And this thing's like, you know, it's gorgeous. It's like, beautiful. It's made out of bamboo. And one of the guys, like, tells me on the. He. I'm like, oh, this is amazing. He's like, yeah, I made this. And I was like, what? You made this thing? Like, you. This thing's in crazy.
And. And he's like, yeah, yeah, I made this whole thing I had before I was doing podcasting. Like, I had a ukulele company from like 2009 to 2022. And then we all went under during COVID and we were making like 50 of these ukuleles a month and shipping them to a buyer in Hawaii, but he was selling it to tourists. And then so tourism died and then the whole, like, export. We couldn't export them. And so the whole business went under and it was him and his wife running it. And then he. He's one of our, like, top podcast producers and is still with us. And.
And so out of this thing, I came back and I was just like.
Had him ship me. He had. He had like 20 of these ukuleles that had just been sitting there for years that he had finished and never could sell. And so I just. He shipped them to me on consignment. I paid for, like, shipping or whatever. And this is what's crazy is I did all this off of credit card points in the business is I just funded the whole thing with my credit card points. It's kind of like pretty wild. And so I got all these and then we just put up an Etsy store. I got them, like, professionally photographed. Use chat GPT to write some cool descriptions. And we just start selling ukuleles on Etsy. And I would say we've sold probably 50 to 60 of these things now. We've got a bunch of different models.
There's effectively like a luthier or two almost now in the Philippines that are working full time on this. His wife is kind of running now the Etsy store.
My guy is the producer, is kind of like the lead designer in Luthier. He comes up with the ideas and then like, gives them to the other luthiers who are kind of building them, because they were like the other guys that were like, the instrument makers were driving taxis and stuff.
[00:33:26] Speaker A: Sorry, what is a luthier?
[00:33:28] Speaker B: Luthier is someone who makes wooden instruments. It's like a woodworker of instruments.
And so yeah like it's, it's wild like and they're just, they're making these and they're shipping these out and it's like it is. I have not made a dollar off of this but I got this to be a self sustaining business now where like they're selling you know, three, four, five of these a month and it's, it's up and rocking and like they're all able to make a living doing this thing now which is like super cool to me. So. Ye. That's, that's the, that's ukulele.
[00:34:01] Speaker A: I love it man. I, I've mentioned this to a couple of folks but the idea of being in a position where you can have some free time and the resources to actually like not just do something commercial but something that's useful for a community or folks that need an extra helping hand or whatever else. So I got to commend you on that. I like that's one of my favorite stories of this year. Just you'd strumming away on the ukulele talking to Meta.
[00:34:29] Speaker B: Yeah, it's just like it should open up a whole dream for me. Like I said, my whole vision on this is like I have this whole in a separate LLC thing and I'm just like can I just make a company that just helps creatives get self sustaining projects going and like use my skills? Because I think there's just so many artistic, creative people that are just really bad at business and for me I'm just like wow. Like the, like, like how can you not like these things are amazing. Like it's just, it was just for me it's not that hard to get that steps moving to get emotion. But for someone who's a creative or someone who's just like a woodworker who doesn't understand like Internet marketing or stuff like that, it's like. And that's where it's just really fun thing. It's like how can you use your skills in this unique fun way and get to a level of abundance through your business where like you can do this and it's not a distraction, it's like fun. You know.
[00:35:17] Speaker A: I mean I'm having a flashback now to 2019ish and the like the, the distinction or the comparison between Jake of 2019 to Jacob today.
I'm, I'm very impressed man. Like I'm just, I'm so pleased because what you like the Thing that you've done really well is being able to. And it comes through in some of the stuff that you say, which is, like, you seek improvement, you do therapy, you seek coaching, but that's one thing. But you also execute and keep, like, kind of failing forward.
Like, you'll just make mistakes, and then you'll course correct and make mistakes and course correct. And there's something to be said about that. Like, the willingness to just give it a crack. And you have many times coached me on this, be like, yeah, cool. Just do it. Like, Sounds good. Yep. All right. What have you done? Yeah, sounds good.
So there's something to that, man. But, yeah, I got to commend you on that. That's a trait that. I mean, I wish.
I don't know. I don't know if that's, like, a nature thing or a nurture thing.
[00:36:20] Speaker B: Yeah. I just think it's, like, whether it's, like, resilience or whatnot. But I think, like, that question is, like, I'm looking at even this article that, you know, I shared with you, but, like, you know, it's like assuming you're. You're. Anything you'll be will succeed. It's like, why are you, like, just once you assume success, it's like, at some level, too. And there's, like, there's so much of a journey of this, too, of, like, wrestling with your money mindset and stuff. It's like this whole phase you have to go through and get into, like, abundance mindset, which sounds fluffy, but it is, like, such a thing to go through, too.
And, like, I think at some point, too, whenever you just, like. Like at some point a couple years ago, I just was like, so I'm gonna be multi millionaire. Like, it's gonna happen. It's just the time's the only differentiator. It's like, I'm gonna screw up. I'm gonna have some things. I've definitely gotten some, like, cash crunches, you know, or, like, you know, got some debt on businesses at times, and it was like, oh, crap. And, like, you feel like you're backsliding, but it's just like, no, like, in the grand scheme of this, like, I know I'm gonna continue learning. I'm gonna overcome this, and I will get to this success point. And then it kind of just.
It was like a whole abundance mentality where you're just like, hey, I'm not gonna worry about buying the more expensive thing at the restaurant, or I'm just gonna buy the good version of what I want and not try to be cheap. And you start to just get to this like, thing because you're like, even though I don't have unlimited capital now, you start to have this abundance mentality as an entrepreneur where like money is infinite, I will make more.
And like, it's just like that's feel like that's a whole nother part of this journey that you go through, which gets you to that level and gets you comfortable taking risks and playing at a level because you realize a setback's not a big deal. You're going to overcome it as long as you don't make your risk exposure too big. Which you also taught me risk management. So yeah.
[00:38:03] Speaker A: No one wants to hear about risk management, dude, but I think it's so prudent. It needs a sexier name so people will actually listen. Because as soon as you say risk management, it's just like straight into store mode.
[00:38:16] Speaker B: It gives you so much comfort whenever you think about it. And you're just like, like I said, like looking at this like bet of trying to do something new, like, or starting a new venture or ramping up this new service line, it's like, okay, like, like, like so much like thinking about things in probability and odds. It's like, okay, I'm gonna put $5,000 bet, I'm gonna go higher or do this thing and I'm gonna put this here. And I have a high conviction that this is gonna turn into a hundred thousand dollar payoff, you know, and it's like, okay, my downside is 5,000. But it's like, you know, as you gotta like play those bets where it's like the bigger the bet gets, you know, what's your risk of your downside? Or what are other things that can go wrong with your business? Or like, you know, just trying to like some level. It helps you sleep at night too. I remember just doing the whole like, what are all the things that could cripple me? And just like doing that exercise. And then she's like, okay, like what kind of things can I put in place? Let me get business insurance. Let me like go check this. Like do you know, let me go make sure we've got some level of like two factor on all the stuff, you know, it's like, let's like you just start going through and you just do a bunch of those things and you're just like, wow, like I feel. And then you like, you've looked at what can cripple you, you've taken the actions you can, you're like cool and I just move forward and I feel like a little safer to sleep at night.
[00:39:29] Speaker A: Exercise. If there's like one thing that people listening to this or watching this take away and you have a business and you've got. It's almost like there's this like portion of the back of your head, 10 or 15% that's just taken up with this swirl of things that could go wrong.
Write down a massive list of everything you think you can cripple your business. It's like small or as large as you want it to be.
And you can just, on the next column of this spreadsheet, write the like the manager. Like the things that you can do, the actions you can take to manage it. And just by getting it out in front of yourself. Holy crap, dude. It is, I don't know, it's like freeing. Almost like it gets all this noise out of your head in front of you. You can take some action on it and you're not going to get everything and there's going to be like weird black swan events that happens because that's kind of how life goes. But just for your like day to day sanity, I just wish. Is there a better way to say risk management so I can make it more appealing to people? I don't know what I can. I don't know. I can dress it up.
[00:40:31] Speaker B: Downside mitigation.
Yeah, I don't know if that's an improvement.
[00:40:40] Speaker A: Yeah, that's pretty good.
[00:40:42] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:40:44] Speaker A: All right, so this blog post that has never seen the light of day. One of us has got to publish it. It's got to make its way onto the Internet. I think it's still. Some of it still stands or hopefully all of it still stands.
Is there anything in here as you scan that table of contents that jumps out?
[00:41:04] Speaker B: First one at the top. You are the worst person to do every job in your business.
I love that one. And it's like some of these I'm even looking at, like that's a great reminder to myself now because there's so many times where you're like, no, like, I can't get this to anybody else. And it's like I remember, like I held on to account management for years and then I bring in this guy who's an account manager and he's like ex salesforce and he's been like trained in account management. It's just like instant upsells. I'm so, what the, what the hell? Like, I didn't upsell anybody. I just, I just avoided Churn, like, and like, it is just like, you're like, wow. Like, no. Like, you find people who are good at the role and even if, like, they're 80% as good as you, they're not overburdened by everything that else that you're doing in the business that they're going to do better than you.
And like, that I think is just such a huge thing. Like, I found this on the recruit. I tried to, like, the start of this recruiting thing. I was trying to like, manage the whole recruiting team there. We like, flopped on our face and failed horribly. As soon as I put like, a lead in there, we sent. We just like, crushing it. And it's just like, wow. Like, get the hell out of the way.
Hire people that know how to do what you're trying to do. And like, they like, just will they deliver better than you will. And it's just like, that's just a beautiful thing to learn and see and realize that you are not the superhero.
[00:42:19] Speaker A: But you so badly want to be sometimes so badly want to be the expert, man.
[00:42:25] Speaker B: I called out one of my partners on this at one point because, like, there's this like, huge client issue. And I was like, I was like, look, man, I know you want to Superman this. I call it Supermanning it because there's points in business where you gotta, like, superman it and you just like, hop in there and you just brute force, like, fix some huge client problem.
And I was like, but like, like, you. You can't keep doing this at the scale we're getting to. Like, you've gotta like, let go, give someone ownership, put them a bonus structure on the other side of fixing this problem and get the hell out of the way. Like, and, and like, that is like, that works. It's amazing. Like, you know what you can do. Like, I've done that a bunch of times where like, I remember we had one of our huge enterprise accounts that was like, we were kind of flopping. And I just went to like, my lead on the account and I was just like, look, at the end of this, if they renew their. Their thing, you're gonna get a $2,500 bonus. And it's just like, if they renew their. Their contract, contract renewed, you know, it's just like, it's just, you know, you just like, put that into there and it's just like, it's just like those simple things like that where like, you can start to just get the hell out of the way. And like, what that does to level up people Is. Is next level.
[00:43:31] Speaker A: There's something. There's something about the trust that that requires.
There's, I think, like, the way that I'm wired, I, by default, would trust. So I have that default thing. And I'm like, I'll give you space to operate and move, and you're going to make mistakes. And that's completely cool for you. As, like, someone that came from, like, a solo background into building a team, did it take you some time to be able to feel comfortable having that level of trust and, like, letting go of some of these things?
[00:44:00] Speaker B: 100%, yeah. That was like a lot of that autocratic thing. I came over, like, the biggest thing I came, like, I would just, like, I was just hard for me to trust people fully. I would manage way too far. I was really, really hard to let go.
And like, whenever I was just like, hey.
And like, I just remember, like, going through that whole, like, exercise and just be like, okay, give someone a clear outcome. Get really good at defining, like, what success is.
Give that to them. And then be like, what do you need from support?
Check in with me. But, like, here's the outcome. This is what I need. Go. And like, and it's just like, next level. And I think everyone's a little different on that. Like, I've got other partners who just, like, their fault is, like, over delegation. Like, they're just, like, over trusting people. And then, like, they kind of, like, look back in later on and they're like, what the hell's happening? You know, and like that. And, like, so they come on the flip side of the problem.
But in some capacities, like, I think that if you hire the right people, I think that's almost like a better model for quicker growth than being, like, overly controlling. I. I don't know. Like, my partner grew faster, but I grew and had much tighter ops. Like, I don't know, he's making more money. So it's like. It's like, you know, it's like you kind of look at them both ways in there. So, like, there. There's pros and cons to both of them in that sense there as well.
[00:45:13] Speaker A: All right, we'll do one more. We'll do one more note off the list, and then we'll wrap it. Is there anything else that jumps out at you from that mega, mega list?
[00:45:26] Speaker B: I love this one that I think this is. Overall, I'd still say, I don't know. It's like, almost counter. I have this one that's. Never hire a problem, someone to solve a problem you haven't solved yourself.
And I think that that's, it's almost like counter in a ways we have to this that I wrote down on there. And I'm wondering if where this hits. But I think there's some level too of like, you know, it's like the number of these like startup people or like founders that go like oh, I have a sales problem, I'm going to hire a salesperson.
And like they, it's just like that, that, that mistake over and over and over done.
Or just like trying to hire an ops person without learning the ops things yourself and like building those kind of like foundational ideas or systems. Like I think there's like some level of like as I look at this one, as I almost like update. It's like there's some level of competency you need in all aspects of the business to be able to hire someone effectively. And, and this is like, I think a lot of business owners just like I'm not good at that. I'll just hire somebody, you know, that doesn't work. It's like you gotta get decent and then hire someone to manage. So like you can manage them. I guess.
[00:46:39] Speaker A: I had a convo. I was at this conference just the other, it was like two weeks ago and I was talking to this founder, she's quite early.
And they're doing what is it? It's kind of like a patient note software for clinicians.
Ish, that kind of solution.
And selling basically like B2B. So selling into the like surgical people or the practitioners, doctors, whatever else. And they're looking to make their first marketing hire. And so the question she asked me is like, I'm looking to make my first marketing hire, like what should I look for?
And the first like the first direction I go in is have you sold to people that are outside of people that you know? Because you know when you launch you'd go to the folks that you know and they're like this is an awesome product.
She's like, no, not really. I'm like, okay, well that's a good starting point. So you can feel the pain of how difficult it is to just get in the door. Um, so like walk the process yourself, figure that out. But then secondarily when you're hiring, what's going to happen is you're going to be feeling the pain of that problem so much that your view will start to distort because you want, you want like a shining light of someone that can come in and save the day. Like your superman type of thing, right?
This pattern I've seen over and over again, which is, we have this functional gap in our business. We're going to hire someone really, really competent to do it, but they don't have specific experience solving the problem that we need to solve.
So maybe they have, like, they're experienced in an adjacent product, or they're like more of a brand marketer rather than like a, you know, boots on the ground type marketer.
And there's this disappointment that wells up after two to three months, which is you get someone in that seat, they're a gun of whatever they used to do. They don't have specific experience accomplishing what you do. And then it becomes like, they were a bad fit.
And I've heard. Dude, I've heard this. This story many, many times.
And then the question becomes like, so had they demonstrated ability to do what you hired them to do? It's like, no. And then it's like. And you expected them to be successful in that particular role? It's like, yes. It's like, okay, let's play that back. And eventually the penny drops. So, I mean, yeah, 100%.
[00:48:56] Speaker B: And it's like. And I think that's where it's like, you need to get some level of understanding. And I think anyone, like, I feel like it's just a massive growth impediment, whether that's like, finance. It's like, I remember, like, going through several painful finance hires until I was just like, all right, I gotta just learn the hell out of this, get good at this, and then, like, now go vet. You know, as I look for a new, like, fractional cfo, and it's like, okay, I know what to look for. I know I want to see, like, their model. Like, and I get it because it's like, I kind of, like, learned that myself, went through finance courses, and it's like, I. I could do it all, but I don't have time to do it all. But, like, I understand it all now, and now I can. And now that makes me way more effective with my, like, fractional cfo, where I'm just like, okay, cool. Like, I get it. And, like, same with ops, it's like, I had that same thing where it's just like, you have someone who's like, a project manager trying to be, like, the COO of your company, and it's like, well, like, they're not really knowing how to build systems or stuff. And, like, really what that meant was, I need to, like, look at this and get better at Understanding, like, what the heck does this company actually need from a system standpoint? And then my next COO or OPS hire was awesome because I knew exactly, like, what it is I was looking for because I built that core competency and, like, built some foundational systems which were, like, messy and ugly and not great. But, like, they did the job and they got us, you know, to the first million. And then you're like, okay, wow, this is starting to break. This op stuff is becoming a lot of me. But to me, it's like, some people are different. Some people like to just.
Are just better at understanding and finding talent. And I think if you have that skill, that's great.
For me, it was. But, like, it was just like, I need.
I need to have some strong level of competency in all areas of business so I can properly manage. There was, like, how it showed up for me.
[00:50:49] Speaker A: I think I remember when you were studying the accounting finance stuff, because it was something that was.
There was this, like, whipsawing effect you were seeing in your revenue and cash. And then you're looking at, like, layoffs, and there's like, this. There was some gap in your competency around that. I guess it was just management of funds that were sitting in the business and it was creating a huge amount of distress because you're talking about people's jobs. So. Yeah, I remember that one. That was a good one. And then you kind of put your head down and buried yourself in all of this education.
[00:51:21] Speaker B: Yeah. And it's just like, that's a, I think a good tactic of just like, I'm weak in some area. Let me just go get really good and learn as much as I can. Find the best books. Find an advisor or someone that. Or a coach that can kind of like point to there or just something. But like, yeah, and it's like, the money stuff is super stressful. It's like, that's on. Candidly, like, that's how I ended up in debt a few times throughout the business where it was like, wow, whoa. Like. Cause it's so crazy as you build a business, like, where you just go from being like, oh, I don't know, we spending like, our costs are like 5,000amonth. And then you're like, oh, cost 10,000. Okay, wow. We're spending a hundred thousand dollars a month. And like, you screw that up for like three months. And like, that's. It's. It's big, you know, like, the. The mistakes just get bigger as you start to deal with bigger numbers.
And like, that is like, you know, and I remember even talking with one of my other advisors that I hired specifically for the finance stuff for a period of time. He's like, oh yeah, that's cool. Yeah. I mean you got $100,000 mistake there. I had a half million dollar mistake when I learned that lesson. So it's just like, you know, it's like the lessons you have to learn and then like you eventually, okay, these are the tools. This is how I look at my finances. I check this every week. This is what I'm looking at and this is how I get ahead so I never end up in that situation again. And you know, you start to see things like customer prepays and you're not properly tracking that or holding cash aside. All those kind of things are the things that will trip you up as you kind of go from that small business to enterprise. You know, it's like, oh, I gotta. Someone pays me a hundred thousand dollars for the year and it's like, oh, I need to hold that money throughout the other. Like you don't, you don't do that when you're a rookie. Like you screw up. So yeah, I.
[00:53:00] Speaker A: Within these catch ups. I've heard the, the beast of accrual versus cash accounting many times.
[00:53:06] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:53:07] Speaker A: And this is a funny one which is like you, you start to make money but then you don't know how to manage the money and you overextend and start hiring like crazy or investing in marketing like crazy or doing these other things and you're like shit, they just canceled. Oh shit, oh shit. Like we don't need to fulfill. Oh.
[00:53:28] Speaker B: Yeah. And like when you like when it's just like you're flying blind when you don't have the tools or the understanding and you're just like, it's just horrible like just looking at your, like you're just like oh God. Like where are you on money? And like you just can't understand it and you can't comprehend. And it's like when you don't have the visibility, you're like, you can't tell the difference between like we're unprofitable and we have a customer who's slow to pay or we just signed an enterprise customer and they take a long time to pay. Like you can't tell the difference between that when you don't have that financial understanding. And like. Yeah, I see. Like, I feel like that's got to be just a massive, like it's a trip up. I feel like for everyone as they go through these growth stages and work with these big customers who start paying net 60 or net 90 is that stuff can crush you, like, in a capacity where, like, that's why lines of credit become a thing, because you're just like, wow, this is wild. Like, you know, you're not used to waiting that long for payments, and enough of those hit at once, and suddenly you're just like, you're extending pretty far, and you need. You need visibility, and you need to understand what the hell's going on.
[00:54:31] Speaker A: A lot of wisdom in this. All right, let's wrap it, dude. Thank you so much for joining.
If people want to find out more about you and what you're working on, where should they go?
[00:54:40] Speaker B: Yeah, jakejorgaman.com is the main site for all the blogging and the stuff like that as well.
And then contentallies.com would be the other great place to go and see kind of full B2B growth agency and everything there as well.
[00:54:54] Speaker A: Right on. Yeah. Thanks again, man. And again, sincere thanks for kind of being my coach. You've coached me a lot.
[00:55:01] Speaker B: We've coached each other, Gotten a ton out of there. Let me just drop my recommendation here.
If you haven't worked with Alex, you should work with Alex, because he leveled the hell out up out of me. And, I mean, I would like. I would not be where I am without all the support and guidance. So thank you, man. Thank you.
[00:55:17] Speaker A: Appreciate you, man. Means a lot.
