0:00

If you want to get what you want , help other

0:02

people get what they want . If you walk down the

0:04

streets , you're gonna see like five or

0:06

six restaurants . Does that mean that you

0:08

shouldn't open a new restaurant ? I

0:10

don't think so . I still talk weekly with customers

0:13

, Like really weekly . I have at least three

0:15

or four conversations with our customers and

0:17

if you look at other CEOs , they

0:19

will not want to do it .

0:21

See this guy right here . Yes , this guy

0:23

. He is the founder of a $150

0:27

million company . He started

0:29

Lempire with $1,000

0:31

and his girlfriend paying the rent

0:33

to his home . Since then , he's made over

0:35

$47 million

0:38

across six different products

0:40

. He also sold one business after

0:42

growing it to over $600,000

0:44

in annual revenue in just 18

0:46

months . This episode is a deep

0:49

dive in how you can do this , going from $0

0:52

up to your first $1

0:54

million . We're documenting exactly

0:56

the steps you need to do to find a great

0:58

big idea , to master your outreach

1:00

, to master your sales , to build a great product

1:03

, build a great team , for you to hit your first

1:05

$1 million . What's

1:07

up , people ? Before we get into this video , please

1:10

make sure to subscribe , like

1:12

and comment down below so we can get bigger

1:14

and better guests for you every

1:17

single week . Let's get straight into the video right

1:19

now . Let's kick off . Well , man

1:21

, I'm excited for this . Been a long

1:23

time coming and before we start , I think

1:25

one of the most interesting observations I have of

1:27

Lemlist well , obviously there's Lempire , which sits on

1:29

top , but of Lemlist is that it's

1:31

the only product that I have to

1:33

cancel my subscription for because it works

1:35

so well . Genuinely

1:38

, every time I use it . It works

1:40

and I cancel my subscription afterwards . I

1:43

genuinely handle my heart . So for

1:45

the past two years I would get

1:47

the subscription , I would run a shitload of

1:49

sales outreach and then I would

1:51

get the leads I need , and then I would sign the clients I

1:53

need and then I'd just cancel the two last two . I

1:57

need to get a better way to the clients , man . But yeah

1:59

, it's very impressive what you've been able to build for the last

2:01

couple of years .

2:02

That's really the best testimonial

2:04

ever . I'm going to take that part of the podcast

2:06

and put it on our website . I

2:08

guess now I don't

2:11

know .

2:11

That's awesome . I want to get into just

2:14

really going through the entire

2:16

details . Bring something zero to one million , right

2:18

. But I want to start somewhere interesting , which is I heard

2:20

you mentioned that most founders are looking for

2:22

excuses . What do you think that is ?

2:24

Yeah , I think overall

2:28

, everyone's looking for a way

2:30

out , everyone looking for something

2:32

that's not working . Everyone's trying

2:34

to understand why they're not generating revenue

2:36

. I think , as

2:38

founders , when you take

2:40

the leap of faith and you go all in on a project

2:43

, you really need to believe

2:45

in yourself , because most people won't

2:47

I mean , unless you are very

2:50

, very well surrounded . But

2:52

often people don't really

2:54

like to see someone they don't change , because

2:56

it also reminds them that they're

2:59

not taking action , they're not doing something outside

3:01

of their comfort zone . I

3:03

feel like when it gets really hard

3:05

which it always will when you launch

3:07

a company , people are looking

3:09

for way outs . I

3:11

think often founders

3:14

believe that it doesn't work

3:16

because the product is not good enough , it

3:19

doesn't work because their team is

3:21

not the right team , etc . But for

3:23

me , in the end , it's

3:25

on the founder's shoulder to make

3:27

a business work . If you can't do sales

3:30

, learn how to do sales , because sales

3:32

for me is pretty much everything . A

3:36

lot of people believe that they can build

3:38

an awesome product and that everyone will come

3:40

and use it . It's not the case . Even product-led

3:43

growth companies started

3:45

as sales-led companies . The

3:48

founder was outreaching

3:50

to potential customers , onboarding them personally . Whenever

3:53

you want to hire someone . It's exactly the same as sales If

3:56

you want the top talents , you

3:58

need to outreach to the one that you

4:01

know like , get maybe 100

4:04

job offers every single year and

4:06

you need to convince them to join you on the adventure . So

4:09

I think people will always find excuses and

4:12

I think if you start

4:14

acknowledging the fact that you're

4:16

the owner of your own success and that

4:18

whenever you face a challenge , you can always

4:21

overcome it Overcome it by

4:23

learning , overcome it by getting

4:25

coached , overcome it by I

4:27

don't know making mistakes , then

4:30

eventually you get better , and

4:32

I think this is when you start owning your destiny 100%

4:35

.

4:37

And that's where a lot of entrepreneurs their

4:39

success on other ways too . Right , so

4:41

it could be in a fitness I know you're into the captain

4:43

fitness as well as myself or even just

4:45

taking responsibility for their life . They're usually

4:47

the one that can control the destiny , right

4:50

? Are you familiar with Steven

4:52

Pressfield ? At all Talks with a wall of resistance

4:55

. He's a great book called Turning Pro

4:57

which you would really like . He also has the art

4:59

of war yeah , the art of war

5:01

and ours , the war of art of war , I think

5:03

it is and basically talks with the wall of resistance

5:05

, saying that most people when they have

5:07

they split into an amateur or a pro mindset

5:10

just for life and someone who's

5:12

an addict could have the same example . But

5:14

when they have the amateur mindset , they're basically coming

5:16

up against a wall of resistance and looking for a way out , like

5:19

a cope or someone to blame

5:21

or so on . But basically the crossing

5:23

, the kind of the chasm , basically

5:26

, is coming up with resistance . So if you

5:28

can push through those resistance , those resistors

5:30

, that's when basically you have like more of a professional

5:33

mindset and whatever you do , basically

5:35

you're kind of like all in . And having

5:37

that kind of like all in a mentality means that

5:39

when you do come up against it , you'll find

5:41

a coach , you'll find a tutor , you'll buy a course . You'll

5:43

basically be able to solve that problem because chances are

5:46

someone else has done it anyway . And it's a beautiful

5:48

book because he went through kind of his story and his journey

5:50

, how he ran from his problems for so many years

5:52

as a writer and then basically

5:54

was working in like these picking cherries

5:57

and apples and then swapping back over them

5:59

to writing when he had the money . And I saw it was

6:01

very , very interesting because , like it's never

6:03

been easier right To some degree

6:05

, to be able to build stuff . We have the

6:07

availability .

6:08

So when you have these excuses , it's almost like

6:10

the excuses are also never

6:13

been more as well at the same time , yeah

6:15

, and you know to build up on what you say

6:17

, it's never been easier , like

6:19

to build something . But actually I think

6:21

, like most people , especially

6:24

like in our current

6:26

like era , I think

6:28

, are a bit too weak . Like everyone

6:31

wants , you know , like the easy way , everyone

6:34

wants the overnight success . No

6:36

one understands the true power of delayed gratification

6:38

. No one understands

6:41

, like what sacrifice it takes

6:43

, you know , to be at the top or

6:45

like just reach like summit . So I think you

6:48

know , like social media are also like

6:50

part of it . When you have like

6:52

always like instant gratification

6:55

and dopamine hit every time you post , every

6:57

time you do something , I think people

6:59

like yeah , don't

7:01

realize that they can push themselves and

7:04

every time it gets a bit hard , they give

7:06

up . And I think it's

7:08

a shame because if you

7:11

live an intentional life

7:13

, meaning you set like a goal

7:16

that might sound like unrealistic

7:18

for many , but that's also

7:20

linked to your passion and what you want to accomplish

7:22

If that goes

7:25

aligned with what you're

7:27

ready to sacrifice , then you know like you're

7:29

going to enjoy the

7:31

journey , no matter what happens , no matter the up , no

7:33

matter the downs . You know that you will do it for a reason

7:35

, and

7:38

I think that's the power of delay , gratification of overall . It's

7:41

like can you like sacrifice

7:43

your current state so your

7:45

future self can be proud of you ? Man , where did I come from ? For

7:47

you .

7:49

Because , like , when I even observe the way like your attitude

7:52

is , you're always smiling , right , the companies

7:54

were like 150 million and

7:56

you're like , if I saw you in the street or I saw you

7:58

in Cape Town , you're like chill as fuck . But where

8:00

does that kind of mindset come from ? Because

8:02

, like , that's the kind of rootless side , I guess

8:04

in many regards right , that

8:07

you've kind of controlled and tamed and basically can

8:09

work with Oops , sorry , my camera just

8:11

jumped . Yeah , it's back

8:13

, never mind . So that's like the other side basically

8:16

. So how have you been able to kind of build

8:18

those other principles , because they're very foundational

8:21

principles to build huge , successful companies

8:23

, I imagine right .

8:23

Yeah , I think , to be honest , I think I got

8:25

lucky Like my parents

8:28

, like they come from a very

8:30

like modus background , like my grandparents

8:32

were like farmers . My parents

8:34

, like they don't have any degree so

8:37

they work really like they're ass off for

8:39

jobs that we're not paying like really

8:41

well . But since

8:43

I was a kid , you know , there were rules where

8:45

I lived so I could go out

8:48

and play in the street with my friend

8:50

when I was like younger , as long

8:52

as you know , like I would do my homework

8:54

and get good grades . So I knew

8:57

that I had to be like super focused

8:59

on doing things the right way so

9:01

later on I could have fun . Then

9:03

, you know , it was like if I

9:06

was doing the right thing , or even

9:08

when I was maybe like tenish my

9:11

grandad's after he retired

9:13

he didn't have like a lot of money , so he would

9:15

work on like construction

9:17

field , like to help like build houses etc

9:19

. And during the summer we

9:21

would go there and I would help

9:23

like move like bricks from

9:26

the car to like the house

9:28

and at the end of the week I would get

9:30

maybe like the equivalent of two or three

9:32

dollars . I was definitely not good at business

9:34

back then , but for me , you know , like all

9:36

the efforts was rewarded by

9:38

money . And when you are like I don't know , like

9:40

10 and you start getting money for the

9:43

work you do , you understand that sometimes

9:45

, like suffering can lead to

9:47

, you know , like more reward in the

9:49

end . And eventually you know like

9:51

, with that money I would like maybe

9:54

buy little things and then start trading

9:56

it at school and get like even bigger things

9:58

. So I understood two things

10:01

. One is like if you put in the work

10:03

, you get rewarded , and

10:05

then with the money that you get , even

10:07

if it's not a lot , you can always purchase

10:09

things that in people's mind will get

10:11

a greater value and

10:14

leverage it afterwards to get the thing

10:16

you want . There is a code that says , I think

10:18

, like if you want to get

10:20

what you want , help other

10:22

people get what they want , and

10:25

I think it's the same like , for example

10:27

, for you know , like simple

10:30

example , you have someone like I'm

10:32

currently in Cape Town , there

10:34

is like a place called Lions Head

10:36

which is a place you have to climb

10:39

upstairs so you have to work for maybe , like

10:41

I don't know , depending on your condition , let's

10:43

say , two hours if you're like in very

10:45

basic condition and

10:47

at the top . Obviously it's like super

10:49

hot , it's South Africa , you have sun

10:51

, et cetera . People , like a

10:53

lot of people , don't have water . If I'm

10:56

on top and I meet a guy with like

10:58

a billionaire , you know like it , just climb

11:00

all his way up and

11:02

I'm selling water . What price

11:04

is he going to be able to pay ? A lot

11:06

, because that's what he wants . So the value of the

11:09

water totally changed because

11:11

you are like in a unique space , rather

11:13

than if I was just down the street at the shop

11:15

and I tried to sell him water , he

11:17

wouldn't care . There are plenty . So for

11:19

me it's always the matter of how

11:21

can you find like those really valuable

11:23

things for the right people

11:25

at the right time , and then you're

11:28

good to go .

11:31

And then , like , as you get older and

11:33

you're not even old dude , right , but you see the bigger

11:35

opportunities that lie within there . And if you

11:37

ever write cash for tithing , he always quotes like

11:40

the deeper , like pursuits , right , which is like

11:42

survival . It's like sex relationships

11:45

, status . I don't even think money was in it . If

11:47

money wasn't actually one of the key factors , it was like a

11:49

secondary factor . But knowing that , basically

11:52

it's like make people money , save people time , improve

11:55

their status . That's kind of like what we do at our podcast

11:57

, for instance . But then , in contrast , as

11:59

you got into Lemlist and Lempire

12:01

, you were just putting that on fire

12:03

basically , wasn't it effectively ? Because

12:06

you met such a big need , basically

12:09

, and like your kind of story from , like

12:11

having a lead agency seeing all the

12:13

problems and then being like , okay , we're going

12:15

to recreate this and build a new , better tool , made

12:17

it like the obvious choice , like , would you consider

12:20

Lempire or Lemlist to be the

12:22

main sales outreach tool in the world

12:24

at the moment ?

12:25

We have like competitors based

12:27

in the US that have raised like

12:29

hundreds of millions of dollars . So

12:32

, obviously , like they are like a bit

12:34

they're always they're a bit

12:36

bigger than we are . No , but

12:38

it's quite funny because , like I

12:41

think , from our stage

12:43

meaning like they were created maybe like

12:45

five or six years prior to us , but

12:48

if we look at the current growth versus

12:50

what they accomplished , I think we're like faster

12:52

and at a higher stage , with zero

12:55

dollar raised . So I would say that our

12:57

trend is to , later

12:59

on and at the goal , like overtake them . But

13:03

yeah , I mean for me what's good

13:05

, it's like markets are huge . A

13:08

lot of people are afraid of competition

13:11

, but I think like it's really

13:13

like the wrong way of doing things . I

13:15

remember when I started my first businesses , every time

13:18

I had an idea like to launch a business and

13:20

someone would tell me oh yeah , but there is

13:22

this tool or is that tool that does exactly the same , I

13:25

would be like crushed . I would be so discouraged

13:27

, I would be fuck . I

13:29

thought I was creative , etc . But

13:32

later on I realized like if you don't know

13:34

about something that already exists , maybe it's because they're not marketing

13:36

properly , maybe it's because the market

13:38

is so huge that there is room for everyone . Like

13:43

it does seem like if you walk down the streets

13:45

you're going to see like five or six restaurants . Does

13:48

that mean that you shouldn't open a new restaurant

13:50

? I don't think so . You

13:53

know , like all the studies and research that

13:56

have been made shows that when in a street you have like more

13:58

and more restaurants , it actually

14:00

doesn't reduce the amount of

14:02

money that they are making . It's actually

14:04

the opposite , because it becomes like the restaurant

14:07

street . So people like come because they

14:09

want to eat in that street and they know they will

14:11

have the option they want . So

14:13

it drives a lot more traffic and hence a lot more revenue . So

14:17

for me , you know , like if

14:20

I had to start all over again

14:22

, I would pick a crowded market

14:24

because it means that the product market fits Already exists

14:27

, but I would focus on a

14:29

niche that is underserved . Because

14:31

if you go back to pretty

14:34

much like every success stories

14:36

that exist today , you mentioned , like earlier that

14:38

you were working with Salesforce . Salesforce

14:41

is a really good example Right

14:44

now . Salesforce , they are making

14:46

the most of their revenue with the

14:49

biggest enterprise in the world , talking

14:51

like companies with hundreds of thousands

14:54

of employees . But if

14:56

you look at where they started , they

14:58

started focusing on small companies . Why

15:01

? Because their product wasn't ready , because

15:04

it was super important for them to get

15:06

a lot of feedback so they could iterate , etc

15:08

. So they started focusing on the niche

15:10

of the smallest companies in

15:12

tech and , step by step , they

15:15

started expanding . And

15:17

once they expanded , essentially you have this cycle

15:19

where you start super niche , then you

15:21

start to expand , then you want to go

15:24

up market , so all the features you're developing

15:26

are more like oriented towards

15:28

enterprise , and then

15:30

what happens is that your product actually

15:33

become irrelevant for the niche

15:35

that made you successful . And

15:38

this is when market opportunities happen

15:40

. This is why you always have cycles whenever

15:43

you have like crowded markets , and this is why

15:45

a company , for example , like Pipe Drive managed

15:48

to come after Salesforce and Upspot

15:50

and eventually like grew to $100

15:53

million in annual revenue by

15:56

focusing on that specific niche . So

15:58

for me , it's wild .

16:01

That's wild Because you would think so . I mean , you're up to

16:03

you , but you would . You would assume that people would stay

16:06

in there initially , like as someone who's outside

16:08

, but it makes perfect sense . So it's

16:10

why we've moved on to even enterprise clients

16:12

, or moving up to enterprise clients . But , to your

16:14

point , there's a point when you're

16:16

ready and there's a point when you're not ready . We need to learn

16:19

and get feedback early on , right , but it's

16:21

like everyone wants to jump up there but they're not willing to do the

16:23

work to get into that position in the beginning . Right , but

16:25

it's very interesting because , like , there's room at the

16:27

top for everyone and also , if you

16:29

have one or 5% of market share , you can

16:31

still make a multi seven figure

16:34

business that you can sell . Right , that's the kind of idea

16:36

here is that you don't need to be so let's take a step

16:38

back . So on the on the path to

16:40

making the first million , you look for a crowded market and

16:42

that would be , you know , at odds with

16:44

. People would usually say now talk

16:47

about , talk me through . Like the idea process

16:49

. I like some of your videos on that being like a good

16:51

versus great idea . How do you decipher

16:53

?

16:54

the difference . For me , to be honest

16:56

, like when it comes to the idea , once

16:59

you have picked your markets . So first , the first

17:01

question is how do you pick your markets ? For

17:03

me they are like basically like three options . Option

17:06

one you've been part of

17:08

a specific industry and

17:10

you have a unique insight . To give you an example

17:12

, I was running sales

17:15

campaigns for companies around

17:17

the globe with an agency and

17:20

I was using pretty much every single sales

17:22

automation tool on the market and

17:24

I found that , even though they were saying

17:26

put your sales on autopilot , it was not

17:28

really the case . There were tons of manual work

17:30

. It was really annoying . They didn't

17:33

offer like a lot of personalization

17:35

, even though personalization was key to actually

17:37

get meeting booked . So I got like

17:39

so frustrated that I had a unique

17:41

insight and I decided to solve

17:43

a problem that I had for myself and

17:45

I realized many other people had that same problem

17:48

. So the industry and the market was well

17:50

known , but I had like a unique take on

17:52

that position . Option two it's

17:55

it's a market you're passionate about

17:58

and you know people in

18:00

that market . So , for example , I

18:03

don't know , it can be like your

18:05

wife , friends all work in a specific

18:07

industry or your friend actually

18:10

work in a specific industry that you really love , or

18:12

you've met that guy that's at a hotel

18:14

, at a bar or whatever . That

18:16

just like gives you like insight on

18:18

an industry and you start being passionate about

18:21

it and you know that they can introduce you

18:23

to that market . Once you have that , then

18:25

everything becomes easier because you already

18:28

have kind of like your first customers to

18:30

test the product . And option three

18:32

, which is the hardest , is

18:34

you don't know anyone but it's still

18:36

like part of your passion and

18:39

you are good at sales , so you know you can outreach

18:41

to people and you know you'll make it happen

18:43

. So once you first have like this first

18:45

step , I would if it's your first business , I would

18:47

focus on one or two

18:49

maybe , but the first option for me

18:51

is the best . And then once you have that

18:54

, this is the time where you need

18:56

to pick up like the right idea

18:58

. So what I love , to be honest , especially

19:00

when it's the first business , is to find

19:02

something that already exists that

19:05

you can improve . And

19:07

you know like if you look at how

19:09

ideas have been created

19:11

and how you know like we've

19:13

been developing things year after

19:16

year , it all comes down to

19:18

small improvements . You know , before

19:20

you know , we had cars . We had basically

19:22

like the wheels , and then the wheels we

19:24

put that , you know , with horses . Then

19:27

people were sitting on there , then we started

19:29

like moving everything from that

19:31

. Then you know , like , we build engine

19:34

and then we're like , okay , actually an engine plus

19:36

wheels , that sounds like a good combination

19:38

. Let's make cars . So it's

19:40

always the same . So for me it's like

19:43

take something that already exists and

19:45

after that , the way I would do it is

19:47

I would go , you know , like to , if you

19:49

want let's take an example and you want to build

19:51

like a software , if

19:54

you want to build a software business , I would go to

19:56

website reviews , like

19:58

G2 , crowd captera , etc . I

20:01

would find a product that I want to improve . I

20:03

would go to that product . I would look

20:05

at all the negative reviews and

20:08

I would see what people complain about . Then

20:10

I would go on Twitter , I would search for

20:12

, like , what people are complaining about again

20:15

on that product or on Reddit , etc

20:17

. And from there , this is where I would build

20:19

my pre-audience of people

20:21

I would like to reach out to and serve better . So

20:24

once you have that , this is when you

20:26

find like a profitable market and

20:29

your profitable market is essentially like

20:32

people who are already paid

20:34

customers because they left a review

20:36

they must be paid customers and who

20:38

have like enough buying power that

20:41

essentially they will be able to purchase your

20:43

product and ideally

20:45

they are part of a

20:48

growing market , which means that

20:50

, for example , if

20:53

you take salespeople , you

20:56

know that every single year there's

20:58

going to be tens of millions

21:00

of new salespeople around

21:02

the globe , maybe hundreds . If

21:05

you take , like CEOs of companies

21:08

with 10,000 plus employees , the

21:11

market is not growing that much every single

21:13

year . You're not going to find many

21:15

more CEOs of 10,000 plus companies

21:17

in a year . So I

21:19

will always find a market that is accessible

21:22

, meaning that you have an entry point as

21:24

I mentioned , option one , two or

21:26

three or that you can outreach easily . And

21:28

I would also take a growing market , because if

21:30

you run a growing market , chances

21:32

are that every single

21:35

year your market becomes new

21:38

again , so you can target

21:40

new people and it's basically a lot easier

21:42

to grow when you do that .

21:44

All right people . We're just going to take one short break

21:46

for a little update about podcast university

21:48

. So if you enjoy podcasts like this and you

21:50

want to start your own podcast , head into the

21:52

links down below the podcast university . This is a learning

21:54

platform that I've built to help people like you

21:56

build , launch and scale your own

21:59

podcast . I wasted many years doing this

22:01

, making it all up as I go , so

22:03

I put everything together in a very seamless and

22:06

easy to follow course for you guys

22:08

to follow and just learn exactly

22:10

how to do it . So if you want to bypass a lot of the mess

22:12

with your podcast , check out the links down below the

22:14

podcast university and we'll show you exactly

22:17

how to launch and scale your own podcast

22:19

. Your LinkedIn sales navigator

22:21

when you refresh it , you come up with new people

22:24

every year . I

22:26

want to dig into maybe some of the aspects

22:29

that you mentioned around the purchasing power , so this is quite

22:31

interesting . So I run a B2B

22:33

business , so purchasing power and I also want to dig into

22:35

the CEO list . So we

22:37

do B2B and sometimes I think B2B

22:40

can almost be easier than B2C , and

22:42

I'll tell you why because generally we need to interact

22:44

with someone . They kind of know that it's about

22:47

sales or it's about a product , about a service . They're

22:49

kind of more educated , put it that way . But

22:51

B2C I kind of get scared on

22:53

sometimes because it's like you need so much

22:55

of a big critical mass or you need

22:57

like a lot more volume of people . Right , and I know

22:59

you're like an excellent community builder , it's

23:01

like a big skill that you have . So

23:04

like , how do you think about that ? Because , like , with

23:07

the purchasing power , we'll give

23:09

a bad example . So like , if you're

23:11

selling , if you're selling , I

23:13

don't know , like insurance to students , students

23:15

are fucking broke . They're just like , oh , I'm not going to get sick

23:18

, I don't need it right Now . It is like a growing

23:20

market or it's like a stabilized market , but

23:22

it's like it's not , it's not a starving

23:24

crowd , they're not going to have the purchasing power . So how

23:26

do you kind of think about that philosophy ? Because for Lemlist

23:29

and for your other products , it's almost

23:31

like an obvious choice , right , like that's

23:33

where people get stuck for it . They're in a wrong place

23:35

.

23:35

It's a really good question and I think to me

23:37

it's . It always comes down to like

23:40

positioning Because , for example

23:42

, you know you say , like students

23:44

are the starving crowds and

23:46

they don't have purchasing power . I

23:48

agree with you , but if

23:51

you look very closely at

23:53

how many students have an

23:56

iPhone , you realize

23:58

that the purchasing power

24:00

is actually there . It's just like the perceived value

24:02

An iPhone versus like a health insurance

24:05

is not quite there and

24:07

for me , for me , that's like the power of brands

24:09

. I think in B2C it's

24:11

you must build a strong brand

24:14

. If you don't have a strong brand , you'll never

24:16

do anything , whereas in B2B

24:18

, even if your brand is not that strong

24:21

but you are really good at building trust , then

24:23

you can succeed easily . So I

24:25

tend to agree with you on the fact that I

24:28

think you can make more money more easily

24:30

in B2B . But in

24:32

B2C I feel like if you have

24:35

the secret sauce to building a brand

24:37

because , I don't know , you just

24:39

have the right way

24:41

of approaching a certain target

24:43

market then the

24:46

cumulative effects that

24:48

you can build and the traction you can get on B2C

24:50

for me can be insane . Because

24:52

B2B , yeah , it

24:54

compounds , because for B2B it's pretty like , it's

24:57

pretty basic Like people will buy , as

25:00

you mentioned earlier , either because you help them make

25:02

more money or save time . In

25:04

B2C it's a bit different

25:06

. Like they can buy because of

25:08

their health , their wealth , their status

25:12

. It's the purchasing

25:14

decision are not , I would say , influenced

25:18

by the same factors and parameters .

25:20

So tell me this from the master community

25:22

builder how is that brand built

25:24

and how is the community built ?

25:25

Yeah , for me it's a good question

25:27

, but I really like what

25:29

Brian Chesky was saying . Like the

25:32

CEO of Airbnb , even in

25:34

a B2C product , all you need is

25:36

100 true fun . And

25:38

I think that people who

25:41

launch businesses are often

25:44

afraid of their customers . So

25:46

if you look at what we did when

25:49

I launched Lemlist , I spent 18

25:51

months being the only one doing

25:53

customer support , meaning that I was

25:55

the only one answering every single

25:57

ticket online . So I had

26:00

intercom open almost 24

26:02

seven and I would answer and talk with my customers

26:05

and what I've realized is that most

26:08

people they don't want to do this . Even

26:10

now , like the company is making , like

26:12

we cross $23 million in

26:14

annual recurring revenue , highly profitable

26:16

$8 million in EBITDA I

26:19

still talk weekly with customers

26:21

. Like really weekly , I have

26:23

at least three or four conversations

26:25

with our customers and

26:28

if you look at other CEOs , they

26:31

will not want to do it . And if you want

26:33

to build a true community , like if someone reach

26:35

out to me and even if they're not customers , actually

26:37

, if they reach out to me and they

26:39

want help on a specific topic , like

26:41

they send me , for example , like here

26:43

is a business I do , here is where I'm struggling

26:46

what would you do in that situation ? I

26:49

would always spend the time to answer

26:51

with a very specific response

26:53

and as many insights as I can

26:55

from my learnings . Like

26:58

this is what I do . So for me , to build a community

27:00

, you need to be passionate

27:02

about helping people , and I think a lot

27:05

of people are not just passionate

27:07

like they want to make money , they want to have

27:09

the fame , they want to do like all

27:12

the nice stuff , but

27:14

for them , helping others is

27:16

not a top priority . And if

27:18

you look at what we did with Lemnist at first , like

27:20

in the community , it was pretty simple , like

27:23

I would run . Like if we look at our gross

27:25

loop , basically it's step

27:28

one . I built a product where

27:30

I knew the exact needs that people

27:32

might have because it was my needs . So that's also

27:34

like a good thing to do , like solve

27:36

your own problems , essentially From

27:39

there . Exactly what we did For

27:41

me . I think it's the best , because a lot of

27:43

people will tell you yeah , you need to be careful

27:45

because , like , you don't represent your

27:48

entire market , etc . Etc . In

27:50

my opinion , we're seven billion people

27:52

. If you have a specific problem

27:54

, chances are that there are at

27:56

least 10 million other people in

27:58

the world who have the exact same problem . Like

28:01

probabilistic speaking , to be

28:03

honest , it's you

28:05

will find others . So once you have

28:07

that , once we start having that I was step

28:10

one , eating my own dog food . So using

28:12

my product to actually launch sales prospecting

28:14

campaign . The one that would work

28:16

, I would write deep down articles

28:19

explaining why they would work , and

28:21

the one that would didn't work I would not talk about

28:24

it . So from these campaigns

28:26

I would basically be on meetings

28:28

with people . I would be able to close deals , start

28:30

making money the same way you do it for

28:32

your agency and you cancel

28:35

your subscription afterwards , which I don't

28:37

recommend . And

28:41

once I had , like , the meeting

28:43

booked , I would basically invite all those

28:45

people inside a community where

28:47

I would share with them very dedicated

28:49

insights on what works , what

28:52

doesn't work . Then they would ask

28:54

questions , they would give feedback , they would

28:56

think like , hey , could we do XYZ

28:58

, or hey , I'm stuck with this

29:00

, and that From their problem

29:02

I would recreate more

29:04

content to help them , and

29:07

they would be really grateful for it . Share insights

29:09

will allow me to improve also my

29:11

product . So we would develop like new features

29:13

, new add-on , et cetera

29:15

, and from that I would go

29:17

back to using my product and , this time

29:20

, leveraging the feature that

29:22

they had asked for as specific

29:24

when they give specific feedback , and

29:26

the loop goes back again , because once you start

29:29

doing that , what happens is that

29:31

people are going to keep talking about

29:33

you because they're going to be like and

29:35

to build also a true community , which

29:38

is something I forgot to mention . But I think

29:40

it's like . The foundation is

29:42

to mention very clearly what's

29:45

your mission and where you want to take your company

29:47

, because , from day one , what

29:50

I did is I told everyone

29:52

that I wanted to

29:54

build the best sales automation

29:56

platform ever created in

29:58

the world . That's

30:00

still my goal , like every day

30:02

, this is what I want to do . So , for

30:05

me , when you do that and you

30:07

keep repeating it , then people

30:09

want to be part of the adventure Because

30:11

, in the end , what's in it for

30:13

them ? It's like if you manage to do this

30:15

, they're going to get better results , they're

30:17

going to be able to close more deals , they're going to be able

30:19

to make more money and if they see

30:21

you trying and trying every single day

30:24

some of them when

30:26

you say that for the first time , I remember when I got

30:28

started , people were like who

30:30

the fuck is that guy Like why

30:32

is he saying that ? Of course

30:34

, yes , he wants to create the best sales automation

30:37

platform . Thank you for that . But then

30:39

when they see you doing things

30:41

every single week , then they're

30:43

like why the fuck is he posting on LinkedIn ? Why

30:45

is he doing this with his French accent , et

30:47

cetera , et cetera , like haters , haters

30:50

, haters , haters . But then

30:52

after a few months , they're like you

30:54

know what , maybe I'm going to give it a try . And then it's

30:56

like oh yeah , it works actually . Or like , oh

30:58

yeah , I'm going to give it a try . Oh , he's answering my message

31:00

when I send him a message . Oh , he's doing

31:02

X , he's doing Y . And then after like

31:04

a year , everyone is like , yeah

31:07

, but you know , like from the beginning , I knew that

31:09

you would succeed . I

31:13

remember .

31:14

Man , that's always a fucking case

31:16

, man . I actually

31:18

send you my post on that . It's

31:20

like day one , day one , they say

31:22

like it's not going to last three weeks . After

31:25

six months they say oh , he's so fucking annoying

31:27

. After a year they say , oh

31:29

yeah , like you know , you're getting a bit of traction . And then after

31:31

two years , I ask you for your help . That's always

31:33

the case , right , but

31:35

it's with everyone you know , because it's breaking

31:38

the belief , shattering the internal belief

31:40

and bringing them across . Man , and

31:42

I can't believe you're that close to the product

31:44

and to the business , right , because that's the reason

31:46

why it works , right . And if you kind of

31:49

, you almost forget that those

31:51

things happen . And a friend said to me recently he was like you still

31:53

take your sales calls . And I was like , yes , I did . I went

31:55

fucking sales calls and he was like , why just just

31:57

bring someone else in ? And I'm like , because I can find

32:00

out what we should be doing by getting

32:02

the feedback right . And it's a great book you

32:05

might actually like . This is called Gapsaling .

32:06

Yeah , yeah , yeah from Keenan .

32:07

Like I call it , keenan . Yeah

32:10

, I'm actually interviewing him in a couple of weeks

32:12

, but I love the philosophy

32:14

behind it right .

32:14

We spent three weeks on a bus together in

32:16

the US .

32:19

No way , what the fuck . I've

32:23

never seen him but like well , I haven't seen much of

32:25

his videos , but like his , the way he writes and everything

32:27

. What was your , what was your impressions from the go ?

32:29

Get ready for it is a is

32:31

a puncture , is a professional puncture ? Yeah

32:34

man .

32:37

I have a fucking crazy story even just

32:39

with him and in that book . But

32:41

what I love that approach basically is just because

32:44

, like , when you figure that out , you like can't unlearn

32:46

it and you realize that all you're doing is trying to get people

32:48

to realize the pain that they have and

32:50

then bring them to the new path . Right

32:52

, and that's what you guys are able to do so effectively

32:54

.

32:55

And I really like like his approach . You know , like

32:57

to gap selling . What I really really

32:59

like it's like digging to

33:01

understand the true problem . So

33:03

you know like whenever someone is telling you like

33:06

hey , I want to lose weight , ask

33:08

why I want to lose weight ? Because I

33:10

want to look good , most people will

33:12

stop there and they would focus on , like hey

33:14

, here's a like weight loss program , so you

33:16

look good . No , ask why again , why do

33:18

you want to look good now ? Like why now ? I

33:20

mean you , you're like 35 years old , like

33:22

you've been looking like shit for

33:25

35 years . Like what's happening now

33:27

? Oh , you've met that girl , ah

33:29

, okay , so you want to look good for that girl , but why

33:31

? Yeah , because you're in love with it , okay . So

33:34

you know like the more you dig , the more you're going to understand

33:36

why people want to

33:39

do things . And the

33:41

minute you understand what they're

33:43

true , why , the easier it

33:45

is for you to find the right solution . Because

33:48

maybe actually , you know , like the the

33:50

issue is not like your weight , is not

33:52

like looking good , it's just like your

33:55

self confidence , and to boot self confidence

33:57

. You know , maybe like doing sports is

33:59

going to help you boost self confidence , but just

34:01

because you're going to feel good , not because you're

34:03

going to look ripped and super handsome

34:06

, et cetera , you know . So I think it's super

34:08

important and most people think

34:11

that to be a good sales rep you need

34:13

to be like a kind of like a park

34:15

someone like always smiling , like

34:17

talking a lot , making people's laugh et

34:19

cetera . But actually , like during like

34:21

my sales goals , I mostly don't

34:23

speak . I ask one question . When

34:26

people like answer , I

34:29

always leave two or three seconds

34:31

of silence , so often they

34:33

keep picking up again . When

34:36

you know like I feel like they didn't give the full

34:38

answer , I just ask do

34:41

you mind elaborating on this ? Then

34:44

you know like they continue and the more

34:46

you listen , the more you're gonna understand

34:49

what true problem people are facing

34:51

and the easier it will be for you

34:53

to give them the right solution . And

34:55

sometimes you are not the right solution and that's

34:57

fine and people appreciate it hundred

35:00

percent because it's better like yeah

35:02

, I think you agree on that . But it's like if

35:05

you become really good at sales you

35:07

have like you start

35:09

, it starts becoming easier and easier to close

35:11

deals . But the fine

35:13

line is also being able to say

35:15

no to the deals that are not the right one

35:17

, because often it happens that people

35:20

are looking for something that we're

35:22

not doing and it's fine

35:24

. It's fine to say . It's fine to say that it's not

35:26

a fit , because if you have people

35:28

Coming in and you've oversold

35:31

and you can't deliver , what's

35:34

gonna happen ? They're gonna turn , they're gonna

35:36

be unhappy and they're gonna say that your service

35:38

sucks . Is that like the type

35:40

of things you want people to say ? Probably

35:42

not . It's always best to focus

35:44

on the straving . Yeah , definitely .

35:46

It's always impact and man , what's so

35:48

perfect or not , as well as the fact that when

35:50

you do a proper like gap-selling approach

35:53

, you can basically just be like you may see

35:55

Articulated individual , why they're

35:57

not a good fit and they'll come , they might even want to

35:59

come back . So I'll give you a very good example . To

36:01

even happen today . It was so the gap-selling

36:03

approaches , like understanding the

36:05

facts , the problem

36:07

, the impact , the root cause and

36:09

the future . And Basically , after doing

36:12

that , the gap wasn't big enough and I

36:14

just said you know what we recoup in six

36:16

months , twelve months , maybe we big enough

36:18

, but it wasn't something that was a big enough investment

36:20

for that individual as an emotional investment

36:23

, not not financial investment . Therefore

36:25

, it just was better not to go through the process for

36:27

them . I mean , that's way more trustworthy

36:29

than bringing someone in and the

36:32

time delay effect . I think which is very interesting

36:34

, which I really observe from your work too , is the fact

36:36

that when you do the work now and you

36:38

build a community , build a brand , that

36:40

doesn't take effect for a month , it takes effect

36:42

six months , twelve months , eighteen months , and this

36:44

is what you have , probably such a fucking

36:46

low turn rate . Right , because time

36:48

time tells the ultimate is the ultimate

36:51

. Hell , did you do the work ? And also

36:53

, is your work shit ? I always think about that , right ? Oh

36:55

, it's been a big philosophy over . Is everything

36:57

really ?

36:58

a basketball . You know , like a funny story

37:00

, I I still have people

37:02

replying to my

37:04

cold email campaigns from 2018

37:07

. What , how , how

37:10

. Some people it's like , you

37:12

know , like they see me on social media , they

37:15

type my name in their mailbox and they realize that

37:17

reached out and now they want to demo

37:19

. You know , even though I followed up five times and

37:21

I have zero . It's

37:24

really funny , it's really funny .

37:26

How do you stay

37:28

like , let's say , like at a high frequency

37:31

with sales and like your mood and everything I

37:33

mean it's really like admirable to you because , like you're on the

37:35

front line with sales , you're building product , you're

37:38

not just doing sales , and you're not just doing

37:40

product , you're doing everything right . So how do

37:42

you stay at that level ? Right , because it's

37:44

been so many years .

37:45

Yeah , to be honest , like I

37:47

think this year it's like changing . So

37:50

I feel like I'm still very

37:52

like external facing , so I

37:54

spend time with our customers , but mostly

37:56

like to talk about their success . So

37:59

like customer stories etc . This is something

38:01

I still do and I love it . I

38:03

still answer every people who has like Issues

38:06

or troubles , etc . So that's also

38:08

important . I don't really do like

38:10

sales calls anymore Like as closing

38:13

calls , because we have a team for that and

38:15

you know like from time to time , I would listen

38:17

to sales calls and maybe give like some feedback , but

38:20

otherwise , like I try to . You know like

38:22

I've delegated to the team and I trust them

38:24

and it's important to do so . And

38:27

now I think like Since

38:29

I hired like a COO

38:31

, so chief operating officer , I think

38:33

like is the transition period was basically

38:35

until the end of 2023

38:37

and now my

38:39

focus is really more like the top-up

38:41

funnel . So I spend a lot of time with

38:43

people who are trying like to grow

38:46

their business , to understand what pain they are

38:48

solving , and my goal is really like

38:50

with . So lemlist is obviously

38:52

like the maybe most well-known of our

38:54

software , but we have several and the goal

38:56

is to kind of like , build a

38:59

suite of products that helps people grow

39:01

their business . And for each product

39:03

that we develop , we have only one rule we

39:06

must be power users of what we

39:08

want to develop . If we're not power

39:10

users , it doesn't make sense for us to develop it

39:12

, because the the goal is

39:14

we don't want to teach something

39:16

that we don't use ourselves

39:18

. We want to be like , as

39:20

authentic as possible . We don't want to tell

39:23

you because you know like it's the

39:25

same . Like if you look at all

39:28

the I don't know biggest companies

39:30

in the world , like if you take Coca-Cola , for example

39:32

, and you say , okay , like , if Coca-Cola

39:35

was like so good would you have ? Like

39:37

your children , you know like drink

39:39

this In the morning , at

39:42

lunchtime , and you know , at dinner , and

39:44

the person's gonna say no , you know like . But if

39:47

I asked myself , like , should you use lemlist

39:49

morning , lunch and dinner ? Yes , I

39:51

do it . You know like I send outreach

39:53

campaigns . I love that . It allows me

39:55

to meet with people like I thought

39:57

I could never meet .

39:58

So yeah , man

40:01

, I love that your future kids

40:03

are gonna be using it . Go into school ? I

40:05

hope so . I want to

40:07

ask you about your sales process yourself , as in

40:09

your outreach strategy , because what's

40:11

Very unique from your scenario

40:14

is that , like you know , you're a power user for yourself and

40:16

then for different things you do . And what's so

40:18

beautiful about sales is like when you learn it

40:20

, you can transfer it over . So to give me , give you an analogy

40:22

, I was doing sales for my podcast

40:25

for many years , for like for many years before

40:27

my company was built . So I was convincing

40:29

people to come on my show and they give the

40:31

transfer of Knowledge for the platform

40:34

and distribution . Like that was the exchange of value

40:36

. And then , as the show grew , it

40:39

didn't become easier . I was going after bigger guests

40:41

and then the platform as it grew

40:43

was a . It was a bigger , more powerful tool and

40:45

I just kind of intuitively brought that over

40:47

into a business world because it was the exchange of value and

40:50

I was able to do it . But my sales education

40:52

is very like limited . It's not like I went off

40:54

and learned lots of stuff . So how do you kind

40:56

of go about that ? Writing philosophy , some theories

40:58

and practices you've been kind of implementing . All

41:01

right , guys . One short little update for Vox

41:03

. I want to give a short overview about my own

41:05

company , my media company called Vox . So

41:07

if you are a company or you are an enterprise

41:10

looking to grow your brand and

41:12

looking to grow your podcast , feel

41:14

free to reach out to work with us at Vox . What we

41:16

do is a fully fledged end-to-end

41:18

management of your podcast . We take care of the strategy

41:21

, the consulting , we take care of the growth

41:23

, the management . We take care of all the editing

41:25

, all the boring stuff , so you can focus on creating

41:27

good podcast and create and growing your brand

41:29

. If you want to grow your podcast and get to

41:31

new users , if you want to grow your business , generate

41:34

more revenue and all that good stuff , check

41:36

out the links down below to Vox . You can follow through to

41:38

schedule a call with our team or else you

41:40

can fill out the application form to see if you qualify

41:42

to work with us . Thank you .

41:44

Yes , it's a very good question . So

41:46

the first thing is , in

41:49

today's world , if you don't do multi-channel

41:51

, you're shooting yourself in the foot . So

41:54

multi-channel outreach is basically

41:56

the most important , because what I've realized

41:58

is that some people Will

42:00

never pick up the phone and they will always

42:03

answer email . Maybe

42:05

they're gonna answer LinkedIn too , but some people

42:08

Will always pick up the phone and

42:10

never answer their emails , nor the LinkedIn

42:12

, and some people will not answer

42:14

their email , not pick up the phone

42:16

but answer on LinkedIn . So if you're in

42:18

B2B , there are like three things

42:20

that you must do , which are email , linkedin

42:22

and phone . If you don't do the three

42:24

, you're basically like missing on a lot

42:26

. That's , for me , like the first

42:29

rule . Then the foundation

42:31

of sales , especially in B2B , as we

42:33

said it's earlier , is trust

42:35

. To give you like the . The simplest

42:37

example if Tomorrow

42:40

you tell me hey G , if

42:43

you give me like a hundred bucks

42:45

today , I can give you like a thousand

42:47

dollar in a week . I've got

42:49

this fence like really nice thing , etc . Because

42:53

I trust you , I'm gonna give you a hundred bucks . But

42:56

if there is like a random dude in the streets

42:58

, I don't know who they are , I don't know

43:00

what they've done and they asked me for a hundred dollar

43:02

now and I give them like , and they will

43:04

give me back like a thousand dollar . I

43:07

will not give them a hundred dollar Because

43:09

I don't trust them . So the question

43:11

that you should ask yourself is Is

43:15

what I'm doing building more

43:17

trust ? If the answer

43:19

is no , then do something else and

43:22

then you should ask yourself what is trust

43:24

built upon ? And for me

43:26

, trust is about essentially like

43:28

a triangle where you have like

43:30

three sides . The first step

43:32

is reliability . Second

43:35

step is credibility

43:37

. Reliability means

43:40

if you say that you're gonna do something

43:42

, do you actually

43:44

do it ? Then the

43:47

credibility part is okay

43:49

. Is that person legit ? Do they have

43:51

social proof ? So , for example , like when you

43:53

asked me to come on the podcast , yeah

43:56

, I looked at your profile , I look at what you were doing

43:58

. I looked at one of the interview

44:00

. I look , it was legit . So I was

44:02

like , yeah , there is trust . So , of course , you know

44:04

like I enjoy doing this and for

44:07

me , once you have , like built

44:10

a lot of trust and you

44:12

understand , you know , like why

44:15

people are doing things , then you should ask

44:17

yourself how do I build trust at

44:19

scale ? And Today , in

44:22

today's world , the best way to

44:24

build trust at scale is to start

44:26

writing contents . For me , if you're

44:28

like a founder and you don't write posts

44:30

on LinkedIn or Twitter or

44:32

even Instagram if you want , you're

44:35

missing on a massive opportunity

44:37

. Because right now , whenever

44:39

, like Even my sales

44:41

rep and my team , like when they reach

44:43

out to People and do

44:45

their outreach campaign , the amount of time of

44:47

people mentioned my content or

44:49

the content of our team is just

44:51

insane . It's insane because

44:53

you reach millions of people by

44:56

writing valuable content that

44:58

people are gonna see and it's

45:00

a simple way for you to

45:03

have people see what's inside your brain . But

45:05

at scale . So for me

45:07

, you know , like , the the more you write , like and

45:09

and the reality

45:11

is like , if you look at my reply

45:13

rates and how it increased over

45:16

time when we launched Lemlist , it

45:18

really correlates with the

45:20

increase in Reach

45:23

that I had through my post on LinkedIn

45:25

. So at first , what

45:27

I would do is just like post , post , post

45:29

, post regularly and eventually I

45:32

starting like getting more and more traction . I

45:34

would reach out to people who have engaged with

45:36

my content and the reply rate

45:38

would go from yeah , like five

45:41

to ten percent to maybe

45:43

like 50 percent sometimes in some

45:45

of my campaigns and if you want to do like

45:47

another bit , because

45:49

there is something that I've discovered

45:52

recently is that

45:54

social media platforms are full

45:56

of lurkers that will

45:58

never engage and the biggest deals

46:00

that I closed in the past . So let

46:03

me tell you the story of how I discovered it . Essentially

46:06

, when we closed like a Zen desk

46:08

, which is one of the biggest

46:10

like support company in the world , it

46:14

all started by a guy messaging

46:16

me Telling me like hey

46:18

, I've watched your content for like six

46:20

months . I saw that you also

46:23

have like fresh desk , which is their biggest

46:25

competitor from India , as

46:27

customers . I'd love

46:29

to have a demo . And

46:31

eventually like Actually

46:35

, no , it's the other way around . I reached out

46:37

to them out of the blue

46:39

because I wanted to close bigger

46:41

tech companies , and they replied that they were

46:43

watching my content for months , which

46:45

I was like what the fuck . So when they told me that

46:48

I went through every

46:50

single of my posts in the

46:52

last six months and

46:54

you know what ? Not a single

46:56

like , not a single comment

46:58

from the guy I was in there , so

47:01

then I was like what the fuck

47:03

? And then what

47:05

I realized is that if I look at the

47:07

amount of views that I get

47:09

on my profile versus the

47:11

amount of like I get on my post or

47:13

comments . I get actually

47:16

maybe a hundred

47:18

times more profile views than

47:20

I get likes and comments , and

47:25

then that's insane . And

47:27

here's the trick . What you can

47:29

do now with Sales Navigator is

47:31

that you can look in Sales

47:33

Navigator . You have a filter that shows show

47:36

me all the people that visited

47:38

my profile in the last 90 days . So

47:41

what I do is all these people

47:43

who visited my profile I know

47:45

they look at my content , I know they watch all

47:47

my stuff I put them directly

47:50

in a campaign and I started to reach out to

47:52

them and even though they had never

47:54

engaged on my post , never commented , never

47:56

liked they knew who I was . They

47:59

knew that my content was getting rich , they knew

48:01

that everything I was saying actually

48:03

made sense and they answered

48:05

because they wanted to meet me and

48:08

they knew that what I was doing was actually

48:10

like helping the community . So

48:12

for me , it's really about building that trust

48:14

and then trying to grasp as many

48:17

people . So the best way to

48:19

do outreach is to have a combination

48:21

of pull

48:23

and push . Some people will

48:25

obviously reach out to you , but

48:28

it's social media . It's

48:30

the same . You know what you mentioned at the beginning

48:33

of the show . It's

48:35

like , hey , I was following you on Instagram

48:38

for two years and then

48:40

I make the connection between you and Lemlist . But

48:44

here's the thing , if you were

48:46

a follower and I have done

48:48

my job properly I should have reached out

48:50

for being a guest on the podcast , because

48:52

the podcast is great and

48:54

that's the thing sometimes we're missing opportunities

48:56

.

48:59

And a lot of your followers are tire kickers

49:01

to begin with , so the majority of them may not interact

49:04

or buy anyway , so it's going to be the people under

49:06

peripherals , but it's not even like

49:08

. It also works from a social perspective

49:11

. That's like fucking literally insane right To

49:13

see someone sitting on the side , and I'm

49:15

well actually aware of that , but it's

49:17

like seeing it in motion . But another thing

49:19

I look at it too is like if you do

49:21

sign a client or you do sign a customer in your instance

49:23

, they'll usually validate before

49:25

getting on the call or saying yes , by

49:27

checking you on social anyway . So

49:29

if this is the start of the getting them

49:32

into the funnel , it's basically like they land

49:34

on your page and realize you're not a robot . And

49:36

that is like the ultimate combination because , like

49:38

, at the end of the day , people want to realize that you're

49:40

literally not a robot and that's the best

49:42

way to do it . And I've several

49:44

clients that we're working through this process with

49:47

at the moment and they're like , yeah , they're

49:49

content businesses , right , so they sell like info products

49:51

or learning products and so on , and

49:54

they're hesitant to do it . And I'm like it's

49:56

not like someone will read a post

49:58

and then just buy , but what they will

50:00

do is they'll get the . Actually , you'll find it's

50:02

quite interesting If you're familiar with a guy called Daniel

50:04

Priestly , a guy who should definitely check a very big

50:07

and Instagram yeah , very big on LinkedIn . So

50:09

he's wrote several different books called oversubscribed

50:11

and keep person of influence

50:14

and you're really a key person of influence

50:16

. You've kind of built that trust . He is a fucking

50:18

great start , which is like people need

50:20

to consume about seven hours

50:22

of content with you before they purchase . So

50:25

let's give the example of a

50:28

podcast you could listen to seven episodes of kickoff

50:30

sessions and be ready to purchase . Or

50:32

if it's your post on LinkedIn , that

50:34

could be a year of reading to

50:36

get to the seven hours and at that

50:39

point then they're ready to get on the call , right

50:41

. So it's like again

50:43

it goes back to cause , effect and time

50:45

. One thing's cause and effect , but they don't

50:47

realize the time delay in it and when

50:49

you're bootstrapping you only have all these obligations

50:51

, or when you have , like , your cost covered

50:53

, you can kind of play a long game , right , is that correct

50:56

?

50:56

Yeah , definitely For you guys too . And

50:58

I think , like I mean , I think podcasts

51:00

and videos are extremely powerful

51:03

because , like the day like

51:05

you start seeing people , the day like you start

51:07

listening to what they say , their tone of voice , because

51:09

sometimes you know , like when you write , people might not

51:11

notice that it's actually a joke , people

51:14

might not understand it , but if

51:16

you're listening to people , like I'm guessing that

51:18

you know , like , if people have been

51:20

listening to this like 15 minutes of

51:22

podcasts so far , they already have

51:24

an impression , like they understand whether

51:27

or not , like they like us , whether

51:29

what we say is relevant , like they

51:32

have their opinion . And

51:34

I think , like the more you help people from being an

51:36

opinion about yourself , about

51:38

what you can deliver , the easier it

51:40

is to build trust . And the more trust you have

51:42

with people , the easier it is later

51:45

on , like to do business together . Because the

51:47

reality is like for

51:49

us , if someone is not

51:52

getting more money , and it's the same for you , like if

51:54

, if the people you work

51:56

with don't get more money one

51:58

way or another , it's a

52:00

fail . It's a fail for you , it's a fail for me , like

52:03

it's it's not something we want . So

52:05

what people need to understand is

52:07

that they are using the right tool

52:09

, that they can have access to the right

52:11

content , that they can have access to the right

52:13

people , so eventually they can succeed

52:15

. And for me , like

52:18

once you make sure

52:20

that people are convinced about that , then

52:22

every come be everything becomes easier .

52:26

I had a call with a podcast where they

52:28

call Matt Shields . He's built seven

52:31

different agencies and made 7 million

52:33

across seven of them . To prove that I wasn't a joke

52:35

or wasn't a fluke . And he actually

52:37

went to scale an agency with acquisitioncom

52:40

. So he applied to

52:42

go to acquisitioncom and

52:44

with Hormozzi , and I was like , oh

52:46

, were you not kind of pissed off

52:49

? So he had the calls , he went through all the sales calls and

52:51

I was like , were you not kind of pissed off that you

52:53

were not interviewed by him ? And

52:56

he was like , no , not at all . He was like . He

52:58

was like I didn't presume it , just like when people come

53:00

true and interview to come in or to

53:02

do a discovery call for my company , they

53:04

don't get access to me . So it's kind of similar

53:06

to you , right ? You're the one that's building the brand

53:08

and the trust and so on , and people may not even

53:11

ever come to interact with you . Well

53:13

, I know they can , but they may not ever have to come and interact

53:15

with you and you can still make those sales . And I

53:17

think that can be a big kind of issue

53:20

for some founders because they're like oh well , you know , I'm not

53:22

really customer facing , I'm just building this product

53:24

and I'm even , like you know , a really big CEO

53:27

and we don't interact with them . But it's like those

53:29

small nuances , I call it the intangibles

53:31

. It's something you find very difficult to measure

53:33

, which is kind of why

53:36

people look down on branding so much not

53:38

so much , but there's a negative connotation , because

53:40

they're like , well , we could just run a fucking ad and

53:42

, as a result , they don't realize the benefit and

53:44

to double down on what you were saying .

53:46

It's like I think that's why video

53:48

is also so important . If you go on

53:50

Lemlist , like you're going to see like

53:52

I'm introducing the product , I'm doing , like , I

53:54

think , a video demo and

53:56

you know , like if you're

53:58

. If you go on a website , let's say , to buy

54:00

like I don't know , clothes or anything

54:03

, and you feel like the website is maybe a little

54:05

bit dodgy or there is one thing that feels

54:07

weird , maybe there is a glitch on

54:09

the website , and you're like , hmm , should I put my credit card

54:11

on that website ? But then if you see

54:13

like a video of someone was

54:15

a founder or was like explaining

54:17

something , et cetera , and then you

54:19

check the name and you look that that person

54:21

is real , that they are actually

54:24

like writing good content or they are talking

54:26

about stuff , for example , even even if it's fashion , like

54:28

the guy can have like an Instagram

54:30

account where he shows like different

54:33

ways to wear , like shirts or whatever , eventually

54:37

you have trust because you know that

54:39

there is a real person behind it . And

54:42

I think in the world where everything can be automated

54:45

, everything can be like done from

54:47

a computer anywhere in the world . Having

54:50

this human touch is actually

54:52

like game changer and I think , like too

54:54

many people , especially in the software

54:56

world , believe that human

55:00

and people are like useless

55:02

and everything should be automated . For

55:04

us , it's something we're like tripling

55:07

down , like we have customer

55:09

support , for example . Like if you ask me what's one of

55:11

our differentiator , I would tell customer

55:13

support , because we serve exactly

55:16

the same way like the small customers to the

55:18

big one . We answer very quickly

55:20

, we have like a dedicated

55:22

team to help people being onboarded

55:25

, understand etc . And

55:28

that's not something you can copy because

55:30

it's part of human 100%

55:33

.

55:33

And you know , like Peter's , and that's

55:35

what people want as well , right , you know ?

55:37

go ahead . You mentioned Peter . Yeah , peter said you know he was saying

55:39

like competition is for losers , and

55:41

I really like that , and for me it doesn't mean

55:43

that you shouldn't compete , it's just like you

55:45

should focus on what makes you different

55:47

. And for me , the best way to be different

55:50

is to be unique . And to be unique you just got

55:52

to be yourself . You know like we

55:54

all have sometimes like different

55:57

combination . So , for example , yes

55:59

, I love software , but I

56:01

also love triathlon . I also

56:03

love like different things and

56:05

eventually you know like the moment

56:07

you start sharing the unique things that's

56:09

part of your life , the

56:12

broader the audience you get , or sometimes

56:14

you know people discover a new like facet

56:16

of your personality and they connect a

56:18

lot better . So for me , I think

56:20

like we shouldn't hide behind

56:22

who we are . We should like show

56:25

to the world . You know like how we can help people

56:27

and just be ourselves

56:29

. Because in the end , when we build a company

56:32

, you want to be like surrounded

56:34

with people who you get on well

56:36

. You want to help the people that you get

56:38

on well with . Like I don't want to help like

56:40

if a customer is a jerk , even if they want to

56:42

pay like a million dollars per year . We're

56:45

not going to work with them Like that's out

56:47

of the , out of the way , like directly . So

56:50

building a business is hard , don't make

56:52

it harder and find like shitty customers

56:54

Of course , and

56:56

that's always the case , right , it's like one , it's

56:58

80 , 20 .

56:59

It's like one bad apple can infect entire place

57:02

. It can affect your culture too , right ? I've even observed it on myself

57:04

, Just like guys being down

57:06

as a result of like negative feedback

57:08

or just I would just say like disrespectful

57:11

you know , disrespectful feedback . You

57:13

mentioned a really good point about the human

57:16

to human touch and it's something that I'm massive

57:18

on . I have loads of questions for you off that , on

57:21

the human to human side , even thinking about

57:23

like AI and tech and moving forward in

57:25

automation the way I'm positioning

57:27

like podcasting and is the art

57:29

of communication and I feel like the

57:31

art of conversation is like we're losing

57:34

that . It's like a lost form , right , of

57:36

how we converse to each other . So I'm basically trying to like bring

57:38

that back , and it's a philosophy in our business that , hey

57:41

, like you can automate everything , but you can automate

57:43

this , right , and that's what people are seeking

57:45

. People seek to keep the connection . Now

57:47

, when I use Lemlist , I know you started implementing

57:49

AI and AI writing and AI

57:52

systems . How do you think that's

57:54

? How's it going so far , and do you think that

57:56

will kind of mimic human touch to some degree ?

57:59

I think it's very difficult to predict

58:02

where AI is going to go . To

58:04

be honest , two years ago , everyone

58:06

was like , well , it's never going to replace

58:08

a human . Now we're like , oh

58:11

, I actually counter the difference

58:13

if it's been automated or if

58:15

someone actually spent an hour reading

58:17

all the posts that I've written . For

58:20

me , I think what's

58:23

the most important and why I love AI

58:25

is that it removes the

58:27

blank page Whenever

58:31

you're staring at a blank page and you don't

58:33

know where to start . For me , I

58:35

think AI will get better

58:38

over time . I don't know how much time it

58:40

will take , but it will get better Eventually

58:43

. I do feel that we

58:45

need to see it as a

58:47

human enhancer and not as

58:49

a human replacement , because

58:52

for me , it's like , whenever you have AI and

58:54

you start writing things , if

58:56

AI can help you make

58:59

it sharper , make it more

59:01

understandable , make it in a

59:04

better tone of voice from your audience , or

59:06

even better when

59:08

it comes to targeting . This is something we want to start

59:11

implementing . It's like smart campaigns

59:13

. For example , you're

59:15

going to tell me that your target

59:17

markets are executives

59:19

at tech companies in

59:22

the marketing department . That's

59:25

pretty specific , but

59:27

maybe you know what we're going to do is

59:30

start reaching out to a lot of execs

59:33

at working in marketing at

59:35

tech companies , then what we realize is that the

59:37

people we reply to you are actually the

59:39

one that have a marketing budget over

59:42

2 million , that have more

59:44

than 50 percent growth

59:47

on social media followers in

59:49

the last three years . That's

59:51

more and more criteria . By

59:53

understanding this , through AI , we can recreate

59:57

sub-campaigns automatically to

59:59

narrow down even more your

1:00:02

target audience . You don't have

1:00:04

actually to reach out to thousands

1:00:06

of people , but you can reach out to 100

1:00:09

and get 80 meeting booked , because

1:00:11

my goal down the line is to reduce as

1:00:14

much as possible like spam and wrong

1:00:17

targeting . The

1:00:20

vision of Lampire overall is like

1:00:22

you have a great idea and a service

1:00:25

. That's all the specific problem . There

1:00:27

are a lot of people having this problem

1:00:29

, but it's sometimes difficult to know where

1:00:31

they are , etc . Can

1:00:34

we be the connector from your great idea

1:00:36

and service these

1:00:39

people who have a problem ? I

1:00:41

think AI can really help

1:00:43

you do that .

1:00:47

That's super interesting , man . It's like taking

1:00:49

the extra data points that you would

1:00:52

forget yourself . I'll give an example

1:00:54

there of the social media growth . Now

1:00:57

I know LinkedIn sales navigator

1:00:59

tries to do something similar which is like oh , you've

1:01:01

posted recently or something , but there are

1:01:03

things that you wouldn't observe or you

1:01:05

wouldn't be able to articulate in LEMLIST

1:01:09

or in specific sales automation platforms . You

1:01:12

would need to go and do that work . Basically , that's

1:01:15

what currents into a lot of issues . It's basically

1:01:17

like a way to be more

1:01:19

specific , less about how

1:01:22

to replace how you write things

1:01:24

, maybe improve and enhance them , because even

1:01:26

if you get really good at GBV

1:01:28

, you can make your writing

1:01:30

better , but sometimes you can't . If

1:01:32

I just drew in a post , it would

1:01:34

compare it to a shitty novel , but

1:01:37

it wouldn't tailor it for LinkedIn . Does that make

1:01:39

sense ? It's like the

1:01:41

knowledge base that it's trained

1:01:43

on needs to know

1:01:46

how to be specific , basically , which

1:01:48

, as you said , it's going to take time . It's just going to be longer in

1:01:50

that process . Now question for you , off that

1:01:52

is I've asked a lot of people

1:01:54

that are kind of I wouldn't say spearheading

1:01:56

it , but are just definitely thinking ahead with

1:01:58

this stuff , with products and services . It's like how

1:02:01

do you make yourself AI-proof in

1:02:03

that instance ?

1:02:04

In what sense ?

1:02:07

Sales , marketing product . So

1:02:10

let's say you're coming in to build the

1:02:12

next couple of years and watered out

1:02:14

those kind of skills that you need to be

1:02:17

AI-proof . Now it's kind of different for a founder , but even

1:02:19

for employees , because

1:02:21

we've seen companies get

1:02:24

rid of copywriters , get rid of marketing executives

1:02:26

, get rid of designers , get rid of editors , to

1:02:28

go zero to one and to stay at one for

1:02:31

their current process .

1:02:32

basically , that's a good question

1:02:34

, I

1:02:36

think . The fine line is , I

1:02:40

think the way we create is going to evolve . We

1:02:43

went from creating from blank pages and

1:02:46

building up to being able to

1:02:48

have something that can

1:02:50

create for us and where

1:02:52

we can pick what the right way . But here's

1:02:56

the thing If

1:02:58

ChatGPT writes you like 50 hooks

1:03:00

because it

1:03:02

can write 50 hooks or 100 , how

1:03:06

do you pick the hooks for your social

1:03:08

media posts ? For

1:03:11

me , I think this is how you are AI-proof . The

1:03:14

AI-proof means you still

1:03:16

need to be skilled and knowledgeable about

1:03:18

a specific topic if you want to be

1:03:20

good with AI . I think people

1:03:23

who are average will always be

1:03:25

average with AI , because they're not

1:03:27

going to be . I've seen

1:03:29

people create content with AI . I've seen people

1:03:31

using pre-written prompt

1:03:33

etc . Eventually , what they do is

1:03:36

that they create something that's

1:03:38

average because the input

1:03:40

, which is their knowledge and

1:03:43

how they see things , is average

1:03:45

. For

1:03:47

me , what you need to

1:03:50

be AI-proof is to be extremely

1:03:52

good at noticing what

1:03:55

good looks like . What I've

1:03:57

noticed is that it's very tough for people to

1:03:59

notice , because to notice you need experience

1:04:01

. Experience is something you can't

1:04:03

buy . If you want to know what

1:04:06

hooks will work best in your next

1:04:08

social media post you need to have

1:04:10

posted at least 100 times .

1:04:12

If you're familiar with Dakota Robertson . He describes

1:04:14

it as you need to be the orchestrator

1:04:16

. If you're at a play , there's

1:04:19

a guy at the front who's running the entire

1:04:21

show , but he doesn't play every

1:04:23

instrument . He's the orchestrator

1:04:25

. He pieces it together . The beauty of

1:04:27

that is that when you are a good writer , you

1:04:30

can make your writing better , but if you don't know

1:04:32

what good writing is , you're fucked . That's

1:04:34

the same with Dalai , the new tool . We

1:04:38

do a lot of design work let's put it that way a lot . We

1:04:41

started using Dalai to do thumbnails

1:04:44

. We would

1:04:47

see some of them being really good , really bad , but

1:04:49

we can decipher between which is good

1:04:51

and which is bad and then give it to designers

1:04:53

to make it one bit better . Does

1:04:55

that make sense ? Our click-tru rate is actually a

1:04:57

lot higher because we eliminated

1:04:59

24 hours of concept design

1:05:02

. Basically , like air says , that's

1:05:04

basically what you're doing every single time over . We're

1:05:07

able to get up to 90% . The

1:05:09

other 10% is just branding , colors

1:05:11

, schemes , a few small changes

1:05:13

, because that's what we're trying to get to . Initially

1:05:16

, when we looked at it , it was like this will never make

1:05:18

sense . I think we did it for a three-week

1:05:21

straight and now the model is familiar

1:05:23

with our process . There we

1:05:25

have it . It's done . Now we still have the designer

1:05:27

, because we're still going to need the designer , right , but it's

1:05:29

just a small extra bit .

1:05:30

Yeah , I agree . I agree 100% . I

1:05:33

think it's all about knowing

1:05:36

what good looks like eventually , like picking up

1:05:38

the right and being the orchestrator

1:05:40

. I love that image .

1:05:43

It's a nice little analogy . I

1:05:45

want to finish up with some of your influences . Who

1:05:47

can influence you ? I know you mentioned Justin

1:05:50

Welch , who is writing through your content , which

1:05:53

has been really cool . He's been on my show a few times . He's

1:05:55

a great guy . He's unbelievable

1:05:57

for young people coming through . But some of your

1:05:59

influences in product

1:06:02

, even in content , because you do

1:06:04

, again , many different stuff , right .

1:06:05

Yeah , I like the approach

1:06:07

of Jason Fritt from Basecamp

1:06:10

. I think he's

1:06:12

really smart in the way you approach things . Yeah

1:06:16

, I think his way of thinking is

1:06:18

pretty unique . I love

1:06:20

Navau also Navarravikanth . For

1:06:23

me , he's one of the smartest

1:06:25

guys alive . As a

1:06:27

philosopher and business guy , I

1:06:31

think it's quite nice . When

1:06:34

it comes to SaaS

1:06:36

in general , I also like Jason

1:06:38

Lemkin . I think he has

1:06:40

really good knowledge and has been in the SaaS

1:06:43

space for a long time . Kyle

1:06:46

Porter , also from OpenView . Elena

1:06:49

, who was VP

1:06:52

Gross at Dropbox I forget her last

1:06:54

name , but she's also publishing

1:06:56

really in-depth content

1:06:59

. I think there is something like a newsletter

1:07:01

called Sakura also , which

1:07:05

is really good when it comes to insights

1:07:08

about industries et cetera , et cetera . To

1:07:11

be honest , I follow

1:07:13

a few people and I love to read articles

1:07:16

and blog posts . When

1:07:19

it comes to also the journey in

1:07:21

itself , the

1:07:24

delivering happiness from the founder

1:07:26

of Zapo , I think it was really nice . I

1:07:29

really love these entrepreneurial

1:07:32

stories with the ups and downs when

1:07:35

it comes to why you should bootstrap and

1:07:37

be owner of your company . I think Renfischkin

1:07:41

is also a really good one . Renfischkin

1:07:43

was the founder of Moz , which

1:07:47

was like an SEO platform . He

1:07:49

wrote a book that's called

1:07:52

I

1:07:55

forgot . I don't know why I forgot the name

1:07:57

. Let

1:07:59

me double check Lost

1:08:06

and Founder . Lost and Founder

1:08:08

is a really good book because it goes through

1:08:10

in full transparency with

1:08:13

how you went from raising funds

1:08:15

, getting an offer from HubSpot

1:08:17

to be acquired , having investors

1:08:20

saying that it was not the right offer to

1:08:23

the company , starting Plateau and declining

1:08:25

because of the market

1:08:27

in which he was , to him getting

1:08:29

fired of his own company

1:08:31

. It's just crazy

1:08:34

. I think we don't realize . We

1:08:38

see in a lot of press articles

1:08:40

tech crunch how

1:08:43

we're always raising the most amount

1:08:45

of money , especially in 2020

1:08:47

, 2021, . Capital was

1:08:49

so easily accessible , money was

1:08:51

free , everyone would raise

1:08:53

, everyone would do these crazy rounds . What

1:08:56

people don't talk about is the

1:08:58

rounds and the valuation are

1:09:01

just the tip of the

1:09:03

iceberg . What matters is the

1:09:06

terms . If you have people

1:09:08

that can fire you , if you have people that

1:09:10

have all the voting rights , if you're just

1:09:12

a CEO but you

1:09:14

can't decide exactly what you're going to do and

1:09:16

every single decision must be approved by the board

1:09:19

, it's not your company anymore

1:09:21

. It becomes something very different

1:09:23

. I think this

1:09:25

is the hardest part . Another

1:09:28

good book , inspiring on my

1:09:31

journey .

1:09:33

Man , I'd love to record an entire

1:09:35

podcast around your thoughts on

1:09:37

VCs and valuations . I'm

1:09:40

very much in a similar position . When

1:09:42

I was leaving the trading world , I

1:09:45

was told I was holding my hand

1:09:47

on my hand . I was in Singapore . I was told that with

1:09:49

a slide deck , I could get access to just any

1:09:51

funds . I was like that's a fucking red

1:09:53

flag . That was in 2021

1:09:56

, 2022 . They

1:09:58

were like you want to build a trading product ? They were

1:10:00

like we can get you a call . I

1:10:03

was like I had

1:10:05

a product background but

1:10:07

not engineering background . That

1:10:10

was the challenge . Right , how the fuck do you

1:10:12

build a global product with zero

1:10:14

money and zero engineering experience ? That's

1:10:16

what made it funny . I love that lesson

1:10:18

from you . There's lots of them . Next

1:10:20

podcast I do really want to go down that route

1:10:23

and there's obviously a thousand different ways . I think the

1:10:25

next one will be in Bali or Cape Town

1:10:27

.

1:10:27

I like that .

1:10:28

I like that .