From $0 to $1,000,000 in 3 Months Selling on TikTok Shop

Believe it or not, you probably will believe it, but this morning I woke up, walked out of my bedroom, looked on my counter, and this was actually on my counter from my girlfriend: Evil Goods, baby! So she shops on TikTok 100%. I thought that was the most crazy synchronicity from the universe, considering we had this podcast planned. I never mentioned it to her; she has no idea who you are. It was holy [__]. So I asked her how she found that, and she said it's a really trendy product; it's proven to be like the

best face care, beating all the other face care routines. She saw it on social media, looked at the comments, and that's what everybody recommended. It's pretty crazy that I have one of the founders. Let's put it like this: the fastest way to create more generational internet wealth in today's world is that there's a window here where TikTok equates to your first-time buyers, Amazon equals your repeat buyers, and private equity will pay you 20x for however many repeat buyers you have. That formula, in a nutshell, is creating enterprise value with CPG brands—I mean physical product brands.

It's a level that I just haven't seen ever, you know, since I've been on the internet. We launched that three months ago, and in month three, we did a million dollars in very profitable revenue. When you do a million bucks in month three, you're pouring it all back into inventory and whatnot, but we're talking 30-40% margin on a company that is brand new. That's the virality of TikTok, its short-form discovery. It's sad that many people are not aware of this because everyone on the internet is like, “This is how you make money; follow me to

make money.” We're going to look back at this window as if, “Oh, this is Amazon FBA again in 2024.” I started Amazon in 2013, back before anyone was talking about it. You could really blow [__] up with very little money. So, you mentioned two things: you have to get eyeballs, and you have to get repeat buyers. I think a lot of people overlook the repeat buyers, but let's start with eyeballs. This is not something that you started with a big audience or pushed through YouTube or a personal brand or whatever; this is something that you

started organically, and then you just went out and did the hard work. It seems TikTok Shop has made it quite easy. Could you give me a high level of what your initial marketing plan was when you launched that 90 days ago, and how did you action it? We have a playbook with TikTok; you don't need to spend money on ads. The algorithm is discovery-based. People think of social media like Instagram or YouTube as building your follower count or subscriber count. On TikTok, they don't care if you have 200,000 followers. If you don’t post for a

while, the account’s basically dead. You can have a brand new account on TikTok, post a video, and get 10 million views—that happens all the time. So our strategy is really manipulating that. This actually started on one of your original interviews with Oliver Broca about Tabs Chocolate. He was kind of the pioneer of the strategy when he said, “Hold on, I can get 20 kids to make Tabs Chocolate accounts.” It doesn't matter if it’s leading to any specific brand page; these kids are just going to post a piece of content optimized for TikTok and sales every

single day. If 20 of them make a video and two of them go viral, this pays for itself a million times over. In a nutshell, that is our strategy. We have 40-50 different creators that are educated on the brand; we give them a brief, they know how to make content that works in the algorithm, and we set them loose. That's the basis of our playbook. I still have a whole Amazon background, where what happens if you're going viral on TikTok? You're selling in retail, you're selling on Amazon, people are coming to your website, they're Googling

you. TikTok is changing the world in terms of discovery; that is where people are now going to find new ideas. It's not just physical products. When we go to a restaurant in a different city, my wife looks up TikTok. She wants to see it, and that's how they operate in Asia. That's what's happening here, and we're just fortunate to be at the forefront of it on the brand side. Interesting. Okay, so I guess, is it cool if we go through why you chose this product? Because I had never heard the word "beef tallow" before; it

sounds like such a strange word and a concept foreign to me. So why did you choose the product that you chose in the first place? That was all my partner Jake. He's very interested in holistic wellness, and kind of Jake Tran—he makes videos on what scams are and got kind of down the rabbit hole of how bad skincare stuff is. It turns out just natural beef tallow is a really good hydrating, repairing alternative. Was kind of his Genesis. Now, there are two ways to think about it: like, if we're talking about launching a brand from

scratch and what products to go after and what ideas to build with, you can find something that has some viral tailwinds. Or, in my opinion, with this era, you can popularize near anything from scratch. That sounds like outlandish, especially in the dropshipping world, right? You're supposed to match demand to what's there. But if you think about it, so many ideas have blown up because they purely have enough reach. Even political ideas—if you say something enough, it eventually becomes true. You've seen brands over the years buy that same concept, right? You pay enough celebrities—Kim Kardashian eats

the weight loss gummies—and all of a sudden, those work. It costs the brand $34 million, but because it was seen by so many people, it becomes truth. What happened with TikTok? If you're finding a way to go viral with something like beef tallow—because we were kind of the first to pop off—it was starting to trend up on Amazon, but we probably have gotten 100-plus million views in the last 30 days on TikTok, really just by knowing that algorithm. So, we've kind of taken it to a whole other level of, like, what's true. That’s where the

dropshippers go, “Oh, this beef tallow thing is really interesting.” Because of the ability to get so many eyeballs with not a lot of dollars—that’s the magic. If I had $10 million, I could accomplish the same thing by just running Meta unprofitably over and over and banking on retention. But we're profitable on the front end, so we can reinvest and get more views and shape our own narrative. Does that make sense? Yeah, it makes total sense. So you didn't—so Jake just happened to have been in the space and kind of figured this out through making content

and discovered it silently? Or did you see—that, like you said, it was trending up on Amazon first? Is that like your proof of concept? Or like, what made you—'cause your experience, you've sold a supplement company for $30-plus million in your early 20s. So what made you want to get involved in that, basically? Well, so my whole thing right now is I want to invest in good ideas and good brands. I'm building a couple from scratch, and I realized it's so much better when you have an experienced operator who does a lot of the legwork, and

I can write a check and bring our TikTok system. So the whole story with Jake—you know, I mean, he's a ferocious entrepreneur. He launched a new channel, Evil Food Supply, and, you know, he's a YouTube whiz. He realizes the CPMs are not profitable like business, so he goes, “What can I do to maximize the value of this channel, Rob? I think it's a good idea to do a product.” I'm talking about all the stuff wrong in the CPG world, and so, you know, he jumps in the Million Dollar Brand Club, kind of all my framework,

goes through the Amazon stuff. He's real—like, he's one of those super autist genius guys who'll pour in and deep dive. That's where he kind of decided, “Hey, you know, in this health space, beef tallow is trending up. It looks like it might be at the forefront of a good run. I think I should do this.” So, he gets to work developing it, and then we didn't partner till he was damn near ready to launch; like, we didn't officially invest. I was kind of proofing his stuff and going over all of it, but that's kind of

where it came to be. Okay, cool. So, once you have this product, you invested. Is your main goal to market it to find like 40 TikTok creators? Is this kind of your specialty? Yeah, yeah. We've been really fortunate. Oliver's roommate, his name is Jimmy Farley; he's my business partner on all of this stuff. Ah, okay, I see, I see. So that's kind of where this all comes from. I'm the old guy; I'm still the Amazon vet, and I know this world, but when it comes to TikTok-native stuff, it is that generation. Jimmy's 22; he lived

with Oliver. He was running like the agency side of their business while Oliver was building the brand. Right after you did that interview, I went to Arizona and did one with Oliver. Jimmy got dinner with me. He's like, “I could run this for you,” and I go, “Oh, okay, all right, that's a good idea." Mhm. So, he had like 10 creators, and you know, he charges me nothing. He's a young kid, probably making $10,000 to $15,000 a month at the time, and he's like, “Just give me a shot.” I'm like, “Yeah, like whatever, you know,”

and he makes it this big thing. I'm like, “No, literally, but it's like $10,000; just give it a shot.” You know, and long story short, he puts everything into this, and it doesn't go well for like a month. Then, like five, six weeks in, creators start going viral, and my coffee brand, Top Shelf, the next supplement brand I have, goes from like $150,000 a month to like $800,000 in, you know, two months. Wow. And this thing just goes explosive, and then he sits back. He goes, "Hold on, to scale this, I need more creators. There's

only like 10 or 15 creators." So, he ends up launching a program called Creators Corner, which is, you know, I'm partnered with that; it's all kind of one big family where he now trains creators to make content for brands and obviously get paid commissions. It's a life-changing thing, and so that's our, I guess, flywheel, or like kind of our secret sauce. We have the brand side, and then we have the top creator talent that comes from Jimmy. Then, what do you think is the pay structure for those creators if they're working with the brand? A

flat monthly rate, or no? So now, with TikTok Shop, they usually get some sort of retainer, but then they get huge commissions too. I've had kids—like when we launched our cologne, Love Bombed, I had one creator make like $110,000 in a month. He was a waiter three months ago. Just to see kind of the... that’s what I said. When you talk about this "make money online" stuff, it’s like it used to be a win if someone started their copywriting course and made like three grand—you know, like replaced their income. Now we genuinely have, you know,

brand owners creating millions of dollars in enterprise value, and we have, you know, young creators who are great kids dabbling—like finding themselves in this internet money world—making... I mean, we have probably seven or eight kids that have made six figures in a month. I've had two people also DM me from that podcast, and they just implemented the same system, and they're all eight-figure brands at this point. That’s such a big number; that's not like a little... no, the cat's out of the bag. This is the thing now. If I could go back and, I shouldn't

say anything crazy, but you know, if I could go back and cancel your guys' podcast and keep all of this internally, we would probably be a lot closer to a billion—like actually a billion—than we are. Because now, like, all the—you know, I'm tapped into this world. I got friends at Physicians Choice; you know, multiple nine-figure brands—they're all in, they're spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on this. What it's done is it's just that natural competitive cycle. Back when I started on Amazon, it was easy because no one was doing it. Ads were cheap, you know,

the ability to rank was cheap, and then all of a sudden more people pour in. It doesn't go away; it just gets incrementally harder. So, we're at the beginning stages of that with TikTok. It's still mind-blowing to me. You said it yourself; like, people on YouTube aren't searching TikTok Shop. It's still not in everyone's face, but the money being made is stupid. You just mentioned that you had like four different brands like this, like just now; it's a repeatable process to you. And so I would love to understand how, like these—I never—as someone who's in

this online world, I kind of understand the marketing system, but like you have the idea. How are you choosing, how are you like literally... because you talked about repeatability, and for that, like the most important thing is like what the product is and that it's actually a good product. So, what are you actually looking for, like very tangibly, in the products you would go all in on? And then how are you actually making sure it's a good product, and how are you even getting it manufactured? Yeah, absolutely. So let's do a case study: Hiber Tape.

This is a student of mine that I also invested in; it’s mouth tape. And it's one of those products that, you know, month one he did six figures. It's very cheap to start; he started that business with a couple grand, and it should be a million-dollar brand within 12 months. When you're finding the right idea to sell or the right product, you're looking at things like there's a software called Helium 10, which pulls together all of the Amazon data. You can look at something called Magnet, which basically filters a lot—probably like YouTube—it filters how many

people are searching for that versus how many products are actually being sold, okay? So, you use something like that, and then you're starting to see what's going on. Then you can use something like—but I like to triangulate. I don't just like to have one data point. So then we can take something like Exploding Topics, which gathers all these different internet data points. Gotcha. And will tell you ideas that are trending up? So, Exploding Topics is showing like search terms on the internet—like actual popular trending terms in industries, basically. And then Helium 10 is like showing

you what's—Helium 10 is showing you all of the actual Amazon search data. Search data; it's like supply and demand, exactly. And then what’s Magnet doing? Or is that the same thing? That’s the specific tool within Helium 10. Gotcha. So, the Magnet tool in Helium 10 is showing you how much supply, how much demand basically. And the more demand, less supply—that's an opportunity. Exactly; they filter the magnet score, is that? And then Exploding Topics is like the meta trends of what people are looking for. Actually interested in right now, and you're comparing that? Ah, that's really

cool! So then, that's how you then keep going. Sorry, thank you. Yeah, and so, I mean, those are two really good ones. You can also start—TikTok has like Cido Data, which is a new software there that is showing what's selling on TikTok. And so, same deal: if you take those three points and just do your homework, and kind of like what is actually out there, what are the opportunities, what are the pain points—because what's happening now with TikTok Shop is you have a lot of stuff going viral with a lot of really shoddy products. And

so you could see, like, okay, there are four mouth tape brands on here doing well, but the reviews are horrible. What's wrong with the reviews? Right? And then, that's where all of a sudden your opportunity lies. So, okay, so then you'll look on TikTok and see what is actually getting the views. I know Oliver's strategy was to find an intrinsically viral product, so he chose like a controversial sex chocolate. But mouth tape isn't as controversial, but you know there's a lot of interest there. And so then, within the market, where we have proven interest, you're

looking for better reviews to find a product differentiating factor, and then going all in on making that the core message of your product based on the pain points people are having with other products. Exactly, is that correct? Exactly. Okay, so that's how you're finding the product idea. Yep. Then how do you make sure it actually... like how are you going about getting it manufactured? I think drop shipping, people lean towards it because it's just like already there. You have a product, whatever, now you just need to sell it. Yeah, but to really ensure that you're

going to have enough supply and the product is actually quality and good, how do you do that? So, one fundamental thing: the 3% rule, Virgil Abloh. You need to make something 3% better to inherently add some sort of value, and I drove that home all day. So the mouth tape brand my student is looking at is Hostage Tape, which is like the million-pound, or the $20 million brand in that space. And he's going, how can I improve on this? So obviously branding is one, and he just had the idea to make scented versions of it.

And so he goes out and finds the same supplier, you know, through Alibaba and some of those other tools where you're just finding other people's manufacturers. Import Yeti is another one where you can see other brands' manufacturers. Often, we’ll do stuff like that, especially when it's overseas. That’s probably the best way to do it if there's a brand you like. So, you can just find a brand, you can use a tool called Import Yeti, and literally find who's making it. Oh, so then you literally have to reach out to them and explain what you're looking

for? Exactly. And so he reaches out to them, and he's like, "Hey, can you do this, you know, with a lavender scent?" And that's when the dialogue kind of opens up. There's some back and forth, you get your samples, they ship them over, and it's not always like that quick and easy—sometimes you’ve got to go through different manufacturers. But he found a great one, and those guys shipped over, you know, the first order. Or, excuse me, we got to get to actual branding, but his samples are great. Like, all of a sudden, he's got a

lavender mouth tape. Then the branding component is especially important in TikTok. And believe it or not, though we've had so much success with AI—like in getting the actual framework down—when I used to start creating brands in 2013 with Amazon, it was all designer. It was like hosting contests; it was all these really kind of pain-in-the-ass methods. And now all of a sudden, you learn these prompts, right? And we have, you know, like a huge framework for putting that together. You can get the basis of your brand dialed with two graphic design—you mean, like for the

brand? So you're literally just using, like DALL-E 2 and prompts, to come up with like what's on the label? And Midjourney? Yeah, really, and then you take it to a designer. 'Cause it can't—like not to get all your legal stuff on there, but like Evil Goods was like—that woman on the sea—that is an AI-generated image! Like actually, and this is a million-dollar brand in month three. That is insane! No, I mean, it's getting easier than ever. And I hate saying that because obviously there’s a lot of work that goes into being successful in anything. But

the fact you can generate stuff like that in a couple of months with artificial intelligence, it’s mind-blowing to me. To be fair, when you were back 5-10 years ago, if you wanted a graphic design mockup, you'd find a human being and explain with words, and then they had to go through iterations. And it was probably not even... yeah! So, it’s a lot of—so that actually is like a huge time-saver, and that's just like the concept. And now you can get it perfected by a pro, but it's all there. That's really cool, actually! And so then,

they just have like a standardized format or like size, like 20 by 4? Exactly. The manufacturer is typically like on the mouth tape. It's like, "Hey, it's..." Coming in this type of jar here, it’s called a die line. They give you the die line; the die line gets filled out by the designer. Gotcha! Wow, that’s cool! I can’t believe you can just literally find manufacturers from other products, and then it’s just like already there, and you kind of make it a little different. Yeah, cool. Okay, so then was there anything specific with branding that you

have a little bit of sauce on? Is there like—do you have an eye for it? What is your... like, I’m so passionate about branding; it’s not even funny. I think in today’s world, like to Oliver’s point, finding a viral product is important, or can be, but having viral branding solves that too. When you see it and it’s disruptive and it’s loud and it doesn’t look like everything else, it is just inherently—the visual hook! You know, it’s inherently more likely to get people to stop scrolling. So, kind of thinking through that framework, I encourage people to

be aggressive. I encourage people to be loud. I encourage people to draw from different industries. Like, if everyone’s making the same beef towel that looks all natural and foo-foo, like, go to the '70s and draw Marilyn Monroe screaming! And don’t be—seriously, don’t be afraid to push that. Because what’s happening is the world is shifting, and you just need to play by the rules of the new world. There’s a potential scenario where websites are slowly becoming obsolete and people are buying—which is an egregious statement—but people are going to be buying live, and they’re going to be

buying visual. So, with that in mind, what do you want to be? You want to be the loudest brand! And we’re just—we're leaning into that hardcore. There’s always like a counterculture, always. And so how can you predict what—not even counterculture, but more just like—the table turns all the time, constantly. So what is it? The pendulum swings. Yeah, cool. I would say Evil Goods is like—you would not expect a skincare brand to be called Evil Goods! No, it’s like contradicting! Almost like Liquid Death or something, like it’s making something very normal and good for you sound

intense. Yeah, the thought process is good there. And then you did Genius, right? I had bought some of your products before, dead ass! Was that—did you do that just because it was like optimizing the thought process for productivity for entrepreneurs? Or was Genius just the association, or why did you choose that? Yeah, in that phase of my life, I always made products for me. Like, I wanted to build—a passion for me—I’ve wanted to build a lifestyle that I want to live every day. And so Genius was just me finding the best version of myself. And

as I got more into work, it was nootropics; it was how can I maximize productivity? And believe it or not, that trademark just wasn’t taken! Like, I was like, there’s gotta be... what? A supplement smarter? I was going through names—no chatty! You know, I’m sure they would have given me Genius, but the Genius brand was untaken. I was like, what a great name! So you had to trademark it? Like, you do that first thing usually? Yeah, well, you at least want to. Yeah, you almost always want to trademark something. What do you have to do

to trademark? Is it hard? No, it’s very easy! It’s like, you can—there are sites online that’ll do it for you for a couple hundred bucks. Is it fast? Usually, the application process is fast, and then it depends for like two or three months. So you have to wait to launch until that goes through? No! As I say, as long as you’ve checked that there’s no one else with your exact name— you know, a quick Google—you’ll be the first one to have it, yeah, as long as you apply, you’re good. Yeah, okay, cool! That’s so interesting.

Okay, so you’re really just trying to make something really pop—it’s not obvious and stands out. I’m sure there’s like... too subjective to really get into it. So once you have the branding down, is there like a— I know I think the least sexy thing about physical products is the margins in most people’s minds. So, it’s like, do you have like a—like how would I choose to price something? That’s a good question! I always—I’m like a big premium product guy, for sure. And I think you need to make—also, I say come up with the product first,

and then set the pricing. Yeah, and I always want you to make like two and a half times your cost of goods—like minimum. Like, that is a range that you can survive ads; you can run a profitable, scalable business. And it’s not a percentage, because with something like cookies, 60% net profit versus a $100 test booster— the dollar amount is dramatically less on cookies. And so, think about like when you’re running ads—the CPC, you know, four or five bucks on a $12 product versus a $100 product is going to destroy all of your margins. And

I learned that the hard way; I have a failed cookie company, you know. Gotcha! What’s a test booster? Um, like a supplement, you know, that supports testosterone—that type of thing. And so, yeah, I say, two and a half times. Times your cost of goods. But on that note, it's like if you're making the product good—and this was my eye-opening moment in the supplement world—I come in and there are all these products being sold for like really cheap. One of the first eye-opening moments was a fat burner product I wanted to put together. I go to

this pharmacist, I'm like, "Hey man, we got to make the best thing that actually works. Nothing crazy, but like that actually supports weight loss; put everything into it." He gives me back the quote of what the product costs to make, and my cost of goods is more than what all of the top brands are selling for. I go, "Huh! No wonder people say this industry is a scam. No wonder people say these products don't work." So rather than shut it down, I said, "Well, surely there's a narrative here, and there's a need for this clearly.

So why don't we just price the product where it needs to be priced, come out with it anyway, and then let the market decide?" That was really the entire thesis behind Genius, and it's my philosophy to this day. I would rather see people innovate and make things better for retention and repeat buyers so they have a sustainable business instead of trying to be like everybody else. So, you think that people who are doing this just wanted to save as much money as possible? From their perspective, when you're marketing something for the first time, there's really

no way to tell how good the product is. It's all about the marketing, and so they choose the cheapest, quickest option. Yes, they get rewarded for that at the beginning, but then over the long term, they fail. Yeah, and so you're really focused on like the actual brand building and the repeat buying, but they have to have that good experience. So how have you been able to—have you just been able to out-market those people regardless? That's been the beauty of direct-to-consumer and TikTok and Amazon, right? I wouldn't have been able to do that when it

was like supplements used to be the good old boys' club, and it was like GNC and your distributors. It was a very set way of doing business. That's when I got started; I kind of wandered into that world right as Amazon came, and all those guys were not quick to adapt. I had the luxury of being able to do whatever I wanted and go direct-to-consumer, and honestly, end up making more net from some of it because I didn't have to play by those rules anymore. Interesting, and you look at things—and that's just true across the

board. You look at Tabs. It's a good example: one Tab is not a good product. I mean, it's a $30 sex trick, and all of them would probably say that, right? It's gimmicky. Yeah, it's gimmicky, and it's one that went crazy viral, and they made a ton of money. But is the retention there? Will that business still be around? Probably not, right? Just because of that. If they don't iterate or make things better, then that's how I think about it. I think longer game; you make less money in the short term, but that's what ultimately—like

we play this to win-win, and that's how you have to think about it. Interesting. So you're really open about numbers. I remember watching this Instagram carousel of this product, and you were literally talking about how much it cost, what your margin was, and everything. Could you break that down so I at least know the lingo and the verbiage? Oh, that one? Off the top, can I pull up the carousel? I would love to go through that whole carousel in this podcast because there's so much there. I mean, that's been one of my things on social;

I want to be like, no one's really putting it out there. Some of these I got to be careful; you know, I have a partner in that business obviously, and at a certain point, we'll stop talking publicly. But it's been such a cool success story in the beginning. Quickly, like, relatively it was this thread, right? The 25...uh-huh, yep, so this one was doing $25k a day, three months old, found a winning product, selling it for $50. Yeah, so each unit is about six bucks. It might be a little bit more, like $6.30, something like that.

I try to keep clean numbers for sure—the tweets—keep it simple. But it retails for $50, we're doing around 500 units a day. Amazon takes their $12.40, and like gross profit every day is close to $15,000 to $20,000. So you're selling—so it's $6 to make them, you charge $50 for it, you're selling 500 a day, so that's $25,000 a day...and then Amazon takes 15%, so that's, what do you say, $12? So basically you're all in $20. Are you running ads on Amazon? PC? Yes, that's gross profit, and we spend money on those creators. That is not

net profit; that's gross profit. And so that was that one example on Amazon. Mhm. Is TikTok Shop and Amazon partnered, or are these people seeing the brand on TikTok organically and then just going to Amazon to search it? It's kind of paired that for now. We just... Launched this on TikTok Shop, and TikTok Shop itself has like no— they're taking 8% right now. Like, the numbers on TikTok are better, but you give a bigger commission. We just decided to use our creator system and focus all on Amazon to kind of start this off. But this

could go nuclear in our TikTok Shop too, so I'm curious about what's like the nurturing sequence to make sure they get to Amazon or noted to go to Amazon. Obviously, that's pretty obvious, I'm sure; like a lot of things now. But is there— like, I know Oliv had the reply to comments, where like if you had one creator go viral, then like reply to the comment, like it was kind of like a strategic retargeting video to send. We don't do a lot of that; honestly, it's been just such discovery-based, and that's where it's found right

now. There's a link in the bio to Amazon, but it's been far from perfect. But when you're talking 10 million views on a video, like, yeah. So are there really any other costs? It's $6 for the product; Amazon's 15% fee—are there any other like set costs other than paying the creators? No, not set. We run ads on Amazon and stuff; we spend money a lot of places. What are Amazon ads? How does that work? Uh, it's almost all, you know, cost per click based on keyword. So if they type in like "beef tallow," you would

just be the first— that'd be $4, right? $4. And the goal—like, where you make your money on Amazon is not ads; like, you'll hopefully break even on that or lose some money. Your end goal is to be the organic number one product for beef tallow. So if you pay for the ads, you'll get purchases, good reviews. Over like two months, you'll be able to basically buy your first purchases, which could ideally lead to five-star reviews, which would then help you rank the highest. Exactly, and there's a—it's a complex algorithm. One of the things right now

that Amazon changed over the last two years: they love external traffic. So if your people are searching "Evil Goods beef tallow," that is direct— they love it; they will reward that all day. So if people are specifically Googling the brand name "beef tallow" and then clicking on yours, that's like a signal to them that you're the authority off-platform. Exactly! And they reward that. It's just like—it's like YouTube, where you know the recommendation engine. Yeah, you go viral, you go viral on Amazon—like, you are the suggested product next. Like, someone bought snail moisturizer, and then they're

shown Evil Goods. And when that pops, that's why I said Amazon brings you all your repeat buyers. TikTok is your discovery, and then Amazon is your sustainability in like 100 million-plus Prime shoppers. Yep, there's like a click-through rate; the first purchase is kind of like the high AOV—average order value—durations, repeat buys—yeah, it's all the same. We are in the algorithmic world. Okay, so then you have the product, you have the price, you've got good branding, you trademarked it, you're on Amazon, then you're going to run Amazon ads to really beef up the first initial sales

to really see if people are buying, to really like test if the product's good, and to hopefully like build up some reputation on the platform. Then, simultaneously, you're going to TikTok, and you're just partnering with, like, are these like women creators? And it's just like they're all over the place, but they're like—it's like 16 to 25-year-old kids. Okay, so you're—how are you—I know Jimmy does yours, but like how do you guys objectively find these people? Is it like going on Twitter and typing in "UGC creator"? No, no, it's—there's only a couple people that like have

this real edge right now, and I would say 80% of them are coming from Creator Corner, which is his thing. So it's like, you guys—just to briefly summarize what that means—he basically runs ads teaching people how to be creators on TikTok and make money as a UGC creator. But he's like training them on like the best practices, and then you have a strategic partnership with him where he just supplies you exactly 50-plus creators. Does he manage that for you? When you think of businesses growing their sales beyond forecast—like, Mattel sure, you think about a product

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store, in their feed, and everywhere in between. Upgrade your business and get the same checkout Mattel uses. Sign up for your $1 per month trial period at shopify.com/wgmi—all lowercase. Go to shopify.com/wgmi to upgrade your selling today. shopify.com/wgmi. Uh, so he—he has—man, it's a pretty robust system. He's got managers, there's like a—in Creator Corner, which is in a Discord—that's his place. There's, you know, job postings, there's manager training, and basically that— What we do have a manager, and then the manager is kind of the one handling all of the hiring. So it's so interesting; this is

like in big corporate companies, where they have hundreds of course materials, like onboarding things. If you get hired, you have to go through two weeks of onboarding where you're just watching courses on how to do stuff. So it's almost like he's democratized that as an arm of your business, where he's just creating this recruitment engine—recruiting, training, and onboarding engine—and hands it off to all of your different teams. That's such a cool machine! It's been really cool because it's been one of those rare times where everyone's making a lot of money; everyone wins because he gets

paid for the courses and for the creators who are getting paid. We're selling a product, and they get guaranteed placement, which is basically college for a corporate job. I've seen a lot of people try to copy what Jimmy's doing—like teaching people how to be creators—and they're missing all those pieces. The education's not strong; the placement isn't guaranteed. It's been quite the experience. I've been very impressed with him. That's very interesting, though—it is like the modern-day version of going to college, getting a degree, and getting a corporate job. They'll help you do that. Like in college,

they help you make a LinkedIn profile and then help you get a job. Now it's just, "Create an ad on how to make money, teach them a method of making money, and then guarantee them the placement by partnering with people like you." Then you're just scaling a huge business. I'm trying to keep as many brands flowing in as possible because it keeps getting bigger. At first, it was just our three in-house brands, and we couldn't create brands fast enough. I don't want to run a million brands, so it's like, "Okay, million-dollar brand club, TikTok shop—how

can you guys get these out?" We have the creators, so it's been really—it's got to be great for deal flow for you. It's insane, like a huge private equity type or VC. It is, so we're trying to snag up as many as possible. Yeah, well, thanks for telling us! I actually do appreciate you sharing this because anyone who's actually serious about the game, this is like—I told you, that's my model. I want to be the creator that actually runs this [__] up in public and does it in a way that makes sense because social media

is so powerful, and a personal brand is so powerful. But not many people are thinking through the actual monetization component—like the actual, "What are you trying to sell?" Everyone's trying to sell a course and make their info-money, which again, that's piece one of three that actually matters. Yeah, and "core credits" are where I kind of saw Acquisition.com. I'm going, "Oh, okay. I see the equity component with it." Yes, yes, it's smart; that's how he gets deal flow. Private equity—what do they need? Deal flow. What do you need for deal flow? Entrepreneurs making like three to

four million a year, so you can help them scale. Well, how are they going to choose you? Well, if I just help them go from 300k to 3 million through free content, they'll come to me. Exactly. That's a content thesis—exactly. Super important. Very cool. Okay, so I’m curious. I don't know how much you would know about this if Jimmy's handling it, but I'm sure you're aware of—what are, like, if you had ten creators for a brand right now, and they're trained, let's say they already know the concept—what are the best practices or content styles that

you're having people make that are working for you? So honestly, it changes every two to three weeks. Where you really make a lot of money now, since it's getting a little more competitive, is when someone comes in and innovates something totally new. Again, I'm not the young kid in this world, but I do understand: you need disruption. So the hook—whatever that is—and then you need retention and repeat. And that’s pretty much it. That’s what Jimmy does well, and so do I. I encourage these kids to not just copy what's working because that happens too: you

get one viral video for your brand, and then they all pour on it, which is great; that's like rocket fuel. But when all of a sudden there's a brand new style—like six months ago, these kids figured out you could use 11 Labs with this voice atom, and you start with that hook and a visual of the product. It's this really deep voice with mid-journey, you know, wild images. It's like, "If you took this product for 21 days," and it was just so, so disruptive. They have pretty good—I'm sure Jimmy has the copywriting formula down, where

it's hook, disruptor—like getting them to stop the scroll. Then it's like they have the retention optimized. But I'm curious: the format you were saying involves an AI voice—like the 11 Labs AI voice generator, Journey images—and then you're just funneling a copywriting script and showing it over literal AI voices? Yeah, and the AI images are flashing up. And it really is. Could you just give me a little more description of what the copy is? It's like, if it's for the beef tallow one, are you just showing people with acne? Are you choosing UGC creators with acne

or something? Some of those work. One style that went crazy nuclear was slideshows. Slideshows aren't even video; it's just, you know, like before and after. Yeah, the SE or no, it would be like the seven products at Walmart that can help your skin, like a listicle. Planting yours as one of them means that would always be the last available now at Amazon, and you'd be shocked that some of those would get like— we've had slideshows get 15 million views. Is it pictures on Instagram? Yeah, on TikTok. So it's just a TikTok, but it's a video.

But it's just—no, no, that's one of the modes on TikTok. It's not all video; it's still pictures. On TikTok, you can do that now. Oh, I don't use TikTok. That's crazy. You're healthier for it! That's why it's like dangerous. No self-control over here. So they literally let you do just a carousel, basically, very much like Instagram. Interesting. And then is it—so your whole goal is to basically get 20 creators at the same time, just like a VC, spread out the risk, let creativity? Yeah, so you're giving them a flat basically $1,000 a month, $2,000 a

month, something like that? Is that the right range? Anywhere from literally like new ones can be $300 to we have some creators that are really good that you kind of got to give them some crazy deal because they know how much they're worth. Once they're doing something right, it could be anywhere from $300 to maybe $3,000 or even $5,000 if they're crazy good. And then they all get the affiliate link through TikTok shop directly, yes or no? So, two different ways to do it. Like Evil Goods, we started with an Amazon-only campaign. Top Shelf, my

main brand, we're all in on TikTok shop, and TikTok shop, they pay that commission directly. So for the Amazon-only ones, they’re just all paid monthly, pretty much. Then we'll do things like view bonuses; we try to set up affiliate links for certain ones because you can loosely track that. Do they have to post every single day? They're supposed to post. So they're supposed to post every day. That's Jimmy's job to stay on top of them. And then how do you know when to cut them if they're not performing? We give everyone a month, and then

if there’s not traction—because a lot of them are kids, right? So they'll miss days. You can tell. That's where the manager tier that Jimmy added has been really helpful. Would you expect to be profitable in the first month from one of these accounts? Absolutely, yeah. That's the magic of it. Would you say how many would be profitable in your first month if you had 10 creators? If you did 10 with 10 creators, I'd say maybe 50 to 60%. So you've literally got a 50/50 coin flip if this person's good enough? Yes, 20 to 30%. I’m

talking like 90%. How? Just because you have more swings at bat. Someone cracks it in the second, someone cracks it, and you share it. Exactly. That's interesting. So if someone cracks it, like you find you basically have 30 people, and you just need one person to find a really good winning format. Then as fast as possible, you take that and you put it into... do you have like a community of these people? Each brand has its own little Discord. It's a Discord, and just like all of them? Okay, so basically all of the creators then

get onboarded into a Discord. They're all making content, and then you're just monitoring it. You see one pop off, then Jimmy or whoever's managing it takes that and says, "Winning format, everybody copy this right now." And then when it rains, it pours! Exactly. Then you kind of run up that little micro-trend, and they do weekly calls. So you're managing and training all of them? Yeah. Are they like employees for the company? Type like contractors. So do you guys require full-time or anything, or just you have to be on this call, post this time? At this

point, too, it’s very— they don’t, because now the demand for it is so high and brands are paying more. It's much more like the brands are having to work hard to retain talent. Gotcha. And so is there like a little ecosystem of like—how can you message creators directly from TikTok? Yeah, it doesn't work well, so don't do it directly. Twitter is probably the best place to find them. What we did too, to kind of not democratize this, but like Creator Corner is $3,500, $4,000. So we have one called Your First Dollar as well, which kind

of runs through me, because I got a big audience and a lot of kids that want to make money online and don’t do anything. So Your First Dollar is $50 a month, and it’s... Like the intro level to all of this, but Million Dollar Brand Club Brands will post in there. It's like a micro version of it, and so somewhere like that's a good place to find creators. There's no, like, but you're trying to, like, not... yeah, you're trying to, like, create them in a way; like, you're trying to, like, attract them into an opportunity

and then create them, train them yourselves. So, you're really putting a lot of effort into making sure the quality control of even the creators is correct and they're trained. That's why your success rate is so high on Creator Corner in particular. Yeah, like, Jimmy turns away people if he doesn't think they're going to be good. F... yeah, interesting. So, if you're, like, lazy and you're just trying to hire one UGC creator—like “great, I'm doing this”—your odds are just not stacked in your favor. Correct? But, so cool, you have, like, all these little advantages. So, then

once you have the creators going, I'm curious: how, like, is this actual brand equity? Like, is this, like, repeatable since it's democratized across—not a personal brand, but, like, 30 just UGC creators? Once you have that down, like, is there another vertical you tackle or is that just, like, you try to scale to as many creators as possible? Because it seems like, at some point, you win TikTok if you're, like, at your scale—like, not if you're the number one product. So, yeah, everything has its moment is what we've noticed on TikTok too. So, it's not like,

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millions, NetSuite helps you respond to immediate challenges and seize your biggest opportunities. Speaking of opportunity, download the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning at netsuite.com/wgmi. This guide is free to you at netsuite.com/wgmi. Thank you for sponsoring today's episode. You know a product will go viral and then it will pull back—like people just get fatigued; they've seen it enough, the angles aren't working. It's like evil goods: like that million-dollar month, as epic as it was, we will pull back; I guarantee it. We'll need to come out with new products, and we'll need to keep the

community engaged. But my whole edge on just holistic business has been the Amazon component of it. Amazon is ungodly stable, so if you are the number one beef tallow organically on there, you can bank on 50,000 views a month with a 5% conversion, giving you however many sales that is, in a very consistent and planable manner. So, that's been kind of my whole edge, if you will, taking that Amazon piece, which is like old school now—which is crazy to say—and rewarding yourself with all the external traffic during the peaks on TikTok, while doing all that

well. So, they have a stable business, then you can keep tinkering with cracking the money machine. TikTok's the magic money machine; Amazon is the stability. Interesting! And so, it's kind of like the email list. Do you have email lists? Is that a thing? They're a joke. Yeah, they're a joke because you're not running to Shopify or anything—just straight to Amazon. Okay, cool. So, but have you tried to dabble? So, it's like you're trying to put all this—like, right when you're launching a brand, you're putting all this money into TikTok creators. One person cracks it; you

spread that message and then you're trying to hit this big month and win the market, have that one moment, and you stabilize on Amazon. Now you're organically ranking for that term, and so is that, like, kind of the strategy? It's like put everything into trying to rank number one for the term, and then once you're there, you're pretty solid. Obviously, you need to stay on your toes for another person, but that is the entire strategy. And Amazon has a thing called a honeymoon period. It's an algorithm, so they need data. When you introduce a new

product to Amazon, there's a 90-day window because they always have a 90-day lookback on how they want to reward you—reviews, your conversion, all of that. So, when you introduce something brand new, there's 90 days to basically tell Amazon this product's fantastic. And if you combine that with the TikTok spillover, that's why we didn't give people the option of buying on TikTok Shop with Evil Goods. We wanted to concentrate that Amazon boom to the point that we are number one; we are sticking; we are viral on Amazon. And when you hit that, then you have yourself

a permanent winner. Think of Amazon like digital real estate. All those search words are digital real estate. Yeah, and once you buy that, you're being paid every day. So, that's the true brand equity right there. So, would the creators—like, would you dial back on the creators after that hit or do you just keep them going? We thought a lot about this. It's new, right? Like Top Shelf, my first brand was kind of the... Pioneer, we had a product like this, and then down. It's some mix of keeping that community engaged and strong because creators will

go to new brands; they go where the money's at, right? They want to be paid. So how do you keep that community strong and kind of weaponized? And then how can you feed them new products? Because... and then how can you reignite the existing ones? Because they will come back—like evil goods can go like this, then down, and then give it two or three months, and you find a new angle, or something happens in the news, right? It can always be very, um, culture-based too. So there can be moments where it comes back interesting, and

if you can kind of run it like that, then you're going to capitalize on really maximum monetization. You'll find all the times when you can go viral. When you go viral, it's free money, while still running a stable, healthy business. But there are just those moments you need to be on, be shooting for. So you're saying keep the community of that Discord? The Discord, correct. But then what about, like, how would you introduce—if you said you were going to make new products, like a product line—how would you introduce that to existing buyers? Same, same, same

playbook, really. So even if it's a new line, it's like a related product, and the branding should be in their mind. Exactly. But you still have to get them through TikTok, the discovery machine. Exactly. But on Amazon, there are things you can do. Amazon has a lot of brand pages, and now they're even letting you email existing customers. Like, Amazon's pretty good for introducing... So you can email existing customers through Amazon? So you don't get their contact, but you can, like, end their back, and you can hit send email to your whole list or just

single customers? To people that have bought the—yeah, to people that bought the product. Yeah. And is there, like, a limit to that, or is it just... it's not super strong? And I don't—don't quote me off the top—but I'm pretty sure you can send, like, an email a day. So you're not running email marketing through that or anything? It's templated; you don't have a lot of creativity or anything like that. But you can contact everyone who bought your thing and introduce a new product. Do you think they should open that up? Like, if you had the

emails of the customers, would you even run it? No, they'll never open it up. They've made every effort to... you know what's on Amazon is Amazon. I guess that makes sense because then you're just going to try to siphon them off. Exactly. Yeah, it's a Shopify page or something. Okay. Huh. So then you have the—that's like your go-to playbook here for company-to-company. I'm curious—this is just like a general, genuine question; don't take this the wrong way—but why go for so many brands and not just put all your effort into, like... like, do you not think

that it's like... like why would you run Facebook or Instagram ads? Do you run YouTube ads? Is there, like, YouTube creators—not even ads, just YouTube sponsors? Like Jake, and go after everybody? Like, Jake basically, um... what's the thought process behind that? Brother, BL, blame Jimmy. He makes money training creators, and the creators need somewhere to go. That's just the machine you have built up. It's the machine, and it's challenged me from a business perspective to be able to think through scale and getting, you know, partners and people in place and figuring out how to systematize

and get the right things in order. Because we definitely have, you know, I mean, there's one brand that has 400 or 500 million potential for sure that I don't talk about on here, and that's like one that's its own focus. Like, we hired a CEO, and we're spinning it off, right? And we're doing those things. We're doing Facebook, we're doing YouTube, we're going for retail. So is that how you would scale? I guess... I don't even know. I don't know if that was a naive question or not. I'm a guy that, like, I go from

zero to 50 million. Well, like, that's kind of my range. It's good self-awareness. Yeah, and you're in your 20s. My other partner is the guy that, you know, he sold a pet business for 600 million, and so he's kind of seen that world and becomes more corporate and stale. But 0 to 50 million, you're looking for a profitable playbook. So all I think about is what are the pieces that you can put a dollar in the machine and make five? And when you talk about things like meta ads, it's pretty well known, like, they're not

what they used to be. 100%. You know what I mean? Like, seven years ago, that was the thing option. Yeah, yeah. And so YouTube, like, I'm constantly scouring opportunities, but for two years until I saw your podcast with Oliver, there wasn't a thing. Like, Amazon was drier than ever. Like, you know, it was mature comp, and then all of a sudden I saw this thing, and I go, “Oh, okay. We have something again.” It’s been two years, and, um, that’s how I think about business. So I’m always looking for those verticals. You have the biggest

arbitrage right now with TikTok Shop, so that’s the biggest opportunity. Maximize it, and then once you do that—I mean, 50 million is great. You sold your last one for 30 million, right? I’m saying 50 million revenue. Yeah, yeah, right. But how much—how old were you? How old are you now? Uh, I’m 32 now, and I was just about to turn 27; it’s 26. So you sold your company when you were 27, and now you're 32? Damn, dude, you’re a killer! That’s crazy! Okay, so then you are investing in like—is there any sort of like—how are

you getting— I don’t want to go deep on this topic—how are you getting deal flow? Like, how are you finding people? It’s my community, so that’s what the whole point of your personal brand is now. Exactly. So it’s kind of like the same thing as Haros, a private equity firm. The only difference is, I charge—to be a million-dollar brand club. I looked at Haros’ thing, but you’re more like incubating, right? So you’re like an incubator for physical products. I mean, he’s just—he’s just good at sales, so he’s optimizing for companies where you can just implement

a sales team for info. Basically, we’re just looking for good product ideas and entrepreneurs, and then we have the edge for them. At that point, you kind of have to charge because if you get a ton of free offers, then it’s overwhelming for people. Yeah, like I mean, out of all the things we’ve done, we’ve invested in—because most of these brands, even if they make some money over a couple of years, the chances of them selling for money that matters to me or my partners is low. So we’re trying to be really strategic with the

actual investments. You know, we’ve made seven of them in two years, so it’s not like we’re trying to grab pieces of everything; it’d just be a pain in the ass on the tax return. Yeah, yeah. It’s just like you’re making content that gets 100,000 views; you sort through a series of 100 people, and out of those 100, you choose the seven that actually have what it takes that you can put your machine into. Dude, you’re playing the game at the highest, most modern level. This is sick! Well, we’ll see how it plays out. I’m trying

to do it right for real. What do you think the time horizon is that you have to play on? I think—in two or three years, we’ll know who wins this game. Is the selling process hard for these types of companies? Like, I'm very curious about how a CPG brand would go through an acquisition. The bigger the exit, the more stringent the acquisition process. Are there companies that just scoop up like $10 million suppliers? They let you do all this work and then just scoop up $10 million to try to take it to 50 or scoop

up 50? Is that a thing? Is there like a team to it? Absolutely! So that’s why you said you're like a 0 to 50 type of guy, and then there are people that—once you get to 50, they know how to scale. But that’s more like local manufacturing and distribution. No, it's more about systems and processes and business operations. That’s when you kind of go from being in the Slack room with your guys, firing off ideas and thinking about everything, to all of a sudden having a marketing department, a CMO, and probably what— you know, Wop’s

going through—all that organizational stuff that I don’t like. I just—I don’t like corporatization. Me neither! And yeah, I was like, I’m a content creator, you know? That’s what’ll take a brand from, you know, double-digit million enterprise value to multiple nine figures. Just because it reduces risk—it's no longer dependent on Rob’s brain or just on the TikTok system. All of a sudden, you have a well-oiled machine that anyone can buy. Okay, so I think that it’s kind of crazy. I don’t know if I’ve—since I talked to Oliver, I’m so understanding of the strategy, but there is

no doubt that everything you just said is 100% objectively correct, and it's the most modern, optimal way to scale a brand, and it’s repeatable. You’re doing it with seven people, and you just told everybody in the world what to do just like Oliver did a year ago. You’re seeing the success, but yet a lot of people watching this won’t do it. Why is that? It’s probably like ego—or not ego, but you’re scared of trying because then if you try and fail, that’s my only perception. Like, the easiest cop-out answer is: you know what you need

to do, but then if you haven’t done it yet, what does that say about you? It’s kind of a hard pill to swallow for your ego, and you kind of—like, but it’s easier to just say this guy on the internet is a scammer or whatever. It’s easier to protect yourself than admit that you don’t have what it takes right now and that you need to go work and gain skills. Yeah, that’s my best answer. What do you think? I got a couple of takes on it. Why would anyone lead with their ego when success often

comes from failing fast, and your ego never wants to lose? I failed for several years after I sold that first portfolio like a double-digit entrepreneur, you know, eight figures. I failed for several years. I went under on a cookie company; I went under on a protein bar company. But it was those losses that led me to Oliver and this system. If I led with my ego, I would have kept trying. The ego wants to win, right? But once you logically understand that losses are what are going to shape wealth and your actual growth, then you

level up. I think most people are afraid to think about it like this. It gets way too philosophical, but the genuine reality of life, of existence, is that people don't think about "I'm going to die." Mhm. I'm actually going to die. And I'll have all this Netflix information, and I'll know who won the sports ball game on Sunday, and I was too scared to start the business even though I went down the rabbit hole and told my friend about it because it felt good, and I was really smart. I think if more people looked at

the lens of life through death, they would be more willing to do [__] that actually mattered and do [__] that changed their life. I've been trying to speak a lot more on that because, you know, social media is relatively new to me. Like, how long have you been doing YouTube? Eight years? Three for my this channel—for this channel! But yeah, content for eight. Yeah, and content is probably like a two-and-a-half-year thing for me, serious. I was like, I can just come with tactics and show people exactly how to do this and just be raw and

real. Then I didn't realize how many people are in their heads; they just need to be told they can do it or that their self-limiting belief needs to blow up. So I’ve really tried to make that a pillar of my personal brand because I think it's important. I don't want people to give a [__]. I don't want people to give a [__] about other people's expectations. I want them to look at me and see a guy that's close to unhinged with just the lack of care for what other people think about me. What was your

self-image before you started your first brand? This has always been my natural state of being. I feel like my mentality has been the exact same since I was like 18 or 19 when I picked up my first camera. It was like, this sounded like a fun thing to do. I just like trying stuff, going out, doing things in the world, and making money from it. I feel like I’m just doing the same thing for nine years even though every business has been different. There have been a ton of failures. So what was your mindset when

you were just starting out? Not mindset, but self-image—perception of yourself. I've been born and died like seven times in the last 20 years—like, actually. When I first started, when I first got out of college, I think I knew I'd be an entrepreneur. I just knew I'd find a way to work for myself and make money. I still spent most of my time eating Chipotle and going to the gym. I was like a gym bro, and then I was looking for side hustle type things to kind of, you know, find whatever. Mhm. It was when I

found Amazon and realized how much money that was being made that like—that was like my first death. I went from being a guy that knew how many times I could bench 315 to my life being like that—that was my self-image. I didn't particularly care about clothing or fashion or anything like that. It wasn't a huge interest. It was your thing; like, I’m the gym guy. I’m the gym guy. And that person died violently and was replaced with a kid that was willing to sit at that computer every minute of every day and do whatever it

took to grow that business because I knew there was a window. Could you explain that death? What do you mean by that, and why do you use such aggressive language? Because that—that was my entire personality. That was me. But was it like a hard thing? Were you hit in the face with something that made you do that? How were you able to kill that identity? It’s hard to do, like, consciously at least. Yeah, honestly, one of the moments that sparked all that was the passing of my grandma. It just—it all happened at once. I wandered

into this Amazon world, and I was just kind of starting. I had a different brand, Modern Man, that did well, but I was just starting that. I was kind of dabbling, making some money, and she was like the center of our family. That's why I tied everything back to death earlier. But I’ll never forget this: I’m sitting at my desk looking at some Amazon stuff and my mom calls me and she's like, "Hey, your dad took your grandma in," and she trails off, and I'm kind of sitting there like, "What’s going on?" For an operation?

She—she... "Didn't wake up, and her voice just explodes, you know? And, uh, I'm... everything just kind of went numb, and I'm like, 'What?' You know, what's going on? I'm this kid; I don't understand death. I haven't lost anyone. I got both of my parents, and it was just like shaking. She went in for an operation, had something in her leg fixed. It was like super routine—young, 70—like the center of our family, you know? Saw her once a month for dinner, had been with her two weeks before, and, uh, her heart stopped. They spent 50 minutes

reviving her, and long story short, she's in ICU all week. And that week of seeing my dad—a guy that I look up to, my dad—he's like my idol. Seeing my dad for the first time just lose it, like actually break down, and seeing people come and console him as he’s just begging his mom to wake up on this hospital bed, she’s a vegetable. Like we know she’s probably not right; we’re just hoping for a miracle. It was this relatively traumatic event as a young kid who, like, at the very end of it, it’s on EAS

of all things. After that whole week, you know, my grandpa decides it’s time to pull the plug. We all went in the room; my dad couldn’t be in there, my grandpa couldn’t. It was my mom, my wife, and then a couple of the other women. And, you know, they’re playing Elton John’s 'Rocket Man,' her favorite song. And I just remember that flatline, you know? They take the tube out, gas for air, flatline. I remember just going over and looking out the window, like, 'Whoa, that’s going to happen to my dad; that’s going to happen to

me. What is life actually?' And it kind of led to some turbulence in my personal life and a lot of issues after that. But on the other side of that, that’s where I realized, like, okay, well, Nana would have wanted to see me do something meaningful with my life. She would have wanted to see me build something. She was already proud of the direction that we were headed, you know? She was born when my dad was 15, in Tennessee. They came from nothing, and my dad's been a relatively successful entrepreneur with, you know, no college

education. I know she was super proud of that. She was proud of the direction I was headed; she was encouraged. And I just kind of grasped onto that and said, like, okay, well, let’s make this life something that generationally makes sense. And, yeah, did you... so, so sorry about that story, but it’s very interesting. Did that—what, like, so you said that you basically—the mind frame shift was: I was just doing being a gym person, but now I need to actually accomplish something of myself. And so it gave you the kick in the ass to, like,

I need to be something. Why was the 'be something'? So, the 'be something' was because your dad was an entrepreneur that she respected, and so that’s what you wanted to be in line with, is that correct? I think just in general, I wanted to do something meaningful with my life. I'd seen all my friends in the same hometown doing nothing, and it’s just like, okay, it’s time to separate. How did you settle on what you like to supplement or whatever the first bus was? So, I was already kind of wandering into that world, right? It

was there. Around that same time, I had a friend sell a company for $4 million, so you saw it. And that number to me was like insane. I was like, 'Oh, if I could do that, then I'd never have to work again.' Obviously wrong; you know, a million ain't that much. But that sparked everything and just woke me up. And I—I didn’t go to the gym for two years. I lost all my—like, literally two years I lost all my muscle. I sat behind a computer, I developed like damn near scoliosis, and I learned so much

about business and scaling. I read all the Google archives; I read everything I could about Amazon and that A9 algorithm. Like, and that’s what it took. Interesting. Did you... I'm curious because you have like a really cool aesthetic, and it's like a very coordinated look. Thank you. But your look before this was also, like, I would say it was slightly different, but it was all very put together and unique. Which time? Which time? I've dyed a lot. Remember, I'm kind of old; I'm 32 now. Well, that’s what I’m saying. But I’m saying that I don’t

know, like, you seem to be putting effort into that. And I was wondering if that is like when that happened. Did you also use—like Kanye has done this—and don’t compare me to Kanye, but maybe I should. But he goes through different eras, and he fully commits, like his aesthetic, his personality. So, is that a self-image change? Like, do you use your clothing and your appearance as a weapon? I round into new eras, and if I'm in Austin, I got Cowboy Rob, and there’s been an alien Rob at some point. You know, so explain this to

me because have you read the book 'Psycho-Cybernetics?'" Of course! Yeah, so I'm like, is this like a— that's why I'm asking, asking all of this: is this like a thing that you've leaned into, where it’s incredibly powerful? You're explaining, 'cause you're like someone who’s doing it very visibly, and that's really cool to me. So, I'd love to hear your thought process behind that. I spent $70,000 on a permanent diamond in my tooth, so, yes, and your teeth are funny, sick, but psycho-cybernetics, is that that idea that like confidence in who you are comes from looking

at yourself? You know, and I wasn’t that building genius; that was an afterthought. It's been something over the last three years where I say, if I want to be that guy, or I want to be like a pop culture icon or a billionaire, or like all these goals that I don't yell about but might have written down, I need to continually become that, and I need to invest in that. Those need to be the—we talk about investing all the time, putting money in the S&P 500 and this and that, but where is the investment in

yourself? You know? Like, where's the investment in the gym? And it almost sounds cliché, but I want to—I don't want to talk about it; I want to literally be it. I want people to go look at Rob from two years ago, and I want you to take notes on financial success and visually what I look like and all of that. I want you to see that, and then I want people to understand that playbook is real. The more you focus on—I call it life-maxing—but you take that scorecard of all the things you like. Fashion's unique

to me; I love it. I don't think everyone should. I think a lot of people shouldn’t give a damn about it. But you all have your unique things that you do love, you know, whether that be guitar or whatever. And you focus on developing those components of your life, and the returns I think are unmatched. But do them intensely and consciously. Is that what you're saying? Int—yeah, with intention. Like, literally make a scorecard. Like, fashion right now: if L.Y. is 100, like where am I at, and what do I need to do to get there?

What do I need to learn? What do I need to—so it doesn't matter what or why, but if whatever it is, do it fully. Essentially, is this something that's conscious for like personal branding? Like, I didn't know if you were like, “I'm going to be on camera, so I need to be identifiable.” Is it—was it like when you—'cause you kind of pivoted into this personal brand game now too? Not pivot; it started that three years ago. Just, I was in Puerto Rico in my, you know, $15 million house, and I'm not going—I'm getting no TikTok

action. I bought these Tom Ford glasses 'cause I'm in Puerto Rico, and I yell about people; they're not going to be multi-millionaires in crypto with my glasses, and it goes crazy viral. And I'm like, huh? Since then, I've probably bought, you think, a hundred different pairs of sunglasses. We spent a hundred grand on sunglasses since then. But that was like my first kind of understanding that that visual component really matters. People love to say how you look doesn't matter; it’s what’s on the inside. It’s [__], it’s [__]. But the cooler part is you can 100%

influence and control that, right? Like, I still—I mean, cool, the teeth are one thing, but like, I hit the gym like crazy. Like, I spend time like curating these things, crafting these things during that—after that period. You tried two more brands; is that like—yeah, I started four, and actually, three of them failed. One of them was like an investment, so I don't really like—yeah, chalk that up. And the other was Top Shelf. Like, Top Shelf rode it out through that time period. And now, so what’s your thought process? Because, like, I've—I also have had like

18 different businesses, and there are periods—it’s so interesting for me to look back because I'm like, I was so delusionally sure about that one being the thing and was so into it, telling everybody around me, “This is going to be a huge deal! All in on it!” And then something else pops up. How do you allow yourself to like—your ego to take that, and then to move on to the next one and then equally get as delusional about that one? What were you doing in the L’s? This is like my question, I guess. It’s that

failure. It’s when you feel sick that you lost, or you’re not who you thought you were. Those are the moments that actually shape you, and you go through enough of those that you almost start looking forward to them. Like, you—no, I mean really, you almost walk through life like, you know what? Everything's just an up and down; it’s another test. As long as I’m strong, as long as I'm—like, but this is what dictates everything between your ears. Like, happiness comes from your mind state. Like, if a loss is a lesson, you’re good, you know? And

the stronger you train yourself up there, the more routine all of this comes, and the more you know to seek out the good things. So, getting delusional on new ideas, it'll always... Be there, but I'd say there's a level of understanding that I've just… I've been. Hey, look, like I’m older now—I live and learn. You know, like the first time it happens, it’s demoralizing. Have you found the way you think when you were like 23 or 24, being very outcome-focused or material-focused? Now that you’ve gone through the spiritual phase, did you think that more stuff

would alleviate your concerns? I’m curious how your mindset shifted after the spiritual phase or how your approach to life has changed. Right now, I’m much more... Have you read "The Surrender Experiment"? Have you ever read that book? Where you just like… you kind of just agree that you’re not in control, and you intend to be in a certain direction, and just things are going to work out for you? Basically, things are just going to work out for you. You do the work required to succeed, but don’t think your analytical mind is going to predict every

single step. No, exactly, exactly! So it wasn’t really from my spiritual time, but I had an experience a couple of years back where I thought I was going to have a long battle with cancer. I had a melanoma cut off my ear, and it was jarring because, again, you’re that health freak. You’re this guy like, "Yeah, health! You’re not going to die young." Then I had a pretty real flirt with disaster, and that sent me down a long, long path where the outcome, when I came out on the other end of it, was, "Wow, this

whole thing is a plot that we can’t see." The more you’re in tune with that—this is kind of the spiritual side—the more you surrender, the more you’re quiet to it, and you realize you can kind of see it unfolding and even influence it sometimes. When you resist, when you fight it, when you want some other plan that’s not already there—like entirely not there—you become unhappy and you lose. Think about your life: the moments that brought you here, how you found YouTube, how you’re friends with whoever—they’re so random, and they’re so… why I’m here! They’re so

fluky, right? You want to know how I know Jimmy? Jimmy's probably the single most impactful person in my life over the last decade, financially and in life. I met Jimmy because a deepfake went viral on Coffeezilla with Joe Rogan and Andrew Huberman. Do you remember that? It was all over internet history. You made a video on it; a lot of people did. No, but that was someone who was working for me for Top Shelf with that brand. Oh, you’re talking about the Deepfake AI Joe Rogan ad promoting a supplement? Uh-huh, yeah, you guys did that.

That was my supplement! Good marketing! Jimmy was the person that retweeted it. I had no idea who this kid was. He says, “Holy [__], you know, AI for supplements now? How is this legal?” First comment: an attorney says, “It’s not.” I’m watching this thread—30,000 views. It’s Super Bowl Sunday; I’m like, "All right, this is going to blow over." Right? Halftime, it’s at maybe 200,000. It’s bad, but it’s not going to ruin anybody. Coffeezilla retweets it—20 million views within the next 24 hours. Coffeezilla is reaching out to me. He’s going on to Rogan. It was this

whole thing. I’m like, “Damn, this company’s over! My rep is going to take a little hit here; this ain’t good!” You know, and it was genuine. I was trying to do that affiliate system with people, and someone spun that off. So one of your affiliates did that? Yeah, and it didn’t sell any product. I mean, the numbers on the business were what they were. I wasn’t making good money, and that fluke goes viral. Jimmy retweets under the thread, “Well, if anyone actually wants to learn how to make money on TikTok without deepfakes, hit me up.”

Nice! So I did, and I had no idea who this kid was. If that sequence of events didn’t happen, my life would probably look dramatically different. At that time, that was probably a horrible thing to happen in your mind—sickening! I’m on the phone with my attorney on Super Bowl Sunday—I'm like, "Man, we’ve got to talk to Rogan’s people." I'm like, “Tell him I’m sorry.” Huberman’s tweeting on the thread. I’m like, “Damn, how’d they find you? How are you even associated with it?” I own the company! So they just back, okay, back. I wasn’t secretive with

it, yeah. And obviously, that was kind of the message too. It’s like, "Okay, well, do you think he okayed this?" Like, he’s… and so shout out to all those people involved: Huberman, great guy; Rogan, great guy. They all… you had to talk to them and like clear it up. Like, “Yeah, we donated to Huberman’s charity, something.” They were cool! Like they were like, “Show us. Did you make money? If we made money, they’re going to take that money.” Yeah, but they're like, "No, this is the numbers," and like, you know, all because you had an

affiliate program and an affiliate saw an opportunity to use AOG. Yeah, it was a horrible defect; it wasn't good, but it was like in the time where that was really popular, and it was like it was the first, bro. Honestly, it was smart. It was the first. If you could do that, that'd be the smartest thing to do. But yeah, super legal. So yeah, that all went down. But that's my point: it's like after that moment, I just felt like there was a whole new level of trust in the universe and less care about money.

It's kind of funny; the less I've cared about money, the richer I've gotten. The more I've been willing to go all in on experiences, different people, buy gifts, like really just invest in life, the better it's gotten. I feel like that inherently comes from trust in faith, like whatever that might be—God, however you want to call it. Yeah, so I just want to go back to that because I think a lot of people, we hear these stories on these podcasts, especially if people don't know anybody that goes on these podcasts. You're just like an everyday

person in Kansas, where I'm from, and you hear someone say that; that sounds really like, "Oh, that's amazing for this guy. He made that video go viral and then he met his partner." But I don't think people fully grasp how unfun that month was for you, and then you had no ability to see that this Jimmy Farley guy that you replied to was actually going to turn into what it is right now. At that time, you just replied to a tweet totally out of your mind, and you're going through a whole-on crisis. This company's over—like

literally probably one of the worst times of your life for months, day in and day out, anxiety. You have to reach out to these teams; uncertainty: are you going to get sued? Like, very, very not fun—one or two months, I'm sure, or a week or however long. Bro, I mean, really a brutal two years prior to that, on top of the two years, yeah. Like, it was really just, you know, I had the health thing, and I would say what started to shape everything—this is why I can't tell you exactly. Like, people say, "Oh, that's

fufu, that's stupid," but I got through that, like, you know, kind of cancer scare and realized, "I want to live life." Mhm. And I'm tired of being this guy that wants to be super frugal and sit on money. I was like, "Jing, my wife, I haven't seen the world." Like, I can go spend $50,000 on a vacation, and it's not. When I stole genius, I didn't do anything with the money for like two years. Like, I had a Model X, you know, and like a $2 million house in Issaquah, and I just—I don't know. I

was trying to figure out how to be rich; I was scared to lose it, and it was very strange. Then something broke in me where it's like, "Okay, I could literally be dead tomorrow. M, let's go spend that money and go stay at the best hotels in Italy." And so we started—like, you know, my parents, I come from a— we have conditioning from our parents, of course, and I come from a very—you know, my dad grew up with nothing. And so that was drilled into me, and so they'd call it frivolous; they'd call it stupid,

and I was like, "[ __ ] it." You know? Like, no, we're going to go see the world. Like, I worked hard for this; I could be dead tomorrow, and—or cancer could come back, and like, I could live an entirely different life. So let's hit it. And it was when that shift happened; that's when I started buying nicer clothes. Like, I stopped worrying about those things, and slowly, I think that's what attracted the better things in my life. Like, actually—and this is a double-digit millionaire saying that, who, you know, is very analytical. Like, I went

through all the wealth protection stuff of risk and, you know, how to properly manage your portfolio and all of that. Then I was like, "No, [ __ ] it. Like, let's—money is energy. It's energy, and it's something that can be exchanged for a better life, for better experiences. And those experiences could introduce you to one person that makes you 100 million." And that's the shock that people don't get: the more you're fluid with it, the more you're abundant with that [ __ ], it goes out, it comes back, and your life just keeps getting better.

It's not like a good economy right now, and we've been like balling for a while. There are better deals on the fashion, you know, and I really believe that. But it's hard; it's hard. And I think there's a lot of work that needs to go into it first. Like, people need to separate themselves from—it's that, like, cliché self-help stuff, but really, like, separate yourself from the down energy, separate yourself from the friends that aren't going anywhere. You know? Like, start taking care of yourself to a respectable level; start having respect for yourself. Like, hit the

gym—like, those are all the things, and then the second you do those... Get you get motion, but the problem is people aren’t—they want the motion immediately. Nothing happens immediately, like you expect, 'cause you went—you know, it's almost like the universe is watching you and rewarding the effort, and they put the next carrot in front of you and see if you'll catch you're stepping, take the right to. And if you resort back to old ones, it's like killing momentum and then downward trajectory. Exactly. And if you like reinforce that behavior, it's what you get; like the

universe is a mirror. Exactly! You're stepping into who you're supposed to be, and then the further you get into that—'cause even at the highest level, you get pulled back. Like, [ __ ] just happens. But when you're really—I'm telling you—you're like there with fate. Like, time's damn near not real. You're like, "Oh, I already achieved that! I can actually see it; like that's how that was supposed to be. I was supposed to get my wife here. I was supposed to..." Like, you can—you're so in tune with it. And so then, when something bad happens to

you in the future, you just laugh and you're like, "Alright, like this is for..." You have to trust; it's for some reason, and there's some lesson here that's going to get you to where your self-image is saying you want to be—as long as you made that mental decision. That's how you have—that's the perception you have to have or perspective you have to have. Could you point back to when you were going through those two years, for like the failed cookie company, to what the piece—the lesson was with that business that then resulted in what you're

doing now? Like, what you gained from that? The health stuff, the health stuff is what made those matters zero. It's that Naval quote: it's like, show—what is it? Show me any—your incentive? No, that's—no, no. Naval has one, it's like any dying man only wants to be healthy or something like that. I butchered it, but it was that. It was like none of this business stuff matters. You know, I'm 28, 29—like it'll sweep away people. Like, who cares what other people think? What matters is I'm healthy and have the opportunity to live life. And so that

added—I’ve had so many layers of perspective added on top of just general business, right? Like real [ __ ] happens. Friends die; like those are the moments where you kind of go, "Okay, this is super important and I love it, but at the end of the day I want to be living life a certain way." And so if I'm doing those businesses and not liking my life, I shouldn't be doing them. So then, would you think about yourself? This is where I get so in my head about stuff. Like, if you were 22 again, is

this the correct advice? Or is it the point that when you're 22, you're so hungry for it, you need it, but you have no hard skills? And so is that the luxury that you get to once you have hard skills? And that by the age—by the time we were both 26, we both had accumulated a lot of hard skills, then we were like... So is that—that's what I'm saying—the need for those hard skills? But I’m still understand—I don’t buy into like the balance and the seasons or this. I'm always curious and I'm always trying to

learn new skills, and I never want to get old. And I'm learning from younger people; that’s been one of my biggest advantages. Like, I accept I'm not the young kid anymore. Like, I can tell you more about TikTok business than most of that generation, right? Because I'm curious and I'm constantly developing hard skills. You can do those things now when you're 22; you have literally none, so you need to sharpen something fast. But I look at these kids who come into Jim’s Creator's Corner, and they develop that first skill and they make money. And this

is kind of our whole philosophy with all of it, right? Okay, now put that money out there in the universe, see what it does for you. Don't take your eye off the ball; keep working, keep thinking bigger, but don't be afraid to—you know—move to Miami. Don’t move to Miami! Terrible place; I hate Miami. But that philosophy—you know, they have to get some hard skill—but once you're kind of on that treadmill, you can do it all. That’s the life maxing MMO. So it's like such hard advice to take on the internet because it’s like there are

wrong things to spend money on, but spend it. It's energy; use it to move forward in momentum as long as it's directionally where you're trying to go. Take the risk—100%. But I guess with what I was talking about with the cookies and whatever these examples were, like, is there a lesson that you learned? No, but it’s a good answer. But is there an objective—like can you look back and be like there was a lesson in that business that I learned or a perspective or a strategy or something that you like actionably used now that is

key to this business? Yeah, I chased things I didn’t give a [ __ ] about. I built those brands—so I'm full of clichés—I built those brands for money. I thought keto was super trendy. I didn’t give a [ __ ] about keto; I knew it would die out and I... I thought I could just catch the wave. I learned that unit economics really matter. Like, you can make a 60% margin, but if it's $25 a bag, that doesn't work on the internet. So, I preach that from a tactical perspective, but there's something to be said

for having a level of care, interest, and passion in what you're doing. That's so cliché. People want to go where they know they can make money, but you can make money and do something you like. I can build a company; I'm way more interested in evil goods—the branding, all of it. My partner, the $600 million one, you know, he loves the pet space. So, when he's invested in one of my sub-businesses, he doesn't give a [__], but when he's launching his pet venture, you see that fire ignite. When that fire is there, you're amplifying your

learning, you're amplifying your growth—like all those things, right? That constitute a day. If you're going through it half-ass, you're not getting better at the speed that the guy is whose heart's on fire, right? So, that was the mistake there for me—that's the “Nal quote”: do what feels like play; what looks like work for others feels like play to you, or something like that. That's why I love this stuff now. I genuinely love it. I know I'm not the best, but I know I've learned a lot, and I've just seen my growth in two years of

this personal branding content versus trying to pick up other skills that I don't care about. I progress zero. Whereas this, it's like, "Oh, what constitutes a hook? What you wear, the different sunglasses?" You get those reps in and that's how you become something. It's like, do what gives you energy. I feel like the clichés are actually what you need, but you have to experience it first to then understand the data compression. If you learn the cliché first, it's like, "Do what gives you energy." It's like, "Okay, I'll do cocaine." But that’s why I'm doing this—not

the cocaine, I'm not doing cocaine. That's why I'm doing this: because you can't tell people [__]. People don't listen, but you can show them. When you look back and see the video of like, "Oh, this was Rob, you know, three years ago," and then you see me sell a company and live another one and live this certain life, that's when people go, "Oh." I realized that when I sold Genius—I told you I didn't spend any of that money, right? No one took me that seriously in my hometown. I didn't know it. I think they were

like, "Oh, you know, successful entrepreneur," or whatever. Then I go buy the crazy house in Puerto Rico and start talking online two and a half years after I sold my business, and people are like, "This guy's something." You can use that as inspiration for others if you do it right, and that's what I hope to accomplish. What experience did you have that actually showed you personal branding? Yeah, like you had $30 million or whatever it was, and no one gave a [__] and probably didn't believe you. But once you started showing it, they were like,

"It's like undeniable." What experience did you have that made you see that personal branding was the thing you wanted to do? I actually wanted to do it; I just enjoyed it. Honestly, I enjoy every component of understanding. I think it's the opportunity to communicate at scale—to the masses—and I think there's something really powerful in that. You see it in political discourse, and I think it's one of the best talents you can have. So that drew me to that world, just the skill. So right before this podcast, right before we recorded, you said the stuff about

Mark Cuban. Do you think these people now that are doing personal brands are going to be how we perceive Elon, Mark Cuban, all these people that are like the 40, 50-year-old big boys—the PayPal Mafia, all those guys? How we perceive them now, do you think the people who have personal brands now will be the equivalent in our generation in 10 years, 20 years? I think whenever you combine enterprise and media, you have a real shot at something lasting. That was Trump, that was Cuban—like, you know, the broadcast.com or whatever. Cuban sold a company, was a

successful entrepreneur, and then went into Shark Tank and got the media. Trump was whatever he was and then The Apprentice; then he was a TV star. We don't watch TV anymore; we watch YouTube. So if you're doing this properly with the real enterprise component, some people in this space will become the future voices of that. So is that when you see the perspective of documenting and stating what you're doing publicly on purpose, or just being in the public eye and then people kind of know you're the TikTok shop CPG guy? At the end of the

day too, no one knows Mark Cuban is BR. We know broadcast.com, but the average... A person knows that’s the successful business guy that owns the Mavericks, right? The Mavericks? Yeah, now it’s the Mavericks. Yeah, yeah. Even though he sold them. But I mean, Trump—similar deal. Like, no one knows. That’s a whole another case, I guess. But it’s on the hotel. It’s just the ability to inspire and entertain people, mm-hm. However you do it, that’s kind of the beauty of it. We don’t know exactly. Like, didn’t the Horos just mess around with like a docu-series? Like,

Meet the Hormos? Like something like that? Yeah, that was like on their channel at the bottom, like the Hormos, right? Yeah, yeah. And so we have that ability. I just believe I want to create the world I see in my head, and I know the components of it. It’s like if you entertain people, they will watch. Or if you inspire people, they will watch. Like if you’re—uh, I draw a lot of inspiration from music, and you look through kind of what makes an artist successful. It’s a lot of those pieces with a certain image. And

so if you can bring those components into some form of media—whether it be Instagram, YouTube, live streaming—while still having those actual credentials, I think there'll be some very strong household names over the next decade. Because this is how we grow up, right? This form of media, it’s kind of accessible in like a land grab, in theory. Even though it’s kind of mature, it’s still kind of early for this. It’s shifting to that level, right? 100%. What have you learned from artists? That’s interesting. Oh, I—I draw most of my stuff. Like, my Instagram is largely based

off Drake. Yeah, it works! Like, every component of Drake for visibility and personal branding—from the stuff he wears to he’s the guy that played this last decade perfectly in the Instagram era. He just, you know, from picture posting to collabs—to all of it. And you go, if it works in that domain, it’ll work in another. And, um, artists are some of the best marketers in the world. Like, it’s kind of no different. Their business is the music, but their personal brand is Instagram and their perception and the stories and the PR and rumors getting told

around them. And now we’re shifting into this TikTok era where that’ll be different than Instagram. Now it’s like, who can tease the songs? Who can go viral? Who can do multi-channel distribution? What we’re doing with products, but what we’re doing with products works with music. If we had 50 creators who could do 50 dances that, you know, could go viral, you could have a number one bestselling song on all platforms. It’s a fundamental shift of the world across the board! So in theory, everything’s a personal brand. Everything? I don’t know if I’d say everything’s a

personal brand. It’s just information is being disseminated in a fundamentally new way, and every time the ground shifts is where all the opportunity is. Like, I mean, Tate leveraged exactly what we’re doing with product, and he became—Tate’s message isn’t new; Tate’s persona isn’t inherently that new. Right? Like, guys like Ric Flair were around. It’s a likable thing; we know there’s a market for it. But it was that manipulation of information—how it’s disseminated. And there’s no gatekeeper on who can distribute that. Exactly! In your control! It used to be Hollywood; it used to be TV networks.

And all of a sudden, if you make something dope enough, you can be whatever you want. But you have to be in full control of that and creative enough to do it, and have the balls to just, like, the BS—put stuff out there. Right? I put out a lot of content that like, flops, but that’s what you have to do. I mean, the hardest part is that you’re going to say something now, and in six months you’re going to have a completely different opinion. And then the exposing niche of YouTubers are just going to—hey, that’s

no issue for politicians. You know, I never said that! It’s right here! No, but luckily—well, yeah. Exactly, exactly! Say we’re going to have that excuse in the future, which I’m actually so excited for! Not because like I need it, but just because like imagine being in the 80s or 90s or 70s—like just being able to be yourself and not have any worry. Now, you go to clubs or anywhere out in public in LA and people are just like afraid to have fun because everybody can record it. So maybe AI will give us that freedom back.

That’s my thesis. That’s my hypothesis, and we’ll check back in 10 years or it’s the worst thing ever and there’s cameras detecting everybody. But who knows? We all are AI and just gone. Yeah, we’ll see. Terminator! All right, well, your YouTube channel, you like, came on the scene really strong. And your YouTube content is like super informative. You’re probably like one of the most—like actually credible people to be teaching, especially your actual domain of expertise and not selling some sort of like productivity course or anything like that. So shout out to you for being so

open about it! Shout out to you for giving everybody the blueprint! It’s nice that when we talk in this podcast that you are just literally sharing the best practices that you’ve learned through 10 years of failures. Like you exactly how you said the last two examples of cookies and the other one before that—like choose a product that... You're happy with it. Make sure your margins are high enough. Those are all lessons you learned, and you just internalized them in the first 45 minutes. You just gave us the objective, correct path and exactly what's working right

now. So anyone watching this that wants to do a physical product business knows what they need to do. Now, let go, do the work, take risks, fail, and learn. But absolutely, Rob, huge props to what you're doing, brother. Thank you for coming. Is there anything else you want to share? Any platforms where can they find you? No, just I appreciate it. Rob The Bank on Instagram, Rob The Bank on YouTube, and I have a new thing I've been saying: if anyone wants to thank me for any information I put out, just go get rich yourself.

Oh, that was sick! Hell yeah, thank you so much, bro. Thank you!