Noah Kagan built 8 businesses each worth +$1 million (Kickflip, Gambit, KingSumo, SendFox, Sumo, Tidycal, Monthly1K, AppSumo). And… most were started in a single weekend. He touches on his latest book, "Million Dollar Weekend," detailing his journey and the methodologies that have driven his success.
Hear how Noah bounced back from getting fired from Facebook after being Employee #30, learn to make things happen SUPER quickly using NOW, Not How, and calculate your Freedom Number to help you quit your day job.
Key Takeaways:
- The Power of Asking: Noah dives deep into the art of asking and how it can unlock doors you never knew existed. From getting discounts just by asking to knocking on doors of millionaires for advice, this episode will challenge you to step out of your comfort zone and start asking for what you want.
- Overcoming Fear: Discover the two biggest fears that hold people back from starting their business and how to conquer them. Noah shares his personal experiences and gives practical tips to help you overcome the fear of starting and the fear of asking.
- The Value of Advisors: Learn about the "cheat code" that helped AppSumo soar to incredible heights. Noah swears by the power of elite advisors in every aspect of business and life, and he's sharing how you can leverage this for your own success.
- Mindset Over Tactics: We discuss why tactics alone won't lead to success if you don't have the right mindset. Noah emphasizes the importance of building a strong foundation to overcome the fear of publishing and sharing your ideas with the world.
- Security Guards and Personal Safety: In a surprising twist, Noah sheds light on the affordability of personal security and how it's not just for the ultra-rich. A thought-provoking take on safety, privacy, and the cost of peace of mind.
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Noah Kagan:One of the cheat codes and the reason AppSumo does almost 100 million a year in revenue, a year, and our cheat code is advisory. Everyone wants more money. And I believe everyone should be a millionaire. Being rich is awesome. It's just way better to be rich than poor. And it's available to everyone. It's not exclusive. There's not some guru. What they do is they create a distance. It's available to everyone. You know, even if you're anti-Jews or anti-Israel or you're anti-Trump or you're anti-Biden, whatever your anti or your bro, you know, you're still at least allowed to be able to speak. And that's something I want to keep encouraging in our society. The other surprising thing is security guards are not that expensive. I know that sounds kind of crazy, but like if you're, let's say you make a million dollars a year, one, you can expense it. It's a business expense. So you have like, it's not that he's paying out of pocket. Secondly, they're around. How much do you think security is? It's about 60,000.
Andy Mewborn:Uh, well, you know, I was like, I'm going to bring this up with Noah. Anyways, I was out there. My buddy was like giving lessons to, uh, Zuckerberg and who I noticed first was, uh, Dustin. What's his name? Moskowitz. I don't know if you know Dustin as well. I saw him and I was like, that guy looks familiar. And my buddy was giving them lessons and he had like an NDA. He can't like say anything. And I was wondering why there was like 15 security guys on the beach. Right. I was like, this is a little weird. Um, there's like 15. And they're trying to like cover up like in dress. They were like in beach shorts and like a regular T-shirts, but then they had these earpieces and I'm like, guys, like, like the, the, the, who the hell has earpieces on the beach, man? Come on. Like, it is interesting.
Noah Kagan:I think if you've read in ran and if you look at some societies, um, there's a likelihood that more and more people are going to get attacked. So I actually make it makes a ton of sense. I was even thinking about it for myself last night as my status is raised and Uh, I don't have a lot of money. Let's just put that out there. Don't come to my house Yeah, but yeah, I think a lot more people I think more people now than ever are frustrated About the opportunities frustrated about what's going on and I think one avenue for some people which is disappointing They need a better chance is to take it from someone else. And that's scary. I was a little scared for myself. Thank God I have an AR-15 in the house. I've got guns. I have an axe on my bed. But it's unfortunate. And the answer is how do we create opportunities for people? so that you don't need so much security that we have to be so worried as people who are creating that someone else is going to take it from us? How do we help everyone try to raise up? But yeah, it is interesting that those guys have 15 or so security guards. But yeah, it makes sense.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah. I mean, honestly, we won't talk about this too much, but like I get it. I mean, the dude can probably be one of the most powerful people in the world if he controls like what everyone's consuming every minute of the day. You know, like if you think about that,
Noah Kagan:The other surprising thing is security guards are not that expensive. I know that sounds kind of crazy, but like if you're, let's say you make a million dollars a year, one, you can expense it. It's a business expense. So you have like, it's not that he's paying out of pocket. Secondly, they're around, how much do you think security is? It's about 60,000. which is not bad. Let's even say you pay for two and you get around the clock $120,000 a year as a percentage of their revenue of a company. It's pretty small to have that level of protection. I've definitely considered it. I haven't had threats yet and God willing, I never do, but it's kind of affordable. And I do think there's, for influencers, I can see a world where they have them just to get more attention. When they go out, they have this person like, you know, we did that actually. We did it a few years ago at South by Southwest. Me and my friends dressed up as security guards for one of our other friends. And we're walking around as security guards. And we're like, please don't talk to this guy. Okay, you're good. You're good. And I will tell you we got into the clubs you buy those earpieces on Amazon the ones with little squiggly things and It's it's insane how much attention and how much people who is that person?
Andy Mewborn:Yeah, the costumes matter Yeah Shoot man. I mean if you let's say you were to get some security guards, like would you get like what would be your strategy there? Would you get like black belt? you know uh you know triple black belt guys that are like you know deadly hands or would you go for like the ex-navy seal kind of vibe
Noah Kagan:I'm sure there's some sophisticated answer here. I met Peter Thiel and what was most fascinating about meeting him was his security guards were unassuming and you couldn't tell who they were. So I think that's almost the most interesting one where I think he had five, give or take, and you didn't notice they're there. That's some ninja stuff, right? You know, he's got a lot of strong opinions. He's got a lot of wealth You know, he could be polarizing so I can see him, you know needing that potentially But I think those are the kind of security guards the ones you can't see.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah, you think You think this Tucker Carlson guy has security guards. He's got to have security guards, right? I Definitely.
Noah Kagan:I think it's I mean, I am shocked lately at just the level of anger in people and the amount of hatred and how far people are willing to go to, you know, create animosity between groups. And so, yeah, anybody who's kind of presenting a very aggressive opinion, not even aggressive, but a distinctive opinion, a non-centralized opinion, is ripe, unfortunately, in this country, maybe in others, for harassment. I was just going to say, like, it's unfortunate that we can't speak our minds. You know, I went to UC Berkeley, and that was, I think, one of the worst places I've ever seen for people being able to speak opinions. They used to censor people that had an opinion and not let them speak on campus. That to me is the purpose of education, is to be able to hear new opinions, process information, hear and learn different things and be able to think about how to think. And just disappointing nowadays that, you know, even if you're anti-Jews or anti-Israel or you're anti-Trump or you're anti-Biden, whatever your anti or your pro, you know, you're still at least allowed to be able to speak it. And that's something I want to keep encouraging in our societies.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah, man, I'm worried. Like, I think people are going into like these universities and coming out dumber than when they went in. Like from a from a being able to think from yourself standpoint, you know, because as you meant, like, I agree. I think you should what it should teach you is how to think for yourself, how to be the clear thinker. And they come in being able to recite a doctrine is kind of what I like. And of course, not everyone. But I feel like but like, you know, I've kind of like noticed this trend. I'm like, man, Like, you know, why is that the case? And I think, you know, I graduated college in what, 2013 or something like that. So 10 years ago. Right. And so, you know, I don't know when this kind of started, but I felt like coming out of engineering school and think like, Oh, let me hear the other side's opinion. Who's, you know, everyone's got a different upbringing, a different mind. Like they came from a different background. So in doing that, like, yeah, they're going to have this difference of opinion. And I think like, I just feel like a lot of that's been lost. Let me hear out the other side and know that it might not be black or white. There must be nuance.
Noah Kagan:Have you ever chatted with someone and then you ask them, are you actually open to hearing a different opinion? Are you actually open to changing your mind? And the reality is that probably ninety nine percent. The other person is not. And so we still want to be like, no, no, no, no. Let me tell you more stuff. It's like if they're not willing to open their mind and that's OK, that's OK, then just save your breath. But I think that's that's a powerful question. I've started. I've used, I don't know, decades now. Just like, hey, are you open to change your mind? OK, fine.
Andy Mewborn:And then you just stop. That's actually not a bad technique, man. That's a great question. Ask someone like when you're when you're trying to be, hey, are you open to like another opinion or are you just going to try and take yours to the grave, die on that hill, you know?
Noah Kagan:Yeah. I mean, it's especially true at work, right? If you're working with your teammates or potential customers or partners, whatever it is, you know, on the other side of that, as I'm working with people, what I actually look for, I want conviction. I want people who are like, I care about this so fucking much more than you can believe. I'm like, well, I don't care about that, care about it that much. So tell me more. Because I'm looking for the person, not necessarily the loudest voice, but the most belief in what they're actually talking about. And then, you know, at AppSumo, we have a phrase called farm for dissent. And it's just like at least this happens at Amazon to at least ask, hey, OK, why is this not a good idea? What could be wrong here? There's a lot more stuff around that, but that's kind of at least trying to be mindful of other opinions. Otherwise, I think most of us, we just always assume I think most people assume they're right and then just go down that path.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah. Do you feel like that causes tension with people, even if you try to push it, you know, and say like, Hey, this is what we're about, you know, here are the other side's opinion, all that, because, because we're in the workplace, that's what it's about. Do you think that ever causes tension between people?
Noah Kagan:Well, I think tension's good. Yeah. I hope it causes tension. I think it's great when you have tension. You know that's part of how you get better answers, better results, and the best people I've ever worked with or hired have always been the most challenging. Not challenging in a, and let me be clear, not challenging in a disrespectful way, but challenging in a, actually, why are we doing that way? And you're like, what do you mean? I'm the boss. And they're like, no, I don't care. Why are we doing that? And you're like, oh, great. I love it. Tell me more. And that's a powerful phrase. Tell me more. And so these people at Facebook, I remember, the people at AppSumo, and they're saying, how come we do this for three days, not one? Or how come we don't extend it? Or for example, we were doing budgeting for December marketing spend. I think we were going to do $200,000. And one of the guys was like, well, we're doing a million dollars in spend for November this month. And the guy was saying, well, why are we going down to 200? Can we do 500? Can we do another million? That's ROI positive in our marketing spend. And I tend to see that those people rise the most in organizations and in their careers and in life, because at least they're questioning things that are going on.
Andy Mewborn:Do you think that's just like, Do you think that's liked by the ultimate boss, which is would be you, right? And like, that's something that you really like, so it helps them rise? Or do you think like you've empowered leadership to also help those people rise that kind of are the question seekers, right?
Noah Kagan:someone goes and does this at another company and gets fired. Noah said I should challenge.
Andy Mewborn:What the fuck?
Noah Kagan:It depends on the organizational culture. It depends on the organizational culture. You have to do it respectfully. But the bigger problem that happens, especially in entrepreneurship, or whether you're an employee or as we call them at AppSumo teammates, is that we get used to the broken doors. And that's the problem in life and in your career. And what I mean by we get used to the broken doors is that we had a broken door at our office. And you walk in, we have two doors, and you try to pull the left one and it's broken. So you're like, oh, use the right one. And then after about six months, we just accepted that the right door is always broken. The right door is just always broken. And I remember thinking like, why the fuck are we just OK that this door is now broken and that's how we're going to accept things? And I think that that's a very powerful thing to be thinking about in your personal life, but even more importantly in your career and especially as an entrepreneur, and how something is broken and we just start accepting it over time. And I believe success. is when you're like, huh, we're doing this, it's not working. Let's fix that fucking door. Let's change something about it. And I think the more that we can at least take a step back or get other people with new opinions or get people with fresh eyes, advisors, potentially, whatever that is, helps you see where the doors are broken and then start adjusting them and fixing them.
Andy Mewborn:From a personal standpoint, right? Like outside of work, how do you self-manage that? Like your broken doors. We all have a broken door at some point, right? I want to get more fit or I'm okay eating shitty food or I'm okay doing that. Like, what are your self, how do you self-diagnose that? I guess I would say for that. I'm curious.
Noah Kagan:I believe most people know their answers. The problem is that the answer is hard. Everyone knows their answer. Like if you're fat, or if you're poor, or if you don't feel you have integrity, or if you don't like things, 99% of us know the answer. And the best answer is just hard. And that's what we're not willing to accept. And so then the question becomes, how do we accept that answer and how do we embrace that to make that change? And so what I believe is that you need to have the outcome outweigh the cost and the excitement and the dream outweigh the pain. And so that's generally where I've led like, oh man, it wouldn't be exciting to have this thing. And then, okay, I know where that is so I can deal with a little bit today. So that's number one. And the second part of these broken doors in our lives, whether it's in your career, whether it's in your relationship and knowing that, is that what's the smallest, tiniest fucking thing I can do right now, not how, this is one of my mantras now, not how, right now to make a change towards that. And that is empowering and that is self-confidence and that's a lot of what people are lacking. They're lacking that belief in themselves that they can get to that destination that they kind of want. And that's a part of it. And then I would say ultimately, some of these broken doors, it's okay to accept. Like lately in the winter, I like drinking and eating. And what we do is that we guilt ourselves and say, I should be having healthy, I should be healthier. I need my six pack here. It's like, No, I'm happy getting fucking fat and being moderately healthy until, you know, while winter is coming. And then when it's summer beach body time, I'm going to come back on it. But what we do is that we guilt ourselves and castrate ourselves and punish ourselves and do all these negative things to ourselves versus just accepting ourselves and being more OK with. It's a time period. There's a lot of a lot of power and patience and kindness and generosity to yourself.
Andy Mewborn:Speaking of ideas, right? Because you have this book came out, which is like how to launch a seven figure business in 48 hours. And I think one of the most powerful things that has personally helped me like get through anything. So I, right. I trained for Ironmans. I do just weird hardship. Right. And so like every time I do that, I get an accountability buddy, man. Right. I get someone that like holds me accountable and like to do the thing because for me, I need someone like whether, you know, I don't make my wife because my wife, you know, she'll, she'll make it easy on me. I think, but like, I'm like, you know what? I need a coach and I'm going to get that. And that's going to be my accountability, buddy, the coach. I really think of his accountability. Right. Cause I don't want to like, I'm a people pleaser. I don't want to like let that person down. And I think there's a bigger thing here with like an accountability aspect to helping people achieve like any goal they want through this, like, I don't know, and it may be an accountability marketplace or something. Marketplaces are hard to build, but you know what I mean? Like, like giving people that option, because I think, you know, anything is easier if you can explain to people what it is. set your stake in the ground of like, Hey, this is what I'm going to do, but take it out of your head and have someone else almost hold you accountable daily. I think there's, there's something huge there, man. Um, and maybe this is a seven figure business idea. I don't know, but the easiest one is for like weight loss, right? Like that could be a huge thing where you just like have accountability buddies for like a weight loss thing or something, but anything right. Like that is, that is something that I think would make the world a better place. Right? Like somehow if we were to systematize this accountability process, but if you were to hold someone accountable to something and you were like an accountability, you'd also have to be playing the game and someone had to hold you accountable to being better too at something or that you want, right? Because I think naturally everyone wants to do better at something. Even these people that are like trolling on Twitter and talking shit and like super negative. You know, maybe I'm giving some people too much credit, but like everyone I think is still striving to be better in some way. Maybe I'm super optimistic, right? But I think somehow there's this play with accountability, but I don't know. Have you ever used something like this or are you just like, shit, I'm going to do it on my own? Like when you're learning something new or trying to take on a challenge.
Noah Kagan:One of the cheat codes and the reason AppSumo does almost 100 million a year in revenue a year is because of our cheat code. And our cheat code is advisors. It's elite advisors in every aspect of our business. So I do that in my personal life and we do it in our professional life. So our head of revenue has the CRO from Microsoft and MindBody Online. We have the cheap people officer from Duolingo. We have Indeed.com number two, who's the CEO, GM of Indeed, who helps with the organization. So in almost every single aspect, marketing at AppSumo, we have Moody Glasgow. He's the former CMO of Zapier and Glassdoor. You could say I might be an advocate of advisors and accountability buddy and specifically what's appealing about it is that you basically are paying for their 10,000 hours and you're paying a very cheap price. Even I pay people $1,000 an hour, no problem, which I remember back in the day, maybe five, 10 years ago, I was like $1,000 an hour. You are insane. You didn't go to college for this. You're not a doctor. And the reality though, is that the value of what they can either hold you accountable on or specifically the strategy and experience that they've already, they've put the time in, you can shortcut. And so I do that in my personal life just as well. Relationship coach, dating coach, chess coach, Hebrew coach. I'll do Spanish coaches. I have a therapist. I mean, therapist is a separate one. I have business coaches. I have another CEO coach. You can actually apply this in a lot of aspects. And when you realize that you're like, oh, wow, I can get a lot further ahead a lot faster. And they can provide accountability, as you were mentioning, in different areas.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah, that's interesting that you have like these elite people that are advisors for kind of each of your leaders at your organization. Right. And so you pay those advisors to get on the phone with your leaders and basically help them shortcut stuff. Right. Well, shortcut in the good, basically learn from their mistakes and all that. Not like, no, I want to cheat.
Noah Kagan:I think there's good cheating and bad cheating.
Andy Mewborn:This is good cheating.
Noah Kagan:Yeah. What's bad cheating to you then? What's bad cheating? Cheating is when you question, when you do things that question your integrity. Yeah. Yeah. I think we cheating is actually a good thing. You know, I think we're conditioned to not cheat and you want to cheat. That's how you can win sometimes. But if you're cheating with low integrity or that are that's illegal, like cheating like this, taking soda from the fountain that but you only paid for a while, but you only got a water cup. I think that's cheating. You're taking some that's not yours. That's not good. Yeah, that's almost stealing. But being an advisor, that's stealing. Yeah, that's low integrity, high integrity, paying an advisor that can help you shortcut all these things around marketing, which we've done with Moody from our how we do our paid acquisition, how we're thinking about our strategy, to how we're hiring. That is good.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah. And so you have a book coming out, right? And you did a book before, which is like how I lost hundreds of money. Yeah, there it is. Well, so what was your what was your cheat code for releasing that? Because it's self published, I believe, right?
Noah Kagan:Yeah, I took them all offline. So those other books I've written are gone. And the reason that is is that I think it's better to have just the thing you think is best for your audience. And what I believe is the best thing I've ever done in text and instructing people for how I've been able to make money is this book. And so everything else is gone. And then I cheated in what I like to call is stacking the deck. in creating this book to make it the number one book on the market, where when someone's like, hey, I want to start a business, what should I do? It's checking out Million Dollar Weekend. And that's what that was my inspiration for it. Fifteen years ago, I was on a bike ride with my accountability coach for health named Adam Gilbert from MyBodyTutor.com. We're biking around New York and I was like, all these books fucking suck. There's not a book that if there's so much out there, why isn't there a book or something that if I can give to someone, they're like, I can get a business going. And it was through years of doing it myself, research, putting this together. And I can share more if you're curious how I stack the deck to ensure that this is going to be the book to help people.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah, I want to hear it, dude. Because one day I'm going to want to do a book myself, right? And so I kind of, what's the playbook? Now I'm channeling that energy here, dude. And seeing how I'll stack the deck in the future.
Noah Kagan:In all aspects of a business, it's how do you improve your odds of success? You know, there's a probability and how do you get it closer and closer to 100%? And when there's 100% generally, there's no risk, which means there's no upside. And so, you know, given the constraints of things, how do you do as much as possible to make sure what you're doing is going to be successful? And that's what the book does in saying, hey, with 48 hours with no money, let's help you get a business going that can be seven figures and beyond in 48 hours and change your life. And so stacking the deck with this book, it was hiring James Clear's proposal writer. It was, you know, I don't know anyone else on the planet who started as many companies that have done as well as I have publicly. Like, there's a lot of fiction writers, I call them, that are on YouTube and fiction writers on Twitter. I've never seen their businesses. They didn't work for Zuckerberg. They didn't help buildment.com. They didn't help start AppSumo. They didn't help start TidyCal and SendFox and Gambit and Kickflip and all these companies you can see. They're like, oh, yeah. And so I've done it. And then in stacking the deck more and more, it was I hired Tal Roz. He wrote Never Eat Alone and Never Split the Difference, which are two of the best selling business books in the past 15 years. So he wrote those. Then I hired Ramit Sethi, one of my good friends, his agent. She's one of the best in the business, I would say Lisa Dimona. And so just in terms of stacking the deck and then we, you know, a thousand people have beta tested the book. So every weekend we do five beta testers and we've been doing this now for months. Every single chapter, every single word was beta tested, meaning that I had the ideal person who is going to be someone 20 to 45, give or take, that wants to get a business going. And so everything was tested. And this is stuff I've done in person for the past 10 years around the material. So it's definitely vetted in stacking the deck. Hired Charlie Hohen to help edit. He's Tucker Max, Ramit Sethi, Tim Ferriss' editor assistant. Yeah, I mean, there was nothing. I'm stacking the deck. So, you know, what that means is like all the cards are in my favor, ideally. And you can't, I can't control the outcome, but I'm going to put all my inputs into control. The thing that was surprising about the book is that if there's so many business books out there, how come there's not one that everyone goes to? Why is that? And that's where this book solves, which is like, yes, all the books, there's a lot of business material out there, but why is it not working? And it's not working because people are afraid and people have fears that are holding them back from these dreams. And so how do we get the dreams bigger than their fears so that they can overcome it? And it's through fun and stories that they can actually do in 48 hours and change their lives.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah, that's you know, that is such a good point. So I think something similar. I have this LinkedIn basically course that we do is we've had over like 4,000 people go through it right and it's paid and You know in this course You know, we got a hundred couple hundred people in at first and we're like, all right We're gonna help you that was simple start writing online LinkedIn, right? Like that was it we're gonna help you start writing on LinkedIn so that you can create opportunities for yourself right creating content and The first couple, like couple hundred, what I was doing is like, here's the hooks you do. Here's how to write. Here's how to do this. And here's how to do that. And like, it wasn't really sticking. Right. And so I was like, what the hell is going on? And about three months after doing this, I personally had this inflection point. I was talking to someone on the call, on a call and I was like, Hey man, we've had a couple of people here. Like, you know, we helped you get started. It's like this 30 day challenge. A lot of people like at day 10 are just stopping, like, why do you think that is? And this person goes, well, I think it's because you, you get right into the tactics and not building it up with the mindset that people need to have getting into this. Cause a lot of people are scared and anyone can throw out the tactics on how do you now, especially these days with chat GPT and all this shit. Right. And what's interesting about anyone can do the tactics, right? Chat GPT, wrap me a viral LinkedIn post, whatever. But what it can teach is the mindset for you to go into it. And so we basically changed the whole curriculum right after a couple hundred people. And what that did is it's a whole week of onboarding. That's literally just about how to get over your fear of publishing. Right. And it's the whole fear base in that it took our like, I would say our completion rate from like 35% of people to like 87% that got through all 30 days of like publishing every day online. So I was like, holy shit, this is crazy. And for me, that was a big learning lesson going back to what you said. And I haven't read Million Dollar Weekend, right. But maybe I'll be a beta tester now. And so that goes back into that like Million Dollar Weekend, right, which is, and it's hard to just tell someone this, but once you start one business, and you know, it or not even one, 10, you figure out that like, this is just death by a thousand cuts. You get better at making it less cuts, right? But you figure it out as you go. So anyways, going back to that, the mindset, man, so, so important. So I'm glad you said that about the book, right? Which is the fear. You go back to the fear of doing it, like the fear of starting the business, whatever that is. And I'm sure you have some thoughts on it you put in the book, right? But like, what do you think is that fear holding people back?
Noah Kagan:There's just two but the two are big Very big and they're both solvable. Thank God and The first one is the the fear of starting the fear of getting going the fear of what what can happen the fear of I don't know That fear. And that's solvable. And we solve it in the book. And then the second fear is the fear of asking. It's the fear of asking someone else, which all business is, asking them to buy Andy's course, asking them to consume your content, asking your husband or wife or girlfriend out, asking for a sale. And the more that you can get comfortable asking, and it's not as scary, which we have challenges in the book, That are fun that people literally I got a text from this guy Rico today. He's like, holy shit I got three customers and Rico said I this is insane. It's like yeah, it's It doesn't go away. You just get better. I was I was I was a rollerblading last night Yeah, with my family. As we like to do on Sundays, you know. Dude, the people who rollerblade are special kind of people. And so I'm rollerblading with my family last night and my nephew's there and he's never rollerbladed before. And so he comes out on the thing and he just falls. And it was like, oh, interesting. And it made me think about this book because most people, everyone wants more money. And I believe everyone should be a millionaire. Being rich is awesome. It's just way better to be rich. And it's available to everyone. It's not exclusive. There's not some guru that creates some big, what they do is they create a distance. It's available to everyone and you should do it. And so my cousin or my nephew, excuse me, he needed a little support. And so they had this thing that you hold. It's like a little bunny rabbit of sorts that you hold onto. So while you skate, you can now hold onto it. And so he was now kind of moving a little bit better. A little bit. All right. He's practicing. And then, you know, as you can, you know, where the story's going, as the night went on, you know, he got better and eventually that the bunny rabbit can go away. And that same thing goes in business, you know, where I'm afraid of getting started. So that's why we teach now, not how. All right. What are what are exercises? What are things? Oh, you want a business? OK, let's post it on LinkedIn right now. You want to see if you can get a customer. Let's call someone right now. Don't worry about the how of these things. Don't worry. Oh, you know, what's my LLC or someone messaged me a few days ago. He's like, how do what should I do for my website's terms and conditions? And I was like, who's your who's a competitor? Who's someone else? Copy theirs. And then that's not what matters to your customers. Your customers care about a solution. They don't care about what's going on with you. They care about their life and their problems that ideally you can solve. And yes, we pay law firms now to do that kind of stuff. But really, especially in the beginning, it's getting going now. And these fears, how do you do them in a fun way so it's not so scary? And it never goes away. I'm still scared. I'm still scared of asking people for things. I do a lot of YouTube videos. It's like a million subscriber channel where it's me going and asking a yacht person or asking a private jet person or asking first class passengers or asking on the street or knocking on people's doors. And it's just showing, you know, and I don't say I'm a business owner. I don't say anything. I just I'm a guy. And it's the reality that the the upside of asking is unlimited. It's unlimited. You literally can get everything you want in the world if you just ask anything you want. You want money, you want a partner, you want a business, you want to hire someone, it's an ask. And so the more that we can practice those things and then as you move around the rink and you keep going, you keep experimenting, keep going, eventually those become easier and you get to the level of success that each person's looking for.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah. And you, you know, that was one thing I was, when I was doing some research here is your YouTube channel. Cause everything is like, Hey, I asked these people in first class on a plane, how they got rich. Right. I'm like, Oh, that's so. And, or you went to, uh, what's the neighborhood lake, uh, in, in Austin, the bougie neighborhood, Westlake Hills, you went knocked on doors and you were like, Hey, how'd you get rich? Right. Um, Yeah. And all that. And I feel like it's a muscle, man. I feel like like this at like asking for things. And you've obviously built up this muscle through doing it through this YouTube channel and stuff. But I also feel like it's a it could be a muscle, right? It's like who was it that said like Starbucks by asking if you can have your coffee for free or something?
Noah Kagan:Was that you that's that's a signature thing in the book. Yeah, the coffee challenge. That's one of the most things I'm famous for Yeah, that's you.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah, that's you.
Noah Kagan:I don't even forgot that was you so basically going Going to a coffee shop and asking for 10% off and just letting them reject you Don't explain it. You can tell Noah sent you if you need to feel if you need to say something and The practice of that is the reality that once you get rejected, it's not so bad as you think. They're not saying you're bad. They're just saying they don't want to do this thing. You have ability and you can keep going. And the more that you can just get these reps in and it's not, I still do it to this day. It doesn't go away. And so two days ago, I see someone with a jacket I liked. And I was like, do I have to do it? And I'm like, yes. I like the three second rule. Just don't give yourself more than three seconds to negotiate out. Just go do it now.
Andy Mewborn:Right now.
Noah Kagan:Just get going. And I went up to the guy and said, hey, where's your jacket from? I said, cool jacket. Complimented him. And he felt good. And I said, where'd you get it from? He's like, Urban Outfitters. And I was like, damn, dude, I'm 41. I don't know if I can buy from Urban Outfitters. But yeah, but once you hit 40, they don't even nice job. Yeah. Yeah, they kick you ban you from that store It's like dude now you have to go to what is it? Eddie Bauer some old person store point being though. It's an ass It's just an ask and then you keep asking like I got earrings They gave me that now I don't even have to ask they know me now They're like, oh, it's the discount guy and it's not even clear. It's never about the discount It's never about getting the 10% off It's about asking for something. A lot of people actually get it, but realizing when you get rejected, it's not so painful. And this is in a safe space. You're super safe. They don't care about you. And by doing it there, when you actually do it in business, which it's still safe and it can be fun and you get rejected, you're like, oh, cool. Let me learn something from this. And then you could take that learning, that feedback and keep improving.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I did this once. It was like a concert or something. Just two of my buddies had a me and one of my best friend had a ticket and we had two buddies with us after dinner. And they're like, hey, like, like, maybe we should see you go to the front kiosk or whatever. We'll call and see if they have more tickets. I'm like, oh, that's pretty much sold out. But I'll ask and I'll get us two tickets. Like, how are you going to do that? I'm like, dude, we'll just ask. Right. And so, you know, you go to get up to the front window, we grab our two tickets. Hey, my two buddies, like, Basically, they didn't buy a ticket. I'm going to be completely honest with you, but they really want to see the show with us. Can we get two tickets by chance? We'll pay you, you know, a high price, whatever it's going to take. She's like, oh yeah, one second. Goes talk to her boss, come back, gives me two free tickets. You know, Oh, wow. That's cool. Yeah. Yeah. And I was like, wow, that's the upside of asking, man. It's crazy, man. I love it. It's crazy. And at a concert and my buddy's like, Oh my God, you're such a good like salesperson. I'm like, no, dude, I'm not a salesperson at all. Like I just asked the question, which, uh, which, you know, another one I was at like, uh, my, my wife and I, we went, um, And my son, I was like, you know what, let's freaking go golfing. Let's go. I'm not a huge golfer, but I was like, yeah, there's no surf today. Like, let's go try golf. Right. And so we go and we're at the golf course and you know, who pulls up is, is Dave Ramsey. you know, Dave Ramsey, like financial guru, Dave Ramsey. Yeah. Yeah. Like I'm like, that's Dave Ramsey. And I was like, Oh, I love that guy. And so I was like, Oh, I'm gonna go ask him. You can take a picture with, with us and Apollo, my son. And she's like, no, don't do it. Don't do it. Like hitting me, you know, hitting me. Don't do it. Don't do it. I'm like, oh, screw him. I'll grab Apollo. He can't say no to baby. You know? So I go over, ask him and freaking Dave's like, yeah, absolutely. You know, in his Texas accent, like, yeah, of course that's possible. You know? And, uh, get a picture with Dave Ramsey, man. And, uh, you know, I was fanboying, of course, like, dude, this guy's awesome. Uh, you know, like he's a, and he's like helped so many people with like finance stuff. Like Ramit as well, your buddy. Right. But, um, just, yeah, man, like what's, how's the saying goes? Close mouths don't get fat.
Noah Kagan:Yeah. I've always liked the squeaky wheel gets the grease. That's my mom. She's still asking for things all the time. I'm like, Oh, you're a mom.
Andy Mewborn:I got a what's the last thing she asked for?
Noah Kagan:We were two days ago. We went and got coffee. She didn't like the way the coffee tastes. So she asked for a refund. Yeah, it was hot chocolate. And she just was like, you know, this is, you know, partially where I learned it from. Same as from my father. And then just from practice. Yeah. Just like, hey, I don't like the hot chocolate. Can I have my money back? And I think a lot of people would just accept it. And I admire her for You know for some people it's uncomfortable and for her it's like no it's it's what's right And I and I do believe if you have a product like your maybe your LinkedIn course or for me this book million-dollar weekend It's it's not an ask. It's not a sell. It's it's a belief. It's an education It's like hey if you have a problem that I truly believe I can help you with I think it's my duty to say hey this I believe is gonna help you and to me it's not as fearful as something good and I think a lot of people look at sales and Asking as a negative and I really think it's an optimistic and a positive It's like, hey man, this is great. Tell me, is it telling me your problem? Yeah, I can get you on that. I help you on that. And I think the more that we can look at it in that manner, the more that we can ask for more things and get more what we really want.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah. And I think Dharmesh said this, but like going back to what you said is like, you do AppSumo, so you do a lot of SaaS, right? You deal with that. And one thing that he said that always stuck with me is like, every SaaS these days or a majority of them are just a spreadsheet with an opinion. And I was like, oh, that's funny. That's that's that's good. That's good.
Noah Kagan:Well, that's funny, given his businesses is literally a spreadsheet. It's a literally like, you know, $5,000,000 spreadsheet. So clearly something. Yeah. Yeah. Pretty valuable spreadsheet.
Andy Mewborn:Yeah. Hey, I got to. Hey, I enjoy this.
