Business Principles 101

1. 0:00 – 2:07

   Series kickoff: what Business Principles 101 is (and what it isn’t)

   1. CWChris Williamson0:00

      Today, we are starting a new series, Business Principles 101.

   2. JOJonny0:04

      If you just want to replace your income by doing something you enjoy doing, you could absolutely sell some kind of expertise, or even sell what you're currently doing, but package it in a business.

   3. CWChris Williamson0:13

      If you want to become good at business, a formal education is in no way mandatory. People love the idea of being an entrepreneur or a business owner more than they like the idea of doing business.

   4. YUYusef0:25

      Mm-hmm.

   5. CWChris Williamson0:25

      Because they want the title without the graft. If the title could be attained (snaps fingers) overnight, in that case it's not worth anything, so you shouldn't want it.

   6. YUYusef0:33

      I've seen people set up a- a blog or a- a YouTube channel, and really plow money into it and try to get the production quality working, and just get nothing out of it, because you can't rely on organic traffic being a- a thing.

   7. CWChris Williamson0:46

      Not anymore, man.

   8. JOJonny0:46

      If you just do for a living what you find intensely interesting, then immediately you have a massive advantage over everybody else.

   9. CWChris Williamson0:54

      We're not actually that good at business, but we've made 13 years of mistakes that we only made once. I'm joined by none other than Jonny and Yousaf from propanefitness.com.

   10. YUYusef1:07

       Oh.

   11. CWChris Williamson1:09

       (laughs)

   12. YUYusef1:10

       (laughs)

   13. CWChris Williamson1:10

       Welcome back, man.

   14. YUYusef1:11

       Welcome back.

   15. JOJonny1:11

       Welcome back.

   16. CWChris Williamson1:12

       Welcome back indeed. Um, today we are starting a new series, Business Principles 101. Uh, we have all had a lot of experience. I've done 13 years of business operating. You've had maybe a decade now?

   17. YUYusef1:27

       11, yeah.

   18. CWChris Williamson1:27

       11. Jonny, something similar?

   19. JOJonny1:29

       Same here.

   20. CWChris Williamson1:30

       It's like 30 years of combined running and failing at business between us.

   21. YUYusef1:35

       Lots of failing.

   22. CWChris Williamson1:35

       Mostly failing.

   23. YUYusef1:36

       (laughs)

   24. CWChris Williamson1:37

       Um, we are getting quite a lot of requests for advice for entrepreneurship and stuff like that, and I figured the, uh, wealth of experience that we have, both good and bad, could be pretty valuable to people, and there should be some golden stories that come out of this. Also, all of us did business degrees of one sort or another.

   25. JOJonny1:55

       Sort of, yeah.

   26. CWChris Williamson1:56

       Accounting. What was your actual degree?

   27. JOJonny1:58

       Economics.

   28. CWChris Williamson1:59

       Was it?

   29. YUYusef2:00

       Yeah.

   30. CWChris Williamson2:00

       Okay. And then you did ...
2. 2:07 – 3:34

   Why learning from “strugglers” beats learning from naturals

   1. YUYusef2:07

      I think something that's really useful as well, of hearing our failings that are to come, is that if you ever want to learn something from someone, I think if you've got a choice between learning from someone who's a natural and just struck lucky first time, compared to someone who was terrible or ma- failed multiple times and grew into a stage that- that you've seen this progression, there's so much more to be learned from that person. Like- like we were saying in Relationships 103, where the guy who's been divorced 15 times knows a lot more about marriage-

   2. CWChris Williamson2:40

      (laughs)

   3. YUYusef2:41

      ... than the guy who-

   4. CWChris Williamson2:41

      The guy that just happened to look into a harmonious one. You always say this about mobility, right? You wanna learn from the guy who couldn't get into good squat position.

   5. JOJonny2:48

      Benchpress.

   6. CWChris Williamson2:49

      Benchpress.

   7. JOJonny2:49

      But like, I, yeah, you don't wanna learn from the guy with little arms. You wanna l- learn from the guy who's world record level, but has got really long arms.

   8. YUYusef2:55

      Grinded it out and-

   9. CWChris Williamson2:56

      Yeah.

   10. YUYusef2:56

       Yeah.

   11. CWChris Williamson2:57

       Cool. So, um, where do we start with Business Principles? I guess, come on, um, I don't wanna hot potato you, Jonny.

   12. JOJonny3:03

       You are going-

   13. YUYusef3:03

       (laughs)

   14. JOJonny3:04

       I knew this was going to happen.

   15. CWChris Williamson3:04

       I'm going to hot potato you.

   16. YUYusef3:04

       No, no.

   17. CWChris Williamson3:05

       I'm sorry, I apologize.

   18. JOJonny3:07

       (laughs)

   19. CWChris Williamson3:07

       Uh, also, before we get, before we get cracking, in the comments below, or message me on Instagram, if there's any particular areas of business that you want us to cover, any stories you want us to elaborate on, any advice you'd like us to go for with entrepreneurship or our experiences, or if you need an accountant, I've got a mint accountant as well, so just, you know, magic man Chris Ayers. Um, so Jonny, what was your first foray into entrepreneurship or business operating?

3. 3:34 – 4:50

   Jonny’s first venture: early blogging, naming, and the long runway

   1. JOJonny3:34

      Um, so I- I was sat watching TV one summer, I think still at school perhaps, and used to read T Nation, bodybuilding.com a lot.

   2. CWChris Williamson3:48

      Mm-hmm.

   3. JOJonny3:49

      And clearly remember the thought of, th- that can't be that difficult to do. Like, it's just a website with articles on.

   4. CWChris Williamson3:56

      Blog. Fitness blog.

   5. JOJonny3:57

      Yeah. Let's do that. Texted Yousaf, well, I actually started one myself on like blogspot.com, like one of these like really old now, um, websites that allow you to set up a really bad website.

   6. CWChris Williamson4:10

      (laughs)

   7. JOJonny4:11

      Texted Yousaf and said, um, "Shall we set up a website? We'll call it optimumfitessystems.com." And you, I remember you were like, you were super keen.

   8. CWChris Williamson4:21

      Mm-hmm.

   9. JOJonny4:22

      But you googled how many results optimum fitness systems came up, and it was like hundreds of thousands.

   10. CWChris Williamson4:28

       (laughs) And this is probably, what, like 2008? 2006?

   11. JOJonny4:31

       Probably before that.

   12. YUYusef4:31

       Yeah, 2006, 2007.

   13. JOJonny4:33

       Yeah.

   14. CWChris Williamson4:33

       Geez.

   15. YUYusef4:34

       So we were like ...

   16. CWChris Williamson4:34

       So now, Optimum, if you are thinking-

   17. YUYusef4:36

       We should change the name.

   18. CWChris Williamson4:36

       There's our first piece of advice.

   19. JOJonny4:38

       (clears throat) For God's sake.

   20. CWChris Williamson4:38

       If you are thinking, do not call it Optimum-

   21. JOJonny4:40

       Yeah.

   22. CWChris Williamson4:41

       ... Optimum Fitness Systems.

   23. JOJonny4:42

       Yeah. Yeah, so that was it. That was it, and it didn't become a business until 2011.

   24. YUYusef4:50

       Yeah, so ca-

4. 4:50 – 6:49

   Fitness “expert” demand & the comedy of unsolicited advice-seekers

   1. CWChris Williamson4:50

      Yeah, 'cause for you guys, you just started the blog as like a, "Oh, we do fitness. People ask us..." When are you getting hassled loads about fitness?

   2. JOJonny4:56

      Yeah, get... Well, I think when you're like the- the fit one in your friends.

   3. CWChris Williamson5:01

      Yeah, yeah.

   4. JOJonny5:01

      In your friendship group. People ask you like, you know-

   5. YUYusef5:04

      "How do I get big arms?"

   6. JOJonny5:06

      Uh, way in the morning, two scoops, strawberry.

   7. CWChris Williamson5:09

      Strawberry?

   8. YUYusef5:09

      Oh.

   9. JOJonny5:10

      (laughs)

   10. YUYusef5:10

       I get cornered in the gym with people being like, "Oh, excuse me, uh, just, uh, 'cause, uh, just so you know, I have, uh, me- me breakfast, 7:00 AM. Strawberry, two scoops."

   11. JOJonny5:21

       (laughs)

   12. CWChris Williamson5:22

       (laughs)

   13. YUYusef5:22

       "With, uh, just-"

   14. JOJonny5:23

       I love the, "Just so you know."

   15. CWChris Williamson5:24

       (laughs)

   16. JOJonny5:24

       Like no- no context, just-

   17. YUYusef5:26

       You know-

   18. CWChris Williamson5:26

       You know?

   19. JOJonny5:27

       ... he's just telling you, you know-

   20. YUYusef5:27

       And he'll start then, he's like, "Well, it's too rude to interject at this point."

   21. JOJonny5:30

       (laughs)

   22. YUYusef5:30

       "So I'm gonna have to wait until he makes his point."

   23. CWChris Williamson5:32

       What's the-

   24. YUYusef5:32

       And then he just takes, he's just going through his entire day.

   25. CWChris Williamson5:34

       (laughs)

   26. YUYusef5:35

       Being like, "Oh, I'll have me oats, 30 grams. Uh, d- Sc- Scottish rolled oats."

   27. CWChris Williamson5:41

       (laughs)

   28. YUYusef5:41

       "And then I'll have two egg whites."

   29. JOJonny5:45

       Not the pot? Not the instant pot?

   30. YUYusef5:45

       Oh, no-
5. 6:49 – 8:39

   Yusef’s eBay battery arbitrage: the first “time is money” lesson

   1. YUYusef6:49

      Yes. Uh, I- I used to drop ship batteries on Ebay.

   2. CWChris Williamson6:51

      What the fuck? (laughs) Here we go. Excuse me. We need to ring the Yusuf alarm.

   3. YUYusef6:56

      Stop the podcast. (laughs)

   4. CWChris Williamson6:58

      (laughs)

   5. YUYusef6:58

      What was the last ... This was when you ... It was on Life Fails when you told us that you'd been going to, like, Blyth for 12 weeks to do-

   6. CWChris Williamson7:04

      Oh, for a cult?

   7. YUYusef7:06

      Right. So it was last summer.

   8. CWChris Williamson7:06

      And so you've been drop sh- drop shipping. I bet he's still doing this, you know?

   9. YUYusef7:11

      (laughs)

   10. CWChris Williamson7:11

       (laughs)

   11. YUYusef7:11

       You'd have gone to a drop shipping battery conference last weekend.

   12. CWChris Williamson7:13

       (laughs)

   13. YUYusef7:15

       (laughs)

   14. CWChris Williamson7:15

       That's where you were. You went with your girlfriend-

   15. YUYusef7:16

       Oh, yeah.

   16. CWChris Williamson7:17

       ... in the cottage somewhere.

   17. YUYusef7:18

       The game that was just a cover story. I was- I was in the warehouse in Slough-

   18. CWChris Williamson7:21

       (laughs)

   19. YUYusef7:22

       ... trying to arrange a deal for Taiwan.

   20. CWChris Williamson7:24

       First principles, man, yeah.

   21. YUYusef7:25

       Yeah. Drop shipped batteries. Actually I misused the word drop ship. It- I arbitraged them.

   22. CWChris Williamson7:32

       (laughs) That's even worse. So you never actually owned them?

   23. YUYusef7:34

       Well, I- I owned them for- for a short time. So I used to buy batteries in bulk, the littleum, C137 or whatever they're called.

   24. CWChris Williamson7:40

       Oh, yeah, yeah.

   25. YUYusef7:41

       Yeah.

   26. CWChris Williamson7:41

       For scales?

   27. YUYusef7:42

       Yeah.

   28. CWChris Williamson7:42

       Yep.

   29. YUYusef7:43

       Um- I had to buy one recently for my car key. Oh, I should have bought one off me. I get you good-

   30. CWChris Williamson7:46

       (laughs)
6. 8:39 – 12:11

   The Planner’s Dilemma: ideas are cheap, execution compounds

   1. CWChris Williamson8:39

      So talking about, um, the issue of time, I think this paralysis by analysis issue that we came up against or what me and, uh, one of the guys, part of the Modern Wisdom project, Jordan, dubbed the planner's dilemma, similar to the prisoner's dilemma, is a lot of people are averse to starting a business because they would rather plan and think-

   2. YUYusef9:05

      Have the perfect business.

   3. CWChris Williamson9:06

      Yeah, the perfect business, whereas definitely I'm ... We- we will all agree that a lot of the skills that you learn in business just occur from operating something.

   4. YUYusef9:16

      Yep.

   5. CWChris Williamson9:16

      Like, just having to deal with the situations which arise as a byproduct of having a business, and they become so robust and transferrable.

   6. YUYusef9:24

      So great principle for this is idea is the constant and execution is the multiplier, whereas a lot of people who haven't done something like this before thinks that- think that the idea is like, "Oh, mate, I've got this really sick idea, but you've got to sign a non-disclosure agreement if you're gonna talk about it with me 'cause I'd have to kill you if it..." And it's like no one cares about your stupid little idea because unless you actually execute it well, it d- ... Like Amazon selling stuff, selling items online. It's not a- it's not a groundbreaking idea, but it's executed so well that it becomes ...

   7. CWChris Williamson9:55

      Yeah.

   8. YUYusef9:55

      So, um, I think that's something that ... And- and it comes into the planner's dilemma because people think that like if they craft this perfect idea, it's like ... But actually if they just got moving and doing things and then failed forward into stuff and then you figure out what works and what doesn't. But I think the best description I've heard of business operation is just professional problem solving. Mm-hmm.

   9. CWChris Williamson10:15

      Yeah.

   10. YUYusef10:15

       And like you- all that happens is you are trying to make something continue happening and happen more or faster, more often or at bigger- bigger scale, and loads of problems happen.

   11. CWChris Williamson10:28

       It feels-

   12. YUYusef10:28

       And you have to solve them. Each time something happens, each time you- "Oh, no, there's a problem. Oh, I got to find a solution. Oh, that's created another problem."

   13. CWChris Williamson10:33

       Yeah. It feels like to me controlled falling business. Like, someone's pushed you at the top of an infinite set of stairs and all you're doing is going ... (footsteps pattering)

   14. YUYusef10:43

       That- that's what Ben is so good at. So we- we have a friend who ran a- a bike company and he was consulted ... He got a phone call the other day of someone being like, "Oh, you all right, mate? Something's gone wrong in the labs. Like the- the inducer isn't working through the thing and it's letting off this blue steam." And Ben was like, "Okay, so maybe just try this and then I'll- we'll get Christian to write a bit of code so that it only functions intermittently." I'm like, "Ben, what- how do you know about lab equipment?" He goes like, "I don't really. It's just kind of problem solving." Just systems, isn't it?

   15. CWChris Williamson11:12

       Yeah. (laughs)

   16. YUYusef11:13

       You know.

   17. CWChris Williamson11:13

       At some point in his history he's come up with something that links to this. But yeah, controlled falling, man. Like again, a lot of people that think they're ... Or that perceive professionals, high performing professionals, as being good at business would be so amazed to realize how little of a clue they have about what they're doing. So I was listening to ... And this is a really fucking good podcast, and I haven't lost my mind. Logan Paul.

   18. YUYusef11:38

       (laughs)

   19. CWChris Williamson11:38

       Logan Paul's podcast really fuck- ... He's got some ... He's got some shite guests on. Like he'll- he'll probably have like Nicki Minaj or something.

   20. YUYusef11:46

       But even still, fair fucking play.

   21. CWChris Williamson11:47

       Matty had-

   22. YUYusef11:47

       That's a big guy to play.

   23. CWChris Williamson11:48

       ... he had The Real Wolf of Wall Street on.

   24. YUYusef11:50

       Really?

   25. CWChris Williamson11:51

       Like giving sales advice. Motherfucker.

   26. YUYusef11:55

       (laughs)

   27. CWChris Williamson11:56

       So anyway, um, and he was talking about ... All of the guys in the room were talking about the fact that all of them have pitched themselves into meetings with people that are super successful-... and said that they are the best at social media in all of LA when they've never done social media or digital marketing before.

   28. JOJonny12:11

       Mm-hmm.

7. 12:11 – 13:42

   Start small, limit liability: don’t bet the house on your first try

   1. CWChris Williamson12:11

      And then they've just had to learn on their feet. Now, I think that you can overshoot, and this goes back to what you were saying about just getting started with something. If you're going to start a business, I think starting small, i.e., do not, I repeat, do not ring me-

   2. JOJonny12:28

      (laughs)

   3. GUGuest12:28

      (laughs)

   4. CWChris Williamson12:28

      ... and tell me that you've remortgaged your entire house to start a business when you have no business experience.

   5. JOJonny12:34

      Mm-hmm.

   6. GUGuest12:34

      Yeah.

   7. CWChris Williamson12:34

      I.e., start with a low amount of financial liability.

   8. GUGuest12:37

      Oh, I've seen that before. It's terrifying.

   9. CWChris Williamson12:39

      You've never run a business before and you've put 50% of your net worth into this business.

   10. JOJonny12:43

       You see it on Dragons' Den a lot, if you ever watch that.

   11. GUGuest12:45

       Oh, people just go-

   12. JOJonny12:47

       People that are like-

   13. GUGuest12:47

       ... "All chips on the table."

   14. JOJonny12:48

       Yeah, when they're like, they're asking for investment, they haven't made many sales, it's like, "How much have you invested?" Like, "Oh, 100,000 of my own money. I've remortgaged my house twice." You know, like, hmm.

   15. GUGuest12:56

       You're like, I-

   16. JOJonny12:56

       You know, you get (laughs) -

   17. GUGuest12:57

       There's, there's great optimism.

   18. CWChris Williamson12:58

       Well, I've got to pay, like, once I take off the child support and my divorce settlement, like, yeah, painful.

   19. JOJonny13:03

       It's why-

   20. CWChris Williamson13:03

       Everyone just thinks they're going to be Levi Roots, don't they?

   21. JOJonny13:05

       Well, yeah, like the one diamond in the rough success story.

   22. CWChris Williamson13:09

       Yeah.

   23. JOJonny13:09

       But it, it's, it's kind of why the, the Gary Vaynerchuk advice of, of, like, you know, the people asking him a question like, "I'm, I'm 29 and I've got this idea, but I think it's too late to start." And he's like, "Fuck you." You know what I mean? He's like, "Of course it's not too late to start." And it's like, well, Gary, that's fine, uh, un- until it's negligent. Until, like, the person actually doesn't have a really good idea and they ruin their life-

   24. CWChris Williamson13:31

       Mm-hmm.

   25. JOJonny13:32

       ... pursuing this like, well, I just need to keep trying and keep investing and keep going.

   26. CWChris Williamson13:35

       Mm-hmm.

   27. JOJonny13:36

       So-

   28. CWChris Williamson13:36

       I was-

   29. JOJonny13:37

       But you only know that if you just... Well, it's the Facebook thing of move, move fast, break it-

   30. CWChris Williamson13:41

       Mm-hmm.
8. 13:42 – 15:18

   It’s not “too late”: the surprising age reality of major founders

   1. CWChris Williamson13:42

      So in- interesting point here. David Epstein, guy that wrote Range, he said that he'd done an analysis of when the, uh, av- the average age of the CEOs of industry-changing businesses. So he asked, "What's the average age of in- of, uh, CEOs in industry-changing businesses when they founded the company?" So not when it went public, none of that shit, what's the average age? And they asked this at this, like, super starty-uppy, Silicon Valley, quantified self, vegan bullshit conference somewhere.

   2. JOJonny14:17

      Like, astroturf on the walls-

   3. CWChris Williamson14:19

      Yeah.

   4. JOJonny14:19

      ... basketball hoops everywhere.

   5. CWChris Williamson14:21

      Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Um, and-

   6. GUGuest14:23

      Foosball. (laughs)

   7. CWChris Williamson14:24

      Foosball, fucking loads-

   8. JOJonny14:25

      (laughs)

   9. GUGuest14:25

      Ugh.

   10. CWChris Williamson14:25

       ... of foosball, yeah, exactly. Ask this question and the room was like, "Uh, 23, 24, 25." Because everyone knows the Mark Zuckerberg story, about he was, I think, 23-

   11. JOJonny14:34

       Mm-hmm.

   12. CWChris Williamson14:34

       ... when he started Facebook. Average age, 44.

   13. JOJonny14:37

       Yeah.

   14. CWChris Williamson14:38

       So-

   15. JOJonny14:38

       I think that's what I said before.

   16. CWChris Williamson14:39

       Bill Gates and, um, that era of CEOs seem to play around in a number of different industries before they get to something.

   17. JOJonny14:50

       Mm-hmm.

   18. CWChris Williamson14:51

       But what have they got? Wealths of experience.

   19. JOJonny14:54

       Yeah.

   20. CWChris Williamson14:54

       And masses of failures as well.

   21. JOJonny14:57

       Mm-hmm.

   22. CWChris Williamson14:57

       Probably.

   23. JOJonny14:57

       Well, even, even like on a really PG, like BBC level, Dragons' Den again.

   24. CWChris Williamson15:02

       Mm-hmm.

   25. JOJonny15:02

       If you watch that lineup, like none of them are such and such founded a business when he was 18 and it was the first business he did and he went on to be a multimillionaire. Like, all of them had like eight businesses that at- like spectacularly failed, and then the ninth one just went all right.

   26. GUGuest15:17

       Mm-hmm.

9. 15:18 – 18:18

   Chris’s origin story: learning a business from the ground floor up

   1. CWChris Williamson15:18

      So as a, uh, to try and give some of my genesis story, I guess, with this, which is a little bit contrary to what we've said so far, the first ever business that I started was when I sat down at my first seminar for uni in Freshers' Week, sat next to my business partner, my f- my would-be business partner, said, "I'm skint. I've spent all of my money in Freshers' Week drinking." This is when like maintenance loan was like three, two and a half grand or something in pennies, but then also accommodation was also pennies. Uh, sat next to him and he said, "Oh, well, there's this company that I used to work for in Leeds called Voodoo. Now, you can come and get a flyering job with me later on. Like, do you want to come to the meeting this week?" And then from then, we started working together and that, that was my first ever business, first day of university, sat next to my business partner. 13 years later, still together.

   2. JOJonny16:07

      Still doing it.

   3. GUGuest16:07

      There's a key difference there, though, isn't there, as to why that was successful, and the people who quit their job and remortgaged their house before they've f- fathomed an idea, why, why that was successful and what you-

   4. CWChris Williamson16:21

      We very delicately treaded in and moved up through the business.

   5. JOJonny16:24

      Mm-hmm.

   6. CWChris Williamson16:25

      So definitely one of the principles I think that people need to keep a hold of is that if you've never run a business before or if you're wanting to start a business, you have to, as far as I'm concerned, especially small businesses, if you are a specialist in logistics or something like that, there's no reason that you couldn't, after a lot of time doing logistics, then jump from perhaps management to ownership. That's a, a fairly easy one. But for a lot of SMEs, my best bit of advice in terms of starting is to learn every phase of your business from the ground floor up.

   7. GUGuest16:59

      Yeah.

   8. CWChris Williamson17:00

      So the lineage of a typical club promoter would be start as a flyer boy, be good at flyering, then maybe become like a senior flyer boy where you manage the other PR staff. Then junior event manager, event manager, senior event manager, city manager, maybe business development manager or something like that, then director. And once you've done through all of those different stages, you understand, you've got a bird's eye view of recruitment, of marketing, of HR, of accounting, of B2B, of B2C, all that sort of shit, and then when one of your employees comes to you with an issue, you can deal with it-

   9. JOJonny17:37

      Mm-hmm.

   10. CWChris Williamson17:38

       ... because you have seen-

   11. GUGuest17:39

       'Cause he brings every cog in each wheel.

   12. CWChris Williamson17:40

       ... every single thing and you've got a process. So there we go, another principle is, as you move through the business, as you encounter particular issues, write down your solution that you gave to those issues. Because now, for me and Darren, again, one of the things that we talk about with our business is that we're not actually that good at business, but we've made 13 years of mistakes that we only made once.

   13. JOJonny18:06

       Yeah.

   14. CWChris Williamson18:06

       And now, we have a process for ... there's very rarely, very, very rarely that I come up against, and this will be the sa- I know it's the same for you guys because I've seen your auto-responder email.

   15. JOJonny18:16

       (laughs)

   16. YUYusef18:17

       (laughs)

   17. CWChris Williamson18:18

       Um-

   18. JOJonny18:18

       (laughs)

   19. YUYusef18:18

       (laughs)

10. 18:18 – 21:32

    “Your situation is unique” (it isn’t): standard problems and standard fixes

    1. CWChris Williamson18:18

       ... that very rarely do you encounter a situation after running a business for maybe more than five years which you haven't encountered before. There's something quite symbolic about that as well, that the vast majority of problems that people believe is this unique curse bestowed upon them alone-

    2. JOJonny18:35

       (clears throat)

    3. CWChris Williamson18:35

       ... are actually just really representative of what everyone's suffers with.

    4. YUYusef18:38

       We, we get that with, 'cause we, we offer business coaching as well. And sometimes you'll get an inquiry from someone that's like, "Hey, guys, I was gonna sign up for your program, but my situation is like really unique and different and special. So, I need customized, I need something that's more bespoke." And then they describe their situation and you're like-

    5. CWChris Williamson18:58

       Mm-hmm.

    6. YUYusef18:58

       ... "That is the most standard of standard businesses."

    7. JOJonny19:00

       (laughs)

    8. YUYusef19:00

       Like you and the other 10 people who emailed this week with exactly the same unique specific-

    9. CWChris Williamson19:05

       Did you listen to the Tiago Forte podcast? He said that his first ever business was, um, fixing people's Windows XP computers.

    10. YUYusef19:12

        Oh, yeah.

    11. JOJonny19:13

        Oh, yeah.

    12. CWChris Williamson19:13

        Everyone had this very unique problem-

    13. YUYusef19:16

        Yeah.

    14. CWChris Williamson19:16

        ... that they came to him with.

    15. YUYusef19:16

        He just Googled it.

    16. JOJonny19:17

        (laughs)

    17. CWChris Williamson19:17

        He, no, no, no. He just did, uninstalled the operating system-

    18. JOJonny19:21

        (laughs)

    19. CWChris Williamson19:21

        ... and put it back in, restarted it, gave it to them.

    20. JOJonny19:24

        (laughs)

    21. YUYusef19:24

        'Cause like-

    22. CWChris Williamson19:24

        He apparently sat there like, "Really?" "Yes, yes."

    23. JOJonny19:27

        (laughs)

    24. CWChris Williamson19:27

        They were like-

    25. YUYusef19:28

        (laughs)

    26. CWChris Williamson19:28

        ... "Oh, like, yes. So, what, what's the problem that you've got? Oh, yes, yeah. Oh, it's difficult when I does."

    27. YUYusef19:32

        Can I fix this?

    28. CWChris Williamson19:33

        It's difficult." Yeah, exactly. One solution fits all.

    29. YUYusef19:36

        Well, like, there, there's something to be said for that. Like, in offering any service, obviously, my like background is in delivering healthcare service, but it's the same thing that there is a, there is an evidence basis behind, and this is seeing behind the, the wall now, behind when a doctor asks you-

    30. CWChris Williamson19:55

        Oh, God. This is how medicine works.
11. 21:32 – 27:03

    E-Myth lessons: technicians, systems, and the trap of buying yourself a job

    1. JOJonny21:32

       So, yeah. So, we've got E-Myth revisited.

    2. CWChris Williamson21:35

       Mm-hmm. Just-

    3. JOJonny21:35

       Book.

    4. YUYusef21:36

       Just thinking.

    5. JOJonny21:36

       Basically describes exactly what you've just said. E-Myth. E-Myth.

    6. YUYusef21:38

       What, what are the three stages?

    7. JOJonny21:40

       E-Myth.

    8. YUYusef21:40

       You become ... You're the technician when you start.

    9. JOJonny21:42

       Yeah.

    10. CWChris Williamson21:43

        So, okay, so who writes it? It'll be in the show notes below.

    11. JOJonny21:45

        Uh ...

    12. YUYusef21:46

        Uh ... I can't remember.

    13. JOJonny21:47

        Can't-

    14. YUYusef21:47

        We'll find out.

    15. CWChris Williamson21:47

        It'll be in the show notes below. Don't worry.

    16. JOJonny21:48

        So, it's the, the entrepreneurial myth. So, he describes a situation of this woman who works for, works in a baker's, loves baking cakes. She's like, "Right, I'm gonna set up my own bakery." Sets up her own bakery because she loves making cakes.

    17. CWChris Williamson22:00

        Mm-hmm.

    18. JOJonny22:01

        And then realizes like, "Oh, fuck. Like, I need to like clean the surfaces, do the books. Oh, God, I need to set up all these systems and, and do, and manage my advertising, and I need an employee." So, then she brings someone in to help and the manager then does everything, hires all the systems. And 10 years later, it's this massive bakery. And she goes in and tries to speak to one of the employees and the employee goes, "Who are you?" And she, and th- she's like, "Oh, um-"

    19. YUYusef22:24

        She hasn't baked a cake in five years.

    20. JOJonny22:25

        "... I'll help with this." They're like, "Oh, no, no, this is how we do it." And she's lost complete control of the business because she didn't do every step.

    21. CWChris Williamson22:32

        Mm-hmm.

    22. JOJonny22:32

        So, it ... that is 101, like if you wanna, if you're look ... 'Cause I think the, the most common movement into business for most people is they are doing something or they see the way something is done and think, "I can do that or I can do that better." Or whatever.

    23. CWChris Williamson22:48

        Mm-hmm.

    24. JOJonny22:48

        But they often miss like the, the rest of the picture.

    25. CWChris Williamson22:52

        It's the same as what we talk about a lot here, which is a lot of people want quick fixes. They want the fat loss pill, not to consistently do calorie deficit with some cardiovascular exercise.

    26. JOJonny23:02

        Not, not the euros dieting.

    27. CWChris Williamson23:02

        Yeah.

    28. JOJonny23:02

        Yeah.

    29. CWChris Williamson23:03

        And it's the same for this. People love the idea of being an entrepreneur or a business owner more than they like the idea of doing business-

    30. JOJonny23:12

        Because-
12. 27:03 – 33:18

    Education vs real-world skills: marketing, sales, and self-directed learning

    1. CWChris Williamson27:03

       So, I think definitely one of the things that we've touched on there which is super important is if you want to become good at business, a formal education is in no way mandatory.

    2. YUYusef27:13

       I think it's unhelpful because it's a waste of time that you could be spending doing other things. Like, the ability to learn and assimilate information is the useful part, but the content that you s- you have to learn in a business degree is useless.

    3. CWChris Williamson27:25

       But you-

    4. YUYusef27:25

       I did a, a module in entrepreneurship 'cause I thought like-

    5. CWChris Williamson27:28

       I did, I did one as well.

    6. YUYusef27:28

       Did you? It was like, I turned up and it was totally misadvertised basically. It was like the history of entrepreneurship in the 1930s America, and like, there was nothing applicable. You're just like ...

    7. JOJonny27:38

       You did a marketing one.

    8. CWChris Williamson27:39

       Master's.

    9. YUYusef27:40

       Yeah.

    10. JOJonny27:41

        Is his act- Do you use that?

    11. YUYusef27:42

        Master's.

    12. CWChris Williamson27:42

        Never once.

    13. JOJonny27:43

        Really?

    14. CWChris Williamson27:44

        Never once. So the reason that I did a, uh, extra degree, a postgrad was because I knew that the first half was covering things that I'd done in my degree. It was the same, some of the modules were given the same names that I'd just finished in my third year. Some of them were given-

    15. YUYusef28:01

        Rethinking.

    16. CWChris Williamson28:01

        Yeah. So I was like, oh okay, I'll just repurpose my existing coursework that I did either one of the last three years. And then sure enough, did that. The only thing I needed to do was a, um, uh, what's even-

    17. JOJonny28:14

        Dissertation.

    18. CWChris Williamson28:15

        Dissertation at the e- at the end of it. Yeah, I mean, that's, that's obviously how much I concentrated on it.

    19. JOJonny28:18

        I can remember you doing the dissertation. I can remember being in the flat while you were doing the dissertation. (laughs)

    20. CWChris Williamson28:23

        Was it that 36-hour period with the window?

    21. JOJonny28:27

        Yeah.

    22. YUYusef28:27

        (laughs)

    23. CWChris Williamson28:27

        Yeah. That was a very-

    24. YUYusef28:27

        There's two types of people in this world, the ones who do the dissertation in 36 hours-

    25. JOJonny28:31

        (laughs)

    26. YUYusef28:31

        ... and the ones who do it in a year.

    27. JOJonny28:32

        Yeah. (laughs)

    28. CWChris Williamson28:33

        I did mine in 36 hours. So yeah-

    29. YUYusef28:36

        With like 10 Red Bulls and-

    30. CWChris Williamson28:37

        Yeah, and all the rest of it.
13. 33:18 – 38:19

    Propane Fitness monetization: from £12 plans to the ‘platinum’ sale that didn’t exist

    1. JOJonny33:18

       ... ProPay. Well, so like, we started and we had no clue. Like, not a clue, 'cause he-

    2. CWChris Williamson33:23

       How did you begin to monetize? So, people'll be listening, they'll think, "Oh, I could do a this, a draw."

    3. JOJonny33:29

       I could do a blog.

    4. CWChris Williamson33:29

       Or, "I sing." Or, "I am good at writing."

    5. JOJonny33:32

       Mm.

    6. YUYusef33:33

       Mm-hmm.

    7. CWChris Williamson33:33

       Or, uh, arbitraging batteries, like ...

    8. YUYusef33:34

       So, so the ... yeah. That's, that's an interesting point, 'cause we, when we started Internet was much younger. Like, a year in Internet land is obviously 10 years in normal.

    9. JOJonny33:43

       Decade, yeah.

    10. YUYusef33:44

        Yeah. And so we started in 2008, 2009, where (clears throat) by ver- by dint of just creating a blog and posting content, it would start to reach the top page on Google.

    11. CWChris Williamson33:54

        Like YouTube six years ago.

    12. YUYusef33:55

        Yeah, exactly.

    13. CWChris Williamson33:55

        Or like podcasts now.

    14. YUYusef33:57

        And so, like, yeah, if you look at old school YouTube, things like Power Thirst and those kind of old school viral videos that just went ...

    15. CWChris Williamson34:03

        Crazy.

    16. YUYusef34:04

        It's because they were the only content on there.

    17. JOJonny34:05

        Shit quality, but-

    18. YUYusef34:06

        Yeah.

    19. CWChris Williamson34:06

        First mover advantage.

    20. JOJonny34:07

        Yeah.

    21. YUYusef34:08

        So, so instantly, like, by, just by having a website, you suddenly are seen as an authority, and it was very demand driven for us. So we started to get inquiries just off the back of that. So we didn't... we then were almost spoiled by not having to learn marketing and not having to do anything apart from create content and

    22. GUGuest34:22

        (clears throat)

    23. CWChris Williamson34:22

        You were just getting organic traffic through the blog posts.

    24. YUYusef34:25

        Yeah.

    25. CWChris Williamson34:25

        Didn't you write something ... isn't, isn't your best performing article on caffeine?

    26. YUYusef34:28

        Ramadan.

    27. CWChris Williamson34:29

        Rama- rama- Ramadan.

    28. YUYusef34:30

        Say it again. Say it again?

    29. JOJonny34:32

        Rock, Ro- Ro- Bless you.

    30. YUYusef34:33

        (laughs) Um-
14. 38:19 – 43:01

    Scaling pain: capacity bottlenecks, pricing fear, and building leverage

    1. YUYusef38:19

       And then, um, s- so you know you were saying it's a series of problems that you solve.

    2. JOJonny38:24

       Yeah.

    3. CWChris Williamson38:24

       Mm-hmm.

    4. YUYusef38:24

       So the bottleneck was revenue and sales not coming in. So we fixed that.

    5. CWChris Williamson38:29

       So what was that, due to traffic? Due to volume?

    6. YUYusef38:31

       Well, yeah, like a traffic and conversions.

    7. CWChris Williamson38:33

       Conversions?

    8. YUYusef38:33

       Both. So, so, so we improved both from the, from the traffic. So you improve ... From the, um, course, from the marketing course.

    9. JOJonny38:41

       Marketing.

    10. YUYusef38:41

        So then you improve traffic and conversions. Then suddenly you've got revenue coming in, more client demand, but we can't actually cater to them all.

    11. JOJonny38:48

        (laughs)

    12. YUYusef38:49

        And so we end up just getting less and less sleep, and taking more sales calls at, like, 2:00 in the morning to someone in America. And, like, just ... And you can see on the videos, there's a period on our YouTube channel where both me and Johnny just start looking more like that.

    13. CWChris Williamson39:00

        Sullen.

    14. JOJonny39:01

        Mm-hmm.

    15. CWChris Williamson39:01

        Have you ever seen Brian Cox go into a centrifuge?

    16. JOJonny39:05

        (laughs)

    17. YUYusef39:06

        No, but ...

    18. CWChris Williamson39:07

        Have you seen it? Have you seen it?

    19. JOJonny39:10

        I think I might have seen the video where he's just like-

    20. CWChris Williamson39:12

        Dean, can you make, can you make Brian Cox ap- in the centrifuge appear just here please? Thank you.

    21. JOJonny39:17

        He's like ...

    22. CWChris Williamson39:17

        Look at his face. (laughs)

    23. JOJonny39:18

        Yeah.

    24. CWChris Williamson39:18

        Hang on. Bing.

    25. JOJonny39:20

        Bing.

    26. YUYusef39:20

        He won't. (laughs)

    27. JOJonny39:22

        (laughs)

    28. YUYusef39:23

        Brian Cox is not gonna come on this.

    29. CWChris Williamson39:24

        Actually, someone, someone called us out on one of the videos and said, "I swear that you say Video Guy Dean's gonna do loads of things that he doesn't do."

    30. JOJonny39:31

        Yeah.
15. 43:01 – 48:38

    Delegation and process: 204 Saturdays in a row and the cost of control

    1. CWChris Williamson43:01

       The baby's turned into fucking NYPD. So, um, good ... a couple of good stories to start framing this. I guess the principle we should probably try and either before or after a principle try and summarize it, and I guess what we're talking about here is the art of delegating or the art of scaling. 'Cause the art of delegating is a massive topic that we need to get onto, which is bringing in people who fill in the gaps in your particular skill set, and that's probably a full episode on its own. Um, but a fairly charming story to do with this is I worked 204 Saturdays in a row without stopping. Um, didn't miss a single Saturday. So when we-

    2. YUYusef43:44

       Four years of ...

    3. CWChris Williamson43:45

       Yeah, four years.

    4. YUYusef43:46

       Yeah.

    5. CWChris Williamson43:46

       So w- when we first launched our first ever weekly event, that was the f- ... what is g- ... to the listeners at home, Yusuf has lifted his leg in the air like a cat.

    6. YUYusef43:56

       Had a repair. (laughs)

    7. CWChris Williamson43:57

       You've patched your pants the ... right. I mean- (laughs)

    8. YUYusef44:01

       Carry on. I, I, I didn't mean to distract you from your story. I was just thinking-

    9. CWChris Williamson44:04

       Jesus Christ. (laughs) That's gonna have to be cut out, isn't it? (laughs) Just leave it. Leave it. And video man Dean will have cut all this out by now. As long as he's put something over your crotch. So- Dee-jay Dean. I worked, I worked, um, over 200 Saturdays in a row without taking a break. That included ... that wasn't just me working on the nighttime and being kind of the slightly more swan around boss that I am now. That was getting up at 10:00 in the morning, going to the club for 11:00 AM, putting up the inflatable-

    10. YUYusef44:32

        (laughs)

    11. CWChris Williamson44:32

        (laughs) ... that, that goes up in the main room. Like, plugging up- (laughs) Yeah. (laughs)

    12. YUYusef44:36

        The, the, the big goose that you have to-

    13. CWChris Williamson44:37

        (laughs) Plug- plugging in all of the DJ decks upstairs. Like, a job which with a written process could have taken anyone three hours to do would've cost us 18 quid a week. But oh no, because I was terrified, I was so, um, neurotic about the business, and I think this is something which is-

    14. YUYusef44:58

        You're like, "I can do this well, and if I s- if I give it to someone else, they would."

    15. CWChris Williamson45:01

        Yeah. The problem is, uh, if you want a job doing properly, do it yourself- Absolutely. ... is true. Yeah. And the conversation that I had, pardon me, with Steven Wolfram the other week was he ... a lot of the time, because he understands coding, right, from the ground floor, he goes into Wolfram Language or Wolfram Mathematica and just checks out the code. So he'll go onto, like, wolframalpha.com and just look at the code and just code check shit and debug shit. And you're like, "Hang on, you're the CEO, 800 people work on this. Do you know who wrote that bit of code?" (laughs) Like, some spotty teenager in San Francisco who works off his, like, out of his mom's basement or something like that. 'Cause everyone's remote pretty much in Wolfram. And you got the CEO going in and just being like, "Oh," drop him an email and be like, "Oh, just checked out the code. There's a little bit of debugging to be done in here. 10 minutes," and he'll do it.

    16. YUYusef45:52

        But the, the problem there is that he has set up his life so that he can do that because that's what he loves.

    17. CWChris Williamson45:56

        Yeah.

    18. YUYusef45:57

        But that's not the way that most people would want to run a business. They, you know, like, he's a, he's an odd character because he-

    19. CWChris Williamson46:04

        Very much so.

    20. YUYusef46:04

        Yeah.

    21. CWChris Williamson46:05

        Very unique.

    22. YUYusef46:05

        He set his life so that he can code more, whereas-

    23. CWChris Williamson46:08

        (laughs) Most people want to do it so they can do less. Mm-hmm.

    24. YUYusef46:10

        Well, yeah, like what we're saying about the, the e-myth concept is that you graduate from technician to franchise owner where actually you're not breaking the bread at all. You don't even see the flour anymore.

    25. CWChris Williamson46:20

        Mm-hmm.

    26. YUYusef46:20

        You wrote the process and then someone else is carrying it out, and you've got people telling people-

    27. CWChris Williamson46:25

        I remember what ... so the day I quit, or maybe like the week before I quit, sat there- Sat, sat down there. Um ... December time. KPMG. Sat in w- where nobody can see, but behind the camera in this mystical land of- This is a set. ... CrossFit.

    28. YUYusef46:42

        We're in.

    29. CWChris Williamson46:42

        Let's not forget that this isn't actually my living room. This is a podcast studio built to look exactly like my living room. Ah, of course. But that's actually just all open walls there and this is- It's just black space. Infinite black space.

    30. YUYusef46:53

        We're, we're made of cardboard, so, like, it's just ...
16. 48:38 – 1:03:39

    Quick-fire marketing takes + closing: why now is the best time to start

    1. CWChris Williamson48:38

       There we go business principle, print media, fuck off.

    2. YUYusef48:41

       Create your own.

    3. CWChris Williamson48:41

       No one looks at a flyer anymore, man.

    4. YUYusef48:42

       One of the rotating elastic bands that just fires flyers at people.

    5. CWChris Williamson48:44

       Actually, I'm gonna do ... we, well, we can do a little quick fire round. I think we're about ... I started and we've got loads of outtakes at the beginning, so, (laughs) uh, I think we're about maybe 50 minutes in. Couple of things, just some quick principles off the bat.... um, mail shots through the door, as far as I'm concerned, if you are launching a business, nah, fuck off. No one wants your, like, if you put junk mail through someone's letter box, you're probably just either wasting money or damaging your brand.

    6. JOJonny49:09

       How do you feel about junk mail, Yousaf?

    7. YUYusef49:12

       A- absolutely terrible. I mean, we, we've, we've heard ... If you've not heard the li- is it Life Fails? Where we talk about-

    8. CWChris Williamson49:17

       It was a catch-up episode.

    9. YUYusef49:19

       ... catch-up, yeah.

    10. JOJonny49:20

        On his letter box, he has written-

    11. YUYusef49:22

        (laughs)

    12. CWChris Williamson49:22

        "No junk mail."

    13. JOJonny49:22

        ... "No junk mail" because never has there been a more effective deterrent-

    14. YUYusef49:26

        (laughs)

    15. CWChris Williamson49:26

        (laughs)

    16. JOJonny49:26

        ... to someone whose job is to give you junk mail-

    17. YUYusef49:28

        It works pretty well.

    18. JOJonny49:29

        ... than the words.

    19. YUYusef49:29

        The only people that get through are Oatine and Farm Foods now.

    20. JOJonny49:33

        Oatine?

    21. YUYusef49:33

        I u- I used to have, like-

    22. JOJonny49:34

        That one road? (laughs)

    23. YUYusef49:35

        Yeah.

    24. CWChris Williamson49:35

        You've got, like, the sack on the other side of your door, huh?

    25. YUYusef49:37

        I have a sack and I, I chase people down the road, if they-

    26. JOJonny49:40

        And then you have a, a musket, don't you, on it? Like, like (laughs) -

    27. YUYusef49:44

        A musket. Yes. (laughs)

    28. CWChris Williamson49:44

        But his, his goes across the top of the yeti, your yeti that's in there. Actually, you've just got the line of sight is directly across the top.

    29. YUYusef49:51

        Just the musket. (laughs)

    30. CWChris Williamson49:51

        Yeah.

Episode duration: 1:03:39