 Hey everyone, welcome to the podcast Today I talked to a great guy called Michael Edge who is the founder of a digital marketing Agency called Electric and we had a really cool chat about digital marketing and marketing how it's evolved We talked about psychology in business and we talked about whether businesses should be putting purpose before profit Which was a very interesting conversation, so I hope you like it Hey, it's Lewis. Welcome to the podcast Enjoy conversations anytime anywhere Cool, I'm alive. Thank you for coming on the podcast Michael. Thank you for inviting me pleasure Happy new year. Happy new year to you too. So you're just telling me you were DJing in Glastonbury. That's correct Yeah, cool. Um, what were you doing? I play house music. So my first career Straight out of sort of school, I guess was DJing and I was a pro DJ for five years nice jealous Yeah made my own tracks used to work with eight to eight states if you remember those guys Back in the day and it's just something that came back recently and we'll probably talk about like coaching and things later but my coach Last year I said, what's the thing that really fires you up and gets you sort of passionate and that's a music You know and DJing and she said to me why aren't you doing it? I said, that's a great question You know, where do I get the time from? Yeah, so do you have you have a light like a life coach or mentor? Yeah, so yeah, um, I have a few coaches actually, but I did the Tony Robbins programs and I'm still doing them Okay, amazing. Yeah, let's definitely talk about that. Yeah later. So you're a digital market here That is my main line of business. Yeah, which and the job that didn't exist what 10 years ago Well, I've been doing it. I built my first website in the 90s. Wow. So like, you know, digital has been around a long time But yeah, like there's this whole new movement towards digital marketing and blending psychology With automation that's really come about in the last few years for sure So have you seen your you've seen your like job and role evolve from making a website? Yeah to something called digital marketing Yeah, it's happened very quickly. Yeah, well, well, I like to have been doing it since the 90s and we've been running electric since 2013 and what is electric? So electric's a digital marketing agency. Yeah, which you found it. I found it. Yeah back in 2013 and Really our sort of mission statement is to help people grow Grow faster and shine brighter And that's what it's really about we used to you know, we used to build websites and we used to do videos for people And then we realized it's actually about results You know, like can we deliver results for people? Can we create growth for people? Can we make people more famous online? You know, and and that's really I think the The landscape that we operate in now, you know, it's in the past You could put up websites and hope that Google pick you up and you know, there you go You've got some some traffic and some some work and business out of it But it doesn't work like that anymore, you know You have to sort of put yourself out into the marketplace and use all the tools and Psychology and creativity at your disposal to do that fine. So psychology being what what consumers are thinking feeling for sure Cambridge Analytica style. I Mean, you know, that's that's hard to access now With GDPR and all the sort of rules that is there some kind of of ethics So you've got a like adhere to and obviously living by your values because it's quite a powerful combination. Yeah Yeah, for sure. I mean when when we set up electric We were really we did it for a reason, you know There was there's definitely a reason behind electric and we solidified that more over the last few years But the purpose is really to help companies who are doing good in the world do better, you know So so for us, there is a huge responsibility in marketing, you know, I used to work for big corporate brands I was in advertising for a long time and and it sort of made my heart and soul sink like Well, if you know a product is Bad for people and you're pushing it and marketing it then you're really complicit in that, you know And especially as a sort of senior person in an agency, you know, my job was to and sell products And and really I only wanted to sell products. I ethically agreed with you know And the work times when you know that that line was approached, you know, and I think you know as individuals We we have a we have responsibility to do what we feel is right. Yeah So is that kind of what inspired you to start on your own and yeah, for sure. Yeah. Yeah I went through a phase where and so I worked for some really awesome ad agencies, you know and digital agencies as well and But there was times where I really didn't know why I was doing the job You know Like it just didn't feel right, you know, there's I don't know if you've ever experienced that where something just doesn't feel yeah Yeah, you know, but then you know, you're employed. Yeah salary have to do your own got a choice Yeah, you know the shareholders, you know, like you have to do what you paid to do, you know So I guess I had an epiphany moments in about 2010 where there's a couple of things that came together at the same time and one was was this like Are you doing something that you feel is right, you know So like every day are you getting up and are you creating a better planet or not, you know And that that was a big question mark in my head But at the same time what I was noticing because I was luckily working at the cutting edge of digital marketing even back then You know, we had great amazing clients, you know And I worked on Xbox for four years doing their digital marketing works for all two works, you know some really top-end brands and and what I started to notice was People's behavior online was just changing so quickly because the technology was changing. So, you know, and I Post on Facebook today. I bought a phone back in 2006 Which had email on it and that was like revolutionary. You know, that's yeah, yeah, you know That was changing and then the iPhone came out in 2007 and that really changed everything and Facebook came along And then YouTube came along and it's all like, yeah, 12 years, whatever 10 years Yeah, these things all happen really quickly around that time and What I started to realize is that the old models were just gonna fold pieces, you know So like we were doing TV ads and charging really high fees for these TV ads, you know And as YouTube came along what you started to notice was people stop watching TV Started to watch YouTube yeah, and all of a sudden those Huge budgets didn't make sense anymore, you know So so the technology was changing the people people's consumption of digital media was changing and For me also my values were changing as well So these things all happened and I had an epiphany moment where I just thought I want to do something Different, you know, I wanted to create something that didn't exist And in a selfish way in a lot of ways, you know, I wanted to give something and to myself Yeah Create something build something that I you know, it's my life. I go, you know, yeah I have so much to go with it exactly you have so much time. So I wanted to create something that Really worked for me as a lifestyle, you know as well. Yeah with this Okay, social media digital marketing a lot of influences are being used now in marketing Yeah, you see and there's a huge impact on society, especially with young people. Yeah Yeah, what do you think about that? I think we're in a interesting time I Think we're always in an interesting time So, you know, like like there's a relative it's you're living when you're living and yeah I mean people talk about innovation and change. There's always been innovation and change, you know And I think like now and it's really pronounced and you've got phenomena happening like, you know Sort of narcissism trend where people Everybody wants to be an internet superstar and we'll sort of do anything to make that happen, which you could argue is dangerous Yes, yeah, but it's not your really new normal life. I mean you're seeing people post like, you know Doctored photos of themselves portraying their best selves or their image of their best selves Yeah, and people are getting paid quite a lot of money Yeah, sure influencer. Yeah. Yeah, and but for kids growing up now I'm obviously very different when I grow up It's a tough old tough old game. It is. Yeah I mean, we sort of flip it around a bit because I I truly believe in authenticity So I think you know, we grew up in a time where advertising was just everywhere, you know And it's got worse and worse and worse and now like like my four-year-old boy Will skip a YouTube advert as soon as that skip button comes on. I've got four and a half your girl And she's exactly the same. Yeah, I mean literally they're like they know exactly where the skip button is They've got they've got BS detectors built in. Oh, yeah Yeah, like and they can sniff it out and and I think we all can you know And that's why when you're talking about doctoring photos and things I actually think that's sort of gonna backfire on them because people really what people really want and people will always connect with And this is universal truth. Yeah, he's just authentic to like people know when things are real and people know when things are fake and For so long advertising has been this fake thing. That's pushed although Kardashians Which sister was it? That's the first billionaire. Yeah, which one was it not Chloe? Comment which one is now She's got her beauty line. Yeah, and all from Instagram and she made like she's the youngest billionaire And assisted at the porn video It's interesting how it develops, but I think you yeah, I do you won't be able to get away from it It's just interesting what's gonna happen in the next say five or ten years because the internet's only been here 25 years Yeah, Facebook and stuff 12 years. It's just amazing to think about what's coming next if you can even imagine it I Think imagine and it's gonna be the struggle because you know if you go back to 2005 who could imagine an iPhone in 2005 and You know now you can't walk down the street without seeing everybody staring at the phones, you know We've got this crazy supercomputers that can do everything Well, we've given birth to any life form we really have probably more phones on the planet than there are humans Yeah, yeah, and I mean, you know if there's sort of a dystopian and utopian future that you can talk about We'll probably end up somewhere in the middle. Yeah, yeah, but these these devices we have on us are listening devices Viewing devices. They're all hooked up to you know, pretty much Artificial intelligent beings called Google and Facebook. Yeah, just collect all this ridiculous amounts of data by us all the time And do you like that or is it exciting and scary both? Yeah, it's like I mean technology, you know you technology is neutral, you know, it's how you use it. That's that's interesting, you know and There's always good and bad can come from anything, you know, so surveillance cameras you could argue that surveillance cameras are really bad, but did they reduce crime? Yeah, they do So, you know, there's always sort of a good and bad argument for these things and we really just don't know I mean where it gets interesting is where you plug artificial intelligence into this Because then you've got the potential that You know people a lot smarter than me have talked about this, you know like Elon Musk and yeah You know you create these beings really, you know, these super super brains that Could be smarter than humans at some point. Absolutely. I was reading homo deus. Yeah, yeah awesome book and You know, he puts forward the notion that you know, we haven't been on top of the food chain for very long And who's to say will we remain so for sure? So I think that's really interesting Yeah, and as AI takes off it might just be you know We're gonna be having these nanopropes in our blood soon. It's fighting all disease and we'll live to 150 and then We'll probably then start traveling intergalactically and God knows what yeah, it could be really interesting I mean, you know that the new neural links and things that Elon Musk's talking about where amazing stuff You could separate your brain and consciousness from your body and things like that I mean, who knows where this is gonna go We have no idea, you know, but equally if you look in history civilizations collapse Yeah, you know, so we might be at peak civilization. No, who knows. Yeah, you just don't know You start colonizing Mars or something exactly So we're gonna talk about whether businesses should put purpose before profit or therefore this AI stuff takes off It's probably almost a pointless conversation But there seems to be a big wave of certainly from the last 10 years financial crisis People wanting to put purpose before profit And so you were talking about your ethics values and the epiphany moment So do you yourself running a company clearly having to make money for it to survive and and so forth Are you putting purpose in at the heart of it? Yeah, it's just marketing. No, it's not marketing. It's not because the Reason that I found that the company was for my heart and soul really, you know I could I could have stated a good job all my life about one of money, you know And as you know as an entrepreneur like money is an interesting thing as an entrepreneur, you know, is it? Yeah, yeah, you live in a world of uncertainty. You know, it can be feast. It can be famine So, you know, you've got to be go sort of separate that I but No purpose for me is really really important And I think as well because I've got children as well. That's really sort of shifted things for me Because in what way? Well, you start to think about legacy, you know, you started to think about well the planet that we have and Which is amazing Like what are we doing to it? You know and as business owners like we really have a responsibility in that area because And the decisions we make will affect the future of the planet, you know, and it really will and Do you want your children to grow up in a planet that's you know, a lot worse than when we were born? I certainly don't you know, so so for me, this is a really big responsibility and You know when we talk about only working with companies that that do good, you know, that that's such a hard thing to define Like what does that mean? but um Ultimately, it's like are they going to Leave the world in a better place or worse place. What's their intention here? You know, is their intention to just make money and and take take take Or is it to give something back and said to sort of help the world? So so for me it is really important like super super important Do you think The main purpose of of the businesses should be making the world a better place Um, or should it just be part of? You know, obviously lots of different companies doing lots of different things. Yeah. Yeah, but um at the heart of it There should be some kind of social impact social benefit Or not just thinking about making the next paycheck and it's up to the individual, you know It's really it's up to the founder, you know, like why they want to do it and I think sometimes as well Like a lot of people talk about purpose as if it's like this huge grand thing like what is my purpose in life And they spend years and years and some people never find what the purpose is And you know, like purpose can be something really simple It could be like my purpose is to make people happier than when I met them It's a good purpose. Do you know what I mean? It should be that simple Well, happiness is the thing that everyone shares. I mean everyone's after Being happy. It's just how you get to happiness. Maybe varies from person to person Yeah, but if you just like bring a light, you know when someone walks into a room And some people like bring the whole energy of the room down and some people walk into a room and just lie to room Yeah, yeah, maybe that's your purpose You know and and as a business maybe that's the purpose of the business just to bring a little bit of hope to the world You know, so no, I love that. I love that. No, I love that He's even I was reading there's an article in the ft about this actually Yeah, oh really? Yeah, like last week I thought it to you and Anyway, there's a guy called Larry Fink who runs Blackrock. Yeah, and he writes a letter every year He's about to write his one for 2019, but the 2018 one Actually, and this is the guy who manages the most money in the world 6.3 trillion dollars under management His big thing is is investing in companies with social purpose So this is this is a big wave even from the, you know, the most powerful people in the world To make sure that businesses are having a social impact. Yeah, what I find interesting though is Should it be governments that are trying to make the world a better place? Um, it feels like people are like losing faith in politicians currently And it's and it's falling on it's interesting. It's falling on businesses to make the world a better place Yeah, and I find that quite interesting. It feels like it's you know changed recently There's definitely a shift for sure. So I I also do some innovation consulting for firms as well and last year 2018 we were doing things like Kindness and compassion in business for big corporates. Oh, nice. So what's that? and in turn like within the company training programs in some of the big corporates and The that goes down really well, you know, and you can actually see measurable performance improvements After the training because people again, it's connecting you back to your purpose You know, it's like what is your purpose is your purpose to good things in the world or not? And I think I think younger people growing up really connect to that too You know, so I love that. So you she did what workshops within companies? Oh, yeah For people just being kinder give someone a hug. Yeah, be nice empathetic. Yeah, empathy is a big one. Yeah, absolutely empathy is a big one. So Yeah, it's it it's right at the board level this this discussion. Yeah a lot of it's around employee engagements Yeah, you know as you you'll probably know absolutely. Um, you know people want to feel part of something so like you know Tony Tony Robbins has some great frameworks for this So if you've I don't know if you've been on any of his I've been I've been on his um Um, like a two day two three day thing unleash the power unleash the power. Yeah Yeah, so you'll know all about this the the six human needs you've probably come across this tell us tell us Yeah, so so you've got certainty So basically the first four everybody needs these first four and then the second the second two Um, you don't need them but they make your life amazing. So the first four everybody wants these so and and some more than others So the first one is certainty So the reason people have jobs and you know, the reason people Have a house with a mortgage and you know, the reason people get married Um, it's because the the craving this certainty in their life You know, they want to make sure things aren't too crazy. Things are just things. There's something to feel safe in their life Yeah, stable stable. Yeah But then if it was like that all the time you'd go Might you'd be so bored that you got your mind, you know So as weird as humans are yeah, we have we want uncertainty or variety, you know, and and massive sort of sort of um I'm not being biased here, but generally like ladies women. Yeah for a certainty men prefer a bit of uncertainty But everybody wants both, you know, everybody wants just slightly mixed. Yeah, but some yeah, and you'll find like entrepreneurs Generally pretty comfortable with uncertainty Um, whereas someone who likes to work nine to five wants a bit more certainty, you know, so you so people have different balances Then you've got um Significance So everybody wants to feel a little bit significant, you know, so they have a job title or maybe they have a nice car Or maybe they wear designer gear or yeah, you know status some kind of status. Yeah. Yeah And interestingly if you say I I don't wear designer gear that in itself is significance You know, because you're making a statement Yeah, you're sort of better than those don't brand understated So you so it's not a bad thing. It's just something that's hardwired into us And then the other one is love and connection You know, so we all want to feel part of something. We all want to have friends We all want an intimate relationship. Yeah. Yeah part of the tribe and exactly. Yeah. Yeah, and that's um, that's coming back to this Kindness coaching in corporates People get that, you know, like, yeah, these are real human needs like people want to feel connected and have a purpose Yeah, yeah, and then the final two and and this most people are very happy to get the first four but if you want to feel um Really like you're getting a lot out of life getting the juice out of life You need to go for the last two and that's So the first one is learning and growing Yeah, so you should always feel like you're learning something or growing or challenging yourself, you know So it might be you go and run a half marathon, you know And every every week you train a bit further and you feel like you're doing better Or you might go back to school or you might read a book or you might listen to podcasts, you know, whatever Yeah, and then the second the last one is contribution So this idea that um, it's not just about taking it's about giving back to the world and that might be charitable donations It might be volunteering You know, it might be um If you've got a business it might be a percentage of your business revenues goes into Something you believe in But it's just realizing that it's not all about you, you know It's yeah, it's about your your purpose really is to help other people Yeah, I see I see the the role of a leader is to service their employees Rather than what can their employees do for them? But no, it's completely on like a topic every every HR director I meet Or someone related to people are all implementing a mindfulness thing yoga They're trying to organize things to connect employees certainly in big companies where Most of the big companies now have don't have enough desks for their employees So like probably two thirds of required desks. You don't sit with your teammates Um, so it could be quite lonely. I mean living in London not having a team to sit with Needing to feel part of a tribe. How do you get all this, you know social interaction? I think yeah, these things Are really important that that's something we've as a business have struggled with So I feel like you know when when when I set up electric one of the big um, sort of finding values was freedom so, um We don't have Hours, we don't have a physical office. We've tried that a few times, but we've decided we don't want it and um It's a real challenge because you're trying to create a culture and a tribe Without All being in the same room every day, you know and so and I think that's going to become more and more Just some the way we work. So that does create an interesting challenge for businesses So what's the benefit of operating that way? Oh huge benefits. So, um One hour overheads are ridiculously low I mean, I'm in my office here in the middle of the city and it's like I wartingly expensive. Yeah. Yeah, but I think for a lot of people like, um There is a huge benefit for having an office, you know, a massive benefit for having an office but um for the time of people that um, we started employing originally like developers and creative types They just didn't want to come in the office, you know, because they're quite comfortable working on their own um And the commute was just a waste of time for them. They felt, you know, so that was really interesting I think the second thing was um from when we started the collaboration tools just became Very very easy and very cheap, you know, so like pre 2010 to run a business, you really had to have an exchange server You know, you had to have all these physical things and people looked into a network Super expensive and then all of a sudden, you know, g-suite comes along That was that that's what that's what we use. Yeah, it's great and you can work from anywhere Yeah, you know, and and what I what I find was really interesting is when I said super electric um There was an expectation of my clients to have a room full of bums on seats as we call them, you know And we actually lost pictures because we didn't have that. So did they ask you how many people do you have sitting in your office? For sure. Yeah. Yeah, and that was a deciding factor. So what were you like actually they're sitting at home on the couch Yeah, and for some people actually companies you think would know better would say, well, no, you can't pitch for this Interesting. No, it's the opposite now. Most of our clients have got totally flexible working as well So they just think this is normal And you know, it's very accepted whereas in the past it wasn't at all No, it's completely accepted and and for certain. Yeah, I agree for certain types of jobs and things It's cool. I mean, they have to be in the office. Yeah, we're set up that way We we cut the cords to our desk phones. Yeah, no desk phones We've got um VoIP on the laptop on mobile. Yeah, we can work on the beach in Cape Town Yeah, exactly. Why not we've we've gone for an office because um, you know ours is uh Same as your consulting firm, but a lot of the the guys and girls It's kind of sales environment And and it's really nice to To bounce ideas of each other motivate each other. There's huge, you know, it's like a kind of, you know, I'd say coming home Yeah, it's like you know, it's like a And you're free from distractions. That's the other thing because when you when you mention like Doing your work on the beach everybody dreams to be a laptop person on the beach. I've done it Now I've did it. I've done it for a long time, right? And it can be hard, you know, like getting getting sanding your laptop And also you could be a really lovely venue and they say look, you know mobile phones here And you can't use your laptops downstairs But it's a problem as well and if you are in a beautiful place you don't necessarily want to be staring at your laptop You know, you probably want to be experiencing the place. So do you think then But where are you most efficient? That's a great question and I think what what's interesting is um If you if you're really analytical like this you probably have different functions that you do during the day So for me as a as a sort of business owner a stroke creative director stroke technologists I will be more efficient and productive in different environments for different tasks So for example, yeah, if I wanted to be really creative I would not sit in an office If I wanted to get all that cool office the dog running around and the wee work style No, I wouldn't in fact I was really lucky to work with one of the best creative directors in the world In my career and what he what he said is You shouldn't be sad at your desk. You should be out walking around getting inspiration absorbing things and then when you want to Produce it come back to your desk and produce it. Yeah, but you need these subconscious Like stimuli stimuli, you know all the time, you know, so yeah, so I think I think Flexibility is the word, you know Like if you if you can afford it for sure have an office or have some other few officers where people can touch in you know, um But don't expect don't chain people to the desk. That would be right my recommendation. No, no, you need to be Yeah flexible about it. Yeah, but then it's And then it's challenging to create that like team culture for sure Yeah, I don't know if anybody's got this right No, no, it's just developing right? I mean because you've got a new frontier You know I say like I don't want to split into age because you know you see people that like both because But it feels like you know younger people want flexibility. Yeah older people are used to working in an office But but it also it flips as well. It does flip and what was so we we work with for example um Mums, you know who've basically decided that we don't want to work in the city anymore We want to move out to the countryside and we will take a pay drop um If we don't have to go and work in the city So, you know for them for us, they're great. They're great contractors. Yeah, that's perfect because they've got all the experience and the knowledge Um, but they want flex pure flexibility and most companies won't give them that whereas we can do we can offer that to them So that's quite a big advantage. Do you find that people are expecting companies to be flexible but not offering flexibility in return How do you mean? So there's a big the conversations around companies being flexible right, so You know working from home Good work-life balance although the term is strange because the opposite of life is death and everyone's equating work to death So that conversation needs to be changed. But Um, but when they're but then you find that employees or contractors or whatever Yeah, um, I find they're less flexible if required to do I don't know go the extra mile Come in a bit earlier work a bit harder, you know, like people are like this is my work time Right outside of that my social time, you know, I'm offline or whatever Do you see that or not? Yeah, I mean, I think that's just gotta be part of your hiring process, you know, and you might even want to mix it up I mean we have guys who will literally work any hour of any day And they really they're really cool about that, you know um And you have other people who might maybe have children and they they can't work at certain times in the day So you've got to work around that So so probably you want a little bit of a mixture, you know, and um But it's tricky, you know, it is tricky like figuring out what's going to be right for you It's really hard. Yeah, it's hard for well firstly for the companies to decide what type of like organizational structures and Whether you have holiday days or no holiday days. Yeah, I'm sorry unlimited holiday days. It's a friend of mine. He's got um If they're kind of advertising art type companies come on the podcast In a few weeks, uh, he's scrapped holiday days. Yeah So he's just going for whatever you want to go holiday great And these are like permanent employees, salaried employees And I think he's found that uh, people take less holiday days. It's true I was over in los angeles and there's a big games company over there And they have unlimited holidays and people generally test Take less holidays than the 20 days that most other people are allocated Which is there's all these strange things, you know around psychology that and also the other thing just to tie Our tech conversation in is that with technology and social media As an as an employee, you're able to see what other companies are doing. Yeah more than You know 15 years ago where Actually, the only way you could find out how much your mate in the competitive was earning was by asking them Now you just go online. Yeah Or whatever right or the benefits packages plastered on people's websites You know bring your dog in unlimited holiday days So so technology again has been a great catalyst for for all of this type of stuff For sure. Yeah, which I find interesting. I mean the biggest shift for us was when we started to use Like video conference in technology. It's like zoom. Zoom is a big deal for us And if you've you I don't even use zoom and yeah, we we uh, yeah, we use ring central Which they have the video thing powered by zoom. Yeah, it's a shame. Yeah, it's great so you can have up to like a hundred people all on screen at the same time all around the world and That made such difference to us because I think the problem with the distributed workforce Is you've got this trust element, you know, it's like, what are you doing? You know, like literally I'm paying you every day. Like what are you doing? And I think the the the thing that you've got a shift towards is instead of thinking about like time in the office It's results. So like, you know, like Really we're paying you for results not for the time you spend on this So if you want to take like a minute and you can deliver that result That's still worth the same to me as if you take 10 hours to deliver it So it's really thinking about like your kpi's and your targets and making sure people are clear on that and You know, it's a work in progress. But the the other thing around, um You know, moving from conference calls and emails onto video chat All of a sudden you can look in people's eyes, you know, and yeah, yeah, it's amazing. There's noise hide, right? And you've got to get dressed up. Yeah, good background. Yeah, well, yeah, and yeah, I mean, it's fine if you were, you know, if you don't but But yeah, it's just that it's just that turning up isn't it? It's like you say it's like being present being being there be more connected with people and I think the really interesting thing that Digital video has enabled us to do is convey emotions really well Yeah, and you know as humans we need that emotional connection with each other and the conference calls never did that really, you know True. True. Do you think it's interesting because it's a very, um It's a very like what's a new way of working, but it's quite, uh, you need to be very disciplined. Yeah and uh, I'll be really interested My kid like yours is four almost five Is school preparing her for the you know, because you've got to be very self-motivated disciplined efficient Yeah, um, you know, I mean we weren't prepared for working like that. No, it was like nine to five Um life was you know education a career and retirement And now like forget retirement, you know, and you might have three careers in your life for sure So yeah, it's interesting to see um, if if school will prepare them for What lies ahead? It's a great question. I'm not sure it is doing efficiently, but um Equally, I think I do believe that kids tend to prepare themselves So, you know, like I was I was genuinely shocked at how well my little boy can use ipads and things like that With no no true. That's right. He just figured it out, you know, and I remember as a kid myself You know, I was playing computer games. No one was teaching me I was just literally picking things up and like learning them and I think that the amazing thing that we've got now is You know like youtube like you can literally learn anything. Oh, it's amazing I mean, I thought this new mixer had to get out to youtube how to use it. Yeah Yeah, so like our school's even relevant anymore. I don't I don't know like what kind of frameworks do we put in place for our children going forward I don't know we've got these mucs massive online learning communities and all these universities are doing stuff online Do video courses degrees? Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah, but but then equally, you know, like anybody can be university Yeah, you know like like anybody can go on so udemy and create an udemy course So, you know, um In the past, you know, when I learned computer science, you know, we had some great teachers But it was a mix, you know, some people were right at the cutting edge And some people Were teachers because to be fair they couldn't make it in the real world, you know So your your your level of expertise was really varied, you know, when you were being taught in an academic institution Yeah, that's true Whereas now you can learn from people who are are really the best genuinely the best Without having to go and spend a fortune or go to a different place, you can do it in your bedroom Yeah, you know, so the playing fields are just being totally levelled. But what you said about, you know, this um Discipline and this like desire to learn Like, you know, the amount of books that I want to read at the moment is ridiculous But I've got to actually go and read them, you know Well, you know, I've got to be honest. I I've just started all two books. Yeah, so Yeah, I've never done it before I did. Oh, well homo deus. I mentioned the sapiens both on audiobooks 20 minute commute press play It's great. Yeah, go for a run You can do while you're running, go to gym Because on the tube, it's really hard to like pick the book up and you're knocking into people So no, the the audio stuff's great. And for the first time in history So usually um, if you think back, I don't know, even 30 years you learn from reading But now you're learning from listening and watching videos and so, um, like More people that have access to all of this knowledge now is is just exponential. It's great And it also makes you think around, you know, like Memorizing things like do we actually need to ever memorize things anymore if all the information is just there all the time Yeah, I can just say okay google and then yeah search Yeah, I mean again again voice search, you know, that's that's huge Like yeah, my my four year old can do okay google Siri Alexa, you know, it's crazy, right? Yeah, so like they've just got access and he was literally saying to um Google google home this week. He was saying okay google tell me about tectonic plates This is a four year old Right, so and he's not particularly special. You know what I mean? I mean, obviously I think he is but like, you know Like I could could you do that four years old? You know like But we're going back to your point. I mean We never had it. Yeah, maybe we could have it's funny because everyone says oh, you know when I was growing up and I said it a few times Okay, but you know they growing up now And you just adapt to your environment. We're not even adapt. It's just this is your environment. This is it This is what we're adapting because we remember back when but now it's just they're born into this environment They're native to it And they just you know, I've even got I've got a two and a half year old and she's skipping the adverts Yeah, she's like I've actually had to I'm actually taking away the ipad Because the problem is is that she watches something but she can't watch the whole thing She's flicking up to go to the other things to really bad. That that that is something Like her attention span attention spans are ridiculous. So like instagram, right? Like these technologies now are reducing people's attention spans to next to zero So, yeah, like There will be there's going to be a counter movement again But the thing is like if you look at anything there's always a counter movement So if you look at like music, you know, everything went digital guess what people are playing vinyl again Yeah, yeah, so there's always these swings, you know, could you unplug and go and live in a cabin in Greenland Personally, no It's just almost I mean Be super hard to uh, yeah I mean, I guess one of the bigger things that I think about sometimes is, you know We become so dependent on technology like this interconnected web of technology if it goes down Would we be able to survive for a day as a society? You know, like because when the cash machines stop working, you know, when those supermarkets don't refill themselves, you know, like What happens? Yeah, you know, no, it's it's part. It's part of us now. Yeah 100% but what if there was, you know, an an electromagnetic pulse that wipes whole this out? Then what do you think would would you feel would we feel cleansed or just lost? I don't know. That's that's a really great question. Yeah. Yeah. It's a great question Is tony robbins coming up with anything interesting to help us deal with that stuff Um, but what what have you been doing? So you've been doing So have you been doing like his various courses and others? So I sort of signed up to the whole lot. So I did business mastery And then a thing called mastery university, which takes you through all these big programs. You get a coach You do Unleash the power, which is the one that you did. Yeah. Yeah. You do date with destiny, which is his like big flagship big events You do life mastery and wealth mastery Awesome And all for the point of kind of integrating it intertwining it within your digital marketing so the marketing and psychology The cycle. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, and I think you know, I think what's really important and and something I didn't do for a long time Was just investing myself Now I think as a business owner Um, and this brings us on to something else as well that we're that we're working on at the moment But I think as a business owner Especially at the start Your growth is directly linked as a business directly linked to your own personal growth Yeah, true, you know, and often we forget to invest in ourselves And we you know, we just think that our business will grow on its own and it won't you know, unless you're incredibly lucky You have to really invest and grow yourself as a person and learn new tools new skills So that that was part of that for me, you know, really sort of like fine So it starts out as a personal investment in yourself Yeah, and then it's kind of fed through into Your business activities and so forth. Yeah, and it's led me down different paths as well So I spent a lot of time of last year or so with One of Tony Robbins coaches. Oh cool. So he's a guy called Donnie Epstein. Okay, and he works on Tony Robbins's energy field Right, which is so so all of us if you think about this, you know You go into the quantum physics realm and Really the only things in the universe are energy and information So we are made up of energy, you know and If our energy is out of line, you can feel that, you know So like like I was saying before if someone walks into a room you will feel their energy You know, you will feel like if they're all putter down, you know between us now like we are sensing each other's energy Yeah, absolutely And if you've got someone like Tony Robbins, you know, he stands up in front of 13,000 people If you've ever seen him, he's got so much power and energy You know, he can literally hold an audience of 13,000 people for four days Like and the days are long, right? They're full on crazy. Yeah. How does he do that? You know like how does he do that? Right? So he actually works with people to just maintain that energy in him So he has all that energy and that power And there's a few guys he works with but the one that I really sort of connected with is Donny Epstein And yeah, he's created all this science around your energy fields and amazing So he does some courses you've been on Yeah, yeah, yeah, he does one-to-one work. Oh, nice. Um, American guy or? He's yeah, he's from Brooklyn originally and he lives in Denver, Colorado now A lot of the courses are in Denver Okay, cool. So you've been over there? Yeah, I've been out there twice last year Nice, nice. Yeah, yeah And it had an impact For sure. Yeah, yeah, and it's quite, um At the time when you're doing them, um, it's quite hard to like Understand the impact they have on you But then what what happens is other people noticing you so people will say like Wow, you're totally different since you went on that course, you know So the they'll sense the change in you which is really interesting. Nice. Yeah And do you mention briefly so you're doing a new venture? Is that right? Yeah, yeah, so, you know, it's part of this, um It's part of this journey towards Investing in yourself and growing as a business owner and growing the business Um, one of my clients is Really really into this so this is a guy who set up some businesses one was called get licensed And um, they just went really big, you know, very quickly and He he really took this notion of investing in on yourself Um, quite a long way. So he goes to Harvard Business School for three weeks in the year You know, he does a lot of spiritual work. So yeah, you know, go off to burning man and a nice nice just come Come back from a Wim Hof course in Poland. I don't even know Wim Hof the ice man. Oh, yeah Yeah, yeah, yeah, he's very cool. I've done his courses as well. Um, but One of the things he realized was when he was on his courses is that he was a teacher You know, and he realized that that he'd been able to invest himself in a high level Um with some some of the big sort of business training programs and business networks But there's a real gap in the market And there's there's lots of people who focus on brand new startups and how to get them off and run in And there's lots of people who focus on like very big sort of five million plus turnover businesses But there's a bit of a gap between the hundred thousand and one million turnover and um He really wanted to put together something that helps people Get past that one million pound revenue barrier You know, because a lot of people get stuck there, you know And it's really at the point where you sort of question yourself like can I do this? You know, you've probably been there as a business on like you get so far and then it's like But it's also it's like Goal setting mindset. Yeah, all of that stuff just peer groups Have spend most time with exactly having the right goals setting them up as high as possible Yeah, having the skills, you know having the knowledge having the network all those things that are really important Yeah, um, so he's put together a program um And it's it's basically like Weekend program but then also a community of like-minded people as well And it's going to be called founders academy. Nice. Um, so that's going to launch in february. Amazing. And you're doing it with him Yeah, so basically he's a client of ours anyway, and we're doing it as a joint venture Amazing. Yeah So if you're interested in that it's just founders dot academy The site will be launching in a couple of weeks if you want to find out more about it You can email me or contact me in any way. Um, so yeah, if you if you get to network with fellow entrepreneurs Yeah, and all of you trying to get above The million that's the goal and then the next course above two million and then 10 million Well, there's other people who do that. Yeah. Yeah. So there's there is a gap in the market Yeah, definitely. We feel yeah to get people beyond that and then so it's going to be what's a mindset goal setting Yep, absolutely some quite practical things So like, you know, how do you get your marketing machines running properly? How do you get your recruitment machines running properly? You know, how do you how do you position yourself in the marketplace? Nice? So something like implement implementable strategies, but they can go back to the go back to the office and just Start absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So part mindset part practical Part support network as well So a regular series of events online portal all all those things, you know that yeah You really need as a business owner when you feel a little bit lost and Don't know what to do. No, that's true. It's true. I mean, when I started I read a couple of books. I read I read emith revisited. Yeah. Yeah, which is great And then there's a guy called so ronald cohen who was the founder of apax partners So the first project to firm in europe say and he wrote a great book And I was reading it and it was about his investments and didn't work out and yeah You know on the bread line and then he built apax, which is like amazing private equity firm And I thought soda. I'm just gonna crack on. Yeah. Yeah, and then it starts to go and you experience all these things and I had a little network of Friends that also started businesses around the same time So like my my kind of weekly catch up call would be to my mate. How are you getting on? It'd be like great. Just done like, you know, these deals or have these successes and I'm like, oh Shit, um, you know it motivated me to like do better next week If I hadn't done as well and it's really it's really important to have the network Yeah, yeah, it's quite a lot. You can be quite alone. It's very long Because you know you start something and you're working harder longer for less money than you were when you're employed No one tells you that no one tells you that you're the HR guy the sales guy the finance guy the cleaner Like everything everything and then you're like, uh, this isn't as cool as it's supposed to be And then once you start realizing that and you start hiring people into different jobs And you start looking for help and support and stuff then you can create something really cool Yeah, I guess that's um, I don't you've read the book think rich grow rich. Napoleon Hill. I haven't but super famous Awesome book, but he introduces this concept to the mastermind So and it's exactly what you said then you just get a group of people together And maybe once a week sometimes once a month and you just discuss the issues that you've got and all of a sudden You know, it just brings all these new perspectives saying all these new ideas in and it's just amazing Yeah, it was like you were saying about um Coming up with new new ideas and being creative and innovative If you step out of your business and speak to people that are unrelated to it And you start talking And then just things pop in your mind or yeah, or you just ask the question You're like, well, why don't you do like this and you're like, uh, yeah, I don't know Why don't I and yeah, I love that. It's great. So I'll come along to your first one. Awesome Yeah, you're very welcome. Thank you. Well, thank you very much for uh, for coming on We've done like almost an hour, which is cool. And then uh, I'll get you one next time. Awesome. Cool. Thanks so much Cheers, luis. Hey folks. Thanks for listening. Don't forget to subscribe in all the usual places