Episode 84 – John Lee Dumas – Secrets to Podcasting

Welcome to the Human Experience Podcast. The only podcast designed to fuse your left and right brain hemispheres and feed it the most entertaining and mentally engaging topics on the planet.

As we approach our ascent, please make sure your frontal, temporal and occipital lobes are in their full upright position.

As you take your seat of consciousness, relax your senses and allow us to take you on a journey.

We are the intimate strangers. Thank you for listening.

I was already, it was in the middle of my day. I got a phone call from Adam Lowry of the Cognitive

Rampage. And he was just, he was just like, dude, where's, where's the episode? Dude,

where's your episode? That's exactly how he sounds, by the way. So, you know, we're, I'm,

I'm pushing a 16 hour days here. And a couple of the things that we're really working on and making

you guys' membership section of the show where you will have exclusive content, content that

we haven't released. We're going to be doing bonus episodes, bonus minutes with the guests

that we bring on. We really just want to give you the experience, but we want to make it special

and we need to monetize in some way. You know, a question that I'm asked a lot is,

how did you start this show and what brought you to do what you're doing? It's an interesting story.

So I found myself wondering about big questions. Why are we here? What is our purpose? And big

existential deep questions about life and meaning and found that I was having a lot of

different conversations with my friends about this same subject. And so I thought it would be

interesting, and this is before I even knew what podcasts were, I thought it would be interesting

to bring on the people that I respected, the heroes that I really respected and thought highly

of and to get their answer, to get their idea of what was going on here. And we've had on some

really amazing guests. And, you know, for us, it's not a numbers game. It's a quality thing.

We want the best of the best. That's how we operate. And there's some other shows that

they're aiming to release their next episode. And no, we don't do that here. We feel like there is

a guest on that doesn't meet those standards, we will crush that episode. You know, it happens

from time to time and I'm not going to drop names, but it does occur. Switching gears here. And I want

to shout out to the HXP team. Kimmy, thank you so much. You know, Kimmy is one of the writers here

at HXP and she is the female version of Hunter S. Thompson. She's great and just so much love to

Kimmy. Connor is doing some of the marketing for us and what a solid human being and just

love what he's doing. Josh is coming on as a producer and so much talent behind what he's

doing and just so much going on with him and so excited to bring a family vibe into the show that

I've been running on my own for so long. There's a couple people that I'm leaving out on purpose

because they're a little bit shy. I want to go back through a few episodes that really blew me

away. And a few episodes that changed my thinking. And if you haven't heard these episodes yet,

you absolutely need to really take some time and listen to these episodes. The first one I'll

mention is Elizabeth Lesser. Elizabeth Lesser is one of those people that she defeated so many

odds. You know, she's the founder of the Omega Institute. And I just have so much respect and,

and love towards her just because when you, when you talk to these people who are super famous and

A-listers and world-class there, you know, it's, it's, it's difficult to find someone who was as

humble as Elizabeth was when, when she came on, you know, it just felt like talking to an old

there was just a deep connection that happened between her and I. And, you know, we, we try to,

to keep an open relationship with all of our guests and we're professionals. We are

consummate professionals. And, you know, we do that for our listener base as well as

the guests that come on and we have a process and, you know, a lot of this is structured and

it deliberately strategically planned, we really feel that that is part of what makes us as good

as we are. I've stopped really looking at the numbers. The numbers scare me at this point. And

I've found that we've had so many people on like that have just talked about how important value

you is. You know, success and chasing money or numbers, you know, it's not just about that.

It's about the amount of value that you're creating for the world. I feel like we're doing

that on an everyday basis and on a regular basis with this show and on an everyday basis with

what we put out on Twitter. If you're not on our Twitter feed, you're truly missing out.

My next person, my next guest that he really impressed me was Rob Bell.

Rob Bell was a Christian pastor.

He kind of went a different direction with it.

And he wrote a book called How to Be Here Now.

And Rob was very much like, you know, what I respect in a guest,

which is someone who is humble and open to whatever might come up.

And, you know, there's, there's, I could go on and on about the different guests that

we've had on, you know, Dave Asprey, Rick Strassman, and Rick Strassman is just a consummate.

He's a scientist and he just, you know, he's all about the science and he's, he's a little

bit eccentric and comes with all geniuses, but he is hardcore about the science. Dr. Gabor Mate.

Dr. Mate has done so much work on the body and connections with trauma and what's going on with

your inner dialogue. And a lesser known person that was on last year that I really respected was

Anders Ericsson, he wrote a book called The New Science of Expertise.

Phenomenal read.

Really interesting.

I highly suggest that you check that episode out if you haven't.

Peter Sage.

Peter Sage has some great, great knowledge.

Vishen Lakhiani, the founder of Mindvalley.

I mean, every single name that I've mentioned so far is a game-changing, you know, game-changer.

and I'm very, very grateful for every single person that we've had on the show

and I'm very grateful for everyone, all of our listeners that listen to us every week

and it really does mean a huge amount to me that we're able to be in a position to affect

so many people on a regular basis, on a weekly basis

And it's heartwarming, it's humbling, and I'm very, very grateful to be in this position.

And as I look back on 2016, and one of my philosophies is to learn from the past.

And, you know, it does tend to repeat itself.

With 2017, I think we're going to be changing some things around.

And we're going to keep the content as high-end as it's been.

But we really want to develop a member side where we are giving special thanks to the people who believe in what we're doing and creating a section of the site where you can log in and there's a string of content that's not available for just the general public.

You know, it's truly going to be phenomenal.

You know, anything that we put our hearts into, just we put that work in.

I mean, we're doing everything we can over here to really push the show to its limits.

And I deeply respect all of you for being part of what we're doing.

And to all of the people who have donated, thank you so

very much. It took me a while and I had to wrestle with bringing on sponsors and whether or not to bring on people to sponsor the show.

And for the first few years, I was very against it. And the donations aren't really that much. It's a few bucks here and there. That might change as well.

I think we're leaning towards sponsorship next year. I think that with the numbers that we're collecting and the caliber of the show that we are pushing right now, that we really want to bring on companies that share our ethics and our morals and have a sense of getting back to humanity.

and whoever we pick to sponsor the show is definitely going to be in in that frame of

thought you know with that guys i'm gonna i'm gonna move into the episode here for you guys

today this is john lee dumas if you haven't heard of john he started a podcast called entrepreneur

or on fire. He has a very interesting view and take on podcasting. And we basically just talked

about what success means and how a person can be profitable, how to capture a niche audience.

And if you have any interest whatsoever in podcasting yourself, we are launching a coaching

program. I really want to share the things that I've learned over the years to other people who

are interested in starting in their own shows because I've learned a lot. I'm really good at

what I do, you know, and there's, yeah, there's some confidence there, but I fell on my face a lot.

I've, and those, those mistakes are when you learn the most. So if you're interested in starting your

own show get on our main page the human xp.com slash contact yeah guys very very excited about

2017 and every everything that's possible for the show that we have planned for you guys and

it's really truly exciting so i hope you guys enjoy this episode john it's only about 15 minutes

which is why I wanted to do this little monologue for you guys about what we have planned and going

back through some of the guests. And just once again, thank you so much for being a part of what

we're doing here. And we do this for you. We do this because we want to make an impact in people's

lives. Without you guys, without our listeners, we wouldn't have a show. So thank you guys so much

this will be our first episode for 2017.

The human experience is in session and our guest today is Mr. John Lee Dumas.

John, thank you so much for doing this.

Xavier, there is literally no place I'd rather be.

Thanks for having me.

John, so I know we're short on time,

so I'm just going to bounce right into the questions that I have.

Um, you know, I, what I'm really curious about, I've heard a bunch of your interviews.

What is success been like for you both before you monetize what you were doing and then

after?

So I will say to me, like success kind of feels like the quotes from Albert Einstein

that really resonates with me through and through, which is try not to become a person

of success, but rather a person of value.

And so for me, like I, I failed trying to be successful and trying to acquire success

years and years and years because that was what I put first. But when I flipped it on its head and

actually said, you know what, I'm just going to strive to be valuable, to create free, valuable,

consistent content on a daily basis, that's when things actually started coming back to me in the

form of success. So, you know, for the first six months post launch of EO Fire, there was no

financial success, but there was feedback. There was success because the show was helping people

and resonating with people.

And then at about month seven,

we started to slowly see the revenue trickle in

to where we got to month 13

and it was our first six-figure month,

which we've now had 39 straight months of.

So the success started from just knowing

that it was impacting people

from the value that I was providing

and then just continued to trickle down

into where it's at now,

where we've grossed almost $10 million

in the past three years.

Wow, that's huge.

Love that story.

What do you think the biggest mistake that other podcasters, other content creators are making that you see in the industry today?

Well, I can definitely say this.

I mean, we all are standing upon the shoulders of giants.

So I don't like when people just kind of blatantly say, oh, this person's copying that and this person's copying him and her and whatever.

That's going to happen everywhere in every industry.

like the great quotes, I can't remember who said it, but you know, good artists copy,

great artists steal. That will always be the case. Like we are all standing up on the shoulders of

giants. I learned from people that came before me, like Andrew Warner and Davis-Eightman Garland

and you know, you name it. And, and people have learned from me going forward. Now,

what I will say is this, like when you stand, when you're standing upon the shoulders of giants and

you've learned from those who have come before you as fast as possible, you need to find the

unique voice, the unique message that you're going to bring forth in your show, in your interview.

And that's critical because again, you're just going to be another voice screaming into the

wind if you don't do that because there's so much noise out there. So what do you stand for? What

are you bringing that's unique to this world that has to be shining through?

Yeah, it's so powerful. John, if there has been a moment such as this for you, I mean,

I'm sure there has. Has there been a most challenging moment for you through this process?

I mean, just in content creation and podcasting or before that?

The hardest moment for me, which is the hardest moment for every content creator,

is pushing the publish button. I've hesitated and been terrified at every single one of those

moments, whether it be EO Fire, whether it be Podcasters Paradise, whether it be

Freedom Journal. And now currently my, you know, my project, the Mastery Journal, like all of these

things, it's been pushing the publish button. So if we can just recognize that that's where we're

going to fail is by not pressing publish, then we can say, okay, I get it. That's a human trait

that we all have. It's, you know, the imposter syndrome screaming at us, who are we to do this

thing? And then we can embrace it and rise above it and know that it's just a natural feeling.

So are you saying that there is no sense of sort of being perfect and we need to just get out the content that we're creating regardless of whether we think it matches our preconceptions?

Listen, you're never going to be perfect no matter what you do, no matter how great it is.

And the thing is, your work's never going to be great until you have feedback from the people that you're creating it for.

They need to give you the feedback.

So you need to ship whatever it is that you're creating and say, listen, I know this isn't perfect. I know that this isn't the end product. I'm looking to improve it, but I need your help. What works? What doesn't? What resonates? What isn't? Ask those questions. Engage with your listeners. Find your avatar, that one perfect reader, viewer, listener. Engage with them.

Yeah, that's perfect. Where do you think the most improvement can be made with the content that you see other than just sort of hitting publish? Is there any sort of constructive feedback that you can give to people that you see maybe are making the same mistake that you kind of made?

Yeah, you're not niching down enough. Like you're not niching down till it hurts, meaning you're being too vague, you're being too broad, you're trying to impact as many people as you can, which you think means to start off by not being, you know, disclusive of anybody, but trying to be inclusive of everybody.

Well, that's the wrong way to do things because you need to first build that initial momentum, which you're never going to do by trying to just to be broad and to appeal to everybody.

Because if you're trying to resonate with everybody, you will resonate with no one.

So who is that small, tiny, but passionate audience you can resonate with?

They can say, oh, man, like I feel like Xavier's talking to me and me alone.

That's where you're going to find that initial raving fan base.

That's where you're going to get your initial momentum.

them. And then as your success starts to snowball, then you can broaden out as the timing is right.

Yeah. I love it. Uh, has there, you know, has there been a mentor figure for you or someone

that you've looked up to while you've been kind of going through this process?

Yeah. Somebody who's dead and has been dead for a long time. And his name is Benjamin Franklin.

I loved this guy. I've read his biography multiple times and he's just been my inspiration,

You know, from him leaving Boston as a teenager to go to Philadelphia with nothing in his pocket except a piece of bread, you know, to all the different careers and things that he mastered.

He was a person of curiosity, one that was always interested in trying to improve himself.

And he just was living life.

You know, he never got stuck in that rut.

You know, that Mark Twain quote I love is when you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to pause and reflect.

And he always paused and reflected.

And that's powerful.

Yeah, cool.

Has there been

a most sort of profitable content niche that you've seen versus others?

You know, I just feel like there's so many ways to be profitable in this world, defining on how you want to define profitable.

I mean, for some people, you know, their definition of being profitable is generating $3,000 a month doing something that they love because, you know, they live somewhere where they're bootstrapping and they're happy and they just don't have this lavish lifestyle and they can make it happen.

And, you know, where other people profitable means, you know, $30,000 per month.

And I get both sides of those things.

But I think what the real thing that people should be thinking about here is, you know, what is the profit number that's going to make you happy without you having to sacrifice yourself?

I mean, you know, is that person that commutes two hours from middle of Connecticut into New York City every single day, you know, to fund, you know, his lavish lifestyle of a house that he leaves at dark and returns to at dark?

Is that somebody who needs to be making $250,000 a year to maintain that lifestyle?

Or could they shift their lifestyle and be making $75,000 a year, but he's waking up

and he's taking his kids to school and picking them up and going to their games and spending

time with his wife and doing this and whatever?

That's just a random example.

But what is your profit level that's going to make you happy?

And shoot for that.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. It's so important to really, you know, really get an idea of that.

John, you know, the journey for you has been pretty interesting.

Where, I mean, has there been a moment where you were ready to kind of just turn things off

and go in a different direction?

Not with EO Fire. I mean, that's happened multiple times in my life and I've done that

multiple times in my life. I did that with law school, with corporate finance, with commercial

real estate, you know, the list goes on. But with EO Fire, like I really did find a niche that needed

to be filled. And I've really enjoyed serving that niche. And it's just kind of been something that

I've been passionate about doing and hasn't stopped yet. And as long as that fire is burning

within, I'm just going to keep doing my thing. I mean, I think you're known most for, you know,

podcasting for profit and kind of jumping into $2 million in sales in year two with, you know,

And a lot of people look up to you for that.

And I mean, how so how can people, you know, kind of kind of learn from your mistakes and the things that you've you've gained and and and learned through your journey?

One of the mistakes that I made was I really stopped doing things that don't scale.

And I did that for a decent amount of time, meaning that, you know, I stopped having the one on one conversations.

I stopped connecting with people to the level that I was, you know, starting on day one

because I just thought, wow, you know, now I just have too many listeners and too many

followers to really do that.

So I'm just going to turn it off completely.

And that was a huge mistake and something that luckily I realized was a mistake pretty

quickly.

And I completely went the opposite direction and said, I'm actually going to double down

and do even more than I used to day one because I realized the value because it's my audience

that gave me the idea for Podcasters Paradise, for Webinar on Fire, for the Freedom Journal,

mastery journal. These ideas haven't come from me. They've come from my audience, from the one-on-one

conversations that I have, from the actual connecting with them and saying, Joe, Sarah,

what are you as an individual struggling with right now? And then listening to their answer

and then hearing their pain points, their obstacles, and then providing solutions to them

when I see the commonality start to bubble to the surface. When I hear 60 people out of 100 that I

speak to are all talking about they're struggling with goals. Well, maybe there's a reason why the

Freedom Journal, you know, was so successful and, you know, became the sixth most funded

publishing campaign of all time on Kickstarter when we launched last year and has sold over

16,000 to date. It's because I listened to my audience, identified a very common problem

and provided the solution that they were looking for.

Yeah. You know, John, I really want to know, you know, and a big part of it for me is learning the struggle of another person and where, you know, the hardest points were. So, I mean, before Entrepreneur on Fire, I mean, you said that you were aiming for success and failing. How did you feel like you were failing and what was your definition of success back then?

so I was failing because you know I wasn't achieving what my definition of success was

and that definition was money respect fame fortune like just fill in the blanks like you know I was

your typical like 20 something year old that was just looking to you know to to really kind of cash

in and and it wasn't working I wasn't finding happiness I wasn't finding success there was no

motivation there was no excitement to what I was doing day to day like it was just all kind of blah

and like, you know, kind of ho-hum.

And that's, you know, to me,

again, using that Albert Einstein quote

that flipped everything on its head,

which was don't become a person of success,

but become a person of value.

That light bulb moment changed everything for me.

And since that day,

I've always put value as a priority of what I produce.

You know, that's why I have four courses that are free

that teach you how to podcast or do webinars

or accomplish goals

or create your own funnel on fire.

Like those are completely free courses

that I could charge real money for,

but I know that there's more value

in giving them to a larger audience

who will know, like, and trust me more because of that

and recommend me to their friends,

to their followers and continue to grow.

And then maybe when I do come out, you know,

once a year with like the Freedom Journal,

they're there to support me with bells on.

Yeah, you know, it seems like everyone

has a podcast these days.

6p about three years ago and i think we entered the market right before it became you know kind

of saturated with people i mean who were doing their own shows is is there something that you

see that you could sort of give advice to these people i know time is running short but um any

word of advice any last sort of thing that you could say reach out to these people that are

struggling with their own shows i mean is is it a numbers game are you do you think that it's

people to reach out for more listeners, more downloads, or how do you process this?

So it's the opposite of all of what you just said. It's not about more listeners. It's not

about more downloads. It's not about the numbers game. Like people that are really

passionate about podcasting and want to create a show because they know they can deliver value.

You have to stop thinking about numbers. You have to stop thinking about listens and downloads

because those things are just all vanity metrics.

It's just like me having 35,000 Twitter followers.

That doesn't mean anything.

That means nothing, literally.

It means nothing.

What matters is, are you serving people at a very deep level?

And the answer is probably no, you're not.

You're not serving people at a deep level.

If you were the podcast for ice fishing for New England,

you'd win because you'd be serving people at a deep level

and you would connect with them and they would rally around you

out what they're struggling with and you create solutions and you'd find sponsors that are just

looking to get to that demographic and you'd win, you know, maybe not on a multimillion dollar a

year level the first couple of years, but you'd win on a level. And that's what a lot more than

people can say right now within podcasting, because a lot of people aren't winning because

they're not finding a specific niche. They're not finding a specific pain point in serving that

religiously. So niche down, drill down until you're literally like, I just don't even know

They will listen to this show. Guess what? That means you can probably dominate that niche because nobody else is doing it. Then you win. Then you build that initial momentum and then you can start to broaden out if and when it makes sense.

yeah for sure you know just to kind of wrap up here um for me it's it the the idea of success

has changed and altered so much through the three years that we've done this show first it was sort

of the numbers game and once we started to hit that it changed again and again and again and

you know um i really do feel like we are providing a lot of value with with the show but john i mean

i really appreciate your time and i really feel like what you're doing is is super unique and uh

to watch you work, sir. Well, it's been a blast, Xavier. Thank you for fitting into my time

parameters and I enjoy chatting. I really appreciate it, man. Why don't you give us a

link to where people can find you, please? Well, all the magic for us happens at eofire.com.

Again, that's just where we have all our free courses and just a lot of great resources.

My most latest project, if you want to check it out, which I'm super passionate about is

where you can follow my step-by-step guide

to master productivity, discipline, and focus in 100 days.

Awesome.

John, thank you so much for your time.

Thanks for being here, man.

I really appreciate it.

Thanks, brother.

Have a good day.

You too. Bye-bye.

Bye.