Seanwes Podcast

If someone has money to spend, they're doing something right. If you want to get hired by high-value clients, you need to remember that they don't have time to waste. Unlike bottom-of-the-barrel clients that treat you like a commodity, micromanage, and demand revision after revision after revision, high-value clients value their time. They will actually pay more to get results in less time. You have to act like the opposite of a commodity. A commoditized technician is someone who performs tasks and gets paid by the hour. They're incentivized to make a job take longer, because they'll get paid more. Of course, this also means that the kind of clients they attract want to pay them as little as possible. High-value clients will pay more to get results in a shorter amount of time. That means if you have the experience to produce great results in a short amount of time, you actually get paid more to work less! But to attract these clients, you must operate differently. You need to stop making them do work. Wh

Talking about yourself is difficult. Most of us don't like doing it and it feels awkward. That's why writing your About page can be so difficult. But here's the secret: your About page isn't really about you. Ok, it is about you, but it's not for you. The purpose is to provide value. The reason you're writing it is for your reader. This actually changes the way you approach it. It changes the way you structure it. People are looking for a story on your About page. They're looking for a story they can see themselves in and they're also looking for an outcome. This is an opportunity. Learn to write an About page even if you hate talking about yourself!

I have a special guest today. Aaron Dowd joins me to talk about his really interesting method of planning a successful day in advance. Aaron works at seanwes full time as podcast editor for the seanwes network. He also has his own show on the network, The Podcast Dude. Aaron regularly wakes up as early as 4 AM and even 3 AM! He creates a hand-written schedule every single day in a basic journal. He writes, he edits shows, he rides his bike, he's working on a book and a course called Successful Podcasting, he works out almost every day, and plays in a band. Tune in to hear Aaron share how he plans his day for success.

I get very real in this episode. I share some information about my situation that I wasn't planning on sharing. We talk about how prevalent scarcity mindset is and how it affects your mindset and performance in all areas of life. This is a very real thing that many people deal with and have trouble getting ahead of. Getting enough resources is also not a cure for scarcity mindset. This has to be dealt with at every level and it must be consistently fought off. But understand that scarcity mindset is a way you choose to operate. It's a mindset that you feed. Your circumstances do not determine it. You do. I share in today's episode how I'm able to keep my mindset in a place of abundance regardless of the external circumstances.

A recent conversation in the Community chat inspired today's episode. Someone mentioned that there were a lot of people who couldn't afford a certain product in their market and they saw that as an opportunity for them to enter the market with something cheap to sell at scale. But when you sell a cheap product, your margins aren't going to be very good. That means for it to be sustainable, you have to mass produce. To mass produce, you need a ton of up-front capital! So first, you need a lot of resources to sell cheap in a sustainable way, but second, you're limiting your potential. Selling cheap affects your brand. When you have a cheap brand, you can't very easily sell higher-ticket products. When you start with premium or high quality, you always have the option of coming down, but when you start cheap, it's an uphill battle to do anything else. How do you resist the temptation to price match with others in your market? How do you find the confidence to charge more? Primarily, it's positioning and selec

My brother, Ryan, was in town to visit. We were sitting on the couch having this great conversation when I asked him, "How would you feel about having this conversation on the microphones and sharing it?" He chuckled and said he thought I'd ask that. It's a very serious conversation about who your friends are, who you hang out with, and who is worthy of your time. You can't be close friends with everyone. It's also a conversation about the power of your words. Here's how Ryan puts it: "Everywhere I go, the relationships I have, the people I speak to, I have an opportunity to make a lasting impact on the way that they see life and the way they treat other people."

On today's sabbatical episode, I'm joined by Ben. This was an "after show" conversation that I thought I'd share as a mini episode. Now, we don't expect the internet to go away, but as a thought exercise, we talked about what would happen if it did. What would you have left? What would people do? How would they find you? What kinds of businesses could survive? This really highlights the importance of your name and investing in that name. It also underscores the importance of building your own platform. The relationships you've built are what remain. If you have an email newsletter, that can be a way to build a relationship with people, but only if you're speaking to people as you would one person! Many people address their newsletter as if they're speaking to a crowd of thousands. But an email is just one person opening one email from one other person. The more you treat it that way, the more of a relationship you build. I hope you enjoy the episode (it's just a few minutes long). It definitely got us t

It takes hearing new information seven times in order to retain it. For people to really hear and internalize your message, they need to be exposed to it seven times. This concept applies to products you're selling just as it applies to relationships in your personal life. People don't notice announcements; they notice consistency. It takes hearing about your product or your message seven times for people to even be aware it exists! We feel like we don't want to be a broken record, but there are creative ways to repeat ourselves while sharing new facets of the story. There's nothing new under the sun. There are people sharing very similar messages to you, but you have a unique voice and a unique perspective. The great part about The Magic of 7 is that when someone hears something for the seventh time and it resonates, they will attribute the value of that thing to you. Even if six other people put in those initial impressions, you get the credit just by being the seventh person.

Do you know what revenue looks like for next month? What about the month after that? A cash flow forecast is incredibly important. Cash is survival. If your business doesn't have cash, you're done! You can be profitable on paper, but without cash in the bank, you can't pay your bills, cover expenses, or make payroll. A lesson I've learned this past year is you have to earn the right to think long term. By default, I tend to make long-term investments. This is great if you're around in several years to see the returns, but if you don't survive until then, it doesn't matter! You have to focus on short-term cash flow and making it predicable. That's what we talk about in today's show. In doing research on this topic before recording the show, I saw a lot of advice saying to borrow money, talk to banks about getting a loan, or run an extreme sale when you're in a tough spot. These make sense logically, but they conflict with my no-debt mentality and my decision against discounting and devaluing my products.

There are two ways to approach life: with an attitude of responsibility and with an attitude of excuses. Responsibility and excuses have one thing in common: when you look for either one, you will always find what you're looking for. If you want to find someone to blame for your situation or external forces that are at fault, you will always find them. The same goes for places where you can take responsibility. You can always find a way to take personal responsibility for everything. This episode explores what it looks like to apply an attitude of responsibility to various scenarios of life such as clients, money, relationships, communication, and even citizenship. What you will find with this approach is that there is no such thing as clients from hell. It's your responsibility. The situation you're in with money is because of choices you made. It's your responsibility. The people you're communicating with are not at fault for missing your message. It's your responsibility. It can be very challenging t

Today, we talk about the habits of successful people. There's nothing stopping you from getting what you want in life except yourself. We kick the episode off with three things you should stop doing immediately (going to bed late, saying yes, and quitting), but then get into the habits that will enable success for you (hyper focus, massive action, writing, reading, ignoring negativity, future focus, and much more!). Success means a lot of things to different people. We share definitions of success from over a dozen Community members in the first half of the show. To me, success is freedom. It's choice. Success is doing what you want to do when you want to do it. At least, that's the selfish part. I also believe it's defined by the amount of people who are able to live a better and more fulfilled life as a result of what you've done. However you define it, this episode is sure to help just about anyone reach any definition of success for themselves.

A lot of people think you need to be an expert to teach. You don't feel qualified or you don't feel like you know as much as someone else. But all you need to know to teach is more than one other person! It’s a common misconception that you have to be an expert to teach. It actually works the other way around: leaders are seen as experts BECAUSE they teach. You might think teaching is a job best left to the masters. But the masters aren't often the best people to teach the beginners. Often someone who is a little bit ahead is better able to relate to the struggles of a beginner. The master has already long forgotten. Teaching establishes you as an expert. It's a fantastic way to build an audience. But don't think it stops there. Teaching is actually a great way to get clients too. While clients aren't necessarily interested in learning how to do what you do, the very existence of educational material positions you as an expert. Guess who clients want to hire? An expert. There are so many benefits to tea

A listener wrote in to ask if we'd do an episode dedicated to business lessons found in nature. Boy, did we deliver! Ben and I spent the past week gathering inspiration from nature for this metaphor-and-parable-laden episode. From bananas, squirrels, water, and vineyards, this episode truly packs some exciting stories and unexpected insights that apply to business and life. This episode was unlike any in recent memory and was a lot of fun to do. Thanks for the suggestion, Robert!

Aaron says I need to charge for this one. He's our podcast editor. After listening, he said, "No, really, you need to be charging money for this episode." And I know. It's true, I should. I'm giving away better content and education here than what other people are charging for. But I'm demonstrating what I teach you in this episode. Give away your best 10% for free. The reason this episode is so good is because I'm giving you my best. Learn to build a writing habit, the difference between content marketing and copywriting (and why not knowing the difference is destroying your sales), and what to give away for free vs. what to sell.

Do you really need a website? Do you really need your own domain and a place to call home? There are a lot of tools and platforms out there happy to represent you and act as your home. A lot of the hard work of development is taken care of for you. You can just show up, do your thing and be done. But it does mean pointing people to those platforms. If you're telling anyone to go to your profile on these other platforms, you are telling them that's where your home is. This means you are putting your trust and livelihood in platforms that are looking out for their own best interest. They can change the rules, they can change the game, and there's nothing you can do about it. The online world looked very different 10 years ago and you can be sure it will look very different 10 years from now. The only thing that is certain is change. When you build your home on someone else's platform, you are putting your full trust in them. But they have to look out for their own best interest. The only platform you contr

What does it look like to own your life? What if everything you had was bought in cash? People say they don't like living in debt, but they keep using it as a tool. It is possible to live a life without debt. It is possible to buy the life you want in cash. But it's not easy. Just wanting to have no debt isn't enough. You have to define the life you want to have and work backwards from that. Shift your focus back toward the life you've always wanted to have for yourself: what does that look like? What does your ideal day entail? It's a matter of reverse engineering the life you want and making sacrifices to get there. I guarantee this episode will give you a ton of ideas and a ton to think about. It's not just about how to cut expenses and save money (though there are some great tips on that), it's about shifting your focus to the areas where you have the greatest impact. It's better to make $10 than to save $2. I'll show you places where you're missing out on the $10. I get really practical in the epi

We often use the expression, "leave a legacy." Usually, the emphasis is on the word legacy. But the first word is just as important: leave. You have to actually depart at some point. That is when you leave a legacy. While you're alive, you can influence your legacy, but eventually it goes on without you. Other people will be the ones to define it. Imparting a legacy starts with defining your values. If your values aren't written down, you don't have values. I'm serious. That statement might offend you if you believe you have values, but unless you can articulate them, all you have is a warm, fuzzy feeling. Most of us want to believe we are people of values, but if you don't have those values written down, they are not actually tangible. Once you have your values defined, take those values and turn them into principles. Principles are like sayings or expressions that are based on your values. Principles can be shared and passed on and referenced by others without your being there. We talk about what to do

Do you ever wake up some days and wonder, "Why am I even doing this?" I do. Sometimes it's just a fleeting moment and I push past. Other times it lasts more than a few minutes. "Will I have something good to say? Am I just repeating myself? Does what I'm doing even matter?" Without a reason for what you do, it's hard to stick with something because things are not always going to be easy. You're going to wake up not feeling like doing the work sometimes. You're not always going to want to show up. That's where your WHY comes in. We talk about how to find your why, if you can have multiple whys, and whether it's ok for you to have selfish whys or if they have to be altruistic.

To learn, you must consume. But most people consume inefficiently. They allow "educational distractions" and pursue things during times where they should be doing important work. Becoming a learning machine doesn't mean watching or listening to things on 2X speed or speed reading. It's about how you optimize your consumption time, not the pace at which you consume. Consumption is a good thing only if what you're consuming enriches your life. Increasing your consumption speed only means you will consume more. It doesn't actually mean you'll retain what you consume (and isn't that the point?). Educational consumption can be detrimental if it's taking you away from important work you should be doing. The key is deferring your consumption. That's what we talk about in this episode. Learn to optimize your consumption habits and become a learning machine.

One of the Community members, Scott, listened to the last episode on The Long Game. I talked about the importance of not worrying about short-term recognition and instead making your work for ten years from now. Scott said, “Clearly you need to show up everyday, strive to improve, and work hard. What I’m wondering is if you invest more time, will you see faster results? For instance, if you sleep six hours a night instead of eight to create two extra hours, would you realize your investment sooner?” I thought this would be an interesting question to discuss on today’s mini sabbatical episode.