Misfits, this episode was recorded while I was on the road with live mics, so it will sound different than normal, but I promise that you will absolutely love this episode. This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Peter Katz. Peter is a Canadian Screen Award-nominated singer-songwriter. He’s been rated the best Male Vocalist in NOW Magazine and is has been #1 on the Itunes Singer-song writer charts multiple times. He’s toured the world playing to sell-out crowds and has built an incredible fanbase of loyal listeners, selling over 25,000 copies of his discs mostly from stage, one show at a time.

I recently got to see Peter in a private concert and meet and spend time with him - and I have to say I came away incredibly impressed. Not only is he one of the best voices I have ever heard sing, but also one of the most down to earth people I have ever met.

And make no mistake, he understands business. Especially in today’s world, where to succeed as a singer-songwriter, is radically different than the days where you could just cut an album and get it on the shelves. Nowadays, it takes the whole package. It takes having a great product, understanding all the different channels to market it through, being truly genuine and engaging your fans in a meaningful way, and above all - staying true to yourself.

There is a lot we can learn from Peter on how to succeed in business and I’ve brought him on today, to teach it to you. We may even get to hear a song or two if we are lucky.

www.PeterKatz.com

@PeterKatzMusic

Peter has been touring for the last 12 years. For the first 10 years, he was doing about 150 shows/performances a year, playing to small crowds, sleeping on floors, and figuring out how to make ends meet. He would drive 8 hours a day to do a show for sometimes just a few people. After over 10 years of doing it, his music began to take hold and he began to get a large following and got his first major hits.

“The only way I was going to get good at being a singer/songwriter was by doing it all the time.”

Peter talks about how each show he got better and he had to go all in and that everything he learned helped him to get better and better. It then led to a bunch of unexpected outcomes which added to his success.

At the 13 min mark, Peter tells the story of a certain hotel that kept popping up through his story and what he realized about life’s journey…It’s best to just listen to the story.

• You will go through your biggest fears in your life at some point and you will be able to get through them, because they are not as big as you made them out to be. You will be OK.
• Learning to maintain perspective in the face of all the bad and good that happens, is very important.

How do you keep perspective and stay true to who you are?

• Live your life by the “head on the pillow rule.” When you lay your head on the pillow at the end of the night, can you honestly say that you have given your best, done your best, and treated everyone with integrity? If so, you will sleep like a baby.
• You have to be able to stand up and believe in what you are doing, saying, and in your actions.
• If you are going to pick an entrepreneurial or unconventional path, you might as well do something that you can believe in and be proud of as that may be your only reward as an entrepreneur for a while.
• It’s the self-respect you must have to keep perspective and stay true.
• Create standards to live into.

Tell us about how you built your business and lessons you’ve learned…

• Do every job you can in your business before having someone else do it for you.
• You will need to learn to let go of the reigns at some point and it will be challenging – but to grow you will have to do it.
• You have to find a way, make a way, and hustle. Get out and create your opportunities.
• The only way you can get better is by doing it every day in and out, not just once a week.
• Your team will build over time. Be patient.
• Make it a point to spend the most time and where you make the most impact on the business.
• It’s a balance of hustle and continuous improvement.

Talk to us about what it means to be relentless…

• First, you can push too far…you have to realize this.
• You must schedule time for yourself away from it. You should be relentless in your self-care the same as you as in your work.
• Re-charging yourself helps you to be more relentless.
• To be relentless, you must constantly make choices toward what you believe in and not stop in your pursuit.
• You have to want it so bad that you will move heaven and earth to get it. And this puts you into a whole new category of possibility.

What are some of the principles you have used to build and keep a loyal following?

• From day 1, treating people with the respect and recognition they deserve.
• Always honor people in your life and business. Remember their names. Be genuine.
• Show appreciation to those that help you and follow up with thanks. Show up.
• Show up on time and be your best. There is no other way to do it.
• Be kind and remember that people will remember how you treated them- sometimes many years after.
• Be and stay consistent

How do you overcome and put yourself in a place where you are always ready to perform?

• Be open, honest, and vulnerable.
• Wherever you are before you walk on stage, compete, etc. – acknowledge where you are starting from and go from there.
• Trust that you will get into the moment. You must have self-respect for yourself in that when you perform at whatever it is you do, enjoy it.
• Nervousness is selfishness. You should be thinking about those that you are performing for and everything it took for them to be there. You are doing it for them – not for you.
• People don’t want you to fail – they want you to follow through on the promise of what you can be to them or their business.

Any success hacks or habits you can’t live without?

• Going to the gym or physical activity in the morning is a miracle cure.
• It is focused time to take care of yourself.
• You will feel better after every time.

Best Quote: People don’t want you to fail – they want you to follow through on the promise of what you can be to them or their business.

Peter's Misfit 3:

1. Follow the “head on the pillow” rule. Be and do your best. Hold yourself to a higher standard.
2. Make sure you carve out the time to work on “the thing.” You have to work on whatever it is that needs your personal focus.
3. Practice self-care. Everything falls apart if you don’t take the time to take care of your body, your mind, and your relationships.

This week’s Misfit Entrepreneurs are Tom Antion. Wow, where to start with Tom. Tom has never had a job. He has been an entrepreneur since he was a kid. He owned 5 apartment buildings and a hotel before he graduated college. He owned and operated the 2nd largest nightclub in the state of West Virginia. On top of that, he has started and owned everything from print shops to video production companies and entertainment companies. He was one of the early online marketers and has a number of businesses online.

And if that is not enough, he is a top rated speaker, consultant, and founder and host of the Screw the Commute Podcast.

It should be pretty obvious why I had to have him on at this point, because Tom has Misfit Entrepreneur written all over him. And today, I’m excited to share his best advice on how to succeed on the entrepreneur’s journey.

www.ScrewtheCommute.com

Tom’s family came over on a cattle boat from Syria and his father by the age of 13 had started his own electrical business, so Tom has entrepreneurship in his blood. By the time Tom was 10, he was selling advertising door to door and once he got a license sold encyclopedias. As Tom says, he’d do anything that is ethical and moral to get out of working for someone!

Tom ended up with football scholarship to play at West Virginia. In college, he read a book on how to “Turn a $1000 in $1 million in real estate.” He ended up buying 5 apartment buildings with no money down. At same time, was helping the landlord where he lived when something needed fixed. The landlord mentioned he was retiring and like Tom so much that he offered to give Tom a hotel he owned. He helped finance it and Tom owned it for 5 years making almost $400k on it.

He did some other jobs and then bought a nightclub. He took a biker bar in the country in West Virginia and fixed it up. But, there will still problems with fights, shootings, stabbings, etc. around it with patrons.

He got out of that and then created a practical joke company where people hired Tom and his group to pull practical jokes – think Jackass before Jackass. He also started speaking and training during this time.

In 1994, the internet came along. He spent two years figuring it out and eventually started learning how to make money and things went from there.

At the 9:45 mark, Tom talks about what he loves most about entrepreneurship and why…

• The freedom of it all. The freedom to create. The freedom build things the way you want, etc.
• You only deal with people that you want to deal with and not have to put with unethical or amoral people.
• You can speak your mind
• You can make your own schedule

What advice would give someone to get to their first $1 on the internet?

• You must be somewhat frugal – not cheap.
• Don’t get sucked into having to spend a bunch of money to start a business.
  • For example, you can use a solution called speakpipe.com and get messages to from your website directly to you and send them back to engage your audience.
• Get some knowledge and spend time using the tools that are virtually free online. Keep your costs low

At the 14 min mark, Tom gives examples of businesses you can start online with no cash…

• Use affiliate marketing. Market a product that already exists online and get a commission for it. You don’t even need a website. All you have to do is find a way to promote a product online.
• You could go to Youtube, create a video on your phone and put the affiliate link in the description. When or if people go buy thought the link – you get a commission.
• You don’t even need a website….just a phone camera and a little bit of time on Google.
• A podcast is a great example of something you can get going in about an hour on audio.fm
• Write an e-book. All you need to do is compile the information and there are ton of people out there that can make it into an e-book or with a little artistic license, you can do it in word and convert it to a PDF. You can sell e-books from $17 on up.
• Record video on how to use a software or solution by recording your computer screen and put it up on Youtube or link to where they can get it.

Where can people go to sell their product such as E-books, etc.?

• Clickbank.com is good and is kind of the old guard.
• JVZoo.com is newer and is growing fast because it has a mechanism that if you qualify, you get paid instantly where you have to wait with Clickbank. 
• Those are really the only two you need.

At the 21 min mark, Tom talks about how to make money online with their hobbies and make them tax deductible.

You can create things out of thin air. Try them with a free Wordpress site. And you are in business without going broke. You can try any idea for basically lunch money!

What are ways that you use to drive traffic to these ideas you create?

• The #1 thing is also the #1 mistake. That is Key Word Research.
• Every idea is a CSI. A “Crappy, Stupid Idea” until you can prove that someone is really willing to pay for it and can back it up with real numbers.
• The first thing you should do is key word research. Google Keyword Planner is a free tool that tells you stats on key word research as well as related terms.
  • Make a big list of all the terms
  • You then need to include as many of those terms on your website.
  • The return on investment is huge.
  • You want to incorporate key words into your social media posts, blog posts, videos, etc.
• Once you get some money flowing, you can spend a little money on Google or use
• Youtube Skip Ads Youtube Skip Ads are one of the best bargains. If people don’t watch all 30 seconds, you don’t pay.
• Youtube is more fair than Facebook when it comes to how they charge for ads.

What are some of the overarching things entrepreneurs need to do to succeed?

• You have to be willing to give up things in the short run and delay gratification
• At the 35 min mark, Tom details the “Marshmallow Test.” Listen in on this!
• Reinvest in yourself and your business – spend money today that you made last year.
• Delaying gratification, just a little bit is the BIG secret.
• The most successful though are not balanced, they are highly focused and devoted. An extra hour a day can make such a difference in your success.

Best advice for an entrepreneur just starting out?

• Get some knowledge and you have to avoid shiny object syndrome. Stay focused and be careful with who you learn from.
• You can learn anything you want from Youtube Videos that are free.
• One specific thing that can ramp in a hurry is membership sites. A membership site is one of the best ways to create a business with your knowledge. If you had 100 members at $20/mo, you can have a $24,000 a year business.
• Listen at the 42 min mark for the “embroidery example that generates $200k per mo”

You were a college football player at WVU and a state champion wrestler – what are some things you learned from sports that have helped you to succeed in business?

• You are pushed to your limits and beyond in high-level sports…
• If you can learn to push yourself past what you have dreamed you can do, you can create amazing results for yourself.
• You have to develop your own sense of confidence and sports does this. Even when you lose, you learn, and you get better.
• You learn to work on your weaknesses. Open up and work on yourself where you are weak.

What advice can you give to maximize their business and career through speaking?

• Know that you don’t have to do it.
• If you are willing to improve your skills to be in front of people, they get a better feel for who you are and it helps your online business or other businesses.
• It builds your credibility and broadens your reach.
• There are a lot of ways to speak…
• Being on video is public speaking
• Being on Podcasts is a form of public speaking

Best Quote: “If you aren’t commuting and going to and from work in a car, making someone else rich every day, you can live 2 or lives with that time and accomplish so much more!”

Tom's Misfit 3:

1. Give before you get. Prove yourself first and you will stand out like crazy to others that can help you.
2. You have to keep going.
3. Excellence. Don’t you ever do anything in your life that is not excellent and learn what you need to know to be excellent.

This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Dale Beaumont. Dale is an award-winning technology entrepreneur, speaker, and author of 16 Best-Selling books. He’s been featured everywhere from Forbes to Business Insider, GQ and Gizmodo. Dale started his first business at 19 and has been building companies ever since.

He is the creator of BizVersity. BizVersity has been called the Netflix for business which gives users access to over 1,000+ TV-Quality videos, which have been produced by over 250+ leading business experts from around the globe to give you The World’s Best Business Training. Anywhere, Anytime.’

With a passion to give back, Dale’s goal is to help more than one million entrepreneurs around the world with Bizversity.

Dale made his first million before 25 and has gone on to train over 50,00 people to achieve business success. There is so much we can cover today and I’m going to get everything possible that I can out of him for you in this episode.

www.DaleBeaumont.com

www.BizVersity.com

Dale grew up in Sydney Australia in a middle-class family. His father owned a small business. He grew up sort of being in the business with his dad. His journey really started at 7 years old when he started gymnastics. He was an energy ball and he had a talent for the sport. At age 9, he was selected for an elite squad and by 10 years old, he was training 36+ hours a week while going to school.

It was very intense and became his life until he was 18. He learned a lot of great lessons in hard work, the value of having a coach, how to motivate himself and push through barriers as well as discipline. He made it to multiple world championships representing his country, but by 18, he had a few big injuries that put him in place where he had to take his life in a different direction.

He decided to go into business and started seeking out mentors and coaches to help him learn. He went to seminars and events of everyone from Tony Robbins to Zig Ziglar, Tom Hopkins, Robert Kiyosaki, and others. He was always be one of the youngest in the room and people would tell him how they wish that they had learned the stuff he was learning at a young age.

This gave him an idea – to help youth get the type of training he was getting. He started Tomorrow’s Youth, a company that teaches personal development and life skills to young kids to help them get ahead in life.

He only had 3 people in his first workshop and realized that you can be great at what you do, but if you aren’t good at marketing, you can’t get that far.

He figured it out and the business expanded to other countries.

Then at 25, he wrote a series of books called the Secrets Exposed Series. He came up with a format and over the course of 3 years developed 15 books which sold over 250,000 copies.

He had a few other businesses he did but started teaching and doing workshops on how to succeed in business. This grew with him doing workshops and teaching thousands.

The need to give this content in a bigger way and reach more people lead to the creation of BizVersity.

Out of everything you’ve learned, what is the most important lesson to succeed?

• Invest in your self-education and self-growth to become better
• The more that you learn, the more you will earn.
• One of the best ways to learn is to find people who have done what you want to do and learn from them. Read their book, listen to their podcast, whatever you can do.
• Never stop growing and learning.

What do you see that holds people back the most?

• The beliefs they have that are not serving them.
• They are just really excuses.
• You can make money, or you can make excuses, but you can’t make both.
• Don’t tell yourself the wrong story and put brakes on yourself.
• Whatever your reason or “excuse” for not being where you want to be, is, someone has had it and overcome it before.
• You can’t control everything that life throws at you, but you can control the things you can control – and your beliefs are in your control.

How do people change their belief systems?

• First, you must become aware of your beliefs – find out what beliefs are causing you to put on your brakes.
• Once you start to find them, write them down and choose which ones you want to change.
• Ask yourself what your new belief should be and why…
• Make the conscious decision to change it to what you want and write it down in spite of what your brain is telling you.
• You then have to start deliberately finding opportunities to make that new pattern come alive and gain evidence to support the new belief for your brain to register.

You made your first million before 25, what can you teach Misfit Nation about creating their first million?

• Find an existing idea that is already working and improve on it by 10-20%
• What you create must be something that can be duplicated, scale and be sold repeatedly.
• Build a product that you can sell thousands or millions of times.
• Dale’s tip – Document the process from the very beginning to create a model and systemize everything.
• Patience is very important. Success doesn’t grow in a straight line but has a compounding effect. Play the long game.

You’ve sold over 250,000 books, what is your best advice on how to sell a book?

• It’s important to realize that a book today is a doorway into your business or the products and services you offer.
• They can be used as a great marketing piece and to gain customers.
• In some ways, a book is like the new business card.
• A book is a message that you can take and recreate in many different ways from workshops to course, to audible, Udemy, etc.
• It better to sell a thousand books to one person – so search for groups to sell you books to. Examples are promotional companies that can give it as an option to their clients. Business groups are also great prospects.

At the 36 min mark, Dale talks about his 52 Ways workshop of tested strategies to become a multi-million-dollar business and live the lifestyle you want.

• There are 8 topics: Technology, Marketing, Websites, Sales, Social Media, Strategy/Systemization, Outsourcing
• Under Systems – you need a place to store all your systems or SOP’s such as google drive or docs. The key is to get them all in one place.
• For project management, you can use Teamwork or Trello.
• Get a good CRM system as well for all of your contacts. 15% of people buy in the 1st 3 months, but over 80% will buy over 18 months. You need a way to nurture your lead over a period of time to be there when they are ready to make a decision.
• Follow up with people that come to your site through re-targeting.

How can people travel 3-4 months out of the year, while still making millions?

• Design your business around your life, not your life around your business.
• You absolutely can with technology.
• You need to build a good team and systems first.
• Have everything online in one place where people can search and find the processes they need is critical.
• Dale uses an app called Voxer for his team to connect with him while traveling.
• Book the travel in advance and lock yourself in, so you can’t make an excuse not to go.
• Start small. Maybe 2-5 days. Then grow the days from there.
• Most importantly, have the courage to do it and follow through.
• Doing this will make your business a better one and self-sufficient without you.

At the 47 min mark, Dale talks about how to market, fill an event, and grow your message?

• You need a good BIG idea – a concept for your event that really grabs attention.
• It has to be appealing and bring massive value that make people want it.
• You can fill the room through Facebook marketing, partnering with businesses that are complimentary (JV’s) – this is one of the best ways.
• Use local media to help spread the word.
• Engage attendees to help promote the next event.

Best Quote: “The more you learn, the more you will earn...”

Dale's Misfit 3:

1. Invest in your self-education. The more you learn, the more you will earn.
2. Get a good coach to guide you and support you. Someone that already has the results you want. Ask them to mentor you.
3. Your environment and who you spend time with directly impacts your success, so choose wisely in these areas. You network = your net worth.

This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Tom Nardone. Tom is known as the Millionaire Mailman. He is a great example of ingenuity and the American Dream. He is the co-author of the best-seller, Secrets of Real Estate Millionaires and has been featured on Good Morning America, CNBC, and others.

At age 19, Tom started working for the post office, but according to him, it didn’t take him long to realize that the security entrapment of a “good job” is NOT a lot different from a 30-year jail sentence.

So in 1993, he took some real estate investing courses and bought his first property. But, he realized that he had a huge advantage where others didn’t. Every day, he would see properties along his mail route. In fact, being a mailman, gave him even more huge advantages which I won’t spoil and let him tell you about.

Because of the system he developed, Tom was able to retire at 35. Nowadays, he has purchased over 250 properties and works with and mentors others on their path to real estate investing success.

The lessons he will share with you will not only help you if you invest in real estate but also in your business as well.

www.MillionaireMailman.com Get

Tom's Free Ebook on How to Make $10,000 in Your First 90 Days in Real Estate: Text Mailman to 31996

Tom started working as a mail carrier in 1979. After 5 years, he and his wife wanted to find a way for her to be a full-time mom. And one mailman’s paycheck wasn’t going to make it work. So, Tom went to a few real estate seminars where he met a couple mentors that were real and doing the business. They helped him to realize that he was in the neighborhoods everyday where he got to look at houses and start a real estate business doing what he was doing every day.

He got started by buying run-down, foreclosed houses on his mail route. He slowly fixed them up and rented them out and after 10 years, he woke up and realized that he had enough cash flow that he could go full time.

At the 6:30 mark, Tom reveals more about how found and got his homes…

• He would see the notices of potential foreclosure in the mail where he had to deliver a certified letter.
• The home owner would mention needing to get rid of the house and Tom would offer to help.
• He would come back after work in his civilian clothes and work out a deal with the seller.
• Tom stressed that timing and being prepared to act are big keys to success.

What is different between the crisis in the 80’s and what we saw in 2008/09 with real estate and what are you seeing in the market now?

2008/09 allowed many to reinvest in the market at a very low price which hadn’t been available in a few decades.

• There are signs to watch for to see if there will be a slowdown in real estate or a future buying opportunity.
  • Look for new housing starts to slow
  • Look for defaults on credit cards to pick up
  • Look for defaults on car payments
  • After these happen, then you see foreclosure filings go up.
• At this point, Tom is seeing houses not move as fast and prices begin to flatten out.
• There has been an uptick in foreclosures.
• The next crash is not here yet, but things look to be slowing or at least in a softer patch

Tell us about your system. How do you find properties and make them profitable?

You want to buy houses for way below market value – find $1.00 for $.50.

• Tom uses postcards/mailers to find interested parties that need to get out of properties
• Mailers still work very well.
• You can get much more “intelligent” mailing lists
• You can get lists of absentee owners, 2nd homeowners, age, price range, how long people have owned properties, and also the equity spread, etc.
• Your profit as an investor is directly related to the equity already in a property.
  • For example, if you find a property worth $100k and the owner only owes $50k on it, but wants to get out…you can negotiate to get the property below market value.

Where can an investor get a list like you mentioned?

• Listability.com
• Listsource.com
• Where you need to be careful is that it can be expensive to test because of mailer costs.
• You have to give it a shot and when you find a good response rate with a list, stay with the company you got it from because the data is good.

What is the criteria you look for in a deal?

• Look for problems, not properties.
• There needs to be uncomfortable circumstances with the seller and they have to be ok with selling at a discount. They just want to get out.
• There will be work that needs to be done – so you have to have a good idea of what those costs will be.
• If you can do a cash offer, you have a better chance.
• Only a small amount of offers you put will have interest and you will close a few over time – so staying consistent is important.

At the 26 min mark, Tom talks about wholesaling and how you can make money that way.

When flipping a property, you don’t want to have more than the 40% mark in the home compared to similar homes in the market. This means if houses are $200k average, you don’t want to have more than $120k in it after purchase and repairs.

How does someone purchase a property if they don’t have the ability to do an all cash offer?

• Throughout the country there are real estate clubs and meetups.
• Go to the meetings in your area and start to make connections and learn
• These connections will have money and or be able to help you.
• Meeting others in the space can help you as well in evaluating deals to make sure you are not doing a bad deal.
• There is even the ability to use 401k or IRA money.
• There is a lot of money from non-traditional places looking for a home. It’s called “lazy money.”

Talk to us about renting…

• That is the endgame. You want to have a rental portfolio in which the tenants pay down and eventually become free and clear.
• This will give you great cashflow and tax benefits over time.
• This cashflow is better than most retirement plans. But, you must be willing to play the long game to get there.

Thoughts on AirBNB?

• You can do really well with them.
• It is more hands on as you need to run a tight ship with them.
• You also need to get good reviews from your guest

Any other tips and tricks?

• Don’t become emotionally involved in a property.
• If you are buying a distressed property, it has problems, so the numbers have to make sense.
• Treat it like a business.
• Be careful about borrowing money personally – make the asset the sole collateral.

What have you learned from real estate investing that translates well to running a business?

• You cannot and should not do everything yourself
• Put together your team of all stars in the areas where they are needed to help you.
• Stick with your unique ability

Best Quote: "Look for PROBLEMS, not properties..."

Tom's Misfit 3:

1. Don’t settle for mediocrity. Do something bigger and braver.
2. If it doesn’t feel right, don’t do it.
3. Where the mind goes, the man follows. Feed your mind with good things.