Welcome back budding rockstar! On this episode Stefan interviews John Roman of BattlBox and Carnivore Club. John is a marketing genius and helped grow BattlBox to $6M in year 1, and over $55M in revenue since launch.
They discuss:
- How to make the most of the Coronavirus situation
- Finding your business idea opportunity whilst making sure you're still passionate
- How to reduce dependency risk by increasing marketing diversification
- The importance of being community focused
- And how he'd use $100 if he was starting his business again
- And some important advice on mental health
Transcript from video:
Introduction
0:02 this is a special episode for the subscription rock stars podcast because
0:07 first of all we're in quarantine second of all this is the studio so it's quite interesting I don't know what you think
0:13 of sublease to do is coming from quarantine and also I'm doing a second interview somebody who I already know
0:20 and I'm very fond of his name is John Roman and John and I did a podcast on
0:25 when I was doing some to sound podcast was it two years ago now two years ago
0:30 yeah yeah I think yeah and John and I connected on that podcast and then we
0:37 met a sub-sub summer as well last year and also another reason this is a special episode this is actually the
0:43 first podcast episode that wasn't published a because of crota virus and
0:48 be from the last sub summit so this is the beginning of a new stage in this the
0:55 subscription rockstar podcast and additionally this is the tenth episode
1:01 so it's a cool one it's a pivotal one so thanks for doing this John and I'm just
1:07 gonna give the formal introduction as well if you don't mind get to to just quickly and make sure everybody knows
1:12 who you are so John Roman currently serves as chief marketing officer of battle books a
1:18 managing partner of Carnival Club prior to five years ago and John entered the e-commerce subscription space he was in
1:24 business to business sales managing multiple terms so I teams in the technology and software space now I can
1:31 tell you from personal experience Jordan is an absolute weapon and he knows his
1:36 stuff and the bow box guys and I've done an extremely good job and are a very
1:42 successful company and the carnival club as well which you probably have heard of them to be honest if you if you're listening to this podcast so John thanks
1:49 for joining them on yeah thanks for having me I'm honoured with all the the
1:55 reasons it's such a paramount episode I'm uh I'm honored that yeah well you
2:02 know when when it's done alright I feel like as I said it's a pivotal episode we
2:08 have an existing relationship which really helps and you know I felt like it would be good fun as well just to kind
2:13 of revisit and do four official stubbly and podcast so and also
2:19 as well I just want to mention something so in our previous episodes the format was a little bit different
2:26 I'm actually gonna mix it up on this episode where previously you know we've we've interviewed people of similar
2:32 caliber to yourself and we tend to go into more of like the top level like the
2:39 trials and tribulations and and those are kind of lessons I've been learned a later stage in the business now I know
2:46 you your marketing genius so I want to bring it back a bit okay and I want to
2:51 actually start to talk to you about like the early stages of over-over business
2:58 and e-commerce business and we kind of like we made some mistakes so yeah
3:08 basically just want to dive into a bit more of the tactical stuff and kind of principles very like first level
3:13 principles and and kind of reverse engineer a wee bit about about battle
3:21 boats but before we do can you share a couple of vanity metrics just to kind of really give people a picture of they don't know battle books
3:27 sure so we started battle box in February of 2015 it was perfect timing
3:35 to enter the subscription box space the survival tactical space was trending as
3:42 well so it was kind of a double-edged sword we had two trending topics space
3:48 spaces and we were able to capitalize on both so we kind of hit the ground
3:54 running I think the first year we did just north of six million in revenue
4:01 will hit we just so I think surpassed maybe this month or next 55 million
4:08 since inception you also hit a million packages shipped this year so we've
4:16 we've seen exponential growth crazy journey who would have thought lots of
4:24 mistakes and and bruised knees and those and busted faces along the journey
4:30 but um you know we built a machine at this point and taken all our learnings
4:37 and and just gotten stronger through the years that's yeah that's some serious
Coronavirus impact
4:43 attraction right there I also love her the name battle box okay I kind of I
4:49 romanticized the name of the business even though it's related to what it's related to by like the fact that it's
4:56 kind of like you know we're entrepreneurs we start we start businesses and you're your bat you're in
5:02 a battle it feels like you're in a battle every day so I love that because it's kind of like a romantic aspect of
5:07 it for me personally anyway sure so correct me if I'm wrong given the nature
5:13 of your subscription box and your products are you seeing an impact from
5:19 coronavirus and by the way to the listeners are the viewers you were on our last chrono episode and giving you
5:26 gave us like some really good information about the impact of coronavirus so if you're listening check out the episode do you have any
5:33 additional comments and you if you can't be really good to hear that sure so so as I said on the last podcast
5:42 when we were talking about the Creta virus it definitely creates an opportunity and um you know since since
5:49 I recorded that which I guess was a couple weeks ago we've just stepped into
5:55 the opportunity even when we're a little fortunate you know survival outdoor gear it's our whole mantra is is preparing
6:04 for for that you know [ __ ] hit the fan moment right so literally five years in
6:12 the making is for situations like this um so we are a little fortunate that
6:17 it's a it's a product that that is something people want you know we have right now we're selling up about a
6:25 thousand units a day on this this foam which is an alternative to hand sanitizer but it's a product we would
6:32 normally carry and sell and right now it's just you know it's it's a product
6:37 everybody needs everybody wants so we are fortunate in that sense same with carnivore Club me delivery to your door right now
6:44 is is kind of a gift good product to have no um so you know not not all
6:51 online e-commerce businesses are that fortunate enough that they picked a product that you know strives or
6:58 potentially strives in a situation like this so we're continuing a lean an
7:04 advertisement advertising we've scaled our average spent for battle box we've
7:11 scaled slowly we're we're definitely conservative when it comes to to
7:16 situations like this but we've doing some quick math we've probably increased
7:24 our daily spend by about five hundred percent for for battle box which is when
7:31 it's already a decent spend to begin with in my opinion um and then carnivore
7:37 Club this is typically a very slow time because it's in between Valentine's Day and Father's Day mmm slowest time to be
7:44 here typically what we're seeing q4 numbers so our our spend is actually increased even more than that on the
7:50 carnivore side just because there's such a low baseline anyway okay yeah I see
7:56 what you're saying relative to what normally is at this period yeah I mean I can tell you that it's 2,000 percent
8:04 increase but it's such a glow baseline I think anyway it's it's it's not really relevant but um yeah I as far as things
8:13 we've had to do a little bit different our normal messaging for battle box which which talks about you know that
8:19 moment and being prepared we've actually had to kind of pull back a lot of our
8:24 messaging that we've used over the last five years just put it back a little bit because it was it was aggressive
8:30 I'm not fear-mongering or anything like that but just simply saying you know
8:36 prepare for any scenario mm-hmm now we we can't say prepared for any scenario because the internet trolls will come
8:45 volcon running you're you're only doing this because of coronavirus exploitation
8:53 yeah opportunistic 100% I mean we're getting
8:58 on every so we had to scale scale it back a lot because our normal messaging
9:04 is not something you want to use right now it so it's a very sensitive topic
9:11 for everyone let's us included you know you don't want any company do doing that
9:17 taking a minute of a situation so it's an it's interesting waters that no one's
9:24 ever kind of had go through before so it's we're finding our place we've got
9:31 some floaties on and we're trying to figure it out but it's it's it's an
9:37 opportunity for for businesses at this point yeah and do you think that you
Return to normalcy
9:44 know by adjusting and adapting right now in the in this environment will lead to
9:52 a stronger business at the end of it when it when it starts to you know ease up and things start to quote unquote
9:58 return back to normal which bit of a subjective conversation alone but do you
10:04 think it will lead to a stronger foundation moving forward yeah so I think you know we we were fortunate that
10:11 we we brought on a new CFO a little
10:16 little over a year ago October of 2018 and he really gave us a
10:24 a gut check and started immediately plugging a lot of the holes in our ship
10:30 that could be you know wasteful spent on inefficient spend so so we were already
10:39 kind of already moving towards being a very lean operation to begin with but I think this situation is causing a lot of
10:46 companies that haven't gone through those type of exercises yet to go through not go through them now because
10:53 it's it's it's needed for survival and and you do need to be lean probably in
10:59 general wasteful spending is never a good idea in my opinion and I mean if it's a lifestyle business
11:07 and you don't care it is what it is right if you want to truly grow a business and run a business the correct
11:12 way you shouldn't have that sort of wasteful spending in there so I think a lot of businesses right now are being
11:19 forced to go through that exercise and get lean and not be wasteful and I think the end result will be there will be a
11:26 much healthier business and when we do return to normalcy there will just be in a better more profitable better run spot
11:32 bra so it's kind of the silver lining in all this assuming we do we do return to
11:39 normalcy like you said it's just a whole nother podcast yeah yeah and I guess you
11:47 know let's not dive into too much more than that but I think that you're right
11:52 about the trimming I think that it's very easy when you get to a certain
11:58 stage in a business where you get this kind of expense creep where things just
12:03 slowly build up and you don't realize it because it's very easy to make decisions when you've got cash flow and growth and
12:11 that you know and there's two sides to this I see people spending so much energy and time on spending less and
12:16 saving money and I think it's a double-edged sword though because you know on the other side you've got the it
12:25 can be quite a limiting mindset to always focus on saving money rather than making more sure and this is something
12:30 I'm quite passionate about but a hundred percent like you got to trim the fat every now and again to make sure you're
12:36 running lean because I think if you don't you might just end up in a really bad position later yeah I understand I
12:42 agree it's not it's one of those things you spend too much time on it I mean counterproductive you're not focused on
12:49 growing the business and matter it's a fine balance you know sure cool yeah so
Mary McFly
12:57 okay Karuna excited I'm sure everybody's sick of hearing about Corona I want to
13:02 like let's do a bit of a Mary McFly and going to time machine back to the beginning of battle books right and I'm
13:10 just thinking like I would quite like to get into you know younger John and
13:18 and you have you how many cofounders of you go there's there's two letters two of those okay so the three be together
13:29 well you know we did go in a time machine [Laughter]
13:35 perfect definitely a marketing guy so
13:44 you know now we've got another time machine three of you are together you know Band of Brothers like if you were
13:50 to go back and think about what do you think like what do you think are the reasons for the success of battle box
13:56 sure so because it might destroy you people well distract me I'm like I'm
14:03 like the dog like squirrel is quite
Timing
14:10 comical a little bit so I think I think timing timing is always is always a part
14:17 of the equation and I think you know the subscription box craze that was going on
14:23 and it was you know at a high point in early 2015 so I think that was definitely that was
14:31 definitely a part of it and then again the survival outdoor space was was
14:37 trending as well so I think a lot of it was timing okay the the most interesting
14:43 part so so my business partner Daniel dabs he's he's the guy that that he
14:49 serves as a CEO he's a guy came up with the idea and I think telling the story
14:55 of how the idea came it really probably to a lot of listeners it'll it'll be a
15:00 moment of hey how do you come up with a great idea so his is his wife at the
15:06 time was getting a birch box in the mail and he'd watch her do the monthly unboxing she'd open it up to be the
15:13 excitement you can see the emotions and it led to him saying hey I want a box of
15:19 for myself why would a subscription box so he's big big outdoor enthusiasts and
15:27 he couldn't find hmm simply couldn't find one and and
15:32 that's how I was born it was hey I want this for myself I wonder if there's
15:38 anyone else that wants us to surely there is and we you know we quickly
15:45 found out that and that was the case mm-hmm this was this was a niche that
15:50 was not served or not certain well now since there's tons of competitors and the rest is history but it was it was
15:58 that moment of finding something for yourself and something you wanted and
16:04 rising it doesn't exist and and that's that's that aha moment of opportunity this is basically kind of like a scratch
16:10 or a niche situation yeah okay and and so does sounds so simple but it also
16:22 sounds so was trying to put this it
16:28 sounds like it's not something that you can necessarily control now do you have any advice for somebody who may be
16:35 wanting to start a subscription or e-commerce business in general who is
16:40 looking for that right timing and you know you know the right the right niche
16:47 as well like jarred demand so so I think for any commerce business not or a
Passion
16:55 subscription business I think in general for the business to have the potential be more successful like just super
17:02 successful I think there has to be some passion right and I don't think most
17:07 people are capable of having passion for something that doesn't interest them to
17:12 a certain degree mm-hmm so I think you you look for your everyday life and the
17:18 things you're doing whether it's in your current job current work or your personal life or your hobbies I think
17:25 you find something in the mix of stuff you're already doing that you're already in Julie
17:30 and and and look for any there you know when when you're when you're trying to
17:35 do something and there's not a solution in place or something takes too long or you see something cool and you wish it
17:43 was different I think you pay attention to those moments to find find that
17:48 opportunity because it's there it's so it's so hard but to sit down and say
17:54 really come up with ideas right now right let's launch business and come up with a bunch of ideas I think that's at
18:00 such a difficult way to do it I think it's it's more just pay attention to
18:06 your surroundings pay attention to the opportunity that's that's crossing you know your desk your your everyday life
18:13 yeah I think it's funny because people you know it's almost like a blind spot
18:19 sometimes I think maybe you realize or recognize the opportunity to sing right in front of them yeah I think is it's
18:28 quite really it's a really important point I actually the you know it's about passion rather than just chasing dollars
18:35 and trying to come up with an idea as you said because it's all about execution anyway and and the market
18:40 decides at the end of the day yeah so if you're not passionate where are you gonna get that fuel isn't in you yeah
18:47 exactly because is it you know it takes so long and to really get to that point where you've got this dream in your head
18:53 I think and should never be underestimated even though we always do it I'd I know I did with simply 100% did
19:01 you guys do the same hundred percent yeah it's it's easy to yeah and and and
19:09 and are there any like mistakes or realizations that were painful that you
19:16 you think like they were the most important realizations after you'd already launched and you were kind of in it and you're like oh wait this isn't
19:23 gonna go the way I expected to but I still love it and you know this is what I'm learning from it yeah so there were
Biggest Mistake
19:31 the biggest biggest mistake we made and we were able to move past it and learn
19:38 from it greatly but it was in that first year with with advertising
19:44 you know none of us had run ecommerce businesses subscription businesses like
19:49 this before so you know is this is a huge learning curve right we're kind of
19:55 you know learning as we go baptism by fire mmm and you know we
20:00 launched advertisements on Facebook right away like most businesses do better in the the directed consumer
20:07 space so we saw wild success right away in in facebook you know wiring cost it's
20:16 2015 so you know you can acquire a customer for a couple of dollars back then and we were just growing that as
20:25 much as we could and that was where all of our traffic came from all of our conversions came from and we just had
20:32 blinders on at the time in naivety too to think that we were really a business
20:40 at the moment because we weren't we were 100% dependent on someone else which is a business but if something changes
20:48 would be one variable you're in a really bad spot and we had our advertising
20:55 account on shut down on a Friday at 6 p.m. on Labor Day weekend there gonna be
21:03 this huge huge huge sale so he went from traffic traffic sale sale sale sale
21:08 sales to learn literally nothing our house yeah and uh you know getting over
21:17 Facebook pissed off we were back on probably close to a week later but we
21:24 went from you know sales and traffic to literally zero overnight because we were
21:31 a new brand so we didn't have all this SEO and organic and and buzz and an
21:38 article written about us at the time we were just dependent on one platform
21:44 I think I'm not to derail too much but it's very similar to uh these these
21:50 businesses that are selling exclusively on Amazon mm-hmm right and this coronavirus thing happens
21:57 and amazon says okay we're no longer accepting shipments I think they said they are changing it this week finally
22:03 but for you know over a month we're not accepting any shipments from any sellers
22:09 if it's not an essential product hmm I mean if your business is 100% depend on
22:15 Amazon that what do you do yeah you're literally just out of luck and if you sell out you can't you can't sell any
22:22 more until Amazon lifts which they're just doing this week so I think it's it's the same thing it's you have to
22:29 diversify you have to have multiple lead sources you can't be dependent on on someone else
22:36 any words not a true relationship partnership right yeah yeah I think this
22:44 goes back to kind of like marketplaces in general it's just it should be part of a an overall marketing strategy similar to the situation with the ads as
22:51 you said yeah that's a tough lesson yeah
22:57 it was a good one because we buddy am
23:05 unit immediately as soon as we got back on Facebook our conversations were okay what is this Google what is this AdWords
23:12 thing misty back to you and you know let's let's let's do some some
23:17 advertising on Twitter and it forced us immediately to to diversify and have
23:25 that disaster recovery where we're not dependent on one source I think is it's
23:33 important for people to remember when they're going through [ __ ] to you know remember that there is a lessons and
23:39 there's something positive that is probably gonna come by the other side yes I mean you've got it there's got to
23:45 be a silver lining a learning experience and everything yeah I think I think you have to take those his experiences and
23:52 make the tweaks so let's imagine you're
23:59 a chef right you're a chef now and if you had all these ingredients to
24:06 you know it's described how a successful brand works right what especially from our acquisition
24:13 perspective and when I say acquisition I mean getting customers what would you say those major
24:18 ingredients are you know ideas and just just buzzwords to kind of kick it off
24:24 like value props and positioning etc and make sure so I think the most important
Acquisition
24:33 piece of piece of the puzzle is is truly knowing knowing and identifying your
24:40 demographic and and being being a part of that being a family a community and
24:48 it goes from just your your daily interaction your to your prospects and customers to to the experience of when
24:56 they buy you have to separate yourself you have to especially in the
25:02 subscription box space it's it's becoming less and less about this this
25:08 item and this item only being an item you need to have this experience in this
25:14 community in this this group and I think that's that's probably the most
25:20 important thing when it comes to this you know as a chef and I'm cooking up this dish like the experience that's
25:28 that's what matters and if you know if you're you're at my restaurant I'm serving you it's that that would be the
25:33 ambience right how the food's presented it's all those intangibles that that
25:39 lead to you know at the end of night saying wow holy [ __ ] you know what a
25:45 great dinner mmm it's not just the food there's so much there's so much more to it and I think we we kind of gonna say
25:54 quash but yeah I mean that that's what it is and I think um buyers and
26:01 consumers are almost starting to expect that now mmm the games been been risen and and
26:08 leveled up and I think that's that's that's the main ingredient yeah
26:13 everything else so so and when you're thinking about like gang those very
26:19 first customers and I think it sounds like you actually
26:24 are I needed at an advantage at that early stage actually with regards to your answer to this question it's about
26:31 the experience the the overall wow factor you have more control over that
26:37 at the early stage right yeah yeah yeah it's it's super manageable at that point I remember we we'd be on on Facebook and
Community
26:45 someone would post something in in either myself or Daniel or Patrick our third partner Reena we'd be we'd be
26:52 interacting it was it was enjoyable this was this was our passion this was our product and we wanted to talk talk about
26:59 their experience talk about obviously if they're buying this box where we
27:05 probably have very similar hobbies and we're outdoor enthusiasts um so we
27:11 quickly form this community know and I think I think you have the best shot of
27:16 doing that in the beginning but while it's manageable while it's you know a couple hundred or a couple dozen
27:24 customers hmm and that's the thing you're creating this community and then you know you you then tell your friends
27:31 right energy it just starts this organic snowball yeah yeah definitely I feel
27:40 like some people you know first-time entrepreneurs and I and I see this in
27:46 the community sometimes not that often but people who like they started the business and the ego creeps in quickly
27:53 and you know happens to us all but there's that kind of like oh I don't
27:58 deal with the customers like and some people were thinking like how can I hire someone to do CES customers abour a very
28:06 early stage and really that's you basically giving up your your best lens
28:12 into what the experience is being perceived as by the customer but also
28:17 you know the the connectedness with the community as well which is really
28:22 valuable for them as well and and I want to say something when I see that by doing so I'm so glad the use of it yeah
28:30 it's it's it's it's natural to think and it's probably it's probably the same
28:35 argument we're talking about winning the business is spending too much time on it um yeah you can definitely be
28:40 counterproductive if you spend six hours of the day in in facebook comments and
28:48 not doing mission-critical things for the business I think there is a balance um a prime example a couple hours ago
28:56 actually I you know I I allocate little 15-minute spots throughout the day to
29:02 just get a pulse in and grab it and I opened up Facebook and you know there
29:08 are a couple hundred comments from from last night when we were sleeping so opened it up and this is about seven
29:16 o'clock my time mmm and I go to the first one that was baby from a couple hours ago and my business
29:22 partner Daniel kid already responded because it tells you who who did the responsive it wasn't RCS team it was Daniel you'd
29:30 already beat me to it um but it's that it's you've got you've got to stay
29:35 grounded you've got to stay engaged and you want to have the pulse and
29:40 relationship with these people yeah cuz that just by it's not just buying a product yeah definitely for as
29:47 long as it's physically possible if not forever if you can possibly do that right um okay so I actually have a very
29:55 more of a tactical question actually right now and I need to change gears here because I really want want to hear
30:02 this and I'm sure the listeners do as well but you know and I hate storing the
30:09 clothes for going with this question know at the beginning of it because I think it's kind of cliche or like I've
30:15 used it too many times but the precursors of the question is if you were starting out again what would you do like tactically like principle wise
30:22 as well so like you know are you gonna what advertising channels would you go
30:29 to what approach would you take does that make sense because I feel like a lot of people don't really know where to start when it comes to gang those first
30:35 customers so they had the idea they got the passion they've got the experience they've got the product they've got the box hold on
30:41 but what next like people really get stuck with this like taking this leap into actually acquiring customers and
30:47 that what would you suggest so so obviously touching again on this story I
Acquiring customers
30:54 toured a little bit ago about the Facebook piece on the job testing
31:00 everything on you know take that if your budget is Zack's if I didn't know a few
31:07 pieces that test everything I think we were we were scared to scale as fast as
31:18 possible you know we were in in retrospect in hindsight now five years later if if we if I knew we it was 2015
31:26 and we're acquiring customers for five dollars a piece I literally would have taken every
31:32 called every friend and I would have I would have put bought as many as I could
31:38 for $1 apiece no I think I think it's and it's easy to say in hindsight but
31:44 that's why it's good advice is that while you're having the moderate mild
31:51 success it's it's also human nature just for to become complete complacency and
31:57 just you think that it's just gonna continue like this mm-hmm and and you
32:03 have to take advantage of that situation and strike while the opportunity exists because it goes away so so those are the
32:12 two biggest things one try everything like every medium possible snapchat
32:18 Twitter tik-tok Facebook Instagram Pinterest just go podcasts as soon as as
32:25 soon as you you grow to a point they can you know have that sort of budget yeah and try everything and when you see any
32:33 kind of success go go go on it figure out sourcing the additional and in ordering that all get the sales
32:41 you figure out the rest right yeah exactly get started get the customer in
32:46 the door first then you figure out it's a harder person I agree with that it's really hard for people to see that I think because they're so involved with
32:52 the passion of the product you know they're the experiences we're talking about but what if you only had say a
32:58 hundred bucks right now this we do see this like people who are like what would you do if $100 if you had it how would
33:04 you use $100 to get a customer I mean that's not gonna go far with advertising let's be honest it's not and when you're
33:10 when you're when you're testing it can go it can go by really really quickly I mean you do have time though I would say
33:17 like you either have money or you have time like it seems to be at that early stage just one or the other and I think you know 100 dollars isn't gonna go far
33:24 in advertising but maybe you have some time what we are there are there any suggestions John yeah so if you only
Testing your product
33:31 have $100 in you know test it maybe just test it on Facebook right and that's the place or maybe just test it on Google
33:37 Ads for maybe a very defined search someone's searching for the specific keywords that is your product maybe
33:45 that's where it's best back um but if you have time and we had time so we did
33:50 this because we were bootstrap we didn't take any funding this was earn money
33:57 we were we were on on reddit threads we were in forums um just and it was us it wasn't like we
34:04 were some troll account we were saying hey we just started this there's this monthly subscription box called battle
34:11 box we were we were literally old-school guerilla marketing the equivalent of you
34:19 know walking around your neighborhood with with flyers but we were doing it online talking to the community it
34:29 sounds like it was a very community driven approach in that sense like the people basically helped design your your
34:35 business right back and in we listened
34:40 so I think I think if you don't if you only have $100 you know yeah test it on
34:46 one platform try to get some success and and some revenue to try other places but
34:51 if you have time it's just as valuable of an asset no there's doesn't matter what product
34:59 you is you have there's there's a Facebook group about it I think Facebook did a commercial about like I don't know
35:06 if they had it over there but blossom here in the States Facebook did it was
35:12 it was weird it wasn't underwater basket-weaving but it was something like very very nation might have been a
35:20 musical instrument but it was something and it's a Facebook commercial and the the lady are the protagonist and the
35:26 commercial she finds a Facebook group to find everyone else into it there is a Facebook group for everything this isn't
35:32 a group for everything sure not there's so many forums that are dedicated to that one topic or hobby and I think
35:40 those are your ideal customers anyway mm-hmm let I'm gonna let him know we
35:45 were doing in and you'll be amazing people just want to help just because you're a like-minded individual because
35:51 you have a similar hobby there are no posted places though no no help spread
35:57 it just because it's that community yeah definitely we have a Facebook group as
36:03 well and it's it's definitely been a really great resource for being community driven as a product and I
36:12 wonder percent that I believe like I would probably take this exact approach that you're saying now knowing how all
36:17 this seems to work right but um one thing I will say is a copy I have you're thinking about joining our group told my
36:23 self promote I know John said and I'm saying it but don't do are much more
36:35 open like are less moderated
36:42 okay so I know you're trying on time and we've been talking for quite a bit because obviously we've gotten some
36:48 really interesting topics but I'm gonna I'm gonna dive into this one which is really close to my heart which is about
36:54 mental health and business now you know starting a business is difficult like really hard probably one of the hardest
36:59 things you can possibly do you know for you there's three of you together which probably made the dynamic a little
37:06 different to my experience as a solo founder you know what suggestions you have for handling the the pressures the
37:13 strains and the the self-doubt that comes with starting a business so so
37:18 it's tough I think the word of the our community I think you you have to so I
37:27 got very OCD when when I have everything on my calendar and I'm I'm managing my day Becky does have to do that um
37:34 blocking off time for for for self self-love personal of friends like you
37:41 got it you got it like that in there I think when you're starting when you're starting a business is already not enough time in the day I think something
37:48 you have to make time for your friends for your loved ones if you like playing a video game for that for whatever
37:55 passion and hobby outside of it it's not in the business you have to make time for that and I think I think setting
38:02 those expectations in the beginning just like you're setting expectations for your business and you're building this
38:09 this narrative you have to make time because it's easy just to sit in front of the computer and and lose track of it
38:16 and it's a it's a slippery slope with work/life balance and I think you have
38:23 to make time make initially a priority yeah it's an equal equal priority as
38:29 crazy as is to say now it's not the same it's not the same amount of time you
38:35 definitely still have to invest a lot of time in the majority and in the business
38:40 but make time through throughout it all for for poor friends and family and
38:46 other hobbies because if you don't do it in the beginning you'll just it'll start
38:53 not happening at all guilty it's hard like is it creeps as
39:03 well and you find suddenly you're you're feeling more and more anxious or whatever your symptoms are of not taking
39:09 care of yourself and then suddenly you're like oh yeah oh yeah I need to I need to make more of a priority again so
39:15 it's kind of like an ongoing processes and well look man this has been a really
39:22 great interview and as I said I know you're busy so I appreciate you taking the time out and thank you so much for
39:29 being a part of the of the subscription rocks our podcast now if there's any any
39:35 anywhere that someone you know where listeners can find use like if you got like a trailer hundl or something you
39:40 want to share right now yeah just-joan room my giant siege on
39:48 middle initial hem is in Martin had Twitter King Johnny Browns on Instagram hey it's
39:57 the gums the place fun make sure you give him a follow he's a legend and you
40:04 wouldn't regret it so yeah thank you so much again man and rock on okay thanks
40:12 for having me man yes of course of course we'll be talking again soon stay safe
40:19 you've been listening to the subscription rock stars podcast brought to you by subway the number one
40:26 subscription ecommerce platform we appreciate you taking the time to engage with and listen to this podcast make
40:32 sure you click subscribe to find out when the next subscription rock star podcast episode is available for now
40:38 keep rockin on [Music]