STOP Ignoring the Power of Podcasting with Will Tarashuk

Never Been Promoted Podcast with Thomas Helfrich

Will Tarashuk shares his journey from starting a wrestling podcast in college to becoming the CEO and founder of Willy T Productions. Known for his innovative and engaging approach, Will offers valuable insights into podcasting, video content creation, and balancing entrepreneurship with a 9 to 5 job.

About William Tarashuk:

Will Tarashuk is the CEO and founder of Willy T Productions, a company that helps finance professionals connect through video content. With a background in podcasting and video editing, Will has built a reputation for his creative methods and commitment to helping others stand out in their respective fields. His experience includes creating thousands of pieces of financial content and moderating panels at significant conferences.


In this episode, Thomas and Willy discuss:

• The Journey to Willy T Productions: Will shares his background, from starting a wrestling podcast in college to founding his current business, Willy T Productions.
• Managing Entrepreneurship with a 9 to 5 Job: Will emphasizes the importance of time management, transparency with employers, and balancing both roles effectively.
• The Challenges and Rewards of Entrepreneurship: Will discusses the personal fulfillment and challenges of entrepreneurship, including learning from failures and pivoting business strategies.

Key Takeaways:

• Value of Patience in Entrepreneurship

Understanding that success takes time and being patient with both personal and business growth is crucial.

• Importance of Transparency 

Maintaining open communication with employers about side hustles to avoid conflicts of interest and build trust.

• Continuous Learning and Adaptation

The necessity of ongoing learning and adaptation in both personal and professional life to stay competitive and achieve goals.

"You gotta be patient. You gotta be patient with people's money, your own money, and with what it takes to learn a new skill and master this craft." — Will Tarashuk


CONNECT WITH WILL TARASHUK:

Website: https://www.willytproductions.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/willtarashuk/

CONNECT WITH THOMAS:

X (Twitter): https://twitter.com/thelfrich | https://twitter.com/nevbeenpromoted Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/hovienko | https://www.facebook.com/neverbeenpromoted
Website: https://www.neverbeenpromoted.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/neverbeenpromoted/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@neverbeenpromoted
LinkedIn: http

Transcript

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Welcome to another episode of Never Been Promoted. Why? Because I've never been promoted in my career. Doesn't mean I didn't have a good career. It just means I really just wanted to be an entrepreneur. And the purpose and the mission of of this channel really is to help other entrepreneurs get better at entrepreneurship. And you're gonna do this by kind of cutting the tie to all the things that you, make excuses about, all the things that hold you back, everything that's in your way. That's what we wanna do, though, is enable entrepreneurs to get better in entrepreneurship through the journeys and stories and lessons of other entrepreneurs. So think micro mentoring. If this is your first time here, I hope it's the first of many. If this is, you've been here before, thanks for coming back. I wanna introduce our guest. It's Will Tarashuk. He is the, he helps finance pros connect through, video content. He has a really cool proven interview system. He's a, I think, a multiple founder and, Willy in 1 of them being Willy t Productions, but, he's a producer, podcaster, and also a video editor.
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Will, how are you? I'm good, man. Tom, good to meet you. Good to be here. I'm Yeah. Happy to talk about podcasting, entrepreneurship, live streaming video, financial all the all the all the works under the sun.
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I like I like the name Willy T. I keep on to call you Willy.
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Yeah. Willy's fine. You know, birth name William. Willy T was a nickname that a guy in high school gave me, and I kinda just ran with it. No nobody calls me Willy, like, literally nobody.
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I go by Will professionally. My family calls me William. If you wanna call me Will, willy, Willy T, whatever, just don't call me Billy. Only request. Don't call me Billy. I would I I don't know how people go from Robert to Bob. We have to figure that out on another show. Yeah. But let's let's start let's start with the sort of the lines breaker, shall we? Sure. Maybe we'll do a couple. We'll see how this goes. Alright. What I was thinking this morning, was I was in the junk you know, the junk drawer you have in your house. Right? Everyone has a junk drawer. Saw a roll of duct tape, and I thought, I'm gonna ask Will today. What is the craziest thing you've ever fixed with a roll of duct tape? Oh,
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man. Yeah. So I before I was unemployed in 2018 into 20 this point was 2019. So summer 2019, I smashed out my the windshield, my my car, the back windshield, because I was trying to back up and I wasn't paying enough attention. And, like, it was like the the passenger trucks and, like, the the the shipping container trucks. But it's 1 of those just planted, and I hit the corner and windshield is shattered. So duct tape, you gotta duct I duct tape the entire back windshield so I could drive to Home Depot and then get a plastic bag. So it was yeah. That was a nightmare. That was a bad day. That was that was probably close to rock bottom, me being unemployed. And I called my dad. I'm like, what do I do? My dad goes, well, I can't talk right now. Mom just broke her leg. She was rushing into the hospital for surgery. So I'm like, wow. Power trucks are having a bad day in the middle of summer heat in July. So,
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yeah, duct tape kinda saved my life on that 1. This tape in the window and tape in the bag to my window to get home and eventually get it fixed. I feel like you should totally get it. Duct tape. You should ask your dad, like, dad, just duct tape it. It's fine. Just duct tape the leg together. Yeah. Totally. Walk it off. Totally fine. Walk it off. Walk it off. Ain't that weird how we used to get told walk it off? Like, no. I just spray my ankle. Walk it off. Like Walk it off. I can't. I can't walk it off. My foot looks like a grapefruit now. You know, my parents told me that once. ER visit later. We'll get into that. Alright. Listen. Thank you, by the way, Will. Give us your give me your backstory and kinda what you're working on today. Yeah. So my backstory is in podcasting. Let's go back to February
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2015. I literally just turned about 19, turning 20. And I get I get an idea from a friend of mine to start a wrestling podcast, WWE. So I'm like, hell, yeah, man. Let's do it. And my goal for that was simply to just stand out on a resume. You know, I'm in college. I know the job market's gonna be very competitive. I know that on Harsh University, the radio station was a huge opportunity for me to stand out on a resume as well. So I started the podcast to stand out for the radio station and stand out in my career. And, you know, here we are in 2024, that wrestling podcast still exists, and it led to a job as a producer at a, video start up. They wanted to be the economist on video, so finance. Once I got laid off from there, because start ups fail, I fell back on podcast and build a business. And then from there, I'm a contract livestream producer, and I also run my business. So my whole career has been focused around podcasting and kind of tweaking it and changing it and starting a business, being an entrepreneur with the goal of standing out. I think podcasting is a great way to make yourself, your brand, your business, whatever you're looking to do stand out. Like, this podcast itself, never been promoted. That name itself stood out to me, and I was like, oh, I've never been promoted. Let's check it out. Let's do it. So it's just it's out of the box thinking is kind of how I run my business. And to work in a financial adviser, it's like, alright. You're an adviser. You're not a podcast host. I'm a podcast. So let's connect. Let's bridge that gap and make our forces come together. But, yeah, my story is podcasting. I am a podcaster. I'm a producer.
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I love creating content. Behind the mic is where I feel most comfortable. Yeah. That's great. And it's nice to find that spot. Like and and if you can make a living doing it. And podcasting, for those listening, you know, the Joe Rogan kind of story doesn't really exist. You have to really work through it, and and it takes forever. You'll need I'll assume you have different avenues. I hope you do because you help videos, but your podcasting is also a a way to make money, but it's also a it's it's really a it's almost a vehicle to help people get to where you want a destination to help them with something else. So if you're just trying to do podcasting pure money, it's gonna take forever. You're probably not gonna survive on that. But the the truth is if you can use it and say, hey. Listen. But I have services
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Like, you you make indirect income. Right? Like, my podcast doesn't make direct money. Well, for me, it does. But, like, for you, if I'm who is in a podcast for you? This podcast might not make direct money for you through advertisements, sponsorships, donations, whatever, but it will highlight you as an expert to what you actually make money in, which is your bread and butter service.
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That's right. It's an ad. It's like an ad. Right? You're you're you're you're your own first advertiser. Well, and it's also so it's time in. So if if I spend time with you or I spend time with other people who maybe need help with marketing, LinkedIn marketing, they need help with YouTube or whatever else, we get time together, they get comfortable, and they're like, they ask. They say, hey. Listen. You know, we we're trying to do this. We're trying to do that. Can you help with that? Like, sure. And you have more conversations down the road. And sometimes they don't go anywhere, but but that's okay because I bring experts on to to do that, and I'm sure you do as well that sometimes it's just your own credential building or you're helping the industry. So tell me a little bit how you understand entrepreneurship. Can you define it and just, like, what it means to you personally?
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I think it's in it's it's the it's the epitome of the American dream. You know, it's entrepreneurship is I get to write my own rules to a certain extent. We also gotta live with the rules of the market. Like, people say, I I wanna take the free time. Well, no. No. As an entrepreneur, you actually have less free time. But you have you have the freedom to build what you wanna build, how you wanna build it. So, like, I can choose my own pricing model. I can choose my own service. I can choose who I wanna work with and who I don't wanna work with. So it is it is the hardest but most rewarding career path you can take because you are in full control, which means you're fully in control of the successes as well as the failures. Failures. If your business fails, guess what? It's because of you. It's also a massive responsibility. Like, I I have a few contract editors under my belt that I do feel responsible for. If I don't feed them work, I genuinely feel bad about it. But sometimes there's nothing I can do about it. I'm trying to also feed myself work. So entrepreneurship, it's just it's hard. It's rewarding. It's not for everybody. You know, I still work that 9 to 5 that I love dearly. So as an entrepreneur, I'm trying to find a way to make both work and create that hybrid environment where I can be a contractor here and an entrepreneur here. And that's also part of the journey. Right? There's someone like go when you people like to ask me, when you look in to take this full time? I'm not. I am not. I don't want to. I like I like the idea of my entrepreneurship journey being a vehicle to fund what I really want in life, which is to afford the life, family, house, American dream. It's just it's additional income for me, whereas my 9 to 5 job covers my basic necessities. So entrepreneurship is a self defined term. That's a great question.
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Well, I like that idea. So, you know, that's how I started our company, you know, instantly relevant, and it was, you know, having a really well paying job. And at some point, I just was so much more interested in doing that. Like, 99% of my time was doing that. And I think if you have a great job and you don't mind the trade for time, the 9 to 5, so to speak, and you're getting value out of a side hustle that provides, you know, extra income to buy a boat or go on a vacation or save for the future or whatever else, stay with it. You don't have to go full time. And if but if you really wanna go full time, that is a pivot. That is a when you have no safety net, the game changes, and you get way more focused. I mean, your your level of entrepreneurship and thinking and what you what you waste money on don't just that gets I get that gets honed in. But but as you make that so I like that you have the mindset. It's it's, where you are right now, and that might change, but your mindset is around it's an extension as opposed to just defining who you are. Right? And, talk about that mindset a little bit because I think a lot of people are in that spot where they have a job and they have the side hustle. And how how are you balancing, like, that occasional man, I really wish I would do this full time and and occasionally going, nope. I'm good. Like, I'm I'm sure that comes in your head, but talk about your mindset a little bit. Yeah. The most important skill is time management.
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Right? And and loyalty. Right? So I'm also lucky where my jobs have transferable skills. Being better at 1 job instantly makes me better at the other and vice versa. So the mindset of always learning and finding ways to make it work. But I also got to toe that line, you know? Like my 9 to 5 job is very separate from my business even though they're both in finance. So I got to be very careful of how I tow that line, but managing your time and knowing where your responsibilities lie. So, like, Wednesday Thursday, I am in the office all day. So for really key productions, I am pretty much unavailable on Wednesday Thursday, given, like, extreme circumstances. Like, I can make something work. But, like, Monday, Tuesday, Friday through the evenings, you know, sometimes work until 8, 9 o'clock on this business inside and and and hustle, and it's it's fun. So the mindset of keeping it fresh, keeping it fun, having transferable skills, and being open openly communicating. So for example, last year, I had an opportunity to moderate a panel at South by Southwest, which if you don't know South by Southwest, it's a huge conference in Texas. And it was a it was a moderation panel on, like, content. So great. Cool. I immediately go to my boss and go, hey. Can I do this? Is this a conflict with what I do here? And, obviously, I need to take some time off. And she said, as long as you don't use the company name, it's totally fine. You're a contractor. But the mindset of, okay, my 9 to 5 is not my enemy. My boss is not my enemy. She supports me. She is fully aware of what I do outside of our responsibilities for that job. Yeah. But granted, I'm also a contractor, so I have a little bit more freedom. If you're a full time employee, I would definitely, you know, tread that line a little more carefully, but have the mindset of I am here to learn. I am here to grow, and my left hand is not the enemy of my right hands. You know, if you have 2 sources of income, you can find a way to make them work together. Yeah. No. You make a good point. So you had transparency.
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You also have to find the right employer. I mean, contractor or not. Right? Like, you it's it's it's still a relationship and get rid of you at any point. So, you definitely have transparency. Hey. I have this thing I do. It's noncompetitive. I don't you know? And as long as you people are aware of it, they Tinley will allow the moon lighting, if you will. If you're like, hey. It's just my hobby. Just making you aware of it. If you see me out there, I'm never doing it during work, which it happens. Everyone knows that, but that's good. I think you're a transparent model specifically when you're balancing and toting the line of my own thing that makes money versus this is and and when they're related. If they're not related, like, if you owned an ice cream shop
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that you you tend to in the afternoons after work, you wouldn't have to tell them anything because it doesn't happen. But you're talking on the same similar topics, the transparency matters. And and conflict of interests are real. Right? Those those are very, very real. If you work in media, finance, law, like, it it's it's real and you gotta be careful of that. But life is a game of opportunities and the choices you make to react into them. So you gotta play with the cards that you dealt and just be careful, but don't be afraid to ask questions. People are very, very afraid to ask questions, especially at work. And 10 years of podcasting, I am fearless. I am not afraid to ask a question, unless I don't wanna know the answer. Do not ask questions you do not want the answer to. But, you know, if you are 1 of those people who is kind of intimidated by your boss, man, start a podcast, start asking strangers questions because it does get easier. And that's how you that's how you go up that career ladder. Like, I'm, my contract renews in June. You better believe I'm pushing for a raise and a title change at 9 out of 5, and I have the confidence because of the work I do for this business, transferable skills, and not have not having the fear and being afraid of asking questions and capitalizing,
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choosing to capitalize on the opportunity that I see in front of me. Yeah. You gotta drive if you're driving value, it's completely appropriate to be like, hey. This is my new rate. We're gonna go with this title because the truth is most places don't care. If they do, they're probably the wrong place. They usually have budget, and they assume that there'll be some kind of advance. If they need to keep it there, you can start with a higher hourly rate and reduce your hours, and you still make the same amount. But that way, if they ever extend it, you at least establish a new rate. So I think there's some there's some clever things you can do to maybe you don't make more money, but you have more free time in which allows you to Let let them say no. Yep. Let them say no. I call it throw a turd on the table and see who cleans it up. Yeah. No 1 no one's gonna fire you for you wanting better for yourself. They will fire you, though, if you throw a real turd on a real table. They will they will most definitely do that. I would not advise doing that ever. Go ask. It's it's interesting how things happen. Right? Confidence of interest. So I'll give you an example. So this this is crazy. Our corporate attorney, we're instantly relevant. Right? They she emails me the other day, and she's like, hey. My client reaches out about a podcast, a problem she had with the podcast, you know, the release form. And lo and behold, it's your podcast, and she and I go and the funny I go, the funny thing is you didn't realize that you my attorney had written it. She's like, and I just realized I wrote it. I go, can you just soften the language for all? Because we get people. She's like, fine. But I had to do it like we had to sign an agreement, but it's just funny how that randomly happens. Sometimes you get these conflicts of interest. You're like, hey. But my attorney caused that own her own problem there. Just what, just random. Anyway, they happen all the time is the point. And as long as you're you're transparent with people of what's going on, I think you can can navigate lots of them out there. Absolutely. Tell me about 1 of your biggest success stories.
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Yeah. So, you know, my my business is basically, I will co-host your podcast for you and help you create content that you find valuable for your and your audience. That was not my idea. That was not originally my idea. Originally, my business was ambiguous podcast solutions, where we were pretty much gonna define a complete, a distribution app where you can take 1 piece of audio and put it on multiple podcast feeds at a time. It's like a network feed. And it's like hosting, yada, yada, yada, editing, yada, yada, yada. So the way for me to market and network and do that was I had a podcast called Talking with Tara Shuck, which I still have a goal of bringing back. It was my Joe Rogan impression where I speak to anyone I find interesting. So long story short, I interview an RIA adviser based out of Pennsylvania, about DC economy. I had questions I always wanted to ask an expert in the economy. So after we had about an hour and a half conversation and after we were done, you know, we we do we chat, we network, and we just end up talking. And he goes, well, how much would you, like, would you do this again? You interview me on my book. He had a new book coming out on police retirement plans for police officers. I go, yeah. I would do that. He goes, great. How much would you charge? And I go, that's a great question. How much would I charge? So I was like, you know what? Let me let me get back to you. Let's schedule a date. I'll I'll put my pen and paper. And within a few days, I got back to him. I talked to a few people in the industry I trust. Like, how much would you charge for this? I was like, I'm thinking this. I'm thinking 5, $500. And they go, no. You gotta go more. Go like a few 1, 000. So I go back to them. I go, Chris, $2, 000. He goes, done. Book it. And that was it. That was it. That was literally where Willy T Productions came from. My business idea did not come from me, and I have plenty of ideas for content, strategies, this, that, and the other. But my greatest idea came from my first client. So that is always my success story. I would not be here without my podcast and without Chris Engelbert, an RA adviser out of Allentown, Pennsylvania, giving me the idea for this business. And I'm eternally grateful. I still keep in touch with him, still talk with him. To this day, he was he was on our show, last Thursday. So I got to see him shake his hand, give him a hug, and, you know, he's forever a friend of mine. So I'm eternally grateful. I've spent a lot of time in Allentown, just to be clear. It's a great spot. I love PA. It's fun. It's fun. Not too bad. Kind of a broken town, but it's it's, it's not too bad.
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What's kind of the I mean, outside of your car window getting smashed that day from the business standpoint, what was, like, your biggest challenge?
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And and and what was it? And if did you overcome it? And if so, how? Yeah. The biggest the biggest challenge. So I'm gonna go back to my first failed business. Entrepreneurship is also about learning from your failures. So let's pivot back there. You're gonna fail a lot, a lot. And don't be afraid to talk about your failures. And my biggest failure was so the original idea for the company, we were gonna be made up of, like, 4 separate companies. The marketing side, the distribution side, the production side, and then the studio side. So we had the idea of putting 4 companies into a, partnership. And but it just you know, we did all, like, the paperwork before we even had clients, consistent clients and money rolling in. So my biggest mistake was. Starting like the paper, like ego has gotten away too fast. If you're going to start a business with friends, you know, get everything on paper as soon as possible. Once it's there, set it. But do 1 thing at a time. We were trying to start the business at the end. You got to start a business at the beginning. You start the business by offering free work to people like a for me example, podcast, talk my tire truck was a free entryway into what I do, introduce people what I do, which led to client getting idea. Okay. Now who can I target as a niche? Now how can I promote it? How can I build it? How can I get this? How can I get that? Right? That is the natural step of evolution. We were trying to do it at the ends. We wanna sell this business at this. The parties can break off and then do that and then trickle down from there, which isn't a bad goal to have, but you're mixing in legal paperwork. Ego is getting in the way. Everyone's like, well, my company's gotta do this, and it just became a mess, an absolute mess. The 4 of us were not on the same page. We're in 4 different parts of the country, and it was disorganized, bad leadership, and very bad with finances. So it was just a massive failure on my part as an entrepreneur, my partner as a CEO, my other partner as a COO and the other partner as the head of studios, where it was just it was a very bad experience that I learned a lot from. I learned that I am way better on my own. I am way better steer my own ship, and I need to reevaluate what I really want as an entrepreneur.
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Yeah. So
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I mean Yeah. That ambiguous podcast solutions was a 4 year failure, with some successes. Don't get me wrong. We did make some money. We had I we I learned a lot about CRMs, you know, marketing tools that would be helpful to a full fledged business, but we are buying enterprise software with 2 clients. Like, what what are we doing, idiot? Idiot? You know what I mean? Like, I wish someone just snapped me in the face. It's like, wake up. Wake up. Stop this nonsense. But, you know, it took it took a lot of debt. And my girlfriend sent me a newsletter that made me wanna change my mind. So A newsletter. Where we are. Yeah. My girlfriend sent me a newsletter by this, this company called Day 1. They recently shut down, but they were a accelerator program for entrepreneurs to kind of help you find your niche demographic customer. All this was like a 4 week boot camp and then 4 weeks afterwards of, like, meetings and stuff. And that really got me on the right track. And I don't really read newsletters. I'm not a huge newsletter person, but she's like, read this. I read it, booked a call, talked to the guy, and I was like, I need to work with you. I need to work with you. And it worked and it worked. Now it's almost a year ago,
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to the day. I already shut down. But but 1 of your challenge, come back to that real quick. I think the biggest takeaway, and I try to find these little takeaway moments, is if Yeah. You're going first, I don't think, generally, you wanna start too many businesses with family if you can avoid it, or friends, unless you've upfront like you said, I think it's better actually that you well, you I'm sorry. You definitely wanna clear out the paperwork and all the things first because it's gonna unveil the egos and the challenges. You can you can part as friends quicker than to do something for some time and then try to come together, then the whole thing is gonna fall apart. And I think picking the right people on your team is what the kind of overall message on that is. I'm 1 who would favor not being in business with friends if at all possible, unless there's very clear demarcation of who does what. And I'll give you an example. So we do a bunch of high end kind of cinematic video for, you know, like, with the Hollywood film crew, and the guy that runs that part is a friend of mine. You know, we're acquaintance level friends or become better friends. He does the filming. They do the initial editor selection. My team does the production. It's it's really a defined like, they show up with a crew. I help I'm like, you know, his assistant basically when we're on-site or I'll do the interviews. But if you have very defined rules of who does what works. If there's any overlap of where revenues need to go or level of efforts, you got a you got a problem there for sure. Specifically, someone's like, hey. I'm finding all the deals and I'm splitting it 4 ways with you guys. That's also gonna be a problem.
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Yeah. I think if there was 1 company where each equity holder was an individual instead of, like, another company, it would have been a lot better. Yeah. And, I I also, like, you know, I say I don't say don't do with your friends because 1 of them I'm still really good friends with to this day. We left no problem. I'm groomsman his wedding, and he'll be a groomsman of mine. So that's fine. Right? My other friend, we also had very clear guidelines. Like, I'm yelling at you from a business perspective, not because I'm mad at you as a friend. Like, we were very good at separating our personal relationship from business relationship. Like, I remember we were yelling at each other about, like, an RSS feed. And then once we cash it out, I was like, yo. You're watching UFC this weekend, though? Like, you see who's fighting this weekend? And it was like it never happened. So you you can do it with friends. Be just be very extra careful. You know, my my dad always said, if you're gonna be stupid, be smart about it. So that's that's my advice if you're gonna start a business with your friends. It's it's possible. Just have clear lines in the sands. And once you have a plan, stick to it. I think a big problem with entrepreneurs in general and startups is they pivot too much. They make too much change too fast. It's like, alright, January, we're gonna start, like a 3 man team. Each who's gonna lead a team. But by March, we're buying podcast equipment to sell wholesale. And then by June, it's this whole company shut down. So it's just you didn't give yourself a chance to actually stick to a plan and actually use the software you're pouring all this money into. So if you're gonna pour money into something, make sure you get the most of it and use it and ask yourself, do I need to be spending this money? Like, to me, a successful business is no matter what, you are making more money than you're spending. That can be $50 a month. It could be $50 a month. They'd be 50, 000, 000 a year. As long as you're making more money and you're spending, in my opinion, you run a successful business. It's as simple as that. Sometimes you'll you'll overspend for investment reasons. Yeah. Advertising Debt debt is a tool. Right? Debt is debt is a good thing for a business as well.
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Absolutely. And and you're spot on, by the way. So the so I we look at stuff monthly. Like, hey. We're 3 years or so into a marketing agency. We don't even use a CRM. We used Mailchimp, and it's also the style of kind of marketing agency. We are the reason is for what you mentioned, I was like, well, sure. I can start off at HubSpot for $80 a month, but it's still $80 a month. I don't no 1 really uses it, and it ends up being 3 k in 4 years if you have it. And so the point is, you'd be surprised how little you do need initially. Yeah. And when you when you get to the point where, like, hey. Listen. I'm going full email marketing. Like, yeah. Then you know what? Look at some alternatives and options, but don't start off with this. You know, don't come with a corporate mindset right away. Get in, get some shit done and service your customers really well. And And only that, it's you need to pick up those skills. Like, QuickBooks
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is a phenomenal market, finance management tool. It's incredible. I would highly recommend it for every single business. However, I don't need right now, as a solopreneur, I don't need to spend that $40 a month when I can track my finances manually. I have a spreadsheet. And but I think that's good for me because I learn those skills on how to manually manage my money, budget for a business, and those skills transfer, again, transfer of our skills, into my regular life, into my business, into my professional life. Because if I get turned on for a raise for budget reasons, you know, I can understand and accept that a little bit more and then try again next year. And then once you master it and you get overloaded, it becomes a hindrance, then you automate and you learn how to better use the tools you're putting money into.
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100%. Right? I agree with that. What what do you love and really don't like about your current business, though?
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I love talking to people. This is fun for me. Me and you here talking, shooting a shit. It's it's what I live for. Because fun fact about me, in kindergarten, I would didn't talk. I was a selective mute because of severe anxiety issues. So, like, when my mom goes and bumps in my 2nd grade teacher at, like, Stop and Shop, Like, oh, yeah. This is what William's doing now. And they laugh because it's like, this was not who you were as a kid. So I love I love talking to people. It is I think podcast is 1 of the purest forms of communication. And like, Tom, I don't know you at all very well, but we form a bonds when you spend an hour on a podcast and, like, you know, we're gonna be friends forever. That's just how it works. What I don't like. I don't like the stress because I I do think about this business all the time. Like, last night, I was thinking about it. I couldn't fall asleep. I I think about the best things when I can't write things down, which is when I'm trying to fall asleep and in the shower, and sometimes it just gets lost. So I don't like the stress I put myself in and the pressure I put myself in, and the the the job aspect of being very active on LinkedIn. I've met great people on LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a phenomenal tool. It's the number 1 place I use to grow my business. But it's a lot. It's heavy. It's very heavy. It weighs heavy on my mind. It weighs heavy on my schedule. But, you know, that's that's the sacrifice you gotta make as an entrepreneur because no one's no one's gonna build it for me. Even if I hire them, it's not gonna no 1 does the job better than me right now. So it's it's it's a lot. It's heavy. It's a lot of work, and it weighs very heavy on my minds. And I think about it constantly, which is a good and a bad thing. You're, you're describing why why I mean,
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why my marketing agency solves that problem. Right? And I don't mean as a plug. I mean, like, I know that plug away, man. Well, no. I mean, it's like I'm just saying, like, your your pain is the main reason why I we we focus so much on LinkedIn as an agency because it is it is a heavy platform. If if people aren't in their business is successful enough to afford to hire someone to do it and be and and get it where it's about, you know, 70, 80 percent right to relative to them, but they free up time. It's just where it's part of the path of entrepreneurship if you're using that platform in particular. They're all pretty heavy, though, if you're gonna use them, to be fair.
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Like and I have I have a fear of cold outreach. Like, I have an irrational fear of this DM ing a stranger on LinkedIn out of the blue for no reason. So I try to find icebreakers in ways through my content to make that outreach a lot more warm, a lot warmer. So I'm sorry. And this new thing on LinkedIn on, like, video polls, like actual polls, like a video poll series. I do a video, you know, I've I used to do this morning, previewing the poll that drops tomorrow. It's it's a 3 day poll. And then after I do a few videos going over the results, my own vote, my own take, then highlighting some of the comments from the comment section. And if people engage with that, it's a lot easier for me to reach out to them based like, hey, thank you for, like, engaging with this. What do you do for your business? Let's just start talking. It's a lot easier to do that as opposed to cold outreach. And cold outrageous as a hump. I need to come over from a mental standpoint. So I'm trying to set myself up to do that. So that's not a pain point. Hold on. I like that. That approach is really good.
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It it, and I'll tell you, I think, you know, we and we've done stuff like this quite a bit on on LinkedIn. I will tell you, if you do, if you do a poll, you may not even have to do the the pre 1. If you do the poll and we do I do 1 usually on Saturday, Sunday to kinda drive. You know, I think I do it on 4:20. Saturday was 4:20. And so and and and I might I love the idea, but I think if you just do the post, say, hey. I recently did a repoll. Let me go with some results. Here's what I think. You know, I think if you do that on the front or backside, you you as soon as someone votes, I think reaching out saying, hey. I love how you voted. You know, whatever it is, do you wanna discuss? Is not like, I don't even think that's a that most people will be like, depends on the poll, but yes or no. Like so I think your idea though is fantastic. The the the lesson I'll take away there is you're coming up with something new to address a challenge and and a hurdle instead of saying I'm just not gonna do it. Yeah. And you Outside the box thinking. Yeah. You you and I think that's a big hallmark of being an entrepreneur, so I think that's a really good good for you on that 1. Thank you. If, if you had a if you had the magic ball, right, or somebody comes up to you and there's there's 1 genie in the bottle and that genie can only give you a top tip for an entrepreneur, what what's the 1 tip you're gonna give to an entrepreneur?
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You gotta be patient. You have to be very patient. You gotta be patient with you gotta understand that people do not wanna spend money they don't have to spend. So you gotta be very patient with people's money. You'll be very patient with your own money. You'll be very patient with what it takes to learn a new skill and master this craft. You know, as they say, it takes 10000 hours to become a master at something. In my 10 years of podcasting, I'm probably pretty close, right, to 10000 hours behind the mic. So you figure, actually, maybe not even maybe not even close. I probably don't know about 500 actual episodes of talking behind a microphone. So it's if it was, what, 2 hours each? I'm probably pretty close to 10000 hours, but that makes up by I'm not a master yet. So it takes a long time to to get good at something. So if I was a genie and I could you're good at something, it would be patience. So you gotta be patient. I love that. Well, let's take that threat. So fast forward a year, what did you accomplish? Oh, man. As opposed to where I was last year to now, it's it's night and day. So put it this way. This time last year, I had $6, 000 of credit card debt. Now I have 0. I I am positive. I am net positive. I I picked up about a few clients, few 1 off clients. They need content for the website. So great. 1 of them 1 of them is actually in polling. They are they are a poll app for, they pretty much sell the data, and you can also profit off your own poll deck polling data. Really interesting company, called Hubbub, HUBBUB. So check them out. They're really cool. I worked with a cybersecurity guy. I worked with an RA adviser. I worked with an RA adviser firm about AI in the financial adviser space. So that was really cool. Right now, I'm currently working at a company called IDA Ireland, which works on bringing American companies investing into the EU. So they help you transition from, like, Washington, DC into Ireland and then connecting you to the rest of the EU. So if you're looking to expand overseas, that's what they do. So we're creating content around. It's called FDI Investing, foreign direct investment. So that's really cool. That's a really cool series I get to be a part of in front of the mic as well as producing behind the scenes. So I've definitely made money. That's a big 1. You know, I've made a decent I've made I'm net positive. I am projected to probably do $20, 000 of revenue this year. And I have very little I cut my overhead, like, in by 75%. So I am effectively managing a business. I am effectively in control. I'm starting to hire editors and contractors. So I am growing the business at the pace and speed I want to grow it at, and that is very comforting. As much as it weighs on my mind, it's very comforting knowing that I am where I am. I can look back and actually be proud of my work for once. Yeah. It's very it's very hard for me to it's very hard when you're in the rat race to be, like, to look back and look at your growth. So where I was in this time of the year has always been very special for me because it's gonna be a time though I made that switch, made a few mindset adjustments, made a few strategic adjustments, and it made all the difference. But at the same time, I can look ahead and go, I have so much more work to do. I'm still trying to figure out the perfect formula for LinkedIn. I've been doing it for about 8, 10 months on refocusing my niche and creating my thoughts and content, and I'm still figuring it out. So I need I still need to be patient and kind of just put the pieces together. But, yeah, looking back and being proud of what you're doing and from a year a year ago is massive. Massive.
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And and I think I I think the question and I love the answer that way. Was what's the next year? You fast forward a year from now. What have you accomplished? What have what have you done a year from now? Like, you're sitting here and we're talking again. You're like, man, last year, I did what?
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Yeah. I think well, my goal honestly, my goal is I I wanna say a low bar isn't, like, appropriate, but my goal is not as lofty as other people's goals. My goal is to have 3 or 5 consistent monthly clients I work on very, very closely. Like, we are gonna be working incredibly close. I'm gonna give you my full attention on that content on a monthly basis. So 3 to 5 of those is what I can handle with my current job. So that is my goal. I think this time next year, I'll have those 3. And I'll be turning people down for, like, incoming calls. When people reach out to me, go, sorry, man. Sorry, Craig. I'm filled up. My calendar is full. I am That's it. You know, these 3 workers are doing what they're doing. Maybe maybe this time next year, I start looking for a host that can do what I do. Like, it's it's very it's going to be very, very hard for me to trust someone to interview someone else for their content because that is what I'm best at. So a year from now, I'm probably in a mindset or starting to look for that number 2. Not for me to do something else, just so I can expand sideways. Instead of going up and down, expand sideways.
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That's a hard step to get someone to outsource a core skill. Speaking from experience, like, I lead all the sales and closing for my own company. It's I found it very difficult to put someone in that role. So I if you can do it, great. That might be 1 you have to accept that when you're full, you use somebody to do that and train them because it doesn't matter to your bottom line if they miss a couple. Yeah. That's 1 of those strategies. The last question is gonna be how to get ahold of you. But right now, what's the question I should have asked you that I didn't
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question you should have asked me that you didn't you know that's a really hard question You know, you should have asked me about my hair.
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Everyone assumes my my my hair here is is fake. This gray hair is real. It's a birth You know, I saw Freddy Krueger when I was little. I figured, like, somebody came out of a boiler room, gave you this hair, and you got the streak. Tell me about your
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hair. Tell me about my hair? For those listening, he's got a great head of hair. I got a great head of hair. I I got I got my mother's hair. I got that Italian hair. And, my brother goes to me when I'm, like, 19. He goes, is that is that gray hair? And it was on this side. It's like my right side. 2 little hairs, I plucked them out, but then they grew back. So is this this gray streak? Every barber I go to says, man, I'm jealous of your hair. So another reason I'm a great host for you because I'm gonna look like I guess, I'm a Tom Selleck because he's still a sex symbol. It's this thing I pulled out of my ass. But, yeah, III I'm I'm gonna come prepared and look in this look in the part. And, you know, how you how you look on camera is very important. You know, I'm not gonna if you're sitting like this, I'm gonna tell you to raise your I'm gonna tell you to raise your chair up, you know, because people do not know how to frame themselves.
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They they don't.
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Yeah. So I guess that also that also be a good question you should have asked. Like, if someone's gonna start doing what we do, what technical what technical advice would you give them? What little details make the most difference? And the answer to that question is be center. You know? Be in the middle of the frame, a little bit of headspace. You know, you wanna fit, like, your head like this above, so it works, but you don't wanna be too low. You don't be off to the side. You know, how you position yourself on camera, whether it's horizontal, like 19 by 16 horizontal or 9 16, which is for phone. You wanna be where the eyes are looking in the center.
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So That's right. Right. Very interesting. If someone who runs 5 cameras for the podcast, the video, I agree. Yeah. Detail matters.
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100%. Hey. Well, so listen, how do people get a hold of you? Who should get a hold of you? Yeah. That's the best place to find me is on LinkedIn. It's Will Tarashuk. It's t as in Thomas, ARASHUKI do my best to post Monday to Friday. I work specifically with financial advisors. So how it works is you would book a call with me. We would spend about 30, 45 minutes going over, okay, your audience, 1, the questions they need answered, some common themes on a podcast, and then we would book the interview. I talk to you for about an hour, a very engaging, in-depth conversation like this. I'll give you the questions ahead of time. You can approve or deny questions. You can also say, Will, I want you to ask this question specifically. And I'll be like, Yes. We will lead with that. And then from there, depending on the package you get, you can get 5 to 15 clips that are 60 seconds, 2 minutes, 10 minutes. You know, you can trust me to go and pick them, or you can give input. So when you work with me, you have full creative control of the content. And that creative control can be, will I trust you? Go do it. Or will I'm gonna give you step by step directions on how to do this and whatever works. So I work specifically with financial advisors. I've been covering I've created over 5, 000 pieces of financial content in my career. So I've traveled the world for, conferences in crypto, blockchain, ETFs, you know, CES technology. So I am very well versed in finance. I'm not a financial adviser or an expert myself, but I know what questions to ask you from a perspective of just your regular dude. Like, I'm 29 years old, so I'm gonna ask you a question from the perspective of a young person, millennial, which is typically the demographic that financial advisors are not looking at. It's something they're they're ignoring. But, you know, our generate or my generation, Tom, we got a lot of debt. And by the time we reach that golden age of 55, where the financial advisor's target, it's not gonna you're gonna be managing debt, not money. So get them while they're young is what they say. Get get get get get the kids financially literate while they're young, and that is my goal to help you bridge that gap between
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millennial Gen Z and the advisor through video content. The best way to reach me, LinkedIn will tear a shock. Yeah. I mean, will your I mean, your so Will Tarashuk definitely and and by his good good LinkedIn profile, you're learning it. The but the thing I hear you're really expert on, there's plenty of financial experts. You're expert of getting the most out of the financial experts so they can promote themselves, and that is an expertise as I know what questions to ask you, so you sound smart, knowledgeable, trustworthy, and I think that's who comes to get you. So if you're a financial expert, you're a financial provider, you're in that space, and you're looking to kinda, you know, expand your your base, you get a hold of Will. Will, thanks so much for coming on, by the way. I I appreciate it. Of course. What were you saying? Sorry. I cut you off there just a bit. No. No. You're good. This this this has been this has been incredible. I've had a lot of fun here, and I'm glad I'm glad we did this. Thank you. Me too. Listen. Will, thanks for coming on. And if, this was your first time here, thanks for for, you know, for making it this far. And if you've been here before, I always give away dad points. So take them, put them in your pocket. You know, you can spend them somewhere someday if you could just figure out where. Get out there. Go unleash your entrepreneur. If you are in the middle of it, you know, I am a big fan of you learn by helping others first, so think of helping another entrepreneur or somebody else get going because you're gonna learn about yourself as well. But get out there, go unleash it, cut the ties, all the crap that holds you back, And until we can meet again, get out there and go unleash your entrepreneur. Thanks.