Jesse is the FIRST lawyer we’ve had on the show to try and help answer questions for you on why having a lawyer is important, how to best use that lawyer when starting your business and more. In 2006, he graduated magna cum laude with bachelor’s degree in exercise science from Eastern University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Jesse earned his law degree in 2009 from the Wake Forest University School of Law.
Jesse has been working with the Law firm Forrest Firm here in Raleigh-Durham which is my personal firm and why I thought it would be good to have him on and speak with you. Jesse and his firm are well grounded in the startup space and have a developing partnership with American underground a google supported co-working space that you’ve heard me talk about in the past. His areas of focus are Specific start-up counseling, seed, venture capital, and debt financings, mergers and acquisitions, and the negotiation and structuring of a wide range of contracts and transactions. Jesse and I cover;
Other Business Law Related Questions:
Eric Bandholz couldn't grow facial hair at his corporate bank job. So he took the next logical step: He quit and built a business around his beard. Eric is husband, father, entrepreneur, YouTuber, world traveler, and designer. Founder of beardbrand.
Eric is what he called “An urban beardsman” His vision is fostering a community for the bearded lifestyle that gives men the tools to wear a beard in any environment. Since launching an e-commerce site in January of 2013, Beardbrand has grown from zero to over $120k per month built primarily on branding. Eric has appeared on national
television show Shark Tank, been viewed nearly 4 million times on YouTube, and featured in Wall Street Journal, NY Times, Details, Business Insider, Fast Company and Forbes.
An entrepreneurial individual with 10 years experience in marketing, sales, and design, Eric is building lasting business relationships that result in fruitful partnerships which has been their key to success.
Dan is the owner of Evolving SEO, a boutique SEO company located Massachusetts. Dan’s been heavily involved with SEO after starting in helping his father establish his business onlne. Dan who went to college and graduated with a degree in music switched gears after doing side work in music, started his own business and this is where the journey and evolution begins.
Dan and I discuss;
Awarded as an iTunes Best of 2014 podcast, The $100 MBA Show is a new kind of business podcast where you simply get better at business with our daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. These no fluff, 10-minute episodes are packed with only the pure business building training you want.
Omar Zenhom, co-founder of Webinar Ninja. Omar and his partner and wife Nicole used their years of education experience to develop software and training resources for webinars. Omar also hosts the $100 MBA show, a top-ranked podcast with over 50,000 downloads per day.
In this episode, Omar and I discuss;
Damon Brown believes technology can bring us closer together and, after talking with him, you probably will, too.
Damon's recently acquired Apple Top 10 app Cuddlr (now known as Spoonr) a location-based social-meeting app just for cuddling landed him on the cover of the Wall Street Journal and kickstarted the platonic connection industry.
Damon is also the author of 13 books including his highly acclaimed TED Book Our Virtual Shadow: Why We Are Obsessed with Documenting Our Lives Online" foreshadowed the modern analog living movement. He's also been a speaker at TED, Al Jazeera America and other outlets. Damon shares entrepreneurial insights in his daily Inc. Magazine online column, Sane Success, and regularly contributes to Playboy, Entrepreneur and Slate.
Damon and I cover;
The equation is simple. Soul + swag x New Orleans = Dee-1. He has created his own lane in Hip-Hop by making music that motivates anyone on a mission to win the game of life. He is the voice of those underdogs who grind with a purpose.
Dee-1 is Real, Righteous, and definitely Relevant. I enjoyed talking with the LSU about his viral hit “Sallie Mae Back” which you hear in the opening of the podcast and he discusses quitting his job as a middle school teacher to rapping full time which has since taken off!
Dee-1 also known as David talks about the man you see on stage is the same man he is off of it and you have to respect how pure that is. He also talks about turning down a record deal provided by Cash Money/Young Money Records because his message was so different (he does not curse in his music).
Dee-1 and I also cover...
I had the absolute pleasure to speak with Isa Watson, CEO of Envested. a social network giving platform created so that you can do your part to transform your community.
Isa started her career as a chemist for the metabolic diseases group at Pfizer before pivoting over to the world of business. After getting her MBA, Isa worked as VP of Strategy and Business Development at JPMorgan Chase and then creating Envested in 2015 to merge her business experience with her charitable side.
Paul Jarrett Co-Founded Bulu, Inc. also known by the subscription box name Bulu Box and Bulu Marketplace in 2012. Paul was running in a marathon with his wife and as the volunteers were handing out sample products for them to use along the run, they later realized that there was an opportunity and a market for sending out health products and vitamins to others in a more curated process and collect essential data along the way.
Paul’s work experience spans the country. From NYC to San Francisco, he has launched million dollar brands such as Neebo and executed multi-facted campaigns for Lowe's and Nike so he understood what it meant to take this subscription box idea to market and quickly began to see success. It also helped that he was Vice President and Board Member of Complete Nutrition which also provided a little insight into the space. He built the Marketing Department, trained dozens of franchises and positioned Complete Nutrition and its products for success in a saturated market.
I enjoyed my conversation with Paul and I hope you do as well and helps you along your journey. In this episode we cover;
Matt Tran started off as a Mechanical Engineer after graduating from college with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and was unhappy because of the long, boring days and was ultimately fired from all 3 jobs. He walked away from engineering to focus on his YouTube channel full-time against the wishes of many and has grown and amazing following and amassed millions of views in total over time.
I’m a fan of Matt’s channel because of his honest conversations with guests about college, careers and beyond. He talks with real professionals (like myself) who have gone through the fire of sorts and willing to share their thoughts in that field of workforce.
I had a chance to sit down with long time digital marketing veteran, Ian Fernando. I've been in the affiliate marketing space for almost 10yrs and Ian has been in it longer then me but we finally got a chance to meet face to face at Affiliate Summit East in NYC. We talked briefly about outsourcing and I thought he was a cool guy then.
Ian was a college drop out at the age of 20, Ian has pulled himself out from a life of struggle. He talks about how he worked multiple jobs to help support him but also applied some hustle on the side. He mastered driving high volumes of traffic using mainly Google Adwords then progressed to his own digital products and today finds himself building with a team in the Philippines .
Ian and I discussed;
Nick is an entrepreneur, author with several books on Amazon and lead Hustler atSideHustleNation.com, a growing community and resource for aspiring and part-time entrepreneurs.
Nick worked full-time for a giant corporation, but spent his nights and weekends working on a comparison shopping website which eventually led him to stitching together other side projects ultimately launching out on his own and finding success.
Nick starting getting more questions on how he created his side businesses and that’s where Side Hustle Nation was born. Side Hustle Nation is a growing community of aspiring and part-time entrepreneurs, where he also hosts the top-rated Side Hustle Show podcast.
Nick and I discuss;
Miko Branch, co-founder and CEO of Miss Jessie’s, started the company in the early 2000's alongside her late sister, Titi Branch.
Miko and Titi Branch didn't have to go far to get their business chops. Their father and Miss Jessie, their paternal grandmother who the business was named after, gave them the push they needed to forge the road ahead. Miko, a 70's, hip-hop baby like myself and the environment that holds in NYC, help to visualize, shape and launch their entrepreneurial spirit in addition to their family.
At one point, Miko says she wanted to go into fashion, but decided to go another route. On the day that she graduated from the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City, she enrolled in beauty school. This is where we pick up her story.
Miko and I discuss;
People always want to know what the silver bullet is for getting rich online. Frankly, it’s a lot of hard work and hustle. Jeremy Schoemaker– also known as Shoemoney has been willing to change his life with health improvements and more focus to gain in his lane.
Jeremy began his career as an appliance salesman, all-the-while, creating his own side hustles…sometimes while at the gig. Jeremy started playing around online and created an extremely popular ringtones company (who remembers those) eventually leading to the widely known photo with a Google AdSense check in the amount of 132K taken back in the early AdSense days.
I interviewed Jeremy in this transparent, fun-filled, explicit discussion to get down to business on what it really means to make serious money and his thought process behind it.
In this session we covered a lot of ground including;
Jalem Getz is now President of Wantable Inc. but he hasn't always been at the top. I sit down to talk with Jalem who I consider a friend and talk about his Journey from dropping out of college where he was studying to become an engineer to creating his first retail business which would eventually evolve from a Kiosk to an estimated $400 Million online business known as BuySeasons which housed the Brands of BuyCostumes.com, Celebrate Express, Evite to his current business and position.
Jalem and I discuss;
Michael Smith and I continue our discussion on Faith, life, business and more. Michael T. Smith is Founder and Former Pastor of The Church of Jacksonville, an amazing husband, father, storyteller, leader, mentor, counselor, philosopher, and more.
In this part we cover;
I am so excited to be able to share an interview with a true leader, and introduce you to a very special friend who I’m so blessed to know more and more about. Michael T. Smith is an amazing husband, father, storyteller, leader, mentor, counselor, philosopher, and so much more…and not in that order. Make sure you have your notebook handy, because you’ll want to take notes and really chew on what’s shared here today. This is Part 1 of our 2-part discussion.
In this part we cover;
Useful Links:
TEDx Talks
Black Murder is Normal
Racial progression in our generation
Personal Blog
michaelandconnie.com
Joel Comm is an entrepreneur, New York Times best-selling author, public speaker and an all around funny and cool guy. How do I know. We;ll…did I mention he created the app iFart? Yeah..he’s done that too. I consider him to be a friend and he’s serious about his business and causes. Although he does tons on interviews and gets a chance to get in front of people his mission has really been making it about YOU. What I mean by that is he’s
a leading authority on social media such as Facebook and Twitter (where he’s written
several books) and has helped big name companies market their brands online.
I really enjoyed talking to Joel. He’s a fun guy to listen to and someone that I think has his finger on the pulse on what’s ahead in the digital marketing world. Recently, he’s been putting out fun, insightful stories on Snapchat and having lots of Blab and Facebook live conversations. The kicker is…he believes video is just taking off and I agree!
In this interview, Joel and I discuss;
J.R. Tolver isn't what's considered to be the standard ex-"jock" or the statistics that tend to go with them. A new study says that 16 percent of NFL players will go broke within 12 years of retirement. The findings are markedly different from a 2009 study that put the number at 78 percent just two years after retirement.
Regardless what the percentage is, some people don't plan to fail...they fail to plan. In some respect they're not just talking about money in terms of being "broke". This also includes in spirit.
J.R.'s spirit and drive remains strong and he attributes that to the way he was raised and the example set by his father. So by the time his playing days in the NFL were over, he knew what he had to do next. He earned both his Bachelors and Masters...with that and the connections he made during his playing days, he set a plan in motion. You have to respect the grind!
In this interview J.R. and I cover his journey;
The Affiliate Mission team spent over a year in American Underground, a startup (co-working) hub in Raleigh-Durham and our experience was awesome and one I would recommend to any new business looking to connect and build with other entrepreneurs.
American Underground is setting trends to become the most diverse startup hub around and that effort is led by Chief Strategist and all around good guy, Adam Klein. Companies like Google has seen something special in this hub and sponsored them in their efforts. CNBC even visited AU late last year to cover how it’s sparking a business revival in what once known as ‘Black Wall Street.
Adam and I sat down and discussed;
Jon Acuff is the New York Times Bestselling author of five books including his most recent, Do Over: Rescue Monday, Reinvent Your Work and Never Get Stuck.
For 18 years he’s helped some of the biggest brands in the world tell their story, including The Home Depot, Bose, Staples, and the Dave Ramsey Team. Most recently he’s spoken to hundreds of thousands of people at conferences, colleges, companies and churches. Featured regularly on national media, Jon has been seen on CNN, Fox News, Good Day LA and several other key outlets.
Syed Balkhi is the Founder of WPBeginner, a WordPress resource site that helps beginners for FREE. He's also launched List25, that offers curated lists of information on a different subjects. Syed also serves as a writer for The Huffington Post and Entrepreneur, where he has authored several articles.We discuss;
Joel says Startup Dad Headquarters where we are exploring the intersection between Fatherhood, Entrepreneurship and Life and he’s on that road himself. His goal was to be engaged with his family and pursue his dream of starting a business.
After nearly 14 years as a successful manager at Intel, Joel decided it was time to stop working on someone else’s dream and start working on his own. He pursued those dreams and launched Startup Dad HQ, a business interview show and podcast which has added business coaching and other community components this year.
We discuss;