0124: You’re A Big Deal! How to be, and find Awesome Guest’s for your Podcast, Show, Blog, and Events with Author, Stanford, Harvard, TEDx Speaker, & CEO of AwesomeGuests Joon Han

Intro [0:00]

EA Interviews Episode 124. Inspiration, transformation, success stories, and the Imperfect Action Round seven days a week. Join Mario Fachini for today’s Expert Authority Effect Interview.

Mario Fachini [0:12]

So you have a business. It’s an awesome business. But I have a question for you. Have you ever wanted to start a show? Maybe you have a show, but you’re looking for more guests. I know when I started mine, this was a question I had. And that’s why I’m excited to bring to you Joon Han. He is the CEO of AwesomeGuests. And he’s going to be sharing with us today how you can get more guests for your show that are awesome. And if you are a CEO, an entrepreneur, a business owner, and author, speaker consultant, if you want more publicity, you need to talk to him. Because whether you have a show or not, he can help you get booked on more shows. I’m excited to bring him p right after we thank our sponsor.

SPONSOR Rosh Tips [1:02]

Winning With Google in 2020? Of course you want to. I’d advise Google search advertising and YouTube specialist Rosh Sillars. Download the free Winning With Google in 2020 Guide at EAInterviews.com/RoshTips.

Mario Fachini [1:17]

Here is ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Joon Han. Joon, how are you doing today?

Joon Han [1:21]

Great, man. Thanks for letting me be on the show, Mario. I appreciate it.

Mario Fachini [1:25]

I am so excited to feature you ever since we met back at one of the podcasting events. I’ve just been so impressed with what you’re doing and who you’re helping. How did it all come to be?

Joon Han [1:37]

Well, yeah. I mean, you know, I’m most well known for my TED Talk Get Ahead By Giving Back. And I did that to grow my first company ever started, which is super boring stuff, a strategy and process engineering company. And we did what you’re supposed to you as a small boutique company. You just keep growing it and growing it by getting larger clients. And about seven years ago, we kind of hit our numbers. And the work wasn’t as fun as it used to be. So I effectively retired from that. And you know, that’s why I did my TED Talk and still chipping away at this book along the same kind of things using generosity in business. But just like you, Mario, I know that you and I, we probably network a lot of entrepreneurs. And the good thing is we meet a lot of great people. The sad part is we meet a lot of people that aren’t going to be in business, maybe two or three years from now, which is heartbreaking. And what you find all the time is there’s a lot of people that, unfortunately, had this label being the best kept secret, right? And it’s just like the kiss of death. And in business, it means that to be a successful entrepreneur, you have to have three different buckets of skills. One is the technical skill, one is the management or the project management and leadership, and the other one is sales and marketing. And so a lot of people that are really good at one actual skill are usually not very good at sales and marketing. So they died as like horrible best kept secret death. And so about four years ago, my business partner and I, we we’ve known each other for years, we just – even though I was retired, we’d meet every Thursday night at a Denny’s like [11:00] at night just kick around ideas and share what we’re reading and things like that. And somewhere around the time I retired from my strategy company – so this is about, I want to say, almost eight years ago, we were kind of just – I think about what podcasting was like eight years ago, right? You know, under 40,000 podcasts. It was a mostly people that had the technological kind of knowledge know how to do it. So we did a show as an experiment for exactly one year. And it’s called Your Biz Rocks. It’s a general business advice show. You can find on YouTube or iTunes, whatever. And then after we did that experiment for a year, it wasn’t like we wanted to grow that brand. That wasn’t the point of that show. So I’ve been watching the podcasting industry ever since and come to realize like podcasting is a very powerful medium for people to shed this best kept secret kind of thing. So if you’re an author or you’re even like crowdfunding something or a lot of people on our platform are coaches or consultants, you get on one really good podcast and you share your expertise in a very authentic way. And answer very forthright questions from the host and whatnot. That that could set you up for like a year’s worth of business if you get on the right show. And so we were just kind of like, “Well, how do people find people?” You know this. If you do an interview based show and even if you have a pretty good network, like right around Episode 37 to 39, you start running out the best guests that you have that you are directly connected to. And so then the question is, how do you keep that?

Mario Fachini [4:59]

I got to ask you, do you have specific stats on that? Because it’s a little surreal you say that.

Joon Han [5:06]

Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. So we built AwesomeGuests, technologically, we started building it up three years ago. But we did a lot of – I have a lot of friends that introduced me to – I didn’t have a lot of connections in the podcasting space but I have some pretty prominent friends that introduced me to other podcasters. And so we interviewed about 300 hosts. And we also interviewed about 200 bloggers. Because our site can work for if you’re a blogger or podcast, it was defined like guest contributors or interviews. And we got back a lot of interesting data. I mean, I wish in hindsight, we could have asked a couple more questions but I don’t know if we would have gotten the great response rate. If you ask three questions, you can pretty much get all of them answered. If you ask five, you’re not getting some of the surveys back. And things that we found, that the average the average host of a sustainable show past its first year, the average host is spending anywhere from seven to ten hours searching for and vetting a guest. Now, I would like to go back and see which is the more time consuming part, the searching or the vetting. But I think that probably differs based on the guest. But yeah, like a newbie podcaster just starts out the gate with some relationships and people they know on LinkedIn. And again, right around like I said about 37, they still haven’t gotten to the year mark but they’re kind of tapped out of their direct network. And so usually, your guest quality at that point is either going to go down tremendously because you’re not able to vet higher quality because your network has run dry. Or your show is really taking off and your guests start to really go up in prominence and things like that. So sorry, I didn’t mean to creep you out with the network system like that.

Mario Fachini [6:53]

No. No. I’m fascinated by it. And I’m excited to hear what that revealed to you and why you built the software. But I’m blessed that I haven’t had an issue with a guest as far as finding people because I knew a lot. And it didn’t hurt that I was also an author, and speaker, and trainer because I knew others. But there’s been some interesting things where there’s people I thought would be all gung ho. And it just didn’t pan out. And then there’s other people that I was like, “You know, they’d be good. I’ll ask them down the road a year or two or three when my show really takes off.” Come to find out that they’ve been watching and they’re like, “Oh, I’d love to be on your show. What do I have to do?” I’m like, “You’re a-year-and-a-half ahead of my schedule. What do I do?”

Joon Han [7:40]

Yeah. I mean, so that’s the one of the things, right? Is that, like, if you found me on paper or on LinkedIn, what does that mean? That doesn’t mean I’ll be a great guest. That doesn’t mean I want to be a guest necessarily, right? And so, for lack of a better analogy, we built the world’s first podcast guest matching site that runs off of the same kind of algorithm software as like a ZipRecruiter or like an eHarmony kind of thing. We’re actively matching people. So there are about four or five just databases that static directories you can look up. And they’re all free. So I encourage everyone to do that. Or the free Facebook Group as a guest. But the example is like, something as ubiquitous as, say you’re running – we have a member, the guests she’s looking for are female Latina. So women that are Latina and culture heritage but are also entrepreneurs. Now, those three words are not very – those are fairly ubiquitous terms. But how are you going to find that on LinkedIn? If you’re an entrepreneur, you don’t necessarily put entrepreneur in your title on LinkedIn. You don’t put your gender. You don’t put –

Mario Fachini [8:54]

I don’t even think you can search that. I know you can do zip code, area, you can go to a geographic location that you might know is a higher density of a specific demographic.

Joon Han [9:04]

You can search things like job titles, for instance. Because LinkedIn is a headhunting site for executive recruiting firm. They’re the major founders of that company.

Mario Fachini [9:17]

But that’s borderline, like, nowadays unless you’re in a modeling – from my experience in the modeling industry. You’re not just generally searching people out by height, weight, hair color, and stuff like that. That’s kind of – you get in trouble for that now in business with LinkedIn.

Joon Han [9:33]

Yeah. But on LinkedIn, I could look up like – for instance, if I’m trying to find entrepreneurs, I might be searching by titles like founder, principal, CEO. But you and I know, like, just because you’re CEO, it doesn’t mean you’re an entrepreneur. Just because you’re the principal, it doesn’t mean you’re an entrepreneur. And then there’s –

Mario Fachini [9:50]

It’s more of a behavioral type, wouldn’t you say?

Joon Han [9:52]

Right. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. And so again, most people are not going to put that on their LinkedIn profile, right? And so you even look at – if you’re looking for Christian businessmen. Well, how do you look up something about faith? That’s not something that most people are putting in something like a LinkedIn kind of thing as well. And so we’re proud of the fact that our platform, you can put your values and what you believe in. And it’s not necessarily – there’s two parts of a guest profile. There’s things that are public, like the book, books you published, your bylines, any podcasts, or other media, or blogs that you’ve contributed to so I can quickly vet you in just a couple seconds instead of spending seven to ten hours on average. But the reality is, on the back end of every profile, I can put things like my faith, or even more sensitive things like gender identity, or things like that that people do not want to put in a public forum. Our profiles are not indexed by Google on purpose. And so the back end, you can be found by shows that are based on your values. Or the fact that – listen, I’ve been arrested in two different countries. That’s not something I’m going to put on my LinkedIn profile. But it makes me a great podcast guest. Those are interesting stories, right?

Mario Fachini [11:05]

I love how you’re like, “Well, that’s something I don’t want out there in the public” as we’re live and this is going to thousands of people.

Joon Han [11:11]

Yeah. Well, it’s fine. But I’m not putting on my LinkedIn and I’m not putting it –

Mario Fachini [11:15]

No. I get it. I’m just messing with you.

Joon Han [11:15]

I’m not putting up my YouTube video tags and stuff like that. Or even something simple as like –

Mario Fachini [11:23]

That’s a heck of a headline though. Maybe you could put it on your LinkedIn profile or at least a cover photo.

Joon Han [11:29]

Yeah. But things like you know – even things like, “I’m a dad. I’m also a coach. I live in the inner city. I’m very justice oriented. I’m a retired pastor.” All these things are necessary things I put on my shingle – my professional shingle as far as, “I’m a professional speaker. I speak on getting it by giving back. We’re a podcast analyst for the industry.” Those are things we put out there but all these other things that might be interesting, yes. Like say, “I love fishing.” If I’m CPA and I’m in a commoditized industry, if I get on a fishing podcast and I tell these great fishing stories, anyone listening to that show that wants a CPA, they’re going to hire me. Right? Because I had this affinity that they have as well. And we just thought it’s about time –

Mario Fachini [12:18]

You could even argue that you’d be doing something better than just talking about your surface level stuff. Because most people don’t even get into, “I love swimming, boating, water sports. I grew up on the water. I live on the water. I always been on it. I love it. I always ask for the jacuzzi rooms and view of the pool at hotels and stuff. The background is blue.” But that’s what people want to connect with. So you’re saying, not only can I go in there to find great guests, I can find the shows to be on. And I can get in there at really specific thing – because, again, it’s cool to say, “I’m a number one international best selling author.” But there’s also other authors, speakers, trainers and it’s like, “Oh my god.” Once you’re in it, it’s like a dime a dozen. I want to know who likes what you’re talking about fishing, boating, family, Christianity.

Joon Han [13:11]

Yeah. I mean, it’s the things that – listen, if you met someone in real life, we all know that we’re more than just our job. The job is one thing but that’s like the most boring question you can ask someone. The best question is like, “What’s the best vacation you had? Or what’s something you learned this year? What’s something that makes you uncomfortable?” But those are the kind of things that make for very compelling interviews. And so for instance, if you’re a coach and you’re in the coaching industry, professional coach. If you share some of those kind of stories with an eating disorder, or mental illness in your family, or you helped someone that had a nervous breakdown, and you helped that CEO get back right on track. Things that are based on value and authenticity, that’s where podcasts rule. That’s the beauty of podcasts as a medium. And so we’re proud of the fact that we’re the global leader in this kind of stuff. Nothing exists that helps you showcase the more important parts of yourself, is what we like to say.

Mario Fachini [14:08]

I love that. So you kind of alluded to it but if I were to directly ask you, who do you help, is it strictly authors, speakers? I mean, who is your ideal prospect? For someone listening going, “I need to get on AwesomeGuests.”

Joon Han [14:23]

Yeah. I mean, you know, admittedly, I’ll say it’s a little bit wider than that. And it’s that someone that’s just to the point, like, “You know what? I know that I got some great stories to tell. Maybe I’m not killing it in sales and marketing.” And maybe I don’t want to put in the work of putting together like a good podcast myself. But the podcasting gold rush is here and it’s here to stay. So the question is, how are you going to take advantage of this medium without having to do your own show? And the reality is if you’re a podcast host, the best way to grow your show is to be on other shows. So it’s basically anyone that wants to shed that best kept secret kind of label. We do have specific tools for – like there’s a recent PR agencies. We have five really large PR agencies that use our tool. They load up their clients because the clients are never going to use it. We’re a do it yourself solution, right? So their clients are never going to use our site. But these are PR agencies that get paid per, like, show placement for each of their clients. So they load up all their clients. For instance, if I’m an author right now and I know I want to do my Amazon book launch February 1st, I will do as many –

Mario Fachini [15:34]

Whoa. That’s the day I launched my show.

Joon Han [15:37]

Awesome. But say, I want to do as many shows – there’s basically a feature if I had like a marketing budget, I can do what we call fast track fee to say, “Listen, book me on your show because I’m interesting. But after the interview goes well and you think it’s great, could you specifically release that episode within a specific window of time to help me with my campaign.” And so think of our crowdfunding, or again, a book launch or a speaking tour. Like, if I’m speaking in the Baltimore area, I can look up Baltimore centric podcasts as a guest and just pitch them and say, “Listen, I’m going to be in your town to do this keynote speech on Thursday. How about anytime on Wednesday until on Friday, I pop into your show? Preferably maybe before the event, right?” It’s just kind of generates some publicity for that. So it’s kind of it’d be nice if this was on radio. But radio, you know, it’s a live medium. And you can only do this kind of stuff if you have a large PR agency. But since this is a do yourself tool, we built all the tools in there for you to get the publicity you need to grow your reach and influence without a million dollar budget. Like, if you said, “Hey, podcasters. If you will promise to release my episode within this window, I’ll pay you 100 bucks.” That’s a really good use of $100. It’s a really smart use. Instead of just Like a Facebook ad or whatever you’re going to do.

Mario Fachini [17:03]

Well, I’m glad you made it. Because when you were telling me about it, I was geeked because I had just launched my show. I admittedly had no clue what the heck I was doing short of the video side of things. But I was freaking out because audio podcasting, it was new to me. I knew I’d figure it out. I always do. And I always hit my goals. But what I loved was – and you’re sharing it now – about there’s people that want to drop their book. And yeah, they want to be on 100 shows but it’s not just throughout the year. It could be in three weeks. When you coincide that, that is a huge Expert Authority Insight that you’re sharing. Because one of the things when I’m taking my clients through the book launch process, that is part of the process we talked about, how much publicity can you get leading up to it so come launch day they’re aware. That’s great, you’re on 100 shows two months from now. But if your launch days today, or tomorrow, or this week, you want them ahead of schedule. And you have the foresight to build that into the software. So I just have to click a button and go, boom, boom, boom.

Joon Han [18:08]

Yeah. I mean a lot of this because, you know, I have been a professional speaker for, I want to say, ever since I was 16 years old. And so we swim in a lot of the same circles. A lot of these expert people that want to be infopreneurs or expertpreneur kind of things. And I just said like, “There’s got to be an easier way.” There’s ways back in the days. Still, if you want to get in traditional media, you got to hire a PR company. And they’re going to do a lot of this legwork. But this kind of tool doesn’t even exist for traditional media. So probably in the future. I know for a fact right now we have three journalists that use our site. They sign up as a host because what they’re looking for are guest sources for their different articles and whatnot to do background research and stuff like that. So eventually, early media or traditional media is probably going to use this site just like anyone else. But we specifically built it for, like you’re saying, the author or a crowd funder. Something that has a specific timeline in mind. Because you can load up – you can just do all these interviews right now. You can pitch 100 shows a day on our platform. There’s a way to do it like on autopilot, even, if you wanted to. And then yeah, and then make sure it’s all going live right around the same time. So it feels like there’s legitimate buzz around your initiative.

Mario Fachini [19:30]

That’s very exciting even to me. I know, there’s a lot of people listening that are like, “Wow. I need to get this.” And I’ll make sure there’s a link in the show notes on EA Interviews, the website. But I kind of want to launch a new book now just to put all this into action. I mean, I understand the value of this and I wish I would have known about it seven years ago. Tell me what is your biggest success story you’ve had? Okay. We’ll try this again and act like I’ve done this 100 times plus. What is your biggest success story you’ve heard from someone using your platform?

Joon Han [20:06]

Yeah. I mean, well, say, so unfortunately, we have some pretty big shows using our site to get guests. But there’s a feature built for those kind of host called stealth mode, where they basically can use our site without [inaudible] [00:20:23].

Mario Fachini [20:24]

I saw that.

Joon Han [20:25]

And the point is that we went to a podcasting conference, I want to say, about two-and-a-half years ago, almost three years ago and I was able to talk to some NPR producers. And they love the technology. They’re, like, they have some really esoteric guest needs. But the woman who produces two different shows, she said, “You know, we would never use this technology though. Because we already get pitched to death. And so this would just put that on like turbo.” And so we didn’t know what to call it back then. But we had that feature built out. So I showed it to her. She’s like, “Oh. Oh, yeah. We’ll totally use this. Basically, people don’t know we’re using it.” Now, we’ll tell you the people that are most successful are someone that knows kind of what the medium. The medium is a very intimate medium, right? So you and I, we were public speakers, right? But when you’re doing podcasting, if you’re speaker guy, that’s not going to work for this medium. You got to kind of be a little more authentic, share some stories that are really more vulnerable, and more on the somber side of things and whatnot. You still want to lighten it up at the end. People that have done really well that we’ve been seeing right now are people that actually do coaching, like professional coaches. Because coaching is just about fit, right? Most coaches know the same thing as other coaches. Like you and I, Mario, even though we’re not professional coaches, we could still coach people to be successful in their businesses. But you hire a professional coach based on the fit of values. And like, “I think this person is going to get me. You know, I’m a yoga lifestyle kind of person and they seem like a yoga lifestyle kind of person.” Or, “I’m a hunter, like red meat potatoes kind of guy. And this guy is like a no nonsense straight shooter kind of guy. He’s my kind of guy.” So the people that are doing really well are those kind of things. So there’s a guy named Aaron Walker – and I wish he could take credit for it. But he grew his coaching business before our platform even existed. And just like you said, you wish this platform had been around. He wishes this thing was around. He did in his first three years of coaching, he had zero clients, just retired, pretty young age, a very successful CEO kind of position whatnot. And he didn’t have any clients. And you know, how do you start coaching? But the problem is he’s like an old, ubiquitous white guy. There’s nothing special about him. He’s not going to get on Good Morning America. It’s just hard for him to get on traditional media. So he started looking at podcasting. In his first three years, he did over 308 interviews. And by the end of those three years – again, I want you to listeners to be clear, it wasn’t an overnight kind of thing. But after three years, he was doing $50,000 a month in coaching. So $50,000 a month. I know most entrepreneurs after three years of business would love to be doing $50,000 a month in anything. Now to his credit, the guy just worked really hard. I mean, to do 300 interviews, basically, 100 interviews a year and be super compelling and shares the same story like it’s the first time you did it, [inaudible] [00:23:31]. I think that’s really hard to do. Now, since his – I met him after that three year period. So he’s going into year four. He has since done about 300 interviews per year. And now, obviously, with our technology can do it even faster. And so that’s amazing to me.

Mario Fachini [23:48]

So he’s using it almost exclusively just to book more and more shows?

Joon Han [23:52]

Yeah. Just to put more and more shows. And back then – so what he perfected after three years – and I sat down and interviewed him. Because, obviously, he’s doing something in his interviews that’s lending him coaching clients. That’s not a given. Just because you’re a coach and you’re on podcast doesn’t mean you’re landing clients. But he has figured something out. And so I was curious, I interviewed him to see if he knew why his interviews are doing well. And he basically, after three years, figured out what he needs to say, what he needs to not say, that kind of stuff. So he perfected his side of the interview. And then now using our platform, it’s just like, turbo fuel. Because now he knows what to do. And now it takes all the work out of pitching shows. It’s like his assistant just logs in into the account and just pitches, like, 50 shows a day. That’s it. It’s pretty simple.

Mario Fachini[24:41]

That is not only in a very successful and inspiring success story but I’m glad you mentioned him specifically because I know him and having him on the show.

Joon Han [24:54]

Yeah. It’s awesome. And the thing is, a lot of people that are successful, it’s an iceberg, right? Like, what you see on – what you think is their secret to success is only the very, very tip of that iceberg. And so there’s a lot of things he’s going on. But one thing he will say is like, he grew his coaching business zero to 50,000 a month on the power of podcasting. Back then he hired a PR agency because tools like this didn’t exist to do that kind of stuff.

Mario Fachini [25:29]

And the whole tip of the iceberg thing is, I hear a common theme between all of my VIP guests, and it’s the people who are successful were willing to put in the work, basically. Everyone knows what to do. But I mean, you’re just rattling off, “Oh, yeah, I did -” whether he’s 300 a year or 300 in three years, that’s a lot.

Joon Han [25:52]

Yeah. It’s really work.

Mario Fachini [25:53]

And like you said, most people stop at what 36,37? I know that I heard this stat. Most people don’t even get their podcast the first ten, whatever.

Joon Han [26:04]

[Inaudible] [00:26:04].

Mario Fachini [26:04]

Past the first ten episodes.

Joon Han [26:07]

Yeah. It’s a real thing. Right? And I mean, the thing is, listen, that’s actually one of, I think, the biggest misnomers about entrepreneurial success is that everyone’s telling you like, “I got to work smarter and not harder” kind of thing. But smarter and not harder only applies to you if you work for somebody else. If you work for somebody else, you get paid for eight hours and just do an hour worth of work and get it done. But for entrepreneurs, you could look at any successful entrepreneur, they work smarter and harder. They’re putting in, like, 60 hours a week but working really smarter for each hour. So basically, Mario, if you are working smarter and harder and I’m just working smarter and not harder so I basically put in two hours of work and I got eight hours of work done, yay. And you put in eight hours of work but you’re working smarter and harder, you’ve basically left me by a week in one day. And then basically in six months, you’ve left me by almost two years if you’re working smarter and harder. And so, I mean, listen, I don’t know anyone that’s a self-made millionaire, we will all tell you it took us 11 years to become an overnight success. It took us anywhere from nine to 11 years to become an overnight success. And that is a fact. Anyone else that does it other than that, that’s like lottery odds kind of stuff. It’s not a way you can plan your success.

Mario Fachini [27:35]

Well, it sounds like you’re helping a lot of people and you definitely have a lot of good insights in there. Where do you see this going over the next five or ten years?

Joon Han [27:45]

Yeah. I mean, I definitely think – I know podcasts will be around. But you and I know, there’s a lot of big money entering podcasting right now as far as traditional broadcast media. And then when you think of the growing, like the home speaker, the Alexa device kind of thing, those things, they’ve been growing by exponentially in their sales the last two years. And that’s not without self-driving cars yet. Well, the self-driving cars, I think that stuff is going to explode even more. Because you’re going to be able to import your Alexa settings from your home to your mobile office. That’s like a self-driving car or whatever. And so we will still be doing this service. But there’s probably other – there’s other things going to open up in the industry. But there’s no way for us to know. I know that podcasting will still be around. But I’m not sure the media will be the same. I don’t think people will consume it or create it in the same way that we’re doing right now. I think we have – AwesomeGuests, when we built our company, we said we have a ten year runway to make money the way we’re currently making money. Ten years from now the current way we make money is going to be extinct. And that’s just being a conservative. So I’m not saying that podcasting is going to go away. But I think the way the medium is getting created and consumed will change significant enough that I think our business model will not survive past the ten year window. So we’re about two years in to our ten year forecast. So it’s still good healthy run. That’s [inaudible] [00:29:18].

Mario Fachini [29:18]

If you were to take a guess, what do you think’s going to change? You said “the way that people are doing it.” They’re still going to – the devices they listen on may change. But what do you think will change about how – you mentioned the process to create the podcast itself and what we’re doing.

Joon Han [29:34]

It’s going to be more along lines of Netflix experimented with their choose your own adventure movie. I think it was like Black Mirror: Bandersnatch or something like that. So probably not the too far future, my narration of choice, like, James Earl Jones or something like that. He’s going to be able to read me my Alexa skills but in his voice. So already like Waze two years ago, they had Terry Crews navigate your directions and stuff like that for you. So in three years I think all my content is going to be customizable according to my settings, not you as a creator. So right now, audio SEO is garbage. It doesn’t really work very well. Google is trying to hack that right now. Adobe has created software where I can type something and I can make you say something you never said based on a document that I typed based on your voice. They just need to hear 40 sounds that you make and they can make you say anything. So the scariest –

Mario Fachini [30:40]

Please tell me what that software is.

Joon Han [30:43]

It currently exists. Go look up Key and Peele Adobe. And they basically make them say stuff they never said in this live demo. I think it’s, like, two years old now. And so the crazy thing with them is that, those 40 sounds they need to hear from you this is the same thing  what Like seems like Dragon [inaudible] [00:31:00] ] speaking software or whatnot. Every president has enough footage out there that they can make a president say anything they want to at this point. So it’s kind of a scary thing. But on the positive side, is that my media will – I’ll say like, “Mario, maybe I love your podcast. I love the content.” But I want a different voice. I want Allison Janney from the West Wing. I want her voice telling me this stuff. And maybe it’s a boring interview from Slate Magazine. The interviewer, I can choose James Earl Jones ask the question and then Margaret Thatcher does the answers in a British thing. I believe that all of our media will be highly customizable that way. So it’s going to be – I don’t know what the role of the creator is going to be and what copyrights are at that point, but right now as long as I tribute you as a source, I can parody your stuff. I can play almost your whole interview as long as I’m doing it as a commentary.

Mario Fachini [31:57]

Wow. That’s interesting. So if you don’t like my voice, you could replace it with Elizabeth Hurley, for example.

Joon Han [32:03]

Yeah. And I can say – you know what? Also, there’s a sportscaster, his name is Adrian Wojnarowski. He breaks all this NBA news. But on his podcast, the way he talks is really annoying. It’s very herky jerky. He’s clearly a journalist that deals with the written word, not the spoken word. What I would say, I love his content but I want it to be read by someone else that’s more fluent. I wanted to be read by you. I don’t want it to be read by him and that kind of stuff. And so I just think everything is going to move to customizable because that is the future. Right now there’s very little technology-wise that we can’t get our own. If you have enough money you can get designer drugs for your DNA, like your blood pressure medicine and mental illness kind of stuff. In about two years, if they map our guts properly, like your gut what they call microbiomes, the bacteria in your gut is different than my gut. And so we will be able to generate diets based on our specific gut content, things like that. And so, obviously, it starts with a super wealthy. Get that kind of Cadillac kind of designer drugs. But eventually that all trickles down. And so the thing with content creation, I think, the highly customizable thing is probably what’s going to happen.

Mario Fachini [33:25]

That’s very interesting. I remember when I was studying video production and animation and all that stuff, they were already. And this is, let’s just say, a few years ago. They were already talking about the 3D models of being able to take any actor or actress while they’re in their prime, map them, and then they could – they’ve already done it with some movies.

Joon Han [33:50]

Yeah. And actually, it’s really interesting. There’s a definite dividing line in Hollywood of that. And that they don’t want to get in the business of using artificial intelligent versions of like Carrie Fisher in Star Wars. But then I just read the Fast and Furious, they’re bringing in the guy who’s dead, Paul Walker. They’re bringing them back for this movie. And they’re using it as a selling point. Whereas, the Irishman is coming out on Netflix later this month and they used a lot of de-aging technology, the same de-aging stuff they used on Samuel Jackson for Captain Marvel. But Robert De Niro said, “Well, using de-aging technology, we don’t need makeup artists anymore. So you’re like, “Okay. But then the de-aging technology, that’s not that different than an AI version of you.” It’s just what’s happening –

Mario Fachini [34:42]

And it’s also the digital version of whenever people do cosmetic surgery.

Joon Han [34:47]

Right. So let me tell you something that a lot of people don’t know, back I want to say, almost, 15 years ago, there’s a defense contractor, like Northrop Grumman, those kind of things. They had a software that can mimic the AI of a person. And the reason they did that is that there was an ex-Navy SEAL guy who was the world’s foremost consultant in antiterrorist proofing your building. There was just something about the way he saw things that he was like, “This is exactly how you attack it.” Which is different than the way a slot person would look at a building and stuff like that. But the problem is, there was only one guy. And they wanted to reproduce him. So they built this technology that, basically, downloaded his persona. And mostly, like his social defects, the way he sees the world in a very unique way made it so now his AI can be consulting buildings and architecture plans from the very beginning. So the only reason the software is not ubiquitous right now is that the government is already using it to terrorist proof buildings and whatnot. Because they’re afraid if one guy is going to die.

Mario Fachini [35:54]

Well everyone will eventually.

Joon Han [35:55]

Right. And the reason this software hasn’t become ubiquitous yet is that there is a very real intellectual property quandary. Because the people that want to use the software the most are engineering companies. Because what happens, Mario, is if I retire from engineering company after a long career of 30 years, I’ve seen a lot of really weird problems and fixed them. So then the gap between me and a newbie from college is a 30 year experience gap. It’s like a problem solving gap. And so what these companies want to do is, before I retire, they want to download my AI onto their servers. So now, the company owns that. But then these engineers are like, “Wait a minute. But that’s me though. You don’t own me.” And they’re like, “Well, we kind of do. You solved all these problems on company time. You went to conferences and learned on company time. So that knowledge should belong to us.” So it is a very real active court case going on. And I don’t think this is a real answer for it. And so a lot of good stuff like that, like, litigation, they’re very mindful. Because litigation is all about precedent, you know, what has been sentenced. So once that changes – and so even in Hollywood now, the Hollywood studios, I don’t think there’s one studio that wants to be known for the studio that basically ushered in the era of using all AI actors. So what you’re seeing is they’re doing it in very small pieces because there’s like a union issue, obviously, between them and the actors. But also they’re not sure what kind of future that is. So there’s not a studio alive on the on the planet right now that wants to be known as the one that ushered in this weird era of whatever. But the technology is already there, man.

Mario Fachini [37:43]

Yeah. I’ve seen it with – I know people that are scientists and it’s the same thing. “Well, you created that – you found the cure for cancer through our company and we funded it.” Well, I’m the one who found it.”

Joon Han [37:54]

But usually science, something like that. But this is even more esoteric past that level. Because it’s not like – it’s not an invention. It’s me. It’s the way I think. I played some role in that. They’re like, “Well, maybe. Maybe not.” Like, “No. No. I don’t like – you can’t download my idiosyncrasies and say those are yours. Or my values. Those are mine.” And so there’s a legit battle that they have –

Mario Fachini [38:22]

It’s you while it’s working for them. The second you try to get out of it, it was theirs all along.

Joon Han [38:27]

Yeah. Yeah. So it’s creepy stuff. But like I said, the future is all about custom tailored stuff.

Mario Fachini [38:37]

Does that include suits?

Joon Han [38:39]

Yeah. I mean, that’s the promise of 3D printing. And so it should be, right? Is that I put on VR goggles. I can go to a mall. And a tailor can measure me specifically. And then they have a certain source code that only belongs to that retailer. And they could print me my suit on site. mean, that’s not that far.

Mario Fachini [39:02]

This is exciting and fascinating. And here I thought I had a fancy show. And I feel just like, “Well, this is a good start” But I think it’s awesome the Expert Authority Insight I’m hearing is you had a ten year forecast. You plan this out and you already have the exit strategy for it. And most people don’t think a year or two down the road when they should be because all this stuff, the reality is, it is changing. I was going to crack a joke but I didn’t want to interrupt you in the beginning when you said, “You know, eight years ago with podcasting.” And I was going to say, “Is podcasting been around that long?” The truth is, yeah, it has. It’s been 15 years. Actually, it’s been over a decade for sure. And it’s still in its infancy, like you’re saying.

Joon Han [39:43]

Oh, yeah. It’s still just getting started. It’s still just getting started.

Mario Fachini [39:47]

And it sounds like we’re already 20 years ahead of where it’s at.

Joon Han [39:50]

Yeah. But again, to say that this is the way the media will be created and consumed, there’s no way that that’s going to be true three years – like you said, in your window, three years from now, maybe. Five years from now, no way. There’s no way.

Mario Fachini [40:06]

I don’t know whether to take offense if someone really likes the content I’m putting out but doesn’t like me. It’s like, “You can replace the host.”

Joon Han [40:13]

But then other people might want you. They prefer like, “You know what? I don’t like this guy. I want Mario to read this.” And then you’re back in. You’re getting paid to do the voiceover for someone else’s podcast at that point.

Mario Fachini [40:26]

That’s so surreal. I’m thinking of some other shows. It’s like, “No. No. We need you to do the voiceover for my show.”

Joon Han [40:36]

Well, so the danger is that things become consolidated. So then basically, when I listen to podcast, there’s only 20 voice options. But then if I pay an upgrade, I can download some other voices. And I can even pay for the original voice. I don’t know. Who knows where it’s going to go? But if you’re going to make me guess five years out, that’s what I’m guessing.

Mario Fachini [41:01]

That’s interesting. So I could technically be on 50 other shows.

Joon Han [41:07]

Yeah. Absolutely. But I mean, think about it, there’s voice actors right now, right? And so they could say, “Listen, I’ll hire up my – you want to use me for your travel guides or your home Siri system? Great. This is how much it costs per month.” And so now these voice actors get subscribers to their voice, which is crazy. But why not?

Mario Fachini [41:28]

Now, that is fascinating to me. Because I have done voice work for various things outside of the show in the last, let’s say, few years. So if anyone does want to use it, let’s talk. I’ll be happy to listen to your offer or whatever. I don’t know. But let’s have a conversation. So I have one more question for you before we go to the Imperfect Action Round. And it is who is an entrepreneur you would love to meet that you haven’t had the ability to yet – or opportunity, I should say?

Joon Han [41:56]

This is an interesting one because I just saw her name pop up on the news. I mean, although it’s controversial, I would love to sit down and have just a candid private dinner with – forget her name. But she’s the cofounder of Theranos. At the time, she was the youngest billionaire – the youngest woman billionaire in the world. And then they found out –

Mario Fachini [42:17]

I know who you’re talking about.

Joon Han [42:18]

– it’s all fraudulent and stuff like that. So she was in the news yesterday because her lawyers have been complaining that she hasn’t been paying them for a year. So had an arraignment day. But I just think that’s – I mean, if everything up to her becoming the youngest billionaire female billionaire, she was inventing stuff when she was in junior high and all this kind of stuff. I think she had a Stanford education. I think that would be such an interesting person to just figure out what happened. And what are some other ideas she has that she can’t do because her name has been silly. But she’s probably got business ideas, right?

Mario Fachini [43:02]

She has the behavior and the personality type that she’s that creative, ambitious –

Joon Han [43:08]

Yeah. But where did it go wrong? Where did it go wrong? And why did it go wrong? And was it really just one thing? Was it that her and her cofounder were secretly dating without anyone as a company knowing? Did that lead to then other secret things? Or was she the instigator? Was he the instigator? Because there’s a typical story of one person was corrupt and then lover, basically, corroborated their efforts. Who knows? So I just think it’s fascinating. But I don’t know if I’ll – I don’t think she’s doing interviews right now.

Mario Fachini [43:40]

We should reach out to her. I find it interesting. This is the first time this has ever happened where both of us don’t know the name.

Joon Han [43:49]

Yeah. I just know her as the founder of Theranos.

Mario Fachini [43:52]

You know what? I’m going to do something else I’ve never done. Hey, Alexa. Who’s the founder of Theranos? Great. Alexa don’t even know. Could you hear her?

Joon Han [44:07]

Yeah, I could. That’s cool.

Mario Fachini [44:11]

What the heck? I’ll tell you what, we’re going to thank our sponsor and we’ll figure it out by the time we get back.

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Mario Fachini [44:55]

And we are back with the Imperfect Action Round. And today’s special password, keyword, special reference, whatever you want to call it – I’m making all this up – her name is Elizabeth Holmes.

Joon Han [45:07]

Yeah. That’s her. That’s her. At 19 years old. Awesome.

Mario Fachini [45:12]

Thank you, Google. And now I’m more inclined to hook up the Google Home that’s sitting in the box because, well, you’re useless. All right. First question, what – this was awesome. What is the fastest path to the cash?

Joon Han [45:31]

Like, for me or in life?

Mario Fachini [45:34]

For your prospects.

Joon Han [45:35]

For our prospects, if you have a very, very defined niche. I think that’s the hardest thing for entrepreneurs to do, is to really niche down. Because you feel like you’re leaving money on the table. But here in San Diego, we have a world famous example of niche which is Comic Con. There’s 140,000 attendees. It sells out in two minutes every year. But they’ve never moved off of their niche. And so I think the hardest thing for entrepreneurs – Mario, if I was to ask any of your listeners say, “Hey, who’s your ideal client?” They would say kind of like something somebody I might know. Who woke up this morning praying to God that they would meet you? There is a person that meets that criteria. They are very, very likely to buy. But I think, unfortunately, most people don’t know who that is.

Mario Fachini [46:27]

Very well said. Number two, what is the biggest problem you see your prospects making and the fastest way they can fix it?

Joon Han [46:38]

Yeah. I think the biggest problem, I’ll say with people like AwesomeGuests, is that they’re trained by things like LinkedIn and Facebook trying to put all the best envious parts of yourself out there. But to really be good at podcasting, you’ve got to share your stories about your warts so that people can identify with that the zero to hero narrative arc. So if you always going to cost to the hero, it’s never going to work for you in podcasting. In podcasting, you’ve got to show up with a story that tells people where you were at zero and then how you kind of grew out of that. And so, again, that’s why on our platform, people are allowed to put in or should put in as many things as possible. But one of the things we see is, most guests experts are only putting the good things about themselves and not the things that make them really more interesting.

Mario Fachini [47:32]

So like you were saying earlier and I wanted to ask you but, again, you were doing so well, I didn’t want to ruin the flow. But the podcast when you made the comment about Mr. Public Speaker, it sounds like you’re saying that podcasting is more conversational. Where public speaking, you kind of got to do the acting show piece kind of deal.

Joon Han [47:55]

Yeah. It definitely is more of like when you’re speaker guy, you are trying to exude in your presentation and even your articulation this expertise. But in the podcasting medium, your expertise gets revealed by your vulnerability, by your authenticity. So less performance, more genuine vulnerability and things like that. Yeah.

Mario Fachini [48:23]

All right. Number three, what is the best way to maximize customer lifetime value?

Joon Han [48:31]

Yeah. I think if you know who your ideal customer is, then you basically only listen to them. You don’t listen to the naysayers, the haters. You don’t listen to your maybe customer. You listen to your ideal customer. And lots of people, once we get the sale, we stop asking them. Because we’re just like, “Well, we got money. Relationships over.” But then you ask, “Hey, Mario. So now that you bought this thing, how’s it going?” But you do it more than just once. The typical way you do is like a net promoter score, on a scale of 1 to 10, how likely you’d recommend us to friend or colleague? Why or why not? That’s the part that a lot of people leave out why or why not. So if I say, “Well, if you’d recommend AwesomeGuests?” You’re like, “Well, yeah. Well, I give it a seven.” Okay. Well, that’s not that’s not a ten so why or why not? And you would say, whatever, whatever. “Oh, those are future products and services.” And so we even know, like in our company, we have a map of features that we’re rolling out and it’s all data driven. It’s all about people saying, like, “I’m trying to do this. The site is not quite doing that.” So we know what we’re going to roll out. We’re not just guessing. So that’s the key to lifetime customer value is you lock in your loyalty by just having a good authentic feedback relationship.

Mario Fachini [49:47]

And I think it’s so important that you’re sharing that, getting the feedback from your customers. And I’m thinking of the story you shared just a bit ago when you’re going – when you’re talking to the lady from NPR at the event and she’s going, “Well, we’d never use that because we already get so many requests and this would just amplify that.” Well, check out this new feature where you can browse in stealth mode. “Oh, we’re going to sign up for this.” And also a great success story for you too. Because it’s like, when you know what your customers want and you give it to them – I mean, it’s not rocket science. I can help you this way.

Joon Han [50:26]

But I think that the hard part is to – even back when we ran our strategy company, we only needed, like, 14 clients a year. So we’re not talking like high volume. But when someone didn’t choose us, when someone didn’t accept our proposal for services, we ask the same question, on a scale of 1 to 10, how likely you’ll recommend us?  And so it’s interesting. I’ll tell you the story. Someone gave us a 10. They would, on a 10, recommend us. But they didn’t hire us. I’m like, “That’s a huge disconnect. Why is that?” They said, “Well, because in order to hire you ,we have to put down 20 percent up front. And we just don’t have that kind of money. If you had a payment plan, we would hire you right away.” I never thought like for a $90,000 service, we should do a payment plan. Because I was like, “You either have the money or you don’t.” But I asked that question for a sale that we didn’t get. And then we ended up getting that sale because he’s like, “Well, yeah. If you just had payment plans.” “Well, what do you mean payment plan?” We can’t start working with you until we have 20 percent banked in.” And then he was like, “Well, that’s fine. Let me start paying towards that though every month.” And we never would have figured that out on our own ever.

Mario Fachini [51:41]

So you didn’t get started on the service but you let them start paying for it until they hit that threshold then you started the services?

Joon Han [51:49]

Absolutely. Yep.

Mario Fachini [51:51]

That’s very valuable feedback.

Joon Han [51:53]

Yeah. Because that’s like a consultant, we never gave people access to our calendar to even start scheduling time until they put down 20 percent. Because why am I going to give you time in my calendar that someone else can be paying for if you’re not paying for it? Doesn’t make any sense.

Mario Fachini [52:10]

So we got a whole other interview right here. You’re just throwing it all down.

Joon Han [52:16]

Yeah. Well, that’s another life, man. That’s my old life. I don’t want to do it anymore.

Mario Fachini [52:20]

Valuable tips though. Expert Authority tips. I love the insight.  What is a book you would recommend to Expert Authority World?

Joon Han [52:31]

My favorite book for entrepreneurs is Great by Choice. It’s from the same author Jim Collins, Good to Great. But Good to Great was really written for large companies, like Fortune sized companies. It’s a book on leadership. Where Great by Choice is a great book for entrepreneurs. And Jim Collins is smart. He wrote it when the economy was tanking and more people were getting laid off and starting their own companies. And so it’s an academic read just like a Good to Great is. But man, I give out three books like candy. Anytime I do a workshop for entrepreneurs, I give out three books. I give out Great by Choice. I give out the Emyth Revisited by Michael Gerber. And I give out Everybody Writes by Ann Handley, which is the best marketing book, bar none, on the planet. Very practical. It’s not about marketing strategy. It’s how to actually do marketing. But those three books are my go to’s for anyone that wants to become better at what they do.

Mario Fachini [53:29]

Well, I appreciate that. And you’re making this super easy. I had a feeling you had more than one and I was going to say if you want to give a couple, like three. Perfect.

Joon Han [53:38]

Yeah. Yeah. That’s it. Those are my go to.

Mario Fachini [53:42]

You are awesome. I have thoroughly enjoyed this. I can’t wait to see you again at the next event. Where can people learn more about you and sign up for awesome guests?

Joon Han [53:50]

Yeah. I mean, to learn about me, just look up – you can look at my TED Talk. Just look up TED, Get Ahead By Giving Back. You can find me on LinkedIn, J-O-O-N – I think – you put that in the shownotes. I’m pretty sure I’m the only Joon out there. And then yeah, AwesomeGuests. They can always take a look. But I would recommend them to go through the link that you put in the show notes because it will send them to a specific page just for your listeners.

Mario Fachini [54:14]

Excellent. Well, thanks so much Joon. It’s been a pleasure. I definitely had a lot of fun. And you shared some really great Expert Authority insights. So thank you.

Joon Han [54:23]

Yeah, I appreciate it. Thanks for letting me serve your audience and hope to hear some great feedback in the future from the different comments and all that stuff.

Mario Fachini [54:30]

All right. Expert Authority World, we have another great episode here. I hope you had as much fun as I did. We’ll see you on tomorrow. Have a great day. And God bless.

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www.EAInterviews.com [54:55]

Hey, thanks for listening to today’s episode. I hope you got a lot out of it. I know I sure did. If you haven’t done so already, I invite you to subscribe to the show. And also be sure to check out EAInterviews.com for complete show notes, the full interview video experience, links to the resources we mentioned, and more. Have a blessed day and I’ll see you tomorrow.