My guest today is Scotty Russell who is the founder of the Perspective Collective. In this episode, we discuss Scotty's struggle in the early years when starting Perspective Collective Podcast, overcoming the urge to quit, nailing down the audience avatar, disadvantages of comparing yourself to the top creators, dealing with bullies/haters, power of working out, letting go of creative control as you scale, building your side business while at your day job, conducting podcast interviews during corporate job lunch break, getting laid off after buying a new home, golden handcuffs, hiring coaches to level up, like-know-trust-loop and much more! For show notes, guest bio, and more, please visit: www.designmba.show Level Up Your Design Career (Free Email Course): https://levelup.designmba.show/
Scotty Russell is an artist, designer, coach, podcaster, and speaker working under the name Perspective-Collective. He’s also an outer space, pizza loving cat dad, AND human dad based in Cedar Falls, Iowa. After 5.5 years working of building his creative side hustle outside his Corporate Cubicle, he made the full-time shift to Side Hustle Coach in January 2020. His mission is to help creatives blaze their own path to side hustle success outside their day job through his weekly Perspective Podcast, Side Hustler’s Coaching Program, and digital resources.
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Jayneil Dalal: Today's amazing guest is Scotty Russell who's an artist, designer, coach, podcaster and speaker working under the name Perspective Collective. He's a loving cat dad and a human dad based in Cedar Falls, Iowa. After 5.5 years working on building his creative side hustle outside his corporate cubicle, he made the full-time shift to side hustle coach in January 2020. His mission is to help creatives blaze their own path to side hustles outside their day job through his weekly Perspective podcast, side hustles coaching program and digital resources.
Scotty, it's a pleasure. Thank you so much for coming on the show, man.
Scotty Russell: Of course, man. I appreciate you having me.
Jayneil: Yeah, dude. It’s just like I saw that post you had on LinkedIn that you shared about the pain it took you to kind of get to where your podcast is now. So, quick check. How many downloads does the podcast have now?
Scotty: I guess, as we're recording this, about half a million.
Jayneil: That is insane.
Scotty: But nobody listened in the first two years. So, there's a lot of things I did wrong that I’ve been figuring out over the years in terms of like a marketing standpoint of this.
Jayneil: Yeah. Of the top of your head, what are some of the things you would do again, when you said like some of the things you did wrong?
Scotty: Okay, this works for like everything, being clear and concise. Nobody knows what the hell Perspective Podcast means. So, immediately in the title I got to make people guess. So, I have to tag on a sub tagline “creative fuel for your mind and grind”. So, be clear and concise. Don't be clever and cute. This works for anything whether you're naming your business, your Instagram handle, your bio, whatever it is, clear and concise. When you confuse, you lose. And I knew what I kind of wanted to talk about was just like motivating creatives because that's what I need and so, I guess, I would just share kind of what I was learning along the way, what my lost self needed five years ago but from there, I needed to know like who my work was for, who my perfect listener was. And for everybody else listening, maybe you don't have a podcast but it's who's your perfect follower, who's your perfect client, who's your perfect reader of your blog, who's your perfect watcher of your YouTube channel. I didn't have like that avatar set. Over the years, I’ve just kind of like figured it out because I continued to show up sometimes turning off the creative switch and turning on the marketing switch. So, that's a lot of things I would learn from the beginning if I was to do it over and help someone else start a podcast.
Jayneil: Wow! And how many downloads do you recall in the first two years when you were not happy with numbers?
Scotty: Let's see. I had probably 100,000 within two years. It started picking up towards the end of like the second year and then going to the third year, things started picking up.
Jayneil: Wow! So, in the first year, I’m assuming that downloads were not that high.
Scotty: No, honestly, I couldn't even go back and tell you. It was sad. My mom wasn't even listening in the beginning but I just showed up and just started doing. It would have been August 12, 2016, and I’d been sitting on the idea for four months I wanted to do a podcast. I gave my first big talk at a conference earlier that year Creative South. Everybody came up to me like “You should start a podcast.” And honestly, I was just really, really scared to do it, imposter syndrome, judgment. I played a lot of Pokémon Go that summer so it distracted me but, yeah, I’ve been doing it pretty much 90% of the time weekly since.
Jayneil: Wow! You got the voice too.
Scotty: I don't like the sound of my voice. So, it's nice to hear someone else say that. I hate the sound of my voice, hate being on camera. So, this is all continually just uncomfortable.
Jayneil: Wow! So, you started in August 2016, till December you're not getting the numbers, your mom is not listening to it. Did the talk come like “You know, maybe I should just stop this. What am I doing?” Did those thoughts of second guessing yourself and just quitting come to your mind?
Scotty: Every week still to this week, always. It's too easy to get wrapped up when someone else is big podcasting like I don't have their numbers but then you lose sight that someone else just starting off, wish they were where I’m at. So, it's just put your head down and grind. And I figured out I find my voice, my message a little bit more each time I show up and I understand who's on the other side listening as I continue to show up. So, I just keep going deeper. Instead of trying to go for width and cast a wide net, just going deeper. Creative side hustlers, that's who it's for.
Jayneil: So, I’m looking at your numbers and I’m like “Damn, dude. I mean, I got to get to that half a million” and you're looking at maybe Joe Rogan like “Holy shit!” That's like so …
Scotty: Yeah, Joe Rogan or Andy J. Miller created pep talk. He's pretty much the don in this industry. So, it's like I can't pay attention to that. And I personally don't even try to pay attention to numbers. It's bigger than that. I’m trying to connect with someone, one person at a time. That's what it's about.
Jayneil: One person at a time. I love it. And now, I look at you, you're working out, I mean you're, like a buff dude. I mean, people can't see. I can't imagine like you were bullied at some point.
Scotty: Oh, yeah, man. I had a rough go-around from elementary. I even had like bullies as coaches all the way through college football too. So, I’ve always had some type of bully, some type of hater. My brothers would kick my ass growing up too. So, it's like I’d get beat up at home and then go to school and get beat up. So, getting into sports and hitting the weights really helped me out mentally and physically for people not messing with me anymore.
Jayneil: If I see you in the streets, dude, I would have think twice before even considering the idea of bullying you.
Scotty: Good. I don't want to be that intimidating. I want to be approachable still. So, that's my sanctuary, man. That's my me time. After we get off the call, I’m going to go hit the weights too. Yeah, that's my peace. Lifting weights and meditating, that's what it is for me.
Jayneil: You work out every day?
Scotty: Five days a week. I hit those weekends but we got the kiddos at home. So, that's dad mode, husband mode.
Jayneil: Damn, man.
Scotty: Try it.
Jayneil: That's insane. I have a lot of friends too, and maybe this is an observation that I’ve seen, you get married, you have kids, I mean, I’m not married, but I mean, you have kids and then suddenly the working out and stuff takes second priority and then you lose all the gains and stuff. So, it's really admirable that you're still sticking to it like “Oh, I got to work out no matter what.”
Scotty: If I don't, I notice a significant difference in my self-esteem, my attitude, how I treat other people. It even shows up in my work, my energy, my motivation. So, you can't pour from an empty cup and this fills my cup, for sure.
Jayneil: That's deep. I think that's meditation kicking in.
Scotty: Yeah, trying to feel enlightened and keep shit as real as possible here. Can I swear? I already am.
Jayneil: Yeah, that's fine.
Scotty: Okay.
Jayneil: I’m just going to put an ‘E’ next to the episode.
Scotty: That's fine. Yeah, that's part of my brand. It used to not be though. I used to filter it all out and pretend to be someone else.
Jayneil: Are you still editing those podcast episodes yourself or do you have like a …
Scotty: Thank God, I have a wonderful woman in Ireland named Anna Brennan and she's been editing. I edited for the first year and then I hired someone. So, yeah, this is just too much with kids and I had a day job and I was freelancing, speaking, selling online stuff. I was just doing too much. So, I had to get stuff off my plate. It's hard to delegate but it frees me up to focus on bigger picture tasks, stuff that can bring in more income too, since I do this now full time.
Jayneil: Man, I can't agree more. I probably spent the first couple of episodes editing myself and then Tony Daussat who runs Experience Design but now rebranded to Liftoff, he's the one who got me started and he's like “Dude, you need to stop editing it yourself” because I was so much into editing out every single “um”, “so”, “you know”, it sounds so robotic. And now, the best thing is now I have almost one year's worth of podcast content edited and ready to go and it feels like so liberating that I’m able to talk with you and not worry when the hell am I going to edit your episode and stuff like that.
Scotty: Yeah, I feel you, man. There's still a lot I need to kick off my plate that I’m slowly trying to get rid of. So, it's harder when I do custom episode artwork or yeah just so many things, it's hard to let go of but I’ve gotten better.
Jayneil: Wow! And then when you started the podcast in 2016, what was the work situation like were you still working full time at that point?
Scotty: I was in a corporate day job. So, yeah, I started it, I was at my day job for about two years already, I started in 2014, corporate, and in 2016 I was at my day job, I literally built a business while at a corporate day job.
Jayneil: Wow! And how did you find the time because, I mean, the typical thing is that you go into 9 a.m. and then you're there till like 5 or 6 p.m. and afterwards when you come out, all that fucking bureaucracy with the corporate day job kind of drains you. So, where did you find time to do the podcasting? Is it weekends?
Scotty: I put my dream first, man. Woke up in the morning.
Jayneil: What time?
Scotty: So, I worked from 7 to 3:30, 4. And so, I’d wake up. Man, there were mornings I’d get up at 4 a.m. to grind on my own stuff, especially if it was a launch or like a coaching program coming up or whatever it was or a product release, whatever it was. So, I’d wake up, put my dream first, clock in my dream before I went and clocked in and invested my time into someone else's. And then I’d get two 10-minute breaks at my day job, 10 a.m. and at 3 p.m. I would do something there, whether it's like post on social media, respond back to comments, connect with students, whatever it was, get back to DMs. And then on lunch break, I would work again whether it's work on episode artwork or whatever moves need to be made. Clock out, go to the gym quick, come back into family mode and before I had a kid, I would work a little bit at night and then after I had kids, I would put my kid down and grind a little bit more at night, plan my next day but early mornings changed the game for me and making sure I always had a plan, always making sure my week and my next day is always planned. That's so important.
Jayneil: So, what time did you wake up today?
Scotty: Today? 6, got my kid ready for daycare. Now that I get to do my thing full time, I don't have to wake up at the butt crack of dawn anymore. So, sometimes it's 5, sometimes it's 6 but like 6 o'clock is good. If I can get started at 7, grind my little biscuits off until about 2:30, go to the gym from 2:30 to 4, go pick my kiddo up from daycare, then it's back to husband dad mode after that.
Jayneil: I’m still trying to get to your level. I’m not there yet. I woke up at like 8:30 or 9 a.m. today.
Scotty: Do you have a day job or you do your thing full time?
Jayneil: So, now I’m doing my thing full time. I left my job at AT&T on June 20th. And since then, what I’m doing is I teach at Career Foundry. So, I start teaching from 1 p.m. to 10 p.m. Monday to Thursday. And then Friday is just my side hustle day where I just focus on the podcast. And then during the day Monday to Thursday and before 1 p.m., I also have podcast interviews and stuff.
Scotty: So, yeah, you got a routine. Basically, I realized shit wasn't popping off for me and I wasn't seeing progress. I was getting too wrapped up in what everyone else is doing, everybody else's wins. It’s because I’d show up and wing it each day. One, I didn't know what I wanted. Two, I didn't take myself seriously. And when you don't take yourself seriously, no one's going to take you seriously. So, it's more just a mindset shift and knowing what you want and then making time for it because you get people … I’d say the biggest struggle that people tell me, creatives tell me they struggle with is not having the time to grind, they're too busy. And I realized when you say you're too busy, really what you're saying is your dream is not a priority to you. And it's a simple mindset shift in when you treat your side hustle it's your full-time grind, people from the outside are going to be like “Whoa! I didn't realize you had a day job.” That's how it was for me my first couple years. People didn't know I had a day job. I’m like “Okay, I need to talk about this more.” And eventually, when I got let go last November from my safe day job with massive corporate cuts, I wasn't ready to make the full-time leap, I was probably thinking I was like two years away but I was prepared because I showed up, I knew how to get up and do shit when it wasn't convenient, I know how to put in the work, I know how to put in the sacrifice. And so, when I lost my job and made the leap, it's like “Oh shit! now I got way more time to focus on my dream during the week” than what I had before of 10 hours, 15 max during the week” after I had kids.
Jayneil: But, Scotty, when you were going for the corporate job last year, you had a mortgage and you have two kids and you're married. So, there's a lot of financial …
Scotty: It's crazy. This is what's crazy. His life was going great, just launched a coaching program, did a first live podcast at a conference, found out we had kiddo number two coming along the way all late September, early October and job, I just got a raise making 61,000, I keep saying 59,000, but 61,000 thousand as a UI/UX senior designer and my wife and I, towards the end of October, we're like “Yo, we need a new house.” We expanded a new house, sold our house within 24 hours, landed the next one within three days later, finalized on it, doubled our mortgage and we're like “Wow, this has all gone so quickly,” riding a high and then a week later I lost my job.
Jayneil: Damn!
Scotty: And it's like wow, okay, you never know when the rugs get to be pulled out from under you. So, it was scary, dude. I was freaking out thinking that I was just about to lose this new house, get my family on the streets somehow, how am I going to make extra income and I was thinking I was going to apply for a day job too for like an agency job or for another web design job. I had my close friends, I talked to them, called one dude, it was basically Peter [inaudible], our homie, he was like “Yo, honestly, your web design work sucks. Why aren't you doing more custom illustration and branding and lettering?” So, I built a whole portfolio before I even decided to pull the trigger to do my thing full time with the push of my friends and my wife, my wife especially, the one who probably should be more scared than I am. They're all like “Dude, you haven't been building your side hustle this long for no reason.” You want to talk numbers. I made 35,000 last year with my side hustle as opposed to 61,000 with the day job. So, imagine if I had all this extra time. I had a program coming up. I had ideas for products. I just didn't have the time to do it all. So, I said “Fuck it,” pulled the trigger. My severance package ended January 11 this year. So, technically, that's the day I went full time but that summarizes it. just I don't want people to think I quit and I made the leap on my own terms because I was ready. It was definitely a leap, scary, it's still scary, back is against the wall every day but I love that shit.
Jayneil: Holy shit! I mean, it's just insane. Think about it because, I mean, mine was a similar path like when I left from AT&T, I got a severance, I was able to negotiate that. So, the thinking at that time was scary and coming from Indian family like my mom's freaking out, she's like “What the hell is wrong with you?” and stuff but that one year before, so what happened was in 2019, I was trying to like get that severance but I couldn't get it because one of my best buddies left for Amazon. So, they're like “We don't need to give you the severance” because he just left on his own. So, at that point, I was so frustrated and that is the point when I started to think about “I need to diversify my sources of income. I can't just depend on one tap,” if you may. So, I grew the teaching business to now where it's like hundred plus students. So, when all this shit happened at work I was like “Well, you know what, let me see what happens now till the end of December this year.” And I think just like your friends did, my friends were like “Listen, Jayneil, you can always go back to a full-time job in January like it's not going anywhere but this time is so precious. Don't waste it.”
Scotty: Especially like in a pandemic, coming up, you couldn't foresee this. And had I went and pursued another full-time job and started something new at the beginning of the year and then I’ve been a low man on a totem pole or had I like pursued full-time freelance, all my clients would have been gone, I hadn't been freelancing a while just because it didn't light me up but now you're putting yourself in a service with the educational side of business and providing value to people in an online format, you're pandemic proof right now. So, there's never been a better time to invest in yourself and pursue a side hustle because you never know what it could evolve into or it could save your ass and that's what I’m big about. I’m very passionate about getting people like that started. So, you did yourself a favor.
Jayneil: Oh thanks, man. I think the biggest thing I learned, as I was talking to this person, he was asking me about podcasting and we're just chatting about the lessons we both were learning and the biggest struggle that I saw is when I worked in corporate America, the issue is they own my calendar. Like you said, you can wake up at the crack of dawn and do it but the issue was if I had scheduled a meeting with you when I was still having my day job, the most embarrassing thing would be I would have to like go to that obviously the work meeting, I can't just ignore it, but then I would have to write to you like “Hey, Scotty, I’m so sorry. I’m going to have to cancel our interview.” So, I think that was the biggest issue for me is like trying to get guests on the show and then control my calendar. So, when you started launching the podcast, were you just recording all these interviews on Saturday or were you doing it during the work day?
Scotty: Shit! When I first started, it was solo, just solo episodes. I was blogging a year before that.
Jayneil: Oh yeah.
Scotty: And nobody read. And so, I would just like turn these blog posts into episodes. And I still do solo episodes but dude, when I started, my kid wasn't born, he was born in 2018, I started in 2016, I started doing interviews 2017 and, honestly, most of my interviews, all came over my lunch period at my day job. So, I scramble home and get everything set up. I’d have constraints. Luckily, I lived really, really close to home but I had to like get on, get a guest. If there's technical difficulties, well, that just means our interview got cut a little bit shorter. So, I worked within my constraints and I always tried to keep weekends open because nobody wants to record on a weekend. So, I did everything on lunch breaks for podcasts. I’m four years into it. So, three years, everything was on a lunch break for a podcast. I built a fucking podcast over lunch break. That's crazy when you say it that way. That's pretty crazy.
Jayneil: Oh my God! That's an amazing time of building podcasts over corporate break.
Scotty: Right? I like what you said also, I had to write it down for a note but a day job owns your calendar. And that's true but at the same time, people glorify doing your thing full time and I’m like “Dude, this shit's hard.” Luckily, my wife has insurance through her day job but what I teach people, there's nothing wrong with having a day job. A day job will cover your expenses. I teach people how to leverage your day job to fuel your dream job. So, as long as 100% of your expenses are covered, you can take risks and experiment and really grow and scale your thing and find your groove at your own time versus feeling you have to jump right into freelance and you don't have a saving, you don't have clients, you don't have a name, you don't have templates and models and systems set up or feeling like you have to monetize your side hustle right from the jump. I’m not big in that world of taking risks. I like calculated risk. I still go with my gut and intuition often to make sure I’m not digging myself a hole financially or having to go into debt just to survive. I’m not a big fan of just taking a leap without having your ducks in a row. So, there's nothing wrong with a day job and that's what I teach my students. It's like this is how you leverage your day job to fuel your dream job. What skills aside from covering your expenses can you get? Everything took off for me when I learned of Creative South in 2015. All my Instagram friends or my friends I had never met before were all going to it, everybody was talking about it. And so, I wrote up a proposal to my day job to sponsor me to send me off to this conference. I’m really good at selling – “Hey, I’m going to take these workshops on logo design, icon design. Here's the speakers I really want to attend” when really I was hardcore into hand lettering at that time and go catch up with some new homies for work to sponsor and send me and continue to invest in other things, send me to other conferences or invest in other resources so I could grow my craft. And that's just the way I leveraged from the day job. I call it stealing from your day job but really you're not. I took on a web design role so I could learn CSS and learn HTML so I can do it on my own site. So, that's just ways of leveraging your day job to fuel your dream job aside from just covering expenses. I think that's important to talk about.
Jayneil: It is, it is. And I think one of the things I always try to caution myself is not getting high on the corporate paycheck. I was talking with a buddy of mine, he's in Silicon Valley and the thing is he's always been entrepreneurial, wanted to work at startups and when I talked to him, he was like “Man, I need more stability.” And he got married and stuff. So, suddenly what happens is I feel unless somebody's like got this written down like “Okay, I’m going to do my side hustle,” when you're getting paid like at these Fang or Amazon and Googles of the world like 200,000 dollars a year and stuff …
Scotty: It's golden handcuffs.
Jayneil: Yeah, it's like why would you want to leave and stuff with all the stock options resting. It's really hard to just get out of that amazing paycheck and do your own thing. So, I think that was something that I notice in both of our paths is that life made a choice for us. It's like we both were hesitating in a way like “Should I?” and then boom! Things just aligned. So, when you launched the side hustle coaching program, did you had already like prototyped the idea before, done some beta testing if this is going to sell out or not or what was your thinking behind launching that program?
Scotty: Yeah. So, if we were to rewind, early 2019 I did four fucking important things, oh my God, with my homie Tom Ross from Design Cuts, Entrepreneur Guy, Biz Buds, [inaudible] whatever but he helped me niche down into becoming a side hustle coach. I felt super gross but I’m like everybody in my audience wants to know how to grow their creative side hustle, creative business, freelance whatever and how to make more time to do it outside of day job. So, I niched down, still weird, still scary, but now if you think of side hustle, I’m hoping in this creative community, my name comes up first. And from there, I got tired of doing freelance and I got tired of shipping and fulfilling stuff for my online shop. It just wasn't fulfilling and it took time away from like my family. So, those are my two biggest bread earners from my side hustles and went all in on side hustle coaching. And I started off with just like five prototype offerings, five one-on-one sessions for a hundred dollars, offered them and within 10 minutes they were sold out and I’m like “Whoa! This is something here. How do I scale it?” And then enter um a coach of mine. I’m a big believer in like woo-woo stuff like 11-11 or the universe, law of attraction. And in with the breeze came a good friend of mine that I had met over the years through hand lettering and she's also a coach, her name is Maida Leon, and she becomes a coach of mine and she kind of helped me build out a way to scale these one-on-one calls into a group coaching program.
Jayneil: Oh, I see.
Scotty: This would have been like May, not 2019. We worked together for like six months. Behind the scenes I was just building out this coaching program, formatting, launching, copywriting, email marketing, drip campaigns, podcast episodes, you name it, just building a launch around it and it started off with just 10 students for three months, 12-week program, three months Side Hustler’s Coaching Program and God, it was scary. I was going to charge maybe a couple hundred bucks per person and she's like “No, fuck that. You're going to do 2000 per person and wish you charged more” and I’m like “There's no way. There's no way I’m going to fill it.” I still had a poor relationship with money. I started to operate from a mindset of abundance more by my experience in the past, lots of debt, money was hard to make and keep, so don't spend it, frugal and sure shit, I filled up 10 slots, had a bunch of people applying, made 20,000 dollars in a week and I’ve never done that before even with freelance and I’m like “Whoa! Something's here, you know.” And I did regret not charging more because nine out of the ten people all paid in full with one person with the three-month monthly option. And I learned some of the greatness last year from a marketing workshop, if you're doing some kind of service like this and over 50 of people are doing paid in full, that means there's room to scale your rates. So, I raised it another grand. So, this spring, I launched it again, 3 grand per person. And I scaled it up to 12 people. Eight out of 12, they paid in full.
Jayneil: Damn!
Scotty: I’m in the middle of doing my Fall of 2020. I just started it last week. Seven out of 12 people paid in full.
Jayneil: Wow!
Scotty: So, there's room to grow up but I inject even more value. I find ways to go all out and I show up, man. I invest 120% in this stuff but that first time around making 20 grand in a week and I made 15K earlier in the year with affiliates and sponsors or freelance, so at the end when I’m like “Wow! I made 35K this year and I lost my job.” I got a coaching program I’m starting. Here again, I’m doing it Spring and Fall, Spring and Fall. That could be take the full-time leap into coaching versus freelancer, getting a day job and maybe that can cover six months of expenses as well as 12 weeks of maternity leave for my wife because she didn't get any. And it did. I kicked the year off making 36K, already surprised from my side hustle. So, this shit doesn't happen overnight. I’ve been putting in the work, side hustling for five and a half years, figuring out what worked, what didn't work. So, that's the honest numbers. I think people don't talk numbers and just making that 20K radically changed my relationship with money, my abundance of money like I’m a fucking money magnet, an opportunity is going to come my way always. I’m an opportunist. Everything's an opportunity now not to be a snake oil salesman. That's whack. I don't sell stuff I don't believe in but I’m very in tuned with who my perfect listener, perfect person, perfect fan, perfect follower, perfect client is and tap into what their biggest struggles are. And so, I’m creating assets and resources that serve them what they need. So, I’m creating stuff that provides someone value to help them blow up their side hustle so they too can take the leap full time if that's what they wish. So, I’m very, very hyper targeted in what I’m putting on to the world and what I’m selling.
Jayneil: Man! But I think what gives you the confidence in a way is … I mean, obviously you've sold out three of these cohorts for your Side Hustler’s Coaching Program but would you say that because of your built-in network with the podcast and all the drip campaigns, you already have a steady stream of followers.
Scotty: Yeah, I took a slow and steady grind and I built a brand. In a marketing world it's all about like, know, and trust. The more people like you, the more people know you, the more they're going to trust, which people are going to buy from you. I put a lot of focus on building community. Shit! I’m even working on my first video course behind the scenes right now to launch this year. I’ve never done a video course but it's all about how to build an engaged community around your work and convert fans into customers but I took the time just to give away value, give, give, give, give and pay attention to what people's struggles are, invest in myself and my own personal development to build this and just consistently show up week after week for five and a half years. A lot of shit can happen. It's a microwave society where people are wanting results overnight – “I want to be a tick-tock star overnight”, “Oh my God, this person's video. They've been on tick tock for a month and they got million views.” I’m not about that culture. That's not what I teach. That's not what I believe in. And so, my style isn't for everyone.
Jayneil: Yeah, you're about more with the long game it seems, not like “Yeah, go to the gas station. Let me get that power lotto ticket.”
Scotty: And if you can do it, that's fine but I see most people flop and most people just aren't ready to put in the time and I’m about like sustainability. That way, long-term, you can win, you can survive and thrive doing your thing that you love full-time while still making an impact on other people. That's what I’m about. This isn't like short bursts of quick money schemes or stuff.
Jayneil: With the video course, did you already know video editing, I mean, shooting and stuff?
Scotty: Very, very minimum basically but, again, I got a coach and she's a wizard at copywriting, email marketing and launching courses and just launching products in general. So, I’m on my third time with her, paying a pretty penny, she probably doesn't want me to say her rate because I know it's gone up but I’ve been grandfathered in, say it's multiple thousands but it's worth it like I’ve always gotten more bang for my buck back like huge ROI and that's why I’m a believer. I’m a coach who will always have a coach like why invest in a coach who doesn't have a coach. How's anybody going to take me seriously if I don't have a coach? So, I’m a big believer. I put my money where my mouth is. Coaching changed my life. So, I know my coaching can help radically change someone else's creative side hustle.
Jayneil: Wow! You're going to pretty much edit the video yourself too.
Scotty: Yeah, I’m going to keep it super simple, value driven but just like screen recordings and stuff. I know how to use all the Adobe Suite Premier. So, I’ll get the first one down just like I started the podcast first on my own and then when I’m ready for my next course, I’ll relaunch it bigger and better, I’ll hire an editor for sure but I want to understand the first time around. That way I have a better way of working with someone else to explain what I want.
Jayneil: Yeah, I kind of noticed that, I think, because I also tried to edit some of my episodes myself, I heard myself speak. So, I could understand how can I become a little bit better at interviewing. And if my editor is on a leave or on vacation, at least I’m not stranded.
Scotty: Exactly, exactly. So, you got to back up to back up your backup plan.
Jayneil: Oh my God!
Scotty: Yeah. I think it's important to get in the trenches first even if you just edit your first couple episodes or whatever it is just to understand before you delegate. I think that's important. That maybe not for everyone, especially if you're like a huge like Joe Rogan or Lewis Howes, you don't have the time for that but if you built that celebrity status, you built that brand early on, you can get past that but, yeah, I want to help people build their personal brand in a sense, their creative personal brand in business.
Jayneil: That's insane.
Scotty: And grow like a like-minded tribe around people who give a fuck and care about what they're doing and the human behind it. That's cool. That's cool to me.
Jayneil: Wow! Now, again, sort of like these macro influencers, I definitely feel that we're going to this age of like micro influencers where first you had all these like Tik-Tok stars that millions of people are following but now it's going to the age where people don't want to go to that main person like the don f the industry who's got like millions of following. They want to go to Scotty. They want to have like more intimate one-on-one.
Scotty: Fingers crossed. That's what they want to go to. Yeah, I believe in the personal side of a personal brand, for sure. I want to have a genuine connection with people in my life. I’m not worried about having hundreds and thousands or millions of followers. I don't care about that. Have you heard of the concept of thousand true fans from Kevin and Kennedy? To me, that's what I’m all about, man. I want to know that what I’m putting out there resonates with a core amount of people who vibe to what I’m putting out and give a shit about me. I make a good living. I’ve doubled my income from what I made as a salary last year doing the work I love for the people I give a shit about the most. To me, that's dope. I don't know if I’ll make millions doing it. Who knows? I’m never ruling it out yeah but, yeah, that's my mindset about it.
Jayneil: I love it, man. I was just thinking about a lot of the advice you said about the course. So, right now, the podcast is going strong. The next thing I’ve been working on behind the scenes is trying to launch my blog. So, this is designMBA.show, the podcast. Then I’m going to launch the blog designer MBA, the blog, just as a way to write essays that stay for a long time, just my thought process, and then the thing was for me to launch my own course. And, obviously, the fear is that, obviously, I don't have a following like you built yet.
Scotty: Yes, keyword. Good. I’m glad your mind is on that and be like “I don't have a big following like you” but no, the yet is the most important because your brain's already anticipating that you will. It's just a matter of your reality aligning with your mindset.
Jayneil: Thank you so much, dude. I can already feel this juice flowing from my creative mind and grind, as you always say in your podcast.
Scotty: Yeah, that's sort of the … I mean, yeah, it'll come. There's always something like if you work towards something and you believe you're working towards something big, that thing is like working back towards you. Law of attraction. Woo-woo stuff but it's fucking real, man.
Jayneil: So, everybody that's come on the show, I’ve gifted them a copy of a favorite book that has changed my life. And since you're talking about this woo-woo stuff, after our interview, I’m going to ask you for your mailing address and I’m going to send you this book that's called … let me just make sure I get the name right. It was published in, I think, somewhere around the 1800s or something. So, I really like those kinds of books because if they have stood the time for that long, it just tells me that they're going to last longer but the book is by Florence Shinn, called The Game of Life And How To Play It. And that's what I’m going to be sending you. And one of the things that I really liked in the book was … I mean, it talks about the law of attraction and all these things but the thing that it really talks about is what people and creatives don't understand, it's like you might have seen the creators downplay themselves like “Oh, I’m not a good designer,” “Oh, I will never make money at it.”
Scotty: It's the inner critic, man.
Jayneil: Yeah but the thing is the universe is so powerful that it picks up on those words. So, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy like “I’m not going to be successful.”
Scotty: Yes. The more you keep saying that you're broke like I did for 20 something years, you're manifesting more brokeness into your life. How could this day get any worse and then you go and stub your fucking toe. Yeah. Oh man, I’ll read the shit out of it and I’ll give you a [inaudible].
Jayneil: Yeah. So, that book was amazing. What advice would you give right now to all the people who are in corporate America right now thinking about pursuing their day job and they don't see light at the end of the tunnel, what would you tell them?
Scotty: Imagine when you're on your deathbed, you're about to croak and you're looking back on the rest of your life, do you want to look back right now on this moment and be like “Damn! I never gave myself a shot. I listened to the inner critic. I played it safe, didn't rattle my comfort cage because I was too worried about failing, too worried about letting someone else down, too worried about what other people would think.” You can't make everyone happy. You are not pizza. That's my motto. You can't be people pleasers. When you die, did you spend your entire life building up someone else's dream instead of investing in yours until life finally began when you were in your 60s and you got to retire, that's when life started for you because you never know if you'll get to make it. So, if you're on your deathbed, are you going to regret this moment by not taking the time or making time or carving out time to invest in what's most important to you.
Jayneil: Wow! That is so deep orbit but true. That is really true I think most people don't really think about these things. It’s more about just like “Oh, let's just cash in the paycheck and …”
Scotty: Go home and watch cat videos on YouTube and binge shameless on Netflix or something.
Jayneil: It definitely takes some kind of like realization, I think, to come to that point. How can people find you and how can people connect with you?
Scotty: So, website, Perspective-Collective.com. I actually have a free resource for people who are looking to get started in growing a profitable, fulfilling, impactful side hustle. That's over at SideHustleFreedomToolkit.com. You might even have that in your show notes at Perspective Collective, no vowels; on Instagram, just type in “perspective collective”. And if you want a weekly dose of creativity lit under your keister each week, that's at PerspectivePodcast.com.
Jayneil: Awesome. Thank you so much, Scotty, for coming on the show, man. It's been a blast. Appreciate you having me on. Thanks for the opportunity.
If you made it this far, you are what I call a design MBA super fan. And I’ve got a gift for you, my super fan. Head over to designMBA.show where you will find my email address. Email me one thing you learned from this podcast episode and I will get on a 30-minute call with you and help you in your career goals.
See you in the next episode.