POV: You’re Running a $96M / year Business

Who speaks in this episode?

• Noah Kagan (Main speaker)

What is discussed, and when

1. 0:00 – 5:00: AppSumo
2. 5:00 – 10:00: AppSumo, Die With Zero, Reed Hoffman
3. 10:00 – 15:00: AppSumo
4. 15:00 – 20:00: AppSumo
5. 20:00 – 22:47: AppSumo, Die With Zero, Bill Perkins

Notable quotes from "POV: You’re Running a $96M / year Business"

• Your house takes maintenance and your business takes maintenance I would say my job at appsumo is to help make sure that the people working there are living the lives they want to live and I think I used to feel guilty like oh I should be.

  about AppSumo · at 3:09

• Go for a walk and then get back into the appsumo meetings oh this is cool just got a podcast request to go on Masters of scale with Reed Hoffman yes that is sick Reed Hoffman is the founder of LinkedIn he was an early investor in Facebook.

  about Reed Hoffman · at 7:11

• $100 million a year yes and an honorary billionaire check out Bill Perkins he's also written die with zero my favorite book and business check it out right up here Uncle Noah loves you and I'll see you out there pew.

  about Die With Zero · at 22:32

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

• Noah Kagan — Person · Main speaker · 2 mentions
  Narrates a POV 'day in the life' while reflecting on lifestyle design, leadership at AppSumo, content creation, and spending decisions.
  Your house takes maintenance and your business takes maintenance I would say my job at appsumo is to help make sure that the people working there are living the lives they want to live and I think I used to feel guilty like oh I should be.
• Reed Hoffman — Person · Referenced expert · 1 mention · first at 7:20
  Mentioned as the host of 'Masters of Scale' who invited Noah onto the show; used as a credibility/achievement marker in Noah’s reflection on chasing vs. being present.
• Bill Perkins — Person · Referenced author · 1 mention · first at 22:35
  Cited as the author of 'Die with Zero' and recommended as an example of an entrepreneur story to watch/check out; supports Noah’s theme about spending/time and life design.
  Story about an entrepreneur who makes a $100 million a year yes and an honorary billionaire check out Bill Perkins he's also written die with zero my favorite book and business…

Books & papers

• Die With Zero — Book · 2 mentions · first at 6:38

Companies & orgs

• AppSumo — Company · 16 mentions · first at 2:18

Full transcript with timestamps

0:00 POV Day in the Life $100 million CEO I'm not even super rich but I'm at a point where I don't have to do these things it's like business advice in in a sauna you know you do entrepreneurship or you have jobs so you can create a lifestyle if you're worried about the day-to-day of your business there's probably some core issues holy distractions I'm distracted as am I doing what I really want to do or is it because like I'm chasing like more recognition or more fame or more money dude I'm tired I'm starting to get stage fright from expenses how do I say this without sound like a total dick kids these days don't want to be rich all right I think a lot of times I we wake up and I'm like okay we have to go we have to go or well hurry the hell up think of having a little more patience that's my word of the Year and I love having nothing from like when I wake up until noon and that is such a luxury and it's just a really nice time

0:55 to be like okay is there anything I have to get done or want to get done that's outside of the norm or just really let me relax into the day how do I say this without sound like a total I'm not even super rich like I'm trying to also buy a car today for my wife but I'm at a point where I don't have to do these things so it's like what do you really want to be doing and I think this is how all of us live the lives we want to be living where it's do the thing you actually want to be doing but it's like making content I think this is where we get fued up just cuz like you're like hey I want to make content cuz I like sharing what's going on and then it's like well we have to do the content that's going to get a lot of views and I just I'm not as excited to make that video today and you have to balance what you want to make with what people want to watch I do love making content I think it's just

1:34 being like okay you want to make this content or is it just cuz you you have to make it or you're supposed to make it and so I I try to tell myself to just listen to that voice and tempting right because you want the money or you want the views but I think the more that you just stay true to that the better you'll feel and if the views come great and if not you still at least feel good about what you're doing but let's go let's go chill on Thea dude I needed like a little chill sash it's like business advice in in a sauna I wasn't really looking forward to making this video uh and then I was supposed to make another video and then have a podcast and it's just like why you do entrepreneurship or you have jobs so you can create a lifestyle I wanted to just come like relax just like let my mind be empty not have technology not have to do video not have to go into appsumo meetings I think it's tough when

2:20 you wake up and it's like I got all this to do I'm on the phone some slack thing happened an email thing happened this thing went out and it wasn't correct and you kind of just get riled up at least I do and so again my word of the year is patience so trying to just like let's come in let's be patient on these things and then kind of in a woooo way reenter the day and then uh come back I don't know you just I feel brighter what do you really want in this life how do you really want your days to be and be okay if if it's not what others want and if it's not where you want to be just start planting the seeds today to get to that point you know I think people miss that in businesses like absum was 15 years it's not you know it's it's now in high school hating its daddy you can't force a dream onto someone else dad and so be patient that your business takes time to mature you know what it is things take

3:06 maintenance and I think we forget that sometimes our body takes maintenance your house takes maintenance and your business takes maintenance I would say my job at appsumo is to help make sure that the people working there are living the lives they want to live and I think I used to feel guilty like oh I should be at the computer working and I should be doing this like no I want to live how I want to live and within the rest of the company I want everyone else feeling that way too uh that those are my my Ona thoughts of the day is just let go of the attachment of these accomplishments or these identities we think of for ourselves versus what we really feel and what we're aware of in a wake with ourselves and then secondly uh just be grateful and and help all the people that are helping you live your own great life too I wanted to just call out so there's a lady back here helping with the

3:47 pool shout out to her it kind of just makes me realize like we all need people to help us in our lives whether it's to coach us or support us or maybe you hire them to do things for you and so uh sometimes it's just I think that's a lot of SE stuff it's like where are you going and how can you find other people to help you do those things so just want to thank all the people I don't know where she went helping do things uh in my life how do my goals align don't look at me private all right next up uh because my wife wants breakfast and I'm doing it's cool I want to prioritize my family so I'm going to be cooking her some eggs toast uh and some fruta how does this make me feel makes me feel like I'm prioritizing what I said I'd prioritize and taking care of my family makes me feel good about myself like I think we can all do these things like it doesn't you can either make breakfast for someone you can call someone but I

4:41 think it's like one of the things that make you feel selworthy people might be wondering like Hey how do you know how suumo is doing and I would say when you get to higher levels of your business you don't necessar if you're worried about the day-to-day of your business there's probably some like core issues to really focus on one of the ways that helps me at least at that cuz I go in slack and we have a thing called daily pulse and so we can share some of the numbers blurred out and so even from far away just even look far away you see how there's like green check marks I just come to basically make sure it's like everything on track or not and if if there's yellow or red I'm going to go talk to the the person who owns those numbers uh and say hey is everything okay and if not see what's going on if I'm worried about day-to-day like who the people are or how the numbers are doing there's something core that needs

5:28 to be worked out in the business that's why really haven't even checked in or really gotten too involved in abso just yet I'm G to do my journaling uh and then I'll start getting into some of the prep for the abso town hall and checking in on things for absum I'm going to get into writing when I start writing I don't do anything also Isaac is here with me I'm writing out what's been happening really proud of myself for not doing extra filming today which is ironic given this is the film also for pausing the podcast that I didn't want to go out need to make sure it doesn't wear out the team but it's also good to be aligned and check in with how I'm feeling happy I talked to my mom in the morning always plus it is a check-in but that's what she needs and I can do a better job of asking her what's going on in her life busy day with doctors yesterday definitely miss having the assistant do some of this

6:06 work definitely want to get a executive assistant or personal assistant to support a lot of the basic things that I've been doing around the house and scheduling way to take your power back do the content and videos that you want to be doing which videos are those how we launch Bree do which is on track for seven figures my skincare routine Day in the Life videos like this one how are you investing in app sumo's future I'm excited for Neville's bachelor party W woop proud of you for being more mindful about my own weight and working on it day by day exercise mindful eating and consistency is the solution for the results you want in business same for the relationship maf's car is kind of a lot of money at $77,000 it is not cheap at all she's going to love the car worst case scenario we sell it and lose 10K will I notice the money when it's gone no this is die with zero man just definitely need to support on the taxes

6:40 and the accounting side personally feel like not as present are available to do those things in those areas I love the sway of our tree in our backyard so cool to Tri spread roots and with maintenance still grow and get bigger I don't mind these point of view videos it's very met I'm writing about it that's okay they have to record four sometimes and just dial it in things I'm looking forward to this week ride with Ian massagi appsumo H2 meeting and my wife pregnancy class and nightly walks all things good # morning Pages now we're going to go upstairs do a little bit of prep work for the appsumo meeting finish up the million dooll weekend videos I might take a break and play Pinball and then go for a walk and then get back into the appsumo meetings oh this is cool just got a podcast request to go on Masters of scale with Reed Hoffman yes that is sick Reed Hoffman is the founder of LinkedIn

7:25 he was an early investor in Facebook he's literally a legend in Silicon Valley super fire that that's a huge win I think what's been interesting is like chasing versus being with making content and getting on shows and you know having the book come out where am I doing what I really want to do or is it because like I'm chasing like more recognition or more fame or more money you know what kind of content would I pay for us to be making and I think those are that's an easy way to kind of think about these things when people aspire to run a million dollar100 million $10,000 business whatever size it is I think you have more satisfaction and more success when you're just clear with what parts you really enjoy and staying true to that throughout the process because I do think over time you start doing the stuff and you're like man I'm not enjoying any of it and so it's something I have to kind of keep coming back to

8:16 myself on it's a nice feeling like saying no to something which keeps me open to available to have something like this come up so that that's definitely um super nice it's very exciting like someone wrote an email saying thank you for million doar weekend can we chat for 15 minutes holy distractions I'm distracted as I don't know if you expect CEOs or people that are doing things to be distracted but we like to be distracted it's important not to guilt yourself for it I think if you're not accomplishing things or your whole day feels like this I think once in a while that's actually okay but if your whole day whole weeks whole months it feels like you're just constantly distracted doing uh not moving in a direction you want or not accomplishing the things you want uh it's good to just kind of like double check yourself with that be aware wake up and think okay are there any changes I want to make here uh that's not

9:04 helping me do the things or get to the places I want to be going another hack learn how to tie faster if you think about where you start everything like your bed is where you start your computer is where you start your hands are where you start I think people are trying to learn like for new tools and I mean appsumo we're the number one place to help sell tools so I think it's how do I learn how to use the tools more effectively and and think about where you're spending a lot of your time typing writing maybe reading maybe using your trackpad and there ways that you can learn how to use them more efficiently all right I am reading an app Sumo email this is a product called Eureka research topics valid ideas create books so one thing I think about when I'm like checking out our emails and reading this kind of stuff is are you tasting the soup if you're making a service if you're making a product if

9:57 you're selling digital whatever it is if you're making YouTube is are you watching your stuff so for me I like watching my own stuff I like reading appsumo emails and pay attention when you're zoning out pay attention when you're not paying attention and that'll kind of show you some areas that you can work on in your business if you are paying attention go be a customer of your business and I think you always kind of find out new things versus as you get further away or as you grow businesses you kind of get disconnected sometimes from your customers or your partners uh and this is a nice way for me to make sure that I'm staying connected to what appsumo is doing we have a town hall in 20 minutes so I was reviewing the entire agenda if you think about it it's like 100 people times their hourly like that's that's a very expensive meeting that we're doing so we want to make sure that the the

10:43 agenda is super dialed in I'm going to go for a quick walk before the meeting uh and a lot of great stuff comes that it's also just being relaxed every day I I appreciate not having to be stressed or like full on 100% go and so this is this is behind the scenes of what I I spend my day doing I try to get the hell out of the house all the time you know you especially if you work from home you're it's definitely like okay I'm here I'm here I'm here I need to get the hell out of it I was kind of just thinking about like if people see the POV they're like you looked over agendas you double checked some numbers and you didn't really do anything today a lot of my job is okay have we set up a vision for appsumo yeah be the number one place to distribute tools for solopreneurs so we have this like tons of cool stuff we're thinking about for the next few years do we have a super clear plan for the

11:28 quarter yeah do we have most of the right people in place yes and so a lot of my my time is not necessarily dealing with the day-to-day or the month-to month it's more of like the quarter or the year or the few years and so my day is just kind of making sure everything is is on the right track and um a lot of my day now is like creating content that helps build awareness for appsumo and then also hiring some of the new Executives within marketing within Finance where there's some gaps within helping run appsumo it's kind of my sweet spot it's my dream like I like making content I like marketing I like promoting I like what we get to do at AB suumo and the amount of involvement I get to have so I don't know it was just interesting to reflect that when you hear this when people talk about it like the CEO sets the vision the CEO hires the team you're like dude what are you talking about aren't you working cuz

12:13 I think when you're starting out you are doing all these things and you're like what do you mean you you you just set the vision you choose the players you Cho you know and you you let them do their their execution you don't really I think it's hard to really connect or grasp that I've been really trying to extricate myself from day-to-day of the the business and I like the Cadence of it and kind of part of my job with all of it is just like making sure the people are happy you know make sure you're you're happy make sure your team is Happy make sure your customers and partners are happy so what we have we have the town hall meeting from 3:00 to 4: I get a 30-minute break then I meet with my business partner we meet every week twice a week so I have 30-minute chat with him then we go meet with a potential nanny for an hour at a coffee shop then we go to a SAS Meetup so it's uh with a bunch of different SAS

12:56 creators that's where we promoted appsumo and then that's State and then I'll come home here and have dinner definitely is picking up in the afternoon that's why I like kind of like a slower quieter morning a lot of are you there whose music is that that was my regone apologies not apologies actually how's everyone else doing so I am being filmed we're doing like a appsumo POV video Isaac come come say hi this is Isaac you seen at our event so he's filming it's our town hall it's like 70 people all our meetings are optional so if people don't think people should come we just don't make people come if you don't see people especially when you're doing remote culture it's nice to have like the connections and people talking about different things so this is that moment once a month to bring everyone

13:50 together so we just did the town hall pretty good there's some things that happened for honest like we're hiring new people that I wasn't informed of which part of abso values is ask for forgiveness not permission so I do things where I want people to just do what they want and then I'm like why did you do that so you have to be mindful what you're conditioning people on like if you get mad or you say hey why did you do that they're going to be then timid to do those things so um we're hiring two new roles and so I just asked uh our chief operating officer I said hey like just curious like how did we make that decision and so she gave me the information and then she said yeah I think I should have just shared that with you and the rest of the leadership team in the future and I was like great cuz when she actually explained it it was totally made sense and I love that she took the initiative like that's

14:34 what you're looking for you're looking for leaders to lead and so she was doing that and it was an amazing uh initiative I think maybe two years ago Noah would have just jumped on her like don't ever do this why did you hire someone and just kind of run really fast in the wrong direction versus trying to pause and really understand it now quick chat with my business partner we talk twice a week every single week in the past we used to not do this and uh we always would feel disconnected Ed and then I would get mad at him and we wouldn't know what's really going on and so it's just it's a way to check in there's no official agenda it's just like hey how are you doing good do you need help with anything any problems how do you think the business is doing a lot of times it's not the formal stuff that makes a difference it's kind of the Casual check-in hello uh that you can have big impact on so it's that and uh yeah been

15:18 overall good day yeah I think it's going to be good it's it's interesting like today I was just like oh I'm not like in a bunch of meetings today was nice good yeah you yeah it's been um pretty good good Bal good Focus time chat is great it's just like a check-in I mean I think the big takeaway from that which was interesting I think sometimes in these business meetings it's like CEO talks to the person the person like reports in and is my partner but too with all the meetings how do you make it two-way streets so you're kind of having communication back and forth uh about hey how are things here's what's going on with me and here's what's going on with you think about sharing so instead of asking how someone's doing share how you're doing and then ask them how they're doing I've always found that to be a really good approach uh and then lastly in our town hall with everyone it was cool that so

16:19 many people have worked here for so long we have a lot of people with over 5 years of being at appsumo to me that makes me so proud to create a company that I want to be at and that so many other people are excited to to be there so sometimes I I have to warn people when they're applying for jobs I'm like you might actually like it here you see people we we that hire and they do like one year stints they come to have and they just like kind of like stick and uh that always makes me feel very proud a few moments later dude I'm tired that's funny cuz the morning was like chill and then I think like around like 12ish or so when we finally started dialing in it was like back toback Non-Stop and I I think like any athlete or professionally or whatever it's like you do your thing and then you rest and you do your thing and you rest and we're not in the afternoon but I appreciate we had a slower morning but yeah it's

17:01 definitely hectic and excited to go see the nanny person potentially and then uh meet some Partners I'm going to be taking my scooter shout out to my vesa boys out there uh scooter gang bang bang all right we're out here filming got Isaac the videographer tailgating me scooter life is dope I don't care what anyone says man I love this scooter life so we don't have to fil but I'll just give you a quick Insight my wife wants to go back to work someone to help coaches about how to have the kids someone to help around the house someone to make our life easier uh so we've been interviewing a bunch of different ones and somewhere kind of final stages but definitely you know sensitive to have someone in the house we're new parents so think be also good to have some kind of Abita some Grandma support in the house so that's what we're doing here the N is cool she's you know super experienced has a lot of things but I I

17:54 think what I noticed today is I'm starting to get stage fright from expenses you know the nanny 50k about to buy my wife potentially a $75,000 Range Rover and I'm like ah do we really need these things like I know my wife's happy with the Honda we can have our moms come and help out with the baby but definitely like you know we're about to drop $120,000 kids are expensive I've got to make a lot more YouTube videos I think is what I'm learning today I think it's going to work out great and if it doesn't fine we're going to learn and keep evolving but I'm also trying to be mindful like we make money uh to be able to either have more time or make our life easier and I think both these things will be great for my wife uh both these great for wife and and great for our new family uh so now we are heading out I'm late uh but we're going over to an appsumo meet up with a bunch of our partners honestly sometimes I I I get a

18:39 little hesitant cuz it's it's a lot of people who know who I am and I'm like okay I just want to be home with my with Isaac the videographer or with my wife or with my friends but a lot of times I go meet super cool people and I'm happy I went it's just getting there in social events sometimes is the introverted kind of like energy stuff coming out I'll see you there good this is all the people from saso yeah it's all people from SAS yeah name company City if anyone could spell this beckan let's do an all right let's go come on in let's just follow him POV it POV it it's so cool to come and and see all these people that are excited about about the things that we're working on as excited as we are and it just makes uh it makes me happy it feels surreal cuz that wasn't the plan the plan was can I make a few bucks promoting cool deals and be able to travel the world my way it's it's amazing how far it's come

19:43 uh it's definitely beyond my dreams with appsumo it's so cool there's people literally around the world that have made cool software products and we get paid to help promote that and then our customers like buying those deals and it's special to be able to impact people's lives whether they're buying the products we're promoting or it's the partners that we helping you know change their lives by promoting their business being able to just know that we've been a little part of helping them succeed in in the businesses that they've been creating I think that's the part of appsumo in my whole journey whether it's the book million dollar weekend or whether it's this event or whether appsumo in general if people have done cool stuff how do I help them promote it or how do I help people do their own business and and that's what bringing people together for this event and and running our business is all about it's

20:24 it's interesting you do these internet businesses and they get to sizes and you you know you you you never really get to meet some of your customers or your partners and as you know so coming to something like this where we hosted the event it was nice to be able to connect with a variety of people we connected with old people that used to work at appsumo and sumoi connect people who bought our recent business sumo.com they actually literally the new acquir was here uh people like younger kids these like 19 and 20-year-old kids I'll call out their company it's called Zealot they're like oh we know you from YouTube we know your stuff I'm like yo y'all are the Future these guys are like starting hustling like crazy uh definitely like the younger hungry rer generation you know they got the energy but maybe not as much the experience just yet kind of it feels like me 20 years ago I will say so many times I've

21:06 met people at events like this um magically you meet someone and like I had a dinner with Mark Manson years ago and end up you know kind of becoming friends you know recently this is POV a day in the life of a $100 million CEO it started in the morning what did I even do today I'm curious what people think a day is like someone put out a video recently about a day in life of a million where they hung out with me for a day no one watched it and it made me think kids these days don't want to be rich I like this kind of content because it's literally my day and it shows people it's possible I I think one of the cool things you can be like holy I'm going to work hard when I'm 20 or 25 or 30 or 35 or 40 or 45 or 50 and then you build it up over time you hire enough people you can actually spend your day really ideally how you want it and you don't need to build a $100 million year business to do that and and

21:53 also when I started this whole thing my dream was not to have parties and do any of this it was to make a few thousand bucks a month promoting software deals so it's been a true dream and I think maybe another video in the future about like how do I how have I chosen these industries that have really expanded so much and then we've got to be a special part of it you know we're evolving people we're we're out here figuring out life uh doing our best what do you all think about my day running a $100 million a year company that's appsumo docomo below and if you want to check out another really really interesting story about an entrepreneur who makes a $100 million a year yes and an honorary billionaire check out Bill Perkins he's also written die with zero my favorite book and business check it out right up here Uncle Noah loves you and I'll see you out there pew pew

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "POV: You’re Running a $96M / year Business"?

Noah Kagan (Main speaker).

What is discussed in "POV: You’re Running a $96M / year Business"?

In order: 0:00 AppSumo; 5:00 AppSumo, Die With Zero, Reed Hoffman; 10:00 AppSumo; 15:00 AppSumo; 20:00 AppSumo, Die With Zero, Bill Perkins.

What is mentioned in this Noah Kagan episode?

5 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including AppSumo, Noah Kagan, Die With Zero, Reed Hoffman, Bill Perkins. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "POV: You’re Running a $96M / year Business"?

The episode runs 23 min; the transcript is about 5,282 words in 29 timestamped sections.

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