In this episode, Mike shares his experience of shooting his new TV show, The Four-Minute Money Maker on Vizio. They chat about how authorship can inform performance on stage or in front of a camera, and how being on camera can inform how you write and tell stories.
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Profit First for Minority Business Enterprises, by Susanne Mariga
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Episode 105: “What I Learned from TV”
Mike Michalowicz: Welcome back to the Don't Write That book podcast where you can learn how to write your bestseller and own your authorship. Follow along with us as we give you an insider's view of the book industry. Now, here are your hosts. Myself, Mike Michalowicz, and AJ Harper.
Mike Michalowicz: Have you ever AJ, had overnight oats?
AJ Harper: No. I feel like I would, I would maybe try it, but I'm worried about the texture. Mike Michalowicz: It's muddy
AJ Harper: Oh you do? Do you put stuff in it?
Mike Michalowicz: Well, I don't make it yet, so I was gonna ask you if you knew
AJ Harper: Oh.
Mike Michalowicz: So at the airport I travel United almost all the time, and I have the club pass. Which I'll tell you, when you're traveling regularly, like I travel up to twice a week, I'm flying somewhere. So that means four flights there and back. Minimally. These clubs are a little bit of a respite from the mania of an airport.
AJ Harper: Yes. I'm usually in the Delta Club.
Mike Michalowicz: Oh, oh, okay. Okay. Hashtag worth it. So they, they have food. What's so funny is, I noticed about two years ago, they used to rotate the food at these clubs, the United Clubs and dinner's always the same for the last two years. There's always chicken, and it's always the same style as chicken. And I get it, economically. And listen, it's, for me, the most two meals a week, that's the same meal. Like, I do that at home, so it's not like it's, it's unpalatable. Like I can't eat it again. But for breakfast, I notice they serve these overnight oats. And it's, it's chilled and I love it. It's delicious. Chill. I like oatmeal,
AJ Harper: Muddy and chilled.
Mike Michalowicz: Oh, so good. It's so good. Muddy meaning the texture. It doesn't taste like the, the flavor isn't like mud. It just has that soupy.
AJ Harper: Okay. You're not selling it
Mike Michalowicz:
AJ Harper: So, you're requesting a recipe.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. Yeah.
AJ Harper: Can I, can I request a recipe?
Mike Michalowicz: Sure.
AJ Harper: Okay. So I, I gave myself a win. What, what am I gonna buy myself if I lose 50 pounds?
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah.
AJ Harper: And I've lost 54 pounds. So what I decided to buy myself is a ninja Creamy. Do you know what it is?
Mike Michalowicz: No.
AJ Harper: It makes ice cream, but you can make it with like protein powder or like, oh fair life and stuff. And you can do the, you know, their pint is not an actual pint, but just imagine a pint. You could have the beautiful ice cream, 200, 300 calories for the whole thing, and just sit down and eat that whole pint watching Hallmark Christmas countdown. Sounds perfect to me. But I need recipes, you know, that are low calorie, high protein. Yeah. I joined the Ninja Creamy Facebook community
Mike Michalowicz: To our most dedicated fans. Email us at hello@dwtbpodcast.com and say, here's your recipe you requested. Yeah.
AJ Harper: You know, it's, you know, what's bad when you're announcing these things on a podcast, instead of just having normal human interactions where you could ask for these things.
Mike Michalowicz: You know what I admire about you, AJ, is your willingness to share with your own personal struggles. Not just the authorship challenges that you have faced. That helps our listeners, but also your personal journey. You're very candid about that, and I know there's a listener or two or many that are being impacted because you're willing to do that. So thank you.
AJ Harper: Thanks. I used to not share this stuff at all. I used to also not share challenges and requests. So, for example, I would go into into an event and I could, anybody who's really overweight, what we'd first do is scan the room and we try to see are the chairs gonna be okay? You know, yeah. So I, and then I would just always chance it, and, oh, I hope the chairs are okay now. If I'm really wanna be there, I will actually in advance say, Hey, can we just see if there's some sturdy chairs on hand in case those chairs aren't gonna work for me? And I just say it. I, I mean, I'm gonna need that less and less. Like, I was so excited because I, I went out to dinner with Sade and Laura at our last, our, we had our last retreat here on the island last week, and we went out to dinner at The Pub.
AJ Harper: And I had two glasses of wine, which I never do. Oh, never, ever, ever. Yeah. Thankfully. Yeah. I'm, I'm such a lightweight, but I always have to sort of ask for another chair. My team is so kind. My team is so lovely. Sade was like is this gonna be okay for you? You know, she's just quietly asking for me. And I used to just suffer. Like, I would shove myself into the, I would just sit there in pain or whatever and not say anything. So I've been really good about just saying, Hey, can you bring me another chair? You know, maybe one with not arms sat in it just fine, sat in it just fine. Nice. So, yeah, I was like, Hey, let me try. And in the past I wouldn't want to say, let me try in front of people.
AJ Harper: I would try alone, but I'm not gonna like, oh my gosh, I wouldn't wanna sit in this chair. And then it doesn't work. And then I say, oh, that doesn't work. You know, I wanna draw attention to myself. I don't care anymore. I don't care anymore. Because I think it's helpful. I think people need to see obese people, overweight people, and think, is there something I maybe could do? Like, could I maybe just think differently about the chairs I have in a restaurant? I think that's okay. So I think it's helpful for people if you're just honest about your experience. But anyway, I just had to share that I could fit in that.
Mike Michalowicz: Mm, I love it.
AJ Harper: Chair at the pub. No more do I have to ask for it.
Mike Michalowicz: Now you're a wino. “Give me another glass.”
AJ Harper: That'll probably be the last wine I have for a year.
AJ Harper: Anyway, anyway, I had, I know we diverted, but I was
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah, no, it's important to divert. So today's episode,
AJ Harper: No, no, no, no. What something I admire about you.
Mike Michalowicz: Oh, yes, yes, yes.
AJ Harper: If I tell you stuff like that, if I say, Hey, Mike, did you know that you maybe weren't aware of you? Will you pay such close attention to it. So, oh, you and you always say, thank you. Thank you for alerting me to that, is what you'll say. Alerting me is one of your words where you say thank you for sharing, is another thing. You say, thank you for sharing that with me. That
means a lot. That's what you would say. But I be you, you're taking it in and you're trying to remember, and you're filing it away because you want to be more accommodating, compassionate, caring. I know that about you. And so it's important to you to understand another person's experience. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz: Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. I'm really excited about today's episode because I'm learning as we're doing it. So I think I have some stuff to share that our listeners can leverage, but maybe we'll have some discoveries for myself too. So the topic for today is what I've learned about authorship while making a TV show. So I, I thought I'd start off by sharing how it came about, what it is, some of the people behind the scenes, and then maybe aj you can fire away questions that you think our listeners would want to know answers to. What's
AJ Harper: That tv... What's that TV show? Mike
Mike Michalowicz:
Mike Michalowicz: Well, Jen Tuma-Young came to me about 10 years ago and said, Hey, I wanna do a pilot with you. And we filmed it and she is the kindest, but also most driven person I know. And she said, well, I'm gonna make this work. I'm gonna make this work. And sure enough, behind the scenes month in, month out, year in, year out, she kept on finding angles to get this little pilot going. And she ultimately found it and it went to Visio. Now, Vizio is a television manufacturer. There's something really interesting going on in television. I think authors need to know this 'cause you can leverage it. What happened was Vizio and Samsung and Sony, or whatever television you have at home, what they all discovered is we created the device that a person paid one time for. You know, you paid $500 for that TV of yours.
Mike Michalowicz: And they said, but Netflix is charging you 20 bucks a month for the rest of your life. That's 250 bucks a year for 10 years. They're making thousands when we get one transaction. And they said, but we made the device, we have control over that device. So they sent a Flash Rom update or whatever it was to all the TVs. And now when you turn your television, it doesn't show Netflix exclusively or whatever the streaming channels are. It shows their own content. Now, Visio has one called Watch Free. And what it is when you turn on, if you have a video television, and I do, but you turn it on and it shows their programming selection. They procured the exclusive rights to this TV show, the four minute money maker with an exchange or promise of 10 million views. So they said, we're gonna have 10 million people see this or view it. However they measure that. And that's one of the challenges we're facing. What is a view? And we get the exclusive rights for six months after that. You can continue to use the content in other ways. And that's where we stand with this television show.
AJ Harper: What do you mean other ways? What, what other ways mean?
Mike Michalowicz: It can go to Amazon Prime, which is massive distribution. Apple TV and so forth. So you can YouTube if we want.
AJ Harper: So when, when is that six months up then?
Mike Michalowicz: Early February. So, okay,
AJ Harper: So right before, after, right after the book launch?
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. Okay. Now the summary of the Vizio exclusive thing is it has been a cluster bump.
AJ Harper:
Mike Michalowicz: Like, like there is no communication and I don't want to vent my frustrations. There's multiple parties involved. So Vizio is is one, but we don't have access to Vizio. So we don't know what they do know or don't know. We haven't gotten the data yet, and the TV show's been out for over a month or two. We're, we're not getting any information. This TV show came about. 'cause The sponsors, like, there is two major sponsors behind this television show, and we don't have data to show them. And, and they sponsored, I mean, they put money into the show specifically to give their brands exposure and opportunity, and we can't report it.
AJ Harper: So are they pound, are they hunting you for it?
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah, I'm, I'm getting the first calls. Now. The nice thing is, I am a executive producer for the show by title, but I'm not getting access to data. Executive producer means like, you're an owner of this show, like you. You're a partner in a business. Like you own equity,
AJ Harper: You invested in it.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. But there's other executive producers and Jen Toma Young is one. There's another, and they're great. And there's others too. And they're just, the communication is somewhere between a non-existent to just abhorrent. Um I just don't hear anything. So everything goes into this kind of void, at least for me. But also as the author. I'm the one who brought in the sponsors. So the sponsors are calling me saying, Hey Mike we we put money into this television show. Your team said, we get this data, we've got any data, what's going on? Now, the other challenge is these sponsors sponsor me for other things. They, they pay for me to speak at events. They'll, they'll pay the speaking fee because they wanna get exposure to a market. They'll do other kinds of promotional events, webinars, podcasts, or other things. They'll have me just do endorsements of their stuff.
Mike Michalowicz: And so now I have a reputation with them. I brought them into this opportunity saying, this is really cool. Now there's a TV opportunity. And they knew they're getting into the lawyers were involved and all that stuff. But there is a cost that if, if, if I do one thing with them, that doesn't go well, that can taint the other things. Yeah. And so I'm in this really awkward spot, not knowing how successful or unsuccessful this show is. I, I have no data. I, there was a, in the wild spotting of the show, someone was walking through Walmart, said, oh my God, you're all over Walmart. All the TV's there. 'cause that's Vizio.
AJ Harper: All the Visio TVs?
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. They sell Vizio TVs. So they sent me pictures. AJ Harper: That would be cool. Wait, did you get a picture?
Mike Michalowicz: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I don't know if I, I, I'll see if I can find it, but Yeah. One of my friends was walking through a Walmart and he's like, dude, you're everywhere. He's like, I know that dude. In,
AJ Harper: Remember back in the day when they used to have the camcorders in the TV section?
Mike Michalowicz: Oh, wait, I can't, I can't see anything I make get super bright, bright as I can. So let's see if there's—
AJ Harper: That's so cool. But remember back in the eighties when the camcorders came out and you would walk through the electronics section of the department store.
Mike Michalowicz: Oh, you see yourself,
AJ Harper: And you would see yourself on every tv. This is way better.
Mike Michalowicz: It was so cool with the camcorder. And then like, you'd wave your hands real fast. Yes. But the camcorder king couldn't keep up. So it would like move slower. Yes.
AJ Harper: Yes. That's cool. All right. So, so you're frustrated with that,
Mike Michalowicz: But, but there's also been some wins and some opportunities. And I think version two is more likely than not happening at all. And I think we're gonna be positioned for it. So that I thought in this episode, we could share what works, what doesn't work.
AJ Harper: Yeah. And I, I wanna see how it ties into the books. I mean, yeah. Can you also just describe for those who haven't seen the four minute moneymaker? Yeah. What's the basic gist? Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz: Okay. So it is like TikTok, but a 30-minute show. So it's a full show, a 30- minute television show with commercials is actually 22 minutes of broadcast time, the content. And then there's eight minutes of commercials spread throughout. So what Vizio did, just to finish that earlier story, is they, and these other companies said, oh, we're gonna make our own contact and we're gonna promote it. And how we're gonna generate income is run these commercials. So it's like old school TV again, with commercials mm-hmm. As opposed to streaming. So that's what they're doing. And what, now what was the question about how the books are integrated?
AJ Harper: What's the basic gist of..?
Mike Michalowicz: Oh, the basic gist. Okay. So the basic gist of the show is it's like TikTok in that it's, it's very kind of short quippy tips and ideas. A guest will come on the show virtually and say, here's the problem I have in my business. What is your solution, Mike? And I'm giving four minutes to give a download of all these different ideas and strategies to help them out, hoping that they can spawn or take one or two ideas. This repeats three times during an episode. So someone comes on, they ask a question for a minute or two, they set the stage, there's a package. A package is where they show behind the scenes of the business, give you a sense of what it's about. And then I'm given four minutes to respond. So that's roughly six minutes per four and two. So six minutes per project, or per client, or per guest, I guess times three, which is 18 minutes. And then there's some other additive content. Like, I'll say, Hey, when we're doing the show, you saw some logos. Here's a logo I love, but there's a big part missing. Can you guess what it is? And I show them how to fix a logo and stuff like that. All business tips.
AJ Harper: And how does, and how does this tie into, I mean, it's kind of obvious, I guess, how, but how does it tie into your catalog of business books?
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah, so it's, it's all the ideas from the books that I present just in these very quippy soundbite pieces.
AJ Harper: Do you get to talk about the books at all? Or is that often--
Mike Michalowicz: I do reference them. What's nice on the show is you, you'll see I'm standing in front of a desk. It's a standing desk sitting on the desk. Are the majority of my books profit first, the pumpkin plans there, fix this next get different, and they're all stacked up in front of me. I don't get time to talk about each book, but there are sometimes reference, I'll say, you know, one strategy is to use a model of dad. This is for my book, get different. And what it is, is you have to first differentiate before you can attract. And you have to track before you can tell people what you want to direct them to do. So, so it is embedded that way. You know, what's interesting about these shows, AJ, as, as you record it it's intense. We recorded a six-episode season, which is the smallest kind of season you'd record in two days, which was th three episodes per day. And while the broadcast time is 22 minutes, the recording time is about two to three hours. There's a producer coming, Hey, we wanna change this. Can you reshoot that? And your energy level has to sustain until the very end at the same level. So it was, it was intense.
AJ Harper: Yeah. Well, so I'm curious, I, it sounds like there's some things that you would like to wish were different. You know, what were some things that you wish you could change about it, or that you wish you knew beforehand?
Mike Michalowicz: What I, what I love about it is probably the better start starting point is how it morphed into a studio show. Originally, it was gonna go on site and kind of do business turnarounds like these, these makeover shows, which I liked. It just wasn't unique. So through tests, what they had me do is, like how I'm talking right now on this podcast with you, I'm also looking at the camera. They virtually had me go through shows like pretend, and they modified the show as we moved along to be more talkable and to match my personality more. So I like that. What I didn't like is when everything's virtual, it still feels virtual. I, I wish those guests could have come in and, and there's, yeah, there's a practical component to it. There's a, a budgetary component to it.
AJ Harper: Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz: But you definitely feel that, and you're, you're not having a live dialogue. So I'm giving these tips without knowing or being able to see their face, if it's landing, if it makes sense, if to build out on an idea or to just skip over an idea altogether. So I, I didn't like that. What I don't like to, or, or it is just a natural challenge of television is it's tele friendly, but it's not real stuff. These, I, it's a download of, of a million ideas. It's like reading a blog, an audio version of a blog on 1.75. Like you're blazing through it, and while you hear all the content, I don't know if it sticks. So I wish we had time to dig into an idea deeper. There wasn't a before and after. And I think that's the most important. It was just all before. Yeah. So, one, one of the businesses was a a spa for young girls like preteens, and it's for parties. You, you, you, you come and, and the girls have a spa day. But the problem that the business owner had, which is, is funny and shocking, but also not shocking at all, is that the moms would want to have spa day with their daughters. The whole idea was for these girls, these preteen girls have an experience together, but mom keeps on inserting herself. Like, I want a spa time for myself. Right.
Mike Michalowicz: How do you navigate that? So I, I gave tips and ideas of how you break mom away from that, but while also recognizing she's the one paying the bill. So how do you make her still happy? But we're never gonna see an after I don't think, but
AJ Harper: Could you, I mean, could you follow up with them and see,
Mike Michalowicz: We could just, how the show was created, it just doesn't afford that. So you absolutely could, what did you do? How'd it come out? We could do a follow-up season. But just how it's been created at this point, that's not allowed. And, and for a, a, a consumer, we want the full arc. We want the conclusion of the book. You want that chapter that ties it all back together, and you don't get to see that in the show.
AJ Harper: Yeah. I mean, of course you want that. You're, we're doing that in all your books,
Mike Michalowicz: Leveraging? It's interesting how it brings authority. So that's one thing. So for speaking engagements, I've got some large speaking engagements, not because of the show, but the show was another asset. They said, oh, that's amazing. He's got a television show. We haven't seen it. So a television show, interestingly, even if it hasn't been seen is still a big deal.
AJ Harper: Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz: The other parts, SEO. So if you type in, you know, anyone listening in Google, Four-Minute Money Maker, there's another category. You'll see all this content around me and, and hosting this television show. So it further substantiates your internet presence when it comes to ai like ai, SEOI don't know if they call a Ai, SEO, but you know what I'm saying, when you go onto your AI platform of choice, and you search for me, you'll see, you know, more depth to my CV or bio, because he's not an author alone, he's also a television host. It just, it, it ex extends that cv. And I think that's a big deal. One technique I wanna share is even when it ends, you can still use that. You taught me this, AJ we wrote, wrote for the Wall Street Journal for a year and a half, maybe. And that came to an end as a small business columnist. And you said, oh, just say you're a former Wall Street Journal. Business column. It's like, that was it. I'm like, oh, it, it, which is, it's totally truthful. It recognizes that that's come to an end, but it also is an additive to your cv.
AJ Harper: For sure.
Mike Michalowicz: My speaking fees have gone up, not as a result of the four-minute money maker specifically, but because of that collective cv So the second, the second of the show broadcast, my speaking agent, Lee Hayes, the company's called Go Lee Word. So if someone's looking for a speaking agent, she's very selective. She works, I think, with 25 speakers at any given time. And that's it. Which is a rare, there's a lot of these bureaus that work with thousands of speakers and--
AJ Harper: Yeah. It's like a factory.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. And I can tell you why they're, they can be risky. So she probably won't represent anyone new, but she does have tools and resources for free. She has a, she has a podcast called Path to the Main Stage You should check out. And she instantly said, okay, new speaking fee which I think is now 50 something, maybe it says 50. And she and a big announcement went out, and I think seven engagements were booked. It was a reason to go back out to a list of people that have inquired about me in the past, or had me speak in the past. I know of at least of one major event that said, we want Mike back and we love Mike, and now we have a reason to have him back. It's just a little bit more of a story. These speaking events don't want the same prophet first speech or get different keynote. They, they want something fresh and they say, oh, you got a TV show. That's a reason to bring them back in. So that's been another asset or benefit.
AJ Harper: So I'm also, before we move on to how authors can create something like this for themselves, I wanna understand what you learned maybe about yourself or about authorship in the process.
Mike Michalowicz: I, I think I have a natural ability with a camera that if I respect it, I'm good. And if I don't, I'm bad. So, scripted and teleprompter type of stuff is not my thing. And it's the natural tendency of, of producers and stuff to say, well, just read the teleprompter, just read it off. And while I can do it, it's robotic and I ain't good. When they invite me to riff, they're like, wow, that's so natural and fluid and unexpected and fun and personable. And arm over the shoulder, they said, could you just riff more? So the big thing was to leverage what my natural talents were in front of the camera. And so that was a big realization. If I, if I'm true to that and I protect it and defend it, I will do well on the television shows. If I'm, if I'm not riffing and I gotta go by script, oh, my watch out. It's, it's a disaster waiting to happen.
AJ Harper: Hmm. And did anything translate to just thinking about yourself as an author differently?
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah, I think so. I think one thing is storytelling. It just confirms storytelling is the way to make a idea sticky or memorable. What I noticed with this four minute moneymaker, it's only four minutes. It's idea after idea. And I try to insert stories, but sometimes they don't, they don't play out fully. It's, it's very tight. So one idea for an example is there was a bakery that was a gluten-free bakery that was specifically targeting children. And I said, well, here's a tip. Walk through your bakery the owner and see what is eye level. I said, now buy a scooter from like a auto shop, the one that they used to go into cars and sit on that, and now go around your bakery and see what's eye level. That's what children are seeing. And you can see your bias. That's the tip. But in a book, we can put a story behind that.
AJ Harper: Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz: And, and there could be a moment where they see a cupcake that was so visible that now you see just the, the little paper, doily paper below it as a kid and how gross it is. Or not gross, but how is unattractive. It is. And so our perspective changes in a book. We can play out that whole story, and you can feel it, and you can live it in television, it was just way too fast. So you had to imagine it. And so that was a great learning lesson with authorship. As I think authorship, we have this opportunity to tell stories and draw such pictures in people's minds that are so strong and sticky that we can't do on television. Ironically, on the visual media, we can't draw pictures like we can on the written.
AJ Harper: We have a new appreciation for authorship,
Mike Michalowicz: For storytelling specifically. Yeah.
AJ Harper: Yeah. So, okay. How do authors create these opportunities? Because I'm sure a bunch of our listeners are thinking, no one knows who I am. Yeah. How is this gonna, Mike tried for 10 years, did eight pilots. Yeah. Should I even bother? Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz: So the answer is, if you want to spread your idea to a community beyond traditional book readers, which sadly I think is the modicum of readers, at least in the entrepreneurial community, most business owners are run across the local deli down the street. John, he's a great guy. Like, what business books have you read? And he's like none.
Mike Michalowicz: That's you turned on another box, the radio, and you got, but now it's this one box. It's your phone. And everything's on there. All media is on there. The radio equivalent, the television equivalent, the music equivalent, the CDs, it's all there. So, to, to differentiate television from, from streaming media or from YouTube, or your own broadcast from an Instagram live show, I, I think is, is pretty, it's pretty much blended wifi authors to do is if you have something you guys start spreading the word on is get in front of any camera. And I'm saying like a physical camera. It couldn't just be holding your phone and get in front of that camera over and over and over again. So right now, I, I have a camera in front of me. It's, it's a, a high def 4K camera. And if you're watching the podcast on video, I, I don't take my eye off the camera.
Mike Michalowicz: It's just a natural instinct what most people do. Now, aj, I'm looking at your eyes on my screen. That's what most people do. But the consumer is not engaging that way. They wanna see me looking at them. You'll start learning these natural things. You'll learn what's called lower thirds, upper thirds. So you'll see my head is usually about one inch from the top of screen. So two inches top of screen. That's by design. That's called lower thirds. It's, it's because a consumer will see you at eye level if you're positioned lower. They actually have to change their head to see you. So there's these different things you learn. You learn about lighting, key lights, I have a backlight on me and so forth. That took years of learning, just of making videos. I think one of my favorite kind of broadcasts ever was by Suzanne Mariga, who we both know. She wrote a fabulous book profit First for a minority,
AJ Harper: Minority Business.
Mike Michalowicz: Business owners. Yeah. Minority business owners. And we were talking about her promoting, and I said, well, you gotta get it out there in video. And I said, the best way to do it is back then was Facebook Live broadcasts, I think. 'cause Her community was gathering there. So she started doing it. And I remember attending her first one, and there was one guest, you know, the count. And I was the guest. I was the guy.
AJ Harper:
Mike Michalowicz: And she does her presentation. I come back a week later, and there's one person there again, the third week I forgot to attend. The fourth week I got there, there was two. I was one of them after a few months. I said, Suzanne, like, why are you still doing it? No one's showing up. She's like, Mike, you said just, just do it just to do it. I said, yeah, I, I just didn't think you'd stick with it. I came back six months later, there was like 30 people on there. Yeah. And she, she got the reps outta the way. So, lesson one, if you wanna get a television show, realize it's just mastering the camera. And television is simply, means a form of distribution, but it's no different than staring at a camera like I am now. So do that. The second thing is to amplify exposure to get much as possible.
Mike Michalowicz: Make really digestible, interesting, compelling, entertaining content. Something that speaks to who you naturally are. Get comfortable being the real you in front of the camera, which in the beginning is very weird. People talk differently. We feel it's awkward. We feel it's mechanical. We get scared when we hear, even though there's no one in this room. It's just me. And there's a camera here. There's hundreds of thousands of people watching interweb. Ooh. I get all nervous.
AJ Harper: Yet. You know, I don't, I'm gonna double check. Double check. We, we get the question a lot. We should probably do it.
Mike Michalowicz: We should do it. Sponsorships is the most overlooked, potentially largest source of revenue. Largest source of audience expansion. Largest source of platforms outside of a book to give you inherent, automatic, immediate exposure to,
AJ Harper: Why do you say audience expansion?
Mike Michalowicz: So one of my sponsors that I'm working with, or at least that we're negotiating with, is a company called Kick. So, kick has this accounting platform that is AI driven. It's competes with other traditional accounting platforms. And they approached me, said, we want, wanna work with you because we want exposure to small businesses. I brought them to Profit First Professionals 'cause they also wanted access to accounts and bookkeepers. And only once that was solidified did we start any conversations here. And that's been solidified. Now we're, we're seeing if there's something there. Well, they have countless already established users using their accounting platform that have never heard of Profit First. These are small business owners, never heard of it. And they said, you have countless readers of Profit First who's never heard of Kick. Okay. So we want you on our show, and we're gonna bring in our audience. We want you to bring in your audience. And now you mix these audiences. So it's, it's new immediate audience.
AJ Harper: I like, I like that. Because you think of sponsorship as primarily a way to fund things.
Mike Michalowicz: Correct.
AJ Harper: I love that other benefit. That's cool.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. It's funny, this, this show itself is bringing exposure for me to Profit First. I had one listener that I met, I met someone somewhere a speaking gig, and they say, I love your show. And nowadays, and you probably have do the same thing when these people say, you know, I love your ex. It's like, well, which one of those exes? So I'm like, you love the show?
AJ Harper: Well, you have multiple podcasts.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. Which, which show?
AJ Harper: And you have a TV show.
Mike Michalowicz: Don't write that book. I'm like, oh, I love that. You don't, that you found that show and you love Don't write that book. And she's like, I'm really sorry and embarrassed. I never heard of you before that show. I'm like, that's amazing.
AJ Harper: No, that's good. That's amazing.
Mike Michalowicz: Amazing. You, you discovered me because of a show 'cause of your interest. So that's a very basic example of the power of sponsorships, if you will. So,
AJ Harper: Yeah, because you're, you know, Mike, I hear all the time people getting your catalog of work because we reference it so much and they're not actually your reader.
Mike Michalowicz: Correct.
AJ Harper: But they're reading it and, but we, you never could have imagined this. They're reading it. 'cause They wanna understand what we do when we write those books and they're reading it from an author standpoint of studying books that work, as opposed to, I need what this book promises.
Mike Michalowicz: I met with Jesse Cole. I flew down, met with him a week ago. I interviewed him. So I have a new podcast coming out, called Becoming Self-Made by the time this one airs. The show will already be out there and will be starting season two. What's interesting about this
show, this podcast, which podcasts like we are blending with television, like this is video too, AJ, what we're doing. And it's very quote basic. It's not sophisticated, but this will be on YouTube. It'll be circulating out there. This is a form of a show. It's not a television show, per se, but is a show. So I invite our listeners to it. Well, becoming Self-Made, we study the journey of entrepreneurs, but the struggle, not for where they have arrived, but the struggle that they're still in. And so Jesse and his wife Emily shared, they have a wildly successful baseball team, the Savannah Bananas. It's,
AJ Harper: That's everywhere right now. Way beyond way. It's massive, way beyond.
Mike Michalowicz: It's massive. But there's, there's cost and struggle associated with that. So we explore that together. And it's being, it's filmed. So the, so, so what I was talking to Jesse and he also shared about sponsorships. So Under Armour is a sponsor, and Nike is a sponsor. And they've brought in significant, not just revenue, but marketing momentum. So these sponsors, when you pursue a television show or any kind of show and get sponsors, they want that show to be successful. So there's two forms of compensation. They may compensate you for the work you're doing for the celebrity ship that your book or your work has done and brought, and the new new audience they'll have. But also they, they wanna put marketing dollars behind it. So this Becoming Self-Made is sponsored by Relay Extraordinary FinTech, they're a banking platform. They support Profit first. They're putting large dollars also behind the marketing of it.
Mike Michalowicz: So they're making it, producing it, compensating for it and marketing it. So sponsors are, I think, often overlooked. And I think we also try to swing for the fences and say, well, you know, if they're not putting in x tens of thousands or or hundreds of thousands, it's not
a good sponsor. You know how Savannah Bananas started is they found someone that was a willing to donate bananas to their games. So they could do their different things with bananas, which is just fun and hysterical.
AJ Harper: So, I mean, we're talking about all sorts of opportunities people can create for themselves. But I mean, you knew Jen Tuma-Young. So what if you want the TV show, like you have, how, how can people start to find some of those connections?
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. Okay. So if you want like to do a TV show that has distribution, you know, it goes, so let, let me qualify what I mean by television show that it broadcasts through traditional live TV that still exists. So major channels 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 on 10, you know, whatever they're N-B-C, C-B-C, whatever the CS are. Or the secondary channels like the ms NBC, the CNN, BBC and so forth. The streaming channels too, like a Netflix, maybe an Amazon Prime, prime, those are considered TV shows where they're specifically produced for that platform and distributed through that platform, most of them have a production house. So what's a, that's where your starting point is. What is your show concept about? So start working on a concept. Do you have an idea? And you can approach production houses and say, I have a concept. Secondarily, you can just approach a production house and say, I have a desire to have a television program.
Mike Michalowicz: I have some ideas, but I wanna work collaboratively with you. So Jen Toma Young and this other person I didn't mention yet, Tara Fogarty Giovanni or Tara Giovanni Fogarty or Tara Fogarty. Giovanni Giovanni. So sorry if I, I I messed that up. She has a production house she formally produced for Rachel Ray. She was the ex EP for Rachel Ratio that now has retired. And Rachel, I started her own network. And so she has a production house. They produce many television shows. And so Jen said, Hey, let's get Tara involved and let's talk about the concepts you have. And we started to mature those and circulate, circulate those. Another, in this case another couple people came in, and then the show came about from that. The production houses are not necessarily these massive entities. When I did the show with Discovery Channel I think it was called 4 95 Productions, that was a larger, sophisticated operation.
Mike Michalowicz: It was definitely a 15 minutes of fame type thing. They flew me out to Lake Tahoe. I arrived, there was a basket waiting on my hotel bed. I'll never forget this. Plus cash, $500 sitting there spread out like in a fan. And I What? Yeah, yeah. I called my wife, I'm like this, this is kind of tacky. This this weird. I'm like, what's going on? Or maybe it was in an envelope. It felt like it was a fan. And I said, it's 500 bucks here. And then called the agent, they said, oh, that's part of the deal that that's your per diem for the week. We agreed to a hundred a day for five days in cash because likely you're not gonna use much of it. And sure enough, it came home with me and my wife went out and bought a new purse with it
AJ Harper: Extra, stick an extra sandwich in your, in your briefcase.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. Basically, yeah. But breakfast, lunch and dinner, everything was cared for that. That was a full production. This four minute money maker wasn't like that. Listen, they had food services and so forth, but it's because the sponsors stepped in. So we created the show concept. The production house started shopping, and Vizio said, we have interest. Some other folks said they had interest in having what's called an exclusive, but we had to produce a show at our cost. So Vizio said, our exchange is we're gonna guarantee 10 million views, for example. I think that was exactly what it was. And in exchange you had to have a show that is, is finalized and polished. So that's why we got sponsors. Sponsors came in, they fa funded the production of the show. They're integrated into the show, so they get some commercial exposure. And that's how the show came about. So
AJ Harper: Yeah, if you're an author, how do you know you're ready to do this? How do you know you're ready to, whether it's, you know, as simple as a Facebook Live or doing a bunch of stuff on TikTok or creating something more formalized. How do you know you're ready?
Mike Michalowicz: For me? I was, I was approached enough times. I said, oh, I, I really should pursue this outlet that maybe I had some skillset there that that would work on the video media. So that's one way. The second way is your readers start telling you, like, I'd really like to see this in a different format. You know, I like your book, or I love your book. Would you tell me more about it?
AJ Harper: So not necessarily saying, Hey, I wish I could see you on a TV show, but
Mike Michalowicz: More like, yeah, I don't think people are that specific. They could, that that could happen, I guess. But people are like, Hey, I, I I love to dig in deeper. Can you, can you give me more, you know, I do interviews with, with my readers. Occasionally they're deploying some stuff I'm doing and say, Hey, can I record this on video? And then I broadcast the video and people like, oh, that's really good, Mike, your insights there were so interesting. Or your energy was so infectious. Or something to that effect. Mm-Hmm
AJ Harper: Bob? Was he the, it wasn't Bob, it was after Bob
Mike Michalowicz: Ell. He was after Bob Villa. So he's the person that comes out. He was the guy that came after Bob Vela, Kevin O'Connor, whatever. That
AJ Harper: That used to be the only show.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. So he's not the predecessor. He's the post access and successor
Mike Michalowicz: Success. Oh, there, thank you. That's the word I was looking for. He's the successor. And he said I didn't, I didn't wanna be on television. They called up he, he was actually one of the houses that Bob Villa did a makeover for and said, I didn't, I didn't wanna have my own show, but they said, Hey, would you be interested in auditioning? We just liked how you presented. He's like, okay. And then it became a show. Yeah. So, so do you don't, you know, it's, television isn't about like, you have to have this ego and desire, and it's important to you, and it's about the fame. In fact, I think that would work against most people. I think it's just if, if you can serve your audience better that way, it's just natural and fluid. Build it and start seeing where it goes.
Mike Michalowicz: But you can, no one has an excuse not to start today if that's what you so desire. You can start filming today, even if you just record it to your camera and share it with an audience of one which is the most painful, which is yourself, and watch yourself on camera. That, that's something a lot of people don't do. And I think that's the biggest mistake. I will film something just me and watch it back, and I wanna throw up my own mouth. And I'm like, that
was horrible
AJ Harper: You, we, we started talking this episode. We shared, I shared some stuff about being okay with people knowing about my own challenges, being overweight. But I, it's something, I don't look at my stuff anymore. I don't freak out anymore. Yeah. You know, I get this, I totally forgot that we're, you're gonna put this video up on YouTube somewhere. I guess It's fine. It's fine. I'm never gonna look at it. And I, I understand, I understand why you're saying that, but I also think if you're someone who's afraid to be seen, another good way to do this is to just do it and then just let it go. Oh,
Mike Michalowicz: I a hundred percent agree.
AJ Harper: Like, let it go. That's what I do. I don't even think about it
Mike Michalowicz: When I watch myself. It's to improve myself. There's another component as when I'm doing it, I want to be in it. I just filmed with Amy Porterfield. It was a magical filming. And I was interviewing her and we were having this great dialogue and at the end, so she, she was, before starting her business, she was a cheerleader in high school and stuff we talked about. I said, oh my God, you need to teach me a cheer. And I'm praying.
AJ Harper: Did you, did you do a cheer? Yeah,
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We, we do a cheer together. And I said, you ever see this Saturday Night Live? Will Ferrell? And I think it was Cheri Oteri.
AJ Harper: Oh my God, they're the best. The cheer
Mike Michalowicz: Cheerleaders. I, my god, I that and
AJ Harper: That are on at the chess match.
Mike Michalowicz: I dunno if it's chess match when they do the cheer squad. AJ Harper: Oh, yeah. They, their joke is that they're not the real cheerleaders. Mike Michalowicz: Oh, they're oh, oh, oh.
AJ Harper: They're the chess ones. So they show up at all the stuff where, where the real cheerleaders don't go.
Mike Michalowicz: Oh, I got you. That's right. So I, I did it with her. But what was so great was it was in the moment, it was fluid. It felt like there was no cameras there. And that's, that's when the cameras capture the essence of you. And it's the most genuine. So it, it's interesting. I watch it to critique it and improve it, but there's certain things, once they're out there, I'm never gonna say like, you know, how can I get better at cheering? No. Mm-Hmm
it gets out there. And it was the most natural, fun, crazy. She was awesome moment. The other thing is criticism. As your exposure increases, you already see it with your books. You get that first review and that it's not a five star. It's painful. We overreact to the one criticism and undervalue the praise.
Mike Michalowicz: And in television is just amplified. So just the critical feedback and, and, and the people that criticize you, I don't even know if they're real. It could be an, a robot who knows if it's even a real person. They're behind a screen. There's no social grace necessary. They can say the most hurtful or crazy than they want to. And I think a lot of people say, have a thick skin. I don't know if that's really the solution. I think it's just, just ignore it. I don't even, I don't even read it. I don't pay attention to the news. I literally do not know what's going on this planet. Because it's so bad. It's constant. And the criticism I gets thrown my way. I, I, I'm just, I'm just playing out. A hundred percent be me. Love me or hate me, but I'm just not gonna not be me. And I, I know if I start consuming the criticism, I'll try to start playing a little more neutrally. Try to reduce the meanness. And that actually destroys everything. So just, I wouldn't say to have a thick skin, I would say just don't even consume it in the first place.
AJ Harper: Yeah. I don't, I don't think you should consume. I think you should just do it. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Yeah. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah. Agreed. Alright. That's it. That's it. Whoops. I almost knocked on my, my coffee here. Good. Well, I hope our readers got some, oh dear. Our listeners got some interesting insights.
AJ Harper: And readers too.
Mike Michalowicz: And readers too. Yeah. And our readers. And I hope you do become a reader. Make sure you read Write a Must Read by AJ also, my new book. It's in pre-order state status right now. It's called The Money Habit. I'd love if you got both books. Next week we're gonna talk about the author, the author's Emotional Journey.
AJ Harper: Mm-Hmm
Mike Michalowicz: The peaks, valleys, everything in between.
AJ Harper: This Is a request from a listener.
Mike Michalowicz: Oh, I'm super interested in talking about it. 'cause for me, AJ is so extreme. Like, I will love what we're working on one day and the next day I'm like, why even does this exist? It's so bad. And then I love it again, but it's also predictable for me. I wanna invite our listeners to go to dw tb podcast.com. We have resources there. AJ has prepared a boatload of amazing content that's totally there for you for free. We simply ask that you sign up. That way we can stay in touch. Aj, we forgot. Pick the dates. We'll do that. We said we're gonna pick dates for our live show. We didn't do that
AJ Harper: To, you know, give us, you know, we're taking two minutes in between these recordings.
Mike Michalowicz: Yeah, I know, I know, I know. But I said we'd do it. So I want to at least carve out a little bit time to do that.
AJ Harper: Okay. I'm, I'm ready.
Mike Michalowicz: I'm gonna, we're gonna, gonna take a five minute break, five minute break. Email is a hello@dwbpodcast.com. If you want to get more information, don't forget, I have an imprint. If you're an author in Entrepreneur Space, it's called Simplify. It's with page two. Don't
forget, AJ has extraordinary support for authors who wanna be in the top three. Check out her workshops, her retreat at Madeline Island and all that stuff. Thanks again for joining us on today's episode. We can all say this together 'cause you know it. Please, please, please don't write that book. Write the greatest book you can.