Below is the transcription for this episode:

Matt: Hey what's going on everybody when I say it's Wednesday January 26, we are live as always, we go live every Monday through Friday at 10am. Eastern. We've been doing this for quite a long time actually. Specifically, we started this in around March or April of 2020. And it just caught on. We are killing it, crushing it. And it was funny when we started it was just kind of a question we get maybe once a week or twice a week or something. And then really since then, the community is just really taken off. And we've got lots of success stories. So we go live every Monday through Friday at 10am. Eastern, if you're new and watching the replay or watching us live, you can actually send a text message to us to get a reminder every morning. You can text the letters WUL stands for Wake Up legendary, WUL to 8132968553. And every single Monday through Friday at 10am. Eastern you're going to get pinged with a text message, it's going to give you a link directly into our Facebook streams. So you don't have to go looking for it every day. You can just jump right in. And it's super easy. It's really convenient. If you're unable or maybe you got to work during this time or something like that. You can also find us on the Spotify podcast. You can actually watch on Spotify, too. They just started a video feature there and you can tune in on Apple podcasts, Stitcher, different things like that. So just go to whatever your favorite podcasts that you have, And just search wakeup legendary, pretty simple. But anyway, we're gonna bring in a returning guest. Mike Mefford and what's going on? 

Mike: Thanks for having me on again.

Matt:So you were in. You were on the show in October, right? So remind everybody where you're from, and maybe it's been a while ago, I feel like I kind of remember a little bit about your story and stuff. But there's a lot of new people here, who’ve never met you or heard of you or anything. So tell everybody a little bit about your journey, how you found legendary and what your journeys have been like, up until now.

Mike: I live in the Kansas City Metro Area. I worked in IT for 25 plus years, I thought I had a pretty safe job. Turns out I did not. So in November of 2020, I was informed that my position was being eliminated and that they weren't going to offer my skill set to the company anymore. So that eliminated my job. Luckily, I had until January of 2021. So they gave me like three months there to prepare myself. So I have started looking for another job. I still get my email reminders of jobs that are out there because I just want it to be a reminder that Hey, I don't want to go back to that nine to five life. So I still leave them in my inbox. I still get them every day. These are the job postings out there. So yeah, this little reminder to myself, Hey, I don't want to go back to that nine to five. So anyways, I had been following a few people on tick tock and different platforms on you know, this kind of side hustle and stuff. So you know, I decided to jump in. And, you know, I took the seven day challenge and By day three, I pretty much knew that this was something that interested me. It was totally outside of my comfort zone. I had never done a video filming whatever from the ground up. I grew 130,000 in like a three month period so that’s my story. You know, I lost my job. I needed something to pay the bills. So I jumped into doing this.

Matt: Very cool. See you've got you've got a pretty solid like business that you've now got going but you were never the business entrepreneurial type. Like totally new.

Mike: I've never owned Business in my life, I've never done anything like this. I was a nine to five guy, you know, I got up and went to work every day.

Matt: And you're also a little bit on Instagram too. How's that? 

Mike: It's good.I really just started concentrating on trying to grow it. But yeah, it's definitely starting to take off a little bit. I've posted a little bit more videos on YouTube and Pinterest. I repurpose live videos on all platforms. 

Matt: So good, good. And what he means for those of you who are newer and kind of wondering, what does he mean by repurpose is he's taking content that he's produced, and on tick tock, and then downloading that video, removing watermarks, putting it on different social media channels. So he can create one piece of content and reused it on multiple different social media platforms. So he's not endlessly creating videos all day can just create a piece of content, repurpose that over and over and over again. So. Very cool, Mike. Very cool. So in your questionnaire, I was kind of curious, you mentioned something about building a business through DMS. So what I thought would be interesting is if you could talk us through a little bit about your content creation process, but then also taking, let's say, your followers and turning them into leads, turning them into buying customers, and what's your process then like for that as you grow?

Mike: So basically, I do fun things every morning, I use a scheduled block. So I set, you know, time periods aside, and I do content at that time, it could be you know, the typical, hey, click on the link in my bio, or it could be Hey, comment, and we'll have a conversation we'll have that just turned into a big, big thing for me is the DM conversations, I probably started doing this totally wrong. I totally tried to push, hey, click on my link, and it just didn't work very well. Just didn't buy in. So I started doing the DM thing. And I could spend all day answering DMS probably right now. So I started that conversation with them. If you know, I get to know them, you know, what their pain points are? You know, how can I help them? You know, is my product even a right fit for them? So, that's how my DMing conversations usually go. And then, you know, I send them off to my landing page, right? I offer a free ebook, and I capture their emails and names so I can have future follow ups with them and then hand them off to Dave at that point.

Matt: Nice. So you've reminded me that you might have just said this. But how long ago did you first find our challenge?

Mike: I started in March of 2021.

Matt: Okay, cool. I always think when people make it a year, it's like, it's a big milestone. It's like 10 years, and it's like affiliate marketing years are like dog years. It's just like, it's a lot longer than you might expect. Or you might think So you also got our Blueprints, you've been through a lot of our training coming from more of a corporate world or corporate style world, I guess you might say. How, what was that? Like? Was it hard because some of the entrepreneurial parts can be a little bit overwhelming for people. What was that like?

Mike: So the software side of it, setting up the funnel was, that wasn't all that difficult for me because I do have an IT background. But it's very beginner friendly. That was the easiest part in the support community that's out there. It was awesome. You know, everything was step by step, you guys laid it out perfectly. You didn't really have to go searching around for a whole lot of answers, followed the blueprints and your instructions. It worked. So I didn't really struggle with that. The hardest part was the video part. I was not comfortable on camera. I'm still a little shaky at it at times. 

Matt: So there's like a lot. I mean, there's a lot of people on here, they'll say the same. For instance, we'll have like, we'll have a young girl on the show, like your early 20s or something. And you'll see a bunch of you'll see a bunch of old guys in here in the chat just like yeah, but she's cute. She's attractive. You know, it's not fair. I could never go on video. I have a face for radio, you know, all this stuff. And, and tell us a little bit about how you were able to overcome that and get it you've been doing this for like, you know, almost a year now. And to go from that sort of like maybe more introverted or maybe a little bit more shy kind of camera presence to going, like, Hey, I'm gonna go on camera and I'm going to deliver with confidence. That's a big shift internally, I found because I was the same way. how did you sort of work through that internal world and start creating content? Take us back to your very first videos on Tik Tok, and what that was like?

Mike: I was right there with you. I don't know how many retakes I tried to do to make them perfect. And that's one thing I learned right off the bat is they don't need to be perfect, perfect. You're not filming a, you know, a TV commercial? I mean, you're kind of sorta but not really. I mean, you don't have to be perfect at what you're doing. I just finally said, Screw it, I'm just going for it. You know, I just started, I started out with, you know, you know, three to five videos a day. So believe me, that was? That was a lot in the beginning. So it does take a while to get comfortable doing it. But you overcame it. And the more and more you do it, the more and more comfortable you get it. I think I'm at like six or 700 Tick Tock videos now. So

Matt: That's crazy. Yeah, it does get, I felt like it does get a little bit easier over time. And maybe yeah, unless I'm in a meeting, or I feel really on the spot, or I feel like I'm in a meeting. You know, I don't know, maybe like a celebrity or something I'm not super familiar with. I virtually like, I don't know, I think my life is pretty dry right now. Like, I'm just like, I'm not, I don't know, it's, you can just kind of show up. And boom, you're on video. Alright, let's go. But I think it's, it's just how, you know, when you're in those first days, I always like to go back to those very first beginning days. It's interesting in those first days, where you conceptualize yourself as a static person who's not capable of change, right? You're always saying things like, Yeah, but I don't have charisma, or I shy away from the camera, or I'm an introvert, or I've got a face for radio, all this stuff. And the perception of that is just that, you know what, I'm not capable. I'm not capable of this, or it could never happen for me or something like that. But as I think over the years of how much I've shifted as a person, and I've changed internally to be more, not extroverted, it hasn't really changed anything. But like Spencer just said in the comments, turn your weaknesses into strengths, right? So I think what a lot of introverts do in the world of Tik Tok and Instagram is they have a level of honesty and transparency, because it takes so much to get through to people it takes so much just to even upload a video people can feel that. Now, I think that for a lot of people, when they speak with sort of that nervousness, that way, lack of confidence, they end up not generating a lot of leads and sales, that starts to come. Later on, we've started to speak with real confidence, right? So what helped you with going into that place of confidence? Did you see your shift in terms of yourself? Was it just in the business area? Did you experience it and relationships? Did you and then how did people experience any change from people and how did they respond to you at all, especially with your followers?

Mike: So when I started getting like feedback on my posts and stuff that that definitely helped my confidence, you know, hey, people are you know, buying into what I'm saying people are commenting, you know, you know, when you start getting the the haters on your posts then you know you've made it on TikTok, so, you're definitely gonna get the haters that come in and you know, this is a scam and all that I just kind of ignore him and move on. So yeah, but confidence wise, you know, my wife tells me I do find even my 17 year old daughter said, Hey, Dad, I can't believe all my friends see you on Tik Tok when they see your TikTok famous and stuff like that, because the amount of followers you have, it's funny, because that helps build your confidence, you know, 17 year old kids are telling you, that's cool that you're on Tik Tok that helps, you know, not that I'm really selling to them.

Matt: But yeah, totally. And I think that one thing that I think is really cool is that I love what I witnessed from my parents when I was growing up. My dad had a job and still works. He's worked this job now for probably close to 40 years. And, my mom is a little bit more entrepreneurial. She just had trouble finding good daycare and whatever. And so she started her own hair salon, in our house. And in the front room of our house, literally the front end where you walk in and My dad plumbed out the sink and chair and put a couple of hair dryers in there. And poof, she was off and running. And, she crushed it. But when I was little, maybe in fourth or fifth grade, she forced me to start a paper route in our town of 450 people. And she would get up with me every morning at 5am, we would hop on bikes, we bought baskets for the front of our bikes, and put frickin newspapers in there. And we'd started the paper. I mean, and, and it's just funny to me how I look back sometimes. And I think to myself, I look at somebody like you, or I look at anybody in our community. And I look at them and say, you know, so much drive and entrepreneurial creativity and energy and all this stuff. And, man, I feel like some days I don't have that, when I look back on my last 10 years of all the ventures I've started and all the ways I've been successful, and even just, you know, kind of, in a sense, carved out some form of like, role here at legendary. I mean, with the help of our team, and then finding me a role here too. But it's been very non-traditional, like not traditional at all. I don't even think I applied for a job here. And I messaged and I got hooked up through a friend, right, it was just weird. But I look back. And I think to my mom, and I think about what that example did for me setting sort of a work ethic thing of like, Hey, you might be in fifth grade, but like Get your ass on this, like you're waking up at 5am. And I've basically woken up at 5am and been grinding. Ever since I got done with college. All through college, I worked a job and started entrepreneurial, all through college. And after all of it probably leads back to that. I say that all because, you know, one of the things I think that parents underrate a lot is what the people working on, say, what what your friends and family and their friends, you know, seeing somebody who's did it for 25 years, and maybe struggled initially with some of the charisma and I'm on camera, this is no this, like, consider that and grow through that is a really emotional and really like transformational thing to see. So I think that's really cool. And I just wanted to say that I say that a lot to parents when their kids are commenting about, you know, Jay Z or TikTok famous for all this stuff, like, you know, and that really shapes a person. It's really shaped me and I think that that's just it's a really cool testament to you growing through a lot of whatever it is insecurities and stuff but that's really cool, Mike. 

Mike: Well, thank you very much. I appreciate that. Yeah. 

Matt: As you've gotten going now, like as you move into the new year, like what's what's been on your mind in terms of like are you just continuing to do what you've been doing and what is work? Do you have plans to expand? I don't know if you have interest in doing coaching or what this year is going to look like?

Mike: I do actually have an interest in coaching eventually. I would like to do that. I don't know if I'm to that point right now that I'm ready to start doing that. But I did get myself a coach and mentor. So it really helps me build that part of my business. It's kind of like I've just started as a paper right now. So, you know, I eventually want to do that. But right now I'm continuing to do what I'm doing. My plan is working. I didn't grow up as an entrepreneur, I was a tech person. And so this, like, you know, I jumped outside of like, everybody I know, lived with work, worked a nine to five job that was the way you've made money you went to work every day. And that's not the case anymore. You don't have to do that. I lay in bed every morning and start my day answering DMS and emails and stuff in bed. So I don't have to get up, get dressed and go to work. 

Matt: Yeah, I would say, You know what, the thing that we just tell people is, you know, just don't screw it up. You know, I mean, if you got something that's working, we've sort of figured out a formula to make a couple of $1000 or more online, like, Hey, first things first, if you're in a build up something else, just make sure the first part doesn't stop working. And, you know, that's cool. And I also like that you've got, you know, you went out sought out somebody to get some mentorship from, we had this we have this girl who just, um, I know that she went over the years in her business, and decided to buy our Blueprints, and hadn't bought them before she found us nine months ago or something. And, and I was like, Wow, that's pretty interesting. And actually, we've now had two different people that I know, who are six figure affiliate marketers, whether with us and other companies. I mean, they've got a lot of other streams of income, too. But most of them have hit six figures with us and purchase the blueprint after the fact. And, you know, that's why that's why, you know, I've paid a lot of money, investing in myself, but I've also paid a lot in time. And what people can't invest in money, you can obviously invest in time. You know, Elon Musk always talks about how, look, there's, there's a certain amount of hours in a week, and if I work 100 hours a week, and everybody else is working 30 I'm going to beat him, eventually, I'm just going to learn more, I'm going to experience more. It's just a formula. Not that I'm a big advocate of working 100 hour weeks, but But I do think that sometimes when people have sort of, you know, made it, one of the things that always pissed me off was when people made it, and they're like, oh, yeah, just just, you know, 30 minutes, you know, 20 minutes here and there, like, just whatever. And I'm like, I'm like, if you're hungry, and you're really, really hungry and ready to go after it. Like, you should get in there and use every bit of energy that you've got, especially if it's making you happy and fueling, I see all these posts on Twitter and Instagram about, you know, mental health and, and, you know, it's not always just about grinding, and I'm, like, totally for you. But don't tell me that, like, I'm hungry, and I'm having fallen, and you've got habits that you do, or you've got hobbies that you do, maybe you go golfing, maybe go hiking, whatever my hobby is just trying to make more money and free myself financially. And I love that. And, and so I just, you know, for our community, you know, do what's right for you, do what's right for your energy levels. I've been in and out of a flow for the last 10 years where the first five years I could wake up, go around, sleep just jacked and pumped up on energy. I need eight to nine. I gotta have like 8 hours or I can't even function. I'm like I hit 1am And I'm like, Oh my gosh, I'm in such a bad mood. You know? I don't know where I was going with that rant but

Mike: I just get you know, if you're not grinding because I feel it. If you're not working on your business everyday. You don't want it bad enough. That's my philosophy if you're not working on it, and you don't want it bad enough. So I'm down here every day

Matt: Especially, especially when you're first getting started and it's like there's This, you know, some people don't believe in momentum. But there is a little bit that can happen with these with these. With an online business or with a following like building a following building a list starting to get sales, when you first start, there's a little bit of momentum that you've got to create. It's, it's a big boulder that sitting there and it's not moving, and you've got to put in extra effort versus a couple, you know, let's say, a couple years down the road, you might not need to put in quite as much effort, you need to put in effort, but like, you can, it's already moving, there's a little bit of the ball rolling. And so in the early days, that takes effort, every single day, you got to be showing up, you got to be grinding, you got to be pushing, and eventually that ball and that takes look some people it's a week. Some people it's five months, sometimes it's, you know, we've had people I've seen people go to six figures, 90 days, this is not all that common. It's not the norm. But yeah, it's definitely happened. And I've watched it happen. But for most people, that's usually not the case. For most people. It's like, for most people, it's a little bit slower. And David, he just said something here, he said, treat it like a job. Well, at the at our masterminds what Dave says is, he says, you know, if you were the chief marketing officer, if you were the chief executive officer, or let's just call it up, if you were the Marketing Manager for your own business, or for the for the business of somebody else, would you hire yourself, like, Would you hire yourself for this job based on how you're showing up on a day to day basis? Because sometimes, as an entrepreneur, I don't have any category that understand what I'm doing. I don't, what am I doing here? I don't, I'm just, I'm just creating content? Well, no, you're the marketing manager of your business. And as a CEO, you sit down and look at yourself and say, well, like, your performance here. You're not showing up. Where are you? What's going on, ma'am? And then you're like, Damn, you're right. Like, if this was a job, I'd have a job description. I know what I need to do every day. I know, I have a checklist of stuff I need to complete every day. And then you do a little, you know, you do a little mirror therapy. And you give yourself a good hard look in the mirror and say, Geez, I guess I don't deserve a race here. I'm not sure I do. Do I don't I don't know if I deserve to get a promotion. You know, all this is a powerful question.

Mike:  Sometimes you're gonna have it down. And, you know, that's the point where you don't have to dig a little harder. Back to that core of commissions or whatever it may be.

Matt: Yeah, totally. Totally 100% So for people who are here, law, a lot of people who are new, a lot of people who are just discovering legendary and really just think beyond even legendary, they literally just discovering, like, hey, there people, ordinary people out there who are making money on the internet. Like there's this massive pool of money on the internet. And there's people who are just normal freakin ‘it guys. Frickin you know, nannies, like restaurant workers and grocery store clerks that are just like just taking a loan nice and just carving out a tiny slice of that pie and saying, you know, what, if all these people have a little slice of the pie, I'm gonna pull it out my own slice, let me come up to the table and cut my own slice. What would you say to those people to sort of give them a little bit of inspiration, a little bit of your take on making money on the internet.

Mike: Normal people can do this. It all comes down to being you know, if you want it bad enough, you're going to go get it to be consistent with what you're doing. You don't have to quit your nine to five. start this you can start this as a side thing and you know, build it on the side and then when you reach that point that you know you're consistently making that income to replace your nine to five then you think about quitting your job I was forced into, you know, not having a nine to five so but yeah. You believe in yourself and you know, you don't have to be an entrepreneur to do this. 

Matt: I like that a lot. And quote, you don't have to be an entrepreneur to do this. That's really powerful. I think. Yeah. This isn't your typical way to try to sell that. You don't have you don't have to have any experience to do this. It's funny, I found this site where you can sort and leave our audience best. I found a site where you could sort tweets back. So it goes backwards in time. So you can see people's first tweets without having to scroll right? And actually, it might just be on the Twitter site. I'm not going to do it right now. But you can sort for and you go back and look at the first couple of months and even first year of his Twitter account. There. It's crickets, people. He's just sitting there posting, typing, typing about all this different stuff. And then you start to see a little bit of traction, he gets a couple likes, he gets a couple comments. And he puts out this mass amount of content until one day, you know, he gets 40 comments on his right. And people are like, Whoa, this is a hot take. This is interesting. And then they start following. And then he keeps he's like, Oh, I discovered something here. Right. And there's this big buildup of discoveries. But my point is, there's always a day zero for everybody. For dave for you, for me. You know, for everybody who's sitting watching the comments, we say it to whoever's listening, whether the watch live or replay or whatever, there's always the day zero. whether you're getting laid off from your job or whether you're quitting your job or whatever. As a reminder, there's always that day zero where you've got to, you don't have an option. You gotta figure it out. That's it. That's the only option. You have to figure it out. So thanks, man, is the best way for people to find you on Tik Tok @mikemefford6

Mike: That's the best place to find me

Matt: I'm gonna throw up your handle. It is now on the screen. And, Mike, thanks for coming on, man. 

Mike: I really appreciate it.

Matt: Yeah, let's touch base again, for a lot of us who come from a background of I don't really own a business. I don't. I'm not a business owner. It's just a good way to get an inspirational boost every day to see somebody creating content and to look back and know That guy's day zero was about a year ago or less. And it's really powerful. It's very inspirational because you know more people that you follow. Were in your niche or who started out kind of in the place that you did. You'll begin to pick up on stories and you'll begin to see yourself in their stories. And it'll help boost your confidence and help get you going, but give him a follow and and support Mike posts on his comment or sorry, comment on his post and let him know what was good from today. Let him know. What was impactful and let him know that you saw on wakeup legendary. We'll be back here tomorrow. Dave will be back here. Thursday and Friday, hosting. I was covering on Tuesday and then I typically host on Wednesdays. He'll be back here Thursday Friday. We'll be back guests and great stories for Thursday and Friday. Peace out everybody. Have a good rest of your Wednesday. See you back here tomorrow.

Comments

comments