As The Leader Grows with Ken Joslin
As The Leader Grows with Ken Joslin
Paul Jamison | From Lawns to Legacy
Ever wondered how a struggling lawn care business owner transforms into a thriving entrepreneur and industry consultant? Join us as we chat with Paul Jamison, an expert in the landscape business and an Amazon bestselling author. Paul takes us through his incredible journey, from the early days of financial strain and long hours to the game-changing moment he sought mentorship from Rich Jansen. He shares the profound impact relationships and mentorship had on his business, a concept also explored in my new book, "Proximity is a Cheat Code." Paul also paints a vivid picture of his current life in Sarasota, Florida, navigating the chaos of a hurricane, adding a unique layer to our discussion.
In this episode, Paul reveals how his career took a fascinating turn from lawn care to becoming a successful podcast host. Starting in 2018 with humble beginnings and subpar audio quality, his podcast quickly gained traction and major sponsorships. Paul recounts how he sold his lawn care business to focus on podcasting full-time, guided by mentorship from influential figures. We also explore his surprising journey into social media influencing and book writing, where he transitioned from mowing lawns to earning substantial sums through influencer campaigns. Paul’s story is a testament to strategic decision-making, mentorship, and the pursuit of financial freedom and success, offering valuable insights for anyone looking to transform their business and personal life.
Welcome to the ATLG podcast I am your host Ken Joslin, former pastor turned coach & host of CREATE, the #1 Faith-based Entrepreneur conference in America. My mission is to help faith-based entrepreneurs become the best version of themselves by growing in our Core 5: Faith, Health, Relationships, Business & Finances. You can get more information as well as join our FREE Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/676347099851525
If you enjoyed this episode, please share it on social media and tag Ken Joslin.
Hey guys, welcome to as the Leader Grows. My name is Ken Jocelyn, super excited for you to be on this podcast. We're going to talk about leadership, business development, all of those things. I've got my good friend, paul Jamison, which he's actually in the middle of an eye of a hurricane right now as we film this podcast. Paul is a friend of my best friend, nate May. Many of you guys know Nate really, really well here in our community, in our collective. They used to live close to each other. So I met Paul one day at the pool and he starts telling me this story about how he had grown this landscape business, exited, started a super niche podcast and he helps landscape businesses grow and develop. Listen, he's a five-time Amazon bestselling author. He works with some of the biggest landscape companies in the world Toro, john Deere, on and on and on and on. Paul dude, what's up, man?
Speaker 2:Hey, ken, good to see you again and thanks Nate May for setting this up. It's been a long time coming. He's been trying to get this connection for a while. So, I'm thankful to finally be on your show, Ken.
Speaker 1:Dude. Well, tell me about the hurricane. What's it look like outside down there in Sarasota, florida today?
Speaker 2:Well, we have palm trees down here. I used to live in Atlanta, so I know your guys' trees. But the palm trees look like they're about to bend over. I don't know how they stay in the ground, and it's about 60 miles per hour winds right now. Thankfully, the main part of the hurricane is a little bit farther out west in the Gulf of Mexico, so it's passing by us. We're just getting the outer bands of the wind, but from what I understand it's headed straight up the panhandle and straight to Atlanta, so by tomorrow you guys are going to be having winds. We've been getting rain like crazy.
Speaker 1:It's been like rain. It's rained for like two days, but anyway, let be, we've been getting crazy. It's been like rain. It's just rained for like two days, but anyway, let's get back to that. Let's get back to the thing everybody's in here listening to. So, dude, you started a landscape business and you're cutting grass and you're doing your stuff and you've went from there in this journey to growing a very successful landscape business, exiting, writing five books, all bestsellers on Amazon to really now helping other landscape owners and business owners in that, in that vertical scale. Dude, how talk to me about how that happened?
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, it wasn't some grand plan, ken. I didn't have this all strategically figured out, that I was going to build the business and then become a consultant and blow up on social media and all of that kind of happened to my surprise. But I started the lawn care business in 2011. And the first few years I was on the struggle bus. I actually had to go get a job at Carrabba's. My prices were way under what they should have been and I was like a chicken with the Ted cutoff out there just working sunrise to sunset in the lawn care business. Yet I was broke and I was working hard and I was making a lot of money, but I was spending all the money on on running the business and so I was working at Carrabba's and then finally I started getting some good mentors in.
Speaker 2:My lawn business started growing. I was working in Sugarloaf Country Club in Duluth and had a bunch of the Atlanta Falcons. Raheem Morris is the head coach now, but he was a coordinator coach back then. He was one of my customers. Actually, he was head coach for a while that season because they fired Dan Quinn, but anyway, I was doing a bunch of the Atlanta Falcons players, coaches, and my business was profitable and things were going really, really well. So in 2018, I wanted to kind of share my story with the world and I started the Green Industry Podcast and I was basically just sharing how I went from struggling lawn care business to a thriving lawn care business and the show blew up, as the kids say, it got into the top 100 of all the business entrepreneur podcast and just getting, um, you know, over a million audio downloads per year talking about growing a lawn care business.
Speaker 1:And so in 2020, well, hey, let me back up. Let me back up real quick, because there's something you said that I want to hit on real quick. My new book is called proximity is a cheat code, and it's about the power of relationships and how relationships always open doors for you to get to the next level. You said I was struggling until I found mentors. Yeah, exactly who were those mentors and how did you find them?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So one of my mentors, his name's Rich Jansen and he owns an irrigation company. So I didn't do the fancy lights and the irrigation. So some of my customers want their house lit up all nice, you know, with the fancy lights and all of that stuff. And I, when it comes to electric, electricity and stuff, can I just I get stressed out. So I hired this guy who is very, very reputable, his name's Rich and he would, I would subcontract out those jobs to him. So we had developed a relationship where he would fix my customer's irrigation problems. These are multimillion dollar homes, these are big jobs, nice homes and then he would set their lights up and enhance their lights.
Speaker 2:So one day I was out in the front yard and we were just talking. He's like how's things going, paul? And I was just honest with him. I was like, man, I'm struggling, like you know, I'm just struggling and I was. I have all these multimillion dollar accounts, I'm making all this money, but I'm I feel like I'm broke. And he's like why don't you print out all your checking account statements and any tax information you have from last year, like any financial stuff you have? Bring it to me and let's take a look at this.
Speaker 2:So I went over one Sunday night. His wife made a steak and he had all my finances on his kitchen table and he had his glasses on and a calculator and he's looking at everything. And he looked up at me, ken, and he said, how are you paying your bills? And I was like I don't know. And he's like this is horrible. And he got to the bottom of my prices were too low.
Speaker 2:But I was just. I was just vulnerable and humble and this was probably 2014. And I was just like Rich, I'm struggling. And he took me under his wing and he showed me cause. He worked for the biggest landscaping in the world. It used to be called Brickman, then it was called Brightview and then he eventually started his own thing. But he knew how the finances worked from the biggest company in the landscaping industry. It's a multi-billion dollar company called Brightview now, but Brickman then. So he knew how they come up with their prices and how they run their business and he started helping me. And that information he gave, I immediately raised my prices. That was the first thing I did and that helped right out of the gate. And then, from there, he just kind of helped me.
Speaker 1:Let me ask you a question real quick. When you raise your prices, what did the conversation look like with your current clients? Because a lot of people are afraid to go. Oh man, I'm underpriced, I'm delivering all this value. How do I have the conversation with my client?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I only lost two customers. It was a lady from Germany and she had another property, but other than that everyone was kind of joking like, yeah, I thought your price were kind of low, paul, and like you know, they kind of all understood and I just was honest with them. I was like, hey, all my costs are going up and I got to kind of raise more so I can attract good labor, so that we can do a good job for you. It costs a lot to hire someone who's going to be a good labor, and so they that my customers understood, and in many ways they're in this.
Speaker 1:This conversation you went in was a value add. Yeah, absolutely. Here's the reason why I'm having to take the prices from where they are to a little higher level.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it wasn't a little higher level, Ken, because my prices I had to go up 25%, which most lawn care businesses raise their prices between 5% to 10% annually. I had to go a one-time jump of 25% because that's how underpriced I was. But yeah, raising my prices was a game changer because that immediately started bringing in more revenue for the same amount of work.
Speaker 1:I love that. And so mentors you get, you're in this process, you start the podcast. Tell me, where did that come from? Where did the idea to start a podcast come from?
Speaker 2:Well, in 2018, podcasting wasn't as popular as it is today and I felt like I missed it. On YouTube, I'm like man, there's all these lawn care YouTube channels that are blowing up, and TikTok wasn't even around back then. But I was like, what could I do where I'm a first mover, where I'm out ahead of the curve? And I was just thinking about podcasting. I just I just had a sense, um, that this, there could be something here, and so I started the podcast and it wasn't that good. The audio I you know, I didn't have this fancy microphone and I didn't. I didn't really know that much about podcasts in my first a hundred episodes weren't that good, but the show, uh, picked up traction because an Apple and Spotify.
Speaker 2:When someone typed in lawn care, my show popped up. I was like the top of the algorithm, the top of the food chain, and so, because I was a first mover in 2018, it was just like this snowball. I just kept getting more and more listeners because the algorithm was promoting me. So then, in 2020, more revenue was coming in from sponsorships with John Deere and Lowe's and Toro, and these big companies with these big marketing budgets were paying me outrageous amounts of money and I was talking to my bookkeeper and they're like you're making more money doing the podcast. You should double down on that and sell the lawn business and then, if it doesn't all work out, you know how to start a lawn care business that you can go right back to that.
Speaker 1:What did you think? You just started this podcast? What was going through your mind when you're looking at the numbers with your financial planners and they're like dude, you're making more money doing this than you are.
Speaker 2:How did that make you feel? Well, they said, paul, this is unreal because my profit margin is 90%. They said this is unreal because my profit margin is 90%. With the podcast. There's no overhead, other than I have a subscription to my podcast RSS feed. I have an audio producer who had a very reasonable rate back then and they're just looking at the revenues more, but your profit margin 90%. You have barely any expenses. So they're like this is absolutely insane. You need to. You need to see how far you can go with this thing.
Speaker 2:And so, from a numbers perspective and at the time, ken, I literally had raheem morris. Uh, atlanta falcons head coach. He was actually the head coach back then as an interim head coach. Uh, the defensive coordinator coach, richard smith. I had a bunch of the players. Uh, like my business. It made no sense to leave the lawn business, other than the math was telling me, if these companies are already offering you, you have to understand Lowe's and John Deere and Toro and these companies. Their marketing budget is so gigantic and they have to spend it.
Speaker 2:It's the people's job and the works of marketing, they have to allocate these funds, and so it was just like let's, let's rock and roll. Love that dude.
Speaker 1:I love that. So you process through before we get to selling the business. I want to back up just a little bit to your mentor and the different people that spoke into your life to help you grow your business.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so go ahead.
Speaker 1:What were some of the things, paul, you told yourself during that process of really learning and kind of digging yourself out of a hole? What were some of the things you did internally, mindset-wise, to help you stay the course and be consistent and not quit or not give up?
Speaker 2:Yeah, rich is one of my mentors back then. But my main mentor was actually the defensive coordinator of atlanta falcons. His name's richard smith and he was my customer and he could tell that my business needed some improvement. So he would, you know, grab a beer and send me on the back porch and he's like, let's talk, because I'm gonna teach you about marketing, I'm gonna teach you about this, and and he, he would he just taught me about, because I had a.
Speaker 2:I had an employee who would show up late and he's like he's gone and he was just teaching me how they ran the Atlanta Falcons. They went to the Super Bowl not that long after that year, while he was coaching, and so it was a lot of fun to, kind of, I actually got to watch the AFC championship with him and go to the. They won the NFC championship and then I gave him and his wife a ride home afterwards and got to hang out with them. But I mean, like the way they ran the Atlanta Falcons the year they went to the Superbowl, he was teaching me all these principles about running a business and it just made him the way I uh, the way I treated my employees, the way I attracted the best clients. It all um was from his mentorship and him teaching me the ropes.
Speaker 2:And you mentioned proximity. But once I got into that fancy country club where the defensive coordinator lived and the other Atlanta Falcons players lived, it was like all the women talked to each other and it was all this networking where they were just like, oh yeah, you need a long guy, paul's your guy, and so it all kind of tied in together with that proximity that you're talking about. I love that.
Speaker 1:I say a lot. You're only two things away from the next level information and action. And you got the right information and you were looking for the right information and then you just took action on what they told you and then next thing you know you're sitting at, I'm looking to exit so I can move forward in my writing books and so I can move forward in my podcast. What was that process like that, trying to find somebody to buy the business, cleaning up the books, like? Walk me through that process too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean it was. It was exciting, ken, because in 2020 and 2021, I started shifting all in on the podcast and the more time I invested to that, the bigger and better the sponsorships got and the more influence that I got in the industry and things of that nature, and so it was just a no-brainer to go all in on the media company and on working with these brands and my customers. It was this big transition, but everything I learned about business about what to charge and about how to save money for taxes and all the nuances of running a business the lawn care business taught me that. Then I kind of got into the big leagues where my customers went from being a lawn care yard which might do like four or $5,000 of revenue a year for the maintenance and then the mulch and all of that. Typically, a customer per year is about four to $5,000 for these homes.
Speaker 2:My customers then shifted to John Deere and Lowe's and Toro, which is tens of thousands or even in some cases over a hundred thousand revenue from one customer, and so the scale was major of what I was used to. So now my customers are these multi-billion dollar companies, but the principles were the same in business and so I feel like the lawn care business prepared me for the media business and the podcasting and now my customers being these major brands in the industry and serving them, I create content for them, I promote them on the podcast and things of that nature. But if I would have never gone through running a lawn business, I wouldn't have learned business language and how to run a profitable business and things of that nature.
Speaker 1:You were a learner. You wanted to learn, you wanted to get better, you wanted to be able to do what you love to do and actually make money. And when God put the right mentors in your life, you actually listened and you took action on the information that they gave you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I didn't love what I did. Lawn care is hot. You live in Alpharetta, man. In the summer it's hot, there's snakes out there. I didn't like the lawn care. I just did it out of necessity for the money. The podcasting I fell in love with it. I get. I get to network with people like you and so many folks that I've met through podcasting, Like I found my passion.
Speaker 2:It's it's podcasting, it's social media, it's the internet. This is my passion. That the lawn business wasn't my passion, but it taught me the fundamentals of business and the language of business and all of that.
Speaker 1:So yeah, it was a transition. Yeah, it was a vehicle for you to get where you are today. Yeah, totally yeah, Talk about so which came first, the podcast or your books?
Speaker 2:The podcast started in 2018. It exploded around the end of 2019 and around 2020. We started getting about 160,000 downloads per month.
Speaker 2:And so when that was happening, that was 2020. When that was happening, I was like, what can I do other than the sponsors to make money? And so I wrote a book called Cut that Grass and Make that Cash. That was my first book Because I had an audience who already listened to me, knew, like and trust me you know that that sold thousands of copies because I already I already had an active audience and then it just enhanced, um, the authority I had in the industry, like if I go to an event, they would buy a few hundred books and give it out at the event and things of that nature. So it was kind of a next progression of writing the book. But from a revenue perspective it's a small, small amount compared to my revenue comes from sponsorships because the John Deere's and the Lowe's of the world their budgets are just massive for what they spend on marketing.
Speaker 1:So what was the shift in you then as a business owner? What shift did you have to make in communicating with a Raheem Morris and, hey, your yard is going to be six grand a year, to communicating with a marketing guy from John Deere and your budget six figures a year? What transition or growth did Paul have to go through to get to being able to have those conversations?
Speaker 2:through to get to being able to have those conversations. Yeah Well, the main one. Ken is. I had to find out my worth because the first time you have a company offer you six figures for one deal. I'm like this is crazy. You know what I mean. And I talked to a mentor. I have a mentor. His net worth is over a hundred million dollars. He sold a software company and I was struggling with this and I called him because I knew he's worth he has multiple.
Speaker 2:Ferraris and a mansion and more than $100 million. But he's like Paul. He said the value you bring to a company like a Toro or John Deere, whatever, because I have this audience and they switch and then they start buying that equipment. It generates hundreds of thousands of dollars of revenue for that company. It generates hundreds of thousands of dollars of revenue for that company. So them giving you $100,000 or $200,000 or whatever, that might seem astronomical to you but you're worth that because you're making that company more money than that.
Speaker 2:So, just realizing my worth in lawn care, anybody can go and mow Raheem Morris's yard or put in a bush form or that stuff. Anybody can do that. But not everybody can get butts in seats at events or get people to buy mowers and lawn equipment. And there's an event in our industry that they give me a code like an affiliate link and the event's actually coming up in October but so far 623 people have signed up for this event using my affiliate link. And my mentor is like those email that you just got them 623 email addresses. You know attendees at their show, like you, have no idea what, what value that is. So, yes, that company is paying me tens of thousands of dollars, but he's like you're. You're worth more than that, and that's why they're happily paying you tens of thousands or in some cases.
Speaker 1:Go ahead. What was that process for you, paul? What was that process like internally, with you wrestling with dude I'm cutting grass, I'm on the back porch with the defensive coordinator drinking a beer, I'm hanging out with the other guy who does lighting and all these hardscapes. I'm going through P&Ls and check checking statements and now these guys want to give me 200 grand Like what was the process, mindset wise for you to get from one to the other. That's a huge jump bro.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the first one was shock. I was on a. I was on a call with the brand. This is the first time my brain brain got frozen, if you will and I was just asking them. They wanted me to make a couple Instagram reels and just some basic social media content. And I asked them I was a newbie at all this. I was like, well, what do you usually pay an influencer for a campaign like this? And they said between 20 and 80,000.
Speaker 2:And I froze up because I was like 20 to 80,000. That would take me going all year long for a lawn care yard, mowing their yard every week, plus doing their mulch, plus doing that. I'm just thinking how much work I'd have to do for that. So I'm thinking 20 to 80,000. And I got off that call and I was just like man, there's so much money available out there. And I asked the lady I was like is that, is that for the whole campaign of all the influencers? And he's like no, no, no, that's just per influencer. I was like there's $80,000 on the table out there If I would learn how to, you know, communicate with the company and everything. And so I fumbled that deal. I didn't know about negotiating or anything, and only I only did it, for they paid me $25,000, and it was like effortless to them.
Speaker 1:It just you know they.
Speaker 2:ACH'd it in my account. I'm looking like $25,000, and then it take me more than the data.
Speaker 1:Do you remember the yards I got to cut in the country club for $25,000?
Speaker 2:Right, and I filmed the Instagram reels and published them.
Speaker 2:I mean, there's no way it was more than probably 10 man hours of work for 25 grand. So it just my brain couldn't compute until I started realizing how much money there's actually out there in these big companies and their marketing budget. That they used to spend, Ken, on TV and radio and billboards, Now they're spending it on Instagram and podcast and TikTok and social media. If you can figure out a way to line yourself up with helping them reach their marketing initiatives and their marketing objectives, there's so much money on the table out there for influencers.
Speaker 1:I think that's amazing. So talk to me then about the, the transition of dude. You're doing a podcast, you're getting, you know, a hundred thousand downloads plus a month, and then you're like I want to write a book. Tell me, tell me where that came from. I see you smile when I said you want to write a book.
Speaker 2:You're like, yeah, yeah, well, I thought I had a pretty cool story of I really didn't emphasize how bad my business was in 2011 and 2012 and 2013,. But I got behind with the IRS. I owed them 56,000 bucks. I got behind with the Georgia Department of Revenue. I mean, I dug myself in a hole and I remember how stressed out, I was driving my ghetto little truck around town, just stressed out about life.
Speaker 2:Then over the next few years of serving the Falcons players in these really nice homes you live in Atlanta. You know these fancy country clubs. I was in Alpharetta. There's a neighborhood called Country Club of the South that I worked in. That's very nice off Old Alabama Road. Back there these homes were so nice.
Speaker 2:I was like I just wanted to share my story. Here's how I went from being broke, busted and disgusted to serving these nice yards and I just wanted to get the story out there. And also, I don't have kids yet, but I want to have kids one day. I was like I want them to be able to read about their dad's entrepreneurial journey, cause my grandpa owned a gas station growing up, but all I really have is the memories of him in the nursing home, as he was kind of dying in the last few months. He would tell me the stories of his business. It was a gas station, filling station, they called it back in the 40s and 50s. But I wanted to have a resource that, when I'm gone, my kids can read about dad or grandpa's lawn business and everything that I learned along the way, so you wrote your first book.
Speaker 1:When did you write your first book? 2020.
Speaker 2:So you wrote your first book in 2020 and hit what was the name of it?
Speaker 1:again, cut that Grass and Make that Cash. Come on and you hit Amazon bestseller.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was a number one on Amazon bestseller. Cut that Grass and Make that Cash. I love that dude.
Speaker 1:How did that make you? You've got just these steps that you just kept taking up and up and up. I remember when I hit Amazon bestseller for my first book, I was like people are buying my book, they want to read my stuff. What was your reaction when that happened? Yeah, it was very satisfying and it happened.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean it was very satisfying and it was very encouraging, and I encourage everyone to write a book, Cause when you wrote your book and I wrote my book, it builds you as an authority in the space. So what I noticed is the book came out, then the trade show that I mentioned, that we've we've got a lot of people that signed up, for you know, they invited me to speak on the big stage and they bought hundreds of copies of my book. So they and everyone's seat was my book and it, just it elevated my brand and my authority to the next level, and so it's hard to put a a quantitative number beyond, just you know, the, the small commission that Amazon shares with you of of how many doors it opened for me, building me as an authority in our industry.
Speaker 1:And so yeah, I love that dude. So what's been the most satisfying part for you over the past four or five years in this journey?
Speaker 2:Yeah, helping others, ken. It's been awesome when somebody shares with me their story of how I've motivated them to get out of debt and start building their net worth. And these guys that, paul. I started my Roth IRA. You know he's 22, 23. I'm a big compound interest, like I preach to these. A lot of my audience, ken, is these guys are in their twenties and I'm just like guys you got to get a Roth IRA, you got to start investing and you got to just financially.
Speaker 2:I teach the basic principles of how to build wealth. If you have a lawn care business, you can sell. A lot of these private equity and a lot of these companies are buying up lawn care businesses. So it's cool to see some of my listeners sell their lawn businesses for boatloads of money. That's satisfying and me kind of helping them get max dollar at that and save on taxes when they sell their business, that's very satisfying. And then, you know, having a 25 year old tell me he started his Roth IRA because he hears me preaching about it so much on my podcast, that's that's satisfying to me.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So when I had go ahead, go ahead. I was going to say when I had my lawn business, you know, I influenced about 50 people that that's about my customers per year for maintenance and installation and to go from that. And those people about 50 people, that that's about my customers per year for maintenance and installation and and to go from that, and those people I don't think they appreciate that. They don't care who's cutting the grass, as long as a grass looks nice. They don't, they don't really care about you to to switch to a lawn care business where guys have me in their ear and I'm teaching the principles and they appreciate it. And it's more than 50 people, it's it's a lot more than that. But it's very satisfying to have people who appreciate what you do and are grateful for the information I share.
Speaker 1:That's amazing, dude. So five books, all Amazon bestsellers, three and a half million podcast downloads, bro, that's like legit. That is legit. Tell me what's next.
Speaker 2:Paul. I'm just kind of rinsing and repeating what I'm doing. As long as these marketing budgets keep paying me what they're paying, I'm just really trying to serve them well and stay. The way it works is kind of they spend about five to seven percent of their revenue from the previous year on marketing and they build their budgets out, ken, like a year or two in advance. So these big companies, they already have their plan for 2025. Like, if you want to get on their plan for 2025, you missed the boat. They settled that in September and so my goal for what's next is to continue to stay as a line item on their 2025 budget, on their 2026 budget and beyond. I kind of found a niche here with with some of these big companies in our industry and making content for them, um, so so just really rinsing and repeating that um is is kind of my my goals for. For what's next, I moved to Florida, uh, playing a lot of golf and enjoying life down here.
Speaker 1:So that's fun, except this week It'll be. It don't be much golf going on this week when you've got you've got hurricane going on. Dude, what's the best, the best place, the best way for people to get in touch with you, paul?
Speaker 2:I have a website called the Paul Jamesoncom. That's got all the books and everything over there and our, our resources to train lawn care business owners. I know your audience is faith-based entrepreneurs. My content is very, very, very niched, if you own a lawn care business.
Speaker 2:I can help you, but I specifically keep it super niched on that. But on Instagram I'm realpauljameson and I post every day over there some motivational things and business principles and things of that nature. I do a proverb of the day. So for your faith-based entrepreneurs, I do have a touch of that on my page over there.
Speaker 1:We're going to get you up here for Create Conference in January. Hang out with me and John Maxwell and Gary Brekke.
Speaker 2:Let's go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's going to be good, dude, I'm super stoked this year. Yeah, it's going to be good. Dude, thank you so much for taking your time today in the middle of a hurricane. Thank God that our internet worked in the middle of a hurricane. But, dude, thank you so much for taking time to be able to share.
Speaker 1:I love your story and your journey. One of the things I love about it is you didn't go into podcasting to hit it big. You were just like I have information and I want to help people. And when you do that, what normally happens is there's a lot of passion behind that and a lot of authenticity. And when you do that, what normally happens is there's a lot of passion behind that and a lot of authenticity. And when people hear you and they go hey, I was broke, busted and disgusted and I'm sitting on the back deck having a beer and the guy's helping me build my business, I want to help you. And when you have a heart like that, dude, I'm telling you, man, people are attracted to that. And obviously, three and a half million downloads later, five Amazon bestselling books, bro, you've done. You've done an amazing, amazing thing. Talk to me about the fulfillment that you feel now in what you've done and the people you've been able to help, paul.
Speaker 2:It's, it's awesome, ken, it just feels well. First of all, it's just humbling and it's a lot of pressure when you know somebody's going to listen to you and we do our show every day, monday through Friday. So the pressure and the responsibility that I always talk about Tony in Lake Oconee. I have an avid listener. He services Reynolds Plantation Yards out there in Lake Oconee and he listens to me every morning and so when I'm creating my podcast he's like my ideal listener and I literally picture, okay, tony, who runs a lawn business in Lake Oconee, he's going to get in his truck in the morning after kissing his wife goodbye, and his kids go off to school and all that, and he's going to tune into my podcast and he's trusting me to provide him the information, the motivation, the knowledge to take his business to the next level. And it's so satisfying when he, you know, gives me feedback and he's like great, you know he should shoot me a text, but great episode today, paul, and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:It just feels like man it's good, it's awesome, so I'm absolutely loving it.
Speaker 2:And it's satisfying. I'm just be honest. When these big companies pay me a lot of money and the money goes into my account, that's satisfying.
Speaker 1:I'm just like pinching myself.
Speaker 2:Like yeah it's a dream, this is incredible the money that you can make in social media and in online and stuff like that. I'm just like pinching myself and I'm like I don't want it to stop, but I'm just like appreciative with each brand deal. I can't believe how much money I make for the relative little amount of work. But back again to value. I'm adding value to these brands and they keep paying me because it brings them more customers than they have now.
Speaker 1:So it's awesome. Yeah, I love that, grant. I've heard Grant's been saying this for the four and a half years I've known him. Money exchanges hands. When problems are solved so good, they've got a product, they need a buyer and you're the guy that connects them because you've got this whole audience over here, dude, I love it. Paul man, dude, thank you so much again for your time. Listen, guys. Check him out the Paul Jamisoncom. You can check him out. Check him out on Instagram Real Paul Jamison J-A-M-I-S-O-N. Head over to Amazon. Grab one of these books, dude. Thank you again so much for joining us today, my friend.
Speaker 2:Thanks, ken and Nate. Thanks again for making it happen. I appreciate you, brother.
Speaker 1:Guys, thank you for joining us on this episode of as the Leader Grows and, as always, man, we are super stoked that you hopped in here and listened to my good friend Paul and his unbelievable journey. Listen, we'll see you next week on as the Leader Grows.