BigDeal

If you've been saying you want to buy a business for years, your next move is HERE. Get your ticket to Main Street Millionaire Live and learn how to find deals, evaluate them, finance them, and own the upside: http://info.contrarianthinking.co/msmlbig-deal
Already a business owner? Growth Boardroom is where established owners tap in to a real board of advisors to find profit levers to find hidden cash their businesses. Check it out: https://contrarianthinking.biz/bdbr

What if everything you think you know about success is wrong? What if the biggest risks aren't reckless, they're required? And what if the person everyone loves to hate is actually the one we should all be studying?

Eric Jorgenson spent five years studying Elon Musk and distilled everything into his new book, The Book of Elon. He's the bestselling author of The Almanack of Naval Ravikant and has built a career decoding how the world's most effective people think, operate, and win. In this episode, we break down the exact frameworks Elon uses to build companies that rewrite entire industries, why he takes insane risks that would bankrupt most people, and how his relentless focus on speed, truth, and deletion makes him the most leveraged human alive.

In this episode, you'll learn:

Why Elon split his last $30 million between SpaceX and Tesla when everyone told him to pick one, and how that decision proved he's mission driven, not money driven

The five step algorithm: question requirements, delete, simplify, accelerate, automate, and why doing them out of order wastes millions

The idiot index: how to identify parts or processes where you're paying 100x more than the raw materials cost and why aerospace was a thousand to one before SpaceX

Why Elon fires fast, moves into factories during production hell, and demands hourly updates on bottlenecks, and how that hardcore culture filters for missionaries

Why demos beat PowerPoints every time and how showing physical progress collapses communication gaps and accelerates decisions

___________

(00:00:00) Introduction: The Risk-Seeking Mission-Driven Mindset of Elon Musk
(00:01:42) The 2008 Story: When Elon Split His Last 30 Million Between Two Dying Companies
(00:05:40) Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway: How Elon Pushes Through Obstacles
(00:06:57) Why Elon Is Polarizing: Politics, Billionaires, and the Nerd Who Became Controversial
(00:08:33) The Bottleneck Formula: Working on the Right Thing at the Right Time Right Now
(00:09:31) Production Hell and Sauron Focus: The Model 3 Story
(00:19:11) Hardcore Purpose: The Rage Demon, Torture, and Being Wired for War
(00:31:25) The Path to Billionaire Icon: Focus Intensely on What Nobody Else Can Do
(00:33:31) Never Burn Bridges: The PayPal Mafia and Founders Fund Investment
(00:36:51) The Idiot Index: Why Your Parts Cost 100 Times More Than They Should
(00:42:37) Speed Is the Ultimate Advantage: Rejecting the Fast-Cheap-Good Trilema
(00:47:57) Empathy at the Mission Level, Not the Individual: The Firing Philosophy
(00:53:29) Show Don't Tell: Demos Over Decks and the Power of Physical Progress
(01:01:06) The Algorithm: Question, Delete, Simplify, Accelerate, Automate
(01:06:44) The One Sentence Onboarding: Be So Good They Talk About You at Dinner
(01:11:21) Is Elon Happy? The Storm in His Head and What We Can Learn

___________

MORE FROM BIGDEAL
🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@podcastbigdeal
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bigdeal.podcast
📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@big.deal.pod

MORE FROM CODIE SANCHEZ
🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@codiesanchezct
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/codiesanchez
📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@realcodiesanchez

OTHER THINGS WE DO
🌐 Our community: https://contrarianthinking.typeform.com/to/WBztXXID
📰 Free newsletter: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3XWLlZp
📚 Biz buying course: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3NhjGgN
🏠 Resibrands: https://resibrands.com/
💰 CT Capital: https://contrarianthinking.biz/4eRyGOk
🏦 Main St Hold Co: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3YfGa8u
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you've been saying you want to buy a business for years, your next move is HERE. Get your ticket to Main Street Millionaire Live and learn how to find deals, evaluate them, finance them, and own the upside: http://info.contrarianthinking.co/msmlbig-dealAlready a business owner? Growth Boardroom is where established owners tap in to a real board of advisors to find profit levers to find hidden cash their businesses. Check it out: https://contrarianthinking.biz/bdbrThe best investors in the world aren't gambling. They're copying. They're patient. And they're finding asymmetric bets where the downside is capped and the upside is unlimited.Mohnish Pabrai is a legendary investor who turned $1 million into $14 million in five years by openly copying Warren Buffett's playbook, and now manages $1.4 billion using the exact same principles that built Berkshire Hathaway. No secret formulas. No complex algorithms. Just discipline, patience, and the willingness to look for weird things that make no sense.In this episode, you'll learn:* Why you don't need original ideas to make money and how shameless cloning beats innovation every time* The 10 bet rule: why concentrating your investments in a few great businesses outperforms diversification by 10x* Why selling too early is the biggest mistake investors make* The downside protection framework: how to structure bets where you can't lose more than 10% but could gain 100x* Why most people fail at investing because they chase what's popular instead of looking for anomalies that make no sense
___________

(00:00:00) Introduction: Never Sell Your Winners Too Early
(00:00:34) The Laws of Investing: Why Buffett Wrote the Physics of Money
(00:01:04) Spend Less Than You Earn: The Nonlinear Power of Compounding
(00:02:02) The 168 Hour Week: Don't Quit Your Job, Build Your Side Venture
(00:03:46) Entrepreneurs Don't Take Risk: The Upside Without Downside Framework
(00:08:12) Selling Skills and Unique Value Propositions: The Only Two Things That Matter
(00:09:58) Shameless Cloning: Why Original Ideas Are Overrated
(00:15:43) The 650K Lunch: How Warren Buffett Led to a Friendship with Charlie Munger
(00:18:12) From One Million to Fourteen Million in Five Years: The Buffett Approach in Action
(00:23:51) If Wealth Is Lost, Nothing Is Lost: Surviving 2008 and the Character Test
(00:26:08) Finding 100-Bagger Investments: The Turkish Company That Went 100X
(00:27:11) When to Sell: Only When It's Egregiously Overpriced
(00:29:59) Looking for Anomalies: The Mental Model for Total No-Brainers
(00:31:57) The Level 3 Communications Bet: Tripling Money on Fixed Income
(00:36:31) Pokemon Cards and Rembrandts: Understanding Asset Classes and Circular Competence
(00:41:30) The Truth Framework: Why Lying Weakens You and Honesty Creates Strength
(00:47:26) Screening CEOs: The Competitor Question That Reveals Everything
(00:49:35) A Day in the Life: Managing 1.4 Billion with Four People
(00:52:57) Warren's Pinball Business: The Blueprint for Finding Great Business Models
(00:55:58) Ambitious But Lazy: The Filter for Two-by-Four Business Opportunities

___________

MORE FROM BIGDEAL
🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@podcastbigdeal
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bigdeal.podcast
📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@big.deal.pod

MORE FROM CODIE SANCHEZ
🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@codiesanchezct
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/codiesanchez
📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@realcodiesanchez

OTHER THINGS WE DO
🌐 Our community: https://contrarianthinking.typeform.com/to/WBztXXID
📰 Free newsletter: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3XWLlZp
📚 Biz buying course: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3NhjGgN
🏠 Resibrands: https://resibrands.com/
💰 CT Capital: https://contrarianthinking.biz/4eRyGOk
🏦 Main St Hold Co: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3YfGa8u
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As every great founder will tell you, trading time for money is a losing game. Ownership is how wealth actually gets built. Come to Main Street Millionaire Live and learn how — http://info.contrarianthinking.co/msmlbig-deal

You've got the skill. You've got the product. But every time you talk to a wealthy buyer, you drop your price before they even ask. Here's the truth: broke people buy for price. Rich people buy for risk mitigation. And if you're still leading with "affordable," you've already lost the sale.

In this episode, you'll learn:


The four currencies wealthy buyers protect above all else: time, risk, reputation, and control, and why price doesn't even make the list


Why ego kills deals and how to turn your buyer into an ally instead of making them defend their identity


The EGO framework: Earn, Gap, Outcome, and how to diagnose instead of describe so you sound like an expert, not a salesperson


How to anchor the conversation around consequence, not cost, so price becomes irrelevant


The three buyer types: optimizer, delegator, and rationalizer, and why each one needs a completely different close


Why "just checking in" is the most useless sentence in sales and the three piece follow up framework that actually gets responses: Point, Proof, Path


The premium close that gives control back to the buyer and makes them feel smart for saying yes

Stop apologizing for your price. Start solving expensive problems. Rich buyers don't want cheap. They want certainty.

___________

(00:00:00) Introduction: Why Rich People Don't Care About Your Price
(00:01:02) The Four Currencies Rich Buyers Protect With Their Lives
(00:03:59) The Ego Framework: Earn, Gap, Outcome
(00:06:30) Stop Describing, Start Diagnosing: The Authority Shift
(00:12:54) The Three Types of Rich Buyers and How to Close Each One
(00:17:09) The Premium Close: Options, Recommendation, Reason, Next Step
(00:19:42) Say the Number and Shut Up: The Silence After Price
(00:23:01) The Three-Piece Follow-Up: Point, Proof, Path
(00:26:23) The Prize Is Trust, Not Money: Building Referral Engines
(00:26:57) Clear Over Cheap: Selling Like an Operator

___________

MORE FROM BIGDEAL

🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@podcastbigdeal

📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bigdeal.podcast

📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@big.deal.pod

MORE FROM CODIE SANCHEZ

🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@codiesanchezct

📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/codiesanchez

📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@realcodiesanchez

OTHER THINGS WE DO

🌐 Our community: https://contrarianthinking.typeform.com/to/WBztXXID

📰 Free newsletter: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3XWLlZp

📚 Biz buying course: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3NhjGgN

🏠 Resibrands: https://resibrands.com/

💰 CT Capital: https://contrarianthinking.biz/4eRyGOk

🏦 Main St Hold Co: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3YfGa8u
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You work harder than half your team. You deliver results. But somehow, the person who talks a good game in meetings just got promoted ahead of you. Here's the truth: hard work doesn't get you promoted. Visibility, advocacy, and understanding the game do.

Ethan Evans is a retired Amazon VP who spent over 15 years building billion dollar businesses inside one of the most demanding companies on earth. He went from getting fired twice early in his career to running Prime Video, Twitch sponsorships, the Amazon Appstore, and a t-shirt printing business that now does over a billion dollars a year. He worked directly with Jeff Bezos, survived public failures, learned how to navigate corporate politics without losing his soul, and retired early to teach others how to do the same.

In this episode, you'll learn:

The magic loop: how to turn your boss into your biggest advocate by making them successful first

Why invisible performers lose to visible performers every time and how a weekly status report changes everything

The exact script to ask for a raise that gets results without threatening to quit

Good boss versus bad boss: why consistency beats likability and how to tell the difference in an interview

How to give difficult feedback that actually lands: professionally firm, personally warm

The career killers nobody talks aboutJeff Bezos's philosophy: strategically patient, tactically impatient, and why Amazon banned PowerPoint for six page narratives

___________

(00:00:00) Introduction: Why Half Your Talent Wins and You Don't
(00:00:56) Corporate Politics: The Game You Didn't Know You Were Playing
(00:08:28) The Magic Loop: Turn Your Boss Into Your Biggest Advocate
(00:27:20) Invisible vs Visible Performers: Why Hard Work Isn't Enough
(00:16:30) How to Actually Ask for a Raise and Get It
(00:06:13) Good Boss vs Bad Boss: Consistency Over Likability
(00:42:42) Giving Difficult Feedback: Professionally Firm, Personally Warm
(00:51:28) Career Killers: Betrayal, Gossip, and Breaking Trust
(01:04:51) Jeff Bezos: Strategically Patient, Tactically Impatient
(01:11:05) The Six-Page Narrative: Why Amazon Banned PowerPoint
(01:18:06) Building Billion-Dollar Businesses: Prime Video to T-Shirt Printing
(00:58:22) Burnout Is About Vision Loss, Not Hard Work
(01:24:48) Hiring A Players: The Reference Check Hack Nobody Uses
(01:32:28) Final Advice: Know What You Want and Make the Deal

___________

MORE FROM BIGDEAL
🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@podcastbigdeal
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bigdeal.podcast
📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@big.deal.pod

MORE FROM CODIE SANCHEZ
🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@codiesanchezct
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/codiesanchez
📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@realcodiesanchez

OTHER THINGS WE DO
🌐 Our community: https://contrarianthinking.typeform.com/to/WBztXXID
📰 Free newsletter: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3XWLlZp
📚 Biz buying course: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3NhjGgN
🏠 Resibrands: https://resibrands.com/
💰 CT Capital: https://contrarianthinking.biz/4eRyGOk
🏦 Main St Hold Co: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3YfGa8u
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you've been wanting to buy a business for years, get your ticket to Main Street Millionaire Live. You’ll learn how to find the right business for you, make deals, evaluate them, finance them, and own the upside: https://contrarianthinking.biz/MSML26_BDYT

You've got a product idea. Maybe you've even built the thing. But now you're stuck on the part that actually matters: getting people to give you money before you've spent a fortune building inventory, hiring a team, or raising venture capital that'll own your company before you do.

Everett Taylor is the CEO of Kickstarter, the platform that's helped creators raise over $8 billion and launch everything from billion dollar companies to side hustles that print cash. He came up through the mailroom, got stabbed working a parking lot, and built his career by learning how to sell himself before he had anything to sell. Now he runs one of the most creative funding platforms in the world and he's breaking down exactly how to raise money without giving away equity, how to pitch without sounding desperate, and why most people fail before they even start.

In this episode, you'll learn:

Why selling yourself is the first skill every founder needs and how to build confidence even when you're starting from zero

The pre-order pyramid: exclusivity, urgency, value, timeliness, and trust, and why video is the number one thing that makes or breaks a campaign

How to calculate your real costs so you don't lose money on every sale and why you need a 25 to 30 percent buffer for the things you can't predict

The biggest mistakes founders make when pitching: not being concise, not building trust, and not understanding the difference between pitching VCs and pitching customers

Why raising venture capital means giving up control and how pre-orders let you test demand, keep equity, and build a real business on your terms

___________

(00:00:00) Introduction: How to Raise Your First 100K Without Connections
(00:00:52) The Self-Selling Framework: Marketing Yourself Before Your Product
(00:03:54) Mental Toughness and Emotional Regulation: The Two Traits You Need
(00:08:24) Pre-Orders Over Venture Capital: The Kickstarter Advantage
(00:10:21) The Pre-Order Pyramid: Exclusivity, Urgency, Value, and Trust
(00:13:41) The Video-First Rule: Why Great Campaigns Start With 30 Seconds
(00:17:11) The Biggest Pitch Mistakes: Get to the Point or Get Lost
(00:20:20) When to Bootstrap vs When to Raise Millions
(00:23:02) The Venture Capital Trap: Why a 250M Offer Got Rejected
(00:26:29) Cost Management and Buffer Strategy: The 25-30 Percent Rule
(00:32:46) Surprising Success Stories: 28M Board Games and Comic Book Empires
(00:37:49) The CEO Playbook: Mental Toughness, Humility, and Rolling Up Your Sleeves
(00:40:43) Remote Leadership: Trust, Aggressive Goals, and Performance Management
(00:43:26) The Kickstarter Turnaround: Rejecting Mediocrity and Rebuilding Culture

___________

MORE FROM BIGDEAL
🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@podcastbigdeal
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bigdeal.podcast
📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@big.deal.pod

MORE FROM CODIE SANCHEZ
🎥 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@codiesanchezct
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/codiesanchez
📽️ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@realcodiesanchez

OTHER THINGS WE DO
🌐 Our community: https://contrarianthinking.typeform.com/to/WBztXXID
📰 Free newsletter: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3XWLlZp
📚 Biz buying course: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3NhjGgN
🏠 Resibrands: https://resibrands.com/
💰 CT Capital: https://contrarianthinking.biz/4eRyGOk
🏦 Main St Hold Co: https://contrarianthinking.biz/3YfGa8u
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices