Happy THURSDAY! A quick update on what’s been going on in my life since the launch of Million Dollar Weekend (then onto my billionaire lessons).
What happened in March:
- Got MARRIED and baby due soon. 💍👶 Huge personal news. So grateful for my wife, Mafe. 🙏 Went on our honeymoon, an RV trip to sights like Zion National Park and Sedona. ⛰️
- Reviews. Reached goal of 1000 book reviews for Million Dollar Weekend!! 🥳 THANK YOU. Continuing the momentum. Leave a review if you can: amazon, audible, goodreads
- Billionaire YouTube video launch. Great human lessons from the super rich, watch it here.
- Podcast. Some fire 🔥 episodes recently. If you missed it, here’s How to Get Rich as an Introvert and Brutally Honest Career Advice I Wish I Knew Earlier
- MDW Weekend Bootcamp. Hosted a workshop for people who bought 2 or more copies. Helped people get results from one weekend of work.
- Mark Manson. My interview with Mark Manson just got released on his channel, give it some love.
What’s coming up in April
- Florida trip. Prioritizing more time with family and doing our babymoon. Then interviewing PBD for YouTube channel…
- Shows. Connecting with Aaron Marino’s community this week. On CLS Experience with Craig Siegel and Talking Too Loud with Wistia CEO Chris Savage end April. Any others that I should be on?
- Podcast and Newsletter. People loved the “Brutally Honest Career Advice to my Younger Self” episode and email. Planning to do more on relationships, mindset, fitness.
- Filming. More YouTube videos. Plus Cybertruck interview with Codie Sanchez for an AppSumo surprise and future podcast episode.
Ok. Now onto this week’s newsletter…
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There are 2,640 billionaires in the world.
My career has enabled me to work with / interview 1% of the world’s billionaires.
What do they know that everyone else doesn’t?
Here are the 6 biggest lessons they taught me:
1- There are no employee billionaires
Every billionaire I’ve met became a billionaire through entrepreneurship.
Why?
Because as an employee, there’s a cap on your salary. The average annual raise is 3%.
But as an entrepreneur? Your only limit is YOU.
You’re in full control of:
- What you sell
- How much you charge
- And how many people see your offer
I’m not here to say that having a job is bad. But the truth is you’re not gonna be a billionaire with only a salary.
Sam Altman, the founder of OpenAI said, “The biggest economic misunderstanding of my childhood was that people got rich from high salaries. You get truly rich by owning things that increase rapidly in value.”
If you want control of your income, start a business.
2- Billionaires create their market
Whoever creates the market, takes home the billions.
When we started AppSumo, there were ~10 SaaS tools. Now, there are tens of thousands.
A growing market makes business easy. A shrinking market makes business hard.
How do you pick a growing market?
Your belief in yourself has to be higher than the belief you place in others.
In the Summer before 1995, Elon Musk was considering going to Stanford to pursue a PhD studying material science. But as he got closer to enrolling, he began to worry.
At the time, the internet was quickly gaining in popularity and the opportunity to capitalize was not going to wait for him to finish graduate school.
“The internet revolution only comes once in a lifetime,” Elon’s boss, Peter Nicholson told him, “so strike while the iron is hot.”
Elon ended up enrolling at Stanford but then immediately requested a deferral to pursue his startup. Four years later, Elon sold that startup for $307 million.
You have to be okay with looking “foolish” NOW to be right LATER.
What details do you notice that most people don’t?
3- They are okay with being boring
You don’t need to be in a sexy market (like tech or AI) to do well.
Larry Janesky became a billionaire with basements. Michael Hudner became very wealthy with shipping containers. The other day I met a kid who got rich selling ninja swords.
The point is:
There are SO many ways to get rich.
You don’t have to pick a miserable business just because everyone else is doing it.
What do you enjoy? What do you have an advantage in?
You’re much more likely to be successful when you follow your energy instead of the crowd.
4- Their attitude towards money never changes
When you think of how you’ll meet a billionaire, you probably think of seeing them off the coast of Monaco in a super yacht with a helicopter on the rooftop and them wearing expensive designer clothes.
But that couldn’t be further from the truth.
When I met Paul Orfalea he was wearing short socks and sneakers. When I met Michael Hudner, he was wearing casual slacks. Zuck is notorious for wearing a simple gray t-shirt with jeans. Peter Thiel was using an old iPhone 7 and Hanes socks.
In fact, the billionaires I’ve met live surprisingly simple and aesthetically UN-extreme lives.
They’re less concerned with LOOKING rich and more concerned with BEING rich.
They’re also super frugal. They won’t pay for an overpriced product.
Billionaires RESPECT and PROTECT their money. They don’t fling it around because they realize the blood & sweat that went into getting it.
Money doesn’t change your character, it only reveals it.
5- Billionaires got rich doing ONE thing
Money gurus tell you to “diversify” your money.
But the truth is you don’t build wealth by diversifying. You build wealth by doing ONE thing.
Mark Zuckerberg didn’t have side hustles. He built Facebook.
Same with all the other billionaires I’ve met:
Larry Janesky → Basements
John Paul DeJoria → Haircare
Michael Hudner → Shipping Containers
Try a lot of things. Once you find one that works – DOUBLE DOWN!
Diversification is for wealth preservation and protection, not wealth creation.
6- Billionaires pay the price
Nothing comes without a cost.
Many of the billionaires I spoke with told me how high the price was to make their money. They sacrificed personal relationships with their spouse and kids.
They also said they’d give anything to have those relationships back.
“You can’t get back the time with family, but you can always make more money.”
Entrepreneurship is NOT just about getting rich or becoming a billionaire.
It’s about creating your dream life. It’s about finding the right path for YOU.
Not everyone wants to or should become a billionaire.
For me, I’ve never wanted to be a mega-billionaire or own a fleet of yachts. I wanted the freedom to work on stuff I love and be with my favorite people.
Every billionaire I’ve interviewed and met was just a normal person.
They became obsessed with a specific, painful problem. Created a solution that was scalable to the masses. And were willing to pay the price to turn their product into a billion-dollar company.
YOU can become a billionaire.
But you have to start.
Right now. Where you are. And with what you have.
Rooting for you,
Noah 🌮
Ps. Fun fact: The word “honeymoon” is thought to have originated in medieval times. At that time, it was common for newlywed couples to drink mead (a fermented beverage made from honey) for a moon cycle (30 days) after their wedding. This tradition was believed to bring good luck and fertility to the couple.
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