I have to take off a week from podcasting.

The Community is set to finally re-open on Monday, May 18th, with a very big launch after being closed for developments for over a month.

However, there’s an incredible amount of work left to do. Recording 3 or 4 podcasts a week and shipping them with featured images and shownotes is more than a full-time job. There simply was not going to be enough time to re-launch the Community if I continued my normal podcasting schedule.

This is where I had to face a reality: I’m going to have to break my routine.

You’ll hear me face this reality and talk through the impact breaking a routine has on an audience. While I initially felt like I was doing my audience a disservice, I came to realize that it would be an even bigger disservice to neglect taking care of the very things that allowed us to continue providing value.

This episode also takes an interesting turn. I talk about prolific film-maker Casey Neistat who’s been doing insanely epic, daily vlogs for nearly 50 days in a row now.

We talk about overcommitting and what happens when an audience comes to expect an unrealistic output resulting from overcommitment.

Confrontation isn’t pleasant. It’s typically associated with arguments and hostility.

Whether it’s a client, your spouse, family, or friends, there’s nothing pleasant about confronting someone. Out of self-preservation, we often expect the worst based on past situations that went bad.

Ben mentions in this episode that you generally have two types of confronters: doormats and bulldozers. Both of them stem from fear.

We share several anecdotes and lessons learned from past encounters along with some healthy ways to approach confrontation—everything from asking your boss for a raise to talking with the neighbor who plays his music too loud.

You may have heard me talk about the importance of building your own platform, but social media is also a great way to engage with people.

Your audience is already using social media, so meeting them where they’re at can work to indirectly bring them back to your site.

It seems like you’d want to engage on a bunch of platforms and share your work in as many places as possible, but today we tackle an interesting question:

Is there such a thing as being too many places?

At what point is someone’s first experience with your brand potentially a negative one because you’re on a platform where you’re not really engaged?

I don’t think the answer is as simple as a number. There’s a fine balance to strike between maximizing what’s working right now and being an early mover on the next big thing. We talk about that in this episode.

They say public speaking is the number one fear—even above death. But do you know where that supposed “fact” comes from?

It turns out it was popularized by a book written in 1977 citing a very unscientific research study.

While we debunk the number-one-fear myth in this episode, it doesn’t detract from the fact that public speaking can still be scary.

This episode is for you if you identify with any of the following:

1. You’ve never spoken before but want to know what to expect for the future when you speak someday.

2. You’ve been invited to speak and have a gig coming up soon.

3. You’ve spoken in the past and want some refreshers on how to prepare, overcoming common issues, and how to get more requests to speak.

You’ll hear some very practical techniques for minimizing fear and hear me share absolutely everything I’ve learned about speaking.

I focus on preparing for your speech, how to practice, delivery, slides, how much time to allocate to your introduction vs. your message, what to do if you freeze, and how to prevent freeze ups from happening in the first place.

Let’s face it: life can be stressful at times. It’s frustrating enough thinking about the things that are stressing you out, but you know what’s the worst?

A lot of times, you don’t even know where the stress and anxiety are coming from.

Many of us live with a base level of stress. The first step to getting out is acknowledging stress that’s already there.

In this episode, we talk about some extremely practical tips for reducing stress. These are very specific, actionable things you can do to help discover, acknowledge, and decrease stress in your life.

Wait a minute… didn’t tax season just end? Well yes, it did, but this is actually the best time to start preparing for next year!

A lot of people start off by saying, “Now, I know this is a boring topic…” If there were any topic to do that with, it would be taxes.

But I don’t want to do that. Remember, people feed off of your energy! They’re looking to you for how to feel.

That’s why I’m going to make this fun. This is going to be an exciting episode about taxes that will help you feel a lot more prepared for next year.

This is an ideal episode for freelancers, small business owners, and any kind of entrepreneur.

If you’re looking to understand taxes better, feel a little more prepared, learn to categorize expenses easily, reduce self employment tax, and get a handle on things, this episode is for you.

Choosing a niche can be scary. Narrowing your focus can be overwhelming.

I’ve talked a lot about how people will put you in a box and that you want to define the box they’re going to put you in. A lot of people have been saying they want to curate what they share and niche down, but they are afraid.

It seems like you’re saying no to so much. What if you’re too specific? What if the industry changes or your niche is no longer valuable?

What balance should you strike between entering a validated market and distinguishing yourself by offering something different?

Ultimately, it comes down to people. When you’re focused on understanding and serving peoples’ needs, you’re always going to be tuned in to what’s relevant and valuable.

We talk about all this and a lot more in this episode.

We just returned from a conference and we’re feeling that conference high. You know, where you’re super inspired and fired up from spending time with incredible people and you feel like you’re ready to take on the world.

I remember I used to feel this feeling once or twice a year when returning from a conference. But then it would slowly dissipate. The coals of my inspirational fire would cool and I yearned once again for the engaging discussions with likeminded people.

The Community is like the conference experience you love, but it’s with you every day and right in your pocket.

Cory Miller joined the Community on May 8th, 2014. Over the course of a year, I got to know Cory really well. He completely turned his life around. He went from gaming every single day to growing his own apparel brand.

I loved what he was doing so much that I ended up hiring him to become the full time Product Director at seanwes. I got to hang out with Cory at the conference and he also drove down to the studio to join us for this episode while he was in Texas.

This past week, we were fortunate enough to hang out with 19 of our Community members who attended the conference. What incredibly genuine people they were! It was remarkably un-weird how normal it felt to meet them in person.

While I was there, Colin (pictured bottom left) told me he wished I'd done an episode of the podcast dedicated exclusively to the Community. He just joined a few weeks ago and he said he's kicking himself for not joining sooner. He faults me for not pushing him over the edge and I accept the blame—so now we dedicated an entire episode to the Community.

We take you behind the scenes of the Community and show you what goes on inside and what it’s like. Other members also share their experience and what kind of a positive impact it’s had on their lives.

There are only two prices where a product or service is acknowledged for its full value: full price or free.

For full price it’s obvious: when someone purchases at the full amount, they value for the full amount.

When a buyer purchases a discounted product, they don’t see the original price as the value—they value it at the discounted amount.

The only way to win by discounting is to become a discount brand. Discounts are always a devaluation.

Giving someone a gift or doing work pro-bono is giving them something of full value at no cost. Unlike with discounts, the recipient of the gift values it at the full amount.

In this episode, you’ll hear why I never ask clients for a budget and why discounting not only sacrifices your long-term profitability and brand perception, but it’s a big middle finger to your past customers. I talk about you what to do instead to create urgency and sell.

Just about everywhere you go, you see comments. All social media has commenting ability and everyone has a chance to voice their opinion.

This makes sense for social media. After all, the people are what make the platform. But what about for your own domain? Should people be able to comment on your website?

The immediate answer seems to be “yes,” but remember: your website is your platform and letting people comment is giving them some of your platform.

You are offering them an opportunity to be seen by your readers and that’s a very big responsibility.

Comments can be useful, and you’ll hear me acknowledge some of the upsides, but I’m also going to make some compelling arguments for disabling comments on your website entirely—as well as showing you what to do instead to maximize engagement.