Hustle Machine

Because we know you’re here for our witty banter as much as our extensive business acumen, we once again start off on a lighter note this week, talking about the etiquette of headphone fashion choices and castigating Zack for his debilitating Apple products addiction. Still, he makes up for it this episode with a proper shout-out to our championship Georgia Bulldogs, so we’ll let it slide this time.

This week’s topic is on loss leaders: when do you create something for a client just to gain exposure, versus when do you stick to your guns and demand payment for service?

We don’t issue hard and fast rules here at Hustle Machine very often, so we don’t outright tell you not to provide something for a client for free. Circumstances are wildly variable, so it may work out for you. A free job for the right client really can lead to a great deal of paying business down the line if things work out well and you can reap the benefits of a loss leader project for a long time to come.

Still, we tend to advise entrepreneurs to avoid outright free loss leaders. What works well for a retail business is often less effective for a small business owner. You’ll want to be careful about doing anything for exposure alone. After all, once you’ve opened the door, where does it close?

To quote Jason’s better half, “No is a complete sentence.” Don’t be afraid to ask for payment, even if it’s only to cover costs, rather than a full price bill. Charge something, negotiate for your needs and know that your work is more valuable than a rotisserie chicken at the back of a Costco.

We also take time to talk about when it's appropriate to lend help to a friend, discuss proper technique for unpacking after a vacation and listen to Jason sing a snippet of “Schoolhouse Rock” for your listening pleasure.

Know that we believe in getting paid here at Market House, even if we do offer Hustle Machine for free. Exposure is great, but cash is much better.

Go Dawgs!

It took us 17 or 18 takes to get this one in the books because Jason’s computer kept freezing up, including at least once early in this final shoot. Find any more instances of him freezing up to win a prize! 

As our duo learn revenge is a dish best served cold, Jason begins considering his career viability in case of a zombie apocalypse and Zack is confronted with whether he’s the Jack Shepherd of the group in perhaps the most tortured “Lost” metaphor of the past five years.

We almost break up the podcast entirely over Jason’s terrible Yoohoo take, but we do get down to business eventually in this marathon episode about the need to dress for success.

The irony of Zack wearing gym clothes while Jason wears a blazer over a graphic T-shirt to discuss this is duly noted, we promise.

Nonetheless, Zack in particular emphasizes the importance of first impressions and creating an office culture alike through office apparel, while Jason faces an existential crisis about his possible lack of a fashion style and whether he’s changed in the years since he once swore not to allow any hats in the office. 

(Has Jason potentially been replaced by a pod person since then? What is he hiding under the cap he once threatened to ban from the workplace? Stay tuned to find out!)

We’ll talk about elevating your style, the difference between wearing certain clothes for client meetings versus wearing them for a day in the home office, and how wearing a nice outfit, even at  home, can make your work feel like your career and not just a hobby. We note how people treat you differently depending on your attire and talk about how to maintain your individuality even as you find ways to dress up to the expectations of new clients.

And as Jason, in particular, tries to find that perfect balance between the three-piece suits of the past and the casual Friday approach of the weekend, we can all remember that, if the apocalypse does happen, we can dress down as much as we want. The zombies won’t care.

To start with, a disclaimer: no one at Hustle Machine is a licensed medical practitioner and neither Jason nor Zack are qualified to give medical diagnoses or professional health advice.

Yes, it’s that sort of episode this week, the sort that starts with discussions of “shoulder nipples” and “gut bugs” and veers into Zack showing off his basket full of vitamin supplements as he decries the unhealthy habits of modern society and our need for more nutrients. You have been warned.

Eventually, however, we do execute a clumsy segue into talking about the unhealthy landscape of American business practices as we talk about today’s topic, when to listen to your gut. (That’s not a weight joke, or, if it is, it’s at Jason’s expense, which makes it OK).

As Jason says, “Listen to your gut bugs,” (which may or may not look like those cartoon viruses in “Dr. Mario,” mind you). That is neither a reference to Zack’s future rock band name or to Jason’s hypothetical college nickname, but simply a colorful way to tell you to learn when to trust your instincts, and when to seek a second opinion.

We’ll talk about learning to look for red flags, finding someone to serve as a sounding board, recognizing the difference between a gut feeling and simple doubt and determining when something is simply not a good fit for your business.

Trust your gut but have someone to keep your gut in check. Know that sometimes, your gut can be wrong. Sometimes you can let hope or excitement override your gut feelings, despite Jason’s desire for an emotional readout of his current state of mind.

All that, plus Jason fails to pronounce “inevitably” correctly in nearly a dozen tries, Zack toots his own horn, we demonstrate some invisible semaphore, Jason shows off his handy dandy notebook and we even slip in a oblique Captain Planet reference at one point. Add on to that more mentions of “gut bugs” than you’ve ever heard in one place at any point in your life.

Yes, it’s just another extraordinary episode of Hustle Machine ready for your listening pleasure. Have at it!

Today’s episode of Hustle Machine is our longest yet, partly because we spend the first half dozen minutes of the episode on our new focus on funny stories about Zack’s bad work habits and unfortunate timing at his old radio station gig.

We also find time in the early moments to compare our children to both a cartoon frog from a classic Warner Bros. short and the Peanuts gang dealing with their adult trombone chorus, so pick your poison on that combination of pop culture references.

Meanwhile, watch as Jason flips his microphone upside down to mimic Joe Rogan’s mike technique, all in a probably futile effort to match his podcast following. But hey, at least he’s trying, which is more than we can say for Zack’s Rogan techniques.

All of this in the first 10 minutes!

You get a big bang for your non-existent buck when you’re a regular listener to the Hustle Machine.

Eventually, though, despite our best silly time wasting efforts, we do manage to reach this week’s topic, which is Goals: how to commit to them, how to reach them, how to define them.

It’s a big topic, which explains the extra length this week as we talk about how to know when you’ve met your goals, how to break big goals down into smaller, attainable goals and how to make sure you don’t bite off more than you can chew in creating realistic, manageable goals.

Meanwhile, Jason both explains what a Juicy Fruit budget is (oddly enough, it doesn’t actually involve gum at all), then accidentally lets his secret Hulu habit slip out on the air. If we do come back to that funny story angle, maybe he can lead off next time.

There’s a lot to cover this time around, even with the jumbo runtime, so don’t delay, hit that “Play” button and let’s get going into the secret but lucrative trade of goal-setting, and all that that entails, on a specially tailored episode of Hustle Machine. You won’t want to miss it, so set your next goal to listen to this episode and hop to it.

Sadly, our faithful viewers just miss out this week on our wonderful dancing intro, which Zack cut off right before the cameras went live. Jason, at least, demonstrates his record scratch technique, so look forward to that in the opening minutes of this week’s episode of Hustle Machine.

This week, inspired by a text from a friend of Zack’s, we’re talking about what to do when you’re overwhelmed by your to-do list. We talk about making a list of your top three things, followed by a secondary list of five more things, which makes eight things, until you may lose count of exactly how many things there are at this point (there’s a reason the Cat in the Hat restrained himself to merely Thing 1 and Thing 2).

We’ve got a lot of useful advice on this particular topic, based on our years of dealing with overcrowded schedules in previous work environments. Everything from working hard through your most focused time of the day, to scheduling big tasks throughout the day to simply changing up your schedule to start work early in the day are mentioned as options.

There’s also focus on the importance of negotiation, delegation and self-determination in making your workload work for you. We talk about being a generalist, not a specialist, and not putting too much pressure on yourself by sticking to deadlines.

We also have plenty of time to spend on the usual amount of inanities, too, from Zack on the perils of frog consumption to Jason advocating arts and crafts time for a DIY door on open floor plan cubicles.

All that, plus baseball chatter, Jason accusing Zack of being old, Zack explaining the frog eating was actually referring to a book and not literally eating an actual frog and Jason advising listeners of the best way to brood in the dark while still getting your work done. All in a day’s work for our intrepid podcasting duo.

That’s right, it’s another episode of Hustle Machine and we’re glad you’re still with us as we dive into our latest topic on entrepreneurship at its finest.

Today’s episode of Hustle Machine is, admittedly, unfinished, or at least only covers part of the topic. We’ll tell you that upfront because, honestly, we could discuss aspects of this week’s topic for hours on end and we try not to strain anyone’s patience in any given episode.

Honestly, though, every episode of Hustle Machine is, to some degree, about this issue and we’ll be discussing it again and again as we continue to keep things chugging along over here.

That’s right, it’s time to start talking about starting a business, a topic that will keep us occupied here at this podcast for many episodes to come as we touch on aspects of it again and again in various ways.

We’ll talk about the basic steps you’ll want to take first, from creating a business plan to researching the market before spending any money. 

Jason will also do his best to pretend there are no other website design companies extant other than ours, to variable results.

We’ll also say the word “differentiators” so many times this episode it may no longer sound like a real word by the time we’re done.

From knowing your strengths and weaknesses, and hiring the best people to cover the latter, to budgeting properly for marketing, there’s a lot to know in starting your business, and we hardly scratch the surface in this week’s episode.

We do find time, however, to debate the existence of the Dead Letter Office and continue to pine for our fabled angel investor as we search our spam folders for his or her grant offer yet again.

While we keep looking for that offer, make sure to come back for more talk on this topic in the future. The Hustle Machine is on the move but we’ll make sure to keep circling back on this particular issue as many times as needs be.

We considered a lot of names for this episode, from “When It’s Time to Fly” to “When It’s Time to Jump Out of an Airplane.” We apparently had aviation on the mind when we were discussing this week’s theme of choosing the right time to take that big step, whether it’s launching a new business, starting a new side hustle or taking the plunge in whatever enterprise you’re engaging in next. We promise there aren’t any jokes about hatching or shoving you out of the nest, at least.

We do spend a bit of time just marveling at reaching this point – not only Episode 3 of Hustle Machine, but to have this project moving forward after nearly a year of considering it but worrying about when it was the proper timing to jump in ourselves. We have to take our own advice, sometimes, when it comes to deciding what’s the right time to start something.

Jason shows off a bit of cultural literacy this episode, quoting both Emerson and “Seinfeld,” without making any judgment on which one is more impressive. Zack, on the other hand, refuses to let Jason make a list of top five signals to look for, as part of the unofficial Hustle Machine policy of “no listicles.” And you can take that promise to heart.

We do give out some advice, though, about finding the self-awareness to find the right time to make a career transition; leaving old jobs on a high note to make sure you can keep up old relationships and networking chances for the future; scheduling around your passions, so you can know when you want to take a chance and when it’s time to make time for the others things in life, like friends and family; and more that we won’t list here lest we break our brand new listicle ban right after making it.

Ultimately, the only way to know when the time is right is to know yourself, a task beyond our capabilities to advise you on; for that you’ll want a philosopher, or at least one of those self-help book writers. But once you DO know yourself, come back over here to Hustle Machine and we can give you more advice on making your business moves at a time best suited to your needs.

Welcome to episode 2 of the Hustle Machine! 

That’s the advice we found from a certain 9-year-old to her older sister and we encourage it wholeheartedly here at Hustle Machine. We just hope that little girl doesn’t have her own podcast yet or she might put us out of job in giving peptalks to those of you in need of finding a better mindset.

Lo and behold, it’s already time for Episode 2 and the Hustle Machine is up and running again as we focus this time on the importance of mindset in keeping your small business or other enterprise going strong.

Mindset is very important to us here at Hustle Machine. It plays a big part in hitting goals and you’ll hit more goals, quicker and better, when you’ve got your head fixed in the right mindset.

We talk about the difference between a fixed mindset and a growth mindset, and how the latter can help you set new goals, take advantage of opportunities that come your way and fight complacency to keep growing and changing as a business owner.

In addition to space metaphors, we’ve got all sorts of other metaphors to go around this episode, from mountain climbing to the first, and almost certainly not last, reference to the Boy Scouts and Scouting from Jason on this podcast.

We’ve got a lot of advice to go around this episode, from reading a lot of business books (the average CEO reads 60 books a year!) to being receptive to feedback when it comes your way.

Overall, we hope our listeners can use some of this advice to find themselves in the right headspace in their business dealings going forward. Mindset is a big deal at Hustle Machine and we want you to find the right one for your work, too.

And if you still need more of a peptalk after today’s episode, well, you can always try and find an encouraging 9-year-old to put you in the right mentality, whether it’s to go the bar, start a business or, yes, go to outer space. Maybe we’ll see you there.

Get Our Free Stop Start & Continue Worksheet

In the show, we also discussed the Stop, Start, & Continue method. Grab our free worksheet here and do this with your own team.

Do more. Be more.

Welcome to the first episode of Hustle Machine, our new podcast designed for the entrepreneurial community.

We’re Jason Marlowe and Zack Tatum, co-founders of Market House, a website design company specializing in branding and automation, but this particular podcast goes far beyond the scope of our small business.

No, Hustle Machine is our attempt to build a community and connect with entrepreneurs and solo-preneurs and focus on the various elements of running your own business, operating as a freelancer and how to make your hustle or side-hustle work for you.

In this inaugural (that’s another, fancy way to say first-ever for those of you skipped senior English in high school) episode, we want to, in fact, focus on that word, “hustle,” and perhaps re-define it, in effect flipping the script on what it means for people today.

We’ve been running Market House for nearly a decade. We, ourselves, are hustlers. But we knew from the beginning we didn’t want to run ourselves ragged or neglect our families and friends to make our business a success.

We want to show you can hustle as a business owner or freelancer and still establish a balance between business and personal life. We want to change up the business culture and overcome that negative training.

Going forward, we hope Hustle Machine will allow our community to connect with another, mentor each other, form peer groups and provide continuing education for business matters.

Hustle Machine will come out every week, with plans for some live episodes going forward. In the meantime, you can listen to the episodes we’ve already uploaded, visit us online or connect with us via the social media site of your choice, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.

And if you like what you hear, we hope you’ll subscribe and follow on your platform of choice as we continue to expand and explore what Hustle Machine can become. Drop on by and listen to two college buddies turned business partners explain what they know about business to you, with some bad jokes and good tips along the way.

Let's start the hustle.