Jon Nastor's Hack the Entrepreneur

My guest today is an author, a teacher, and a brilliant entrepreneur that currently runs two really impressive businesses.

He started Crucial Vacuum when he purchased the merchandise from his parents brick and mortar vacuum store, as they went out of business. He would make it work by learning how to sell stuff on the internet.

In 2015, the Crucial brand, now encompassing Crucial Air and Crucial Coffee, did over $8 million revenue.

While building his e-commerce empire, him and his team ended building a software platform to optimize and run his business. Then he turned that very platform into its own 7-figure business, known as Skubana, by selling access to other high-revenue commerce sellers.

Now, let’s hack…

Chad Rubin.

This is our second episode in our new [Going Deep] series, where we remove the hack and go deep into a topic of real value to you, the entrepreneur. 

Today’s guest has recently ended a 34-year career as a serial direct marketer, and has now made the transition from intrapreneur to entrepreneur.

My guest made this transition while taking Boardroom Inc., which he worked within and later became a partner of, from around $3 million in revenues in 1981 to a high of $150 million, and creating marketing messages that have reached well over 1 billion people.

As of last January, my guest made the official and final step into entrepreneurship with the launch of his own consulting business. To kick off, he held a conference called The Titans of Direct Response and featured today’s greatest direct marketing entrepreneurs.

Now, let’s hack…

Brian Kurtz.

Today’s guest is responsible for more than $500 Million in successful business pitches and deals. He helps people sell companies for a living and he does it really, really well.

He is the Director of Capital Markets for the investment bank, Intersection Capital, where he raises tens of millions of dollars from investors and institutions.

He is the author of a must-read book called Pitch Anything – a book that I have read twice in the past year and I recommend it to every entrepreneur — because if you can’t pitch your ideas, you will never be successful.

Now, let’s hack…

Oren Klaff.

My guest today is a business strategist, author, podcaster, and an entrepreneur.

Almost 14 years ago, my guest left the recruitment industry to start her first business venture called MommyLoves.com. From there she spent over a decade publishing content, building an audience, and producing products.

Most recently, she is the founder of BeautyTechTools.com, where she helps beauty professionals use technology, social media, and email marketing to gain more clients.

Now, let’s hack…

Mary Kathryn Johnson.

Today’s entrepreneur absolutely blew my mind.

He is 35 years old and lives in a small town called Nanaimo, B.C., where his tech firm is one of the cities largest employers, with a staff of 170.

He started his business in 2004 as a single father, taking care of his son and little brother, while also attending school during the day and working at night.

In his spare time, he studied and mastered the art and science of Search Engine Optimization and became know as the SEOguy. This took him to earning upwards of $500 per hour, but he saw a problem — he couldn’t scale.

He looked at his business and realized that some of his best SEO clients were in Real Estate, so he scaled. Big Time. This was the birth of Real Estate Webmasters. Just 10 years later and $10,000,000 of annual revenue and he is nowhere near done.

His goal now is to grow the company to $100-million in annual sales within five or six year years, up from $20-million that he was previously forecasting.

To top it all off, he recently appeared on the Dragon’s Den — Canada’ version on Shark tank — pitching for what he calls “the largest legitimate ask in reality TV history” $2 million for four per cent of his company, for a $50 million valuation. He got his money, and they took 5%.

Now, let’s hack…

Morgan Carey.

• The real reason that most business deals fall through
• The absolute power of confidence in business
• How to get lucky in business (trust me, it’s not what you think)
• What happens to your life and business if you take things for granted

Today’s guest cleared his own path to success with over 30 years of hard work and it paid off big time.

At 29 and living in his home country of Australia, he decided that a life in Public Accounting was not for him! He quit his job and went to California to look for a new business idea and to surf all the legendary breaks.

He soon noticed that there were no sheepskin boots in California, so he and a friend dug up $500,  bought six pairs from Australia and brought them to California.

This was the birth of  UGG Boots.

For the first 13 years, he was crippled by a lack of financing to purchase product, in order to meet sales demands. His company was taken from him at one point —- then he gets it back. This is an absolutely crazy story of wins/losses/rags to riches.  But he overcame and built an internationally recognized brand.

He is now a newly published Author with his new book The Birth of a Brand: Launching Your Entrepreneurial Passion and Soul.

Now, let’s hack… Brian Smith.

Go to school, get good grades and become a Professional Accountant. That’s what they say, right?

Today’s guest did just that, but with a slight twist. Immediately after he obtained his. Master’s of Accountancy degree and then his CPA license, he let it lapse so he could work on his business full-time.

He is a brilliant entrepreneur and the founder of YouNeedABudget.com — Software built to give you laser-focus with your money.

When he isn’t writing or speaking about budgeting and being smart with your money, you can find him spending time with his wife Julie, and their five children.

Now, let’s hack…

Jesse Mecham.

My guest today is former legal transcriptionist turned brilliant entrepreneur.

After being fired decided in 2011, my guest decided to start freelancing as a legal transcriptionist.

In July of 2012, she made $1300. Next month, she made $2500. By December of that same year, she was earning over $4,000 a month.

Her entrepreneurial spirit quickly got ahold of her, and she started building a business teaching others to become courtroom transcript proofreaders. She now runs ProofreadAnywhere.com, a very high six-figure company, and apparently, plays a lot of Nintendo.

Now, let’s hack…

Caitlin Pyle.

My guest today is a marketing strategist, groundbreaking podcaster, and an entrepreneur.

He is the co-founder of Internet Business Mastery.

Back in 2010, when I was still performing energy audits on houses, I spent countless hours driving from house to house and listening and learning to my guest on his podcast.

During those years, I learned a ton about online business from him, and I am excited to share him with you today.

Moving beyond Internet Business Mastery, he is now a marketing strategist helping doers amplify their message and change the world.

Now, let’s hack…

Jason Van Orden.

Today’s guest is an inspiring entrepreneur who defies the odds in a male-driven industry and has many thoughts on changing this status quo. Rather than focusing on issues, she collaborates with organizations to provide a gateway for young people to develop an interest in technology and entrepreneurship.

When she was 8 years old she submitted her first marketing plan, managed a non-profit event at 12, led a team of marketers in one of Canada’s best-managed companies at 24 and was a Director at a Publicly traded company at 25.

She co-founded her first company with her sister and then leading to a global market share of non-profit customers for communication and membership management.

Today, she is working on a new company, realSociable, focused on social insight for deeper engagement with customers. RealSociable is making a lot of noise and growing rapidly. so far, customers have included such companies as HP, Vodafone, Microsoft, and Salesforce.com.

Now, let’s hack…

Dalia Asterbadi.