Jon Nastor's Hack the Entrepreneur

My guest today has dedicated her life to making the world a better, brighter place with the power of doodles.

She was a Financial Empowerment Consultant and the founder of The Empowered Dollar. During this time, she helped millennials and low-income families fix their finances and feel empowered to take control of their financial destiny.

Her latest and fastest growing venture is Art To Self — which she started early this year and has seen incredible growth from it.

It is a website and newsletter of daily art and inspiration sent straight to your inbox — I have to say they help my mornings.

Now, Lets Hack…

Stephanie Halligan.

In this 33-minute episode Stephanie Halligan and I discuss:

Today’s guest is an entrepreneur on the path to success, in fact if you visit his site, you can follow him on his journey from zero to $20k per month.

He is a mobile marketing consultant, entrepreneur, podcaster, speaker, coach, advisor, and friend.

In September 2013, my guest quit his job and made the move from corporate to entrepreneur.

His journey, along with its bumps and struggles, is one that many of us can relate to. He is currently the co-host of Zero to Scale and the host of Mobile-Friendly, two podcasts worth checking out.

Now, let’s hack…

Greg Hickman.

In this 31-minute episode Greg Hickman and I discuss:

My guest for today is a freelancer, turned agency owner and entrepreneur. His first introduction to working for himself was doing side-work after hours.

This eventually grew to the point that he was able to quit his job and freelance full-time. He expanded to a physical office and had eleven full-time salaried employees with clients all over the world.

Family and health reasons forced him to step away from his brick & mortar agency, while moving into software and online training. Now he makes his living by providing great software and products to freelancers and consultants from his upstairs office, with his wife and two girls just a room away.

He is currently the founder of Planscope.io, a project management tool built for consultants and he is the founder at Double Your Freelancing where helps 24,000 freelancers every week with his weekly newsletter.

Now, let’s hack…

Brennan Dunn.  

In this 41-minute episode Brennan Dunn and I discuss:

In 2009, my guest co-founded and was Director of Analytics at Loudpixel, a successful social analytics company. After many successful years she realized it wasn’t quite what she wanted to be doing, so she made a change.

Today my guest is an independent wedding and lifestyle photographer. In a market that most people struggle to start a business in, my guest has managed to build a business to where she works part-time and makes a full-time income. This allows her time to spend with her 1-year old daughter.

She also runs an interview podcast series for photographers called Photo Field Notes and teaches in Michigan State University's Advertising Department.

Now, let’s hack…

Allie Siarto.

In this 35-minute episode Allie Siarto and I discuss:

My guest today is a communicator, consultant, creator and an entrepreneur.  He is also a writer, speaker and a master at audience builder.

Originally from Chicago, he then moved to Nashville after graduating from college and spending a year traveling with his band — I think we relate well because of the traveling musician connection.

He has written four books including his latest The Art of Work, and also teaches a popular online course called Tribe Writers.

Now, let’s hack… Jeff Goins.

In this 30-minute episode Jeff Goins and I discuss:

My guest today is recognized as an unquestionable authority in the content strategy space, after having written her seminal article, The Discipline of Content Strategy.

She is also one of the coolest, most passionate and friendly people that you could ever hope to meet.

Although we don’t avoid content strategy explicitly in this conversation, we are here to talk about her as an entrepreneur.

My guest is currently the CEO at Brain Traffic, and Founder of the Confab Content Strategy Conferences.

Her agency Brain Traffic is home to a team of renowned content strategists, serving clients like Hewlett Packard, Coca-Cola, Merck and Best Buy.

She currently lives south of me in the northern city of St. Paul, Minnesota with her two kids.

Let’s hack…

Kristina Halvorson

In this 37-minute episode Kristina Halvorson and I discuss:

Before today’s guest built a successful company in China, he was just a wandering 20-year-old backpacker, only looking for an adventure.

He planned on making a brief stop in the city of Beijing to earn some funds, see the Great Wall and move onto his next adventure. Turns out it would do more than just earn him enough funds to travel, it would lead him to become a pillar of Beijing’s pop culture.

He is the founder and Creative Dictator of China's first streetwear clothing brand, Plastered T-Shirts.

He has also been awarded the British Chamber of Commerce in China’s Entrepreneur Award in his home country of England.

He lives near his flagship store in Beijing with his wife and four children, and is far happier now than when he first arrived in the city.

Let’s hack…

Dominic Johnson-Hill

In this 33-minute episode Dominic Johnson-Hill and Jon discuss:

Today’s guest is a social entrepreneur. About 10 years ago, she took some off-the-cuff advice that said, you should build your career around three things you are passionate about. For my guest, these three things are: music, charity, and the environment.

She is presentlyof the founder of LSTN Headphones, a headphone company with a goal of giving the gift hearing to those without. Maybe you are one of the millions of people, to see the commercial on YouTube, where they put headphones into the young girls ears as she can hear for the first time ever -- that's LSTN Headphones.

Every pair of headphones LSTN sells gives the gift of hearing to someone — they have been able to give the gift of sound to over 15,000 in the U.S., Kenya, Peru, and Uganda.

Prior to founding her own company, my guest worked her way up from working at a record store, promoting concerts and eventually landed at Universal Music Group at just 19.

Now, let’s hack…

Bridget Hilton.

In this 32-minute episode Bridget Hilton and Jon discuss:

Today’s guest is one of the most well-respected and prolific marketing minds alive today.

After his first job out of college working at a software company, my guest started a book packaging business, which he later sold to his employees.

He then co-founded Yoyodyne, a unique marketing service and company — he sold this company to Yahoo! in 1998 for $30 million.

During that time, he launched another web company called Squidoo, which was acquired in 2014 by HubPages.

He writes daily to his blog, one of the most popular blogs in the world, and he has also written 18 books that have been bestsellers.

You can win a copy of his latest book here.

Now, let’s hack… Seth Godin.

In this 37-minute episode Seth Godin and I discuss:

[episode]

[episode_ad] [episode_transcript] Coming soon ... [/episode_transcript]

Today’s guest is the founder of The Improv Effect, a company that gives their clients the competitive edge, through creativity, collaboration and effective communication.

My guest's goal was to help businesses reach their full potential and she has successfully done this for global companies such as Groupon, Johnson & Johnson, The PGA Tour, Crayola and many more.

With techniques that she learnt on the job at Disney and Sesame Street, she leads teams and organizations to achieve teamwork, creative problem solving, presentation skills, and product development sessions.

In addtion to this, my guest is a much sought-after speaker and speaking coach to leaders worldwide.

She also co-authored a book called CTRL Shift: The book for any day.

Now, let’s hack… Jessie Shternshus

In this 30-minute episode Jessie Shternshus and I discuss: