Useful Not Famous

We've found a way to use worry to improve our lives.

Worry, problem solving, attacking constraints, whatever you call it, it's what we do before going all in on an idea. By taking this approach, we've found it's given us a superpower:

Conviction.

Leave us a voicemail to be featured on the show: call.show/usefulnotfamous

Chapters

• (00:00) - Worry Before Betting

Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow us! Jeff Sarris | Amara Andrew

Support the Show
Readwise is the way to get the most out of what you read and is the only subscription that we find so valuable that we can imagine keeping it until the end of time.  Sign up for Readwise using our special link, readwise.io/maven/, and get 60 days free!

Half a million followers. $323 a month. That's the average.

In this episode, we break down why fame is one of the worst goals you can chase — and why the people getting rich aren't the ones you see on your feed. They're the ones solving hard problems you'll never hear about.

We get into:
• Why the right tools in the wrong hands are worthless
• The "aspiring entrepreneur" trap (and how to escape it)
• Why your phone is enough to start — and proof from creators doing it
• The real reason famous people spiral while engineers thrive
• What a study of nuns' brains taught us about staying sharp
• Why hiding behind the camera is killing your content
• How constraints (not gear) actually make you better

If you've been waiting for the right setup, the right camera, the right moment — this one's for you. Stop buying. Start making.

Leave us a voicemail to be featured on the show: call.show/usefulnotfamous

Chapters

• (00:00) - The right tools in the wrong hands

Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow us! Jeff Sarris | Amara Andrew

Support the Show
Readwise is the way to get the most out of what you read and is the only subscription that we find so valuable that we can imagine keeping it until the end of time.  Sign up for Readwise using our special link, readwise.io/maven/, and get 60 days free!

Change doesn't fail because you're too early. It almost always fails because you're too late.

In this episode, we explain why chasing views, followers, and “fame” won’t pay the bills without a real business behind it, and how to flip the whole game by becoming genuinely useful to a specific group of people.

We break down usefulness as a chain (audience → business owners → advertisers/customers), why we evolve offerings instead of constantly restarting, and how patience beats high-risk hype.

We also share a real hyperlocal case study: two simple videos helped a brand-new coffee shop with no marketing open to a slammed weekend and why that only works when the product is actually good.

If you don’t feel useful, it’s time to change...before it’s too late.

Chapters

• (00:00) - Change Too Late

Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow us! Jeff Sarris | Amara Andrew

Support the Show
Readwise is the way to get the most out of what you read and is the only subscription that we find so valuable that we can imagine keeping it until the end of time.  Sign up for Readwise using our special link, readwise.io/maven/, and get 60 days free!

"Work smarter, not harder" is comforting advice—until you realize it's also a complete lie. Your competitors are doing both: using AI to sprint through research, production, and decision-making while everyone else scrolls.

This week, we break down why tools like Grok and Claude can compress hours of work into mere seconds (if you know how to prompt well), why offloading your thinking is the fastest way to lose your edge, and how a single search can reveal what's completely hidden from Google.

Finally, we tackle the quiet mistake draining most small businesses: treating platforms like separate worlds. In an interest-graph, algorithm-driven world where 75–85% of views come from non-followers, the smartest move is to cross-post everywhere, ignore vanity metrics, keep personal and business accounts separate, and let the audience, not your assumptions, decide what hits.

Chapters

• (00:00) - Smarter And Harder

Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow us! Jeff Sarris | Amara Andrew

Support the Show
Readwise is the way to get the most out of what you read and is the only subscription that we find so valuable that we can imagine keeping it until the end of time.  Sign up for Readwise using our special link, readwise.io/maven/, and get 60 days free!

Most people are stuck solving the wrong problems. They obsess over pixel-perfect website tweaks, compare follower counts, and replay awkward conversations in their head while the questions that actually move the needle go unanswered. What are you building? Who is it for? Why does it matter?

In this episode, we break down why small problems shrink your life and how choosing bigger, harder problems is the fastest path to growth in business and personally. We dig into the "pick your battles" framework, why the interest graph has made followers nearly irrelevant, and the real math behind creator income. One YouTuber made $1.2M from a single video while a TikToker with 1.4M followers and 360M views couldn't cover rent.

If you want to be useful, not just famous, this one's for you.
Topics covered: vanity metrics, interest graph vs. follower graph, AI search, hyperlocal platforms, timeless marketing, and what it means to be a student of the craft.

Chapters

• (00:00) - Small Problems, Small Life

Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow us! Jeff Sarris | Amara Andrew

Support the Show
Readwise is the way to get the most out of what you read and is the only subscription that we find so valuable that we can imagine keeping it until the end of time.  Sign up for Readwise using our special link, readwise.io/maven/, and get 60 days free!

You crave certainty, yet that need is precisely what's holding you back. This week, we talk about why building trust with a personal brand, going hyperlocal, and creating real-life experiences people want to talk about are the only left ways to thrive in the AI future that's rapidly approaching.

Chapters

• (00:00) - Certainty Quote

Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow us! Jeff Sarris | Amara Andrew

Support the Show
Readwise is the way to get the most out of what you read and is the only subscription that we find so valuable that we can imagine keeping it until the end of time.  Sign up for Readwise using our special link, readwise.io/maven/, and get 60 days free!

We’re engaged! But before we share that story, we talk about pronoia (the opposite of paranoia), choosing to believe the universe is working in your favor. And how that simple shift changes what you notice, how you feel, and how you perform.

We also talk about a gratitude practice that’s not a reaction (“grateful for”), but surprisingly far more effective.

Plus, a wiener dog joins the show mid-episode!

So many kind strangers have randomly taken our photo and shared them with us over the past ten years. See them all here!

See our engagement photos on Instagram!

00:00 Pronoia Mindset Shift
02:10 From Funk to Optimism
04:56 Belief Creates Results
06:00 Nickelback and Perspective
07:33 Body Image Reframe
09:54 Gratitude as a Practice
10:52 A wiener dog joins us!
14:48 Strangers Taking Photos
18:59 Miami Beach Setup
19:28 Beach Stranger Approaches
20:19 Unexpected Photo Offer
21:06 Birthday Dinner Cover Plan
23:06 Staged Photo Setup
24:06 The Proposal Moment
25:43 Ring Details and Reactions
26:29 From No Marriage to Yes
28:01 Keeping Surprises Secret
29:28 Miami Favorites and Friends
32:07 Pronoia and Gratitude Mindset
34:55 Back to Work and Opportunity
35:41 Wrap Up

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Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow us! Jeff Sarris | Amara Andrew

Support the Show
Readwise is the way to get the most out of what you read and is the only subscription that we find so valuable that we can imagine keeping it until the end of time.  Sign up for Readwise using our special link, readwise.io/maven/, and get 60 days free!

If you think being adept at shortcuts will make you indispensable in an AI world, think again.

Mastery takes time, practice, and, like Steph Curry who shoots 500 shots every single day, lots of reps. The best results come from action, learning, and exploring the stepping stones right in front of you.

That also means choosing better inputs: books, high-level conversations, and real proof of skill, not endless scrolling. In a world full of AI, low-effort work and copy-paste content won’t stand out for long.

Trust, taste, and being truly useful will matter more, but only if you can show you’ve done the work. The future will reward people who use AI to boost real skill, not replace it.

00:00 Why Shortcut-Seeking Kills Mastery (Robert Greene Quote)
00:59 What “Mastery” Really Means: 10,000 Hours & the Long Game
02:26 Steph Curry as the Anti-Shortcut Blueprint
05:25 Mastery = Transformation: Action → Experience → Opportunity
07:29 Einstein’s Patent Office: High-Level Inputs Fuel Breakthroughs
10:27 Avoiding the Ideation Trap: Baby Steps & “Keep Going” Momentum
11:52 World-Class Inputs vs Noise: Social Media, Books, and Signal
15:31 Trust, Bias, and Vetting Expertise in the AI Era
22:56 Curation Becomes the Product: Paying for Trusted Taste
24:43 Personal Brand as Proof: Being Useful in an AI World
27:07 Taste Makers, Luxury Signals, and the Rise of Experiences
30:56 Does Mastery Still Matter When AI Can Do the Menial Work?
33:23 Nvidia, Amazon & the Rise of the Digital Middleman
34:25 Tesla/SpaceX as Rare True Manufacturers (and Why Most Outsource)
34:58 Mastery + AI: The 10x vs 1/10x Divide
36:21 Jobs AI Will Wipe Out—and Why Menial Work Won’t Matter
37:01 Data vs Personal Brand: Two Kinds of Power
38:33 Robots Are Closer Than You Think: 30-Month Timeline & Constraints
39:53 Training Optimus: Tesla-Style Data, Simulations, and the Go/Watson Lesson
42:05 Assume You’ll Be Replaced: Becoming Irreplaceable Through Experience
45:09 How Mastery Is Built: 2009 Grind to MAVEN's 10,000-Videos-a-Year System
46:43 Why AI-Generated Content Is a Dead End (TikTok/ByteDance “Seed Dance”)
48:22 High-Effort Systems Win: Barrier to Entry, Autonomy, and “Fire Yourself” Thinking
53:35 Final Story & Wrap-Up: The Buffalo Airport Flight Miracle

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Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow us! Jeff Sarris | Amara Andrew

Support the Show
Readwise is the way to get the most out of what you read and is the only subscription that we find so valuable that we can imagine keeping it until the end of time.  Sign up for Readwise using our special link, readwise.io/maven/, and get 60 days free!

Not everybody wants to be looked at, but everybody wants to be seen—and that fear shows up fast online, especially when friends and family might judge us.

In this episode we also discover that we fall into a new category: “all bite, no bark”—doing real work without talking about it—and why success often needs both strong work and smart marketing.

00:00 Not Looked At, But Seen: The Quote That Sets the Tone
00:42 Looking vs Seeing: Why Visibility Feels So Scary Online
02:15 Art History Lens: The Active Work of ‘Seeing’
03:40 Amanda Palmer & The Art of Asking (Plus How We Save Quotes)
04:59 All Bite, No Bark: Doing the Work Without Talking About It
08:03 Bark vs Bite in the Real World: Billionaires, Brands, and Balance
11:34 Useful Not Famous: Why Fame-First Usually Fails
12:59 The Iron Law of Stardom: The 3-Year Fame Window
15:43 Turn Fame Into a Business: What Actually Sells
18:09 Proof in the Age of AI: Real Humans, Real Trust, Better Output
22:07 AI as a 10x Team: Scaling Creative Output Without Hiring
23:23 Beyond “AI Slop”: Taste, Intentionality, and the Dead Internet Problem
25:09 Proof You’re Real: Why Authentic Local Presence Matters More Now
27:02 Human Slop & Trend Chasing: Why Copycat Content Builds Nothing
27:54 The Influencer Money Myth: Views, Burnout, and the Hamster Wheel
30:19 Own Your Audience: Escaping Algorithm Dependence with an Ecosystem
33:22 All Bark vs All Bite: Start, Keep Going, and Manage Your Time
37:39 No Magic Pills: Temporary Fixes, Root Causes, and Getting to Work
39:41 Resulting & “Thinking in Bets”: Luck, Variables, and Long-Term Compounding
43:10 Closing + How to Support the Show

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Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow us! Jeff Sarris | Amara Andrew

Support the Show
Readwise is the way to get the most out of what you read and is the only subscription that we find so valuable that we can imagine keeping it until the end of time.  Sign up for Readwise using our special link, readwise.io/maven/, and get 60 days free!

Trust the process. Time is the essential ingredient of success. Use it to your advantage. In this episode, we start with Kevin Kelly and Robert Greene, discuss the value of enduring the slow process of mastery, and emphasize why having the right focus in a hyperlocal market is crucial.

We also share our personal struggles with content creation (despite running a video marketing agency), the paradox of choice, and the importance of transformation in storytelling and business.

00:00 Introduction and Quotes
00:54 Exploring Daily Meditations
01:54 Patience and Process
03:51 Social Media and Attention Span
07:34 Hyperlocal Platform Strategy
18:19 Link Trees and Online Presence
23:36 Client Collaboration and Decision Fatigue
24:24 Hyperlocal Platform Explained
25:15 Personal Content Challenges
26:35 Content Creation Strategies
28:04 Paradox of Choice in Content Creation
30:47 Exploring Video Concepts
37:11 Importance of Storytelling and Transformation
41:27 Sales and Transformation in Business
42:53 Conclusion and Upcoming Plans

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Useful Not Famous is the podcast for people who care more about making money than getting likes and subscribers.

Join our useful family at usefulnotfamous.com to get one actionable tip delivered to your inbox every Monday morning.

Follow Jeff Sarris
Instagram | YouTube | Facebook | TikTok

Follow Amara Andrew
Instagram | YouTube | Facebook | TikTok