Top 5 Episodes in 2020 – A Year in Review

/ Podcast Episodes /

Episode 53

Here’s an appreciation episode for the beloved members of Firing the Man Nation. Today, Ken and I will talk about our top 5 episodes of the year. The top 5 includes two interviews with two amazing entrepreneurs, one book review, and two discussions that will surely add value to your e-commerce career. If you are here for the first time, we suggest that you start with these episodes. 

Let’s dive right in and listen to Firing the Man’s Top 5 episodes of 2020. 

[00:01 – 02:29] Opening Segment

  • We introduce our topic for today
  • Don’t forget to check out our Top 5 episodes after listening!

[02:30 – 07:47] Be Vulnerable

  • Know your numbers
  • Take action and be consistent
  • Build your network

[07:48 – 13:55] Find Value-Adding Services 

  • Find and utilize a 3PL
    • Know what is a 3PL below
  • Buy then build

[13:56 – 17:25] Closing Segment 

  • Connect with us. Links below
  • Find the links to our Top 5 episodes below
  • Final words

Tweetable Quotes:

“Being an e-commerce entrepreneur is a long journey. It’s not an overnight success…It’s a long game.” – Ken Wilson 

“When Ken and I decided to start this [podcast] a year ago, we really didn’t know what was going to happen. It was a slow start, but the further into this we get and the more engagements we have from you, the listener, the better things seem to go…We really appreciate your time.” – David Schomer

Resources Mentioned:

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Ken 0:00
When you want to learn something that you you don’t know anything about you, you go find somebody that’s done it. And then you ask them how they did it or you follow them, right? And you learn from them. And that and Scott Voelker is one of those people that I, that I like to learn from. And the book that he, you know, that he that he wrote, that was his first book, The take action effect, which we reviewed in depth on the show.

David 0:19
And a lot of times you see people that are, you know, selling eight or nine figures, and you just assume that they do everything, right. And Carlos talks about, you know, failed partnerships, failed businesses, and talks about a lot of his mistakes. And, and I really find that to be sometimes more valuable than the success stories,

Ken 0:37
being an e commerce entrepreneurs a long journey, right? It’s not an overnight success. Like, like you mentioned, you look at, you know, 7, 8, 9 figure businesses, and they don’t happen overnight. So it’s the long game. You know, Carlos has been in this game for over a decade, right?

Intro 0:54
Welcome, everyone, to the Firing The Man podcast, a show for anyone who wants to be their own boss. If you sit in a cubicle every day and know you were capable of more than join us, this show will help you build a business and grow your passive income streams in just a few short hours per day. And now your host serial entrepreneurs David Schomer and Ken Wilson.

David 1:18
Welcome, everyone to the firing demand podcast on today’s episode, Ken and I recap a year of Firing The Man podcast, a show for anyone, and identify our top five favorite podcasts. Ken, what’s going on?

Ken 1:30
David, David, I’m glad to be here. It’s kind of an amazing journey, you know, 52 weeks into a podcast. I remember when we chatted about starting a podcast and and you know, we spent a few months figuring it out. And and yeah, we took action. And now you know, that compound action is going 52 weeks. So super excited to be here. And to kind of give back and to share our you know, our top five episodes of The Year?

David 1:56
Yeah, absolutely. You know, we made a promise that we were going to release one episode per week, every week for a year. And I’m proud to say that we did that we’ve got a perfect record. And a lot of times people ask me, you know, hey, you’ve got a lot of episodes, what would be a good starter episode. And, and so we could pick just one. And instead, we picked five. So so we’re going to run through these today. And for those of you new to the podcast, check out these five, because we really believe this is our best stuff.

Ken 2:26
Yeah, absolutely. So David, let’s get right into it. Remember that time when you went full on nerd,

David 2:33
dude, accounting nerd? Absolutely. So the episode that you’re referring to is, know your numbers. And as some of our listeners know, I am a CPA by day. And I swear that my brain is organized into rows and columns, just like an Excel sheet. And so I am very interested in profit margins, gross profit margin, net profit margin, I like to look at Amazon fees. I like to look at everything when I’m watching a product. And so what we did on this episode was we built a calculator, go to firing demand, comm slash calculator, and you can get a free version of this. But I went through all of the fees that I am considering before I launch a product. And what I like to do is get to a fully loaded cost. So not just the price per unit that your supplier is going to tell you. But what are the Amazon fees going to be? What about tagging products? What about labeling boxing, there’s all kinds of extra fees that can take a product that appears to have, say, a 30 or 40% profit margin and drive that down to you know, 10%, or even zero or below zero. And so knowing these on the front end is so important. And I would say if I had a nickel for every time I’ve mentioned margin on this, on this podcast, I’d have a ton of nickels. It’s so but anyway, yeah, that was a that was a great episode. And I’d say for any one that is thinking about launching a product, go to our website and download that calculator. I went all in on building that. And it’s free resource for you out there. So moving on, can you introduced me to Scott Volker? And I remember when he published his first book, we were very excited about it in Episode 19, was called the take action effect book review, which made the top five Tell us about it.

Ken 4:23
Yeah, absolutely. So I’ve been following Scott Voelker, you know, for several years now. And you know, kind of like what we always talk about when when you want to learn something that you you don’t know anything about you. You go find somebody that’s done it and then you ask them how they did it or you follow them right? And you learn from them. And that and Scott Voelker is one of those people that I like to learn from and the book that he you know, that he that he wrote that was his first book, The take action effect, which we reviewed in depth on the show. That book kind of shares his personal story and some of his struggles and how he overcame those and this is a really good book on motivating you And and explaining that taking consistent action equals results. And I think that is probably one of my, you know, big key takeaways there is to take action, you know, you have to consistently take action to get results.

David 5:15
Definitely, definitely, yeah, I thoroughly enjoyed that book. And we we go from A to Z in that episode and everything in between in terms of what Scott highlights. And so if you’re thinking about buying that book, you may listen to our podcast first. But I would also say that, because it is such an excellent Lee crafted piece of work by the book, you won’t regret it. It is a positive ROI activity just to read that book for sure.

Ken 5:42
So David, moving on to the next episode, we had a huge guest on we were super excited to have him on. And yeah, it was it was an amazing, he’s an e commerce legend. So David, you want to talk about the episode?

David 5:55
Absolutely. So this was our interview with Carlos Alvarez. And as you mentioned, he is an e commerce legend. What I love about Carlos and specifically this interview are two things. One, he is the king of networking, he runs the largest Amazon meetup in the world, the guy is just constantly networking and building out his network. And you know, in talking to him, you can really see where that has led to some success. The other thing that I’ll say about Carlos is in, especially in this interview is he was super transparent about a lot of his failures. And a lot of times you see people that are, you know, selling eight or nine figures, and you just assume that they do everything, right. And Carlos talks about, you know, failed partnerships, failed businesses, and talks about a lot of his mistakes. And, and I really find that to be sometimes more valuable than these success stories. And for a guy of this caliber to really let his guard down and talk about his failures, I think is something really special. And so this was an awesome interview. And I’m really glad that Carlos took the time and took a bet on firing demand to be on our podcast. So yeah, definitely check out that episode with with Carlos Alvarez. Yeah, the

Ken 7:06
one thing on that episode that stood out to me like, like you mentioned, Carlos before, was vulnerable and shared a lot of his, you know, mistakes and failures. And so what that really highlights is that, you know, being an e commerce entrepreneur is a long journey, right? It’s not an overnight success. Like, like you mentioned, you look at you know, 789 figure businesses and and they don’t happen overnight. So it’s the long game. You know, Carlos has been in this game for over a decade. Right. So it’s a that’s a great episode to go and listen in and just get a glimpse of who Carlos Alvarez is, and yeah, give a shout out to Wizards of Amazon is his cellar meetup. For sure,

David 7:46
for sure. The next episode was Episode 38 called finding a third party logistics company for Amazon fulfillment now can correct me if I’m wrong, but 2020 has in terms of inventory management has been a total mess. Tell me why we did this episode. Oh, wow.

Ken 8:05
Yeah. So I don’t even know how to begin like, so. 2020 you know, the year the pandemic it has just wreaked havoc on inventory management on you know, a few like David You and I, we have we have Amazon native centric businesses, right. And it’s really it’s really put a spotlight on on parts of our businesses that we have to pivot and adapt. Right and one of them is getting our products into a three PL expanding sales channels and doing all these things. And yeah, three PL was probably one of our top downloaded episodes. So we go in depth of what is the three PL what can How can it help you and how to leverage a three PL to increase your sales channels. And, you know, just really bring some diversity into your business. And I don’t think this topic is going away anytime soon. You know, you have Walmart knocking on the door now they’re starting to come in, you know, you have a lot of Amazon sellers that just been getting kicked their teeth kicked in for a long time by Amazon and they’re just pissed. And it’s like, Okay, well, let’s start looking at these other avenues and add some diversity. So yeah, this this episode on three PL was was we went really in depth on that. So if you’re, if you’re looking for something like that of Hey, you’re going to expand or you’re going to try their sales channels or just add diversity. And so the next time Amazon decides to, you know, not accept your shipments. Well, you have another avenue. So that was a really good episode.

David 9:33
Absolutely. We went through our decision making process and actually identified about 10 three PL companies that are out there. And so if you picture a funnel, you know, we networked we ask people in our network about what three PL companies they use, and we came up with about 10 candidates. And then we following this episode, we had an awesome interview with Michael CMA from deliver and as well as an excellent interview with somebody From shipbob, to very prominent three PL companies. And those were really helpful in making the final decision on what we wanted to go with. And once we are have reached our final conclusion, and if had some interaction with the three PL company that we’ve chosen, we’re going to do a wrap up episode and just talk about, you know how dealing with a three PL differs, say from dealing with Amazon FBA. So stay tuned for that that’ll be coming probably sometime early 2021.

Ken 10:29
Yeah, excellent. So David, to round out the top five episodes, what was your favorite book that you read in 2020?

David 10:38
That’s easy can it is up Buy Then Build by Walker Diebel. This book is I am not sure why it is not a New York Times bestseller. And you know, a requirement for every MBA student in the world. Really, Walker Diebel makes a very compelling case in this book for why you ought to buy a business and existing business, as opposed to starting one from scratch. And it was one of those books that as I was reading it, it made so much sense. But simultaneously, I was kicking myself in the butt because all of my brands I have started from scratch. And boy, has it been like a slow road to you know, even turning them profitable. And you know, one thing that stands out from that book is he talks about how about 90% of startup businesses fail. And so if you buy an existing company, you are weeding out that pool of 90 90% of the startups that are failing. And so it was an awesome interview. You know, Walker has a really diverse background. He’s directed some films, he’s bought company and exited them. He’s a certified m&a advisor and former sec licensed stock broker. Currently, he’s a broker at quiet light brokerage. And it’s just a wealth of information. And so I really, really enjoyed this book. Ken, what are some things that stood out to you about this interview?

Ken 11:57
Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, shout out to Walker. he’s a he’s a local here in St. Louis. And it was an honor to have him on the show. The book was, like you mentioned to me, when I read that book, it was really eye opening to me, you know, here I am. And, you know, kind of, I think I’ve read the book, I was probably a year or two of building a couple of brands, you know, and I like you, I was reading the book, and I was like, What am I doing, you know, so so then I kind of joked, I think I even told Walker, you know, it’s, maybe maybe it should be build buy then build, right? So you can learn how to build a company and then run one and all that. But yeah, you know, some of the hard facts that Walker lays out in that book, you cannot deny, right, like, one of them that comes to mind is the $2 trillion tsunami meaning and the next two decades, you know, the generation that are between 60 and 80, that own or 50, and 70, I might be butchering the name, the age group, but there are there’s an age group that is retiring over the next 20 years, they need to sell off their businesses, because they’re not going to run them, who’s gonna buy them? Well, I don’t know who is right acquisition entrepreneurs, right, or someone else, but it’s $2 trillion worth of assets that are going to be sold. So this is a massive opportunity. And, you know, just, that’s just one highlight of the book, the book is really in depth. So if you’re looking to kind of read something about acquisition business, and that and the opportunity over the next, you know, decade or two in this space, this book is highly recommended. Yeah, and if if you’re, you know, seriously considering anything like that, I know, Walker does run something on, you know, kind of a program called the acquisition lab that really kind of, you know, kind of handhold you through the process, and you’re amongst a bunch of other acquisition entrepreneurs to share their stories and stuff. So yeah, that was a great episode. Definitely. That’s, that’s a must listen, and also, go grab that book buy then build. Absolutely.

David 13:57
So that is a recap of our top five episodes. And one thing I want to spend some time on is just to thank that firing demand nation, everyone that is, you know, left us a review everyone that sent an email, all of our podcast guests, when Ken and I decided to start this a year ago, we really didn’t know what was going to happen. And you know, it was a slow start. But the further into this we get in, the more engagement we have from you, the listener, the better things seem to go. And so to every one of you that has tuned in every week, or just periodically, we really appreciate your time. And if there’s ever a question that you’d like to see answered, go to our website, Firing demand comm and click on the microphone, and you know, leave a voice recording of something you’d like answered, and we can address it on a future show.

Ken 14:46
Yeah, absolutely. I would like to echo what David said, you know, we do this podcast to help the community. You know, we interview people, we bring our knowledge to the table and we just want to share with everyone because, you know, David and I are super passionate about entrepreneurship and building businesses. So we hope we are delivering you know quality content and I definitely want to thank all the listeners for emailing us sending in questions you know show ideas anything like that so you know we do do private coaching on the side also but we do take coaching calls and you know, so if you have questions or anything we just recently did coaching call which I really enjoyed giving back and sharing that was that was awesome like so if you have any questions or you know, you want to you want to just just reach out to us email us support at firing demand calm or David at firing, demand calm or Ken at firing, demand calm. We’re listening. We’re here for you guys. I appreciate you.

David 15:42
So to anybody that wants to check out the episodes that we talked about today, I’m going to tell you the link that you can go to that’ll take you right to the episode on our website. So the first one we mentioned know your numbers go to www.firingtheman.com/12 for the Scott Voelker take action effect book review, go to firing man calm slash 19. For the interview with Carlos Alvarez go to www.firingtheman.com/19. For the episode on how to find a third party logistics company for Amazon fulfillment. Go to www.firingtheman.com/38 and for the interview with Walker dyball in the book review by then build go to www.firingtheman.com/45

Thank you everyone for tuning in to today’s Firing The Man Podcast. If you like this episode, head on over to www.firingtheman.com And check out our resource library for exclusive firing demand discounts on popular e commerce subscription services that is www.firingtheman.com/resource. You can also find a comprehensive library of over 50 books books that Ken and I have read in the last few years that have made a meaningful impact on our business, or that head on over to www.firingtheman.com/library. Lastly, check us out on social media at Firing The Man on YouTube at Firing The Man for exclusive content. This is David Schomer and Ken Wilson. We’re out

Transcribed by https://otter.ai