Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: People were reaching out to us from America and saying, hey, we recognize that this is a canadian based podcast platform. We really enjoy the content. We've been consuming it. And could you point us in the right direction for somebody who might be able to help us implement this process in our lives? So we heard that enough to the degree where we said, we've got to do this, we have to be thinking about this in terms of North America. And because a process doesn't recognize a are what's interesting. Third anniversary. We are the longest running podcast in Canada that specializes in conversation that's informative and accurate and insightful. The infinite banking concept. Concept. The process of becoming your own banker. And we would rank probably third longest running in North America behind wealth without Wall street and banking with life. So Russ, Joey, James, Ryan, like, we've known them all for years. So we're all kind of in the same circle. And it'd be really cool if the six of us got together and did a show and just talked about the journey, but also to share our latest and best insights on the infinite banking concept.
[00:01:20] Speaker B: To do our best impressions of Nelson would be do.
[00:01:23] Speaker A: Yeah, we could do like on the, golly, the late night show when Jimmy does the, he hits the button and then it spins and then it gives you the topic so it could know, impersonate Nelson in this situation. So he goes, ok, I got know we could have a whole entertaining thing on, but y'all got a weed eater. Oh, that's good. That's so good.
Three years.
[00:01:51] Speaker B: Yeah. So three years.
[00:01:52] Speaker A: Three years.
[00:01:53] Speaker B: Man, it's been an interesting ride. Thanks for everyone listening who's participated and been with us on the ride.
[00:02:01] Speaker A: Yeah, without you, we wouldn't have even passed the first five episodes.
[00:02:06] Speaker B: Yeah, we didn't even know you then. And now it's like we're old friends. But I thought it was interesting just to look back. So in preparation of this, it kind of dawned on me a little bit late, I don't know, maybe two weeks ago that we were coming up on this kind of milestone. I remember it because it's always a busy time frame because we originally started and we recorded our very first episode in the old Ascendant office in September of 2019.
Jonathan was there with us. That's right, Amazon Jonathan. And so we didn't have our tech set up. We didn't know what we were doing.
One of the microphones, we had a third mic and it was plugged into whatever. The rodecaster wasn't really working very well.
[00:02:49] Speaker A: Not at all.
[00:02:50] Speaker B: Didn't know how to line up the cameras. We were tripping over cords. It was all kinds of chaos. And then we recorded it, and then we recorded a couple of other ones not long after that time frame, I think you had some travel lined up, but then actually trying to figure out how do we launch this thing and how do we get this edited and what do we do next and what's the strategy?
It was a lot of crazy work and effort. So building up to that, it wasn't until February 4 of 2020 where we officially launched. And we launched with three episodes that went live at that time. And then we started, I think we launched the next one the following week. And we first started doing this. We were doing it every two weeks.
And I think we did that for the first maybe ten or eleven episodes.
[00:03:38] Speaker A: Yeah, I think so. It was in that range.
[00:03:41] Speaker B: And then we made some changes in a pivot, and we realized that we needed to kick it up a notch. Of course, kicking it up a notch also means some capital investment, because production costs aren't that. So that Jason and I aren't sitting in front of a screen trying to edit videos, which nobody would watch them if we did that.
[00:04:02] Speaker A: They would be, oh, God. Yeah, I know.
[00:04:04] Speaker B: Be like, watching YouTube would shut us down.
[00:04:08] Speaker A: He'd be like, your editing capabilities are horrible.
[00:04:12] Speaker B: It'd be like watching a preview of one of the newest VR games, and then Jason and I's videos would be like, pong from, like, 1975.
[00:04:22] Speaker A: Totally.
[00:04:23] Speaker B: So, thankfully, we've got some great. Who's helping us out that aspect of the world, so. Yeah, so February 4, 2020, was our official launch, and we planned like, oh, we need to get this out because we have our think tank coming up and think tank. I think we launched, usually think tank. Our annual conference was always the weekend following Super bowl, and it still is.
[00:04:44] Speaker A: It's just. Super Bowl's been.
[00:04:46] Speaker B: Super Bowl's moved.
[00:04:47] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:04:48] Speaker B: So. Because David Stearns doesn't want to compete with the Super bowl, of course. That's right. And so we ended up launching right at that time so that we could have episodes available for people when we went to the think tank, so we could say, hey, guess what? We got this brand new podcast. Hopefully you can download it, essentially. And then, yeah, it was really fun and really interesting environment. Of course, Russ and Joey were involved in one of the first three episodes to say, thank you for letting know. Ask them politely to kind of do a spin or a playoff of their name. Wealth without Wall street. And we also had David Stearns, of course, in that first group of episodes, which was really important. So it's been a wild and interesting ride. And I think it's cool for people to maybe hear and understand that you have something that's an idea and a concept. You know, you kind of want to.
[00:05:36] Speaker A: Do it, then you actually make the.
[00:05:38] Speaker B: Decision and the commitment to do it, and then you figure out how the heck is it actually going to get done. Originally, I had started the idea of wanting to do this about a year prior, and then I think it was. I'm trying to remember, jason was probably like in April of 2019 when we were talking about doing some fun stuff together. And then we really started the discussion about, well, mate, why don't we have a podcast? And what would that look like? And so from those initial discussions to about six months later having the first recording, to another five months later before we actually launched the dang thing. So really it's the third anniversary, but it's actually closer to the fourth anniversary of the idea and the decision that this is something we're going to do actually happening.
[00:06:30] Speaker A: Totally. Yeah, man. You think back to how far we've come with the show, the feedback from listeners, the feedback from people on the YouTube, the subscribers, all of the wonderful people that were privileged to serve and who have embraced the process, and it's just been an amazing journey. And when you start to tally up everything, I mean, 130,000 plus downloads were ranked in the top 2% globally. For podcasts. That's no easy feat. That's the top 2%. I don't know how many millions of podcasts there are out there.
[00:07:11] Speaker B: It's over 3 million podcasts. Why don't we show them? For the folks on YouTube watching, we can show you. We had our amazing guy Moses put together a cool infographic for us.
[00:07:24] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, I remember this. You showed this the other day.
[00:07:27] Speaker B: So again, February 4 was official launch. We've launched our first two books. We have our third one that's in editing stage. Hopefully we can get that out by the end of the month. We have our Facebook community, which at the time that we got this data, had 1819 members. We were at 152 episodes. We've now released 153 as of the time of this recording with Kathleen Adams, almost 133,000 audio downloads, 73% of those in Canada. So of course, our good canadian friends. But what's cool is that 23% of those are from our american friends and counterparts. And so we love that. We have really, we have a north american podcast. Well, we started out as a canadian podcast, but the reality is what we discuss, what we talk about. It doesn't really have a border. Jason, you're fond of saying, hey, we're just going to go get the biggest HP number two pencil that exists on planet Earth or get it made, and we're just going to go up and down the 49th parallel there and just going to erase that stupid border out of the way when it comes to podcast.
[00:08:28] Speaker A: Well, we serve Americans now through the implementation of this process, and that just began January of 2023. And so again, people were reaching out to us from America and saying, hey, we recognize that this is a canadian based podcast platform. We really enjoy the content. We've been consuming it. And could you point us in the right direction for somebody who might be able to help us implement this process in our lives? So we heard that enough to the degree where we said, we've got to do this, we have to be thinking about this in terms of North America. And because a process doesn't recognize a border, right, the infinite banking concept doesn't get flagged at the american US border crossing, wanting a passport vaccination status like.
[00:09:15] Speaker B: All this other stuff doesn't set off the alarms at the TSA.
[00:09:19] Speaker A: No, not at all. So the process doesn't recognize any borders. And so we thought, hey, we can serve people in the United States as well and help families and businesses there, which is what we've done. And over the course of these three, like we always remember, we will never forget Nelson saying repeatedly, the more that you see the, the, the, the, the, the infinite banking concept, see? And we continue to learn every time we are blessed to teach what he taught us, because our thinking grows, our thinking expands, and we're continually interpreting and developing a deeper understanding of what he was trying to get across to us. Fundamentally, that the process is not a plan, it's a lifestyle. It's a way of moving money through your life. It's a way of creating a peaceful, stress free way of life. Financially, it's not a financial plan, it's not a product.
It's just a process in your life. And how far we've come in three years alongside our listeners and subscribers, yeah, we're growing. Every day has been amazing.
[00:10:37] Speaker B: I didn't know a damn thing about podcasting before we got started.
I don't know if I do now, but I certainly would say that my knowledge base is a lot higher than where it was. A couple of things I thought was interesting in our little statistical data here is that our number one listening location is actually the province of Ontario. Very interesting percent followed, of course, by Alberta, which, although I no longer call home, will always be home to me. And then BC in third place, and then Quebec, and then Saskatchewan. So that's pretty cool. Big time on the apple. So our listeners are very apple based. They have 46% of all of our stuff coming through Apple podcasts, and then 12% with Spotify. So again, very interesting there. And just looking at the YouTubes is kind of cool because that's really where a lot of our focus is now as we move forward. It wasn't when we began, but it's really transitioned that way, certainly in the last year, in the last six months, even over 18,000 content hours consumed. So that's pretty cool to see. Got 163 videos on the channel that's now gone up as of the last couple of days, 42 lives. We're going to be doing more of those this year. And we're now starting the YouTube shorts a little bit, so we understand them a little bit more. We've got some coaching on that. Again, coaching is always important. So getting the YouTube shorts going, getting some clips out of the episode, some of those golden nuggets. We did some the other day with Mark Benson that were just phenomenal.
[00:12:03] Speaker A: I mean, oh, my God.
[00:12:03] Speaker B: Enjoy those. Such a good conversation.
[00:12:06] Speaker A: Great conversation.
[00:12:07] Speaker B: Yeah, totally. We had 1816 subscribers. That's obviously gone up as well at the time of this recording. This is what Jason was referring to. So there's a website called listen notes you can go to and you can check out. It's kind of a global ranking system for podcasts. I'm not sure where they get all their data from, but they assess over 3 million, 3,029,000 podcasts globally, and they provide a listen score and then a global rank. So we're in the top two and a half percent of global podcasts, which is pretty phenomenal. It's a nice little tip in the hat, I guess.
[00:12:38] Speaker A: That's a great place to be.
It'll be awesome. Three years to now to celebrate being in the top 1%.
[00:12:47] Speaker B: Agreed? Agreed. And what's cool, too, is looking at the interviews. We've had 114 guests on the show, and some of those are where we've had two guests at one time. 24 client interviews we've done again. There's actually a couple more there because we've interviewed a few clients more than once, 27 of our colleagues as infinite banking practitioners. Some of those are members of our team, some of our external colleagues, especially down in the United States, over 20 featuring authors, most of them best selling authors, and we've had about nine repeat guests. So all in all, it's been a really amazing journey. And what we're finding is that as the content comes out, as we hear the feedback from people, both through email, through comments on social media, and some private messaging and stuff, and then of course, it comes up in our regular conversations as we're meeting with clients. And what we hear from our team members as they meet with clients is how the podcast is really helping them. I guess what comes up for me is sticking between the ditches, keeping it between the ditches.
I'm pretty sure everyone listening to the podcast has probably gone in the ditch at least once in their life, most likely in the wintertime. And then you're trying to flag down traffic or you're trying to figure out how do you get sands all traction, tow truck, whatever to get you out of the ditch. You keep a shovel in the back of your car your mean. I know I've done that a ton, especially in my youth growing up in a small town in Alberta. But we all have periods of time where we feel the pull when you're at the edge of the road and it starts to suck you into that ditch and that snowbank. It's important that you can figure out how to get a little bit of control and recognize when you're getting too close to pull yourself back on side. And I think that the podcast and what we've heard from a lot of people is that because of its regularity and its consistency and the types of conversations that we have, it's really helping them stay mindful and stay focused on their path that they've chosen about incorporating infinite banking in their life. And from the entrepreneurs that we speak to, we've interviewed a ton of amazing entrepreneurs. People who have sold businesses, had great exits, understand how to sell businesses, understand how to prepare your business for sale. They're learning a lot about mindset, a lot about setting large goals, a lot about how to rethink maybe what type of business they have and how that business can add more value into not only their life, bless their family more, but also bless the people that they serve in their business more. So, totally, there's a lot of things that are outside of the fringe of what we talk about, just around Nelson's message and IBC. And I'm grateful to be a part of the journey, Jay, with you and that we've had a ton of fun totally doing it, and I can't wait to see what more fun we get to have me too.
[00:15:42] Speaker A: Yeah, we're going to have a lot of great guests, too. And with everything that's going on out there, sometimes people can get hung up in all the noise. And so we do, I think, a really great job of really dissipating the noise and helping people really understand what Nelson would say is the ridiculous simplicity of IBC and to change more lives in a really positive. Yeah, it just feels incredibly fulfilling and it's great. And we receive a lot of kind feedback, which we sincerely appreciate from listeners and people who tell us that they find it really informative and entertaining, which just so happens to be the language we use in promoting the podcast, because that's the feedback that we're getting. It's like you make the topic informative and it's entertaining at the same time. When you have guests on, you're very entertaining, and it's fun to listen to and it's enjoyable, and you get to learn and develop new insights in your thinking. And so that's one element of, I think, among so many things that we miss about Nelson so much, is that I always find myself curious. What would Nelson be saying about the times that we're in? What would he be reading and what would he be encouraging us to read, and what conversations would he be sharing, and what infinite wisdom he'd be passing along. And he had a brilliant way of doing it where he just planted that seed in your brain which triggered, okay, I've got to rethink my thinking on this. And then once it strikes, you contact him and you have the discussion about your thinking.
And he was always so happy about that. He would always go, all right.
Or he would emphasize, he would say exactly. Or he would say precisely.
And then he would just kind of go, know, expanding on. So what a great man.
[00:17:54] Speaker B: It's interesting to think about that. And as you're discussing that, I'm like, yeah, well, imagine if we would have had Nelson on the podcast and had the chance to interview him. What would he say? And then my brain instantly answered the question of, well, of course I know what he would say. He'd say the same thing that he said all the time because he always kept it consistent. It's all about the message. And then he would go down a rabbit trail of some kind.
And probably by the time that we needed to wrap up the episode, he would circle back around and close the loop.
[00:18:23] Speaker A: Totally. That was Nelson. That was totally.
We're here. We're here doing this because of all of the people being the some parts of everyone who's mentored us and provided us with great guidance and great counsel and great wisdom. And being surrounded by so many great teammates who take care of all the other unique capabilities that make a recording blossom into video and social media content and written content, blog articles, just to name a few. All those references, books. We're releasing a book every single quarter and so much more that we have planned to create value for our listeners and to our subscribers. And we want to encourage people, let us know what exactly it is that you truly value so that we can deliver more of it to you. And we're remarkably grateful and humble with all the kind feedback that we get. And we're always the door to ideas and suggestions on what you'd like to hear us and see us talk about. That door never closes. It's open 24 7365. So continue to bring that feedback to us to say, here are some things we'd love to see you guys talk about and hear you talk about on the show, and we'll make it happen.
[00:19:50] Speaker B: And if you'd like to be a guest on the show or you'd like to come back on the show, let us know that too.
[00:19:56] Speaker A: That would be a miracle.
[00:20:00] Speaker B: We definitely have lots of people that are interested in joining the program and we always are looking for having more of those amazing conversations, especially with folks that are already embracing and utilizing Nelson's concept in their life in some way and sharing what comes up for them, what's true for them. And with that in mind, I just want to do a big shout out and say thank you to all the amazing guests that have been on our program for blessing their time and their knowledge and their capacity to give and share so that our listeners can absorb a lot of that amazing content and that mental power that can be then used as fuel for your own future decision making.
[00:20:44] Speaker A: Amen to that 1000% all day long. And so to our viewers on the YouTube tubes, boom. The playlist appeared again. And it's amazing. Keep progressing on your journey. Watch the next video that we've recommended to you. We know you're going to love it. And to all of our listeners, thank you. Thank you sincerely for all your support, and stay tuned for the next three years because it's going to be pretty incredible. Bye.
