EPISODE 1
HOW TO NOT ABSOLUTELY SUCK AT PODCASTING – WITH MICHAEL O’NEALToday we are joined by Michael O’Neal. The reason I have him coming on is when I first got started an entrepreneurship, this person is the very first person that above like close to 5000 friend requests, had about 5000 friends on his Facebook, accepted my friend request and I thought that was like wow that’s kind of crazy. This person also happened to be the emcee of my first live event and he also is someone that helped me create my first custom suit that I’ve ever had.
Michael is the host of The Solopreneur Hour podcast.
Transcription:
Preview
Michael O’neal: In 2018 there’s no reason for your show not to sound great. Shits too cheap! If you summarily ignore everything that the pros have been doing forever, and then you expect that someone who doesn’t know podcasting, who doesn’t know marketing.
Calvin Wayman: Is listening to it the first time.
Michael O’neal: Listening for the first time, to switch over from NPR, or morning radio, whatever to your janky sounding podcast where you’re a shitty host, and you expect your show’s gonna do well, you’re crazy.
[Intro Music]
Calvin Wayman: What’s up crew! So our next guest (laughs) that’s funny I just said next guest. If you are coming on to the podcast right now you know that there is no next. This is the very first podcast ever. Our guest today, the reason I have him coming on is when I first got started an entrepreneurship this person is the very first person that above like close to like 5,000 friend requests, had about 5,000 friends on his Facebook accepted my friend request and I thought that was like, “wow that’s kind of crazy”. This person also happened to be the emcee of my first live event and he also is someone that helped me create my first custom suit that I’ve ever had. And he’s also the first one that’s ever called me out at a social event for bringing flip flops to a party. Hadn’t had anybody ever call me out for that. And so I thought it would be none other than appropriate to have him on as the very first guest of my very first podcast. So ladies and gents, please welcome Michael O’Neal: .
Michael O’Neal: See Dubbs. What’s up man?
Calvin Wayman: Yo! Doing pretty well.
Michael O’Neal: Congratulations on episode uno.
Calvin Wayman: Yeah I’m super excited for this. And as you can tell probably a little bit nervous. There’s always like those butterflies that the very first one so…
Michael O’Neal: I got you baby. We’re gonna make this awesome…
Calvin Wayman: Sweet! So let’s have some fun with it.
Michael O’Neal: : Yeah. And I like your Judy, the time-life operator headset you’ve got on tonight.
Calvin Wayman: Oh thank you. Does it does it kind of…?
Michael O’Neal: It’s great.
Calvin Wayman: It’s good for a first timer. I’m going up to get something like super sick like your mic that you got right there……
Michael O’Neal: Little Heil PR-40…
Calvin Wayman: The only thing the problem with that is, it isn’t that a bitch to like carry around like if you’re…
Michael O’Neal: I carry this around. I have a portable setup that I put in this.
Calvin Wayman: How portable is your set? Like if you’re going to jump on a plane. Let’s do this.
Michael O’Neal: Exactly what my set is for. I’ll describe it for those of you listening podcasts only, I have a Zoom H6 recorder.
Calvin Wayman: Ahem
Michael O’Neal: Which is a Zoom Handy Recorder. It can it can handle four microphones. (coughs) Excuse me.
Calvin Wayman: Very nice.
Michael O’Neal: And then the mics…
Calvin Wayman: Sweet. Hold on. So you can have you and three guests if you want.
Michael O’Neal: Right. Yep. Right. See?
Calvin Wayman: That’s super sick! That’s something that I want to have.
Michael O’Neal: The mics… hold on. You talk amongst yourselves for one sec.
Calvin Wayman: Sweet. So while we’re chatting amongst ourselves, Michael O’Neal: has his own podcast at solohour.com. That’s where you can find him and he’s also on the socials, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. All that at SoloHour.
Michael O’Neal: Cool. So this microphone I’m holding in my hand is a handheld version of the Heil PR-40, it’s called the Heil PR-35.
Calvin Wayman: HEIL, how do you spell that?
Michael O’Neal: H-E-I-L
Calvin Wayman: H-E-I-L
Michael O’Neal: Yeah there. It’s Heil sound. But this is a fancy handheld. If you want a nice portable setup together you don’t need to spend this much money. This is almost $300 mic this little guy here and I have two of them. So you can see it, if you see it close and it’s just so beat up. It is very worn.
Calvin Wayman: Aha
Michael O’Neal: The Shure SM58 is about $99. You can get it on Craigslist for $50 and get a couple of those suckers and you are good to go. Man it’s a bomb proof.
Calvin Wayman: What about headsets? Are you fan of that like you feel that Joe Rogan’s guest or Lewis Howes’ guests they have like this pretty sick microphone and that’s got to be a pretty easy thing too right? Like if you could have like just a plug in and just have a headset like weren’t you a fan of headsets?
Michael O’Neal: I don’t mind them but I do I think because I love public speaking and I love standup comedy and things like that. I loved to hold a mic even when I… If you ever watch me at an event and…
Calvin Wayman: Do you stand up?
Michael O’Neal: It’ll long…
Calvin Wayman: Have you?
Michael O’Neal: Little. Whenever I’ve got this head like everyone’s doing the big headset I always ask for a hand-held mic even at the event. So if you see social marketing world I’ll be holding my mic and not head setting out.
Calvin Wayman: Is that a branding play so that when any shot whether it’s like photo or video they see with the mic which means credibility person up on stage with the mic type of thing? Type of that thing?
Michael O’Neal: No didn’t even crossed my mind at all.
Calvin Wayman: It just feels good to hold the mic.
Michael O’Neal: I just like hold the mic. Yeah I’m old school. So my little portable setup is in here it’s the two mics, the Heil the two Heil PR-40 Zoom H6, couple of XLR cables and it just goes in this little Heil sound leather case.
Calvin Wayman: Oh that is so freakin’ small!
Michael O’Neal: And I brought this all over the world.
Calvin Wayman: That can go on your carry on. You’re not even have any…
Michael O’Neal: That’s tiny little thing yeah.
Calvin Wayman: Awesome
Michael O’Neal: And you could, I mean I could theoretically split it all out as well and maybe I will, we’ll see. I’m going to be getting a new backpack soon but that’s not good pod so…
Calvin Wayman: Cool well I’ll be needing to get something similar to that because again like my first major thing where I want to go on the road is like in March. Maybe it’s social media marketing world.
Michael O’Neal: Cool!
Calvin Wayman: To just like jam with people kind of onsite and so that’s when you’re looking to do.
Michael O’Neal: Do you know kit.com, KIT.com? If you go to Kit.com/solohour. I have my whole podcasting set up available right there.
Calvin Wayman: I will go there.
Michael O’Neal: Kit.com/solohour and you can check it out. It’s basically all a bunch of Amazon links but I have the whole package together. The portable/studio podcasting kit handles all with one purchase gives you everything you need for your home and fully portable setup.
Calvin Wayman: Cool! So kit.com for anybody else that’s thinking of starting a podcast.
Michael O’Neal: Slash solo hour.
Calvin Wayman: Slash solo hour so that you can get like the affiliate stuff.
Michael O’Neal: Not that, you put your own kit together.
Calvin Wayman: Got it!
Michael O’Neal: So you assemble things that you love and that’s what the kit is. You can put, you can make as many kits as you, I learned from Tim Ferriss.
Calvin Wayman: Are you saying that this is so you already have your kit there so if somebody wants to start a podcast they go to kit.com and then you have your kit there for all of the podcasting with the links and everything that’s what you’re saying. Right?
Michael O’Neal: But you have to go to slash solo hour to get that.
Calvin Wayman: Right! Right!
Michael O’Neal: It’s not just an affiliate link. That’s the only place where you can see my kits.
Calvin Wayman: Got it, got it.
Michael O’Neal: I have a video kit, I have a men’s grooming kit, I have a podcasting kit, you know just random stuff that I like is all on there.
Calvin Wayman: Cool. So kit.com/solohour. Cool! So in addition to that besides all that we’re here in January as of this recording which everybody setting their new year’s resolutions just curious like what you’re up to. Do you have any like any projects coming up or are you a resolution setter or like what’s going on on your end in San Diego?
Michael O’Neal: Hasn’t been really formal. I thought this year, yeah I’ve got a couple things that I wanna do. I’m not making them public.
Calvin Wayman: Still kind of in that behind the curtain stage.
Michael O’Neal: No I just…
Calvin Wayman: Working on it.
Michael O’Neal: No I just don’t. These are my resolutions so I’m going to make sure I will make myself. Publicly I know that I have any that I can think of but I just have some internal things certainly object wise I’m going to finish my book.
That is something I will make public when I finish my book. It’s been 75% of the way done for a year. And then what else?
Calvin Wayman: What’s your book on?
Michael O’Neal: Well it’s called Unemployable and it’s about how to help how to build a business out of your hobbies and skill sets. Just like the show. That’s what it’s about…
Calvin Wayman: Love it. Is it gonna be like paperback audiobook all that jazz?
Michael O’Neal: Yeah. All the above. Yeah it’s a Morgan James joint. So it’s kind of like that half self-published deal but it’ll be in Barnes and Noble kind of cool those deals.
Calvin Wayman: Cool
Michael O’Neal: So that will happen and which I don’t know like I’ll finish it. That means it will probably won’t come out until 2019 or something but either. And yeah I don’t know. I’ve found myself that I’m not a huge goal setter for better…
Calvin Wayman: I was going to say, are you have you always been that way because you’re in the entrepreneurial space you live in San Diego which is a huge entrepreneurial hub I guess and it’s kind of around that thing like. Did you ever like fall into it think you need to have a big vision or have you mostly just been like “well this is what I wanna do so this is I’m gonna do?
Michael O’Neal: Latter yeah it’s more of the latter. It’s kind of this is what I wanna do. So I’m gonna do that. Yeah
Calvin Wayman: That’s how you found the podcasting I imagine.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah yeah. It was very when I when I first started it was I was behind the scenes for somebody else. And it was a guy that had come to me with a YouTube question I was doing a bunch of social media training at the time and I go, “Dude I’ve seen you speak in front of 10,000 people and you could hear a pin drop. It’s one thing to get a crowd amped it’s not going to make them quiet”. He’s just amazing speaker and I guess we should think about growing your brand. And he goes, ”well how do we do that?” I was like, “what about a podcast?” And he goes, “What’s a podcast?” Well it’s like a radio show.
Calvin Wayman: What was this like 2009 or something?
Michael O’Neal: 2012 or 2011…
Calvin Wayman: Got it so it’s still fairly new. Okay
Michael O’Neal: It’s certainly new for this baby boomer I was talking to. And I said “well we should create a podcast” and he goes “what’s podcast?” I said “well it’s like a radio show you download it” and then so I started this thing called The Kickass Life with David Wood and I did everything he spoke into the mic and I did everything else I did all the web stuff and branding stuff and social media and marketing all stuff.
Calvin Wayman: Is this the same David Wood that’s kind of like in like MLM type stuff or is that a different guy?
Michael O’Neal: There’s actually two David Woods in MLM.
Calvin Wayman: That’s interesting.
Michael O’Neal: There’s so there’s the one guy…
Calvin Wayman: That lives like in a bus or something down by the river.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah it’s not him. Different guy. This is David TS Wood. This is a guy that was with ice eugenics and he’s part of the transformational leadership council with Jack Canfield and Les Brown and Marci shimoff and John Assaraf and those that whole crew and he’s a great personal development dude. Was in Canada and we started the show and it was great. And he was climbing Mount Kilimanjaro as he wants to do. And he needed a Thursday show so I jumped on the mic for the first time and I did a 45-minute show on how to grow your business using social media.
Calvin Wayman: And you just did it totally solo. You didn’t have any other guests on or anything like that?
Michael O’Neal: Yeah jumped on and did it. And a couple of things happened. One it was like I hit stopped I was like, “Huh I was kind of easy”. And then the second thing was I got all these e-mails were like “you should do that”.
Calvin Wayman: Like all the time.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah like that. So that was interesting to me.
Calvin Wayman: So when was that?
Michael O’Neal: That was…
Calvin Wayman: When did you do that?
Michael O’Neal: 2013 that was like, 20 February of 2013. And those of you know me. I don’t know if you can you can’t see this but on the camera you’ll see that I have this…
Calvin Wayman: Drum set
Michael O’Neal: I’m actually you know I can show you right here.
Calvin Wayman: He’s got a sick drum set.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah I have a big drum set but also have this is a hines… This is a Hines Ward football helmet from the Steelers, he’s number 86. He was always my favorite football player and I have on the wall Hines Ward jersey and then right above the door, one of my listeners made me a plaque because this is we call this Studio 86 that’s the name of this little studio and the crazy part was this is one of those things that Facebook reminded me of a couple of years later. You know like on this day right, my show that I did for the Kickass Life was episode number 86
Calvin Wayman: No way
Michael O’Neal: I thought that was crazy. Yeah I would end up. By the way hosting a show with Hines Ward and for a year which is crazy too. But…
Calvin Wayman: Dude do you believe in like that. Like that’s crazy coincidence.
Michael O’Neal: Like that’s crazy dude. Anyway, so I had a lunch with Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income and we chatted for like two hours here in San Diego and we are just about to leave and he stopped in the doorway, he goes “dude, thank you”. I never get to do that. And I will “what?” he goes I mean because we talked about fashion and cars and girls and life and everything. He goes, “every time I have a conversation it’s about SPI. It’s always about this fact that I got a conversation I want to thank you for it”. I thought “Hmm what an interesting idea for a podcast”. And that’s the basis of Solopreneur Hour is like let me just bring people on and just have a cool conversation with them.
Calvin Wayman: You know what? Hence, the reason I wanted to have you on. So in addition to all the firsts so this podcast. Yeah you didn’t you probably didn’t realize all those things like…
Michael O’Neal: I didn’t
Calvin Wayman: Like the… I’m… it’s only been like two and a half years since I was in the entrepreneur game. And seriously I remember talking to my wife Becca was like “dude like this person, Michael O’Neal: accepted my friend request he had like 5,000 friends because like back then everybody and my friends were like 300 friends, 400 friends and stuff like that. So you were first there and the custom suit by the way I’m gonna be rocking it on stage.
Michael O’Neal: Bang and…
Calvin Wayman: Thank you. I’ll be rocking it in San Diego actually this coming weekend, next weekend.
Michael O’Neal: What?
Calvin Wayman: Epic Mastermind Experience.
Michael O’Neal: Cool, great you’re speaking there.
Calvin Wayman: I am yeah.
Michael O’Neal: Sweet man good for you.
Calvin Wayman: So it’s gonna be fun but what you just barely said with Pat making a show that’s like talking about what like you’re talking about topics that people that’s just human stuff. Right?
Michael O’Neal: Yeah
Calvin Wayman: It’s not just like nailing people down like boxing them in for that one thing whatever they are known for. And that’s what I want this show to be and so kind of what I think could be fun to jam on with you is. It was February 13th where you did that first show right? To February 2013 when you…
Michael O’Neal: Yeah yeah.
Calvin Wayman: And when did Solo Hour start?
Michael O’Neal: August 23rd, same year.
Calvin Wayman: August 23rd so you’ve been in the game now for
Michael O’Neal: For four years and change
Calvin Wayman: For years and change and so in that time one thing I know about you because we’ve jammed at other events and stuff like that is you look at the pros in podcasting you also notice like shit that the amateurs do and things that like it’s like nails on a chalkboard type of a thing. By the way that’s probably a rule number one turn off your phone.
Michael O’Neal: That is the amateurs move right there it’s you.
Calvin Wayman: Check this out though. It’s on airplane mode. I swear it was just some yeah it was some alarm so I’m gonna keep that in because I want to keep it real.
Michael O’Neal: Keep it real.
Calvin Wayman: But you have some opinions and some thoughts around podcasting and so would love to kind of just jam on some of the for sure do’s and for sure don’t do’s and I want to like figure out a way to make this show something that is it can be kind of like a used as a business vehicle but also kind of as a fun thing. So like for you was a Solo Hour like this is gonna be my business this is gonna be my thing or to start off like I want to have a way to just have fun and whatever comes, comes.
Michael O’Neal: That’s exactly right. The second one I just wanted to have conversations with cool people I had no. And I think that’s a lesson. I think the minute someone goes on “I’m gonna start a podcast in January, February I’m gonna start my mastermind, March I’m gonna do the world tour”. You go, “dude, first of all I want you to think about whether your podcasts. If anyone is gonna give a shit at all like because if you’re unless you’re some big international brand unless you can be Tim Ferriss withstand being shitty at podcasting for the first six months you know then which we can’t there’s not enough. We don’t have enough brand equity to be able to do that. But Tim did but he’s also the consummate learner. So he recognized that he needed to step up. He kept stepping up you know. But we don’t get that typically people will listen to your show for about 45 seconds and go, “oh they have chops or they don’t, either sounds good or it doesn’t”. And that’s it. In 2018 there’s no reason for your show not to sound great, shit’s too cheap. You can buy an ATR2100 microphone for $69. That sounds like you’re in a radio station. So it’s like ok that’s that out of the way. B, if someone starts a podcast and is completely ignoring the protocol of 80 years of radio before podcasting started. Meaning like this is how you bring a guest on. This is how you’re a host. This is how you conduct an interview. If you just ignore if you summarily ignore everything that the pros have been doing forever and then you expect that someone who doesn’t know podcasting who doesn’t know marketing…
Calvin Wayman: Is listening to it for the first time
Michael O’Neal: Listening for the first time to switch over from NPR or morning radio or whatever to your junky sounding podcast where you’re shitty host. And you expect that your show’s going to do well. You’re crazy.
Calvin Wayman: How do you balance making it polished and making it something that wants to sound good? Because obviously I want to do that with also keeping the personality and like something I know you do on your podcasts that I haven’t fully decided if I’m gonna do this but probably. And that is hit record hit stop whatever happened happened. There’s not any polishing or editing in between. Like how do you decide that you’re not going to do any editing or stuff like that because a lot of the higher ones, I would imagine like NPR or whatever like they’re like making sure it’s so perfect before it ever goes live and stuff like that and you’re more of if I said five amps, who gives a shit? I just did it
Michael O’Neal: No, so I don’t rely on podcasts ever as my benchmark for quality. I rely on live broadcast from my benchmark quality so I envision this show being a radio show in the 60s where there was no such thing as I think of this as radio more than anything so I wouldn’t look at NPR podcasts. I would look at a live NPR interview is what I would be listening to. I would be on there you know…
Calvin Wayman: Got it
Michael O’Neal: On their morning radio where she’s interviewing some author or they’re interviewing some scientist. They’re not cutting that up like you’re getting the interview you’re getting a live interview because they’re on you know what is that fresh air. You’re they’re doing it live. So that means that the host has to have chops…
Calvin Wayman: Yup
Michael O’Neal: And reason why I can do a show that I can start and hit stop is because I happen to have chops. Not everybody can do that. That is that is…
Calvin Wayman: They have to edit because they either get too nervous or say, “oh, redo that say that again” type of thing.
Michael O’Neal: Right. And I would I would never do that. And I think it’s because I grew up around entertainment and I grew up around radio. I listen to Howard Stern my whole life. Who was still I believe the best interviewer that we have in our generation…
Calvin Wayman: So good so good.
Michael O’Neal: And just it’s a mentality I had the second that I hit record for the first time in my podcast. My thought process was “I am now a professional broadcaster”. So I need to up my own game so I’m gonna study the greats, A. B, I will never let equipment be a reason why my show fails. So I’m I…
Calvin Wayman: Do you mean like the quality is gonna be awesome? Or do you focus more on the content? What do you mean?
Michael O’Neal: No I mean I’m gonna rely on I believe in Aerosmith and I believe in the Foo Fighters. I believe in so when I was with the Hines Ward Show we went to the Super Bowl and I got to go to media day at the Super Bowl and that’s 300 media outlets from all over the world all the biggies and hundreds of small stations and I walked in there as a podcast and that’s been doing it for three and a half years, four years, and (cough) excuse me. And I said, “Whatever the pros are using I’m going…
Calvin Wayman: That’s what I’m using.
Michael O’Neal: I’m gonna keep an open mind because I know that whatever they’re doing whatever they’re set up is gonna be on these tables are gonna be the no compromise professional version of broadcasting in a mobile setup” Right?
Calvin Wayman: Totally because it’s live. They’ve got to capture the action and all that.
Michael O’Neal: Well and they’ve got you have the way those things work. People come in for 10, 15 minutes at a time you’ll have Jerry Rice and then Joe Montana and then Hines Ward and then you know all these big famous people. Cuba Gooding Jr. all these people are going through and they’re doing these shows. There is literally zero tolerance for “oh my Skype crashed or my softw…”
Calvin Wayman: Yeah can you retake that?
Michael O’Neal: It does that they go, “pssh”. No and they’re gone. So universally I mean honestly probably 242 out of 250 tables had a little mixer, a hardware recorder like a Zoom Recorder or something like that. With XLR mics nobody use software nobody is using like recording right to audition or something nobody likes 6 places were. And it’s like gee I wonder why. Because it’s buggy and it crashes and things happen and it things never happen. I should say never, cross my fingers right. But very very very very rarely happened with a hardware setup versus the software.
Calvin Wayman: So when you’re recording with the Solo Hour, aren’t you doing it through Skype? Are you using…
Michael O’Neal: No I go Skype into my mixer right into my Zoom Recorder. So it’s hardware
Calvin Wayman: Got it. So the only thing that could ever go wrong is your internet connection.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah and by the way if that happens I can I have I can cover because I’m still live I’m still recording into my…
Calvin Wayman: Totally
Michael O’Neal: So my…
Calvin Wayman: So it’s just your… yeah
Michael O’Neal: And the audience by the way none the wiser because I do this for a living I can cover and I can say you know that’s really interesting and I’ll describe something or I’ll say something that’s long and I’ll watch until they come back on. Then I’ll lead that guest right back in the audience was none the wiser. But I’m also hardwired here so it’s rare that my internet connection goes now.
Calvin Wayman: Genius.
Michael O’Neal: Some people did it for me it’s not genius. The pros do. That’s all.
Calvin Wayman: What about like after you have the audio you’re done.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah.
Calvin Wayman: How are you getting the MP3 or whatever onto your like super basic questions like “How you are like getting it to computer then upload it to iTunes and things like that?”
Michael O’Neal: It’s just an SD card that goes into the Zoom recorder so you just I just pull the card out plug it into my MacBook and I have a template. I still use garage band but I have a template for the whole show. So I’ve already got the intro the outro and all my bumpers and all my music and all my little I have these little like these little drum brakes where if I have to transition between you know intro section to the main interview section to the outro section I can put a little drum brake and I just recorded that at my drum set and then it’s all there. So I just dragged the new MP3 and move a couple of things roundhead export it takes me about three minutes to do my show.
Calvin Wayman: So you do all the post-production?
Michael O’Neal: Yeah. In and out.
Calvin Wayman: Why…is it because you like the whole process or like? Like for me like I freakin’ hate it like one thing that I’ve kind of made a decision on is like you, I want this to be an excuse to talk to cool people like yourself and like just have cool conversations with what I’m curious about and don’t want it to ever feel like it’s like too much work and so I have somebody right now just a VA that knows how to do all that stuff for me like just curious, have you ever thought about doing it yourself? If like why not just like say here this is the process just record. So all you can do is the fun stuff with the conversation and have somebody else do all the well the minutia.
Michael O’Neal: Well it takes me about three minutes to process and export my show so it’s not a huge deal.
Calvin Wayman: Really?
Michael O’Neal: Yeah I mean it’s really nothing. The beauty about having a hardware setup is right now I can be talking to you I can look at the little gauge on the Zoom H6 and see that your level is exactly the same as mine because I tweaked the knob on my mixer so I haven’t been sounding perfect in my ears which means the recording is perfect which means when…
Calvin Wayman: Which means there’s nothing to edit.
Michael O’Neal: There’s nothing to do. I drag it in. I literally just have to move my intro and outro so it’s in the right spot. I choose which bumper to use. I have probably I don’t know 75 bumpers, “Hey this is Calvin Wayman: Wayman and you’re listening to Solopreneur Hour with Michael O’Neal: ”, “Hey this is Johnny Dumas and you’re listening to”… So I have I just choose which one I’m in the mood for. And sometimes it’s congruent with the guest I have on which is another reason why I can’t have somebody else. And then the other part is there’s a rhythmic delivery to the transitions of a show and certainly of my show where I think that the way that I especially with the intro, I’m sure somebody else could do it but I know that for the first like two months I’d be like, “oh man they let that park go a little bit too long. It drove me nuts and it might kind of like takes me couple of minutes to do it so it’s not that hard to…” So that’s A and B, C is that sometimes my show ever my shows have a really tight turnaround time. I might interview you on Friday night or like Thursday night and put the show on Friday morning.
Calvin Wayman: Heck yeah.
Michael O’Neal: So I do that on purpose by the way. I don’t…
Calvin Wayman: You don’t have a backlog of like 8, 10 months worth of audio?
Michael O’Neal: Leave in it I think that’s another…
Calvin Wayman: Me either
Michael O’Neal: Of shitty modern podcasts or a way to go about it. Because well it depends on your show. But consider this Calvin Wayman: , consider how you learned when you were a kid and your favorite teacher that you ever had. Did you like that teacher because they were really great at giving you data or did you like that teacher because they were entertaining and they were able to wrap that data into an entertaining candy shell? Right?
Calvin Wayman: Totally.
Michael O’Neal: It’s always the latter. It’s very…people are like, “oh they’re really good at…” so when I see the shows that are like 10 great tips for blogging better. I go, “God, that sounds…” that was boring to me.
Calvin Wayman: It’s fake.
Michael O’Neal: It also takes away what I think the best part of podcasting is which is that humanity and the intimacy of the…
Calvin Wayman: Of the conversation.
Michael O’Neal: Well that’s in the conversation and sometimes when you’re in a conversation I don’t know how the rest of this will go. But if we were well we’ve already done it a number of times we’ve said well next week.
Calvin Wayman: Yeah
Michael O’Neal: Next week I’m going to be speaking at blah in San Diego. If this were a 10-month backlog show next week was nine and a half months ago.
Calvin Wayman: Totally.
Michael O’Neal: It doesn’t make any sense for me so I still run it a lot like the Adam Carolla Show or Howard Stern Show or something more like this topical relevance. We could talk about anything we could talk about the NFL playoffs right now if we wanted to.
Calvin Wayman: We could talk about Logan Paul getting hated on right now.
Michael O’Neal: We could talk about Logan Paul who I had never heard of until I read the article about.
Calvin Wayman: You really haven’t? Well that doesn’t… that makes sense because you’re… that’s kind of like the younger crowd.
Michael O’Neal: I don’t follow. I don’t follow that world. He’s a YouTube guy, right?
Calvin Wayman: Yeah. Made it in Vine. He and his brother made it in Vine when Vine was huge like they were the first big viners
Michael O’Neal: The dead body guy was out?
Calvin Wayman: Yeah yeah
Michael O’Neal: Yeah
Calvin Wayman: Yeah yes. So he showed that dead body and then like apparently made fun of it type of a thing on his show. And he’s a vlogger every day but he hasn’t blogged since. And this was like four days ago. So yeah. But yeah…
Michael O’Neal: You really lambasted about it. I mean…
Calvin Wayman: Yeah society is trashing him. We’ll see what YouTube does. But yeah to your point this is topical right now. I mean this show if you’re listening to us right now it’s going to go out January 15th and hopefully it’s still relevant because it will be a couple of weeks since. But yeah I totally feel you there, I should be topical, I should be relevant, should be something that’s like not something that happened like eight months ago saying Merry Christmas and we’re now a Fourth of July type of thing.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah. And I don’t want to be talking about the Olympics when they’re following… Anyway, point is…
Calvin Wayman: Right
Michael O’Neal: I’ll be at CES when the show comes out in Vegas.
Calvin Wayman: Is that why you’re going to Vegas for?
Michael O’Neal: Yeah.
Calvin Wayman: Yeah.
Michael O’Neal: Very excited. I have another podcast called Beginner Audiophile which is just a fun little hobby of mine.
Calvin Wayman: Beginner aud…
Michael O’Neal: Yeah it’s like how to… the contention is that most people have not properly heard music maybe ever for the people that sort of grew up in the Pandora, Spotify generation they’ve actually they have favorite bands that they’ve actually never heard the real version of the songs that they love. And then sometimes you hear the real version you go, “Holy shit I had no idea there was a tambourine…”
Calvin Wayman: By real version. Do you mean like more acoustic or what are you talking about?
Michael O’Neal: No I’m talking about…
Calvin Wayman: Like original songs like back in the day type song.
Michael O’Neal: No I’m talking about a high rez version of the stuff you listen to. So you listen to Pandora and Spotify it’s a low resolu…
Calvin Wayman: That’s not a high resolution? Really?
Michael O’Neal: No!
Calvin Wayman: Are you serious?
Michael O’Neal: Oh, it’s awful. That’s my point is you don’t even know. People don’t even know…
Calvin Wayman: Yeah
Michael O’Neal: That they’ve never heard their favorite music. And so that’s the it’s like if I if all I could do is get somebody to like what you’d give a good pair of headphones in your life? Is that the ones your wife?…
Calvin Wayman: Have I’ve been given them? Well this is actually this is good for the value.
Michael O’Neal: Okay
Calvin Wayman: Nothing too crazy but yeah I’ve had like a Bose headset before. That is insane you like push a button and this is like, boom! And then silence is everything…
Michael O’Neal: That’s not what I’m talking about. But we have so much work to do in our lives in society (both laugh) when both becomes the benchmark for good sound you go, “shit we have so much…”
Calvin Wayman: Oh my God!
Michael O’Neal: That’s like your… well never mind. It’s like your old suit.
Calvin Wayman: So anyway yeah.
Michael O’Neal: Point is that when somebody hears a high resolution file. So like if I can just get people to start using Tidal instead of Spotify. T-I-D-A-L, Tidal. T-I-D-A-L. It’s the music service owned by Jay-Z and it streams high rez files even if all you did is you listen to a song on Spotify then listen to the same song on Tidal. Even with the same crappy headphones you’d go, “Holy shit that is a different experience!” So…
Calvin Wayman: So what’s the subscription on that? You know?
Michael O’Neal: 20… 20 bucks.
Calvin Wayman: Sweet, 20 bucks a month.
Michael O’Neal: 20 bucks a month. And so it’s you pair that with what’s happening now is it’s a bit of a vinyl revolution is record players are coming back and you’re starting to see these record stores that have these record players in these nice little 2 channel amplifiers and you and I play stuff for people and they look at they’re like “that’s a completely different experience” and it’s what I used to be able to experience when I was a kid. You know early 80’s listening to music that’s what you would do if you’d come home at night and you’d put some records on or you’d listen to an album or whatever with your friends and it was a very different visceral experience and now we’ve cut the… we’ve cut it out. So it’s we’ve been listening to fast food and I’m trying to get people to do a version. So they go, “Oh man, I didn’t realize that. That’s what a burger was supposed to taste like!”
Calvin Wayman: Totally. You’re very particular. So that’s kind of the approach you like to bring on your podcast as well like. Like a very certain way high quality not sounding like just a bunch of B.S. Not like something like this headset something a little bit nicer.
Michael O’Neal: Your headset actually sounds fine. It just sounds really digital. It’s a very dry digital sound. It doesn’t have a lot of warmth to the delivery. It sounds like you’re a pilot you know and that’s fine…
Calvin Wayman: By the way, how many something I was going to ask a second ago is how many episodes do you try to hit every week and are you hitting them every time kind of everything I do and as…
Michael O’Neal: Yeah I’ve done 660 episodes I do three times a week. I do a Monday Wednesday interviews, Friday cut like a free coaching Friday show.
Calvin Wayman: Sweet. That’s exactly my format. I want to do Monday Wednesday Friday. So super sick! Do you really set a certain time or?
Michael O’Neal: Generally midnight than you know the night before so Sunday night at midnight kind of vibe.
Calvin Wayman: Cool
Michael O’Neal: Yeah.
Calvin Wayman: So 12am type of thing and you’re able to. And how much how live are they all like right now? Do you have a queue of like all of next week’s recordings done because you’re going to CES? Are you going to be doing recordings there in CES like what’s kind of your thing there?
Michael O’Neal: I have. I will be doing recording CES. I have Mondays show but not Wednesdays yet.
Calvin Wayman: Gotcha! Dude that actually makes me feel so good that somebody like you that has that many episodes like because I mean look, you and I were good friends with JLD, John Lee Dumas. We love his show. It’s his thing but his backlog is like. I mean when I was chatting with him like he can have like two months at a time right because he just get so many in at one time and that’s just not my vibe and so it’s cool to kind of see a different flavor of yours just a completely different podcast less shows. And you also have like just different quality different flavor altogether. You’re not having like all of this same question stuff over and over and yeah. More relevancy which is why…
Michael O’Neal: Old times yeah well the… my primary goal is always to make the show entertaining. If I can make it entertaining first and a guy I think about teacher entertainment first and then if someone is paying attention then you can teach them things and…
Calvin Wayman: So edutainment.
Michael O’Neal: Through the Art of Conversation and The Art of the Interview which is the name of my course, The Art of the Interview. You can… if I can demonstrate the way these people think. So instead of being like “here’s five tips to blah blah blah”. I want people to understand why they made the decisions they made because if they understand that then they can learn to make their own decisions and make their own five ways where blankety blank, you know what I mean?
Calvin Wayman: Yeah thought process and mindset.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah that’s always the ideas like I want to I want them to feel a snapshot of that person’s life at that certain time so that when they’re faced with that same thing they go “oh this is what that person did and here’s the direction they went because of it” that’s the idea behind these deep dive conversations
Calvin Wayman: Now kind of random question. With speaking of keeping things relevant and having your show kind of close to the times. I saw a Facebook post and I don’t know if you were joking or not but you said something like that you’re going to change the name of your show to like something with Bitcoin or something in it?
Michael O’Neal: Yeah I mean it was that news story that somebody. What was the name of the… they put the word Blockchain in their brand, in their whole brand…
Calvin Wayman: So you were totally trolling right? You’re not changing…
Michael O’Neal: Oh, totally. I wasn’t…
Calvin Wayman: Because you had the whole logo is changing and everything is like I’m going to update my…
Michael O’Neal: Your Blockchain Hour. And people were like “Oh I don’t know I feel like it dilutes your brand” I’m like, “it feels like you have no sense of humor”
Calvin Wayman: (laughs) Yeah I saw that and I was like “Please tell me that this is not true that it’s…” because everything everything’s Blockchain…
Michael O’Neal: Smart people got it.
Calvin Wayman: Yeah
Michael O’Neal: That’s all
Calvin Wayman: I’m glad. Yeah. So what Blockchains kind of a hot thing right now that’s kind of topical as well.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah.
Calvin Wayman: Like I wanna bring our friend Joel Comm and talk about kind of because he’s like in the entire world right now. But you have the same time. I don’t actually I’m going to I after I talk to Joel. I’ll see the best place to like put a little in just for fun. But at the same time I kind of feel like I can’t remember who said this but when your cab driver is telling you about a thing that’s when you really need to be careful. And that’s kind of the place where Crypto and Bitcoin is right now is everybody is talking about it. So if even your cab driver is saying, “Do you have Bitcoin and stuff like that then that’s enough to be like…?” But I know you’re pretty big on it too right?
Michael O’Neal: I’m on it. I’m pretty leveraged in there so…
Calvin Wayman: When did you get in? Like at what price point? What time of the year?
Michael O’Neal: It was like… oh man, it’s a little painful to be honest when I first heard about it. It was at like I think it was at 2,500 bucks of coin and…
Calvin Wayman: When was that?
Michael O’Neal: This was like July or something and…
Calvin Wayman: Really? Man, that hurts because I first was introduced to it in January.
Michael O’Neal: Oh yeah. You really blew it.
Calvin Wayman: Yeah.
Michael O’Neal: And so once it was finally explained to me I said, “Oh I’m in I’ll just take five grand I’ll buy a couple of Bitcoin or I’ll buy like I’ll buy one Bitcoin and a little extra and then I’ll do I’ll put a grand in a light coin a grand into Ethereum.” And so that was the plan. And now this happened in like July or whatever then the money I had allocated they delayed it 10 weeks. And by the time I got to five grand Bitcoin was at like 62 or 5,800 bucks or something I’m like, ugh!
Calvin Wayman: Oh my God.
Michael O’Neal: I put a little bit in it was ok. And then I even just recently I went to Australia and I got a good chunk of cash. And I was like, “I know I’m not going to able to use this cash for at least a month or two I should just buy some Bitcoin with it” So I was going to buy two full Bitcoin, Bitcoin was that like 62 or something like that. And I was in Australia so it it…I couldn’t literally get through all the security every step I took my bank account thought it was fraud because I was in the diff…
Calvin Wayman: (laughs) Yup, aha.
Michael O’Neal: I was like and to buy that I had to go through a few different steps to make it happen. And then it went from 6 grand to 19 grand in record time and I think that’s cool I only lost $27,000 because the security thing that…
Calvin Wayman: (laughs) I wasn’t even it wasn’t even that you probably should invest but don’t want to. You were actively trying to put it in with every attention.
Michael O’Neal: I was trying to just because… Honestly, I was like you know what it’s going to make it’s going to even if I leave it in there for a month it’s going to make more money than my bank would. Sitting in there and then it… not only made more money but it like tripled. And I was like snap off. So that’s…
Calvin Wayman: That’s gotta hurt.
Michael O’Neal: I missed it.
Calvin Wayman: That’s gotta hurt.
Michael O’Neal: I totally missed it. So that was a bummer.
Calvin Wayman: And now it’s like it what? Like 14?
Michael O’Neal: I probably yes probably it stabilized but then but then a ripple just went from 25 cents or something in…
Calvin Wayman: That’s another crypto.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah to 3 bucks. It went from 25 cents to 3 bucks.
Calvin Wayman: Are you Interpal?
Michael O’Neal: I’m not.
Calvin Wayman: I mean may as well right? If it’s just like if it’s something so cheap or find some other ones that’s what I keep hearing in…
Michael O’Neal: You never know.
Calvin Wayman: A lot. Yeah exactly. So a ton of my friends that are at least a few of them that are in this whole crypto craze is, they’re like Bitcoin is not where it’s at. Like it’s in another crypto currency.
Michael O’Neal: The move is
Calvin Wayman: Yeah
Michael O’Neal: Go you know if you’ve got five grand, spread the five grand out 500 bucks each ten different coins that are… Some of them are a fraction of a penny. You know some of them are tiny. So if they go up to like 10 cents you’ve just destroyed. You know you’ve just come on you’ve gone from having 500 bucks now to having like $76,000 in that account you know!
Calvin Wayman: So if you’re somebody listening if you’re upset that you didn’t get into Bitcoin when your brother in law at the 4th of July party told you to get in. Just find something that’s like 20 cents or something less and get ready for the next 4th of July party.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah exactly.
Calvin Wayman: So you can go on it
Michael O’Neal: You need to go, and by the way, neither Calvin Wayman: and I are advising you.
Calvin Wayman: (laughs) Yes.
Michael O’Neal: And he’s not… we are not on for your cash.
Calvin Wayman: Yes please. Please check with your adviser and tax person before you do anything your financial adviser.
Michael O’Neal: I wouldn’t do that for them either
Calvin Wayman: Cool
Michael O’Neal: Because they don’t know anything about it…
Calvin Wayman: They don’t know.
Michael O’Neal: Do your own research. That’s the bottom line.
Calvin Wayman: So a couple other things I just wanna touch on before we wrap this up. First thing is like I wanna talk a little bit about like one of the reasons you started your show one of the reasons I started this show is to connect with really cool people and things like that. So I want to talk about that kind of at the end. But before then like, is there any other things that you’re like absolutely should be done? Because again I understand personality like again there’s your show that’s a little bit different than like Tim Ferriss’s or Lewis Howes’ or John Lee Dumas’ or Joe Rogans’. So there’s personality. They all work but then there’s like things they all do well and then there’s things people do that is like tacky or not cool. So what are some like things that in your humble opinion are like this is something that all the pros do, friken’ do this and this is something that only tacky people do. Please for the love of God, Calvin Wayman: , do not do this on your show.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah. The two things are sort of related that I that I always you know annoy the heck out of me. I’ve done now a number of different speaking gigs where I’ll ask the crowd how often you make it to the end of a podcast like a show of hands. How much you like to the closing credits and it has ended up being about 15% of the people make it to the very end of a show and I’ll stop and I’ll say all right when do most 95% of podcasters promote their guests and everyone’s like, “Oh…”
Calvin Wayman: At the end
Michael O’Neal: At the end of the show. So…
Calvin Wayman: By the way, Michael O’Neal: is at Solohour.com
Michael O’Neal: That’s right. When you think about how… what’s in it for the guest. The guest is hoping that they’re gonna be able to reach out to your audience and your audience is gonna like what they have to say and they’re gonna seek them. They’re gonna find them somewhere online. Well they’ve already clocked out by the time you get to the point where you promote them. So that’s a…
Calvin Wayman: Totally
Michael O’Neal: If you listen to any good pro brings somebody on, they’ll introduce like you know, let’s say, Jimmy Kimmel or something you will say you know, “Please come in Brad Pitt, Brad’s new movie out you know January 15th in theaters blah blah blah…” So the plug happens at the beginning it all happens during the course of the show so often when I’m interviewing somebody and they say something cool I might be like, “Oh you guys have to tweet make sure you tweet them at SoloHour. And let them know you really liked that blah blah blah…you know” So I’ll integrate that generally in the course of the show and then of course the end I’ll promote as well. But I’ll do it constantly. I want that guest to go, “wow I didn’t have to lift a finger to promote!”
Calvin Wayman: Yeah.
Michael O’Neal: And this guy really…
Calvin Wayman: I am glad I spent the 45 minutes or whatever it is on that show.
Michael O’Neal: Absolutely because the goal on our end as the podcaster, we bring this big influencer on we want them to have a great time and we want them to promote our show to their big audience.
Calvin Wayman: Totally
Michael O’Neal: And I can tell you unequivocally that if you’re shitty at podcasting they will never promote your show to their audience.
Calvin Wayman: Yup totally.
Michael O’Neal: If you’re great at it they totally will. So it’s… you’ve got to… which means you have to develop your chops. You’ve got to be good at it. The other part is, imagine bringing somebody into a house party at your house. Right.
Calvin Wayman: Ahem
Michael O’Neal: Let’s say you bring or I bring you in. I’m having a wine and cheese party. There’s a bunch of people that you recognize here. Right.
Calvin Wayman: Ahem
Michael O’Neal: And I bring you in and I go, “Hey everybody this is Calvin Wayman: . Calvin Wayman: , tell everybody what you do”
Calvin Wayman: Ugh! F’n sucks!
Michael O’Neal: Awkward is that.
Calvin Wayman: Tell us your back story like put yourself up like promote your own stuff type of thing.
Michael O’Neal: So I’m the…
Calvin Wayman: Instead of like, ladies and gentlemen. Yeah you’re the host.
Michael O’Neal: I’m the host of that party. So I’m going to bring you in and say, ”Hey guys this is my good friend Calvin Wayman: , Calvin Wayman: ‘s an author, Calvin Wayman: ’s a great new podcast to Calvin Wayman: does an amazing work with social media and digital marketing for a bunch of entrepreneurs”, which gives people all kinds of context about who you are and what you do.
Calvin Wayman: Ahem
Michael O’Neal: And it’s how you are a good gracious host when you introduce some…
Calvin Wayman: Ahem
Michael O’Neal: When you have to do that yourself. If somebody says, “Hey, tell people where they can find you at the end of the show” Not me to go “Oh well I guess because you suck at your job. I’ll tell you that you could have asked at the beginning. I’ll tell you how to find me on social media which you should have asked at the beginning. And now I feel awkward because I’m the guy who’s self-promoting on your thing. And that’s so…
Calvin Wayman: Dude.
Michael O’Neal: That is a… that is something that we constantly do that is…
Calvin Wayman: Yeah
Michael O’Neal: By far my number one pet peeve in podcasting that’s why you
Calvin Wayman: I’m gonna have to put it in my back pocket.
Michael O’Neal: I like that idea. Hey I’ve just gotten a pretty hellacious echo from. Did you change any of your settings? Did you do something on your cord?
Calvin Wayman: No
Michael O’Neal: Now it’s gone. Whatever.
Calvin Wayman: This is so weird. Good thing to know. So I just barely just had to unplug my headset and plug it back in. I’ve had that happen before.
Michael O’Neal: Okay
Calvin Wayman: That’s super interesting
Michael O’Neal: Yeah. So I’m not sure if that last thing you said translated to the recording or if you heard yourself in it did that but it definitely did it on my end. So you’ll have to just double check like look at the time stamp of 101 and see if your voice was weird.
Calvin Wayman: Yeah I’ll go I’ll check it.
Michael O’Neal: Cool
Calvin Wayman: So anything that is besides like an absolute cheesy thing that you hear some podcasters do that would kill my show if I started it from the very beginning doing that.
Michael O’Neal: So the other one is we talked a little bit about the intro but it’s really helpful to have you did a great job with my intro on this show and I think as long as you continue to do that you’re good to go.
Calvin Wayman: You mean just something that’s just specific. I didn’t pull it off of your about me page and stuff like that?
Michael O’Neal: It’s ok if you do it. And in fact that’s in The Art of the Interview, it’s self-plug. I talk about 8 Mile which by Eminem and, you’ve ever seen the 8 Mile?
Calvin Wayman: Ah just pieces.
Michael O’Neal: All right. So the end of 8 Mile, they have a rap battle and Eminem is up against that guy.
Calvin Wayman: I’ve seen that
Michael O’Neal: In a rap battle, you wanna go second. You wanna go last
Calvin Wayman: Totally
Michael O’Neal: And you can see what the other person said and use their words against them. Well in this case Eminem had to go first. So his move was he just busted his own balls the entire time. He’s the “I am white trash, my mom didn’t sleep with this person or you know whatever it was and…”
Calvin Wayman: He took away their material
Michael O’Neal: He took away their ammo. And so by the time they got to actually go he had nothing to say. So you can by using their About Page you can use their About Page against them. So you can say this person is known for blank blank blank blank blank. This is how he solved it. Ladies and gentlemen you know Grant Cardone or whatever it is and in doing so that person you’ve just taken away the story that they’ve told on 50 other podcasts.
Calvin Wayman: Ahh yeah
Michael O’Neal: Yeah you original material for your show. So I really like that.
Calvin Wayman: Cool. I love that.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah.
Calvin Wayman: So
Michael O’Neal: Never do the move where you go you make people tell the rest of the story of their own.
Calvin Wayman: I so am not going to do that because I’ve had that question asked me so many times. And that’s one thing that I kind of appreciate is I can take some of the context of the different podcasts I’ve been on to see what I liked as a guest
Michael O’Neal: Sure
Calvin Wayman: And what I didn’t like to put to this…
Michael O’Neal: That ackee.
Calvin Wayman: Yeah
Michael O’Neal: Yeah
Calvin Wayman: But bottom line is the part that you and I super agree on is having it be something that it’s just a way an excuse to get to cool people and if you can monetize it down the road or something like that. Cool but the number one thing is not business or anything like that. Like see where it goes. Quality personality and do the stuff the pros do.
Michael O’Neal: If you’re good at it. Doors will open. And that’s all. That’s all you can ask for. Doors are still open.
Calvin Wayman: Speaking of doors are open. That’s what I wanted to end on because that’s kind of the next step for me with this show and that is getting to doors are getting the cool people. You’ve had some really cool people on your show.
Michael O’Neal: Ahem
Calvin Wayman: And so just kind of want to see if there’s like I know there’s like there talking to them meeting them it’s also always cool if you have a warm intro to the person and things like that…
Michael O’Neal: Yeah
Calvin Wayman: Somebody recommends you. Is that how you get most of your people on like what are some of the things that you would recommend to me for this brand new show to get the like people on high quality people that you want on your show like what’s kind of that goes as you?
Michael O’Neal: Yeah. You’re already doing most of it
Calvin Wayman: Cool
Michael O’Neal: Now which is there’s little…
Calvin Wayman: Events
Michael O’Neal: No better way than going to events.
Calvin Wayman: Sweet
Michael O’Neal: That’s the best way. I’ve seen you in a million different events
Calvin Wayman: Yup
Michael O’Neal: And you’re definitely on that path. The second best way is like you said a warm e-mail intro. It’s never you know it’s not that big of a deal. It’s a reach out to someone to go, “Hey I saw that you had blankety blank on your show. Would you be willing to give me an e-mail intro?”. They can… it’s no big deal. You can say no. They can say no on the other end. You know you can be let go. You have you know blankety blank and I’ll go sure and I’ll reach out and go, “hey a good buddy mind starting a podcast. Is it ok if I send you an e-mail intro?” they can either say yes or no.
Calvin Wayman: Totally
Michael O’Neal: They’re not offended that I’m asking. So but that’s another really great way to do it but nothing is as good. It’s another sort of weird self-plug but I have a free course called Conferencetopia. I don’t know if you got a problem.
Calvin Wayman: What’s a Conferencetopia?
Michael O’Neal: Yeah and it’s how to conference better so that you can grow your business nearby.
Calvin Wayman: I do remember that because you gave it to my peeps or at least mentioned it
Michael O’Neal: I did?
Calvin Wayman: On my live event that you emceed.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah I mean I did. So it is a it’s sort of a primer on how to a conference like literally how to conference so that at the other end of the show you’ve grown your network you’ve grown hopefully your net worth you’ve connected with some of the people that can help open doors for you that kind of thing.
Calvin Wayman: Cool conferencetopia.com yeah. Cool I like that. So I’m gonna use that especially with introing like. So continue going to events go where the cool people are and obviously on a warm intro at the event would be cool too. Yeah right.
Michael O’Neal: Yes
Calvin Wayman: Like if you have a podcast. If you if somebody knows the person that you want to connect you connect me and then start a conversation like “hey you should totally come on my show”. Is there anybody that even with the warm intro like I would imagine the percentage is pretty high of people that want to come on right? Do you ever run into those like where even though you’re getting a warm intro even though you want to come on the’re. They’re just like super like “yeah you know what? No” Like have you had any trouble with that?
Michael O’Neal: No I’ve had more people that have said yes. And then it’s a pain in the ass to book them and make it.
Calvin Wayman: Got it.
Michael O’Neal: You know
Calvin Wayman: It’s just because they’re busy you got to maybe…
Michael O’Neal: Or something. I have this sort of 4-year… don’t know what it is with Gary V where we’ve said…
Calvin Wayman: Yeah we chatted about Gary V. Yeah we it’s because it’s due in part because your show is an hour bro. He can’t be sitting for an hour. Well that’s it.
Michael O’Neal: That’s why he’s not on.
Calvin Wayman: That’s awesome.
Michael O’Neal: We’ve now rejected each other I think twice each for because I’ve been like “Dude I’ll come to New York I’ll fly out. We’ll just do we’ll bang it out you know.” But he’s you know he’s like “dude I’m sorry”.
Calvin Wayman: Well he loves the hustle.
Michael O’Neal: He does it.
Calvin Wayman: You should totally send him an email like right now with the book coming out. His new book crushing it like send the e-mail and be like “hey like we’ve…”
Michael O’Neal: I don’t want that interview.
Calvin Wayman: You don’t even want it anymore.
Michael O’Neal: No it’s not that I don’t I don’t want I want the non-book promo interview.
Calvin Wayman: Totally
Michael O’Neal: That I’ve been waiting for. And if this is happened then it’s fine. If you hear the book from the interview. It’s literally the same one that he’s done a thousand times.
Calvin Wayman: Totally.
Michael O’Neal: So that’s why I don’t care about that show. I’m like you can get that show from any hack.
Calvin Wayman: Totally
Michael O’Neal: Podcaster I don’t need that show. I don’t need your name on the marquee.
Calvin Wayman: Right
Michael O’Neal: If you are everywhere. But I do wanna be known as the guy who got the best interview from Gary V.
Calvin Wayman: Totally.
Michael O’Neal: That’s the one like I want him…
Calvin Wayman: Who has that right now do you think?
Michael O’Neal: Jordan.
Calvin Wayman: Me too. I totally agree. Jordan, the Art of Charm. Jordan, the Art of Charm. I totally agree…
Michael O’Neal: Haven’t really had to going to him “Goddamn that’s my interview. That’s mine” But I also think that I can bring my own version to the table and I would like that. I would like those to be bantered about like who did it better you know? So it was…
Calvin Wayman: Cool
Michael O’Neal: Yeah.
Calvin Wayman: Cool well yeah coming in for landing then let’s just wrap it there. It’s like totally I don’t have the sexiest way to exit this because this is my first time I’m sure I’ll come up with some sort of flow at the end.
Michael O’Neal: Just go, thanks for doing this. And let me and I’ll give you guys I’ll give you and the listeners if you’re interested in really stepping up your game and being a great interviewer. Listen to a show called Off Camera with Sam Jones. Off Camera with Sam Jones.
Calvin Wayman: Is that like. Is that are you finding that like on iTunes, YouTube?
Michael O’Neal: iTunes, he actually does have a little show on DirecTV too but that one and here’s the thing with Alec Baldwin. Those are the two that I think are of the real pro internet. I mean the first one Off Camera, Sam just I mean I interviewed him on my show but dude this dude is a monster. Question asked are so good.
Calvin Wayman: Just good at like just pulling out the Mining the Diamonds?
Michael O’Neal: He’s so good so good so good so good. So he’s a good litmus test if you listen and you if you’re listening to that show and you’re if you’re not saying “oh wow that was a great question into a great story” and of course Howard Stern. Listen go to YouTube and listen to Howard Stern’s long form interviews with celebrities and you’ll be blown away by the web site that he has.
Calvin Wayman: Yeah I know you like the one the one I also like it’s where he interviewed. What’s his bucket Instagram star? Yeah Danielle Marion super good interview. Pulled out some…
Michael O’Neal: Right the interview and from a strategic interview technical standpoint it was a masterclass in opening up a tight guest. It was just, wooh!
Calvin Wayman: Totally so you’ll be at CES all week huh.
Michael O’Neal: CES
Calvin Wayman: I’ve never been to CES. What’s kind of year is this like has this been kind of an annual thing for you? Like what takes you there? What Takes you there do you go to like all the stuff you just meet cool people are you in the lobby most of the time? Like what’s your thing?
Michael O’Neal: This will be I think my fifth and this one I will be going under the auspices of beginner audiophiles so I’ll be definitely hanging out in the high end audio which is the couple there’s a couple of hotels that have just the main audio stuff but then I also wanna really get into. I’m interested in some of the security stuff like some of the nest cams and those kinds of things and just gear in general. I’m very interested in this year, the wireless ear buds to see any of them can sound good because I think the Apple ones are terrible and I haven’t heard any that are great yet so I’m curious about those and maybe I’ll get a few sample pairs and that kind of thing. So
Calvin Wayman: The interview is right.
Michael O’Neal: Have good interviews. Yeah whatever is on there?
Calvin Wayman: Just people you talk to and you’ll just figure it out then.
Michael O’Neal: Yes. So I often especially in the audio world. Well it depends it depends on who it is and what the show. Some will be under for Beginnner Audiophile and some will be Solopreneur Hour. Depends on what they do and who they are.
Calvin Wayman: Well, for somebody for being myself being somebody that goes to events you mention that I have not yet been to some of the really big ones. This will be my first year didn’t make CES this year but this will be my first year at South by Southwest.
Michael O’Neal: Oh sick that’s awesome!
Calvin Wayman: So super I won’t be there for all the two weeks I’ll be there from like the 11th through the 19th or something like that of March. So if anybody’s there if you’re listening to this, I hope you there.
Michael O’Neal: Music or tech? Which one?
Calvin Wayman: I don’t even know the only like I have I had a speaking gig in Tampa, Florida like the weekend before that so I couldn’t do like the first part so I literally just said K after that weekend I’ll go to whatever else is left.
Michael O’Neal: Cool
Calvin Wayman: So it’s like seven days of whatever that is. I think it’s mostly the music stuff.
Michael O’Neal: Sweet
Calvin Wayman: But just curious about the vibe and stuff I’ve never been to Austin yet.
Michael O’Neal: Oh dude you’ll love it.
Calvin Wayman: So super excited. Well bro that’s a wrap. Thank you for like you just officially made the episode uno for curious with Calvin Wayman: Wayman so…
Michael O’Neal: I love that. It’s been a little slice of heaven my friend thank you.
Calvin Wayman: Thank you so much bro. Peace out. Catcha at some other points probably some other event. By the way, solohour.com, you can find it everywhere at socials, Facebook, Instagram and what’s the… do you use Twitter more? What’s the best place for somebody to reach you?
Michael O’Neal: Instagram
Calvin Wayman: Facebook. Instagram @SoloHour, Facebook @SoloHour and if you want…
Michael O’Neal: Beginner audiophile if you want. You can follow that one too.
Calvin Wayman: And beginner audiophile, phile is spelt like you do a ph right? ph.com
Michael O’Neal: P-H-I-L-E yeah.
Calvin Wayman: Audiophile. Audio p-h-i-l-e.com?
Michael O’Neal: Some really cool gear there if you want to. Yeah
Calvin Wayman: Cool. That’s up man.
Michael O’Neal: Yeah you know if they come or I begin audiophile on Instagram.
Calvin Wayman: Cool.
Michael O’Neal: Thank you, my friend.
Calvin Wayman: You’re welcome. Take care. See you around.
[Outro Music Plays]
video version of the Episode
