Dan Martell - April 22, 2025


If I Wanted To Go From $0 to $1M in 2026, I’d Do This


Episode Stats


Length

15 minutes

Words per minute

232.67151

Word count

3,707

Sentence count

156


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, I talk about how to go from being a broke 24-year-old to building a $100M empire. These are the same 10 steps that the top 1% use to build businesses that generate millions.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
00:00:00.000 I'm gonna share with you the blueprint
00:00:01.520 to make your first million dollars.
00:00:03.480 These 10 steps are what the top 1%
00:00:05.800 use to build businesses that generate millions.
00:00:08.300 They're the same steps that I use to go
00:00:09.920 from a broke 24-year-old to building a $100 million empire.
00:00:13.480 So without further explaining it,
00:00:15.020 these are the 10 steps to make your first million.
00:00:17.220 Which brings us to step number one,
00:00:18.960 build a six-figure skill.
00:00:20.320 See, I've watched people try to make money for years,
00:00:22.920 and I've learned that interested people
00:00:24.860 watch obsessed people change the world.
00:00:27.160 Obsessed people make money.
00:00:28.800 obsessed people develop skills and those skills will get them paid so i spent the last six months
00:00:34.160 researching analyzing the most in-demand skills that are going to get you paid that are the
00:00:38.960 easiest to learn right now in 2025 starting with number one ai prompt engineering what you do
00:00:45.360 is you go learn how to communicate with ai and that's why the best companies are going to pay
00:00:50.400 you top dollar to help them develop prompts they're going to improve their business number two
00:00:54.880 coding this is actually what i went deep on back when i was 17 and back then it took me literally
00:00:59.840 two years to get any good at coding whereas today with the new technology you can figure this out
00:01:04.480 in the next few months so go on youtube and study programming languages these are ways that you can
00:01:09.600 get paid money to build them applications they're gonna improve their companies number three video
00:01:14.160 editing this one's my favorite because it's the most creative we hire video editors many of them
00:01:18.800 who taught themselves how to edit we pay them top dollars because they take the content that i put
00:01:23.520 out and clip it in a way that creates engagement which gets me views which i will pay a lot of
00:01:28.000 money for and people will pay you number four ghostwriting most people don't know this because
00:01:32.240 it's kind of this skill set that's behind the scenes but when i wrote my book i had a ghost
00:01:36.400 writer and i paid him six figures to help me work on my book because it was that important
00:01:40.800 and there are people and entrepreneurs out there that will pay you top dollar to help them work on
00:01:44.960 their creative projects number five chat sales this is a fun one because we live in a world where
00:01:49.840 where you can build a very big company with no ads,
00:01:52.560 no funnels, and no phone calls,
00:01:54.000 because people are taught how to sell things over chat,
00:01:57.200 social media chat, text message chat,
00:01:59.360 emails considered chat.
00:02:00.460 I have one of my top sales guys
00:02:02.040 that makes a million dollars a year
00:02:03.460 in commissions over chat sales.
00:02:05.720 Number six, cybersecurity.
00:02:07.340 If you think about it in 2025 with the rise of AI,
00:02:09.960 the biggest problem that's happening
00:02:11.200 for all business owners is getting hacked.
00:02:13.520 If you can help other businesses protect themselves
00:02:15.940 from security attacks,
00:02:17.080 you are gonna be incredibly valuable.
00:02:18.420 Number seven, large language model SEO optimization.
00:02:21.800 So if you think of chatting with AI,
00:02:23.680 there are people that specialize
00:02:25.000 in search engine optimization
00:02:26.880 or essentially AI engine optimization
00:02:29.260 to become the recommendation by the AI.
00:02:32.360 And this is a technique and a skill you can go learn
00:02:34.560 and get paid top dollar to help these businesses
00:02:36.600 become discoverable on these AI chat platforms.
00:02:39.640 Now that you've got your skills locked in,
00:02:41.540 sharpen your saw,
00:02:42.600 which brings us to step number two, learn, don't earn.
00:02:45.600 When I moved to San Francisco,
00:02:47.020 one of my mentors told me,
00:02:48.100 go find the best companies and offer to work for free.
00:02:51.220 Why?
00:02:51.700 He said, you will learn more than you could ever get paid
00:02:54.800 to do the work by just being around these people.
00:02:57.360 Offering to work for free for all these startups
00:02:59.520 for the first year that I was there
00:03:01.000 taught me way more than I could ever learn on my own.
00:03:04.020 But most people do it wrong.
00:03:05.280 The key is you wanna get someone a result
00:03:07.540 as fast as possible, even before you start working with them.
00:03:10.260 People message me every day and they're like,
00:03:11.820 I can be an editor, I can be a copywriter.
00:03:13.680 I'm like, why don't you just do it?
00:03:15.380 Do the thing that you tell me you can do and show me.
00:03:17.420 So in your learning, not earning phase,
00:03:19.840 here's the three steps to learn even faster.
00:03:22.300 Number one, find a mentor.
00:03:23.940 My role for a mentor is somebody
00:03:25.380 who's at the top of where you wanna be
00:03:27.380 and is willing to give you the advice
00:03:29.260 and give you the opportunity
00:03:30.440 so you can demonstrate your eagerness to do great work.
00:03:32.940 Number two is do great free work.
00:03:35.140 As I mentioned, a lot of people reach out to me
00:03:36.940 to wanna do things for me.
00:03:38.240 And the problem is, is their free stuff isn't very good.
00:03:40.340 So go spend the time learning the skill
00:03:42.060 and then do the projects before you're ever asked to do it
00:03:44.460 to show them that you're the person.
00:03:45.960 Number three, and this one cannot be missed.
00:03:48.520 You have to ask for feedback.
00:03:50.120 The only way you're gonna learn and get better
00:03:52.740 and not lose is get feedback
00:03:54.740 so you could take that and implement it
00:03:56.480 in the next iteration.
00:03:57.580 But getting to your first million
00:03:58.780 is gonna take more than just free projects.
00:04:01.220 Which brings us to step three, sell it before you're ready.
00:04:04.000 Before I start any business,
00:04:05.600 I actually sell it before I know exactly what it's gonna be.
00:04:08.560 When I started my elite coaching business,
00:04:10.160 I was on a hike, I was inspired by a conversation
00:04:12.500 I was having on Instagram,
00:04:13.780 and I just decided to start this group.
00:04:15.380 i sold it before i ever held my first call why i wanted to know if anybody else wanted to buy
00:04:20.660 what i had so i want to tell you five hacks that i use to sell more stuff even when i'm not ready
00:04:25.780 number one is start warm these are your opportunities these are your people usually
00:04:29.540 found in your network through referrals friends you want to get somebody to introduce you or
00:04:34.820 ideally they know of you prior number two spear message spear stands for short personal and
00:04:39.860 expects a reply and usually it's like nine words you can do it over email or text message and what
00:04:44.820 What happens is that it's so short and personal,
00:04:47.280 the person feels obligated to reply
00:04:49.380 and that will help you sell.
00:04:50.580 Number three is simple offer.
00:04:52.400 Most people complicate things
00:04:53.740 because they think they need ads and a funnel
00:04:55.780 and a bunch of copy to sell anything.
00:04:58.300 And I'll be honest, when somebody goes like,
00:04:59.840 how does it work?
00:05:00.540 I just grab a bulleted list of things
00:05:03.120 and I just send it to them.
00:05:04.360 I keep it short and sweet.
00:05:05.500 And most of the time I put it on my notes file on my phone
00:05:08.200 so I can make it copy paste
00:05:09.600 because I'm just looking to test
00:05:11.580 and I don't want to overcomplicate it.
00:05:13.040 number four is obstacles versus objections see most people deal with objections because they
00:05:18.720 wait until they present the price to then have the person object i like to bring those up early
00:05:23.440 and test the objections those become obstacles so i can deal with them early in my chat or my
00:05:28.720 sales conversation so that when i finally get to the price it's either a yes or not now number five
00:05:34.240 is take the money if somebody says sounds awesome i'm in say great you want to put that on a credit
00:05:39.600 card or you want to wire me the money make the assumptive close and go straight to payment and
00:05:43.680 get paid but now that you've got the sale it's time to deliver which brings us to step four
00:05:48.960 under promise and over deliver when somebody buys something they have an expectation for what it
00:05:54.000 should be like and that's totally cool you should get really clear about what they expect but then
00:05:58.320 i would write down all the other things you can do that would make wow factor so for example when
00:06:03.120 somebody comes to my event what they don't expect is the fact that we create a whatsapp group with
00:06:06.800 with all the other attendees
00:06:07.940 and then prompt them to connect with each other.
00:06:10.120 They don't expect that we give them
00:06:11.560 a full documented handout with all of the resources
00:06:14.520 that are gonna be mentioned on stage,
00:06:15.680 including some internal playbooks,
00:06:17.520 so they get massive amount of value.
00:06:19.280 My philosophy is simple.
00:06:20.520 If you want your business to be extraordinary,
00:06:22.980 you need to be extra.
00:06:24.520 So here's how to over-deliver.
00:06:26.040 Number one is promise as little as possible
00:06:29.080 that gets them a result and nothing else,
00:06:31.720 because step number two is go above and beyond.
00:06:34.460 So it's really hard for me to do that
00:06:36.140 if I gave away all my best stuff in the offer.
00:06:38.420 And number three is make it right.
00:06:40.200 When things go wrong, it's my favorite part
00:06:42.720 because now I get the opportunity
00:06:44.260 to show you how good I said I was.
00:06:46.260 But after that foundation, most people can't scale
00:06:49.140 because they're still doing everything.
00:06:51.200 Which brings us to step number five,
00:06:52.860 hire to buy back your time.
00:06:54.260 Every time I meet somebody for the first time,
00:06:56.160 they go, how do you run multiple companies
00:06:58.280 and get everything done and travel the world
00:07:00.100 and all that stuff?
00:07:00.800 The truth is, is I don't run every company.
00:07:03.240 At my level, I've bought back my time
00:07:05.220 so that I can be the talent in all these companies
00:07:07.500 that can be the problem solver
00:07:08.500 without being responsible for any work products.
00:07:11.060 See, I believe your company will only scale
00:07:13.080 to the level of your ability to work through people.
00:07:15.860 So if you're always the person that's dependent
00:07:17.540 for something to get done,
00:07:18.820 then you'll always be needed inside the business
00:07:20.720 and you don't have time to work on the business.
00:07:22.500 So follow the buyback loop to buy back your time.
00:07:25.360 The first step is to audit your calendar
00:07:27.340 for all the things that would cost you very little
00:07:29.380 to pay somebody else.
00:07:30.380 If you take all of that, put it into a bucket
00:07:32.360 and then do step two, transfer,
00:07:34.120 give that to somebody else, that changes your whole life.
00:07:37.760 The best way is to record yourself doing the work
00:07:39.760 so that when you hire the person,
00:07:40.980 you can transfer it without having to take time
00:07:42.940 to train them.
00:07:43.640 The third step, Phil, is the most important
00:07:45.860 and most people miss it
00:07:46.960 because we wanna now add things to your calendar
00:07:49.240 that makes you the most money,
00:07:50.800 that gives you the most energy.
00:07:52.320 If you implement these steps,
00:07:53.880 you will build a business that you don't grow to hate.
00:07:56.180 For most people, their first hire
00:07:57.940 should be an executive assistant.
00:07:59.760 Most people get stuck
00:08:00.600 because they don't know what to get that person to do.
00:08:02.260 So if you want to get my internal document on my standard operating procedure for my
00:08:07.000 executive assistant, just find me on Instagram, message me YouTube EA, and I will send you
00:08:11.960 my doc directly with no opt-ins, no nothing.
00:08:14.300 But now that you have some time back, what do you do?
00:08:16.480 Which brings us to step six, upgrade your circle.
00:08:19.240 One of my favorite things to accelerate my learning as fast as possible is to get around
00:08:23.320 other people doing the same thing I'm doing.
00:08:25.360 So twice a week for the last two months, I've been doing lunch meetings with five to six
00:08:29.640 other incredible AI people that I found on YouTube or TikTok or that people introduced me to. And then
00:08:34.940 that way I'm starting to build a peer group of other folks that are building similar type tools
00:08:39.360 and going in the same direction as I am. And as my buddy Cole says, I'd rather have four quarters
00:08:43.840 than a hundred pennies. I'd rather have less people that are incredibly valuable to my goals
00:08:48.480 and my dreams than have a lot of people that just cost me a lot of time. So here are a few ideas
00:08:52.540 that you can use to upgrade your circle today. Number one is join a mastermind. I just found a
00:08:57.320 lot of people are also interested in AI and organize these lunchtime calls where we'd all
00:09:01.720 share what we're up to and how we can help each other. And it creates a mini mastermind. You can
00:09:05.360 join one if you don't have one, but you can create your own just as easily. Number two is join a
00:09:09.580 coaching program. There is literally a person out there that is the expert at the industry or
00:09:14.980 business you want to be in. And they have a group that you can join and not only learn the best
00:09:19.580 practices from them, but also meet other people just like you that are working towards the same
00:09:24.540 goals. Number three, hire a private coach. My whole philosophy is I have an unlimited budget
00:09:29.300 for my health and my mind. And a private coach will get you to accelerate even faster towards
00:09:34.820 your dreams because they're going to be able to show you how to do what you need to do to be
00:09:38.640 successful. But if you actually make it to a million, it won't be random. Which brings us
00:09:42.620 to step number seven, scale with systems. It's crazy because a lot of people can be winning but
00:09:47.300 still be making massive mistakes. It's like my buddy Peter who owns a plumbing company. He was
00:09:51.300 growing really quickly but then he was forgetting to invoice and all of a sudden he couldn't make
00:09:55.460 payroll because he didn't have a system for invoicing what i want to share with you are
00:09:58.980 four core systems in your business that are going to help you avoid going broke number one is
00:10:03.060 playbooks these are documents that contain the outcome for a department the north star principles
00:10:07.860 that a department would use to make decisions and then the processes they use to get the work done
00:10:12.260 just like my executive admin playbook that i shared with you earlier number two is checklist
00:10:16.340 this could actually be a checklist app or it could be a checklist and a document but those
00:10:20.020 are different because those are kept short and are always used when the person's doing the work
00:10:23.940 number three is stencils and stencils are one of my favorite because they act like blueprints for
00:10:28.900 doing repeatable work think about if i was painting a wall and i had to put a bunch of
00:10:32.500 birds on the wall if i did it by hand it would take me all day but if i had a stencil and i could
00:10:36.340 just spray some paint i could get that done in an hour stencils help you do the work faster over and
00:10:41.300 over again number four is sensors and this is essentially ways for you to delegate a whole
00:10:46.340 outcome like marketing or sales but then check that the activities are being done right so maybe
00:10:51.220 after a sale there's a survey that goes to the customer asking if they're happy and if you get
00:10:55.140 the report the sensor then you can get involved if people are upset by the service they just bought
00:10:59.540 but now that you're getting the machine running it's time to give it some fuel which brings us to
00:11:03.860 step eight build demand i used to brag about batching all my content i went into studio two
00:11:09.540 days every quarter and i would batch all these videos change t-shirts problem was for nine years
00:11:15.300 all it got me was 100,000 followers on YouTube
00:11:18.360 with videos that might get 2,000 or 3,000 views.
00:11:21.040 Two years ago, I decided to go pro,
00:11:22.920 and in the last 18 months alone,
00:11:24.940 I've added close to a million followers.
00:11:26.840 And today, with those million people,
00:11:28.460 I get more demand for speaking and business opportunities
00:11:31.580 that I know what to do with,
00:11:32.680 because it's not who you know, it's who knows you.
00:11:35.820 See, organic content, you control all those links
00:11:38.660 and those pages that people click through
00:11:40.260 to learn more about who you are, what your business is about.
00:11:42.400 That's how you generate authentic trust
00:11:44.440 and demand for your business.
00:11:45.640 See, it all comes down to reach and reputation.
00:11:47.720 If you have the reputation of being awesome,
00:11:49.380 which I'm assuming you are,
00:11:50.420 but nobody knows who you are,
00:11:51.700 then you're not gonna generate demand.
00:11:53.380 That's why you have to create content.
00:11:55.280 So these are the four C's of viral content.
00:11:57.640 Number one is capture.
00:11:59.160 My philosophy is simple.
00:12:00.540 The energy that you create your content in
00:12:02.860 is felt by the viewer.
00:12:04.300 So you have to ask yourself,
00:12:05.740 when do you create content easily that's fun,
00:12:08.560 that's exciting for you,
00:12:09.520 where you feel like you're just capturing something else
00:12:11.740 and it makes it very natural to put out on the internet.
00:12:14.080 When you do that, people are gonna feel the authenticity
00:12:16.520 and they're gonna wanna learn more about you.
00:12:18.420 Number two is create.
00:12:19.600 So if you've captured a lot of great content,
00:12:21.580 now you've got to edit it and tweak it
00:12:23.520 for the different platforms.
00:12:24.800 So for example, YouTube video is completely different
00:12:27.500 than an Instagram reel.
00:12:28.700 So the different platforms have different formats
00:12:30.880 that you're gonna have to craft
00:12:32.120 so that it gets the most reach.
00:12:33.560 Number three is collaborate.
00:12:34.900 This one is fun because you can collaborate
00:12:36.820 with other creators and ask them to do collabs,
00:12:39.480 but you can also collab with your audience
00:12:41.520 by asking them to ask you questions.
00:12:43.360 Number four is consistency.
00:12:45.040 This one, most people mess up
00:12:46.380 and it's why they'll never grow their audience
00:12:48.000 is because they do it for a week and then they stop.
00:12:50.520 My philosophy was very simple when I started.
00:12:52.620 Can I do this every week and never miss for a decade?
00:12:56.320 If I do that, then it makes my goals inevitable
00:12:58.960 because I keep showing up every week and I don't miss.
00:13:02.440 So if you do those four, you'll build massive demand.
00:13:05.240 Now that you got demand,
00:13:06.220 this is how to really scale your business,
00:13:08.000 which brings us to step number nine, hire drivers.
00:13:11.080 Unfortunately, most entrepreneurs
00:13:12.440 build a prison of their own creation.
00:13:15.240 They're the genius with a thousand workers
00:13:17.160 because nobody does any work
00:13:18.840 without verifying that it's the right work.
00:13:20.880 You don't wanna do that.
00:13:22.140 Instead, you wanna do this.
00:13:23.600 Hire people that make the business better behind your back.
00:13:26.960 This is how you identify and hire drivers.
00:13:29.320 Number one, offer the opportunity.
00:13:31.020 The truth is people who can grow your business
00:13:32.980 without you being there are already employed.
00:13:35.040 So you're gonna have to pull them from other companies.
00:13:37.900 If you're just putting up a job spec
00:13:39.180 and having people apply that are looking for a new job,
00:13:41.820 these people have very low probability of being a driver.
00:13:45.120 Number two is you gotta align the upside.
00:13:47.220 The people that can come in and build your business
00:13:49.240 and help you achieve your goals,
00:13:50.740 they're gonna wanna get paid based on their performance
00:13:52.940 because they trust themselves.
00:13:54.380 So you have to build a comp structure
00:13:55.980 where they get paid based on performance.
00:13:57.940 Number three is give them the challenge.
00:14:00.000 See, drivers like big problems.
00:14:02.300 They like big visions.
00:14:03.400 They love trying to create stuff
00:14:05.040 that very few people have done before,
00:14:06.760 that for them, it might be the first time,
00:14:08.160 but you have to give them full ownership.
00:14:10.880 If you say, hey, I'm gonna give you a tough challenge
00:14:12.740 and then check in with me every time you make a decision,
00:14:15.000 drivers are gonna leave.
00:14:16.040 Now that you got those drivers,
00:14:17.460 how do you keep them on your team
00:14:19.100 to build your million dollar business?
00:14:20.700 Which brings us to step number 10, craft your culture.
00:14:23.460 So a few years ago, I woke up to an HR nightmare.
00:14:26.580 I had built a business with a bunch of people
00:14:28.740 to the point where I didn't wanna work with these people.
00:14:31.680 I built systems and I thought that I managed things right,
00:14:34.320 but I wasn't a leader.
00:14:35.820 I didn't set the standard.
00:14:37.140 I didn't communicate my expectations.
00:14:39.660 And the truth was, I wasn't being intentional
00:14:41.440 about the culture I wanted in my business.
00:14:43.940 Your culture should make some people uncomfortable.
00:14:46.600 So here's how to build a high-performance culture.
00:14:48.860 Number one, implement standards.
00:14:50.760 Not only for your team, but most importantly, for yourself.
00:14:53.900 See, most leaders ask other people to do things
00:14:56.520 they're not gonna do for themselves.
00:14:57.860 And the truth is, is you teach people how to treat you.
00:15:00.300 Your standards aren't what you say they are,
00:15:02.000 they're what you accept from other people.
00:15:03.900 So if you're not hiring and firing
00:15:05.420 and inspiring against your values and your standards
00:15:07.640 and you don't have any.
00:15:08.800 Number two is train, don't tell.
00:15:10.780 See, when something goes wrong,
00:15:11.980 most people blame the people because it's the easiest,
00:15:14.180 but I always default to the process.
00:15:15.920 Did I have a checklist the person should have followed?
00:15:18.340 If I do, did I train them against that process?
00:15:21.260 See, without that, I can't really blame the person
00:15:23.680 because I didn't properly equip them
00:15:25.520 with the process and the training to be successful.
00:15:27.760 Number three is connect to vision.
00:15:29.840 My philosophy is very simple.
00:15:31.200 If I want somebody to be bought in,
00:15:33.260 I just gotta do one simple thing.
00:15:34.440 I need to understand what their five-year goals are
00:15:36.580 and have my vision big enough
00:15:38.020 so that their dreams and goals fit inside of it.
00:15:40.260 If I can't connect what they want for their own life
00:15:42.720 to the things that we're creating in the business,
00:15:44.540 then why would I get them invested
00:15:46.080 in trying to show up to help me achieve my goals?
00:15:48.300 So that's how you build a million-dollar business
00:15:50.080 in 12 months.
00:15:50.960 But if you wanna learn the 13 simple rules of business
00:15:53.520 that will make you rich,
00:15:54.580 click here and I'll see you on the other side.