Creating a Business

Andrew Warner has been part of the internet startup scene since 1997. Andrew and his brother built a $30 million per year online business, which they later sold. After taking an extended vacation and doing some traveling, Andrew started Mixergy. Mixergy helps ambitious upstarts learn from some of the most successful people in business.

Andrew and I talk about his new book, Stop Asking Questions. It’s a great read on leading dynamic interviews, and learning anything from anyone. We also talk about longevity and burnout as an entrepreneur. Andrew gives me feedback about my interviewing style, the direction I should take the podcast, and much more.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• Why you need to understand and communicate your mission
• How to get your guest excited about being interviewed
• What to do instead of asking questions
• How to hook your audience and keep them engaged

Links & Resources

• ConvertKit
• Gregg Spiridellis
• JibJab
• Ali Abdaal
• The Web App Challenge: From Zero to $5,000/month In 6 Months
• Groove
• Zendesk
• Help Scout
• Jordan Harbinger
• Noah Kagan
• Bob Hiler
• Seth Godin
• Morning Brew
• Alex Lieberman
• Keap (formerly Infusionsoft)
• Notion
• Sahil Bloom
• Ryan Holiday
• Brent Underwood
• Ghost Town Living
• Trust Me, I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator
• Damn Gravity
• Paul Graham
• Y Combinator
• Nathan Barry: Authority
• Ira Glass
• NPR
• This American Life
• Barbara Walters Richard Nixon interview
• Oprah interview with Lance Armstrong
• Matt Mullenweg
• Chris Pearson
• Conspiracy: Peter Thiel, Hulk Hogan, Gawker, and the Anatomy of Intrigue
• Peter Thiel
• Gawker
• Nick Denton
• The Wall Street Journal
• Rohit Sharma
• SanDisk
• Jason Calacanis
• Dickie Bush
• Sean McCabe
• Daily Content Machine
• Jordan Peterson
• Tribes
• Warren Buffet
• Sam Walton
• Ted Turner
• GothamChess
• LinkedIn Learning (formerly Lynda.com)
• Inc.com: Selling Your Company When You're Running on Fumes
• Chess.com
• Mark Cuban
• James Altucher
• Rod Drury

Andrew Warner’s Links

• Andrew Warner
• Stop Asking Questions
• Mixergy

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Andrew:
The top 10 interviews of all time are news-based interviews. We, as podcasters, keep thinking, “How do I get enough in the can, so if I die tomorrow, there’s enough interviews to last for a month, so I can be consistent, and the audience loves me.”

That’s great, but I think we should also be open to what’s going on in the world today. Let’s go talk to that person today. If there’s an artist who’s suddenly done something, we should go ask to do an interview with them.

[00:00:32] Nathan:
In this episode, I talk to my friend, Andrew Warner, who I’ve known for a long time. He actually played a really crucial role in the ConvertKit story in the early days, and provided some great encouragement along the way to help me continue the company, and get through some tough spots.

We actually don’t get into that in this episode, but it takes an interesting turn because we just dive right in.

Andrew’s got a book on interviewing. He runs Mixergy. He’s been, running Mixergy for a long time. We talk about longevity and burnout, and a bunch of other things. He dives in and challenges me, and gives me feedback on my interviewing style. Where I should take the Podcast, and a bunch of other stuff. It’s more of a casual conversation than the back-and-forth interview of how he grew his business. But I think you’ll like it. It’s a lot of what I’m going for on the show.

So anyway, enjoy the episode.

Andrew, welcome to the show.

[00:01:25] Andrew:
Thanks for having me on.

[00:01:26] Nathan:
There’s all kinds of things we can talk about today, but I want to start with the new book that you got coming out.

This is actually slightly intimidating; I am interviewing someone who has a book coming out about how to be good at interviewing. Where do we even go from here? You were saying that you have thoughts?

[00:01:47] Andrew:
I have feedback for you. I have a thoughts on your program.

[00:01:51] Nathan:
I’m now even more nervous.

[00:01:52] Andrew:
I’ve been listening, and I’ve been following, and I’ve been looking for questioning styles. Is there feedback I could give him? I mean, I’ve wrote a whole book ...