Personal finance advice I wish I had known in my 20s: Was chatting with @jayyanginspires (19 years old) and sharing my biggest financial regrets and tips. Figured others would benefit:

I was employee #30 at Facebook. Then I got fired.

For a long time, I was bitter that they let me go.

But the lessons I learned from Mark and Facebook helped me build a $100 million/year company.

10 lessons I learned from working directly under Mark Zuckerberg: 1) Focus on ONE goal

“Mark, we’re not profitable. Let’s try selling tickets inside Facebook events,” I pleaded.

He said no.

Then he took a dry-erase marker and wrote on the board: GROWTH.

My #1 regret in life:

I wish I had taken myself and dating more seriously in my 20s.

8 pieces of Brutally Honest relationship advice that I’d give to my younger self (so you can avoid my mistakes): 1/ Improve yourself

You have to love yourself before you can expect someone else to.

And if you don’t, it’s a BIG ask to imagine a person will love and fix you.

The best way I’ve found is to focus on the things under your control:

Please don't quit your job and "go all in".

It’s much simpler to build a side hustle alongside your day job, hit your freedom number, and then jump ship if you want.

Here’s how you can do it: Step 1: Write out your Dream Year

One of the biggest things I notice when I speak with people is they DON’T BELIEVE they can live their dream life.

The more you write it out, look at it, and think about it - I promise you - you deserve and can have that life!

This is Bill Perkins.

He made $100,000,000 in a single year, trading oil and natural gas.

He’s a hedge fund manager, high-stakes poker player, and author of one of my favorite books Die With Zero.

Here’s Bill’s story: 1) Early Life

Growing up, Bill always knew he wanted to be rich.

He started as a screen clerk and was exposed to energy trading.

“If these idiots can be rich, so can I,” Bill thought.

14 pieces of non-obvious advice after two decades of entrepreneurship:

1. If everyone’s doing it, you’re late. When we started AppSumo, I paid Tim Ferriss $5,000 a month to sponsor his website.

We did that for 2+ years and made millions from it.

Fast forward to today - Tim charges a MINIMUM of $50,000 (!!) per podcast.

Ever wonder how top authors (like James Clear, Mark Manson, and Ramit Sethi) consistently sell millions of copies of their books?

The secret lies in their Evergreen Marketing System.

Let me show you exactly how to create your own (and how it helped my book cross 100,000 sales): The Evergreen Marketing System is broken into 3 parts:

1- Exposure - Create value directly on other platforms to grow audience
2- Collection - Turn that audience into your email list
3- Nurture - Automatically nurture them into buyers with a welcome sequence

Note: This system can be used in MANY businesses, not just if you’re promoting a book.

My newest startup did $60,093+ in 40 days.

It’s our 4th product in the last 3 years on track to generate $1M in revenue in ~12 months.

Here's our 5-step process to launch winning products: Last week, I sat down with David Kelly, the General Manager for AppSumo Originals to share how we ideate, build, test, and launch products.

Context: The goal of AppSumo Originals products (TidyCal, KingSumo, SendFox) is to introduce people into the AppSumo ecosystem.

I asked my audience for their BEST piece of parenting advice.

Thank you ALL soooooo much, it was overwhelming, and felt very loved with great advice.

We picked some of our favorite 10 in no particular order... for all the parents (or parents-to-be) out there: 1- Deal with your own shit

We all have emotional baggage from past experiences.

The best thing you can do is make sure you’re good on the inside - so you don’t transfer it on your child.

@RyanHoliday

As the founder of a $100M/yr business, I’ve read thousands of books.

A tiny fraction of them are worth your time.

Here are 9 that changed my life and business: 9/ Million Dollar Consulting

What you’ll learn:

How you can build a million-dollar 1-person business with the skills you already have.

Few like to say it out loud - but your health & face are one of the most important things in life.

Makes business and life a whole lot easier :)

Here’s my simple skincare routine (that anyone can copy): I get asked all the time about my skincare routine. I’m 42. Started it at 25.

Most of it - I credit my genetics (thanks Mom and Dad!!)

So that’s tip #1: Choose better parents.

Just kidding 😂

If everything is a priority then nothing is a priority.

How I plan my week (as the CEO of a $100M/year company): 1) Clarify your Top Priorities

If I asked you, “What are your top 3 priorities in life?” How would you answer?

Mine are:
1. My relationships
2. @AppSumo
3. And Million Dollar Weekend

If you don’t know what your priorities are, everything seems urgent.

AppSumo does ~$8.3M/mo in revenue.

We spend $165,000/mo on software to run it.

Here are the 50 most important tools in our tech stack: Our team has tested tens of thousands of tools across dozens of categories.

Some will surprise you, some will disappoint you, and some will be new that you can take to run your own million-dollar business.

**(The full tool stack will be linked at the bottom of this thread)

Culture is how people behave when no one is looking.

I’m the CEO of a $100 million company.

Here’s the exact internal culture handbook we use (bookmark this for later): 1) This is your company

We hire adults that we trust to embrace this mindset.

After working at Intel, Facebook, and Mint, I wanted to work with adults who took ownership of their work, could get stuff done, and were a joy to work with.

Kids make excuses. Adults take ownership.

A few months ago, a high schooler sent me a 19-page slide deck on how I could improve my content.

Now he runs all our social and email marketing.

Here's how he landed a $150k job with me (and how you can use the same "Pre-Work Method" to create opportunities): It’s 2006.

My buddy Dave McClure introduced me to a guy named Aaron who was building a product called (at the time it was called MyMint).

I was super impressed. “This is the best product I’ve ever seen,” I told him.mint.com

I was employee #30 at Facebook. Then I got fired.

Now I’m the CEO of a $100 million company.

10 non-obvious lessons I learned from working directly under Mark Zuckerberg: 10) Focus on ONE goal

Mark’s goal was 1 billion users.

Every idea we’d bring, he’d ask, “Does this help user growth or not?”

If it wasn’t driving toward that goal, we didn’t do it.

You don’t grow fast by doing many things, but by doing ONE thing extremely well.

Kids these days impress me.

Last Friday, I spoke with a class of high school entrepreneurs.

And I was amazed at how smart and mature they were. A few of them had already made thousands in revenue (!!)

7 things new entrepreneurs need to know: 1/ Get ultra-specific

When I asked them what they wanted for their businesses, many replied with vague answers.

“Gain traction. Go viral. Get rich.”

That’s a good start. But the more specific you get about what you’re trying to achieve - the easier it is to get there.

My #1 regret in life:

I wish I had taken myself and dating more seriously in my 20s.

8 pieces of Brutally Honest relationship advice that I’d give to my younger self (so you can avoid my mistakes): 1/ Improve yourself

You have to love yourself before you can expect someone else to.

And if you don’t, it’s a BIG ask to imagine a person will love and fix you.

The best way I’ve found is to focus on the things under your control:

I’m the CEO of a $100 million business.

But I’ve tried (and failed) to build 20+ startups before.

Here are 10 pieces of brutally honest advice after two decades of entrepreneurship: 1/ Leverage your Zone of Influence

When I was at UC Berkeley, I noticed many freshmen couldn’t get summer jobs.

So I started HFG Consulting, a local consulting company, and hired them to help. I figured we could sell to local restaurants how to market to our college. It worked.

AppSumo is about to do $100 million in revenue this year.

But the first 10 years:

• Rejected by Google (2x)
• Fired by FB after 9 months
• Built 20+ startups that didn’t work out

Here are 9 pieces of brutally honest BUSINESS advice (I wish I knew earlier): 1/ Spend more time picking your partners

In my previous business, Gambit - each partner thought we were most important and had our own idea of the best direction.

It didn’t work well.

A lot of entrepreneurs tell me they need a co-founder, and my response is always...

I’ve met 25 billionaires during my career as a tech entrepreneur and YouTuber.

Collectively, they’ve created over $1 trillion of value for the world.

Here are the 6 biggest lessons they shared with me: 1- There are no employee billionaires

Every billionaire I’ve met became a billionaire through entrepreneurship.

Why?

Because as an employee, there’s a cap on your salary. The average annual raise is 3%.

But as an entrepreneur? Your only limit is YOU.