Out of Your Comfort Zone

In this episode…

Nic Cary interviews Zuby and they discuss the lessons learned during his career journey including:

• The importance of aligning investments with values to create both financial returns and meaningful social impact.
• The value of resilience and adaptability in overcoming challenges and thriving in dynamic markets.
• The necessity of fostering collaboration and building strong networks to drive innovative solutions and long-term success.

Sponsor for this episode:

This episode is brought to you by Sky’s The Limit, one of the largest nonprofit programs for underrepresented young adult entrepreneurs in the US. Sky’s The Limit is a quick-growing digital platform that connects entrepreneurs with their peers, volunteer business mentors, training resources, and funding.

Our goal is to develop the social capital that founders need to chase their business dreams.

To learn more, please visit www.skysthelimit.org today.

Episode transcript

INTRO (00:04):

Welcome to the First Buck podcast, where we feature stories about entrepreneurs and the people who support them. Now let's get started with the show.

Nic Cary (00:22):

Hello and welcome to the First Buck podcast, brought to you by skysthelimit.org. We feature stories about entrepreneurs and the people who support them. Today we are joined by Zuby, an independent rapper, author, podcast host, public speaker, and creative entrepreneur with millions of followers on social media. He was born in the uk, raised in Saudi Arabia, is an Oxford graduate student. He has sold tens of thousands of albums and books independently. He's performed all over the world and gained over 50 million online video views. His podcast, real Talk with Zuby, has surpassed 20 million downloads and streams and reach listeners across the globe. Zuby has also interviewed some of the most prominent leaders and figures in the world today, including Joe Rogan, Elon Musk, and many others, and we're very excited to pick his brain a bit today. He's the author of two books, strong Advice, Zu Be's, guide to Fitness for Everybody in a children's book, the Candy Calamity. So without further ados, we we're really grateful to have you on the podcast today, but we have a little tradition around here. We need to ask you, how did you earn your first buck, pound, or euro?

Zuby (01:26):

How's it going, Nick? Thank you for inviting me on. I think I earned, well, the first currency I would've earned would've been Saudi reels. So I'll explain how I earned my first reel.

Nic Cary (01:37):

You're the first person to say that on this podcast.

Zuby (01:41):

Yeah, I grew up in Saudi Arabia, so the first, I mean, the first reel, I don't know if I necessarily earned it, I probably just got given it by my parents, but the first one I remember working for was during a summer vacation period where I had a part-time job working at the local school. So I was working at the school, I believe I was earning 15 reels per hour, which is, gosh, I think somewhere between two and a half to $3 per hour. And so I was just doing basic administrative tasks. It was actually pretty fun because lots of my friends were working there as well. It was one of the only jobs available during the summer vacation, so we were just hanging out listening to music and doing random administrative tasks. And yeah, that was my first buck or Riel earned.

Nic Cary (02:34):

I love that. Okay, so you're helping out at a school during the summertime. Talk to us maybe about some of the other things you sort of gave you a bit of experience in the entrepreneurship world when you were younger.

Zuby (02:45):

Yeah, sure thing. So I went to boarding school from the age of 11. So as I said, I grew up in Saudi Arabia and I went to boarding school in the UK from 11 onwards. So between the ages of 11 and 20 through seven years of school and three years of university, I was living in Saudi Arabia. But during term time, I was back in the uk, so I was traveling internationally by myself during all that time. So I actually used to do a little bit of a import export business. So there were certain things that were, there were certain things that were a lot cheaper in Saudi Arabia than they were in the uk. So I would take orders from people, I'd go to school and I would find out what people wanted, and then I'd go back to Saudi, I'd buy it, I'd take an empty suitcase, fill it up with Timberland boots or trainers or sneakers to Americans, certain types of candy, maybe some fake watches.

(03:44):

I can't confirm or deny various things that I could get, various things that I could get in the sort of markets and malls in Saudi Arabia, which were hard to come by in the UK or much more expensive there. And then I'd come back and I would sell those at school. So that was definitely my first entrepreneurship. So those were the first pounds I earned. This is prior to me going out and promoting and selling my own music. I actually used to have some very sort of basic level. This is as a teenager, I probably started doing this from, I dunno, 14, 15 years old. So yeah, I guess that was my first entrepreneurship.

Nic Cary (04:23):

All right, I get it. So now we get the administrative background from the time in the school. Then you basically build an import export business. And a lot of the things you must have learned doing that, listening to you what people wanted, inventory management, basically moving stuff around across borders, all those kinds of things become very, very important actually as fundamentals for any type of business. And then you take a turn into music. I think this is something I really wanted to talk to you a bit more about because a lot of the entrepreneurs we support at Sky's The Limit have ideas to potentially build a fashion brand or go into influencer marketing or something else. Talk to us a little bit about what it takes, especially now, you've been doing this for a long time, what were some of the things that you got? What were some of the things you think are maybe different today? And for anyone who's an aspiring musician out there, what's sort of changing in the marketplace of music?

Zuby (05:16):

Man, dude, it's completely changed. I mean, I put out my first album in 2006, so that's like half a lifetime for me ago. And at the time, this was when physical album sales were around their peak. So any young person listening now is probably just familiar with streaming and downloading you. Maybe even depending on your age, some of you would've probably missed the greatest time of downloading. So when I first started out

Nic Cary (05:48):

Baxter era, God, they don't even know

Zuby (05:50):

Anymore. This is what I mean. When I started out, the word streaming didn't mean anything in a musical sense, and downloading wasn't even that popular yet. iTunes was just coming around in its sort of initial incarnation. So everyone was buying CDs, people were buying mixtapes, people were buying CDs, people were going to the store, buying physical albums. I have a lot of nostalgia for this. I think we've lost something now that fewer people are doing this, sadly, but I won't get stuck on that. And so when I started making my music in my late teens, it was a no-brainer to me to press up my own discs and to promote and sell them to people.

Speaker 1 (06:32):

So

Zuby (06:32):

I remember very clearly, I remember I put out my first album, commercial Underground when I was in my second year of university, and I remember just making 50 copies to begin with. I found a local CD printer. I got the artwork done. One of my friends took the photo for the album cover, and then I got a graphic designer to make it look a little prettier and do the track listing on the back and all that. So I remember at this time, most other independent, or as it was called Unsigned Artists at the time, this is back when everyone wanted to be signed. And you have to remember this time, it wasn't cool to be an independent artist. Now, it's cool to be an independent artist, but at the time it was just like, oh, why can't you get a record deal? And most people would just have their burn CDRs and they'd scribble on it with a marker. But actually from day one, I got all my stuff pressed up properly. So you could take my CD and it would look like something you could buy from HMV or Virgin Mega Store or any other sort of CD music store. So I got 50 copies pressed up. I remember paid maybe, gosh, maybe I paid a hundred pounds or so for 50 CDs, and I sold them all in under a week.

Nic Cary (07:42):

Nice.

Zuby (07:43):

Because I was in the university setting, I was surrounded by thousands of students. People at this point already knew that I was rapping and had heard some bits and bobs. I actually had a song that made a decent dent on local radio. It was called Step Into Me. I even had a music video for it that was on a channel called Channel U, which used to be very popular in the uk. So I'm just there a student. I'm like 19 years old, and I was just in hustle mode. And so I got these 50 CDs pressed up, and I sold 'em all, and I took that 200, 250 pounds I made, and I went back and I made 200 CDs, took those 200 hand to hand, managed to sell them all. And then I went back and I did the big investment and I printed a thousand. Okay. And so by this time, I've mostly exhausted the people who know me, right?

Nic Cary (08:37):

Yeah. You've run out of friends and family that're like, we love babies,

Zuby (08:40):

Zuby Music. Exactly. I'm running out of friends and family. So this is when the light bulb moment kind of hit. So at this time, there used to be a website called MySpace. This is a trip

Nic Cary (08:51):

Down memory lane.

Zuby (08:52):

This is a trip down memory lane, man. I had about 28,000 followers on there. So I thought, oh, maybe I can sell to all this audience. So one thing I definitely learned is just because someone is a follower or a social media friend does not mean that they are a potential customer.

(09:07):

So I had this sort of grandiose vision that, oh, if I can just get X percent of my audience to buy this, then it'll be easy to sell a thousand. It was very, very difficult. I sold a handful to people who were following me online, but then I was like, man, I've got all these boxes and boxes of CDs. And I knew as a hip hop fan, I had bought CDs from people off the street before when I was in Lester Square in London or walking down Oxford Street or certain areas, I had been stopped and had these independent rappers sell me their CDs. And some of them were actually pretty good as well. It wasn't like it was rubbish music just because it was coming from the street. And so I was like, and I'd read stories about how guys like 50 cent, ludicrous Pap papoose, slim Thug, I don't know, all these American rappers, Chamillionaire before, they all sort of got their major deals. They used to shift a lot of mix tapes.

Speaker 1 (09:59):

So

Zuby (09:59):

I was like, Hmm, I can sell my CDs on the street. So I remember the first time I ever did it was in Leicester Square in London. Anyone who is familiar at all with London knows that Lester Square is a busy place. It's packed just full of people from

Nic Cary (10:17):

Almost like the Times Square of London, arguably just intersection people, bright lights. It's going nuts.

Zuby (10:23):

It's a great way to put it. Yeah. The Times Square of London. And so you can imagine me as a teenager, and I've put these CDs in my backpack, and I'm suddenly out there amongst strangers and all of this chaos and noise and mayhem, and I'm like, oh my gosh, this sounded good in my head, but how the heck do I just approach strangers, complete strangers, and not just talk to them, but try to sell them something and not just sell them something, sell them something with my face on it that I created. And so I remember it took about maybe 15 minutes before I approached anyone, I'm just sort of standing there

(11:05):

Looking around feeling a bit like, oh my gosh, this is my heart is beating. And eventually I worked up the courage to approach somebody. I wish I could recall who the very first person I ever approached was and what they looked like, but I cannot. And I remember the first person I approached stopped to talk to me, and I'm sure my pitch was terrible, and I didn't really know what I was saying, and I like confidence, but they heard me out. I had my MP three player, and so I had the songs loaded up on it. So a lot of rappers at the time, I remember other guys who were selling on the street, they didn't let people listen to the music. They just sold them verbally. And I was like, no, I want people to listen to it. I want people to hear it. I want 'em to actually like it. If they're going to buy it, I don't want them to take the cd. And then they go home and it becomes a Frisbee or a coaster. I want them to know that they like it before they buy it. And I remember I used to actually charge a little bit more for my CDs than everyone else did. Other people were selling them for one, two, or three pounds. I was selling mine for five pounds each, and mine looked good. It wasn't just a CDR with scribble on it.

(12:11):

So I don't know how many people I needed to approach until I sold one. But I want to say within my first five approaches, I'd sold my first cd. And this was a very pivotal moment for me, not because it was the first CD I'd ever sold, but it was the first CD I'd ever sold on the street to a stranger through a completely cold approach in one of the busiest cities in the entire world. And so if I could sell one cd, I can sell more than one. So that gave me a little boost of confidence. And the very first day I went out, I only took five CDs with me, but I sold all five of them within two hours. So I was like, sweet. I remember I came back home, I didn't have a lot of money. Oh, cool. I made 25 pounds. I covered my costs,

Speaker 1 (13:01):

I

Zuby (13:01):

Covered my travel costs and made a tiny, tiny profit. And so I came back the following day and I was like, I'm going to take 10 with me. Sold 'em all, came back with 20, sold 'em all. And I spent a whole summer. I think this would've been, if I'm correct, I want to say summer 2006. I pretty much spent that summer just hustling CDs in Central London, just day in, day out. I was just there from, I love that 10:11 AM to 6:00 PM Gosh, I'm reminiscing about this. And I almost, yeah, I have many fond memories of this. And so that became my kind of bread and butter. And then I learned, okay, if I can do this in London, I can do this in other cities. So I started selling my CDs in Oxford, in Southampton, in Portmouth, in Norwich, in Manchester, all over. And then after I graduated university in 2007, I took a year out. I took a year out, and I just did music full-time for one year. So I released a second album called The Unknown Celebrity, and then I just started traveling the whole country. It became my full-time job just to, I was barely making new music. I was just hustling CDs. I was just grinding. I had two CDs to sell now,

Speaker 1 (14:11):

And

Zuby (14:11):

I was just traveling all over selling them, and I sold thousands during that period. Then in, if you want me to pause at any point, let me know. In

Nic Cary (14:19):

2008,

Zuby (14:21):

In 2008, I started working in the corporate world. I actually was a management consultant. Years.

Nic Cary (14:25):

You worked at Accenture?

Zuby (14:28):

Hey, I don't normally give the name away, but yeah, I did work at Accenture. So yeah, I worked at Accenture from 2008 to 2011, and then in October, 2011, I left my job. I bought myself a van. I wrapped it in purple with my big logo on it, and I became a full-time rapper.

Speaker 1 (14:50):

And

Zuby (14:50):

I would just travel all over the UK doing gigs, organizing tours, selling my CDs, promoting my music, passing out flyers to anybody and everybody who would listen. And over the course of time, I sold tens of thousands of albums I've sold in total. Gosh, it's somewhere. I've sold about 30,000 albums hand to hand during the course of

Nic Cary (15:17):

That

Zuby (15:17):

Time. So to sell 30,000 albums hand to hand, you have to talk to somewhere between 400 and 500,000 people,

Speaker 1 (15:25):

Which I

Zuby (15:26):

Did in the mid 2010s. I moved from just selling on the street to, I started doing pop-up shops. So I started myself and my good friend, who's also an independent rapper, we started running something called the Blue and Purple Store, which was the first of its kind in the UK to this day. I don't know if anyone else has even done it. We used to get kiosks in different shopping centers in the uk, and we would promote and sell our music and merchandise at them, our CDs, our t-shirts.

Nic Cary (15:57):

The customers came to you for a change.

Zuby (16:00):

We still went to them, man. Sometimes they'd come to us sometimes, but we were still approaching, if you just stand there all day, then you're not going to get a lot of sales. So we would just engage people, and we did those popup shops all over. The first one was at Whiteley's Shopping Mall in London and Bayswater. Then we did them in Southampton at West Key. Lots of the different Intu shopping malls. We did them in Manchester, Redding, Norwich, Newcastle,

Nic Cary (16:30):

All over place. The place covered a lot of ground.

Zuby (16:32):

Yeah, we covered a lot of ground. I mean, I've been to pretty much every town and city in the uk, including, I haven't been to Northern Ireland, but Scotland Whale all over England, even to the freaking Isle of White. Yeah,

Nic Cary (16:48):

You shopped around Isle of White. Oh my God.

Zuby (16:50):

Yeah, man. I've been to, I've sold CDs in the Isle of White. Yeah, dude from

Nic Cary (16:55):

The place is famous for sailing for our

Zuby (16:58):

Listeners'.

Nic Cary (16:58):

Amazing. So I

Zuby (17:00):

For six, yeah, go ahead.

Nic Cary (17:02):

No, so you were talking about you take this detour as a management consultant for a bit, go work in one of the biggest companies on the planet, and then what gave you the confidence to make that leap of faith? I talked to a lot of young entrepreneurs that they're always asking, how do you know when it's worth it? Or how do you make that risk assessment? I may have a side hustle or a job, but I am really passionate about this other thing and someone that did that. What would you say to someone who's contemplating taking that first leap of faith on a new journey?

Zuby (17:38):

Excellent question. And I think the answer is very important because I know a lot of people wonder about this. So I'm going to come at it from a couple different directions. I'll give sort of three or four answers. The first thing I'll say is that I knew from my late teens, early twenties at the latest, what my purpose on earth was

Nic Cary (18:02):

In

Zuby (18:02):

This human realm. And I knew that that was to positively inspire as many millions of people as I could through my words. So I thought that was going to just be through my music. And over time, anyone who knows me now knows I do a lot more than just music, but I still have the exact same goal and vision. It's just I've added podcasting and public speaking and writing books and so on, and social media. And so in my management consulting job, I knew I could not fulfill this goal staying where I was. I was like a lion in a zoo. There's nothing I am comfortable. I am taken care of. I am good at what I'm doing, but this is not in line with the big goal, the big vision. If I'm going to put a dent in the universe and be known and impact millions of people in a positive way, I cannot do it from this office.

Speaker 1 (19:00):

So

Zuby (19:01):

That is one part of it. Another part of it was I'm at this company and I'm in my early twenties, and most of the people, given I'm in my early twenties, 98% of the people I'm working with are older than me. So I'm working with people who are in their thirties, forties, fifties, even sixties, and I'm thinking, okay, 10 years from now, 20 years from now, 30 years from now, 40 years from now, do I want to be in that man's position?

Nic Cary (19:37):

The

Zuby (19:37):

Answer was a resounding no, not because nobody should do that, or because I frown upon office work or nine to fives or anything like that. It just was not my calling. I'm creative, I'm entrepreneurial, and I always have been. So I knew, Hey, I don't want to be a 40-year-old guy still working in this place or somewhere like it. So for me, it was very obvious. It wasn't, there wasn't a debate there. If I'm just looking and I'm thinking, do I want to do something? No, I don't.

(20:05):

So that's the second part. The third part is more practical and pragmatic in a way. Maybe I'll even add a fourth part. The third part is I was already a rapper. I was already making music. I already had released two albums, two eps, and I had sold several thousand albums at this point. I already had thousands of followers on social media when I was still working in my corporate job. The people who knew me from my music didn't know I had a corporate job. Most of the people at the corporate job didn't know I was in music, didn't

Nic Cary (20:39):

Knew, you know, were a rapper.

Zuby (20:40):

Yeah. So wasn't starting from ground zero. It's not like I left and I just started making music and was giving it a shot. I was already five years in at that point. So I already knew I could sell CDs. I knew I could make money for music. I didn't know how much, I didn't know exactly what the trajectory would look like, but I was already getting to a stage where the two careers were starting to interfere with each other.

(21:07):

And so it was like, alright, if I'm really going to succeed in this or that, I need to spend my time and energy on the one I really want to do. And as I already mentioned, that was a no brainer for me. And maybe the very final part of it is I also knew that that was the time to do it. One of my fears, having worked in the corporate environment for a couple of years, was actually getting too comfortable. I didn't want to get too normalized in it. I was like, look, I am 24 years old, don't have a wife. I don't have children. I don't have a bunch of expenses, I don't have a mortgage. I don't have all of these things that may come in the future for me, which will make all of this a lot more risk, would make all this a lot more risky.

(21:57):

I'm like, I just need to take care of myself. If I can sell enough CDs on a day to day, a week to week basis to just keep myself alive and keep myself fed and to keep supporting what I'm doing, then that's sufficient. I don't need to answer to anyone else. I don't need to worry about this. I don't have kids that are going to starve if it doesn't work out perfectly and so on. And then also, I have a degree from Oxford. I have three years of work experience. I have a family. So if I were to do this, I knew I wasn't going to completely flop, but it was like, what is the worst that can happen here

Nic Cary (22:34):

If

Zuby (22:34):

I quit and I go and I chase this dream of being a musician, and somehow it all my mind changes, it all falls down in this flaming heap of rubble, then, oh no, I, I'm not going to be on the street shaking a cup. I've still got, I'm a smart guy, I'm resourceful. I have backup in all of these different senses. So it's like the failure would be not pursuing this. That would

Nic Cary (23:02):

Be affiliation would be to not discover whether you were really achieving your potential. Yeah.

Zuby (23:09):

There you go. There you go. So that's like a sort of four or five pronged answer to that question. So there's the sort of practical and pragmatic aspects. There's the financial aspects and there's also just the mindset and psychological aspects to it as well.

Nic Cary (23:26):

Amazing. Let's talk a little bit about this mindset for entrepreneurs. I think there's a sort of archetype of the Elon Musk, but what about all the regular people out there that are just trying to grind it out and hustle themselves? What are some of the things that you've witnessed that have been guiding you When things get tough? Entrepreneurship can be arguably kind of lonely or difficult. It's certainly something that can be taxing on a personal basis. So what are some words of advice for how especially younger entrepreneurs can sort of navigate the adversity of putting yourself out there and figuring out if anyone likes your music or likes what you're building or your idea? Talk to us a little bit about that psychology.

Zuby (24:12):

That's a wonderful question. I'm going to approach it in a way that I think most people wouldn't and give some atypical answers here. First atypical answer I'm going to give is your health is incredibly important.

(24:26):

Take care of your health. Get in good shape. If you're not already in good shape, get in good shape. Get your body in very good shape. Get your nutrition down. Get your sleeping down. Get in an exercise routine. Get lifting weights. If you're already in shape, then maintain it. Every single thing is easier when you are healthy and when you're in shape. It's not about having bulging biceps in a six pack and ripped packs. All those things are good. I recommend that too. But it's really about having energy and building a work ethic and having discipline and consistency, which you can then apply to everything else in your life.

(25:05):

That is one of the first things I'm going to say, which probably might be a bit left field to most people to prioritize that. The next thing I'll say is I don't recommend starting something unless you're willing to commit at least a decade to it. That doesn't mean it's always going to take a decade to get some type of results, but I find that especially entrepreneurial and ambitious people, but actually not just us as human beings, we want things now. We want them fast. Yeah. Short-term thinking, gratification. Yeah, we want, and I think that's even more common now in this internet era where because of social media and YouTube and view counts and follower counts and all these things, people have this expectation that things should just come quick and people should care quickly and money should come quickly and people caring should come quickly. And that is the exception far more than it is the rule.

(26:01):

So unless you are willing to dedicate, say you want to start a YouTube channel, you want to start a podcast, you want to become a writer, you want start a business, you want to be a musician, whatever it is, if your mindset is, alright, I'm going to give it it six months, I'm going to give it a year, I'm going to give it two years, I'm going to give it five years. I'd say, if that's your thinking, maybe you don't start. Maybe you're not cut out for it. If you're not willing to eat dirt for at least a decade with not a lot of tangible results, you're probably not cut out for it. You're probably not. If I had quit at the 10 year mark, that would've been giving up in 2016.

Nic Cary (26:38):

Yeah, think about that. That's amazing point.

Zuby (26:41):

99% of people who now know me and who follow me

Nic Cary (26:45):

Have

Zuby (26:45):

Learned

Nic Cary (26:46):

About you probably after 2016,

Zuby (26:49):

No, after 2019, to be even more precise, 99% at the beginning of 2019, after more than a decade on social media across all the platforms combined, I had about 50,000 followers at the beginning. January, 2019. I had 50,000 followers as we speak today, I've got somewhere about 2.1 million across all of them. And

Nic Cary (27:13):

Imagine if you got discouraged or just given up and you're like, ah,

Zuby (27:16):

Man, I've a decade, right? I've given it a decade. I hadn't even started my podcast then. I hadn't written a book then. I hadn't done a public speech by then. I was just in music mode. So you to, I had the same thinking. I started my podcast in January, 2019, and before I started my podcast, I took my own advice. I was like, am I willing to do an episode every week until at least 20, 29 before I jump into this? Because this is a big endeavor? And the answer was, yeah, I actually am. I'm willing to do an episode a week for at least 10 years at least. And if you want to start a podcast, and that sounds scary to you and you're not that committed because you'll filter yourself out, you'll filter yourself out and you'll know. Because things where I think, am I willing to commit 10 years to this? And the answer is no. I'm just like, okay, then maybe I just shouldn't start. Maybe I have a random desire to learn Chinese, and I'm like, okay, am I really going to dedicate at least a decade to this daily? My motivation is not strong enough for that, but there'll be something else

Speaker 1 (28:27):

Where

Zuby (28:27):

I'm like, oh yeah, I'm willing to do that. So that would be my second piece of advice. And then the third one I'm going to say, and this is going to sound a little bit generic, but it's incredibly important, and this is to keep going, keep on going. I think that a lot of success is just about not giving up. It's about outlasting the typical person.

Nic Cary (28:54):

Most people, I call that persistence warfare. It's just don't quit.

Zuby (29:00):

Most people in most things in life quit too early as far as I'm concerned. This could be starting a diet, starting a gym routine, starting a business, getting in a relationship, getting married, doing whatever. It's, most people quit too early. Most people quit too early in everything. So you can often win just by being willing to put up with more crap and outlast and just go through it more than other people would. Those moments where a normal person would just be like, I'm not doing this sucks, dude. I could tell you infinite stories of times where I'm out on the street, I'm in freaking, I was living in Bournemouth and I'm in Glasgow and it's snowing, and I'm out there on the street on a Tuesday afternoon talking to strangers trying to sell my cd. A year ago I was working in my suit and tie in my job in the city of London, making a nice steady income and I'm up in, and no one told me to do that, right? This is on my own volition. I've just had this. Or you're performing, you're doing a show in Manchester and you've traveled four hours to get there, and you get there to the venue and there's six people in the crowd

Nic Cary (30:12):

There. You played the crowd

Zuby (30:13):

And you give those six people a show as if it's 60,000.

Nic Cary (30:17):

That's right.

Zuby (30:18):

And most people aren't going to do that. Most people don't want to do that. It sucks. It can be demoralizing. It can be exhausting and tiring, but you just keep going. You just keep on doing it. You enjoy the process. You find the humor in it. You find the humor. You have to find the humor in the crappy parts. Every entrepreneur is going to have stories of times where it's just, it sucked. It sucked. And you're doubting yourself and you're questioning your own life. Other people are questioning you too. Kind of like when you're having those conversations with your parents and other people, why

Nic Cary (30:51):

Would you do that? You had the stable thing and you're like, I had to.

Zuby (30:55):

Or even harder, even harder. They're like, man, you've been working on this for six years. Are you sure? And you have to be willing to just be like, yep, I'm sure you need a delusional level of self-belief and an ability to just block out all of this stuff that's going to even come from well-meaning people, your family love you, they want the best for you, but even they good friends will be like, huh, man, it doesn't look like that much. Progress is being made here. Are you sure you don't want to? And again, there is a time and a place where you need to change tact or you need to change direction or something is totally failing and there's something else you should be doing. And there's a time to shift, right? So when I say keep going, and when I'm talking about not quitting, I don't mean I that on a grander scheme. I don't mean you're running down the wrong rabbit hole and you keep on going even though you're just crashing out and losing money and hitting your life. No, I don't mean never pivot, but don't give up overall. Don't give up. Overall, you could be going to the gym for a long time, and I don't know, this particular routine is starting to suck. It's not getting you results or whatever. Nothing wrong with switching the routine, but don't just quit exercising, right? Don't just be like, all right, I'm done. I'm never stepping in the gym again. It's like, no, find the thing that you like and keep on going.

Nic Cary (32:21):

I think there's some real really good pearls of wisdom in all of that. I like the health thing is so important and older people have been trying to convey this information to younger generations for a long time because as a young, healthy person, if you're fortunate enough to not have any big challenges, there are so many people that would trade everything to be in your shoes for that day. And you owe it to them to give it your best. And so I think everyone will deal with health issues in their lives. And your body is that machine, right? It needs nutrition, it needs rest. It needs to be treated appropriately. And you talked about the development.

Zuby (33:00):

Can I jump in there Nick and say one more thing on that? Because I'm super passionate about health and fitness. It's the one thing you also can't replace. You can't replace it. And you get one, you get one, you get one when you're born and it's got to last you from zero until however long you make it. And we're all going to face illness. Accidents happen, tragedy happens. So all that, we can't control everything, but the things that you can, it's very wise to do that. And if you build those, I'd also say, I know it's mostly a younger audience. If you ingrain those habits early,

Nic Cary (33:36):

Early, yeah,

Zuby (33:38):

It's easier than to wait until you're in your thirties or your forties or fifties and then catch up. It's never too late. But it's much easier to build those habits early on and just maintain it.

Nic Cary (33:48):

And you described that development of discipline and that consistency when the rigors of the world and the stress has come and the dark days inevitably happen, and having that resilience baked in physically into your experience will pay dividends. And so I think that message that it's never too late to get started, but the earlier you do, it helps build up that old deeper strength. So thank you for being such a passionate advocate about that. Alright, well we're coming up on time. I wanted to ask you one last question and we'll leave it with that. A lot of young people don't know where to turn to today. It feels like there's all this stress in the world and entrepreneurship especially may not seem like an obvious choice. Parents want their kids to sometimes follow in their footsteps or do safe things. So what's maybe some final tips you could give our listeners for how to explore their own potential and creativity through the route of entrepreneurship?

Zuby (34:50):

Sure thing. I would say you want to find the intersection between three things. And if you can do this successfully, you will have a happier and more successful life than most people. If you can find the intersection between something that you are really good at and something you're really interested in and something that there is some type of need or want for, if you can find the intersection between those three things, then both your business and personal life will be far more enjoyable and successful. You can have success without all three of them. For example, you could just be really good at something and there's a market demand for it and you don't enjoy it and you're not that interested, but you are good. And so you make a lot of money, but you're going to be missing the enjoyment. You could have something that you're super passionate about, but you suck at it. Right? You might be, might love basketball, right? You might.

Nic Cary (35:56):

I am not a professional football player, unfortunately.

Zuby (35:59):

Kind

Nic Cary (36:00):

Of suck at it.

Zuby (36:01):

So yeah, if you can find that intersection, that's what I'd say. Find the intersection between strong interest, strong ability, and market demand. Find that thing and you will be both successful and happy in the long term, I believe.

Nic Cary (36:17):

Amazing. Alright, well thank you so much for coming on here today. We learned a little bit about how you earned your first reals in Saudi Arabia to earning some pounds selling CDs, and then finding really product market fit by listening to customers and finding new ways to engage with an audience, especially with the emergence of new tools to connect with listeners of music. You said a couple of things I thought were really important for especially young people to not confuse. Don't confuse followers with customers. That's a really important one. I think there's too many people that seek just the big count numbers for whatever their social marketing presence might be, but those may not be the ones that might ultimately exchange hard earned money for something that you're trying to sell to them. And so just be wary of that trap. One of the things I thought that really stood out for Zubi is come out a couple of times was there's some real benefit to stepping out of your comfort zone.

(37:08):

There's some real benefits going out and interacting with that customer in a place far away from home and trying to get them to understand your voice. And by practicing getting out of your comfort zone, you get better and better at doing those things. Get better at public speaking, get better at making the sale, better at connecting with people on an emotional level. So I saw that through your whole story arc and really appreciated it. Finally, you had a couple things around how to think about what it takes to be a potential entrepreneur, and we covered the health bit. Can't emphasize that enough. You can't do anything if you're not taking care of number one in the body that you were born with in the first place. So take care of it. It's very important. Maybe have a longer term mentality about things. It's easy to get sucked into the short term stuff today, but it's going to take at least 10 years.

(37:58):

And most people don't realize that even some of the most successful companies in the world don't turn profit for even longer than that. Airbnb took over 15 years, and they're an example of a very successful organization. So I think if you can develop those habits that are very necessary around discipline and consistency, and then execute them for a long period of time, that persistence and perseverance will pay dividends. And then, yeah, your intersection between three things I thought was a really great way to conclude this. So find something you're really good at, find something you're interested in, and find something that hopefully people were willing to pay you for. And if you've got those three components, then I think you can lead a pretty extraordinary life. So thank you so much for teaching us so much today and for taking time out of your schedule. Really appreciate it. So thanks again.

Zuby (38:46):

Nice one. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Nic Cary (38:47):

Great. All right. It's skysthelimit.org. We connect entrepreneurs with volunteer business professionals for free, one-on-one mentoring. We also provide business guides to all our members, monthly funding opportunities, everything is free. So if you like what you heard today, please subscribe. Thanks.

OUTRO (39:04):

Thanks for listening to the First Buck podcast. Don't forget to join the community of underrepresented entrepreneurs and their supporters by signing up at skysthelimit.org. Click subscribe and we'll see you next time.