AI will replace Content Marketers if you Don't Do THIS | ‪@RajgoodmanAI‬ | Ep.260

Anup Ghimire: All right, thank you so much for making time. Raj Goodman Anand: Anup, absolute pleasure. Thank you for having me and uh looking forward to this awesome opportunity. Anup Ghimire: Yeah, and actually it was a good, good conversation. I mean, like when I figured out about you through Sumai podcast, Sumai post, and then I started digging on your LinkedIn and doing around some Google searches, I was like, "Oh my god, this guy is the guy I should meet." Like, 10 plus years, 10 plus years in content marketing. Raj Goodman Anand: Yes. Anup Ghimire: And now that you are doing a lot of AI stuff, but then I think AI is something that you have been doing since quite a while. Raj Goodman Anand: For 21 years, yeah. 21 years of AI. And, um, but, um, you know, AI was something I did a lot of work as a researcher. And, um, very curious. I mean, one thing you, I think we discussed yesterday as well, was that I'm a very curious person. Thirst for learning was what drives me. And actually, something in my life which didn't drive me as a as a younger adult, and I, I kick back, kick myself on that, you know, why didn't I kind of think about being a learner earlier? But learning is something I love. And AI has been a passion. And I got into AI not because, "Oh, I'm going to be a researcher." I love video games, you know. And basically, I went to a professor back at university and said, "Hey, you know, these video game bots are so stupid, like they just go in round in circles." And he's like, "Fix it." "What do you mean, fix it?" He's like, "Go and fix it. Why don't you go and like learn AI and get into it?" And that was amazing. That's when I jumped into AI. I built some video games, did some research to pay the bills, and there I was, you know, it's was incredible. I feel good things were meant to happen, and it happened. And now I sit here, uh, now very deep into AI in terms of training and and teaching people. In the back in the day, it was all about myself learning about AI and implementing AI for software I built. Anup Ghimire: So, how does these two things play around with your time? I mean, like you lead a whole agency around content marketing, and then you have this AI First Mindset. Raj Goodman Anand: Yes. Anup Ghimire: Another company of yours. Raj Goodman Anand: That's right. Anup Ghimire: So how do you balance both? Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. So, you know what they say, like, as you embark on the journey, you become better and smarter at it. And I would say that earlier in my life was all about doing it yourself. Every time is all about doing it yourself. Like, "Can I do it myself?" You know, I build a company and I get myself a good job as a CEO. I realized that actually the worst entrepreneurs are the ones who do everything by themselves. The best ones delegate everything out. And for that to happen, it's all about bringing the the right people. And so the last few years, and this is not from the beginning of Goodman Lantern, which is my content marketing agency, but I would say midway through, I had this learnings from, we'll talk about that later on perhaps, EO, Entrepreneurs' Organization, that's all about delegation and to bring in the opportunity to delegate at scale. And so at Goodman Lantern, I would spend one hour per week. Whereas in AI First Mindset, which I just started it properly, I spend spend most of my time there. Anup Ghimire: Mm. Anup Ghimire: So, let's talk more about this, the whole content thing. Yeah. And how, like, I think you have been able to see how it started with text, and now how every other platform is going into a video side, right? That's how I, I see it. Yeah. Maybe I'm a bit biased because I come from a production side. Raj Goodman Anand: Sure, sure. Anup Ghimire: But the world has, the world of media has completely changed in the last 10 years. Raj Goodman Anand: That's right. Anup Ghimire: How do you see it? Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. Well, let's first figure out why that's happened. Back in the day, to do video production would mean that you have to stream that video, and internet bandwidth was so bad everywhere. Today, I'm impressed to see even like in Nepal, you can use your mobile phone, you can stream a nice, you know, HD video, 4K video, absolutely easy, no problem at all. That wasn't possible. So, with that happening, obviously, we as human beings prefer videos. We love interaction. We love human beings. We love to see other people talk. And so I can see video has kind of taken, taken over. But not only video, but also audio as well. Listen to podcasts while you're in the gym is now a norm. I think we all do that. So the written word has been sort of bolted on with video and and audio. Saying that, still people love reading books. I mean, I see books right just behind you. I can see that books are an important part of what who we are. So we still like the books as well. And what we noticed is that now it's become a bit of a blend. There's, there's visuals in the form of images, there's text, there's videos, there's podcasts. And, um, we set in a very B2B environment, and B2B still has some traditional elements to it. Uh, in B2C brands, for example, consumer brands, say Colgate, banks, for example. Banks can be both, you know, in the consumer side, B2C side, you'll notice that there still is a a bias towards documents, uh, content which you can print out, for example, could read, for example. And that's where we kind of come in. We do effectively content marketing for B2B brands who are focused on looking at how can they grow their presence, but not in a very public way. Many of them are very private about how they, uh, grow. And these companies are doing million-dollar businesses, for example, some household names, but they will not sell the way B2C brands sell. Anup Ghimire: So, have you, because the rise is there for sure. Yeah. Have you never ever thought of expanding your content marketing, content production side into more videos, audios, and design side? Raj Goodman Anand: So, we do a lot of design work. A lot of design work because all these content has to be bolstered with a lot of design. So we'll do a lot of design work. Um, we do video and audio production as well, but not as much as probably you do. Uh, but we do a fair bit of that. We've done, for example, again, I can't disclose names here, but for Sovereign Fund, we did a a massive video production for their exhibitions, for example. So, we, we, we, we do do that, but I would not say that that's a core business because where we sit in B2B, there still is a big demand for strategy, content production, and in distribution. And production would be typically would be thought leadership pieces, and that still is consumed in a very text format or, for example, audio format, but you'd have to start with the text format. We'll have multi sort of multi-modal ways of communicating that information. Anup Ghimire: So, how, so walk me through how does a standard procedure of producing a content works in your agency. Raj Goodman Anand: In fact, that's all on the website. So we have what we call a proven process. Typically, we'll get somebody who will come in and request for information. And if you look at how we do that is that, uh, we are ranked really well on search engines. And now every on ChatGPT or Perplexity, rank very well, typically ranking number one. So, for example, "write content writing for manufacturing," "writing for telecom," we rank number one for these things. So they'll find us through SEO, Google for now. Anup Ghimire: Mm. Raj Goodman Anand: And then when they send us an inquiry, what we will do is, we will get someone senior to have a chat with them to learn about the pains, what's the requirements. We will then go through a a process of understanding the requirements, talking to experts in a company, an editor, for example, or somebody who's a senior strategist. Do a proposal for them, go through that process. And typically your clients would would want to have a way to kind of engage us for a long, long term. So, we will might do a trial for them. Anup Ghimire: Mhm. Raj Goodman Anand: Uh, a paid, a paid pilot, and then we'll get into a long-term engagement with them, producing content for them regularly. And, um, in that process, we'll do constant communication. We have a platform where they can interact with us. They prefer email, use email. And we'll engage with them on a constant basis to first understand, build a brief internally, build a knowledge base for them, and create for them content pieces, learn from them what they need. That way, we also build a better knowledge base for them, and that becomes part of their IP as well, because now we understand them deeply and we create content constantly. So it becomes easier for them to engage with us and and and retain us for a longer period of time. Anup Ghimire: You mentioned how you, the article that you have written has also started performing on Perplexity and ChatGPT. So, how have you, what changes, or let's say, how did you, uh, how did you start changing your writing style so that it not only performs on Google, but it also starts listing on these AI chat platforms? Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. So, just to kind of explain why this is important, why this is interesting, is that many companies relied on SEO. That stands for Search Engine Optimization, which obviously we understand. And HubSpot, which coined this term inbound, kind of meant that many B2B companies also got into getting inbound inquiries of outreach into companies through cold calls or cold emails. Now, that was really good till AI came into play, and people started to move away from normal SEO to putting their queries in ChatGPT, Perplexity. What happened with that is that these sites like Google and Bing started to lose, lose traffic. Today, the eighth most visited website is ChatGPT. And I just read this morning that in the last 24 hours, they gained a million users thanks to that new launch of their new image creation tool on ChatGPT 4.0. So, it's important now to rank on ChatGPT and Perplexity as well, or AI tools, which we are calling AI SEO. So, SEO inside AI tools. The principles of of AI SEO is similar, but they're dramatically different. There are three steps involved in ranking for AI SEO. Number one is in-depth research to figure out when people enter terms where you should, where you should appear in the answer and citation, why aren't you appearing? So, you, you note down those content multiple times. You do it like 10, 20 times the same queries for different requirements. You note all the content you're seeing right now, who's appearing. Then you convert your content on your site to match those requirements. That's the first part of of that AI SEO. Number two is, SEO is still really important, right? If you, if you can't do SEO, AI SEO will not be possible. That's number two. And number three is knowing, having the knowledge that ChatGPT, which is OpenAI, the parent company, has done private deals with companies like Reddit, Wall Street Journal, Times magazine, and so they have a thousand plus publications, both in online formats and also offline formats. So, now it's not enough to just rank for online platforms. You have to also rank for closed communities and publications as well. If you, if you do all these three things, you'll rank really well. Anup Ghimire: So, how does getting published on a print affects the online side? Because whatever gets printed, printed on, printed on paper is also get published on online. Is that's the logic? Raj Goodman Anand: No. So, what OpenAI has done is that they have done private deals with these communities where they have access to printed content as well. So, they're indexing that as well. Suddenly, what was not important for SEO, which is like offline content, is also important for ranking on ChatGPT. And that's the, the, the uniqueness of of this opportunity. To rank really well, you have to be truly a a leader in that space. I think we talked about yesterday as well, you know, owning a space, like owning the space completely. Do one thing really well. And in my case, you know, in our case, it could be Lantern. We own the space of B2B. If you're looking at telecom content writing, manufacturing, defense, Goodman Lantern is the company. Owning it, right? 10 years it took to own that space. Wasn't easy, hard journey, you know, many of times you're like, B2C people doing, you know, much more revenue, let's go to B2C. Stuck to our guns, continued doing it, and now we own the space. Anup Ghimire: What was the moment, uh, when, when you figured ChatGPT for the first time? Did you feel that, "Oh my god, this might take away what we have been building?" Or the next moment you realized, "Okay, I can leverage this more to make more money." Raj Goodman Anand: It's a great question, actually. And I, and I, you know, I think about this all the time. And it was actually a conversation between three people. We had lunch together. And this is the beauty of meeting people. That's why I love kind of dinners, lunches, coffees, teas, you know. Is I was always into AI, looking at what AI is doing, you know, version 2.0, for example, in ChatGPT, interesting, but not that great. 3 and 3.5, ChatGPT 3.5 and 3 were the changing moments for me. I could see the power of their change. And initially, I was very scared. I was very, very scared about the future of Goodman Lantern. You can create all the content using ChatGPT. Why do you need individuals to do it for you? It took me a couple of days to really deep dive into it to realize that actually now it's the moment of building a Gucci, Versace, Louis Vuitton, or Hermes. Because there will be a distinction between cheap clothing versus high, heavily listed, expensive opportunities. When I say cheap and chirpy, I, I don't want to use brand names here, but like, you know, you think of a, you know, a 100 rupees or a $1, $5 t-shirt versus what you can spend on a very, very high value, high quality, uh, clothing, right? And that'll be the difference between this. And why is that? Let's think about what does AI require, or what does Google require? Google is an AI itself. If we use AI content to on a website to tell Google what you do as a company, Google understands that the content written using AI. Why is that? You show that content to my editors, within a couple of minutes, they can tell you if the content is AI or not. There are some patterns there, right? Google can definitely do that as well, right? Now, Google doesn't want the same garbage material which they can produce from the site, right? They want unique perspectives. They want a genuine value of the company to emerge. They want real thought leadership in there. They want your bias as as a consumer. If you don't have that, why does Google care? They don't want to really grab that information. They don't want garbage in, garbage out. They want genuine content. They want your unique content. The human, the human creativity is what they really want. And that only happens if we genuinely create something which is useful. Now, we can research using AI on different topics. But when it comes to on production, it still has to be a human thing. It's a human trait because being creative is a human trait. This is a human trait. We can't replace this with like bots unless we just write it down and say they say it out for us. So, I feel that this, this was an opportunity for us to really think about it. And on our website, it says it clearly, "Content marketing for humans, by humans." Because we believe that humans create something very unique. Anup Ghimire: But you guys do use AI tools, right? To Raj Goodman Anand: We use AI tools for research purposes. Uh, we would, in the end, the content produced by human beings, we will use AI to make sure that we have hit all the the key notes, for example. But we will not use AI to write content ever. In fact, in our contracts, we have that written as well. Anup Ghimire: Yesterday you asked me a question, and I could not answer you right there while I was saying you, "Braj, in Nepal, a lot of my energy, for example, if we have to, for, if I have to give an example of 100%, I invest at least 50 to 60% of my energy to actually convince a client to bet on our strategy, to convince a client to invest on our content." And you asked me, "I hope you charge for them for the strategy." And I was like, "Yeah, I do." But in back of my mind, I, I was generally, "Okay, in Nepal, we generally bundle it up with our production, and then that's how we we charge." Yeah. So, I think Nepal is still on a very nascent stage of understanding the content, why it is important. And, you know, like we, we produce a lot of content for B2B as well, and there's a trend that I see, and I have been pitching it to my clients. Please correct me how how it works outside Nepal and if I can improve in any way. So, I've been telling a lot of our B2B clients that I think organization is a reflection of the leaders they have in, right? It's the expertise, knowledge base these leaders have. I think these are the knowledge-based resources that needs to be converted into a content and that needs to be published outside. Yeah. But I think organizations still find it difficult in Nepal to promote its team, to humanize their brand by putting people in front. Yes. For them, I think, uh, still creating a faceless content is way better because they would rather choose to not promote a face than to promote a face. And I'm having a really difficult time to make B2B, uh, decision-makers understand that at the end of the day, it's people follow people, regardless of B2B or B2C. And maybe it's high time we bring out these thought leaders, we bring out these knowledge holders outside of your, uh, the, the institution face, and then give a face to the institution. And I'm having a really tough time, and at times I feel that, am I going in a wrong direction? Is this is not the new trend in B2B? Yeah. What do you think? Raj Goodman Anand: Knowing Nepal, which I know a little bit now, there used to be this notion that we, if we pump enough money and if we are the dominant force, that we remain the dominant force for many years to come. What's happening in the West is that no company can survive for 100 years, right? Because there's a constant churn. The top 100 companies will constantly keep churning. And to survive as a top leader, you have to constantly keep branding, marketing, which perhaps in Nepal is not as required, perhaps, but that's changing as well. Because now you can build a brand at minimal cost, right? You have, there's a lot of work to be done with AI, there's digital, for example. And that is going to change everything. Because suddenly, the legacy banks, legacy insurance companies, legacy car manufacturers, legacy or a category you can think of, will need to market themselves heavily. Because if you don't do that, they won't exist. And that's the thing which I, which I also want to educate in Nepal as well. If you feel that because you have the cash and you can leverage your cash to generate volume or growth constantly, you're wrong. Somebody right now is working on the brand quickly, authentically, with their founder's face, leadership team's face, that will come and replace you before you know it. Now think of this, right? Kodak camera. Who killed them? People think, "Oh, camera company." No, mate. It wasn't a camera company, it was iPhone, it was Apple, because people realized that Apple can do better pictures quickly and go develop a picture, a film, for example. So I feel that at this point in time, the feeling is, "Well, I will not be replaced. So I, I'll be okay." So that's one thing. Number two is by the founder leadership. The easiest way to build a brand is through genuine people who lead the company to come and talk about it. Anup Ghimire: And it does not have to be the founder all the time, right? It should be executives on, on, on top. Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely agree with you. Founders usually do a better job at it because the passion comes naturally, right? So that's why it's easier to get them in. Leadership team is the next step in in that journey. Why is that important? Because I mean, look at Tesla versus Elon Musk, right? Tesla's following is, I don't know how many X more than less than Elon Musk. Elon Musk's following is far greater than Tesla, SpaceX. Why is that? Because he is the brand himself. He places his feelings, his emotion more authentically than a brand could ever do. And so it's important that we put our brand as individuals out there, and that will help our other companies as well. Anup Ghimire: So, uh, let me ask you a tricky question. Raj Goodman Anand: No tricky question at all. Ask away. I'm here for any question you have for me. Anup Ghimire: So, you, you've been doing this since last 10 years, and most probably, I think the phase we are in right now in Nepal, most probably you faced a similar situation 10 years back in the UK or maybe other continents that you provide service to. So, how do I hack it? How did you hack it? How do we expedite the process of making these leaders understand that it's high time you invest on good, genuine, thoughtful content? Not just bet on these 30 seconds to a minute long scripted TVCs. Obviously, that that would do a job as well, but then that is not just the only way. You bet on this genuine first-hand content. How do I hack it? Raj Goodman Anand: How do you hack it? Get one awesome case study where the company was not a leader by default, and you build that brand. You just need one. You, you lift an underdog. That's it. You take one example, one company who take it from zero to hero, for example. The hero is formed. The day the hero is formed, your company goes from, you know, multi-million to multi-billion. Anup Ghimire: Hmm. Okay. That was a quick answer. Raj Goodman Anand: Well, I mean, that's the reality of it. I think at the end of the day, as marketers, we forget the value of case studies, and they are the most important piece of content or recommendation you can ever have. That's why if you look at Google, for example, case studies are really important. If you want to grow your Google ranking, they say put more case studies out there. Anup Ghimire: And I'll also like to answer my question that I asked you. While, while we see a lot of video thing is going all around. I mean, like, so I started as a blogger, by the way. So I started blogging, then I got to got into photography, then designs, then videos, now podcasting, and now we also do web series, short movies. And the more content we invest in, the more I have learned in content marketing, everything starts with the text. Even when you do a scripting for a web series, you got to start on a blank paper writing about the screenplay, writing about the script. So, so I'm trying to answer my the question that I raised you, like, definitely video has taken over, but the relevancy of text is so high. I mean, like, and when I, when I, when I see the trend of chatting with ChatGPT, it's all text-based, right? Yeah. So I think, yeah, I think for niche industries, text still does the wonders. Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. I mean, I'm looking at your watch, looking at my watch. I got a digital watch, if you can see it on the camera, and you got an analog watch. But all the expensive watches are like yours, right? People still prefer those watches. They're still the sign and symbol of wealth and growth and success. Why is that? Because back to the basics, like we as individuals, as human beings, we love traditions. We love what is genuine, and digital somehow doesn't feel as genuine as a watch. It doesn't have to be a big brand, but success comes from people who understand those small little things. In fact, recently, uh, I had the pleasure to meet this gentleman who's a billionaire coach. He's trained people like Warren Buffett, Oprah, for example, billionaires basically. And he came to do a a learning event at EO Bangkok. And I was hoping to hear from him a silver bullet to be a billionaire. There wasn't one. What all he told me was that billionaires do the same tasks millionaires do, much better. Building better teams, finding better, uh, frameworks. That's it. That's success to being a billionaire. And I was like, damn, I should have known that. But the reality is like every little step counts. Like doing that content writing before producing the video, that is really important. Doing that right, hitting a nerve every time you create content, people genuinely believe and trust what you do. That is where the opportunity lies. You know, like when yesterday we spoke about this, this, this, this podcast, for example, a videocast. I was like, when I come to do a a talk or when I come and do a podcast, I don't hold back. You ask me a question, I'm going to tell you. If it's for my life or my business, I won't hold back because that's me being genuine. That's me being who I am. If I don't be authentic and genuine, I don't want people to listen to me. There are a billion more podcasts out there. I don't want to listen to Raj Goodman, you know. It could be another person you can listen to. And it's because I believe in being authentic and genuine. And if I can't be that, then why am I here? And in fact, when I start any workshop, I'll tell them about my family first. So my cards are put in front of me. I'm not BSing anybody. I'm telling you exactly how it is. Anup Ghimire: And maybe that's one reason why podcasting is picking up so well. I mean, like, you can't really fake for an hour-long conversation, right? Raj Goodman Anand: And yours are an hour and a half, two hours, right? You can't even if you got fake for two hours, it's really hard. Anup Ghimire: That, that's my strategy to actually. Yeah. Time out. Raj Goodman Anand: That's me being genuine. That's me being who I am. If I don't be authentic and genuine, I don't want people to listen to me. There are a billion more podcasts out there. I don't want to listen to Raj Goodman, you know. Could be another person you can listen to. And it's because I believe in being authentic and genuine. And if I can't be that, then why am I here? And in fact, when I start any workshop, I'll tell them about my family first. So my cards are put in front of me. I'm not BSing anybody. I'm telling you exactly how it is. Anup Ghimire: And maybe that's one reason why podcasting is picking up so well. I mean, like, you can't really fake for an hour-long conversation, right? Raj Goodman Anand: And yours are an hour and a half, two hours, right? You can't even if you got fake for two hours, it's really hard. Anup Ghimire: That, that's my strategy to actually. Yeah. Time out. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Anup Ghimire: Yeah. But I was, I was really impressed how you have scaled your content marketing business. It's, it's amazing. Uh, maybe because I'm at this point in my time where I feel that the, the kind of a work that I do is, is not really in very high demand in Nepal. We have a very niche industry, and I'm thinking of scaling outside. And I think what you have done, like you stay in Thailand and you run a global team all remote. That's pretty impressive. So, is this running a remote thing was something you had in your mind from day one? Raj Goodman Anand: No, it wasn't. Sean answer was it wasn't. Um, why is that is because, so I was, I used to work, I started a company, didn't go anywhere. So started my first business ever was a social media, um, white label service. At that point, my my downfall or my shortcoming was that I wasn't in that learner's mindset. I was constantly thinking I know it all. I didn't. I was stupidest thing ever. And then I started working for a company. Uh, at that time also had this business called Spicy Hen. You can talk about later on if you like. But, um, what I learned was that from the business was that it's all about seeing what's out there, and the world is an awesome opportunity to learn constantly. In that time, working for a Spanish company, I traveled extensively a lot. I was digging around 100 flights like I'm doing right now, and I was go to meet different people, and that was amazing. That opportunity to learn from people was great. And then that time, working for a Spanish company, I was the only non-Spanish person. So they sent me to Asia to open up Asia offices, and uh, I was in India, and then I traveled to Bangkok regularly, and that's why I wanted to like, I fell in love with Bangkok. I said, one day I'm going to move to Bangkok. But now I have an in-person company. How do I change that? And so I started to really think about a remote, remote future. And so first of all, made the Spanish company work, started working remote, which was a big thing for them. They started calling it teleworking, teleworking, which is interesting what they call it. Now it's called remote working. And, um, my company was formed with the idea of working remotely. But my focus was selling in London and the UK. So silly. If you're a global company, why sell only in the UK? Why not sell everywhere? And that's that changed midway through the company. So really sell globally remotely. And people say you can't sell agency work remotely. I say that's wrong. If you have a genuine belief in what you create, what you offer, you can sell anything remotely. Services, products, you name it. And so that, that changed for us, and we started to sell remotely our services, and and that allowed me to kind of actually go remote. I see the first book you have there is called Remote. Anup Ghimire: Yeah. Raj Goodman Anand: Uh, which is, which is very interesting. And, um, as it also happens, the big proponent of going remote was Tim Ferriss's book, 4-Hour Workweek. And that book was, it's got a lot of garbage in it, to be honest with you. There are some nuggets over there. One of them is from working remotely. Anup Ghimire: I, I got inspired to start a podcast because of Tim Ferriss. Raj Goodman Anand: Interesting. Anup Ghimire: And one of the reasons why I kept the name of the podcast "The Doers" and not "Anup Ghimire" is because in one of the podcasts, he mentioned how he wished he had kept a different name than Tim Ferriss. Because now he can't exit, he can't sell, and either he has to keep doing it or he has to kill it. And that really got me thinking, okay, I think building a business around your name has both pros and cons. Because I think in today's world, something with a human name sells more, sells faster. I mean, it's much easier to grow, like you mentioned earlier, the social following of Tesla versus the social following of Elon Musk, right? Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. Anup Ghimire: But I think I got sold on his narrative of how it is much easier to sell things or automate things if it's not under your name directly. And he is more or less like a guru in that terms for me. Raj Goodman Anand: Of course. I mean, what I've done is I've put Goodman in my middle name. Goodman Lanten is the name of my company as well. There's a story behind that. But I think there is a connection between the founder and the company, and there should be an element of the founder in the company as well. That, for me, is the way to grow faster. So if I was Elon Musk and I didn't have his following, I would probably call it Tesla Musk or Musky Musky X, you know, I don't know what you'd call it. Anup Ghimire: But I think using a second name is also a smart move, I guess. Raj Goodman Anand: It is. Anup Ghimire: Not the first name because Raj Goodman Anand: It is. But again, as marketers, right? I think the benefit we have is to have a story for everything we do. And I have a story for whatever I do, like why an AI-first mindset, why Goodman Lanten. If there's no story behind it, then why do it? As a marketer, story is what makes people go. I mean, let me give you an example of why it's important. I have a four-year-old daughter now. Every day, what she wants to hear from me is stories. Last night, she asked me a story about Bumblebee. I'll make it up, you know? I'll make up the story, right? About Bumblebee, you know? Anup Ghimire: That's expertise. Raj Goodman Anand: That's expertise, right? That's what we learn from marketing, right? And what I'll do is I'll make a story up based on what she did that evening. Anup Ghimire: Okay. Raj Goodman Anand: So, like, you know, Bumblebee went for a puja, and she went for some prayers, and she went to see this ceremony for her cousin brother. And so she loved that story, and then she falls asleep to that story. And the thing is, she's so comfortable with that story because it's her story in the form of Bumblebee. Anup Ghimire: And I think the whole idea of if you want to really scale a story, you've got to make it more relatable, right? One reason why movies do so successfully is because somewhere, one way or another, you find your own story in the protagonist or antagonist. Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. In fact, if you think about our civilization, the human race, I close my eyes and think about the past of the human race. I think of this one leader by a fireside with all the followers sitting down there, and him telling a story. Think about all these stories from the Bible, from Ramayan, from Guru Granth Sahib, you name it, right? It's all stories. And people link to these stories. Real things are formed based on stories, right? So this is the power of what you have: the human race loves stories. You tell good stories, you're going to win. And I believe in podcasts, videocasts, these are all stories. You know, you're asking me stories here, I'm telling you stories. You're telling stories as well. So we link with stories. We genuinely build connection with stories. We can't tell a story. That's why when people do these workshops and it's just boring technical stuff for four hours, they're like, "What the hell are you doing? Tell a story. Make it like an experience." If you can't bring in humor, sadness, laughter, learning experience all in the four hours, I think you haven't really succeeded in the way you could have. Anup Ghimire: I think for me, even when I was on my holidays of podcasting, and I think it's still true at times. At times, I think where I struggle is integrating stories when you are doing a very, very technical conversation. I mean, because technical conversation is it's mostly involves a lot of science, a lot of facts, a lot of numbers, a lot of how and what. And I think not just me, a lot of other storytellers also struggle with the art of integrating the science and the objectivity with the subjectivity, right? So I think maybe even when you're telling me, I have something going on in my head was how do I integrate more stories in the podcast? Because how I got this podcast started was because I wanted to create a step-by-step process for young entrepreneurs to learn things from other successful entrepreneurs. And I realized I should not do more general stuff, more general conversation. I mean, you find general conversation everywhere. So I should do more technical, more niche conversation. And then I realized when you go very technical, when you go very niche, the whole idea of reaching out to people and inspiring more people goes down because you're not reaching out to more people. So now you need this thing called balance, probably the easiest to understand, hardest to implement, of integrating subjectivity and objectivity so that obviously people find steps to go and implement, but at the same time find it very relatable so that it actually sticks in their head and the motivation lasts longer than a fleeting motivation, right? And I still Anup Ghimire: podcast started was because I wanted to create a step-by-step process for young entrepreneurs to learn things from all the successful entrepreneurs, and I realized I should not do more general stuff, more general conversation. I mean, you find general conversation everywhere. So I should do more technical, more niche conversation. And then I realized when you go very technical, when you go very niche, the whole idea of reaching out to people and inspiring more people goes down because you're not reaching out to more people. So now you need this thing called balance, probably the easiest to understand, hardest to implement, of integrating subjectivity and objectivity so that obviously people find steps to go and implement, but at the same time find it very relatable so that it actually sticks in their head and the motivation lasts longer than a fleeting motivation, right? And I still have this challenge. I think I'm still going through this loop of crafting my narrative, of creating a more technical yet a very storytelling form of podcast. Raj Goodman Anand: Interesting. Now, as you say this thing to me right now, as a thing in my head, almost every holy book or book of importance has chapters, right? Every good podcast has chapters as well. They have like narration, they have like these kind of one, two, three, four parts to it, right? Why does YouTube have chapters as part of the thing, or what do they call it now? Is because even if you look at like Hinduism, and I'm bringing it because I just thought of it right now, we have these four phases of Hinduism, right? Actually, I'm not Hindu, so I'm just doing it for my learnings as well. We have phases of life, for example, phase one, phase two, phase three. So, as individuals, we love stories. Now, in all my workshops, it's all a story. I make stories out of like technical information. And this is all my idea. Let me explain how it came about. Many years back, there's a guy called Jeremy Hill. Jeremy Hill, if you're listening to this podcast, you know, good to mention you again today after a very long time. Jeremy Hill is an awesome, how should I call him? He's an absolutely awesome consultant, teacher, author. Now, he has done a lot of work with publications. He'll go and train them. I went to one of his trainings. I was impressed to see that these are expert people who are training about digital technology in the 2010s, for example. I'm like, "Wow, you don't even know that." And the reality is they will understand a little bit of it, but most of the time what happens is people don't really understand it deeply enough because they get scared of the technical terms. Because that's the hardest bit, right? Who wants to learn about SEO? Who wants to learn about PageRank, DR, right? I don't want to learn about that. What I want to learn about is tell me an easy way to understand it, right? Make it snackable for me so I can easily grasp the concept. And that's what it comes down to. So now I focus on teaching subject matter in a simple-to-understand format. What I do is I think of my grandfather, actually not my grandfather, it's actually my father's elder brother, who is considered to be a grandfather. I try to see him in the audience. When I talk to people in the audience, that's my sort of bar. It's so simple for him to understand that he can understand it. If you can understand it, then I'm good. Anup Ghimire: You make me remember a quote. Maybe it was Einstein or somebody who said, "If you cannot explain things in their simplest form, you have not understood it." Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah, I mean, look at history, the theories, right? Simple action, reaction, like you get it straight away. It's memorable, right? So, this is what is really important. Like even my tasks which I do, exercises I do, these are all stories. Actually, you are a company called, you know, Awesome Threads. You are a small medium SME, small enterprise. Now, this is the task for you: use ChatGPT to help you out with this. That's awesome. Anup Ghimire: So, would you also use the same approach when writing core niche B2B hidden content for, let's say, for a defense company working in defense? You not. Raj Goodman Anand: No, absolutely we do. Let me explain why. Most of the content for B2B companies is so dense and hard to understand. The people are like, "I can't be bothered to read this," right? Even if I'm a defense contractor or I'm from the army, I don't read this stuff. Anup Ghimire: But then you're writing it for very technical people, right? I mean, you're not writing it for general people. Raj Goodman Anand: But you break it down so anybody can understand it. Let me explain why. While the people who are going to say yay or nay are the technical people, but one person who's involved is the CFO. The CFO has no idea about, you know, high-tech AI or high-tech defense. All they know is numbers. So, how do you explain to him or her what that content is? And that's what's important: that everybody can understand it. And that is where the expertise lies, right? And you can write content using ChatGPT. Can you explain it in a way that can be understood by anybody from, say, high school? Anup Ghimire: So, is that a hack whenever you're doing B2B content, right, with picturing the CFO in mind? Raj Goodman Anand: I I mean, Anup Ghimire: Is that a formula? Raj Goodman Anand: Many people do, companies do that, for example, and many people in a company would do that in mind. Like, how do you write content that is so simple to understand for anybody? And people make it tougher and harder for people to understand. I'm like, "No." I'm not a writer or editor myself, but I love to get into the content and read what's going on. I want to understand what's going on. So, I'm curious. And I'm sure people like me are curious all the time. Anup Ghimire: Mhm. And you know, like with more abundance of content, with more abundance of like generative AI, the importance of storytelling has gone way up, right? I mean, it's probably one of the most important things right now because you can create a great product, but if you cannot tell a good story, and now you can white-label the product. So, the product is no problem, but you cannot white-label a story. The story has to be unique. Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. In fact, you talk about yesterday, you talk about communities. Community is very important for you. Communities are formed on stories as well. Anup Ghimire: 100%. Raj Goodman Anand: Stories are the glue or the drama that sticks people together. Anup Ghimire: Absolutely. It is the binding force. Like your story, my story as a founder, like that is a story. People love stories and they always will love stories, right? And also, for example, the promise, right? So, one brand which I love a lot for my travel gear is Tumi. T-U-M-I. I love it because they probably are a luxury brand, probably they're not, I don't know, but they are really good. Like you buy a Tumi, I bought a Tumi suitcase, it lasted me like for 11 years. It doesn't look like it's like 11 years old, right? And that's what I love. That's a promise. So, the story, the promise, I love it. Anup Ghimire: Mhm. Raj Goodman Anand: Now, sorry, one thing to add there. Samsonite bought them out. Samsonite and Tumi should be the same. Similar prices perhaps as well, but it's different. Anup Ghimire: Tumi is a little expensive one. Raj Goodman Anand: Tumi is a little bit more expensive, but still their promise, their story resonates with me. It's clean. It's clear. Samsonite, maybe the same material, same build, I still prefer Tumi. Anup Ghimire: You know, like as a marketer. Yeah. I mean, we build businesses for someone else. We build IPs for someone else. We create traffic on their website. We talk to them about how they should approach their brand. I mean, you do a lot of things for people. Obviously, they pay, but then I think brand building is probably a process where it cannot be justified with money, right? No matter how much you charge, you always end up going the extra mile because I think because we all, I think the one pattern that I've seen among marketers is they love building brands, be it for someone else, but be it for them. And let me tell you my mindset. In 2016 and 17, I started asking myself the question that if I'm so good with marketing someone else, if I'm so good with building someone else's brand, why cannot I build my own brand? I mean, by my own brand does not mean a personal brand, but why cannot I have my own other businesses that I can actually market? So, that's where I started building other IPs and now a few of them are good in their niche, they're making good revenue, and we have closed down a few of them. Obviously, not every idea works. So, all I'm trying to say is as a marketer, there has been a constant questioning that I did to myself was, if I'm so good with marketing, why am I not building my own product? And I believe this is not a unique mindset, and this is something every entrepreneurial marketer goes through. How has this mindset... So, I'm curious how you have been able to move along with this mindset and what are the things that you have built along the way? Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah, great question. By the way, what you're talking about is what we call private equity. So, private equity, you would basically buy out a company or you build a company and like basically grow the sales of it through marketing. And that becomes your own company. This is done at scale by a lot of founders. It's not something which is like Anup Ghimire: So, you put in capital and you also put in your skillset as a marketer. Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. So, for example, do you know a company called GoDaddy? GoDaddy.com. Anup Ghimire: Yes. Raj Goodman Anand: Was bought by a private equity firm, and they've grown their sales dramatically. Because they can bring in more people, bring in better teams, for example, and just grow the company massively, right? And then they sell it off eventually. It's exactly the same flow. Great marketers, great founders buy out companies, scale them. Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah, great question. By the way, what you're talking about is what we call private equity. So, private equity, you would basically buy out a company or you build a company and like basically grow the sales of it through marketing. And that becomes your own company. This is done at scale by a lot of founders. It's not something which is like Anup Ghimire: So, you put in capital and you also put in your skillset as a marketer. Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. So, for example, do you know a company called GoDaddy? GoDaddy.com. Anup Ghimire: Yes. Raj Goodman Anand: Was bought by a private equity firm, and they've grown their sales dramatically. Because they can bring in more people, bring in better teams, for example, and just grow the company massively, right? And then they sell it off eventually. It's exactly the same flow. Great marketers, great founders buy out companies, scale them up and sell them again. So, that's private equity, and a lot of people now who have sold one or two companies will just do private equity as a public business, right? Okay. So, have I done it? Yes, I'm still doing it. And in the past, I have built, for example, a company called Spicy Hen, a Hen Party Company, which is for people who know Hen Parties, it's basically a bachelorette party. In the UK's tradition, the bride, her best mate, the bride's mate will go out and throw a party for her. Call her family, her female family, friends, and other friends. And in the past, that was not something which you'll just pick up from the website. You would have to find the dancer because dancing was a big part. 60-70% of Hen Party people will do a dance lesson which they can then do again at the wedding. Now, in the past, you had to go book a studio, find a dancer, then fly to a different city in the UK or fly abroad and find it. It was very hard. So, I just made a package out of it. And I know SEO really well. So, I started to rank really well for it. Then I made it into the biggest dance-based Hen Party Company in the country. Sold it off, right? So, I keep doing this now with an AI-first mindset. It's very similar. I mean, we've grown so quickly. I mean, I'm surprised. I started doing this thing properly in May onwards. I don't know, there were 50-plus workshops. I got team members doing this as well. I feel like my passion is to educate people. I'm a marketer, yes, but I still love to add value. And my way of adding value is to create something which is helping people out. That's what I do. Um, and the money is a byproduct of all of this stuff, right? So, I'm doing it only for the money. Because only for the money, I probably wouldn't be doing anything right now. I'd probably be sitting, just investing money into crypto or into shares, and then that's it, right? But that would be very boring for me. I'd get so bored. I wouldn't be able to do it for very long. Anup Ghimire: So, if we are so good, or if you are so good with building your own brands, why still do the agency thing? Because you could leverage the same time resources for building something else, something you truly believe in and scale it and make more money, make more impact. Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. So, as we talk right now, I'm also putting feelers out there to buy companies out as well in the UK. People who are looking to exit the company. In fact, if somebody's looking to exit their B2B company, they want someone to buy it out, I'll happily buy it out. And I can help you, you know, get you a nice pension from this because I can help the company grow further, and you can then retire on the monthly revenue we generate, for example. So, if you're a company looking to exit. Anup Ghimire: So, you give 100% exit. Raj Goodman Anand: So, what we do typically is we'll give you some cash upfront, and then we'll give you like a monthly sort of profit share. Anup Ghimire: And will there be a lock-in period for a founder to stay in a business for the next couple of years? Raj Goodman Anand: No, I would say a month or two if it's a, you know, most businesses. If it's a very complicated business, then I like to stay in a bit longer. I also give them some shares in the company as well. So, they don't have to work anymore, they can just retire, but we will bring in the right teams to help. Anup Ghimire: But a lot of B2B businesses are built upon relationships, right? Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. Anup Ghimire: So, if the founder is gone, how do you maintain that? I mean, the existing client base would definitely want the founders because that's whom they did the deal with. Raj Goodman Anand: It depends. Most businesses which we like to buy out are not based on the founder itself. They have a product or service they're selling. Okay? And we are buying that out, that goodwill. So, we might retain the entire team and we will work with them. And we don't want to create a disruption in the company. We just want to help the company grow further. And we have multiple things going for us. We are a remote-first business. Number two, 70% of our staff are women, for example. A big part is women empowerment. So, we'll bring in more women in the company as well. And that's all we do. We kind of have our own unique take. We have our own DNA, and we've seen that that works really well. Anup Ghimire: But then again, my question, why still do the agency thing if you can leverage the same time resource into building your own IP or buying out these profitable businesses and make more profit? Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. Like yourself, I learn a lot from it. My teams learn a lot about what's going on in the market right now. So, we learn a lot. The agency world is also a very good opportunity to learn what's happening in the space. I mean, we talked about yesterday as well that we understand a bit better the ecosystem because we're in the agency world, right? So, I'll give agency anyway. I just want to learn from what's going on in the market. I mean, we, I can't disclose names, we work with some of the top tech companies in the world. That's amazing, right? That's amazing because you're learning what they're doing in a very deep manner. And yes, you have NDAs, you can't share, but I'm learning from it. That's, I think that's awesome. Anup Ghimire: 100% I agree. And I think one of the reasons why I see the agency business is not going away is because you can't get all these creative ideas from your in-house team because your in-house team is only working on your product, whereas the agency is working on 10 different products, 10 different niches, 10 different industries, and you can't match the interdisciplinary reflection the agency people might have, isn't it? Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. I mean, if you look at 20 years back and I tell you, like finding the most innovative bank or cap company, you'd probably get like the biggest cap provider or bank. Today, these are all app-based companies. 20 years back, they didn't have app-based companies, right? So, that's awesome. I learn so much from this experience, and I will not change it for anything else. So, I'll keep the agency anyway. People have actually approached me to sell the agency company several times. I get hounded by people constantly, emails, phone calls. People start sending gifts, for example. I once got a coconut sent to my mailbox in London, and they're like, "Hey, um, you're a hard coconut to crack." You know, that was the joke. They kind of just shared the whole thing up because I'm just a genuine thing. I'm not selling this company. I'm selling the companies I have because they are, I want to keep building them up. Build 10 companies, for example, and then maybe go public, or I don't know what I want to do with it, but that's the plan. Anup Ghimire: Now, let's talk about the AI-first mindset. Raj Goodman Anand: Sure. Anup Ghimire: I think I was reading somewhere, and the amount of money IBM made by making companies AI-able is much higher than the profit these other LLMs are making. I think most of these LLMs are not even profitable. So, I see a very big market as of now in the industry where a company is helping other companies to use, to leverage AI more so they can automate it. So, there is a big opportunity in training, workshops, research, integration, or let's say making companies AI-able. Raj Goodman Anand: Sure. Anup Ghimire: And I think you are also playing on the same gap, I assume, the training part. So, how does it work? What is the value you bring to the table with this workshop? Are these workshops for individual people, or are these workshops for B2B companies? Raj Goodman Anand: Great question. So, the AI-first mindset, the concept really is that for any company to survive post three to five years from now is that they should have the AI-first mindset. That means that before you embark on any problem, use AI first. Doesn't work, then use people and technology. That's the concept. Now, we want to help companies put AI into every part of their workflow, every part. How do you do that? The way we do that is to educate people first because if you don't know what AI is, how are you going to implement that in a company? So, we educate them first. We do workshops that could be in-person, could be online. We will train people in different niches. We do B2B, we do B2C, we do both. And we help them inculcate that. In that workshop, we'll ask them, "What do you feel is the AI-first future of your company?" And we'll get from them, the team members, what is useful, and then we'll help implement those automations for them in their accounts, in their marketing, in their sales, in their strategy, for example, at scale. This could be both manual as well as automated processes in the company as well. I believe this is a very important requirement because my personal mission is to educate 1 million people on how to use AI. So, it'll be my teams and I. Currently, I'm in the tens of thousands of people I've already trained. And I get emails and WhatsApps that make me cry because they have generated a million revenue plus in their companies. And like, "Wow, using AI." And like, "Wow, that's amazing, right?" So, the ROI for me into karma is incredible. But also, I'm seeing the company grow much faster. So, just to answer your question, highlight overview, we do AI workshop education. Raj Goodman Anand: strategy, for example, at scale. This could be both manual as well as automated processes in the company as well. I believe this is a very important requirement because my personal mission is to educate 1 million people on how to use AI. So, it'll be my teams and I. Currently, I'm in the tens of thousands of people I've already trained. And I get emails and WhatsApps that make me cry because they have generated a million revenue plus in their companies. And like, "Wow, using AI." And like, "Wow, that's amazing, right?" So, the ROI for me into karma is incredible. But also, I'm seeing the company grow much faster. So, just to answer your question, highlight overview, we do AI workshop education. We do training in that same space. We create automations in AI and workflows for them, and then we help maintain that. So, if they need any further changes or updates, we'll be there for them as well. Anup Ghimire: So, do you also go? So, how I have seen this industry is you do the workshop, the workshop acts as lead generation, then you do, if the need be, for example, there is a very unique problem, you go into more research. So, there are AI researchers who figure the problem or solution out, or if the problem is not very unique, you go into more software development side, integrating the existing systems that are already there. So, I see three businesses over here. So, is your workshop also acting as lead generation for either into research or into doing the software development? Raj Goodman Anand: Sort of. Well, I think each one has their own unique challenges. Some of them will say, "I don't want to do a workshop. I'll just say, this is my issue, fix it for me." Right? Others might say, "Well, I need a workshop as well." So, what I'm doing is adding value. How I do it is based on the company and how they need the help, for example. And one might say it's lead generation, but I might say this is like the proven process of how it can help a company. They decide how it works for them. For me, I can tell you that it works really well to do it in this way. If you skip a step because, you know, cut corners, it doesn't help the company eventually. And for a few thousand dollars, it's worth doing it. Anup Ghimire: So, for now, the most revenue you make is through the workshop. Raj Goodman Anand: At the moment, it's workshop and automation, both of them. Both of them. Yeah. It's it's gangbusters, man. I'm literally flying around. Like the problem with that is that I don't, I miss my family a fair bit. Um, I would, I'm currently on a two-month travel. Luckily, my wife can come and join me in Nepal. Usually, you know, I have to go days. And also, I mentioned yesterday, I've got a bit of a back issue as well. But for anything good to happen, you have to make sacrifices, right? Anup Ghimire: Do you see the market of teaching AI, making people AI-able, or giving the AI-first mindset is going to shrink away because I see agents like literally AI agents. Because how I see it right now is there is a big gap between the researchers, the people who are actually working in AI, and the normal people. There's a big gap. So, I think there is a big industry for workshops and these training packages. But then I feel this is also shrinking because now AI is helping people to understand AI better through ChatGPTs, through chat modules, through agents. So, do you see this shrinking, or do you have your own take on why this is only going to grow? Raj Goodman Anand: Let me answer this question by not talking about AI for a second. Uh, so for a very long time, I had a physical trainer who would come and train me. The science of getting fitter in the gym has been around for decades, but we still prefer a human person to come help us, educate us how to use it properly. The most asked question at the end of the workshop is, "This is really awesome, Raj, we're going to learn more." Trust me when I say this to you, I can't find one up-to-date AI workshop online. Why is that? Well, there are awesome trainers out there, but the AI world works so quickly that to find good AI workshops regularly, at a high consistent pace, aligned with current innovation is almost impossible. The worst ones are university ones, right? They are stuck in time from three years back, which is just garbage, right? And all the other ones you find on, say, Udemy, for example, they're great. I mean, don't get me wrong, they're great. But for example, till about four days back, the best image-creating tool for me was Grok. Grok uses Flux as a background to generate images. Today, after three days of OpenAI launching their open, uh, ChatGPT 4 image model, it's number one by far. Right? So, that has happened. Now, someone asked me today, "Which is the best AI image generation tool?" I'll give the answer which is aligned with today's reality. But four days back, reality was different. So, what I tell people is, every six months, at least do one refreshing course, refresh your course, ideally every three months. So, wherever I've done these workshops, I go back and do it again because I'm helping them to add value. And that's what the reality is. So, I don't think this is true for AI. It might be true for, I don't know, an archaic sector, but not in AI. Anup Ghimire: You make me think that maybe now reading books to understand technology would be stupid as well, because it's printed and it was maybe printed ages back. And then maybe podcasts are a better way, right? Because at least you find people talking about information up to date, for example, just like you did now. Or maybe live workshops with people like you, trainers like you. Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. I mean, that's why I think mindset stuff, which has been true for decades of years, uh, for thousands of years, works great. But these technology-based books and writing, I agree with you. Totally rubbish. Anup Ghimire: So, what would you suggest? I mean, like, for now, I think maybe we cannot imagine an industry that will not have its impact through AI. I mean, like AI would be like the internet, right? Whatever you do, you've got to use AI. So, what would you suggest to an expert who has spent 10 years of their life in one domain, and now they are willing to adopt AI? How should they think now? What, what, what should be their mindset in coming years so they can leverage or build upon the base they have built for the last 10 years in one domain? Raj Goodman Anand: Well, first of all, if you don't use AI in your workflow, you're screwed, unfortunately. That's, that's for sure. Number two is, see which parts of your current work can be automated using AI and just use that at scale. Number three is, there is still immense opportunity to be creative as a human being. In fact, being creative is a genuine human trait. And for AI to replace that, it will take a lot of time. So, in my opinion, be creative in your own space and just keep going cutting edge. In fact, it's like, I think it's like the 20/80 rule or, um, Pareto's, uh, law that 20% of the companies have 80% of the business, or 20% of the boys get 80% of the girls. I mean, it applies to everything, right? And so, be that 20%. Spend time to be the expert, and AI will help you to achieve that. So, use AI extensively in your workflow. Anup Ghimire: And I also see personally, when I, while reflecting on your conversation yesterday and listening to other good podcasts, I feel there is a good opportunity for a lot of domain experts to actually use AI and then become these AI domain experts. For example, let's say somebody has spent 10 years of their career in marketing, become an AI marketer, and then maybe also leverage that understanding to make other marketing companies AI-enabled. So, there is a good opportunity that if you can be one of the first movers in your industry, you can actually leverage into education, workshops, training, or helping other companies leverage AI and then monetize that process, right? Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. I mean, for every domain expert. Well, that happened for digital, it happened for email, it happened for social media. So, yeah, absolutely, it happened for AI as well. I mean, that's without, without a shadow of a doubt, that's going to happen. But be genuine about it. Genuinely understand about AI, spend time on AI, learn about AI. There are enough YouTube videos out there, there are enough tweets out there to learn about it. So, learn, yeah, absolutely, deep dive into it. Anup Ghimire: So, do you think even in AI, there are going to be niche AI experts? For example, niche AI experts just in banking, niche AI experts just in, uh, health tech and medical, niche AI experts just in marketing? Or would they be more general AI experts that can, uh, use their framework into any industry? Raj Goodman Anand: I feel like in any industry with any new innovation, there'll always be niches. Niche is going to be, niche is always the way to go forward. I talked about yesterday as well. There is an element of a general-purpose AI need, but when I go into companies, I'm niching down quite a lot. You have to. Why would the learnings from a jewelry maker help automation like an automotive manufacturer help? There are some common elements there, but there are a lot of things which are genuinely niche down to their requirements. So, Raj Goodman Anand: I feel like in any industry with any new innovation, there'll always be niches. Niche is going to be, niche is always the way to go forward. I talked about yesterday as well. There is an element of a general-purpose AI need, but when I go into companies, I'm niching down quite a lot. You have to. Why would the learnings from a jewelry maker help automation like an automotive manufacturer help? There are some common elements there, but there are a lot of things which are genuinely niche down to their requirements. So, Anup Ghimire: So, what is your niche? What is the niche you're niching down into? Raj Goodman Anand: So, well, at this point in time, the way place where I kind of bring in a lot of value is AI for. I've got three, four different areas we're currently focused on: AI for marketing and sales, AI for operations, and AI for innovation and business development. Common theme there is growth. Anup Ghimire: Growth. Raj Goodman Anand: Saving money and making money. That's the, that's the thing. Now, every business does that, right? That's what business is all about. But I feel like this is the place I can give a lot of value. Industry-focused right now, even with Good Milan, we have a lot of people, experts in different areas. For example, for, um, without naming a company, the organization, uh, a military organization, to bring in a military writer who's ex-army, who writes content for that organization, because a person who is from that organization in the past will do a much better job than someone who's like a random writer, right? So, you have to bring in good writers. Similarly with AI as well, we bring in experts as well. People who understand that industry very well, we pair them up with AI experts. Anup Ghimire: So, for example, if you're doing AI work for bankers, there would be integration of an expert in banking and an expert in AI, and then delivering 100%. Raj Goodman Anand: That's how we work. Anup Ghimire: Good one. Okay, let's talk about a topic the whole world is talking about right now: personal branding. Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. Anup Ghimire: You have been quite out there, like talking about personal brand as well. So, how do you see this evolving, and why do you think every person should think of building their own personal brand? And with personal brand, I think when I talk to people about personal brand, they feel like, "Personal brand is like, so I have built a quote, building a personal brand is not like becoming a Shah Rukh Khan. You could be a niche Shah Rukh Khan. You don't have to be a person that the world knows about. You can be somebody quite well-known in your particular industry, right? And that's that's the beauty of building a personal brand in one particular niche." Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. Anup Ghimire: How do you think personal brand is literally changing the way we buy things, the way we sell things, the way bigger businesses are built, the way B2B businesses are built, the way these B2C public companies are built? And how do you think this is going to evolve in a post-AI world? Raj Goodman Anand: Let me give you an answer a little bit, a little bit deeper. Let's let's not go superficial, let's go a little deeper. I lost my dad about one year back, right? Anup Ghimire: Sorry to hear that. Raj Goodman Anand: No, thank you. He lived a great life. Unfortunately, um, some lifestyle choices, you know. But, um, and, uh, so when I, when I lost him, and you know, as, as a Sikh person, Hindu Sikhs, you know, we have very similar sort of way we say goodbye to our loved ones. And, um, I remember the last, the last moment, you know, when, when I, when I, you know, I had to do the last rituals, it occurred to me that as human beings, we come from the ground, you go back in the ground. In fact, the last thing you have to do is, if you put in cows, cow dung on, on, on human beings to say that, you know, we came from planet Earth and we go back to planet Earth. And what we leave behind is genuine value and that ethos of care and love and, and to, to kind of substantiate that, you know, last moment for him was a lot of people who loved him were there. They flew from everywhere to kind of be, be in his last moment. And that's what you leave behind. And one might say that that is, you know, your karma. Some might say that's your, your value. But for me, that's also a brand as well. You create, you create a brand of care, about genuine love. And that love is shown by people even when you're not there. In fact, that's what I think all the time. You know, I have a picture of me, an old version of me. I think to myself, before I leave, what legacy can I leave behind? And that legacy is really important to me. Always think about me on my deathbed, right? That's very important to me. And that, for me, in some ways, if I go to the digital world, is also your personal brand as well. What do you do for other people? These podcasts, for example, yeah, we there might be a personal brand element here. Also, we talk a lot of stuff openly, honestly, to share with people so they can use that. Somebody somewhere, you know, maybe, you know, a Bob, you know, who's like 20 years old, or maybe there's a, you know, Jenny who is like, you know, 11 years old, gets inspired and does something awesome. And we had 0.001% to their life, right? And that's what we're doing. And that builds karma points or brand for the person, right? So, personal brands are very important because this is what you, whether you go to a different company, and like it doesn't matter, it's B2B or B2C, it's in the end, it's B2P, person to person, right? Your brand is something you, you go around with it, a bit like your shadow. You can't go without your shadow. Shadow comes with you, right? Your brand as well. Whatever you've done so far, the value you've created for people, that will stay with you. So, build a personal brand, not because that's something you should be doing. Do it because this is part of who you are. You go out there, you talk about people, you talk to people, that brand gets elevated or diminished based on what, how you add value. So, I mean, my value of my life is to, you know, grow and add value to people's lives. Um, and that's why 1 million people to educate using AI, because I, I care about people. And that education will help. And I can show you articles of people written about the value they've created from these AI workshops. Yeah, it makes me feel better. But also, what I've added to, to their, these people's lives. And these people have business owners. So, they will go and talk to their, their team members. The team members also grown up as well using AI. That's awesome, right? So, yeah, build a brand because this is what you leave behind. Anup Ghimire: You know, I think one of the common narrative that I find among people is they say, "Me, I've not really achieved things to go and start speaking, go out and start talking. Maybe someday I'll reach a point and then I'll start building my personal brand." And I, and I think I figured a very strong call to action for them. I'll be like, "You build your personal brand to expedite the process of reaching where you want to be. It's not something you do after you have reached somewhere, but then you want to reach somewhere and you definitely would want to expedite that process, right? So, the process of building a personal brand is actually, it will act like a catalyst to reach somewhere faster. And it's up to you." Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. I mean, people do videos about opening like tin cans, right? And actually, they add a lot of value to my life, you know, like these all these these hacks in the kitchen, for example, they are awesome. Why would you say that you don't have anything to add to the world? There's a lot to add to the world. You just like to find that unique opportunity. I think there's a lot to add to the world. And everybody has some skill or the other. Like you just don't feel like that's not enough. I mean, I'm not Einstein. I'm doing, I'm doing whatever I can, right? And, um, yeah, there'll be flaws in my presentation or what I'm adding, but I'm just doing it genuinely. Just do it genuinely. Just want to give back to people. That really helps. Anup Ghimire: Yeah, 100%. I think in maybe instead of confusing it with building a personal brand, I think the maybe next time I meet people, I I'll start telling them, "Just add value to the world outside." And I think in doing so, the brand will be built. Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. That's that's literally it. Anup Ghimire: Add value. Raj Goodman Anand: Towards constantly add value. In fact, you know, when, when did I ever grow massively is when I just did it, which I love, love it, and it just led to more value addition. The day I was conservative and I was just like to myself, I just lost value. Anup Ghimire: And maybe how do you stand out in the process of adding value, if you can bring that from your own personal experience? Because that would put a very unique perspective, right? Because everybody can add value with AI if it's just about teaching somebody something. For example, how to operate a camera. I can go and do a quick AI search and I can come up with a text and I can put that into a status. But then if that the process of adding value does not come from your unique experience, now it does not have a unique perspective to it. And like the example you give on how Google on how AI and how these AI of these big discovery platforms used to push more of these content with unique perspective. And I think the same goes with almost every platform. If you're writing on LinkedIn and if if you're just copying and pasting this AI content, LinkedIn is going to identify this is AI and does not have a really unique perspective to it, right? Obviously use AI, but whatever you're doing in the process of adding value, if you can actually bring something from your own personal experience, I think that's where you are standing out from these, uh, GPT's text, right? Raj Goodman Anand: 100%. Like, you know, Anup lives in Kathmandu, Raj Goodman Anand: 100%. Like, you know, Anup lives in Kathmandu, born in Baraba, for example. That's a unique perspective. Um, when you talk to from your perspective in Nepal, people listen to you because they, you know, you represent Nepal's growth, for example. You have perspective on that that you can talk to them from their perspective of understanding what the context is. I can't do that. I, I can't do that because I don't, I don't have the same privilege like you perhaps have, or your experiences like, like you have. So, Anup, the same thing we talk about, or to make tea, for example, you're different in how you explain it, or how I explain it. And that's, it's always great to have that in your way, right? Number two is, some people say, "Hey, yeah, I I'm happy to add value, but I will not scream about it." Now, think about this, right? Say you were by the seafront in Thailand when there was a tsunami happening. Would you tell everyone one by one, "Hey, uh, tsunami is going to happen right now? Tsunami is going to happen right now?" Or would you scream and say, "Hey, run, run, run, run, move to high grounds." That's what it's all about, right? And it's our job at that point. It was our job, and you know, to make people aware of the tsunami, for example. Anup Ghimire: 100%. And I think the problem is people are not embracing the experience they have. I mean, like they are not very proud of the experience, the background they come up with. And until unless you don't really embrace that, I think it, it is difficult for people to leverage that, isn't it? Raj Goodman Anand: It is. But, and you know, I don't blame them for it. You know, many at times, I mean, I, I was a timid, introverted person. I know it doesn't come across, but I was, I'm, I was very introverted, and I've worked really hard to showcase I'm extroverted, but inside me, I'm still a bit introverted, to be honest. My wife doesn't agree with that, but I, but I, I know I'm, I inside me, I'm introverted, right? And it's because my upbringing was such that I was told that all you can do in your life is a maximum be like a programmer sitting behind, doing your coding quietly. That's what, that's what you're worth, right? And people feel like that's what they're worth. And then you realize that, well, the world is my oyster. Let's go and explore it. I was lucky to have that opportunity to do that. But, um, yeah, otherwise I would be exactly the same. Sit, sit behind, wonder, you know, what this whole thing is happening. I can't talk about it because I'm the introverted person sitting behind. Whereas when you realize that actually everybody has a voice, and our job is to spread value and evolve the human race, that's when things start to change. Anup Ghimire: Reflecting on your conversation we had yesterday, you have, you have a quite a unique interdisciplinary experience of being born in Kuwait, being raised in the UK, coming from an Indian origin family, working in Thailand, having a Nepali wife. That's quite a lot of unique experience, you know, I mean, like that makes you so much interdisciplinary, not just in terms of what you have seen, but also in terms of the culture that you have, you can actually bind together and build something more unique. Raj Goodman Anand: Firstly, I was lucky with all the stuff. Number two was, I'm very, very curious. I'm very curious, and that's that's an issue and an opportunity. I, I mean, born to an Indian family typically would say you to get married to an Indian person. But I was always curious. I always wanted to like learn, and I obviously I met my lovely wife many years back, and that became, you know, that, that, you know, translated into getting married and having a child. But, um, I just get bored really quickly. I get bored really quickly. And not my lovely wife. No, no. So, so you're fine, don't worry. But like, if I was doing the same thing for like, you know, one year, two years, I can't. I just can't do it. I, I'm constantly trying to find the next thing, right? So, I speak different languages, for example. I worked in Spain, for example, for many years. I understand Nepali because, you know, "kura katna mildaina," you know, like, yeah, exactly. Because I was just curious what they were talking about. Madan Lal was very keen, I talked to her in Nepali constantly. So I don't speak Nepali. Um, I Anup Ghimire: But you understand Nepali well, right? Raj Goodman Anand: Extremely, extremely well. Um, Anup Ghimire: You can't fool me. Raj Goodman Anand: Can't fool me. I honestly, I struggled a little bit with some of the, uh, outskirts of Nepali, for example, from, you know, but otherwise, I can understand Nepali fluently. And in fact, you know, many of times I would sort of like hear what people are saying, you know, and and act like you don't understand. I have no idea what you're talking about, but I just, I just, you know, I understand what they're saying. And it's kind of fun because that's, that's the beauty of it, right? Same with Spanish as well. I think 70, 60, 70% at one point, I guess I understand Spanish. We speak a lot of Spanish as well. It was really fun because like, you know, it's a new language you speak. Anup Ghimire: And you can really connect with the other person in their own native language, right? Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. And you, you know, like the, like just to give you an example, in boardrooms in Spain, it's like a fiery experience, right? You're just like on fire, you know, Spanish Latin vibe, it's impressive. It won't be the same, for example, in a Thai boardroom. A Thai boardroom is very respectful, you know, you keep folding your hands constantly. In Spanish, you know, you, you put your chest out and you just say something out, you know, and that's a Spanish way of doing things. I love that, you know, I love the Thai way as well, the Nepali way as well. And I'm just curious, right? Anup Ghimire: Where do you think we lie? Are we more towards Thailand or more into the Spanish way of approach? Raj Goodman Anand: I will say it's more Thai way when there's no alcohol in the system. Anup Ghimire: On spot. Raj Goodman Anand: But after a few Gorkhas and a few Kukri rums, I think it's Spanish. It's a bit more Spanish. Anup Ghimire: Yeah, nice one. Raj Goodman Anand: No, it's true. I mean, that's why one thing I I like about Nepali culture is, you know, it's a very, very genuine culture. Um, like it's rare to see that that kind of vibe of like just being relaxed, you know, and some might say that doesn't help the economy. But I feel like if you just look around, like Patan Durbar Square, for example, just sitting down there, like you just, they just have no worries of life, right? Anup Ghimire: Do you find people in Nepal are working slower than people in the UK? Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. Absolutely. And, you know, like this kind of like "bal chhaina," you know, I love it. I love that, you know. Anup Ghimire: "Bal" meaning? Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah, exactly. It's amazing. Like it's just like, you know, just want to have a good time, you know, I just want to genuinely just just be around people, you know, have have your meal, have your bit of raksi and just like just take it easy. And that is missing around the world. In my travels so far, like I see everybody's just like constantly in a rat race, constantly. Anup Ghimire: The world should learn something from Nepali culture. Raj Goodman Anand: 100%. Anup Ghimire: Go a bit slow. Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. In fact, a lot of people who come back to Nepal constantly, they come come for the Himalayas, yes, they come for the culture, but they also come for the people. The people of Nepal are genuinely the most amazing people ever because there's an element of no rush. There's an element of like, just enjoy the moment. Anup Ghimire: But you know, I mean, like maybe it applies to both the economy, country, and a people as well. At times, your expertise also becomes your weakness. What has helped you reach somewhere is also becomes a bottleneck for you to not reach the next level, right? I mean, yeah. Raj Goodman Anand: I mean, you're right. Like every feature or characteristic is a pro and a con, right? There's a guy called Naval, I'm sure you know Naval. He says that the most, the ideal state to be is to be present. Right? And I find a lot of Nepalese are present. They, at the moment, they are present and they're enjoying that particular time. A lot of people in the world are not. I'm not present. I mean, I, I feel like I'm either thinking about the future or sort of thinking about what happened in the past and like, ah, that was, I could have done a bit better job there. And I wish I could be more present. And that's something to learn from Nepal because everybody's like, like I can tell you this experience I had, first time I got here, it was one, one of the squares, Mr. Mr. Durbar Square was, I have no, I'm not sure. But someone sitting over there just like observing us, right? And not because they, they wanted to kind of like get something from from us or like sell something to us. They're just looking, just genuinely just just curious what's going on, right? And smiling and engaged with us. I love that. I wish I could be that. I wish I could be that that person in the Durbar Square, Patan Durbar Square, wherever that might be in, in, I could be that person sitting there, just observing the world and looking at and genuinely genuinely happy doing that. Basking in the sun, for example, and just like being part of the current moment, which I don't think I am, and I wish I could be, and I hope that one day I will be that person. Raj Goodman Anand: ah that was I could have done a bit better job there and I wish I could be more present and that's something to learn from Nepal because everybody's like like I can tell you this experience I had first time I got here, it was one one of the squares Mr. Mr. Durbar Square was, I have no I'm not sure. But someone sitting over there just like observing us, right? And not because they they wanted to kind of like get something from from us or like sell something to us. They're just looking, just genuinely just just curious what's going on, right? And smiling and engage with us. I love that. I wish I could be that. I wish I could be that that person in the Durbar Square, Patan Durbar Square, wherever that might be in in I could be that person sitting there, just observing the world and looking at and genuinely genuinely happy doing that. Basking in the sun for example, and just like being part of the current moment, which I don't think I am and I wish I could be and I hope that one day I will be that person. Anup Ghimire: I think so, I was listening to a podcast of Naval today, today morning, and he mentioned it is much, much faster to go to a path of more awareness through a materialistic approach than giving up everything and going through the struggle. So maybe, yeah, if you are economically well, if you're financially stable, it's all good to go and bask in the sun, spend the whole day in the Durbar Square, be happy about it. But if you are poor, work hard, make sure you, you, you go seamless with, uh, adding value and bringing something out of it for yourself, for your family, and then maybe you spend some good time under the sun. What do you think? Raj Goodman Anand: I can't deny it. I mean, I think both are in that sort of same rat race, aren't we? Uh, we are constantly trying to get the next best thing, trying to grow the next next possible way. And, you know, in, in Steve Jobs world, you know, "stay hungry, stay foolish," you know, you constantly want to get the next thing, right? Reality is, both of us can retire today if you wanted to. We don't want to do that, right? Because we have this, this next thing you want to achieve. And maybe it's only for us. Maybe we have this kind of fire in our belly because we want to achieve this next thing for us. Um, it will help the whole world as well. But there is this thing to be said about going fast and going slow at the same time. And, um, I'm still jealous of that person who's sitting in the Durbar Square, right? I, because I want to be like him. But I also can't not do what I do right now. I can't, if I wasn't traveling constantly, adding value to people's lives, I will regret that. I will not be happy with myself at the end of my life. So I'm just like constantly thinking of these things. And I think about, I mean, there is a, is a, I made a, using AI, made a screensaver, uh, like a background for my desktop, for example, and it has my core values or my core last thing I leave. And one thing is legacy. Legacy is a very important thing to me. Legacy is for my daughter, for example, legacy for the entire world, for example. If I sit over in Durbar Square in the sun, enjoying people moving around, I will not achieve my legacy. And so I'm constantly Anup Ghimire: Maybe it's the clarity of what you really want, that's what's missing in the world. The clarity of what you really want, what is something you're after, and maybe going after that is the good karma, isn't it? Raj Goodman Anand: Probably. But, you know, I'm sure you heard this, like this kind of like story about this fisherman, you know, who was just like sitting down on the Anup Ghimire: And then asking questions, "What did you do after this? What did you do after that?" Yeah. Raj Goodman Anand: Exactly. And they're like, "I'm, I'm currently, you know, I'm relaxed right now. Why should I go do this, right?" Anup Ghimire: So, see the power of stories, you can actually make it inclined to any direction, you know, I mean, like somebody can write a story that is more inclined to the the businessman who is giving advice one after another, right? Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely. But I think it's, it's experiences, Anup, you know, it's what we have gone through before, which defines it today. Anup Ghimire: True. Exactly. Right. And where all the combination of our trauma. Raj Goodman Anand: That's it. Yeah. That for me, for example, it is that that belief that I can't do it. I'm like, no, no, no, I can't do it. You know, that, that person you have got behind this guy kind of struggling to get up, for example, we were helping out. I want to be the person who's actually helping the person come up because I was the guy on the cliff who was trying to get up, you know, and I was struggling with that. Anup Ghimire: You're this guy. Raj Goodman Anand: No, I'm, I'm, I'm this person over. I'm working on a. I'm not, I'm not beginning right now. I'm somewhere on the journey. I feel like I'm, I'm getting there because, yeah. And I don't, I don't know where the end point is. I don't think I have an end point at all. I just keep going and going till till time I cannot anymore. Anup Ghimire: Do you want to find a place where you can put your butt and then relax? Like this is the guy maybe in in the Durbar Square. Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah, he's found his nirvana for sure. He's found his nirvana for sure. Um, yeah, I don't think I, I thought one day I'll be that person, I'll retire. I can't. Anup Ghimire: And, and to your question of going fast and going slow, I, I read it somewhere. Don't go fast, go smooth, because smooth is the new fast. Raj Goodman Anand: Um, yeah, I guess, I guess, I guess do things gracefully. Yeah, be smooth. Yeah, I, I agree. Um, yeah, if I put that into my context right now, like fasting and fast, going fast and breaking things is not always ideal. People do do that and they, they often say ask for forgiveness. But for me, I think whatever we do, whenever we do things, we leave a brand, we leave an impression, we create a memory for people. And if the memory is negative, it's really hard to reverse that. Anup Ghimire: Exactly. True. Raj Goodman Anand: So even if I do something, I'll do it with everything I have in me. Even if I'm tired, my back is aching, for example, I'll still give it everything I have in me because that's so important. Anup Ghimire: And maybe that is what a personal brand is in its true sense because you don't fake it, you can't fake it. And maybe it's a lifestyle, how you live your life, isn't it? Raj Goodman Anand: And I think my business is a lifestyle. Like my lifestyle is my business, right? Like my daughter knows that this is my life and she'll ask me about these things. She's only four years old. You know, at one point she thought I worked for EO, which is a volunteer role. But I'll spend so much time with EO. But I was like, I don't care. I'm giving back to the community, which I, you know, for entrepreneurs, right? So I didn't care. And I have a mission in life, right? So I'm driven. I'm just driven. But it's only because I was told I couldn't do it. And I was like, no, I can. No, I can. I definitely can. Anup Ghimire: Amazing. That was fun. Raj Goodman Anand: That was fun? Anup Ghimire: Did you have fun? Raj Goodman Anand: Absolutely, absolutely. It's really good. Anup Ghimire: Thank you so much, Raj. Thank you so much for making time. You had such a, I mean, like yesterday, I actually gave you three time slots, and I was like, okay, I'm going to take two of them. One, I'm going to meet you, second, let's record the podcast in that particular time. Uh, thank you so much. It's a pleasure talking to you. It's a pleasure knowing you. And I believe this is the beginning of our relationship. We'll figure out something to work together on. Raj Goodman Anand: 100%. I'm sure. And thank you for the opportunity, Anup, and to the platform. I really appreciate it. Thank you. Anup Ghimire: Thank you so much to everybody who's watching this. I think there are tons of takeaways. Rewatch it, rewatch it with a diary, with yourself. Tons of value. I have my own takeaways from this podcast. Maybe you should share this with somebody who you think might need it at this point in time because I think the content definitely inspires people to take the next step, right? So, and by the way, if people who are watching this podcast, if they want to reach out to you, what would be the most ideal way to reach out? Raj Goodman Anand: Yeah. So you can add me on LinkedIn, for example, but I've just started my Instagram, which I literally started like four days back. So yeah, look for Raj Goodman AI. Anup Ghimire: Okay. So we'll link his Instagram and LinkedIn below. Um, every amazing person I've met, it's because I made an effort to reach out with a very genuine approach. So don't just say hi, go with the context because people are busy and they would want to know more about the context and why you are reaching out to them. Uh, for everybody watching this, it's two of us talking in front of a camera, but there are amazing people behind the camera making sure this is happening, right? I'd also like to thank our production company, We Find Us, for making this happen. We Find Us is one of the biggest, one of the largest B2B content production companies in the country. If you want to come up, if you want to activate your sales, if you want to activate your digital footprint, if you want to activate any of these social channels and build your brand and get more sales, we are definitely one of the best companies to reach out to. We produce tons of videos, tons of written content. Do reach out. There's a link below. And I'll also link Goodman Lantern. Raj Goodman Anand: Goodman Lantern. Anup Ghimire: Goodman Lantern link. So yeah, build content, do content because I think the internet is either code or content. So I think you better start producing more content. We'll be back again with another amazing episode, another amazing guest. Till then, you guys, take care. Bye-bye. Raj Goodman Anand: Lovely. That was fun.