The Brave Podcast
The Brave Podcast
Becoming a Person of Value with Alex Sanfilippo
In this episode of The Brave Podcast, we get to hang out with Alex Sanfilippo. Alex discusses how he got into writing, despite having severe dyslexia. We also discuss elevating Jesus instead of ourselves, how to prevent burnout and being okay with failure. Towards the end of the show, Alex shares how he came to know Jesus.
Alex is the host of Creating a Brand, a top 20 entrepreneurship podcast where he interviews successful leaders and experts on topics that matter to entrepreneurs who want to grow faster both personally and professionally while saving time and money in the process. Alex lives in Florida with his wife Alecia.
In this episode, we discuss:
- Calling
- Content Creation
- Burnout
- Faith
- Rest
- Failing
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Alex San Fillippo
[00:00:00] Alexis Newlin: [00:00:00] Hey guys, welcome to another episode of the brave podcast. If it sounds like I'm laughing, I had this intro and I was talking and I really exciting push record, which is very helpful. If you're trying to record a podcast guys. Push the record button.
Top tip of the day, write it down. All right. Thank you guys are tuning in so glad to have you here today. It is November. We're probably like if it's the 18th today. Then we are like nine days away from Thanksgiving. Wow. Can't believe that Thanksgiving is on the horizon. I'm actually heading out to Florida to be with my family, this Thanksgiving, which is really exciting for me because that usually doesn't get to happen. And I'm usually with friends from church, which I love, I absolutely love being able to hang out with my church family on Thanksgiving. Like since my mom has passed, I've been adopted by all these amazing people at my church. And so I never have to worry about where I'm going to go for the holidays because every year since she's been passed and it's been 10 years now,
I've always had a place to [00:01:00] go. People have always opened their home for Thanksgiving and Christmas. So thank you to you. Those of you who have done that, it's great for. People who don't have family in the state with them or people who have past holidays can be really hard. And so just so thankful to people who open up their home. So to my church, family, to those of you who have done that for me, thank you from the bottom of my heart. I really appreciate you. I love you is kind of an early Thanksgiving.
Shout out because Thanksgiving is in nine days, but I'm doing it now. Who cares? All right. So just thankful for those people. And so if you know someone who is alone on the holidays, And reach out to them. It matters so much. It really does. Okay. Off of my soapbox. So before we get started, I wanna remind you guys of.
Dr. April Jones retreat that she's hosting on December 5th. Um, through the drifted drum company, you can sign up on that website, go to advance, click on it. You can pay [00:02:00] there. And if you use brave at checkout, you get 10% off, which is awesome. All right. Now onto our guest today's guest is Alex Sanfilippo.
The cool thing about Alex is I met him at, pod Fest, which I went to in March before the whole world kind of shut down. And I went to one of his sessions about creating a brand. And Alex. Also is a podcast host. He has the daily PS, which is an inspirational blog sites or tons of authors get together and kind of share hope. And point people to Jesus Christ and he just does all the things. He talks about entrepreneurship. He talks about overcoming dyslexia and becoming a writer. , we talk about burnout and there's a lot of cool topics we cover in this short interview. We didn't talk very long, but it was such a great conversation. And I was still glad I got to like, sit down and talk to him. So you're going to love our interview. So without further ado here is my interview with Alex. [00:03:00]
This is Alexis Newlin and you're listening to the brave podcast. And my guest today is Alex. I'm going to have you say your last name,
Alex San Fillippo: [00:03:08] Alex. Sanfilippo. I actually appreciate that. Most people just try and totally butcher it. So thank you, Alex SanFilippo, that's my name.
Alexis Newlin: [00:03:15] All right, Alex, what you do and why you're awesome.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:03:19] Oh, well, thank you first off for calling me. Awesome. So I've actually been in the blogging and podcasting and basically content creation space for about eight years now.
And it's something that I've just become very passionate about and hopefully we will get into this story a little bit today.
Alexis Newlin: [00:03:33] Definitely.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:03:33] and yeah, and the reason I'm awesome. And this is probably a little bit of a cliche on, on a podcast like this, but because I'm created in God's image. And I believe that only God makes things that are awesome.
So I try to use that word pretty, pretty sparingly and only really say it when I'm talking about another human being, because we're made an image of God and we're awesome. So for me, the reason I believe that I'm awesome is because I am living out the calling that I believe God has placed in my life.
And that's what I've defined myself by completely.
Alexis Newlin: [00:03:55] I love that. Thank you, Alex. Let's get into your journey. How did you start [00:04:00] in the blogging content creation realm?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:04:03] Yeah. So the very first thing I did was sit down to write a blog post one day and Alexis, I don't know. Have you done much writing?
Yeah, I also, write.
Yeah. Yeah. I could tell. You seem pretty well-versed, I can appreciate a good writer, so, but the first time you sat down to write, did it come naturally to you? Just wondering.
Alexis Newlin: [00:04:24] Honestly, yes. I've always written better than I speak. So I always kind of been naturally a better writer than speaker, which is so funny because I'm a podcaster now,
Alex San Fillippo: [00:04:35] right? Yeah. Well you're well versed in both now. Good for you. So I have the opposite story. The first time I sat down to write it was. So scary and here's, here's my reason for that to go like way back when I was a young kid, I really struggled with English. Reading and writing was really difficult for me. And, it got to the point where my parents decided to take me to a doctor to find out why I just couldn't seem to figure out teachers couldn't seem to teach me.
[00:05:00] It turns out I was severely dyslexic. I could not see the words on a page and it really struggled to write. It's funny, people to this day. now people laugh about it because I'm in my thirties and now it's a funny thing apparently. I've fully recovered from being dyslexic, which was really incredible, like really miraculous healing from that.
But the scars that it left were mostly emotional, but even to this day, when I write there's certain letters that I don't write properly because I learned to write the way that made sense in my head as a kid, and I just never really learned. So like, it still is that he will watch me write something and it looks like normal handwriting, but be like, wait, how'd you just make an E they're like, do that again.
Like, why do, why do you write it like that? Yeah. Anyway, it's just one of those things it's kind of like held on from there, but the reason I'm sharing this whole story is the first time I sat down to write, I felt internal calling to do so. And I can't explain what it was or why. I just know I needed to sit down and start writing.
And so the first time I did that, I was so nervous because , I somehow made it through high school and had just, you know, got a C all the way through. Worked my hardest, get a 110%. But I swore to myself, I was done. I'm like, [00:06:00] I'm not going to sit down and right ever again., but I just felt like I was supposed to.
So I actually sat down and started writing. For whatever reason, the words actually made sense. Like it actually worked out. And I remember when I sat there and wrote my first few blog posts, which today I'd be scared to death if anyone could find them, because I don't know if I want you to read them today.
But at that point in time, they really helped me. And they helped a lot of people as well, that were in my area of influence. So I just sat down one day as fearful as I was of it, knowing that I was supposed to do that because I knew it was going to help somebody in my life that really needed it. And I just responded to that and sat down and started writing.
And this was about, I guess, close to eight years ago now.
Alexis Newlin: [00:06:37] Do you remember what you wrote about?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:06:39] Yeah, , I wrote a lot about leadership in overcoming fear. So like overcoming fear as a leader was really what I kind of went for for at least probably the first six months of my writing that was really my focus.
Alexis Newlin: [00:06:49] Okay. So how did you start to grow that into a brand, into a business?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:06:54] Yeah, so when, it was just me by myself and it was called daily ps.com. That was the name I wanted [00:07:00] it. the idea was to provide a paradigm shift. That's what the PS stands for. So people thinking one way to just shift their focus and think a totally different way.
And that was kinda the idea of it. And, believe it or not, you as a writer, you'll also appreciate this. Or maybe you get scared by this. But I started off saying I was going to write Monday through Friday, every single, right. That's the response that every writer gives me like, Ooh, no, no, no, no, no. Don't do that Alex.
And, I got about, like I said, I made it about six months and I was like, okay, this is not going to work. Like I became a good writer pretty quick because I was writing a lot of content. And, but I decided, I was like, just thinking, I'm like, well, there's other people that I know that have said, Oh, Alex, I wish I had a blog like you have, like, that would be really cool. I've always wanted to do that. And I just started asking people, well, do you want to take a day of the week and write? So within another couple of months, probably by our seventh month, there was five of us. We were all writing once a week, which is still for me quite a bit.
You know, like now I look back that's a lot. Yeah. And, over time, let's fast forward many years, and we can kind of fill in some gaps if we need to, but fast forward, seven years now there's 130 plus authors writing on daily [00:08:00] ps.com. no one writes more than, Oh yeah, it's incredible. No one writes more than once a month, including myself.
And there's a podcast to go with it. There's editors, there's a full team running it and everything. And it's been a really, really cool experience just to be able to impact and change lives.
Alexis Newlin: [00:08:14] What are some of the things that your writers write about on that blog?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:08:19] Yeah, there's, it's, it's quite a wide variety. Anything that we believe is a positive perspective to, to change your day. So we want to make sure that people are focused on positivity and providing some sort of perspective it's out of the norm. So a lot of our content is not long form. It's fairly short. I'd say the average blog post is between six and 700 words.
And it's something just positive and encouraging and it's all around faith. So it's all around leading people to Jesus. Christianity is what the whole blog is based on. We're making sure we're bringing that positive twist to people's lives. so like last week we had a really cool, a really cool blog post that I really enjoyed.
And it might've been a couple of weeks ago, but whenever this goes live, hopefully I'm telling the truth is the one it was. But [00:09:00] regardless, it was just about like, Understanding how to, to grieve during difficult times. So it was somebody who had gone through some really tough times in their life, and they just gave three really practical points for being able to grieve well and get through difficulty, which is something that I have not really been through something that's caused me a lot of grief and that's just my life. But they are able to talk about that because they've been through something and the amount of responses we get and it helps so many people is just incredible.
Every day. It's a little bit different. It's a diverse group. We actually, the 130 people that are writing are all around the world. So they're all in different nations, different countries, everything. So it's really cool to just see what kind of different content comes up.
Alexis Newlin: [00:09:38] how do you get writers for your blog?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:09:40] Yeah, that's, that's a great question. First off. I think that going multi author is, is a great decision. Unless of course it's something that it's, you're just doing, but it's really providing the platform. So making sure that it looks nice, it looks a certain way. If anyone visits daily ps.com, it's beautiful on a mobile device.
It's beautiful on a computer. it looks exactly the way we've [00:10:00] designed it to look and we wanted it to be a certain way. And from there it's just really inviting people. So about once a quarter, we do a post. We
, we actually haven't done one this year, but previously we're doing one post, a quarter that was inviting people saying we're looking for more Christian authors to join our platform.
And still this day, one of the main links that navigation is right for us. And people can actually fill out a form and then we can create them at an accountant. All done through WordPress and they can be a contributor. And from there they can submit posts whenever they want. And we tell them up to once a month, we'll share your content.
Alexis Newlin: [00:10:29] That's awesome.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:10:30] Yeah, it's been really cool.
Alexis Newlin: [00:10:32] So how did that lead you to get into podcasting?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:10:36] Yeah, so , I enjoyed blogging so much that it actually I'd like to talk more than I like to write. So I was actually starting to speak at a lot of conferences, from that blog. especially in the WordPress space, a lot of people had seen it and seen what we created and just kind of the, the flow of it.
So I started traveling a lot, talking about content creation, writing blogs in a way that people want to read them and kind of got a bit of a framework. I'd go [00:11:00] around the country sharing. I never left the United States for that, but I was always going around just different word camps, WordPress conferences, and sharing.
And a lot of people were like, man, you should do a podcast. I remember the first time somebody said that I had no clue what a podcast was. I'm just going to be real. I'm really late when it came to podcasts and I'm like, Okay. I'm guessing it has something to do with Apple, you know, like what is it? So I started listening to podcasts and pretty much immediately fell in love and went ahead and decided to start one.
And, so the podcast that goes with daily, ps.com is called good Christian podcast. A disclaimer here, when you've listened to the intro, it says, we're not saying we're always good Christians, but this is always a good podcast for Christians to listen to. So the claim is not that we're, that we're good Christians or anything like that.
I don't want to use those words necessarily. But, yeah, so the idea was just an extension of the content, that we're, that we're doing. So for me, the blog post I do once a month is the first Monday. And I do a podcast episode with it. Eventually it might move into multiple days and have other hosts as well, but we haven't gotten that point yet, but, yeah, that's how I got into it and it's, it's been very organic and something [00:12:00] I've really enjoyed.
Alexis Newlin: [00:12:01] That's really cool. And so you only post once a month, your podcast?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:12:06] Yeah, once a month. And it's, it goes along with the blog posts I do on daily PS. So again, I have. First Monday of the month is my set day. And it's the day I write my blog posts and the day that I produced my podcast episodes.
Alexis Newlin: [00:12:17] Okay. So I have another question for you being a content creator there's a lot of, kind of putting yourself out there, like on social media, out in the web. How do you get your stuff out there, but it also elevate God at the same time without elevating yourself. Does that question make sense?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:12:36] Yeah, it does. It's it's a fine line. Isn't it? I'm sure you've found that as well.
Especially when you're with somebody who's creating heavy amounts of content. Yeah. People, people, I think many people, my question like, okay, you promoting you or are you promoting, what is it that you're trying to do? And so for a lot of these, the ways I'll do that is really making sure that I keep my internal focus right first.
So I have to constantly evaluate why I do something. [00:13:00] And an example of this is actually daily ps.com. We have never made a penny with that platform. We've never done it. I haven't done any advertising. We've never done any promoted posts. We don't do anything like that at all. And the reason for not there's anything wrong with that, but it was to make sure that I stay in the right place.
And everyone who has joined that platform has agreed that that's the way we're going to do this. So even though the staff team, as we call them doing air quotes, here is a, is all volunteer. All of us are volunteers, including myself. And, that really helps us. That's one way that keeps our hearts right.
And I think if we were trying to bring in an income with it, it might become more about us. Then maybe about our primary objective. And so for me, when I'm sharing things, I always tell myself the same thing. Alex, remember, you're a person of value, not a person of profit. So the day after my myself, I'm going to be that person of value to other people, because I believe it's the example that Jesus left for me and my entire life is, as I said, the beginning, like, I, I want to be a representation of him and to serve people that way.
So I have to remember that when I'm, when I'm writing something, I have to look at it that way. [00:14:00] And I've got a great support system of friends around me and recently. , one of my VA's, actually submitted something on my behalf. It left a part out where it said, like, I'm so thankful for this blah, blah, blah.
And it just turned into just the stats of something. And somebody, me, like one of my friends called me out right away and says, this doesn't seem like something you would write. And I was like, Oh my gosh, thank you for telling me, like, it looks like I was posting out and they took it down and then like redid it.
But it was one of the things that have those right people in my life that have permission to say, Alex, be careful. so yeah, it's a bit of a fine line, but it really just comes into, into having some accountability and making sure that your heart is right in the background of it.
Alexis Newlin: [00:14:35] Thank you for that because that's always like a struggle is doing, like, I want to elevate Christ.
That's the reason why I'm doing this, but then you also want to get your content out there and just trying to find that balance. And I liked that. You said you had like an accountability group that kind of , help you stay balanced and make sure that your purpose always is to show people Christ.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:14:57] Yeah. It's so important to do that. The other thing is, I [00:15:00] think that people like you and me that are creating content, we, we do want people to see it, right? I mean, that is the idea because we believe it'll help people at the end of the day. I believe our mindset has to be, I'm going to do for one, what I wish I could do for all, which means if the right person sees this or the right person hears this, then it was worth it.
It doesn't need to be a million people. It needs to be the one person that this is ultimately for. And I believe that there will always be more people than that. It will continuously grow the more consistent we are that we do. But if we keep that mindset of I'm doing this for that one person that needs it, most, it really helps us stay grounded and keeps our minds in the right place along the way.
And I've, I've found that to be so true for me. And, I think it's been really helpful on the line.
Alexis Newlin: [00:15:38] Okay. Have you ever experienced burnout with doing any of this?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:15:43] Of course. Yeah. I've definitely, I've experienced quite a bit of burnout. you know, maybe not as much as some people, because I'm really big on building systems. I'm really big on consistency. I do have a pretty strong internal drive when it comes to what I do, but I've [00:16:00] definitely had some burnout along the way, for sure.
Alexis Newlin: [00:16:02] How do you kind of, so you said you built systems., what kind of systems do you build to kind of help you when you hit those points of burnout?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:16:09] Yeah, so it's, it's really big on understanding what you're getting yourself into. I think a lot of us we're too quick to say yes to opportunities that appear to be opportunities and to do new things or to take on a little bit more. But the truth is when you take inventory of what we're already doing and make sure we have the capacity to do more than that, taking inventory is as simple as walking around with a notepad for a week and just writing down everything that you do.
And, you know, if it repeats itself every day, fine, but you can look at it and say, okay, I can get rid of a few of these things that just don't really add value, or they're not really helping me or anybody else. And when you do that and you start taking that inventory, it helps you to understand what you're able to do now.
Let's say you've done that, but it's just a lot of work, right? Yeah. For me, the next system is to make sure that we actually document what we're doing. So example, a podcast episode, with, I have two podcasts, my other one's called Creating a Brand, which is a much bigger production, if you will. that one's like a [00:17:00] revenue drain a stream and everything like that.
Now that one, I know that there are 22 tasks from the time that I reach out to a guest till the time I hit publish. So there's 22 things that happen and it takes an average of six hours total between that whole time. But I know that.. I know exactly what I'm going to. Every time I do it, I'm able to put that in the calendar.
So not only am I putting that in the calendar, making sure I'll have time blocked off for rest. To make sure I'm getting a good night of sleep. To make sure I'm getting a weekend off .To make sure I'm able to take some time to go do something that I enjoy. So I'm actually refreshing the real problem that we, the real reason we all have burnout is because we just don't have energy.
Like we're not energized. We're doing, and energy begins with joy. there's a great mentor in my life. His name is Brendan Bouchard and he talks about bringing the joy. He has a little bracelet, whereas they were just as bring the joy. And for him, he just knows if he can keep his joy up, he can keep his energy up.
And when he keep his energy up, he can keep himself from being burnt out. And I think that many of us, we just have to remember to do the things that we enjoy doing that bring that joy in our lives. [00:18:00] Don't have to be all the time, but we have to make sure we are doing enough of those. We don't get burned out on the other things that we know have meaning, but might be a little bit difficult at times.
Alexis Newlin: [00:18:06] I love that energy brings joy or joy brings energy.
Joy brings energy.
I really liked that. Cause yeah, when you stopped loving what you're doing, it's just it's, it becomes pointless and it could be something that's awesome that you're doing. But if you're not taking time for rest, like you said, or doing the things you enjoy outside of work, it can really weigh you down and ruin something. That's very good.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:18:29] Yeah, I can definitely.
Alexis Newlin: [00:18:30] So let's talk about your creating a brand. How did that come to fruition?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:18:35] Yeah. So, you know, it's, it's funny. My whole story is a little bit organic if you will, because I started blogging because I felt like I was supposed to, and then podcasting started because of that.
And then people started asking me how to blog and how to podcast and how to go Mo multi author and all these different things. So it started coming up and I also have a background in aerospace is the business I've been in for a long time. I'm not an astronaut or a fighter pilot or a skydiver . I think [00:19:00] my history was running a commercial operations division, which basically means I protect the company's profit margins and make sure we're running efficiently.
So that's where like a business mind comes from. But yeah, nothing that people think of. When I say aerospace people, astronaut.
Yeah,
Alexis Newlin: [00:19:10] I was going to ask you.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:19:12] I've never been to space and honestly, I probably not smart enough, so, and I'm okay with that. but anyway, so I'm good at making sure that things are profitable and making sure they're running efficiently because of that.
I ended up doing quite a bit of coaching and it all seemed to be around the digital side of things. So again, it was on blogging, podcasting, how to monetize these different types of things and Creating a Brand just was one of the things that I knew I had wanted to do for a long time. And I just finally had the capacity to actually to go for it.
So for me, it's helping people that are new in their entrepreneurial journey. So they haven't taken too many steps yet and just have them to make sure that next step is one that's going to be profitable and helpful for them. It's the right one that needs to be taken. That's the whole idea behind the podcast and in any product or service I offer alongside it.
Alexis Newlin: [00:19:54] Okay. So I wanted to ask you about your testimony, how you became a [00:20:00] Christian.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:20:00] Yeah. Oh, this is great. well, you know, I actually grew up in a Christian home and so for me it started at a young age or so I thought. Many times I find that when we grow up in a Christian home, we don't really have the faith for ourselves.
Okay.
Now, not everyone's like that. There's obviously people that are not like that, but for me, When I got out of my own, I realized that I didn't really have a relationship with God. It was more so just following my parents lead, if that makes sense.
Yeah, totally.
And for a few years, I, I would definitely consider myself somebody who maybe had Christian principles and values, but wasn't really someone who was walking with God or who was a Christian by any means.
And my life reflected that, especially in my early twenties. And, it just, wasn't the type of person that I knew I wanted to be. One day I woke up and. And just realized it, I don't know nothing terrible happened or anything like that. I wouldn't say, I mean, I, I had a pretty messy life at that point when it came to relationships, when it came to my investments and things I worked at, worked with.
Wasn't great. But you know, you actually did an episode recently on this topic. No mess,o [00:21:00] message. It was dr. April Jones, which I encourage encourage listeners to go back and listen to that one if you haven't yet. Cause that's that's good. but anyway, so for me it was one of those things I went through that time.
And, one day I just got a letter in the mail, believe it or not like actually physically in the mail. And I remember picking it up and it was an invitation to like a young adult, church service. And I like looking at the address. It was like the same zip code. And I was like, that's like, just like a three minute drive down the down the road.
It's like in a warehouse somewhere. I'm like, Oh, I'll go to that. I'll check that I haven't been to church in a long time. And, so I ended up going and really instantly realizing that, that I just need to get my life right with God. And I really just took off. I never looked back. So for me, I remember going to that service and just showing up every week and just making my peace and making things right with God and getting myself around better people that really encouraged me and motivate me to, to, to just live a better life.
And for a long time, I just wasn't around that type of people. And I wasn't around people that really even love God. So for me, it was getting myself back into that culture and it really changed who I was. So [00:22:00] my, my mid to late twenties became a lot better than my early twenties.
Alexis Newlin: [00:22:04] And so how long have you been a Christian? You said since you were a child.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:22:08] Yeah. I mean really though, I would say probably 10, 10 years is probably more realistic. Yeah. So 22, so I'm 32. I just gave you guys the age there. But yeah. So the last 10 years have been, they really have been the best years of my life as well, and they just keep on getting better as I continue to focus on our relationship with God and grow that, it's been, it's been really great.
Alexis Newlin: [00:22:27] Okay. In your time in businesses, are there any failures that you've faced and how would you encourage someone to get past a failure that they may have as an entrepreneur or business person?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:22:39] Yeah, it's a real, I love that question, Alexis. I'm glad you asked that. I think first off, so many of us were scared to fail.
Like that's the, that's the biggest fear we have, right? It's who I don't want to make the wrong choice. I don't want to do the wrong thing. And I hear that time and time again. And. I think that we have to actually overcome that idea. [00:23:00] Really, if you don't take a risk, sometimes you might not ever receive a reward.
Right? If we always stay in our comfort zone, we'll go through our life and it might be mediocre. And we, none of us want that. We want to be able to achieve greatness. And there's been times in my life where I've even had to let go of the good to get the great had to actually say, okay, this is a good thing that I've got right now, but I have to let go of it because there might be something great over here and take that risk and potentially fail.
But so for many of us, we have to just be willing to say, okay, you know what? I might fail at this, but as long as you fall down five, six, seven times, and you get up one more time than that, then you're still, okay. You're not a failure. Now I want to make sure that people understand that. And so for me, one of the big areas that, that I really failed them was right before I started Creating a Brand, I had a different idea that I wanted to do it.
It was around the idea of building blogs for people like actually building the platform. So just doing some web design, some platform creation, basically building them the. the foundation for making a multi-author blog more or less and make it in a way that would be SEO ready, like everything that would need.
[00:24:00] And that was my idea. And I invested some money in it and I invest a lot of time in it and it just didn't work. Didn't take the way that I thought it would at all. I expected it to be really big, really fast and ended up being more of a nightmare. I remember the first client I got with that. Ended up just sucking up so much of my time, that that individual is like a monster to work with.
And I don't mean that mean way. Like, they, they were nice enough. They just were very demanding for, for what was involved. It was one of those things that I had to, I actually had to just pull back from it and tell people, sorry, it was, it was giving people money back. It was telling people, sorry, I can't do this.
And it was one of those things that, that was just not a great, not a great experience, you know. But at the end, the day, I don't regret any of it because. Now I'm able to actually talk up to that type of thing and help people understand, okay, this is what you have to look, look toward. Like if you're going to do that, here's what not to do.
Here's what you can do. That might be a little bit different. I'm able to talk about those things, but that wasn't my big failures, but the thing is that was right before I launched creating a brand, that podcast, that website is [00:25:00] actually listed as a top 20 in the entrepreneurship category. So it's one of the, one of the bigger podcasts out there.
And I don't say it to brag. I said it to, I pivoted, I basically had an idea that didnt' quite work and I decided, you know what, I'm going to make the, I failed. It's okay. I'm going to get back up and I'm keep on trying the next thing. And that was one of those things in my life that I just needed to do. That's what needed to happen.
Alexis Newlin: [00:25:20] I love that. I love the fact that you didn't stop and you just tried another thing because sometimes when you fail, you just decide. I'm not going to try anything. I'm just going to stay. What keeps me comfortable.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:25:29] Yeah. Oh, yeah. I've, I've seen a lot of people do that. And again, my, my thing I want to tell people is you've just got to get up and keep on going after it.
You got to keep on trying. And the truth is John Maxwell, who's one of the greats in the area of leadership. I mean, he's got one of the, he might be the biggest name. I think if you look up the word leadership in the dictionary, it's his picture there, you know, but, he talks about failure as much as he talks about success.
And he's somebody who has just achieved so much, but he says he's failed more times than ever succeed, but he succeeds because he's willing to fail. I think we all have to be willing to do that [00:26:00] ourselves.
Alexis Newlin: [00:26:00] Yeah. I agree with you. All right. So you're starting a new venture of pod match. How did you come up with that?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:26:08] Yeah, so again, everything I do is kind of a bit of a flow, right? So yeah, one of the ideas with creating a brand was to make it very top of funnel. I believe that podcasting is not necessarily a direct revenue driver and that's okay. That's just what a podcast is, but it's something that you can use to funnel in ideas and input and things like that.
So, I just evaluated my audience time and time again. And I was speaking at conferences about Creating a Brand. And when I found the commonality that people were saying is they're podcast hosts. And they're saying, Oh, I can't find any guests for my podcast. I'm having a really hard time finding the right guests.
And on the flip side, these same conferences with people who show, who want to meet hosts because they want to be a guest. And they're saying, I just can't find the right ones. And that to me really triggered something internally. If there's one thing I know about business, it's the best businesses are built off solving somebody's problem and making an idea off of that. Not making idea from scratch, it's actually saying, okay, here's the [00:27:00] problem? What can I do to solve this problem for somebody? So for me, the way that I wanted to solve that was basically build an online dating app, but for podcasts, guests, and hosts to meet and to be able to have interviews.
And that, that was just the idea I had, which really, if you think about it, it's not like a, it sounds like a cool idea, but anyone could have thought of that. Right. It was just, I was there and I was evaluating people's problems and I just created this service to be able to actually solve it for people.
And the way that creating a brands involved is, again, the podcast is a bigger podcast. There's a lot of entrepreneurs that listened to it. So our new, it hasn't started yet our new advertisements is going to be join pod match. So we're able to connect the things together. They're not super random or disconnected by any means.
They all really flow together well, but yeah, the idea was just to solve people's problems and it's been a very big success so far for us.
Alexis Newlin: [00:27:44] I just interviewed someone that I met off of your site . And it was a great connection. I'm so glad I would've never met her or gotten connected with her had it not been for your site.
So thank you for that because it was a great interview.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:27:56] I'm so glad to hear that. That made my day. Thank you.
Alexis Newlin: [00:27:59] All right, [00:28:00] Alex, what are some of your goals for 2020? I know it's been kind of a whirlwind of a year.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:28:05] Yeah, all of my goals changed this year. First off. I don't know if you remember this, but people used to go to conferences and networking events in person and like shake hands and hug.
Man. I could use a hug from some random person I've never met, you know, like somebody, somebody just a good hugger. That's what I'm looking forward to. It's such a weird thing to say, But anyway, I miss doing that, but I initially, goals this year to speak at 12 different conferences. That's something that I do every year.
I shoot for 12. And those went out the window. So a lot of things disappeared that I really wanted to do this year personally. That's okay. Again, it goes back to, we need to pivot. I can't look at it as aww man. I can't believe this happened to me. This happened to all of us right. Yeah. I mean, there's, there's people and, you know, I don't wanna get into politics.
People worse than I have this year. Like this year has been relatively easy on me when all things considered. So when I, when I just look at what's happening in the world right now, I want to be thankful. So that's the first thing you have to do when we're changing things. So again, my whole year changed, but right now, the big focus is [00:29:00] to grow pod match. we're working, it's just, it's a very, it's a very lean startup if you will. So getting it through the beta phase, our goal is by year end to have it as a mature product. Like next week, we're rolling out a totally new way to do the messaging and the booking and stuff like that.
That's way nicer than what we have right now. But Hey, we've been launching every chance we get making the changes, making the upgrades. So for us by year end is to have a really. Solid platform. Okay. And, and then I've got a ton of personal goals, which is actually to take some time off and things like that, and actually disconnect for a little bit, something that I love to do to, so again, get that joy and energy so I can continue moving forward, with, with daily PS it's to continue to, to produce great content that people are really loving.
And, those are some of the big goals I've got right now.
Alexis Newlin: [00:29:44] Okay. And my final question for you, when did you decide that you were brave?
Alex San Fillippo: [00:29:50] You know, I decided I was brave a lot later than I initially thought. Okay. I think we maybe all feel like we're a little bit brave at times right. I realized I wasn't brave [00:30:00] until going into my mid twenties when I really started getting bold about my faith and where I stood with things, instead of just being willing to kind of be a bit of a chameleon maybe.Where it was just like, you know, if that makes sense.
So like, yeah, it started it where I just knew that, Hey, like, this is who I am. This is what I believe. And I'm going to own that. And since I've done that, I've, I consider myself to be an individual that's brave because people were able to see that and I won't back down from it. Like I'm not going to be mean or harsh to anybody, but I'll make sure they know where I stand.
And it's spoken to far more people than I ever did before. When I was just adapting to the different situations I was in. Now, Alex Sanfilippo is a person who loves the Lord and wants to stand for what's right. And, at the end of the day, what I believe is my life is to love God and to love all people.
And when I think about that, everything that I do or all the bravery that may have my life, what makes me brave is being able to do that in a bold way every single day.
Alexis Newlin: [00:30:51] I love that. Thank you so much, Alex. And I will put all info to get ahold of you in the show notes. So people can look you up and connect with you.
Alex San Fillippo: [00:30:59] Okay. [00:31:00] Perfect. Alexis. Thank you so much. This was a blast. I really enjoyed being on here on your show.
Alexis Newlin: [00:31:03] Yeah, thank you.
Hey guys. Thanks so much for tuning in to my interview with Alex him. Felipo. Like I said, I loved getting to sit down and talk to him and he had so many awesome nuggets. To share in this interview. I love what he said about failure and not being afraid to fail. And I know for myself, that's something I'm afraid of doing. And it kind of keeps me from trying and the things that God has asked me to do or things that even just want to try.
And. Failure is not the end all be all. It's just another way to pivot, like he said to him is like you said, in the interview. So yeah. I love that piece. All right. Three things I'm going to ask you guys, as I always do, first ask is subscribed. If you want to be in the know about all things about the brave podcasts, you can go to www.apeachincali.com.
Go to contact us, click on that, put your email in and then boom, you are on the email list. Being on the [00:32:00] email list allows you to get the podcast a date early. You also find out about anything that's going on with the brave podcast. So that's my first ask for you. Second, is ratings. If you are loving what you're hearing. I love feedback. Feedback helps me know what is working off the show and things you want me to work on. It also helps other people find the show. So ratings are awesome. You were kind enough to do so I would love ratings from you. And then finally, share the podcast with a friend. If you hear something today that you absolutely love and you think could help another person.
Go on and share that podcast with them. That would be fantastic. Alright. Next week's guest. Is Dan Sauer. And so Dan is a fellow podcaster, so that's always fun to talk to other podcasters and he's a new podcast or like myself. So in our interview week out quite a bit about podcasting. So just give you a heads up about that, but you're going to love Dan and his love for Christ and his joy for podcasting. It's just a fun conversation that I had with him.
All right, guys. Thank you so much for tuning in. [00:33:00] And I'll see you next week Bye.