[Rob's note: This is a guest post by David Orlando Hincapie. David reached out to me a while back with a shared interest in Tim Ferriss blockbuster: The Four Hour Work Week. He Face-booked me last week, with photos of he and Tim, at the Four Hour Body launch party in Manhattan. I asked him, if he would share his story, of how he wound up partying with Tim. ]

Enter David

My phone rang and a message read, “Want to go to a Tim Ferris book launch party? Tuesday 8pm NYC.” It was Tito, of course it was. He always knows about these kinds of things; seminars, concerts, charities, you name it.

I offered the invitation to Mohammed. After all, I was at his close to finish property, which he had bought only months before, and was nearing conclusion.

“Bro, want to go to a book launch party in New York?” I asked.

“Book launch for who?” he replied.

“It’s Tim Ferriss, an author that I’ve followed for a few years. He demonstrates how to automate things in your everyday tasks and business while enjoying the simplicities life has to offer”, I told him with an optimistic tone.

“I don’t want to give you an answer yet, I still have homework, but I’ll let you know” Mohammed answered. After all, he was right, we had finals that week at Rutgers. My Economics classes and his dual major in Finance and Accounting weren’t exactly a walk in the park.

Either way I replied, “Nice. Alright, where at?”

It was Tuesday night, Mohammed wasn’t coming and Tito wasn’t here. “Where is this guy?”, I asked out loud and then proceeded to text him, “Donde andas?” ,which literally means, “Where are you walking?”, but in many Latin American countries is used as a means of saying, “Where are you?” or “Where you at?”.

I should be used to this, after two years and almost ten months, this is the norm. But it goes both ways, I’m usually late, my brother is too, and Tito, well he’s just Tito.

Who would have predicted that this business would have lasted for as long as it has. I mean, I haven’t had a romantic relationship that has lasted this long. But out of all the distresses, the agony and the frustration, this had grown to be a much more mature bond that was previously thought to be.

What was it that had brought us closer together? Maybe it was the cleaning or the constant oversight of each other’s work, or maybe the endless nights, when psychics, economics, astronomy, politics, and the future of civilization were discussed at two in the morning inside some empty cafeteria. Or just maybe, that before there were four and now the partnership consisted of only three.

After the man of the hour had finally showed up, we hopped into my sister’s hybrid. It had to be the hybrid, I mean it does around 45 miles per gallon and it’s a very comfortable. I guess that’s what I usually look for, no need to go from 0-60 mph in under 2 seconds, and have to fill it up with $60 worth of gas, or have a shiny logo in the front that basically means it’s the same car as the downgraded brand only worth $20,000 more.

The uneventful ride through I-95 North to Manhattan consisted of a brief conversation about the franchise, wikileaks and my appetite for public radio. We took the Lincoln Tunnel which was surprisingly empty and once in the city it only took a few turns and a drive through seventh street until Greenhouse.

It was a frigid night and the line extended around the corner of the club.

“This means waiting”, I said, “I hope they let us in with my book and your camera”, I added. He could not leave that camera. What began as a form of entertainment for him had now developed into a business that consisted of capturing images of voluptuous young women, national sporting events, and even family portraits.

Inside was packed. A myriad of yuppies stormed the club, some with expensive suits and others with high heel boots. Maybe it was the open bar feature that the club had been promoting for the event, or maybe they really liked Tim’s work. Either way, we took higher ground and waited for the show to begin.

A surprisingly fashionable Tim appeared in a high VIP booth that held an entourage and various owners of the venue. “Thank you so much for coming everyone, I really appreciate it”, said Tim, in his distinctive tone of voice.

I couldn’t believe it. Right there in front of me was the polyglot that held a Guiness world record in tango and did all these amazing things around the world and now he was talking to us. His fans.

A million things to say came to my mind and while Tim kept talking to us and saying how he had read every forty five thousand of his messages, I shouted, “What did I say?”, which apparently a few people including Tim found hilarious.

The extroverted gear kicked in and made me want to say something else. So, as he concluded in telling us that he would come down and greet us personally, I shouted, yet again, “Sign my book!”.

As he came down from the vip booth, he was surrounded by fans and six feet tall bodyguards, stopping for anybody that wanted a picture.

“Alright, here he comes!”, I said. I knew he had to come by us so I reached for the marker in my pocket and pointed at him. Tim looked confused, but proceeded to grab it. I pointed at my chest and signalled to sign it, which cracked him up.

“No, not me! The book! El libro!”, I shouted.

“The first edition! This is great!”, Tim said in a surprising manner and proceeded to sign the book.

The book read “Pura Vida” which is used in Costa Rica, as a way to express satisfaction or a means of saying, “very good”, or, “great”, and even to say, “thank you”.

He took a few pictures with us and proceeded to meet the rest of the awaiting fans.

“We have to speak to him!”, said Tito in a determined tone.

“Let’s just wait until there aren’t that many people surrounding him”, I replied.

Through out the night we met some interesting people. Financial guru, Ramit Sethi, was there, along with Christian Hudson, who was accompanied by a tall brunette. Daniel Huss who wasn’t famous, but was a huge fan of Tim’s work. Daniel, a young entrepreneur that had built a “muse” business helping college students ace test like the GMAT was about to go into a three month trip to Thailand. Nice.

After the mob of fans had left and Tim was ready to leave, I approached him and praised him for his unique people-charming skills and asked him various questions in Spanish and English.

“Tim, have you ever been to Colombia?”, asked Tito.

“Never, but I have been wanting to go for a long time”, Tim replied.

“You have to, it’s a beautiful country!”, I said.

“And your Spanish is not bad at all. How long did it take you to learn it?”, I asked really intrigued. After all, this guy knows fluent Japanese, Chinese, German and Spanish.

“Well, it took me about three years”, He confessed.

“And you have an accent! An Argentine accent!”, I quickly added.

“Yes, it’s a Porteño accent. I picked it up in Buenos Aires”

I told him that for some reason Argentinians were very cocky and thought of themselves to be better than everybody else. I shared the joke of the Argentinian, that while making love to his girlfriend, he made her yell out loud “Oh, God!”, which he then replied “Just call me Carlos”. I thought he found that humorous.

Either way, I must agree, they have excellent fútbol players.

“Hey, Tim, so when are you going to Colombia?” I asked.

“I don’t know, but tell you what, leave me your business card and when I’m ready, I’ll send you an email and we’ll go!”, Tim answered.

I proceeded to give him two, in case he lost one.

We took a few more photos with him and then proceeded to leave.
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David Orlando Hincapie has been living in the U.S. since the age of fourteen and against his efforts has kept a distinctive accent. David acquired a commercial cleaning franchise using only credit cards and has kept himself in business for nearly three years. Mexico is his favorite country to visit, especially for its gastronomy and the modesty of its people. David is currently finishing his undergraduate studies in Economics at Rutgers University. Although he seldom writes, he loves the power of words and is considering very deeply into writing a financial help book.  Reach out to David on Facebook here www.facebook.com/davidohincapie

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Rob: Speaking of Colombia. Kim and I are off to Cartagena for the New Years celebration. If you’ll be in the area- hit us up on FB or Twitter.

I hit a point where I just got tired of running into people who were taking a month off at a time. It seemed the further I got out of the U.S. the more I ran into these people. How were these people doing it? The answer is actually fairly short, (as most truths in life are) they DECIDED to!

I know what you’re thinking, “you don’t know my situation”, or, “I have a wife, kids and more importantly a job that would never let me do it”, I know I had that, too. “Oh yah, and…and…. I have a mortgage, a car payment and private school payment…..”, I know, I had those too…..and…and…. “what about my credit card payment and and….ya know the economy is in the toilet”. I know, I live in the same world as you do.

Any of that sound familiar? We all have (or have had) that kind of crap to deal with in our lives. But, the truth is that will NEVER change, unless we DECIDE to change it. In other words, make a choice, draw a line in the sand, get pissed if you need to, but do something to change it.

Kim and I made a list of every expense and decided what was worth keeping in our life and what wasn’t. We ruthlessly assigned a happiness index to each dollar we were spending. Before long, we came up with an overhead that was over 50% less! There was so much crap. We had no idea where it all came from. Don’t get me wrong. We still live pretty large. We just eliminated the things that weren’t serving us any longer.

Let’s put things in perspective here. We’ve got roughly 80 years to live on this planet. How much joy are you really getting out of paying 100 bucks a week for the gardener or the pool maintenance guy (insert your own low happiness index expense here). If you’re over the top in love with what a particular expense adds to your life- just keep it, but if you’re not, cut it out like a cancer. Your life is just too damn important.

Rome wasn’t built in a day. Start with a goal of taking two weeks off to travel. But, have a plan, (an intention) to be taking 1 month off to travel within in 3-5 years and NOT when you retire. Striking that balance between working hard now so that you can live a bigger life later, is not always so easy- I’ll readily admit that, but it is critical.

Kim and I have been blessed to lead this amazing life of world travel. And, yes, we’ve also been blessed (and probably lucky) to have the income to do it. But, don’t kid yourself, we worked hard to make it happen.

Here’s some real actionable tips that you can use to start your journey to taking a month off.

1. Look at every expense that doesn’t give you a happiness index of 10 or higher and cut it out.

2. Make a list of everything that you want to put in your dream life and decide how much it costs per month. Let’s say it will costs you $30,000 per month to live the fantasy. It probably won’t, but let’s think big. Calculate how much per day that would cost.

3. Create and sell an information product online to pay for your dream life. Using the above example of a dream life that costs $30,000 per month. If you work the math backwards, that means that you would have to sell an average of one $1,000 product per day to achieve that dream life. If you don’t believe you could ever do that, you’re probably right. But if you do believe that, you could do that- you’re probably right as well:). There are people, every single day, achieving that goal and more. I know because I’ve interviewed half of them for Jet Set Money.

This is all within your reach and totally possible. All you have to do is make the choice. Make a decision. The word decision comes from the Latin word incision (which means to cut off from). Cut yourself off from all options and make it happen!

In fact, if you’ve made it this far, it shows me that you’re serious. I want to acknowledge and reward you for that. As my gift, I’m going to let you try the first module of Jet Set Money for a buck. Here’s the link

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If anyone is going to be in Cartagena, Columbia during the holidays and want to ring in the New Year with us– just shoot us an email to heyjetset at gmail dot com.

I received a question last week (by video which I thought was very cool) and decided to answer it here in the blog.  Bobby is struggling with a lot of the same issues that many people are such as how do I find that thing that’s going to make me money to live the life I want?  I don’t have a bunch of time to go into great detail in this blog, because I’m literally on the way out the door to leave for Italy for Xmas and New Year (here’s where we’re going).  But, I did want to answer a few points.

What If I Don’t Have Anything I’m Super Passionate About?

Great question!  I speak a lot about doing what you love and monetizing it.  But, what if you just don’t have anything that you are ‘over the top nuts’ about?  Here’s what I would do.  There is a great guy named Adam Short who runs a site called Niche Profit Classroom.  The reason why I’m recommending this for you is because his system is entirely neutral as far as whether or not you love a particular niche.  It’s entirely based on math.  The math is very clear and very easy.  I interviewed him for Jet Set Money and was super impressed.  His program has over 150 videos (they’re short and amazing).  If you didn’t want to sign up for his program you could start by getting on his email list and he’ll send you a bunch of free videos that are of very high quality and content.  After I did my interview with him I created a niche site based on his system- My Positano Wedding.

Full Disclosure:  This is my affiliate link, if you sign up I get paid- Niche Profit Classroom

Here’s Another Option:

John Jonas has a site called Replace Myself.  John is a HUGE Four Hour Work Week guy.  He uses many of the same principals that Adam uses in the Niche Profit Classroom, but has one major twist.  His program is solely designed for your outsourcers to run everything.  John is the real deal and a totally cool, honest and ethical guy.  I currently have my two outsourcers taking his training and have had great results and a bunch of free time.

Full Disclosure:  This is my affiliate link, if you sign up I get paid- Replace Myself

One More Option:

There’s this great guy named Robert Murgatroyd who owns a website called Jet Set Life.…that was fun!  Last year I got really frustrated listening to all these people bragging about how much money they were making online and decided to do something about.  I decided to interview the leaders in online business (interviewing is how I personally learn best) and ask them how they did it.  I created a program that has 12 modules and goes right to the core to make this work (with or without having a passion for your niche).

Full Disclosure:  This is my own link, if you sign up  I will DEFINITELY get paid: Jet Set Money

Hope that helps.

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If anyone is in Florence, Italy over the holidays shoot me an email to connect at:  heyjetset@gmail.com

The following is guest post by Jonny Gibaud of JetSetEntrepreneur.com

Rob:

Hey Everybody,

We have been getting some amazing letters since we’ve been here in France – mostly congratulating us on our new product, but there was one letter in particular that really stood out for me.  I thought it was so cool that I asked him if I could post it and write a blog about it.  He agreed and here it is. Enjoy!

Hi Robert and Kimberly,

I think you guys are awesome and are very inspiring people.  Thank you, I wish you all the best in whatever you do.

You have inspired me to take a year out and pursuit the Jet Setting lifestyle starting with a 3 month stint in Thailand, then off to the Philippines and up through Vietnam.  I have a few ventures I will be pursuing while away including an Emergecy Food Storage business that can and is currently run from a laptop.

I am going to be documenting the experience through my blog JetSetEntrepreneur (hope you don’t mind the name) so who knows, maybe our paths will cross.

I will continue to be following you guys.  Have a great life.

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Its 3.11am as I write this post from a small farm building outside Athlone around an hour and a half’s drive from Dublin, Ireland. I have just made it back from the festival and fireworks that conclude the annual Tri-Fest here. Over the weekend thousands of competitors, of varying degrees of fitness, have competed in the town’s Triathlon to pit their strength against 2km of swimming, 40 km of cycling and 10km of running. This year a local lad , Sean Keane, came from the back to win the elite mens race in an impressive 1 hour 45 minutes. Some pictures from the event are posted on my blog at JetSetEntrepreneur.com.

I have been kindly asked by Robert to write a guest post for Jet Set Life describing a philosophy that was inspired by the likes of Robert and Kimberly of “Jet Set Life” and others such as Tim Ferriss of “The four hour workweek”.

The self coined Jet Set Entrepreneurship.

Who am I?

I am a 24 year old entrepreneur from Liverpool in the Uk.  I studied Industrial Design at university and previously had a design company called Nurtur which developed Mini BioSpheres named enu’s that encouraged school kids to learn about the ecology lifecycle. These are still being used in many schools across the Uk.  I closed that company in 2008 in order to pursuit a career in Project Management with the Swiss Engineering company Sulzer.  This went great for 18 months and I got to travel a fair bit, but the call of the entrepreneur was too great and so I handed in my notice and gave up my high paying and high position job in order to once again pursuit the life of an entrepreneur, this time as a jet setter.

So what is a Jet Set Entrepreneur?

By employing the effects of currency leveraging and combining them with the power of the internet for mass communication and outsourcing, Jet Set Entrepreneurs move their business out from the traditional office setting and structure and focus on a more exciting balance to business and lifestyle design abroad.

Jet Set Entrepreneurship vs traditional entrepreneurship.

Traditional entrepreneurship fundamentally focuses on having an office or base, filling that office or base with people in order to realize your idea and then trying to drive customers to your business/idea through direct advertising. The overheads associated with this approach are very high, usually requiring hefty bank loans and severely reduces the lifestyle quality of the entrepreneur as 14-16 hour days are typical and the risks are great.

The main focus of Jet Setting Entrepreneurship is on setting up and running low investment, non leveraged, cash generating ventures that are removed from an office, are run by temporary staff from around the world and focus on carefully benchmarked and targeted internet marketing.  These can all be overseen on the move from a laptop anywhere in the world and are core to freeing up the entrepreneur’s most valuable asset, their time, so that the can enjoy the adventure.

JSE focuses on five core concepts in order to cut the business fat and create lean, mean, cash generating machines that are free from the main constraints of typical business practice and give the entrepreneur the time and financial freedom to explore the world.

1. Reducing overhead drastically by moving or traveling to where living costs are low.

2. Using the power of the internet and outsourcing principles to remove the need to have an office and permanent high cost staff.

3. Outsourcing business activities to where labour costs are low, therefore, drastically reducing the cash flow burden.

4. Moving advertising solely online where customer targeting can be much more effective and flexible, and costs vs results can be effectively benchmarked.

5. Streamlining and automating their businesses so that the entrepreneur is removed from the business equation as soon as possible.

The Jet Set Entrepreneur 12 month trial

Starting September 11th 2009 I will be flying out to begin a 12 month experiment into the practicalities of Jet Set Entrepreneurship with the aim of continuing it indefinitely if successful.

The journey starts with a 3 month stint in Thailand moving on to the Philippines and up through Vietnam with plans for Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Argentina in the new year.

I will be documenting every aspect of my journey through JetSetEntrepreneur.com with advice and tips to inspire and encourage anyone interested in giving it a go. For those not interested in becoming a JSE there will be plenty of articles on lifestyle and business design, travel, living abroad and productivity as well as photos and videos from the road.

If you have enjoyed the Jet Set life, which I am sure you have, then I encourage you to check it out.

My thanks goes out to Robert and Kimberly for generously giving me a platform to describe Jet Set Entrepreneurship, for the inspiration and for the excellent material they produce at Jet Set Life.  I am sure you’ll agree we have all been inspired by these two great trend setters and I know we can expect to see more great material in the future. All the best to you both.

To all Jet Set Life’s readers, thanks for reading and I hope you will join me on my journey.

Today we have the pleasure of interviewing Keith Wolf from Virtual Appoint (virtualappoint.com). As many of you know I am a HUGE fan of outsourcing. Keith has taken outsourcing to a whole new level. He has identified (and fixed) a problem that most people encounter when they enter the world of outsourcing- making effective sales calls.

Let’s get right to the interview.

1) Keith, would you start out with a little background about you and the types of things that you have done prior to Virtual Appoint?

Sure, after graduating from the University of Texas, I started my career in market research at Procter & Gamble where I designed research studies to understand the market for various household consumer products. From there I joined Invisalign, where I was the second marketing person hired to join what was then a fledging start-up. The company was founded by two Stanford MBA’s and it went on to help revolutionize modern orthodontics by inventing a product category known as invisible orthodontics. It was at Invisalign that I was first exposed to the cost and efficiency benefits of outsourcing. It was 1999 and outsourcing call centers internationally was still a relatively new concept to most US companies. We were in the middle of Silicon Valley, yet through a combination of our company’s own international operations and outsourcing, we had call centers, manufacturing, marketing, and software development operations in Pakistan, Costa Rica, and Eastern Europe.

Following Invisalign, I studied at Harvard Business School. I vividly recall one prominent venture capitalist who guest lectured on campus saying that he would not invest in a company that did not have an outsourcing strategy. Fast forward 5 years – since business school I have been involved in two other companies that have outsourced everything from bookkeeping to manufacturing.

2) Why did you create Virtual Appoint?

My background has given me a unique perspective on what resources are available for companies that are looking to outsource. But the one service that I had never seen done well was cold calling. The argument that cold calling doesn’t work is an absolute myth. For those who have tried it, I would guess that it ranks up there with death and public speaking as an activity that they fear the most. But there’s no arguing that it works. It’s just a time and numbers game. Most people do not have enough time in the day and/or enough resources to engage in a successful cold calling campaign. Just like with direct mail, the success rate is relatively low on a per call basis, but if you’re smart, have great phone skills, and make enough calls, you will find prospects who value your product or service. Part of Virtual Appoint’s value is that we hire only the absolute best of the best in the industry. Our associates are well educated (most have their MBA’s), speak fluent English, and take the time to really understand a client’s business before we start making calls.

3) Why is outsourcing sales calls with your company different?

Virtual Appoint provides our clients with a higher level of personalized service and expertise in the cold calling market. We do this by not only screening for the best talent, but also by being extremely critical of the nuances of language and accents. Unfortunately, lower end international operations have trained US consumers to be leery of the small time delay before someone says “hello”. And we’ve all had the frustration of speaking with someone who we know is thousands of miles away – it’s impersonal and it’s frustrating. Virtual Appoint’s state of the art IT technology eliminates phone delays and our exhaustive hiring and training process removes the language and accent barriers.

But in these economic times, service is not enough – we’re also significantly less expensive than US-based business development companies. Our management team is US-based, so we’re able to engage our clients directly and understand their needs from a business perspective. But, our international operations give us cost advantages that simply cannot be matched domestically. I do not know of another provider anywhere that will help build your business with a graduate degree caliber staff for as little as $16/hour.

4) Would you give me a thumb nail sketch of how the Virtual Appoint process works?

Sure, the process is actually very simple. First, clients visit our website, where they create a profile and sign up for a block of hours for the month. This takes less than 3 minutes. Within 1 hour the client receives a call or email – whichever the client prefers – from a Virtual Appoint associate who will assess their needs. This typically includes a basic education on the client’s business and an introductory assessment of the project. We then set up a meeting for a comprehensive training where we can really dig into a client’s business and help them devise a plan for the cold call project. This can include generating a target list if they don’t already have one, writing a cold call script, and identifying key points to highlight with the target market. Once the calls begin, the client can log-in to their account at any point to view the results of calls that have been made. The goal of most campaigns is to set appointments for our clients so they can meet face to face with prospects. In those cases, we make an appointment in the client’s online calendar – clients can log-in to virtualappoint.com to view their appointments in real time. At the end of each business day we email clients a full report that highlights how many calls were made, the result of every call, and how many hours they have left in their account. If clients run out of hours, they can visit their online account to purchase more hours at any time.

5) What industries do you serve?

We serve a wide variety of industries – entrepreneurs in a variety of industries, advertising and public relations professionals, financial and insurance companies, internet marketing companies, IT companies, small business owners, the list goes on.

6) Who is a typical client?

Most clients come to us because they are looking for new and efficient ways to reach their target market. In a marketplace that’s being flooded every day with more print ads, more TV commercials, more of every form of advertising marketers can dream up, the need to engage customers in a verbal conversation – to really get in front of customers – is becoming exponentially more difficult. Our clients range from medium sized business owners looking to expand their businesses to independent sales reps who use us as their personal business development department. We really cater our services to our customers’ needs. At the end of the day, we’re in the customer service business – if we can help our clients, we will.

7) Does Virtual Appoint offer other services besides cold calling?

We do and while the cold calling aspect of our business seems to get the most attention because of its uniqueness, our virtual assistant services make up about 40% of our business. Our Virtual Appoint associates help clients with competitive and industry research, writing business plans, submitting expense reports, making travel arrangements, and any other service that does not require our physical presence.

8) What’s the oddest request you’ve received to date?

(laughs) Nothing too crazy yet. As long as it’s legal and in good taste, we’ll take it on. Although we did turn down one request from a prospective client who asked us to manage his Internet dating life. Some things just shouldn’t be outsourced!

9) Do you have plans to expand your service to other countries?

The US market is years from being tapped, but we do have our eyes set on UK, Canada, and Australia. As English speaking countries, they’re logical expansion targets.

10) What’s the best way for people to get in touch with you?

Just log on to Virtual Appoint and all our contact details are right there.

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If your interested in hearing more on outsourcing you can contact Keith at Virtual Appoint here or you can sign up for our Early Alert list here for our newest product Secrets of Successful Muses. We just finished an amazing interview on outsourcing a full time VA from the Philippines (not India) with John Jonas. It is AMAZING! If you want step to the front of the line and find out when that launches sign up below.

By far the most common question I receive is on Muse Creation and Development.  I’m a big believer in modeling successful people and reproducing their strategies.  If they can do it, I can do it, too.  It looks like I’ve found just the guy to model and he’s willing to share his secrets.  I recently sent out a Tweet asking “if anyone has a muse that truly requires less than four hours a week and makes six figures a year”.  Out of all the responses I received – I like Dale, of Pigtones.com, the best.  Dale’s muse hits all of the muse criteria so perfectly (i.e. online, automated and scalable, etc.).  So, without further ado (does anyone actually know what ado is?) let’s get right into it.

 Muses are such a pressing topic with our Jet Set Life audience that I decided to create a series on Muse Creation and Development.  I want to feature people who are really doing it.  People that get to live the life of their dreams by leveraging the two most powerful currencies, time and money.  The Four Hour Work Week is very clear that with these two currencies all other things are possible and without them, nothing is possible.  So, let’s get right into it.  I would like to start from the beginning (muse creation) and go right up to where you are currently (muse development).

Before we jump into the questions, tell us a little about yourself, including what you were doing before you created your muse. 

I have always been a serial entrepreneur.  I have started and ran 13 different businesses.  Some successfully, some not so successfully.  But my most successful one (before the muse) was my last one. It was a real estate company that I built up and took public in 2003; it focused soley on buying non-performing mortages from banks.  I was the CEO for 5 yrs before leaving in December of 2007. 

I left because my wife and I were getting ready to have our first daughter, she was only a few months away.  The 80-100 hour work-week for the CEO of a public company was grueling and no place I wanted to be when I had a new daughter.

I had read a book that previous summer called The 4 Hour Work Week, by Tim Ferriss, and it fundamentally changed the way I looked at business.  Before, it was all about trying to get the biggest company or make the most money, because somehow that was to translate into freedom at some unspecified future point.  I knew I was no where near there yet.  I had to totally reevaluate my life.  In December of that year I decided to leave the company that I had built (and took public) and put it in the hands of  a new CEO and the largest hedge fund investors.  I really didn’t know what I was going to do, but I thought I had about 3-4 months until my daughter was born to figure it out.

[Rob: I did an interview with Tim Ferriss of the Four Hour Work Week here which maybe useful in understanding Dale's thought process and some of the terms used in this post.]

 1) That’s a great story and one that we can all learn from – waiting for that big pile of cash at the end of our lives isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.  I understand that P.I.G.TONES is an online business that allows you to change the voice of your GPS system in your car.  Is this something that you came up with or has this been in existence for a while?

On December 31, 2007, a friend of mine and I were driving from Idaho back to Dallas, Texas.  It was snowing like crazy in the mountains of Colorado and it was about four o’clock in the morning.

We couldn’t see the road ahead and the mountain pass was closed behind us, but we had a brand new GPS from under the Xmas tree.  We had zoomed in so much that we could see the twisting turns in the road ahead and it helped us drive through the total white out.  In the exhaustion and the unreality of the situation, we imagined different voices coming out of the GPS, including the voice of GOD, as a humorous voice, asking us what we were doing up on the mountain in those conditions.  We managed to survive the trip and the next day when we were relating our trip to our friends, we told them about the funny voices we imagined hearing from the GPS.  We thought it would be cool if we could change the voices on the GPS to something funny.

 I began research on Jan 2^nd and after about 3 days of research I determined there was a viable market with no one doing it for Garmin and only a few sites for Tom Tom.  I launched into a week long research project to see how we could do it and whether or not it was really a viable market.  At the end of the week I determined it was open territory, the market was ripe, nothing existed yet, and there was a demand.  I wrote out a 32 page business plan so I would have a reference to look back on and see if I was on track.  And away we went.

2) Why did you choose this particular model as your muse – in other words, were there certain criteria that were musts for you in selecting your muse?

Having previous experience running several businesses (and being a CEO for a publicly traded company), I have a pretty good idea what needs to be in place for me to take a run at it.  I determined that the market fit several of my core criteria:

1. The market was huge.  Over a 10 year period GPS sales were significantly increasing and in December of 2007 several important bench marks had been attained:

        a.     The market reached a market size similar to cell phones (back when ring tones started to become popular).

        b.     The GPS was the number one requested electronic device for the Xmas season in 2007.

        c.     There was very little competition.

        d.     It could be created, hosted and delivered online with no physical product (one of my top criteria).

        e.     I determined that the voices could be created  by other people (this was important since I didn’t know anything about audio production). I also determined that all the editing could be outsourced as well.

2.     It had an existing model already out there.  Ringtones were a huge money maker for many people and are still downloaded by the millions.  So, I saw that the customization of electronics were a hot product.

 3) Having a truly automated (and scalable) business is critical in setting up a great muse.  Could you describe for us the automation process in finding all those great voices we see on your site as well as the process in having them ready for download and sale?

One of the most important things we wanted was to have an automated business.  After creating the first eight voices we realized that we had established a system.  We mapped it out, assigned the process points to people, figured out where we had to interject ourselves and under what circumstances.  Our process is not simple, but it is well mapped out now.  Since the end goal is to create a new voice at least once per month, we send a survey for voice suggestions (including a space to write in your favorite) to our customers.  We get the survey back and pick the top 2 and send those to our audio guy.  He submits the character voices to an audition process, picks the top voices and sends a script to the voice talent.  The script is written by him (and his wife) and is submitted to us for additional lines or funny things we might want to add.  If he doesn’t hear anything from us in 48 hours he goes ahead with it.  From there the audio is sent to the sound engineer who has a very complex process to cut and modify it to fit the software requirements.  We actually had to have a piece of custom software written for us to be able to even create the voice.  At that point he runs it through the software program and we have a finished voice.  It is then posted to the site and an email that fits the “character” that we created  goes out to our list as well as creating new blog posts, etc.  The site handles the delivery of the product via electronic delivery through our shopping cart (1shoppingcart.com).  Support is assigned to a single person who we pay less than $250 a month.   We also have outsourced someone to do the blogs and the videos for the products.

The only things that I do now are:

 ·      Check the script going to the talent for additional lines that I think should be included.

·       Check the accounting monthly.  

·       Send out the survey asking for new voice ideas.

·       Enjoy the cash flow!

  4) Was it difficult to get cooperation from the big companies in the GPS world like Tom Tom and Garmin?

Actually, Tom Tom allows users to create voices, but it’s not easy.  There is no need to get their permission.

Garmin, however, made it almost impossible.  They didn’t want anyone mucking around with their software/hardware.  We actually had to take apart several Garmins, reverse engineer them to be able to figure out how they made the voices.  Then we had a custom piece of software written for us to make the voice.  Since I didn’t know any of the tech stuff, I had to find people who were capable of overcoming the technical hurdles.  The funniest part is Garmin recently contacted us and said they loved the site and were actually impressed that we broke through their protections and created something fun and funny.  It actually earned their respect and they recently even decided to let us use their software as a test to see what we could do with it.  Our site caused them to start developing voices for the Garmins as an experiment.  Our early attempts to contact them made it clear that they really didn’t have anyone for us to talk to when we initially began this process. So, we did it any way.

  5) What would you say was the biggest obstacle in getting your muse up and running?

I would have to say, without a doubt, knowing absolutely nothing about:

1.     The tech of the GPS.

2.     Anything internet marketing related.

3.     Websites, Adwords, etc.

I had been a Commercial Diver in Alaska, a Commercial Fisherman, a Landlord, a Repo-Man/Bill Collector, a Real Estate Investor and CEO of a public company.  I didn’t have any tech background other than my constant use of computers.

Knowing nothing forced me to think in terms of systems and delegation.

The one thing I did have to do was- totally- commit myself to the idea.

I locked myself in an office for 45 days and just read everything that I could get my hands on about internet marketing.  There were not many exact models out there that I could copy.  In fact, much of what I read was about creating an information product and being a guru.  This is not guru stuff. I focused on what did work and let go of anything that was in the “supposed to work”  sections.  I also have a principal that I operate from that helps me with the obstacles:  failure is part of the process.

Anything that I engage in, I go into it  KNOWING that I will fail at various aspects of it.  I just like to get those aspects out of the way as fast as I can so that I can get to the fun and successful parts.  Obstacles are there to trim off all the things that don’t work.  

 6) Knowing what you know now, what would you differently?

If I had to start over I would do 2 things differently:

1.     Hire some really good talent in traffic generation on the internet (adwords, paid search, content networks).

2.     I would have showed up on Garmin’s door and bugged them until they gave me a sit down meeting.  It would have saved me having to reinvent the wheel with all the costs and time that were associated with that.

Those 2 things would have saved me about 75% of what I did spend and it would have sped up our launch and ramped us up considerably.

7) Let’s talk about testing the muse.  Would you describe for us what that process was like?  In other words, did you use Adwords and if so, what was your click through rate like and what have you learned from that process?

When we were in the testing phase we didn’t know anything about adwords.  Our first month we spent $5K in adwords and had $800 in sales.  Pretty dismal.  We were bidding way too high on keywords we thought would bring the traffic.  We got traffic, but no one was buying, which really meant we were getting the wrong kind of traffic.  We threw a lot at the wall and wanted to see what would stick.

Our next month we did $3K in adwords and had $2500 in sales.

What we learned was a couple key things:

1.     Optimize your page for the words you are bidding on.  It brought our bids down from $1 a click, to .22 cents a click.  A huge step in the right direction.

2.     We no longer target the word Garmin.  Although there is a HUGE amount of traffic for that one keyword, we found most people were looking to buy Garmin GPS units.  They were not searching for what we had to sell.  We had to get more specific in our keywords.

3.     We tried a bunch of voices we thought people would like.  The first time we asked our customers what they would like, they told us. We created that voice and in 1 month that 1 voice outsold everything we ever did prior.  It was amazing.  We stopped thinking we were funny, or knew what people would want.  In fact, we never actually used a voice that we came up with.  We simply ask our customers now and give them exactly what they are asking for.  So simple it slipped our minds for months.  Huge lesson there.

8) Do you own any other muses?  If so, would you describe them?

I have been creating one recently and just made it live last week.  This one is a 52 week course in a specific niche.  Something that I discovered a few years ago, there is very little good or reliable information out there.  It’s what I wished I had when I started business.

It’s a 12 month membership course that’s all about how to raise money, where to find it, how to get it, how to get the funding for start-ups, or growing a business.  I have raised a little over $90 million in the last 15 yrs for my projects and companies.  And it’s a huge secret how to do it correctly, or seems that way.  It’s kind of like an insiders only club of people who know how to do it.  If you want to grow a company to a huge size, or start one, you need capital.  So few people really know how to do it.  I got some of my friends to get together with me and develop this course.  Everyone, from a guy who buys and sells public companies, to professional money raisers, to SEC attorneys and professional investors.  It’s a good group and we are developing some great stuff.  This is more a passion of mine and I mostly do it simply, because it’s fun.  We are only allowing a limited number of people on the site at a time, because I don’t want it to eat up too much of my time.  The ideas we have put together on how to raise money I haven’t seen anywhere else.  It’s just fantastic insider stuff.  I know I personally have paid over $100K  a year to professionals to come and help me raise money, so I know the value of the information we are giving.  Since it is insider type info, I called the site www.raisingcapitalsecrets.com, an excellent  place to start.

 9) What was your work life like before setting up P.I.G.TONES and what is like now?

Just prior to starting P.I.G.TONES, as I mentioned, I was easily doing an 80-100hr work-week as a CEO of a public company.  It was just too much time.  After reading Tim’s book, I had to reassess my life.  When I was younger I spent almost 7 years traveling and playing – I loved it!  But I was broke most of that time.  The reason I got into real estate was so I could have passive income.  What a joke.  Real estate is NOT passive if you really want to be successful.  As I’m sure a lot of people are discovering in these hard times.  But the lure of the carrot was out there and I continued to build up my real estate holdings and even took a company public doing it.

I waited until I was 38 to have a baby .  I was ecstatic and just couldn’t wait to be a father.  There was just no way I could spend time with my daughter working as many hours as I did.  After reading The 4 Hour Work Week, I reevaluated my whole life and decided that I didn’t want to be like so many older people that I know.  The ones who say, “kids grow up so fast and I missed so much of it”, that was the single driving force in developing my muse.  I also realized that:

1.     It was possible, therefore, I could do it.

2.     It was critical for me to be able spend time with my daughter.

I reevaluated and re-engineered my life to make way for a new baby.

I now work from the house, but mostly I get to hang out with my wife and my daughter.  Perfect.

10) What was your first month of income like and what is it like now?

Well, since I had left my job as CEO and my wife was no longer working as a Pharmacist, our income went to zero.  So, it was critical to make this work.  There was no “going back”.

As I mentioned before, we had a negative cash flow for the first couple months.  However, on month 3 we had about $6500 in income and about $2k in expenses.  From there it went to about $8K a month, same expenses (mostly adwords expenses) till it reached $10K, in month 5 it jumped to $15K then to over $20K.  We had to keep our expenses low.  The cost of voices, the cost of accounting, the cost of support and Ad Words, our expenses were coming to just over $3K a month.  The time spent on it has dropped as well from an all out 40+hour week to just a few hours per week.  There are weeks when I won’t even look at the site.  Our support is simple.  If any one has a problem that support can’t fix or they are unhappy for any reason, we simply refund them.  Period.  If we can make them happy by giving them an extra voice or 2, great.  We love testimonials and even have one from a Vice President of Google.   After receiving a testimonial, we usually send a couple voices as a thank you gift.

The site consistently does over $20K a month now and we are just getting ready to revamp the site, as well as come out with a new product.  A “recording of your own voice” product where we will let the customers make their own voice and if it’s good we will sell it and share in the revenue with them.  This should be out in about 2 weeks.

11) What advise would you give someone who says “I don’t even know where to begin to select my product”?

Someone once told me, “look for a hungry crowd”.  I didn’t really understand that until P.I.G.TONES.  I had always dealt in necessity (real estate:  people need a place to live) rather than a group that wanted something.  When I mentioned the idea to people, I kept getting almost the same response, “Wow, I love that idea” or “Can you do X actor”.  Everyone thought it was a no brainer.  

I say if you are starting out, develop the skills to sell something online.  Try selling some other person’s stuff.  See if you can master that. Then creating your own product simply becomes:  find the hungry crowd and feed them.  It’s easy to feed a hungry crowd.

The next step is to put yourself in the place of a consumer.  What do you LOVE to consume (and sell that).

Or, as I am doing with the new site, sell your expertise.  I know how to raise money.  It’s easy for me.  There are people out there who would love to know how I do it and would happily pay to know.  I know I did.

 12) Are there any resources you would recommend?  Things that helped you out?

Yes there are:

1.     If you don’t understand business, go read anything by Peter Drucker.

2.     I would recommend The 4 Hour Work Week by Tim Ferris, excellent book for change of mindset.  It’s only ok on the “how to”, but great on the “why to” parts.  Life is far more important than work.  Design your life around what you would like to do and it can happen.

3.     For internet learning I would recommend 2 things:

        a.     The Internet Business Mastery Podcast by Sterling and Jay.  Absolutely right on excellent stuff, both in the “how to” category and the “why to” category.  They have a number of podcasts stretching back a few years.  Made my driving to work an excellent place to start thinking about this stuff.

       b.     NitroMarketing’s the Nitro Blueprint.  Just an excellent 10 step course on getting a muse up from the scratch.  Good stuff.  I used most of it for P.I.G.TONES (everything, but the specific product development).

12) What’s next for Dale?

Well, my daughter takes center stage, so obviously that.  Since I never could sit still, I am going to be taking up flying and ultra light flying.  I’m looking into that now. 

P.I.G.TONES is in negotiations with some top Hollywood talent to start producing voices.   Secret stuff I can’t tell you about until we complete the negotiations.

www.raisingcapitalsecrets.com is coming along nicely and should be up for some big advertisement we plan on starting in the next month or so.

One of the biggest things I have realized is that I can spot trends and I can act on them.  I am thinking of going into publishing people and their muse.  I have been toying with the idea of a back office support network to muse development for other people, sort of like a muse incubator if you will.  Let them come up with the content and product idea and I can help take it to market.  I’m exploring that now.

Another project that I had put on hold when my daughter was born, was the development of several private islands in Belize.  Some time next year when my daughter is a bit older, my wife and I will pick that project up since we love it.  We will see where it leads.  Well, I hope that helps.  Anything you imagine you could do.  Why not?  Could be fun!

Rob: Dale, thank you so much for your candor and willingness to share everything you did in this interview.  What’s the best way for someone to get in touch with you?  ”They can reach me at Dale@pigtones.com.”  Great.  Thanks again for this interview.

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We’re off to South Beach tomorrow for some sunshine and parties!  If you want to follow our updates in Miami (or around the globe) follow Rob and Kim on Twitter  here.

Winter is approaching in North America which means summer is on its way for the New Jet Set. With our muses locked and loaded, virtual assistants and outsources on auto pilot- it’s time to party! Most of my peeps head south of the Equator this time of year to enjoy long summer days. While our muses are ticking away in all their outsourced glory we’re keeping the sun shining. Last year it was Punta- this year it’s Buenos Aires, then on to Rio for the New Year’s parties. Wintering like old money!

Anyone who has ever seen these South American beauties up close understands when I say avoid standing next to them on the beach if you can help it (see above photo). Their bodies are slammin’! This year, in an effort towards leveling the playing field, I took a totally different approach to getting the cream cheese off me. I decided to apply the 80/20 principle to create the beach body I wanted. I had to face the fact that my high school bench pressing strategy was making me look more like Fabio than Beckham.

The 80/20 principle (or rule as it is often referred to) was developed by Richard Koch and made even more famous by Tim Ferriss of the Four Hour Work Week fame. What it says in a nutshell is that 4/5 of what you do to achieve something is largely irrelevant.  A small number of your inputs or efforts usually leads to a majority of your results. 80% of what we achieve on our jobs comes from 20% of our efforts. You can take this principle to the extreme. 20% of the clothes you wear will be worn 80% of the time. 20% of your carpet will wear out more than the other 80%. You get the idea. The fact is it’s hard to STOP doing 4/5 of what you are doing. My regime of back and biceps on Monday and chest and triceps on Tuesday etc- was largely irrelevant to creating what I was after.

After a bunch of micro testing (including training and running a full marathon) I think I have the 20% of actions (as it relates to my body) that I need to do to keep me in the game. Here’s my list- I thought you might find it helpful.

1. Do P90X 6 days per week.

2. Perform each workout at a perceived intensity level of 7 or higher.

3. Do it in the morning when you’re fresh. You’ll need the energy. Really.

4. Eliminate white flour (including bread) between Mon and Sat.

5. Eat ANYTHING you want ALL DAY on Sunday. Really!

*Cheat Day Rule – You’re only eligible to participate in the Roman all day eat-a-thon festivities if you did the scheduled P90X workouts the previous 6 consecutive days and ate a clean diet.

45 Day P90X Update:

I’m half way (45 days) into my 90 day P90X experiment. Here are the photo’s.

This photo was taken at Day 0 (I call this one Blob-O)

This photo was taken at Day 45 (half way mark)

Ok. Not exactly David Beckham, but definitely better than the blob-o (above photo). In 45 days and only doing the 20% that made a difference, I was able to achieve way more than I ever had when I was spending countless days at the gym like Rambo or running like Forest Gump.

45 Days left and counting…to be continued…

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We are in the process of coordinating a list of best Jet Set Travel Resources. If you have one to share please comment below.

To follow Rob in real time click here

Every once in a while something happens that makes you say Holy Sh** Balls! This is the first of a two part post. Part I will cover “You’ve been invited to A Small World” and part II will cover “Tim Ferriss is on the phone”. As you’ll see the two are strangely linked together in some sort of weird cosmic way. Here’s part I:

Kim and I were taking a mini-retirement to Punta Del Este to shoot this video for Jet Set Life. It was New Years Eve morning and we were having our breakfast on the outside veranda of this great Posada on the ocean in La Barra. We were chatting it up with a few people (who were part of a group of 500 that were flown in from Manhattan to attend the wedding of a very wealthy Argentinian business man’s daughter) and they were asking us if we were going to the ‘A Small World‘ private party tonight (they must have thought we were part of the wedding entourage). I said “No, we’re not going but what’s ASW?” After obviously (but unknowingly) outing myself I received sort of vague and cryptic answers from that point on about what ASW was and how it worked. From what I was able to piece together from Wikipedia (after a short and very jealous rage which was followed by a brief pity party) was that ASW was an ‘exclusive-invitation only online social network that included people with large personal networks, frequent travelers, highly active personal lives, royalty, film directors, and musicians to name a few. Also, that only some members have the right to invite others and you are not allowed to discuss the inner goings-on of a small world on any website, and doing so may result in internal exile to “A Big World“.

*My C.Y.A.(cover your ass) Disclaimer- It is NOT the intention of this post to talk any further about this secret society except to say “I wanted in”!

After my privileged new friends had moved on (to presumably some other ‘in the know’ spots in Punta) I sat with my ‘large world’ , the ocean and my thoughts for a few minutes. Then, I decided- why not me? I grabbed a cup of coffee, my favorite pen, my moleskin notebook and listed out my intentions for the coming year. I’m a fan of the Zen Habits site who teaches you to focus on just a few goals you really want and focus on making them happen. So, I set just two clear goals for 2008.

Goal 1- Get invited to A Small World

Goal 2- Meet Author Tim Ferriss

Well,10 months had past since setting those goals and absolutely nothing had happened. I had literally met and asked 10 ASW members (which I’ve met on my travels for Jet Set Life) for an invitation and regularly received the same answer- “wish I could help you but I don’t have any invitations to give”. As far as meeting Tim Ferriss was concerned it seemed that the closest I was getting to him was the 17 copies of his book I had on my desks (home and office), ipod, Amazon Kindle and iPhone (to name a few) and his egg video on you tube. It seemed that no matter how hard I ‘pushed’ – Nothing!

It was “wine Wednesday” (a weekly ritual that Kim and I have to celebrate the middle of the week with a great bottle of wine) and it was also the day after my birthday. My executive assistant had called to let me know that I only had one e-mail to handle that wasn’t covered by my rules (I really do practice what I preach and have a sub assistant in India and an executive assistant in North America to process my in-box). There was one message saying that I received an invitation to a small world. From who, where, why, how???

As it turned out there was a really great guy that had been following Jet Set Life and just thought we should be invited. It was as simple as that. No pushing, no begging, just a nice guy that said ‘I’m happy to do it for you’. Talk about the universe giving you what you ask for. Goal 1- Accomplished. Boom. Just like that! Maybe those crazy hippies in the Secret were on to something. Ok, so you may ask “What’s that got to do with Tim Ferriss?” I’m getting to that- right now.

With my new ASW invitation in my hot little hand- I tucked my daughter Demi in for the night (as is my daily alternating daddy duty- Kim gets the reverse nights) and I hear the phone ringing in the background. Kim answered it and I jumped into the little boy’s room. The next thing I know a swat team opens the bathroom door (it was really just Kim but in my defense there was a lot of commotion) and announces ‘you have a phone call’ (with this sort of sh** eating grin) and hands me the phone. I gave here a weird lingering slow motion eye squint followed by a quizzical stare as if to say this couldn’t wait 8 more seconds for me to come out of the bathroom (did the person on the other end of the phone really need to hear me flush- a fact that later will turn out to be most embarrassing).

I said, “Hello?”… “Robert?” said the voice on the line. “Umm Yes.” I replied. “This is Tim Ferriss Happy Belated Birthday!”…..

Are you F&*%$ kidding me! It seemed that Kim used her magic girl powers to make this happen (which BTW she’s still not telling me- or you- how she did, so don’t bother asking her). Two random goals completely ‘unrelated’ to each other happened in the span of just five minutes. Synchronicity? Who cares! It happened and I am forever grateful to ALL the powers that played a role! What proceeded was an amazing phone call from an incredible man who is truly changing people’s lives. In my next post I’ll tell you how the phone call went.

Part 2 Teaser Alert….Kim had asked if I could interview him for this blog. In true Tim Ferriss fashion he said he doesn’t give interviews to bloggers -but- he would make a special exception, as long as the following three conditions were met:

1-  I could only ask three questions.

2- The questions could never have been asked before and must be interesting.

3- The questions must be asked right now i.e. (I wasn’t allowed to schedule it when I was better prepared- recall the above ‘I was just in the bathroom story’).

Let’s just say it was an experience I’ll never forget….to be continued…..

Now, I’m off to New England for a few days to see what autumn really looks like….

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Follow Rob in real time here.

We all know about outsourcing to India, Croatia etc., but what we don’t know is who is on the other side of the phone, instant message or e-mail. Maybe it’s not that important to some, but after beginning my quest to outsource my muse, I got to thinking- who is this guy in India that’s up at 2a.m. working on my stuff? Where does he hang out? Does he watch Bollywood movies? The following is an interview with Bhupendra Singh Kunwar (yes, I can say it and no, he doesn’t call himself Tom Smith).

Where do you live?
I live in New Delhi, India

Are you married? Kids?
I’m single.

Please describe your background and training?
I hold a Bachelor’s degree in Arts and Humanities, as I had a deep interest in web design and programming. I do not hold any degree/certificate in Computer Education. I learned through my experiences over the last 6 years.

Do you own your own company or work for someone else?
I am somewhere between the above two categories. I have been employed (with other companies) for the past 5.5 years but since April of this year, I’m self-employed and plan to open my own company in a couple of months.

Do you use any other companies other than e-lance for work? If so which ones?
No. Apart from e-lance, I work on my own projects.

What type of projects do you enjoy working on?
I enjoy projects related to S.E.O., Web Development (PHP based) and Web Designing.

Would you say that you could earn a better living working through companies like e-lance, than you could by working for Indian companies?
Definitely, workplaces like e-lance certainly give more earnings than working for a typical computer company in India. In addition, you have the choice to do the projects you like [with e-lance].

Do you find yourself working odd hours so you can communicate with those in the US?
Yes, due to different time zones, I have to work odd hours especially with buyers in the US. We can communicate by email to avoid odd-hour working, but at times instant messaging/chat is essential for the quick and smoother delivery of projects. Nonetheless, I feel more comfortable working late at night than I do in the day hours.

Do you work out of your home or in an office building setting?
I work from home.

When a client awards you a job, do you do the work yourself or do you delegate it to other people?
In 90% of the cases I do the job myself. If I feel overloaded, I’ll get some help from others.

Which country provides you with most of your work?
The U.S. and U.K.

When working with Americans what do you like most and what do you like least (be honest)?
Like the most: Clarity in communication and quick payments
Like the least: Not very concerned about quality (perhaps they aren’t aware that things could be done better) and it seems that they are technically less skilled (which sometimes results in me having to explain every bit to the buyer through long emails, charts, diagrams etc.).

What language is spoken in your home?
Hindi.

What languages do you speak?
English & Hindi.

I understand that English is widely spoken in India- what would you say are the biggest obstacles (if any) when communicating in English to Americans?
When it comes to written communication I don’t feel that there are any obstacles, but when it comes to voice communication (like talking with an American over the phone) the different accent of the Americans does influence and cause an obstacle at the early stages.

I notice that Indians adopt American names- what’s your feeling on that practice?
Yes, it’s true that Indians adopt American names. The good part of this practice lies in the fact that Indian names are difficult to pronounce or spell for the American or British people. In fact, the names of several places within India were changed during the British rule for that very reason. I have also observed that many Indians who migrate to the United States adopt similar American sounding names. In principle, I do not favor this practice and never have “changed my name”.

Would you sketch out a typical day (just the every day stuff)?
My day generally begins at 10 am
11 am:           Breakfast at the dining table

11.30 am:      My work hours start

2.30 pm:        Lunch at the dining table

3.30 pm:        Back at my work table

6.00-9pm       Break from work- with family/out for a walk/television

9.30 pm         Dinner at the dining table

10.30pm – 2.30 am      Second work shift

On the last Saturday night out, where did you go? What did you do?
On Saturday [or weekends] I’m generally with friends, out for a movie or maybe at a bar/restaurant. Though, I don’t drink, I do enjoy the company of friends and the chit-chat. If there is any long weekend or holiday, I may trek out on a Himalayan tour.

Trekking on a Himalayan tour?
I love trekking through the Himalayas. Photography being my other passion, it gives me double pleasure to conquer the treks and capture the unspoiled beauty of nature through my camera. Some of the treks I would like to visit again include the world famous Valley of Flowers and Auli (Skiing destination). Other favorite Himalayan encounters include boating in the grand Nainital Lake and rafting over the Holy Ganges. You may find the photos that I collected during my journey at here (Except for the album titled “Member’s Contribution”, I own all other albums to my credit on this website).

Do you get together with friends and watch sports? If so, where do you watch the games? At home? At a bar? Which sports do you like?
I do get together with friends on weekends [I normally avoid watching sports] but when I do- I prefer watching Cricket at a bar.

Do you enjoy watching Bollywood movies and if so what’s your favorite movie and who is your favorite male and female actors?

Yes, I do watch Bollywood movies.

My favorite movie is: “Rang De Basanti”.
Favorite Actor: Aamir Khan
Favorite Actoress: Tabbu

Last year there was a big political controversy when the American actor Richard Gere had a public kiss with an Indian Actress? What was the talk like in India and what are your personal thoughts on it. It’s a silly question I know, but there is just such a broad difference between American and Indian social cultures that I thought it would be interesting to hear thoughts from a local.

This controversy was bricked politically while it hasn’t gathered any special attention from the general public. The issue was highly raised and objected by some of the political/social groups to gather unnecessary attention.

Personally, I see it no more than propaganda to make a mountain out of a molehill. Though, I am also a conservative Indian, but I don’t see it as objectionable to make a controversy out of it. There were times when people used to object to girls wearing jeans and mini skirts in India!

What’s your favorite American import i.e. Hollywood movies, Coca Cola, etc.
My favorite American import is my Intel powered PC.

Are there any other projects you’re working on now (outside of what you do with e-lance) that you would like to share?
I am planning to launch a B2B travel portal in India which will offer services to travel houses, tour operators and the hospitality sector to e-nable them, making the use of Internet to reach directly to their customers/prospects. Currently, the tourism and hospitality sectors in India hugely rely on travel agents (most of whom operate offline).

Besides this, I am the founder of a regional community website euttaranchal which offers information about Uttarakhand (a Himalayan state in India) and connects the people of the state worldwide through this platform. The website has been running since 2003 and offers completely free matrimonial services as well.

Lastly, would you give us a lesson in Hindi and teach us how to properly pronounce your Indian name?
Sure. Bhupendra could be pronounced as:

Bhu as Bhoe (pronounce it similar to Shoe)
pen as “pain”
dra as dra in “hydra”

My Family calls me Bibu (Bi as Bee & bu as boo)
My Friends call me Bhupi (Bhu as Bhu in Bhupendra & pi as pea)

What’s the best way for someone to get in contact with you?
The best way is through my personal website www.bhupendrakunwar.com

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I thought you might find this interesting as well. It seems that even Snoop wants “in” on India. Check out his new bollywood video- Snoop goes bollywood…

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On another note. We have been receiving a lot of requests for blog interviews. We will be doing only five (as it’s not easily scalable) if you’re interested please send us an email to heyjetset@gmail.com or you can leave a message here.

I’m a huge fan of the Four Hour Work Week and particularly of the dreamlining process. What is the dreamlining process you ask? Only the best way to live the life of your dreams-that’s all! The best way to get the DL on this is to get the book and read the chapter on dreamlining. For now the simplest way to describe it- is a place to record everything you want to have, be or do over the next 6 to 12 month

Here’s the catch. This is NOT the place for all your business goals or your new years eve resolutions. This IS the spot for you to record what you would actually do day to day with your life if you had 100 million in the bank.  In other words, if you woke up tomorrow morning, checked your ATM and it said “you’re rich go have fun”- what would you do? Tim Ferriss: “Dreamlining focuses on activities that will fill the vacuum created when work is removed. Living like a millionaire requires doing interesting things and not just owning enviable things.”

I promise you it’s way easier to set goals like make a million bucks, loose 10 pounds or spend more time with the family. You need to dig way deeper. When you first do this (and I really do hope you’ll give it a shot) you’ll likely say to yourself,  “If I actually had the 100 million dollars I would know exactly what I would do.” But chances are, once you have the pen in hand, you’ll draw a blank. So sit, with a glass of wine and a clear head and answer this question: “If I had 100 million dollars in the bank right now what would I want to do, be or have over the next 12 months?

I have lots of rich friends and this question wound up pissing them off. Really. It’s happened. There’s nothing worse for them than to work their ass off around the clock, get a few bucks in the bank and realize that they’re living boring ass lives, just chasing the almighty dollar so that someday they can ________. Problem was, they didn’t actually know what to fill that _______ (blank) with. If you can’t actually define what you’ll do with your life when you achieve X -the mark just keeps moving and you slip into hell (working for work sake). And, in Tim speak you wind up being the fat guy in the BMW.

Here’s the part of this whole thing that will blow your mind. This worksheet that you can get here (brilliantly put together by Jared from Technotheory which, BTW is an outstanding blog that I read all the time) actually quantifies your dreams with dollar amounts in a well put together and easy to use Excel spread sheet.

You’ll be shocked by two things. Many of the items on your list won’t cost much at all (learn a foreign language, try rock climbing, become an author, etc.) and it will cost way less then you think to live the entire Dreamline. In fact most people find that somewhere around $7,500 per month can do the trick (although mine happens to be about $20,000). The game then becomes finding a four hour per week muse to create the money you need to live out the Dreamline (that’s a subject for another day and another blog). The HARDEST part is coming up with what to put in those little boxes (that cursor will be blinking a long time if this is done in earnest). I know it’s sound crazy but just try it -you’ll see what I mean.

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Ok-  I know people are going to have a tough time with this and need some references to look at. So, if you think you got this nailed please send me an email with your dreamline (the excel spread sheet) to heyjetset@gmail.com and if it makes the cut I’ll post it.