Ezra Firestone's Prescription For REAL Profit transcript

[Music] foreign [Music] ER Ferris podcast thanks so much for joining me for another episode of the show today on the show I have a legend in the e-commerce space Ezra Firestone you've heard me talk about how this episode was coming and uh it is finally here and I'm really excited about it I'm excited to talk about Ezra to talk to Ezra about all kinds of things if you know Ezra and you probably do if you're listening to this podcast you know him as the CEO of Boom by City Joseph and of overtone and the founder of zipify and smart marketer and you know just been around educating a lot of us in the space was one of the first voices I personally trusted to weigh in on eCommerce strategy and tactics when I was on the early stages of my career learning things and today on the show I'm going to actually talk with Ezra about something else you probably know him as which is a person who cares about values and what is this for and and what is the purpose of all of this work that we're doing so I won't delay it any longer I am thrilled to have Ezra on the show let's jump into the conversation all right Ezra thanks for taking time man I'm so glad to be talking to you yeah man thanks for having me on I follow you on Twitter so you know it was nice to nice to hear from you and I always like talking about business and life and you know with other people who are in the game so yeah yeah definitely well let's just there's probably somebody listening to this who doesn't know or watching this who doesn't know sort of the full scope of what you're doing and and what your eCommerce background is so I gave a little bit of biography but do you want to just give people the quick overview of sort of like your e-commerce background and what you're working on right now and those sorts of things sure I started real early I started back in 2005 with you know back then it was Drop Shipping but not from China it was Drop Shipping from American suppliers it was like when Wayfair and ivg stores and all those cats started we were all doing like search engine optimization exact match domain you know SEO to sell grandfather clocks and dog supplies and gift baskets and bar stools and you know I've been I I was fortunate enough to kind of grow up in the industry I moved to New York when I was 18 to play poker for a living and I ended up finding e-commerce through a whole you know series of funny events and I was America's number one mullet wig afro wig and Elvis wig online retailer in 2008 2009 so that's kind of one of my claims to fame I had these uh these these Hasidic Jewish cats yeah because the Jews in New York they run the wig business you know what I'm saying so I had some I found these dudes in Midtown this cat named Elliot and this other dude named Moodle and they they imported wigs from China and they um they supplied all the like Halloween stores and stuff anyways so you you know I've been in the game a long time and I've been fortunate enough to have a lot of successes you know and I started blogging about e-commerce way back in like 2011 before it was really popular and because I was one of the first voices I was one of the only voices and and people like Shopify picked me up and made me one of their teachers I just I got a lot of visibility because I was early I wouldn't say I was better than anyone at the time I just was doing it and talking about it and that afforded me a bunch of opportunities to meet people to network to you know learn and over the years I transitioned from you know things like Services agencies to you know all kinds of different businesses and what I landed on that I liked the most was manufacturing my own products and I started a company in 2010 that I still run today called Boom by Sunny Joseph and we've done a couple hundred million dollars in sales I've bought and sold several other companies I just bought a hair care company that I rolled into the boom organization it's a hair dye where you you know fantasy hair color and so that those are that's my main gig is I run that on the C of that of those two Brands I also have an education company that's run by a really amazing woman named Molly Pittman and we teach courses and stuff like that I have a mastermind where I get people together and we have events and then I have this other company which is fun called zipify which is a software company for Shopify so I'm kind of I'm just in the game you know I'm like mainly an e-commerce operator but I also you know do some other stuff on the side and I really love it and I think there's a lot of I think entrepreneurs are really cool people doesn't matter if you're an e-commerce or not you know they tend to be folks who are out there doing it so I like I like engaging with other entrepreneurs and that's why I like doing these podcasts and stuff yeah it's funny I I've felt the same way like one of the things I feel like really fortunate about in my work is that I deal with not like the middle manager at a giant company but like with entrepreneurs you know with people who are like like you've started a business found the thing they like took some risks along the way and then maybe they've built something small big medium size whatever but there's like there's some element of staying close to it and I feel the same way it's just so fun yeah just so fun to see those kinds of people succeed so and and you you were like yeah you maybe it is just because you were early but like I got an e-commerce like 2014 really beginning 2015 and and at the time definitely they were just like it was so I think I was listening to e-commerce people very very early with Andrew Darien and then seeing you and those were like those were like the first two voices that I really trusted and that I would go like the oh it wasn't clear that you guys were trying to sell me something I mean you didn't have this community but you know he did not yeah it just was really helpful stuff I was definitely trying to sell you something I'm sure you were I'm sure you were but it wasn't clear that you were it wasn't coming straight from trying to help you know I wasn't only trying to sell you something yeah I mean listen I'm trying to sell people stuff you know so yeah that's it's not not a problem that's actually a nice like segue so I think one of the maybe maybe something people know about you if they've followed you at all is sort of your tagline which I've seen for you from you for a while you've had a lot of success and I you know I think that's sort of clear and in a few different places you you're in the SAS game you're in the education game and of course you've got brands that you yourself are leading and working on you have this tagline though serve the world unselfishly and profit yeah I'll sort of let I'll leave this open-ended but I'm curious sort of to hear you unpack how you came to that how Central that is to what you're thinking and because that because this actually gets into some of the stuff I was most interested to talk to you about so people listening to this may may expect us to go down the tactics rabbit hole but I actually want to go down the the purpose Rabbit Hole a little bit more and because because of some stuff I've seen you put out along these lines and actually seeing you talk about more and more and more recently so maybe you could start there talk to me about that tagline a little bit well I think it's a description of the way that the world works it's not really like it's not a mandate it's not like I'm telling you go do this it's I'm describing the way that I see it which is that if you are in a role of service and you're doing so unselfishly so with the goal of getting yours in the giving you profit from that act and you also then profit your business tends to profit if like if you're if the goal of your business is to truly serve truly make the best products truly take care of your team and people you know truly take care of your customers and you're constantly looking for how to do that better you end up with a strong stable business with people who want to come back and buy more from you and so you end up profiting through having that as your goal so yeah so I think it's how I think it's how things work I think it's a description of the way things are and I think it applies to more than just business you know so I mean there's so many obvious examples and well so the claim isn't necessarily that the opposite isn't also true that you could serve the world selfishly and profit right like because I mean it seems to me that plenty of people do that as well well I mean you have to look at what is your what is your description of profit right so if you are interacting with the world in a way that is out of Integrity with your own moral compass or the world's moral compass you're going to pay for that in some way and you may pay for that in how you feel about yourself and your own mental state you may pay for that in certain things that come your way because of your actions and behaviors it's like you there's a price to be paid for your actions and so you might as well act in good faith and in Integrity because you want the price that's going to be paid to be a good one so okay so this is great okay so if you take profit purely of dollars it's it's possible that you could serve the world sure yeah yeah you could be a total [ __ ] and pilfer and steeple and be terrible to people and still and still make a monetary profit but but I'm talking about a greater sense of the word profit which is profit as a human being profit as an individual profit as a and also Pro you know and part of that is you know you got to feed yourself and take care of your family and have some Surplus to spread around to others so that's profit as well but I'm I'm looking at profit if you're only focused on money go ahead and enjoy that life good luck with that strategy see how that goes so okay so do you have any sense of what you how you think about I mean maybe the way to ask is how do you know when you've profited in your definition well you feel good about what you've done right you you feel good about the way in which you are navigating your world and I can tell in my life when I'm out of Integrity as soon as I start to break deals that I made with myself right so I made a deal with myself that I was going to do something or or behave in a certain way and then all of a sudden I'm not doing that or I'm not I'm not walking that path I need to either check the shelf life on the deal that I made make sure it's a deal I still want to adhere to or get myself back in alignment because I'm out of alignment with with my own moral compass and so after I forgot your question but you answer it it is because the question was like how do you know when when you've profited in that case right because it because with dollars it's pretty easy you can tell pretty fast there's a master now although although it's worth noting probably that actually one of the one of the sneaky things about dollars is that it actually isn't that clear when you've profited because if that's the whole goal the goal post will incessantly move they will incessantly move they will not they'll actually never be enough well what tends to happen is your your consumer habits raise with the amount of money that you make and so you end up sort of in a similar spot like a lot of people who make money have an easy time making it and a hard time keeping it and maintaining it and having it work for you and creating savings and vehicles of investment things like that's a lot harder than it is to make some cash so it's more it's a more difficult game to figure out how to keep it than it is to figure out how to constantly make it yeah yeah and even if you can do that then the consumption standard just raises even more right so like if if money is the only goal I mean I the example I was given this one is good money will buy you comfort it won't buy you happiness right yeah the example I was given is like everybody has who's run a Shopify store for any amount of time knows what it's like to look at the Shopify dashboard and to see the number get to the highest number it's ever gotten to and within five seconds you think about how how can you beat it right it is so fleeting and I think that that basically that same thing is happening with like your personal checking account or whatever you know or your Investments you know it's like it's just it's very very hard and I'm I personally feel like I have a lot of clarity to this issue like I I've identified this and and have noticed it in my life and I put my finger on it and it's still really hard for me you know it's so Insidious it's just like I'm like not above this at all I've thought about like I have I have right now let's be totally realistic I'm doing fine I'm in a position my career where I'm you know making the most money I've ever made all those things in the same time you still feel like wait how could I how can I get that number up more how can I get that number up more I need nothing I have no need for anything and I'm not even a big super spender or anything but it's just there's something about the game of pursuing it more even aside from the consumption that it always goes and there's nothing wrong with that inherently it's a fun game to play it's fun to try to grow but understanding that it's just a game that you're playing you know once you're at once you're at satiated right obviously there's people listening to this podcast who were in the position I was when I started which is they're hungry they are not satiated they don't have stability they don't have their bills paid they don't have a you know it's like that's a different you're operating from a different perspective and vantage point and you're in a different spot when you're like you know hungry than when you're like pretty stable and now it's about how do you you know take care of the folks around you take care of your family continue to do what you're doing better while enjoying the other parts of your life I think the secret to the game of life is getting good at enjoying what you have right if you can want what you have you have won because there was a Jewish rabbi his name was maimonides and what he said this was like you know thousands of years ago maybe 5 000 years or something was that it's a far greater skill to have the ability to enjoy what you have than to have the ability to get what you want because if you get what you want and you can't enjoy it what was the point of getting it in the first place right so getting good at finding right and finding enjoyment in the Here and Now with what you have ultimately leads you to getting more of what you want and makes the things that you do get more pleasurable so okay so I mean I completely completely agree with that and I'm reminded of a lot of different sort of comments to the same same man and quotes the same and and real quick on that one of the things that you want is to Chase and to pursue and and you can enjoy that process as well you can enjoy the pursuit you can enjoy the chase you can enjoy the striving and trying to make you know it's like that is a valid experience also I'm not saying don't have that experience I'm just saying also spend some time and energy and effort focused on enjoying what else you know the goodness that you have in your life because if you're listening to this podcast you probably live in the west so okay you live in the best country in the world or or you live in Europe you know it's like you live in a western free Society you've got food and shelter probably for the most part and nobody's making you do anything I mean this is the greatest that anyone has ever had in human history you're doing better than everyone who's ever lived yeah and that's actually another Insidious thing though right is that people especially in a sort of especially a bunch of entrepreneur types you know who are sort of naturally competitive and risk Risk Takers and some of that they're just going to select for people who are just going to compare themselves to the people above them you know as sort of the natural thing and you know that perspective shift is really helpful I think so what have you done in your life to actually do that how are you Ezra Firestone enjoying the things that you have and what has helped you to do that maybe maybe also what is what has made it harder for you to do that I'm curious if there's times when you have felt like that's been out of whack for you yeah so the the secret to this game is to be present in your life right like to actually derive like you get as much enjoyment out of an experience or a moment as you are willing to derive from it as the amount of attention that you're willing to bring to it and it's a practice it takes energy it's why I do this I did this talk on the Buddhist right that that there's certain monasteries well they will have you you show up there and they'll say okay go cut the grass with scissors and you'll be like what I'm like no go cut the grass with scissors and so you're out there and you're cutting grass you're cutting the grass and most people think well that's a stupid thing to do but what you learn is that hey this is an area that I'm directing my attention and you know you start listening to the birds and seeing the little Grasshoppers and seeing the Beetles and like you start to understand that the amount of attention that you bring to a to a moment is equivalent to the amount of experience that you can have in that moment and that's a practice right and so you get out what you put in to your life and that comes with that comes with the enjoyment as well right as much as you're willing to enjoy it which is as present as you're willing to be with it which is a practice and the other thing that I think robs people of enjoyment of their life is the very very very common I mean almost unanimous experience that people have of feeling inadequate in some way right people are sold from the time they're [ __ ] born that they're broken that they're flawed that they need fixing that their teeth aren't wide enough that they don't smell right that they're they don't have enough hair that they don't have enough muscles that their hair is not the right color that they're too fat that they're too skinny that they're you know whatever you know they don't make enough money they're whatever it is and people buy into this Viewpoint that they're inadequate and that they're flawed and they're constantly trying to fix it they're defending against some societal conditioning of their own inadequacy and as long as you're doing that good luck I mean you're going to be constantly playing defense in your own head comparing yourself to others worried about ways in which you're not good enough and the real secret is to figure out how to get happy with who you are to actually approve of yourself genuinely find yourself right like you're not broken you don't need fixing you're right just the way that you are and maybe you want to add on and that's fun but you're doing so from a place of it would be fun to add on to myself versus I need to fix myself to get right and as long as you're trying to get right and as long as you're trying to you know fix some perceived flaw you're gonna have a hard time enjoying yourself because you're going to be constantly in this mental masturbation around your own [ __ ] is the belief that I am flawed itself a flaw or is that something I should accept no it's just holding you back it's just it's not true for one okay you're not I mean hey maybe you have some hey we've all had our like maybe you have some trauma you had some abusive parents whatever you had some you've had some traumatic experiences and you're carrying those with you and those are things that you want to work through and they're you know they and it has you have fear of intimacy or whatever maybe you have some like you're a product of your conditioning and your experiences right if you grew up in a certain place with certain viewpoints you probably adopted those viewpoints whether or not you recognize it if you had certain traumatic experiences you probably have some behavioral patterns that are stemming from that but that doesn't make you broken wrong or inadequate that just makes you a person who's had a certain level of conditioning and experiences and maybe you want to work through that in certain ways or change that or add on to yourself but but you don't have to do so from the Viewpoint that you're broken and need fixing you could do so from the Viewpoint that you're right just as you are and things are good and you want to add on to your already good life and it makes it a lot of easier when you operate from that Viewpoint to have a fun and pleasurable life and it's your choice right you get so what's interesting about us as humans right is in this particular society right in the west is we are the ultimate Arbiters of our world and what that means is like you for the most part get to direct where you put your attention you could choose to leave your wife and kids and go to the beach and be a bum you know deadbeat dad you could choose to do that right and put your attention on yourself and your own whatever you want right but what you're choosing is to put your attention on your work life and your kids and your wife and you know baseball and your hobby so like you get you're choosing where you direct your attention right which means you're choosing the experience that you have and then you are placing a value judgment positive or negative on the experience that you just perceived so you got to choose what you perceived for the most part right you don't get to you didn't get to choose covet that just happened right so this is like there's levels to this the the whole world was affected by that thing you get to choose how much you engaged with the [ __ ] now you didn't get to choose whether or not you wore masks in certain places but my point is for the most part you're getting to decide where you place your attention and then you're getting to decide whether the experience that you just had by where you placed attention was good or bad that's a lot of [ __ ] power that's a lot of agency in your world and if you were to choose to find more of your experience as positive and right and good and approve of it and enjoy it you'd have more fun yeah I see what you're saying I think interested because it seemed like let's take the example you just gave let's say I go and be a deadbeat dad right let's say I go take you up on that is the answer to that to stop being a deadbeat dad or or is the answer to that to accept accept that choice in my in myself you know what I'm saying I think there is a so society would tell you that you know you are a terrible human being four leaving your wife and kids and so there's people who would have that Viewpoint right so yes some would right but for the most part I think it's pretty unanimous you get looked down upon if you're if you're you know not supporting this family that you've created maybe there's more to the story maybe your wife is not someone who you can relate with in a good way and it's not there's no way for you to win there and there's no way to engage in a way that's safe and you can't get the kids away from it like I don't know what the situation is but but I don't think there is an inherent right or wrong what if what if I'm just being selfish I mean what if I'm just like and I know I just throw values around there but this is this is actually the reason I'm asking is I think it's a really interesting thing that you're bringing up and I'm not trying to just be like do a gotcha thing here like I think it's a really interesting question because I hear I hear this kind of thing all the time and there is this sort of there is this weird mix in humans of like I think everybody can Intuit what you're saying has this truth to it of this sort of notion that like if you don't actually have some sense of value for yourself and belief that like what your experience matters and some of those things it's gonna be really really hard to ever sort of experience real joy and have the kind of outcomes that you want in your life right at the other hand I think the other thing that is like there are just really some things about myself that I actually do want to change and I would like to be different and all of that and and I actually think they're negative qualities of mine but here's what I'm saying is that finding yourself right doesn't remove or make less valid the desire that you have to change things about yourself but you're starting from the point of view of you're a good right person who is walking through the world making the best decisions you can make based on the information that you have and you feel good about that and hey you know you want to change some stuff great but you're not doing so because you think I am [ __ ] up and I need you know it's like as long as you think you're [ __ ] up you're gonna have a hard time if you think I'm a good person with integrity and I'm doing the best I can and I'm working towards X Y and Z goal great but that's not where a lot of people are coming from a lot of people are just defending against you know their own perceived limitations they're defending against the ways in which they think they're wrong they've been conditioned to believe that may not actually be true and then going back to your wife and kids it's like I don't I'm not the Arbiter of morality here I don't know what's right or wrong for you I think you got to make the decision for yourself maybe that would then set up your kids to be some kind of you know they would have like they grew up without a dad and it sets them up to be some kind of amazing who knows what that would do for them you know I don't know what the right you know I wouldn't leave my wife or kids that doesn't sound like fun or like a choice I would want to make hey if you've been listening this podcast for a little while now you know that I love working with more Staffing and I love working with them because they will connect you to incredible talent for your eCommerce business in the Philippines they will do all of the important work of recruiting getting you great candidates I just went through their process of finding incredible candidates for my own business in the Philippines and they were so easy to work with they found the talent they put the talent in front of me in a way that was easy to digest and they are going to do the work of onboarding recruiting training all the things that need to be done to bring bring great Ecommerce Talent from the Philippines into your business I love this partner I want you to go check them out if you are interested in adding talent to your business from the Philippines and I don't know why you wouldn't be at this point you can get incredible people at a much lower cost than doing that in the US but also in a way that is awesome for them in the Philippines it's going to support their careers it is a win-win across the board and you should be considering it so virtual assistants are helpful virtual professionals can be transformative for your business and that is what is available to you with my friends at more Staffing if you're looking at expanding your team take a call with them explore whether or not you should be adding Talent from the Philippines anywhere in your eCommerce business incredibly talented professionals across the board go to morenow.co tell them I sent you that's more now.co to get started with more Staffing today I mean on the other hand you just you did just give me a sense of like sort of a a way to approach a better and worse life that was pretty heartfelt and by the way I I think that's great like I I think you you have a sense of of view you have a point of view in the world and sort of that leads to more and less thriving in people's lives the way you just framed it right you just framed an idea of like my self-acceptance in a way that ought to do that and I realize also that you're you're doing that in a way that you're you're I think you're doing that with some humility in the sense of you're going like well yeah there's maybe something I don't know about the situation and all those things but this is this is like and I this is so interesting to me because even when you get to some of these questions that I first want to bring you on for right the the thing that triggered me reaching out to you was I saw this video of you where you're talking about you know this goal of business success being to create assets that have value independent of your time right like a business or something like that and then to use that of the wealth generation machine and this I think what almost everybody who's listening to this is trying to do in some way or another you know trying to mark up their time a bunch or whatever but they're trying to create wealth for themselves and that's what success in some ways measured by and so we've already poked at that some which I love but then you also point to this idea of of ultimate the purpose of actually generating Surplus wealth is the phrase you just used a little bit ago and then being able to allocate some of that towards causes that you find Noble right and that being sort of like one of the main goals even of business and that's a really fascinating goal because it is actually a really sort of in one sense others focused goal and not a self-focused goal but in another sense one of the things that I get from you is that actually the world is actually that it's totally self-interested and I mean that is a good thing that you're actually trying to generate joy for yourself and that the the case you're making for generosity in this case and forgiving here is actually self-interest well it feels good to give right it feels good to give and I think look the first step is feed yourself okay like literally before anyone else take care of yourself because if you are burnt out and tired and diminished and hungry and energetically depleted what good are you going to be to anyone else you gotta you gotta fill your cup so that you you cannot you cannot pour from an empty cup so take care of yourself like you know take put your oxygen mask on and then put the oxygen mask on the person next to you on the plane right so then you take care of your family and your community because that's the you know how fun and good of a life are you gonna have if it's just you and everyone around you is [ __ ] hungry and miserable it's like no so the next step seems to be take care of the people around you and then the circle goes one wider take care of the people around them because that's what feels good and that is what is fun and that's like for me I'm not look you would adopt whatever goals you you want but the way I look at the world is I'm interested in generating resource I didn't grow up with resource I grew up poor right and so that I can take care of my family and my community and myself and then also use that resource towards causes in the world that I find Noble and like hey there's a lot of stuff going on in the world world's a very big very big world and no matter how big your business gets it's unlikely you're going to be able to address all of them so kind of pick and choose the ones that are meaningful to you that feel good to engage with you know and and that it feels really good to do and it's also like what is the point of having if not you can't take it with you you're gonna die what are you going to do with this resource put it in a trust so that your kids down the line can spend it okay put some of it in there they're probably gonna blow it you know might as well use it for stuff that is impactful I yeah the way I've talked about this is sort of like Joy return on investment and there's like like jroi you know it's like because that's actually what everybody's trying to do I think like when somebody buys a car right they're not actually trying I mean if they buy like let's say like a luxury car more than they need right so there's there's like level one which you just referenced so just like take care of your needs and I mean could sort of Define that as maybe a broader sense of your spiritual needs and your in your all those kind of things but I'm even talking about here from a pure Financial standpoint like food and clothing you know like there's there's an element of that that I think is is sort of a baseline level of there's going to be a pretty high Joy return on investment if you go from literally lack to like having it you know I think that's been pretty well documented too actually there's like a meaningful growth and happiness when you stop struggling to get by but then and there's exceptions to that too but anyway then there's another another step though let's say you buy a luxury good of some kind when somebody buys a lot let's hold it yeah maybe that's an easier version if you buy a yacht what you're actually trying to buy is Joy you're actually not trying to buy the boat I think you're trying to buy the thing the boat gives you which is which is joy and you may have all kinds of reasons why you think it will get you there and hey maybe it will maybe it will have some kind of return for you but but that's the thing people are interested in and so so I'm interested to hear how you arrived at the case that the best because look you've been in e-commerce for a while so far as I could tell you've been very successful uh I don't know maybe you have a yacht but but like what what's the like make the case that make the case to me that the joy return on your investment in generosity is actually higher than keeping that money for yourself because you could put it in a trust or you could go buy way more nice stuff and cool toys for Ezra you know so burn it all before you die so I think everybody's desires are different but what I find is that the juice of Life the sweetness of Life the goodness of life is found in intimacy and connection and relationships that is really what it's about you know you you have a death in the family or something and you realize you realize what actually matters in the world right this this is a common experience that people report and it's certainly one that I've had myself and so if you subscribe to that idea that really what it's about is relationships and community and intimacy and connection then bobbles are fun like stuff right but they're more fun shared with other people how fun is it to drive your sports car alone it's okay more fun to drive your sports car with your wife in it you guys go out on a cruise together that's fun you know and there's a there's a side of generosity where if you just give people stuff sometimes they don't value it right so 100 you don't want to just give things away necessarily you want to ensure that what you're giving is given in a way that people can actually receive and feel good about and enjoy so there's like levels to that as well but I think that ultimately my experience and Viewpoint is that what's fun in life are experiences and relationships and community and and so that's what I optimize for and and I I have fancy stuff I have 150 000 Mercedes I like fans I'm into consumerism I'm not anti-buying stuff I buy stuff that I want and need I don't buy stuff that I don't need or that I don't want or that you know like I I'm not like just crazy about spending money on [ __ ] but I'm happy to buy nice things it's fun my wife likes to buy nice house stuff I got a whole gym set up over here like it's fun to have things I'm not anti-having stuff but I think there is a level at which you know I see often people consuming for the sake of consuming and going from one thing to the next versus like do you know how much joy I get out of my kettlebells I love those things whatever Russian Cat 500 years ago decided to strap a handle to a cannonball and invent the greatest [ __ ] workout Implement of all time was a genius and it's like I love those things and I enjoy them three days a week I'm playing with those things and having fun with them so I'm into like I'm into buying things that I will use and enjoy I'm not into buying things just to have them yeah those are about 50 a pound though you know I mean I think that's like that's not Out Of Reach For A lot of people like I think the 150 000 car is an interesting question like and again like I think you know as you've referenced some of this and some things you've heard about you know we're recording this like the day after I think it was uh there was a thread that went sort of sort of viral on Twitter about Patrick from profitwell you know having a 200 million dollar exit and then like just sort of like the difficulty afterwards of the insane range of emotions related to that kind of exit and sort of the good and the bad and I'm continue to be continue to be fascinated by this question of sort of like meaning and purpose and and and really how do you optimize for Joy like you talked about optimizing for relationship and I actually love that term for this and this is sort of the phrase that I I've thrown around the closest I have to serve the world unselfishly and profit is optimized for Joy I think that's I think that's the real thing that's everywhere I think there's no single Human Action that isn't self-interested in the entire world I think Mother Teresa every second of her life was self-interested I I don't mean that as a value judgment it's exactly what you said about your phrase right which I just think that's the way the world is everything we do is in some ways coming back to that and that like possibly it's the case that the highest Joy return on your investment is actually in terms of generosity what I'm really curious about is sort of like even if you can measure the joy return on your investment and measure quote unquote I know you know there's no this is graph here but like the joy return on your investment in times you've given generously to something that you cared about to a cause you found Noble versus uh on your 150 000 Mercedes like do you have any do you have any sense of those kind of things or is that not the way you look at it that's the way I'm framing it that way I think it comes back to again how you feel about yourself right it's all about like how you feel in relationship to yourself and your world and having a fancy sports car is fun I enjoy I love looking at that thing I love driving it it's I looked at it for 10 years before I bought it every year I looked at every variation of it I could afford it for a long time but I was kind of like I don't really want this crazy car like am I gonna be that guy you know and then also doing things in the direction of my community and my family and my friends building the house for my parents like that stuff feels really good and I think about that and it makes me feel good it makes me it so I think it all it all has its place it's not like one there isn't really a a scale or a spectrum here and I think the same is is to be said for you know money like I got a friend who's a musician who Gardens and plays music doesn't make a lot of money and is happier than most people that I know it's like you don't need a lot to be happy you have to be enjoying the choices that you've made and the way in which you're walking through your life that's the key is to be in agreement in Integrity with and happy about how you're navigating that and it doesn't really matter you don't have to be generous and you don't have to make money you don't do any of that stuff you just have to figure out a way to enjoy what you have and enjoy the decisions that you've made and find those right and that's what it's about and there is I don't think there's really a scale of which is better I think they're all good and they all contribute to you having a good life and I want I have the goal of wealth creation I want the [ __ ] fancy car and and the 100 Acre property and I want all that [ __ ] too so that makes me feel good to have that you know yeah I'm curious if you have ever had a moment of generosity that were you where you've gotten a noticeable High Joy return like do you know what I'm saying where you've given to something and you know uh this could be a touchy people may not want to give to this but or people may not want to share this sort of thing but if you're comfortable sharing sort of a time when you've given I believe in doing Anonymous good so I believe in in doing putting good things out into the world taking care of people contributing to causes anonymously and that feels better because if it is not Anonymous it's barter whether you want it to be or not because the person now knows you have given them this thing and they feel some form of you know need for reciprocity they feel indebted to you so my favorite strategy is to do Anonymous giving because I put good out into the world and there is no where for anyone to place the blame on that they just experience it and that actually feels the best yeah that's interesting because then it's it's still self-interested but it's self-interested without getting something back from the bartering you know it's self-intercept purely on the joy of return you know like like you said that feels the best yeah yeah I think that's the highest form of giving when the person who is receiving it doesn't have any way to who that's just pure that just it's just good that came their way and there's nowhere for them to attach that to so they can just receive it and they don't feel any kind of you know yeah that's a good point they don't have to yeah that's yeah because it can actually be hard to receive gifts too especially if that happens I have a hard time with it yeah yeah all right look we I don't want to go past our time there's so I mean we could do this this is these are these are some of the most fundamental questions of human life so we could we could spend a lot of time on this but let's let's give the people one tactical e-commerce thing because they can't when they sat through the the meeting conversation so here's here's my question I don't know how many people I don't know how many people we kept with this stuff man yeah I think we kept a lot I think every I think people are hungry for for this kind of information like when you look at sort of who is popular on culture and who's talking right now like it's I think there's a lot of people who are hungry for it so hopefully it wasn't like eating your vegetables you know just I'm just curious one thing with from where you sit right now one thing is sort of top of mind for you that you think is like a something you're seeing work or just any anything that's sort of top of mind would probably yeah great everybody is is so focused on marketing and ads and it's like all you got you have to be but most but it's like yeah you have to have good ads and good sales funnels and good email marketing good SMS and good optimization All That Jazz but the people who put as much energy into the optimization of their product and the product development pipeline as they do into the marketing win the game because ultimately the best promise wins the customer the best product wins the repeat customer and so if your product doesn't live up to the promise that you made you'll never get another customer again and so what we're doing is constantly making our products better listening to feedback changing the packaging changing the formulas trying to make them better releasing version two adding on products that people who bought from us once would like and that has really been our secret to weathering the intensity of the postcovid down period of e-commerce it's tough out there ads are tough you know email is tough you know margins are thin everything's more expensive it's it's a rough time in e-commerce you know we're down year over year we're not up year over year but we are one of the things that's really working in our favor is product launches and product optimization it's really good I I've thought for a long time that you know especially on the retention side of things that there's very little tactically that you can do that can meaningfully move the needle on retention you could do some stuff of course and and there's exceptions to this but but that yeah it is so much about what you acquire a customer to that is going to end up like meaningfully changing their relationship to your brand into your product so that's exactly the kind of thing I was looking for I thought like I everybody I ever talked to on this show who's involved in the day-to-day in the trenches there's something that's bubbling to the top of their mind and they're just thinking about a lot and noticing a lot so great answer all right man um listen where can people find you if they want more of that good Ezra Firestone content that they've been getting for all these years Instagram at ezrafirestonesmartmarketer.com I'm on Twitter uh although I don't get a lot of love over there because I do videos and Twitter you got to write stuff so so anyways I'm on Twitter too I'm on LinkedIn I'm on Facebook you find me you know but smart marketer I think is like you know if you're interested in more long-form content blogs and courses and all that kind of stuff and thanks for having me on this was fun I like talking about this stuff yeah good and of course all those links are in the show notes also link up to zipify I have used one flick upsell a lot in the past one I know that's not the the entirety of it but that's also something that's a sort of a no-brainer for a lot of us it's 70 of the business it's the best app for sure it I mean it it makes all sense in the world if you don't know one click upsell it's post purchase upsells and so you've already collected credit card information it is just extra aov and it has very little downside that I can really see and especially when done well it makes a lot of sense so go check that out if you were looking to add a little bit of aov as well again links to everything's been shown as Ezra this is a conversation that most people have with me I specifically sought you out to have this conversation I really appreciate you doing it sometimes these things can be vulnerable they can get into all kinds of stuff and so I am sincerely grateful for you taking the time to uh to talk to people about things you've learned in your success in your time and man we appreciate you you're an important part of the e-commerce industry and you've been a lot of help to a lot of people so thanks thanks for having me on appreciate it [Music] I really hope you enjoyed that conversation I was so excited to talk to Ezra about that stuff because he is clearly a deep thinker who cares about a lot of these things he's working hard in his businesses to not only create a great business but to do things that I think are meaningful and important in life and that I think is what most of us are actually all about the pursuit of Joy the pursuit of meeting the pursuit of purpose the things that are going to be truly and deeply satisfying and I'm always glad to kick those around with not only somebody who's been really successful certainly much more successful than I have been and measured at least in dollars and also just like a famously good dude so really appreciate as we're coming on the show I hope you enjoyed that a lot I love your feedback on this episode if you have any of it just email me at podcast agfgrowth.com reach out to me on Twitter at Andrew J Ferris you know what to do you know where to find me all the usual places and don't forget to like subscribe do all the normal stuff with this show you could do that on YouTube you can do that on whatever podcast app you're listening to this on I hope that this has been helpful to you as always please let me know if it hasn't been until next time [Music] with my eyes [Music]