Sean Allen is the CEO and Co-Founder of WizeFi, a personal finance platform that helps you make the most of your money and helps you make more money so you can live your ideal lifestyle. With 20+ years experience in the financial advising industry, Sean is bringing a tool once reserved for professional financial planners to the masses.

In this show, Sean explains how important behavior change is to achieving your desired financial goals, and how WizeFi illustrates how each decision you make can impact your current and future net worth. Through his platform, he believes that anyone, no matter their income, can learn to spend their money in a way that makes them more money, which in turn lead them to their best financial future. Sean also speaks to his journey back into startups after decades in the professional industry and gives advice to new entrepreneurs, young and old, on how to structure a business to eventually become passive income.

Some Questions I Ask Sean:      

• What is WizeFi? [1:42]
• What does WizeFi do? [2:00]
• What carries more weight on the platform, the affiliate program or the investment side of it? [2.44]
• Do you provide training to your users on how to onboard their friends? [3:41]
• What’s the benefit of going with WizeFi over a Wealthfront-type competitor? [4:50]
• Why do you think it is that doctors/lawyers/dentists bring in half a million a year but end up having so much debt? [10:53]
• Where does the quote “Wealth begins in the mind” originate from? [13:23]
• Why is it that people behave as if they’re wealthy when they’re not? [15:49]
• It seems that people are always chasing but never reaching their financial goals - why do you think that is? [18:05]
• Productive and nonproductive assets - why is it important to understand the difference? [21:41]
• What would be a very tangible example of a productive asset? [23.37]
• Does the current market climate impact what is a productive or nonproductive asset? [25:38]
• Is affiliate marketing a good example of a productive asset? [28:31]
• What’s a nonproductive asset? [34:01]
• Is your goal in your own businesses to replace yourself and let it run on their own? [36:42]
• What advice would you have to founders who are trying to replace themselves? [38:41]
• Why do founders try to do everything? [40:38]
• When have you learned from your business failures? [47:37]
• Why circle back around to a startup after 20+ years in the industry? [51.48]
• Why is dedicating time to planning so pivotal? [59:14]
• What books would you recommend for financial help? [1:00:18]
• What are 3 primary pieces of financial advice you would give to someone? [1.03.49]

Some Things You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• Invest your money in productive assets - things that bring you additional income. Otherwise you’re just transferring your wealth to someone else.
• A budget by itself is useless if not accompanied by behavior change.
• The first step to achieving your financial goals is making sure they are realistic.
• As an entrepreneur, your goal should be to surround yourself with talented operations people. It opens the door for you to remove yourself later.
• The hardest moment in starting a new business is the idea phase - step one, get it onto paper and figure out what your role should be. Whatever you can’t do, you should look for in a partner.
• Great companies are 1% good idea and 99% good execution.
• Most great entrepreneurs will say that they wouldn’t be where they are without learning from many failures along the way.
• We’re a product of our surroundings - influences from the media and those around us can heavily impact how we behave and spend.
• Pivoting quickly is essential to success - otherwise you risk spending too much time running down the wrong path.
• The best entrepreneurs take their business one quarter at a time - execute for 12 weeks and spend one week in reflection and planning.

Get in Touch with Sean:

www.wizefi.com

sean@wizefi.com

Josh Haynam is the co-founder of Interact, a platform and software serviced based out of San Francisco. Interact creates quizzes (“like the ones that you see on Facebook”) and assessments for clients wanting to reach potential customers whose interests may align with those of their company’s.

After cultivating an entrepreneurial spirit at the start of high school, Josh had to switch gears and buckle down for college, where he met the person who would later become his co-founder. When he and his co-founder launched Interact in 2014, Josh began building quizzes for clients and brainstorming new, innovative ideas for a wide range of different companies. In addition to that role, he’s branched into the public relations arena and also creates continuous, original blog content for Interact.

Some Questions I Ask Josh:

• What does Interact do? [1:03]
• Do both small and big companies use Interact’s product? [5:25]
• What are your thoughts on how people brainstorm their business ideas? [26:30]
• What’s your take on growing your business in its beginning stages, as opposed to just being able to pay yourself? [31:00]
• How do you determine who your next hire should be? Do you use any sort of formula? [35:47]
• After you finished school and launched the business with positive results, did you stay in L.A. or decide to move, and what was the criteria for making that decision with your co-founder? [40:15]
• How did you and your co-founder communicate, being and working in separate cities? [41:48]
• What was the timeline of your initial user acquisition like? How did you go about accomplishing the phases that went into making that happen? [45:02]
• When customers initially signed up for Interact, was it using a SaaS business model? [54:25]
• Was there ever a moment where you thought, mathematically, the company may not work out? [55:08]
• Who’s been the wildest customer you’ve had for Interact? [58:44]
• What was the business structure like after you moved to the bay area and began gaining more customers? [1:02:01]
• How were you structuring your payment during those initial stages? [1:04:19]
• What does your day-to-day look like now? [1:18:20]
• Why do you feel now is the appropriate time for you to focus on and do PR? [1:19:24]
• Are there any books you’d recommend people read, whether it’s in or outside of the business/startup field? [1:21:25]
• What’s your morning routine consist of? [1:23:18]
• Is there any structured involved in your journaling habits? [1:24:07]
• At what point did you decide to bring on an executive coach? [1:26:03]
• What do you do to wind down at the end of the day? [1:29:00]
• What words of advice would you give to anyone looking to start a company? [1:31:49]
  

Some Things You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• How much the public really enjoys taking quizzes
• Some of the clients Interact provides services for
• How Josh created and grew into an entrepreneurial spirit from an early age
• What platform Josh used to advertise his business services in high school
• How Josh met his co-founder
• The framework for how Interact hires new people
• How Interact came up with their idea for interactive ads and quiz creation
• What the problem with his business model was when he was in high school
• How Josh and his co-founder made living and working in different cities work
• How content marketing got Interact its first, legitimate clients
• Some of the nonprofits Interact provides services for on a pro-bono basis
• What the first big challenge for Interact as a business was
• How much time passed before Interact’s revenue really increased

Get in Touch with Josh:

• Email: josh@tryinteract.com
• Website: https://www.tryinteract.com/