90 Day Challenge Success Story - Live Interview with Tom Johnston Best Education Page #Online Earning

loading the stream we are live thank you

very much for joining this is miles

becker miles becker comm and today I

have a very special guest I have Tom

Johnston here with me hello Tom hey

miles how you doing good to meet you

face-to-face for a change

absolute pleasure so tom was one of the

early adopters of the 90-day challenge

which is how my wife and I started our

first business and that's how I've

really kicked this channel you're

watching off and tom has now crossed the

90-day mark and I wanted to interview

him to understand a little bit about the

the mindset and and the heart and the

the whole process the challenges the

good and the bad to give you another

voice right it's one thing to hear me

say it and then it's another thing to

hear others say it so Tom thank you very

much again for joining here my pleasure

and you're the expert voice and I'm the

novice and maybe people be able to

relate to me a little bit and there's

knowledge to be had from people at all

levels and that's really I'm so excited

to have you here so real quick if you

could give just a little bit about your

background your story sure yeah

we'll make it quick so again my name is

Tom Johnston and I'm tom Johnston comm

or excuse me Tom Johnston org and I you

know I had a career in finance in my 20s

and then I became a diplomat in my late

20s and did that for 13 years I was

focused on economics and finance I was

all over the world I lived in Jamaica

Latvia Washington DC Croatia Ukraine I

also lived in Belgium in high school so

like miles pretty international

lifestyle but as I got to be about 40 I

sort of just felt like I was starting to

stagnate a bit career-wise I was doing

very well but internally I just wasn't

feeling as challenged and was wondering

about just what I want to do for the

long haul all my best friends when I was

a diplomat were always entrepreneurs a

little bit rougher and ragged ER and

looser than the average government

employee so I decide I also hit sort of

bare bones financial independence and

that's actually what I'm really focused

on as an entrepreneur is teaching people

how to get to financial independence so

I bailed a little over a year ago and

now I'm learning this whole new skill

set and game which is Internet

her ship and it definitely has been more

challenging than I expected certainly

starting over was a bit of a rude

awakening and that's me in
a nutshell

and from Colorado that's where I live

now and I've delighted to be here

talking to you great so it sounds like

you went through a career phase so you

did kind of hit that early retirement

point already recently it sounds like

yeah I probably hit it about 40 41 I

kept working for another year year and a

half just kind of Pat it so that I

wasn't as under pressure that way like

if you have inflation kick up or things

like that I didn't want that sort of the

income from your assets and the

expensive to your assets to be like

perfectly equal I wanted a little bit of

a cushion there which I definitely would

encourage anybody to do because you

don't want to be under a lot of stress

perfect and if I can kind of get my

version of that to people who are

watching so the the financial

independence retire early generally

means live a frugal lifestyle save as

much as you possibly can invest that in

a very secure kind of investment vehicle

like an index fund and then when you

have 25 times your annual income you

theoretically can withdraw 4% for life

without touching your principal and at

that point you've retired early because

think I wouldn't exactly yeah that's

close enough I'd probably be a little

more conservative than 4% withdrawal

rates and a few things like that but

that's basic idea the only other thing I

would say this is a big part of the

mission that I'm on is yes frugal and I

write about frugality all the time but

you know what I did to reach financial

independence and why I think most of us

can do it's not really about self-denial

it's about being smart right like you

know by a two-year old car instead of a

brand-new car and saved the $10,000 in

appreciation just things that you know I

did like my friends becomes a diplomat

would fly halfway around the world with

their family to go on vacation and you

know I was supposed to in Latvia I get

in my car and like drive to this amazing

island and Estonia and you know my

vacations were like a fiftieth of the

cost but I honestly think they were just

as interesting probably more exotic

actually man lifestyle creep is

interesting especially as incomes rise

people's expenses can

so I think that's a great starting point

because what I what I'm hearing here is

that you built a life experience through

work and through years and you've made

conscious decisions for decades to be

conscious of what you and now that

you've reached that point which was your

goal you're able to look back at what

you did to get there and now you're

trying to share that with the world

through your content is that correct

absolutely and the other thing is by

hitting that goal I was able to come out

here and do what I'm doing now right if

I hadn't reached financial independence

I honestly don't think I would have left

that super high quality job that I had

because I was building towards it and it

just didn't make sense but once you kind

of get to that point your options really

open up massively and you know the only

other thing I'd say is I did start

investing like at 19 and then I started

reading books about financial

independence at like 22 23 right as I

got out of college and on my website I

have like all sorts of stuff about the

key books that I used that there was

just like really five books that I read

right around 23 to 25 that just honed in

my thinking and this is like before

retire early financial independence was

really even a thing I mean this is

pretty old-school and and it just

changes your way of looking at the world

it does make you a little bit out of

sync with a lot of mainstream society

but actually you can totally manage that

I mean people who knew me and my

colleagues I don't think they thought I

was odd or they just you know you could

totally manage perceptions in a way that

you're just like grooving you're just

being a little bit more strategic about

what you're doing

brilliant so I've got this thing I

haven't done a video on it yet but it's

um its head hands heart we learn it

mentally which you did in your 20s we

get hands-on with it and you put into

practice what you learned and then you

hit a point where you know it by heart

when you're there that's the time to go

build the platform and you are the tutor

feels fantastic awesome a future video

sneak peek for everyone so now at what

point did you start looking at the

internet as like okay I want to try this

internet marketing thing where did that

rabbit hole up here yeah great question

so it's pretty funny um so my second

olestra was in car

raesha and I was ahead of the economic

section there and we did a lot of stuff

there promoting entrepreneurship in

Croatia and we worked a ton with the

tech sector and honestly it's almost

like I started to believe my own

propaganda like I was always going out

there giving speeches to high school and

university students like you should

consider entrepreneurship

super-important its way the future and

if you're going to do it do it

technology based digital base you can

leverage out you can reach people all

over the world super low expenses which

by the way has blown my mind to get as

far as I've gotten I mean I bet you I

spent less than a thousand dollars so

far on this whole venture probably about

a thousand with lights and three year

you know hosting service and all of that

and so all my buddies were like these

really intense super successful

entrepreneurs some of them are tech and

I was like if you can't beat them join

them now I'll be honest I realize now

that I've like bailed

those guys were like 10 to 20 years deep

there were like you right and I'm like

whoa

what am i doing like honestly I really

was naive in understanding the amount of

work that's involved in the skillset

that I lacked you know I had become a

very good if I may say so diplomat but

starting over with this stuff um it has

been intense but great I mean that's the

whole point I felt like I'd plateaued

and I'm definitely not at a plateau

anymore probably in a bit of a valley

but I'm climbing back up that hill so

that's awesome so then you went to

youtube at some point and it encountered

my videos I'm just kind of looking at

it's a great great question you know I

did a Google search this goes to your

whole point of search engine up to the

optimization and I searched on some like

spiritual topic and I'm like you know

page three I found your wife's website

and I read this I read this article and

I was like wow that's really cool who is

this person so I saw some of her videos

and she was like all over the world and

I was like man maybe she like married to

a diplomat or like somebody in the

military like this lifestyle I couldn't

quite like figure it out so then by hook

or by crook I kind of linked through

found you and I was like whoa this guy

is like I mean this is pretty early you

were still in your 90-day challenge and

you were just like

spoon feeding me exactly what I needed

because honestly I bailed I started

making a website but I clearly lacked

like the vision of like this stuff I

mean honestly I hadn't even heard the

terms sales funnel like I mean I was raw

and so you were I just liked you I

thought you had a cool personality and

then actually the very few bunch of

questions early on and the first thing I

asked you was like doing persuasion

techniques to scan people and then you

made a video about it right I don't know

if you remember that how you made it

yeah it was in a park in Oakland that I

made that video house yeah awesome

totally and it was like okay this is a

good dude cuz honestly I do think in

this space there are a fair amount of

like sketchy people who are just trying

to like make the quick buck and that's

just not me at all and so I felt like I

could relate to you and so here we are

and and you know definitely those first

few videos were super helpful there's a

lot of things still though that like

what sure why I don't think I have that

completely hammered out yet and I think

once I do it'll help me even take it to

the next level and one other thing I'll

mention just because it's one of your

earliest videos and I think it's really

relevant to your viewers is that video

you talked about like produce more than

you consume like I realized okay

I've been spending a couple months

you're like not just looking at your

stuff it's sucking stuff down and it's

like you know there's like diminishing

marginal returns like I gotta get out

there and I gotta go and you know not

too long after that that's when I kicked

in on the 90 day challenge perfect segue

so there there's definitely that like

analysis to paralysis point and totally

YouTube's goal is to make it really easy

for you to go down that rabbit hole and

spend seven hours straight watching

video after video and at the end of it

you're like you're fried your eyes heard

and you've heard so many approaches that

you're just you're like confused and

it's literally like I'm gonna go like

take a nap

cuz yeah impossible to be perfectly

honest what I did I liked you liked your

videos I figured you know what I'm just

gonna kind of like stop searching I'm

just going to like put put myself under

miles as wing you know like I could I

could have research like a thousand

lighting scenarios but instead of like

yo miles what do you recommend for like

lighting

and you like did your little thing and

you sent like some links and I just

bottom like I didn't go out and do and I

honestly I'm sure there's probably

something that's like slightly better

for my needs but it's not worth 10 hours

of my research to do that and actually

you know what you need once you're doing

it anyways right so I needed to just get

the basics and get going and so I've

kind of you know used you as my mentor

if you like like a digital meant awesome

and I'm that been my whole goal and I

think that proves for people watching

that's how affiliate marketing is

supposed to work right be genuine be

honest put the viewers needs first at

all costs and when you have that moment

of like I don't really want to go down

this rabbit hole of researching lighting

what do you use here's an affiliate link

on Amazon I get like 3% Commission you

get what you need to Oh everyone's happy

so this this brings us to a really cool

point and you were very active in the

comments for a while and you you how to

throw your hat over the fence moment

which I'd like you to talk about and

then you didn't appear from comments for

like two and a half months so explain

that transition from kind of commenting

on every video being there with me to

kind of like here's my hat over the

fence moment and then what happened when

you disappeared yeah totally so you know

first of all in all honesty I had kind

of like a stable of 40 or 50 blog posts

like in various degrees of completion so

when I was ready to throw my hat like I

wasn't completely under the gun and

actually I'm sure a lot of people who do

this they're going to build up to that

and I think that's a good thing but yeah

I was reading your stuff I was learning

frankly I spent while I was kind of

commenting with you probably a month

learning WordPress and that was actually

really long hours like there's obably to

week so just like sunup to sundown and

then some like even to like midnight

just learning WordPress getting a couple

of websites going the other one I have

is mighty investor calm and I you know

asking you those key questions like

about naming you and I went back and

forth on like good name stuff like that

and then honestly and I'm sure your

viewers can totally relate like I was

kind of nervous and I was nervous about

the exposure like honestly as a diplomat

you're super

behind the scenes usually like it's a

very low-key thing like if you're

getting a really high profile you're

making an error like your ambassadors

along with the high profile and so for

me to like pivot and honestly I'm still

really learning that like my personnel

even in this conversation I'm actually

probably a bit more of an animated

person but still getting comfortable

with video and that kind of stuff you

know and so I don't know like finally I

was like f it you know either you're

going to do this or you're not and the

way for me was to do that and I pledged

$1000 to the charity of your choice

which is a lot of money for me I may be

you know financially independent but I

did I didn't get there by blowing a

thousand dollars like you know like I'm

pretty strategic about this stuff and I

took that for real I mean if I'd missed

a day I would have definitely stepped up

so I don't want to belabor this but you

know I stepped up did it and then just

dove in working on those post specially

those first few weeks I mean if anybody

goes and looks at I have like a 90 day

scorecard I mean in those early days

there were some days where I did like 16

posts and that's like some of those are

already half written but so yeah I just

like disappeared I felt like I got what

I needed from you to get the start right

like because I couldn't even start until

I had like some idea of what I was doing

and then you know it was time to go to

work and then I reappeared I don't know

a couple weeks ago and said hey dude I

think I had a question for you probably

that's probably why I reappeared and

here we are so and that's brilliant um

the word I like to use for that feeling

is vulnerability being vulnerable and

putting the heart on the sleeve and

getting out there on camera even if it's

just written word it's it's really it's

it's pressure I literally I mean I've

been behind the scenes doing this stuff

full-time for seven years now I've been

making money online for 14 plus years

and I literally just started last year

teaching this stuff because it was

there's all those thoughts and I God do

I really know enough and so good on you

for for kind of being vulnerable way to

get some leverage on yourself when I

started my 90-day challenge it was also

with a thousand dollar donation to the

guy who challenged me to the the charity

of his choice and that was that that

a bit of leverage I needed to like hell

or high water this is getting rolling

every day and I'll add a couple things

with again real quick yeah Urmi once

once that pledge was up there by the way

for those of you out there who are in

whatever financial circumstances I mean

doesn't have to be money it could be

like I'll do this for my friend or I'll

go volunteer or whatever I just want to

say that but um so for me the second

that I call it the thousand dollar

guillotine it was like hanging over me

and I mean honestly from that point

forward I got out of bed and I got that

post up like before I did anything and

that was pretty much true for all 90

days and the other thing I want to say

if you're nervous and I'm sure almost

anybody who's watching this who hasn't

started this stuff is the truth is

you're going to like zilch for traffic

when you start so you're way less

exposed than you think you are you know

like if you don't announce to your

friends and family you're doing this

you're going to have like no traffic for

a while and so I would say like if you

want to be like quiet about it at first

and do it just get going you'll still

feel exposed because it's out there and

it's always out there even if you take

it down Google's gonna have mirrored it

somehow so there's still that exposure

but you know and one other thing I want

to say real quick is um I really think

this 90-day challenge isn't just for

people who want to be these like expert

marketer people I think anybody who

wants to do entrepreneurship in the

modern world learning how to build a

website learning how to market learning

I mean I still so suck a design like

some of your ears are gonna look at my

websites and I think they're so weak

still and I know that but all of that is

like say you want to have a

software-as-a-service company or you

know all sorts of stuff like drop

shipping all of this you're going to

need these skills and I think the

earlier you can do it and just get out

there and do it and honestly that's me

like I'm definitely going to keep doing

money management and you know teaching

people how to invest and because I just

love it and I want to share it a lot

like you but whether or not that's

exactly what I do to do my internet

entrepreneurship at the long haul is

still a work in progress for me and you

talk about that all the time like people

start and then they pivot and you know

I'm certainly aware

and you can't pivot till you start right

you got a head down that palate orc and

then you hit another fork and then you

hit another fork and all sudden you're

doing something very different so in

your 90 day challenge um did you have

like I like to say they use a term that

life happens and did you have any points

where it got like oh like something new

entered the space but yet I've made this

commitment and it almost made it extra

challenging up dude I mean I if people

want a bit of inspiration I actually had

a pretty significant health issue pop up

and it had to do with getting a

concussion skiing and it was something

that yeah now I got it before the 90-day

challenge but the issues had lingered a

bit and so I decided to go out Utah and

do this like super intensive treatment

for you know if you have a little bit of

lingering concussion symptoms and it was

like all day you know five days a week

and honestly I like pre rode a bunch of

blog post I didn't have them completely

done but I had them mostly done and I

just worked around it but for sure like

just getting and you know I I don't

exaggerate it it wasn't like I was like

totally debilitated or something but I

mean I was definitely like I had to keep

it going and also you know I think I got

the flu at one point and you just keep

on grinding but honestly for me and this

is what I felt was such a great sign for

me from the 90 days I actually really

enjoy it like I enjoy the process of

writing the blog post I probably like

the writing more than the videos at this

point because I've done it a lot more in

my life but and I just like you know

getting it out there and playing with

the website and you know what I haven't

best definitely figured out like how am

I going to monetize this and turn it

into anything financial and I do want to

do that I have that motivation but you

know just doing it I really like it's

quite creative in its own way also I

mean you're just like I'm so many of

your viewers are gonna laugh because

they're just going to think I'm old but

I feel like yeah part of the internet

you know like this thing that like is

the big thing that's like destroying

everything in its path like all the

retail stores are getting crushed by

Amazon and I feel like I'm getting on

that wave and that's the future and

if you're going to make a living and you

want the skill set for sure and I feel

great about like learning about like how

does Google search algorithms work and

as you know because I've commented I

kind of hate that stuff I hate that I'm

having to write to those algorithm but

that's the reality and yet you know it's

brilliant and I think one thing that's

kind of cool is like if you think so

the web is disrupting pretty much all

industries and then if you even look

down to WordPress WordPress I believe

30% of websites on the web or WordPress

based so WordPress is kind of like

disrupting the website in many senses

and then content marketing and all the

traffic is either on generally speaking

like 80 plus percent of traffic is on

YouTube Google and Facebook every day

like that's that's a absolutely yeah so

if we're not showing up there and if we

don't understand how they work in those

platforms and how to connect because

when we build a website we're

essentially an island in the middle of

the ocean and there's nothing connecting

but when we start to get little bridges

to our island from Google and Facebook

and all these that's where the traffic

comes from and like you said a lot of

the viewers are younger and like someone

in their 20s or 30s who jumps in and

literally just does this exercise just

for the experience when you come out the

other side you'll probably have more

like any big corporation you probably

have more great real world marketing

experience than 80 to 90% of the

marketing department at fortune 500

companies yeah it's just so true and

it's a skill set that's it's going to be

utterly crucial for you know going in

the future and actually you know you

just touched touched upon like how do

you get Google YouTube these people to

notice you that's actually Phase two for

me right right 90 day challenge was like

just dive in you're in the deep end

you're swimming you're barely keeping

your head above water you've created

some content and for me one thing I

really have to do is I gotta like niche

it down and get narrow I'm just like all

over the map I started a second

website because like I was writing so

much different stuff and it didn't even

really hang together in terms of niches

so I've might investor comment on Jon

Stewart for like different stuff but now

I got to figure out like how do people

find my websites because they're not

really finding it and the truth is I

wasn't really focused on that

that was also because I'm still shy

about it and I wanted to kind of like

you know do the baby steps and then

worry about getting covered but that's

what I got to do now is start you know

getting the word out there and by the

way thank you for having me on your show

because I'm sure it will up my traffic

quite a bit relative to where I've been

so I see Lee do appreciate that yeah and

I think it I think it's so valuable for

because it's one thing like I said for

me to say it and it's another thing to

hear you go through it and I think you

know the way kind of maybe an analogy is

you went to the gym and you've been

working on arms and chest right just of

the brute force and we got a remember

mixing leg day or you know like that guy

who has got the big arms big chest

little chicken legs right and totally

but you are now you put your voice out

into the blogosphere you could and I'm

not necessarily trying to say what you

two do from here but I mean there's so

many options you could go be

participating in local forums with a

link in your signature you could compile

your best blog posts into an e-book and

put it out on Kindle you just comment on

the other blogs and people talking about

your subjects and topics and eventually

Google starts to notice that oh Amazon

links over there and all he's got blog

posts links from all these other

comments he's commenting you know you

are a part of the blogosphere and

absolutely actually you get rewarded so

when you enter this idea of I'm gonna do

the online entrepreneurship did you have

like a like a meant like an idea of I

bet in a year I bet a few months I'll be

able to be making some money it was

there any belief that you had before you

took the yeah I mean well first of all

you know I told you I was inspired by

these dudes that I was working with

overseas I mean these guys like were

they founded like a software service

firms that got like American venture

capital investing multiple rounds these

guys are big time they've you know

they've got like well that big time but

they've got like 50 employees now and

they're you know they started with angel

investing and they they really so yeah I

mean I didn't think I was going to go

from zero to hero and a half a year but

I definitely had this idea that I would

you know what I what I thought I would

have honestly and maybe this is just

unique to me was greater clarity faster

I thought you know within like six

I would just be like full speed ahead

building a business with very great

clarity even you know potentially like

bringing on employees and blah blah blah

and then I realize like I just don't

have enough knowledge and experience to

really have clarity in terms of exactly

what I want to do and as you know I mean

you do it you learn it by doing it and

your story of like the different things

you did from like I don't know roughly

year 2002 when you started what's really

succeeded for you guys in around Oh 809

I'm thinking that is like rket yeah it

really started working for us 2013 but

I've been fiddling with making money

online since the late 1990s totally and

you know that's where I said earlier I

was naive and I honestly was that's okay

I mean that's life right you learn by

getting in there and doing it and I

certainly know a lot more now than I did

but yeah to answer your question I mean

I I would have thought it would move

quicker and I think there are those

people those rare people who for him

that happens but even you know it's just

like you and and for example I would say

your channel on YouTube has had a lot of

success pretty quickly but that's built

off of like a decade decade and a half

of experience and even like there's one

guy who's a blog I like Zen habits I

don't know if you ever read that we had

like that guy was like a professional

writer for 20 years

like literally making his living and you

can really feel he was building off and

he was already publishing freelance

online so it does I mean anything in

life that's worth doing takes a lot of

time and investment so one of the things

I really get into in my blogs is I don't

like hacker mentality like I'm gonna

shortcut my way I just think it it's

like I don't think it really works and

even if you make money I don't think

you're really happy I think it's like

you plant you cultivate you harvest it's

a longer process it's much richer and

more rewarding and you know a lot of it

I won't name names but some of these

most famous guys that are out there kind

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