Steph Smith On Anti-Cheat Businesses, Ethical Hackers, and 5 Bus…
About This Episode
Shaan Puri and guest Steph Smith explore a range of high-potential business opportunities, from A/B testing digital restaurant menus to the burgeoning NIL (Name, Image, and Likeness) market for college athletes. They also discuss the psychology of cheating in games like chess and poker, the value of interactive personal portfolios, and the unique consumer spending habits surrounding breakups.
Episode Description
Show Notes
- 01:50- Podcasting
- 09:15- Cheating Scandal
- 28:20- Ethical hacking
- 31:00- Internet portfolio
- 42:25- Salty bowls and smelly water
- 44:50- Idea: A/B Testing Menus
- 51:15- Inflections that create businesses
- 01:03:40- Breakup Businesses
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- Past guests on My First Million include Rob Dyrdek, Hasan Minhaj, Balaji Srinivasan, Jake Paul, Dr. Andrew Huberman, Gary Vee, Lance Armstrong, Sophia Amoruso, Ariel Helwani, Ramit Sethi, Stanley Druckenmiller, Peter Diamandis, Dharmesh Shah, Brian Halligan, Marc Lore, Jason Calacanis, Andrew Wilkinson, Julian Shapiro, Kat Cole, Codie Sanchez, Nader Al-Naji, Steph Smith, Trung Phan, Nick Huber, Anthony Pompliano, Ben Askren, Ramon Van Meer, Brianne Kimmel, Andrew Gazdecki, Scott Belsky, Moiz Ali, Dan Held, Elaine Zelby, Michael Saylor, Ryan Begelman, Jack Butcher, Reed Duchscher, Tai Lopez, Harley Finkelstein, Alexa von Tobel, Noah Kagan, Nick Bare, Greg Isenberg, James Altucher, Randy Hetrick and more.
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- Additional episodes you might enjoy:
- #224 Rob Dyrdek - How Tracking Every Second of His Life Took Rob Drydek from 0 to $405M in Exits
- #209 Gary Vaynerchuk - Why NFTS Are the Future
- #178 Balaji Srinivasan - Balaji on How to Fix the Media, Cloud Cities & Crypto
- * #169 - How One Man Started 5, Billion Dollar Companies, Dan Gilbert's Empire, & Talking With Warren Buffett
- #218 - Why You Should Take a Think Week Like Bill Gates
- Dave Portnoy vs The World, Extreme Body Monitoring, The Future of Apparel Retail, "How Much is Anthony Pompliano Worth?", and More
- How Mr Beast Got 100M Views in Less Than 4 Days, The $25M Chrome Extension, and More
Links
- * Steph Smith
- * a16z podcast
- * Sh*t You Don't Learn In School podcast
- * r/contagiouslaughter
- * Fake data to catch cheaters tweet
- * Wiz
- * Interactive resume Robby Leonardi
- * Bruno Simon
- * Neal.Fun
- * Electric Chopsticks tweet
- * air up
- * Meet the People Who Design Restaurant Menus
- * Do you love MFM and want to see Sam and Shaan's smiling faces? Subscribe to our Youtube channel.
- * Want more insights like MFM? Check out Shaan's newsletter.
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Key Takeaways
Treat digital restaurant menus like landing pages by using A/B testing software to optimize layout, wording, and pricing, which can increase the average customer value by several dollars.
The new NIL rules for college athletes represent a massive unsaturated marketing channel that founders can leverage to build high-growth e-commerce brands before the cost of customer acquisition rises.
Prioritize 'evidence over confidence' by building interactive or hyper-specific portfolio websites that demonstrate technical ability through tangible projects rather than traditional resumes.
Business Ideas Mentioned
A/B Testing Software for QR Menus
SaaS
AngelList for the NIL Marketplace
Marketplace
Viral Post-Breakup Product Brand
E-commerce
Competitive Integrity Anti-Cheat Agency
Agency