Our circle of influence shapes who we become, and I’m intentional about mine. While I enjoy meeting friends in the city every week, my free time is predominantly devoted to consuming content from individuals I deeply respect and consider successful, they practically make up the 3 out of 5 people around me. Consuming all this content from successful people has significantly expanded my understanding of business and finance. They helped me uncover unknown unknowns and think about the right things. To me, there are four levels of engaging with these people.

Level 1 - YouTube and Articles

They’re good but only last 15 minutes. They’re also heavily edited, so it’s hard to know what they think in day to day life.

Level 2 - Podcasts

This actually feels like sitting in a room full of successful people and listening to their candid talk for hours everyday. It’s a more personal and immersive way to connect with their thought processes, given the extended duration compared to a brief YouTube video or article.

Level 3 - Twitter

After checking out those polished and edited videos and articles, now it’s time to dive into their daily thoughts and opinions. Twitter is the perfect place to get it. I’m following several successful entrepreneurs and my Twitter feed is full of business, world politics and tech. Twitter is a gem if we use it right. It’s incredible how much these folks share on Twitter - posting thoughts, responding to comments, asking questions - multiple times a day. And here’s a little tip: while they might get thousands of comments on YouTube, their Twitter comments are usually in the tens, making it easier to get a reply from them and catch their attention. I won’t say it’s better than a podcast, but it sure is another fantastic way to interact with them.

Level 4 - Hanging out in person

Nothing better than this but a long way to go until this happens.

Build Your Twitter Feed

On Twitter, it’s crucial to follow the right people and actively mark boring/irrelevant content as not interested to keep your feed clean. The platform’s feature that suggests similar accounts after you follow someone is super useful. With just one click, you can follow all those suggestions and build a whole niche in your feed. I’ve listed some seed accounts you can use to get started. Remember to go to their account page, follow them, and then follow all the suggestions that pop up. Make sure to use the mobile app to do this.

The Guy Mafia

Tons of these anonymous guys out there sharing insider insights of their industries.

Business

  • SMB Attorney - Small and Medium Business Acquisitions
  • Mr Beast - Giant influencer but is branching out to real business taking advantage of the huge number of subscribers. He’s already a billionaire.
  • Steph Smith - She has great ideas and I like listening to the MFM episodes she’s in. Sam Parr thinks highly of her, so it’s obvious to follow her.
  • Shaan Puri - Host of the MFM podcast, has an e-commerce branch doing 8 figure revenue and investor in tons of companies.
  • Val Katayev - Really successful businessman. Worth 9 figures already.
  • Michael Girdley - Owns a lot of businesses that do 9 figures in combined revenue.
  • Sieva - Owns a lot of businesses.
  • joe Speiser - Sam Parr’s current business partner building Hampton.
  • Suli - Shaan’s friend and also a successful entrepreneur. His episode on MFM was cool.
  • Codie Sanchez - Owns stake in 25 companies. Focuses on acquiring boring businesses and growing them.
  • Pomp - Really smart guy and excellent interviewing skills. His podcast is awesome, when not talking BTC all day.
  • Moiz Ali - Sold his company to P&G for $100M

Future Billionaires

There might be other people in this blog post I missed who’ll end up as billionaires, I’m not sure. For example, Pomp, Val katayev, Sieva, Girdley, Joe Spieser, etc. But I’m confident for these folks below.

  • Alex Hormozi - Has ownership in a portfolio of companies and is growing them. Great business and sales advice.
  • Nick Huber - Created 9 business over the past few years, each doing $1M+ in revenue. Amazing how fast he creates companies, hires people to run them and moves on to the next thing. He’s going to be a billionaire soon if this continues.
  • Sam Parr - Sold newsletter company to HubSpot for mid 8 figures. Currently working on another business that’ll do $100M ARR in the next 5 years.
  • Andrew Wilkinson - Owns 15+ companies and is already worth at least $700M. He’s smart and down to earth. Listen to MFM episodes featuring him, you’ll know why I respect him.

Software Businesses

  • Alex Becker - Sold his SaaS for $110M recently
  • Acquire.com - My ticket to my first $10M, I’m going to sell my SaaS here.
  • Pieter Levels - The guy who actually implemented the 4 hour workweek in present day. Earns $2M+ through his online businesses.
  • Andrew Gazdecki - Founder of Acquire.com, he routinely posts practical tips and motivation nudges to build your startup.
  • Justin Welsh - Advocate of an online solopreneur style business
  • Dharmesh Shah - Extremely smart person and founder of HubSpot. Check out MFM episodes he’s featured in, just like Andrew Wilkinson.
  • Jason Calacanis - One of the popular VC people online. Great insight into the industry.
  • Austin Rief - Co-founder of Morning Brew, the biggest newsletter out there.
  • Jason Lemkin - Great advice on SaaS businesses

Other

  • Andrew Huberman - Professor at Stanford, the guy I trust for all my lifestyle choices.
  • Lex Fridman - MIT Professor and great podcaster. His podcasts are dense but great.
  • Naval Ravikant - One of the most popular people in Silicon Valley. Great life and wealth building advice
  • Bow Tied Ox - Based fitness talk