Ep 83: From Running an Arsenal Review blog with 500k views to Google & Podcasting | Bilal Zaidi (Entrepreneur & Podcaster at Creator Lab & Not Investment Advice)

It’s always exciting for me to introduce another podcaster on STIMY, and today’s guest has not 1, but 2 highly successful podcasts: - Creator Lab: an entrepreneurship podcast & growth marketing consultancy - Not Investment Advice: a weekly business podcast covering the latest in business, tech & web 3 Bilal Zaidi has interviewed some of the world's best, including people like Jim Mckelvey, the billionaire co-founder of Square, Tim Urban from Wait But Why, Kat Cole, president of Athletic Greens, Daymond John from Shark Tank & Gary Vee. Beyond entrepreneurship - he's interviewed a wide range of creators ranging from Hollywood actors, Emmy-winning performers, leading writers, billionaire investors & non-profit founders. He started his first company, an e-commence business, aged 16yrs old after selling sim cards, CDs & clothes at school & also an Arsenal Review blog that racked over 500,000 views. He later spent 7.5yrs working at Google managing a $100mil+ business. After meeting the founder of leading social enterprise, charity: water, Bilal left his job to join their leadership team full time as their first ever Director of Brand Partnerships, partnering with brands like Saint Laurent, J Crew, Amazon & 100+ others to raise money & awareness for clean water. To date, charity: water has helped almost 15mil+ people get access to clean drinking water in 29 countries. Bilal is now a full time entrepreneur & creator, working on several ventures as a podcaster, consultant & investor. Highlights: 3:40 Growing up in East London as a Pakistani British 6:52 Being a fan of Nars the rapper 7:42 Taking money seriously 9:47 Starting his first company, Street Vibes, as a student 12:49 Learning the art of selling from the vendors at London street markets 15:24 Running an Arsenal Review website with over 500,000 readers 18:44 Being headhunted by Google on LinkedIn 22:14 Almost turning down the opportunity to work at Google 23:25 Being seen as a drug dealer?! 25:37 Spending 7.5 years at Google 27:19 Shutting down a $300M company within Google 29:19 Getting out of his low period 32:16 Starting the Creator Lab podcast 36:43 How Bilal lands amazing guests 43:49 Focus on one platform 48:26 Landing podcast sponsorship deals 53:05 Milestones in Bilal’s podcasting journey 55:30 Meeting the Winklevoss twins 58:40 Interviewing Gary Vee 1:05:39 Jack Butcher - going from cold DMs to close friends 1:14:40 How much personality should you show? 📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/83 💌 Sign up for the weekly STIMY newsletter: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/ebf231f605 🪙 Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/sothisismywhy