This week’s episode of Be On Air features Brendan Kumarsamy the founder of MasterTalk. Brendan is a communications genius and started his YouTube channel to help the world master the art of public speaking and communication. This conversation is loaded with great tips for youtubers, podcasters, creators, and influencers of all kinds. We explore strategies for handling miscommunication, improving education for all, public speaking, presentations, feedback and much more.
For more instructional and coaching videos on how to be a better public speaker and communicator check out MasterTalk on YouTube.
Want to talk about your podcast? Connect with K.Lee and Podcast Farm
Book a free strategy session to talk about your podcast:
Join the podcast farmers FB group and grow your show!
00:00 – Introduction
02:01 – Where Brenden is from?
05:05 – Handling miscommunication
09:47 – Empowering youth with voice
15:09 – Magic, Illusion & Presentation
18:39 – Speaking tips for podcasters
26:36 – Biggest hurdles for MasterTalk
31:50 – Youtube and Podcasting
38:07 – Clubhouse for communications
42:57 – Brendan’s why
45:56 – Final thoughts
Brenden: [00:00:00] So when this behavior, when this pattern goes on and on and on presenting topics, you don’t care about. To students who don’t listen to you to teachers who don’t have time to coach you?
No wonder we hate public speaking. We grow up thinking that communication is a chore. It’s like doing the dishes. Right. So how do you reverse that?
K.Lee: [00:00:48] Hello, and welcome back dear listeners. It’s so good to be here with you. This is K.Lee . You’re listening to be on air and today’s guest is a master of speaking. In fact, his YouTube channel master talk is one of the most educational shows I’ve seen on the platform for learning how to master the art of talk.
So Brendan is the founder of master talk and he started it to help the world master the art of public speaking and communication. He’s also been. A huge presence in the clubhouse scene on the new social media app, audio only clubhouse. And he has been sharing so much tips showing how to be a good moderator on the app.
So we’re going to, we’re going to talk about a whole range of subjects today. So this is going to be a good one. Brenden. Thanks for coming on the show. It’s great to have you.
Brenden: [00:01:38] Of course, K.Lee , it’s my pleasure. Great to be here.
K.Lee: [00:01:40] So, all right. So it, it, it was a, it was a quest to, to have the honor to get you on the show. It took a little bit of perseverance, so that which we were talking about, and it, it makes it even more exciting to have you honestly, a little bit of challenge, right? It’s great. I’m so happy that you made time to be here and we are going to get into some pretty amazing.
Topics topics that are close to both of our heart. And I thought a good place to start is actually from the beginning. Like where did you grow up, man?
Brenden: [00:02:06] Yeah, absolutely man it’s great to be here. So I grew up in Montreal, so it’s a city in Canada where we basically live in igloos and drink maple syrup all day. But yeah, so Montreal is probably a couple of hours drive from New York city.
So I grew up in a suburban city near there, and I studied in French my whole life. And then through that, that’s kind of where the communication journey started for me, where I didn’t know how to speak the language, but my parents looked at me and they said, well, Brenden, you got to learn the language. So we’re going to put you in a French education system.
So for the first 15 years of my life, I pretty much presented in a language I didn’t know. And that was a, that was my growing up uh, Area, so to speak.
K.Lee: [00:02:44] Wow. Yeah. Well, that’s a, that is a, a challenge. I also, I lived in Mexico for a while and I had to learn art history and Spanish. And that was, that was challenging too, to get this whole new vocabulary of words, like beyond the common where’s the bathroom.
You know, can I have limonata. It’s like, how do you, how do you talk about all of these high concepts and stuff? Do you still work in French? Do you still talk in French?
Brenden: [00:03:07] I do actually, yeah, I keynote a lot in French, too. Uh, mostly in my home city and I also do some videos, not a lot. And I think I’ve done one video in French, some of it, just to show the differences in languages.
K.Lee: [00:03:19] So when, when, what would you say is the, for you? How do you, how do you think about language? How do you think about this weird. Mouth wiggling thing that humans do with each other.
Brenden: [00:03:31] Yeah. I love it. I think for me, language is all about culture. Right. It’s the way that we interact with people. There’s this quick quote that I’m going to butcher, which is if you speak, if you speak to a man and in a language that’s not their own it’ll go straight to their head.
But if you speak in a language that they understand that they speak as well, it’s going to go straight to their heart. And I think a lot of that has to do with language where we can communicate in a way that feels like we’re a bit more closer together. I think that’s one piece of it, the culture piece.
And I think the other piece is how do we break down the barriers of communication? Because what fascinates me more about language rather than the words that come out of our mouth? It’s the energy of someone. So let’s say for you, K.Lee , I knew like two seconds in oh, this guy’s a chill dude. Like I’m going to have a great conversation with this guy and you didn’t really say anything.
It’s not really. Oh, you, you get, let me give you a 30 minute spiel about who I am. It was just, it’s just the way that you are. And I think for some people that that’s also language too.
K.Lee: [00:04:31] Yeah. That’s a great point. And I, you know, that brings up a point that we can talk about clubhouse and the power of voice in a second.
But I want to talk a little bit more about language because there’s this great book that my mic is actually on. Let me, it’s called thanks for the feedback and. Even when it’s off base, unfair, poorly delivered. And frankly, you’re not in the mode and it’s by Douglas Stone and Sheila, Sheila, Sheila, Sheila Heen.
They’re their last speakers at like Harvard. And, um, wow. This book has changed my life really quickly. And one of the things it talks about is when I speak to you, unless I say you’re so nice, or that thing you did was really kind. The, the, what it’s doing is it’s called it’s a label and it’s calling up a movie in my mind.
And if I tell you that it’s calling up a movie in your mind, but those movies maybe aren’t even in the same genre, right. They could be completely different. And so it takes a lot of, or it can take either the energy of, you know, hand movements and eye contact and physical to help kind of. Not lose the message in translation, or it takes some more definition and stuff.
And so I think there’s a lot of issues that go on in the world because of miscommunication. So I’m wondering if you could speak on that a little bit and things you’ve found to help with that.
Brenden: [00:05:51] Oh, yeah. You’re, you’re absolutely right on that one. K.Lee, and, and this the sense that because of miscommunication, misinterpretation of information, it can lead to a hundred different things.
And I think the main issue or the main cause of that, it’s just the way that humans think when something happens we assume the hundred worst things possible, and we don’t really consider objectively what could have really happened. Right. So let’s say, I don’t know, your, your partner comes up to you and goes.
Hey, you, you didn’t do X. You didn’t do the dishes. You didn’t do the, you didn’t pick up the trash or something like, you know, to her, let’s say, it’s, let’s say it’s a, her, let’s say she’s coming up to, and you’re like, okay, well, from her perspective, it’s not a big deal. It’s just trash. But the other person might be, why are you attacking me?
It’s just trash. Right? So even something as simple as that, we can construe. A message similar to like the telephone game, where when you, you hear a certain message and it goes through the whole telephone, those 20 people. And then at the end of the telephone game, it’s a completely different message. Right, so the way that I’ve done this. For me personally, there’s a lot of different tricks that you can try. But I think at the end of the day, it’s really learning how to be an active listener specifically, not just listening and active listening means how can we pay attention to what someone is saying in a way that makes them feel that they’re being heard, seen and understood.
So a good trick that I use because I’m a loud mouth trust me , I’m as extroverted as they come. And you probably realize that when you looked up my name and you’re like, holy shit, this guy does like a lot of, but so the same thing, right? So I talk a lot, but what I did to fix that is I would practice listening to conversations that were already over.
So let’s say I’m listening to your podcast with another guest. The advantage that I have in listening to that is I can’t butt in . Even if I wanted to, even if I had something to say, I could raise my hand, but the conversation’s over. So it forces me to sit down and listen to that whole thing from end to end to just take notes.
So I just did that 10 hours a day before a clubhouse, pretty much 10 hours a week, sorry, for a couple of years. And that’s how I learned how to get better at that.
K.Lee: [00:07:59] Wow. Yeah, I, I, I love that you brought up active listening because that is, is a practice that I think about on the daily. Um, so what I just heard from you is you listen to a prerecorded conversation so that you can’t interrupt, you can’t use, and you can’t let any of the sort of subconscious patterns of, of whatever come up.
It’s really, it’s about paying attention and then you’re writing. So you’re also benefiting yourself by kind of integrating the knowledge more too, right?
Brenden: [00:08:28] Absolutely. And another piece I can give you now that I’m thinking through it with the question is you don’t have to do this all the time. I would only recommend doing this on the, really the relationships you want to go 10x on.
So like the, like for me, that’s probably like 5% of my network that you really want to go deep with. You could add in an extra layer where if you feel something’s not being understood correctly, like with the significant other, this is always great, you could say something like, based on what you said, this is what I understood.
Did I get that correctly? And most of the time they’ll go. No. So, so that’s a good learning as well. That’s another trick I use. Not in everyone though or else’s exhausting though.
K.Lee: [00:09:06] Yeah, it’s a good point. And you mentioned like the 5% of your network. So in relationships, in, in intimate relationships, especially where we are bound to be more triggered and more activated, um, it’s so important that the other person feels understood.
Until they feel understood. Not until I think they’re understood, but until they actually feel understood. And part of that is, is it’s sort of, again, this label thing where we’re checking is my label, correct about your label? Is that right? Am I, am I close to it? And that helps us get consensus reality, which is really what communication is for me is like the message is sent and received.
And, and, and that’s a back and forth. I have to keep in the box here, it’s back and forth. And so I’m curious, you know, When we were talking a little bit before we got on the air, that we both have a, it’s close to both of our heart to work with youth and empowering them to use their voice. How, what are some of the challenges that they’re facing with that and how are you kind of approaching, working with them and empowering them in that.
Brenden: [00:10:03] Yeah, absolutely. That’s a good question. So, so let’s look at this high level. Like the reason I started the YouTube channel was mostly for the youth, right? Not really for people who can afford my coaching services is really for the next Elon Musk, the next bill gates and Jeff Bezos, the next Brene Brown you know, they might just be a seven year old girl in Cambodia.
Right. Who how do we know? Right. So because of that, those people who are about to be the next big stars, the big change makers of our society, they didn’t have access to free communication tools because let’s face it. Communication coaching is not, is not cheap just based on how the market works and just the demand for those types of services.
So what I thought about was like, how do we create videos for the youth? So that’s why I started that channel. And what it turned into was a lot of lessons for me on how the industry is actually, How the industry actually works. So I’ll give you the best example. Why do most kids grow up to be bad speakers or better yet or worse yet rather?
Uh, why do they grow up to be fearful of public speaking communication? So it’s a good way for us to understand that first piece is to ask yourself as a simple question, where do we give most of our presentations, whether we’re 10 years old, 15, 20, 25, et cetera. And the answer is almost always school. Well, we wake up one morning and we have to give a presentation in history in French in any other language, but here’s the punchline a hundred percent, not 90%, not 80%, a hundred percent of all those presentations are mandatory.
We don’t wake up one morning and say, Hey K.Lee , you wanna. Get breakfast and present all day. Nobody says that. Right? So your 15 year old and high school classroom teacher comes up to you and goes, uh, um, K. Lee, I needed to do a presentation on the renaissance and you’re like, what is this? Like a fruit. So you present to an audience that doesn’t want to listen to you, you’re presenting a topic.
You don’t even get to pick to teachers who unfortunately are very well-educated, but don’t have time to coach you because there’s so many presentations to go through. So when this behavior, when this pattern goes on and on and on presenting topics, you don’t care about. To students who don’t listen to you to teachers who don’t have time to coach you?
No wonder we hate public speaking. We grow up thinking that communication is a chore. It’s like doing the dishes. Right. So how do you reverse that? We reverse that by fixing those three pain points, right? You never get to pick the topic. How do you fix that? Make kids pick the topic. So let’s say you were in the class.
I would just go okay K.`Lee What do you, what do you care about? Can you care about telling stories of other people you care about podcasts, you like helping amplify the voices of others make that your presentation because that’s something you’ll have ownership in. You’ll have skin in the game. You’ll enjoy it.
That’s one piece. Second piece is. You’re always changing your presentation. So let’s say you do history. Well, what happens is kids aren’t incentivized to make the presentations great because there’s eight of them to kill through. Right? They’ve got to go through history, then they dump history. They go to English, they do the English presentation, et cetera, et cetera.
They’re just trying to survive. Right. I can’t blame them. I was exactly like that. So the second piece of that is saying. Do the same presentation, hundreds of times or dozens of times. Okay. So K.Lee, you got this presentation on amplifying the voices of others. Do it, do it every time next week, do it every week.
So that way you’re not scared of, oh, I have to create this new content. No, no, no, just do it again. And then the third piece of that is accountability. Make kids, the teachers. This is very counterintuitive, what I do with the kids I coach mostly my executives as kids is I ask them to give feedback to each other first, even if they’re not coaches, because that way they get forced into an accountability system with each other, and then they want to see each other win.
And then they all become phenomenal speakers
K.Lee: [00:13:55] that is really inspiring and very it’s very clearly laid out. Obviously you’ve thought about this a little bit, right. And yeah, I mean, It’s passion, right? It’s like helping. And this is the, this is what’s broken about the education system where it’s broken, because obviously there’s some amazing teachers out there.
There’s some amazing school systems out there. But overall, I would say that what’s broken is that there’s not a dedication to letting the student find their own inspiration and find their own passion. And that would fuel everything you’re saying, plus that practice and the coaching. Is that right?
Brenden: [00:14:31] Absolutely man, like, and that’s the thing, like, you know, to the education system point, like. People don’t have to pay me for this. Like literally take what I said, reapplied to the education system. And that’s how broken the system is. Like these changes that I’m suggesting right now in the show. It’s not rocket science, like the, like to your point, my, my sister is an English teacher.
They can easily apply this in the curriculum. All the teachers just come together and just make and just say, okay, These kids, I got eight presentations or this is not helping them. How about we just do one presentation a semester, but make it really good, right. That build their confidence up.
K.Lee: [00:15:05] Yeah. I liked that idea of, of, of sort of like, so I don’t know.
Are you into magic and illusion at all?
Brenden: [00:15:13] Yes. It’s probably not the same context as you though.
K.Lee: [00:15:16] Well, tell me, what do you think about when I say magic and illusion?
Brenden: [00:15:21] Just think about like the magic of life and like the magic of serendipity, like, especially with us. Cause I know it was like an intro from Nelson, but then we just met again on clubhouse. Like that’s kind of magical too.
K.Lee: [00:15:32] I love that.
Brenden: [00:15:33] I think that’s that’s magic. I think magicians is magic. What about you? What do you think?
K.Lee: [00:15:38] Well, I think magic is another channel of communication and you can do some extraordinary things. And maybe we’ll get into that before the end of the show, but you can do some extraordinary things with magic tricks and elevate them beyond magic tricks to moments of astonishment, especially when you can combine it with powerful speaking.
And as a education tool, as a presentation tool, adding like just, uh, just, uh, what do you call it with salt? What is it like a pinch, just a little seasoning into your presentation. You can blow people’s minds and, and anchor information into their brain in a much different way. And that, and I think it’s really powerful for kids because it maybe is a.
You know, it’s you do something with your hands and it’s some bilateral stimulation. And so you can kinda, you know, you have, you have a couple of things going on cause right. I, I would imagine one of the things on stage is like, where do you walk? How do you stand? Where do you look? Where do you put your hands?
Like, how do you hold space on stage? And so sometimes having something to do that also has a positive impact on the audience is kind of cool. So I was curious if you had ever played around with some magic.
Brenden: [00:16:50] Yeah, I love that. And I think super, super easy way, you know, for educators who are listening, a good analogy, I like to use that I guess is magical is I compare presentations to jigsaw puzzles.
You know, those jigsaw puzzles you kind of do as you used to do as a kid. So let’s say, I asked you this question. If you were working on a puzzle yourself, which pieces would you start with first and why?
K.Lee: [00:17:15] Yeah, the edges, that’s the flat pieces because it’s the easiest to find.
Brenden: [00:17:19] Exactly. Right. So you start with the edges and then you work your way into the middle, right?
Yeah. So another question is, why don’t we do that in public speaking? Because in public speaking we do the opposite. We shove a bunch of content. We start with the middle first and then we do our whole presentation. We get to the end and it sounds something like this. Uh, uh, so, uh, uh, thanks the way I think about it is no, no, no.
Start with the edges first. Do your introduction, 50 times, not two times not three to do like 50 times. It’ll take you like an hour. It’s not that hard. It’s like a minute or two, same thing with the conclusion. Do that 50, 60 times it’ll take like, what’s a great movie with a terrible ending, right? Terrible movie.
Last time I checked the same, same thing, right? 50, 60 times. And then after like, not two years of practice, man, like two hours or something, you can do this in middle of it. Like a sandwich break or something. You look at this, you’re like, wow. My presentation is really good. Now tackle the middle.
K.Lee: [00:18:15] That is so intuitive and it, and it’s funny that we don’t approach it that way.
Like, Just having the first impression and the last impression solid kind of gives you a picture of the puzzle and then you fill it in. And even if you only filled it in like 50%, you get an idea of what you’re trying to talk about. That’s a great analogy. So again, on this communication tip, you just painted a picture.
So you’re using imagery. Could you, could you share some, I know there’s like a million public speaking tips. I know you have an amazing channel master talk. Everyone should go listen. Um, I’m just curious what what’s coming up for you now, as far as these listeners podcast hosts, my audience are people who are either podcast hosts now, or they’re planning to be there planning to broadcast.
What are some things that we can think about, especially we’ll start at the beginning with the edges, with an intro.
Brenden: [00:19:05] Yeah, absolutely. So in the context of podcasts, us, what I always recommend is. Think of other ways outside of your podcast to make yourself an exceptional communicator. So I’ll give you a really easy example of that.
Make a presentation on your podcast and start presenting it to different places in your community. So it’s in your case, K.Lee you have a presentation or rather you have a podcast on amplifying the voices of others make a presentation on that, like a full keynote. And go present it like pat Flynn does with SPI smart, passive income and is, you know, other like Lewis house does that, what school of greatness make a presentation and start pitching it at universities, go here.
Here’s my podcast is what we care about. This is what I’ve learned since I started it. And what’s going to happen is that’s going to create a lot of excitement, enthusiasm, but also feedback on how your podcast is being perceived by other people. So when people come up to you, you can ask them a simple question, like.
What do you think my podcasts about? And if they don’t give you the right answer, the answer you’re looking for, it means you need to re message that presentation, but remessaging that presentation will also help you in the podcast itself. Because I think what most podcasters are missing is what is my clear.
Value prop, why, who is this podcast for? Why is it important and where do I see this podcast going in the next five to 10 years? Because if you don’t have answers to all three of these questions, you’re going to, what we call fade out. Right. You know, I’m going to really be able to keep going for a long period of time.
So that’s, I would encourage people to do and also apply the puzzle analogy to podcast episodes, intro. Conclusion and then figure out the pieces in the middle after.
K.Lee: [00:20:50] You just dropped a lot of value in a very short time. So I want to unpack some of that for a second. First of all. Applying to colleges for speaking engagements, like the old that’s like the O G podcast or something.
I just like it just dawned on me , I’ve never thought of that. I’ve never thought of that. And I’ve never told of my clients to consider that. But as an expert, if you’re listening to this and you want to be a public speaker, you want to be a podcast host and you’re not doing that. It seems like pretty low hanging fruit to reach out and try and do some appearances for universities and colleges.
Right? Like, whoa, that’s a really cool tip. I’ve never thought about that.
Brenden: [00:21:25] Yeah, like it’s I know I’ve been saying you have the charge, these people, a lot of my, my keynotes when I started, cause I was a keynoter long before I was a YouTuber. Right. And I wasn’t a good keynoter to trust me. I would like my first keynotes were two people.
It was like, this is how you master communications I was like 19 or something. Literally. Wow. Yeah. They’re like what? Like, I don’t understand, like, why are you talking about sandwiches? It just didn’t make any sense. But then over time, as, as I refined it, and then my coaching skills really started, I started maybe at 20 to start coaching people for free mostly, and then over time I just got really good at it.
And then I was able to create really strong content on YouTube. So for people who already have podcasts, it’s the same analogy. Just do the opposite. So now what you want to do is just look at your network and just go, okay. Do you know a teacher? Who would want to have you as a guest speaker? I doubt everyone’s going to say no.
One of them’s gonna be like, sure, K.Lee , I got to, I got a class on public speaking or stuff. Why don’t you come and talk for like 20 minutes and just explain and, and show the students how else you can apply this knowledge outside and you don’t have to charge either. It’s just good practice.
K.Lee: [00:22:29] Brendan is blowing my mind. Brendan is blowing my mind. If you’re not watching YouTube, you can’t see the, the mindblowing gestures that I’m making. I love this. And I’m personally going to be implementing this because. I’m taking my idea to a lot of adults and educators and design thinkers, which is great, but I just realized the importance of taking it to the people who it’s supposed to be for, which is the students.
And like, boom, if they can’t tell me what I’m saying, and they’re not interested in it, why am I it’s like market validation? You know, just got to do it. That’s amazing.
Brenden: [00:22:58] Dude I got to add on there. Cause you said something so good. You just said something so good. Why do you think I have the kids program that is not for money, dude.
Okay. Most of the clients are executives as kids That’s not a money thing. I’ll tell you exactly what it is. It’s I want to be in their psychology. I don’t have access to kids. Right. Like, cause I don’t have a lot of like cousins who have young children. So for me it’s like, no, it’s a psychology play. Like how are my tips actually working?
And to be honest, that’s where the real learning occurs when I did my first batch. Wasn’t that great. The first couple of weeks, because the six-year-old in my class would go like, uh, what’s a speech. What’s a this, and that’s how I came up with puzzle. It was through those interactions. I was like how to explain this in a way, a six-year-old will understand it You need to play in the dirt.
You need to be there with the core customer they’re not even the customer, the person that you want to impact, so you can get it from them. Another quick example, I’ll give you was when I started my professional, uh, Uh, keynoting career. I as very insecure because I started keynote as I was like 21 or something. I was presenting to execs who had worked at the company longer than I’ve been alive.
Like it was really threatening. So I would show off a lot. I would just go, okay, these are my clients. Take me seriously until I give a workshop to a youth group. And they just looked at me and asked me the best question I ever got asked in my career and probably ever will get asked by. I think it was a nine year old.
She looked at me, she was like, What’s a CEO and I just went you’re right. What does a CEO like, who cares? Let’s just focus on the good stuff. So yeah. I just wanna throw that .
K.Lee: [00:24:28] Wow, from the mouth of babes. Yeah. They, they they’re at a different layer of reality. And again, it sounds like what you’re saying is feedback is important.
Like direct feedback. So yeah. That’s what I’m hearing from you because we put out our call, we put out our communication there and we’re not mind readers. We cannot know what’s going on in another person’s head unless they share it back. And it’s not that we interpret that. Right. Which is why we have to be like, okay, is this what you’re saying?
And so much feedback is not received, which is what that book is about is how do we receive feedback? Because if it’s negative feedback, we turn it into. I’m not good enough. I’m bad. Everyone hates me. Like we, we take it personally and that may even have been what the feedback was, but it doesn’t mean we have to take it personally.
But anyway, so feedback seems like a really important piece of communication. It’s not just speaking at people, it’s listening and speaking.
Brenden: [00:25:23] Yeah, absolutely. The layer would add to that is I think Seth Godin has a great point of view on this is get feedback from the people you want to make a difference for.
Like, you don’t need feedback for everybody. Sure. It’s important to consider all that stuff. But I think the real thing is the people who, you really want to impact, get their feedback and value it the most. That’s how you prioritize it. So let’s say for me, it was really important that the six-year-old understood me because I want to make sure that after I’m dead, people can use my YouTube videos forever.
Like I want to be the next Dale Carnegie. That’s like my big dream. And it was unfortunate that Dale just didn’t have access to the technology I do today. And the same way Dale disseminate his information through books. He couldn’t start a YouTube channel. He couldn’t guest on a show like this. Right.
Which would have been super cool. So I have to do that for him. Well, that’s kind of the way I see it. So for me, it’s important that the six-year-old understands, but to someone who’s listening, the six-year-old might not be your audience. For me it is. So I spend a lot of attention listening to them for you.
It might be a nurse, might be a doctor. It might be a dentist or somebody else. So focus on those people have dinners with them. I literally have dinners with them and I just asked them questions and I take notes.
K.Lee: [00:26:34] Yeah, that’s fantastic advice. So I’m curious, like on your, on your journey, what’s, what’s something that has, what’s been like the greatest, uh, hurdle that you’ve, that you’ve been able to overcome. And how did you do that on your, on your speaking and your influencer career on youTube?
Brenden: [00:26:50] I like how you said influencer career.. That’s funny
K.Lee: [00:26:53] you got me here. You got me here. You influenced me and all these people on clubhouse.
Brenden: [00:26:57] Yeah, I guess so. I appreciate it. Yeah. I think the way that I see it is like, I, you know, there’s always going to be hurdles along the way.
There’s, you know, there’s definitely dozens of them. I’ve been through, like when I, when I started moderating a cause what I was like, how do I talk to, oh crap, I keep interrupting people. That’s one. And then on YouTube, it was, I took me three weeks. To like show up with my first video. I was like really scared to post the first one, especially since at the time, I believe, I think I was the youngest communication coach on the platform.
Yeah. Which of course sounds cool, but it wasn’t so much fun because everyone else has a PhD and I’m just there in my mom’s basement. Just like, yeah, I think I know as much as the next guy or gal on communication. Right. So, so it’s definitely nerve wracking there. So I think with every hurdle. When there’s a lot of hurdles that I’ve went through.
But on these two specifically, like when I started mastering, another example is when I started posting videos, I thought to myself, well, the education system is probably going to value these videos. Why don’t I send it to a bunch of university teachers and see what happens? And it didn’t go my way. A lot of people replied and said, who’s this young guy, look, I’m not going to listen to this guy.
A lot of people gave me like really harsh feedback that wasn’t even like warranted just as like really bad people. I was like, whoa, like the, just a university teacher, like leave you alone. But like, but, but I think the way we get over that hurdle is by really paying attention to the person that we want to serve.
And I think talking more has a great point of view on this. He says with every why. Right. You know, Simon Sinek start with why there’s always a who behind that. Why, who is the person that you want to serve? And if you don’t understand at a granular level who that individual is, it will be really hard for you to jump through hoops, to go through different hurdles.
Right? So when I started YouTube, I sucked. And if you don’t believe me, go check my first videos. They’re still up. Like, I wasn’t that good on camera, but then over time, the reason I kept getting better was because I know the seven year old in Cambodia can’t afford me and can’t reach me. So I have a choice to make, do I make those videos for everyone or do I just serve the people who are willing to pay for my services?
And most people in my industry pick the second option. They go, well, if I got 10 executive clients that pay me 10 key each, I have a six figure living right. Done rest for me. It’s not the game I want to play. Like I do well in my business. That’s great and everything, but like, how do I create resources that help the whole world?
And the only way to do that, in my opinion, in my industry is through a YouTube channel.
K.Lee: [00:29:26] Wow. Okay. Well, I would love to talk to you a little bit about YouTube. So I’ve been saying to people that like the Trinity and I kind of heard this from, from Lewis, which was YouTube mailing list podcast. Like the Trinity of financial abundance online right now, if you can do that, I tell people, podcasts is the audio platform and YouTube is like the podcast platform, but it’s video, even though there are some differences, but would you say that’s sort of an accurate way to think about it?
Brenden: [00:29:57] One, you need to send me that episode. Cause I’ve never heard that from Louis before, so I need to get that from you.
K.Lee: [00:30:02] It was on Clubhouse , sorry.
Brenden: [00:30:03] Oh, geez. Crap. That’s good. But I think Lewis has absolutely. I never heard him phrase it that way because I’m obsessed with Louis, like the way that he thinks about his content and the way that he’s, he’s influenced me in a big way.
But yeah, that’s great. We’ll have an offline conversation about that, but I think he’s, I think he’s right. Like the mailing list, the YouTube channel, the podcast is the Trifacta. But what I’ll add to the conversation is to really spend time focus on one rather than the other. So mailing list is fine. Like, just add to that.
But what I really do recommend is zoning in on one. Cause I think the biggest mistake with podcasts and YouTube that most people make is that they try and focus on both and fail at both miserably. So for example, they have a really good podcast and then they put it on YouTube and it sucks cause they just copy paste.
They don’t have a production team. The interviews aren’t in person where somebody like a Lewis or Lex Friedman are good examples that come to mind where it’s like since the podcast is in person, the experience audio and video wise is very high quality versus same thing. YouTube is trying to become podcasters, which is a good idea, but I think you need to double down first and get really good at that one platform.
And then after you dominate, then you can start to spread out your influence. So for me, that’s why I don’t have a podcast and I just guessed on them sometimes because I really want to be the best YouTuber on communication. That’s really my zone of genius. So I really need to focus all my promotion efforts, everything I do on that.
And then as that grows, Then it starts to trickle down into a podcast I’ll probably have in the future.
K.Lee: [00:31:40] Absolutely. And you know, real quick. So we’re at 30 minutes. How are you on time? Let’s keep going.
Brenden: [00:31:46] This is a good conversation? Stop whenever you want. We’re good.
K.Lee: [00:31:50] Alright. . Um, YouTube. So. One one thought in there, cause I’ve given this a lot of thought and I have no I’ve launched.
I’ve helped co-found a YouTube channel that has done really well. And, you know, as a, touring musician some of my songs have like, you know, I think I have like a million views on two songs total. So I’ve had a little like dip into YouTube, but my own channel for the, for podcast farm is sort of the repository of where I put these podcast episodes.
And so this is what we’re recording eventually a live stream to it. I don’t, I don’t really think that this is the most engaging thing to watch. I don’t really think a lot of people will watch it. Although my brother has told me he prefers the YouTube. So I think there are some however, um, The search engine feature.
So just putting it up for the benefit that if someone searches for some topic or some guests that you, that it’s there, I think there’s some validity there. And then a tip that I got from Wyatt Wyatt, Troy from, uh, Dawnation. He has a great YouTube channel behind the DAW. And he says, he’ll do the podcast interview like this, or actually he’ll do audio only.
And sometimes, and then he will hop off and film an intro, like a proper YouTube video intro and he’ll film a proper video outro and he’ll slap that on. And then even if it’s an audio gram, like a sound bite, like an image in the middle with just audio for viewers, there’s some bridge that brings you in.
And it, and it, at least, you know, it feels like a YouTube, like you’re on a YouTube channel. So I thought those were two interesting ideas. And I’m curious your thoughts on that?
Brenden: [00:33:21] Yeah, I think that’s good K.Lee, but if I’m being perfectly honest, I think that there’s two ways of winning in my opinion and the podcast, but obviously there’s exceptions.
I know Sam Harris posts his audio only on his YouTube channel, but he’s Sam Harris. Right. So let’s focus on the norm rather than the exception. So, so I think that the key here. Is there’s two ways to it. One is to have an in person show or really high quality because the issue with podcasts and you’re doing this really well, by the way, but the issue in general with the medium.
So she went to the guest in a virtual lens is the quality isn’t as good because if your guest doesn’t have a high quality Mike or something, it ruins the experience for the end user. So I think there’s two ways. One way is to have it in-person show, which obviously costs a lot of money. Right. You know, you bring people in, in person, you have somebody record it and then it looks really clean.
You have it on the YouTube channel the other way, which is only if you’re interested in growing YouTube specifically, this is my recommendation always is do solo episodes. So solo episodes means every week you shop alone, but because it’s you and nobody else, you can create your own production around that.
So notice how there’s no guests on my show, but also notice that every single episode is gold, right? It’s like super well-produced and it’s like, well, I don’t want to say yet to put a suit on it. That’s just my style, just like that. But, but I think the. The, the takeaway, and this is what I recommend for podcasts.
We really want to grow the YouTube. Following is you either need to make your podcast in person and have people like videotaping it and making it look clean or you come on as a solo artist every week. And you talk about, so for example, you could do an episode on the three ways to book a guest. You can do an episode on the three lessons I learned from speaking to X guest.
I think that’s the right way. To, to grow the YouTube channel and the way that people come back every week or else people will just pick another show. Right. Cause if I’m on YouTube and I get to pick between somebody who just copy paste this on, on, on YouTube versus like Louis, where it’s like HD video or like, and I get to watch the people like interact.
I’ll just pick that person any day of the week.
K.Lee: [00:35:26] That makes so much sense. And, um, you know, I’m going to just give a shout out here to Deseret Lee, who is, uh, is an amazing author, and this is what her Instagram looks like. So the reason I am showing this is because yesterday on clubhouse, she is she’s found a way to live stream to YouTube with her clubhouse screen on the screen.
So people can see the little faces talking, and that is brilliant to me. That is a brilliant, innovative way to do a YouTube thing and it, and she’s against a nice background. So it’s sort of like a nice solo cast. But there’s this, uh, this like voice only audience, uh, contributing value and stuff. So that’s an interesting thing, but I really agree with you.
Don’t diversify our opinion or our energy, like focus on a platform and go all in. And this idea of the solo cast is super smart. And I’ve never thought about that, that in addition, and you could easily just use that as the audio for your solo cast on your podcast platform. Bingo, but that’ll help your YouTube channel grow.
So I heard this weird thing that potentially YouTube, like pet penalizes, you for posting smaller videos and longer videos. Do you think that’s true?
Brenden: [00:36:37] Um, what I, um, I think, I think a better way of understanding this. It’s more like you do P penalizes watch time. So, so think of it like this. If your audience is used to two, five minute videos from you and you start posting 20, don’t be surprised if your watch time’s really low because you’re conditioning your audience in a certain way.
They think about mine. My videos are always within the same length. Because I want them to be, but the other reason is because I know someone won’t want to sit through a 30 minute episode on communication just too long. Right. But that’s my niche. Right. More specifically to me, but, but I think that’s not the case with podcasting because Louis posts up as full episode and people watch the whole thing.
Right. So, so I think that the takeaway here is always put yourself in the mind of the viewer. Right. And the number one question you’re always gonna ask with YouTube. When you look at your channel, you have to always be honest with yourself is if I was looking at my own channel, what I want to go through every single video or not.
It’s when people who are looking for communication tips, they know I exist. Cause that’s always the issue with me. It’s not like implementation when people know me like your audience was listening to me now. It’s always not knowing quiet. So when they type master and they see the YouTube video, Holy shit.
And they started bingeing like, fuck. So that’s why I know my YouTube channels working worse versus if they go, okay, here’s one video that Brendan sent me and I’m kind of done with this channel. That’s when you know you’re doing it, right. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So watching there, there, the leaving of the video, watching them leaving your platform is really important.
K.Lee: [00:38:07] Totally. So then let’s, let’s kind of, I would love to kind of talk to you about clubhouse briefly because it is a new platform. Um, I’ve been called in. Evangelist of it, which was not my intention ever, but because of the kinds of interactions that have happened because of the experiences that have happened and because of growing my Instagram by 250 people in under two weeks, uh, which for me, being under a thousand followers on Instagram is huge.
You know, maybe for someone else, that’s not a lot, but for me, that’s like a mat that’s like a hundred, almost 200% growth. Um, What do you think about this new cutting edge voice only platform?
Brenden: [00:38:43] Yeah, I mean, I mean, you know, that I’ve spent a lot of time on the app probably too much than I should have , but I think that the key with clubhouse is look, I, I was really bullish at the beginning.
I’m a bit more pessimistic on the future of the app, but what I will say is in this moment of time, as of this recording, clubhouse is probably the best place to be. If you are specifically a thought leader, That nobody knows about yet. So repeat that again. Clubhouse is the best place for thought leaders who are not yet known.
I’ll use myself as an example. So I’ve been grinding YouTube for maybe two years now. Right. And I probably got like 6,000 subscribers or something like that. My YouTube channel, which is not bad. But like by hustle, I really mean hustle. Like I did like hundreds of podcasts I went to like, did all these speaking engagements, bunch of stuff to grow the channel, and it didn’t really give you that much traction because most of the podcasts I did had smaller audience, which is totally cool.
Right. But what happened with clubhouse? Was what’s fascinating about this app? The thing that excites me the most is especially at the beginning, when I joined a December where the user base was like 500,000 and very highly engaged to throw really smart, really successful people, high quality audiences that you would have to spend thousands of dollars to get access to.
Normally that just came at your fingertips right away. That’s one piece. And I think I still think that’s true for the next couple of months. I don’t think there’ll be true in a year from now, though. The other piece though, is this idea that there’s no more gatekeepers? What’s fun about clubhouse is the democratization of ideas.
It’s a marketplace. Whoever has the best idea wins. If your idea’s good people will listen to your room. And if your idea’s bad people won’t pay attention to you. And I love that about clubhouse because that means. If you’re someone that nobody knows about and you take the effort to spend hours a day on the app and your ideas are actually really good.
And no one’s heard of you before you will explode on clubhouse. And that’s what happened to me day one, I think I started December 29th or something. I was like, okay, I don’t understand what’s going on after an hour or two of like speaking. I was like, here, this is what I think about public speaking.
Everyone was like, Holy shit. Like this guy does a lot about community because remember I’m really young. Right. So before like, you know, gatekeepers, you know, I want it to go by the way I’m 24. I’m 24. Wow. So they would be like, oh yeah, you’re like young. We don’t have put you up on stage. What clubhouse?
Like there’s summer gatekeepers. So if you’re the smartest guy in the room or you have something smart to say and you make people feel great, you take the time to DM them. You take the time to build relationships with them. Clubhouse is your oyster. So yeah, I grew really quickly and, uh, I plan on staying on, I’m actually quitting my day job to go all in on clubhouse until, until this thing goes down. Yeah. Yeah.
K.Lee: [00:41:26] I think what you mentioned is really true, that it, it’s hard to believe once all Android users come on and once it’s like completely open and somehow monetization and all the, all the. Gatekeeping stuff comes into it. That it won’t be the opportunity. Like it’s, it’s almost like the gold rush right now is how it feels to me.
And I experienced a similar thing where you go onto these stages and contribute something and it levels the playing field because it’s all voice and yes, there’s moderators. And there is, you can tell by people’s bio and how many followers and stuff, but no one on there. You know, no one can have a million followers on it.
It’s not even that many people. And so it levels the playing field. And like you said, it’s a marketplace of ideas. So if you go up and you share something that inspires people, like you get instant feedback and like instant follows, and then you engage so much and you have these conversations with people and you meet your best friends that you never knew you had.
And it’s just a, it’s a special time. And it’s, you know, if anyone listens to this, it is April 3rd. And 2021. And I think that is, it is still totally a great time to get in, find someone who has an invite. Us, me, maybe I have a couple, maybe Brendan has a couple just like get in and check it out for a while because it is an exciting opportunity right now.
And yeah. Who knows where it’ll go, but I’m really happy to hear that you had traction because. And who knows if that would’ve happened. Exactly. If you hadn’t done all that hustle before and polished yourself and gotten yourself to that point, right? So it’s the universe works in mysterious ways, but I wanted to kind of bring this back to you and your why.
And I’m curious if you could talk to us, why did you put in so much work? Why, what was it that. Allowed you to have that much passion and purpose to do this?
Brenden: [00:43:06] Right so there’s two pieces to that. There’s the clubhouse piece. Why put in so many hours, and this is the mission in general. So clubhouse is really simple, right?
It’s just a moment in time. And I’ve been given an opportunity that I’ll never get for the rest of my life, which is here’s the audience. Brendan. You have a chance to reach them all right now, are you going to take it? Because after a clubhouse is saturated, like YouTube is now and all that stuff, you won’t have that chance anymore.
Do you want it or not? So I said, yes. So I spent, uh, you know, 10 hours a day on the app for a couple of months and it led to the results of dead. But, but for me, the bigger piece here, and that’s why I think I’ll be the last moderator standing on this app because my mission in life is to be the bridge between everyone’s ideas.
Hmm. But if everyone, whether you’re a seven year old girl, like in Cambodia, I know he was just a country, but whatever Laos, whatever, or whether you’re, you know, the 14 year old girl in Utah in the U S you know, studying in high school, scared of to give their first classroom presentation. If I give you the bridge between every single human beings ideas, what would that, that would imply that all of the best ideas would be heard.
And if all the best ideas were heard, the human race will advance at a much faster rate. Almost exponential. So that’s why for me clubhouse became my gateway because this has given me an opportunity to be the bridge between everybody so that I need to be in every room. I need to be on all the time, so I can constantly share who I am and what I’m about.
And, you know, so people can get access to my free tools and things like that. So, yeah, that’s the mission is to be the next Dale Carnegie and help generations after me master this important skill.
K.Lee: [00:44:43] Wow. That’s super noble. And that is such an interesting visual in my mind of being the bridge between all ideas and trying to understand what that, what that even like looks like or takes a form of.
And it’s exciting because I think that is the experience on the app. And it’s not about clubhouse. It’s about human connection. I think this happened. Before in other ways, and it’s happened through books and it’s happened through all the, all this stuff. But clubhouse has given us this sort of neural net, this parallel processing distributed network, neural net of humans.
And like you said, it’s sort of a high quality audience. Not in worth every human is worthy, but in, in like expertise and the time they’ve put into their passion and purpose. And so you get these ideas that kind of. Just like you said, they rise to the top and these ideas kind of float around on the rooms.
And if you’re in all the rooms, you kind of amass, this coagulation of, of interesting ideas and, and that has been really enriching. And it sounds like it’s still requires a lot of work and a lot of dedication, and that’s why you’re going all in because you’re seeing, Hey, I’m putting, I’m putting my time in here and this is having so much more results than putting anywhere else.
Like, why go anywhere else? Just focus there. Yeah. So as we’re winding down towards the end of the interview, this has been really educational. There’s a couple areas I would love to touch on before we, before we wind down for today. So the first one is what are some books like? What’s one book that you would like the world to read.
Brenden: [00:46:15] I’m so glad you said that because most people go, what are the three books? And I always listened from a podcast is personas. Like we’re going to go out there and buy three books. Right. So I love that you said that specifically one book. Okay. The one book that nobody recommends on public speaking is my Bible.
Okay for everything I do. And it’s called Thirst by Scott Harrison. Scott Harrison is the CEO of charity water. It’s a nonprofit. He started to help people get access to clean water, but more so than that, Scott, in my opinion is one of the best storytellers in the world because he took. An idea, raised half a billion dollars off of the idea to help people get access to water, but he did it through public speaking and communication.
And what’s fascinating is that’s a lot harder to do nonprofit because in nonprofit you’re exchanging. Money for a non-tangible good. So I’m giving you money for your cause. And you’re just giving me the satisfaction that I contributed to your cause. That’s very challenging versus it’s a lot easier to sell me a thousand dollar iPhone than it is to sell me a cause.
Right. So I think Scott’s been masterful at it. He’s a personal hero of mine and it’s a book that, you know, a lot of famous people recommend. And I think it’s a book. Everyone should be reading. And, and the way he did that was through story telling, is that correct? That’s how he, he anchored the value of the cause to the donation.
Yeah. So I have a whole video on my channel about just Scott and the way he did that. But, but the idea is pretty simple is how do you tell the stories of other people. To include them within the mission of your organization. So charity water’s not about Scott. It’s about everyone around, around the organizations, the donors who give money.
It’s the seven year old girl. There’s a great story. About a seven year old girl giving like seven 50 to the charity. They made a whole documentary around her. It was amazing. And they said, look, or it could give seven bucks. Why don’t you get, they raised like $150,000, right? So it was, it’s just so smart. I just, like, I just liked what they do.
I think Scott’s one of the few nonprofit executives I’ve seen in the world that knows how to tell stories and that can actually solve the problem, which I wouldn’t say for many charities, but I’ll give him, I’ll give him that stamp of approval for sure.
K.Lee: [00:48:24] Yeah, definitely check out that book. And even the intro of this podcast, uh, my, my magic and illusion mentor, Jeff McBride, he, uh, he’s friends with David Copperfield and he has him on his broadcast, uh, live magic and mystery school broadcast that they do every week.
And he was saying, David copied that David Copperfield is a billionaire and he. And it took a lot of work and a lot of suffering to get there, but, but the way he did it was he tapped into the power of storytelling to do that. And I think that’s what you’re echoing and it makes so much sense. That’s what we are doing since the Dawn of man and women and women is use our voice to communicate with each other and tell stories.
And that is what podcasting. And so that leads me to my next question, which is what is a podcast that you want the world to hear?
Brenden: [00:49:11] Oh, that’s a tough one. I would probably say Lewis Howes, the school of greatness. I’ve always been a big fan of Lewis. He’s the reason why I am the person I am today started listening to his podcast and I was 17 when he was getting started with the show and I’ve been following it ever since.
So I definitely recommend, and of course the episode I’d recommend is the one he did with Scott Harrison.
K.Lee: [00:49:32] Oh, double, double whammy. There. You can kill two birds with one stone. That’s awesome. So then as a final. Magic trick or game, you do this amazing thing that you probably get asked all the time. So if you don’t want to do it, I totally understand.
But you maybe already know what it is. Um, you, you, you show people the power of sort of improv. We could call it freestyling, but, but how you can practice public speaking. Would you mind giving my audience a demonstration of what that is? Yeah, absolutely. So it’s called the random word exercise. So essentially what that is, K.Lee , somebody gives you a random word and then through that random word, you have to create a presentation out of it, which I’m happy to do.
So why don’t you give me the word and I’ll give you the speech. Okay. We’re going to do it really randomly. I’m going to open up my book. Hold on. Let’s get this camera going. I’m going to open up the book. Just one, one random word, right? Yeah. Just make sure it’s a word. I understand. That’s all. How about feedback?
Brenden: [00:50:22] Feedback is great.
As I sit on my kitchen table. Yeah. Not a chair. I just like sitting on my table. I ask myself what is the best way for me to enjoy the, what, what the world has to offer and sure. As I’m munching away at my dinner and I’m enjoying the life that I have. I also think about how I got there, how I got so
lucky. To enjoy all of life’s delicacies. And I think the reason has everything to do with feedback. Feedback can be easy for some but difficult for most. Feedback is required to help us advance, to help us get better for us to sharpen up the sword that we use to go to battle. It is what helps us refine who we are and what we want to achieve with our lives.
So I ask you all today, whether it’s good feedback, whether it’s bad feedback, whether it’s feedback you want to hear or better yet feedback, you don’t want to hear to listen to it anyways, to sit down, pay attention and ask yourself the simple question. What’s the lesson here. What’s the lesson there, what’s the lesson everywhere.
And if you can keep accumulating like a collection of cards of feedback, I think that you’ll be the master of your own game. You’ll have so much feedback that you’ll know exactly how to get better, how to get from point a to point B, whatever that point B may be for you and achieve the goals that you want out of life.
So go out there and receive feedback and also give it to the people who need it the most. Thanks. Just give you a like , an idea. Wasn’t that great. It’s kinda like, eh, but yeah,
K.Lee: [00:52:27] that was, that was fantastic.
Brenden: [00:52:29] Thanks man.
K.Lee: [00:52:30] Brendan Kumarsamy,
Brenden: [00:52:32] Whoa you pronounced that perfectly.
K.Lee: [00:52:35] Brendan Kumarsamy from master talk.
Please go check this gentleman out. He is making serious waves in the communication and public speaking world, and he’s very generous with his. With his knowledge and tips and just support on clubhouse to go find all his rooms and Brendan, that was amazing. That was so fun to get to talk to you. And I hope that we can have another conversation in a few months after you’ve blown up even further.
Brenden: Appreciate it, brother. Thanks for having me. It was great.
K.Lee: I’ll catch you on the next one. Take care, man.
