82: The Secrets to Viral Content with Karl Stedman (Part 1)

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Alaskan born Karl Stedman didn’t grow up inside an igloo, but he does know how they are built and why they stay warm inside. In this episode, he shares with us his down-to-earth business wisdom, built off the back of three of his toughest experiences.

Karl, founder of PSTV, a Netflix style platform for positive bias content explores how the way our brains are wired affect the virality of content, and how to exploit that for the good to spread positivity, and earn buckets of money at the same time. Join us for a fascinating episode guaranteed to leave with you with lots of food for thought.

My Guest: Karl Stedman

Karl Stedman is the founder of PSTV a platform with a bias for content that leaves his audience feeling positive and inspired. He is also the author of soon to be released “Broken Open” and host of the podcast Unsubstantiated Genius. Karl has been through an extraordinary journey. Everything from breaking his back in college basketball to creating startups and losing it all. He is now focused on bringing positivity to the world through his platform, PSTV.

Episode Highlights:

3:55: Estie: Are there real igloos?

Karl: Yes, but not where I lived. I lived in the southern part, so there’s a lot more rain. And actually I lived on a island in the middle of nowhere with 8000 people. You had to boat or fly in. So there was like-

Estie: Oh my gosh, so how do you get food? Did you like fish for your food and eat grass?

Karl: That does exist. That does exist. Yes. But no, I mean, we have 737 Jetson and we have shipping containers, all that stuff. So it all gets shipped in, which is why Alaska is cost of living so high.

5:54: So the following year after my Redshirt year, I made the team and I ended up getting bilateral spondylolysis which is two stress fractures on one vertebrae. So I went from being able to bench press reps at 220 or 210, to not being able to lift the bar. It got so bad where I couldn’t walk from my car door to my front door, and at that point, I realized that I had to figure something out, or I probably would become crippled.

10:35: So that night I went home and I wrote a five page business plan. I brought it back to him the next day knowing that he’d be there. And I said “Here, take a look at this.” He brought it home to his wife and a couple days later, I had a check for $50,000 and another three weeks after that I had another check for $50,000.

30:01: My mom was sending me positive, uplifting quotes. I was like, “Okay, why isn’t this an app?” So last June, I taught myself how to code Swift, which is Apple’s native coding language. Mind you, I’d never really coded in my life before, I made a beta app within a month and a half. And then it just kind of started taking on form. So it turned from an app to a network and started attracting content, people and things that resonated with our message. We are trying to build a platform, a Netflix style platform for positive bias content. 

 38:40: There’s a direct correlation between the number of media hours consumed and your probability of being depressed and suicidal.

41:09: You and I both met, I’m sure many people who have a lot of money, but they’re very financially insecure. Because there’s no amount of money that gives you financial security.

44:09: The other thing was actually just communicating the fact that this idea will succeed, because people are like “Positive content doesn’t sell.” It does. It’s just a little bit harder because it’s not as massively in your face as negative content.

44:47: Why do you think cats playing pianos are the most viral content in the internet? Because they make people smile.

Quote:

Invert everything. -Charlie Munger

 

Resources & Links:

 

For Part 2 of this episode, where you can hear more business advice from Karl, go to estierand.com/82-2. 

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About the author, Estie Rand

I love turning ideas into money, and helping others do the same. I help small business owners with everything from marketing to fiscal management, business plans to staffing, database architecture to work/life balance coaching and I love it all! What do you need help with today?

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