Abhishek Pinninti: Hey everyone, welcome to Whittle Spot again. We have Varshith here today with us. You know, I think most of my followers and are fond of Varshith I guess because you know, I see a lot of mutuals and for both of us. You know, let's hear from him what you know, I think he has cracked the algorithm well for the last year if I can see, you know, with the followers and all. And he himself is running a personal branding agency where Varshith Merugu: you Abhishek Pinninti: He helps founders to get those algorithm cracks. Come on man, I I just want to hear what you, how did you able to do that? Varshith Merugu: Thanks Abhishek firstly for inviting me for this podcast. I'm really excited to share what we've been cooking in the last couple of years. I would say like it's pretty awesome and the journey has been pretty awesome. It's been a long journey, not gonna lie right. Like my first pastel brand took forever to even to even 1000 followers. I still remember like you know I uploaded around like 100 plus videos and still was at 700 followers in the beginning. I used to do some casual content, I used to actually do some cinematic storytelling content and I still didn't really pick up at all. My highest views video that time was around 20k and that too happened randomly. But now when I look back, I knew why it went wild but before I couldn't figure out why, I couldn't reverse engineer why that was going well. ⁓ The amount of education that we have, the amount of information and the knowledge that we have about content creation, personal branding, didn't exist back then when I first started. So there were no AI tools. was no GPD. It didn't really exist back then. It was still developing phases, right? ⁓ You could basically use it as a Google alternative, but not to write creative scripts. You know, cannot train, cannot build custom GPTs back then. didn't really even exist in our heads. mean, I think Cloud existed, but didn't really pick up at all. Right now, people use Cloud in order to write scripts, do the content strategy, brainstorming for chat GPT, but back then, it was nothing. Now, you also see YouTubers out there, let's say Callaway, Like many other creators as well. Yeah, like many other creators who talking about content creation in general. And even I create content about content creation, you know, on how you can go wild, what are the trends that are happening right now. But back then, Abhishek Pinninti: Bad game. Varshith Merugu: It was pretty difficult. Everyone was just hopping onto this wave of personal branding. lot of people think it's a bubble as well. had some conversations, people think it's a bubble, but I 100 % disagree with it. I think personal brands always existed even back in the day, but just the format has changed right now. Founder-led branding is something that is winning. And I think we're all... Abhishek Pinninti: Right. Let's see. Varshith Merugu: pretty pumped up to ride this wave and make the best out of this wave that we are experiencing in this generation. Abhishek Pinninti: When is that time when you started? Was it like 2020 or when is that? Varshith Merugu: It was in 2023. So I started in 2022. That's when know podcasting really entered into our country. So I haven't doing content since when I was a kid. So it's not like, oh, this is something new that I started. I've always uploaded YouTube videos. I've hopped on the TikTok trend as well. I think there was another platform called Dub Smash, which I used to create content as well. Abhishek Pinninti: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Varshith Merugu: I also hopped on to another platform called like it's a Chinese based platform which went ⁓ Abhishek Pinninti: don't me that you were making stuff with telugu you know yeah Varshith Merugu: The dialogues, yeah, yeah, yeah. It was not just Telugu, I was also doing Tamil dialogues as well, was doing Hindi dialogues as well, Hollywood as well, right? A lot of James Bond dialogues in the platform. Rajnikanth as well. It was just mad, like the peak was mad. So again, like I did it for entertainment purposes, never really went deep into it. But... Abhishek Pinninti: Right, monetization was also part of it. Varshith Merugu: No, that's not a part of it. But there was this platform called like it was a Chinese platform, like I said, not really popular. It was very big in the US, the Chinese markets, but not really big in India. ⁓ So some of my friends told me, bro, like if you get this many amount of likes, you'll earn your first dollar. And I was locked in. I was locked in. So I was just trying to, you know, earn that first dollar, even that one dollar, you know, was really, really special for me. And actually I have posted multiple reels I used to, not reels, multiple pieces, Short form pieces. And then I still remember like after like, I used to do like three to four videos every single day. So the moment I came from school, I used to just record content, post it on like, trying to make that one dollar, right? I was competing with my friends as well. So. Abhishek Pinninti: You Varshith Merugu: I had a friend group who was inclined towards western media so they used to watch a lot of gamers, lot of streamers. All those people used to hop on to like, TikTok, Twitch and other platforms. So they used to tell me about all this stuff and I was pretty intrigued. I was like damn bro, I wanna try, I wanna make that dollar as well, I wanna be the cool kid in the class. And that's how I started like. And you know what, I actually ended up you know... Abhishek Pinninti: I'm in. ⁓ Thanks. Varshith Merugu: earning that $2 or something but that's when I got to know you gotta earn some $100 in order to even withdraw in the first place. That's when I was like, f**king bro. Like, I had to work so hard even to earn that first $1. Like, I created multiple short form pieces but then when he was like, oh gotta earn $100, I was like, it's not gonna happen. Abhishek Pinninti: Mmm, so good. It's a very good study. Yeah. Varshith Merugu: So yeah, that's how I started transitioning to podcasting. went to, I did like some Spotify podcast as well. So it was only audio based platforms. used to, so I should, I used to be big on self-improvement books back then, self-help books. Something that I've realized was lot of my friends are not reading it, but I thought why not just summarize it, give them some bullet points, take some key lessons because I thought most of the book are not even relevant. for lot of people. I thought there are some key points, the biggest takeaways from each book, just to summarize and condense them, make it consumable. So I started a podcast called Easy Books. I've recorded multiple episodes. It didn't really take off. had like 10 viewers, 15 viewers, 100 viewers on a monthly basis. Then I didn't really feel, I used to just have this shiny object symbol, know, switching from one to the other. I kept switching. I kept switching. So... Abhishek Pinninti: Right. I tried. I tried. Varshith Merugu: I also used to create YouTube podcasts literally a year ago. Yeah, so I still have those podcasts. I've recorded podcasts almost three times. So I've attempted to record podcasts three times at this point in my life. One is the audio version. Second thing is in-person. Third one is online. So the in-person podcast never got released. I've done five to six episodes. They never got released. I've did a lot of... Abhishek Pinninti: ⁓ Right. Right. Right. ⁓ But I think with reverse side coming in, know, in person takes a lot of effort. You know, you have to meet, there's a lot of setup and all of that happens and it is very hard. Secondly, back in the day to get a podcast online recorded through a Google or a Zoom call, was not that inefficient. All of that. But this particular space gives us after the conversation, 10 shots, reels. Varshith Merugu: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Abhishek Pinninti: which are it will pick up the best conversations and give us the, you know, a variety based, you know, listing and you know, it is working for me a lot. It actually gets uploaded for Apple podcasts and Spotify podcasts as well. I didn't expect, you know, people who will listen to me in the first place, but I am getting a place of 50 to 100 for each. Varshith Merugu: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I think that's awesome. So even like when I started online podcasts, Riverside was the same platform I was using. It's been almost one year since I hopped onto Riverside again. ⁓ The last time that I hopped on was my last podcast that I've recorded like in the month, in the same literally like, 2024 of ⁓ March or February during the same time. It's like a full circle moment, know. ⁓ Abhishek Pinninti: Right. Yes. ⁓ Varshith Merugu: Using the same platform to record podcast and now I'm getting hosted on the podcast seems really good. Yeah Abhishek Pinninti: So my agenda was to know hop on with founders and entrepreneurs and talk to them about all the operations and strategies that they trying to put them into their businesses or products so that they can share all their experience where other founders could also learn from it and get better of it. It's all information which we can roll out. So Varshith Merugu: Yeah. No, 100%. Abhishek Pinninti: ⁓ That is the value I am trying to provide from this. So coming to personal branding. Okay, before your company, what were you doing? Is this your first thing? Why did you choose this particularly as a service from your side? And what is your background? Like why did you hop onto this as a career? Varshith Merugu: Yep. Hmm. Yeah, so I actually started my business when I was 14 to 15 year old. Not the personal branding, but I got myself into entrepreneurship when I was 14 years old. My first business was selling sneakers. That was my first gig. So this was back in 2020, no, 2020, 2019 and 2020 back in COVID. So we used to buy sneakers for retail from websites like Nike drops or Nike drops. Abhishek Pinninti: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Varshith Merugu: sneakers, right? Jordans and Yeezys were a very big thing back then. I don't know if it's right now. I think I see the hype is dying. The industry is kind of going down. So back in the day, used to, you know, let's say, have the sneaker for like 9000, 7000 and used to sell them for 15000, 16000, 20,000. That's how I got into entrepreneurship in the first place. I did that for a while, earned some decent amount of money. Then I saw that this was not scalable. This is like Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Varshith Merugu: pretty small small margins, I wanted to do something big. Right. And then after running down the line, I didn't do anything. So I was completely focusing on my undergraduate application process to the US. I wanted to get into a good university. That was the goal. then so sidelined entrepreneurship for a while, but then got back into it again to help. So I've realized a gap between the all the study abroad agencies. Right. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Varshith Merugu: So these people were charging so much amount of money and they were pretty much not offering any kind of value. I was like, I want to disrupt this industry. That was the only vision that I had. want to completely. So if you see any study abroad agencies, right, it's very local. So Telangana has certain agencies, Maharashtra has certain agency, Delhi has certain agencies, right. It's pretty broken. I wanted to completely change this. I wanted to, you know, create a branding market. Abhishek Pinninti: Thanks. Yeah. Varshith Merugu: establish a brand in this industry. It was a like a multi-billion dollar market, right? It's a very big market in India. So I wanted to establish a brand. I want to build a platform. want to create a business. So this business is pretty much traditional run by all the old people who don't even have an experience of applying to colleges for themselves. I was like, I know the student POV. That's my unfair advantage. I'm going to create content. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Varshith Merugu: I don't know why, but that was the initial thing. I want to create content. I want to build distribution. I want to scale it across India. So not just in my city. I want across across India. I've developed a website on my own back in the day. No, no code. So it's like not wipe coding. I, yeah, I used to, I, I had to hand build it, right. And then I did it to get, so I learned how to do it. I did that. I approached two schools. I conducted workshops. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Varshith Merugu: This was like when I was 16, 17 years old, right, before coming to college. I convinced myself to talk to the principals and the chairmen of the schools in order to convince them that, okay, you know, I'm young, but I have a plan. I have the knowledge to help this people because it's risky for students, for these principals to, you know, get some 16 year old to even influence some other students in the class, right? Abhishek Pinninti: Hmm. Yeah. Varshith Merugu: because there will be lot of parent influence coming in. But I still managed to convince them, ⁓ sign some clients, made some money. I used to charge like 12,000 rupees back then for like one application when my competition was starting one lakh. That was like the big selling point. ⁓ So, but then I stopped because once I came back to US, it got super hectic and I couldn't really capitalize. couldn't really... Abhishek Pinninti: Thank you. Varshith Merugu: really no marketing and everything. it just stopped. only had some of my applicants and I got them into good universities actually. ⁓ So that went pretty well, but that's when I realized I am not going to go into the product-driven business or let's say any kind of startup ecosystem because something that I've realized and something that I've also kept listening from my family as well. Right. So even my family is into it's like ⁓ So they're into pharmaceuticals. It's a product driven business, but also like service based business as well. It's both. It's B2B. something that I always kept hearing is that, know, startup or let's say any product driven business, even if you want to build a startup, you are to invest capital and then you don't know if the product is going to succeed or not. You want to get the product market fit ready. But I always kept hearing from lot of other entrepreneurs, even advice from the internet was that pick a traditional business that's already making money, which is already proven, the systems are already there, all you're to do is just 10 % of innovation. That's when it clicked me, without a lot of investment, I can still create money. I can basically create money. That's why I started into content creation as well. I didn't have a plan. I was like, I want to create content. Let's see where this goes. I want to start freelancing. You know, I want to, you know, create like an editing agency in the first place. That was the goal because I loved editing. And then I picked up a course for editing from Beobiceps. And then I learned a lot from it. I started editing, creating content. Brand collaborations came in. I was like blown. Like there's a lot of money, lot of creators making money. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Varshith Merugu: Influence making a lot of money. I was like damn this is a good industry to be in. But then that's when it hit me right? This is not something that I'm... I don't want to be an influencer. I don't want to... It sounds cringe for me. Like I cannot always record content, show my life, talk about something, know pick one niche, talk about that. I cannot do it. I'm a combination of a lot of things. That's when personal branding came in. Personal branding is something where you show... you build a brand, you become the niche. End of the day. Yeah, you become the niche and people don't follow you because you're creating content in certain needs. You become the person and people follow you because you are that person. And I started doing that and I started getting a lot of opportunities to be a part of startups. A lot of founders approaching for networking. And then I started podcasting. I got a lot of people as well. I was like, OK, I've grown my Abhishek Pinninti: You'll be... yeah. Bye. Varshith Merugu: you brands to certain numbers. was like, a lot of founders also kept for video or started reaching out to me, you know, can you do this for me? know, can you help me build my content as well? Because I have such brand, I have a company, I want more leads for it. I was like, let's do this. You know, it's pretty fun. I started doing it. Then that's when I realized, okay, there is a market here. It's actually a thing, right? Personal branding agency is actually a thing. Abhishek Pinninti: Mmm. Mmm. Yeah, it's no, it's, a. Varshith Merugu: Yeah, so back then it was not a thing, right? ⁓ But it started becoming a thing. So, especially in India, it was, it always existed in other countries, but in India it started becoming a thing. Abhishek Pinninti: It was just brands who are trying to build content in their own pages but now for the last two to three years they stopped building their brand pages and start building their own personal brand. Varshith Merugu: Exactly. Founder led. Yeah, founder led brands. Yeah. So that started happening. I was like, damn, there's an opportunity. Let me just seize this, right? Something that I know already. I kind of need to understand how the sales works. Yeah. You tell me. Abhishek Pinninti: Right, you want to add a thing here, you know, let's see from India, we are, you know, influenced by politics a lot. If you can see back then, a person's image is more impactful than which party is in. Varshith Merugu: Yeah. Yeah, 100%. Abhishek Pinninti: That is where personal branding started. Varshith Merugu: Yeah, no, 100%. I completely agree with that. Abhishek Pinninti: People used to see that guy face and vote rather than the party symbol. Varshith Merugu: Yeah, 100 % And something ⁓ which is I don't know a lot of audiences might be aware of this but you know Lalita Jewellery right? He was though one of the first fewest people to build a founder led brand through advertising Yeah, like exactly, exactly He shared his story. He was you know, if you really go back Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah, yeah. Exactly. The old school way to use PIC was Varshith Merugu: to see all his campaigns right? He always makes sure to have relatable touch points in order to He's like double Urke varke Rao right? He's kind of targeting that pain point. He's making it relatable. Yeah exactly. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Yeah, It is into everybody's home. That dialogue has went into everybody's home. Varshith Merugu: Exactly. And then it came from his personality because he always genuinely shows up to the camera. Always. It's not any celebrity. It's him coming to the camera and then talking to the customer directly. I took off. Yeah, exactly. Abhishek Pinninti: Exactly. He is the father of personal planning is what I feel because when I go to movies I see him now today also he comes on in between the ads you know movie you know now he has become to next level he has come up as a VFX character he is playing in some buildings you know doing all that stuff I was like this guy has become now he has you know distributed his Instagram channels for each language Varshith Merugu: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, 100 % yeah. Abhishek Pinninti: If you follow him, does it in Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu. He is trying to get very deep into that connection to the people. Varshith Merugu: Tamil, Telugu, Yeah, he's also doing podcasts now like he was on podcast recently as well like yeah, like last year I guess It's just insane. No Yeah, it's always been there. I think the format is changed right now Yeah, yeah, so that's how I entered into personal branding and now I do I have an agency I have a consulting as well. So Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Exactly. Nice, nice man. So let's come to ⁓ breaking down the algorithm for personal branding. If you say what are those ⁓ five important variables that a founder should focus on to get the distribution done? What is your point of view as being a personal branding agency founder? Varshith Merugu: Yeah, I don't think there are five points, but I'll tell you what exactly is really important, right? Something that I've broken down, you know, looking at all the gurus, what other gurus say and what's my contrary opinion towards it. People tell, like, you if you really, first of all, you've got to figure out what do even want to do? You know, why are they even building a brand in the first place? lot of people, like, you know, start off doing some random things because some other competition is doing, right? But I think you have to have an idea on exactly where do you want to even take this to? Why are you even exactly building this brand? So once you do that, you want to come back again and be like, who do you want to become if you want to do that thing? And then what do you want to also talk to the people? So I think these three things are very important because you cannot fake it. A lot of founders that I see right now are trying to fake it because their competition is doing it. Abhishek Pinninti: Right. Varshith Merugu: They might not even know or they might not even be capable enough to also talk about certain things, but they still do it because right now you have tools, you can scrape all the content out, can completely do a viral script and you can talk. But now people are able to sense it, people are able to smell it because authentic content creation is the new format that everyone is moving towards. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Yeah. top content. Varshith Merugu: Yeah, raw content is what is really working. So if you can really come up to the camera and talk about your real values and what you truly believe in, that is what people are going to resonate with. And that's when you're going to get your customers. I think that's pretty straightforward. And something that I also realize a lot of founders are doing this one mistake is, know, again, like this is what other people are doing. This is what my competition is doing. I'm just going to copy the same thing. Abhishek Pinninti: 8. Varshith Merugu: And you know, make sure I push my product. But I'll you a disadvantage with it. You will, let's say Nike, right? You take a brand called Nike. If you copy Nike, would you be ever beat Nike in the same industry? You will never be able to beat Nike. You'll always be the second person. If not, you'll be termed as the copy of Nike. Abhishek Pinninti: Hmm. Right. Nice. Varshith Merugu: That's the worst thing that's gonna happen. The best scenario is you'll be in the second position. If at all you want to beat Nike, you should not be copying Nike and doing whatever that is doing. You want to learn from it. You want to understand how did they brand, how did they even approve this system. And you know, you've got to understand, you know, take inspiration, but it's not like, oh, I'm going to bluntly copy Nike, whatever that is doing. Right. I'm going to use the same strategy. That's not going to work. You'll always end up being the second person. Abhishek Pinninti: Right. Hmm. Thank you. Varshith Merugu: Now I'll give you another example on running on shoes right now this has become one of the most hottest sneaker brands you know the running shoe brands right now in the market right now if you if I tell you you know buy me some running shoes you want to choose on instead of Nike now what did they do differently positioning they did something different right they went on to marathon the founders marathon himself right Abhishek Pinninti: Mmm. Exactly. Yeah, sure. Varshith Merugu: Again, it's a founder-led brand itself. He wanted to develop shoes for his marathons and that's how On was born. He chose one specific niche. ⁓ He chose to become the big fish in the small pond first. Now what happens immediately once a pond expands, your brand also expands and you become the shark in that small pond. Now anyone who wants to come into the industry, you will have that first more advantage. Abhishek Pinninti: Thank you. Varshith Merugu: And you since you have that unique positioning, you'll always be the market pioneer. Now, once you have the brand established, can, you know, diverge into multiple industries. You can expand your, you know, can expand horizontally and establish a brand. Now that's how you have the full dominance. And it's not just in the sneaker brand. If you see any brand right now, like any e-commerce brand, any, let's say, social media platforms as well. Right. If you see even Instagram, Instagram was a very Abhishek Pinninti: No, wait. ⁓ Thank you. Right. Right. So yeah. Varshith Merugu: First of all, it was a photo-driven platform. So lot of times, Facebook was specifically for meta ads. It was always about marketplaces, community pages. But Instagram was kind of fun, just to entertain people, just to share some... It was private communities and stuff like that. Instagram was always that kind of platform. And now they're expanding. They have gone into education as well. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Yeah, Right. Right. Varshith Merugu: They've gone into carousels, reels, communities, broadcast channels, stories, selling, right? Everything. Now they're also launching marketplaces here, right? So if they do it right, right off the bat, right? They would be come across as, you know, copy of TikTok or let's say copy of some other platform. So if you want to build, you know, let's say you already have, you know, you're a founder, you have competition who already has a personal brand. You don't go copying him. You've got to understand, okay, why do you want to do it in the first place? Where do you think you have that unfair advantage that this person doesn't have and completely double down on that? You've got to position yourself slightly in a different way. Like 90 % can be same, 10 to 20%. Right? If you can differentiate that with your brand, right? You will be seen as a different person altogether. And then once you expand yourself horizontally, Abhishek Pinninti: Right. Right. played. Varshith Merugu: you can put yourself in the first position or competing level with your already market leader that you have. That's the approach that I would take. Yeah. Abhishek Pinninti: I have... So, you believe in volumes game for the reach or is it something you do it in a different way? Because I hear from a lot of the founders that it's volume and consistency every day that you keep posting like two to three weeks or whatever content you're trying to put out. Varshith Merugu: Mm. Yeah. Hmm. I think end of the day, comes to the comes down to the founder because for you in order to become consistent, you've got to do something that you love doing. Right. If you really enjoy, you know, if content is something that is really a big concern for you, I would say don't know a lot of volume. Right. Focus on putting out quality content, which takes up time, but you only do it like, you know, one time in a month or let's say one time in a week. Abhishek Pinninti: So. ⁓ Varshith Merugu: but it has to go like, know, break all the records. It has to compensate for all the volume that you have created. Right. Something that I truly believe in again, like it's the game that you want to choose. There are two things, right? The machine gun strategy and the sniper strategy. So if you want to, you know, create the craziest content that doesn't exist outside, right? You want to create something that is super deep. Go through the sniper strategy. Like if you, if you really enjoy doing that. Abhishek Pinninti: Thanks. Yeah. Varshith Merugu: create something exceptional that people come and rewatch the same content piece that you've put out and people are waiting in order to see your next drop. Right now, every video that you drop feels like an exclusive drop and people are craving for it. Even that works. Exactly. Exactly. Right now, that also works. See, end of the day, everything works. You ought to choose which game that you want to play. What I would do instead, like, you know, if you want to be... Abhishek Pinninti: Right, right. Something like KC would do. Varshith Merugu: in between, know, I don't want to be a sniper. I don't want to be a machine gun. I want to be something like a, you know, a sub machine gun, right? Like a AK-47, let's say, right? What would you do? You have your long form content already in a way that can also be clipped into short form content and distributed into multiple purposes. That's what I call the waterfall method. You take one long form content. You already, know, exactly the main beef, right? Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Right, Which is cutting, right, falling, yeah. Varshith Merugu: and you distribute it in according to multiple platforms. Let's say you create LinkedIn posts, create short film reels, you create YouTube shots. You also create some, what do you say, 10 minute clips of that pieces of content onto your other secondary YouTube channel or the same YouTube channel, like the highlight page, right? You're the highlight thing. So it always can be crafted on what the founder wants and really what is really, you know, what you would enjoy because end of the day, Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Varshith Merugu: Content is a consistency game and consistency doesn't mean you gotta post every single day. It's just being relevant and just being in the game for long enough so that people know you well and you're benefiting a lot, capitalizing on the market a lot and you can pick any race. That's what I tell the learning model of my clients. Abhishek Pinninti: I mean this advice has you know took me very deep because I personally been trying to I mean just I've just started it like it's been two to three months where I've started taking serious of my personal brand and building it and whatever you said is actually you know boils down to that unless until the founder feels it you know I know he feels it that he can do it he cannot do anything you know Varshith Merugu: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Abhishek Pinninti: ⁓ Interest is a consistent. Varshith Merugu: I'll tell you one point though. I'll tell you one point though. ⁓ So there is this again, nuance coming here, right? So let's say you're working with someone who has already done it before, That's where I would say the sniper game or like the sub machine gun, the AK-47 gameplay would work really well for you. But. If you're all alone yourself, if you're just starting out, you do not have the capital to invest into a team or let's say some experienced players out there. Then you got to go brute force into creating higher volume because I'll tell you two reasons. One is first of all, you're starting out. You have to get used to creating content in the first place because you're going to do this for a longer period of time. Right. The second thing is you do not have data to really take a decision and differentiate between what is a quality content and what is not a quality content. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Varshith Merugu: Exactly. Now when you have data points, you can tell okay, this is what quality content looks like and you are training your creator muscle, right? It's just like a gym, right? So you're training your muscle now. Now you want to do a higher volume to understand, okay, which exercise works for you and which doesn't work for you. And once you have that, once you scale past like 10 K mark, you exactly know now, okay, now this is going to work for me and this is not going to work for me. I know this format is going to work and this format is not going to work. Abhishek Pinninti: Thank you. Varshith Merugu: That's when you can go back to your sniper method again. Abhishek Pinninti: Exactly and you know as a creator you also know what is your strength and what is it what is not Then you can you know, I think I mean this is a really good breakdown man. I really like the stuff you have I mean the way you have explained Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. I think this will give a lot of input to a lot of people who is trying to build personal brands Varshith Merugu: Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. You know something that I do, something that also is beneficial for me. Throughout the year, there are certain months where you're super motivated and super energetic. your physical energy and your creativity is all time high, Now I use this properly. I use this period so much properly. So it's like you walk like a lion, right? When it's time to hunt, you go all in brute force. You go hunting, get the deer, get your hunt, right? Now, Abhishek Pinninti: Mmm. Varshith Merugu: Let's say for the three months, right? Let's say in this quarter, Q1, right? There are three months in total. I would say 45 of the days, I would be super pumped to create content. The rest 45 days, I would not really be super pumped. Now what I would do is I would just brute force my way in the first 45 days to create so much content. And the next 45 days, I would kind of chill, you know, take it easy. I'd be like, instead of uploading, you know, seven videos in a week, I would do three to four views. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Hey. Varshith Merugu: I would kind of slow down. I'm trying to, know, so that it avoids me from burning out. Because at the of the day, you shouldn't burn out. As a founder, you shouldn't burn out at all. Right? And then this is just a part of it. You have other parts as well. Your operations, your hiring, your team, your business in the first place, right? You shouldn't burn out. So again, if you're doing it all by yourself, I would say is go by phases. Go brute force when you have the highest amount of motivation and energy and kind of slow down and don't hammer yourself down. Abhishek Pinninti: Thank you. Right, Thanks. Thanks. Varshith Merugu: when you do not have the energy and the bandwidth to create content. Take it easy. Abhishek Pinninti: It comes to the day as well. mean, let's take as a week in a month day when I want to create a lot of content, we can do that. I do that. If my mode is right today, I'm going to shoot two to three reels. I'll finish that. And yeah, that is also a way to keep us cool. Varshith Merugu: Yeah. Yeah, do it like immediately, yeah. Yeah, exactly, 100%. Like literally yesterday, literally yesterday I sat down to write seven to eight scripts, right? I couldn't do it. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah, did we miss? Yes. Am I audible? Varshith Merugu: ⁓ yeah, I lost you for a second. There's some glitch in the internet. But yeah. Like I was talking, right? Yesterday, I sat down to write down like six to seven videos. And I couldn't do even one single video properly. I just couldn't. It happens. And there are certain times where I'm like, all of sudden content just flows. Like it just flows. Right? You sit down, you're like... Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Yes. Mmm. Mmm. I it. Varshith Merugu: writing one script after the other one script after the other and you got to maximize the output that you can have during that time. See it's creative task right it's end of the day content is creative you cannot force it you just got to maximize the flow that you're getting you never know when it's going to flow. Abhishek Pinninti: the Thanks. Right. And the place really matters as well, you Sometimes you feel like going away somewhere, sitting down there and you know, get that thought. Varshith Merugu: Yeah, well, I've switched it like three places to four places yesterday just to get my creative flow in. It didn't happen, It just didn't happen. I was just... Abhishek Pinninti: You know, see both of us will relate to that. I mean when we were young, there's this director called Puri Jagannath if you have heard. is very They used to tell that he used to go to Bangkok and write scripts. Yeah, I used to think why is he foolish? Why is he doing that? Now today, now I get it. Varshith Merugu: Yeah! ⁓ ⁓ really? Now you get it. Yeah, environment plays a very big role, bro. it inspires you to create content. It gives you new thoughts, new places, new people gives you new thoughts and a fresh sense of energy. And when you tune into that, you know, when they align together, you're like the flow just enters. You're at the flow state now. Yeah. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. Thanks. Well, good man. People today people are believing in ⁓ I mean the person rather than the brand. You know, they're just believing you rather than know, a company or whatever. Varshith Merugu: or 100 % Abhishek Pinninti: and they are using service or product. I completely being a consumer, I do that and people who are coming to me after you know getting online, I feel that they are relating to us because talking to you, I can relate to you because I've been seeing your videos or your journey, what you have gone through, I relate to you. That's why I'm talking to you, you know, I feel that I've known you for a long time. Varshith Merugu: Yeah. Abhishek Pinninti: That's what it makes, you know. Varshith Merugu: No, 100 % wrong. It always comes down to that thing, right? You relate in a certain way. You share some certain values. Abhishek Pinninti: I tell you the most relatable thing I had with you is your story yesterday or today that you have written down that you you have been zoned out by your friends you know you have been looking out all by yourself that is me in the same place that I've never been in a group I can't wipe the group it is my own thoughts my own space where I'm thinking I am I am a delusional guy Varshith Merugu: Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. ⁓ Abhishek Pinninti: I I can build rockets, I feel I can pull down Elon Musk someday as well. But to be really honest if I tell this to any of anybody, they just laugh about it. But I think I can do that. Varshith Merugu: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. No, 100 % simple. think ⁓ every entrepreneur needs to be delusional, right? Because, you know, it's crazy. Like you need to first of all believe in yourself that you can do it before even if the before even the world pays you, you know, helps you out, build that thing. You are the first cheerleader if you are. Abhishek Pinninti: Exactly. Varshith Merugu: business or whatever that you're starting out or even for your dreams, let's say like let's put it as dreams right any dream that you have in your life You ought to support it first Right and then there are a lot of people Who don't really support it who act, know who pretend to be friends who? Talk in your back, you know kind of make fun of you but that is what really Helps you to filter out the real people in your life because that The of my life really made me build relationships with the people who really mattered to me, who really believed in me and people who are just there, just making fun about me. Abhishek Pinninti: I have a line for you. I heard it from a gentleman. Some people in our life are like rocket boosters. They stay with us for some point of time to reach, then they leave for us to... because they don't have the potential to be with us and they just fell down. And we boost high. Varshith Merugu: Wow. Wow. Yeah, yeah. Wow. 100%. I think that's a very good way to put it on, Like, you try to take them with you, but you cannot because they become weight now. So, yeah, I think... Abhishek Pinninti: Because they are a weightage for us. Exactly. till then they were supportive, till then they could hold us because until leaving the earth they were fine but after going to the mass they feel like where am I, am I right with this guy because they don't have the potential to go with us to the mass Varshith Merugu: Yeah, DSK velocity. Exactly. I think that's a very good way to put this out there. Abhishek Pinninti: Every time I see this, I hear this quote, I get goose bumps because that happened to me a lot of times. Varshith Merugu: Yeah, 100 % yes for me. Like, some relationships are meant to be ended. You know, like, uh... Abhishek Pinninti: to go I mean that is good to go I man. Varshith Merugu: Exactly, that's it. It's just going to be uncertain for a certain time, but it all makes sense once you escape. Once you go into the space, you know why you have to leave them behind. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah, exactly. I had few, you know, see this is my fourth gig which I'm working on. I've been working on like three other businesses and you know some worked some didn't and there were people involved, friends, partners and I've seen a lot. So today where I am is because all of that and I'm in a different space right now and I'm growing faster than before. Varshith Merugu: Yeah. I hope I... I hope I... Abhishek Pinninti: So ultimately, I mean, when I was reading your story, I was like, yeah, this guy is going to this space. Don't worry, man. I felt like, you know, it should happen. Orange, you're not going anywhere. Varshith Merugu: Yeah ⁓ 100 % it happened like way long ago bro like it happened like one year ago so that was one year ago but that's when real switches happened that really helped me to you know escape that velocity that's that's why like Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah. It's not with your partners or friends, it's with clients as well. Some drag you down, pull your maintainer down. Some boost you forward. It's with everything. Varshith Merugu: Yeah, yeah, 100%. 100%. 100 % it's not just friends and family, it's even clients, business partners, founders, the team members that you work with, everyone. Abhishek Pinninti: Exactly, exactly. I just took the time, it went to 40 minutes. I think we'll be sitting down and talking the whole hour. You know, we'll do a part two for sure. I think I have a lot of, you know, stuff to talk about. Everything that, you know, because it's very relatable for both of us. And we have another stuff to talk about it. I will take a break here and let's do a part two sometime in the future for sure. Varshith Merugu: Yeah. No, I'm person who... Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, 100 % roll, like 100 % roll. Yeah. Abhishek Pinninti: Yeah, man. Yeah. Thank you for having ⁓ me. You know, talking to us and I think it will help a lot of fellow founders and people who are trying to get into entrepreneurship. And, you know, we'll catch up and see you guys. Take care. Varshith Merugu: No, thank you for having me, I think.