Adam DeGraide:

Coming up today on David Vs Goliath.

Getting tired of myself saying that, but I said it once about a year ago, and I don’t think I’ve stopped.

What’s amazing about what Mike just said, guys, is that it has to be bigger than you because if it isn’t bigger than you, it’ll always be about you.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to today’s episode of David Vs Goliath, a podcast dedicated to helping small businesses leverage technology to not only help them compete against their large competitors but win.

Your host is currently the CEO of Anthem Business Software, a three-time Inc. 500 recipient, and a serial entrepreneur with a passion to help small businesses everywhere find, serve, and keep more customers profitably. Please join me in welcoming your host, Adam DeGraide.

Adam DeGraide:

Hey, everyone. It’s Adam DeGraide from the David Vs Goliath Podcast. Today, we have Mike Jesowshek. I hope I’m saying that right. He’s a CPA. Small Business Tax Savings Podcast. It should be a lot of fun. We should learn a ton. Today is a great day. I hope you’re having an awesome day.

For those watchers and listeners who may or may not know, I had the opportunity to spend some time on… With Rumble. They just opened up their new offices down in Longboat Key, and I met most of the team, the CEO, hung out with a bunch of bigwigs, as well. What a great team. And if you don’t watch this podcast on Rumble, I highly recommend that you do. Check them out. They’re doing some great things. It’s going to be great.

Well, today’s episode is brought to us by automatemysocial.com, where you can automate up to 100% of your business’s social media and never have to think about it again. Very simple. Visit automatemysocial.com to take the tour.

Also, visit us online at davidvsgoliathpodcast.com. There, you could subscribe to receive our newsletter and also apply to be on the podcast. Hope everyone’s doing great. Here’s another amazing episode of the David Vs Goliath Podcast. And Mike, welcome to DVG.

Mike Jesowshek:

Adam, thanks for having me.

Adam DeGraide:

It’s going to be awesome. I’m so glad to have you. I don’t even know if you know this or not, my current company, Anthem Software, one of our specialty niches now, we’ve been focusing on CPAs, so it’s attorneys, CPAs, wealth managers, anything in the financial services, insurance agents, anything in the financial services business.

So when I saw your application come through for the podcast, I said, “Oh, I got to have Mike.” I love talking to CPAs, and I love learning about what they do. And this is awesome.

Mike Jesowshek:

I just want to say I’m sorry that you have to work every day with CPAs, but hopefully, we can change a new light, and you can understand some of the wildness, too, to our personalities.

Adam DeGraide:

Well, first of all, I wouldn’t… Wild is not how I’d describe you, but I am. And so when you put someone like yourself together with a guy like me, magic happens.

And so, Mike, tell us a little bit about what you’re currently doing right now. I know that you’re the founder and the host of the Small Business Tax Saving Podcasts. And I like what you said here. This is great.

You said that you were tired basically of… “I was sick of asking accountants for tax advice and never being able to get a straight answer.” Me too, by the way. “It was always, ‘It depends.'” It depends on what? Somebody tell me exactly the best tax advice. So I think that’s fascinating. Tell the watchers and listeners a little bit about what you’re doing.

Mike Jesowshek:

Yeah, exactly. So most of my focus is on our Small Business Tax Savings Podcast and really just this idea of getting content and material out to help business owners understand what tax strategies are available to them.

I think the problem that I see with so many small business owners is they think that they have to be rich to bring in tax savings, they have to make a ton of money, they have to be a certain size, or there’s… Taxes are so complex, and they can’t figure out the tax-saving opportunities available to them.

And so, really what we’re doing with the podcast is trying to just change that narrative and do a mindset shift of how do we look at tax savings, how do we look at tax planning, and just let people know kind of what’s available to them out there in also plain English. Because accountants, lawyers, we tend to want to be very, “Here’s exactly how it is. We can’t tell you the right answer because-

Adam DeGraide:

“Section-

Mike Jesowshek:

“… we don’t know all the details.”

Adam DeGraide:

“… 1248-22 85th of the IRS Tax Code.” I don’t need to know that.

Mike Jesowshek:

Yes.

Adam DeGraide:

Tell me what to do specifically.

Mike Jesowshek:

Exactly.

Adam DeGraide:

That’s awesome.

Mike Jesowshek:

Exactly.

Adam DeGraide:

Do you still have a practice… Are you still doing a practice of your own as well, too, or are you doing primarily the podcast full time?

Mike Jesowshek:

So we have a sister firm that we work with. It’s a firm that I used to work… Run day to day. And now, my partner handles all of the day-to-day, so most of my time is spent on the podcast. We’re also doing… We have a training program, so creating content to help people learn how to implement all these strategies. And we have a software project that we’re working on right now that kind of ties into that idea of the training program as well.

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah, so you’re kind of in partnership with a firm that you’re feeding opportunities to, which is awesome because that’s what David Vs Goliath does too. One of the things that we do, we have corporate sponsors.

I happen to be the owner of one of the main corporate sponsors, the business’s, and I love it because I have an opportunity every week to come on, interview amazing business owners like yourself, learn about their stories, learn about how they’re taking on their giant and winning, and then, obviously, can feed the mothership in some ways as well when people have a need. And I think that’s awesome.

So you said that you earned your bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, master’s degree in Accounting, and you’re a licensed CPA. What made you choose this boring lifestyle?

Mike Jesowshek:

Well, so I’ve been an entrepreneur my entire life. And I was in the online marketing industry, and so I was in a… It was in a company, going to college. I was like, “I need a backup plan. I need to go to college.” And so that was kind of my backup plan. I was a partner. There were seven of us in this online marketing company when I was starting college.

And accounting was just kind of my backup, saying, “Hey, if everything falls apart…” I’m a typical entrepreneur that thinks everything’s going to fall on the ground tomorrow. But if that were to happen, I needed to have kind of a backup plan.

So went to school for accounting, ended up digging more into the finance side of our online marketing company, and it just kind of led to the CPA and everything else from there. So I’d say it’s my backup plan, and here I am today utilizing what my backup plan was, but it’s funny-

Adam DeGraide:

It’s awesome, though.

Mike Jesowshek:

… how things work out.

Adam DeGraide:

Well, you’re doing both things, right? You have an entrepreneurial spirit. Where did you get that from?

Mike Jesowshek:

That’s a good question. I started doing entrepreneurial stuff when I was really young. My dad was into… He had a full-time job, but his side gig was going to auctions and buying stuff, reselling them, kind of revamping some things. And so I think I probably got a little bit of spirit from that.

I always say there’s one particular auction I was at… And usually, at auctions, I’d just sit in the back and play pool while he was doing what he was doing. But there was one auction that… He bought a box full of bottle caps, and it was some type of soda or something, but he bought a box full of bottle caps for, like, 10 bucks.

And he’s like, “Okay, this is going to be my project for you. We’re going to take a hundred bottle caps, put them in little baggies, and we’re going to take this couple thousand that we have and sell them in a bunch of individual lots with a hundred bottle caps.”

And we did that, and each baggie sold for, like, $50. So we took $10 and turned it into 800. But I think that that was kind of like… Maybe that was the spark to what kind of got me into that spirit, and then it just kind of-

Adam DeGraide:

Totally.

Mike Jesowshek:

… led from there.

Adam DeGraide:

It absolutely did. One of my things was I was a paperboy, and I had a few different paper routes. I did the morning and the afternoon delivery. I don’t think I got paid for it, so I think I only got tips, whatever people left me. So I figured it out, if I delivered quickly, efficiently, and on time, I’d get a bigger tip. And then there was nothing like Christmas week because Christmas week was when I’d get my big $5 or 10 bucks.

And I’ll never forget the first time I was able to go into a Granite Drugstore down in Coventry, Rhode Island, and I was able to buy my own Musketeer candy bar with my own money. And I said, “That’s it. From now on, I’m only doing my own thing.” And I feel like that’s when the spirit for me was born in my life as well too. That’s amazing.

So listen, we’re going to take our first break from our first corporate sponsor. And then, stay tuned. We’ll be right back here with Mike and Adam, your handsome host. We’ll be right back on the David Vs Goliath Podcast.

Speaker 1:

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Adam DeGraide:

And we’re back with Mike and your handsome host, Adam DeGraide. Getting tired of myself saying that, but I said it once about a year ago, and I don’t think I’ve stopped. And it’s pretty interesting.

So the podcast that you’re doing right now, you’re giving a lot of tax advice. If someone was to tune into it, what would they learn about on a weekly basis? Is it weekly? Is it daily? How do you do it?

Mike Jesowshek:

Yeah, we do a weekly episode. And really, kind of my goal with this… And for every episode we do, we got the audio, obviously, on podcasting platforms. We do a video on YouTube. We do a blog post that kind of accompanies it.

And so the idea is we’re hoping to… However you want to learn, you have that opportunity. But one thing that I really changed is… A lot of times, when you look at tax strategies, you just get the fluff. Hiring your kids in your business example is a strategy I love, but you look online, and it’ll be like, “Oh yeah, hire your kids. They pay no taxes. You get a business deduction. Life is good.” And it just stops there. And so it’s just all, like, “Here’s great stuff,” but that doesn’t seem right. “What do I need to make sure I do?”

And so really, kind of what our goal with the podcast is to just give away as much content, get people to where they’re 90% of the way there of implementing that strategy. They understand it in a kind of common sense, easy-to-understand way.

So I always say, “Business owners of all sizes, whether you’re big, small, just getting started, or looking to get started, every week, you’re going to find some kind of little nugget, some kind of little tip that you can implement in your business.” But one thing I always say is, “Don’t just listen. Don’t just learn.” It’s that implementation piece that’s the most important because you can take in all this information, and then, tomorrow, you don’t implement anything. Guess what? You didn’t save any taxes just by retaining-

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah, totally.

Mike Jesowshek:

… that information or getting that information in.

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah, totally. It’s interesting that you say that. Action is really critical. I always tell people that, “Action is the lifeblood of an entrepreneur.” It’s the lifeblood of anybody who owns a business. Hesitancy is the death of anything in your life.

When you hesitate to make health a priority, you can get sick and die. When you hesitate to look at your business and your tax savings, you pay more money in taxes than you have to. If you hesitate on fixing your marriage, before you know it, you’ll be divorced.

And at the end of the day, these are the things that happen with all of us in our lives. We have to realize that action is where the power is. It’s not just in mental ascent. It’s not just in understanding in the heart and the mind. It’s actually the doing that makes all the difference in the world.

Now, I thought this was interesting. One of the questions we have on our pre-show sheet is, “What are your biggest failures?” And you talked about how you were developing a software product, and you just couldn’t get it to market because you had to make it perfect.

And so, instead of having an MVP and growing from there, you tried to make it perfect. I think entrepreneurs and people that are watching the podcast of all shapes and sizes look at that and say, “I’ve done something like that before.” Tell us a little bit about that and how you learned from it.

Mike Jesowshek:

Yeah, so back in 2013 is when I actually started a virtual accounting firm. And this is obviously pre-Covid, so this idea of working virtually with an accountant wasn’t that common back then, but we’ve been virtual since the beginning.

But back in 2013, the problem that we were facing was that we didn’t have any project management system out there that was kind of specific for accountants to use to work in that cloud-based environment. So we’re like, “Well…” My partner at the time was a software developer. I said, “Let’s go out and build this thing.”

So, sat down, kind of built out, “What do we want this to do? What do we want it to look like?” And we spent three years building out this software. And at the end of those three years, we were like, “Okay, it’s ready to go. Everything… We got every single feature exactly how we want it ready.”

But now there’s six, seven competitors out there that have a cloud-based project management system specific for accountants, all well-funded, and we’re bootstrapped over here. And so the project ended up not going anywhere from there.

But I think that… I kind of mentioned at the beginning, right, now, we’re in another software development phase where we’re kind of building on something there. And what I learned from that has made so much of an impact into this idea where we’re going now. And it’s just that idea of, get something out on the table. Get something out there to gain traction, and then you can always build, you can always customize. But without getting something out there, you don’t know what people want.

What I think a software might do, the users might tell me something completely different, and that’s going to change the scope of that development way earlier on than getting to that end product.

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah, totally.

Mike Jesowshek:

So a lot of learning phases in that.

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah, I build software for a living. And by the way, we do have a killer CRM for CPAs, by the way.

Mike Jesowshek:

I love it.

Adam DeGraide:

Just so you know. It’s absolutely amazing because it’s not just business project management focus. It’s, how do you convert opportunities into actual paying customers? How do you take those paying customers, turn them into a referral source, and how do you take those paying customers and keep them for life?

And all of those types of things, that cyclical moment in business, to your point, is so well taken because nothing’s perfect. Even those other six competitors who you thought were perfect, if you looked underneath the sheets of their software code, it’s all duct-taped together. I promise you. It’s not all what you think it is. They have more money than you, but they may not be better than you. And at the end of the day, you’re going to take on that giant and slay them.

So we’re going to take another break from our second sponsor. And when we come back, I want to talk about a few things. I want to talk about the courage it takes to step out on your own to start a podcast because it’s not easy to do that. And then I also want to talk about a few other things, what you like to collect, and some personal things. So stay tuned. You’re with Adam DeGraide, David Vs Goliath. We hope you’re enjoying the episode. We’ll be right back.

Speaker 2:

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Adam DeGraide:

And we’re back with Mike and Adam DeGraide on the David Vs Goliath Podcast. Now, Mike, you got to subscribe. You got to subscribe to DVG. I’m going to go subscribe to yours.

For all the watchers and listeners, go right now to Spotify, Apple, or Rumble, by the way. Mike, you’re definitely going to want to look at Rumble, great channel for you to be posting your videos on. Subscribe, like it, share it, get the word out there, folks. And Mike, your podcast, how do they find it again as well too?

Mike Jesowshek:

Yeah. Small Business Tax Savings Podcast. Can find it at any podcasting platform.

Adam DeGraide:

So then, listen, stop right now, pause the video, go subscribe. Because people like Mike and I, we need your support. We’re the small guy trying to help the small guy. Make sure you help us in the process as well too.

Now, I noticed that you like to golf, and I enjoy golfing as well too. And you collect logo balls.

Mike Jesowshek:

Yes.

Adam DeGraide:

How many logo balls do you have?

Mike Jesowshek:

Oh, gosh. I would say how many should I have versus how many I have is a differential. But I’d say we probably have about 120 logo balls, but there’s many courses that I miss. And some of them are like… I forgot to buy one at the club shop. So I get onto the course, and I find one that’s all beat up, and I’m like, “Okay, this is my logo ball for this one.”

Or, more likely than not, I… I love golf, not great. And so, more likely than not, I run out of balls, and I’m like, “Well, I got this new logo ball, so I’m going to take that one and use it.” And now we have a used logo ball up there. But yeah.

Adam DeGraide:

That’s awesome. I always think to do that, and I never can do it because I just play golf. I’m a 9-handicap, so I’m not terrible. I have moments of brilliance, where I’ll shoot a 76, and then moments of insanity, where I shoot a 92, but at the end of the day, somewhere in between is the truth. And I love golf myself as well, too. And my father loves to collect those things as well, too.

Now, one of the things I do find as a golfer, and I don’t know if you find this, is I have so many throw-over jackets and more hats than anybody should ever have in their life. Because I’m a Floridian, so as I travel around the country, I forget sometimes to pack my hat or to pack my throw-over.

So I’ll be up in Montana, I’ll be over in Florida, I’ll be over in… I mean, not Florida. California. I’ll be over in Michigan, and I’m freezing. It’s 53 degrees. And so I got to go buy another throw-over. So I don’t collect logo balls, but accidentally, I collect hats, and I collect throw-overs, and that’s what I do.

So courage is one of the things we talk about here. Starting your own business is never easy. It’s not for the faint of heart. What was it in you that gave you the gumption to do it? Is it an intangible for you? Is it something you saw in somebody else?

What was it for you that said, “You know what? I’m going to take the leap. I’m going to work in conjunction with the firm that I’m with right now. I’m going to start my own podcast. I’m going to make it a business venture. I’m going to do something unique in life and leave that safety net, that place of safety that people have,” and try something on your own? What was it in you that made you do that?

Mike Jesowshek:

Yeah. I think there’s two things. Obviously, the whole business side and then the podcast. But when I was younger… I’ve never worked for anybody else. I’ve only worked for myself or a group of partners in a company. So that whole idea of out on your own is the only thing I’ve ever experienced.

The podcast was kind of unique. And it’s funny how things kind of turn around and how things come up, but the podcast… We did some YouTube videos, and someone on our team said, “Mike, why don’t we throw some of those YouTube videos up on a podcast?” And I’m like… I’m not a podcast listener. At least I wasn’t. I love them now and engulfed in them now, but I was not a podcast listener.

And I’m like, “Pat, people really don’t listen to these things.” So we put them on a podcast, and six months later, I got a couple emails, and they said, “I love your podcast.” There was, like, three or four videos that we turned into audio and put on there. And I was getting emails like, “I love your podcast.” And I was like, “I don’t even know what you’re talking about, but sure, I’ll talk to you about business.”

And eventually, it started to click. I was like, “Oh, people are somehow finding us through those few videos that we put up. Why not create some more consistency with this?” And so that’s when we started to do it every week. And I would say when you’re getting into something that’s… I don’t typically traditionally feel comfortable being on video, putting out audio.

And when I first started doing the podcast on a more regular basis, it’d be like a 10-minute episode. I would rerecord… It took me two and a half hours to record this thing because I’m starting to stop and starting and stop and redoing and just not feeling confident with it.

But just as you create that consistency, all of a sudden, now, it just clicks. I don’t record, I don’t stop, I don’t rerecord. It’s just, whatever’s there is there. If there’s some mistakes that are there or something like that, it’s on there, it’s there. That’s part of being real.

And so I think that was a very hard thing to overcome is, again, it’s that idea of being perfect, right? I wanted everything to be perfect. But the listeners didn’t want that. They just wanted the content. They wanted the information. They didn’t care if I stuttered it or if I misspoke on a certain topic. They didn’t care. They just wanted the free content out there.

Adam DeGraide:

Just make sure you don’t say the wrong thing about someone’s gender. Just kidding. Or else you’ll get in massive trouble. It is amazing to me how different personalities are. So when I started David Vs Goliath… I’m in my second year. And naturally, my grandfather was a disc jockey. I don’t know if you guys know that, you watchers and listeners.

Both of my grandfathers were disc jockeys. One of my grandfathers was a disc jockey so long ago, Mike, that he used to sing two albums. So he would put the album on, and he would croon with it on the actual radio. And then my dad, for 30 years, in Southern New England, was, like, the number one radio host on Lite 105 radio and became part of the Rhode Island Hall of Fame in Radio. Both him… My grandfather and my dad are in it.

So it was very natural for me. So that’s where I got the ability to… The gift of gab, as they… So to speak. And I really try not to worry about it too much about what the episodes come out like because I think that people, if they’re hungry, to your point, and they want the information, and there’s something that they’re looking for, you can learn just about anything from any conversation that you listen to, even if what you learned was, “I never want to listen to that again.” But at the end of the day, you learn something. So I give you all the kudos in the world for starting that.

So what advice do you give to somebody that hasn’t been on their own their whole life, and they might be a little bit afraid of starting their own business? What’s the first step you would tell them to do?

Mike Jesowshek:

Yeah, I think when any… And we see this all the time. Working with small business owners, we see people going out on this leap. And I think the biggest thing is you know what you’re really good at. And you might have been working for somebody. And you don’t necessarily need to go a hundred percent in right away. And it’s going to change on profession and things like that. But maybe you’re starting to do a little bit of side work here, a little bit of side work there.

And while you’re doing that, while you’re working full-time, doing a little side work, I think the biggest thing is that many people are really good at what they do, but they have no clue how to run a business. And I was just talking to someone that was at our house the other day, and I said, “There’s a lot of people that are good carpenters. There’s a lot of people that are good plumbers, but you try to get them their own business, they can’t keep up with their clients, they can’t keep record of everything that they’ve got going on.” Because they’ve always known that, “You go here today.” Someone’s directing them what to do.

And when you’re on your own, you’re that director, you’re that director, you’re that doer and everything else. And so, I always say, “Just kind of gain knowledge around that area, be a sponge to this area of, ‘What do I need to know about being an actual business owner?'”

And then the second piece is… I think so many business owners… And I fell victim to this myself. Is you start to get intertwined in your business. Your clients are expecting to see you, that when you try to then grow into different areas, you try to bring other staff in, it’s very tough because you were so, so engulfed in the day-to-day.

And so I always say, “When you’re growing your business…” If I could start out from the beginning, growing my business, I want to grow it assuming that I’m not here. “How can I grow this? How can I build this business so that I don’t have to be here for it?” And if I have that mindset… I know, obviously, in the beginning, you’re going to be there, you’re going to be there every day, and you’re going to be doing a lot. But keep that always in the back of your mind. How can you grow this business in five years where you don’t even have to be there, and the clients don’t expect you to be there?

Adam DeGraide:

And I think what’s amazing about what Mike just said, guys, is that it has to be bigger than you because if it isn’t bigger than you, it’ll always be about you. And at the end of the day, it’s really important, as you’re growing and scaling, that you’re removing yourself out of things that you can do. Not that you shouldn’t… You had to do them at one point, but you don’t always need to do it.

You need to find someone to replace you because then, when it comes time to exit, which every good business does, at least you know the business can survive without you. And that really is a secret, and really, it’s a key.

Mike, this has been amazing having you on the David Vs Goliath Podcast. Have you had fun?

Mike Jesowshek:

Yeah, absolutely.

Adam DeGraide:

I’m going to go follow you right now on Spotify. Make sure you do the same thing for us, man. I really appreciate it. Your episode will be out in about a month. And how can the watchers and listeners find you online?

Mike Jesowshek:

Yeah. You can go to taxsavingspodcast.com. All of our information’s there.

Adam DeGraide:

Save some money on the taxsavingspodcast.com, where he gives you real-world advice and helps you make the decisions to save you and your business money and ultimately make the world a better place.

Thank you so much for tuning in. Once again, another amazing episode of the David Vs Goliath is in the bag. We’ll see you next week. Have a great day.