Episode Transcript

Please note this transcript was generated by AI and contains errors including missing and misspelled words.

Meryl Intro:

Hi there, and welcome to the podcast. I'm your host, Meryl Johnston. The lifestyle accountant show exists to help today's accounting firm owners build successful firms, while also living a healthy, happy life without sacrificing sleep your weekend or time with loved ones. Today I'm chatting with Jason Staats.

You might know him from his YouTube show for accountants, Jason Daily. Prior to 2023, Jason ran an accounting and tax firm in Oregon. He started producing video content from his garage in 2020, and now he's focusing full-time on being a creator and running Realize, which is a community for accounting firm owners.

He has produced commercials for companies like LinkedIn and Zapier. This is going to be a two-part episode with Jason. The first, which we are listening to today, is all about his content creation process. In a separate episode, Jason shares a behind the scenes look at deciding to leave his accounting firm and how he managed that transition with his business partner.

That will be published as part of season two of the Lifestyle Accountant Show, which is all about partnerships and m and a in the accounting industry. In today's episode, we talk about how creating content online can increase serendipity and unexpected opportunities that come your way and why Jason thinks every accountant should be active in creating and engaging with content online.

Jason: [Soundbyte begin] And I'm that guy that doesn't run an accounting firm and tells everybody how to run accounting firms. And I'll be like, yeah, you should start learning video. And they're like, easy for him to say he doesn't have a job. And I'm like, no, buddy. I do one YouTube video a week now. I did two a week for, you know, for years when I was running this firm.

I'm a firm believer that you will do the things that are important to you that you make time for. [soundbyte end]

Meryl: Jason shares the story of how he got started, first of all, by writing on Twitter, which then led to a tech newsletter and him ultimately creating videos. We talk about the way that he balances the responsibilities of a young family and running a 40-person accounting firm while also creating two YouTube videos a week for a number of years before he left to become a full-time creator.

We also take a deep dive into Jason's creative process, what his production team looks like, how he writes scripts. Whether he uses a teleprompter and his advice for accountants wanting to get started with content creation, all that and more, coming right up on The Lifestyle Accountant Show.

Meryl: What was the first step of getting into. Creating content for you and, and why did you get started?

Jason: What opened my eyes was Zero Con 2019 in the US San Diego. I went there and I looked around and I was like, holy smokes, all these people are trying to save the, to solve the same problems as me. Yet for the last decade I've been like, in a cave just trying to solve all of the world's problems myself in a vacuum.

And so that totally opened my mind to realize, oh no, like nothing I'm doing is novel. I just have to get the person who's already done it to tell me how they did it. And to tell me what to do and what to not do, and that would shave years off of my learning experience. So as soon as I realized that I'd been poking around on Twitter and I was just like everybody else, where they're like, well, I don't have anything.

I don't have anything to say on social media. Like, what am I gonna, what am I gonna do? Because, you know, we, we consume like pop culture, social media, which like there are much, there are very grassroots versions. Social media that are much better than all of that. So I just started sharing what I was working on every day and I was an automation nerd and I was like working on stuff in Zapier and this was like very early days, Zapier and I just started sharing kind of stuff I was doing each day and it attracted people who were doing the same kind of stuff.

And eventually I was able to start stealing ideas from people and, um, it really just started there on Twitter.

Meryl: So it started on Twitter first. And were the things you were sharing written or was that, were you starting to create, were you creating videos at that time? That was pre-video?

Jason: Uh, I was just writing stuff on Twitter and then I started a little like tech discovery newsletter launch for accountants, if you know, you know, Uh, it was like this little email newsletter that had like eight new pieces of tech for accountants every single week, and it was just like, Basically geeking out that I was already doing, where I was like finding these interesting things and then I just put 'em in a newsletter for other people to consume.

One of the times I went back and I looked and saw what the most clicked tool from the previous week was, and I made a little 92nd loom of it and put it at the top of the newsletter. I was like, Hey, here's a, here's a 92nd overview of the most recent tool from last week. I did that and like four times as many people clicked on that as anything else.

And so I did it the next week. Before long, people stopped clicking on all the other stuff and they would just watch the video that I put at the top. And then I started posting 'em to YouTube. It went from there. And 18 months later I was shooting a national commercial for LinkedIn from my garage, uh, because they had seen some content that I did and they're like, Hey, can you come shoot this commercial for us that we wanna run as a web ad?

And so like it's just, Like wild, like I would've never expected all that.

Meryl: Amazing. And so when you had made that transition to starting to do those two YouTube videos a week, you're still working full-time at the firm. So when were you creating those videos and, and how did you cut out the time to do the content creation as well as the firm, as well as the family, the young kids?

How did you juggle all of that?

Jason: I think more than most, I think it's, for whatever reason, it's easy for me to delegate things early on. And when I was running the firm, I had a full-time employee and a little production company that was very hands-on with all of the editing, handling more of the editing than the team that I have now.

So I had my firm in a place where, uh, it was like, it was an eight to five for me, pretty reliably. It wasn't a huge obligation, but I had young kids still. So it was like the answer was whenever I could get to it. And that was evenings, that was after kids went to bed. That was weekends. But I super enjoyed it.

Like, it, like I really, really enjoyed the creative process. Of doing those. So I didn't really feel like work, like I was having a lot of fun with it. I dunno, like my big fear, my big fear now is everybody comes and finds my stuff now and I'm that guy that doesn't run an accounting firm and tells everybody how to run accounting firms.

Uh, and I'll be like, yeah, you should start learning video. And they're like, ah, easy for him to say he doesn't have a job. And I'm like, no, buddy. I do one YouTube video a week. Now. I did two a week for, you know, for years when I was running this firm. I'm a firm believer that you will do the things that are important to you, that you make time for and like if it's something that is important enough to you, um, especially when it comes to things that you find you genuinely enjoy.

Uh, like, I don't know, you just make time for it, right? Like when that thing comes up, it means not doing other things. And so I think when you see people that are like, have a prolific amount of output, there may be a degree of them being more productive than you, but I think it's usually because there's a bunch of stuff that you do that they don't do, that they refuse to do.

Uh, I think that's the biggest. Differentiator between those folks that look like they have such prolific outfit output. And you know, you, if you look at those people and you think that, I think it's oftentimes more about what they don't do that you do. You know, I had a full-time admin that like managed almost everything.

They came into my email inbox for me. And so it's just like stuff like that, that when you add it up, I got a lot of time back for me.

Meryl: The three hours of Netflix at night. You're gonna have to make some sacrifices if you wanna be creating content as well.

Jason: I will say I'm making up for lost time now. I've been, I've been putting in some work this year.

Meryl: So do you think building an audience or getting active on something like Twitter and LinkedIn, is it something that every accountant should be doing? Or is it just something, you know, some accountants are cut out for this and some aren't.

Jason: Uh, everybody should be doing it posting online, and this is super woo woo.

Posting online is the, like the ultimate vehicle for serendipity is what I always say. And we all have tunnel vision for what we do today. And we do the things according to how we identify. Like I'm an accountant, I don't identify as somebody who's gonna post online buddy. Like, I see your weird videos.

Like, I get that. That's for you, but that's not me. Uh, when the reality is the internet is bigger. Than any of our little monkey brains can comprehend. Like there are so many people on the other side of every single thing that you post, and so many opportunities and so much nuance out there that you are not participating in if you don't get involved.

And I'm like, and I point to myself as like, what sort of more ridiculous example do you want than this? The fact that I've turned into a job making silly videos for accountants when like I'd never made a video in my life three years ago, and that's obviously, that's not gonna be the path for everybody, but there is so much opportunity.

On the other side of putting yourself out there. And there's a hundred reasons why we don't do it. It's scary. Uh, you know, we think, what will, what will my mom say? What will my spouse say? What will the people I went to high school say? And all of those things are filters to like you. Doing what you wanna do and like living intentionally and all that.

Accountants are very ROI based people where they're like, okay, how am I gonna, what's, how's this gonna be worthwhile for me? And when it comes to being online and being like a citizen of the internet and online communities and all that, I think that misses the point because you can only do that ROI calculation if you have a hundred percent surety of what's gonna come down the road.

We have, we have 2020 vision for all the things we've already done. But like, you don't know what crazy thing is just over the hill. And there is, especially for people in public accounting where you have this unbelievable resource of experience. There is so many cool things out there for you that you could not even imagine.

For me, I, and the analogy I make is it's like pulling a slot machine handle every day. Like you never know who you're gonna meet and like, what amazing opportunity that could unlock for you. So I, that's why I publish every single day and it's been working out for me. I've got

Meryl: a story related to that. So when the day that we started Bean Ninjas was the day that I started writing a blog, I was so scared to, to click publish and felt uncomfortable.

Uh, my writing wasn't that great. And then I wrote income reports and the early years sharing number of clients how much money we were making churn and things like, I didn't know what it, what it was gonna result in, but for me, that actually ended up in a business partner. And so Wayne, my business partner in the US heard of me on the Jet Pack Work Workflow podcast five or six years ago, and then read one of these income reports and his business was at a similar stage, reached out, we got chatting and eventually became business partners.

So that's an example from me of being active online, having no idea what it would lead to. And ultimately it Yeah. Ended up with a business partner.

Jason: That's super cool. Yeah, no, like you don't, and it's, if you only make those decisions through the lens of. Like, Ooh, I want this to happen. Like, I think that misses the point.

Meryl: So before we recorded today, I went out to LinkedIn and asked for a bunch of questions about creating content. And so I've got a list for you. So the first one, uh, comes from Jack Teal and he says, who writes Jason's jokes? Surely that gold can't come from only one person.

Jason: That's very kind. Uh, I write 'em all.

I do, I do all that stuff myself. I super enjoy it. Um, This year. I've probably enjoyed the writing part of it more than anything else. Just like creating ridiculous things. I did a slide whistle, Sarah McLaughlin solo in the last video that I published, like for like the more absurd and like off the wall, like, I don't know, I just think accounting can be so dry.

It's like fun too. It's fun to have a platform to make silly things. Were

Meryl: you always funny or have you done some training around that?

Jason: I don't know. I mean, I screwed around like everybody else did. I wasn't like, I, I, I don't like no training around like comedy or, or anything like that. That is something I've explored more this year.

I did some, I've been doing some improv classes, and that's been a ton of fun to like, get you out of your own head. I highly recommend it whether you identify as a funny person or not, but no, no, like traditional comedy stuff.

Meryl: Next question is from. Moshi Mindi. Hopefully I'm pronouncing that right. And he said, do you always use a teleprompter?

And how do you make your script?

Jason: For my YouTube main channel videos, I use a teleprompter generally. Um, building the script is just like taking a couple days to sit down and chuck a draft in and then kind of tinker with it. And then I usually try to have some sort of funny, absurd thing happening in parallel because that just.

It breaks up the video because at the end of the day, like if we're talking about accounting firms, it is pretty dry stuff. So like you have to somehow create some entertainment there. So yeah, my, on my main channel videos, I will run that through a teleprompter because the YouTube meta is like, Quick to the point, like I want to get somebody somewhere in 10 minutes and as economical of a way as possible.

Um, the daily podcast, uh, is me learning how to do the opposite, so I don't, I'm talking really just from a few bullet points that I've prepared. And part of the reason why I started doing that was I just wanted to get better at like more clearly and logically being able to talk from the top of my head on those subjects because actually speaking from a teleprompter kind of took me the opposite way.

I realized as I was doing more speaking at conferences, I had kind of trained my brain to like read from a script when I'm presenting, and I could do that well, and it's a useful skill, but I needed to exercise a different muscle to be able to do kind of the more unscripted side.

Meryl: And what does your content creation process look like in the backend?

So do you have a number of ideas kind of simmering away that you're thinking about and then you're refining something? Is this all in notion or something like that? How, how does that process work of, of where you're capturing ideas to.

Jason: To the finished product? Yeah, it's a mixed bag. So there's, there's anytime, like if you create stuff, there are times when you'll be on fire and it'll come easy and times where it will be hard.

So when I'm on fire, I try to capture all the stuff that I can so that in the times where it's coming harder, I can refer back to like those ideas and kind of the, the outline of. Of an idea that I'd written. But other days, man, something just like you get the bug on something and you're just on fire and you're like, I gotta go make this thing right now.

And today was one of those days. Have you ever seen the TV show community? No. Okay. Incredible TV show. There's an episode where they like, the episode is basically split into six timelines and like at the beginning they like throw a dice, a dye up in the air, and it comes down and the rest of the episode progresses like through these different timelines.

That are increasingly absurd. And then there's like the darkest timeline. And I got outta bed this morning and I was like, that would make for a really funny spin on this Roast Affirm series that I do where I get info about Affirm and then I like roast affirm. And so that's kind of, I probably spent four or five hours on that today, like creating this ridiculous spin on like giving practical advice to an accounting firm, but in like a really weird, interesting way.

Meryl: So related to that, we've got a question from Matt from Zinc about what apps do you use? So this is in the content creation process, what apps do you use and what bits are outsourced? Which bits do you do yourself?

Jason: Uh, in the video stuff, I stick to the Adobe Creative Suite generally. Um, I've been doing some AI video stuff actually with runway ml, uh, and that's like an interesting way to just kind of, Add funny things to a video, uh, but Adobe Creative Suite for that.

I have a, I have a, a junior editor that does the first couple passes on a video, but then all the videos come to me for final edits and sign off and I'll usually tinker with them a bit before we publish. Um, on the social media side, I use Hype Fury for. Scheduling Twitter, and I think it does LinkedIn as well, but I haven't done much scheduling on LinkedIn yet.

Um, so really all that stuff, like I use, not notion is kind of how I organize my life, but tools around content creation, it's really probably just Hype Fury and uh, Adobe Creative Suite. I use

Meryl: hypey as well for Twitter, well, I used to, I haven't been on Twitter for a while about, about to make a comeback and LinkedIn.

I just use the native scheduling there.  I'm still intrigued that there's, that you are handling a lot of this process yourself without a team. How long would it take you to, in the, the, so outside of recording the video, so putting that to the side in their production, editing that, that process.

Jason: For, for one video if I did the whole thing myself.

The last video I did completely myself was when Open AI announced G PT four, their new AI model, and they ended the livestream announcement by using it to prepare somebody's tax return. Uh, and like gaslighted, you know, all tax preparers everywhere. And then everybody the next day thought that AI could now prep everyone's tax returns.

And like 4 million people watched that. And, uh, and so I shot a video and then I was like, this feels like an important one. And I edited that whole video myself and it took probably three and a half days. And that was a, that was a bigger lift. Video. Um, it was 18 minutes, a lot of editing. Uh, but I did that one myself, and then that was about three and a half days for a normal video where my editor will do the bulk of the work, I'm probably spending, I'm probably spending two or three hours in post production.

And then writing and shooting can be anywhere from a half a day to a day and a half. Well, I, I

Meryl: mean, I've got the AI guy on the podcast, so I have to ask, how are you using AI as part of your content creation process?

Jason: Oh boy. Um, I've been a real ChatGPT dweeb from like the day it came out, and so it's.

Like I have it up almost all day for various little things like to create a, you know, an alliteration around a specific topic like, or, you know, gimme a list of things that rhyme with this or that. Or video titles. I'll use it for oftentimes, like what's a better, more concise way to communicate this or that.

Um, Using some AI stuff in the video production process from like AI cutting out the foreground background, stuff like that. Transcripts are so much better auto transcripts than they used to be. Um, I don't do it in any of my writing. Besides sometimes just for ideation if I'm really stuck on something.

That being said, part of the reason that I was excited about doing a daily podcast, as ridiculous as that was, is with AI now, um, you know, information is more accessible than ever before, cuz it can pull in all this context in a much more helpful way than we've ever had in the past. And so part of that daily podcast, honestly, is like building a library of like, What I think about pretty much everything, so I have all these transcripts from this podcast that I've done and we're closing in on 50 episodes.

There's tools good enough now to like build that into a chat bot where the only thing it draws on is the stuff in that context. It doesn't pull from general knowledge. There will probably be a time in the future where. I can work with AI in a pretty meaningful way to like develop video ideas and, and that sort of thing.

Meryl: Because you've built up this backlog of content, which are your ideas, not everybody's ideas. That's interesting. I.

Jason: Yeah. Yeah. So there's, I mean, a hundred plus hours of me talking about running accounting firms out there. And so I'm extremely documented in that regard. And I think, uh, when it comes to AI stuff like, and how you adopted in your firm and, and all that, how well documented of a person you are like will be a huge differentiator.

Meryl: So the next question is from Samuel, and he's asking, Uh, what's your favorite platform, and then related to that, what frequency of posting would you recommend for that platform? My

Jason: favorite today is probably YouTube. For a long time it was Twitter. Um, It's never been less cool to be into Twitter than it is right now.

Uh, but I posted when I was publishing on YouTube twice a day, I was also publishing on Twitter three times a day for a couple years. Um, and there's no way to not find people when you're out there that much. I would say, I think the answer is probably whatever is most sustainable for you and whatever you enjoy.

I super enjoyed doing videos, so YouTube came really easy for me and then I built a community on YouTube that was like, yeah, you had some people crossing over from Twitter, but by and large, those are people that just were hanging out on on YouTube and that's where I met them. What is the thing that like is most energizing for you?

Is it longer form writing then maybe that's LinkedIn. Is it more bite-sized stuff? Maybe that's Twitter. If you enjoy the video stuff, it could just be published once a week on YouTube or doing a short, a couple times a week or something like that. I don't think there's like an absolute right answer, but the more consistently you turn up, the better.

Um, like quantity, quality matters, but like just being present every day like that is the big thing.

Meryl: The next question we've got is how to get started. So if you were giving advice to an accountant who wants to get started with content creation, so. Is there some kind of quick win or something that they should do to, get started?

Jason: Yeah. Stop asking questions and just start. Don't worry about your niche, don't worry about your camera. Don't worry about absolutely anything. Just get started because it's gonna suck no matter what. Our brains these days, everybody's, everybody scrolls, algorithms all day like that is life now. Like if you're standing in line at a coffee shop and there's a person that's not on their phone, It's uncomfortable.

It's like, what are you doing looking around weirdo? Like every, like, that's just what everybody does. Like when you're standing, where you scroll a phone and algorithms surface the most prolific people there are at anything. And so that's all you see, right? So when you watch, you know, a video mine or, or, or all these people that are coming through where what you're seeing is the product of years and years and years of work.

It's really hard to not think, well, shucks, that's really good. Here's how I look on my webcam. There's a big difference there. So maybe this isn't for me when the reality is these days, the prerequisite to being good at anything is having a willingness to really suck at it. And to put yourself out there and be okay with being bad.

Nobody was watching my first videos and I share my very first videos all the time cause I think it's hilarious. But also a great reminder that everybody is so bad when they start. So like think for you, what is something that you enjoy? What is something that may down the road have a crossover like intersection with something that's useful for you?

And just start. Because like if you're good at any of those things, if it's podcasting, video posting, online, whatever, like all you need to do is get repetitions in, like focus on repetitions. All the other stuff you can worry about down the road. But what keeps people from starting. Is the analysis and like thinking about, oh, how do I do this for that?

And who am I writing it for? And all these things. The, the more you can lower the bar for yourself, the better.

Meryl: I remember, I think it was Ali Abdul or someone like that that said, your first 100 whatevers videos, articles are gonna suck. So just get them out of the way as, as fast as you can and, and move on. But get going.

Jason: Yeah. I mean, that guy's a great example. Uh, he, after like two or three years of publishing, he had. Less than 10,000 subscribers. Uh, Mr. Beast, you know, the first over a hundred videos, he had like less than a thousand subscribers. The people you see who are prolific at things, you didn't see them when they were spending years developing that craft.

And then somebody watches one of my videos and they're like, Hey, you're really good at this. What camera do you use? And I'm like, buddy, it's more than, it's more than that. Or like, are, they're like, Man, you've got the best editor. And I just go and I cry because like, there's so many things that go into like a video hitting right?

From like the music and the writing and all these different things, right? Um, but yeah, when I think when you're like, when you do something well, you make it look easy and you just like, you gotta have the courage to put yourself out there and be willing to just. Like be bad for a while.

Meryl: Next question's from Gareth Burton and he says, what's the one thing you would suggest most accountants do to get more lifestyle in their business?

Jason: Work less. Um, is that an easy one? Boy, there's so many things there. I mean, we chronically undervalue ourselves. We always think if we increase prices, everybody's gonna leave, and then you increase prices and nobody leaves. Honestly, like adulting comes down to tactfully disappointing people. At the end of the day, it comes down to doing the hard things that you probably know that you need to do.

Like you just thought of a couple of clients, like it's time to let 'em go. Like you know that you need to do that. It's just a question of are you willing to do it? Have that uncomfortable, uncomfortable conversation. You will be so proud of yourself. On the other side, if you wrote a list right now of the five things that you need to do, you would be a changed person.

On the other side of that, where most people are is they're just not doing those five things. What it's really stopping you from doing is being a better person today. Because if it takes you five years to get over those hurdles and do it, man, think of all the other cool things that could have happened in that five years that you just burned from tee-ball games to soccer games, to you know that that cool person that you could have met online because you had time to write that post or something like that.

So, I don't know. I think most of us know what our problems are. We just, we just get stuck.

Meryl: And last question. And this one's from me, just to tie it all together. I'm interested in what your life looks now like now compared to when you were running the firm. So what's the day to day? Is it any different in terms of family health, the kind of projects that you're working on?

Jason: I tell you what, I've got a little bit of a tan going for like the first time maybe in my life. That's been a lot of fun. My kids like, we got a little backyard. My kids like run around. So every afternoon I try to like at least go outside a little bit, which I know for accountants is, is something we don't do.

But to be honest, like I'm still figuring that out. Like, what is, man, ever since from the day I left college, I've gone into an office every single day, like my entire professional career. So I was 15 years and I am, in many ways, I'm still like, floundering. Like I, I may ultimately like. Like that structure, and that's okay.

You just then have to like manufacture it for yourself when, when it's not being imposed upon you by, you know, all the people that, that you work for and all that. I've learned that I work best with like forcing functions. Um, you know, where my editor's gonna do a video a week for me and like, I just like having him there to do that will make me like, follow through and do that.

So I'm still. Like learning what that looks like for me, but ultimately like the agency of being able to like craft that stuff from scratch right now is really enjoyable. Like for me, the biggest counter argument to staying at that firm until you're 65. Is, this is how good you are on the first iteration of doing this thing.

Imagine how good you would be on like the third iteration of doing this thing, but you'll never know. So like I may run a, I may spin up a firm again someday, and I'm gonna be so much more informed and well-rounded because of the stuff I've done in the meantime and because of the things I did in the past.

Like, I just, I just think like that's a more interesting way to. To go through life. Um, these decisions oftentimes feel like forever. Decisions that are gonna like, define what you do. And it's like, buddy, we're accountants. Like, there's never been a better time for accountants. Like we will never be hurting for work.

Um, so I don't know. I think like, you know, you're, you and the family and all that definitely has to come first and like, don't be afraid to do that weird outside the box

Meryl: thing. Amazing. Jason, thank you so much for coming on the show. If anyone wants to get in touch or learn more about what you do, where should they go to find you?

Jason: You told me this before we started recording. I'm everywhere and I'm really sorry to everyone. It's almost hard not to find me, but I pick your platform. You can search my name, you'll find me. You'll find me just about everywhere. Thanks, Daza. Thank you.

Meryl Outro: As someone who's trying to improve my own content creation skills with podcasting and writing on LinkedIn, I found this chat with Jason Equal parts inspiring and useful. I was surprised to hear that Jason only has one junior video editor. I was actually expecting a much larger team based on the quality of his content, but also the sheer volume that he produces.

I'm wanting to do a dive into creating videos myself, but it still does seem harder than writing or podcasting. So maybe this is the inspiration that I need and, and maybe the same for you. Jason's comments about being genuine and authentic when you create content resonated with me, and also his comments around focusing on providing value and solving problems rather than promoting your own work.