TikTok Riches: Why Short Clips Pay More Than You Think | Mark Dohner DSH #718

So, my house got broken into.

I come home from Lake Tahoe.

I walk in the house.

Everything's fine.

I go up to my bedroom.

My whole room is ransacked.

Drawers open.

All my clothes are on the floor.

Because I make YouTube videos.

I'm like, Are you guys pranking me?

Like,

are you guys filming a prank or something?

And they're like, No, what happened?

Messed me up.

And then, like, a week or two later, and my phone rings

and it says my name is calling me.

All right, guys, we got Mark Doner here today.

Thanks for coming in, man.

Thanks for having me, dude.

Are you still in Germany or you left?

No, I'm in Los Angeles.

I lived in Germany for four months during the winter.

Horrible decision.

Don't ever do it.

But yeah, back in LA and now I'm in Vegas, babe.

All right.

Yeah.

Poker tonight.

Yeah, my first time playing.

It's literally your first time?

I've never played a hand of poker in my life.

Dude, I've been like testing on like the apps and stuff.

Yeah.

A lot of patience I'm learning.

A a lot but tournaments are a little different this one is a turbo so what's that mean it's only six hours so you're gonna be going all in a lot basically really yeah because typical poker you could take your time yeah you know cash game i feel a little disrespected heading into this tournament i'm the lowest odds to win what were your odds plus 7 500 holy crap i thought i was the lowest what are you at uh plus 5 000 dude the disrespect maybe because they know they just have an inkling that i've never played i mean it's my third time playing plus

my table is insane i got three pros on my table.

See, I think that's a little unfair.

It's a celebrity poker tournament.

Why are we putting pros in?

I'm with you on that.

That's too much of an advantage for the other people.

You should be all amateurs, right?

All amateurs.

Yeah, man.

Level the playing field.

You're all in on your pod right now, right?

Yeah.

That's the main thing for you?

Yeah.

Doing the podcast, and I just started back up on my YouTube vlogs.

Okay.

I did daily vlogs for two years.

Yeah, honestly, I like look back at that part of my life and I'm like, how did I film my life every single day for two years?

The burnout must have been insane.

The burnout was crazy.

And then I like, I stopped for a little bit.

I started up the podcast and then did like maybe two, three a week and then a podcast a week.

And then honestly took a break for a while.

I just felt creatively burnt out.

And, you know, when you film your life every day for two years straight, you kind of just start to run out of ideas.

And I'm sure, you know, well, you have, you know, multiple guests, but the podcast, you kind of start talking about the same thing.

So I just took a little bit of a break and, but now I'm inspired again and

back on it.

Yeah, definitely with podcasting if you have on the same type of people it could get repetitive.

Exactly.

You end up just like recycling stories too.

That's why I mix it up.

Like today I had a chess player on.

I had a music producer on.

I don't ever do the same topics.

I like that about your podcast because I feel like a lot of podcasts are very driven by the same guests.

You know, everybody has Jordan Peterson on or they have

Theo Vaughn or you know what I'm saying?

It's like, it's really cool to see like interesting people who aren't necessarily like the guy.

Right.

You know what I mean?

And I'll mix those in.

It's the game we play.

We got to get views, but I won't, yeah, I won't, because some podcasts are the same 10, 20 people.

Exactly, especially the comedy ones.

They just rotate.

They cycle the same people.

Yeah.

Did you feel like that was happening with your show?

Not so much.

I guess the reason I started my podcast back up is when I initially did it, what I learned was when I was having guests on that I was interested in talking to, it wasn't performing well.

And this is before YouTube Shorts.

This is before TikTok.

Yeah.

And then when I would just talk to my buddy George, they were doing amazing.

People loved to see me and my buddy George, George Jenko.

He has his own podcast now.

So we did one together.

So I just kind of more so leaned into that because it was being, it was a little more successful for me.

And then, you know, TikTok came around and I'm like scrolling through TikTok one night and I'm like trying to figure out what's next for me.

And

I'm always scrolling through TikTok and I'm seeing podcast clips.

Yeah.

And this is when I was in long distance with my girlfriend at the time.

I was bored.

I got into bed.

I was scrolling through TikTok.

And then I threw up Instagram and I saw a buddy of mine, Spencer Stone, who I had on my podcast.

It was like the eight-year anniversary.

He stopped the train, Paris train attack.

There was a terrorist attack in Paris on a train.

He stopped it.

It got stabbed, gun jammed twice.

Like he has an insane story.

So he posted eight-year anniversary of that.

And I was like, you know what?

I'm bored right now.

I have nothing to do.

I'm just going to go edit a clip.

So I get up out of my bed.

I go edit a clip.

It's like maybe six, seven o'clock at night.

I wasn't going to bed.

I was just chilling to bed.

Edit the clip and I posted it at like 8 p.m., 9 p.m.

And I'm like, it's doing horrible because I hadn't posted any podcast clips on my TikTok yet.

It's doing horrible.

And I was like, maybe I should delete it.

But I was like, you know what?

I'll wait till morning.

So I go to bed, I wake up in the morning and it went viral.

And I was like, oh, all right.

People are interested in hearing this guy's story.

So I posted part two and that went viral and then part three.

And then I was like, all right, I have a backlog of about 100 episodes of guests.

I'm going to start editing.

my old episodes down and post them on TikTok, new platform, new audience.

So then I uploaded a interview I did with this guy, Kevin Hines.

He jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge when he was a teenager and he survived.

And he's one of very few survivors.

And I edited his clip down on a flight back to Ohio, actually.

I posted it on a Spirit Airlines flight.

Shout out to the best airline in America.

Posted it.

They had Wi-Fi on there?

Yeah.

Honestly, it took like, it was probably like, it was like a five-minute clip.

It probably took like 30 minutes to upload.

But I was like, I edited it on the plane.

I'm like, I'm uploading this now.

And then that one did like 28 million views.

I was like, all right.

Yeah.

Holy crap.

I was like, all right, I'm bringing back my podcast because I found what worked, I guess.

And for the longest time, I didn't really know what worked.

And it's interesting that you can like have an hour-long episode of a podcast and it doesn't maybe do too great, but then you upload a 60-second clip to TikTok and it just reaches a huge audience.

Dude, I'm in the same boat as you.

I'll get like 10, 20K on the long form, which isn't that great compared to the bigger shows, but my clips just get millions.

And And it's, it doesn't make sense because the content is obviously there.

It's all about the algorithm and the audience.

So it's like your hour-long episode has quality content in it.

So why aren't people watching that?

I think it's like, that's something that I feel like YouTube has to figure out.

I think I'm partially shadow banned because I have on some controversial people.

But yeah, definitely YouTube's YouTube shorts do decent for us.

But YouTube long form is just like not the best.

Yeah, I think that's what they push.

And that's kind of like, that's what I learned later on actually so when i first started making videos i worked for logan paul and i was filming all of his skits and youtube videos and then he got busy and i started making skits yeah and this was post vine dying and this is right when instagram introduced like 15 second video so i started making instagram skits at 15 seconds and

They were doing pretty well.

I didn't really have a big audience.

I had access to a lot of like the Viners because they were all living in that 1600 Vine building.

So I had some good cameos.

They were doing pretty well.

And then Instagram introduced 60 second video.

And then I started uploading 60 second videos.

And all my stuff was just getting millions of views.

And I only had like 100,000 followers.

And, you know, the big Viners in the building, I remember Rudy Mancuso coming up to me in the gym and he's like,

dude, how are your videos performing so well?

I was like, I don't know.

I mean, maybe they're just good or whatever.

But looking back on it,

when a platform introduces a new feature, and you attack that feature, they push you.

Facts.

So I didn't know it at the time, but they just introduced 60 second video they're looking for 60 second videos i'm making 60 second videos i'm they're pushing me so that's like the same thing with shorts you know they introduce shorts it's like attack the feature they introduce tick tock you can do more than a minute attack the feature uh same thing with instagram reels if you just attack the new feature and then you're gonna get pushed yeah reels are crushing on ig for me yeah so tick tock right now over 60 seconds they're pushing yeah That's good to know.

And then I get notifications too.

Like, and I don't know if there's like,

I've tested it.

It hasn't, I haven't really seen anything.

But if you upload in landscape and it's over 60 seconds apparently they're supposed to boost your views interesting yeah they're doing a bunch of stuff like that dude the money on tick tock's my highest paying right now out of every platform it's crazy it's nuts i'm making more money off of a one and a half minute clip on tick tock than i would off like an hour long youtube for real saying it's nuts and it's way less work So easy.

Because for me, I've outsourced editing.

I mean, you're an editor, so that makes sense why you're doing it.

But yeah, I'll just wake up, clip will have a million views.

I'll get like 500 bucks.

It's like, all right.

Yeah, it's a well, it's interesting because

I don't know what it is that I do in my edits because I tried to outsource an editor and it just wasn't clicking.

Yeah,

and I finally just outsourced an editor and they're doing clips for me, but it's tough, dude, to find a good one, yeah.

But they finally figured it out, and I don't know if I had like a formula or what because I do it a little bit different.

I do, I kind of structure them like I structure my vlogs.

I'll have a hook in the beginning and then do like a little intro tag and then get into the question.

And I think that like that helps lead with the juicy part and yeah the first few seconds are key because people will just scroll if they're if they're not interested in two seconds but what is interesting too like you know you can have them pop off do millions and then the next one does like three thousand yeah no tick tock's so inconsistent it's so yeah for me it's like one and out of every 10 videos will hit a million yeah it's like super random doesn't make sense no sense at all next video will have 3 000 views and i'm depressed we're talking algorithms over here yeah well ig is consistent for me ig reels always hit and how how many times you post in a day?

Three to four.

Yeah.

What about you?

Not enough.

Yeah.

I'm trying to put well my Instagram.

I'm trying to push my podcast channel.

I just, I converted.

I had two Instagrams.

I had like a backup account.

Yeah.

And I switched the name to like podcast.

And it's not, I had one finally pop off, did a million views.

Nice.

But that's been a struggle.

Yeah.

If you don't already have a following on Instagram, it's very hard.

Yeah.

Yeah.

For me, I spent so much money in seven years on Instagram growing it that it's finally paying off.

That's good.

Yeah.

So you and George had a show before his show?

Yeah.

So I had a podcast.

I called it Live and Large.

And then I did a few episodes with George, and then I changed the name to the Two Man Show.

Two Man?

Two Man.

What does that mean?

Two Men.

Oh, Two Men.

But I say it like that because I modeled it.

I saw The Truman Show.

Oh, got it.

Got it.

And I

loved that movie.

One of the best movies ever.

And I like modeled it as like, oh, it's a podcast within a podcast because I already had my Live and Large one.

So kind of like the Truman Show, World Within a World.

That makes sense.

And And we did that for a little bit.

And then

he got off of it.

And then he started doing his own.

And he's had tremendous success.

I'm super happy for him.

He's killing it.

Killing it.

He's got an amazing guest.

Yeah.

Just like crushing the game.

And I'm finally, I'm

proud of him for finding his lane.

That's so cool.

So when he was co-hosting Impulsive, was he co-hosting yours or was yours before that?

No.

We actually did.

So we were really good friends.

We had a little bit of a falling out.

Over the podcast?

No, it wasn't over the podcast.

Just some personal things.

And then he went and did Impulsive, and I just went and continued to do my own thing.

And then, funny enough,

we've been in contact a little bit recently.

He hit me up this weekend, so we're supposed to hang out next week.

Dude, that's cool.

I think it's important to let it go.

Yeah.

Because that shit eats at you.

I've had some falling out with business partners and dude.

It sucks too.

Cause we're friend, we were friends first.

And then, you know,

it's tough to go into business with a friend and it works out long term.

Yeah.

It was, I don't think the falling out was business oriented, but yeah.

That makes sense.

So how long were you editing for Logan?

So, uh, funny story.

So I met Logan at college.

We both went to Ohio University, and

I was a sophomore.

He was a freshman.

And I was making these party videos at Ohio University.

Have you ever heard of Amschmacht?

Yeah.

I used to follow them.

Yeah.

So they used to make all these like party videos going to colleges.

And I was like, at the time, my school, Ohio University, was voted number one party school in America by Playboy.

Wow.

So I was like, I'm going to make a party video, and it's going to go viral.

So I went and filmed everybody partying.

We used to have these things in the spring, I think it was, called fest season.

So they'll shut down a whole street.

Bunch of college kids that live on that street will host parties.

You just walk up and down the street, drinking, doing whatever you want.

And I'm running around filming it.

I filmed the first one.

It was called Mill Fest.

I posted it, that was on a Saturday.

I posted it Wednesday,

and it gets like 30,000 views.

I had zero subscribers.

It just was like word of mouth around campus that I made this video.

So everybody saw the video.

And then the next weekend, there was another street shutdown.

It was called HighFest.

So I filmed the whole thing.

Everybody heard about the first video.

So they wanted to get in this video.

So I got a ton more people in this one.

And I learned that if the more people you get in the video, the more shares it's going to get because they're going to send it to their friends.

Like, yo, I saw you.

I saw you.

I saw you.

So I started to get more and more people in the videos because I wanted to go viral.

So that video got like 75,000 and it got on like a barstool posted it.

And then I learned the power of like, oh, if the media picks up what you're doing, like you can help grow.

And I didn't know anything about YouTube.

I just watched Casey Neistat videos every single day in my bedroom.

OG.

OG, big inspiration.

And Devin Supertramp, too.

I don't know if you know him.

Who?

Devin Supertramp.

I don't know.

He's like OG YouTube.

But anyway, so I made those the first year and they did well.

And then the fest season was over.

And I was like, I don't know what to do because I make party videos and there's no more parties.

So a year goes by.

Logan ends up coming to campus.

I don't know.

I might be mixing up my years.

I don't know.

It's been so long.

But the next year, I was like, I'm going to make the most viral party video ever.

I'm a broke college student.

I think I bought this like big bottle of Belvedere.

It was a display bottle.

It was filled with like saline or something.

I had to like screw, get the cork out.

I filled it with kamchaka, which is like the cheapest vodka you can get.

And I was like, I had this idea in my head of a thumbnail.

There was a dwarf on campus.

They called him frat dwarf.

And there was a guy, he had a donkey.

So I was like, I'm going to have the dwarf drinking this bottle of vodka that's the size of him on a donkey with like a bunch of girls around him.

And it's going to be crazy.

It's going to go viral.

Like I put so much money into it.

I did like a slip and slide intro.

Totally tanked.

And I was like, dude, fuck YouTube.

Like, I just spent so much money.

I mean, it wasn't a lot, but it was a lot to me in college.

And it did horrible.

But anyways, what I'm getting at, how I met Logan, getting off track here.

Tell him my whole day of my life.

He was at that party.

That's how you met him.

He was at one of the parties.

He was not drinking.

He was an underclassman.

And he saw me filming everyone.

And that's how we connected.

And I threw him in the videos.

And then...

Was he big at the time or was he just big on Vine?

Probably had half a mill on Vine, maybe a mill, probably, you know, early on.

And I don't think I've ever told this story, but I used to, this is going to sound really creepy.

So when I, one day I was walking back from class and I looked over and I saw him in his dorm room.

He had a dorm room.

He had a dorm room and he like had a computer right in front of the window.

Yeah.

And I was like, oh shit, that guy lives there.

So

I used to take that route to class from now on.

I usually didn't take that route because I was like, I want to run into this kid and hopefully meet him and film YouTube videos with him.

Yeah, yeah.

Never did.

I saw him at the parties, obviously.

And then I just was like, screw it.

I think I DM'd him on Twitter and I was like, hey, bro, I make those party videos.

Would love to help you with your YouTube.

And then he lived in Cleveland.

I lived in Cleveland.

So then in the summer, we just went up there, filmed.

He moved out to Los Angeles.

He's like, hey, come with me.

I was like, I can't, dude.

Like, I've already done a couple of years of college.

I'm not a, you know, I don't have millions of followers.

I'm not making a bunch of here.

He dropped out.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And he wanted me to come to LA and be his videographer.

And I was like, I got to finish my junior year.

So I took enough credit hours my junior year so that I could finish online from Los Angeles.

So I took all the, I found out what all the courses that you could take, that you had to take on campus.

And I took all those my junior year.

Yeah.

And I saw which ones were offered online.

And I took those from living in his closet on an air mattress in Los Angeles while working through him.

So yeah, I flew out here

after my junior year of college summer, slept on an air mattress in his walk-in closet.

I had like a tiny twin air mattress.

clothes hanging above me.

I'm taking online classes at Ohio University,

editing his YouTube videos because he was starting YouTube at the time.

And then he had this little Honda Grom because I didn't have a car out here.

I'm six foot three and this spike is literally like, I'm not even kidding, like lower than this tape.

Holy crap.

I literally, you seen that Dumb and Dumber?

Yeah.

Bro, I was driving to see to CSUN from Hollywood on the

101.

Cars are like zooming past me.

It only goes 50 miles an hour.

And I'm just like going to take these proctored exams so I can graduate college.

But yeah.

That's wild, man.

So you were a day one for him.

Not day one, but, you know,

before his YouTube, that's very early.

Like, his YouTube took off from there.

That's cool, dude.

I mean, I was in the vlogs.

We lived together, but I didn't edit those.

You were more behind the scenes.

Yeah, I was filming.

I was helping him film his skits.

Majority of his Instagram skits, I filmed and helped edit.

And then his early YouTube videos on the music.

That's cool.

Did you see him taking off the way he did?

Yeah.

It's insane.

I mean, he's a genius, dude.

I learned so much from him, and I wouldn't be where I am without him.

Like, the knowledge that he taught me and just like what you talked about the first few seconds are important.

You know, he would I would just study him and what he did and how he saw things.

I saw things a little different from the technical side than he did, you know, so that's kind of the only like differences we had in that, but he is a genius when it comes to marketing.

And I mean, you've seen it.

I mean, with Prime.

Yeah.

Billion dollar company.

He knows exactly what he's doing.

He knows exactly what he has to do.

And you can learn a lot from him.

Yeah.

Impulsive was actually one of the first podcasts I really watched heavily.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I watched probably the first hundred episodes really you watch every episode you studying it or you at the time i didn't have this show so i wasn't studying but now looking back i probably did pick up a lot of stuff from that show you know because he went through a few co-hosts i noticed so that was important to me to pick out a really good co-host

and i had three as well that i went through really yeah did you did oh you went through a couple too right yeah i had uh george and then i had my buddy pearson and then yeah are you solo now i do i like doing the interviews solo yeah and then i like to do like the friends episodes.

I do it with my buddy Iggy.

Got it.

Yeah.

I got more comfortable, so now solo just works better for me.

It's important to have someone that can add something.

George is a really good co-host.

Oh, yeah.

You know, I don't know what happened with their falling out.

He was my favorite co-host.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, I do know what happened, but I don't think it's public knowledge.

Oh, I thought they publicized it, but I don't know.

I don't think so.

Okay.

But yeah, I mean, he's an incredible co-host.

He's a really good storyteller.

And I think it's important for him because he has so much to say.

So I think it is good that he has his own podcast.

Yeah.

Because

he didn't really get much of a voice on Logan's because it's Logan's podcast.

It's tough when there's three people too interviewing.

I mean, you're only going to get like 5%, 10% of show time.

I went through your YouTube.

There was a couple of interesting videos I want to talk about.

The first one was alcohol addiction.

Yeah.

You went through that in college?

More so COVID.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

I think COVID,

COVID was a huge turning point in my life because

I'm a very social person.

So,

what was it, four or five years ago, I went through a breakup and I really lost myself in that relationship.

I put on a lot of weight.

That was daily vlog era.

Health wasn't really a concern.

It was like you're post-mating food.

You're constantly busy.

You don't really have time to go to the gym.

So I put on a lot of weight, went through a breakup, and then just got really into self-help and read this book, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck, which really changed my life.

Highly recommend it.

and i started going to the gym every day twice a day i lost 40 pounds got into really good shape nice started to feel amazing mentally i brought back my vlogs i was doing two or three a week i was doing the podcast crushing crushing crushing crushing and then covet hits

and i start posting vlogs and majority of my vlogs we go do stuff and i'm reading the comments and people are like you know you shouldn't be out like it's covet people are dying like you're setting a bad example so i like kind of let that get to me a little bit so i kind of i moved into a house with my buddy in in the valley and started making like a lot of videos from home he ends up booking a movie in toronto he was in the movie the man from toronto and i'm in this big house in sherman oaks by myself and

bored at night so i start playing call of duty yeah to be able to socialize with my friends because you can't do anything it's covid getting clapped online for doing stuff start playing call of duty next thing you know i don't even know what happened, but for some reason, one night I was like, oh, let me get some red wine.

Dude, I never had drank red wine in my life except like the body of or the blood of Christ at church.

Like I was not a wine drinker.

And next thing you know, like I got super addicted to playing Call of Duty and drinking red wine while doing it.

Wow.

And I just spiraled, honestly.

And it got so bad, I got, I got to a point, I moved.

So when I was living in that house, it got broken into.

In Arizona?

No, in the Valley.

Oh, the Valley.

Oh, sorry.

I forgot we're not in L.A.

In like in Sherman Oaks.

You know where that is?

I've heard of Sherman Oaks.

It's called the Valley.

Got it.

So my house got broken into when I wasn't home and when my roommate wasn't home.

I come home from Lake Tahoe.

I walk in the house.

Everything's fine.

I go up to my bedroom.

My whole room is ransacked.

Like drawers open.

All my clothes are on the floor.

I obviously notice things missing.

I call my buddies because I make YouTube videos.

I'm like, are you guys pranking me?

Like,

are you guys filming a prank or something?

And they're like, no, what happened?

And I'm like, dude, my whole room is robbed.

They only robbed my room.

Wow.

So I call the police.

They come over and I'm like, why did they only rob my room?

Like, is this like a hit, like a targeted attack or whatever?

And they said, you know, most robberies, they just go to the master bedroom because that's where the valuables are.

So I was like, all right.

So that kind of messed me up a little bit.

I'm living in this house by myself.

My house just got robbed.

I like the first night sleeping there.

I remember I like I locked every door, obviously.

I put a ladder in front of my door.

I had a knife by my bed.

I'd be doing the same thing.

Dude, yeah, because I don't have a gun.

I don't know what the gun laws are in California, but really hard.

Yeah.

Messed me up.

And then like a week or two later,

I'm laying in bed.

It's like, it's early morning

and my phone rings.

and it says my name is calling me.

What the hell?

It says Mark Donor is calling you.

I'm like, this is what?

So I answer the phone.

I'm like, hello?

And it's like, hello, is this Mark?

And I'm like, yeah.

He's like, I am a Russian hacker.

I'm a big fan of you.

And I was like, how'd you get my number?

He's like, I am a Russian hacker.

I was like, well, can you not call me?

And he's like, yes, I am sorry.

I just wanted to say hi.

I was like, all right.

That was it, though.

Holy crap.

What a weird encounter, encounter, right?

You didn't want anything.

And then I like, yeah, just weird things started happening.

Like, I got credit card fraud.

And I was like, I'm going back to an apartment by myself.

Bad idea.

So after my breakup, I went to an apartment, lived by myself.

Great, great time.

This time around, just kind of like stayed home.

I moved to like the east side of LA.

No one wants to come over there.

Isolated myself.

Yeah, fell into like a pit of depression.

And then I called my parents and I was like, hey, because they're from Ohio.

Yeah.

And I was like,

hey, you know, I would call them occasionally, but hey, when are you guys coming to visit me?

Cause I hadn't seen them in a few years because of COVID.

And they're like, oh, we'll get out there when we can.

And then, you know, I was spiraling a little bit.

And then finally, one day I just called my dad and I was like, dude, I need you guys to come out here.

Like, I, I need the support of my family.

Yeah.

Because there's something about your family visiting you that hits different than you visiting them because it shows support in your life and an interest in your life.

For sure, for sure.

You know, like my family hadn't come out to visit me in a long time and I felt like alone.

You know, I'm from Ohio.

My family, I have three brothers and two brothers and a sister.

They all live in the same town we grew up in.

And then I'm just out in Los Angeles by myself.

And yeah, they came out and kind of started to turn my life around, really.

That's cool.

Yeah, you got lost in the sauce.

That's common in LA.

I heard.

Yeah.

You know, because you leave one friend group and then you feel like you're alone.

Yeah, I think

isolating yourself is a really bad thing.

Right.

You could get in your own head.

Get in your own head.

Especially with alcohol involved.

Yes, yeah.

Yeah, that can be deadly, man.

Yeah, that's tough, dude.

Sorry to hear you went through that.

Yeah.

Nah, you got to go through it, man.

It's all part of the story.

Ups and downs, right?

Yeah, life is like that.

You also made a video, seven financial fails you wish you could do over.

So while you were going through this, were you having financial issues?

Yeah, I was living off of savings because I wasn't making any videos.

Yeah.

I made some bad investments in the stock market.

What did you buy?

Well, the thing is, my buddy was like, oh, you know, get in the stock market.

And I was like, what do you do?

And I can't remember what I bought, but we were like day trading.

Oh, that's the worst.

Yeah.

Options.

No, it wasn't options.

It was literally just buying and selling.

And I can't remember what it was, but one day he's like, all right, let's buy it.

And I bought it.

And I think I bought like $10,000 worth or something, $20,000.

First buy ever.

I don't know what the hell I'm doing.

So

we buy it, and then I lose $1,000 in like 20 seconds.

So I'm like panicking.

I'm like, I'm like, sell, sell, sell.

And yeah, and then I just made some bad investments.

Yeah.

Day trading's not for everyone for sure.

Well, yeah, especially if you don't know what the hell's going on because you hear everybody online, they're like, oh, yeah, dude, I make so much money on the stock market.

All you got to do is buy low and sell high.

You're like, oh, all right.

Social media makes it seem easy.

And I bought low and it kept going low.

Another video.

You went to a nude-only spa in Switzerland.

Nude-only spa, yeah.

That sounds fun.

It was.

It was.

Was it packed?

Well, I just titled it that.

That's some clickbait.

I'm not going to lie.

But yeah, you know what's funny?

So in Germany, I had a culture shock moment.

I go to the gym

and I was dating a Swiss girl at the time.

Yeah.

And

men's bathroom, women's bathroom.

She's like, oh, I'll meet you in the sauna.

I was like, all right, sounds good.

So I go through the men's bathroom.

I go into the sauna.

At LA Fitness in LA, everybody's got their clothes on, you know?

You just take your shirt off and you sit in the sauna.

So I go in there with like my boxers on or whatever, and I walk into the sauna part, the spa part, and I just see a bunch of naked women,

like older women.

And I'm like, oh my God, I'm in the wrong spot.

Like this, why are there naked women?

I'm like, well, she told me to go this way.

So I'm like, all right.

So I go in the sauna and I'm like, obviously, like, this is a culture shock to me because I'm usually in the men's bathroom in LA Fitness.

It's just dudes.

We're all wearing clothes.

And now everybody's walking around naked.

I only see women.

And then finally, I saw a dude.

He's naked.

And I was like, oh, this is like a European thing.

Wow.

So, yeah, that video was just clickbait.

It was just a nice spot.

That's interesting.

I don't know if I could do that, honestly.

It's very weird.

Yeah.

Did you stay or did you leave?

No, I stayed because I didn't want to like panic.

I stayed and I just kept my eyes down.

And then I didn't feel comfortable walking around naked with, I don't know, a bunch of people there.

I was like, what if you see someone out in the gym?

You're like, dude, naked.

I'm not even, because people change at the lifetime, like, locker locker room.

I'm under a towel when I take my boxers off.

Yeah, I don't know.

It's bizarre to me.

But yeah, one time I went into the spa, and this girl, like, I don't speak German, my girlfriend did, and she like whispered to her boyfriend, she's like, why is he wearing boxers in German?

That's wild, dude.

It's been fun.

Any dream podcast guests you want to get on your show?

Dream podcast guests.

I just like, honestly, I really like telling people stories that don't really get a chance to tell their stories.

So anybody that has a very good story to tell, I would love to tell that.

That's a rare take.

Yeah.

People think of like celebrities for their dream guests, but I love the normal person with a story because I think everybody has a story to tell.

And I love sharing those stories and using my platform to like spread awareness.

Yeah, that's cool.

So we're similar in that regard for sure.

That's awesome, man.

Well, dude, anything else you want to promote or close off with?

Check out my podcast, Livin' Large, and check me out on Spotify.

Got some new music coming soon.

Inspired by by the breakup, you know I'm talking about.

Oh, those are always the best.

They were Swift.

Yeah, best songs ever.

And then, yeah, just YouTube, Instagram.

Check it all out.

Awesome.

Thanks for coming on, Mark.

Thanks for watching, guys.

See you tomorrow.

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