Entrepreneurship
There’s No Fear When You’re Having Fun With Aaron Patton
What’s your backstory?
I grew up in Maine and then moved to Minnesota for my last 3 years of high school. My family was middle class, and I was a good student throughout my years. After living in Maine and Minnesota all I knew was that I wanted to get somewhere warmer for college. Both my parents were smart, good students and college was the only logical step that anyone ever talked about. I didn’t even give any other paths a serious consideration, or even researched anything.
I just went with the flow of what I was supposed to do. I got into multiple schools and decided to attend University of South Carolina because I received a good academic scholarship, the business school was decent, and it had a good sports atmosphere in the SEC. I double majored in business because I really didn’t know what I wanted to do and at the time it seemed to give me the most flexibility in the future.
I have always been very competitive and quickly realized after several jobs in the sales arena, that this might be something I could excel at. I got my first job offer up in Washington DC and took it. Several months later the office was shut down at corporate and I had to find a new position. Since then I worked at 5 different software companies, each time leveling up my income. All the companies were great in their own way, and had good atmospheres, but it eventually caught up to me.
After 4 years in DC I moved to San Diego without ever visiting the city and without knowing anyone. I found one last sales job at a great company, but after 3 years hit a wall when it came to corporate America. I felt trapped and despite it being a really good setup, I quit without much thought for my future.
I love playing poker, and was ok at it, so I started playing more while documenting everything on Instagram. I was simultaneously exploring different ways to make money online and started to build a couple Instagram accounts. Then I came to the conclusion that I needed to put out some serious content, and started down the road of podcasting.
I’m the host of the New Age Influencers Podcast and have been doing that since, and have started consulting for people looking to start podcasting as a way to kickstart their own efforts to create a laptop lifestyle. In the very near future I will be launching a member community aimed at helping people learn what they need to learn to actually begin efforts of online income creation.
New Age Influencers Podcast
Also, ps, I went on a 3 month eurotrip recently where I let social media followers and podcast listeners vote where I traveled to, which was pretty cool. I take lots of risks in life, and this next step towards the online realm is no different.
What made you decide to choose this career path?
Well I just stumbled into sales, and excelled at it. Nowadays sales is the backbone of everything you do when it comes to online business, social media, and marketing.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
Within my podcast world I forgot to plug in one of the XLR cables when interviewing a guest. I had to redo the whole conversation by just listening to his answers and repeating what I thought I said originally. It seems to sound fine haha.
What do you think makes your company/personal brand stand out?
My ability to take risks and action. The fact that I like to have a lot of fun while working hard towards my goals. I’m not one of those people that’s going to work 18 hour days 7 days a week. I simply can’t function like that. I need breaks. Hopefully that resonates with people similar to me. My view is that life should be enjoyed in the process while striving towards big goals.
What’s a quote that you live by?
“The biggest risk of all is not taking any”