Authority in the Wild

Gabe Marusca
  • 5.0 (10)
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Updated Weekly

Welcome to Authority in the Wild Podcast. I'm your host, Gabe Marusca, helping action-takers achieve Freedom Through Entrepreneurs, without sacrificing the things that matter to you. From sales and engineering to freelancing and business consulting, I've worn many hats for the past 20 years. Leveraging that background, I host unscripted conversations with successful entrepreneurs, renowned business leaders, and subject-matter experts. Learn the insights, tactics, and business principles successful people rarely share elsewhere. Take what you discover and use it to build your path to freedom.

  1. 5d ago

    Why Your Business Is Stuck (And the Fix Nobody Sells) w/ Jermane Cheathem

    Jermane Cheathem has spent more than 20 years in commercial equipment finance and his referral partners made him over $50 million in closed deals. He's the only guest that appeared on this podcast 3 times. And for a good reason. I always learn something new from him and I bet you will too. At his peak he made 300 cold calls a day. Today he works the same four hours and makes none of them, and one coffee at a Starbucks turned into $6.4 million in deals. So I asked him what all that activity was protecting him from, why founders keep buying tactics that make things worse and what a box of chocolates in Dubai has to do with any of it. Then I put my own business on the table. Two offers, revenue split down the middle and a client description I was sure was specific enough. In about seven minutes he showed me I had been describing the wrong person and who I should have been talking to instead. I told him I would make the call the same day. If you keep adding funnels, ads, and tools to a business that still feels stuck, this episode gives you a perspective that might change the way you do business forever. Enjoy! 🟪 Timestamps (00:00) The Fix That Makes Things Worse (06:04) What 300 Calls a Day Was Hiding (11:16) Same Four Hours, Different Game (15:10) The $6.4M Coffee (21:29) Who Else Needs Your Client to Win? (27:47) The $30 Chocolate (36:24) The Deal He Found Playing Basketball (41:00) My Business on the Table (44:35) The Only Person I Should Be Talking To (49:07) Before You Buy Another Tactic 🟪 About the Guest Jermane Cheathem has spent more than twenty years in commercial equipment finance. He runs Creators Learn, where he trains equipment finance brokers to build businesses on referral partners instead of cold outreach, and his site credits those partners with more than fifty million dollars in closed deals. He is based in Scottsdale, Arizona. He left corporate employment in 2016 and built his finance company from scratch, with no capital and no employees. 🟪 Connect with Jermane Cheathem - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jermane-cheathem/ - Website: https://creatorslearn.com/ - YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@jermanecheathem 🟪 Connect with Gabe Marusca - Website: https://www.gabemarusca.com - YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@gabemarusca - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabemarusca - Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gabemarusca - X/Twitter: https://x.com/gabemarusca - Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gabemarusca - TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@gabemarusca

    Why Your Business Is Stuck (And the Fix Nobody Sells) w/ Jermane Cheathem

  2. Sep 22

    What Even Is a GTM Engineer (And Why Startups Pay $260K) w/ Florian Kaspar

    In January 2026, Florian Kaspar was setting up Clay and other go-to-market tools inside someone else's startup. By September he had taken his years in recruiting and bet them on a single job title: GTM engineer. He now runs Pipebuilders, a headhunting business that places only that role, and he hosts the Pipebuilders podcast, where he interviews the people who do the work. Florian sits between founders who want AI inside their sales and the small group of people who can build it, so he sees the job offers, the salaries, and the hires that fall apart. I came in as the skeptic, because to me GTM engineer sounded like a fancy title. So I asked him what these people do all day, what they really earn, how much pipeline one person can create, and what it costs a founder to hire the wrong one. He also told me who should never hire one, and why a job post and a CV are the wrong tools to find the right one. If you still do every sale yourself and your next move is to hire a salesperson, this episode gives you a different way to look at that decision before you sign anyone. 🟪 Timestamps (00:00) One Bet on a Brand-New Job Title (04:56) The Unexpected Backgrounds That Win (10:12) When You Shouldn't Hire One (17:23) The 40% Accurate Job Post (23:52) Watching Them Think, Live (29:59) Goodbye CVs? (37:36) Why 80% Write Back (45:03) Agency, Fractional, or In-House? (47:05) What It Really Costs (55:04) Try This Before You Hire 🟪 About the Guest Florian Kaspar after leaving his HR career to become a GTM Engineer, he decided to double back and bring GTM Engineering into recruitment. Today he runs his own recruitment agency focused connecting companies with GTM Engineers. 🟪 Connect with Florian Kaspar LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/florian-kaspar1Pipebuilders podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/033DXdkcG2wHA4PdhVUgfg 🟪 Connect with Gabe Marusca Website: https://www.gabemarusca.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@gabemaruscaLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabemaruscaInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/gabemaruscaX/Twitter: https://x.com/gabemaruscaFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/gabemaruscaTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@gabemarusca

    What Even Is a GTM Engineer (And Why Startups Pay $260K) w/ Florian Kaspar

  3. Sep 15

    How Anyone Can Learn the Skill of Humor (Even Engineers) w/ Andrew Tarvin

    Being funny is a skill, and Andrew Tarvin has the data showing most of us never practice it. He studied computer science and engineering, managed projects at Procter & Gamble, and joined his first improv group only because his best friend needed someone organized enough to run the meetings. He was terrible at it. Today he runs Humor That Works, has trained 250+ organizations and his TEDx talk on the skill of humor has passed 16 million views. Somewhere between those two points is a method, and this episode walks through it. I opened this one with a confession. I have a physics and computer science background, I tinker with tech all day, and I truly cannot remember the last time I made someone laugh. So I asked Drew to treat me as the test case. In this conversation, we get into: The eight separate skills hiding inside "being funny", and why you probably already have at least two of themThe one habit Andrew's own assessment shows only 30% of people keep, and what it changes about how you see your dayThe three reasons a joke breaks trust at work, and why the joke itself is rarely the problemWhy AI is the worst possible audience for your humor, and the one job it is actually good for Andrew's Humor Intelligence model treats humor as eight competencies you can measure, practice, and point at real problems, instead of a personality trait you were born with or without. If you have ever been told you are not funny or you stay quiet in meetings because a bad joke feels riskier than silence, this episode gives you a place to start this week. 🟪 Timestamps (00:00) Two Nerds and The Theory of Funny (01:21) The Hidden Payoff of Being Funny (06:42) The Eight Competencies of Humor (10:32) Engineering a Laugh (14:53) The Two-Part Practice (19:54) Funny Without Telling Jokes (23:07) Where Humor Goes Wrong (30:41) Forms of Humor (34:54) How to Not Break Trust with Humor (41:06) Where to Practice Humor (46:35) AI and Humor (50:58) Action Point 🟪 About the Guest Andrew Tarvin works with top organizations–including IBM, NASA, and the UN–to solve human challenges with humor solutions. A best-selling author, Andrew has been featured on Dry Bar Comedy, The Wall Street Journal, and the BBC, and was named a ‘Visionary Alum’ by the P&G Alumni Network. His TEDx talk on the skill of humor is one of the Top 50 most viewed TEDx talks on YouTube with 15+ million views (only half of which were from his mom). He has delivered programs in all 50 US states, 36 countries, on 1 planet (Earth). He loves chocolate and singing the Hokey Pokey with his 4 year old daughter (because that's what it's all about). 🟪 Connect with Andrew Tarvin Humor Intelligence Assessment: https://insights.humorthatworks.com/assessmentHumor That Works: https://www.humorthatworks.comHumor Intelligence coaching app https://studio.com/apps/humor/intelligencePersonal Website: https://drewtarvin.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/drewtarvinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/theandrewtarvinInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/theandrewtarvin 🟪 Connect with Gabe Marusca Website: https://www.gabemarusca.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@gabemaruscaLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabemaruscaInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/gabemaruscaX/Twitter: https://x.com/gabemaruscaFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/gabemaruscaTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@gabemarusca

    How Anyone Can Learn the Skill of Humor (Even Engineers) w/ Andrew Tarvin

  4. Sep 8

    What Hiding a Weakness Actually Costs You w/ Lauren Pires

    Lauren Pires was born with a rare neuromuscular condition that leaves her with roughly 33 percent of the physical strength of an average person. She hid it for more than 30 years, and during those years she built an 11-year career in event production at one of the largest music festivals in Canada, a job made of long days on your feet. At 32 she stood on a stage and spoke about it in public for the first time, at North America's largest inspirational speaking competition. She came second, then second again in the finals, and today she speaks to companies about invisible disability, resilience, and belonging. I live with an autoimmune condition, so this conversation got personal fast. We compare the excuses we both used to get out of a hike, how much of your day hiding something actually eats, and the question everyone with something to hide eventually faces: who do you tell first, and what happens after that. If you are living with something people cannot see, or you are ambitious and your body keeps saying no, this episode shows you what keeping it hidden is costing you and what she found on the other side. 🟪 Timestamps (00:00) When Ambition Meets a Body That Says No (04:42) The Secret She Kept for 30 Years (10:18) What Hiding Actually Costs You (14:15) The Energy You Get Back (17:04) A Tiny Ritual Called the Daily Yay (21:54) The Upside Nobody Talks About (26:59) Walking Away After 11 Years (30:56) Afraid of Being Seen Differently? (35:49) The Room She Loves to Speak In (41:53) The Line That Rewired Her Brain 🟪 About the Guest Lauren Pires is an invisible disability speaker from Canada who talks about resilience, joy, and belonging. Born with Central Core Disease, a rare neuromuscular condition, she concealed it for over 30 years while working in event production, public relations, and hiring at a nonprofit behind one of the largest South Asian festivals in Canada. She first spoke about her disability in public in 2022 and went on to become the runner-up inspirational speaker of the year at Speaker Slam. She now speaks to corporate disability employee resource groups and conferences, delivered a TEDxMississauga talk in 2026, and is the creator of the Daily Yay, a practice of noticing one good thing every day. 🟪 Connect with Lauren Pires Website: https://www.laurensaysyay.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/laurensaysyayLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurensaysyayYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@laurensaysyayTEDx talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWVUgHY3ibM 🟪 Connect with Gabe Marusca Website: https://www.gabemarusca.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@gabemaruscaLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabemaruscaInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/gabemaruscaX/Twitter: https://x.com/gabemaruscaFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/gabemaruscaTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@gabemarusca

    What Hiding a Weakness Actually Costs You w/ Lauren Pires

  5. Sep 1

    How to Built $1M/Month SaaS Business with Zero Original Ideas w/ Tibo Maker (Thibault LOUIS-LUCAS)

    Thibault (Tibo) Louis-Lucas burned 500,000 euros of VC money and spent four years on ideas that never generated revenue. Then he rebuilt from zero, sold Tweet Hunter and Taplio to Lempire for $8 million, and now runs a bootstrapped SaaS products portfolio that makes over $1 million per month.Not one of those products started as an original idea. Every single one entered a market that was already crowded and won anyway.In this episode he shares his entrepreneurial journey while walking us through his full playbook in order: how he picks what to buildhow he validates it before it eats a year of your lifehow a copied product beats the companies it copiedhow he priceshow he turns strangers into his sales force. Halfway through, I pitch him a product I have not announced anywhere and let him take it apart on air.If you are sitting on an idea and cannot tell whether it deserves another year or a fresh start, this episode shows you how he makes that call.🟪 Timestamps (00:00) From Burning VC Money to an $8M Exit (03:54) Ship Until Something Works (05:55) How to Choose What To Build (08:47) Your Weird Workflow Might Be a Product (15:01) 10x Better at Exactly One Thing (19:40) Gabe Pitches His Secret Project (24:51) The $15K Bet That Became His Best Product (29:08) The Audience Myth, Debunked (35:34) How to Run Multiple Products in the Same Time (37:30) Pricing That Filters Your Customers (41:07) Turning Strangers Into a Sales Force (43:22) How to Improve Your Product Based on Feedback (47:35) How to Get Started to Build as a Non-technical🟪 About the Guest Thibault Louis-Lucas, known online as Tibo Maker, is a French SaaS founder and product builder. After two failed startups and a stretch as CTO of a fast-growing scale-up, he co-founded Tweet Hunter and Taplio and sold both to Lempire. He now runs a bootstrapped portfolio that includes Revid and Outrank, built for small founders who want more sales and more traffic, and documents his builds, wins, and failures publicly on X.🟪 Connect with Tibo Website: https://tmaker.ioX/Twitter: https://x.com/tibo_makerRevid: https://revid.aiOutrank: https://outrank.so 🟪 Connect with Gabe Marusca Website: https://www.gabemarusca.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@gabemaruscaLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabemaruscaInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/gabemaruscaX/Twitter: https://x.com/gabemaruscaFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/gabemaruscaTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@gabemarusca

    How to Built $1M/Month SaaS Business with Zero Original Ideas w/ Tibo Maker (Thibault LOUIS-LUCAS)

  6. Aug 25

    How to Turn a Personality First Approach to Content Creation into Clients w/ Magali De Reu

    Personal branding changed: expertise is now table stakes, and people buy who you are before they check what you do. Personal brand strategist Magali De Reu breaks down the personality first content system she used to rebuild from zero on LinkedIn, land a Netflix client seven days after one post, and turn content into discovery calls and paying clients. After walking away from a startup that owed her close to 100,000 euro, Magali rebuilt her business on LinkedIn with nothing but her own voice. In this episode she teaches the full system: the three personality signals (scars and stripes, stance, style), the swappable test that tells you in ten seconds whether your content is generic, how much of yourself to share without trauma dumping, the open questions that pull out the stories buyers actually respond to, why content templates become a cage, and how writing about moments instead of topics makes content creation easier and more relatable. If you are a consultant, coach, solopreneur or founder trying to get clients from LinkedIn and stand out with your personal brand, this conversation gives you the diagnosis and the starting point for tonight. 🟪 Timestamps (00:00) Seven Days Later, a Netflix Client. (01:09) The Red Flag That Changed Everything (02:58) Why LinkedIn?! (04:32) What Everyone Gets Wrong About Personality First Content (09:56) How Much of Yourself Should You Share? (13:45) How to Get Client from LinkedIn (16:32) The Questions That Unlock People (21:16) A Safe Space and a Safety Blanket (29:08) The Pigeon That Outperformed the Experts (30:49) Why Templates Become a Cage (35:44) What to Do Now To Start Your Content Journey 🟪 About the Guest Magali De Reu is a personal brand strategist based in Antwerp, Belgium, who works with consultants, speakers and senior experts on positioning around personality rather than competing on expertise. She is a TEDx speaker and the author of two Dutch books on neurodivergence, "Aut of the box" and "Allemaal Autcasts", and she spent years as a technology writer and talk show host before building the practice she runs today. Her work rests on a single argument: in a market where knowledge has become a commodity, the part of you that cannot be copied is the part that gets you hired. 🟪 Connect with Magali De Reu The Obvious Yes Challenge: https://www.theobviousy.es/fll-challengeWebsite: https://magalidereu.comLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/magalidereuInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/magalidereu 🟪 Connect with Gabe Marusca Website: https://www.gabemarusca.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@gabemaruscaLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabemaruscaInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/gabemaruscaX/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gabemaruscaFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/gabemaruscaTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@gabemarusca

    How to Turn a Personality First Approach to Content Creation into Clients w/ Magali De Reu

  7. Aug 18

    How to Grow Your Personal Brand as a Solo Founder (Gary Vee & Hormozi's Brand Strategist) w/ Caleb Ralston

    How to grow your personal brand when you have no content team, no budget and 20 minutes to learn it. Caleb Ralston was an integral part of the team that helped grow Gary Vee's TikTok from 300,000 to over 3.5 million followers in 3 months and helped take Alex and Leila Hormozi from about 1 million to over 11 million followers. Then he left, started his own firm Ralston Select and put a six-hour personal branding course on YouTube for free. In this episode of Authority in the Wild he compresses that course into the steps a solo founder cannot skip. We cover: - Student or expert: the first question every personal brand has to answer honestly - The Brand Journey Framework, the 4 questions to answer before you post anything - Why the selfish goal behind your personal brand is the one that funds the altruistic one - The Charlie Munger inversion for finding what you need to be known for - Picking a content cadence that survives running a business (Caleb started with one video a month) - What the Gary Vee documentation model looks like in 2026 - Views versus conversions Timestamps (00:00) A 6-Hour Course in 20 Minutes (00:55) Where Every Personal Brand Starts (02:54) 4 Questions to Answer First (07:36) Is Personal Branding Selfish or Altruistic? (09:49) The Reputation That Opens Doors (13:14) How to Actually Know Your Audience (14:11) Finding Time When You Have None (17:36) Do Views Actually Matter? About Caleb Ralston Caleb Ralston is a personal brand strategist. He served as TikTok lead on Team GaryVee and was the first content hire for Alex and Leila Hormozi at Acquisition.com, where he built the in-house media team. He now runs Ralston, a consulting firm that builds personal brands optimized for trust rather than virality, and his full six-hour personal branding course is free on YouTube. Connect with Caleb Ralston Website: https://calebralston.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@CalebRalston LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/calebralston Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/calebralston Connect with Gabe Marusca Website: https://www.gabemarusca.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@gabemarusca LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabemarusca/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gabemarusca/ X/Twitter: https://x.com/gabemarusca

    How to Grow Your Personal Brand as a Solo Founder (Gary Vee & Hormozi's Brand Strategist) w/ Caleb Ralston

  8. Aug 11

    How They Build a Personal Brand That Will SURVIVE AI Era w/ Katelyn Bourgoin

    Posting good content stopped working the moment everyone could make it. Katelyn Bourgoin knows both sides of that shift: Forbes hyped her startup as the next LinkedIn for women entrepreneurs, it went bankrupt anyway, and she rebuilt from zero into a one-woman business built on a single ownable idea, buyer psychology, now read by more than 63,000 marketers. This episode is about the move that made the difference: becoming known for one idea instead of chasing visibility everywhere. In this conversation, we get into: - The real reason Justin Welsh owns the word "solopreneur" when someone else coined it years earlier - Why your most valuable idea feels too obvious for you to notice and how outsiders spot it in minutes - A live teardown where Katelyn runs her framework on my own idea in real time - The one-week assignment that surfaces the idea you could become known for If you are an expert whose reputation is smaller than your skill, this conversation shows what to build instead of another content calendar. 🟪 Timestamps (00:00) The Personal Brand Gold Rush (05:40) How The Ownable Idea Came To Life (17:46) Confessions of an Overwhelmed Generalist (22:32) Why You Can't See Your Own Best Idea (26:24) The Want Everyone Shares (29:32) Five Questions Before the Big Idea (35:18) Why it's So Hard to Do It Alone? (41:45) The Messenger Effect (44:36) Your One-Week Assignment 🟪 About the Guest Katelyn Bourgoin is a 4x founder and the creator of Why We Buy, a buyer psychology newsletter read by more than 63,000 marketers. After her venture-backed startup Vendeve failed in 2017, she rebuilt as a solo business teaching marketers why people really buy. Today she runs UNIGNORABLE, where she helps experts distill their best thinking into one idea that makes them impossible to ignore. 🟪 Connect with Katelyn Bourgoin - Ownable Ideas: https://ownableideas.com - Why We Buy newsletter: https://learnwhywebuy.com - UNIGNORABLE: https://beunignorable.com - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katebour/ - X/Twitter: https://x.com/KateBour 🟪 Connect with Gabe Marusca - Website: https://www.gabemarusca.com - YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@gabemarusca - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabemarusca/ - Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gabemarusca/ - X/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gabemarusca - Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gabemarusca - TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@gabemarusca

    How They Build a Personal Brand That Will SURVIVE AI Era w/ Katelyn Bourgoin
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5
out of 5
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About

Welcome to Authority in the Wild Podcast. I'm your host, Gabe Marusca, helping action-takers achieve Freedom Through Entrepreneurs, without sacrificing the things that matter to you. From sales and engineering to freelancing and business consulting, I've worn many hats for the past 20 years. Leveraging that background, I host unscripted conversations with successful entrepreneurs, renowned business leaders, and subject-matter experts. Learn the insights, tactics, and business principles successful people rarely share elsewhere. Take what you discover and use it to build your path to freedom.

Information

  • Creator
    Gabe Marusca
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2026
  • Episodes
    177
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Gabe Marusca
  • Show Website
    Authority in the Wild