#167. The Surprising Path to $401 Million Success with Shazam - Chris Barton | Founder of Shazam

Shazam can identify any song in between two to five seconds. Professor at Stanford said there is no technology that can do that. Chris has 12 patents, one found today within the Google search algorithm. You can schedule a free 30 minute consultation to start discovering more about your mental health journey.

Chris Anderson: How do we think differently? He says in order to achieve innovation, we need to think differently. By just thinking the way we're already thinking, we often miss the opportunities, he says. Anderson: Thinking differently is the secret weapon that we all carry in our own brain.

First principles thinking is this concept of making sure that the starting point of your thinking comes from only what you know to be basic truths. Can you go into reverse engineering since you started Ludus Tat?

Shazam was founded in 1999, before iPhone and before itunes. Founder says his original idea was to tell people what the song is that they're hearing. He says every entrepreneur needs to think about the future in a different way.

I want to talk about novelty because you talked about it twice. Some people don't know that Amazon started off as an online bookstore. Netflix now is not what it used to be. And it took iterations and iterations to repackage, re evolve and readapt to the new marketplace.

Life is not linear. It's exponential and ebbs and flows. We actually reinvented our business model even at Shazam, Several times over five times. I think it's critical for every business to be constantly trying to question the way they're doing things now.

For me, a critical juncture was coming to the realization of what my strengths were versus what my weaknesses were. I'm self diagnosed dyslexic and, and my son is Dyslexic. That realization enabled me to be, really to be an entrepreneur.

You talked about you have undiagnosed dyslexia and you also taught your son. How did you get into UC Berkeley and Cambridge University for two masters with your learning disability? In a way, you were turning reading and writing into a mathematical exercise.

What really is dyslexia? And since you can't really trust everything you read online, and I know in your interview with Tony Robbins you said that dyslexic thinking is big picture thinking. So it's a two part question.

When you're dyslexic, that does not mean that you are an academic Expert in dyslexia. The difficulty reading and its cause comes from the way that the brain processes language and information. The Dyslexic Advantage by Brock and Fernet Ide was game changing for me.

Dyslexia can have enhanced capabilities of creativity, problem solving, spatial reasoning, and enhanced capabilities in intuitive thinking. It can be an enhanced adaptability and resilience. In your case, you're able to implement and apply them very optimally.

Dyslexic brain processes information that's just. It leads to this advantage. You're able to see the big picture, which might just call it intuition. And these are the things that can lead to really novel ideas. That's the superpower that dyslexics can take advantage of.

Great people become great because they take ownership of their failures and successes. What separates great entrepreneurs from good entrepreneurs is their ability to let go and relinquish their ownership. I don't care about the ownership of a podcast. I just want to create the best podcast there is, period.

I believe that one danger we can face is power, right? Is the desire for power, and sometimes is in conflict with doing what's best for whatever you're creating. But that's why it's so important to pick though a really great team.

To achieve collective impact, which most things require, requires collective contribution. One of the secrets is to bring on board people that just have that passion. Pushing to make something amazing, as I like to say, act like a founder.

Benoit: The epitome of passion is obsession. Why is obsession often required to break through status quo? Benoit: When you have an insight, you believe in it and of course you press forward. But as you try to get there, you will face a lot of resistance.

What makes people connect, it's not through stats and facts. You connect through emotions and emotions imply social. Our way of being persuasive and our way of influencing people has to come from what actually moves people. The most powerful thing is stories.

podcast is an extension of my effort to be an educator. These are real lived experiences that took years to get to where we are. They're lived, visceral experiences that we're called to share to other people. It's not just content, it's much more than that.

A big story that Americans strive for the middle class is once I make it financially, like creating a unicorn startup like you selling it for 400 plus million dollars. But the reality of retirement is not what really people think it is. A sense of purpose comes from something that you're aiming to achieve.

Guard is an impact driven startup that aims to prevent drowning in swimming pools. Think of it like a self driving car meets a smoke alarm in a swimming pool. Identification of drowning is the really challenging part of this problem.

Chris: I want to talk quickly about confidence. Everything you talked about because you went through your Shazam Journey, I'm sure, regardless, is the social entrepreneurship impact driven or not? Going through a path of high resistance often has a lot of fruits.

Underneath discomfort and behind the curtains of fear, there's so much opportunities of growth. The secret is to recognize this and realize that it's going to take time. Finding a balance between taking risks and finding safety is key to success.

Benoit: We're ending our conversation with the psychological through online but also entrepreneurship undertone. Whether in life, business or entrepreneurship, find something that you love. Where could people check you out, your websites, maybe the book, the new startup, everything in between.

Chris: The awareness of your strengths and your weaknesses so that you can be aware of that and focus on what you're good at. As always, I want to ask you to share this episode with one friend. It's free for you, but priceless for the podcast's growth.