Ep. 9: From Prison to 7 Figure FinTech Founder!

Wes Paul, founder of UpTrend Credit Solutions and host of the Respect My Blueprint podcsast, discusses his journey from prison to understanding Business Credit to creating the next big FinTech to overtake Credit Karma and others.

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Transcript

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You. Hey, what's up, y'all? This is Jarrett Albritton, and welcome to the Big Tech Energy Podcast. So I've been in the Tech space for 17 plus years and every day I would look around the room and say, I wish there were more black people in this room. I wish more black people knew about tech, and I wish more black people saw incredible success in Tech the way myself and my colleagues have been able to have. So over the last couple years, we've been doing spaces and we've helped over 200 people break into Tech. And now with this podcast, I'm going to be highlighting some of my favorite startup founders, high paid tech employees, recruiters, career coaches, and hiring managers on what steps should you take to be successful, but what is the mindset that has made them incredibly impactful? So take your notes, stay tuned, and soak up this Big Tech Energy, so many amazing people I've met over the last 17 years that are killing it. And I want to make sure that you all understand not only their mindset and the blueprint to their success, but also the strategies and the resources that you can take advantage of to get in the same place. And speaking of the blueprint, we got the man of respect, my Blueprint, we got the CEO of Blueprint Media Group, Uptrend Credit Solutions, and a whole lot of other stuff that we're going to get into. And if you don't recognize the studio, then you need to check out his podcast because this is actually his podcast studio, his content center, and Blue Pair Media Group is killing it. If you're in the South Florida area, you're an influencer. You're a blogger, vlogger TikTok creator, podcaster. You should definitely tap in with him and the team, shout out to Gene and Jason. Killing it over here. And I'm just grateful to be able to be a part of, your, know, the Blueprint and excited to interview you and have people understand how much of a boss you really are if they didn't know already. So I know I kind of stole your thunder a little bit, but I'd like for you to make an introduction and share with the people who you are. Thank you. Thank you. Well, first of all, man, I appreciate the rollout, the red carpet rollout. Absolutely, man. And also, I'm glad to share this platform with you, brother. Of course. Mikasa Sukasa. You already know. And for those that don't know me, like Jared said, my name is Wes Paul, aka Blueprint Mastermind and founder CEO of Uptrend Credit Solutions, as well as Blueprint Media Group and Worldwide Blueprint. The tremendous thing about this entire platform, the content house as well as the fintech company, was this was all done as a level of inspiration, right? Because I wanted to make an impact, which we're going to cover and everything like that. But for everybody that's out there to have a vision, to have a vision, which we're going to expound on throughout our conversation here. And you're going to learn by the seed of everything that I've built was just to have a vision of wanting to make an impact. So, yeah, I'm excited to get into it. All right, yeah, we're going to get into all the details. So the reason why I called it big tech energy besides the play on words, is I really want people to understand the mindset it takes to be really successful. And part of the thing that I also want to share with people is that we don't just pop out successful. You know what I mean? There's a grind to it. There's adversity that comes around and it's either that adversity is going to make you stronger or it's going to break you and your adversity made you stronger. So I love for you to talk about before you got into your entrepreneurial journey, what kind of adversity were you able to go through and what did you learn from it and how were you able to be resilient? Well, just to start off with, I just went through a nine year of term of imprisonment. Right? And I want to start off by emphasizing that because that was a very impactful moment in my life. If you follow my platform, I definitely speak about that time in my life where the really significant portion was the last few years, where at that time I was the lowest. I lost everything, everyone that I have built up prior to then. Right. And at that point, I knew I needed to rebrand myself. I needed to rewire my mind if I never wanted to be put in that place again, that dark corner. So ultimately I dedicated myself entirely to, as I just mentioned, rebranding myself, rewiring myself. So therefore, once I entered the free world, shortly before the Pandemic arrived, I came with a renewed mindset. And that was the largest part of my adversity, which of course I shared with everyone else the Pandemic. Experiencing that shortly after my release and that right there set me back further, further. At that point, I hit a further low point because I had an up and coming child I just released from my nine to five job. So at that point I was like, wow, I need to pivot, I need to figure out something again. But all of the seeds, all of the tools and elements was already ingrained in me from my training and my mindset that I've again built up up to that point, which then when that, again, subsequent pivotal moment of the Pandemic occurred, I was prepared, man. I had the vision, so I was just ready to implement the impact. Yeah. So the key thing about being an entrepreneur is figuring out a problem that affects a lot of people and becoming the solution. So how did you come about to figuring out the problem you wanted to solve and the solution you wanted to implement to become where you ended up being. Really, what's the biggest thing about our culture, me being a first generation immigrant. When we get into early adulthood, we just don't understand the financial system here, right. Understanding how powerful that understanding credit and financial literacy. So with that being said, my early adulthood, I had horrible experience with credit and finances. So ultimately, when the Pandemic occurred, right, same situation. So I was sick and tired of being sick and tired, ultimately. So Credit Repair, which I had again an interest in personal finance throughout the two years, again, of rebranding myself, I wanted to learn the economics of credit and personal finance. So I said, okay, let me get into credit repair. And I used that skill set and that knowledge to propel me into building the fintech company of Uptrend Credit. And of course, throughout that journey was very I went through a lot of trials and tribulations. I'll be honest with you. We rebranded ourselves about two to three times. But ultimately, and I want to share this on the podcast because I have a huge appetite for life, my mission and my vision initially with Uptrend Credit was to replace Credit Karma in the marketplace, which Credit Karma is the leader in the marketplace. But I felt like with the holes that Credit Karma is unable to fill, I was able to fulfill with my platform. So with that, throughout those rebranding periods, I still maintain the vision of replacing Credit Karma in the marketplace. So again, it's the power of having that vision which has just kept me aligned throughout my journey. Got you. And when it comes to Uptrend Credit solution, what makes your business unique compared to the Credit Karmas or the other things that are out there? Oh, come on, now. Listen, man. Are you serious? For real? Come on, man. Hey, man, I know the answer, but the listeners don't. Seriously, man, to answer the question in a way where there are 45 million unbanked Americans in the United States, right? So that's a huge market, a huge hole that needs to be filled. So when I noticed that Credit Karma are unable to fill that void, I said, okay. Plus, to be honest with you, we lack representation. Owners of these fintech companies, from your Credit Karmas to SoFi's to Credit Sesame to we could even go outside of the industry, lack our representation. Again, I could have started off with a credit repair company and just been happy with a traditional seven, eight figure business. But again, I have a huge appetite for life. I've seen Credit Karma was bought out for over $7 billion shortly after during the Pandemic, and I realized, Wait a minute, how can they have been bought out for such an extraordinary amount, but yet they are still not sufficiently servicing the marketplace in credit education, gamification innovation. Right? So with that being said, there's nobody understands us better than somebody like us, man. Say that again. You feel me? Yeah. So with that being said, combine that with my appetite of life. Let's get it. You feel me? Absolutely. And you're doing something really dope that you could be charging money for, but you're not. Can you talk about the course and all that that you're offering? Listen, we're in this day and age where digital media is paramount, right? If you want to promote yourself as, like, what we're doing here, you have to be able to have a platform personal brand yourself. So the reason I mentioned that is because with Uptrend, I wanted to combine the media company, which is therefore, I'd done the course under the media side. And the course is basically just a bird's eye view. A bird's eye view of me wanting to go ahead and merge both concepts of the media as well as the credit literacy. Again, most people who follow uptrend will know that our brand ambassador is Tico, the mascot, and we use the power of Tico within the Blueprint Company to further that's. Who's on your chest? Exactly. You know what I'm saying? Bling. Bling. Exactly. And so we want to go ahead and introduce Tico to the younger generation so they can grow up with know, so there's some sort of familiarity. There you go. That's what I'm talking about. You feel, you know, without being too long winded and everything, like, you know, I built the credit course as an example of the movement of Uptrend, which is credit literacy. We want to not just provide a tech platform. We want to tap into that younger generation in Gamification, in brand awareness. The course is just, again, a small piece of the pie of us correlating with that movement there. Yeah. And before we get into the media company and everything else that you got going on, I wanted you to emphasize to the kids that might listen to this or the adults that have bad credit the importance of having good credit and also building up business credit as a it's it's the most important tool in this country. And again, a lot know, America is built, uh, of people migrating here. Right? So, again, people that migrate here don't understand the financial system and the economics of America, right? It's almost as a know, do it yourself, figure it out. So the importance of credit is paramount. Think about it. It impacts your housing, it impacts your employment, it impacts your personal life. If there's trouble in finances, it usually bleeds into your intimate relationships or with whom you're with. Right? So if you look at it, it touch on all major components. And it's very important that the viewers here recognize that as not only that is the reason why I decided to go into this field, but with the power of digital information like platforms like this, the information is there to be able to tap into this. No longer are you able to use the excuses, oh, I didn't know, or I didn't have access. Right? So you have access. So now the question is what you want to do with it. So I'm here to share with everybody the reason I decided to get into credit. And the importance of credit is because it will dictate your life. Bad credit is not even an option nowadays. Bad credit equates to over$100,000 in debt throughout your lifetime. So unless you have an extra $100,000, you're ready to fork out just for the sake of it, bad credit is not an option. No. 100%. Man and so if you want to just summarize and crystallize what Uptrend Credit solution provides the listeners, can you just give that one last summary journey for Uptrend credit? To answer your question is to rehaul our current platform to be able to provide these services again by the end of this year. So consumers will be able to do things such as report rent and utility payments to increase their credit scores. They'll be able to also obtain secured credit cards to also pay their rent, right. Despite whether the property reports to the credit bureau or not, we will provide that again. You know, with now the new legislation of the government now requiring Vantage Score, which is the rival credit scoring model of FICO, vantage Score must be included now into FHA home ownership applications. Right? Moving forward now, why is this important? Because for a lot of first time home buyers, they seek the FHA loans with the low down payments and the government assistance. So now, by utilizing the Vantage scoring model, these applicants will be able to go ahead and increase their credit scores by again utilizing alternative data such as rent utility payments, which will increase their credit scores, which will ultimately lead them into homeownership, which, as we know, is a big, big problem within our industry as well as not in our industry, within our culture. Membership in black and HR means community and being a part of a culture of like minded individuals, you have a culture within a culture, especially in the black community. And black and HR is that professional culture. We have fun, we laugh and joke about things that are related to us in the workplace, but we also have serious aspects as well, where we help each other grow. And it's just one of those places where I can go to any time of the day, pose a question, and I'm going to get all type of answers, but I'm going to get support. And we all work together to give advice, to give insights, to share tips. The networking is amazing. The people that I've spoken to have allowed me to learn things about myself that I didn't know. So what does that do? When I go to my next interview, I have that confidence when I walk in to be able to explain and speak on what I've done in the past and prove that I am the person for the job. And as a startup founder, you are courting investors currently. Yes. And yeah, talk about how that process has been so far. And if you're listening, all the investors that are going to be listening, in all my VC and Angel Homies credit, karma got bought out for 7 billion. He's about to wash. Exactly. Which is a very interesting experience. Yes. We're about to launch our precede round and we're preparing for that which has brought me in unchartered territories. This is the first time I've ever entered into this realm as far as entrepreneurship is concerned. So it's been a very exhilarating but yet tiring experience, formalities and the legal stuff that goes behind it. But it's exciting, right, because I'm preparing myself to be able to tap into that next level, plant the seeds of legacy, right. Because I truly believe this, that I have a huge responsibility as I've been chosen to potentially break the generational curse for my family as well as those around me. So, yeah, I take it very seriously. That's why I'm entering this realm. It's very, very exciting. All right, man. Well, equally exciting is Blueprint Media Group the Respect My Blueprint Podcast. So you're saying that the media and the fintech, there's a strategy behind it? Absolutely, yeah. So talk about Respect My Blueprint, the podcast, how long has it been on air, some of the guests? And what is the overall vibe of the podcast? Well, just like you mentioned, the title of the podcast, Respect My Blueprint, it's a platform where we want to highlight entrepreneurs, content creators, innovators their blueprint to success, whatever the case may be. Right. Because as I just shared my vision, we want to tap into those visions as well, too right. As a lot of people have their pain points, their journeys that led them as we know it's not traditional, it's not conventional, right. So we want to go ahead and share that experience with the world. And so respect my blueprint. It's a great platform. It's been on air for a little less than a year now. We've had some extraordinary guests, some influencers, some YouTubers reality stars and things like that. Definitely check out the show, guys. And I don't want to give too much tea because if your viewers want to know more information about it, I encourage them to check it out. It's a mixture of entertainment, of course, a little bit of enlightenment as well. Know some fun like we're doing, know some down to earth conversations. And if your viewers love this form here, they're going to definitely love the podcast. We'll check it out. Yeah. And I'm a little bit more laid back as an interviewer than Wes. Wes has like that turn up. I love it. I love it. You know what I mean? So definitely check out Respect My Blueprint because Wes be having a good time. And that's one thing that I love about the show, is that your guests have a good time, you have a good time, but they also get an opportunity to drop gems, right? It's an experience. You want to sell the experience which, as you can see yourself with the entire studio here and everything like that, is I truly believe in investing in yourself. Right? So I've allocated my mind, energy and capital into building this tremendous studio here for the reason of wanting to sell that experience, which I want to highlight Blueprint Media Group, which you have mentioned, and I want to answer that question. The power of media, again, is so paramount nowadays because we realized the significance of media during the George Floyd killing, right? And I shared this in a few other interviews. The young lady that was able to broadcast that killing transformed the power of independent media, right? Had not that video been shown, the entire movement, the entire narrative over the past few years, would it have never existed? Right? That young lady, what she was able to produce with already, what the foundation that was set by YouTube, by Facebook and everything like that, she's just exploded to now enable other ethnicities, like know, other individuals, other thought leaders, thinkers, to be able to say, okay, you know what? There's a need for independent media. There's a need for an alternative to mainstream media. As we have understood for the past few years, sometimes mainstream is not as reliable as we thought. Right? As I'm moving with uptrend, as it's a 1015 20 year goal, same thing. Let me go ahead and bring that power of media I see again where it's going, that 10, 15, 20 year goal. Right? So 10, 15, 20 years from now, I want Blueprint Media Group to be the leading digital network that's rivaling beasts like Peacock, Hulu, Netflix. It was done once, why it can't be done again, right? So as long as you have that huge appetite, it can be done. And that's what's my vision for Blueprint Media Group, as well as nice, nice. And since a lot of entrepreneurs are going to be watching this, I want to highlight your ability to build out a team. And what have you learned in team building and what has made you successful in terms of building out the team? Because I'm going to tell everybody here, the Blueprint Media Group team is solid. Like, really high integrity, high energy, high commitment to yeah, shout out to y'all, man. High commitment to results and really bringing value. And very intentional about the end goal, the product. I mean, if you look at the studio, this is a very detailed setup. If you see outside, check out my Instagram, his Instagram. The office space is fire. Like I said, if you're a content creator, you got to check this place out. But yeah, when it comes to team building, can you give some people some gems in terms of how you approach it, that is a large part of my success, is honing in and nurturing the element of leadership. And when it comes to leadership, you of course, are a leader when you're able to go ahead and build, motivate, and inspire a team. So there's a lot of people misconstrue being a leader from a boss or a CEO, whatever, right. A lot of people that are CEOs and bosses, they don't tap into element of leadership. So to answer your question, the first investment I made when I started uptrend credit after the Pandemic, even when I had nothing and I was living on government assistance, I needed to hire a VA. My job as a visionary, as a leader, as the founder. To be able to execute well in my position, I needed to surround myself with the right team. So I say that to say this. I started off with one, built three, four, five VAS. When you say VA, for those listening virtual assistants, I apologize. Virtual assistants. And my job as a leader was to get, train, nurture, and also inspire them throughout their journey. And I replicated that skill set to now, as you mentioned, with the team here, jason, Jean, and everyone else here at the Blueprint House, it's not easy because you have to make sure the message is not stale. You have to make sure that the message is aligned with the ultimate goal. You have to make sure that you're there for whenever there's any trials or tribulations, if they're going through anything personally, you have to make sure that you're aware. You have to show sympathy, empathy. Right. These are all things that being a leader requires. Ultimately, building a team is the ultimate secret relationship capital. When you have that team, it gives you that skills to set to build that relationship capital to ultimately leads to success. Yes. And I definitely don't want to gloss over virtual assistants because I honestly didn't realize the importance of virtual assistants until maybe the last year, year and a half. Right. So I think there's a large community of entrepreneurs that have no idea of the valuable resource of virtual assistants based in other countries right. And how cost effective it can be, but also just how the return on investment is crazy. Can you just kind of talk about the strategy of finding virtual assistants and then giving them a standard operating procedures to basically do things that would take you a week to do by yourself with all the other stuff you got going on and they can just knock it out like wildfire? Absolutely. The importance of virtual assistants, sometimes you can't even quantify words or anything because the time management so me, I'll be honest, I'll even share the resource for your viewers. Check out the website onlinejobs, PH, which is a Philippine website. I'm here to bring value and gems to your community. Yeah, we don't keep the value, we give it out, which is an extraordinary platform. That's the platform I've been using for the past two years, by the way. I don't get any sponsor or affiliate commission by dropping that. But that's been a game changer for me. Right. So being able to tap in into, again, cost effective, but also efficient resources such as virtual agents in outside countries. Again, I cannot quantify in words because it gives me the freedom I'm buying back time, which gives me the freedom again to be able to go ahead and lead the again. You know, I have a navigator at the ship. I have somebody that's taking care of the gully. I have somebody to pull up the A. So my job is to, again, make sure the ship arrives to its absolutely, absolutely. I appreciate you dropping that resource. And the cool thing about the VA situation, virtual assistants is in America, if you were to pay somebody that amount of money, they would be like, what the heck? Right? But in the Philippines, they're living good. Absolutely. They're motivated, they're happy. Of course, it's mutually beneficial. Yeah. So don't sleep on virtual assistants. Absolutely. Nonetheless, I don't want to gloss over the importance of also have the virtual team in conjunction with also having an in house team. Right. Because an in house team is very important because there was a point in time where it's just myself, I was a solopreneur with a team of virtual assistants. However, you do need that in house culture building. Right. You do need to a point where you need to break through and actually have a team. So what I've done, I've just translated all of the knowledge and skills that I've had with the virtual transcended into, again, building an actual team here, and boom, the marriage has been perfect. So I just don't want to gloss over the importance. Although we're highlighting virtual assistants, also having in house team as well, too. Awesome, man. So my last question before we kind of wrap it up is your whole thing is the Blueprint, right? That's you, that's your brand, that's your mindset. So leave people with, number one, what your personal blueprint is in terms of where you're going. And then what do you think is the overall blueprint to success? That if people implement it, they can be wherever they want to be. The goal for Blueprint, the whole Blueprint brand, is to ultimately be again, I'm going to say, share a story here. My peers, my competitors largely have been individuals outside again, of our culture. Nonetheless, there are great ones out there. Your Eric Thomas's, he's been great and everything like that. But we're talking about some of the other people that preceded him. The Kawasaki's, the Tony Robbins, the grant Cardone's and things like right. So and it's not to our fault because throughout history we've been withheld from financial and economic literacy to bring the representation to the table. I want to be as big or bigger than our peers, right? That is the whole vision for Blueprint. Some people look at me crazy, but hey, I think that's a prerequisite. And the reason why I've built the whole Blueprint brand again is because a lot of people fail to realize, even till myself, till this day, even as I'm speaking to you right now, my ultimate Blueprint is still not entirely clear. But as far as the journey, but the end goal, I have the blueprint for the end goal. So sharing that Blueprint to success, being able to pivot in life, another pandemic may come, another financial calamity may come. Like the 2008 crisis, right? We all may experience different situations that will just take us off our course. So sometimes the road is going to be murky and you're not going to foresee the circumstances that will knock you off. But again, I want to build a platform that just shows individuals have that ultimate blueprint when you have that ultimate destination. So it doesn't matter what life takes you off throughout course, you'll still be able to find your way back to that main highway to the Blueprint, right, to whatever that end goal is, right? I know my end goal is to replace Credit Karma and again to have the Blueprint brand as big as the competitors that I've just mentioned. So it doesn't matter what life brings to me over the next 10, 15, 20 years, I'm going to get there. Yeah. And so just to give you my thoughts on what you just said, number one, once you know your destination, nothing can really stop you as long as you keep focus on the destination, life is 10% what happens to you, 90% how you react. So things are going to happen to you, but if you can react in a way that's always going to keep you towards the destination, you'll be successful. Also, think big, think crazy, you know what I mean? And the average person that's never done it is going to tell you you can't do it. But don't let that deter you because at the end of the day, being realistic is the path to mediocrity. So we need to be a little unrealistic in terms of taking on hulu and taking on Credit Karma and what turns from unrealistic to oh snap, he's actually happening because he put in the consistency, the work ethic and he had a plan and good people around you. So, yeah, no, those are some definite gems you just dropped, man. I really appreciate this conversation. Appreciate Blueprint Media Group. And before we go, I want you to just let everybody know where they can find you, follow you and be a part of your journey, man. Listen, you can follow me everywhere at Blueprint Mastermind, of course, instagram, Facebook, TikTok, all that other good course, you know, check out the YouTube Blueprint breakdown where we give daily. Breakdowns, of course, of the events as well as things that's going on in the world. Respect my blueprint podcast. Definitely check us out. And the Blueprint movement is a new community that we're putting together to go ahead and create new Blueprinters in the world. Listen, if you're looking to go ahead and get to that next level, live life in your own terms, be able to learn about credit and financial literacy, being able to build generational wealth, we put it together a movement. And of course, with collaboration with great platforms like yourself, Big Tech Energy and showing everyone the importance of relationship capital, if you want to be able to tap into some of this knowledge and power of information, check out the Blueprint movement community and keep rocking with us and we bound to do great things. Absolutely. Yes sir. When it comes to Big Tech Energy, just so you all know, he talked about his Blueprint. My goal for Big Tech Energy is to become the black tech equivalent of earn your leisure. In terms of how big they've done it, there's no shame in seeing somebody else and being inspired by it. And what I'm inspired by them is that they are genuinely interested in impacting the black community with financial literacy. Same thing with Wes, which is why I respect him so much. And it's about giving and adding value more than anything else. So when it comes down to where we're going in my journey, I definitely want to tap in with Blackhire.com. That is the space where black freelancers can find opportunities. And if you are hiring freelancers, you're on Upwork, you're on Fiver, et cetera. Please post your roles on Blackhire.com so that you can get some amazing black freelance talent. Also want to shout out black NHR 9000, black HR professionals, creating six figure earners but also giving you career strategy, brand strategy and all the support. And your network is your net worth. And the fact that they're allowing you in their network for such an affordable rate is pretty incredible. And if you want to find me on social media, you can go to my Big Tech Energy. You can catch my LinkedIn, my Twitter, my Facebook, my Instagram, but definitely want you to follow me on Instagram. Dr. J. Sorry, Doctaj. And yeah, stay tuned for the Big Tech Energy website, put in your email, give you a free ebook. So with that being said, thank you all for joining. Make sure to subscribe comment, share the YouTube channel, make sure to subscribe on Apple and Spotify and look forward to seeing you in the next episode or the next in person event that I'll be at. So with that being said, big Tech Energy Blueprint Media Group, we're out. Take care. Membership in black and HR means community and being a part of a culture of like minded individuals, you have a culture within a culture, especially in the black community. And black and HR is that professional culture. We have fun, we laugh and joke about things that are related to us in the workplace, but we also have serious aspects as well, where we help each other grow. And it's just one of those places where I can go to any time of the day, pose a question, and I'm going to get all type of answers, but I'm going to get support. And we all work together to give advice, to give insight, to share tips. The networking is amazing. The people that I've spoken to have allowed me to learn things about myself that I didn't know. So what does that do? When I go to my next interview, I have that confidence when I walk in to be able to explain and speak on what I've done in the past and prove that I am the person for the job.