Welcome to another issue of the no-BS newsletter dedicated to demystifying the world of passive income, where we share practical, reliable strategies to build and sustain income streams that work for you.

If you want to help someone else make money while they sleep, forward this email to them.

In today's issue:

Ever felt like you stumbled into the wrong room?

You peek in. See people in suits—or in our case, hoodies and flip-flops—talking funnels, launches, and email open rates like it’s their native language… and you think:

“Do I even belong here?”

Yeah, I’ve been there. Big time.

When I moved from Ukraine to Israel, I didn’t just carry a suitcase—I carried an accent thick enough to spread on toast. Combine that with being the chubby kid at school, and let’s just say I didn’t exactly walk in like I owned the joint.

So I retreated into online gaming. Because online? Nobody cared about my accent. They cared about my skill. My brain. My moves. For once, I wasn’t “Igor the outsider.” I was just a gamer with a damn good K/D ratio.

That’s where it started—my love affair with the internet. But switching from “online gamer” to “online marketer” wasn’t as smooth as it sounds.

Because here’s the dirty little secret: Belonging isn’t given. It’s claimed.

For years I admired guys like Frank Kern, Ryan Deiss, and Russell Brunson. I devoured their content like it was cheat day and I hadn’t seen a carb in a week. But I didn’t see myself in them. They were those guys. The cool kids. The ones already on the other side of success.

I thought, “That’s for them, not for me.”

Until... money started showing up.

$100 here. $500 there. Then $2K, $5K, $10K a month. Slowly but surely, I stopped waiting for permission to call myself a marketer. Because that’s what we do, right? We wait.

For the certificate.
For the course completion badge.
For someone else to tap us on the shoulder and say, “You’re legit now.”

But online success doesn’t work that way.

There’s no Fairy Funnelmother handing out awards. No guru descending from the mountaintop to knight you “Ready for Business.” You don’t need a license to make money. You need belief.

And that’s the real battlefield: the war between the ears.

Most people don’t fail because they suck. They fail because deep down, they believe they’re not allowed to win yet. They think success has a dress code, a resume, a “you-must-be-this-tall-to-enter” sign.

Bull. Sh*t.

You give yourself permission by doing. By acting before you’re ready. By making just enough money to tip the scales from imposter to insider.

I stopped feeling like I belonged with the people around me and started feeling at home with the weirdos who lived in ClickFunnels dashboards and wrote emails for fun. And I realized: I’m not one of them anymore. I’m one of us.

If you're still waiting for someone to tell you it’s okay to succeed, let me save you some time:

It’s okay.

Now go take what’s yours.

There’s a window in every online entrepreneur’s life where they ask:

“Why the hell am I working so hard… and still not making real money?”

I hit that wall years ago. Then I built something that flipped the script.

I wrote this short book to show you exactly what I did — the system I still use today to turn emails into income, without chasing trends or dancing for clicks.

And yeah — it costs less than gas to get to work.

But don’t let the price fool you.

This isn’t a book you buy. It’s a fork in the road.

Let me hit you with something most people don’t want to hear:

If you’re struggling to charge premium prices, it’s not your product—it’s your mindset.

You think the problem is the market. Or the competition. Or the funnel. Or Mercury in retrograde.

But deep down, it’s that little voice whispering, “Who the hell would pay that?”

Spoiler alert: A lot of people.

See, there’s a funny thing about humans—we don’t just buy stuff. We buy meaning.

Nobody drops $10,000 on a watch because it tells time better than your iPhone. They do it because that watch says something. About who they are. About what they’ve achieved. About where they belong.

When I say people will pay $100K for a car or $500 for an ebook on how to get their ex back, I’m not making a joke—I’m making a point.

Value isn’t logical. It’s emotional.

You might think, “I’d never spend that much.”

Exactly. YOU wouldn’t. But your customer might.

And that’s where most marketers shoot themselves in the foot—they use their own financial thermostat to set prices for someone else’s problems. Big mistake.

Here’s what you need to understand: people pay to solve pain. And if the pain is deep enough—loneliness, insecurity, loss, fear—they’ll pay more than you’d ever guess.

So what’s the mindset shift?

Stop pricing your product. Start pricing the transformation.

It’s not $97 for an ebook. It’s $97 to avoid dying alone with 15 cats. It’s not $1,997 for a course. It’s $1,997 to finally quit your job and tell your boss to shove it.

When you get this—really get it—your whole marketing strategy shifts. You stop underselling. You stop justifying. And you stop looking for permission to charge what you’re worth.

People don’t need more logic.

And when you do?

They’ll line up to pay.

In 1993, when most people didn’t even know what an email address was, Ken McCarthy was already pioneering online marketing. He saw the internet’s potential early on and has been a driving force in its evolution. Recently, this “Godfather of Internet Marketing” made a surprising shift to books.

In this episode, Igor and Ken McCarthy discuss Ken’s pioneering contributions to internet marketing, including his early innovations like email marketing and online video. They’ll also explore Ken’s current emphasis on using physical books as a marketing tool and his insights on the evolution of digital marketing.

Join us as we explore Ken McCarthy’s career, his views on today’s online marketing, and the new direction he’s taking.

Ever feel like your to-do list is breeding like rabbits?

You start the day with 3 things, end with 19, and somewhere in between, you forgot what your actual goal was. Been there and drenched the T-shirt in cold sweat.

That’s why The One Thing is a game-changer.

This book doesn’t hand you 72 productivity hacks you’ll forget tomorrow. It slaps you with one simple, brutal truth:

Success is about doing fewer things—better.

Gary Keller and Jay Papasan don’t want you juggling flaming swords. They want you to find the one thing that makes everything else easier… or unnecessary. Whether it’s in business, health, or relationships, the principle is the same:

Focus like your life depends on it—because it kinda does.

If you’re building an online business, this book is like a GPS for your overwhelmed brain. It’ll show you how to stop scattering your energy across 100 shiny tactics and finally start compounding your results where it counts.

Or, if you’ve ever felt busy but not productive, motivated but not moving forward, The One Thing is your wake-up call.

I hold your prospect’s hopes and fears,

Their secret dreams, their shifting gears.

I’m built from data, guess, and art—

Craft me wrong, and you’ll fall apart.

Who am I?

Think you've cracked the code? Reply to this email with your guess, and see if you're right!