Licensing IP Into New Revenue Streams With Bob Serling & Johann Nogueira

Bob Serling is the Founder of Licensing Lab, where he helps businesses improve their products, positioning, offers, and marketing through deep customer intelligence. He created the Customer Created Framework, which uses insights from actual customers to uncover why they buy and what experience they want. His work includes developing a skateboard toy featuring Tony Hawk’s branding and co-creating licensed assessment software used by Fortune 500 companies. Bob also helps businesses identify valuable intellectual property and turn it into new revenue streams through licensing.

Johann Nogueira is the Director at Ai Tech Advisory, a consulting company that helps businesses implement AI solutions and navigate digital transformation. He is a serial tech entrepreneur, SaaS founder, and AI strategist with more than two decades of experience building and growing companies. Johann has founded and scaled multiple technology ventures, including White Label Suite, and has completed several business exits. He is also the Founder of Business Authorities, an entrepreneur education platform focused on helping business owners scale through strategic insights and resources.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

• [1:18] Bob Serling’s approach to masterminds, relationships, and high-value business connections
• [10:49] The licensing mindset shift that turns intellectual property into revenue streams
• [15:52] Johann Nogueira’s “toll booth” strategy for generating referral income without fulfillment
• [27:27] Building strategic syndicates through partnerships and shared sales opportunities
• [35:26] Reactivation campaigns that unlock revenue from overlooked customer databases
• [47:08] Bob’s Tony Hawk licensing story and the power of royalty-based partnerships
• [54:19] Protecting licensing ideas through documentation, contracts, trust, and reputation
• [56:39] White Label Suite’s growth through software licensing and agency partnerships
• [58:49] Ai Tech Advisory’s AI assessment tool for finding business efficiencies

In this episode…

Licensing can turn existing ideas, processes, and expertise into scalable revenue without requiring an entirely new business model. How can entrepreneurs turn what they know into scalable revenue streams without adding more complexity or overhead?

Veteran licensing strategist Bob Serling believes entrepreneurs often overlook the value of their own intellectual property, from specialized knowledge and business processes to marketing systems and unique solutions. He explains that licensing is less about creating something entirely new and more about finding ways to package existing assets so others can use, sell, or benefit from them. Johann Nogueira, a serial entrepreneur and business builder, shares how he applied these concepts across his companies through referral models, software licensing, and strategic partnerships. Their experiences reveal how licensing can create leverage, unlock new income opportunities, and help businesses grow beyond traditional models.

In this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast, Dr. Jeremy Weisz sits down with Bob Serling and Johann Nogueira to discuss how entrepreneurs can license intellectual property to create new revenue streams. They explore the toll booth method, strategic partnerships, and turning internal systems into valuable assets. Bob and Johann also share lessons from the Tony Hawk licensing deal, White Label Suite’s growth, and using AI to uncover business opportunities.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Bob Serling on LinkedIn
• LicensingLab
• Johann Nogueira Website | LinkedIn
• Ai Tech Advisory
• Prism
• White Label Suite
• Speakeasy Mastermind
• Genius Network®
• War Room Mastermind
• The CEO Institute
• Springfield ReManufacturing Corp.

The Licensing Playbook:

Special mentions:

• Joe Polish on LinkedIn
• Roland Frasier on LinkedIn
• Ryan Deiss on LinkedIn

Related episodes:

• “[Top Giver & Agency Series] The Power of Relationships and Masterminds in Business With Eric Berman” on the Inspired Insider Podcast
• “The Pixar Story: The Letter of a Lifetime That Started Everything With Alvy Ray Smith, Co-Founder of Pixar” on the Inspired Insider Podcast
• “Atari & Chuck E. Cheese Founder Nolan Bushnell Opens up about Low times and Proud Moments” on the Inspired Insider Podcast
• “[Sweet and Snack Show Series] Creating a Positive Impact with Rob Nelson Founder of Big League Chew” on the Inspired Insider Podcast
• “[SaaS Series] The First AI Marketing Platform That Brings Business to You With Johann Nogueira” on the Inspired Insider Podcast

Quotable moments:

• “To me, a mastermind, you get more from the people than the content.”
• “Any type of knowledge that you have and can be duplicated can be licensed to hundreds and even thousands of companies.”
• “I love being the dumbest person in the room.”
• “The truth is, I mean, every deal is only as good as the people in it.”
• “All you have to do is package it and document it in a way that’s really usable for others.”

Action steps:

1. Identify your existing intellectual property: Recognizing valuable knowledge, systems, and processes already inside your business can uncover new opportunities for licensing and additional revenue streams.
2. Package your expertise into repeatable assets: Turning specialized knowledge into clear, usable solutions makes it easier for other businesses to adopt, license, and benefit from your experience.
3. Build strategic partnerships instead of scaling alone: Creating relationships with complementary businesses can expand your reach, generate referrals, and open new channels for growth.
4. Reactivate your existing customer database: Revisiting past leads and customers can unlock overlooked revenue opportunities without the cost of acquiring entirely new prospects.
5. Create scalable business models through licensing: Leveraging licensing agreements allows entrepreneurs to generate income from their ideas, systems, and solutions without managing every aspect of delivery themselves.

Episode Transcript:

Intro 00:15

You are listening to Inspired Insider with your host, Dr. Jeremy Weisz.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 00:22

All right. Dr. Jeremy Weisz here, Founder of InspiredInsider.com, where I talk with inspirational entrepreneurs and leaders today is no different. I’m going to formally introduce Bob and Johann. Before I do to both of you, I always like to point out other episodes of the podcast people should check out.

Since we were just talking about Eric Berman, he runs Speakeasy. This is actually how Bob and I got reconnected after many years. He’s got a great group online and offline, and he’s part of my Top Giver series. He’s just really a true giver of a human being. And we talked about the power of relationships and masterminds in business, which for me has been one of the biggest game changers in my life. When I’m a part of mentor groups, I’m part of EO Chicago, I’ve been a part of Brian Kurtz’s group. I’d love to hear with you guys. Which groups have been influential for you?

Bob Serling: 01:18

Well, for me, of course, Speakeasy. I’ve known Eric for years and years, and we were in another mastermind, a small private mastermind here in San Diego, which led to Eric founding Speakeasy. So that’s been really valuable. I’m not a member of Genius Network, but I’ve spoken at Genius Network. I’ve been interviewed a couple times by Joe for I love Marketing. If I was going to join a really expensive high end mastermind, it would be Genius Network. because I just like the quality of people. To me, a mastermind, you get more from the people than the content. And that’s not to shove the content aside, but that’s what I look for. And Joe curates a great group.

I prefer mastermind, I’m in San Diego and I prefer groups that are here because I don’t like to fly for business. I don’t sleep well in hotels, so, you know, I prefer stuff that’s here. And I also participated a lot with Roland Frasier and Ryan Deiss War Room. I spoke there, I did interviews with them, and that was all always a quality group. And I think their new one is called boardroom. I’m not 100% sure, but they’re really good too.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 02:56

I mean, this really parlays to what we’re going to talk about, which is licensing. Really licensing at its core is relationships. You know, it’s forming amazing relationships and partnerships with people. So this for me has been just a number one game changer.

Johann, what about you? What are some groups that you’ve been a part of and or have heard are good that you like?

Johann Nogueira: 03:19

Yeah for sure. I’ll give you an example of one of the best closers into a mastermind that I’ve ever had. So this gentleman calls up and he said, well, he emailed me. He said, hey, I just heard about you on this podcast. I loved it. I promise I’ll only take three minutes of your time. Can I jump on your zoom? I’m like, okay, cool. Yeah. He pumped up my tires and he’s asked for three minutes. Done. All right, let’s make it happen. So I jump on and he says, hey, look, you know, I know exactly who you are. I’ve listened to your podcast. It’s amazing. This is who I want you to be in the room with. And he opens up an Excel file and he goes, this person, 200 million subscribers on YouTube. This person ate New York Times best sellers, this person. And he just kept. By the time he got to number four, I was like, I don’t know what you’re selling, but I’m in. And it was a high end mastermind, but he had 53 people on that list. And then from there, I obviously signed up and it was just, you build friendships and lifelong friendships there with the right people. I love being the dumbest person in the room.

The mastermind that I’m part of here in Australia is called the CEO Institute. Now, the CEO Institute is absolutely brilliant. They’ve got about 1300 members, I believe, at this point in time, and they’re expanding across. But the reason why it’s fun is because not only are you with good people, but it’s like a game. So to be in there, you got to be doing. They’ve got the entry level chapters, 3 to 5 mil then it’s 5 to 10, 10 to 20, 20 to 50, 50 to 100, 100 to 500, 500 to 1 billion. Right. So to me, it’s a game of, hey, how can you accelerate that? And you know, when not that money to win the game thing, but it’s just a fun challenge. And you get to hang around people who have achieved so many amazing things and you just realize, wow, they’re all just people who have just done more and been through more. And we can talk about masterminds and life and business, but I don’t want to.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 05:06

No, I love it. They’ve kind of gamified it a little bit. So like people are wanting to get to the next.. You know what I mean?

I mean, I think, Bob, I know you’ve been to a lot of direct response conferences. I know like when there was GKIC and Dan Kennedy and Bill Glazer, they did that a lot of like, oh, I want to get to be in whatever it was like the next level group. You know what I mean? So I’m gonna get into it.

Bob Serling: 05:35

Can we diverge just for a second?

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 05:37

Sure. Go ahead.

Bob Serling: 05:38

Me, I maybe it’s because I’m older, but that model doesn’t have any appeal to me. And I’m kind of loosely part of a group of people who are figuring out how to intermingle our business and our lifestyle. So you’re actually working less, achieving more, but you recognize your limits. So I don’t care if somebody else is at 50 million. If 3 million is what serves me and my family and what I want to do more than, that’s what I look for. And I kind of like that orientation. So I’m not part of the Instagram group of people who want to line up 12 more Ferraris.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 06:33

Well, maybe if there was, there was in the CEO Institute, there’s like make 3 million and work two hours a week, maybe you’d want to be in that group. Yeah. Right. They qualify with how much are you working a week with the dollar amount. Right, right. But I get it. Yeah. It’s totally it’s it’s people have different goals at different stages of life. And certain things are important at different phases for sure. You know.

I’m excited to have this conversation about licensing because I’ve been podcasting for over 17 years. The stories are always, you always see like when I had the co-founder of Pixar or Atari, like their stories, you see them like they’ve got it all figured out. But the reality is there’s huge ups and downs and challenges. There’s only one guest I’ve had on where that was not the case that I can remember. Maybe there’s more than one, but, and it was and it was lightning. And he called it lightning in a bottle or lightning in a pouch. And it was because of licensing, okay, that he spent the least amount, didn’t risk any of his capital. Didn’t I hate to say it like didn’t really do much work. The main company spent the capital and did the work. Okay.

And the founder was Big League Chew. Okay. So I had the founder of Big League Chew on. Yeah. And people should watch the interview. And I was like, God, he made it sound so easy. Millions of. And he got a royalty for every pouch that was sold. Except where he didn’t have to put in the capital. And you’ll talk about it. But like I do remember that interview. I’m like, God, that is the key right there. In lightning in a pouch, right. And so Bob is the expert at this. And Johann has used this in his companies.

And so before we get into it, this, by the way, this episode is brought to you by our company where we do two things. One, we help build amazing relationships. We do that by helping people launch and run podcasts, and we help them with direct mail gifting. So sending not just one thing, but like, think sending your best partners or clients something every 3 to 4 months for six years. Okay. So for me, I’m always looking at ways to give to my relationships. I found no better way to profile the people I admire on the podcast and send them sweet treats in the mail. So if you have questions, email [email protected].

But you know, Johann is a serial entrepreneur. I’ve had him on the podcast before. You can check out that episode. He’s achieved four exits. He scales companies with systems automation. Right now, he’s Co-founder of Ai Tech Advisory. He spent more than two decades building, growing and scaling these companies. It could be SaaS companies. It could be, you know, a number of different companies, which we’ll talk about. But he helps harness right now, helps people harness AI to eliminate bottlenecks and scale faster.

And Bob is really a veteran of marketing, licensing strategist, Founder of Profit Alchemy. He spent more than 30 years helping entrepreneurs turn their ideas in intellectual property into significant new revenue streams. It includes creating a Tony Hawk branded skateboard, a toy that was sold all over the world, co-creating software that was used by Fortune 500 companies, and really developing innovative licensing and product strategies that have helped thousands of entrepreneurs and businesses.

So first of all, thank you both for joining. You could check out Johann’s site at AiTechAdvisory.com. And if you want to check out LicensingLab.com, and if you go specifically to LicensingLab.com/ipc, you can see one of the free trainings that Bob has 12 Ways to Make More Money Licensing Your IP. I was asking, and Johann was asking Bob, like, what do you want to get out of this? He’s like, I don’t care. I just want to help people. I mean, that’s awesome.

But why don’t we start Bob, with you and like some of the misconceptions around licensing? Okay, maybe we’ll start with that. Some of the basics.

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