Hey everyone! Today, I share the mic with Michael Yan, Co-Founder and CEO of the popular messenger app ManyChat. This is his second time being a guest on Leveling Up! Check out the first episode with him here!
Tune in to hear why Mikael and his team has witnessed incredible growth over a few years, some practical examples of how ManyChat can be successfully incorporated in a funnel plus hear him share some of the growth tactics that they are currently implementing with great success.
TIME-STAMPED SHOW NOTES:
[00:41] Before we jump into today’s interview, please rate, review, and subscribe to the Leveling Up Podcast!
[00:22] ManyChat’s explosive growth, what their platform offers and the number of customers.
[00:58] When the company was founded and how messaging apps have infiltrated the market.
[01:55] The biggest opportunity in marketing in the last ten years.
[02:27] A few updated numbers, including 800,000 pages connected in over 170 countries.
[03:37] How the platform has changed and how they want to further develop ManyChat.
[05:44] Mikael’s journey as CEO, growing as a leader, and where he gets support from.
[08:21] How using templates is an effective means for companies to adopt chat faster.
[09:12] Examples of where ManyChat has been successfully incorporated in the funnel.
[11:05] How a multi-channel strategy is likely to become popular in 2020.
[12:46] A practical example of how an e-commerce company might use multi-channel.
[14:23] Thoughts on driving customers from SMS to messenger versus SMS to website directly.
[15:53] Current strategies for growth, including focusing more on influencers and relationships.
[16:40] The number of years it took them to get to product-market fit.
[18:08] The top tool and business book according to Mikael.
Hey everyone! In today’s episode, I share the mic with Josh March, the CEO of Conversocial and the Author of Message Me.
Tune in to hear Josh share how he started iPlatform that became one of the first Facebook app development agencies, how Conversocial developed their business model, and why social messaging is so effective.
Time-Stamped Show Notes:
[00:40] Before we jump into today’s interview, please rate, review, and subscribe to the Growth Everywhere Podcast!
[01:20] Josh had an ecommerce company right out of college that failed.
[01:57] He started iPlatform that became one of the first Facebook app development agencies.
[03:00] As communication moved towards mobile phones, Internet, etc. Josh thought it would be smart to create software that would help businesses communicate with their clients using messaging and social networks.
[04:00] Conversocial bridges the gap between traditional needs and new forms of communication.
[04:35] At its peak, iPlatform was making a few hundred thousand in revenue per month.
[05:52] “In business there is never a right answer; There’s never one way of doing things.”
[07:05] Conversocial crossed the $10 Million revenue mark last year.
[07:20] They work with Google, Alaska Airlines, Macy’s among others large airlines and retailers.
[09:45] Conversocial allows for seamless consumer experiences.
[10:55] They have full automation when it comes to messaging consumers.
[11:46] They intregrate on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Google Plus, and YouTube. They also do custom integrations and are looking to include WhatsApp in the future.
[13:45] Josh is a big fan of the book Four Steps to Epiphany by Steve Blank.
[13:56] He used this as his handbook to figure out how to approach his business.
[16:10] Josh saw his business as a disruptive innovation.
[17:45] Brands were confused as to how to treat customer complaints: Was it crisis management?
[18:25] Generally, Conversocial charges per seed.
[20:40] As the social channels became bigger and bigger, so did the task for Conversocial and the companies they served.
[22:00] They originally approached the relationship from a product perspective, but they weren’t really understanding the business objectives of their clients.
[24:05] Pricing depends on the type of needs you have.
[24:25] Their lowest package starts at around $20,000 per year.
[25:47] As companies are now using social messaging instead of email, it has opened up more opportunities for customer care.
[26:26] Mark Zuckerberg launched Messenger by announcing the end of phone calls.
[26:55] Unfortunately, most of the messenger bots were not great and didn’t function well.
[27:22] However, people realized there was potential value in messenger services and bots.
[30:15] Josh has gotten into Mind Maps and believes they are a great hack.
[32:15] Josh recommends the book The Hard Thing About Hard Things.
Hey everyone, in today’s episode I share the mic with Jen Young, co-founder and CMO of Outdoorsy, a marketplace website that allows customers to rent local RVs for memorable adventures.
Tune in to hear Jen share how she did product market research by living in an RV for 8 months, how their customers’ needs forced them to expand their business model, what works for Outdoorsy in terms of marketing techniques, and why she embraces a culture of failure.
00:35 – Before we begin, please leave a review and rating and subscribe to the Growth Everywhere Podcast
01:15 – Outdoorsy is a peer-to-peer marketplace; it allows users to rent the 13 million RVs that sit idle most of the year
02:35 – Outdoorsy has a million dollar liability insurance and has pay-as-you-go/on-demand roadside service, which makes them a more full-service company
03:40 – When they realized there were RVs sitting idle for most of the year, Jen and her partner sold their houses and bought an RV and hit the road for eight months. Along the way, they interviewed other RVers to get an idea of their needs.
05:44 – Outdoorsy’s original customer development was interviewing other RVers at campgrounds
08:45 – The business model expanded because of customer need/feedback. They now facilitate sales of RVs, as well.
09:43 – The struggles of building a marketplace: they needed to be national, but had to start small in counties/towns and then states.
10:41 – Embracing a culture of failure in order to be successful
11:45 – Outdoorsy has facilitated a million interactions this year and a have booked a quarter of a million dollars worth of trips.
12:58 – Families have reconnected on road trips, people have proposed marriage, and bucket list trips were made possible because of Outdoorsy
14:01 – Adwords and Facebook have worked in terms of customer acquisition, as well as engaging content
15:11 – Check out the customer stories and their branding tactics on Outdoorsy.com
15:45 – A cool photo and a great story angle go a long way in terms of marketing
17:05 – Injecting personality cuts through the repetitive style of advertising being used by other companies
17:30 – New tools they have used in the past year and what has worked for them (Quip and Slack)
18:45 – Every morning, Jen builds a to-do list and in doing so, prioritizes the most important aspects of the business that day.
19:30 – She uses the “getting things done methodology”, which helps her organize her to-do list and evaluate priorities.
Hey everyone! Today I share the mic with Amanda Bradford, CEO of The League, a dating app for aspiring power couples.
Tune in to hear Amanda share why her dating app for intellectuals has a 500K wait list and how it’s converting in high volumes, the effects of monetizing the app for both men and women (especially in regards to user habits), and the value of finding the right people to ramp up your company’s growth.
01:34 – Based in Austin, they are opening offices in Dallas and Houston; The League was recently launched in Miami, Atlanta and Philly
01:48 – Looking to expand their dating app to LA, San Francisco and New York
02:25 – Finding your perfect match
02:25 – Users are required to put in their Facebook accounts as well as their LinkedIn which results in a more curated environment
03:00 – Users are matched by considering a variety of factors such as earnings, educational institutions, fields and social graphs
03:31 – It aims to curate users that are ambitious, intellectual and looking for a relationship
03:40 – Just started generating revenue by offering paid memberships
04:04 – The waitlist for The League has ballooned to over 500,000
04:56 – Does not compete with Raya, a dating app targeting wannabe celebrities; at The League, they are targeting more professionally oriented people
05:23 – Appeals to intellectuals such as writers, bankers and journalists
05:54 – Matchmaking: an outdated concept
05:54 – Not uncommon for matchmakers to charge as much as $60,000
06:18 – Matchmaking is an ancient concept and dating apps will replace them over time
07:58 – With the emergence of smartphones and improving technology, people can select their date from a wider pool; chances of finding a good match increases
09:10 – The League wants to be known as a dating app and not as a marriage platform
09:29 – Sends congratulatory gifts on the birthday of league babies
09:44 – Folks in their early 20’s are just looking to date and figure out what they want
10:02 – In spite of giving only 3 to 5 matches, conversion rate is really high
11:10 – Analyzing membership structure and revenues at The League
11:10 – It monetizes impatient people who value their time and are actively looking for a perfect match
12:02 – Annual membership is $180 which works out to be $15 per month
12:47 – Unlike other dating websites which try to monetize the men, revenues at “The League” are split equally between men and women
13:02 – User behaviors have improved after switching to a paid model
14:00 – Marketing strategy
14:00 – Relies on referrals for marketing
14:16 – Uses Hustle Con as a platform to meet potential users and spread the word before launching the app
15:12 – Raised $2.8 million so far
15:18 – A successful match leads to two people leaving and many more joining the app
16:18 – In spite of Tinder being one of the top four Apps used by millennials, fundraising is not easy
17:18 – It’s a lean organization with every person wearing multiple hats
17:31 – They want to use the latest, cutting edge technology to solve people’s problems
19:00 – Aiming to retain non-singles even after they’ve found a match
19:51 – What is the one big struggle you faced while growing “The League”? – Getting the right people on board
21:17 – Entrepreneurs’ Organization managed to increase their revenues from $3 million a year to $22 million a year in a space of just 2 years by hiring great people
21:45 – Monetization has enabled Amanda to hire some great people which has placed The League on the path for fast growth
22:33 – What is one big thing, positive or negative that has impacted your business in a big way in the past one year? – Amanda moved her office to a live/work house and now lives in a studio on the top of her office
25:24 – What’s one new tool that you’ve added in the last year that’s added a lot of value, like Evernote? – Mode Analytics – It is super easy. You can hook it onto any database and put SQL in it
26:39 – What’s one must-read book do you recommend? –Shoe Dog – The story of Phil Knight starting Nike right out of business school
28:20 – Connect with Amanda on her website or Facebook
Hey everyone, today I share the mic with Mike Dudas, co-founder and CRO of Button, a company that helps retailers realize the power of mobile by allowing seamless interconnected services to complement relevant products.
Tune in to hear how Mike has leaned on a unique combination of sound business and dumb luck to create a habitual winner, what the team did to growButton 10X in 1 year and drive tens of millions in revenue within 3 years,how a fortunate change in Uber’s business model allowed Button to succeed early on, and the process they go through to find, court and hire the right people.
01:00 – Button helps retailers realize the power of mobile by allowing seamlessly interconnected services to complement relevant products
01:22 – Mike has been working in the technology industry for 10 years now
01:33 – Started with Medianet Technologies, a startup based in New York City. He spent another 3 and a half years at Google and worked at Braintree/Venmo for a couple of years before starting Button in 2014
01:53 – Shifted his focus from media and ad technology to commerce and payments
02:05 – Got a chance to work on Google Wallet which helped him make the transition to commerce and payments
02:38 – Button has a fantastic team consisting of ex-Google and ex-Facebook employees
03:23 – Works with retailers and merchants to acquire new mobile app users from a number of publisher sources
03:40 – Hard to find cost-effective options to acquire new users outside of Google and Facebook. Button is attempting to address this market gap
04:10 – Mike shares the important numbers around Button
04:15 – Button has more than 50 people
04:21 – Have raised $34 million on the back of a strong revenue story
04:30 – Revenues have increased 10x in the past one year
05:03 – Looked at pain points for consumers and builders for mobile commerce businesses, and discovered that the affiliate channel on desktop was totally nonexistent. Button is attempting to bridge this gap between advertising and commerce
06:52 – “Button” permits product integration on the publisher page and is incredibly effective in driving traffic to another merchant website
09:21 – Merchant pays for the lead driven by the publisher. It can be a flat fee or a percentage of the transaction
10:03 – Large scale shopping and loyalty apps are using “Buttons” in a big way. Metasearch sites like Skyscanner are also using “Buttons” to streamline the payment process and increase conversion rates
11:30 –What is the one thing that is working really well for you in terms of customer acquisition? – Referrals and an experienced sales team
13:11 – You will have to answer 3 questions when you are selling: Why should I do this, why should I do this with you, and why should I do this now?
13:44 – Difficult to convince clients to invest in “Buttons” since most companies are resource constrained on the mobile side
14:25 – Secure money and secure advisory roles from people who believe in your business
15:14 – Really challenging to find the right people — Using your referrals and partner recommendations is a great way to facilitate this
17:12 – Take a casual approach to courting talent and investors
18:14 – A great internal recruiting team does intensive outreach and negates the need for using outside recruiting agencies
19:53 – What’s the one big struggle you faced while growing Button? – Initially Button tried to sell the concept of coalition loyalty. But they found that retention via loyalty was not a top priority for companies in hyper-growth mode. They faced a difficult time till 2014 Q3.
21:40 – Uber opened up their API which enabled adding an Uber button to other websites. Eventually other companies opened up their API’s and the need arose to have a company like Button handle this business function in a dedicated manner
23:10 – What’s one new tool that you’ve added in the last year that’s added a lot of value to you? – Slack: Enables Mike to be in constant contact with teammates, peers and customers
24:54 – What’s one must-read book you recommend to everyone?
24:57 – The PayPal Wars: Battles with eBay, the Media, the Mafia, and the Rest of Planet Earth – “Reading about how incredible people in technology like Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, Keith Rabois, Reid Hoffman and so many others were working together and battling this behemoth eBay and creating a trust based new payment economy”
25:47 – Chaos Monkeys: Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley – “About growing your business in Silicon Valley over the five years”
25:58 – Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike – “My favorite recent business book and a must read for everyone”
26:24 – Connect with Mike on Twitter
27:44 – Check out Growth Everywhere for a ton of additional resources
27:50 – Subscribe to our podcast and get access to value packed content
3 Key Points:
Secure money and secure advisory roles from people who believe in your business.
It is really challenging to find the right people — Using your referrals and partner recommendations is a great way to facilitate this.
You will have to answer 3 questions when you are selling: Why should I do this, why should I do this with you, and why should I do this now?
Hey everyone, today I share the mic with Rodrigo Fuentes, CEO of ListenLoop, which zeroes in on account-based marketing for B2B companies.
Tune in to hear Rodrigo break down how account-based marketing works, how a background in electrical engineering and law led him to a B2B retargeting startup, how one ListenLoop client saw a 22% increase in web traffic engagement with ABM, and what their most effective customer acquisition method is.
01:31 – Rodrigo thinks ABM or account-based marketing is now past the hype curve and people are executing campaigns
01:44 – ListenLoop primarily helps B2B marketers who want to go after a specific set of companies
02:02 – The software will place ads directly on the target companies and targeted job titles as they browse the web
02:31 – Rodrigo is an electrical engineer from Yale, went to Columbia Law School focusing on patent litigation and IP rights, and he practiced law for almost 3 years at Fish and Richardson
02:54 – Rodrigo says law was mentally stimulating, but he found himself more curious about his client’s business problems
03:12 – Rodrigo was asked by a friend to join his startup while he was still at the law firm; he decided to jump into the business
04:17 – Rodrigo is a visual learner and is currently into courses at Udemy because of how visual they are
05:12 – Rodrigo watches videos about marketing, outreach and other business related topics
06:52 – Rodrigo shares an example of a company that uses ListenLoop, called Engagio
07:07 – Charlie Liang, Engagio’s Director of Marketing, uses ListenLoop to combine their marketing activities and advertising with a specific list of target accounts
08:02 – Engagio saw increased engagement with their target accounts when they were exposed to the ads
08:17 – Account-based marketing together with advertising saw a 22% increase in web-traffic engagement
09:32 – Account-based marketing is a strategy that a sales marketing team will use to influence and close a specific set of accounts
10:07 – It is a strategy whereby sales and marketing teams are aligned on a specific list of accounts they want to go after; they use one or more communication channels to reach those accounts and measure the results of the campaign at the account level
11:32 – In a company, people are delegated with the task to research and compare information and this is shared internally
12:12 – Results are measured at the account level of the company and not per individual – you get a holistic picture of how the account is engaging
13:15 – ListenLoop works by getting the domains of a target account; specifically a location of where those contacts will fit
14:28 – ListenLoop has pre-roll personalization that adds animation on top of the ads; this includes a logo of the company you are targeting
14:59 – Ads can be segmented to the bio persona—there can be a different sets of ads that will resonate to the marketer and another to the sales person
15:34 – There can also be a segment across industries or companies
16:19 – ListenLoop is a different channel from Facebook or LinkedIn
17:47 – A CRM retargeting tool works for B2C or business-to-consumer marketing
17:59 – If you are in B2B, the match rate is lower compared to those who are in B2C
18:27 – The problem here is people do not use their business accounts for online transactions
19:28 – ListenLoop uses the triangulation method: the first party data, third party data and the geolocation data is overlapped to create a model; the tiny area of overlap of all these three that represents a B2B persona
20:26 – They were able to generate a 70% match rate in North America and 62% across all the campaigns
20:59 – The price is $99 per month and that includes targeting for 100 accounts that have received impressions
21:41 – Rodrigo says they are friendly to those who are still new to this strategy and pricing will increase for those who are targeting hundreds and thousands of accounts
22:13 – The most effective method in customer acquisition for ListenLoop is using account-based marketing
22:32 – They use ads one month prior to an email campaign, targeting individual contacts from top to bottom. They phone the people who opened the email at least three times, and send direct mail to those with whom they connected
23:06 – They also try to meet these people in person at conferences
23:33 – ListenLoop is managed through outreach and other different tools
24:12 – What’s one big struggle you’ve faced growing this business? – When the business first began, they had to make sure there was a product market fit
25:11 – They had to make two independent bets: prove they had a product market fit for investments and they had to generate enough sales
26:58 – They only had a few clients at this stage in terms of a sample size
27:33 – There is a correct path to do a business and it starts with the product
28:03 – The pressure to show product market fit in a short amount of time forced them to do two different things; they ended up being wrong
29:10 – What’s one must read book you’d recommend to everyone? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things
29:49 – Check out ListenLoop and email Rodrigo at rod@listenloop.com, you can also contact him via LinkedIn
30:31– End of today’s episode
3 Key Points:
Account-based marketing is a strategy that will target specific accounts and it can be segmented into different bio personas.
Account-based marketing can be done alongside other advertising campaigns.
The type of marketing campaigns you need depends on whether you’re a B2C or B2B company and the type of accounts you’ll be pursuing.
Hey everyone, today I share the mic with Noah Kagan, founder of Sumo and AppSumo, and host of Noah Kagan Presents. He was also Employee #30 at Facebook!
Tune in to hear Noah discuss how to create content that works, how he built Sumo and AppSumo by persisting and evolving, why you need to stick with marketing for at least four years, and the two things that surprised him about growing a business.
01:00 – Eric introduces Noah Kagan who is among the first 10 guests of Growth Everywhere
03:25 – Eric shares that when he first started doing podcasts, he only had 9 downloads a day and has now grown to 35,000 in a day
04:13 – For podcasts, if you have old stuff that is good, just recycle it and it can double or even triple the traffic
05:18 – Noah says you get what you put in
05:20 – He spent two months writing a Tony Robbins’ article and it became popular
05:34 – He spent 15 minutes doing a video for YouTube and only got a few views
06:32 – “The easiest way to win is just persist and evolve”
07:18 – In marketing and in business, you should know how to stick with something for a long time
07:37 – Look at what’s working and evolve it
08:04 – Noah says his videos regarding marketing strategies perform well
08:41 – If you are a marketer, know what your goal is
09:04 – For Noah, the goal for AppSumo is to acquire half a million email subscribers in 2 years
09:44 – For Sumo, they have revenue goals every year
10:10 – In setting a goal, be honest with yourself and place it where you can regularly see it
11:44 – People who have reached their financial goals – Larry Ellison, Bill Gates, Elon Musk – are not after the money anymore, but are after a vision
12:10 – Noah is now focused on the purpose rather than making money
12:20 – To figure out what your vision is, talk to a friend, look at your interests and the things you worked on in the past year
13:02 – Noah loves to promote great things and this is what he does with his work
14:17 – Sumo helps the underdog so that they can grow and develop
14:35 – Eric says Noah uses the Top of Mind strategies
15:03 – The best marketing is when people “see you everywhere”
15:28 – Target specific people and cater to them as opposed to being broad
16:07 – The two things Noah learned about goals: they should be hard and they should be continuous
16:39 – The vision is a destination that is almost unreachable but something that you genuinely want
16:46 – The timing for your goals should extend beyond a year; for Noah, they have goals set out as far as 2020
17:21 – Eric’s long-term vision is to improve education around the world, but how he will do it changes constantly
18:51 – “Successful people do the things that unsuccessful people are unwilling to do”
19:16 – Noah would set targets for his podcast, but became disappointed when nothing worked and when the growth was slow
20:16 – Do not be so focused on the goal that you do not see the amazing things happening around you
20:21 – There should be a balance between your plan and creating the right habits
20:49 – One of Noah’s habits is doing the podcast every Tuesday
21:04 – Noah held a technology conference for his club and it became a yearly tradition
22:10 – There should be one day reserved as a day off or a block day
22:46 – Creative ideas come when you are not working in front of your computer
23:11 – Eric went to Napa alone for two days and spent the time strategizing
23:33 – Everybody has to find their creative zone
24:23 – The two strategies to being productive: either do things and figure it out or think about it first and do it afterwards
25:20 – In the case of Sumo and AppSumo, Noah realized that the more people are left alone, the better they become at the task
26:11 – Eric knows someone who grew his company’s revenue by hiring good people and getting out of their way
26:56 – To know if you’ve hired great people, think about how much you are paying them; great people do not come cheap
27:35 – People want to feel empowered by being given a clear goal and vision and then the autonomy to make the decisions
28:03 – As a boss, your role is to trust them but verify their work
28:23 – For AppSumo, they have a yearly and monthly revenue target and they get a report every Monday to show how they are doing
28:56 – To hold your business accountable, have a monthly board meeting
29:07 – Find someone you can talk to who will give you good information about your business
29:43 – Every business is like a Google map—you have a destination and route and when there is a traffic jam, you look for other ways to go around it without changing your destination
30:57 – Eric asks Noah how he finds great board members
31:08 – When Noah started AppSumo, he looked for people who knew the specific things he wanted to learn and it was effective at first, but not for the long term
32:17 – A good strategy is to have informal advisers and ask them to look at your numbers; over time the adviser gets involved in helping the business to grow more
33:51 – A board member may disagree but this will help you look at an issue from a different perspective
34:07 – Find someone who will give you value and who really cares
35:07 – The two things that surprised Noah about growing a business: having monthly board meetings and hiring a recruiter early on
36:06 – There is a lot that can be accomplished in a day, so the important thing is to know what to prioritize
37:14 – If you are just starting out in YouTube, you have to be strategic
37:50 – With today’s technology, everyone can be a star, but there are also more things that are vying for your attention
38:14 – Do the topics that people really want and focus on the quality
38:31 – Invest your time in the content you create
39:17 – Figure out your own unique angle
39:45 – Eric says he likes Noah’s videos because he is being himself in them
40:11 – Be yourself by dealing with your frustrations
40:22 – Noah journals and has bought a chair that he likes to sit on
41:18 – Noah knows a guy who is rich who likes to ask for discounts; he says he is rich because he keeps on asking for discounts
41:45 – In terms of being yourself, find the things that you are great at and that give you energy
42:08 – Learn how to work smarter and be mindful of how you spend your days
43:16 – You can get more out of your day if you spend it on things that give you energy
44:25 – One of Noah’s struggles is finding out if he should do things he is great at or fix the things where he is weak
44:33 – Noah realized he should do the things he is great at and hire people who are strong where he is weak
44:58 – The pigeon theory is when you go somewhere, poop and then fly away
45:17 – If you are committed to doing something, you will figure out ways to come up with ideas
45:30 – “No time is no excuse”
46:03 – The pigeon theory is about knowing what you are strong at and being a part of the solution rather than the problem
47:10 – Noah is very good at feedback and this has contributed to his success
47:32 – “When someone gives you feedback, the first thing you do is say ‘thank you’” – Keith Ferrazzi
48:47 – People should not be defensive when they are receiving feedback
49:03 – Noah gives feedback to a lot of people, but they don’t really listen to it
51:07 – Noah is not into buying businesses and is an angel investor for only 2 companies because he is focused on growing his own companies
52:02 – AppSumo had some problems in the past and Noah had to let go of people; they went back to the basics and they are now much larger than before
52:43 – A vision for AppSumo is to simplify the number of software that’s being used by people
53:26 – When your customer reacts positively to your product, then you should build on that
54:11 – Do not find the next new thing, just work on how you can make your products better
55:40 – It’s easier to work on the things you already have rather than to build new things
56:14 – More often than not, removing things is better for your business than adding new things
57:27 – Noah thinks he is making his videos too quickly
58:03 – Noah says he likes for his videos to be evergreen
58:34 – Facebook succeeded because they were focused; at the beginning they were only focused on Harvard students, then moved from one step to the next until they are now dominating the scene
59:06 – You should recognize what works and do more of that
59:30 – Eric heard that “the organization’s weakness is the CEO’s greatest strength”
59:44 – Noah says the company is a projection of the owner in real life
1:00:16 – Noah is great at growing, but is not as great at maintaining the company and has hired people for that
1:00:43 – Noah is looking for an assistant
1:00:50 – One applicant is a 23-year-old girl who answered questions well and is being paid $22 per hour
1:01:05 – The other applicant is a 50-year-old woman who charges $50 per hour and is a career executive assistant who has 20 years of experience
1:01:38 – Eric was in the same situation recently with two applicants who had equal experience but different rates—they went with the cheaper one
1:02:14 – In Noah’s scenario, Eric would have chosen the woman with more experience because she could get things done faster
1:02:18 – Noah is also leaning towards the woman with more experience
1:02:39 – In sports, the ones who win are those that are paid the highest
1:03:11 – Noah asked the help of an expert for his podcast and YouTube videos
1:04:15 – In hiring coaches and experts, you get what you paid for
1:05:14 – Noah says it is easier to keep people happy rather than look for new employees
1:06:02 – Connect with Noah at AppSumo and Sumo
1:06:18 – Also check out Noah Kagan Presents and search him on YouTube
1:06:27 – Add Noah on Snapchat
1:06:42 – End of today’s episode
3 Key Points:
Persist and evolve—these are the keys to winning and keeping up with the market.
You get what you put in—create a quality product and reap the rewards.
It is easier to grow and develop what is working than building something brand new.
Hey everyone, today I share the mic with Howard Marks, CEO of StartEngine, a company that provides investment opportunities for new startups to help entrepreneurs realize their dreams. He was also the founder and CEO of Acclaim Games, and before that he was a co-founder of Activision.
Tune in to hear Howard reveal his value investing strategy that allowed him to buy video game companies Activision for $400K and Acclaim for a mere $100K, how he had a vision of finance as a crowdfunding platform when no one else believed it possible, and how StartEngine has raised over $30M in capital for over 40 companies in his mission to help entrepreneurs realize their dreams.
If you don’t set expectations, you’re setting yourself up for failure.
As a digital marketing agency, Single Grain clients are sort of a mixed bag. Some clients are much more demanding than others.
We had one client who wanted four hours of in-person time from one of our team members every week. That’s 16 hours of time each month just spent talking to them. We had other clients who worked at much bigger companies and only needed a report every month or so.
If a client has an expectation for you to meet four hours every week and those expectations aren’t clearly aligned at the very beginning, you’re just asking for trouble.
Any time there’s a mismatch between what you’re willing to do and what the client expects you to do, you’re setting yourself up for failure.
It’s the same for personal relationships, too.
Let’s say you’re an entrepreneur and you’re dating somebody who is aligned with the 9-to-5 lifestyle. Sometimes your workdays won’t align. If the other person wants to spend a romantic evening with you, but you’re so dead tired that romance is the last thing on your mind, there’s going to be a clash of expectations.
I was just reading a thread on Facebook the other day where someone asked:
“Hey, is combining marriage and entrepreneurship not necessarily a good thing?”
Somebody else replied:
“Well, if your spouse understands the entrepreneur lifestyle, then it’s an asset. If your spouse has more of a 9-to-5 kind of mindset, then it’s not the right fit. It can cause a lot of trouble.”
My point is, you have to clearly set expectations with clients at the very beginning of the relationship. If you don’t set those expectations, you’re going to set yourself up for failure. Unsurprisingly, our one client who wanted 16 hours of face-to-face time per month didn’t last.
We said, “Hey, it’s okay. We understand where you’re coming from. Totally makes sense, but unfortunately that’s not for us. We can’t do that. We’d like to point you in the right direction of somebody who can help you with that.”
But if we had just set expectations with him the first time he asked for that kind of special treatment, we could have avoided the problem in the first place.
Let’s say you don’t set expectations up front, but you talk about them later. In this scenario, there needs to be a little give and take. Sure, maybe your client is taking advantage of you a bit, but at the same time you let them get used to that. So that’s their expectation. If you want to scale that back, you need to give them something else in return. If you don’t, then the relationship is going to churn.
Here’s the thing with relationships. They either start or they end. If you’re in a service business, your job is to retain your clients for as long as possible. That means doing the best job that you can and meeting their needs. But it also means meeting your own needs so that a long-term arrangement is beneficial to everyone involved.
Setting expectations is also crucial for new hires. For example, let’s say one of your employees has a 9-to-5 shift. Sometimes things happen at home and people come in late. I totally get it. But if you consistently come in 45 minutes late, then that’s a problem.
There’s a misalignment issue because other people on the team are coming in early. If all of a sudden everybody else starts coming in 45 minutes late, it’s going to spiral out of control. Expectations no longer matter.
I was talking to one of my friends about this, and he mentioned that when he began his startup, people would come in pretty much whenever they wanted. But once they got to 100 employees, people had to come in on the dot. Granted, that’s not necessarily the case for every company.
But in a service-based business, it’s important to have people come in on time, and you can’t really make exceptions. Even if somebody’s a top performer, if you’re making exceptions or playing favorites, it rubs everyone else the wrong way.
If you guys can’t get on the same page and it’s your business, then it might be time to make a change. It’s the same for business relationships and personal relationships. There needs to be alignment, but there won’t be alignment unless people talk things through and expectations are set early on.
Let’s talk about micro-retargeting. You already know about retargeting: when you visit a website, you’re going to get ads that follow you around the ‘net.
What Is Retargeting?
Let’s say you visit Zappos briefly and then everywhere you go on the web, you’re faced with random ads. They don’t really know what your intention is because you’ve only visited a homepage, right? They send you generic ads. Which you’re probably not as likely to convert on.
But let’s say you visit Zappos, go to the men’s shoe section, pick out the Nike Metcon 3 and then you add it to your cart. Guess what? You’ve shown a lot more intention, you’ve spent a lot more time on it, and you’re a lot more deliberate. You’re going to be served ads that are very different from the generic ones.
Let’s say these big companies have a million people that visit their site per day. Only a very small number are going to take a specific action and therefore have that kind of message tailored towards them. But the more personalized that experience is, the higher the conversion rates will be.
Micro-retargeting is retargeting people based on the section of your site that they visited, how long they stayed, and things like that. It’s behavioral, but it’s also temporal. You can do it with Facebook. You can target people based on the number of pages they visited or how long they stayed (e.g., top 5% of your traffic).
For Single Grain, anytime someone visits our services pages three times or more, I’m going to re-target them and I’m going to try to get them to come over to our site, go to our case studies page and then fill out a free consultation form.
Yesterday we spent five dollars and got two free consultations. Each free consultation was at about $2.50. Now for us when it comes to free consultations, we’re willing to pay $317 for a free consultation. So far, our CPA is $319.50. But if landing a client gives us $10,000–$100,000 in return, that’s well worth the cost.
Now what I’m missing is the ability to re-target people who have watched, let’s say, 10 seconds of these live videos. I’m doing these live videos, but I’m going to make audiences off of them as well, and it’s really cheap to make these audiences. For Facebook Lives on Sundays, we’re paying about one cent per view for three-second views. For 10-second views we’re paying three cents per views. These views are on autoplay and will stop some people in their tracks. I haven’t even added captions to them (I probably should!).
So I re-target these people and see what happens with them. These are people who have engaged with me, with my brand. A lot of this stuff is hard to measure (ROI-wise), but when I look at my YouTube comments and see, “Thank you so much for your help. I’m really grateful for everything,” I know that these videos are actually working.
Be Patient—Don’t Monetize Immediately
One of my other podcasts, Marketing School, is going to reach 589,000 downloads this month, but we’re not even thinking about how to monetize right now. We just want to build up the brand. We want to get it to a million or 1.5 million downloads, because we know that as long as we continue to create and spread goodwill, good things are going to happen for us.
Same thing with Growth Everywhere. I’ve been doing this for 3-5 years. It’s just goodwill. I didn’t really start to do anything with it monetization-wise until two years in. Being patient, and learning to delay your gratification, is key to building up these big brands. It never happens overnight.
