The Story (& Strategy) Behind This Podcast

WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.040 --> 00:00:08.910 welcome back to be to be growth. I'm here with James Carberry again. And 2 00:00:08.920 --> 00:00:14.040 yesterday we hit a milestone within the company. We hit six years old. We 3 00:00:14.040 --> 00:00:19.310 finally got to that mile marker. Uh, like how Gary v says Like like when 4 00:00:19.310 --> 00:00:22.640 you're starting a company, you kind of have to eat crap for five years before 5 00:00:22.640 --> 00:00:25.830 you can get to the good stuff. And I've had multiple conversations with James 6 00:00:25.830 --> 00:00:28.340 on some of that crap. You had to eat for the first five years of getting 7 00:00:28.340 --> 00:00:32.400 this company off the ground. So I've only joined within the last year. So 8 00:00:32.400 --> 00:00:38.730 I'm like, I got like, past past the pile of crap starting off. Yeah. Yeah, 9 00:00:38.730 --> 00:00:41.960 there's There's been plenty of spoonfuls of crap along the way, but 10 00:00:41.970 --> 00:00:45.730 ultimately, it's it's been an incredible journey and was super fun to 11 00:00:45.730 --> 00:00:49.270 celebrate that with the team yesterday. Absolutely. And I remember just 12 00:00:49.270 --> 00:00:53.400 recently we talked about like how sweet fish became a thing. How the heck this 13 00:00:53.400 --> 00:00:57.480 podcast even got started at B two b growth and I thought for the sixth 14 00:00:57.480 --> 00:01:01.510 birthday would be fun to revisit how this podcast even started. How do we 15 00:01:01.510 --> 00:01:05.690 even get into podcasting? because if I remember, right, sweet fish media did 16 00:01:05.690 --> 00:01:09.580 not start as a podcast company. It started as something a little bit 17 00:01:09.580 --> 00:01:14.230 different. So tell me, how did it How did it begin? Yeah. So, six years ago, 18 00:01:14.230 --> 00:01:21.140 January of 2015, I had just been laid off from, uh, SAS Company, a technology 19 00:01:21.140 --> 00:01:26.400 company. And I was really at a crossroads. I just gotten engaged to my 20 00:01:26.400 --> 00:01:31.410 now wife, and I had no clue what I was doing. I was working at the SAS company. 21 00:01:31.410 --> 00:01:35.920 Their funding dried up. They had to let me dio and I had played around with 22 00:01:35.920 --> 00:01:39.930 entrepreneurship in the past and knew that that was something that I might 23 00:01:39.930 --> 00:01:44.310 want to pursue A You know, down the road, getting laid off was a forcing 24 00:01:44.310 --> 00:01:47.610 function for me to determine. Like do I want to pursue entrepreneurship right 25 00:01:47.610 --> 00:01:51.770 now? And ultimately, I obviously decided to do that because sweet fish 26 00:01:51.770 --> 00:01:56.650 was born shortly after getting laid off, and it was really, you know, hey, I can 27 00:01:56.650 --> 00:02:01.240 either choose to eat crap for the next few years. I don't think I realized how 28 00:02:01.240 --> 00:02:05.800 much crap I would need to eat over those years, but I thought man. I can 29 00:02:05.800 --> 00:02:10.400 either go heads down to the grindstone through my engagement year in the first 30 00:02:10.400 --> 00:02:14.950 couple years of our marriage. Or I can go find another job, have a comfortable 31 00:02:14.950 --> 00:02:20.140 salary and kind of build up, you know, a nest egg. Thio eventually start my 32 00:02:20.140 --> 00:02:23.750 own thing down the road. And then, ultimately, for me, the decision I made 33 00:02:23.750 --> 00:02:27.150 for me was, I don't know that when I've got a five year old and a seven year 34 00:02:27.150 --> 00:02:31.940 old, I'm gonna have the risk appetite that I'm, you know, in the fortunate 35 00:02:31.940 --> 00:02:35.260 position of being able tohave right now, just because I don't need very much 36 00:02:35.260 --> 00:02:41.260 money to live So, uh, made the choice toe bootstrap, sweet fish and just 37 00:02:41.260 --> 00:02:45.780 started finding customers that I thought would need friends of mine that 38 00:02:45.780 --> 00:02:49.150 had businesses that that weren't doing any sort of content marketing. So we 39 00:02:49.150 --> 00:02:52.570 started off just writing blogged boasts. How did you start on content marketing 40 00:02:52.570 --> 00:02:57.110 To begin with? You weren't even in marketing before. Yeah, so I I worked 41 00:02:57.110 --> 00:03:01.320 for a logistics company and then worked for a nonprofit, Did my own thing. What 42 00:03:01.320 --> 00:03:05.030 got me in the marketing initially was my very first start up It was a site 43 00:03:05.030 --> 00:03:10.280 called Worth Day and we planned really cool days for people. And so you could 44 00:03:10.280 --> 00:03:14.830 invite, you know, 20 different people to be a part of somebody's worth day 45 00:03:14.840 --> 00:03:18.880 and plan this extravagant day for them where they get to interact with all of 46 00:03:18.880 --> 00:03:23.530 their favorite people throughout the day. And that's when you know, I had a 47 00:03:23.530 --> 00:03:27.600 developer that was building the tool. He was my co founder, and I was really 48 00:03:27.600 --> 00:03:31.500 responsible for getting customers. So that's when I started taking courses on 49 00:03:31.500 --> 00:03:34.710 marketing and trying to figure out How are we going to get the attention of 50 00:03:34.710 --> 00:03:38.380 people Toe actually want to buy this product? So that was my first foray 51 00:03:38.380 --> 00:03:42.450 into marketing then the SAS company that ended up letting me dio They were 52 00:03:42.450 --> 00:03:46.960 struggling with marketing, and I was like, Man, this content marketing stuff 53 00:03:46.960 --> 00:03:50.670 that I'm that I learned for sweet fish. This could really work here. So I 54 00:03:50.670 --> 00:03:54.700 started building out a content marketing plan for them. Unfortunately, 55 00:03:54.700 --> 00:03:57.520 their funding dried up. They had to let me go before we got to execute on that 56 00:03:57.520 --> 00:04:01.160 plan. But I'd realized that I was really passionate about content 57 00:04:01.160 --> 00:04:04.550 marketing, like I was really convinced. Like this just makes sense to me. This 58 00:04:04.550 --> 00:04:09.230 will work. If you create really helpful content, it's gonna make people want to 59 00:04:09.230 --> 00:04:13.760 work with you. And so that that was really how I got into it. And so I 60 00:04:13.760 --> 00:04:17.380 thought, Man, I'm gonna go to friends that I know that have businesses and be 61 00:04:17.380 --> 00:04:20.630 like, Hey, what if we started writing block post for you so that you could 62 00:04:20.630 --> 00:04:26.020 start generating interest in what you do in an organic way, and that worked 63 00:04:26.020 --> 00:04:31.130 for a while? For the first we we did, I think, the first year of the business. 64 00:04:31.130 --> 00:04:35.540 We did like $73,000 in revenue or something, which in retrospect, doesn't 65 00:04:35.540 --> 00:04:39.990 look like anything. But I was starting from nothing and to start from nothing 66 00:04:39.990 --> 00:04:46.290 charging $150 per block posts to build a $73,000 piece of business. We got the 67 00:04:46.290 --> 00:04:49.920 marketing right. I mean, we had lots of people coming inbound. We were doing 68 00:04:49.920 --> 00:04:54.960 outbound toe people that used hub spot. So we had announced source service 69 00:04:54.960 --> 00:05:00.300 provided that we were using to dio automated outbound, and that got us a 70 00:05:00.300 --> 00:05:03.610 lot of our early customers We were doing good work and getting referrals, 71 00:05:03.610 --> 00:05:07.450 so that was work. Did you write all those block posts? I did not. I wrote 72 00:05:07.450 --> 00:05:13.050 one blogger post, and I remember it was for it was for a custom home building 73 00:05:13.060 --> 00:05:17.580 company. And I wrote one blogger post, and I thought, I never want to do this 74 00:05:17.580 --> 00:05:21.600 again. So that is when I hired Ryan, who's now our director of culture and 75 00:05:21.600 --> 00:05:25.620 people ops. He's been with me basically since the beginning. We brought Ryan on 76 00:05:25.620 --> 00:05:29.490 as a contractor. He was a writer that did some stuff with me. It worth day, 77 00:05:29.500 --> 00:05:33.360 that first technology product that I tried to bring the market, and he's 78 00:05:33.360 --> 00:05:37.260 been with us ever since. So Ryan starts writing for us, and I'm going, Okay, 79 00:05:37.260 --> 00:05:41.160 I'm gonna market and sell this thing. And then Ryan's gonna right, and we 80 00:05:41.160 --> 00:05:45.410 eventually found we still got actually a lot of writers from that initial team 81 00:05:45.410 --> 00:05:49.650 back in 2015 that are still with us today and still help turn our clients 82 00:05:49.650 --> 00:05:55.350 podcasts into written content because you love content marketing. But you 83 00:05:55.350 --> 00:05:58.690 hate ready and blood posts. It seems like those things wouldn't get along, 84 00:05:58.690 --> 00:06:01.910 but you like all the strategy worked behind it without actually executing 85 00:06:01.910 --> 00:06:07.050 that I actually saw I saw Jay decide Talk about this on LinkedIn, he said. 86 00:06:07.100 --> 00:06:11.520 The effectiveness of the modern content marketer is not in the actual writing 87 00:06:11.520 --> 00:06:16.250 itself. The effectiveness of the modern content marketer is the strategy, the 88 00:06:16.250 --> 00:06:20.180 identifying of what topics are gonna resonate. What's the angle of the 89 00:06:20.180 --> 00:06:23.180 content that's actually going to resonate with their ideal buyer's? It 90 00:06:23.180 --> 00:06:27.730 requires a deep understanding off your buyer, and the writer doesn't 91 00:06:27.730 --> 00:06:32.980 necessarily need that. They need some context, but you can have great writers, 92 00:06:32.980 --> 00:06:37.160 and I think that plays out here on our team. We've got incredible writers that 93 00:06:37.170 --> 00:06:41.440 understand that at a high level, lots of different industries, but they 94 00:06:41.450 --> 00:06:46.170 utilized the expertise of our customers and of you in the content that they 95 00:06:46.180 --> 00:06:50.150 right that's related to our expertise to be to be podcasting and different 96 00:06:50.140 --> 00:06:54.310 topics are on B two b marketing. So, yeah, I loved content marketing. I'm 97 00:06:54.310 --> 00:06:57.450 actually a really good writer. People have told me that was a good writer. 98 00:06:57.460 --> 00:07:02.180 You got writing jobs, but I don't enjoy doing it, and I learned that very early 99 00:07:02.180 --> 00:07:05.840 in the business. So after writing one block post outsource that have never 100 00:07:05.840 --> 00:07:09.340 written another block post since. So that's been awesome. But we got nine 101 00:07:09.340 --> 00:07:13.330 months in again, charging $150 per block post. We weren't making any money. 102 00:07:13.340 --> 00:07:16.880 I had no clue what I was doing. And so I thought, You know what? We have to 103 00:07:16.880 --> 00:07:19.920 niche down. I kept listening to podcast saying, like, You've got a niche. 104 00:07:19.920 --> 00:07:22.800 You've got to pick a niche, you gotta pick a niche. And at the time, we were 105 00:07:22.800 --> 00:07:25.600 just writing block post for any company that would let us write a block post 106 00:07:25.600 --> 00:07:31.640 for him and eventually figured out that this one church plant in right outside 107 00:07:31.640 --> 00:07:34.890 of Houston was getting phenomenal results. The content we were writing 108 00:07:34.890 --> 00:07:38.810 for them was going viral on Facebook, we were writing. It was like buzzfeed 109 00:07:38.810 --> 00:07:42.910 style articles except at a local level. So they were in a little town called 110 00:07:42.910 --> 00:07:46.550 Rosenberg Texas, and we were writing articles like, you know, seven date 111 00:07:46.550 --> 00:07:50.510 night ideas in Rosenberg, Texas, or 18 things to do with your kids on a 112 00:07:50.510 --> 00:07:54.310 Saturday in Rosenberg. And so those articles were doing really well. Is 113 00:07:54.310 --> 00:07:57.560 there driving really good traffic to the church's website. And I was like, 114 00:07:57.560 --> 00:08:02.360 Man, if we could rinse and repeat this model in every church plant or, you 115 00:08:02.360 --> 00:08:05.860 know, basically church startup in America, we could build a really good 116 00:08:05.860 --> 00:08:10.350 business. And so I had been doing a podcast with you. And I is mutual 117 00:08:10.350 --> 00:08:14.210 friend Kenny Ortiz called inspiring Awesome. And through the course of 118 00:08:14.210 --> 00:08:17.480 doing that podcast, it was really We had started it long before I started 119 00:08:17.480 --> 00:08:21.470 sweet fish, and I'd realize that anybody that I asked to be a guest on 120 00:08:21.470 --> 00:08:26.060 that show would say yes to me, just this authority of like, Oh, we have a 121 00:08:26.060 --> 00:08:30.510 podcast. You wanna be a guest? It was this unique novel thing. And so I was 122 00:08:30.510 --> 00:08:35.220 like, Man, I wonder if I started a podcast for church planters. If I could 123 00:08:35.220 --> 00:08:38.720 just ask them to be a guest on this show, they'd probably say Yes, I could 124 00:08:38.720 --> 00:08:41.400 build a relationship with them and then figure out if we could do their content 125 00:08:41.400 --> 00:08:45.150 marketing for them. And so we did that Kenny and I, because he's an aspiring 126 00:08:45.150 --> 00:08:48.550 church planner, so he has kind of the subject matter Expertise was like, Hey, 127 00:08:48.550 --> 00:08:52.850 let's start another show called Plant better, and we reached out to 100 128 00:08:53.340 --> 00:09:00.240 pastors of these churches, and 80% of them responded to our email. And so for 129 00:09:00.240 --> 00:09:04.380 those listening, you probably know that cold email response rates are typically 130 00:09:04.380 --> 00:09:09.800 less than 1%. We got an 80% reply rate on this email cadence. We ended up 131 00:09:09.800 --> 00:09:15.460 doing episodes with 45 off those pastors and ultimately figured out very 132 00:09:15.460 --> 00:09:19.840 quickly that churches don't have budget for content marketing. So our our 133 00:09:19.840 --> 00:09:23.320 customer the one that I made the thesis on that like, Oh, man, if we could have 134 00:09:23.320 --> 00:09:27.080 a bunch of these customers would be great. They were funded by a very 135 00:09:27.080 --> 00:09:31.570 affluent family member, and so they had money that most church plants do not 136 00:09:31.570 --> 00:09:35.900 have, and so the willingness to pay for a content marketing service for a 137 00:09:35.900 --> 00:09:39.370 church. It was very low on their priority list. But on a flight back 138 00:09:39.370 --> 00:09:44.720 from San Diego, where my my wife's family is, I just started thinking I 139 00:09:44.720 --> 00:09:49.540 was like, Man, this worked. Like if church planners were are ideal buyer, 140 00:09:49.550 --> 00:09:53.560 this strategy of like doing a podcast asking them to be a guest on it would 141 00:09:53.560 --> 00:09:58.010 have worked. So what if we pivot our agency instead of being a blogger 142 00:09:58.010 --> 00:10:02.810 riding shop. We can still do blogged writing. But what if we're a podcast 143 00:10:02.810 --> 00:10:06.630 agency? And then we can use the blogger riding team that we've already built to 144 00:10:06.630 --> 00:10:11.600 just repurpose the podcast episodes into written content, but really the 145 00:10:11.600 --> 00:10:16.420 value of the services? Hey, we're going to get you into meetings with the 146 00:10:16.420 --> 00:10:19.830 people that can actually buy your service. And it's not the traditional 147 00:10:19.830 --> 00:10:23.350 route of like, hey, want to get on a sales call? It's Hey, collaborate with 148 00:10:23.350 --> 00:10:27.160 them, do a podcast interview with them, build a genuine relationship with them 149 00:10:27.440 --> 00:10:30.700 and then on the back end of that relationship, you can ultimately 150 00:10:30.700 --> 00:10:34.420 determine if there's a possibility toe work with them or not, and you're going 151 00:10:34.420 --> 00:10:38.430 to create great content in the process. So I was like that, that that epiphany 152 00:10:38.430 --> 00:10:45.360 moment being in the plane towards the end of 2015, we went into 2016 guns, a 153 00:10:45.360 --> 00:10:49.720 blazing That's when we started this show be to be growth and for 150 154 00:10:49.720 --> 00:10:53.250 episodes of this show. Dan, I think you know this, but for those listening that 155 00:10:53.250 --> 00:10:56.530 don't the first if you go back and listen to the 1st 150 episodes. You'll 156 00:10:56.530 --> 00:11:01.980 notice that we interviewed all VPs of sales because I thought this strategy 157 00:11:01.990 --> 00:11:07.600 was gonna be perfect for a sales leader, because who doesn't want all of their 158 00:11:07.600 --> 00:11:12.570 reps having tons of conversations with their ideal buyer's every day but come 159 00:11:12.570 --> 00:11:18.910 to find out after 150 episodes? Yeah, they're not in charge of anything that 160 00:11:18.910 --> 00:11:22.220 even smells like marketing. They have budget for head count, and they have 161 00:11:22.220 --> 00:11:26.070 budget for technology. They don't have budget for a marketing service. It was 162 00:11:26.070 --> 00:11:31.340 just out of the realm of what was reality for them. So 150 episodes, 163 00:11:31.340 --> 00:11:34.810 which, because we were doing so many episodes that only took us, I think, 164 00:11:34.810 --> 00:11:39.590 six months to get to 150 episodes. We then pivoted and said, because all of 165 00:11:39.590 --> 00:11:42.010 them were saying, Oh, yeah, you should talk to my counterpart marketing. You 166 00:11:42.010 --> 00:11:47.170 should talk to my counterpart marketing and I was stubborn and ignorant and 167 00:11:47.140 --> 00:11:50.390 delayed making this shift. But when I finally did is when the show really 168 00:11:50.390 --> 00:11:54.060 started to take off, because then we started reaching out to VPs of 169 00:11:54.060 --> 00:11:58.410 marketing, asking them to be a guest on the show. They were saying Yes, we 170 00:11:58.410 --> 00:12:01.010 would have conversations with them about Hey, have you guys ever thought 171 00:12:01.010 --> 00:12:05.420 about doing a podcast and the guest relationships that we were forming now 172 00:12:05.420 --> 00:12:09.150 that we were forming the right guest relationships with VPs of marketing 173 00:12:09.340 --> 00:12:13.290 that started parlaying into new business wasn't always immediate. It 174 00:12:13.290 --> 00:12:18.170 was actually rarely immediate. But the long term ramification of us stacking 175 00:12:18.170 --> 00:12:22.670 up hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of relationships with VPs of marketing 176 00:12:22.680 --> 00:12:26.310 ended up allowing us to grow now a multimillion dollar business over the 177 00:12:26.310 --> 00:12:31.120 last five years without really spending any money. We've not raised any money. 178 00:12:31.120 --> 00:12:34.650 We took out a little bit of debt financing, but we've raised no money 179 00:12:34.660 --> 00:12:39.640 and to build a multimillion dollar profitable business on the back of this 180 00:12:39.640 --> 00:12:46.960 strategy, I think is pretty incredible. I'm obviously biased, but I'm I'm very 181 00:12:46.970 --> 00:12:50.830 proud of the work that we get to Dio. I know that over the years we've had some 182 00:12:50.830 --> 00:12:55.410 people. I think we've got a glass door review where they're like Oh, there, 183 00:12:55.410 --> 00:12:58.480 you know, it's a shady business. They're like tricking people to be on 184 00:12:58.480 --> 00:13:02.440 their podcast and and only so they can sell to them. And I'm like, Well, I 185 00:13:02.440 --> 00:13:06.290 don't It's obviously a disgruntled former employee because they clearly 186 00:13:06.290 --> 00:13:09.410 don't understand that that's not what this strategy is at all. You're not 187 00:13:09.410 --> 00:13:13.660 tricking people to warn you. Before I even worked here, one of your customers 188 00:13:13.840 --> 00:13:16.550 reached out to me to be on their podcast, and that's already after I 189 00:13:16.550 --> 00:13:19.380 heard your Ted X talk and I already talked to you. I already knew the game, 190 00:13:19.390 --> 00:13:22.470 and so when they reached out to me and said like, Do you wanna be on our 191 00:13:22.470 --> 00:13:25.310 higher education podcast? I was like, because that's where I was. I was 192 00:13:25.310 --> 00:13:31.230 working for higher ed. I was like, Absolutely, Absolutely. I want to be 193 00:13:31.230 --> 00:13:34.500 featured on that podcast or you can't even though you knew that you were 194 00:13:34.500 --> 00:13:38.370 probably an ideal buyer for them and we were already in sales conversations, 195 00:13:38.370 --> 00:13:40.880 they were just trying to sweeten the deal and we ended up not going with 196 00:13:40.880 --> 00:13:44.150 them. But I was much more endeared to them afterwards. It's certainly worth 197 00:13:44.150 --> 00:13:48.060 and I knew what was going on and it was still good for me, like I had people 198 00:13:48.060 --> 00:13:51.350 reaching out to me because of that show. I'm linked and being like, Hey, like 199 00:13:51.340 --> 00:13:54.110 the things you said on that podcast. Really cool. I'd like to talk to you If 200 00:13:54.110 --> 00:13:56.710 I were actually in the business of selling higher and marketing like I 201 00:13:56.710 --> 00:14:00.130 could have got some positive leads off of that one show because they had 202 00:14:00.130 --> 00:14:03.190 enough audience Onyx. They've done, like 80 episodes or something about 203 00:14:03.190 --> 00:14:08.010 that point that it was beneficial. It was value driven for me. They turned it 204 00:14:08.010 --> 00:14:11.400 into a full block, posted a video and I shared it with my networks. It was 205 00:14:11.400 --> 00:14:15.010 freaking amazing, even though I knew they were doing it primarily to win the 206 00:14:15.010 --> 00:14:18.670 relationship with me for the hopes that are, You know, that's the beautiful 207 00:14:18.670 --> 00:14:21.800 part about this strategy as much as they were doing it toe win the 208 00:14:21.800 --> 00:14:26.150 relationship with you, which it worked in the sense of you have positive 209 00:14:26.150 --> 00:14:31.040 affinity toward them. You ultimately didn't decide to buy from them, but I 210 00:14:31.040 --> 00:14:34.840 think they would still say that the interview with you was good because it 211 00:14:34.850 --> 00:14:39.220 also allowed them to achieve their content marketing objective, which is 212 00:14:39.230 --> 00:14:45.140 create great content with industry practitioners so that we establish 213 00:14:45.140 --> 00:14:49.990 authority with our potential buyers. So who knows how much that episode 214 00:14:50.000 --> 00:14:53.780 influenced a purchase decision of somebody else that was listening to the 215 00:14:53.780 --> 00:14:57.130 episode or read the block post or somebody that was in your network. And 216 00:14:57.130 --> 00:15:00.990 when you shared it, they saw it and ended up becoming aware of that company, 217 00:15:01.000 --> 00:15:05.820 and they otherwise never would have. So there's so many different facets in 218 00:15:05.820 --> 00:15:09.940 terms of the benefits that you could derive from this, that I think we've 219 00:15:09.940 --> 00:15:13.970 stumbled onto a strategy that is going to be the new way that B two B 220 00:15:13.970 --> 00:15:18.120 marketing is done, where you can accomplish both A B M and content, 221 00:15:18.120 --> 00:15:23.100 marketing objectives and thought leadership objectives all in the same 222 00:15:23.110 --> 00:15:27.200 in the same activity. Yeah, I'm mad that I didn't discover how good this 223 00:15:27.200 --> 00:15:30.620 was earlier. I was like a full stack digital marketer. I'm like, Yeah, I got 224 00:15:30.620 --> 00:15:34.660 my CEO. I got my email marketing automation. I'm a Web designer landing 225 00:15:34.660 --> 00:15:39.680 page optimizer. And then James tells me about podcasting. I'm like, Oh, shoot! 226 00:15:39.690 --> 00:15:42.400 That's like, way better And it's I don't know if you know this by 227 00:15:42.400 --> 00:15:45.570 listening to it, but it's a lot easier to record a podcast than it is. Ah, 228 00:15:45.640 --> 00:15:50.030 right, a block post or create an email campaign or any of those things. It's 229 00:15:50.030 --> 00:15:53.250 just so much straight. It's just easier to get up here and talking, which what 230 00:15:53.250 --> 00:15:56.160 we're doing now. We didn't pre rehearsed this. We didn't even have 231 00:15:56.160 --> 00:15:58.870 bullet points. We kind of talked about what we're going to talk about. We just 232 00:15:58.870 --> 00:16:02.180 started talking. There's something else I want to bring up was I listen to your 233 00:16:02.180 --> 00:16:05.790 story, James, That I feel like is really important is just a for content 234 00:16:05.790 --> 00:16:09.410 marketing, specifically because content marketing to be hard, you throw a few 235 00:16:09.410 --> 00:16:11.930 things out there, you don't get traction, and a lot of companies will 236 00:16:11.930 --> 00:16:16.800 go to a specific channel that's content focused and just call it quits. But 237 00:16:16.800 --> 00:16:21.730 what I find over and over, and the longer I've been pushing this or 238 00:16:21.740 --> 00:16:25.690 banging this drum, the more I believe in it is that quantity really is the 239 00:16:25.690 --> 00:16:29.840 way to get there, because you wouldn't have had the unlock unless you did. I 240 00:16:29.840 --> 00:16:33.440 mean, you already written a lot of block post to find that Oh, let's try 241 00:16:33.440 --> 00:16:37.590 podcasts and just to reach out to people to write more block posts. And 242 00:16:37.590 --> 00:16:41.990 then you did 45 episodes. Where church planners to find out that wasn't quite 243 00:16:41.990 --> 00:16:46.410 the right thing. And then you flip it to be to be and have to do 150 episodes 244 00:16:46.410 --> 00:16:50.940 with sales people to find out the right kind of person and then with marketing, 245 00:16:50.940 --> 00:16:54.440 you have to dial up. We're almost at 2000 episodes now, and it's working 246 00:16:54.440 --> 00:16:58.370 really well. But I find over and over again in order to really hit it well, 247 00:16:58.380 --> 00:17:02.620 organically with content and build an audience and find the way it's gonna 248 00:17:02.620 --> 00:17:06.410 work for you. It just takes. You just have to take a lot of swings in the 249 00:17:06.410 --> 00:17:09.089 beginning because you're gonna swing wrong over and over again. And the 250 00:17:09.089 --> 00:17:13.030 people that I'm finding are the ones who win on YouTube, who win unlinked 251 00:17:13.030 --> 00:17:17.280 and who win on Twitter are just out there multiple times a day. Take it 252 00:17:17.280 --> 00:17:22.190 swings. Figuring out what works. Making modifications. Itt's rare to hear a 253 00:17:22.190 --> 00:17:26.560 story where someone snapped their fingers and e mean, it's almost trite 254 00:17:26.560 --> 00:17:29.720 to say it now, but like there's no such thing as an overnight success. Jimmy 255 00:17:29.720 --> 00:17:34.820 Donaldson, who the world knows is Mr Beast on YouTube as the I think the 256 00:17:34.820 --> 00:17:38.960 largest YouTube channel in the world right now, I think the dude made $97 257 00:17:38.960 --> 00:17:45.730 million from YouTube in 2020 and that's a legitimate business that he's built. 258 00:17:45.740 --> 00:17:51.840 But his first, I don't know, 67 800 videos of him playing Minecraft and 259 00:17:51.840 --> 00:17:55.420 trying different formats didn't work. It wasn't until he figured out. Oh, 260 00:17:55.420 --> 00:18:00.660 when I do these giveaways or these stunts, that's what really gets people 261 00:18:00.660 --> 00:18:04.120 toe want to engage with my content. And But he wouldn't have gotten there had 262 00:18:04.120 --> 00:18:08.510 he not put in the reps from, you know, the age of 12 until the age of you know, 263 00:18:08.510 --> 00:18:13.160 16 or 17, I think, was when he started really getting traction. That's it. It 264 00:18:13.160 --> 00:18:16.400 takes a lot of reps. So I think is you go into channels before you write them 265 00:18:16.400 --> 00:18:20.770 off is not working. You have to really count the cost, and it's not a hard 266 00:18:20.770 --> 00:18:25.290 cost. You can. I love paid media as you can pay to play and get in the game 267 00:18:25.290 --> 00:18:31.890 quick. But organic media the cost is just gonna be time, time and talent. 268 00:18:31.900 --> 00:18:35.630 But the talent comes through the time spent. So how do you think talent if 269 00:18:35.630 --> 00:18:39.250 you're gonna put enough time into it. The bet that we made with content based 270 00:18:39.250 --> 00:18:43.700 networking and with this strategy was that the investment in genuine 271 00:18:43.700 --> 00:18:50.140 relationships is never going to return unfruitful. So the reason why I think 272 00:18:50.140 --> 00:18:54.700 that this whole approach to be marketing is transformational is 273 00:18:54.700 --> 00:19:00.010 because it's rooted in something very human. It's rooted in relationship and 274 00:19:00.010 --> 00:19:03.990 when you can build genuine relationships with your ideal buyer's, 275 00:19:04.000 --> 00:19:09.330 whether they buy from you or not. If you have AH, systematic process for 276 00:19:09.330 --> 00:19:13.590 building relationships over and over and over and over again with people in 277 00:19:13.590 --> 00:19:17.740 your space, it is going to have positive r a y on your business. 278 00:19:17.750 --> 00:19:23.320 Because relationships are the essence of B two B that there's nothing. I 279 00:19:23.320 --> 00:19:26.580 genuinely don't believe that there is anything that trumps the power of 280 00:19:26.580 --> 00:19:31.360 relationship when it comes to influencing a B two B buying decision. 281 00:19:31.740 --> 00:19:34.580 I hear it all the time from Our customers are like, Oh, we came and we 282 00:19:34.580 --> 00:19:37.500 bought. We bought the Kool Aid and we liked it, but we didn't understand was 283 00:19:37.500 --> 00:19:43.420 the that almost the equity they got from building a community and friends 284 00:19:43.420 --> 00:19:47.270 of people all over the place. It's like the reason why they stayed like, Oh, we 285 00:19:47.270 --> 00:19:50.270 came for you because we need a podcast editing. But we stayed because we're in 286 00:19:50.270 --> 00:19:54.670 an ecosystem that took on a life of its own that is so valuable that I can't 287 00:19:54.670 --> 00:20:00.370 imagine going back because maybe maybe 80% of them didn't become customers. A 288 00:20:00.370 --> 00:20:04.680 good amount did. But all those people who didn't become customers somehow 289 00:20:05.140 --> 00:20:08.520 like they've all been ableto been ableto get value out of all those 290 00:20:08.520 --> 00:20:11.620 relationships. And I've been able to add value to lots of them, and all of a 291 00:20:11.620 --> 00:20:15.740 sudden that's lifted us to a new place in so many random in ways that you 292 00:20:15.740 --> 00:20:19.470 can't predict. But it does, because the more people you know, the more chances 293 00:20:19.470 --> 00:20:23.050 of getting to help you need comes around. They might be your next higher 294 00:20:23.440 --> 00:20:26.600 Yep, who knows, Like you don't know how what? How that relationship is gonna 295 00:20:26.600 --> 00:20:30.630 just crazy. I mean, Logan, for you and your next company, you know, it's like 296 00:20:30.630 --> 00:20:34.450 you don't know. Yeah, there's so many different. I mean, Logan was a listener 297 00:20:34.450 --> 00:20:39.140 of our podcast for years, and that's that's ultimately how he got on our 298 00:20:39.140 --> 00:20:43.220 radar and ended up being the guy that tripled our business the year that he 299 00:20:43.220 --> 00:20:48.220 joined a czar. First sales higher outside of, you know, outside of my 300 00:20:48.220 --> 00:20:53.940 brother in law and just completely transformed our business. So yeah, so 301 00:20:53.940 --> 00:20:58.620 that's That's the story, man. Awesome. Well, we'll just end there six years. 302 00:20:58.630 --> 00:21:05.790 Six years, man. Happy birthday to sweet fish. Hey, everybody. Logan was sweet 303 00:21:05.790 --> 00:21:09.740 fish here. If you're a regular listener of B two B growth, you know that I'm 304 00:21:09.740 --> 00:21:13.660 one of the co host of the show, but you may not know that I also head up the 305 00:21:13.660 --> 00:21:18.240 sales team here. A sweet fish. So for those of you in sales or sales ops, I 306 00:21:18.240 --> 00:21:21.710 wanted to take a second to share something that's made us insanely more 307 00:21:21.710 --> 00:21:26.010 efficient. Lately, our team has been using lead I Q for the past few months 308 00:21:26.020 --> 00:21:30.590 and what used to take us four hours gathering contact data now takes us on 309 00:21:30.590 --> 00:21:35.520 Lee. One where 75% more efficient were able to move faster with outbound 310 00:21:35.520 --> 00:21:40.010 prospecting. And organizing our campaigns is so much easier than before. 311 00:21:40.020 --> 00:21:44.150 I'd highly suggest you guys check out lead I Q as well. You can check them 312 00:21:44.150 --> 00:21:49.970 out at lead. I q dot com That's l e a d e que dot com 313 00:21:51.640 --> 00:21:55.590 Is your buyer of UDP marketer? If so, you should think about sponsoring this 314 00:21:55.590 --> 00:22:00.550 podcast. B two B Growth gets downloaded over 130,000 times each month, and our 315 00:22:00.550 --> 00:22:04.360 listeners are marketing decision makers. If it sounds interesting, send Logan 316 00:22:04.360 --> 00:22:07.180 and email Logan at sweet fish media dot com.