10 Signs You Need A Marketing Strategy and How To Get Back On Track

10 Signs You Need A Marketing Strategy and How To Get Back On Track written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

As a marketing consultant, I meet numerous business owners who are all set to take their companies to new heights. But, I’ve also noticed a consistent pattern of confusion about what a marketing strategy truly entails. Marketing strategy is a detailed plan designed by businesses to promote their product or service through different channels and […]

Unveiling The Future Of AI

Unveiling The Future Of AI written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Marketing Podcast with Kenneth Wenger In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Kenneth Wenger. He is an author, a research scholar at Toronto Metropolitan University, and CTO of Squint AI Inc. His research interests lie at the intersection of humans and machines, ensuring that we build a future based on the […]

Embracing Your Entrepreneurial Superpower Being Unemployable

Embracing Your Entrepreneurial Superpower Being Unemployable written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Marketing Podcast with Alysia Silberg In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Alysia Silberg. She is a leading venture capitalist in Silicon Valley, where she mentors tech startups and helps them go public. She is the CEO & General Partner of the investment firm Street Global. Her online radio show: Global […]

How To Write A Business Book That Matters

How To Write A Business Book That Matters written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with Josh Bernoff In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Josh Bernoff. He is the bestselling author or ghostwriter of eight business books and contributed to 50 book projects that have generated over $20 million for their authors. Josh was formerly Senior Vice President, Idea Development at Forrester, where he […] Embracing Your Entrepreneurial Superpower Being Unemployable written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with Alysia Silberg In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Alysia Silberg. She is a leading venture capitalist in Silicon Valley, where she mentors tech startups and helps them go public. She is the CEO & General Partner of the investment firm Street Global. Her online radio show: Global Fireside Chats, brings together global industry titans to share insights on our fast-changing world. Furthermore, Alysia is a UN Women Empower Women Global Champion and an international board director with sovereign wealth fund experience.  Her first book, Unemployable: How I Hired Myself details her life story and guide to financial freedom. It’s a guide that helps to change your mindset from “I can’t” to “I can”.  Key Takeaway: Alysia changes the narrative of being “unemployable” and relates it to entrepreneurship and finding one’s superpower in business. Being unemployable is something to be proud of, as it often reflects the mindset and qualities of an entrepreneur, that can lead to innovation and generate changes. She emphasizes the importance of owning one’s uniqueness, taking risks, embracing curiosity, and seizing the opportunities presented by the digital revolution. The current business environment, which Alysia describes as a “modern-day renaissance”, it’s a time for innovation and new opportunities. It’s important to leverage the power of AI and digital tools to start and grow a business and develop each person’s superpower. Questions I ask Alysia Silberg: [01:52] Tell me a little bit about the artwork from the book cover. [03:07] Your book launch party was at a roller rink. How did that come about? [04:13] Why is the book called Unemployable? [07:20] Can you name a particular instance in your career where you felt like “This is going to work, this is like what I should be doing”? [08:58] You talk about superpowers and finding your superpower. Does your superpower have a name? [10:00] Back in South Africa you got shot, what did that story mean to your journey? [11:53] Is there anything about what’s going on right now in the current business environment that you think makes us a strong time? [15:25] What’s the first step you tell people to acquire the mindset you talk about? [18:23] What are your thoughts on the idea that there are proven business models and you don’t have to like to create a whole new thing from zero? [19:41] Based on where you see where we are today, what’s work going to look like in 10 years? More About Alysia Silberg: Get your copy of Unemployable: How I Hired Myself Connect with Alysia and follow her on Instagram More About The Agency Certification Intensive Training: Learn more about the Agency Certification Intensive Training here Take The Marketing Assessment: Marketingassessment.co Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please! Duct Tape Transcript Email Download New Tab John Jantsch (00:00): Hey, did you know that HubSpot’s annual inbound conference is coming up? That’s right. It’ll be in Boston from September 5th through the eighth. Every year inbound brings together leaders across business, sales, marketing, customer success, operations, and more. You’ll be able to discover all the latest must know trends and tactics that you can actually put into place to scale your business in a sustainable way. You can learn from industry experts and be inspired by incredible spotlight talent. This year. The likes of Reese Witherspoon, Derek Jeter, Guy Raz are all going to make appearances. Visit inbound.com and get your ticket today. You won’t be sorry. This programming is guaranteed to inspire and recharge. That’s right. Go to inbound.com to get your ticket today. (01:03): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Alysia Silberg. She’s a leading venture capitalist in Silicone Valley where she mentors tech startups and helps them go public. She is the CEO and general partner of the investment firm, street Global. Her online radio show, global Fireside Chats brings together global industry tightens to share insights on our fast changing world. She is a UN Women Empower Women Global Champion, and an international board director with Sovereign Wealth Fund experience. We’re gonna talk about her first book, Unemployable: how I Hired Myself. So Alysia, welcome to the show. Alysia Silberg (01:47): Hi John. Very excited to be joining you. Thanks for having me. John Jantsch (01:50): So listeners can’t see this, although you’ll see, you can see it in the show notes, the video of folks obviously will see it, but I, you have a picture of the artwork from the cover behind you there in the in frame and I just, I wanted to start there because I just absolutely love it. So tell me a little bit about, I mean I frankly it’s a work of art. Alysia Silberg (02:08): Thank you. Um, very excited to hear you say that. So you talk about being unemployable, you talk about the future of ai. I know these are themes we’ll be chatting about today, but I had five designers trying to come up with what it meant to be unemployable and no one could convey that in imagery. And one of my founders who has an ed tech startup focusing on AI in Minneapolis, he said, let me sit down and let me take the book and let me put it in open AI’s design platform and let’s see what happens. And the, this is what the AI came up with. It’s the essence of a founder’s journey and it’s interpreting it, you know, that drive and ambition, you know, like that all of its embodied it that in this situation happens to be my image. But I’m, I’m very excited that we created that connection with the AI and it turned out the way it did. John Jantsch (02:55): Yeah, it’s kind of a, a block, almost like a Japanese block print illustration. It’s really fabulous. Okay, another totally unrelated topic to the book, sort of, I also love that you were doing a book launch party at a roller rink. How did that come about ? Alysia Silberg (03:11): Well, we’re gonna be, you know, the book is about finding your superpower and you know, superpowers are often unexpected and we discovered them in the weirdest of ways. And for me, they happened to be, I went to a pair of pink roller skates at five years old. I went to them more than anything on earth and I couldn’t afford them. No one in my family could afford them. And I had to figure out how I could get these pink roller skates and I built a business and you’ll read all about it in the book. Crazy wild Only founders understand what it means to, to want something so badly. And I never wore those roller estates ever. I treasured them cuz they reminded me of what’s possible. The dreamer, you know, anything is possible. And so the idea of having a a roller skating party for the book was the only thing I could do to honor each of our journeys. For me it’s roller skates. For you it was probably something else, but once a founder, always a founder and it was just, it’s the way it’s meant to be John Jantsch (04:05): Kind of sounds like a load of fun too. So there’s that . So why unemployable? I mean that that name specifically or that term specifically as opposed to entrepreneur or, you know, I, I know obviously you’re trying to convey something maybe a little deeper. Alysia Silberg (04:26): Absolutely. So I was trained as an actuary and I went for a career aptitude test at a bank. And I was like, you know, on my way thinking I joined, you know, a big bank and I was told I, I was unemployable in that attitude test and I was devastated. I was like, what do I do now? And I took it as an insult and at the time it was, you know, it wasn’t a compliment and it took me decades to own that. And what I do today now is I’m a researcher and I’m an investor. Like those are the things that make me the entrepreneur that I am. Right. And it was very tough choosing the title. I did a ton of research because everyone kept saying, but you’re not unemployable. How can you say you’re unemployable? And I’m like, well actually I am. (05:07): And it’s okay. It’s something to be proud of. The most important creators in history were basically unemployable to create innovation and change in these things. You’ve gotta be able to just live in a different way to many people and take risks. But there’s a lot of bravery around their title And I, I hope and honors the founder’s journey. So for everyone out there that feels the unemployable, as I say, I’ve learned to own it and be the queen of unemployable . And I know my family members are like, have you lost your mind? But it’s my truth. John Jantsch (05:39): No, it’s funny, I relate to it maybe in a little different sense. I, I’ve owned my own business for 30 years i’s I worked for somebody for about five years and said, you know, I, anybody can run a business. But uh, there was a sense of feeling unemployable but it was more of a probably a self-esteem issue than it was uh, you know, I can go out there and conquer the world. And I wonder if, if, you know, it’d be interesting if you’ve come to this place you’re in right now, but I’m wondering if a lot of entrepreneurs, you know, start with that same view a little bit regardless of what it turns into. Alysia Silberg (06:12): Absolutely. I think I suffered from huge imposter syndrome and the ironic part was it was that bank who didn’t want me and because of my imposter syndrome I decided no one wanted me. So when job offer offers came, I was like whoa, I don’t feel I belong here because there’s something wrong with me. Versus I’m a born and bred founder and this is what I do. Like you, you’ve been running a company for a very long time and I think definitely, I think many people and I think that’s what I hope to get out of the book where each person has something unique and instead of hiding from it and saying I have to con conform to what everybody expects me to do, rather say, okay, AI is bringing all this change. People are gonna lose their jobs, things are gonna be very different. Let me own my superpower, let me bold a business. And even if I do feel a bit like an imposter even now, I still feel like an imposter. I still have to work on it a lot. It’s okay. You will find customers that will support you just the way you are and you can bold something really cool as you have done John Jantsch (07:12): So. So you have started, have you lost track of how many companies over the years? Number doesn’t matter Alysia Silberg (07:18): Too many, John Jantsch (07:18): Many. But uh, I’m wondering if you could in hindsight, as we always do, kind of go back and think about like a time, maybe it was one company or maybe it was a number of companies where you felt like this is gonna work, this is like what I should be doing. And you know, that moment was, you know, not just validating but actually drove you forward. Absolutely. You think about a particular instance Alysia Silberg (07:43): For sure. I think it was the company that we built that brought us to the US in the first place where I just, it was connecting the dots and we were solving a problem for our customer. So it was a very early voice analytics pro uh, platform, which is helping salespeople sell better. Long before sales enablement became like this very ubiquitous thing. And it was just, there was so much intensity coming at us from the market where they wanted something better that wasn’t available. That even though everyone in South Africa said to us, you’re mad, what are you doing going to America for a sales app? The idea that there was a probability of greater than let’s say 10%, that we would bold something extremely valuable. That was enough of, I don’t know, just a spark of you know, like I’m gonna do this no matter what and even whatever happens, I’m doing this and I’m gonna make it work. But absolutely that one was just clear and I think I used that to look at startups today where when I can see something that’s gonna happen, you wanna be on that journey cuz it’s so exciting. John Jantsch (08:44): Yeah. And then it, and I mean this in a positive way then it becomes like a drug, right? You recognize it the next sentence like I want that high again. Right, . Alysia Silberg (08:51): Absolutely. Absolutely. It’s addictive. John Jantsch (08:57): So, so you talk a lot in this book about superpowers and finding your superpower. I’m curious, does your superpower have a name? Alysia Silberg (09:05): I’m obsessed with pattern recognition and I think growing up people saw me as a freak. Like it was very tough growing up cuz I was so different to everyone around me, like in South Africa and absolutely I’m not and I think that’s why I work so well with the AI because it’s so much better than pattern rec, pattern recognition than me. And faster is absolutely for sure. It’s better, I’ve gotta admit I have to, I’ve done a lot of work on my ego, a lot of humility, but I’m obsessed with finding patterns and stuff, which is really cool when it comes to investing. John Jantsch (09:38): It’s interesting, I’ve for years, you know, have told people that my superpower is curiosity and I think that’s probably very related to you know, pattern recognition. A lot of times, you know, I will read a book about architecture and you know, get my best ideas even though I have nothing to do with architecture , you know? Right. I think there’s a lot to that. Let’s go back to South Africa. You’re very young and you had an incident where you got shot or almost got shot or faced where faced and I obviously I I think the story bears interest in where you are today, but also just, you know, what did that story sort of mean to your journey? Alysia Silberg (10:18): Absolutely and I think it was a pivotal moment in the sense that I saw an environment that just made no sense to me. And I was very young and I saw the people around me where they chose to live in an environment that they believed made sense to them because they were fearful of going and as you say, being curious enough to try something that was better, even though it was very scary for me, I had no choice from that moment onwards. I knew I was gonna come to America and it never mattered what went wrong, what obstacle, what was thrown in my way. Like as you read the book, you’ll see the number of times where I had visa troubles and it was like I never gave up on the American dream where you say curiosity, the idea that you can live in a place where the sky is the limit for founders and you can bolt till your heart’s content and there’s so much support available and you’ll always find an investor, you’ll always find customers, you’ll always find team members. I didn’t grow up in that environment and so that moment that happened, even though it was the most terrifying thing to ever happen in my life, I still have the scar to this day and I could have had it removed, but I chose to have it because it’s a reminder of where I came from and to feel a sense of gratitude of where I am and that just never take for granted the luckiness to actually be here. John Jantsch (11:44): Is there anything about this moment in time that makes it like, now is when you should jump now is when you should do your, you know, whatever you’ve been thinking about doing there? Anything about what’s going on right now, you know, in in the current business environment that you think makes us a strong time? Alysia Silberg (11:59): Absolutely. I think, you know, I’m a student of the Renaissance. I’ve studied it in depth and we are living at the most exciting time in history. You know, many people are very frightened, you know, economically, politically, there’s a lot happening. But this is a time of great excitement and I think there are many people who fear the AI revolution and yes, there will be a lot of change in terms of jobs and in terms of all these things that will change, but ultimately they will change for the better. But I think going back to superpowers, why I felt it was so important to get the book into as many people’s hands as possible is I know what it’s like to have no money. I know what it’s like to be frightened. I know what it’s like to have to be poor and like all those things I’ve experienced those things and you don’t wanna be sitting in your job thinking, what’s gonna happen to me? (12:46): What’s gonna happen to my kids? Versus thinking, okay, this may happen to me, but instead of sitting waiting for it, I’m gonna take my life into my own hands. I have something of value that I can offer the world. How do I leverage the power of, let’s say the internet? There are 3 billion people online. So com, the combination of your superpower and the power of the internet, you can easily start a business on the side and you can grow it. It’s, and the fact that you don’t need to know how to code anymore, the fact that you don’t need to know how to do all these things because the AI is so easy, it’s anyone can use it now it’s a matter of, you said it, curiosity coming from a place of like, okay, I’m gonna learn this. This isn’t difficult. Like it’s there and it’s there for the taking. And I think the longer people wait purely because it’s new and a little bit scary for many people, the more you get left behind versus saying, okay, we are living through a modern day renaissance and it’s coming out of the us let me participate, let me do it. And in yours, time at the speed things are going, you’ll never, ever look back that much I can assure you of. John Jantsch (13:50): And now let’s hear a word from our sponsor, marketing Made Simple. It’s a podcast hosted by Dr. JJ Peterson and is brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network. The audio destination for business professionals marketing made simple brings you practical tips to make your marketing easy and more importantly make it work. And in a recent episode, JJ and April chat with StoryBrand certified guides and agency owners about how to use ChatGPT for marketing purposes. We all know how important that is today. Listen to marketing Made Simple. Wherever you get your podcasts. (14:27): Hey marketing agency owners, you know, I can teach you the keys to doubling your business in just 90 days or your money back. Sound interesting. All you have to do is license our three-step process that’s gonna allow you to make your competitors irrelevant, charge a premium for your services and scale perhaps without adding overhead. And here’s the best part. You can license this entire system for your agency by simply participating in an upcoming agency certification intensive look, why create the wheel? Use a set of tools that took us over 20 years to create. And you can have ’em today, check it out at dtm.world/certification. That’s dtm.world/certification. (15:11): I guarantee you, when this book comes out and you’re out speaking to uh, groups or speaking to individuals, somebody’s gonna come up to you and say, okay, your talk was brilliant, I’m so inspired. But like, what’s the first step? . Alysia Silberg (15:27): Absolutely. I’ve tried to take what I’ve learned over the last decade with AI and simplify it in a way that empowers anyone, right? I’m obsessed with being a teacher and I hope, you know, I believe in radical open-mindedness. I hope that what I’ve done is going to help many people. So I have a daily AI use data that’s free and it’s got different sections to it. One of the sections I love the most is tools. And there’s all these different tools there and when people start reading it, they’ll be like, she’s insane. She expects me to understand this stuff and bear with me. As I say, I’ve taught statistics, finance, financial, maths, go and look at the tools every day, just read about the tools and in the beginning it’ll be like it’s a bit new and it’s a bit scary and there’s videos included, there’s all kinds of things. (16:10): And give yourself, let’s say seven days, then 10 days just reading it. And by the end of that you’ll start noticing, Hey, this is not that difficult. Okay, I wanted to build a website instead of going the usual route of all the difficulties of building a website, it’s actually an AI tool that I can use for free or next for free. And I can get an AI tool to build that website for me. And as you watch it build itself and you’re like giving it the parts that it needs to build it, you’ll see it’s actually incredibly fun. It’s, you have no idea how much fun AI’s like, it’s like a form of magic like I use for text messages for, you know, you’re tired, you’re worn down, you’ve had a busy day, you’re trying to convey something, but you just, you’re like, my brain is saturated and the fact that this machine can take what you’re trying to say and just make those micro adjustments so that you’re conveying the right thing, but your tone where you don’t wanna come across as worn down and tired and all these things you wanna be, I’m happy and I’m happy to be talking to and it can do that for you. (17:07): It’s these tiny things where you don’t have to start at the most advanced stuff. You can start at the basics and just bold up and find other people that are interested. That’s being huge for me. Where if you, you bold a peer group of people who are like, I’m really interested in it, why don’t we talk about it? Why don’t we, like one of my friends is doing like music and AI and he’s spending all his time composing music and he’s like, well can you send me your music? I’m like, if I’m embarrassed, he’s like, I’m embarrassed to my music too. But I’m like, okay, let’s share music and see where this goes. And we’ve got this whole AI music group that we’re creating. So I think it’s like, again, taking something you are really interested in and saying, can I have more fun with this? Can I do more with this? And then finding other people who can play with you. It’s a lot about playing. John Jantsch (17:49): Yeah. You know, I started my business before we had the internet, you know, as a marketer I tell that to groups sometimes and they’re like, what? I don’t, I don’t get how right . And I really think that what happens is that with every new tool that comes along, a lot of people get obsessed with the tool itself as opposed to how the tool can be applied to an already proven model. And I think that’s where people miss it. You know, I mean we, I have been licensing our methodology of work for many years and I see AI as a great tool to actually apply to that licensing model as well. And I wonder what your thoughts are on that kind of idea that there are proven business models. You don’t have to like create a whole new thing, you can just use these tools to do it in a different way. It’s pattern recognition in a different way, isn’t it? Alysia Silberg (18:35): Absolutely. Like what you’re doing, it would be a brilliant use case and I’d love to talk to you sometime offline where it’s so much fun to take what you’ve created and say, okay, where are the biggest problems you as the creator with mastery have over your business? Where are those things that you really, you don’t wanna be spending your time on those things, you wanna be spending your time on these other things? And how do we use the AI to give you that time back so that you can spend your time on the thing you love most within your business. And it’s so easy. That’s the part that blows the person’s mind. Where mm-hmm when you actually start doing it. Whe whether it’s accounting, what, whatever it may be, you just don’t wanna be doing it. And the idea that you can outsource it and suddenly and it happens so quickly, you’re like, wow, I have like 30% of my time available that I didn’t have. How do I use that 30%? And that’s an interesting problem to be had. So I would love to talk to you more about like figuring out how we can play together on your stuff because that would be cool. John Jantsch (19:32): Awesome. Let’s do it. Uh, I want you to go beyond where we are today and you know, take the crystal ball for what it’s worth, and say, based on where you see where we are today, where are we, where, what’s work gonna look like in 10 years? Alysia Silberg (19:46): I’m a contrarian and so (19:51): I think this, I think people are going to have, we’re gonna have all these tools, they’re gonna be working for us and I think everyone will have a lot more freedom. I think the machines will be doing all the stuff no one wants to do, which I think is really cool. I think we’ll also go into a very creative period in history again like the renaissance where things that people just didn’t have time to do, they will have time to do. A lot of people around me spend a lot of time thinking about universal basic income. These kinds of things are important to also think about in terms of, in terms of the future, you know, I’ve had an interesting experience on my own team where we started bringing in like digital workers in the team. So like adv, AI avatars. And it’s been very interesting because you think about the team and the team is creating these avatars and my team was like, okay, what kind of demographic do we want? (20:41): What age do we want the avatar to be? All these things that I’m interested to see, like they were literally designing these avatars where lands us up at the same time. I’m fascinated by what young people have to say about this. So I engage a sub even for the book especially, I engage a ton with people like in this 17, 18, 19, 20 year olds

Weekend Favs July 1

Weekend Favs July 1 written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing My weekend blog post routine includes posting links to a handful of tools or great content I ran across during the week. I don’t go into depth about the finds, but I encourage you to check them out if they sound interesting. The photo in the post is a favorite for the week from an […] 10 Signs You Need A Marketing Strategy and How To Get Back On Track written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing As a marketing consultant, I meet numerous business owners who are all set to take their companies to new heights. But, I’ve also noticed a consistent pattern of confusion about what a marketing strategy truly entails. Marketing strategy is a detailed plan designed by businesses to promote their product or service through different channels and tactics, in order to accomplish their business goals and understand their customer needs.But, today I’m not just going to define it for you. Instead, let’s uncover the 10 symptoms indicating your business might be operating without a solid marketing strategy.If you find yourself nodding along to any of these symptoms, it’s high time to collaborate with a strategic professional.This is where the AI Prompts for Building a Marketing Strategy toolkit comes in!This toolkit can help you develop a complete marketing strategy to overcome these symptoms. It’s a step-by-step approach designed to boost your marketing efforts, enhance customer retention, increase online visibility, and improve ROI.Your marketing strategy should be the backbone of your business – a roadmap leading you toward your growth goals. By identifying your ideal customers, creating consistent branding, and tracking your performance, you can start working smarter, not harder. Get Your Toolkit Trying To Be All Things To All People  Lack Of Competitive Edge Forced To Compete On Price  Wasting Money And Resources Inconsistent Branding Low Customer Retention Poor Online Presence Untracked Performance Missed Opportunities Flat Sales And Profits 1. Trying To Be All Things To All PeopleWe’ve all been there. If I’m a dentist, anybody with teeth is my ideal client, right? But this approach, while maybe attracting clients, fails to identify your most profitable, ideal, and best customers. Without understanding this, how can you effectively attract more of them?Instead focus on being the right thing to the right people.The idea of being a universal solution might seem appealing initially, but the truth is, you can’t be all things to all people. In the world of business, it’s crucial to identify your specific target market – the people who will benefit the most from your product or service.Who is your ideal client? What are their pain points? What can you offer them that your competitors can’t? By identifying and understanding your ideal client, you can tailor your marketing efforts to reach them more effectively instead of casting a wide net and hoping to catch something.2. Lack Of Competitive EdgeSound familiar? You’re a commodity. In your clients’ minds, every business that offers the same services is pretty much the same. If you’re just one of many, why should they choose you over ten others who look just like you?Create one.To prevent falling into the “commodity trap”, strive to create a unique value proposition. What makes you different? Why should clients pick you over competitors? Developing a distinct competitive edge doesn’t happen overnight, but it’s well worth the effort. It will allow you to stand out in your market, so you aren’t forced to compete solely on price.3. Forced To Compete On PriceIf your customers can’t distinguish how you’re different or unique, they’ll default to comparing prices. And as we all know, price is a terrible place to compete. There will always be someone willing to sell cheaper than you do.Instead charge a premium.If you’re struggling to differentiate your offering and find yourself competing primarily on price, you might need to reconsider your marketing strategy. The goal should be to provide such outstanding value that your customers are happy to pay a premium for your services.Instead of lowering your prices to compete, consider how you can add more value. How can you make your customers’ lives easier, save them time, or help them achieve their goals? By focusing on value over price, you can charge a premium and boost your profitability.4. Wasting Money And ResourcesWithout a clear strategy, you’re constantly testing the waters, never really sure what’s working. There’s a significant chance that most of your efforts aren’t producing the results you expect.Make sure to resource allocation and track performance.Where are your marketing dollars going? Are you spreading them too thin across too many platforms or channels without really knowing which one is driving results? A robust marketing strategy will include a clear plan for resource allocation backed by regular performance tracking. This approach ensures you’re investing your money and time in avenues that drive results and help you understand what works best for your business.5. Inconsistent BrandingBranding isn’t just for large corporations or soap bars. It’s about how customers perceive your promise or your values. Inconsistent branding leads to confused customers; you either stand for nothing, or you represent confusion.Be Consistent.Inconsistent branding leads to confused customers, and confused customers seldom become loyal customers. Be clear about what your brand stands for, and make sure this message is consistent across all your marketing channels. This includes your website, social media platforms, email marketing, and even your offline marketing materials. Remember, the least expensive thing you can do is to get more business from existing customers. 6. Low Customer Retention You’re losing customers as fast as you’re getting them. Remember, the most cost-effective marketing is getting more business from existing customers.Enhance your customer retention.It’s cheaper to keep an existing customer than to acquire a new one. By focusing on customer retention, you can increase your profitability. This might involve launching a loyalty program, consistently exceeding customer expectations. Here are some ways to make sure you’re always delivering an outstanding value to your customers.7. Poor Online PresenceToday, every business is served by having a robust online presence. If your online presence is weak, it’s likely a symptom of a reactive and weak marketing approach.Improve your online presence. An online presence is non-negotiable. But it’s not enough to just “be online”. You need to have a strategic approach to your online presence. This involves a well-designed, user-friendly website, an engaging social media presence, and maybe even a content marketing strategy that helps establish you as a leader in your field. You need a consistent online presence.8. Untracked PerformanceDo you know what’s working and what’s not? Maybe business is fine, but you don’t know why or whether it will still be good tomorrow.Set a performance tracking strategy.A well-defined strategy allows you to set Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), like website traffic, leads, conversion rates, or customer retention rates. Tracking these KPIs provides invaluable insights into what’s working and what isn’t, enabling strategic adjustments.Having a marketing strategy is about setting goals, tracking progress, and making necessary tweaks. Consistent performance monitoring assures your marketing efforts are steering your business in the right direction. If you don’t know where to start, start by tracking your 3 most important metrics and build on those KPIs. 9. Missed OpportunitiesWithout a strategic focus on your ideal client, you miss the chance to serve them better. You also overlook the potential for partnerships and referrals.Capitalize on opportunities.Every customer interaction presents an opportunity. Are you making the most of these? Could you upsell or cross-sell? What about partnerships and referrals? Data tells that referrals have a 16% higher lifetime value rate, and a 37% higher retention rate than leads generated from other marketing channels. A marketing strategy helps you to spot and seize these opportunities.10. Flat Sales And ProfitsIf your sales and profits are stagnant or even non-existent, it might feel like you’re trapped in a cycle of no growth.Boost your sales and profits.If you find your sales and profits are flat, this is a sure sign you need to rethink your marketing strategy. Integrating sales with a well-executed marketing strategy can help you target your most profitable customers, differentiate your offering, and ultimately drive business growth.It’s mentioned above, but a quick way to turn up the profit machine is to implement a customer retention program. This not only fosters customer loyalty but can also lead to increased spending per transaction.Recognizing and admitting that you’re suffering from these symptoms is the first step towards a cure. The next step is taking action. And that’s where the AI Prompts for Building a Marketing Strategy toolkit can truly make a difference. Start creating your complete marketing strategy with this prompts and see the difference a focused and efficient marketing strategy can make to your bottom line.Are you ready to turn these symptoms into solutions? 

Weekend Favs July 8

Weekend Favs July 8 written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing My weekend blog post routine includes posting links to a handful of tools or great content I ran across during the week. I don’t go into depth about the finds, but I encourage you to check them out if they sound interesting. The photo in the post is a favorite for the week from an […] How To Write A Business Book That Matters written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with Josh Bernoff In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Josh Bernoff. He is the bestselling author or ghostwriter of eight business books and contributed to 50 book projects that have generated over $20 million for their authors. Josh was formerly Senior Vice President, Idea Development at Forrester, where he spent 20 years analyzing technology and business.  ​​His most recent book Build a Better Business Book: How to Plan, Write, and Promote a Book That Matters, is a guide for authors who want to create impact in their business books. Josh teaches them how to refine their idea, choose a publishing model, and research, write, publish, and promote their books. Key Takeaway: A good business book should have a unique idea that solves a specific problem for a targeted audience, incorporating real-life stories and a narrative structure that engages readers. It should follow a natural progression from presenting a problem to providing a solution and explaining the details of that solution, using case studies to support their ideas. It is vital for authors to understand the continuum between big-idea books and how-to books, as both can be problem-solving. The promotion plan of the book is crucial, and authors must not assume people will find their books without proper promotion and by building a platform. Josh shares a five-step process called “PQRST” which involves: Positioning, answering the Question, Reaching the target audience, Spreading the book encouraging word-of-mouth, and Timing the book launch. Questions I ask Josh Bernoff: [01:59] What are the essential elements that a business book needs to be good? [02:49] Can a business book have a similar narrative to a fiction book? [04:03] Some business books are terrible. What are they doing wrong? [04:59] There are two types of business books: the ones that stay in the big idea category and others that are perspective. Are there different approaches that need to be taken for those two different kinds of books? [06:43] Can you explain the different kinds of authors? [08:59] Do publishers care about ideas or do they care about the platform or do you have to have both? [11:16] There are two book approaches, the ones that include research and case studies, and the ones that talk from the author’s daily knowledge and experiences. What do you think of that? [15:09] You have been a ghostwriter on some projects. What are some reasons somebody who has a good idea might use a ghostwriter? [16:01] Let’s talk about editors. In a business book, are they qualified to give much input and help you get your ideas down? [17:16] What role does the design of the interior pages as well as the cover play in the success of a book? [19:36] If you’re going to write a book today, how important is having audio done? [20:54] Can you explain the promotion plan of the book? More About Josh Bernoff: Get your copy of Build a Better Business Book: How to Plan, Write, and Promote a Book That Matters. Reach out to Josh. More About The Agency Certification Intensive Training: Learn more about the Agency Certification Intensive Training here Take The Marketing Assessment: Marketingassessment.co Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please! Duct Tape Transcript Email Download New Tab John Jantsch (00:00): This episode of Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is brought to you by HubSpot. Look, AI is literally eating the web chat. GPT is more searched than I don’t know, Taylor Swift. Check out HubSpot’s AI powered tools, content assistant and chat spott. They both run on open AI’s GPT model, and both are designed to help you get more done and to grow your business faster. HubSpot’s AI powered content assistant helps you brainstorm, create, and share content in a flash, and it’s all inside a super easy to use CRM now. Chat Spott automates all the manual tasks inside HubSpot to help you arrange more customers close more deals, and scale your business faster. Find out more about how to use AI to grow your business at hubspot.com/artificial-intelligence. That’s hubspot.com/artificial-intelligence. (01:14): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch, and my guest today is Josh Bernoff. He’s the bestselling author or ghostwriter of eight business books. He’s contributed to 50 book projects that have generated over 20 million for their authors. He’s formerly Senior Vice President of Idea Development at Forrester, where he spent 20 years analyzing technology and business. We’re gonna talk about his most recent book, Build a Better Business Book: How to Plan, Write, and Promote a Book That Matters. So Josh, welcome to the show. Josh Bernoff (01:49): It’s great to be on. Good to talk to you. John Jantsch (01:52): So I’ll just throw out like one really big question to start us off. Okay. And then we’ll hone in on, uh, things, you know, what are the essential elements that a business book needs to be good. How is that for, how is that for a big question, ? Josh Bernoff (02:06): No, that’s exactly the right big question . And I’d say there are two things, one that everybody understands and one that people don’t understand. The thing that everybody knows you need is an idea. Yeah. That is, you need something that will solve a problem for a specific group of people, and it has to be a differentiated idea that is an idea that hasn’t been heard before. So that’s what people know. What people don’t recognize is that business books are made out of stories about people, stories about business people, about ordinary consumers, about people who have a problem. And you get insight from the way they solve that problem. And unless you’ve collected those stories and shared them in an interesting way, your book’s gonna be boring and it’s not gonna sell. John Jantsch (02:49): Can a business book, like, I mean, a fiction book, you know, has a narrative and a plot and characters and we get to the end hopefully and go, oh, that was amazing. Can a business book have narrative similar to that? Or is it there just to do some nuts and bolts work? Josh Bernoff (03:04): It has to have a narrative similar to that. Now we understand this, if you’re reading a business book that’s say a description of Elon Musk’s life or Right. You know, how Netflix was created as a company. But when you’re talking about a business book that solves a problem, there’s a natural order to it in the first chapter. We have to scare the crap out of you by getting you to see that there’s either a problem that you’re gonna have if you don’t follow the book or some opportunity you’re gonna miss out on. That’s the fear and greed options. Yeah. And then after that we described the parts of the solution. We show you how to implement that. We might show you some more detail about how it applies in different situations. This is a natural progression from you have a problem to the solution, to the problem, to the details of the solution. And that’s just as much a narrative as if narrative as if you were reading a novel. John Jantsch (04:00): All right, let’s some people learn better from the negative. Let’s talk about some business books that are terrible. What are the, without naming names, what, what do they get wrong typically? Josh Bernoff (04:10): So I don’t know if your listeners have had this experience. I have many times of the business book where you read chapter two and you’re like, gee, that sounds just like chapter one. And then you read chapter four and you’re like, oh my gosh, it’s just the same thing over and over again. Yeah. So there’s a word for what that book ought to be, which is a blog post . So if what you have is a blog post, write a blog post and you’ll save us all. A lot of trouble ideas that are worth writing a book about have to be big. That is, they need to affect a lot of people and they need to have consequences. They need to have elements to them. They need to have some subtlety to it that you need to figure out. And unless you have the ability to do that, you really should just write a blog post. John Jantsch (04:58): Uh, there are two types of book business books. I read lots and lots of business books as I know you have as well. There are two types of business books that I really like. Some kind of stay in the big idea category. Mm-hmm. , Seth Godin’s books, I think are a great example of always a great idea that you, that he clearly believes in and that you can believe in, but not a whole lot of how to in them. And then there are other prescriptive books which are probably closer to what I write, you know, which is literally a retelling of what I do , you know, in, in the book. Are there different approaches that need to be taken for those two different kinds of books? And feel free to throw in, oh no, there’s four or five other categories too. , Josh Bernoff (05:36): Well, in the problem-solving kind of book, which is both of those are the big idea books and the how-to books are basically problem-solving kind of books. I think it’s a mistake to think of them as two different kinds. Okay. They’re really two ends of a continuum. Yeah. Right. So for example, the book I just wrote, right? Build a better business book here. This is a how-to book. There’s 24 chapters. There’s a chapter on covers. There’s a chapter on how to do research. Right. These are all very specific things that you have to learn how to do. If you look at the first book I wrote with Charlene Lee groundswell of posters behind me on the Wall. Yeah. That was a big idea book. And the big idea was that social media wasn’t a toy anymore, and people really need to learn how to take advantage of it. But even there we had to say, okay, if you’re gonna use social media for research purposes, here are the steps involved in that. Or if you’re gonna use social media for marketing, here are the steps involved in that. And unless you have some kind of prescription, then all you’re doing is basically throwing grenades and blowing things up. And while that can be entertaining, it’s not that helpful to people. John Jantsch (06:43): All right. So I’m, I’m gonna go down the same path. There are two kinds of authors, I think and, and I think a lot of times they fall into maybe business models or how they think about business models. There’s obviously the Malcolm Gladwell giant big idea that’s gonna lead to giant big stages, maybe. Yeah. I wrote my first book, don’t tell my publisher this, but I wrote my first book to really be a platform for selling product and for, you know, bringing, uh, a licensing program, uh, to the world using that methodology. And that was really, the book was a piece, you know, as opposed to, I, in fact, for many years I didn’t even call myself an author necessarily. Josh Bernoff (07:17): Mm-hmm. . Well, if you wrote a book and you published it, you’re an author, so please call yourself an author. But what people need, first of all, you’re not Malcolm Gladwell. I’m not Malcolm Gladwell. Very few people are Malcolm Gladwell. In fact, I have a section in the first chapter of my book about why you’re not Malcolm Gladwell . That’s funny. So for the rest of us, the success does not come from book sales. Right. That might be a nice little source of income. You might even not suppose you reach a thousand people, is that a failure? Yeah. If those are the right thousand people, that could be an enormous success. So the question is, how will that benefit you? And of course it should start by benefiting the people who read it, but then they’re gonna say, Hey, I should hire this guy. Or, oh, this company is worth looking at. Or this is a different way to look at the world. What vendors can help with it? Oh, look, he’s got one of those vendors he’s associated with. So there are lots of ways that, that you can benefit. I, I guess the simplest way to put it is a book is the largest possible lump of content marketing. Yeah. And just like any other content marketing, it attracts attention by being useful and then it translates into some sort of business for the author. John Jantsch (08:32): Yeah. Yeah. Well, I, you know, fortunately out of some sort of dumb luck, I actually sold a lot of copies of Duct Tape Marketing as well as it being my kinda launching for a platform. So I kinda lucked into the best of both worlds. I guess l let’s talk about book proposals for a minute. You know, which is a typical organ that a lot of people would use to, uh, get a publisher interested in a book. Boy, that has changed in the last , uh, 20 years. Yeah. Uh, or, or so, um, do publishers care about ideas or do they care about platform? Um, or do you have to have both? Josh Bernoff (09:05): Well, you have to have both. But platform’s more important, and that’s a shocking thing to say, right. But in the last 20 or 30 years, what I have seen is that some publishers like Wiley explicitly say, you have to prove to us that you can sell 10 or 12 20,000 books on your own. And the other publishers don’t say it quite so starkly, but they believe the same thing. Yeah. And that means, and they’re not gonna help you very much with the selling. You have to provide that yourself. So you need to have a podcast or a blog or regular appearance on CNN or a Forbes, you know, column or whatever. You need to have some sort of a platform to roll the book out. Now a person with a large platform and no ideas isn’t really very interesting, the publishers, because someone has to get something out of the book, but the, they look at the platform first and the idea second. Sadly, it’s true. Yeah. John Jantsch (09:59): Yeah, yeah. And I think it’s become more true, quite frankly. You know, you mentioned definitely Wiley, for example, I’ve even seen some authors talk about, you know, they had to guarantee that they were gonna sell that . Yes, that’s true. It’s X number. So Yeah, they, Josh Bernoff (10:14): I can’t resist pointing out here that there are alternatives now. John Jantsch (10:17): Sure. Well, Josh Bernoff (10:18): There are hybrid publishers John Jantsch (10:19): Usually change, right? Yeah, Josh Bernoff (10:21): Yeah, yeah. You can pay a hybrid publisher to publisher book. I’m this most recent book I did with a hybrid publisher, and I’m not saying that’s the only model. My previous book was done with a traditional publisher. Yeah. And you can even self-publish books on your own through the Amazon platform. And of course that makes a much less of an impact, but if you really gotta get your book out, you don’t need to go through a traditional publisher anymore. John Jantsch (10:44): Well, I have a few, you know, folks in that, that I know well that have made a whole lot more money on their book by doing self-publishing because it sold really well and they kept 80% Josh Bernoff (10:54): Phil Jones John Jantsch (10:55): , Phil Jones is one first one came. Ok. Now, Josh Bernoff (10:57): Now it’s, but it is hard to make your book catch fire. Yeah, yeah. If you’re doing it, you’re publishing it independently like that. Yeah. The, the traditional publishers have a certain amount of clout and distribution, and the hybrid publishers are helpful within that vein as well. John Jantsch (11:13): Yeah. So my books are not heavily researched in the, you know, the idea that we had 3000 participants in some sort of study. I mean, my books are really kind of more, here’s my daily knowledge. I mean, here’s what I’ve learned working with ex clients. Is there, again, I don’t think there’s a better approach, but they’re quite different, aren’t they? Josh Bernoff (11:34): Uh, you know what, you need something that proves that your book is right. Yeah. And I was sitting down and I thought of these ideas and I wrote them down as not sufficient John Jantsch (11:45): , it might work. Josh Bernoff (11:47): Yeah. And, you know, everyone does secondary research. This is basically going on the internet and finding quotes and studies and stuff. But you need some sort of primary research. But what you said, the, the, you know, the survey kind of research or data Look, I worked at Forrester. I actually created the program that they used to collect consumer data. That was wonderful to have all of that data. Yeah. But you can write a book that’s based on anecdotes. And if you’re telling the stories of, you know, Sarah, that that changed her marketing program, or Alvin who figured out a better way to, to track attribution, those stories are quite sufficient as primary research. You don’t necessarily need a huge amount of data. John Jantsch (12:32): Yeah. I guess case studies would fall into that too. I mean, I know people love to see, oh, I’m a business kind of like that. And they did that. Oh, okay. That will work for me. Josh Bernoff (12:41): Case studies are essential. In fact, I would say when I work with authors and we’re like at the beginning of the book process, the lack of case studies is the biggest problem that they have. So you want to be thinking right at the beginning, where am I gonna get the stories I’m gonna tell, where am I gonna find these interviews? If a book is, let’s say 14 chapters long, it should have 14 case studies in it. John Jantsch (13:06): So you might even organize the book around what you Josh Bernoff (13:09): Got. Is I you saying that? Well, I, one way to organize the book is to start every chapter with a story. Yeah. Yeah. It’s actually pretty common to do that. It fact, they’re No, they’re known as Malcolm’s after Malcolm Gladwell . Right. Who’s like the master of this. And people love that because they read it and they’re like, oh yeah, I’m having the same kind of problem that she had. Or Right. Oh man, he’s, he found an interesting way to solve that. I’m gonna learn from that. And I’ll tell you something. Once you tell one of those stories at the beginning of a chapter, whatever you say in the next three sentences, after that, people will believe no matter what it is. John Jantsch (13:46): And now let’s hear from a sponsor. This episode is brought to you by Business Made Simple, hosted by Donald Miller, and brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals hosted by Donald Miller. Business Made Simple Takes the Mystery out of Growing Your Business. In a recent episode, they talked with my old pal, Seth Godin, where he explained the virtues and values in his book called The Song of Significance, A new manifesto for teams. Listen to business Made Simple. Wherever you get your podcasts. (14:19): Hey, marketing agency owners, you know, I can teach you the keys to doubling your business in just 90 days or your money back. Sound interesting. All you have to do is license our three step process that’s gonna allow you to make your competitors irrelevant, charge a premium for your services and scale perhaps without adding overhead. And here’s the best part. You can license this entire system for your agency by simply participating in an upcoming agency certification intensive look, why create the wheel? Use a set of tools that took us over 20 years to create. And you can have ’em today, check it out at DTM world slash certification. That’s DTM world slash certification. (15:06): You have, as I noted in your intro, been a ghostwriter on some projects. Mm-hmm. . What are some reasons somebody who has a good idea might use a, a ghostwriter? Josh Bernoff (15:15): Well, it’s always a question of time. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. It’s also a question of talent. Some people just don’t feel like they’re good writers. Yeah. But mostly it’s people who could write, but just don’t have the time to do it. And in the cases where I have ghostwritten books and I’ve done three, now they’re all situations where they were senior executives. Right. Very busy people. They had really interesting ideas and sometimes a lot of detail behind it, but they just wanted to hire somebody who would assemble that into a useful book. And what you read there was written on spec based on what the author, the person whose name on the cover asked for. They’ve just outsourced the writing. Just like you might outsource the graphics. Yeah. Or, uh, you know, a, a survey that you did, John Jantsch (16:01): Let’s talk about editors. The, I think the common belief was that an editor was gonna make your book better. You know, certainly help you devise or get your ideas down. Mm-hmm. , and I’m not talking about copy editing, but you know, kind of big picture editing, it feels like, and this is coming from my experience, that, you know, the editor’s role has been to acquire a book, and that’s about it. And that that input, you know, in a business book, they’re not qualified to really give much input. Mm-hmm. , Josh Bernoff (16:26): It’s a question of how busy the people at these publishing houses are. So I, there’s a quote in my book from Holla Heinbach, who’s a, a very well known editor to Hartford Business who says, look, we expect the manuscript to come in ready to publish. Yeah. Um, so they don’t really have the resources to edit your book. Yeah. But that doesn’t mean you don’t need an editor. Most people who work on a good book will hire a developmental editor, and that’s someone whose job is to, to do the work of helping with the ideas, the sequence, the structure, the language, how the chapters are assembled, everything just so that you have a high quality piece of work that’s publishable. John Jantsch (17:08): Yeah. This is gonna be a hard question to have a definitive answer, but I’m certain you have an opinion on . Yeah. What, what role does the design of the interior pages as well as the cover, play in the success of a book? Josh Bernoff (17:23): Yeah. Well, let me divide those two. Yeah. Okay. Unless your book has got some sort of unusual elements to it, like, you know, a lot of sidebars or something like that, the interior design usually just as utilitarian and it doesn’t make that much difference. People need to tell when things are heading or subheading, but, but most books are pretty much interchangeable from that perspective. John Jantsch (17:51): I’ve seen some poor font, I’ve seen some poor font. Josh Bernoff (17:53): Oh, you can definitely make a mistake there, . If your book, if the, the body text in your book is in San Sarah, you’re making a big mistake. That’s a serious readability problem. Uh, I can’t resist mentioning here too that, that, you know, how do you tell when a book is poorly self-published? It’s the margins. It’s always the margins that are screwed up. You look at the book and you’re like, this doesn’t look. Yes. So the margins are like the dead giveaway, but you mentioned the covers. The cover is important. It’s just as you know, you wouldn’t go out and get married and just like grab a t-shirt off of the, you know, the hanger. You, you’re putting your best face forward there and a striking cover design together with a title that connects with it can really make a book much more recognizable. Yeah. But things are sort of backwards. People don’t buy a book because it has a great cover. They remember a book because it has a great cover, and then that becomes an iconic representation of how great that book was. They read it and then they associate that with a cover that they’re looking at. John Jantsch (19:03): I, I know for myself, I’m, you know, walking through a bookstore back when we used to do that, used to do that. Yeah. A facing out, you know, book that had a compelling cover. It, it was a stopper, you know, it would be like, oh, I want to at least take a deeper look at that. Josh Bernoff (19:17): Well, nowadays people are looking at the book on the screen Yeah. And it’s an inch tall. John Jantsch (19:23): Yeah, Josh Bernoff (19:23): Yeah, yeah. So the subtle little details of the design don’t become obvious until the person has had it shipped to their house. John Jantsch (19:30): . Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Very true. Let’s talk about another thing that’s become, I think a must audio. Mm-hmm. , if you’re gonna write a book count on doing audio or having audio done, uh, today, I would guess, huh? Josh Bernoff (19:41): Yes. Audio, you cannot have a book that’s has a full measure of success unless there’s an audiobook to go along with it. Yeah. And people love to consume business books on audio while they’re exercising or commuting, you know, or on an airplane or whatever. So you really have to have that available to them. And in my book, I actually recommend that if the author has got any inclination at all, it’s great if you, the author can record the audiobook. Yeah. Because then your voice and your willingness to communicate the things that are important to you will come across effectively. And even if you know you have a scratchy voice or a nasal voice or something, most people can do a good job with that. Yeah. It’s just, that’s likely to take you 10 or 15 hours and not everybody’s willing to put the time in to do that. John Jantsch (20:32): Yeah. Well, and, and, and if your goal is to build a community, to build a business around a platform, a larger platform around, I know I find it all the time. People are like, oh, now that I met you, you know, I can hear you in my head already, you know, because I listen to your books. Yeah. So it, it really is, you know, I think it’s a must for if you wanna do other things with the book as well. Josh Bernoff (20:51): Yeah. John Jantsch (20:52): Okay. We have exactly 30 seconds left. Let’s talk about promotion of the book . You know, I think a lot of writers, you know, write the book and go, okay, now how do I sell it? Promotion probably starts before that, doesn’t it? Josh Bernoff (21:03): Yes. You need to plan the promotion. And the biggest mistake that authors make is to write the book and assume that people will find it, even if they don’t promote it. And I got a five step process positioning, what’s the question you answer? How are you gonna get reach? How are you gonna get

The 4 Commitments To Grow Your Reach Online

The 4 Commitments To Grow Your Reach Online written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with Becky Robinson In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Becky Robinson. She is the Founder and CEO of Weaving Influence. This full-service marketing agency specializes in digital and integrated marketing services and public relations for book authors, including business leaders, coaches, trainers, speakers, and thought leaders. In April […] Unveiling The Future Of AI written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with Kenneth Wenger In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Kenneth Wenger. He is an author, a research scholar at Toronto Metropolitan University, and CTO of Squint AI Inc. His research interests lie at the intersection of humans and machines, ensuring that we build a future based on the responsible use of technology. His newest book, Is the Algorithm Plotting Against Us?: A Layperson’s Guide to the Concepts, Math, and Pitfalls of AI. Kenneth explains the complexity of AI, demonstrating its potential and exposing its shortfalls. He empowers readers to answer the question: What exactly is AI? Key Takeaway: While significant progress has been made in AI, we are still in the early stages of its development. However, the current AI models are primarily performing simple statistical tasks rather than exhibiting deep intelligence. The future of AI lies in developing models that can understand the context and differentiate between right and wrong answers. Kenneth also emphasizes the pitfalls of relying on AI, particularly in the lack of understanding behind the model’s decision-making process and the potential for biased outcomes. The trustworthiness and accountability of these machines are crucial to develop, especially in safety-critical domains where human lives could be at stake like in medicine or laws. Overall, while AI has made substantial strides, there is still a long way to go in unlocking its true potential and addressing the associated challenges. Questions I ask Kenneth Wenger: [02:32] The title of your book is the algorithm plotting against this is a provocative question. So why ask this question? [03:45] Where do you think we really are in the continuum of the evolution of AI? [07:58] Do you see a day when AI machines will start asking questions back to people? [07:20] Can you name a particular instance in your career where you felt like “This is going to work, this is like what I should be doing”? [09:25] You have both layperson and math in the title of the book, could you give us sort of the layperson’s version of how it does that? [15:30] What are the real and obvious pitfalls of relying on AI? [19:49] As people start relying on these machines to make decisions that are supposed to be informed a lot of times, predictions could be wrong right? More About Kenneth Wenger: Get your copy of Is the Algorithm Plotting Against Us?: A Layperson’s Guide to the Concepts, Math, and Pitfalls of AI. Connect with Kenneth. More About The Agency Certification Intensive Training: Learn more about the Agency Certification Intensive Training here Take The Marketing Assessment: Marketingassessment.co Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please! Duct Tape Transcript Email Download New Tab John Jantsch (00:00): Hey, did you know that HubSpot’s annual inbound conference is coming up? That’s right. It’ll be in Boston from September 5th through the eighth. Every year inbound brings together leaders across business, sales, marketing, customer success, operations, and more. You’ll be able to discover all the latest must know trends and tactics that you can actually put into place to scale your business in a sustainable way. You can learn from industry experts and be inspired by incredible spotlight talent. This year, the likes of Reese Witherspoon, Derek Jeter, Guy Raz, are all going to make appearances. Visit inbound.com and get your ticket today. You won’t be sorry. This programming is guaranteed to inspire and recharge. That’s right. Go to inbound.com to get your ticket today. (01:03): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Kenneth Wenger. He’s an author, research scholar at Toronto Metropolitan University and CTO of Squint AI Inc. His research interests lie in the intersection of humans and machines, ensuring that we build a future based on the responsible use of technology. We’re gonna talk about his book today Is the Algorithm Plotting Against Us?: A Layperson’s Guide to the Concepts, Math, and Pitfalls of AI. So, Ken, welcome to the show. Kenneth Wenger (01:40): Hi, John. Thank you very much. Thank you for having me. John Jantsch (01:42): So, so we are gonna talk about the book, but I, I’m just curious, what, what does Squint AI do? Kenneth Wenger (01:47): That’s a great question. So, squint ai, um, is a company that we created to, um, do some research and develop a platform that enables us to, um, (02:00): Do, do AI in a more responsible, uh, way. Okay. Okay. So, uh, I’m sure we’re gonna get into this, but I touch upon it, uh, in the book in many cases as well, where we talk about, uh, ai, ethical use of ai, some of the downfalls of ai. And so what we’re doing with Squint is we’re trying to figure out, you know, how do we try to create a, an environment that enables us to use AI in a way that lets us understand when these algorithms are not performing at their best, when they’re making mistakes and so on. Yeah, John Jantsch (02:30): Yeah. So, so the title of your book is The Algorithm Plotting Against, this is a bit of a provocative question. I mean, obviously I’m sure there are people out there that are saying no , and some are saying, well, absolutely. So, so why ask the question then? Kenneth Wenger (02:49): Well, because I, I actually feel like that’s a question that’s being asked by many different people with actually with different meaning. Right? So it, it’s almost the same as the question of is AI posing an existential threat? I, I, it’s a question that means different things to different people. Right. So I wanted to get into that in the book and try to do two things. First, offer people the tools to be able to understand that question for themselves, right. And first figure out how, where they stand in that debate, and then second, um, you know, also provide my opinion along the way. John Jantsch (03:21): Yeah, yeah. And I probably didn’t ask that question as elegantly as I’d like to. I actually think it’s great that you ask the question, because ultimately what we’re trying to do is let people come to their own decisions rather than saying, this is true of ai, or this is not true of AI . Right. Kenneth Wenger (03:36): That’s right. That’s right. And, and, and again, especially because it’s a nuanced problem. Yeah. And it means different things to different people. John Jantsch (03:44): So this is a really hard question, but I’m gonna ask you, you know, where are we really in the continuum of, of AI? I mean, people who have been on this topic for many years realize it’s been built into many things that we use every day and take for granted, obviously we ChatGPT brought on a whole nother spectrum of people that now, you know, at least have a talking vocabulary of what it is. But I remember, you know, I’ve been, I’ve been, I’ve had my own business 30 years. I mean, we didn’t have the web , we didn’t have websites, you know, we didn’t have mobile devices that certainly now play a part, but I remember as each of those came along, people were like, oh, we’re doomed. It’s over . Right. So, so currently there’s a lot of that type of language surrounding ai, but where do you think we really are in the continuum of the evolution? Kenneth Wenger (04:32): You know, that’s a great question because I think we are actually very early on. Yeah. I think that, you know, we, we’ve made remarkable progress in a very short period of time, but I think it’s still, we’re at the very early stages. You know, if you think of ai where we are right now, we were a decade ago, we’ve made some progress. But I think the, fundamentally, at a scientific level, we’ve only started to scratch the surface. I’ll give you some examples. So initially, you know, the first models, they were great at really giving us some proof that this new way of posing questions, you know, the, uh, neural networks essentially. Yeah, yeah. Right. They’re very complex equations. Uh, if you use GPUs to, to run these complex equations, then we can actually solve pretty complex problems. That’s something we realized around 2012 and then after around 2017, so between 2012 and 2017, progress was very linear. (05:28): You know, new models were created, the new ideas were proposed, but things scaled and progressed very linearly. But after 2017, with the introduction of the model that’s called the Transformer, which is the base architecture behind chat, g, pt, and all these large language models, we had another kind of realization. That’s when we realized that if you take those models and you scale them up and you scale them up in, in terms of the size of the model and the size of the data set that we used to train them, they get exponentially better. Okay. And that’s when we got to the point where we are today, where we realized that just by scaling them, again, we haven’t done anything fundamentally different since 2017. All we’ve done is increase the size of the model, increase the size of the dataset, and they’re getting exponentially better. John Jantsch (06:14): So, so multiplication rather than addition? Kenneth Wenger (06:18): Well, yes, exactly. Yeah. So, so it isn’t, the progress has been exponential, not only in linear trajectory. Yeah. But I think, but again, the fact that we haven’t changed much fundamentally in these models, that’s going to taper off very soon. It’s my expectation. And now where are we on the timeline? Which was your original question. I think if you think about what the models are doing today, they’re doing very element. They’re doing very simple statistics, essentially. Mm-hmm. , they’re not the idea of, of these models being called artificial intelligence. Right. I think it’s a bit of a misnomer sometimes. I agree. And it leads to some of the questions that, that people have. Um, because there, there isn’t much like deep intelligence going on, it’s just statistical modeling and very simple at that. And then where we are going from here and what I hope the future is, that’s when we start, I think the thing, things are gonna change dramatically when we start getting models that are able not just to, not just to do simple statistics, but are able to understand the context of what it is they’re trying to achieve. Yeah. And are able to understand, you know, the right answer as well as the wrong answer. So, for example, they, they, they, they’re able to know when they’re talking about things they know and when they’re kind of skirting around this gray area of things they don’t really know about. Does that make sense? Yeah, John Jantsch (07:39): Absolutely. I mean, I totally agree with you on artificial intelligence. I’ve actually been calling it ia. I think it’s more of informed automation. is kind of how I look at it, at least in my work. Do you see a day where, you know, prompts asking questions are, you know, that’s kind of the, the street use, if you will, of AI for a lot of people. Do you see a day where it starts asking you questions back? Like, why would you wanna know that? Or what are you trying to achieve, uh, by asking this question? Kenneth Wenger (08:06): Yeah. So the, the, the simple answer is yes. I, I definitely do. And I think that’s part of what, what achieving a higher level intelligence would be like. It’s when they’re not just doing your bidding, it’s not just a tool. Yeah, yeah. Uh, but they, they kind of have their own purpose that they’re trying to achieve. And so that’s when you would see things like questions essentially, uh, arise from the system, right? Is when they, they have a, a, a goal they wanna get at, which is, you know, and, and then they figure out a plan to get to that goal. That’s when you can see emergence of things like questions to you. I don’t think we’re there yet, but yeah, I think it’s certainly possible. John Jantsch (08:40): But that’s the sci-fi version too, right? I mean, where people start saying, you know, the movies, it’s like, no, no, Ken, you don’t get to know that information yet. I’ll decide when you can know that . Kenneth Wenger (08:52): Well, you’re right. I mean, the question, the way you asked the question was more like, is it, is it possible in principle? I think absolutely. Yes. Yeah. Do we want that? I mean, I, I don’t know. I guess that’s part of, yeah, it depends on what use case we’re thinking about. Uh, but from a first principle’s perspective Yeah, it is, it is certainly possible. Yeah. Not to get a model to John Jantsch (09:13): Do that. So I, I do think there are scores and scores of people, they’re only understanding of AI is I go to this place where it has a box and I type in a question and it spits out an answer. Since you have both layperson and math in the title, could you give us sort of the layperson’s version of how it does that? Kenneth Wenger (09:33): Yeah, absolutely. So, well, at least I’ll try, lemme put it that way, , when, a few moments ago when I mentioned that these models, essentially what they are, they’re very simple statistical models. That itself, that phrase itself, it’s a little bit of, it’s controversial because at the end of the day, we don’t know what kind of intelligence we have, right? So if you think about our intelligence, we don’t know whether at some level we are also a statistical model, right? However, what I mean by AI today in large language models like ChatGPT being simple statistical models, what I mean by that is that they’re performing a very simple task. So if you think of ChatGPT, what they’re doing is they are trying, essentially to predict the next best word in a sequence. That’s all they’re doing. And the word, the way they’re doing that is that they calculate what are called probability distribution. (10:31): So basically for any word in a, in a, in a prompt or in a corpus of text, they calculate the probability that word belongs in that sequence. Right? And then they choose the, the next word with the highest probability of being correct there. Okay? Now, that is a very simple model in the following sense. If you think about how we communicate, right? You know, we’re having a conversation right now. I think when you ask me a question, I, I pause and I think about what I’m about to say, right? So I have a model of the world, and I have a purpose in that conversation. I come up with the idea of what I want to respond, and then I use my ability to produce words and to sound them out to communicate that with you. Right? It might be possible that I have a system in my brain that works very similar to a large language model, in the sense that as soon as I start saying words, the next word that I’m about to say is one that is most likely to be correct, given the words that I just said. (11:32): It’s very possible. That’s true. However, what’s different is that at least I already have a plan of what I’m about to say in some latent space. I have already encoded in some form. What I want to get across, how I say it, that the ability to pro to produce those words might be very similar to a language model. But the difference is that a large language model is trying to figure out what it’s going to say as well as coming up with those words at the same time. Mm-hmm. , right? Does that make sense? So it’s a bit like they’re rambling, and sometimes if they talk for too long, they ramble in a nonsense territory. Yeah. Yeah. Because they don’t know what they’re going to say until they say it. . Yeah. So, so that’s a very fundamental difference. Yeah. John Jantsch (12:20): I, I, I have certainly seen some output that is pretty interesting along those lines. But, you know, as I heard you talk about that, I mean, in a lot of of ways that’s what we’re doing is we’re querying a database of what we’ve been taught, are the, the words that we know in addition to the concepts that we’ve studied, uh, and are able to articulate. I mean, in some ways we’re querying that to me, prompting or me asking you a question as well, I mean, it works similar. Would you say Kenneth Wenger (12:47): The aspect of prompting a question and then answering it, it’s similar, but what is different is the, the concept that you’re trying to describe. So, again, when you ask me a question, I think about it, and I come up with, so I, again, I have a world model that works so far for me to get me through life, right? And that world model lets me understand different concepts in different ways. And when I’m about to answer your question, I think about it, I formulate a response, and then I figure out a way to communicate that with you. Okay? That step is missing from what these language models are doing, right? They’re getting a prompt, but there is no step in which they are formulating a response with some goal, right? Right? Yes. Some purpose. They are essentially getting a text, and they’re trying to generate a sequence of words that are being figured out as they’re being produced, right? There’s no ultimate plan. So that, that’s a very fundamental difference. John Jantsch (13:54): And now, let’s hear a word from our sponsor, marketing Made Simple. It’s a podcast hosted by Dr. J j Peterson and is brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals marketing made simple, brings you practical tips to make your marketing easy and more importantly, make it work. And in a recent episode, JJ and April chat with StoryBrand certified guides and agency owners about how to use ChatGPT for marketing purposes. We all know how important that is today. Listen to marketing Made Simple. Wherever you get your podcasts. (14:30): Hey, marketing agency owners, you know, I can teach you the keys to doubling your business in just 90 days, or your money back. Sound interesting. All you have to do is license our three-step process that’s gonna allow you to make your competitors irrelevant, charge a premium for your services and scale perhaps without adding overhead. And here’s the best part. You can license this entire system for your agency by simply participating in an upcoming agency certification intensive look, why create the wheel? Use a set of tools that took us over 20 years to create. And you can have ’em today, check it out at dtm.world/certification. That’s DTM world slash certification. (15:18): I do wanna come to like what the future holds, but I want to dwell on a couple things that you dive into in the book. What are the, you know, other than sort of the fear that the media spreads , what are the real, you know, and obvious pitfalls of relying on AI? Kenneth Wenger (15:38): I think the biggest issue, and one of the, I mean the, the, the real motivator for me when I started writing the book is that it is a powerful tool for two reasons. It’s very easy to use, seemingly, right? Yeah. You can spend a weekend learning python, you can write a few lines, and you can transform, you can analyze, you can parse data that you couldn’t before just by using a library. So you don’t really have to understand what you’re doing, and you can get some result that looks useful, okay? Mm-hmm. , but heating in that process, right? The fact that you can take data a lot, a large amounts of data, modify it in some way, and get a response, get some result without understanding what’s happening in the middle, has huge repercussions for misunderstanding the results that you’re getting, right? And then if you’re using the, these tools in a, the world, right? (16:42): In a, in, in a way that can affect other people. For example, you know, let’s say you work in a financial institution and, and, and, and you come up with a model to figure out, uh, who you should, who you should give some credit, get, you know, approved for, for credit for a credit line, and who you shouldn’t. Now, right now, banks have their own models, but sure, if you take the AI out of it, traditionally those models are thought through by statisticians, and they may get things wrong once in a while, but at least they have a big picture of what it means to, you know, analyze data, biasing the data, right? What are the repercussions of bias in the data? How do you get rid of all these things are things that a good statistician should be trained to do. But now, if you remove the statisticians, because anybody can use a model to analyze data and get some prediction, then what happens is you end up denying and approving credit lines for people who, with you, you know, with repercussions that could be, you know, driven by very negative bias in the data, right? (17:44): Like, it could affect a certain section of the population, uh, negatively. Maybe there’s some that can’t get a credit line anymore just because they live in a particular neighborhood mm-hmm. , or they, you know, there’s many reasons why this could be a problem, John Jantsch (17:57): But wasn’t that a factor previously? I mean, certainly neighborhoods are considered , you know, as part of the, you know, even in the analog models, I think. Kenneth Wenger (18:06): Yeah, absolutely. So like I said, we always had a problem with bias, right? In the data, right? But traditionally, you would hope, so two things would happen. First, you would hope that whoever comes up with a model, just because it’s a complex problem, they have to have some satis statistical training. Yeah. Right? And a, an ethical statistician would have to consider how to deal with the bias in the data, right? So that’s number one. Number two, the problem that we have right now is that, first of all, you don’t need to have that set decision. You can just use the model without understanding what’s happening, right? Right. And then what’s worse is that with these models, we can’t actually understand how the, or it’s very difficult traditionally to understand how the model arrived or prediction. So if you get denied either a credit line or as, as I talk about in the book bail, for example, in, in a court case, uh, it’s very difficult to, to argue, well, why me? Why, why was I denied this thing? And then if you go through the process of auditing it again with the traditional approach where you have a decision, you can always ask, so how did you model this? Uh, why was this person denied this particular case in a, in an audit? Mm-hmm. with a, a, a neural network, for example, that becomes a lot more complicated. John Jantsch (19:21): So I, I mean, so so what you’re saying, one of the initial problems is that people are relying on the output, the data. I mean, even, you know, I use it in a very simple way. I run a marketing company and we use it a lot of times to give us copy ideas, give us head headline ideas, you know, for things. So I don’t really feel like there’s any real danger in there other than maybe sounding like everybody else in your copy. Uh, but, but you’re saying that, you know, as people start relying on these to make decisions that are supposed to be informed, a lot of times predictions are wrong. Kenneth Wenger (19:57): Yes. And, and there’s very, so the answer is yes. Now, there’s two reasons for that. And by the way, let me just go back to say that there are use cases where, of course you have to think about this as, as a spectrum, right? Like yeah, yeah. There are cases where the repercussions of getting something wrong is worse than other cases, right? So as you say, if you’re trying to generate some copy and you know, if it’s nonsensical, then you just go ahead and change it. And at the end of the day, you’re probably gonna review it anyway. So, so that is a lower, probably a lower cost. The cost of a mistake there will be lower than in, in the case of, you know, using a model in a, in a judicial process, for example. Right? Right. Right. Now, with respect to the fact that these models sometimes get, make mistakes, the reason for that is that the way these models actually work is that they, and, and the part that can be deceiving is that they tend to work really well for areas in the data that that is, that they understand really well. (20:56): So, so if you think of, of a dataset, right? So they’re trained using a dataset for most of the data in that dataset, they’re gonna be able to model it really well. And so that’s why you get models that perform, let’s say, 90% accurate on a particular data set. The problem is that for the 10% where they’re not able to model really well, the mistakes there are remarkable and in a way that a human would not be able to make those mistakes. Yeah. So what happens in those cases that, first of all, when we’re training these models that we get, we say, well, you know, we get 10% error rate in this particular dataset. The one issue is that when you take that into production, you don’t know that the incidences rate of those errors are gonna be the same in the real world, right? (21:40): You may end up, uh, being in a situation where you get those data points that lead to errors at a much higher rate than you did in your data set. Just one problem. The second problem is that if, if you are in a, if your use case, if your production, you know, application, it’s such where a mistake could be costed, like let’s say in a medical use case or in self-driving, when you have to go back and explain why you got something wrong, why the model got something wrong, and it is just so bizarrely different from what a human would get wrong. That’s one of the fundamental reasons why we don’t have these systems being deployed across safety critical domains today. And by the way, that’s one of the fundamental reasons why we created splint, is to tackle specifically those problems, is to figure out how can we create a set of models or a system that’s able to understand specifically when models are getting things right and when they’re getting things wrong at runtime. Because I really think it’s, it’s one of the fundamental reasons why we haven’t advanced as much as we should have at this point. It’s cuz when models work really well, uh, when they’re able to model the data, well then they work great.

The 7 Deadly Marketing Mistakes

The 7 Deadly Marketing Mistakes written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with John Jantsch In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I’m doing a solo show, and I’m gonna talk about 7 martketing mistakes that business owner usually make and I give you some tips on how to avoid them. Key Takeaway: Businesses often make seven deadly marketing mistakes: lacking a clear […] The 4 Commitments To Grow Your Reach Online written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with Becky Robinson In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Becky Robinson. She is the Founder and CEO of Weaving Influence. This full-service marketing agency specializes in digital and integrated marketing services and public relations for book authors, including business leaders, coaches, trainers, speakers, and thought leaders. In April 2022, Becky published her first book, Reach: Create the Biggest Possible Audience for Your Message, Book, or Cause. This book provides a structured approach to creating a successful online presence that will generate a big impact on any message. Becky shares a framework to cultivate followers based on four commitments: value, consistency, endurance, and generosity.  Key Takeaway: Building a successful online brand and thought leadership requires 4 commitments. The first one is delivering value and establishing meaningful connections to attract and retain followers. The second one is being consistent in the content shared and messaging to build trust and a strong presence. While it may be tempting to chase quick success, longevity is the third commitment, and being able to create a long-term commitment that generates sustainable growth. It’s important to set realistic expectations and understand that building something meaningful takes time. Finally, being generous: with ideas, time, and support to attract interest and engagement. Becky emphasizes that sharing ideas freely and supporting others can contribute to your personal thought leadership growth. Questions I ask Becky Robinson: [01:54] Based on the title of your book, creating reach starts way before selling or marketing a new book right? [02:35] Would you put the things you mention in your book as a must? [05:48] Can you explain a little bit about self-publishing as a more accessible and streamlined option when someone writes a book? [09:20] Talk a little bit about your journey of creating Reach that led to a publishing deal for you. [13:16] In your book you mention four commitments: value, consistency, longevity, and generosity. Can you explain each one of them? [17:53] Talking about longevity, how do you balance that when everybody wants quick results? [21:52] What’s your relationship with goal setting? More About Becky Robinson: Get your copy or audiobook of Reach: Create the Biggest Possible Audience for Your Message, Book, or Cause. More about Becky and Weaving Influence. Connect with Becky. More About The Agency Certification Intensive Training: Learn more about the Agency Certification Intensive Training here Take The Marketing Assessment: Marketingassessment.co Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please! Duct Tape Transcript Email Download New Tab John Jantsch (00:00): This episode of Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is brought to you by HubSpot. Look, AI is literally eating the web ChatGPT is more searched than I don’t know, Taylor Swift. Check out HubSpot’s AI powered tools, content assistant and chat spott. They both run on open AI’s G P T model, and both are designed to help you get more done and to grow your business faster. HubSpot’s AI powered content assistant helps you brainstorm, create, and share content in a flash, and it’s all inside a super easy to use CRM now. Chat Spott automates all the manual tasks inside HubSpot to help you arrange more customers close more deals, and scale your business faster. Find out more about how to use AI to grow your business at hubspot.com/artificial-intelligence. That’s hubspot.com/artificial-intelligence. (01:14): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Becky Robinson. She’s the founder and CEO of weaving influence, a full service marketing agency that specializes in digital and integrated marketing services and public relations for book offerers, including business leaders, coaches, trainers, speakers, and thought leaders. In April of 2022, she finished her first book with Barrett Kohler publishers titled Reach: Create the Biggest Possible Audience for Your Message, Book, or Cause. So Becky, welcome to the show. Becky Robinson (01:51): Thank you, John. It’s so great to be with you today. John Jantsch (01:54): So I have, because I’ve written a few books myself, I get a lot of people that reach out to me and say, okay, I’ve written my book, how do I market it now? Uh, how do I sell books? ? I sell more books. I’m gonna suggest based on the title of your book that it starts way before that, doesn’t it? Becky Robinson (02:12): Oh, it sure does, John. And you know, I think it starts, hopefully it starts before you even have an idea for a book. If you’re talking about a prescriptive nonfiction book, if you desire to write a prescriptive nonfiction book, you likely should be building an audience and community around your work for years before, John Jantsch (02:31): Yeah, Becky Robinson (02:32): Maybe a decade before John Jantsch (02:34): . So, I mean, are you, I know a lot of people have ideas that they want to write a book and a few of ’em actually get around to doing it. Would you say that this is, I you would put this out there as a must? I mean, you must do the things in your book if you’re going to even consider having somebody look at your book. Becky Robinson (02:53): Well, certainly if you want to attract a traditional publisher, right? You need to build an audience before you go to a traditional publisher because they’re making a business decision. They want to know that if they take a chance on your book and publish you, that you’re gonna be able to drive interest in sales. So, you know, if you dream of traditional publishing, yes, you must attend to growing an online presence to be able to support your book marketing. Now, if you’re interested in, you know, some people come to me and they wanna write a book just because it’s a bucket list item or Yeah, yeah. You know, maybe they wanna use it as a glorified business card in their business and give to potential customers. Now, in that case, you might have a choice about whether or not to build an online presence, but in the book, one of the things I talk about, John, is what I call the influence gap. (03:36): And for anyone who has great real world expertise that they could bring to a nonfiction business book, but they haven’t adequately represented that thought leadership online, then they’re experiencing what I call the influence gap. And that happens when there’s a disconnect between who we are in real life and who we are online. If we want to set ourselves up for success, to have the biggest possible reach for our work, we have to choose to invest in both that kind of offline real world, you know, knowing something about our topics, experience with real life people and work. And we have to translate that and share that journey online as well. John Jantsch (04:14): Yeah. If I can be completely cynical, I would suggest that the traditional publisher is, that’s the first thing they care about. What’s the size of your audience? What’s the size of your reach? Oh, you got a nice topic. Great, we’ll get to that later. It’s more like, can you guarantee us that you can sell 25,000 copies? I mean, I think that’s almost the, the calculus today, isn’t it? Becky Robinson (04:31): It is. And that’s why people who are already famous get book deals. Right. You know, I have, I took a screenshot the day that Barack Obama’s book came out. He sold 887,000 books on the day his book was released . So of course, you know, people who have that kind of existing fame and fortune already are the ones who are gonna get the book deals. You know, that’s why, you know, you see kind of a, a viral sensation happen and someone has a big following. Then quite often what follows after that is a book deal. And that’s an easy decision when the outcome of the success of the publisher’s work is that they sell books. The reality is they may publish a lot of books that don’t sell to that level, and they’re using those huge sale selling books to offset the ones who aren’t. But for people who are not known, you have to be able to prove that you can drive sales. Yeah. John Jantsch (05:24): And it’s probably 90 to 95% of their books, you know, are not, maybe they’re break even or, you know, maybe they make a little money, but you’re absolutely right. They bank on, you know, that top 10. And then of course, years of back list. I mean, but Duct Tape Marketing came out in 2007, and I’m still getting, you know, royalty checks, you know, for that, because that back list of 600 or 6,000, I don’t have many books, you know, is where they actually make their money. Let’s talk a little bit about self-publishing then. You talked about the glorified business card as it sort of called, but it, there’s no question it can be, uh, an effective marketing tactic and that whole world has gotten a lot easier and you know, much more streamlined. Talk a little bit about that as an option. Becky Robinson (06:03): Sure, I’d be glad to. So there are lots of folks who, you know, have a point of view to share, but they don’t necessarily aspire to getting a lot of sales. Uh, in that case, obviously self-publishing can be a viable option and, uh, like even at my company, we support authors who want to self-publish their books, uh, with what I call a book production service. We are not a publisher. Uh, what I would say is that quality still matters. Yeah. So you wanna write a book worth reading because if you’re using a book in that way, those who read it will be using that book to decide if you’re credible and if you’re worth hiring. And so you don’t wanna skimp on a professional cover, you don’t wanna skimp on a professional edit, you don’t wanna skip skimp on a professional interior design. You want to create the best product possible, because obviously that will tell people things about your brand and expertise. (06:54): Yeah. And so in that world, you know, if you’re going to bother to write a book worth reading, then what I would say is then why not invest in expanding awareness of that book even beyond the people who could hire you? There’s so much time and energy and money that goes into that. So, you know, on in some ways, you know, I said that’s a choice that people can make, but at the same time, if you are going to invest to the level that you would need to have a product that can be a good business card for your business, then why not share that value more widely? You know, I wanna pick up on something you said, John, you are still getting royalty checks on a book that you wrote in 2007. So for those who might be listening who are considering a book, you wanna see that book as being a long-term, viable marketing tool for your work and a value add to others. And you know what? An amazing thing to have a book that’s been out there that many years is still relevant, is still reaching readers. And I think that’s the kind of book that we should all aspire to write. Yeah. One that’s going to be timeless, one that’s going to add value, one that can continue to fuel whatever work we wanna be about in the world. John Jantsch (08:00): Yeah. And I, and I think also a lot of times people think of the book as one thing. You know, for me it quadrupled my speaking. It, you know, led to other people wanting, we started a whole licensing program of our methodology be based on the fact that people were able to find that book. So I didn’t write it as a business card, but it certainly has for many years acted as a drawing card for many other things that we’ve been able to build around it. And I, and I think that’s a lot of times people just think the physical book is it, but the physical book might actually be the entry. Becky Robinson (08:33): Yeah, I agree with you because once you have that physical book, the ideas in the book can be repurposed and reused in all sorts of different ways to be able to reach new audiences in new ways. And you know, I imagine, John, you have continued to learn or adapt the ideas in the book. And so as you continue to bring those to new audiences, the power of that original content asset will grow. So chapter seven in my book, for those of you who are interested and have an existing book, wanna figure out how to repurpose and reuse it in different ways, that’s a really powerful way to, to view a book. It’s, it’s an ongoing asset that you can use to add value to the world. John Jantsch (09:10): So because, and this isn’t always the case with nonfiction offers, but because you have actually done what you’re telling people to do, you have your own book now that is out there. Talk a little bit about your journey of creating reach that led to, uh, a publishing deal for you. And we can just use you as a bit of a case study. Becky Robinson (09:28): Sure, I would love to. So John, I started working with authors back in about 2010. And immediately I think as we, we all who love books are drawn to, you know, I saw what my authors were experiencing, and I, I immediately said, well, I want to do this also. And I remember early on, I traveled out to San Francisco. I had an author who was published by Barett Kohler Publishers, who later did acquire my book. And I remember thinking, well, look at how easy this is. Like, I know a publisher. So I, I made an appointment with an editor, I sat down, I shared my first book idea, and guess what happened? He said no. And then a few years later, I thought I had refined my idea a little bit. I contacted the same acquiring editor, and guess what John? He said, no. And then some more years went by. (10:17): And I think in those intervening years, a few things happened. One is that I continued to build my own online presence. I was building my email list. I was establishing thought leadership and credibility. You know, in those years I had a podcast, I had a newsletter. I grew my social media accounts. So there were at least two things that happened during those intervening years between when I started my business and then 10 years after when I finally did get a book deal. One is that I built confidence in the way that I could articulate my ideas, which I think led to me writing a better book proposal in terms of how I framed the idea. So that’s one thing. And the second thing is also just the growth of my thought leadership brand. So in 2012, when I first talked to the editor, I was an unknown. (10:59): I didn’t have, you know, any experience or credibility. You know, fast forward 10 years, I could say, Hey, I’ve launched 150 business books, you know, I’ve done X, Y, Z. So I think that, you know, for those who might be listening, who might be beginners like I was, and have a book dream, be patient, but use your time in the best way possible. Yeah. No, I think it’s possible. I could have gotten a book deal earlier. I had a lot of reasons along the way for why I waited. Finally, the thing that kind of got me over my resistance was figuring out that if I did a book proposal in, I think it was like the fall of 2020 or the leading up to December, 2020, that I could probably release the book for the 10 year anniversary of my company. Mm-hmm. . So that was really the thing that kind of pushed me over the edge, John, to say, okay, I’m going to do it this time. I’m going to write a book proposal and submit it. And so I, I got a book deal in February of 2021. Then my book came out in April of 22. John Jantsch (11:56): And now let’s hear from a sponsor. This episode is brought to you by Business Made Simple, hosted by Donald Miller, and brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals hosted by Donald Miller Business Made Simple Takes the Mystery out of Growing Your Business. In a recent episode, they talked with my old pal, Seth Godin, where he explained the virtues and values in his book called The Song of Significance, A new manifesto for teams, listen to Business Made Simple. Wherever you get your podcast. (12:28): Hey, marketing agency owners, you know, I can teach you the keys to doubling your business in just 90 days or your money back. Sound interesting. All you have to do is license our three-step process that’s gonna allow you to make your competitors irrelevant, charge a premium for your services and scale perhaps without adding overhead. And here’s the best part. You could license this entire system for your agency by simply participating in an upcoming agency certification intensive look, why create the wheel? Use a set of tools that took us over 20 years to create. And you can have ’em today, check it out at dtm.world/certification. That’s dtm.world/certification. (13:16): So let’s talk a little bit about the, I think you call ’em commitments, pillars, whatever we wanna talk about. So there are four that you, uh, talk about in the book, value, consistency, endurance, and generosity. Obviously listeners, you’re going to get the book to get the whole story, but let’s talk a little bit about that idea of giving value. I think there’s a lot of, there’s a challenge for some people because they have a business values what they sell, , you know, but, but giving value sometimes, I mean, we all know it generally comes back, but sometimes if you don’t, if you don’t have enough money to eat , you’re giving value. Feels hard, doesn’t it? Becky Robinson (13:52): Well, yes, and I do want to acknowledge, and I do talk about in my book, the difficulty for some of these ideas, if you happen to come from a marginalized identity. And I do know that my own ability to navigate the world did come from a, a place of privilege as many of us do. So I do wanna acknowledge that first. But in terms of growing an online brand or online thought leadership, it always has to start with value. And that value is, you know, what do you have to add? You know, what’s the topic or expertise that you’re bringing to online spaces? And so showing up with value is the starting point, because why would someone wanna follow you if there’s not some value that you’re delivering to them? I do wanna say, John, that value is not only about the content that we create, but it’s also about the connections that we make. (14:36): And so people might derive value from following us, not only because we have a point of view to share, but also because of who we are as people. And so thinking about value, it’s, there’s value in the content, but there’s also value in the relationships or how we show up in the world. And that’s really the starting line for this. Like, if you don’t have any value to offer, you are not going to attract people to follow you or build community or build an audience. So yeah, that’s really the, the most basic commitment. The second commitment is consistency. And you know, in order for people to count on you or trust you, they have to know not only that you will show up in a consistent way that you’re gonna continue to be there. John, before we started recording, you told me that you’ve done 1500 podcast episodes. (15:22): Now that is consistency, if I’ve ever seen it before. People know John, that they can count on you to show up with something. List interesting to listen to that you’re gonna ask good questions, that you’re gonna share content that matches what they need. So when we show up with value, consistency, people know that they can count on us. And the other thing is, I think people need to see a consistency of message. So sometimes where we fail at building reach, it’s because we, we failed to, uh, we failed to commit to a topic area. And so for example, like today I might wanna write about social media next week I might wanna write about leadership. People can’t figure out what I’m about. So we do need to have consistency in our messaging. John Jantsch (16:03): Yeah, it’s interesting about that topic though. I think some, if I can add a point to that, consistency sometimes can just be a consistent point of view. You know, there are new topics that come up in our, you know, our world of marketing, for example. My consistent point of view has always been that marketing’s a system that starts with strategy before tactics. But Lord knows over the last 20 years we’ve seen a lot of new platforms that fit into that point of view. And I, so, so I think sometimes people do jump around, but I think you can jump around with a consistent point of view. And I, I maybe that’s a subtle point, but I think it’s one worth making. Becky Robinson (16:38): No, I think that’s a really good point, John. And you know, I think that part of it involves ensuring that we’re listing our community and keeping them up to date on our story. Right? Right, John Jantsch (16:49): Right. Yeah. Yeah. Becky Robinson (16:50): So to all of those, you wanna add the third commitment, which is, you said endurance, it’s longevity. Oh. And so we need to commit to showing up with value consistency over a long period of time. John, I’m sure you’ve probably interviewed Dory Clark. Yeah, good friend. Dory Clark says it can take a year of showing up online to get any results at all. And it can take five years to be recognized as an expert. So I think what often happens is people think that they’re gonna come online and start to share something, and it’s gonna be magic, and they’re going to be an overnight success. And that is just not true for many of us. Yeah. I’ve been online since 2009. Yeah. So, and I’m really not all that well known. Right. So it, it’s not likely apart from some kind of magic or as I already mentioned, you know, that you’re already famous, that you’re gonna be able to do something quickly. So we have to show up with value consistently over time for a long time. And then the last one is this added, John Jantsch (17:47): Let, let me before we, that last one I just went, we just lost half our listeners, because they want, everybody wants a quick fix. Everybody wants an overnight, you know, success story. And I think that I totally 100% agree with you, but isn’t, doesn’t that become a harder sell? I mean, you have so many people out there selling the get rich quick scheme of the day. I mean, even Dory’s book the long game, you know, it’s like, that’s just not a very sexy title . So, so how do you balance that? Becky Robinson (18:19): Well, it isn’t, but it’s real. So I mean, on the one hand, like I think it balances the frustration like worth doing is going to be challenging, should be. So, you know, when we were exploring how to name the four commitments in the book we did kind of wrestle with is the idea about endurance, is the idea about perseverance was another word that I chose. You know, in the book I tell a story about 500 trees. So I live on a five acre property in Michigan, and it’s beautiful and peaceful and private because 20 plus years ago, a man and his sons chose to plant a lot of trees more than 500. And they chose to wait for them to grow. So if we want to build something beautiful in the world, we can’t expect that it’s going to be instantaneous. So it may not be sexy, but it’s real. Yeah. And I think that it might help set people up to have that realistic view so that they can decide whether or not it’s worth it to make the commitment. John Jantsch (19:15): Yeah. That reminds me of, uh, a quote, quote I’ll probably get wrong if somebody asked, you know, when’s the best time to plant a tree? And the answer was 20 years ago or today. Meaning, you know, okay, so you did , you haven’t been doing this reach game for 20 years. Start today. Becky Robinson (19:31): Yes. Yes, exactly. John Jantsch (19:33): All right. So I cut you off the fourth one. Becky Robinson (19:35): No problem. The fourth one is one that, you know, sometimes might seem counterintuitive, particularly, you know, if we’re wanting to build the reach of a business and we’re wanting to drive revenue, the idea of generosity as a commitment can seem counterintuitive. And lots of times along the journey, I’ve met people, John, and they say, well, you know, my book’s not out yet. I can’t talk about this. I have to save it back. You know, cherry, I think the more that we can give our ideas away freely to others, the more we will drive people to our work and our message. And people aren’t gonna have any reason to be interested in your work if you don’t make it easily accessible to them. You know, there’s an author, Lilly Zang, she’s a bear. Uh, they’re a Barrett Kohler author. And one of the things they have done is they have taken the content in their book in different ways and shared all of it on LinkedIn. (20:22): Yeah. And what they’ve seen is, well, people wanna buy the book because they see that there’s value, it’s in pieces that they’ve received and they want the book so that it’s all in one place. Yeah. So, you know, I think like it’s a natural response to think like I shouldn’t give away my best ideas. But what I’ve seen is that when you set your ideas free in the world, they are more likely to grow. I share the story in the book of a guy named David and back in the early, I think it was 1980s, David founded an, founded an idea called Appreciative Inquiry. Appreciative Inquiry is an organizational development approach. And rather than copywriting the idea, he set the idea free for anyone to use. And so as a result, that idea of appreciative inquiry has been used by coaches, consultants, organizations, all around the world. And it might have not been known apart from that. So you really wanna think about if your idea has value and merit, if you set it free, it can make the difference that it was intended to make. And when you think about generosity, it’s not only about give away your ideas, it’s about give away your time, your encouragement, your energy, your support. You

How Virtual Assistants Are Reshaping The Business Landscape

How Virtual Assistants Are Reshaping The Business Landscape written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with Joe Rare In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Joe Rare. He is an “underground” serial entrepreneur, investor, and outsourcing expert. Joe focuses on helping small- to medium-sized businesses and currently owns and manages a number of digital companies that are fully run by virtual assistants, including: Level […] The 7 Deadly Marketing Mistakes written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with John Jantsch In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I’m doing a solo show, and I’m gonna talk about 7 martketing mistakes that business owner usually make and I give you some tips on how to avoid them. Key Takeaway: Businesses often make seven deadly marketing mistakes: lacking a clear vision, trying to please everyone, being just like their competition, wasting marketing resources, competing solely on price, succumbing to the idea of the week, and lacking measurable success criteria. Overcoming these mistakes requires a focused marketing strategy aligned with business objectives for creating a roadmap for growth. Topics I Cover: [01:25] Introduction to the 7 deadly marketing mistakes. [02:32] Number 1: No vision of where your business is headed. [03:47] Number 2: Trying to be all things to all people. [05:54] Number 3: Being just like the competition. [08:49] Number 4: Wasting precious marketing resources. [09:37] Number 5: Competing on price. [11:11] Number 6: Getting overwhelmed with the idea of the week. [13:16] Number 7: Having no way to measure your success. More information: Send me an email  if you want to talk about Strategy First. More About The Agency Certification Intensive Training: Learn more about the Agency Certification Intensive Training here Take The Marketing Assessment: Marketingassessment.co Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please! Duct Tape Transcript Email Download New Tab John Jantsch (00:00): This episode of Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is brought to you by HubSpot. Look, AI is literally eating the web ChatGPT is more searched than I don’t know, Taylor Swift. Check out HubSpot’s AI powered tools, content assistant and chat spott. They both run on open AI’s GPT model, and both are designed to help you get more done and to grow your business faster. HubSpot’s AI powered content assistant helps you brainstorm, create, and share content in a flash, and it’s all inside a super easy to use CRM now. Chat Spott automates all the manual tasks inside HubSpot to help you arrange more customers close more deals and scale your business faster. Find out more about how to use AI to grow your business at hubspot.com/artificial-intelligence. That’s hubspot.com/artificial-intelligence. (01:14): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch and I’m gonna do a solo show. Seems like it’s been a little while. I think it’s time. I wanna talk about the seven deadly marketing mistakes, uh, that every business makes, and it’s the ultimate benefit of having a marketing strategy and plan. You know, marketing can seem really overwhelming. There’s more to do every day than you can possibly do. There’s a new thing that comes along every day. Getting it all done just seems impossible. So when I talk about these mistakes, I mean, I, I, again, I think these are pitfalls that people can naturally fall into. And so I wanna talk about the things that you should avoid, things that you need to focus on, because by doing so, maybe I’ll also give you some thoughts about what you should stop doing or not need to do. (02:08): Like, jump on every new trend and new shiny object that comes along, for example. All right, so I’m gonna go into, uh, these seven things that I see, and I call ’em mistakes because that’s a, you know, that everybody’s scared to make mistakes, right? But they’re really just common business, uh, practices that, uh, I want to help you avoid. And by virtue of doing that, help you focus on the right things. Okay? So here they come. Number one, I see so many businesses that have really no vision of where they’re headed. I started my own business without any vision where I was headed. And, you know, you quickly find that you get whipped around by kind of every breeze that that blows. So, you know, not having a roadmap or at least a thought about what success looks like for you. Now, it’s pretty common for people to advise, like, what’s the three year plan? (02:56): And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, except who knows , what the three year plan is. But having some idea, not just of what the numbers are going to be, but what impact you want to have. But I will say when I set goals with numbers, somehow we kind of get there. So there is some real value in just projecting guessing as some numbers, but I think the bigger thing is what kind of impact? What kind of business do you want to have? Who do you want to associate with your brand? I mean, what place in the market do you wanna own? I mean, those are some things that you can make as statements early on, and I think that they can be very invigorating for your team members. They can certainly be attractive to customers as well. So having it holding and at least an outline of vision is so crucial. (03:44): So that’s mistake number one that I see. No vision. (03:47): Number two, trying to be all things to all people. Now, I don’t think people necessarily set out and say, I’m going to be all things to all people. But what happens is there, there is a natural inclination if somebody comes along and says, oh, you do marketing, or, oh, you do accounting, I need that. Then line up like, here it is, you know, buy from me. And I think what happens is, and you’ve probably experienced this if you’ve been around for any amount of time at all, is that you end up watering down any kind of messaging or any kind of brand. In fact, you typically have no brand and you will inevitably attract the wrong clients. And in fact, you’ll confuse the right clients, uh, by saying, look, here’s everything we could do. Uh, does anybody need that? (04:31): As opposed to, here’s the thing that we do that nobody else can do for you. Like we can do having the top 20%. In fact, I always tell people, take a look at the top 20% of your clientele today, your ideal clients, they’re probably in your top 20% because they’re profitable. They probably have a good experience because they had the right challenge and they had the right behaviors on how to solve that. They probably don’t beat you up over price. Maybe they even refer you because they have such a great experience. I mean, those are the folks that you should build your entire business around. It doesn’t mean you won’t sell to other people, but your messaging needs to be lined up to attract more of that top 20%. And then really from a business model standpoint, you wanna make sure that you’re actually not just keeping those folks happy, but continue to explore what else could you do with those folks? (05:22): Because you’ve already sold them, they already love you. Um, do 10 times more business with, uh, the top 20% of your client. You’ll double your business rather than than going out there and, and trying to convince new people, uh, to buy from you. It helps you solidify your offers, helps you solidify your customer journey. It certainly, you know, you can build momentum with repeat business. Um, this is a group that’s gonna refer you. We all know how great referrals are. So focus on that top 20%. Stop trying to be all things to all people. (05:54): Number three, being just like the competition. And again, I don’t think anybody sets out to say, I’m gonna be just like every other business in my industry. But we have a tendency to look around and, and maybe we worked for a company like that. We start our own company. We have a tendency to look around and and find that we are, um, saying the same things. We’re offering the same things, we’re acting the same way. There’s really no way to build trust in that type of environment. And unfortunately, what happens is if you look just like the competition, well guess what? Somebody calls three people in your industry and all they can compare is price. And so you’re constantly competing on price because there is no, there’s no differentiating factor that people value. So you can’t attract the right fit. You can’t really make, or the the promise you can’t attract talent. You know, staff gets really excited about knowing, Hey, we’re, we have this compelling message, we have this compelling difference. Here’s the problem that we solve for folks. You know, this is one that, that I’ve got it right here in the middle of these seven. (06:55): But this is one that, that leeches out into so many other things. You know, you’re gonna waste marketing resources, you’re gonna compete on price, you know, by doing this. And so finding, and guess what? Here’s a clue. Your customers know how you’re different. And so finding and discovering in their words what that difference is, the problem you actually solve is such a huge component that you can build into the overarching strategy. Not just marketing messaging, but the overarching strategy of your business. Your starts with a core message that you then build into everything you do. (07:29): And now let’s hear from a sponsor. This episode is brought to you by Business Made Simple, hosted by Donald Miller, and brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals hosted by Donald Miller. Business Made Simple Takes the Mystery out of Growing Your business. In a recent episode, they talked with my old pal, Seth Godin, where he explained the virtues and values in his book called The Song of Significance, A new manifesto for teams. Listen to Business Made Simple. Wherever you get your podcasts (08:01): Hey, marketing agency owners, you know, I can teach you the keys to doubling your business in just 90 days or your money back. Sound interesting. All you have to do is license our three-step process that’s gonna allow you to make your competitors irrelevant, charge a premium for your services and scale perhaps without adding overhead. And here’s the best part. You can license this entire system for your agency by simply participating in an upcoming agency certification intensive. Look, why create the wheel? Use a set of tools that took us over 20 years to create. And you can have ’em today. Check it out at dtm.world/certification. That’s dtm.world/certification. (08:49): Mistake number four is wasting precious marketing resources. Man, there are so many channels, so little time . They, they’re coming fast and furious every day. And I think there, there is a real inclination to say, oh, I have to be everywhere. I have to do everything. I have to be in this channel. And what happens is, maybe it’s even an effective channel for you to be in, but we’re spread so thin that we can’t make any impact anywhere. I’d rather see you master one channel, one place where you can actually make money consistently and predictably, whatever it is, Facebook content, using seo, running Google ads, it doesn’t really matter. Master one and then move on to the next. You can’t build any momentum by building, by spreading yourself too thin. (09:36): All right, number five, and again, this is another one of those that runs through a lot of challenges, but competing on price. Unless you’re Walmart, you know, uh, competing on price, being the low cost leader is not such a great place because you can’t pull it off . And so again, going back to like being just like the competition, trying to be all things to all people. A couple of the other mistakes I mentioned, that’s what really leads to this competing on price, because you have no option. It’s like the only way we’re gonna get the deal is to be cheaper. Well, the problem with that, of course, is then you have no profits to invest. You’re gonna track the wrong clients. You ever notice how the client that wants the deal is going to be the most demanding client that you sign up? I mean, you can’t innovate. You’re, because you’re serving people that came to you based on price. Guess where they’re gonna go the next time they can get a cheaper deal from somebody else? So you can’t hire, right? You can’t outsource, right? You can’t innovate. You’re gonna attract the wrong clients. And here’s the thing that’s really sad, is that, you know, if you focused on that top 20% that already loves you, that’s already willing to pay a premium, the opportunity for you to grow profitably resides there. (10:49): And not in all the lost opportunity of chasing those folks that just come to you on price. Now, you can’t just, well, you can just raise your prices, but you better have a compelling message. You better have a compelling package. You better promise to solve a compelling, uh, problem for a specific person in a specific way. That’s how you get out of competing on price. (11:10): Number six, overwhelmed with the idea of the week. Anybody feel that? I mean, business is overwhelming, period, , but the pace of change, the new things that come along, the new person that assures you that AI is now like the secret weapon that you can get rich. It, it, you know, chasing these things, and I’m not saying there aren’t times when you wanna look at opportunities, but what happens is when you’re flailing around chasing the idea of the week, you can’t build any momentum. You’re going to waste countless hours. Who knows how much resources you’re gonna confuse your customers. Having a consistent point of view about here’s what we do, here’s how we do it, here’s how we do it, here’s why we do it. Here’s how we do it better than anyone dreamed of doing. Sticking with that long enough for people to actually hear that message and start telling their friends, neighbors and colleagues is how you can get by or get through the overwhelm, you know, with this idea of the week. Now, what this also means is you have to have some data to make decisions. If you don’t know what’s working today, you’re more likely to try something new. Let’s throw some more stuff out there, right? The old spaghetti on the wall, see what sticks. But if you have good data, and this doesn’t mean that you have to be a data nerd and like have all kinds of dashboards and dials of everything that’s going on. (12:35): If you have the six or seven or eight meaningful things, or at least what you believe will be meaningful things to measure in your business, and you put them on a spreadsheet and you look at them every week or maybe every day and you update them and you talk about them in your team meetings, you know, that’s how you’re going to say, Hey, this is working. Let’s stick with this. Let’s double down on this and let’s forget about the idea of the week. Doesn’t mean you won’t experiment, but you won’t be tempted to just run all over without any, any real idea of what’s working and what’s not working. Look, there is too much to do and not enough time to do it. So let’s stay focused on a handful of things. (13:16): Number seven, no way to measure success. So every quarter, uh, actually every month to some extent, but every quarter we get together with the leadership, uh, team, we talk about what are two or three objectives, never any more than three primary objectives for the business. And certainly we boil that down to then what are the objectives for marketing? And those objectives for marketing are going to lead up to, are they going to help serve our business objectives by having those and then filter using that as a filter. You know, every time we get a great new idea, to say, wait a minute, where does that fit into this quarter’s plan? Does it support one of those objectives or not? If it does, great, let’s figure out how to get it done. If it doesn’t, let’s put it in the parking lot. You know, let’s wait on it. And I think having the discipline to follow a quarterly plan is absolutely how we get things done. I mean, you look up at the end of 90 days sometimes and you think, God, I feel like I’m exactly where I was 90 days ago. (14:18): But working with two or three objectives, when we achieve those, we big things, uh, can happen to your business. You can actually accomplish a pretty significant goal in a quarter’s time. And that’s going to serve you in many cases for years to come. Whereas just kind of doing a little here, a little dabble there, a little dabble there, you know, isn’t going to allow you to make any kind of consistent growth. So all of this, uh, all of these seven, uh, deadly marketing mistakes that I’ve talked about are really solved or cured, uh, by developing a marketing strategy. We have a process we call strategy First. I’m sure you’ve heard me talk about it. It is a, a process that we’ve now between myself and my team and, uh, the, the hundreds of agencies that we’ve licensed, we’ve actually run thousands of businesses through this process. And it just flat works. It helps you stay focused on the things that I’ve talked about, uh, today. And it really allows you to see not just growth, but a roadmap of what growth looks like of where you’re going. (15:25): So I, if any of this touch to Nerve, I’m sorry, first off, but I also invite you to reach out. Uh, you can just send me an email, john@ducttapemarketing.com and say, I wanna talk about strategy. I wanna talk about strategy first. Um, we’d love to set a meeting with you and talk about how we could maybe bring, we, we could solve these mistakes if you’re experiencing any of them. Uh, but bring you a solid roadmap that is going to serve you really from a marketing standpoint and a business standpoint for, uh, perhaps years to come. So that’s it. Thanks again for listening and let me know if you like these solo shows. (16:01): I’ll try to remember to do more of them in the future. All right. Hopefully we’ll see you one of these days out there on the road. (16:07): Hey, and one final thing before you go. You know how I talk about marketing strategy, strategy before tactics? Well, sometimes it can be hard to understand where you stand in that, what needs to be done with regard to creating a marketing strategy. So we created a free tool for you. It’s called the Marketing Strategy Assessment. You can find it @marketingassessment.co, not.com, dot co. Check out our free marketing assessment and learn where you are with your strategy today. That’s just marketing as assessment.co. I’d love to chat with you about the results that you get. Scroll back to top Sign up to receive email updates Enter your name and email address below and I’ll send you periodic updates about the podcast. powered by   This Duct Tape Marketing Podcast episode is brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network. HubSpot Podcast Network is the audio destination for business professionals seeking the best education and inspiration to grow a business.  

Weekend Favs July 15

Weekend Favs July 15 written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing My weekend blog post routine includes posting links to a handful of tools or great content I ran across during the week. I don’t go into depth about the finds, but I encourage you to check them out if they sound interesting. The photo in the post is a favorite for the week from an […] How Virtual Assistants Are Reshaping The Business Landscape written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing Marketing Podcast with Joe Rare In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Joe Rare. He is an “underground” serial entrepreneur, investor, and outsourcing expert. Joe focuses on helping small- to medium-sized businesses and currently owns and manages a number of digital companies that are fully run by virtual assistants, including: Level 9 Virtual, Wedding Booking System, Engaged.app and Campground Digital. Key Takeaway: Joe shares his story as an underground entrepreneur with his unique perspective on building businesses in silence, without seeking the spotlight or constantly promoting themselves. He emphasizes the importance of focusing on business growth, making an impact, and connecting with customers rather than getting caught up in content creation and personal branding. Joe is involved in the virtual assistants and shares the benefits of outsourcing tasks to VAs and how it can help businesses grow and be more profitable. It’s important to have a mindset shift to fully embrace this approach. Questions I ask Joe Rare: [01:51] What’s an underground entrepreneur? [04:34] How did you get started building businesses? [06:12] What attracted you to the virtual assistant world? [08:37] Now you’re building some apps and some marketplaces. What what got you there? And what have you learned that it’s going to allow you to repeat that process? [15:43] Should every business be looking at virtual assistans as a way to supplement, grow, be more profitable? [18:50] What’s the best way to go about finding virtual assistants? [20:35] Do you find that people graduate towards higher levels of responsibility for those virtual person where maybe they’re even client facing in some cases? [21:58] Talk to me a little bit about the mistakes or the best practices when you’ve seen the relationship with virtual assistans really work. What’s been the keys to success? More About Joe Rare: More about Level 9 Virtual. Joe’s website. Reach out to Joe. More About The Agency Certification Intensive Training: Learn more about the Agency Certification Intensive Training here Take The Marketing Assessment: Marketingassessment.co Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please! Duct Tape Transcript Email Download New Tab John Jantsch (00:00): This episode of Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is brought to you by HubSpot. Look, AI is literally eating the web ChatGPT is more searched than I don’t know, Taylor Swift. Check out HubSpot’s AI powered tools, content assistant and chat spott. They both run on open AI’s GPT model and both are designed to help you get more done and to grow your business faster. HubSpot’s AI powered content assistant helps you brainstorm, create, and share content in a flash. And it’s all inside a super easy to use CRM now. Chat Spott automates all the manual tasks inside HubSpot to help you arrange more customers close more deals and scale your business faster. Find out more about how to use AI to grow your business at hubspot.com/artificial-intelligence. That’s hubspot.com/artificial-intelligence. (01:14): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Joe Rare. He is a, I’m gonna say self-proclaimed underground serial entrepreneur, investor and outsourcing expert. He focuses on helping small to mid-sized businesses and currently owned and manages a number of digital companies that are fully run by virtual assistants, including Level 9 virtual, wedding booking system, engaged.app campground, digital. We’ll talk about a few of those. So Joe, welcome to the show. Joe Rare (01:45): Thank you so much. I, I appreciate you having me. John Jantsch (01:47): So I have to get into that like underground thing. , what’s an underground, what’s an underground entrepreneur? Cuz you’re clearly like not in a cave or anything. Joe Rare (01:55): No, no, no. Well, I mean, I’m actually in the lower level of my house, so that counts for some. No, I, you know, somebody actually kind of said that to me when I was speaking at an event and we were discussing social media and whether you have to be a personality in order to succeed Right. In business today. And you know, everybody’s kind of telling their story over and telling everybody else what to do and is that necessary? Is that how it has to be? And I said, well, you know, at that time, I mean I’m like, I don’t produce content. Like I don’t do anything on social other than in some, you know, Facebook communities where I engage with people in my market, but I really don’t spend much time there. I don’t post a lot. It’s just not something I love and I don’t enjoy it. (02:34): And so I don’t think I do. And they were like, geez, that’s so underground. Like it’s so, you know, you’re not in the spotlight. You’re not trying to tell everybody how to do everything like everybody else is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was like, that’s kind of interesting. And so that carried over and somebody else introduced me at another thing I spoke at and they called me an underground entrepreneur and I’m like, you know, that kind of sticks and I kind of like it. So, I mean, the way that I say it is I build businesses in. Yeah. I, I don’t, you know, nobody knows. We just lost a company and kind of see here in the background, we just launched a company called visitor match.com and it’s, you know, we did it and nobody knew we were even doing it. Half the com, half of my team didn’t even know we were working on the project. Cause I’m like, look like let’s not do anything until we know it works, . Then we’ll actually say, okay, let’s build it. And so yeah. So that’s kind of how that came up about. John Jantsch (03:23): Well, and and I actually love that cuz there definitely are a lot of people, like you say on social media that, you know, they’re making a lot of noise, but they’re not really making a lot of impact. And I think that, you know, being busy, building a business, making money, having an impact, you know, you don’t really need to necessarily have a megaphone to do that. Joe Rare (03:38): Right. I mean, you look at the, the biggest businesses in the world didn’t have, um, a single person out there telling everybody what they should be doing. Yeah. And I think I actually just had this thought today and I was like, oh, should I make a piece of content around it? Because it’s completely inverse of what the thought is. But I said, you know, everybody out here thinking I gotta make this content to make my business more successful. It’s like, no, you don’t. You need to pick up the phone. You need to contact your customers, you need to sell stuff. That’s how you make your business more successful. So stop producing content at the, you know, where you think you have to. Right, right. The moment you think you have to produce content to make money, you’re dead. Yeah. Because everybody else that’s competing with you, they’re calling your customers and winning the business. John Jantsch (04:25): . All right. So you’ve got, you’ve had a really sort of interesting journey. I wouldn’t say you’re a youthful guy, so I’m not gonna say long journey necessarily, but how, how’d you get started building businesses? Joe Rare (04:37): When I was in high school, towards the end of high school, I think we took a road trip to visit my grandfather in Canada. And so we were driving from California to Canada in an rv and I read the book, Rich Dad, Poor Dad, I think, you know, over a two 10, day two, no, I used this two week trip. I think I read the book six times. John Jantsch (04:57): . That’s awesome. Joe Rare (04:57): And the first time I read it, uh, it literally just, it just nailed me. And I went, yep, that’s exactly what my life’s supposed to be. And so then I went to college and I, you know, started school and thought, okay, I’m gonna go play sports. And of course I’m a five 11 guy who isn’t gonna play basketball at any level, you know, beyond, you know, maybe I sit in the bench in college I decided, you know, maybe I should start a business. And so I dropped outta college, started a business and my thought was, I can always go back to school. Right. If I ever want to, I can go back to school. But the business that I started went from zero to 40 employees. And then I sold the company two and a half years later, . And so I didn’t make a ton of money cause I didn’t know what I was doing. I was in my early twenties and I was kind of an idiot. And so I didn’t make, John Jantsch (05:39): Yeah, you probably made early twenties money. Joe Rare (05:41): I made early twenties money, you know, and, uh, I was able to get into real estate investing and bought some properties and got to play that game. Uh, but that, you know, I, right out of that, I was like, okay, hold on. I, I, this is like, it’s my itch, it’s my thing. And I have to be, I have to be able to flex that muscle. And really that’s, it’s where my interest lies. It’s where my heart lies. I don’t think I could work in a job. I think I would suffocate and it would just be devastating to me. So that’s how I got started . So, John Jantsch (06:12): So what attracted you to the virtual assistant world? Um, you run one of your organizations is fairly large, uh, VA Level 9 virtual is a fairly large VA placement agency. Uh, was it one of those things where you needed one and you were like, Hey, this is cool, this works. And so business? Joe Rare (06:28): Right. So yeah, so I mean, to kind of make this story more colorful, I actually was in the real estate world and I was doing fix and flips and, you know, the 2008 nine economy crashed and I got stuck with a lot of properties that I had. I, I didn’t have any money to pay for. I didn’t have anything to do with it, so I had to give ’em back to the bank. And so I ended up giving I think, eight mortgages back to the bank, which was pretty devastating when I’m, again, I’m in my mid twenties. Yeah. And I felt like at the time, you know, it’s like, hey, I got like, you know, six, 8 million in real estate. Like, I had this, you know, I’m wealthy, but I was broke and gave the money back to the bank trying to figure out what I’m gonna do next. (07:05): And you know, I read Rich, I read Rich, Dad Poor Dad previously, which got me on the entrepreneurial journey. And then I read Tim Ferriss four hour work week. And I went, okay, this digital world seems kind of cool. I could create an e-commerce business, we could do some drop shipping, we could do that stuff. And I started building that business. And so what I did was I literally sat down at my dining room table and I built a business page by page out of the book. Literally every, I executed everything except one, one piece of it. And that was that I sold an ingestible product and he said not to. But other than that, I did everything by the book. And so I got virtual assistance and I started out in India and then I was in Pakistan and in Sri Lanka and Vietnam and all over the place. (07:50): And I ended up down the road, I landed on the Philippines and it was a very, you know, it was very kind of a successful place to land for virtual assistants. Yeah. Just because their culture matches a lot of the United States, right. They watch our movies, they wear their clothes, their clothes, and they listen to our music. And so they very much follow what we do. Street signs are in English, universities teach in English. It was a good fit. That business worked well until the FDA shut down the product. And then we were like, okay, well gotta close that down. And so then that led me into marketing. And I was using VAs at that time, but I hired my first VA in November of 2008. And I’ve had a team working with me every single day since that day. So that’s how I started with VAs. John Jantsch (08:33): Yeah. So I’m jumping around a little bit here now. You’re building some apps and some marketplaces. So talk a little bit about that. I mean, that’s a different beast building an app and building a marketplace around an app. So what, what got you there? And then, you know, what have you learned that’s gonna allow you to repeat that process? Joe Rare (08:51): You know, when it came to like, you know, engaged app process, you know, the, I was looking at, I was servicing my, our clients at my agency, which is wedding booking system, and I was servicing our clients there. We were using multiple softwares to fulfill a service. And because there were so many that we were using, I got to the point where I said, okay, you know, we should probably build our own and put all of this into one. So I reached out to a buddy of mine that I knew was kind of dabbling in the same thing. And I said, Hey, why don’t we pull some resources, let’s see if we can go develop this. And he said, I’ve been trying for a while. The developers couldn’t finish, so I just lost about a hundred grand. And I’m like, oh, that kind of sucks. (09:32): Okay, , this isn’t good. And you know, and then I said, well, look, let’s go to the table and see if we can find somebody else who can help us with this. And maybe somebody could be another partner. And then we could find the right development team. A few weeks later he goes, Hey, hold that thought because I actually know somebody who’s already on track to launch something. And what we could do is we can piggyback off of that and then we can have our own app. And so I said, okay, let’s check that out. And so we got in early, went through the development process of, hey, we need this built in and this built in and all that stuff, and kind of customizing it to what we needed. And then, you know, and that’s how we kind of, but the whole point of the software, the only thing I wanted it to do was service my existing clients. It was never a thought to then go sell it to people who weren’t our clients and just have people use the software. That was never the intent. And then I’m like, wait a minute, why don’t I just do that? And so he started doing that and next thing you know, you’ve got hundreds and hundreds of users and it’s, and it’s doing great. John Jantsch (10:28): So, so an all in one engaged is focuses on the wedding industry. Could you take that to other industries? Joe Rare (10:34): Of course. Yeah, of course. Yeah. And there’s, you know, there’s other people who have, have, you know, dealt with same development company and they’ve taken it to other industries as well. Yeah. Where I kept it was the moment that everybody becomes your customer. Nobody’s your customer. Sure, sure. Right. And so niching down was the key to my success, especially with my agency businesses, is the niche side of things, being very specific in who we service. Because then every single point of communication is designed for that industry, that niche. And so I said, you know, this is what we use the software for. This is how we have it set up. This is why, you know, everything is the way that it is for us. Let’s just keep it that way for that niche. If we wanted to do it for another industry, okay, we should do something completely separate. But, you know, so John Jantsch (11:19): It’s that. Well, and it did support. You were already in that business. Right? So it supported that, which I think quite frankly, I think is always a great play. I mean, if you, if the extra money or the extra opportunity comes out of it, serving in an industry you already know because it already supports your main business, is a great play. Joe Rare (11:36): Absolutely. John Jantsch (11:37): So I just touch briefly on the fact that you’re, you’ve taken a similar thing to the campground industry, an RV industry though, right? Or is that a whole different play? Joe Rare (11:46): No, it was, that was just kind of a, a weird needs play at the time. We haven’t done a lot with it since. So I was, I I keep to tell somebody like, Hey, yeah, don’t even really include that. But I mean, we built a business out of it that produces income that most people would beg for. And the way that I did it was we were traveling during the whole covid crisis. We were traveling around in, you know, an rv. Sure. And, you know, I’m telling my wife, Hey, let’s, okay, let’s stop in this city and then let’s stay somewhere. And so she starts, you know, she’s on her phone in the car and we’re, she’s trying to find like, where do we stay? And she’s like, God, this is awful. Like, I can’t figure out are they good for kids? Do they like dogs? (12:22): Yeah, yeah. You know, like, what are the amenities of the place? And unless she went with like a big company, like K oa thousand trails, like mom and pop places were awful. Yeah. As far as their marketing goes. And I’m like, you know, we could fix that. My wife said, oh my God, no, you’re not gonna try something new. And I’m like, I have an idea. So we end up getting somewhere and we stay and I just, I, I reached out to one of my developers and, and our designers first, and I said, Hey, can you create a landing page? Here’s what I’m kind of thinking. Create like a little brand around it. Let’s buy a URL and let’s throw up a landing page and then I’m gonna make some contact with some people. And so we, I literally just started making calls to all the people that we looked at previously. (13:02): Yeah. And I just started calling ’em. I said, Hey, listen, you know, we were trying to stay at your place. We ended up staying over here. The reason we couldn’t stay with you is because of X, Y, Z. We couldn’t figure out, you know, your marketing and, and the way you display online. I, I couldn’t figure out if this was the right place for us. And, and I said, I, it made me think I have a company, I think that we could support you. Here’s what we do. And they’re like, absolutely, we’d love to help. We always talk about it, but we just don’t know how to do it. We don’t know where to go. We didn’t know who to. And so I’m like, okay, hey guys, can we create like a logo because we need to have some sort of branding around this and like, let’s do it. And so as we traveled, we just kept contacting people and the next thing you know, you know, we got 30, 30 clients paying, you know, a couple thousand bucks a month and you’ve got a real business margins were great. And I went, okay, I have a real business here. Like, this is something we could pursue and grow and do something great with. And so, yeah. And then it’s been very steady for, you know, a couple years. A few years now. John Jantsch (14:00): It’s funny, I own a camper van and we do the same thing. And that’s been my experience too. I mean, they’re just, it’s Joe Rare (14:05): Awful. Oh my gosh. It’s so funny cause it’s like, it’s such a simple opportunity, you know? And I think there’s some other people who have dabbled into it and, and they might be supporting others. But yeah, it was just something that, it was just a happenstance type opportunity. I’m like, let’s just see what we could do. . Uh, yeah. So that was great. John Jantsch (14:23): And now let’s hear from a sponsor. This episode is brought to you by Business Made Simple, hosted by Donald Miller, and brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals hosted by Donald Miller Business Made Simple Takes the Mystery out of Growing Your Business. In a recent episode, they talked with my old pal, Seth Godin, where he explained the virtues and values in his book called The Song of Significance, A new manifesto for teams. Listen to Business Made Simple. Wherever you get your podcast. (14:55): Hey, marketing agency owners, you know, I can teach you the keys to doubling your business in just 90 days or your money back. Sound interesting. All you have to do is license our three-step process that’s gonna allow you to make your competitors irrelevant, charge a premium for your services and scale perhaps without adding overhead. And here’s the best part. You can license this entire system for your agency by simply participating in an upcoming agency certification intensive look, why create the wheel? Use a set of tools that took us over 20 years to create. And you can have ’em today. Check it out at DTM world slash certification. That’s DTM world slash certification. (15:43): All right, let’s pivot back to VAs, the world of VAs. So I, I know your answer to this, but I want you to support it a little bit. I mean, should every business be, uh, looking at that as a way to supplement, grow, be more profitable, , let Joe Rare (15:59): Sort that, I mean, if, yeah, it depends. I think it just depends on what your business structure’s like. Right? Do you require people to be there physically? Mm-hmm. das are not the way to go, but most businesses have the opportunity to outsource something. Yeah. There’s a human being sitting around that could be better utilized somewhere else in the business or at a different capacity. And you could use cost leverage to outsource to a virtual assistant. I truly believe almost every business can do that. There’s a mind shift that has to exist. And, you know, as, as widely known as virtual assistants and outsourcing is, the reality is that the majority of businesses have no clue. They don’t have any idea about this. And so it’s like, wait a minute, somebody where is gonna be supporting my business? Like, that’s crazy. And so we’re still, it, it’s funny, like as long as this has been going on, I mean, we’re a couple decades into this, I I feel like there’s still immense opportunity for businesses to really, you know, grow into this and understand that, you know, as the economy changes, you know, this is the one area that I love to share this with. (17:06): When the economy shifts, people like to pull their marketing out mm-hmm. , and they go, hold on, let’s pull our marketing dollars back. And it’s like, whoa, double down on marketing, decrease your labor costs. Yeah. Yeah. Because guess what? Your customers are still there. You don’t need more labor and less customers. You need more customers, less labor. And so I love that side of it. When the economy shifts, don’t pull your marketing dollars back, double down on marketing, decrease your labor costs. Virtual systems are a great way to do it John Jantsch (17:37): Because good news is other people are pulling their marketing back, which even makes down better. Joe Rare (17:42): And that’s exactly it. And that’s how, during things like Covid and, and all that, how we ended up doing so well was so many people in the agency world and in, you know, in the wedding industry, you know, during Covid, what was funny is, you know, wedding venues who we serve and, and you know, and I’m a partner in five venues, they, everybody stopped. Oh, we can’t have people come tour. I’m like, so like FaceTime virtual tours, have people come until somebody tells you no. Like, we really, we pushed the envelope and I said, everybody stop marketing. We, I, I read it across forums. I saw, you know, in Facebook communities, I saw everybody was pulling their dollars back and I said, Nope, we’re doubling down. And in one of our venues we tripled marketing dollars and we took everybody’s market share. And still to this day, they’re just like, they, I see ’em all the time. We can’t book out our calendars. And we’re like, dude, we’re booked all the way into 2025 . So I don’t know what you guys are doing, but we don’t have that problem John Jantsch (18:38): . What’s the best way for somebody? So, so let’s say somebody’s saying, okay, I can think of some stuff. I, you know, you talked about the marketing world. A lot of marketing agencies, you know, have certainly, uh, landed on this idea. What’s the best way to go about finding virtual assistants other than going straight to Level 9 virtual, which of course, uh, is one option. Joe Rare (18:56): Yeah, I mean, I think you can dabble in the idea by going to like Upwork and outsourcing something. The challenge and the reason that we, that our company’s been so successful is that there’s, you know, Upwork is a huge marketplace for things like that, right? And you could find people from all over the world who have very different specialties. Some people are super inexpensive, some pla people are extraordinarily expensive. And it just depends on who you’re looking for, what you’re looking for. But you can dabble into that stuff. The problem is, is you have to put dollars up front to find out if the person is actually good, right? , what we’ve created and why it’s been so successful for us is we took that model and said, hold on a second here, why don’t we create a team, what we call a pod, which is a, a kind of a play on words. (19:41): It’s projects on demand, but it’s also a pod of team members. And they will do their specialty over and over thousands and thousands of times. So we have, you know, hundreds and hundreds of clients who submit multiple tasks every single day. Our team knows how to do their specialization, they do it every day for hundreds of clients, and we know that we can do it better than everybody else. So you don’t have to go test and put money out and go, I hope this is gonna work out. You can come to Level 9 virtual and say, Hey listen, I want to buy a block of hours. I wanna submit a bunch of stuff to you guys, have you guys help me with it? And then after that you can decide, hey, okay, this is great. I’d love to have my own virtual