Habits and Hustle - Episode 124: Get Engaged Media, Cofounders – TikTok Growth, Content Building, and Influencer Marketing

Episode Date: July 13, 2021

Bennett Hiott, Cam Fordham, and Alex Dermer are the Co-Founders of Get Engaged Media. They’re essentially the biggest, most successful social media, brand managers/consultants in the game. From influencers to chart-topping musicians, to big brands and companies and more, these guys know how engagement works and know what it takes to keep up when it seems like every minute there’s a new way to break and a new way to be left behind. They discuss specifics on what they’ve done to help other artists and businesses, even going as far as doing a live demonstration of how they’d market a product. Needing an inside look at the ever-changing world of social media management and marketing? Need tips on how to keep up? They’ve got you covered. Youtube Link to This Episode  Get Engaged Media’s Website ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Did you learn something from tuning in today? Please pay it forward and write us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. 📧If you have feedback for the show, please email [e-mail]  📙Get yourself a copy of Jennifer Cohen’s newest book from Habit Nest, Badass Body Goals Journal. ℹ️Habits & Hustle Website 📚Habit Nest Website 📱Follow Jennifer – Instagram – Facebook – Twitter – Jennifer’s Website Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When there's a penalty on the field, referees are there to sort it out. When there's an accident on the road... Sergeant Lindros, I'm glad you're okay. That's where USAA steps in. We help make the claims process easy, so drivers can get back on the road fast. Making the right calls. That's what we're made for. USAA Membership eligibility and product restrictions apply in our subject to change. USAA means United Services Automobile Association and its affiliates.

San Antonio, Texas. Vitamin water zero sugar just dropped in all new taste. It was zero holding back on flavor. You can be your all feeling. I'll play and all self-care you. Grab the all new taste today. Vitamin water zero sugar. Nourishcare you. Grab the all new taste today. Vitamin water's zero sugar, nourish every you. Vitamin water is a registered trademark of glass O.

I got this Tony Robbins you're listening to Habits in Hustle. Fresh it. All right you guys so today we have a great podcast because we have one of my dearest friends, Cam and his crew called Get Engaged to be our guest on Habits and Hustle. And some of them even flew very, very far to be here. So thank you and it's great to have you guys. I'm glad to hear it.

Thank you. Good to hear. This has been Alex and I said, Cam and their company is called Get Engaged and they are probably the top at this point. Influencer and social marketing agency and what they do is they take your brand and they will actually what they do is they create and build on your brand. They're at a, you said it earlier, what was that word we talked about? Accelerator.

Accelerator, that's right. So why don't we first just talk about all three of you guys, what, who you guys are, how did you guys start this business? Do you want to start with, let's start with you Ben. Sure. I'm Ben. I'm originally from Columbia, South Carolina.

Group up with a dream of being in music. I chased that dream for a while. I had some very mild success. I would definitely say I was kind of a hometown hero in my hometown of Columbia, South Carolina. I musically sold out about your shows. I went on a few, you know, southeastern and national tours., really tried to break into the music business. Um, moved to Atlanta to try to further that dream. Uh, felt like music was plateauing a little bit. I started to have more interest in business than I did in like being the center of attention.

I kind of want to be behind the scenes making plays. So, um, I started linking with a few different celebrities that I knew. It was kind of a side hustle for me at the time, helping monetize their Facebook pages with editorial and video content. Met Cam, we had been friends for a few years. Cam's obviously super plug, he knows everybody.

Cam was like the connector to the connector. So I mean, that's like, it's unbelievable. Yes, he knows everybody. And if he doesn't, he'll know them in like four. So I mean, that's like it's unbelievable. Yes He knows everybody and if he doesn't he'll know them in like four minutes I mean, it's unbelievable. You are you're like the most socially and it's genuine like you you know how to network like nobody's business And you do it in such a nice like genuine way that people just naturally like love you most likeable Most likeable guy. I mean, that's how we got we We were just saying like we met because I was, we're at a party and I wanted to leave and we're on a mountaintop. So who drives me down the mountain is you?

And well, well, the rest is history. So yeah. So yeah, he came in my office. I was working on some other business stuff at the time. Kim came in my office. We had a meeting. He said, hey, I heard you're doing the Facebook monetization stuff.

I know a bunch of people, I can bring some clients to the table. I was like, all right, let's cool. It's partner on it. And we rapidly grew within a few months. And we jelled as business partners. We were in a co-working space space and Alex was working with another company. I'll let him tell his story. But basically Alex being Alex was the inquisitive guy. He is,

was asking us what we were working on all the time. We knew how brilliant Alex was. We had all been friends for a long time. We knew he'd be an asset as a third partner. So as we kind of grew, we looked at starting to look at other verticals that we could be in the social media, slash digital marketing space. We brought him on as a third partner in the rest of history. I was in 2016. So before we even get into your stuff, Alex, because they're correct. You are very, very smart. Every time I speak with you, I learn something. You're great. So your specialty Ben was much more about the digital, the monetization of ads or just how to kind of boost an impression. Can you kind of just explain what your specialty is, so to speak? Because I wanted to say, I didn't say it at the beginning, but you guys work with everybody in the music business to actually just any other kind of brand offline from the weekend and a million other artists to athletes and give us some of the clients that you work with so people understand I know some of the big music ones, but like give people tell people how you're range you guys are arranged is so deep and good. Right.

Yeah, I think that we are a bit of an anomaly for a marketing agency. I don't know if another one exists that runs socials, for celebrities, also runs socials, for big brands, has a whole content creation and design department, a paid media department, runs marketing campaigns for the biggest artists in the world from the weekend to little baby to Megan the stallion to Justin Bieber, and also has a department that runs campaigns for T-Mobile, raising canes, LG, really, really big companies, and smaller ones too, but I think that that's kind of made us, when you work with big corporate brands,

you have to have a certain level of professionalism the way you execute things, and we were have to have a certain level of professionalism, the way you execute things, and we were able to bring a lot of that into the music space. And I think it's what has really helped accelerate us in the music and entertainment space, because there's definitely a way for that in music business. Absolutely, and that's why you guys are sitting here, if you're success. So Alex, now it's your turn. Yeah, I know, right? So tell us what your secret sauce is and what your role in getting

gauges and your background. Yeah, so I came from the music space. I was managing artist. And I think that really my life, I've tried to almost talk as much as I can to kind of figure out who I need to talk to more. I just was always taught growing up that if you don't say anything yet, you can't say the wrong thing or the right thing. And so for me, it's just been about figuring kind of how to read a room, but also just how to go to everyone in the room and, you know, on the back end figure out who was the right people to talk to and kind of work from there. And so I went into the music business purely by chance at a meeting, actually, can't wait to have the meeting. And it was an artist,

it was a hip-hop artist, walka-flaka, and he had a tour going out the next week, actually. And I just said to him, hey, what are you doing for merch? And that conversation went from us doing the deal on merch to tour management. Yes, that's a short form. To eventually management. And I think that that was one of those things that I always figured that music was a conduit to business. It was a staircase to getting into business in a quicker fashion than taking the meeting by meeting because you had something that people wanted and so you were able to engage and build relationships

off of kind of that desire of wanting to interact with the artist. And I did that for four years or so and then by chance got into the software space. I had buddies that were building buildings for Amazon and got into a location-based task management system that's completely unrelated to music. I did that for about two years, and eventually sold that company to Amazon. And that led us into end of 16 when I came on with Vin and Kim

and the rest is history, I guess. Wow, so then what is your special key then? Because you kind of seem to be a jack of a master of a lot of trades here. You're great. So you're a great networker. You know how to read a room. You go with the other stuff that you just mentioned. Like, what is that one thing when you think of your secret sauce that kind of adds the that flavor to get engaged? Yeah. So I

think that there's two ways to build a business, right? There's you're either good at something or you're good at relationships and then amplification of those relationships. So it's if we're good at cutting grass, then we can be a great landscaping company, or we can just know a lot of homeowners and HOAs and figure out what to be good at and who to hire. And I think that I've always been one of the second approach, right? I'm never, I'm not technically, I don't know how to, like, actually, I'm not a developer, right? But how to solve for a company, because I was able to understand what Amazon needed and then execute on that need. So I think

for us, how we've built our business has been, we've built relationships, which Cam is really good at, Ben is also really good at relationship building. And so are you, really. I sometimes. You which Cam is really good at. Ben is also really good at relationship building. So are you really? Sometimes. You guys are all really good at the same thing, right? So that's why it's interesting because Ben and I hear your background. I know your background, Cam, who's like the ultimate networker, same with you, Alex.

So because you guys all have the same strength, who kind of like does the weakness? Like what is your weakness that you need to have help with that Ben and Cam can help you with? And vice versa to all of you guys. It's gonna be a shameless plug for Adderall, but a ADHD. I think that for me, my biggest weakness

is probably Ben's biggest strength, which is execution. You know, there, execution, you gotta have someone that can execute. The whole business in general is all about execution, right? Your idea is only one percent of it, right? Absolutely. So it's either you hire executors, or you have partners that are executors.

And so I think that that's my weakness, is execution. I'm really good at getting things to the finish line. And I think that's probably a testament to ADD in that world, which can be a whole other topic. Right. The whole other podcast we could talk about. Yeah.

So I think that probably is one of those talkers I've ever say amazing. So he sometimes relies on us to put all the pieces. Right. To actually execute and deliver. No, it's 100% true because whenever I speak to I'm always I'm always captivated and thralled by what you say. Like I said, like even before this podcast, no matter what I say, you can go on about it and say it in a way that I actually feel like I'm like gaining value and learning something.

Like you process information very well. Not a bad heck of a teacher. No, it's just kidding. My lifestyle wouldn't be conducive to being a teacher. No, well listen, I mean, yeah, maybe not. So then Ben, you're the executor, really? Yeah, I mean, I think Alex has discredited himself a little bit because, you know, we both flew here and we sat beside each other on the plane and I looked over and he was writing

a 10-page proposal. One of our directors had put together most of the bones of, but he was going in and adding stuff and making sure that this proposal for this really big deal working on was right and was going to get shipped out the door and be correct. I think that Alex just kind of goes in a lot of different directions. His range just goes 100 miles an hour. Like I can like sit down with a list of things I need to do that day and I can both do them one at a time and I can just, hey you need to do this, you need to do this and like kind of orchestrate things. I would say that also I'm probably, you know, cam is a really

likable nice fun personality. Everybody loves them. Alex is definitely like a jokester in the office and stuff. I probably fall into the category of the disciplinarian. You know, I can be talking to people. I set really high expectations for people because and this might be another story for another day, but I came from really humble beginnings and I moved to Atlanta with nothing and was able to get the ball rolling to be able to build this business with them. So like, I knew what I was able to create on myself. So I'm like, hey, you have an opportunity to work in a disruptive company that's like doing groundbreaking things like don't mess this up.

Right. Don't mess it up for yourself and definitely don't mess it up for us as owners that took a chance on you. So if you guys are, if you're the, that, that was all said. And so that you're the executor, what is your weakness that they provide for you? Oh, I'd say that my weakness probably is, at times, can be effective communication. I think I've made great strides on that. And I think the other one is probably being,

I hate the word sympathy, but being empathetic for people. Because I'm just like, okay, cool, you're having a bad day, like do your job. I have bad days and I get my job done too. I have, sometimes I have a hard time seeing it through other people's shoes. shoes. That's something that probably should have improved on. But yeah, I mean we all another thing is that we all

even though he comes from music and he understands the music space like I from being an artist and just being like a like I really am into music and like the business side of music. So naturally as we built out the music marketing division of the agency, I kind of fell into place with overseeing that and building that. Alex, you can put him in a corporate boardroom. He knows how to navigate the conversation and talk that talk. So he falls into that space.

You know, someone's having a Grammy party and, you know, you're going to be there. So two, three in the morning and you need a guy that's going to look sharp in a tux and be able to walk around the room and get 15 phone numbers and walk out of there with a few leads on some big deals. No better guy than this guy. So we all have a camera. This is like such a big promotion, just for how great cam is. That's what this podcast should be called, right? Like, cam's so great, cam's so friendly. Everyone loves cam.

You should have a show called Everyone Loves cam. Cam's having some hustles. Yeah, exactly. So then, cam, now let's talk about you. So now we know all your great stuff. What's your weakness that these guys help provide or if they're getting that you kind of, you know, you guys work with each other to make your company so

Successful I think we all balance each other out really well You know, it does this doesn't work without all three of us. Right doesn't I think just the structure and the organizational component They've been amazing on you know helping me. I'm you know, obviously a really good connector. I like to bring people value. It goes both ways within a relationship, but, you know, just them, them, you know, being my backbone, you know, helping me stay organized on point. I'm always a list guy, like I make lists. If I say I'm going to do something, I'll write it down and I'll make sure it gets done. But you know, these guys help me. These guys help me. With the backbone of the execution and everything. And just we work, we work really well together. Right. No, I agree with that. I think also just from just talking to you guys now, just the idea,

that you guys seem to be very self-aware of what your strengths are, what your weaknesses are, how you guys help balance each other out because it's very hard to grow a brand, grow a business, be successful when you don't have that awareness, right? Because then like there's always like, there's like a blind spot. And so that's also a good segue into what I want to talk about, right? Which is what your business is and what you guys do really well. And now I feel like it's a great time because the whole, I feel like marketing has shifted so much from where it used to be 20 years ago, right?

So let's talk about that. Like how the business has actually shifted from 20 years ago until where it is now. Alex, do you want to take this? Yeah, I mean, I think that the biggest thing is the ability to target people. I think that's probably the biggest change. If you go back to the days of television, even in the 90s, if you look at episode like Seinfeld, if I'm running an ad on Seinfeld or a commercial,

it was very specific to that audience. And so I'm putting my eggs in the basket of the audience in which I'm basically delivering an ad to. And I think that for us today is you're able to test on a much smaller scale with certain audiences through pay, through influencer, through social media, and figure out the content that works, and then amplify that content.

And I think that's the biggest thing in the difference is, is it the cost of marketing while you can still spend money, and it's not something that you have to spend less to get to that audience, but you can really figure out what works and what doesn't work for a lot less of a cost, and then execute on the strategy that works, versus in the 90s, you had to kind of trust

that the target audience you were going after, which was built off of Nielsen and other ratings that we don't have to go into. That's really the main difference. I think that what we've done is really built a team and leaned on the fact that we are in touch with culture, we're in touch with socials, we're in it every day. And so we're able to go to companies that have been around for a hundred years, that have been around for 50 years, that are really good at what they do. But together, we can be really good at something that marries their world of being good at building a product, a service, whatever it may be, and us knowing influencers, us knowing social media, us knowing

how to navigate that space, coming together to be highly more effective than if they were doing it on their own or if we were doing it. I like to catch them up a little bit. Right, right. But it's, you know, get them up to speed. No, 100%. No, it's true because like even me, like I feel, even me, I don't mean like that. But like, you know, like I feel really old in a lot of these, in these, a lot of these

arenas. And I don't think I'm like that old, but it's really important to be current with what's happening in the times and stay relevant. And so I think when we talk about marketing 20 years ago versus marketing now, I think the first thing is we never had social media back then. We never had, there was no such thing as influencer marketing, social media marketing, which is kind of what you need

to be a successful brand, be it even an individual brand, be it an old brand like Coca-Cola or whoever else. Can we like just talk about that a little bit? Like where did like, so how when this whole thing shifted, so when people come to you, be it an individual or a brand, what do they usually ask for? What is their what is their pain point, so to speak, that they need from you to help basically deliver on? I think there's one thing you said that I want to hit on real quick, which is you said, so social media is a new concept, relatively. Look back to Facebook was 0405, it kind of picked up 06 this halfway.

Influencer marketing has been around. That's true. I was gonna say it's shifted. Like, it's so true. An app that used to be an influencer, right? Like, radio, right? Like, let's talk about how it's made it different. Like how it's kind of-

The keyword is access. So, Cindy Crawford, influencer. If you go back and look, Heidi Klum, throughout from when she was young, she's been an influencer, right? An influencer, you're an influencer, you're an influencer, he's an influencer. The only difference between influencer with 30,000 followers and 30 million followers is the audience you're speaking to, right?

My mom's an influencer, his mom's an influencer. It's because you influence a subset of people, right? And so the only difference is that if Cindy Crawford influenced people, there's just no access to her. So the only way you could be delivered content from her was through a massive paid promotion with a major makeup company or a fashion company or she was the spokesperson. So that's the biggest difference is there's now direct and immediate access to all of these individuals to be able to feel like you're a part of their life. and it feel like you can get something from them, and that's the biggest change since even the,

you know, 50 years ago. That's true. Okay, then have a social media, because we never had social media back then. And now it feels like that if you don't have social media following that has, any type of real relevance, like a large social media following.

You're not relevant anymore. So people have a lot of extra pressure and a whole other like area in their marketing budget, so to speak, that they have to now put money towards to enhance their social media importance and visibility and everything else. So do people come to you? Let's say you know make up one make up any brand or talk about give us some case studies of what you did for certain people So then people can listen and be like you know what this is really valuable I think that a lot of people have a lot of confusion going on right because they hear all these buzzwords

Influencer marketing and this and that but there's nothing that can really like, that's not tangible that they can really kind of, you know, use that information that they can actually use or apply to their own brand or individual enhancements, so to speak. Yeah, so I'll give a short answer and then bounce fast to Ben and Cam, but there's no individual in the world that would probably be more apt to listen to. Let's take Coca-Cola. Let's just use a big brand. Yep. If Coca-Cola.

You're with Coca-Cola? We don't work with Coke, and I think, it's interesting because they're a hometown. They're from Atlanta. Yeah, that's why I thought maybe you did. Yeah, but I think Coke's a good example because that's a brand that has been connected to culture for years.

And Coke does a really good job at, kind of, I would say building brands and purchasing brands that no matter if sort of become something people don't want as much, then they get water, they get a sports drink, or they're able to kind of navigate the space because they've built a big enough company. So they can pivot from one of their products to another. Exactly.

And I think that for someone like Coca-Cola, the reality is while people drink Coca-Cola, they drink Dessani, or they drink any brand that's under their umbrella, hearing from Coca-Cola is cool, but hearing from an influencer who's built a following that people listen to, talking about Coca-Cola's cooler. And so that's where influencer marketing comes in and that there's tons of studies out there

that say that a voice of a Steph Curry or a LeBron James or anyone that has influence that's in the spotlight, whether it's an actor actress or musician or an athlete, they're more likely to convert a customer than the brand itself. And we see it all the time. If we're working with influencers we work with on a daily basis or a weekly basis or a monthly basis, the conversation of us going to that influencer and saying, let's do a campaign,

let's work together on this brand. There's a lot more willingness to connect with that individual and to actually talk to them than if Coca-Cola reaches out from the brand side and says, we've got money to pay you to do content. This is the way we want it. You've got to listen to the influencer. They've built their audience.

It's not the brand that's built their audience. It's you have to listen to them and let them speak to their audience. That's kind of, I would say, the one thing that jumps out, but I'll... I mean, they know what's going to perform best in their page because that's the brand they built and they know their page in their audience. Like, you know what I'm saying? for a mess in their page, because that's the brand they built, and they know their page in their audience. And like he was saying, it doesn't matter if you have 100,000 followers or 2 million followers, that 100,000 followers person could be more effective, because that's the audience that they're speaking to, if it's co-. And some of those 100,000-poller people

listen to them more, because they like them for them and they engage with their content because it's just quality content. So you're winding down with a podcast. Sounds like you have no plans to leave the couch tonight. Nope, you just want to unzip your jeans, slip on a pair of fuzzy slippers and rip open a bag of skinny pop popcorn. Because the only place you're going tonight is the bottom of this bag of popcorn. Vitamin water just dropped a new zero sugar flavor called with love.

Get the taste of raspberry and dark chocolate for the all warm, all fuzzy, all self-care, zero self-doubt you. Grab a with love today. Vitamin water, zero sugar, nourish every you. Vitamin water is a registered trademark of glass. So, right. So then do you guys, so let's say that's going back to the whole question of a brand comes to get engaged, to get to you guys, to help them be cool or be relevant or because that's really what it is, right? Like if a stodgy or brand or a brand that's been around or a very corporate brand, let's just say that, the corporate. And they want to elevate their brand or have that coolness factor.

Do you help with the overall look and feel of the brand? Or do you help them with brand partnerships? Do you say you know who'd be really great for your brand? Let's put you with Drake. I think if Drake and you did a collaboration, like where do you guys come in to the mix and make a difference? I think it's both. I think, I mean, it depends on the situation. Sometimes it's transactional and it comes to us and they say, can you get in touch with any of these five people? Hmm. Sure. You know, we know that person. We can usually get in touch with them directly or really close with their team. Or camcane. Or, I mean, we've definitely grown into a space where we have a track record. We've really proven ourselves our name rings bells so people know that they can come to us

and we can help storyboard everything and come up with really cool ideas and concepts and help see it through. And as Alex was saying, sometimes the brands can come off with like, here's the creative brief. This is what we want them to do. And we do a really good job when we have that trust and collaboration with these influencers and creators and celebrities where we can come up with a concept that's usually a lot cooler and can connect with the audience. Right. And then we're able to go and present that. And it's not always just a post. It's, hey, how can we make this a bigger partnership and go put it in these 40 locations. Right. And this is what we'll do for on-site activations. And how do we take another

partnership with, how do you take a brand that we're working with and mix it with the music campaign and bring them together. That's I think the kind of the magic in it. Yeah, I think you know, go ahead. No, I was gonna say what you guys do really well is like you kind of do a lot of like merging of this of the things together. Can you give us an example of something that you guys have recently worked on? I've got a good one. We helped with the marketing for DJ Khaled's album. And we did a product placement in one of his music videos for a brand. So we're helping on the music side of things

with the marketing. And we also would have brought a brand to the table that we work with to be a music video. Right. So everyone kind of helps each other like in the business, right? Like it's like how do you leverage one thing off of the other to build kind of like exposure and just build your relationships really, right?

Like that's really what it's about at the end of the day, right? Absolutely. If we have a social media client that we run their socials, you know, presenting them music promotion offer that coincides with their content as well. It's that cross-pollination that we like to blend everything. So, like, if someone comes to, like, just an artist, let's say a drink, a weekend, whoever else, like Megan Stallion, oh, a thousand, I can name a million.

Was that her name even, I probably pronounced it wrong. The Megan Stallion. The Megan Stallion. Okay, sorry, I told you, my touch. You need to help me, Rebrand. I was going to say that how these people already have millions of followers, what do you do with them? You just manage it because it's a business. I think a lot of times when they're that big, there's a whole business onto itself

that needs to be taken care of, correct? Right. Yeah, I think Ben speaking to that as far as how we navigate the music space is, this is world, so bounce pass. No, I think, well, there's two divisions in our agency that I can speak to with that. One is the marketing campaigns and roll outs for the project.

And then they catch more often than not. We're collaborating with the Reckner Vagals, which we've earned a lot of their trust because we executed a professional level. We're really responsive. Rob, our director of music marketing and the rest of our team had some, you, they put, they put the effort in to run really professional campaigns, collaborate, communicate, we give them fresh ideas, we're honest and transparent with them. Hey, this, this will work. This probably isn't working. This isn't connecting. We should pivot and change. That's the campaign side of things going back to your center about them having millions of followers and how do you. the campaign side of things going back to your center about them having millions of followers and how do you I guess help them not only amplify but organize social presence I think it's finding

a way to help them effectively communicate across all channels. We actually had a girl that worked for us do a case studying on what it would take for and this is a different division this is our our brand management team that actually manages the digital presence for celebrities, many of them are musicians. And she did a case study on what it would take for a popular musician in this day and age who really needs to have a TikTok, a Twitter, Facebook,

Instagram, community number, or so on and so forth. The amount of hours that would have to be put in if you used best practices to manage each platform, and she got it down to like 70 hours a week. So without an agency partner, it's almost impossible. It's impossible for someone to do it. And then you can go out and hire an assistant to do it, but do you get that agency support and backbone

of our content creation and design team and we're probably also running your music campaigns get that agency support and backbone of our content creation and design team. And we're probably also running your music campaigns and you get this home of a very diverse multicultural team that has experience in all different kind of verticals that can really know how to speak to your brand. I think that Solomon and the rest of the team on the brand management team has done a really good job with helping us

carve our name out in that space. Well, thank you Ben for that piece of information. I didn't, so it's about 70 hours a week just to manage all of the different social media platforms. It's a effectively, yeah. That's exactly how it went by their best practices that they've faced. So then I shouldn't feel so bad or a lot of people listen to it, it feels so bad because it is a massive business. Effectively. Effectively. That's exactly how you went by their best practices in the days. Right.

So then I shouldn't feel so bad or a lot of people listen to you shouldn't feel so bad because it is a massive business. Like I get mad at myself that I'm only posting every like, you know, few days because it's like with your real job and real life out offline and then in core brain, this like online piece that is becoming more important than even your offline business, right? I mean, how do people even, how does a regular person even manage their brand if they're, you know, to be, to kind of, stand out? Like how does somebody in a crowded space when they're not, when they're competing with

lots of companies that have, or people that have a lot of money that can do it properly. How does someone stand out and build a brand in a crowded space? I think you have to find your lane. And I think that that's a lot of times people try to emulate what's working. And I think that as you try things, you have to try things people aren't doing, right? It's why trashmen get paid more than a more desirable job is because there's not as many people that want to do it. And so I think that as you start to develop who you are, what's your channel, right?

If you want to be, and I think we've talked about this, but if you want to be ESPN and that's your channel, ESPN isn't just sports center. It's not just first take. It's not just a singular show. It's a ton of shows put together to make a network or to make a channel. And I think that if people start to think like that and what are you? Why are people coming? The word like is it's not there because people just double click. It's because it's supposed to be there that people like your content. And if you're putting up a picture that might get higher engagement, what are you doing on the back end of posting that picture on the other aspects of the channel?

So if you're on Instagram and you post on your feed, what are you posting on your story because you're going to have traffic if that's a highly engaged piece of content you're putting on on your feed. And so you have to be able to answer that. You have to be able to put out a diverse aspect, like a diverse kind of group of content. You can't just put out pictures of yourself in a bathing suit or in a suit or in whatever it may be, you can, but eventually you're going to realize that you're going to start to fall flat, your growth will stagger, you'll start to lose followers, and it's because

eventually people have seen the same piece of content over and over and over and over and over, and the social platform will get sick of it, and you'll see that too, but then also your followers will want something else. I've been in involved your followers too, sorry. Ask them a question. Ask them a question that they will engage with and want to engage with, you know? Yeah.

Speed to them, like, they're there to be involved in your life, so involve them, you know? That's like he was saying, stick out. What happens if someone's not very creative, right? And they have this like pressure on them now, like, oh, shit, if I want to be successful, if I want my business to do well, I need to be doing this. And I can't afford an agency, right?

What are some pro tips that people can do in order to build their brand without using an agency, right? You're saying stay in your lane. Does that mean then not so much brand? Like don't confuse who you are with too much diversity because you're saying be diverse, but stay in your lane. Yeah, I'm saying don't be afraid to try things. Okay.

And I think one of the easiest ways if you don't have the money, look and follow those who do have the money to do it and see what they're doing. Because a lot of times you can find and identify new narratives, new ideas, and new things that you can test by watching others. And so a lot of people, even at our company, have secondary social accounts

that follow the type of accounts they need to be following to watch so it's not your friends and people that you follow from an influencer perspective, maybe that you're kind of consumed with that content. It's people that are relative to your space. So if you have a consumer product brand, have an Instagram where you follow only other consumer product brands, so you can watch what they're doing, what's working, compare the content that's getting higher engagement,

why and start to ask those questions around like a business, and you're doing R&D, right? I'm researching, I'm developing, and then I'm executing. And so I think that that's one thing that people probably miss is really identifying those in the marketplace and actually consuming their content. If you want to start a podcast, you should probably listen to some podcast.

That's probably the best approach to understand what works and what doesn't work. Right. Right. It's two to three good points out of everyone, you know, who's finding it in the earth. It's time to get back to the beach with America's favorite vacation company, Apple Vacations. Book your summer getaway with confidence and enjoy a one-stop vacation shop filled with exceptional values, personalized service, and so much more. With popular destinations like Mexico, the Caribbean, Central America, Hawaii, and the continental

U.S. there's a sun splashed option for everyone. Each all-inclusive Apple Vacations package includes round-trip airfare, hotel accommodations, all meals, drinks, entertainment, and tips. Non-stop transfers are also included at no additional cost at select hotels. And for a limited time, you can take $75 off your stay at Ibero Star Hotel and Resorts with promo code Sun75. Don't wait. Go to applevacation.com slash habits dash hustle to get the steal of a deal. To your favorite Ibero Star hotel and resorts today. Give me a couple

other pro tips. I think you just got to sometimes you got to swing for it. I'll go back to music. I might be off by the exact number here. I can't remember. I read this a while back. I think it was 75 artists were starting to major label deals in 2020 off of their TikTok presence alone or having a viral song just on TikTok. You know, these kids will have, you know,

a million, five million followers on TikTok that they just built workianically by themselves, you know, and their mom's basement, but they'll have 10,000 followers on Instagram. But, you know, so I think sometimes it's education about other platforms, but I think that what we're finding now is as a new generation cropping up of younger influencers and kids that are

just, if you look at kind of the most popular ones, they're pretty fearless with the way they attack social media. They don't have any apprehension about trying things and testing things and like they just have really figured it out and I think it's because they came up as consumers and they were able to kind of dissect what works for them and what kind of move the meter for them and now they're on the other side of it so like well I know what works and but before that if you have a 35-year-old musician who can go out and sell arenas, they kind of had to be educated along the way these last 10 years of

social media. And it's really, if you really think about it, it's really been like 2013-14 on where it was like, you know, starting to be really, really important. Yeah. It was important beforehand, but like it was kind, you know, starting to be really, really important. Yeah. It was important beforehand, but like, it was kind of when Instagram really blew up, that's when it was like, you really need to have a social media presence. It's like extremely important. So that's really not that long. So what are you thinking for lunch?

Ugh, I can't. I'm getting new window treatments. So I got to go home and wait around all afternoon for a design consultation just to get a quote It's gonna totally mess up my work day. Why don't you just go to blinds.com Because I need custom products Blinds.com products are made to order and totally customizable And you get upfront pricing right on their website to easily get your quote online But I want to see the products in person

Blinds.com ships samples to you fast and free. They can even verify your measurements and handle the installation. Wow. How convenient. Tell me more. Blinds.com also has a huge selection of stylish shutters, shades, curtains, and options for motorization. Even for your patio. Plus, they're 100% satisfaction guarantee. Well, you've convinced me. Let's go eat. I've got time now. Shopblinds.com and save 40% on selected products. Get 40% off selected products right now at Blinds.com.

Rules and restrictions may apply. So, what do you think of for lunch? Uh, I can't. I'm getting new window treatments. So I gotta go home and wait around all afternoon for a design consultation just to get a quote. It's going to totally mess up my workday. Why don't you just go to Blinds.com?

Because I need custom products. Blinds.com products are made to order and totally customizable. And you get upfront pricing right on their website to easily get your quote online. But I want to see the products in person. Blinds.com ships samples to you fast and free. They can even verify your measurements and handle the installation. Wow! How convenient! Tell me more! Blinds.com also has a huge selection of stylish shutters, shades, curtains, and options for

motorization. Even for your patio. Plus, they're 100% satisfaction guarantee. Well, you've convinced me. Let's go eat. I've got time now. Shopblinds.com and save 40% on selected products. Get 40% off selected products right now at Blinds.com. Rules and restrictions may apply. No, I know. Even our cameraman Chris over there, he is three and a half million followers on TikTok. I mean, he's a very hard he does a lot of things He's very hard working. I love them right there And I'm like I always said to him like how did you get like he's like 19 like how old you 20? Yeah 20 years old He's got like millions of followers. I'm like how did you do this like what are you doing?

It's like I just make videos and like he's but that's his generation right like what for those? Not to be just singularly focused here, but a lot of people probably listening to this are not 19 and 20. Besides learning, that's a great one, watching other people and kind of like gleaming some of those great tips. And I think that Lisa is very true. It's like there's a learning curve to all of this stuff. What else can people do who are, you know, a little bit more seasoned in this stuff besides like a, you know, a 19 or 20 year old on TikTok? And how important are all the platforms is Instagram more important than TikTok or now is TikTok over, is TikTok becoming much more important? Where does that, where's that in the whole place? I think they're all important.

Every single platform has their audience. So for example, if you're on Instagram, you're really pop on Instagram, you should create a TikTok and cross-polling a content and be involved in those two platforms, but also like, even like Snapchat, for example, Snapchat. This company back I heard is huge. It's coming back. The content portion of Snapchat's huge, but it's a whole different audience. There's about 300 million active users a month on Snapchat.

Versus how much on TikTok or is it Instagram? TikTok's growing rapidly. I mean, Facebook's still the largest. is how much on TikTok or is it Instagram? TikTok's growing rapidly. I mean, Facebook's still the largest. Who's on, who's on Facebook? My mom's not even on Facebook anymore, I think. Right, surprise. There's a lot of countries there.

Facebook's still the biggest. Facebook, you know? Well, like Snapchat, for example, like the core audience is what Alex 16 to 24, is that sound about right? It depends on probably the aspect of Snap, but core audience 13 to 20. Right, but that's very important to be involved

with an app like that, even though like, some people don't think it's important. It really is. It's a big niche, and it's a big audience crowd. So, I just think, you know, people have to really, you know, just buy in, sit to everything involve a social media to make it all work and come together.

How about clubhouse? What do you think of clubhouse? I like clubhouse. I think that you can't really rule anything out. You can decide what works for you. If you don't feel like you're a public speaker or you don't want to listen to people talk, then into people talk then you don't you don't you don't have to be on every single platform you just need to understand that you are avoiding a crowd that could be accessible to you by not being on that platform. If you look at there's a handful of even back to music once again you've got Jay Cole's and Kendrick Lamar I don't like I don't think Kendrick Lamar has been on social media and I don't know how long like he hasn't posted a single thing just completely missing MIA and

You know he'll come back and drop a album. Yeah, he'll go multiple at them and he'll go doing a rena tour And he won't have to be active and on his story every day and doing that now That's a one in a million artists. Why is that? Why does he get away with that? But nobody else seems to. That's actually a really good topic. And I talk to artists about this a lot. A lot of artists, especially up-and-coming artists,

they're managers and labels whoever, they'll bring them by the office. And I'll try to make myself accessible to people and give them information. And I tell people, at times, more often than not now being a character and I don't mean that in a negative way, but being a character and making people accessible to you as a character is really important for you building an audience, but you occasionally have these new artists more often than not.

They're kind of the older ones that Kendrick andrick and and Jay Kold if they've been an you know artist for a while. Rihanna kind of comes and goes she pleases but she's just larger than like way bigger than music now but look at the way Beyonce runs her Instagram. It's very calculated. She's not super accessible. There's really big ones that are able to do it and you have like a rady rich who can come along and he's not on Social media all the time like you know Showing everything he's doing and document documenting his life But more often than not you're probably gonna have to be pretty accessible on socials

I think that and it's not a knock to any of those other artists that are accessible as music, Drake is a phenomenal artist and he's pretty active on social media. He posts on Instagram a lot, but I think that someone like Kendrick, he has developed such a cult following with his music, that his music is so much bigger than his Instagram or like what he's doing that day. People care more about like, they're really looking forward to him to drop some music. Not who's dating or what he's doing.

Like that stuff doesn't matter as much to them. But more often than not, that does. Because people information is so accessible to people and you have the TMZs and the complexes and the DJ academics and all these different outlets. Are you staking English right now? I don't even have the things you're saying. But you have all these different outlets. Are you staking English right now? I don't even have the things just that. But you have all these outlets that are reporting information

to people on a daily basis that'll be like, Give a web sediction area where I can look up these work, these things. They'll be like, little baby bought a new card today. And that'll be news now. I know, no, no, I'm kidding. You know, because you're saying all these different things that, and names of artists, I'm sure,

like, I cannot please tell me I'm not the only one who doesn't know who these people are. No, I know most of them, but. I don't know who Kendrick Lamar. No, I know Kendrick Lamar, but you were saying other things. What are some of those words you were saying? Like, calm in this.

Calm flex. Calm flex. I could damn, calm flex magazine. I'm gonna do a poll. I'm curious how many people. The main culture of pages now, you need to know those pages. That's my whole, this is the story. That's where we go. at the damn complex magazine. I can I'm gonna do a pull. I'm curious how many people That's my whole this is exactly That's why you're here. This is how you're keeping me hit. I know God can we gotta try way harder

So basically Kendra I know I'm of course in who he is, but so there are anomalies, like Rihanna isn't anomaly, but most people post Malone, he's also, he's not on, he's not active. I don't know, I've made a joke with him. You work with him, don't you? He's really cool, we're really close with each other. Yeah, and I don't, I've hung out with him with Cam a few times, and I always, people are like, very close like, and I make, he's the nicest student in the world, and I always joke, I don't know I'm like, Cam doesn't know, I'm like, I don't know if he owns a pair of shoes or a cell phone. He's just so carefree, I've never seen him

with a phone in his hand. That's in the moment, and like, that's what makes him so special. How beautiful. He doesn't care about that. Not everybody can do that though. That's what I'm saying, like, don't get interested. Like, how is he,

the most kind of people he was discussing are anomaly, they're very special. They're the best at what they do. And when they come back on social media, their fans are that worn gay. They're bravado. They're ready for what people bring them up and use them as an example.

I talk to artists sometimes that are like, I want my music to speak for me. Are you talk to a brand that like, and he can talk about this, but a brand will be like, will we do X amount of millions in sales a year and social media is a really a focal point for us like, why do we need it? And it's kind of like, all right, well, maybe you can, but how much more would you be doing with social media? Yeah, and music and brands are a little bit different. I think every brand should have

a very, very awesome social media presence. But look at Jennifer, Jennifer Aniston. I'm just, because you were talking about Kendrick Lamar and Rihanna. She's another one who was never on social media. And then the day she, the day she went on, the fastest to 20 million. People are like just obsessed with her. They love her. So there are people who just have this like ex-quality no matter what they do or don't do.

They have like a fan base that is so like just like supportive and authentic and real and supportive. I mean, it's been most people, yeah, most aren't doing it, most can't. I'm gonna say big people like that, like the rocker Kevin Hart for example, they're some of the best of what they do. They're very active They're active.

Very active. The media, therefore, when they go negotiate a movie, they can negotiate how social media looks within the deal. And they're paid more because of the promotion with their social media. And they're smart about that. That's very true. Therefore, rock started as the key love.

Yeah. Terramonum. Him promoting it on socials has completely escalated that brand. We're supposed to every day. It's going to be a billion dollar. It's going to be a billion dollar brand already. Already. It will be.

Some million followers. There's a. There's a line there where social has been very important. Oh, absolutely. I agree with that. But for the same on that same note, right? The rock, who's the rock? He's built his base. Basically, he's the most popular, the most well-paid actor, whatever,

or all the above. And he has 200 million followers. I can give you five million other people who are doing the same thing he's doing and can't get arrested. They can't get past 1,000 followers. I mean, why does it work for some? And it naturally starts to track.

And with others, they literally can't get arrested. They cannot get real genuine authentic traction. Because it's up to people. You can do everything, right? Thank you for saying that, Ben. The people decide. They picked them. We love their rock.

We love Kevin Hart. They just chose them. There's other amazing comedians out there Right, it won't ever have close to the amount followers Kevin right the people just chosen they like them and they've There's there's people that play the lottery every day There's people that play once in their life that went right so I think that you have to look at Ha, I'll give you a PSA right. Yeah, yes. I think that the biggest thing is people need to stop over analyzing their content. We deal with this.

So if we come in and we're working with a brand, day one, it's the first thing we're looking at. Whether we're conversing about it or not is that are they treating social content, like they treat television content, or they treating social content like traditional media, radio, billboard, print. If they are, they're approaching it the wrong way.

Because you have to ask yourself, what is the worst thing that can happen? The worst thing that can happen is you pull the content down. Now there's obviously one off stories of content that wasn't thought through, probably enough, and you know, has been worse. But if you develop a strategy where you're putting out more content, you're not over-analysing, you're not having 11 revisions and going to four different groups within an entity

to get approvals, that will slow you down in the social process. And so when we start working with brands, we start to analyze that. We start to redevelop a strategy that allows us to take their brand, their narrative, and what they've done, and how does that port over to 2021? How does that port from a 40 and 50 year old audience to a Gen Z and a young millennial? How do we start to reap? Because it can be the same brand, and I think when we talk about Post Malone and we talk about Kendrick Lamar,

it's a little different. While they're both brands, they're no different than a major brand because people want access to that. The difference is, is Coca-Cola can't go six months dark and then come back and start posting again. Because it's something that I still have to go to the store and buy, right?

I can go listen to Post Malone's music and Post Malone actually makes money off that. So it's a little more easily accessible, right? I don't have to go to the store and buy a physical CD. I can literally take out my phone, click on Spotify, click on Apple, click on any of the DSPs, and start consuming music and consuming content. So that's just I think a little different, but I think that people need to stop thinking that today is 20 years ago. And that's what we're going to see as shift in all these CEOs and it's no knock to CEOs. We love CEOs and CMOs and brands.

But I think that the ones that we've seen be most successful are the ones that will listen to those who are in it, right? We're not out there consulting people on the best strategy for them to target what was good in 1990. We're here talking about how do you build your brand, amplify your brand, distribute content for your brand today, not 20 years ago. And so if people start to listen, that's when the effectiveness you can see an exponential increase in results because of the fact that they're open to working with people that are in it every day That's such a great point and I can see that happening probably in your world all the time because

People get stuck in what what they know right and what they don't know is kind of scary And so even if you're like, you know, you're slightly you're you're interested and you kind of want to know what's happening Hey, but you don't understand it the learning curve is so hard sometimes that it's like hard to probably like really push that control. And you must see this like you said, how often more than not do have the CEOs and the CMOs who can't like just let you go and do what they hired you for because of the problem, right? A lot. A lot. as much as you can. You can't force it. Like, for example, DJ Khaled's awesome at what he does in music. Right.

But in the past couple of years, he's made a resurgence and garnered so many other audiences because of how organic he's been within his social media. Like, he'll take you throughout his day. He'll just pull out his phone and whatever he's doing during the day, he'll help put on his socials. And it's all natural and real and people relate to that. And he's gotten so many more opportunities now because of his social media presence and how much it's grown

from just being himself. You can't force things, you can't do the four revisions and whatever, just be yourself at the end of the day. And just, but if you're trying to rebrand yourself, and I think that's very true, right? But he obviously was somebody, DJ Kelly, who brought you into his world and I helped really elevate and grow as brand because he needed it, right? Kendrick Lamar or Rihanna don't need to do that.

In fact, I feel like because they're not doing it, people are even that much more interested in them, right? Like Rihanna has this mystery about her, or Kendrick Lamar has this mystery about him. So when they are around, or Beyonce, but you're that much more interested and captivated. So whatever happened to the whole idea of less is more, right?

The whole idea that now that the more, the less you know of me, like the whole like old Hollywood, right? The more like the more like sexy I am, the more like mysterious I am, the more popular I'll be. Now it's like literally the antithesis of that for most people except the anomalies we talked about. How do you just depend on who you got to do what's right for you? But that's just a platitude but really whatever happened to it. How did Caled was extraordinarily successful before him? Oh yeah, I'm not talking about him. Yeah, I mean he was doing great.

But what I'm saying, those days are over basically the old Hollywood is over. He's just excited that he wanted to be a social media guru Accessible funny and he's mainstream now because of it. No, it's more to me the interview where he talked about He was posting on Snapchat and you know, I'm not telling the story For Batom, but and you said that like he went to the mall or something in a bunch of like younger kids ran up to him Yeah, Helen, Helen, they all wanted to be on a Snapchat. Like it became a thing.

Oh, for sure. What I'm saying, it works. But I work for him. But you like, that's just probably not something Rihanna is going to do. And the thing that you got to educate. And these are two completely different conversations. The way that there is a lot of similarities with the way you have to communicate with the musician or an actress or a comedian and the way we help them with their brand on our music and

entertainment side of our agency and then it bounced past the Alex but the way you got to educate the CMOs and the CEOs on why it's so important for them is a lot different because you can go back to Kendrick, Keegan, disappear and come back and self-tickets and put out music. If you are selling a product and you have no social media presence, you're actually probably costing yourself a lot of money. No, you are. You're doing yourself a disservice.

But I guess my question or my point was gone are those days when we used to, I mean, I'm aging myself when people would, when I didn't know everything about Tom Cruise. I just saw him on a mission impossible. I thought he was like, or risky business. I thought I was like the hottest thing. I wish I didn't know all the things I did know about some of these people, not Tom Cruise.

But I'm saying all these other people, right? Who I, you know, demystifies people. So I'm saying gone or those days where that demystification, so to speak, helps you with your brand. So my point, I guess, where I'm going with this is, where do you see the future of building a brand online is going? Is it going to get just going to keep on going down this this way? Is it going to take a step back and go back more offline?

It's going to get smarter and smarter. So I think that, and I want to do something after this, which is like take a product, we can pick one probably this water because it's here. Yeah, yeah, it's very good, by the way. Thank you. And we should go through like a live branding session on like how to brand this on social right? branding session on like how to brand this on social right and I think that but to your point as Technology gets more and more intuitive with individuals, right? So we now know more of consumer behavior because we can

Tap into what buttons are my clicking on applications. How long there's there's studies that Apple actually Can identify when you go through a breakup. Because the fact that you can take pictures of an individual from a facial recognition standpoint, and you can start to see there's less of this individual, but also the retention or time they spend on an actual picture, that's captured. And so you literally, they can start some match.com, start showing up for you, or a dating side or tender or bumble solely because technology is getting more and more intuitive and there's, I know there's the social network movie

and there's other stuff but there's literally technology smarter than human beings. Machine learning is coming into play more and more. AI, there's so much stuff that will start to play into understanding an individual so much that I'll give you an Amazon example. Amazon eventually will be able to send a product out to you. And based on data, know that you'll take it, he'll take it or he'll take it. And that's cost effective. It's sent it to you. You say no and leave it on your doorstep. It'll get sent to him. He says no, it gets sent to him. And as long as the third person takes it, it'll be cost effective for them to start that model. And so you'll start to see all of these things

that we don't think of today, like drones, and just there's so many ways to deliver stuff to individuals and that'll get more and more refined. If you look at Amazon, they're building airports, right? They are. They're building it to be more efficient and more effective. For them, yeah. So, Amazon's whole play,

we don't have to make this a session with Amazon, but their whole play is distribution, right? So they go into a market and they want to make it where if I'm this company, it makes no sense for me to distribute this product and send it to you because there's so much real estate that Amazon owns, they can get a product to you quicker and quicker. The average time from you clicking buy on Amazon to being is sub 25 minutes. It's like 22 minutes, probably faster now. So, from the time you click, I want this till the time it's in a box, in the outbound lane to get shipped out, is less than 30 minutes. And that, every second they save is millions

of dollars. And so I think that as we start to think about products and we start thinking about socials, it's the fact that technology is getting better and better. So people have to understand how to utilize that technology in order to become better and better. That's amazing. It's a great example. Go off. So I was at my house like two weeks ago. I didn't want to go to Home Depot. I was like, how far is Home Depot? It was about 30 minutes away. I need a screwdriver. So I looked on the gopuff for a screwdriver, Philpseville.

It was at my door in 16 minutes, like insane, but gopuff has distribution houses in every major city. And that's been their key to success, is they'll buy all this product, you know, at bulk and put in their distribution houses and they have drivers that will get it's here at door in less than 20 minutes. Go up off step by the future. I think go pop is for that kind of thing is what's the price what's out of here? That's amazing. What's a price point? Is it like a 20% increase in price? 10% is it? It's not

it's like it's like Donnie been like a factor. Wow. I think you have to have a $10 minimum order. But like oh my gosh. Everybody can want it because they just buy so much in gold and that's their that's their margin. So it's an incredible company. That's a great one. They bought bad I mean they're containing just the buy assets and they're becoming really, really powerful. Wow, I should, I wanna use it. I've never even thought of using them. It's great.

You'll start using them constantly now. Yeah, now that's it. Yeah. It's just so easy. It's so easy. It makes us so cool. That's the thing, right? If a brand makes it really easy

or a company makes it super easy, that's why Amazon's so successful. It's like, even is there, you're right. Like in two seconds. Okay, I have a couple other questions. Do I though? So while you're doing that. So going back to this, be okay.

Okay, yes, okay. So if you are going to put this online, right? It is online, but okay, yes. It's available in Yuzu is my favorite flavor. But I think that the natural first instinct is, let's do a bunch of product shots, right? So I'm gonna set up social, I'm gonna highlight the different flavors,

I'm gonna highlight the benefits, I'm gonna highlight the product, right? And so one of the things you have to start looking at beyond the product is who's the consumer? And how do I create content to target that consumer? And so you start to think about why do people drink water? When did they drink water? What flavor profiles target specific people?

Are there studies that we know of usu versus lime versus another flavor better for females, males, an older audience, a younger audience. And so you start to develop content strategy, not just behind the water, but behind the lifestyle and the audience and the narrative of this water to build a community. The most successful companies aren't the products themselves that we're talking product brands. They're the communities that are built.

Look at Lulu Lemon. Yeah, I think. Lulu Lemon is a community. It's not just shorts, it's not just leggings, it's not just anything. Spanx. Spanx is a lot about empowerment. Spanx isn't just a product.

It's not just leggings to make you, and Sarah's done a really good job of building that, and a client, for instance, it's really near and dear to our heart, Raising Cains. Raising Cains has done an amazing job of building authentic fans, as they call them canyacs, of the brand. Our job has just been to how do we continue to connect raising canes to culture. And we do it in an authentic way.

So we see, I can't tell you how many times I've personally seen someone advertising a soda that doesn't drink soda. And a brand, how's a brand going to know that? We talk to people, we talk to influencers. If you get authentic connections of people that actually use the product, the content is exponentially better. So going back to be okay is if someone doesn't drink that much water and they hate it, why would you work with them?

Like what's the actual point of working with them? There is none. Right. It's the same way and traditional, but in traditional, you could get anyone to do it on television because ultimately, there wasn't a method and means to see if that person consumed that in their everyday life because there's no access. So now, going back to the word access that we talked about earlier, is I know of access to watch what Ben, I mean, I'll use Ben as an example. I pretty much know a lot of days what Ben has for breakfast, what he's eating for lunch, what he's eating for dinner, what his family's doing because they're socials.

So I can watch, he's got adorable two year old kid. So you can see like his wife takes this kid to play at the park or they're going on a swing. Again, if Ben had two million followers, those other two million people would also know what Ben does on a daily basis. And maybe he'd change his strategy on socialists a little if he had two million followers, but ultimately, at the end of the day, you go back to products. You have to do the same thing.

You have to do the same thing, right? And you've got to build a community, and you've done that. And it's about how do you continue to build and build and build and then you can bring products into that community. You can bring services into that community. You can bring teachings, lessons, whatever it may be, but you still gotta have that community. No, I think when I was actually gonna say,

I have another couple of questions. It's funny that you said that. I was gonna ask you about the authenticity piece and of course on the building of community because at the end of the day, it's all about having an engaged community, right? So, how do you build an authentic? How do you build a community?

Not an authenticity, I mean authenticity, I think that's a pretty self explanatory, but how do you build a community if you're starting with a small amount of people? One-to-one. You start person to person. So socials is the best way for you to go to someone and say, so let's go to Snapchat, Instagram,

there's hundreds of millions, if not billions of people on these platforms every day. Those people are all potential customers. So if I take raising canes, or I take, we work with a company called Owen and Owen is a it's a vegan smoothie basically protein shake protein drink. You can drink it they have two versions you can drink it after you work out you can drink it as a meal replacement you can drink it any time of the day. Oh I like that one I know that one yes yes yes I've tried it. We got to get you we got

to get you more. Actually you never sent me any idea to go with a sprouts and buy one. Okay we're sending you some. Thank you. We're gonna send you some. Thank you, Cam. I'm also Okay, good. Thank you. I know I've actually I like them so not no thanks to you, Cam So so we work with Owen and and there there's two things that we came up with with Owen One is is that you can't just look in the fitness community or in the health community because everyone while some people don't go to the gym everyone wants to feel healthy deep down most people. There's occasionally people that don't but so so there's that. I know right as I looked at you over there but okay and that's the straightforward

approach right so it's you can go to that person that someone says hey I just lost weight or hey I'm trying to find ways to that person, that someone says, hey, I just lost weight or hey, I'm trying to find ways to work out more or hey, I go to lifetime fitness or I go to soul cycle or go anywhere, you can engage with every one of those people one-to-one, whether it's direct messages, comments, whatever. Then there's the creative approach.

So what we just are in the process of rolling out is a fan page to surprise and delight people called Owen fans. And it's a play on only fans, but it's more of a creative approach. And that's the creative input we can bring, which is now it's a raw and uncut look into Owen. So it's the product and it's swipe right

to see the uncensored version, which is the ingredients. Oh, I like that, yeah. And so we're able to go in and, you know, let's say that Cam or you had never tried Owen and you're on Equinox's socials and you're commenting, we can go to you and say, hey, if you work out, you would love our product. We're gonna shoot you a direct message

and we're gonna send you some product to try. Because I know that if I convert that individual, they're not a lifetime customer and I can quantify that value and it's exponentially more valuable than it is to not have to spend a dollar to comment to someone in the age with them. So the cheapest consumer online is an owned customer.

So they follow you. That's the cheapest way to advertise because you don't have to spend any money. Right, but to get them to follow you, I guess, is the kind of- You have to be one-to-one or you have to be a brand that has this allure. And so we work with brands to develop that one-to-one connection. Whether it's at scale and it's posting a picture, but how do you create content that you feel like it's being made for you?

Yeah. No, it's true. It's a real lifestyle and culture. It's what you try to do. Right. That's it. At the end of the day, the product has to be. Has to speak for itself.

That's being a good product. Is that what we can do what we need to do? Is that a clean product? Yeah. I think I tried the Cafe La Te One. I mean, you're not going to say no right now. Cold brew. Cold brew. Is that a clean product? Yeah. I think I tried the cafe latte one. I mean, you're not going to say no right now. Cold brew.

Cold brew. Yeah. Oh, I've never tried that because you've never sent me any. Oh, it's coming. It's going better because I mean, I love that kind of stuff too. I love that stuff. So please send it to me. So what are you thinking for lunch?

I can't. I'm getting new window treatments. So, I got to go home and wait around all afternoon for a design consultation just to get a quote. It's going to totally mess up my workday. Why don't you just go to Blinds.com? Because I need custom products. Blinds.com products are made to order and totally customizable. And you get upfront pricing right on their website to easily get your quote online. But I want to see the products in person.

Blinds.com ships samples to you fast and free. They can even verify your measurements and handle the installation. Wow. How convenient. Tell me more. Blinds.com also has a huge selection of stylish shutters, shades, curtains, and options for motorization. Even for your patio. Plus, they're 100% satisfaction guarantee.

Well, you've convinced me. Let's go eat. I've got time now. Shopblinds.com and save 40% on selected products. Get 40% off selected products right now at Blinds.com. Rules and restrictions may apply. I feel like I've asked you guys, but is there anything else that I haven't really gotten

over that we can go through? I think we've kind of covered everything. You gave me some tips, unless Alex, Ben, Cam, is there anything you want to include before I conclude? We're easy. I mean, are we still wrong? Yeah, we're still going, so you can say anything you want. I don't know if you just want to talk about what we have coming up for. Oh, I have past year how it's how it's looked for us during quarantine. Okay. We've grown a lot. Oh, I can keep on going. I just want to be mindful of your time. I have a bunch of questions. I want to ask you about how your business has been impacted

through the whole COVID-19. It's really I feel like this is when you probably shined and really kind of accelerate your business. It's been fun. Yeah. It's been fun. That we've grown what over 300% in the last year? By volume.

Yeah. Employment, we went from 14 employees to mid 50s. So we're between 53 and 55 employees. Based out of Atlanta, we went from, we worked in the tech village in Atlanta and co kind of co-working space to 4,000 square feet to now we're moving into double that size. Wow. Continuing to grow really quickly. We have some amazing partnerships. And I think yeah, Ben and I talk about our staff. Absolutely. I really do want to take time to highlight our staff because they everyone that works for us believes in the vision.

Right. And we have an amazing leadership team. I'm not sure the exact numbers because we aren't you the leadership team. Well, I mean, we have directors of departments and associate directors. Well, how many employees did you see your grown to now? I think we're 50, we hire a lot of people on a weekly basis. How many people? It feels like full time.

Yeah. But our team is also extremely diverse, you know, from male, female, anything that you could think of. We're not like, I think you see a lot of agencies that can kind of skew one way or the other, racially, whatever it might be. And I think that we've been able to really build a diverse team and people that come from all different

backgrounds and they all bring their perspective to the table because it really does marketing it takes a lot of creativity. And it takes a lot of, you know, you're gonna have your personal flavor that you add to when you market them. And I think that's been really important for us. But yeah, our team, they lay it on the line.

Sometimes there's deadlines and you're up working till 12, one in the morning to get it done and they get it done. So we could not do it without the team that we've got. There've been trippers. I mean, we're not a normal nine to five. Of course, of course. Not to.

We have to work around the clock and like everybody's, you know, we tell them coming in to the job. Like it's going to be like that, but we create a really good culture. We all care about each other. It's a family. Um, we're there for each other. A functional family.

A function of, is there such a thing. A functional? Is there such a thing? We try. Is there such a thing? I mean, I was going to say, my question was going to be, how do you build a corporate culture that a community within your company to feel that way? Because for employees to want to stick around and to really build a business and and and scale that

business. You need to build a community and a culture within your within your four walls that people want to really they feel like they want to be a part of. How do you do that? You have to think about things that they can't get other places. Number one, and a lot of that's connectivity. So it's not building an office that you walk in and 80% of the office is here, and there's a hallway to go to the other 20%. It's got to all be in the 100%. It's got to be, you can't own a business

without being involved, right? I know that you can build a house without actually getting a shovel and being a part of it, but you still have to be a part of the development process. You still have to be a part of picking things out and bells and whistles here. For us, we have shovels. We have hard hats. We are a part of the growth of the business from every aspect.

We try to be there before everyone. We try to leave after everyone. We try to really make it a point that, hey, we're going in this together. It's not y'all are working for us. It's we're working together to build something. We've never taken on funding. We've never had really outside sources come in

to help us, everything's been bootstrap. And so we've really, really made it a point to pick the right people, to build the right team. So when people come to work for us, they're excited, they're proud of it. They want to put getting engaged in their bios on socials. They want to talk about it to their friends. So I think that's one thing, but then also that relays into brands we work with, right? If you have people that are excited to work for the company, they're excited to work for the client. And that's one of the things if someone's miserable at their job, that's going to display in their work product.

And so we do everything we can do to do stuff in and out of the workplace to build that family, to let that kind of bleed over into our client base and be the value add to our clients that we need to be in our. Chair, if you give it back to the community, you know, the things that I think that give us the identity of a company that has authenticity and really cares not only about the staff, but about who we are, about the world in general, having integrity with the way that you handle things, the way you go about conducting business, I think that they believe in it and they feel a connection to it. And a lot of our employees, they hang out with each other outside of work because they've just gotten so close and they feel part of that family. And you know, in the past and we still do, we do, you know, we go out on Fridays and go bowling or we take each other to... You do?

Well, I'm in town. Right. These guys are holding each other to talk about them. Well, I'm in town. Right. These guys are holding stuff. Yeah, right. It's like I said, at the end of the day, family, and we don't need more people. If they have an issue or they have a problem,

just come talk to one of us. Well, you guys are all three of you are just super down to earth kind, great-hearted, authentic guys. I'd like you all. So I can only, and you're welcome. And it earth, kind, great-hearted, authentic guys. I like you all. So I can only, and you're welcome. And it's, I mean that. And so I think it always, if you have that at the top and it trickles down, it's basically the point, right?

Like you have that kind of those characteristics and those values at the top, then you're going to, you know, water does find its level. You find those people, they gravitate to you. Now, if people wanna hear more about getting engaged or anything, where do they find you guys? Is it a website? It's an online social media. It's an app you can use.

I get engaged. On Instagram. Yeah. We've redone our entire web presence. So that's it. So that's a process. No, no, it's next week. We're in the process of rolling out our new, getting Gage Media.com.

And if you really the easiest way and kind of a testament to our business is if you go on Google and just type and get engaged, we populate over any engagement companies, any jewelry companies, any wedding companies. So it's a- It's good to say how the SEO on that must be kind of- Didn't spend a dollar either. That's amazing.

Key word, who? Yeah, so I think that that's the best place. We, from a client perspective, we've never done outside sales. We've never gone after clients. It's always been either client-to-client referrals, personal relationships. It's something been either client-to-client referrals, personal relationships. It's something that we've wanted to stick to and we've said no a lot of times to new clients because it's got to also fit within, we've got to be able to bring value. If we can't bring value, then

there's not a reason to work together. That so that's been something that's been really important is that the clients are just as important as building the business because you've got to be able to share value, but you also have to be able to have clients that represent the business well, which sounds so weird. But so yeah, we've done that. We've learned how to distribute content. We've learned how to make things go viral.

We've learned how to run content. We've learned how to make things go viral. We've learned how to run socials, create content. We've produced billions of impressions across social media. We have partnerships with companies like Snapchat, where we help bring content to the platform. Is that why Snapchat has had this beautiful resurgence? We like Snapchat. Yeah. And so just, there's's watch out for a lot of cool things that we're doing as a business and continuing to grow. And if we continue to grow at the pace we are,

you know, we've become a really desirable company to talk about and we'll continue to do that. So I think that's something that's really exciting for us. Wow, I'm excited to see what the future holds for you guys. Wow. Don't forget the little people as you grow. And the Owen we're sending you. Yeah, I don't believe me. If you could send us some of this, be okay. Why is it really good?

It's going to be on the first shipment now. I swear. I'm so glad that you guys like it. Is this a tea? No, it's a, it has pelvic acid in it, which is why it's black. It's good for detoxification and helps with your absorption. Not to sound like a commercial, but for anastrography, it helps with your nutrients. Yeah, and inflammation. And also, you know, by the way, I know you guys are young, so I'm going

to say this. It's supposed to be a great hangover cure, fall victim. Yeah. We don't drink. So, you know, yeah, sure. And then slide. We don't drink so you know, oh yeah, sure And then that was a presumptuous statement Yeah, right exactly. I know who I'm talking to. I know my audience. Well, I know the people beside me Thank you guys for coming on. It's been a pleasure. Thank you. Thank you. this episode. I'm Heather Monahan, host of Creating Confidence, a part of the YAP Media Network, the number one business and self-improvement podcast network. Okay, so I want to tell you a little bit about my show. We are all about elevating your confidence to its highest level ever and taking your business

right there with you. Don't believe me, I'm gonna go ahead and share some of the reviews of the show so you can believe my listeners. I have been a longtime fan of Heather's no matter what phase of life I find myself in, Heather seems to always have the perfect gems of wisdom that not only inspire, but motivate me into action.

Her experience and personality are unmatched and I love her go getter attitude. This show has become a staple in my life. I recommend it to anyone looking to elevate their confidence and reach that next level. Thank you! I recently got to hear Heather at a live podcast taping with her and Tracy Hayes,

and I immediately subscribe to this podcast. It has not disappointed, and I cannot wait to listen to as many as I can, as quick as I can. Thank you, Heather, for helping us build confidence and bring so much value to the space. If you are looking to up your confidence level, click creating confidence now. Doug Pike here for Kirk Holmes, a third generation custom builder that builds all around Houston and even up throughout the hill country now. They've got a Southern Living Showcase home in Mission Ranch up in College Station that you are welcome to tour or you can start your search down here in their offices or

even at their website to see what your dream home truly can look like. They back their homes with a 20-year structural warranty too. Kirkhomes.com that's KURK.com because at Kirkhomes it's all about you. coms.com that's K-U-R-K because at Kirk Holmes it's all about you.