Nuanced. - 94. Darian Kovacs: Jelly Digital Marketing & PR

Episode Date: February 27, 2023

Darian talks about starting his business Jelly Digital Marketing & PR, the importance of having communication strategies, and his podcast Marketing News Canada.  Darian Kovacs is the Indigenous (Metis Nation) founder of Vancouver based PR, digital ads & SEO company Jelly Digital Marketing & PR and digital marketing school, Jelly Academy. He is the host of the podcast Marketing News Canada and on the board of NPower Canada. Darian specializes in mixing PR with digital marketing and has worked with numerous internationally renowned brands on developing and executing their digital marketing and PR strategies.  Darian lives in Fort Langley, BC with his wife and four children and likes to mountain bike, swim watercolour and read in his free time. Learn more about Jelly Marketing: https://jellymarketing.ca/Send us a textThe "What's Going On?" PodcastThink casual, relatable discussions like you'd overhear in a barbershop....Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the shownuancedmedia.ca

Darian, it is such a pleasure to have you on. I'm always excited to talk to entrepreneurs because the energy, the optimism, the passion, the drive, it's always there. Would you mind giving listeners a brief introduction of yourself? Sure. I can say my name is Darian Kovacs, proud Métis, living currently in Fort Laneley, with my four children and wife. My children are four, seven, eight, and sixteen. I love to swim when I can and do watercoloring. I'm not very good at either of those things, but I really enjoy them. Water coloring.

So I'll use pen and ink to draw things like scenes I see or things I observe, and then I do watercoloring on top with a paintbrush and watercolors. I've got to be honest, when you said it and you said swimming, I was like, do you color in the water? I should. I should try that. That'd be an amazing. I'm going to try that channel.

I'll take you up on that. I'm going to try that this summer. And I recently, this last summer, took up growing dahlias, which is one of my favorite flowers. Wow. Beautiful. When did you become interested in entrepreneurship? When did you decide that you needed to pave your own path, go in your own direction, and bring your own vision to life? You know, is a good question.

I've had the chance that having a 60 year old he started a car detailing business this last summer and I watched him do it and started and made a little registered on Google my business set up a little like

you know Google Maps thing location and started getting these jobs detailing cars and I remember him doing the math app for us because his friends were working hourly for X dollars an hour

and he came and he came to dad I'm making like why an hour right now and I control when I work I don't have to wear a uniform I literally got to get to walk inside the house for lunch because people would bring the cars to our house. And I remember watching in his eyes this something flip

and then be like, well, how would I ever work somewhere else when I can do this? And it was so fascinating and amazing as, you know, both the dad and as an entrepreneur to watch that like the bug, right, if you want to call it that or, you know, like the travel bug or the entrepreneurial spirit or even the entrepreneurial understanding that, like, Like, you can make it on your own.

Like, you can be your own boss. You can do it. So now, you know, it's using grade 11 is the wrestle of like, hey, what else do I want to do with this? And, you know, what would I do if I went to university or college and how does that apply? So for myself, my dad actually came over to Canada as a refugee from Hungary in 1956, like many Hungarians at that time, who lived here now in Canada. and my dad my whole life I watched him being an entrepreneur and I watched him you know starting businesses and running businesses and I watched kind of the ups and the downs and I remember thinking to myself like you know some days he would just work these long hours and working you know and

sometimes in his office then I remember thinking I would never want to do that I would I want like a nine to five I want to go home not have to think about it but I also remember seeing like how much he loved what he did and then And I think, I don't know when the bug hit. I think I've always been an interesting mix where I did go to university and I was involved in a lot of kind of like volunteer stuff and involved in a lot of like organizations and things and I tried a few things on my own, but I think I always would balance it with like a salary somewhere or a contract somewhere.

So I think it wasn't until I fully went all in with jelly about 10 years ago where I actually actually not even then actually I still had a thing on the side but like I'd say like yeah I just recently I'm a more of like I went all in banked 100% of myself versus like balancing it with like a steady paycheck here and then entrepreneurial stuff here not such a bad thing to do right because as you're introducing yourself to that world the the hesitation for so many people is that risk that there is no guarantees there is no like if you fail if you have a bad relationship with client if something goes wrong if a meteor hits your house and destroys your your working space your ground zero you do you have to start over and then going and finding that job can be a challenge

because they go oh like who did you work for give me some references even getting a place as an entrepreneur and they're like give us your references for this and you're like I don't have any like I've been on my own it's just it makes the world a little bit more challenging if things go wrong yeah and I feel even now like the way we structured our agency just daily marketing, most of our client work is retainer based. And so we pay, you know, we have kind of a flat rate each month where we do these services. And so I know what my income for the agency is like, at least for the next year. I know what to count on and can rely on, whereas sometimes I connect with and chat with like friends that are in the website business.

And it's so up and down, up and down are in the branding business, right? So they'll get this really big branding project. But then they'll have no new work for maybe a couple months. So they're still living off of the work that was there and then something big will come. Whereas I think I, maybe it's that what I grew up with watching my dad or, you know, my mom was always instilling me to find a good, steady job somewhere and get a good education and that balance of, you know, running an agency, but basing it based on kind of that consistent retainer business. How did you approach your education? Because some people, more so now, people just go to school and they just, what am I going to major in?

Like it isn't, which is good on the one hand. Like, at least you're educating yourself. But it feels like there's maybe less of a understanding of the why as to like, no, like, I'm going to go get X job at the end of it. But like, how is this going to enrich me for the rest of my life? What tools am I trying to develop? So I'm a stronger, more thoughtful, competent person in the future. How did you approach that decision? Yeah, you know, I actually don't even think it was really.

It was just, you just do it. Like, this was in 1999. It was just, you didn't. I felt like I didn't really have a choice. It was just more of, well, what university will I go to? And so it was, you know, I ended up at UVIC. My brother was there. I studied visual arts.

I went there to study painting. But again, as we know, I'm not very good at that, but I love doing it. So I ended up shifting into child and youth care. But I'd say, and you know what, I never ended up finishing my degree there. I never completed. So I still have like an internship and a few more credits to get to get my balance. But while I was there, like the connections I made, the clubs I joined, the clubs I started, the experiences I had were life-changing.

Like even my own son, I'm like, I'm a huge advocate for like microcredentialing and like, you know, these new forms of education and these new systems. But part of me is like, man, I still want my son to experience university for the social purposes. I was saying, we were driving last week actually. I was saying to him, I was like, you know, but cool is if like, you know, whatever, or BCIT or they had a room full of like gamer chairs like really nice chairs you know if you're not a gamer they're just really comfy and cozy and you can lean back of it and they had these screens

where you could take like your online courses like take those micro credentials from like Microsoft you know Google meta like all the places and then but yeah you're still taking some courses in person but maybe you're able to gather with people who are taking similar microc credentials to you and and you can process it afterwards and discuss them and dialogue and kind of like that hybrid environment like it would be the coolest thing if universities became gathering places of education but they were more agnostic and more Switzerland than they were like no you need to take our courses and our credits here I agree with you it feels like we're in a transition period with educational institutions where there is a bit of a disconnect between them and average

people because so many people go well I want to know about how to make my art better but I don't want to do four years of education on art history in order to start my art project. And it's like there's a benefit, like some of the courses you don't get excited about statistics being like the common one for people. They don't want to do that course. And it gives you tools. So the forcing people to do things is a good thing. But if it's not interfacing with the reality of the world, this complaint with high school where people are like, I'm learning this algebraic formula that I'm never going to use in my life. And if that's how you feel about school in general, we've probably gone too far in the wrong

direction. Yeah. I'm so curious, there's an organization in Ontario called E-campus Ontario, run by guy named Dr. Robert Luke, and he has figured out a way it's really cool to look at kind of credentials and credits from both public, universities

and colleges, and private universities and colleges, and soon to be corporate training microcredentials as well, and figure a way to Lego break them up. So he's figured out a system where through E-campus Ontario, do like a bit of courses there, a few courses here, a little stuff. So think of it like collecting a passport, you know, stamps or brownies or scouts or whatever, all the badges. And at the

end of your four or five years or whatever, maybe three years, you graduate or you don't even really graduate, but you leave the education experience with like a whole bunch of experiences and these little badges to prove that you know that stuff. Yeah. I think that that's definitely something we're going to see more and more of. Oh, it's brilliant. How did you get started with jelly marketing how did you start to think were you thinking about this beforehand were you looking at the world through a certain lens that kind of led to this path how do you get started yes i worked in various sectors mostly youth work was where i i discovered the the importance and the vital need for good marketing um also even just while i was in high school volunteering

i fell in love with the power of PR you know i actually i find in time i had um this opportunity to volunteer for this conference that i cbc put on every year while I was in high school. So this is like mid-90s run by these twins, Elmira and Jobina, Barai, and they show me like what PR can do when you got press for an event and pressed for a thing. And I was like, this is powerful and fascinating when you know how to use it well, right? It was kind of like you remember Spider-Man. It was like Uncle Ben would say, Leon, you know, those with great power have great responsibility, right? And so I watched them using it for good. And sure enough, you know, years later, even now, Al-Mira started a PR.

agency and we were able to connect as like peers and it was so fun to be like then you you put me on to this it's so neat um but i worked in youth work and i watched our kids in the youth group who were on this thing called nexopia at the time and then they got onto my space well i remember that that's great yeah and and i was still studying um at uvick when facebook launched in canada for only university students so i had a facebook account because i had a at uvick address and i remember thinking like this is going to change things. I then worked for an organization where I got to start building apps. So in the iOS store, which is like the iPhone, and just seeing what apps were able to do.

And then I realized, you know, this is important and it's vital. And there's a ton of organizations that just really need to know how to use it well. So then we launched Jelly, actually 10 years ago, it'll be 10 years at a month to help organizations know how to navigate the world of PR. so like traditional PR and then at the time mom bloggers which are the OGs of influencers so we were like the first influencer agency essentially in Canada and then we worked Google ads had just gotten going so we were running Google ads and then managing people's social media channels for them so those are the three things we did for people and essentially

also helped them with their SEO because of those three things were affecting their SEO so that's what we did and I was at the Fairmont with my mom for breakfast and they had these little jars in the table, and I was like, that would make an amazing business card. I went to GoDaddy to see if the domain jelly marketing was available. It was. I got it for like eight bucks. And I took like nine jars home with me in my like pockets.

We're leaving the family, being like, like they were jiggling in my pockets. And I put them in a sink and then got some stickers and replaced the stickers on those jars with our branded jelly marketing stickers that we created. The really interesting thing that you kind of mentioned, mentioned, is this idea that you were getting involved in things maybe before they're popular. Seeing Facebook's potential, Google's potential, it seems so commonplace now to talk about these organizations, but in the early days, Google was competing with Bing and other search

engines. And so I'm just interested, how do you think about the future? Do you get excited when you start hearing about new developments? ChatGPT is a big one right now. Do you get excited when you start to hear these changes? Not really. Like all the stuff around like bitcoins and NFTs and uh you know AI stuff like there's not like I like I could call it web 3.0 but I feel like there's so many small businesses and medium businesses in Canada which is the majority of our economics in our country that have yet to figure out web 2.0 have yet to get a website working that has basic functionality like buying something or selling. something or a website that works.

And so I think that stuff still excites me, like seeing an entrepreneur or getting their website set up for the first time or launching their first set of Facebook ads and seeing like a massive return on their investment and massive conversions. Like I haven't like all the other stuff hasn't been super practical. Like I will give this thing. Okay, I just learned this recently. If there's an old saying that's quite violent, but I like to use like if you feed two birds with one grain or, you know, I would.

feed two birds with one scone but the idea being if you shoot a video like what we're doing now and if we put it into like otter.a i or a transcription tool otter's a great one free and then i don't know if you do this yet but you would turn this interview into a blog post or into an article the problem is with otter is that like you're going to get like the ums and the uh or like the blah little right would you'd be curious to see how that turns out but what you do is you go you can use chat gbt and this is the first practical use i've seen for it and say hey chat gbt turn this section of writing into an article written in the style of uh harvard business review and then it'll take that garbily you know something garbily you can clean it all up make

grammatically correct make it seem functional and actually clean that up so i've seen a practically use there but really i still think like the necessity for people to get just a basic website and an understanding of current social channels and not chasing all the new ones. Like, I still say, like, get your Google my business, get your e-newsletter going and your YouTube and then think about all the others that are out there because, you know, there's so many options at the moment.

Okay, you mentioned mom bloggers, the OGs, and I have to ask because, again, maybe a community that was underestimated at the time that you were interested in them. Oh, yeah. And obviously that's changed. You start to see people. blow up on on TV that have this kind of worldview.

So can you tell us about betting on people, not just yourself, starting a business, but looking at other people and going like, you got something here, even when in the market, maybe it's not quite there yet. Yeah. And I'd say even now more than ever, like with, you know, we're losing cookies, right? The ability to really track people well, ads are getting noisier than ever online. You know, our ability to reach people in a really, you know, quality way, working with creators, as a lot of influencers like to be called now, is so crucial more than ever. You know, their ability to connect with an audience, their accents, their voices, their styles, their point of view, and really the trust that they build up with their followers and their connections is incredible.

It's so valuable. We actually got to work with the brand Coast Capital Savings at the credit union. We got to help launch their first influencer campaign. And again, it was so neat to know that. And again, if you do the math, and this is some math we often use, is to hire talent writers

to write the scripts of these commercials and to film it and edit it, like it would almost be like 10 times the cost it would be to work with a series that we were six creators who kind of wrote and said what they thought about, you know, working with the credit union and kind of their perspective in these really beautifully powerful

videos that they then were able to then and share on their channels that reached an audience that Coast Capital typically wouldn't be able to reach. Or they could, but it would cost them a lot of money with Facebook and Instagram ads. The fear, I guess, from their perspective, and like you don't see that a lot with corporations is now your brand is linked to a person. Yes, like share it from Subway. There you go. And yeah, that's a pretty good example of how that could go wrong. Yes. Yeah. So we again, we worked with like a meat brand. And so they were like, we suggest some people. And then again, someone on their team was like, hey, we found this post from like three years ago where she was trying out veganism. And she did a bunch of like anti-meat posts. So we don't actually want to work with that person. Right. Because they, she may go back to veganism again. So there's like, yeah, you're dealing with a human, right, a relationship with a person. So typically, yeah, we got to vet them really well. You've got to find good fits. And I think too, though, you. you're always going to take a risk.

Like I, Hudson's Bay did a commercial a couple years ago. And again, I love Schitt's Creek. And they use the two actresses from Schitt's Creek, the mom and the daughter. And it was great. It was great commercial. But my feedback, I wrote this open letter to them. And I just said, hey, imagine if, like, I'm just guessing you paid them each say 100K to be in this commercial. What if you took that 100K,000, divide that by, you know, $2,500, you know, and gave it to, you know, and using kind of like,

some of the statistics from our kind of like, how is Canada made up from like, you know, the nationalities and our, you know, kind of how we look and how we look as Canadians. And instead of just using two white women who have like, you know, very similar accents, what if you worked with like hundreds of people across the country and that really represented Canada? You know, you split up that 200K budget divided by 2,500 each and gave it to all these incredible craters across the country. I think the risk is worth a reward. And I think, the brand connection, and even if they're micro-influencers, say they've got 2,000 followers or 3,000 followers, you can re-gram it, repost it, and you've got this beautiful content

from what I think is a beautiful spectrum of people across our country. I think that that's really interesting to be able to use your mind to understand things. Is there things that stand out to you in the industry now that interests you about how we communicate with people? Do you have hope that we're moving in the right direction? The only thing I can think of for me personally is it feels like we're just, we're being sold our own morality. And that's something I don't love. Like having a green image, like a green leaf on something and now I'm a good person and I care about the environment because it has a green leaf on it.

I get worried about that we're incentivizing people to think that they're acting in the world's best interest by having those. What are your thoughts? Yeah, there's an old phrase called slacktivism, right? So it's, you know, and again, people criticize like Bono and Oprah when they launched the Red King. campaign, right? So you could buy an iPhone or buy, you know, laundry soap that was red, right? And it was actually going towards AIDS relief in the world. And, and, you know, you read and study the stuff that Bono and Oprah would say, and their response fact was more like, well, we wanted to give the opportunity for everyday people to be involved in something bigger than themselves. And so if you chose

that iPhone over that iPhone, you chose the red iPhone, like, sure, maybe it's, you could call it flativism. There's the criticism that said, but maybe you're also doing something, you're thinking about something besides yourself for a moment. Or it's considered like commercializing charity, right? But I think there's some cool parts of it. Like I am actually a big fan of B Corp, which is the ability for businesses to register and go through a pretty intensive survey process to be like, hey, here's all the things that I'll comply to.

It's really intensive. But when you get approved, you meet other B Corps who are like, man, you stand for something bigger than just making money. You stand for helping the planet and people. And sure, if people choose to work with us because we're a V-Corps, great. But sometimes we forget to put the logo on. Actually, I forgot to renew it this last year, so we're not actually technically a V-Corp right now. So just for so it's clear, I need to sort that out right now.

But when I see people who are V-Corps, I'm actually pretty excited about it. And, like, you know, Ben and Jerry's, Patagonia, you know, Tentree. I love Tentree. Yeah, like, they're cool companies that are trying to do something. And I think, but I think there's, it goes a lot deeper than that. Like, there's like an amazing project out of the U.S. right now that I'm really fascinated by. I call it creative ladder. So Ryan Reynolds started it when he got involved in the ad agency at industry a couple of years ago, started doing commercials.

Also known, of course, for his acting and, you know, bought a soccer, football club out of the UK. But he realized what he was in the industry, that it was really predominantly white people who were working there. And so they did a study and found that the, you know, main reason they weren't seeing diverse voices in the advertising industry so they didn't really know about it or it wasn't really posed to them as an option while in high school. And so they've been working to change that and working to provide resources and mentors and tools to shift that. So we're working on a similar thing in Canada where we don't see a lot of indigenous voices in the advertising marketing industry. So we've been doing a series of videos about like what a

day in the life looks like, but showing that it's not just a completely white industry. Because it broke my heart. We launched a marketing award show through our Marketing Owners Canada podcast. And I was like, as anyone would do, I'm going to say, hey, who else is doing award shows right now for marketing, advertising in Canada? We studied like, there was 16 of them at the time, for all things, PR, comms, marketing. And every single jury member was a white person. There was not, there was no, it didn't exist.

The non-white jury members was not even a thing. And I think for me, I think my heart was broken. Like, for days, I was just, I was really hurt because I was like, man, I thought I was part of this industry that's super, like, creative and inclusive and open. And then I remember sharing it with someone. And they're like, dude, this industry is as racist as every other industry. Why would you think we'd be any different? And I was like, because we're artists and creators.

Like, we care about that stuff. But he goes, no, man, we're just as bad as everyone else. So I think that kind of propelled me And my wife and I We've set up like a bunch of scholarships To try to help propel more indigenous voices Into the industry and I get I get frustrated in some ways But again, I won't I shouldn't air this on here for it

But I'm like I'm okay, I'll say this I am looking forward to the day when I no longer get hired To help with indigenous perspectives For large corporations and brands Because instead they can go down the hallway and be like Hey Tommy Tell me what about Banner Hey, Tommy, tell me, we got it. We got, you know,

indigenous history month coming up. What should we do? Instead of going to some outside organization, it'd be so rad if they like, they've got to peer at the water cooler or on Zoom or on Slack they can talk to. Yeah, I definitely think I just spoke to Willie Sellers, and we were talking about the growth because I think indigenous economies are really interesting because they haven't participated in a very long time. And so now you're seeing a group of people, Sharon Bond, who runs the Kakuli Cafe, talking about this idea of indigenous entrepreneurs being a community of people who know

adversity, who know how to work hard, who are hungry, and who are willing to put in those long hours to see the difference. And we need that. We're seeing a challenge with getting enough people into Canada who are able to do these jobs. And we have this whole population in so many different indigenous communities that are ready to go that just need to be directed to the school, directed to the resource to start to see progress made. Come on, Aaron. Preach it, Aaron. Come on.

LinkedIn came out with a report, fastest growing jobs in Canada. 2023 growth marketer is number one, fastest growing job. And I would argue this. Again, I'm open to be argued against it, but I would say one of the best superpowers than indigenous people have is storytelling.

And so, and again, more than ever, good digital marketing needs great storytellers and those in PR need to be great storytellers. Those in social media need to be great storytellers. YouTubeers need to be great storytellers. And so if we can provide the hardware, the skills training, and the support, man, I'm so excited to see what's going to come down the pipe in the next, you know, five to ten years. Okay. So I have to ask because this is a challenge I think so many entrepreneurs have.

This, I have the idea. I have the product. I have the food. I have the service. But nobody's order. Nobody's, nobody knows. I'm getting no searches. How do you start that conversation?

We walk in, sit down, and I'm like, I've got this product. You see it's a good product. You know it's a good product. I've got this good product, but nobody knows about me. What is that kind of journey in your mind? How do you break a problem like that down? Yeah, that's a really great question. And usually it's like, if you, you know, you got product, you know, which is business

to consumer, there's like services often which are business to business, right, selling to other businesses so we um essentially break it down in like to seven kind of modules is how we look at it so we look at it like okay what can you be doing on social media like what are you know your audience are they a Pinterest audience is it like a localize should you be focusing on google my business should you be working on an e-newsletter and offering like coupon codes if it's a restaurant should you be offering like specials that lunch and doing a sponsored uh you know email to all the chamber of commerce members in your area um how do you get some earned media what does it look like you know even looking at this podcast and this show like what does it look like to get post media or the

globe mail the pickup how incredible this show is that you're running right and and kind of like you know and again they may not just cover your show but they'd be like kind of like the next generation of indigenous you know kind of content creators right and and who are they and what are they doing right so it's looking at the PR side of things it's looking at the SEO side of things how do you when someone google searches like pizza like best pizza and chillow How do we make sure that your place pops up in those searches? We look at Google ads. Should you be running Google ads?

Should you be running Bing ads? We look at e-newsletter marketing, which is a really big one. Because if you think about e-newsletter is the only social media channel, the only form of media you can socialize with that you own. And you don't have to fall prey to any algorithm by the Facebook and, you know, Twitter gods. That'd be so. That is really interesting. Do you feel like things are getting better for people to get their messages out?

Do you feel like we're in a good time to be a creator and to be trying to get word out? Or as you said, it's noisy out there. And so I'm just interested in your perspective on where the industry is. Yeah, if you look at podcasts, I can't remember this, that exactly. But it was like, I think it was like almost 80% of podcasts only have one episode. So, you know, so if you've got more than one episode, man, you are killing it. And so what I think that was that, I think we're in a time when, like, it's more about curation than it is about creation. And so those that are high, high quality rise at the top.

So if you are producing good content, quality content, and consistent content, you get up there. You know, one of my favorite YouTubers, guy named Mr. Beast, another one's Mark Rover. But if you look at Mr. Beast, like, the way he shoots it and the way it's edited is not great. like it's not professionally shot and professionally edited like it is handhelds and you know quick awkward edits really bad graphics like it's done in such a raw way but just the stuff he does is so brilliant whether it's you know getting a thousand people healed from blindness right whether it's giving a house away to a homeless person it's like these kind of like shock and awe things that Again, we have this, actually this mural or kind of term up in our office, which is thumb-stopping content.

So what can you do that would cause people to stop their thumb? Like, and what is that? And that's why you look at Mr. Beast and others where like the pause screen on YouTube is so crucial. Like that is like a huge, there's a science to it. There's an art to it of what is in that screen that is on the YouTube kind of board up there. Really interesting. So do you think that we're making? it more accessible with all of this technology, do you feel like there's any shame that

people feel in having to market their business? I have a suspicion that people are, they want the product to speak for itself. And I see businesses in community that are like, I just want it to be liked by people. And so if they don't, like, I don't want to force it on them. And that seems to be the fear that people have around taking that first step to start to market their business is I've got this good idea and if people wanted they can come get it yeah I don't I don't find that as much like I call it like the you know

feel the dreams syndrome where it's like if you build it they will come like this old movie for I don't know 90s or whatever I feel it's more people get either paralysis by analysis or they feel overwhelmed with all the channels and the options so it's like they've created

this amazing let's call it this mug right here right like they got this mug and they're about to take it to market and they're so excited because they're passionate about the mug they love their mug they built it they made it you know it's passed down generations of how to make this amazing mug but then when they go to market it and to promote it there's like right now like 200 options do you start a podcast do you go on Pinterest do you go on Twitter do you what like way too many options and then when they realize okay the best option is here they're overwhelmed with like well how do I do it well how do I run a really good Facebook ad and so back in the day it was really way simpler

You maybe put a newspaper ad out, you maybe put something in the yellow pages. Like the options were like a handful of options for a business to start and to get the word out. But now it's overwhelming. And the ones that are there that are really the most powerful, like maybe, you know, a Reddit thread or running some Reddit ads that would be maybe best for that mug company. There's a few steps there to learn how to do it. And so if we can empower people with those skills to both assess, you know, all the whole. the options and to choose what's best for them and then give them the tools on how to do marketing on maybe those three channels the best that's what i'm seeing work really really well and they're

amazing at it once they kind of filtered out the nose and said don't go over all those places and just do these three and do it really well they do an amazing job because they are the creator of said mug and they are the best person to market the said mug i love that and i think that that's a huge argument as to why it's valuable to have a third person in the room a person that's a person that It's not yourself, a person who's able to give feedback to you because sometimes we get so lost in the beauty of this mug. I made it. It took me hours to figure out how to do all the hours of build up. And then we get protective over it.

And we need somebody who's able to come in and say, this is how we get it out to the world. This is how we grow this. This is how we get the message out. Could you also tell us about Marketing News Canada? Because I think it's really valuable for people to start to develop skills around how to communicate. messages and I'm just interested in how that got started for you that was more of like a happy accident so we ran a conference in squamish called the canadian internet marketing conference uh with another agency marwick and uh guy wanted a ticket i couldn't really give away tickets

because i co ran the event with someone else and so i was like why don't you apply to be a press guy be awesome and maybe do a blog or two about it he goes totally we'll do that and so he came and at the end of the conference he's like derian and he showed me this little handel recorder thing is i goes i've done something for you and this was like eight years ago when like podcasts were only on sound cloud and apple was the only real options you had to listen to podcast so the next week he launched uh what was called marketing jam is what we called it originally our pot first episode and it was a series of interviews of all the people backstage like it was like the head storyteller from Pixar to someone from google someone from twitter and we had always speakers but he took

these sound bites and made this thing called a podcast and he's like hey i'll keep doing it so we paid him a monthly fee every month and he kept these podcasts going um and then we hired someone who had a really strong production background said hey man we could do this in house it'd be really fun um this guy actually at the same time was getting a new job and he's like so let's do it so we kept interviewing people in house and then we saw that there was um heritage Canada was supporting Canadian made journalistic efforts but it was only if it was in written word they didn't believe in podcasts yet i don't think they do yet but maybe one day hey heritage Canada if you're listening we would love that um we saw

started transcribing our episodes into articles and so and at that time we changed it from marketing jam to marketing news Canada and got funded by Heritage Canada one year which was kind of cool and then we kept episodes going and then Amazon Prime a friend of mine was like hey man it'd be funny if you apply to try to get your show up there so I sent it in with another guy and we got approved so Amazon Prime picked up 10 of our episodes the video format so we're the first Canadian podcast to get turned into a TV series. It wasn't a very, you know, it was like between two ferns, but like not as funny. And so it's like, no, it was like an awkward show.

And so, but it was fun. We put up one season. They asked for a second season. We never did do it because it was a lot. It's a ton of work to do transcription. What's it called? Close captioning. So we never got around it because you have to do a ton of work.

And it was always a side project for us and always still is. But then we started doing an e-newsletter because people started liking our content. We've got a bunch of people who syndicate their content onto our site now. So we've got, yeah, just almost, yeah, thousands of almost close to, I want to say, 9,000 subscribers, email list. Podcasts go out probably once or twice a week. We were doing way too many, especially during COVID. But during COVID, the best gift was like a guy like Seth Godin, who I would, you know,

wanted to speak at events or interview. All of someone was like, hey, I got some time in my hands. And I was like, I don't know, he felt sorry for here. He's just like, I'm bored. So I got to interview him who was. brilliant guy Kawasaki, who was the first kind of marketer for Apple, got to interview him, and it was a huge treat, head of social media for Lego. And I actually, the only reason I keep the show going, and I don't mind admitting this,

one was I was trying to land an interview with Squarespace, and it took me three and a half years to get it. I finally got it. But then I was like, but I see this as like personal and professional development when I get an interview. So I call it like these micromanor moments. We got to interview like the co-founder of Netflix and got to really like get into the heart of like what happened and what was it like going to that blockbuster meeting where they said no we don't want to buy you um like it's been so cool those interviews like i i walk away just blown away

i couldn't agree more and i think that there is a value even if people just don't even air or share the podcast to work through your own thoughts like it is a form of thinking to be able to sit down and go through and think what are my thoughts on this is this something that i know is true or is it something that I've been, I'm parroting because my parents told me and, is this something that I understand deeply, or am I just repeating things I've heard because it's popular? It gives you that, that opportunity to go through and figure out how do I communicate, how do I think? And that's been one of the best growing moments for myself is figuring out, do I actually believe this, do I actually think this, do I understand this issue? Or am I just saying things to be bold or

provocative? Do I really get it? And then sitting down with really interesting people and hearing them explain their understanding when they're an expert in something and I get to go wow okay how do bees work because I interviewed our provincial apiculturist how do they work how do you see them

why are you interested in this and to take that journey and learn asking if he saw the bee movie with Jerry Seinfeld I didn't ask him that what I didn't ask him but he was as it doesn't even matter if he saw it because he basically explained the plot of the movie

is what we're still doing today so we're in the same problem I think that we were in since that movie um that's fascinating and i i did a fun experience and it's not working great i we did we took a hundred of our interviews turned him into uh chapters of a book and we published a book uh really last month so it's been uh and yeah definitely not a bestseller in any regard but it's been cool to like people that like paper so we've sold like i don't know 10 um copies i don't know how many copies we've sold them so far um but we were able to it so we and we we just hit our 300 episodes

so we're going to do two more of these books where we'll have like the first hundred reviews, then the next hundred, and then the next hundred, and people that like books, or I was inspired by a book called Tribe of Mentors, where he took, again, a podcaster took 100 of his interviews and found, like, the best nuggets from it. And so you could flip through it and circle things. And it's pretty cool. Yeah. I think it's really fascinating to see that trend, that transversion, that changeover from mediums when you see a podcast get ridden out into a substack article or something like that and see people be able to communicate because people like to read, people like to listen, there's different, there's

different approaches for people and to make learning more accessible is really where I get excited about podcasts. And then you can learn from people like yourself and understand an issue in a different way than maybe you did before. Yeah, I know for sure. Can I just ask what advice do you have for people? You've taken risks on yourself over your career. You continue to invest in new ideas to stay fresh and stay current with people. I'm just interested, what can people take away from this? I feel like there's a lot to learn from individuals like yourself and I'm just curious as to what thoughts you have for others who are starting to take those initial steps to start their own business to start to take steps for themselves. I think it's almost like

there's an old saying like you throw spaghetti against the wall and see if it sticks. So like we started a training school out of our agency called Jelly Academy and we just tried it. It was actually funny enough it was one of our clients was like, can you train me? So we trained her and then we tried a few more so we threw a bit more spaghetti out and then we made an open class so people could try it and it worked so it's almost like you know crawl walk run is the old saying but trying it and trying it and then i think we realized you know there was a there's a massive need in this hole in the training industry that we're able to fill and and we just happen to be at the right time and the right place and i think that's what so much of entrepreneurship is is like trialing trialing things

and then sometimes you just happen to be the right place at the right time when it works. The only thing that makes you somewhat unique and I would say the best entrepreneur is unique is that you have a love of the game. You have a love for what you do. And I'm just wondering if you could just speak to that because there is something to like trying new things

but you have to have an initial love of it. You have to do it like a lot of the best podcasters started. No one was listening and they were speaking of a microphone because they loved it. So can you talk about that love of the game? I don't know. I don't know. Like the podcast is more I just found I find people fascinating.

I was like, I got to interview these people. It feels, honestly, this whole last 46 minutes have been super awkward for me because I'm like, I'm used to beating your shoes. And I'm like, feel like this is very unfair. But, and then the other side of like the school stuff we're doing, like, I just love it. And to try things and to, you know, there's an old incredibly wise woman who used to say to her students when they got out of the bus. We always say them, you know, get messy, make mistakes and have fun. Her name is Miss Frizzle.

She has this magic school bus. It's incredible. Check it out. She's very, very wise woman. But, you know, it's so great to be able to live in a time when you can get messy, make some mistakes, and really have fun with it. And if you're having fun, it doesn't really feel like too much work. But, again, it's also like being excited enough about it that you're willing to do so

much the work that I've done. And so many, you know, my partner does is like stuff that no one will ever see, right? It's the late night emails you're doing a night shift. until you know put another four hours in at night to catch up on things you're meeting with people and it not working out and you're trying things and throwing spaghetti and it just falls right off the wall and it never sticks but i think that the core of it is though um finding it there's an amazing book called you are special about these amazing we make people and they they they run around giving you know gray dot stickers and gold star stickers to other wooden people and if you get a star sticker

it's because you're awesome right and if you get a great great gray dot stickers because you're not that great. And there's this one character, Punchadella, who kept getting these gray circle stickers, and he was really sad. And he was just, it was the worst. And he'd try to do these amazing feats. And then he would fail even more,

and then he'd get even more stickers of the gray type. And he would see these amazing wooden people with these beautiful stars everywhere. He's like, I want to be like them. They look amazing. But then one day he saw this wooden person, Lucille walks her down and had no stickers at all. And was like, what?

how is that possible and chased after it goes how is that possible and she goes well actually I just go up and see the woodcarver each day that's it and then she walked away and punchinello goes home goes to bed thinks about it he's sitting up can't sleep

he's like should I go should I do this and he was just covered in these great stickers he's like I'm just going to go so he went the next day and opened up this massive door and walked in and all of then he heard Punchinello it's so good to see you and these big hands came down and lifted Punchinella up and put him on

his workbench. He goes, oh, it's so good to see. And Punchel's like, how do you know me? He goes, well, I made you. Of course I know you. And then he says, oh, man, I'm so embarrassed. He goes, oh, man, you got a few bad marks on you. And he was, yeah, I'm so sorry. I'm just a big mistake. And he goes, you know what, Punchdello? I made you and I never make mistakes. And he says, you know what, come and see me every day anytime. Come on up. And he lifts Punchinello off, puts him down, and Punchinello kind of has a little smile on his face. And as he's walk on and he looks back one of his gray stickers falls off his body i read this story to my children and an incredible i think story for entrepreneurs where you know we can get praise and we can get put in

the newspaper get put in thing we can have a great quarter and that's awesome and but we can't that can't be our oxygen and we can get a lot of negative feedback and bad reviews and have a really grumpy customer and that also can't feed us and fuel us but if you can find that voice whether it's meeting with a if you believe in your creator and you can go see your creator and let your creator whisper over you that I made you and you are amazing and you are not a mistake and I love you great if you've got another method to find that anchor in your life that could just get your feet somewhere where it doesn't matter what anyone says about you, whether it's a partner that can whisper to you at night,

like you are amazing, you are incredible, you're amazing at just who you are as a person, doesn't matter what your business, whether it's ups or downs. Like that's that voice to find. And I think that's been, I don't think the thing that's gone me through all of the ups and downs, and there's so many ups and downs in entrepreneurship that,

yeah, that children's book has kind of been one of my saving graces. What an incredibly profound and beautiful story. Daryan, thank you so much for being willing to do this. Would you mind telling people how they can connect with you, how they can stay up to date with you? Send like a fax, carrier pigeon. Send me a page.

I wish. I wish I had a fax number because that'd be amazing to leave a fax number at the end of this and see if I get any faxes. But LinkedIn is mostly where I reside, but I'm out all the Twitter, Instagram. email even a website jelly marketing or jelly academy or check out marketing news Canada wherever you find your podcast brilliant thank you so much again for being willing to do this um i really appreciate all of your knowledge that story was absolutely beautiful um and i'm so excited to share that with people uh a huge thank you as well to tim for putting this together uh if we could switch to his

camera tim's in the house yes dj dj tim another one All right. Awesome. How did that turn out, Tim? That was great. Well done. Oh, Eric, pleasure to meet you. If you ever want to come out, say hi, and grab a coffee, tea, whatever, I'm happy to host you out here in the, and I have jars that. We actually have jars of jelly. I could give you an actual jar. I would be honored. That sounds fantastic. Thank you.