Right About Now with Ryan Alford - Weekly Business News for June 7 | There Is Actually A Plan! Mapping out Facebook's strategy to bring back the attention of Gen Z users.

Episode Date: June 7, 2024

TAKEAWAYSWealth of the world's richest individualsUse of Apple AirTags in solving a theft caseFacebook's efforts to attract younger usersGameStop's stock influencer, Roaring KittyImpact of a two-week break on viewer engagement in the NBA playoffsFleeting nature of attention in today's worldConcerns about the reckless race for dominance in artificial intelligenceUse of AI in marketing campaignsImpact of certain individuals on the success of businessesChanging dynamics of the soda industryTIMESTAMPSThe introduction (00:00:00) Introducing the show and hosts, highlighting the show's popularity and the hosts' banter.Wealth of the world's richest individuals (00:04:46) Discussion on the increase in the number of high net worth individuals and their total net worth, attributed to the rising stock market.Apple AirTags solving a theft case (00:10:10) A carpenter hides Apple AirTags in power tools, helping police crack a massive theft case, leading to a conversation about other potential use cases for AirTags.Facebook's efforts to attract younger users (00:13:30) Facebook's struggle to attract younger users and its plan to woo Gen Z users back to the platform, including a discussion on Facebook Marketplace.GameStop's stock influencer, Roaring Kitty (00:17:56) Discussion on the impact of Roaring Kitty's Reddit post on GameStop shares and the controversy surrounding retail trading and options trading.Impact of a two-week break on NBA playoffs (00:20:41) The negative impact of a two-week break between the Eastern Conference and Western Conference playoffs on viewer engagement and momentum.The attention span of viewers (00:21:32) Discussion about the fleeting attention of viewers, especially in the context of the NBA playoffs.OpenAI's potential dangers (00:22:07) Concerns about the potential dangers of OpenAI's reckless race for dominance in artificial intelligence.Facebook's use of AI in marketing (00:27:33) Discussion about US Bank's use of AI to create audience models for a national marketing campaign.TikTok's algorithm and potential sale (00:31:40) Discussion about TikTok's algorithm and the challenges it faces in the US market.Caitlin Clark's impact on the WNBA (00:33:48) Analysis of the impact of basketball star Caitlin Clark on the WNBA and her endorsement deal with Wilson.Abercrombie & Fitch's resurgence (00:37:24) Discussion about Abercrombie & Fitch's record-setting first quarter sales and its brand strategy.Doctor Pepper's rise in popularity (00:39:59) Discussion about Doctor Pepper's rise to become the number two soda brand in America, tied with Pepsi.Waffle House and Coke (00:43:29) Discussion about the delicious combo of waffles, hash browns, and Coke, and potential sponsorship.Weekend Plans (00:43:41) Mention of weekend plans and staying hydrated as the weather gets warm.Appreciation and Sponsorship (00:44:40) Acknowledgment of audience support, encouragement for reviews, and appreciation for the sponsor, Brady Bills. If you enjoyed this episode and want to learn more, join Ryan’s newsletter https://ryanalford.com/newsletter/ to get Ferrari level advice daily for FREE.  Learn how to build a 7 figure business from your personal brand by signing up for a FREE introduction to personal branding https://ryanalford.com/personalbranding.  Learn more by visiting our website at www.ryanisright.comSubscribe to our YouTube channel  www.youtube.com/@RightAboutNowwithRyanAlford. 

This is Right About Now with Ryan Alford, a Radcast Network production. We are the number one business show on the planet with over 1 million downloads a month. Taking the BS out of business for over 6 years and over 400 episodes. You ready to start snapping necks and cashing checks? Well, it starts Right About Now. Welcome to the show. It's right about now. It's our weekly business news of the week here on June 7th, 2024. We're taking the bullshit right out of business. That's what we do.

I always do with my good friend, Chris Hansen. What's up, Chris? What's up, Brian? How are you today, big dog? Hey, just taking the BS out of everything, man. I'm over the BS. I don't need any BS in my my life that's why we're here you won't people come to us so we extract the bs we're like a vacuum cleaner for the bullshit we're gonna pull it out we're gonna tell you what it all means and give you what you need and nothing you don't want what's happening, man? Another beautiful day down in Miami.

Getting hot, man. Super hot. Hot Miami. That's the news of the week. I'm enjoying my YLH energy drink. I'm not giving anybody. There's no more freebies here. It's the YLH until, look, a million plus downloads a month. The number one show in

marketing and business on Apple. And we hit number four in business in the world. Look, your logo needs to be here. I drink too many energy drinks. So you'll get better covers than just about anything. That's a fact. Yes, but it's tasty. I don't know how your heart is still beating, but rock on, baby. Dude, I run at like 44 resting heart rate. I don't know how your heart is still beating but rock on baby dude i run at like 44 resting heart rate i don't know so this brings you up to homeostasis you're like i'm normal like everybody else now yes i am well it's not normal and that's these hats i am rocking the new hats from our good friends and that is got the new logo on there, but our good friends at branded bills, branded bills.com look custom patches,

just like these look, man, they're in, we got the other show. Christian. I does vibe science. I passed that's tasty leather right there, my friend.

And then of course the right about now logo custom and in there. Yes, it is. This is where it's at. You want the best for your brand. You want the best for your brand. You want the best for your business, your event, whatever it is. Check them out. The official merchandise sponsor of Right About Now. Chris and I love them. You'll love them. Go to brandofbills.com and tell them

Right About Now. You'll thank us. And look, this is tasty right here. Tasty. Oh yeah. I do love them. Got them surrounded around me. We got like 5,000 hats in the studio. So, look, if you want a hat, DM me. I'll send you one. Someone on the team will. Chris will send you one, too.

If you're down in Miami and you're not scary, Chris might even meet up with you and hand you one. This is true. If you're not a weirdo, holler signing Chris. Follow at me for a shot. We can meet in a public place in the middle of the day. Starbucks at 2 PM. Nothing at night. Yeah. Yeah.

Oh man. You don't need a hat at nighttime. Okay, bro. You can meet me when the sun's out. That's right. We appreciate you wherever you are, whenever you are,

however you are. Hopefully you're watching on YouTube. This shows a lot better better we already talked about how good looking chris is you get to see him you get to see the shine from the gold you get the brand of bill's hats you get the custom look slugger's fragile he is a super talented but fragile he needs admiration of how cool this fucking board is behind me. I'm telling you. He spent a lot of time, a lot of energy, and it's badass. And I kid about his fraughtness. He's super talented.

And I just feel important with the board behind me. I don't have a bamboo tree and a vacay logo up in my Miami lounge like Chris. Hey, we got balance, baby. We got best of both worlds. That's right. You need to watch this on YouTube to get the full experience. We got multi-camera in here. Look, Sawyer's got us hooked balance, baby. We got best of both worlds. That's right. You need to watch us on YouTube to get the full experience. We got multi-camera in here. Look, Sawyer's got us hooked up, man. We got one, two, three, four, four cameras today.

And again, Chris dropping the ones and the twos. So check us out on YouTube. Get the full video experience. And look, this is real gold, baby. They don't just hand these out. You got to see that in person to really know what it is. 60 pounds of goodness. But with all that said, look, hey, the rich are getting richer, Chris. This hit my, this isn't even on our official show notes. Comes to us from our good friends at Yahoo Finance. We really appreciate them.

Yahoo! Remember those commercials? Yeah. That's throwing it back. Dude. Yeah. It's still in the brain, bro. It is. I mean, that's how memories, that's what branding does, though.

I didn't plan that. I really didn't. It just came out. I was reading it off my screen and triggered that brand memory. I'm telling you, it matters. World's richest have never been so wealthy. So says a study from our friends at noshit.com. Yeah, go check them out.

The world has never had so many rich people, and their investments in soaring stock markets have made them wealthier than ever recorded. According to a study published on Wednesday, that would be this past Wednesday, the 5th, the number of high net worth individuals, that's defined as people with liquid assets of at least 1 million, rose by 5.1% last year to 22.8 million people. A lot of wealthy people out there. Their total net worth reaches $86.8 trillion. It's a 5% increase from the previous year. The number of, and their total is the highest since they began the annual study in 1997. And their total wealth is the highest since they began the annual study in 1997.

The fortunes are attributed to the rising stock market, as well as other trading and assets that have increased. Makes sense, doesn't it, Chris? The stock market's never been higher. The wealthy have more in the stock market than anyone else. Pretty easy correlation. I can do that correlation. I know, right? Yeah.

You don't even have to pay me to do the study. Yeah. Yeah. Rich people's money, earning interest, sitting in their accounts, they don't need to touch is growing. Holy shit. I know. But so what does this mean?

I don't know. I, the problem I think going on right now is that it's less, I think it's that middle ground, like right below. Because with interest rates so high and inflation still going on, literally I had this discussion. I've been having this theory, and again, this is probably part of the no shit theory too, but I'm just going to say it. At least it calculates for me. I've been going like, okay, what are the impact of these interest rates? And we've talked about this before, being so high, just getting money in the market. Like people just aren't doing things. People are sitting on houses that they'd love to sell that are worth more than they've ever been worth, but they know they're going to have to turn around and buy in the same

market, which they might actually be OK with. But what they're not OK with is turning a 4% mortgage into an 8.5% mortgage. And so you have a lot of money sitting on the sidelines and a lot of stagnation going on. And so I don't think that's impacting the uber wealthy or what we're talking about here as much as it is that just, we call it middle class. But I didn't say upper middle class, I think, is having an impact. It is. And so those interest rates have to come down. I'll be honest, like even for me, we've considered a couple moves on certain things.

Not selling our house necessarily, but like we've got some rental properties shifting things around and we're like and we don't have to it's not a ton based on the interest rate but it's enough based on the interest rate that's it just you second guess everything yeah and so i know that's what's happening you have people friends talk about this yeah I got a lot of buddies in the mortgage industry. One I talk to almost every day and it's exactly what he's saying. If anything, people are refined to get cash out of their houses since they've appreciated. But that's because people are still tight on money. I think you had, and from the people I know, a lot of people bought houses 2019 to 2021. A lot of them probably spent a little more than they would have usually spent.

Cash is tight. Yeah. You're right. A lot of people just not a bad spot, but they can't really make a move. Yeah. Because they might have assets in equity. So they might,

but it's just not quite as liquid as it would normally be. There are like enough buying and selling and selling at the level to where, okay, maybe I'll downsize my house and take the gains here. I'm willing to buy in a market that's increased, but I'm going to downsize and then take those earnings, invest them in some rental properties, all that's on hold. Yeah, and most people I know,

they're looking to upsize because they're growing their families my age, my friends. And that's the issue is they're growing their families. They're outgrowing their homes, but now they're stuck. They can't afford that next jump up, and they're just sitting there. Exactly. So the wealth are getting wealthier. Not a surprise. And look, I'm not even hating on that.

This is me. Like, hey hey it's capitalism they're taking advantage good for them we're talking about some of the realities of that just underneath that and what that's impacting everything else money moving you need money moving i thought this was interesting this comes to us from mashable.com. Man hides Apple AirTags in power tools. Helps police crack massive theft case. I'm happy to hear them being used for a positive thing. Sort of tracking your, stalking your boyfriend or girlfriend.

Yeah, that's typically what I hear about. A carpenter has provided police with the key to cracking a multi-million dollar theft case it all happened thanks to some hidden apple air tags yeah he spoke on anonymously to the washington post said he decided to hide the bluetooth tracking devices which are typically used to help people keep tabs on things like luggage and keys and spouses, after he'd been the victim of previous tool thefts. It is pretty ingenious. I will say it made me think of, okay, other business cases,

or just use cases for this thing, and not just stalker stuff. That's exactly what I was just sitting thinking. What can I use this for? You've got to have one. I know you have to find your iPhone, so it seems, but if it turns off, if you had one plastered on there, I don't know. I guess someone might take it off if they stole it, but you can hide one. In the case, they ought to build, hey, here's a product idea.

A case that's thick enough that you can conceal one in the case as a backup to find my iPhone. Yeah. I need to think that through, but it sounds smarter on the surface. Find my not found iPhone. That's the name of it. I don't know. Something stupid.

But in all seriousness, I do think there's a lot of use cases. And I think I will say this. If you have a parent or someone like with dementia or something like that, I'd have that shit like all in their wallet, their cars, wherever. And again, you're not tracking them deceptively. It's more care. Hey, nursing homes, every wheelchair should have one of those on it. I mean, grandma rolling out to the parking i roll it out i kid a little bit but i'm actually being serious it's a real thing my grandma used

to take off from her caretaker she would get in the car and leave yeah there's a lot of uses for those things like yeah i would put one on my boat or something. Even luggage, bro. Like, it says in the article. I would, I'd put it in my luggage. Yeah. Never know.

That's a good, because luggage gets lost, dude. Be tracking that thing. Yeah. And they're cheap. They're not like 30 bucks now or something. They're inexpensive.

Anyway, lots of use cases and probably some business models to be developed around them. So that's why we brought it up. Thought it was fun and interesting. And hey, dude, don't be stealing tools, man. Come on, man. That's just like, who would try to do just look all over?

Stealing someone's livelihood. Yeah. That ain't cool. And I hope everybody starts putting air tags on them. Just busting people left and right. This is also for Mashable. I've said this for a while. Facebook has a real problem with the younger generation.

It's like when they think that they call it the boomer, boomer book or something. Yeah, it's true. It's just not cool to get on Facebook. And that's a problem for Facebook because these older generations, they're phasing. We're all, look, these older generations, they're phasing. We're all, look, newsflash, we're all dying. Yeah, your user base is dying.

So we're all, unless one of these AI or things really comes around and makes us live forever, we all have an end date. So you don't want your user base to be skewing too old. And so Facebook has a plan to woo Gen Z users back to the platform. Once a must-have for college students, Facebook is now more commonly reputed as a watering hole for old people. As other social platforms have risen involved to fill the needs of younger generations. Facebook has been peddling election propaganda to folks who can't tell the difference between AI-generated images and reality. Now, Boomer Book wants to reverse course. This article feels like it's so supportive of this reversal.

Yeah, I got to give some props to this writer for making it not so watered down. It's kind's refreshing. Yeah. At an event in New York City on May 31st, Facebook's execs presented their strategy for ensuring the next 20 years of Facebook. How we stay alive. That's never good. When you're even coming out and saying it.

No. Wooing young users and applying AI everywhere. Oh, wonderful. We're still for everyone, President Tom Allison told the crowd, but we also recognize that in order to stay relevant, we have to build for Gen Z. So they're making plans. And look, this is an issue.

I will say this. I got an idea. You know what everybody uses that may not admit it of all ages it's called facebook marketplace i don't care how old you are everybody gets on that shit they do i know i see them people are buying stuff left and right you need to be that like could be the conduit for creating some kind of regeneration of the younger crowd or something because i know people are shopping on that all the time. I see them all the time. I see people doing it.

I know I get on there even for dumb shit. And we have some friends, Kelly and TJ. I don't know if y'all even listen to our show, dude, they are on that shit all the time. Like they're not even shopping. They're just looking,

Hey, going to the never ending yard sale where you're going through everybody's shit. I really need this 1974 bookcase. It's cracked in the middle, but you know what? Put a little wood glue on that thing, and it'll look just like new and porters. But then I do think like that Gen Z crowd, they're always looking for some cool stuff for their house, their condos, going through Facebook marketplace. It's like a treasure hunt.

People love that. Yeah, treasure hunt. Maybe that's the conduit. Put that shit in the metaverse or something and get them some goggles and make it a virtual yard sale. Yeah. I kid, but I do think that is the sort of one app or one within the app that I think a lot of people use universally. Yeah. But it's interesting.

I do think Facebook, I don't know how you get this genie back in the bottle or out of the bottle, however you want to say it, because they say they're working, like if this article further goes on, like they're working on their video algorithm so that they start matching TikTok with aligning interest with what they get shown with the video apps and stuff. And that matters if they're on the app, like in the feed. But if you're not, that's the problem. And so that's what they got to figure out ultimately. So it's a problem. This comes from us from Mashable. This is right up your alley, brother. GameStop climbs as Roaring Kitty reveals $116 minimum bet in Reddit post. GameStop shares jumped 20% on Monday after Roaring Kitty, also known as Keith Gill, the stock's influencer behind the 21 retail trading frenzy, returned to Reddit with a post showing a $116 million bet

on the embattled video game retailer. The stock was set to add $4.6 billion to its market value after surging as much as 75% earlier in the session. Roughly $2.7 billion worth of shares changed hands by 10, 12 a.m. compared to $2.3 billion in Apple.

This one guy that sets all that off. It was first posted three years. This has been going nuts on Twitter. So I encourage anyone to watch the documentary, not documentary, it's a film about this guy on Netflix. I think it's called GameStop. And now the SEC is trying to shut this guy down for options trading.

And the big dilemma is everyone knows now our politicians like Pelosi and all these people options trade and make tons of money. Essentially voting on the stocks they're holding. This guy basically posted on Twitter what he was trading and a bunch of people jumped on and they made a lot of money. And now the people in power

are not very happy about it. But hey, I'm a big supporter of this guy. He's taking it to the man. He's become quite a legend. Yeah, he said off all the meme stocks back in the day too. And so I'll say this, if you're listening,

I'd always be dabbling in this stuff. You've got, you call it retail trading, whatever you want to call it, but the apps are so easy now. This is legalized gambling in a way. Keep your few grand, like just playing around with it, whatever you can afford. But because you never know when one of these things might pop and you turn a thousand into 50,000. And nothing else you can do can make that happen, being a truck dealer, which we don't encourage here. We're taking the bullshit out of business,

but we're not going that far. You know, there are laws here. We're not encouraging breaking them. That's why you get to legalize gambling. That's called the stock market. I would open you a little, I don't know. Is Robinhood even still the thing? Open a little Scottrade account.

Is Robinhood still around? Yeah, but that's the one that they were part of this controversy. They suspended trading on this stock when retail traders were actually crushing it. Yeah. Maybe don't use Robinhood, but like Ryan said, get on there. There's a million apps. Hook up your damn credit card and you can buy some stocks. Yeah.

And don't max it out. Just use like $500. Like you said, $200. Yeah. $1,000, whatever you're comfortable with you know stop betting on those games that you never win throw the stock market you know scratch offs quit it'd be easier to tell your wife that hey i lost a few hundred dollars on apple today instead of going man I lost on the Pacers last night. That conversation goes a lot different because it's business, baby. You were in it for the right reasons.

Yeah, you're right. They're not looked at the same at all. Yeah. LeBron James not scoring 32 points in the game cost that. It doesn't go over so well. But I had some insider tips on Google's AI stock, and I lost $400 last night, honey. Oh, that's okay. You were looking out after our future and all that.

But this is not financial advice. Maybe if you listen right about now, you might make some good picks. Hey, there you go. Hey, speaking of picks, look, I got some beef. Hey, there you go. Hey, speaking of picks, look, I got some beef. The NBA, like, I don't even watch the NBA, but the playoffs have been pretty compelling.

My kids get into it. We've had every night. It's a lot of fun. And look, obviously, condensing down, you have less games, less teams in it. But this two-fucking-week break between the Eastern Conference and the Western, you lose all momentum. Like, my kids have forgotten about it. I would love to see what the ratings are like game one. Maybe they're through the roof because you build up this demand for two weeks.

But we were into it. Yeah. And then the last game was like last Monday night, and it's a full week and three, four days until the final start. And it has something to do with there was a sweep in the East and like a 4-1 in the west. So, like, they went faster than planned. But I'm like, dude, like all momentum just a week and a half later.

In today's world, attention's fleeting. Yeah, a long time. Again, my kids were like into it, like asking me for three days after it ended. Okay, when's the final? When's the finals? Do you think they asked me when the finals were this week? Nope. On to the next thing.

Now, we'll probably get back into it, but I would love to see expected ratings versus actual. I could be wrong. Maybe they built demand. I don't know. I think people forget about things. So, we'll see. But, I don't know.

We're just getting into it. Now, I'm going to... Yeah, you're right that way. Yeah. it now. I'm going to ride that wave. Yeah. All right. This taking the BS out of business. It's open AI insiders warn of a reckless race for dominance. This gets scary,

dude. Okay. You don't want to hear reckless. Yeah. In the same. This comes to us from our best friends at dnyuz.com. Oh. Yeah.

Everybody knows them. Dunyas? I don't know. But this article was at a lot of other places. I just liked the hysteria that this one seemed to be causing. A group of open AI insiders is blowing the whistle on what they say is a culture of reckless and secrecy at the San Francisco Artificial Intelligence Company, which is racing to build the most powerful AI systems ever created. The group, which includes nine current former OpenAI employees, has rallied in recent days around shared concerns that the company has not done enough to prevent

its AI systems from becoming dangerous. A respected ex-employee who actually jeopardized his $2 million exit clause willingly believes that the probability that advanced AI will destroy or catastrophically harm humanity, a grim statistic often shortened to P-Doom, in AI circles. He thinks that percentage of probability is 70%. An insider who's worked on the platform. That's frightening. Yeah. Let that sink in for a minute. The guy built this, yo, yo we got a 70 it's wiping us all out yeah that's well here this same guy said that he thought it would be 50 years before ai reached true human intelligence level he now puts it at 2027 three years from now it'll be greater or as high as human intelligence based on the progression and so he said so with that happening so he's predicting

he puts 70 chance and again this is a guy that worked there since the original he's involved in all this he sees what's going on he knows what's going on. He knows what's going on. And he had a $2 million stock like that he forfeited. He just said, because they had a non-disparagement clause or something, which supposedly they've wiped out now and he's still going to get it. But he didn't know that when he released this quote. And he just said, no, I'm willing to do it because I need people. I want people to know. Put $2 million on the line. And he ain't writing a book. He's just telling people that you should be worried about this. And be careful what you ask for out there.

You know, like. Protect that man. He's stepping on a lot of people's toes, a lot of money. Yes. And just, and it's just, again, there's got to be responsibility around all this tech that's you know being built around it look i'm all for progression i'm an innovator i like innovation i do but i don't really want to blow up the world because we make computers smarter than us and too self-aware i don't want westworld i've watched watched that movie. I've watched that show.

I love that movie. I love the show because it's suspending reality. I don't want reality becoming reality. I don't want my entertainment becoming reality. It's entertainment because it's fiction. Yeah, exactly. And we talk about this a lot because I think it's important to highlight this. People are asking questions.

We're thinking about this stuff lot because i think it's important to highlight this so people are asking questions we're doing thinking about this stuff the right way because there's a lot of just passivity going on we just let this stuff fly okay somebody else will take care of it or people assume it's going to be a benefit yeah i mean i see even yesterday i'm driving by miami-dade college and i a big poster, come learn AI. It's for something that's come so quickly and become in all of our conversations almost daily. Yeah. Especially in the marketing world, right? You're right.

There's a lot of people that are, oh, my Tesla drives itself. This is awesome. And that's where, as far as they think of it. Yeah, exactly. But it's more than that. And it's once you start seeding control, where does that, or seeding, okay, to the AI, where does that stop and start?

Watch Upgraded on Netflix. It's a movie about a guy getting a chip in his brain and basically the chip taking over. Yes. Yeah. Overheaded people. C H I P. And we are not talking about the California highway patrol back on chips

with punch and John. I'm really amazed with that. You know what that is? Chips. Go look at, go watch it. That's a great eighties movie. Our show.

Yeah. Chips. No, that's a team. I'm trying to remember the, they're riding those 80s movie. Our show. Chips. No, that's A-Team. I'm trying to remember. They're riding those motorcycles, dude. Oh, man. Those tan outfits.

Yeah. John was the good cop and Ponce was the bad cop. They were both good cops. But Ponce was a little feisty. He'd punch you in the face or something. Go watch what they used to do. Get away with that now. I don't think so.

You think police brutality is bad now? Go look at the 80s. Yeah, go watch Chips. Holy shit. Oh, geez. Speaking of AI, a lot of marketing campaigns coming out using this. I can't wait to see how this does. U.S. Bank taps AI to create audience models for national campaigns.

Marketingdive.com. U.S. Bank has launched a national campaign, The Power of Us. Leveraging artificial intelligence to create audience models to test its creative against. Per details shared with Marketing Dive, the campaign is the first under new CMO Michael LaCoraza. Campaign is centered around a brand video and three additional spots to tell stories of what U.S. Bank, its employees, and clients can achieve together. Supernatural AI. Agency Supernatural AI's AI platform was used to create avatars

of U.S. banks' core target groups to develop the campaign strategy and conduct testing. Let's see how this goes. Power of us. Power of AI. I don't know. Let's see how it goes. Power of us. Power of AI. I don't know. We'll see how it goes. Power of us.

But we're using fake AI-created characters. Yeah, exactly. That aren't real human. It's going to be interesting to watch this. Look, I like the innovation. I like, hey, personalization and ads. Hey, great. But I don't know.

We'll see. We'll see. You're going to see a lot more of this. And I want to report back. I want to see the results from this. That's what I was thinking. I want to see what was the increase in sales revenue for the bank after these. Yeah.

So I had a really a guy I really admire on on as a guest episode in studio this week. A guy I really admire on his guest episode in the studio this week, Steve Robinson, former CMO of Chick-fil-A for 32 and a half years. Eat more chicken, that guy. And he talked about brand, and he talked about culture, and he talked about what you have to do to build a company. And it's everything but what the hell these people are doing. Let me just tell you that it's so it's it was great and covert cows and chick-fil-a go check that book out and look that episode's coming out soon i'm telling you this is a master class this might be the one of my favorite episodes from a marketing perspective steve is so like easy to listen to but yet so

knowledgeable let me tell you if you're building a brand, you better play the long game, baby. And it's top to bottom. And so very interesting is going through this and talking with someone like him and then reading these other kind of marketing approaches. And look, it doesn't mean they don't use AI. It doesn't mean that Chick-fil-A is not using intelligence to guide things. And he talked about that very thing, but he talked about through the lens with which they do it and how it doesn't change. There's from good to gracious. That's, that's their tagline, not internally strategy. Anyway, really interesting about how they've been successful. And look, they give away the secrets

and the competitors don't even copy it because they can't duplicate it. And it ain't because they pay their employees two more dollars an hour. I can tell you that. You need to check that episode out. Couple more today. TikTok is exploring a US-only version

of its feed algorithm. It's from social media today. Would TikTok still be TikTok if it didn't have its all-knowing algorithm feeding you more and more of the content you want to watch every time you log in? That could be a key question on the next stage for the app as it works to come up with alternatives to remain in operation in the U.S. after the U.S. Senate voted to force TikTok to be sold into U.S. ownership or face a national ban due to national security concerns, Chinese officials have reportedly already vetoed any potential sales of its algorithmic code. Algorithmic code. Under Chinese revised export.

I thought we'd talk about if we were to look 20 years ago, and we heard some of the terminology we use now. It's foreign language. It would be. And it's like the algorithm. I've said it more in the last two years than I've said it in my entire life. Yeah. And now people are using it for other things. We have a custom algorithm for that.

Everything. And it's called just a strategy. We have a trading algorithm. We have a marketing algorithm. We have an email blasting algorithm. We have an energy drink formula algorithm. We built an algorithm to tell us how to do our algorithm.

Yeah, exactly. Literally, bro. If you start a company and you don't have algorithm or AI in it, good luck. Yeah. Then you should call us because your marketing needs some work.

Clearly. It's called creativity. You're missing the keywords bro yeah we've reached the end it's not the end of the internet it's the end of creativity anyway they they're not going to sell the algorithm alone it means that the sale of tiktok as we know it is unlikely and now according to according to reports, TikTok's owner, ByteDance, is working to come up with another proposal. So, interesting. Socialmediatoday.com. So, they don't want to sell. Of course they don't. I don't know what the end game on this is.

I still feel like TikTok stays up, up like somehow some way i agree why did the chinese government just pay an american to buy it from them and then they control them and that just wasn't that was gonna happen they're gonna create a shell company in the u.s with one american board of directors yeah they're already doing this acquiring real estate oh yeah exactly it's a It's not a sham. I think we're trying to do the right thing. It'll be resolved, and we'll probably never know really how it was resolved or the details of it.

Or it'll say a private buyer ended up stepping forward. Private acquisition. Details of the deal to be named later, i.e. never. Yeah, and people forget about it a week and a half later, just like the finals of the basketball tournament. Yeah, exactly. As long as they can keep posting their videos. Dude. No one's going to care about the details.

Yes. Caitlin Clark signs with Wilson, WNBA rookie. With Wilson, WNBA rookie. So, my good friend, literally watching a show this week and talking about the impact of Kaitlin Clark on the WNBA. What I was talking about, because people are getting pissed off because they think that literally all the rookies were having an impact on increasing the WNBA rookie, and the product had improved so much overall. That's why all these numbers were up.

And then they literally brought like all these stats up showing guess who attendance is up guess things that could only directly be correlated to one person versus the entire group and it was all Kaven Clark it's like she's just that figure and making these comparisons. And it was funny. And it was compelling, to say the least. Like sometimes just these figures come along. You don't know when it's going to happen. They have this magnetism combined with ability that has an impact. And that's okay. But let's not overstate what is or isn't happening.

Like the product has gotten a lot better. When you say this, I think of Swift and Travis Kelsey. Yeah, sure. Did that many more people just watch the NFL because they're interested in football this past season, or is it because of that relationship? Yeah, that relationship. Lance Armstrong with the Tour de France.

Who gave a shit about Tour de France and the Livestrong yellow bracelets until Lance Armstrong? Exactly. And look, what can happen is the WNBA might be able to bottle some of this. And look, more people watching. It's like advertising. It's reach and frequency. So you get more people watching more often, whether it's Caitlin Clark or whatever. whatever she's 23 22 years old however like she's gonna be around for a while so bottle it up and look more eyeballs gives you more potential to keep those eyeballs because

they might get interested because the product is better so i think this might end up manifesting into what they're trying to say is happening now because she's going to bring more eyeballs, which might stick around. But what got them there in the first place wasn't what you're saying it is. It's because she's a magnetic, iconic figure that just happened to come along and has a skill set that's highly attractive. And so it's interesting. Saw that this week. But Wilson, Sporting Goods, signed a basketball star, skill set that's highly attractive. And so it's interesting. Saw that this week.

But Wilson Sporting Goods signed a basketball star, Kaitlin Clark, to a multi-year endorsement deal. As part of the agreement, Clark will test and advise the brand on specific Wilson products. The company plans to pre-react drops of basketball merchandise celebrating the former Iowa point guard, and it will partner with Clark to create her first-ever signature basketball line due later this year. Interestingly enough, she's the number four selling jersey regardless of men or women.

That's badass. It's impressive. It is. And that's, I wonder who's buying them. Is it like girls or like dudes are walking? I'm like, hell yeah. I think it's. I bet it's 75%, 80% girls. But shit. I'm sure there's crossover. Good for her. Yeah.

Hell yeah. She's fun to watch. She's jacking three pointers from half court in your eye. Anyway. Those guys got skills. Finally today, Abercrombie & Fitch sets a record with a billion-dollar first quarter. Don't call it a comeback.

Holy shit. When's the last time you walked in an Abercrombie & Fitch? Yeah. By brand, Abercrombie Net Sales rose 31% with comps up. Hollister rose 12.3% as well, which is part of Abercrombie & Fitch. So they're basing it on going back to focusing on the quality of their jeans and a couple other product lines and other tactics. But maybe some of it's just people going back to the mall.

I don't know. But I hadn't heard Abercrombie & Fitch in the news in quite a while. That was the jam growing up. Oh, man. Get you heard Abercrombie and Fitch in the news in quite a while. That was the jam growing up. Oh, man. Get you some Abercrombie and Fitch jeans. Line out the door, bro. Line out the door. And the half-naked guys and girls, like, waiting for you.

And all, like, the... Just reeking, like, cologne walking in and out of that place because they spray so much. Oh, dude. Yeah. You smell like it for four days. It's kind of like going to- I worked at Hollister. I had a half liter spray bottle.

They'd make me walk around the store and spray every hour of just the cologne, literally. And I remember older women coming in, oh God, it's so strong in here. Can you guys turn the music down and less cologne? Less cologne. Less cologne. I'm just telling you. And they've been in some they've had some negative stuff over the years i think i shit for body shaming all that because

yeah you know the half naked i'm like the ceo owner didn't like fat people or whatever he's i don't want fat people wearing my clothes i thought they handled it terribly and no one like that sort of shaming that's ridiculous but i ridiculous. But I didn't think at its core it was, if you want to stand for athletic people that take care of your body and that's part of your brand, okay, that's okay. I can accept that. But you don't have to freaking, you don't have to shame the other side while raising up your side.

That's where it got lost. You can support one team without shitting on the others exactly focus on yours and not belittling the other side i love this issue too dr pepper is now the number two soda in america it used to it's always coke pepsi and then like dr pepper and others and now dr pepper has overt has overtaken Pepsi as the number two soda brand. It is standalone. A lot of people think Dr. Pepper's part is Pepsi, but it's not. Standalone.

So new contender in the cola wars. And it isn't a cola. It's Dr. Pepper. That's a cola. Come on. Love me a DP. It's a cola. Same thing.

It's 130-year-old soda brand is now tied with Pepsi-Cola as the number two carbonated. It's tied, I guess. The regular versions of Pepsi and Dr. Pepper are neck and neck in a spot that Pepsi has held nearly every year for the past four decades. Dr. Pepper. They say it's because, like, new had strawberries and cream much new flavors was sounded terrible i never tried that but i don't want strawberries and cream dr pepper but i do

drink some dr pepper zero it's pretty tasty my kids love it yeah but the soda wars i just remember those remember you get two liters for 10 cents at the grocery store the soda wars no that might be before your time too i was like probably like three yeah you might have been three but they'd have soda wars you get two liter for 10 cents like 20 cents like crazy time to be alive now it'd be now once a soda war would be one for two dollars or three dollars. Because they're normally what, like five now? I don't know. What's a two liter? I haven't bought a two liter in.

I can't remember when. How much does a two liter cost? I only know when it's in a bundle with the Domino's package. Yeah. Like medium, breadsticks, two liter. And when you think about it, two liters are like the dumbest thing ever created. All it does is get flat in 24 hours. I don't care what they say.

Oh, put the lid back on three days later. That shit's flat. It is. And I'd get some stock on some, hey, get on those stock apps. Put a little bit down on the DP, Dr. Pepper. They got it going on here. Get those promos going on. They'll try to feed me that strawberry and cream shit, though.

I don't want that. They said that was part of the reason they've... I think that's all PR. I'd like to know how many true strawberry... And somebody's going to DM me and be like, oh, it's delicious. So good. That's the only thing I drink.

I'm going to have another sip of my YLH with that. Just to get the taste out of my mouth. All I think is just artificial when I hear that. The younger crew though, I think maybe it is. Have you had the zero version or is it the full leaded?

I don't know if it's the full leaded. The full leaded. It probably is artificial, but I don't know. It's good for a little... I drink a lot of it, but I had one too. The full letter. It's good for a little. Yeah. Slogger has cases at his house. We know. Now we know.

Ordering cases all the time. So maybe there is something there. I haven't met anyone that liked it, but I also haven't met that many people that have tried it so maybe i'm short-changing and maybe that is why they grid number two but it sounds to me like i feel like some of these flavor profiles are just the pr of it people go oh wow that's cool then they grab the regular that's like me the coke zero okay i don't know pluto version or whatever the hell like they're all fruity nasty. Let me tell you, I tried one once. But I'll look at it and I'll go, oh, that's cool. But I still grab like the regular Coke Zero.

Yeah. You're like, that's cool, but not enough to switch up what I know I like. That's right. And I know soda's not great for you, but it's so damn tasty. Dude, sometimes you just need a nice fucking Coke. It's better than an ice cold Coca-Cola and a waffle. How much? Ooh.

It's quite a combo. Go to Waffle House and get a waffle with some hash browns with cheese and an ice cold Coke. Dude, thank me later. I'm just telling you. Like, that'll make you run around the house naked seven times, not five. I got my plans for the weekend now. I know it's not healthy. Look,

I run, I take care of myself. I'm not fat ass, but you know what? I'm just telling them, keep it real. We think we're taking the BS out of things, man.

I'm taking the BS. That is a tasty combo. Waffle, hash browns with cheese and an ice cold Coca-Cola. Thank you. Waffle house and Coke. You can be our next sponsors. It's that Greenville special,

baby. Yeah. Dude, you don't even have to be be our next sponsors. It's that Greenville special, baby. Yeah. Dude. You don't even have to be hungover for that to taste good. That's just the goodness. I think that's all. I'm going to end on a high note. It's called Coke and Waffles and Hash Browns.

Yeah. We record at lunchtime. These show notes are making me hungry. Prenzels are making me thirsty. If you're a Seinfeld fan, you know what that means. Chris, any final words, my friend? Everyone have a great weekend and stay hydrated out there. It's getting warm.

Yes, it is getting warm. We appreciate you wherever you are, whenever you are, however you are, for making us number one. Hey, leave us a review. Shoot me a DM. We'll shoot you a hat. And we appreciate our sponsor, Brainerd Bills, for rocking the new gear. BrainerdBills.com.

For Chris Broby Hanson, that's him on Instagram. Check him out. I'm Ryan Offer. You know where to find us. We've got that blue check next to our name. RyanIsRight.com. All the find us, we'll get that blue check next to our name. Ryan is right.com. All the highlight clips, links to the YouTube pictures of Chris,

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