Right About Now with Ryan Alford - Weekly Marketing and Advertising News: Influencer Marketing; Starbucks Oat-milk Shortage; Facebook Kid Friendly Social Media Platform

Episode Date: April 23, 2021

Welcome to this week’s marketing and advertising news on The Radcast! In this episode on The Radcast, host Ryan Alford and co-host Reiley Clark, discuss the ways your business can leverage influencer marketing and more marketing news.These are today’s topics:Simmons Mattress teams with Damelio Sisters.EOS and the viral TikTok Shaving Cream.Starbucks Oat-milk Shortage.Facebook’s Kid-friendly Instagram Platform: is there reason to be concerned?If you enjoyed this episode of The Radcast, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. Subscribe and share the word if you love our podcast, so we can keep giving you the strategies to achieve radical marketing results! You can follow us on Instagram @the.rad.cast | @radical_results | @ryanalford | 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. 

You're listening to the latest Radcast News Update. Here's Ryan and Riley. Hey guys, what's up? Welcome to the latest edition of the Radcast Weekly Marketing and Advertising News. It's Friday, April 23rd, and we're coming to you live from the Radcast studio in the home of Radical, the baddest, coolest, greatest digital ad agency on the planet here in Greenville, South Carolina. I'm joined by my co-host, Riley Clark. What's up, Riley?

Hey, I'll be honest. I'm tired. Wake up! We had a really great week, but it was a long week in some ways. On Tuesday, we had a really long shoot and it was it was a really great shoot. And I think it's going to be a really cool product. I'm sure you're probably you're going to talk about it in some capacity. But so I'll let you handle that.

But needless to say, it's a very long day. It was a long day. Yeah. And the best way. But it's just it's left me day. It was a long day. Yeah. And the best way. But it's just it's left me a little tired, a little tired. Yes. A friend of mine, Marvin Yvette, he's got a new album coming out and we did a little pet project for him doing all his artwork and producing, directing and everything else

here at Radical. His music video for his upcoming release, Soul of a Pirate. So more to call on that. I would say a cross between Jimmy Buffett, Kenny Chesney, and throw in, I don't know, somebody else. Yeah. He's definitely got a country side to him.

He's got a real deep voice, Kenny Chesney-esque it's raspy raspy and then he's got that playful you know tunes and songwriting a little bit of jimmy buffett so uh oh his energy is awesome his energy is just incredible it's gonna be it's gonna be cool i'm excited yeah he produced it in nashville where he's actually pretty well known. He's written some songs and was on some groups there that did really well several years ago. And he's been writing a lot of songs and plays a good bit. We've become friends and we're lake buddies with our doc. And we're actually on the dock shooting the music video for him. So I think it's going to be a great product.

the music video for him. So, uh, I think it's going to be a great product. And I think, uh, for his market, it's going to be, you know, a nice little play for him and get some more notoriety and, you know, you spread the word, but it's, uh, it was kind of a little bit of a detour for us in the week. You know, we went out there and shot everything, but it's been cool. It's, uh, it's fun to get those kinds of projects here and there, you know, from the everyday stuff and helping friends out. But it's been a good week at Radical. We've been busy and the phone won't stop ringing. It's been good. A lot of positive energy on new business fronts and lots of new business clients and opportunities. And it's been great. We've added some new staff, had some new teammates and things like that. And still planning office furniture for the patio.

I know, it's still an ongoing thing. Not that you really care out there, wherever you're listening, but send us some office patio furniture ideas. Yeah, honestly, or can we make it some way, get a hold of Ace and maybe do something different? Yeah, Ace Hardware. We haven't said anything negative about them, have we?

No, no, no. We said all positive things last week on the news about them. Yeah, you really get on Coke, I swear. Yeah. Yeah. No, but no, it's been a good week. I'm excited to give you guys our news topics today. But I think before we, and you know, we talked about this

little pre episode, but I think before we kind of get into the nitty gritty of the topics today, I think it's kind of important to set up a little bit about the topics a little bit about the ad data that we're kind of seeing happen take place, obviously, through the year of COVID and what's happened to ad platforms. You know, I'll let you I'll let you take the take the lead here. It's, you know, influencer marketing has really started to boom. You've seen the increase in that in budgets where it's now actually the largest share of digital ad budget. So in the total digital ad budget pie, and you've got search and display and social media ads, influencer and content, content driven influencer marketing is actually right at 20%. And so super big, super huge portion of it. And, you know, another thing is from an overall standpoint, we've already

are up 25% in overall ad spending this year. So you're seeing, you know, like there was when COVID hit the ad budget just tanked last March, last April. And you've seen not only a full turnaround, but the data shows that we are at the highest point of any March in the history they've been measuring it. So not only is it turned around from COVID, but it's turned around from all spending. And some of that's like pinup savings. You could say, you know, they've had the budget, you know, like certainly revenues have gone down some last year in certain industries. So maybe they had the dollars saved up. So that's why you see the overspend now. But I think it's more a product of the economy really roaring back. And I think you're seeing the ad budgets come along with it. But a lot of the topics that we have for the news today are

in that influencer space. And I think you're going to start to see, well, what happened was in the COVID era, all the brands were nervous to talk about heavy selling. And so they wanted to use, you know, influencer marketing is really more of a top of funnel tactic, meaning it's more of a brand play. It's not an immediate all. I mean, sometimes, meaning it's more of a brand play. It's not an immediate all. I mean, sometimes, yeah, they can have a promotion code. They can have things that can drive immediate sales. But a lot of times that that content marketing and influencer marketing is really more an awareness top of funnel tactic. And with COVID going on

and no one wanting to go, bye, bye, bye, bye, right now, now, now, now, you saw more spinning towards that, but I think you're going to see that carry forward because of just the authenticity factor of having these brand ambassadors and things like that. I think it's just becoming more poignant, more relevant, especially with ads, dollars and cookies going away, different things like that.

You're just going to see, uh, brands expanding, I think upon, uh, those influencers and, you know, at the end of the day, it's, this stuff has been going on forever. Like it was called word of mouth back in the day, you know, uh, and the, the, the the men and women with the biggest mouths always spread the word more. And they were always kind of influencers, so to speak. There just wasn't the channels of social media with which the megaphone could be turned on. And so the more things remain the same, the more things, you know, they say more things change, more things remain the same. It's not so much a new phenomenon of word of mouth.

It's more just the channels and varieties of ways that these things can be amplified. And you're going to see a continued evolution, I think, for how influencers do this organically. We talked about some of that stuff a couple weeks ago with product placement and these brands doing things that aren't heavy sales like content and things like that. They're going to see that same evolution with influencers and subject matter experts and all this stuff. And so the data is now catching up with the trends. You know, it's the number one placement. You've got ad spending going up. You've got influencer marketing near the top of that for digital.

And, you know, as TV budgets come down and digital continues to dominate, you're going to see influencers thus even more. And some of us are probably, you know, oh, God, just another one. But, you know, we say that. But I tell you what, I talk, my wife will sit there and watch these bloggers and everything. I mean, and I don't know if you're the same way. Like she never she never gets old to her. Like, you know, she'll just watch

them and they're relatable. I mean, I've sat there and like watched a video of them. Like, you know, I get it. I see why you can relate to her and you know, they're telling their whole life story and they're just spokespeople. Yeah. Well, I like it too, because it, you know, you, obviously it's relatable and that's great. You know, you need that point of connection with the person, but I think it's also, you begin to trust what they talk. I mean, it goes back to the whole thing about trust. We talk about authenticity, but, you know, you begin to trust their opinions and trust the insight that they're giving you, because obviously you've seen it work already with other things you've done, taken their advice from, you know, been influenced from them by whatever it has been. It has, you know, clearly seen some sort of result, positive result for you. So I just, I like the people that I follow, you know, there are things about them that just make them feel very human, even on social media. And even though I'm probably never going to meet these people in my life, but

I feel like I know them and I just, I appreciate just the transparency about their lives, you know, and it does create that friend level without it feeling like, do you know what I mean? It's yeah. So, you know, I, I appreciate that, but this is why this is just going to keep going. It is. And I think, you know, if you're a small to medium business out there, you know, it's always like, well, you know, that makes sense. You're going to get this beauty blogger and she's got a hundred thousand followers and she's doing this, but she wants $5,000 post and I can't afford that or whatever. Micro influencers are very attainable for small to medium businesses and completely still untapped.

You know, some of the, you know, smaller business startup DTC e-commerce brands are tapping into them, but every other industry is completely untapped. I mean, think about from lawyers to doctors to chiropractors to plumbers to think, you know, and in some ways this is done through reviews and through those types of things. I think these industries have gotten better about leveraging reviews on their website and doing things like that. But I don't think they've taken it far enough. The opportunity is out there for finding these micro influencers that might have 2000, 3000 followers, maybe even potentially even less. Someone has 1500 followers and they're the right followers for what your business is. You're hyper-targeted within a certain geography.

You could be paying this person 50 to $75 a post. And that's like better advertising than you could be in the old yellow pages or even some crappy trade show that you're in, you know, like a journal, you know, a business journal. Not all business journals are crappy, but like something that's just so high funnel, you know, like, like, yeah, maybe someone will read this and maybe they'll think of you in three months.

But like, you know, that opportunity is out there and there's tools to do that. And maybe we'll break down some of those tools on a, on a new, on an episode. Maybe we'll do one about just a micro influencers episode. Yeah, we can well we'll put that in the works we'll put that in the works cool well here's riley with all of this week's news here is the radcast news all right so again this is kind of hitting our influencer market uh just get to give you some examples and what's going on in the real world. Simmons Mattresses is teaming up with D'Amelio Sisters. And if you're not familiar with D'Amelio Sisters,

they are like, I would consider them like the OG TikTok stars. Like they are the, you know, original content creators on TikTok that just kind of exploded. And, you know, since then they've seen huge, I mean, you've seen them on several, several campaigns. They were at the Jake Paul wrestling tournament that happened the other day. I was, whatever, you know what I'm talking about. Whatever that was. But anyway, yeah, but you know, that's going on. And essentially this company is teaming up with them to promote the mattresses. You know, a lot of Gen Zers and, you know, younger millennials are spending a lot of time just chilling on their bed, whether they're going through TikTok and they're on their bed or they're when they're working from home. They are working primarily from their bed.

Apparently, they did this study, this study. And, you know, this all this information came back, yada yada. So apparently this mattress is like prime. Prime for being worked on. Yeah, exactly. And I'm like, what kind of work are we doing here? That's what I'm saying. It's kind of a weird lens to take a mattress promotion,

but whatever. I can think of some taglines. Yeah, exactly. Who are these D'Amelio sisters? Yeah, exactly. No, that's funny. No, but it's so that's just kind of going on. But this just shows the example and the leverage you can use from influencer marketing and tying it to your brand's message. So that's like the point of this, right? Like you can have your influencer marketing and it's it's pointless pointless though, I think. And I think you would agree. It's pointless to have some random influencer that has nothing to do with anything that

stands for your brand, promote something about your brand. Like it has to make sense. Like they have to have a connection, right? Yes. And I will say though, Simmons mattresses historically is not like, even though it's a mattress, I wouldn't consider it like a sexy brand. Yeah. I mean, you know, it's a mattress. Yeah.

Like there's, you know, purple, maybe not sexy, but funny. Like some of the newer DTC mattress brands, you know, and, you know, Tempur-Pedic,ic you know you think of comfort or luxury or whatever Simmons is like I think of it as you know the the infinity of mattresses sort of luxury maybe not quite

uber luxury but nice and above like you know whatever just to give an analogy. That's just my opinion. That's where they fall on my brand, like Ryan Alford's brand meter for Simmons mattresses. Somewhere above the middle, but not at the top.

As far as luxury goes and things like that. Still nice. I'm sure there's somebody that's going, but they have $7,000 mattress. They're definitely luxury. Well, whatever. Generally speaking, middle of the road. But the point is a brand like

simmons can reach out they have kind of a you know ho-hum brand perspective like it's a mattress and hire influencers that make sense for what their product is at this given time in the pandemic and the research that you just outlaid and suddenly be relevant to a target audience. The power and the ability to do that is unheard of. It's just never been as attainable as what these influencers do for brands is immediately get them top of mind with a demographic that Simmons would have no business even having a discussion with, you know, but when done through the lens of the D'Amelio sisters, oh, okay. You know, like people know it's an ad I'm sure, but like, at least it has relevance. It's based on that insight that people are home spending more time on the bed, working on the bed and immediately adds credibility to the brand. And so it's just powerful stuff. It's smart for

the brands to be doing this and to be considering it, especially when they do it thoughtfully. You know, I have no idea what the metrics are of success from this, but I have a feeling it's putting them in a different brand position than they've been in the past. it's putting them in a different brand position than they've been in the past our next topic is similar kind of lens uh eos the evolution of smooth i love i love that name and i love that oh yeah so i'm actually a product of this i will say because i saw this original tiktok video so this girl this influencer, Killjoy on TikTok, she, which I think that's such a clever name for her name to be Joy. It's kind of funny. But anyway, she like literally killing Joy. You know, I'll be honest with you. I only saw the

video about the shaving cream. I didn't, I haven't really watched the rest of her stuff. So, but all that to say, you know, I think this is a really cool thing. Essentially, the shaving cream, you know, she made wildly known about just how great it was for sensitive skin, you know, razor bumps, all that kind of jazz. And, you know, how difficult it is, you know, for women to really get that really nice, you know, shave, whatever. Okay. All that to say. All that to say. You all, man. We're going to just not get on that whole. Yeah, but you know what I mean. Yes, I know what you mean. Okay, you know what shave, whatever. Okay. All that to say. All that to say. You all, man.

We're going to just not get on that whole. Yeah, but you know what I mean. Yes, I know what you mean. Okay, you know what I mean. All right. Well, it's just a fact. This is a fact of life, people. It is what it is. It is what it is. Or if you're a male swimmer, you know, you need to shave for whatever your gender purposes are. You know, there you go. This shaving cream, I will say, changed the

game for me as well. I saw this, went to Target, got the shaving cream i will say changed the game for me as well um i saw this went to target got the shaving cream and love it but did you learn about it from tiktok okay from her yes and it also now i'm just like this is my go-to shaving like i'm just like this is my shaving cream like tell my girlfriends about it this is the stuff but essentially this shows you another way that you can leverage a tiktok influencer because my understanding of this entire campaign is you know killjoy was not an influencer who was approached from eos it like to then promote about the shaving cream. She was like, this is my shaving cream. I love it for these reasons.

And EOS was like, okay, we're going to do a TikTok lab. That was my understanding of it. I think I've heard that too. I think I've heard that before. This is another. Exactly. Where there'll be someone that has influence that talks about something unpaid and then it gets some attention

and then brands grab on and go all right let's pour some gas on this and they pay them and they expand upon the uh content and so you know it's perfect example especially with e-com like stuff that's readily available could be purchased like on the instant like it makes a ton of sense like if you're a struggling brand you need to change your brand awareness like simmons i'm not saying they were struggling i don't know their brand metrics but like has a reputation you want to change it here's on another level ecom direct to market direct to consumer and you can change the game in a second obviously it helps when you have innovative great products and they're already using them.

But then, you know, jumping on board no different than the Cranberry guy. You know, like that was, I think, unpaid at first, wasn't it? And then they bought him a truck. Yeah, exactly.

So, you know, I would like to know how many people try to make money from influencing versus how many do like what that percentage is i don't know we'll probably get that data in a couple years yeah a couple years like only 0.001 kind of like you'd be better you'd have better luck becoming an nba star no it's probably higher than that just a micro influencers That's the thing. You get paid to have an opinion, people, you know, the post content, you know, have an opinion and stick to it. That's the thing. Like be consistent in what you want to say,

but have the understanding of why you're saying it, because someone's going to match with that. If that's your goal is to, you know, be this influencer that some brand's going to be able to match with you, you know, you just got to stick to your mission. And the biggest thing for this, for like EOS or any of these brands, no matter, and I'm not talking people out of hiring an agency here, that's not good for a business, but just being honest, tell like it is. These are ideas that the that the brand would never have come up with on their own. The way that Killjoy did these videos, the way she talked about it, the way she filmed it, the way all that is, that could not have even been concepted by the agents or the company or whoever. It's so organic. The organic nature of these things is unreplaceable. Now, it doesn't replace the need for other tactics.

But as this tactic goes, it's just it's going to supply you with a level of content that you couldn't even have done yourself. Not only the influence that they have, but the, just the organic nature of it. Like, just cause I've watched a couple of these videos and she's quirky and like, just, you know, like, and it's like, you couldn't have even scripted that, you know? Like, and that's, and I think that's where brands succeed and where brands fail in influencer marketing, when they get a hold of an influencer and they guide it too much and you try to direct it, it, it loses the appeal and the brands that let the influencers own the content.

And yes, it's got to stay within some, a lot of standards, you know, like if, if, you know, if you're Disney,

you know, you, you gotta have some family standards and things like that. But, and I understand that. But let these influencers do what they would organically, naturally do. And that's how you get the most bang for your buck. And I think that's the learning lesson. That's the same thing. And I think small businesses got hold of this or they got influencers. They might even tend to want to be even more overbearing because they're dollars probably smaller, less budget.

So I just make sure you mention that I do it this way. And it's like, no, that's not how this works. They need to bring it up naturally within the conversation flow or doing what it is. It's obviously easy when it's or easier when it's a product like EOS shaving cream. It has a direct use benefit versus a service or something else that might be a little more convoluted. But, you know, the real insight here is let the influencer build the content naturally. Absolutely. Absolutely. Shifting gears slightly. Starbucks, if you already, if you go to

Starbucks on the regular and you get oat milk in your coffee, you know where I'm going with this. I saw this topic on our board and I'm like, I almost nixed it. But then I'm like, you know what? I want to have something to say about this. For one, I've never had oat milk.

Well, that's a shame. Everyone that likes oat milk, I'm not surprised there's a shortage because everyone's like, it's so wonderful. And I'm like, why don't I just get some heavy cream? Like, is it really that much better? Is it non-dairy? Is that why? It's non-dairy. So, but I like me some heavy.

You got to care about us non-dairy people, okay? Heavy cream tastes delicious. There are non-dairy coffee drinkers in the world and i did appreciate is it like one of the few things isn't it like one of the few things that has that kind of creaminess to it or something yeah yes and that's why there's a shortage probably well here's did you create the shortage do you have all of the oat milk secretly hidden in your condo here downtown greenville yeah actually my entire refrigerator is uh just stocked of only uh no so here's the deal okay i will never i i have beef with starbucks a little bit because they had not carried oat milk forever i had never heard of

starbucks carrying oat milk until if you'll remember this, the Super Bowl happened. And then I think it was March 6th or March 2nd, they announced Oatly is coming to Starbucks. And I'll never forget that day. I was like, wow, okay. Is that the terrible CEO singing that I was like, that probably won the Super Bowl? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So I'm just going to give you a little bit of my story here. I'm a Dunkin'. I'm a Dunkin' coffee person. Ding.

Yeah. Amen. Hallelujah. But Dunkin' has always carried oat milk, which was, I never had an issue with Dunkin' because they've always had oat milk. Okay. So, you know, then start going to Starbucks a little bit more because, you know, my boyfriend prefers Starbucks over Dunkin.

Yeah, right. It tastes like burnt. See, that's kind of my opinion. But, you know, whatever. All good. So you can make sacrifices because then when they announced they were carrying oat milk, the obvious thing was, OK, we can make compromises with Starbucks. okay we can make compromises with starbucks well now there's an oat milk shortage and not only that they are also out of their only uh syrup that i liked which is the brown sugar syrup so this is it's it's actually tragic so so hence why i'm tired no i'm just kidding so uh how hard is it to manufacture oat this is my question

how did you not prepare like you're telling me the biggest the biggest one of the biggest coffee retailers or whatever in the world probably oh the biggest yeah okay takes oat milk and then doesn't think that their non-dairy customers are going to start requesting oat milk like religiously like how did that not compute i don't know they didn't plan or or maybe it was just or is this a mission or is this a statement we're just trying to build up uh demand for it like there's secret shortage that's gonna come back and then everybody's gonna want it i mean i will kind of want something like right now i mean everyone's like it's this global shortage and everyone's being so dramatic oat milk at the store or is it shortage in the store thank you because this is

my second point i dead ass went to starbucks They said no. I was like, all right, bet. Went to Dunkin' Donuts and they had oat milk. I was like, don't tell me there's a global shortage. This sounds like a Starbucks issue. Yeah, it's a Starbucks issue. It's not a global shortage. But my thing is, how did you not prepare? They probably have like a set price or something.

They can't buy at that price and they're not going to pay more for it. But no hate on the Starbucks right here because I love them and they're so sweet. And they don't want to, like, they have so many locations, it's like they don't, if they can't have it at like some percentage of locations they don't want to have it at all. Forgive my ignorance, but how did you not, how did you not anticipate that?

I don't know. Sounds like a campaign opportunity for Dunkin' Donuts if you ask me. Yeah. Dunkin'. Yeah. Yeah.

But what, I mean, other than, you know, my personal issues with it, did you have thoughts about this at all? You said you had a topic or you thought. Well, I just, you know, I remember at least commercial from the Super Bowl and how terrible the CEO was, but then I thought it probably was very memorable. And it turns out it was from the neurology study that was done. And so, but no more, just wanted you to be able to talk about it.

Cause I know how much you like oat milk. Dude, it was a sad day. It was a sad day. Anyone listening has any say at Starbucks, get that oatmeal back so that we do not break up a happy couple over where they get their coffee from. Oh, my gosh. No, that's definitely not the thing.

No, but it was so funny because then I just, you know, it gave me all the more reason to have a little bit of more beef with Starbucks. Because I originally set aside my beef, but now my beef is back on the table. There it is. My beef is just, I just don back on the table. There it is. My beef is just, I just don't like Starbucks coffee. I'm not a huge coffee drinker anyway, but to me, Duncan's way better. And people are listening going, how, why, why? Cause I know how, I know how like diehard Starbucks people are.

So people are cursing me left and right right now, but I'm not a big coffee drinker. So that should be your first tell that like, you don't have to listen to me. Number one and number two. Then what's mine? I have like five a day. No, you just have better taste because I do think Dunkin' Donuts tastes better. Yeah. Yeah. And it's specially good. I will recommend just a nice Dunkin' cappuccino with oat milk. Just, just sets it apart, man. Anyway. What does it taste, what does the oat milk taste like other than creamy?

Is that a flavor? It does. And not to be stupid here, but it tastes slightly like oatmeal. Like in the sense of it's a little. I really like oatmeal. So I bet you I would really like oat milk. Yeah, like it kind of, it just complements the coffee too well. sense of it's a little I really like oatmeal so I bet you I would really like oat milk yeah like because it

kind of it just compliments the coffee too well there's like this roast process to the coffee that the oat milk just kind of compliments whatever that stuff is mixed with the roast of the coffee I think

I could think I would probably get down with some oat milk and a Dunkin' Donuts. That sounds pretty good right now. Yeah. Now I'm going to probably go get one. But anyway, yeah, so that's kind of that topic.

And so we'll just see what happens with that. Today's Radcast brought to you by Oatly and Starbucks. But you can't get them both. Psych. Psych.

But you can't get them anymore. Just kidding. You can't get brown sugar syrup anymore either right now. Okay. That to say, our last topic for today. This is very peculiar to me for a lot of reasons.

One, I am not a parent. But if I was a parent, which is why your opinion is going to be interesting here. How would you feel if Facebook's coming out with this new platform? It's like a kid's Instagram. 13 years and younger, I believe is was the age range but no the the interesting thing to note here is there's not going to be ads running to the the users on this platform whatever the name's called i didn't see a name yet for it um but you know whatever this platform is going to be called kid gram kid gram something probably something like that probably um my thing is though this

is such an impressionable age that we're now just throwing this very high intensity social media life in their face expecting them to do something with it or what is the point of this like because when you look at young teenagers just from a mental health perspective on social media it's not looking good like it's not it's not great and i'm just my fear is like you're gonna now instill that to a much younger demographic that just doesn't have that social understanding understanding. I think kids should be like 16, like the age limit for social media, you know, like I don't have a problem with, you know, like my kids have smartphones that they're allowed to use certain times, mainly just for watching videos or games or whatever.

We don't let them stay on them all day or anything like that. Yeah, Roblox is like the choice. Buy the stock if you're smart. It'll go up to $200 the next three years. Anyway, so I don't have a problem with a smartphone for gaming, entertainment, communication with us if we get the right time.

But social media is just not a place for use. It's just the the judgment, the the overall atmosphere of just visually being judged by your peers, the comments and all that. You know, I don't know all of the measures around this platform just yet. No ads. OK, big deal. That's called what Instagram was to begin with. But it still is a platform where I don't think kids should be deriving their self-worth and value from. But I don't know that they understand that separation.

No, they don't. And so I just think I'm going to keep my I don't't know, like I have an 11-year-old son, two nine-year-olds and a four-year-old, or a five, sorry, he's turned five, Nash has turned five, all boys. And I will keep them off social media and I make a living off of social media. I believe it has its place and it can be used for good

and for sharing information and transparency. I believe in personal branding, but I just don't think that we have found the right balance of its use for kids under the age of 15, you know, because I just don't think I have no problem with communication. I just don't think I have no problem with communication. So texting, if balanced and managed with their friends, communication with parents and friends. But the social media aspect is so visually driven on Instagram that it's going to just, I think, create a potential for it already is being used, you know, for cyberbullying, judgment, all those things. And I just without I can't speak because I didn't see every feature of this platform.

And maybe as this grows or whatever the next steps is, we'll do a follow up on it. Because Facebook's apparently been pretty quiet about this. Yeah. I think it's been under the radar, but before I judge it in its totality, this platform alone, I want to know more about what the features are. Cause I do think there are things that can come good out of social media.

Like, you know, like it, love it or hate it. Google classroom, which is not a social media platform, but groups and engagement that is positive and generates a positive outcome or a learning environment. use properly for that. But purely an evaluation of self-worth or image or those things are just so ripe for abuse. And, you know, I just can't have it seen at, you know, call it 15 and under real positive outcomes of just the standard experience of an Instagram.

So I wait and see on exactly what their platform is. But, you know, as a parent, I would like I hope that we can evolve to a place where the platforms are more engaging than just self-image. Say it again. No, I'm just kidding. I'm with you. You know, I say that. I mean, like, I'm all about innovation. I'm all about growth.

I'm all about technology and using it. So I'm not trying to stall any of that. I just think that kids are not mature or they have not developed enough internal coping devices to manage it. it's a real shame what it can do in the wrong hands, you know, for our youth. So we'll see where it goes. Yeah. But that's it for today. Those are our,

those are our topics. Little heavy in some ways, but in other ways, it's important. Yeah. Big, big points though, to take away influencer marketing.

It's obtainable in your small, medium sized business strategy. You don't just have to have the D'Amelio sisters to make this strategy feel, you know, realistic or tangible. You're able to do this with the influencers in your community that, you know, are going to bring your brand, you know, in a new light or present it in a new way and just create that really nice organic conversation that fits into with your brand. So, yep. And ad spending is back. I think the economy is set for a really big rebound.

I think all positive news for the economy and for everybody kind of getting back to some semblance of normal while creating even better normal. So we're looking forward to that and excited about all of the marketing and just overall economy growth. So more to come. You know where to find us. We're at the Radcast dot com, the Radcast dot com and at the dot Radcast on Instagram. You can Google us. You can YouTube us. You can IGTV us anywhere, everywhere. Audio, video, audio, video. You know where to find us. Always for Riley Clark, I'm Ryan Alford.

We'll see you next time. Yo, guys, what's up? Ryan Alford here. Thanks so much for listening. Really appreciate it. But do us a favor. If you've been enjoying the Radcast, you need to share the word with a friend or anyone else. We'd really appreciate it.

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