In this episode, the focus is on the challenges businesses face with ineffective marketing strategies, particularly in the digital realm. Guest Nathan Yeung sheds light on the need for realistic market penetration views, operational efficiency, and leveraging proven sales strategies. The conversation emphasizes the importance of positioning, generating conversations, and the value of creative content in marketing.
Guest Bio:
Nathan Yeung, with a background in finance and operations, is the founder of Find Your Audience. His firm prioritizes marketing activities, particularly for companies hiring their first marketing employee, providing tailored services to optimize marketing strategies and execution.
Key Points:
– Introduction to the “Creative Collaboration Show” (00:00)
– Nathan’s approach with fractional C-suite roles for smaller organizations (04:15)
– Cost-effective marketing overhead and target customer profile (09:30)
– Leveraging network effects for company growth (14:45)
– Positioning in marketing and taking actionable steps (19:50)
Main Quote:
“Being in the middle of the market is not a profitable or reasonable positioning for companies.”
Links:
Connect with Nathan Yeung: https://www.findyouraudience.online
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Until next time, keep moving forward!
Chuck Anderson,
Affiliate Management Expert + Investor + Mentor
http://AffiliateManagementExpert.com/
Transcript
Hello, everybody, and, welcome to the Creative Collaboration Show.
Speaker:Chuck Anderson here, your host. This is the show where
Speaker:we serve business owners at whatever
Speaker:stage business they're in to help to, grow their
Speaker:business and, reach their goals faster and easier and,
Speaker:better than, they could before. And we like to have guests
Speaker:here who have something that will help you
Speaker:to grow your business faster, to scale, to
Speaker:manage things, better. And today's theme
Speaker:is definitely all about that. And if you've ever been, on
Speaker:this journey, so many people call themselves solopreneurs, and then they
Speaker:graduate out of that. And, you know, you start to grow and,
Speaker:you you build a team, maybe you have a couple of VAs, and then you
Speaker:grow beyond that. At what point do you,
Speaker:look to outside help such as agencies or,
Speaker:other organizations versus, building everything
Speaker:yourself. And we're gonna talk about that today because our expert,
Speaker:guest is Nathan Young, who is an expert in all of this. So, Nathan,
Speaker:I've wanna, first of all, welcome you to the show. Thanks, Chuck, for having me
Speaker:on today. You know, so we're gonna do a deep dive into this
Speaker:today, and, you know, this this is a this is a topic that
Speaker:comes up a lot in, you know, when we're when we're thinking about scaling.
Speaker:Even before scaling, I mean, you know, when you when you when you
Speaker:start your business, you're by yourself, and then you graduate
Speaker:to, you know, building a team or, you you know, do I do I hire
Speaker:someone? Do I have an agency? I mean, we're gonna unpack all of this today,
Speaker:and I know this is what you do. So, just before we dive into all
Speaker:of that, tell the little, tell the folks a little bit more about you
Speaker:and, and the business you're in, and we'll we'll kinda
Speaker:launch from there. Awesome. So, not a traditional
Speaker:background as a marketer. I went to school for marketing. I was a
Speaker:VP of finance at the age of 21. I was a a bit of an
Speaker:operational slash management consultant for some angel investors. And then
Speaker:I was a CEO for an ad technology company, and then essentially found myself at
Speaker:Find Your Audience. Been running this firm now for 8 years, and a lot of
Speaker:people go, why why have you why did you do this business in the first
Speaker:place? And it was because kinda throughout my entire journey through various
Speaker:cc positions, one of the things I noted, and I kind of always
Speaker:knew, was marketing is really complex. And I find a lot of
Speaker:people take a lot of missteps in marketing, and that leads
Speaker:to a lot of problems. Obviously, you have limited resources. So when you go
Speaker:down a channel route or a tactic, you know, that's 3 to 6 months of
Speaker:invested time. That's time you're not gonna get back. And
Speaker:sometimes people make, you know, some pretty egregious mistakes.
Speaker:And when I started the firm, it was really because
Speaker:I had just been listening to a lot of my friends who are founders or
Speaker:bootstrap founders or just business owners. And I'd listen to the marketing
Speaker:advice, and I just go, why?
Speaker:And and it's because I maybe it's also because because I
Speaker:I come from a a bit of a different background in the sense that I
Speaker:have a bit of a finance hat and accounting back hat. I have a bit
Speaker:of an operations hat. And when I propose marketing
Speaker:strategies or tactics, I look at it in all those
Speaker:lenses versus just a marketing lens. I think it's very easy to just look
Speaker:at things in a marketing lens. It's a lot more difficult when you look at
Speaker:it in a lens of, like, operations and and finance, and and that's kind
Speaker:of where I always go. Marketing is less about trying to do everything, and it's
Speaker:more about me helping you just prioritize what you should be doing.
Speaker:Because we all wanna do everything, but we just can't. And so that's
Speaker:what what my firm does, and and we've we've been focused on that. And our
Speaker:real sweet spot is we're kinda like the best first hire you'll ever
Speaker:have. And and I can walk through that, kinda later on in
Speaker:this in the show. But that was the whole model was I found companies that
Speaker:were hiring their first marketing employee or FTE, full time
Speaker:employee, it it was an awkward
Speaker:space. You're hiring a person who likely only has 1
Speaker:or 2 technical affinity sets, and everything
Speaker:else, they're kind of okay at. And so you get someone who's not a
Speaker:generalist, but is a generalist, isn't performing well because they're not necessarily
Speaker:efficient, and isn't necessarily matching what the company needs. Because as you're building
Speaker:a marketing function, you need a lot of different things. And
Speaker:and so it's this awkward space where you're you're trying to fill that role,
Speaker:but you're not getting really a lot of great out of it, you know, because
Speaker:it's it's this awkward baby. It's chicken and egg problem.
Speaker:Well yeah. And it's a it's a real dilemma for a lot of business
Speaker:owners. I know I've been there numerous times where you
Speaker:have a choice. Do I go this way, or or do I go that way?
Speaker:You mentioned FTEs, full time employees. You know, at a certain
Speaker:point, you grow beyond what you can do yourself and you start to look at
Speaker:that. And, you know, I think it's really popular right
Speaker:now to look at sort of fractional help. You this whole, you
Speaker:know, fractional this and fractional that, you hear it all the time. And I
Speaker:think it kinda speaks to look. You might have a generalist as a full time
Speaker:employee or a specialist. Can you talk a little bit about that?
Speaker:Because, you know, I think that might weigh in on
Speaker:a, you know, business owner's decision. At least it does for
Speaker:me. You can have one person who kinda does things sort of
Speaker:okay versus, you know, a number of people who
Speaker:do things really, really, really well. So what are your thoughts on that? Yeah.
Speaker:And and that's exactly our model. Right? Because I I kinda go
Speaker:to a lot of businesses, you know, whether they're small,
Speaker:you know, as early as prerevenue to mature, you know,
Speaker:10,000,000 in ARR type businesses, and they go at the end of
Speaker:the day, you don't really need a CMO full
Speaker:time, honestly. You might need them
Speaker:slightly part time for all all, for the kind of the entire
Speaker:year, but you don't need them full time. You might need them full time at
Speaker:the beginning where all the heavy lifting is required for them to help institutionalize
Speaker:a process, create prudent processes, make sure that
Speaker:every one of your marketing activities is valuable to the organization.
Speaker:Now what I really mean that is is that, I I don't think any
Speaker:marketing activity is a failure if, unless you don't
Speaker:garner observations from it. So a lot of people can do tactical things
Speaker:and have them fail, but then not do them in such a way where you
Speaker:actually garner insights. Right? That's a complete failure. So you've invested time
Speaker:and money, and then you get no insights. So so having that
Speaker:CMO come in at the beginning, set up all that strategy, and then go part
Speaker:time after being a bit more fractional is is makes sense,
Speaker:and it's the same thing for a fractional CFO. If you're not big enough and
Speaker:you're not worried about debt and you're not worried about cash flow and you're not
Speaker:doing all these things, you don't need a full time CFO. You need a CFO
Speaker:for maybe a month, clean up the books, structure everything, give you a plan, and
Speaker:then maybe check-in on a quarterly basis. Frankly speaking, it it it
Speaker:all comes down to that whole thing again, scale. Are are you big enough to
Speaker:actually afford that? And most of the time, you're not. And
Speaker:then can you even utilize that person full time? Probably not
Speaker:either. So the fractional c suite route makes sense, and
Speaker:it makes sense for a lot of organizations. The reason why we're a little
Speaker:bit different is because I built the fractional CMO department, and then I built
Speaker:a full team to execute. So the whole point is Nathan comes in, I
Speaker:help you institutionalize process, and my team helps execute on
Speaker:that versus me handing it off to you, which also doesn't make
Speaker:sense because a lot of business owners aren't marketing experts to then
Speaker:actually execute on what I've proposed. Right? So it's kind of silly. You
Speaker:get a fractional CMO to come in, and then they go, here's your
Speaker:plan. Go execute. But you yourself as the business
Speaker:owner, you're not necessarily the best person to hire the
Speaker:agency that has creative capabilities, hire the
Speaker:agency that has content writing abilities. So you you kind of handicap
Speaker:yourself. Right? It's like you hired me to help you, but then to
Speaker:do the work, you're now hiring those people not having that knowledge. It's kinda silly.
Speaker:Right? You end up gaining not the best outcome. So that's kinda why we're a
Speaker:little bit different. So I did that exact model because I see this
Speaker:problem in growing companies, and this was the the opportunity we were trying to
Speaker:address. Yeah. This is definitely the struggle. And, again, it's that
Speaker:dilemma of, you know, who who do I hire and
Speaker:and and get to do things? And it's not all about cost, like getting
Speaker:the lowest cost labor. I mean, obviously, we wanna keep our costs low,
Speaker:but sometimes we're shooting ourselves in the foot by doing that. Yeah. And you
Speaker:mentioned budget a little bit. I think it it would be great to talk a
Speaker:little bit about, you know, at what stage of business?
Speaker:Like, where are they either in their revenue journey or
Speaker:maybe their, I don't know what other measuring
Speaker:stick that we can actually use. But when you know,
Speaker:I would say at what point would someone be looking at this, and who
Speaker:is your typical customer in terms of stage of business and
Speaker:size and all of that? It's a great question. So the first thing
Speaker:is is there's no hard and fast rule. I would say if you
Speaker:are a company that's looking for aggressive growth, your
Speaker:percentage of marketing spend to your revenue is gonna be higher. You know?
Speaker:You'll see standard rates at 2 to
Speaker:3%. But if you're a growing company, you might be at 10 or 12%
Speaker:because you're growing. That's the whole point of growing. You're gonna be overstaffing on your
Speaker:sales. You're gonna be overstaffing your marketing because you're trying to you're trying to grow
Speaker:your top line. You know, if I were to just put numbers around
Speaker:it, if you can afford 70 to $80,000
Speaker:a year in in marketing overhead cost, not
Speaker:ad spend cost, just overhead. So meaning, that's the money you're actually spending to
Speaker:get things done like your content, like your SEO, like your trade
Speaker:shows, your sales enablement tools, your product marketing. If you could afford that,
Speaker:that's kind of our sweet spot. So we're typically working with
Speaker:companies anywhere between 1 to $20,000,000 in ARR.
Speaker:And, typically, you know, I'm gonna call it 50 employees or
Speaker:70% of our portfolio is b to b SaaS, which is, you know, business to
Speaker:business, software as a service type companies. But, truthfully,
Speaker:you know, our our organization, we've worked across a very broad set
Speaker:of categories and industries. We have a ton of success
Speaker:also in in, sorry, the fast casual
Speaker:franchise space, which is something people get really weirded out about. Because I'm like, yeah.
Speaker:I work with Constellation Software, and it's like, oh, yeah. I also do food
Speaker:and, like, restaurants. And, and
Speaker:and there's a whole theory behind that. That's our whole foundation of, how we
Speaker:approach marketing. And I can explain that actually right now is our
Speaker:foundation of marketing is if I can generate conversation,
Speaker:then you win. So you can take that
Speaker:very simple framework, and so and you look at your your marketing
Speaker:is, if this marketing campaign can generate a conversation,
Speaker:ask yourself why are you doing it.
Speaker:It's a good point. Right? Well,
Speaker:and ultimately and you can't and it's so funny because I I I come
Speaker:across people all the time who especially with
Speaker:AI, you hear it all the time. Like, they wanna automate as much as possible.
Speaker:Right? Like, you know, how can I spend the the least amount of time
Speaker:marketing myself, but have those automatically become customers?
Speaker:And, you know, I always say, well, if you're selling coffee
Speaker:mugs, sure. But, you know, like you say, it really has to lead to a
Speaker:conversation, especially for high selling higher ticket services
Speaker:or, you know, consultation or whatever it is. It really
Speaker:it really is. It's and and then our metric one of the metrics we look
Speaker:at is cost per conversation or, you know, what does it take to for
Speaker:us to generate that, and are they the right conversations? So is that kinda
Speaker:like what you're what you're looking at and and and what you're
Speaker:working with your companies on? Yeah. A a little bit. And and
Speaker:also, I think when I when I talk about conversations, it's also you
Speaker:know, whatever you're spending time and energy into, you know, can you
Speaker:imagine that individual taking that to a dinner table or their friend group
Speaker:and saying, hey. From this thing, I learned x.
Speaker:Or, hey. This is so interesting. I wanna talk about it. And if it
Speaker:doesn't, then, you know, to me, I'm playing
Speaker:off something called the network effect where I I genuinely believe the network
Speaker:effects are kind of one of the main reasons for companies to grow. So
Speaker:generating conversation is the tactic to generate more network effects.
Speaker:So if you can generate conversation, your network effects compound. And so,
Speaker:therefore, if they compound, you typically will see growth from that. I I
Speaker:can network effects a little bit like SEO. The more you do of it, the
Speaker:more it returns. And, and and so that's kind of
Speaker:the direction I'm going. Not necessarily conversations in terms of just sales conversations.
Speaker:Sales. Right. But but but are you are you generating content that's
Speaker:going to want or make someone have a conversation with someone else about
Speaker:it? And is it interesting enough for them to do that? And if it's not,
Speaker:then you should question the value of your content. Yeah. You hear people all the
Speaker:time, you know, say, I'm gonna create some viral content, and and
Speaker:and and, you know, it's it's really hard to sort of, like,
Speaker:manufacture that. But when you really nail it and,
Speaker:like you say, you get other people talking about it and and spreading
Speaker:it, marketing that's basically growing on your
Speaker:behalf without you having to do anything. That's that's amazing when that happens.
Speaker:How hard are you finding it for people to do that?
Speaker:Because, again, we hear it all the time.
Speaker:And, now now with AI, content creation
Speaker:is, you know, different and faster than it ever has
Speaker:been before. Some of it is really good, and
Speaker:some of it is really terrible. I get bombarded with terrible YouTube
Speaker:ads all the time that are just, terrible kinda what
Speaker:what what are your thoughts there on on that kind of
Speaker:content creation? I think in that
Speaker:sense of content creation in in, like, just, like, word
Speaker:content, let's call it, I think that's becoming more and more difficult.
Speaker:But I think when you wanna look at generating conversation, it needs to
Speaker:be beyond just the content in itself. It's how you package it. It's how
Speaker:you deliver it. It's how you promote it. And I think that's that's where
Speaker:you know, truthfully, I think generative AI will find its way there
Speaker:somehow, and it will likely find its way, especially if you give it
Speaker:inputs to generate interesting packaging forms or distribution formats.
Speaker:But, you know, right now, I think generating just pure word content,
Speaker:yeah, it's hard to differentiate these days. Primary research, I think, is gonna
Speaker:become more and more important going forward. So so actual surveys being
Speaker:done versus ones that are generative or a meta analysis across a bunch of
Speaker:research. I think where people
Speaker:need to look at is is the creative side, which is, like, how do you
Speaker:deliver this and how do you promote this in a creative way?
Speaker:And I think that's gonna be where people will see a lot more value. So
Speaker:you can still have relatively, call it, mediocre content,
Speaker:like, written form content. But if you can find an interesting way
Speaker:to make that creative and and and, and packaged well,
Speaker:then I think that's where you're gonna see that value. And I see that's the
Speaker:fault in a lot of companies because a lot of companies don't like to be
Speaker:aggressive on their creative. And that's because most companies,
Speaker:one, CEOs are overconfident, so, therefore, they have spotlight syndrome, which means they
Speaker:think they're more important than they are. But I always go, if you're listening, and
Speaker:I'm sorry to say this, you barely have enough money
Speaker:to regionally push your ads. So why do you think if
Speaker:you do a crazy creative that for some reason
Speaker:you're gonna, yeah, a 100% penetration rate and reach to your entire
Speaker:market? You're you're probably only getting, like, 2%. So the reality is is
Speaker:that you you're not gonna do well anyways. You're you're barely
Speaker:penetrating your market. You're barely getting any reach, and you have a
Speaker:mediocre creative. So it's a lose lose lose situation.
Speaker:So I I think that's where people fall short. A lot of business
Speaker:owners are overconfident on how big they are. They have have spotlight syndrome, and then
Speaker:they do piss poor creatives. And then they they just get kind of mediocre
Speaker:results. You gotta go far because you don't have enough money to really spend to
Speaker:to not afford to to do that well. Well, I think that
Speaker:also speaks to, if you're gonna do anything like that, then,
Speaker:you know, have someone in the room who's smarter than you when it comes to
Speaker:to that. Like, if you're the smartest person in the room, like, you're probably putting
Speaker:yourself at a huge disadvantage. And, you
Speaker:know, being a former ads agency owner where we did a lot of Facebook
Speaker:ads, and that wasn't that long ago when I exited that.
Speaker:It's such a moving target. I mean, you know, just the way the
Speaker:algorithms and the way the content is is, is
Speaker:done and even how the distribution and the
Speaker:audience targeting is done today at compared to what it was just
Speaker:a few years ago. Completely different. You know, you
Speaker:need to have someone who knows what the heck they're doing. And like
Speaker:you say, like, you know, the the the spray and pray or
Speaker:just like, you know, going going too broad, too fast, or even
Speaker:creative, that is, terrible. And I think a lot of people are
Speaker:doing this because either they don't have time, they don't have the budget. They're just
Speaker:like, well, I'll just try something. Right? And, you
Speaker:know, Facebook and YouTube and a lot of the other media sites,
Speaker:they're just so, AI driven, and
Speaker:and and so you have to you have to do things in the right way.
Speaker:And, so what like, when what
Speaker:I wanted to ask you too is is when people
Speaker:are, or companies are approaching you or you're having
Speaker:conversations with the companies that ultimately engage you,
Speaker:what what are you hearing from them? What are they saying? Hey. You know,
Speaker:I've tried this or I'm I'm doing this. Nathan,
Speaker:I just can you guys help me with this? Like, what are you hearing?
Speaker:Most of the time, I'm hearing companies are
Speaker:flailing around half implementing
Speaker:tactics, not really looking at their ICP
Speaker:properly, their ideal customer profile, not understanding,
Speaker:how different channels have different levels of impact and influence,
Speaker:and are honestly always trying to chase something a little bit shiny.
Speaker:So I think there's an oversimplification that digital marketing is the
Speaker:savior to all businesses. It's it's a
Speaker:certainly a very scalable channel. It's not necessarily the
Speaker:best channel to start, though. And and I think that's
Speaker:what companies end up believing because they have an overconfident CEO
Speaker:or they have an overconfident C Suite. So, therefore, they think they know marketing. So,
Speaker:therefore, they think digital marketing is their savior. So, therefore, they spend money in
Speaker:in, in in digital marketing. Now that's not necessarily wrong,
Speaker:but is it wrong in the sense of priority for the business in
Speaker:terms of a tactic? Potentially, because more often than not,
Speaker:I always go, well, where have you been getting your sales from? And they go,
Speaker:well, outbound. Okay. What have we done to
Speaker:help your outbound team? What do you mean by that? Well,
Speaker:when was the last time we talked to your sales team and asked them about
Speaker:new materials that they need? Oh, I haven't thought about that.
Speaker:Okay. What has been the biggest sticking points or pain
Speaker:points or object or, you know, objection points in calls,
Speaker:and do we have sales enablement tools to support them on that? Oh, that's a
Speaker:good question. Right? And and and I go, why don't we
Speaker:focus on doubling down on what we know that
Speaker:works versus trying to build a brand new funnel that
Speaker:we have no metrics around and spending all this time. So a lot of the
Speaker:time I go, let's go back to basics. And a lot of those times are
Speaker:trade shows. I'll go, what's the metrics on trade shows? It's like, well, we've been
Speaker:going through these 3 trade shows, and it's been really good for us. It's like
Speaker:that. It's a meaningless comment to me. How many leads are you getting compared
Speaker:to how much you're spending? And is that is that a cost that you're is
Speaker:inclusive of their time or exclusive of their time? If it's
Speaker:exclusive, I need it to be inclusive. I need to know the actual cost of
Speaker:these trade shows so we could figure out what your SQLs and,
Speaker:and MQLs actually cost you. And, like, oh, that's a good point. And
Speaker:they go, okay. What's our before, during, and after activations?
Speaker:What do you mean? Well, how are we priming the conference? How
Speaker:are we attending the conference, and how are we following up on the conference? Oh,
Speaker:we don't do that. We just attend. It's like, okay. So what do you think
Speaker:we could get if we did that? Another 30%? Do you think we
Speaker:can increase the amount of SQLs from MQLs from these conferences?
Speaker:Oh, okay. That's a good point. So a lot of times, we chase what is
Speaker:shiny, and that's human nature. Right? We want to think
Speaker:there are easy solutions, but more often than not, there's a
Speaker:lot more lemon juice to squeeze from these lemons that they think are
Speaker:already just dead lemons, but that they're not. There's a lot of opportunity. And
Speaker:that's that's typically what I hear. I hear companies chasing the shiny
Speaker:object and just completely forgetting some of the basics.
Speaker:You know, it it reminds me of a comment that comes up a lot in
Speaker:conversations that we have, and that is the money is in the follow-up.
Speaker:And, you know, I I've I've experienced this where someone goes to
Speaker:a trade show, they get all these leads, and and, like, I like
Speaker:I I love your, reaction to the comment. Well, it works
Speaker:for us. Well, the fine works for us. Right? Like, let's break
Speaker:that down. How do we measure, it works for us? And
Speaker:then and then, like you said, like, really, are we utilizing,
Speaker:like, all these you know, it's expensive to go to a trade show. So these
Speaker:are, pretty costly leads, and, in in
Speaker:some we call them leads. Sometimes they're just name and email address and phone number,
Speaker:which is you know, they're not necessarily qualified. But,
Speaker:you know, as you go through and and and nurture those
Speaker:and follow-up with those is finding, you know, finding
Speaker:more opportunity. And it just reminds me that, you know, the money is
Speaker:in the follow-up. And we do a lot of events with what we work with,
Speaker:you know, webinars and, sometimes multiday events. Same thing
Speaker:happens where, you know, they look at the registrations. They go, oh, we
Speaker:had 200 people registered, and, a 100
Speaker:people showed up. Great. And so then they they're only measuring
Speaker:their sales from that actual webinar. And how
Speaker:about the next 2 or 3 weeks? We actually try to call all the ones
Speaker:that were there and and didn't buy. Right? And so,
Speaker:so that sounds like a is is that a common mistake that you're finding
Speaker:that, business owners are making? Is that, like you said,
Speaker:chasing the shiny thing, like, what new marketing initiative can we
Speaker:do? But how many times are we just, where the biggest
Speaker:gains we can get are from something we already have. We're just
Speaker:not working with it well. More more often than not. Right? And and that's just
Speaker:because no one's focusing on it. Right? There's there's no one in the team that's,
Speaker:you know, maybe the chief revenue officer. There's just no one looking
Speaker:into that detail, and so, therefore, they overlook it. And so they're they're
Speaker:constantly trying to chase for some new revenue stream, which is fine. I I
Speaker:I can understand why you want new revenue streams. But I think you can
Speaker:do that in an operationally efficient manner in the sense that, like
Speaker:again, this is what I mean. I look at this like operations. You
Speaker:have an operations up fronting. You have an upper operation. Whether or no you
Speaker:know the economics and by the way, a lot of companies don't do this. Right?
Speaker:No one calculates the SQL cost with the actual cost of
Speaker:their overhead of the sales team. Like, very rarely do they actually ever bother
Speaker:doing this number. But for some reason, as soon as an MQL comes
Speaker:down, every c suite is breathing down your throat about how it costs
Speaker:$50, and yet an SQL is costing you $2,000
Speaker:because you have never run the numbers before. So
Speaker:so it's like, no one's focusing on it, so, therefore, they wanna
Speaker:chase for something new. But, operationally, we should double
Speaker:down, take the take the the the the value of that, and
Speaker:then use that to, in tandem, build a new funnel. Right?
Speaker:And and I think this is the thing that people forget. Your sales
Speaker:team was a funnel. Your trade show was a
Speaker:funnel. It takes time to build that funnel. So if you
Speaker:wanna be prudent about what you're doing, let's go double
Speaker:down on what we know is working so we generate value. And
Speaker:at the same time, let's take a little bit of our resources,
Speaker:risk it, and build a new funnel, which is maybe digital marketing.
Speaker:But why spend all of that time taking all of your resources,
Speaker:not doubling down, and doubling down on something that you don't know even
Speaker:works yet? It makes no sense. So my prudent approach is take
Speaker:your low hanging fruits, squeeze them dry, and at the same time,
Speaker:take some of that value and go reinvest that into a new funnel because it's
Speaker:gonna take time. Mhmm. But test that on the side. Don't go all
Speaker:in on something that is so speculative. Like, you
Speaker:have no idea whatsoever if this is gonna work. So
Speaker:Exactly. Yeah. Totally makes sense.
Speaker:Listen. I'm sure a lot of our our listeners
Speaker:are are leaning in on this going, okay.
Speaker:Yeah. I haven't been doing that. I have been making some of these mistakes. I
Speaker:think there is an opportunity to do better. Talk
Speaker:a little bit about, you know, what it looks like to
Speaker:engage with you, like, you know and and we're gonna make sure that we
Speaker:put the links to you beneath this video. If you're watching this on
Speaker:video or podcast, it's in it's in the player. So all the links to
Speaker:connect with Nathan are there. What what are some of the next steps
Speaker:someone should take to, even think about this and and even,
Speaker:to have a conversation with you about their
Speaker:situation? It's a great question. Thank you for asking. So
Speaker:we've been in business now for long enough that I've recognized that my full
Speaker:marketing service is not for everyone. So we have 4 different services.
Speaker:We have our advisory service. We have fixed projects. We have fixed
Speaker:retainer, and then we have my full marketing as a service kinda type
Speaker:business, which really is meant for those kind of more you know, I'm gonna say
Speaker:more established type businesses. I think a lot of companies fall in the first
Speaker:three where they're hesitant. You don't know Nathan. That's fine. I get
Speaker:it. Let's do a teaser. So the advisory piece is really,
Speaker:hey. I can't really afford anything right now, but
Speaker:I really need help. Then you you get me 4 hours
Speaker:a month. And, you know, for a lack of better words, I'm your marketing accountability
Speaker:coach. I set the goals. I challenge you. I yell at you. I make
Speaker:sure you execute on them, but I make sure that you don't do stupid things,
Speaker:which means you're not wasting time on activities that I really don't believe are gonna
Speaker:be valuable for you. The fixed project and fixed scope retainers are very
Speaker:simple in the sense that we're just scoped to do a very specific type item,
Speaker:which means maybe someone give you advice for SEO. Maybe I
Speaker:agree with that advice and you hire us just to do SEO. So we go
Speaker:ahead and do that. And our last one, which is for larger companies is, hey,
Speaker:Nathan. I want someone who's gonna be accountable for my company and
Speaker:grow, which means, Nathan, here's my goals. Here's your
Speaker:budget. You're hired. If you don't meet it, you're fired. That's exactly
Speaker:like any other employee. That's their our largest service. So kinda different
Speaker:services for different sized companies. I feel like a lot of people probably fall on
Speaker:the advisory side. So that's something where you can just sign up. I have a
Speaker:quick discovery call and make sure that we have a good understanding and expectations.
Speaker:And and and I also have some experience, you know, while I have worked in
Speaker:50 plus clients, and various different, you know, categories, I wanna make
Speaker:sure that I actually have some industry knowledge. Right? So making sure
Speaker:that I'm a good fit for you guys in the sense of providing some value,
Speaker:making sure that every hour you spend with me is actually gonna be double or
Speaker:triple the value back to the business, and I think that's really important. So that's
Speaker:how you can engage with us. We all do a small discovery no matter which
Speaker:one it is. And, and then away we go, we start actioning and helping you
Speaker:grow your marketing function. Amazing. Well, if you would like to
Speaker:connect with Nathan, his links are right beneath this video. If you're watching it on
Speaker:video, if you're listening to us on a podcast, just check into that player that
Speaker:you are playing this on right now. And, all in the show notes,
Speaker:all the all the links to Nathan are there as well.
Speaker:Look. I we've covered a lot of ground, but we've only we've also only scratched
Speaker:surface. I mean, we could talk about marketing and metrics and all of this,
Speaker:all day long and, and and deep dive on a lot of it.
Speaker:But I think this gives
Speaker:everyone a a lot to think about. And, I mean,
Speaker:that big decision is when when when do you start looking,
Speaker:and then and then also, I think finding that
Speaker:hidden fruit in what you're already doing. And, look, if you
Speaker:just did that, it would probably pay for Nathan's services. So
Speaker:so, you know, it the ROI on this is is
Speaker:not that it's not that far. So now before I
Speaker:let you go, Nathan, I wanna ask you just because, you know, there's a bit
Speaker:of a, you know, obviously, we're we we look to grow our
Speaker:businesses. As entrepreneurs, a lot of
Speaker:times when we grow our businesses, we have to grow ourselves as well.
Speaker:And so I ask all my guests while they're here, for,
Speaker:recommendations on that. So, so much of my learning
Speaker:has come from books, and so I wanted to ask you while you're here.
Speaker:Is there a must read book or a a recent book or something
Speaker:that that has stood out to you or has been helpful to you that,
Speaker:you recommend others read? There's 2 books, actually. 1 is
Speaker:scaling up, which I think is just a great business book.
Speaker:And the reason I like it is because it's a book of books, references
Speaker:a ton of other books, which I really appreciate, which means I think there's a
Speaker:lot of thought put towards the structure and the framework of everything. And I
Speaker:would say more on a personal note, I I read just recently Adam
Speaker:Grant's think again, and I think
Speaker:has fundamentally changed my my view on personal
Speaker:opinion. I think it's a great book in the sense of
Speaker:really challenges, challenges you in
Speaker:the sense of, do you know what you really know, and and are you
Speaker:willing to change that? And I think that's, it was just like it
Speaker:was a it was a really eye opening book for me because I think I'm
Speaker:I'm a little stubborn. And so, it opened my eyes to
Speaker:being a bit more welcoming to new ideas and welcoming
Speaker:to myself. You know? I think, you know, I there's always that saying
Speaker:being kind to yourself being kind to yourself in the sense that you can change
Speaker:your mind, and it's okay to change your mind, but be be prudent in that
Speaker:approach. So I I really recommend that book. I think that's a great
Speaker:message. Be kind to yourself. And I you know, I've actually never read that book.
Speaker:So that's going on the the the the must read list as
Speaker:well, and I always get my book recommendations from my podcast guests.
Speaker:So, this is amazing. You know, when I first started asking the question, I
Speaker:thought I was gonna get all the same answers all the time, either, like, the
Speaker:most recent popular books or, like, the or, you know,
Speaker:the other one, like, Think and Grow Rich and, you know, books like that. But
Speaker:it's just there's such a wide recommendations.
Speaker:So thank you for your recommendation as well. And for those listening
Speaker:in, the links to those books are here as well.
Speaker:So, Nathan, thank you. This is this is, been amazing. It's been
Speaker:great spending some time with you. We live in the same city. We've never we've
Speaker:never actually met in person, but it's, great to get to know you a little
Speaker:bit. And for our listeners, you
Speaker:know, connect with Nathan. All his links are there as well.
Speaker:So before we sign off, Nathan, any final
Speaker:piece of advice or words of wisdom you wanna leave our audience with?
Speaker:Oh, good one. I have a saying that's a
Speaker:little rough. So but I I but I believe in
Speaker:marketing, it's it's very true. The middle
Speaker:is where you go to die, And it's
Speaker:a saying where if you think there's an opportunity
Speaker:where you can go to the middle of profit, there's a reason why people are
Speaker:not there. And I find a lot of companies when it comes to
Speaker:positioning, they wanna be the best, but they wanna be in the middle of the
Speaker:road in terms of price. Or they wanna be
Speaker:the cheapest, but they also wanna provide all the features.
Speaker:There is usually always a reason why people are not in the middle of the
Speaker:market, and there's always a reason why there's actually an opportunity in the middle of
Speaker:the market. It's because, typically, it's not a profitable or
Speaker:or or reasonable positioning for your for
Speaker:companies to be in. So anyone that thinks they're doing well in the
Speaker:middle, I challenge you to think if whether or not you'd actually be better at
Speaker:either being the cheapest or the best, because at least in my
Speaker:experience, every company that has ever done that, you face far more challenges than
Speaker:it's worth. Really recommend people looking to when they make
Speaker:a positioning choice, you're either the best or you're the cheapest. It's one of the
Speaker:other. That is powerful advice. I've never heard it
Speaker:said exactly like that, but that is so true. And we've experienced
Speaker:it so many times even with our own ideas and and with ideas
Speaker:of our clients. So, great words to end this
Speaker:episode by. So, Nathan, thank you so much. This has been amazing,
Speaker:To our audience, I want today to mean something for you. I
Speaker:want today to, help you leverage
Speaker:something we talked about or an idea or, you know, at least
Speaker:move your business forward. So I want you to think about one thing that
Speaker:either, you heard Nathan say or maybe you were
Speaker:reminded that, hey. I I haven't followed up this thing or I
Speaker:haven't done this thing. You know, identify one action step and go do
Speaker:it today. Right? And if you can't think of anything else, then just
Speaker:go reach out to Nathan and and find out, Have a conversation with him.
Speaker:He'll help you figure out, what that is. And, in
Speaker:the meantime, keep moving forward. The only way to fail is to quit,
Speaker:and, never ever give up on your big dream. You could just be that
Speaker:one partner or that one collaboration or that one action
Speaker:step away from the breakthrough that you need in your business.
Speaker:Until next time, this is the creative collaboration show with Chuck Anderson, and we'll
Speaker:see you on the next one, everybody. Thank you.
