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0:00The last three companies I founded and
0:01sold grew so fast it felt illegal. Used
0:04Allen got to $1.2 million per month at
0:06the end of the first year. Prestige Labs
0:08got to $1.5 million per month by the end
0:11of the first year. And Gym Launch got
0:13over $2 million per month by the end of
0:15the first year. I'm going to show you
0:16the strongest growth levers I used to
0:18get these results so that you can, too.
0:21Let's start with the first one, which is
0:23nobody knows you exist.
0:25And if you're under $1 million in
0:27revenue, I can virtually guarantee you
0:28that basically everyone on Earth doesn't
0:30know you exist. And so, the first 4
0:32hours of every day should be dedicated
0:34to solving that problem and going from
0:36obscurity to being aware. And so, we do
0:38that by doing the core four more, which
0:41is you have to do more outreach, cold or
0:43warm. You have to make more content, or
0:45you got to run ads. But the thing is is
0:47you don't need to do all of them. You
0:48pick one, you go all in, and that's what
0:50you spend your first 4 hours every
0:51single day on. Now, the reason that I
0:53talk about advertising more so much is
0:55that advertising is a boom. And if
0:57you're like, "What's a boom?" It's
0:58actually a term that I started using
0:59internally for our business, which is a
1:01business order of magnitude change. All
1:03right? And so, fundamentally, if you
1:05think about a business, there are many
1:07things that you can optimize. So, you
1:08can increase your close rate by 10%. You
1:10can increase your your conversion rate
1:12on your on your opt-in page by 10%. You
1:13can increase your email follow-up. All
1:15of those things are optimizations. And
1:17so, the problem is with optimizations,
1:19you can only go to 100%. They're capped.
1:22But with advertising, you can, in a very
1:24real way, 100x the amount of people who
1:27find out about your business. And one of
1:29the keys that small business owners get
1:31stuck in is they get in this little
1:32optimization mouse trap, where they're
1:34like, "I need to move this. Oh, I I I I
1:36I was at 10.1 one to one, and now I need
1:38to be at at 10.2 to one." It's like,
1:40"Dude, just get 100 times the leads, and
1:42your business will grow." So, here's
1:44what most people think when they think
1:46about their given marketplace. So, let's
1:47say you're a local dry cleaner. All
1:49right? You see that you're advertising
1:50on Facebook. And so, you see you have
1:52the whole pie, and so you're happy. So,
1:54that's just you. Then, you have you plus
1:58one other person. Then all of a sudden,
1:59you've got half of the pie. Then it's
2:01you plus three other people in the
2:03marketplace. And now, you feel sad.
2:06But, the reality is the marketplace is
2:08significantly bigger than you ever give
2:09it credit for. There are so many humans
2:11on Earth. This is what it looks like in
2:13reality. You're actually only
2:15advertising on one of four different
2:17methods, and the way that you're doing
2:19it is only on one slice of the medium.
2:21And then within that, you have your tiny
2:23little quarter that you are taking up.
2:26And so, the marketplace has so many
2:27different ways they can communicate
2:29using each of the methods of
2:31communication. So, for example, if I'm
2:33talking about content, I'm like, "Oh,
2:34there's somebody else in my marketplace
2:35who's marketing on Instagram." Okay,
2:37cool. So, there's that, but isn't there
2:40also other platforms you can do it on?
2:41And don't you think that maybe there's
2:43enough people in your marketplace to
2:45satisfy your business? Probably. The
2:47amount of times that I would have a gym
2:48owner, for example, who'd come to me and
2:49say, "Hey, there's this other guy in the
2:51marketplace who's now running Facebook
2:52ads." I'm like, "You only need 200
2:54people in your gym to be incredibly
2:55profitable. And right now, last time I
2:57checked, you've got a 1 million people
2:59in your city. And so, you just have to
3:00get 200 of them. And so, if there's 10
3:03others or 100 other gyms that are
3:05advertising your area, even on the same
3:07platform, you still just need to get
3:090.00002%
3:11of that audience to just come to you.
3:13And so, you think that as these people
3:15enter, you're losing market share, but
3:18the reality is you're this tiny little
3:19speck, and most people don't even know
3:21you exist. So, the next growth principle
3:24is instead of trying to beat your
3:27competition, shrink your competition.
3:29Eminem has responded to hate in two ways
3:32publicly that I absolutely love. So, the
3:34first is that when Will Ferrell
3:37confronted him about some things that
3:38Afrojack had said to him, he said, "Hey,
3:41Afrojack's been talking trash. Do you
3:42have anything to say about it?" And
3:44Eminem just said, "Who?" And then Will
3:46Ferrell repeated the statement. And then
3:47he just looked at him and he was like,
3:48"Who?" And he was like, "Okay, yep,
3:50that's what I thought." And so, the
3:52first is I'm so big I can't hear him.
3:56The secondary is that you kill them with
3:58kindness, right? So, you either grow so
4:00big that no one can see them or hear
4:02them, or you meet them where they're at
4:04on a different game, which is you play
4:05on kindness and grace. And so, in 8
4:08Mile,
4:09Eminem tries to claim all of the flaws
4:11that he has so that no one else can say
4:13anything. And so, I get hit on a lot.
4:16Not like that.
4:18For talking about working a lot, people
4:20are like, "That's not healthy." And of
4:21course, I try to put disclaimers in
4:23every video. I'm like, "Do whatever you
4:24want." Right?
4:25I get hit on for like, "Oh, I think he's
4:28he's trying to make money." Duh. I try
4:31to say it all the time, but people
4:33assume that I am trying to hide this
4:34from others. Of course, I'm trying to
4:35make money. I'm in business. That's the
4:36whole point I do this. And that way, if
4:38I always start with I'm here to make
4:39money, when I do something nice, then
4:42people are like, "Oh, well, that was
4:43nice of him." Rather than me claiming
4:44that I I have to be the super kind
4:45whatever person, and then when I try and
4:48make money, people are like, "Ah." Shake
4:49their finger at me. Like, it's not good.
4:51And so, I try and learn from Eminem and
4:54just take all of the negatives that I
4:55can think that somebody would possibly
4:57say, and then just claim them as my own.
4:58Because, yes, we are all flawed, and
5:00none of us are perfect. And so, for some
5:02reason, we are bothered when someone
5:03else points out our imperfections that
5:05we would readily state ourselves. We
5:06know we have deficiencies. What you want
5:08to do is overwhelm the marketplace so
5:10that you drown them out. You want to be
5:12so loud that no one else can hear them.
5:15You shrink them into irrelevance by
5:17comparison. And so, there's two ways
5:19that you can become the tallest
5:20building, right? You can knock everyone
5:22else down, or you grow so that they
5:24become smaller in comparison to you. And
5:26so, everyone sees their little building
5:29and thinks, "Oh, no, I should knock all
5:31my competitors down." Right? When in
5:33reality, all you need to do is build the
5:35biggest absolute building there. And the
5:37thing is is that you're going to block
5:38out the sun, and your shadow will be so
5:40big that no one can even see these
5:42people. And let me tell you a story
5:44about this.
5:45When I launched my last book, 100
5:48Million Dollar Leads,
5:49I spent a tremendous amount of time and
5:51effort across I think at the time we had
5:53seven-ish million
5:55subscribers or you know audience size
5:57across all platforms. I emailed a bunch,
5:59I made a ton of content, we spent money
6:00on ads, we did outreach, we had
6:01affiliates going, we had all these
6:03different channels going to get as many
6:05people as possible to the launch. And
6:07when I walk around Las Vegas because I
6:09live here, I will usually get stopped
6:12about three-ish times when I do about a
6:1560-minute walk.
6:16Mind you, I walk in a crowded area so
6:18it's not like I'm just like walking in
6:19the neighborhood cuz then that would
6:20just be weird. Anyways, and of course
6:21you should be recognized by your
6:22neighbors. But I'll get stopped by three
6:24people and every time for the month
6:26leading up to the launch, I would be
6:28like, "Hey, you going to the book
6:29launch?" 19 times out of 20, the people
6:32would look at me and be like, "What's
6:34the book launch?" And I was like, "How
6:35do you not know about this, right?" But
6:37it was this wonderful reminder that most
6:39people, when you get tired of your
6:41advertising, most people don't even know
6:43your first name. If you have deluded
6:46yourself into thinking that you should
6:49only have to say something once and
6:51somehow everyone in the entire world has
6:53heard you say that thing, you are
6:55kidding yourself. You need to become a
6:57master of variety in terms of how you
6:59can resay the same thing in different
7:01ways. And taking the natural extreme,
7:04there's this fallacy that most small
7:06business owners think and myself
7:07included for years I thought this was
7:10that repetition in and of itself is
7:12somehow bad. So let me explain.
7:15There's probably people on the internet.
7:17I personally follow a bunch of
7:18philosophy accounts. And so most of the
7:21philosophers are dead. And yet I still
7:25love to see the quotes they have because
7:27they remind me of the things that I want
7:30to follow, the way that I want to live.
7:33And it's not like, "Oh, another Seneca
7:35quote. Does this guy never give up?"
7:37It's like he's dead. He hasn't come up
7:39with a new quote in 2,000 years. And yet
7:41I still like seeing the quotes even
7:44though I know I've seen them before. And
7:46often times you serve that role for your
7:48audience more than anything else. Like,
7:50we think that it's like, "Oh, I've said
7:52this one thing. Therefore, they have all
7:53changed all their behavior immediately
7:54and they never need to learn that
7:55again." But, the biggest lesson that I
7:57have learned is that people need to be
7:58more reminded than they need to be
8:00taught. And in the off chance that
8:02you've received hate or you have a
8:03competitor who's talking crap, and it
8:05happens,
8:07this counts double. So, instead of
8:09trying to beat them or prove them wrong,
8:11you only have two options. Option one is
8:14you grow so big that no one can even
8:16hear them. The alternative is that you
8:19kill them with kindness, which is that
8:21you do not beat them by proving that you
8:24are right.
8:26You beat them by proving that you are
8:30kind.
8:32And then by comparison, they will look
8:34bad.
8:36And so, I can only thing I can tell you
8:38about having dealt with plenty of it in
8:39my day is that on the occasion that I do
8:41choose to respond to hate, I try to
8:43respond with kindness. And so, someone
8:45can just absolutely tear me one to say
8:47like, "This guy sucks. He's terrible.
8:48Whatever." Right? I will then usually
8:51say, "Hey, you're right. I'm a super
8:53flawed person. Um that being said, it
8:55seems like you've developed like a big
8:57audience here and they seem to like you.
8:58And so, congrats on your success."
9:00Right? When someone sees that, it's very
9:02hard for everyone to be like, "Man, that
9:04guy sucks." It's just like now, if I
9:06were to try and like list out all the
9:07points, all I do is invite more back and
9:10forth, which I don't want to do and it's
9:11a waste of my time. And so, instead, you
9:14start all hate responses with you are
9:16right because it's all they want to
9:17hear. And there's really nothing else to
9:19say after that. And so, what's
9:20interesting is that often times hate, if
9:22you boil it down, comes down to I
9:25do not prefer the way this person does
9:27things.
9:28I have a different preference. And it's
9:30like, "Great."
9:31Right? Like, I I make money one way. He
9:34makes money another way. And therefore,
9:36he is wrong. It's like, "No, you just do
9:38the way you want, which is awesome
9:39because you do your way and they do it
9:41their way and the people who are
9:41attracted to that will do that and the
9:42people attracted to you will do yours
9:43and great. Like, I mean, of course,
9:45there's engagement baiting and things
9:46like that because, you know, people
9:47people want to get views and all that
9:49and I and I and I respect it. I get it.
9:50Um but but big picture, I think you
9:53can't take it
9:54um
9:55you can't take it personally because
9:56whenever I I fall into that little trap,
9:58I think to myself, "I'm a relatively
10:00developed monkey that is sitting on a
10:02little blue marble in a solar system
10:04that's in one of a billion galaxies and
10:07I'm worried about some screen that has
10:08words on it on a made-up language that
10:10we had in the last 1,500 years of how we
10:12communicate face noise to each other."
10:14And when I think about that, I think,
10:15you know, this would be pretty silly for
10:16me to like ruin a day over. So, the
10:18third big growth lever, and this one's
10:19massive, is clear, not clever. All
10:23right, so what I mean by that? Well,
10:24when I looked at the highest converting
10:26ads that I had run, and I do this pretty
10:29regularly, I look for different
10:31components. Sometimes I'm like, what's
10:32the hook? Sometimes I'm like, what's the
10:33color scheme? What's the What's the
10:35visuals that are being displayed in the
10:37first however many seconds? And in this
10:39one particular pass, I just looked at
10:41the grade level of the language that was
10:43being spoken. And the reason I looked at
10:45that, it was I think it was a you know,
10:46one or two election cycles ago, I'd
10:48heard this research study that had
10:49stated that the president who spoke in
10:51the lowest grade language was the one
10:53that won the election over and over
10:55again. And when I heard that, I see
10:57presidential elections fundamentally as
10:59massive brand campaigns. And so,
11:02I see that as
11:04they were able to communicate a message
11:06to a higher percentage of the population
11:07because they lowered the barrier to
11:09entry of comprehension. Meaning, more
11:11people got what they said.
11:13And so, when I hear that, I thought,
11:15"Man, I like to use all these big fancy
11:17college words and no one knows what I'm
11:19saying. And so, all I do is feed my ego,
11:22not my bank account." And so, I made one
11:24of my big marketing rules clear, not
11:27clever. And so, you want to take
11:29whatever communication is, look at your
11:31landing pages, look at your ad copy,
11:33look at the words you're saying in your
11:34content, and say, "Does a third grader
11:36understand this?" And the point that
11:38some people try to make as a counter is
11:40like, "Oh, I don't want to talk down to
11:41my audience." No. When you speak in a
11:43more broken down manner,
11:45you help the experts understand it more
11:47easily,
11:48and you help the beginners understand it
11:50for the first time. And so, it's not
11:52that experts are all of a sudden saying,
11:53"Oh, no, I don't believe that." Cuz
11:55listen, we get tons of very big
11:56companies that come to acquisition.com
11:58for investment, and the guys who run
11:59those companies very intelligent. But, I
12:02try to make my videos in a way that
12:04people can understand them because
12:06who do I who do I prove when I use a big
12:09word and then all of a sudden 3/4 of the
12:11audience can't understand it. And if the
12:13point of me making these videos is to
12:15make real business education accessible
12:16for everyone, part of it making it
12:18accessible is making it interesting,
12:19making it fun, and making it
12:21comprehensible, which is just a fancy
12:22word for understandable. And what you
12:24guys don't see behind the scenes is that
12:27I will typically self-edit. And so, I
12:30said distilled earlier in a sense and
12:32then I said broken down for experts is
12:34because I said distilled and I was like,
12:35"I have to use a different word." Broken
12:36down. And then I said comprehensible and
12:38then I said fancy word for
12:39understandable. And so, I try to
12:42constantly catch myself in this, and
12:44it's also made me a significantly more
12:45effective leader. So, if I'm trying to
12:47communicate with my team, I'm not trying
12:49to say big words. I don't want to
12:50impress them, I want to change what they
12:52do. And so, I I've taken this to such an
12:54extreme that with my books, I just use
12:56little little stick figures, right? I
12:58have these little drawings. It's like,
12:59"Oh, look, here's a guy who's walking on
13:00a path. Look, little apple, orange, big
13:03dollar sign, little dollar sign, right?"
13:04We try to make this as simple as
13:06possible so that people can understand
13:07what's actually going on. Because if you
13:09can explain it to a third grader, and
13:11this is Richard Feynman who said this,
13:12this is famous physicist, he said, "If
13:13you can explain it to a third grader,
13:15then you understand it. If you can't,
13:16you don't, and you need to understand it
13:17better so that you can break it down."
13:19And so, the broader the audience, the
13:21broader the analogy, and the simpler the
13:23language.
13:24And so, I'll give you an example. One
13:25element is the grade language of the
13:27words you use. The second is what
13:29visuals or stories you use to depict
13:31them. And so, if I'm talking to
13:33mechanics, I might use an analogy where
13:36I relate something they understand,
13:37cars, to something they might not
13:38understand, a business, right? If I
13:40wanted to teach a specific concept. If I
13:42was talking to the same uh I was trying
13:44to teach the same concept, but I was
13:45teaching it to realtors, then I would
13:47probably use a house analogy. If I was
13:49teaching it to baseball people, I would
13:51probably use a baseball analogy, right?
13:53And so, if you have a narrow down
13:55audience, you will increase
13:56comprehension by using analogies that
13:57they all understand. If you're talking
13:59to a broader audience, then you need to
14:01have a broader slice of the market,
14:04probably a more human experience that
14:06all of them have. So, if I'm talking to
14:07everyone, I might talk about food. I
14:09might talk about sleep. I might talk
14:11about driving, right? Cuz most people do
14:14that, assuming I'm not talking to
14:15children. And so, you have to match the
14:18analogy to the history of learning from
14:23the people that you're trying to
14:24communicate to.
14:26And this is what takes your marketing
14:28and your advertising and puts it on
14:29steroids. And to put this to the test,
14:32this is something you can do right now.
14:34Look at whatever emails you send,
14:36run them through a reading grading level
14:38app,
14:40keep working on it until it's below
14:41fifth grade minimum, third grade if
14:43you're awesome,
14:44and then send it. I did this to our
14:46email follow-ups and had a 50% increase
14:49in conversion. I didn't change anything
14:51about what I said, but I saw that as I
14:54got 50% more people to understand.
14:56Because the goal here is to decrease the
14:59friction of comprehension. So, if we
15:01think about the elements of value,
15:02speed, ease, time delay, these elements
15:06are all impacted by complexity. And so,
15:08something complex takes longer to
15:09understand. It takes more effort, right?
15:12And so, and it it's harder, right? And
15:14so, instead what we want to do is say,
15:15"Okay, how do I make it easy and
15:16faster?" Okay, well, then I'll just
15:20speak in a way that everyone
15:21understands. The next massive growth
15:23lever is proof over promise, all right?
15:27And so, what this means is that in my
15:30earlier days, I would spend so much time
15:32on my promise, right? And
15:35I wrote a whole book on promises, which
15:36is basically offers, right? And I would
15:38obsess about the offer. But
15:40and the offer is super important, but
15:41the only thing that's more important is
15:44proof. All right, so let me give you two
15:45hypothetical examples. Let's say that
15:48you've got business one that's selling
15:49thing one and business two that's
15:51selling thing two. Well, let's say they
15:53still compete for more or less the same
15:55audience. And business two says, "We'll
15:57do X, we'll do Y, we'll do Z, we'll do
15:59W, and we'll guarantee X, Y, and Z,
16:01right?" And you look at their reviews
16:03and they've got a five-star rating and
16:05they've got one review.
16:07The other company says, "We'll do X."
16:10And they've got 11,382
16:12five stars and they've got a 4.7.
16:14Who do you buy from?
16:17This guy, obviously. But why? This guy
16:20has a better promise because you believe
16:22this guy. And so, you want to have proof
16:25up to your eyeballs. Proof is your
16:27single highest priority as a business
16:30owner or marketer or advertiser or
16:32promoter for your business. It is the
16:34one thing that you prioritize. Before I
16:36enter any new space, launch a new
16:38product, the first thing that I do is
16:39try and get beta users. I work for free
16:41in exchange for testimonials, reviews,
16:44and feedback, and sometimes referrals if
16:46I'm lucky.
16:47But in the beginning, that is the
16:49highest most valuable thing that you can
16:51do. So, people will say things like
16:54never work for free. And you only hear
16:55that from people who don't make that
16:57much money.
16:58If you make a lot of money, you will
17:00know that you spend so much time in the
17:02free phase because getting the product
17:04right is so important, is such high
17:06leverage. And so, the proof process both
17:09makes you convicted because you get the
17:12opportunity of many feedback loops to
17:14make your product better so that you
17:17then can collect the positive feedback
17:19that you can then advertise to get more
17:21people like those customers.
17:23And the most compelling way to advertise
17:26anything is show, don't sell.
17:30And if I just stand here and said
17:31nothing, and I said and I just stated
17:33the facts and told the truth, and I
17:34said,
17:36"I have
17:3711,382
17:40reviews, and our average review is 4.7,
17:43and I make pasta really good."
17:48And then
17:49or
17:50"I have one review from my mama,
17:53and I make
17:54supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
17:56pasta, guaranteed."
17:58Which one do you like better?
18:00Obviously, this one. You don't need to
18:02say much more. The proof is the pudding.
18:05The most important part of a message is
18:08the messenger themselves. They're
18:10inextricably linked from the thing
18:12that's being communicated, and this is
18:13what people seem to miss when they're
18:14making content, which is why I'm a big
18:17advocate of do epic stuff first, then
18:20talk about what you did. And if the
18:22stuff that you didn't do is epic, focus
18:24more on the doing epic stuff, not on the
18:26talking about it. And so, I started this
18:28channel uh with a commitment to a vendor
18:31saying, "I'll make three YouTube videos
18:32a week." And I was busy, and I was like,
18:34"I'm just going to get a webcam, and I'm
18:35going to talk to the camera." And that
18:36is how this channel was started. And the
18:39only reason, in my opinion, that people
18:42decided to listen was because I just so
18:45happened to have sold a company for just
18:46under $50 million. And so, because of
18:48that, there was proof
18:51that I was able to deliver on the
18:52promise. Whereas, somebody else might
18:54have a totally beautiful studio and have
18:57all these things, but they just forgot
18:59the one most important thing, which is,
19:00"Why should I listen to you?"
19:02And so, either it's going to have to be
19:04proof that you generated for yourself,
19:06or proof from other people saying that
19:07you helped them achieve that thing.
19:09If any of these growth principles help
19:11you in thinking about your business
19:13differently so that you can scale faster
19:15or you need to send it to your team, it
19:16would mean the world to me if you shared
19:17it. Um, that's my only ask.
19:20And appreciate it. So, the next big
19:22thing is the hook. Now, you're like,
19:24"Okay, I've heard about hooks before."
19:26Not the way that I'm going to talk about
19:27it. All right? So, the hook is greater
19:30than everything. Now, you're like, "Wait
19:32a second. I thought proof was greater
19:33than everything." Well, the proof is
19:34going to be contained in the thing, but
19:35no one's going to see the proof unless
19:36you have a good hook. All right? And so,
19:38the one thing that I think has
19:40consistently been reinforced and it's
19:41just like a greater and greater
19:43percentage of my time is allocated
19:45towards this one part of my advertising
19:46that grows my company the most is I
19:49search for the best hooks. And then I
19:52don't convince myself that I'm more
19:53creative than I think I am and I just
19:55keep using the ones that work. So, think
19:57about it like this. These are the only
19:59four things that you can do to advertise
20:00any business. You can warm outreach, so
20:02reaching out one-on-one to people you
20:03know. Cold outreach, reaching one-on-one
20:05to people you don't know. You can run
20:06paid ads, which is going one-to-many to
20:08people you don't know. Or you can post
20:09content, which is one-to-many to people
20:10you do know.
20:11And in each of these four situations you
20:14can double, triple, 5x the amount of
20:18people who open and respond, who click
20:21and watch your ad, who uh watch your
20:23content all the way to the end. And if
20:25you do something like that and you do
20:26increase the click-through rate by go
20:28from 1% to 5% or 2% to 10%, which
20:30absolutely can happen. When you do that
20:35you in a very real way can 2x, 3x, 4x,
20:385x your business.
20:40With just that one thing. Remember I
20:42talked about earlier that advertising is
20:44a boom? It's a It's an order of
20:45magnitude change. Well, what other one
20:48thing can you just tweak that then opens
20:52up the flow to the entire business based
20:55on how good the first 5 seconds are? Or
20:58the first 1 second? And so, in thinking
21:00about hooks, I think about both the
21:02visual hook, as in what's happening,
21:04what that people can see, and then
21:06there's the auditory or or verbal hook,
21:08which is what are the actual words that
21:09are being communicated. And
21:11we have right now we reviewed our top
21:13YouTube videos of all time and I have
21:15made a video about 6 months ago saying
21:17what we found, which is our hook formula
21:19is proof,
21:21promise,
21:23plan. And so if you have the opportunity
21:26to
21:27make content, make ads, run cold
21:29outbound, if you can include these, I
21:32can almost guarantee that you will do
21:34better than if you include none of them.
21:35And this is a force multiplier on any
21:37kind of advertising you do. And so when
21:39I think about like all the different
21:41things, all the effort that goes into
21:42advertising a business, if I can just do
21:45one thing and the crazy part about hooks
21:46is they're the shortest part. They're
21:48the shortest part of the whole darn
21:50thing. And this is where David Ogilvy
21:52says, "If you have written your
21:54headline, you've spent 80 cents of your
21:56advertising dollar." The more advanced
21:58the advertiser is that I meet, whether
21:59it's a content creator, somebody who's
22:01on outbound, somebody who makes paid
22:02ads, the more obsessive they are on the
22:05first frame, the first impression that
22:08someone gets because they know, one, it
22:10increases the likelihood that the
22:11person's going to watch the rest of it
22:12and then potentially buy, and then two,
22:15it changes their entire perception of
22:17what follows. So we actually looked at
22:19this uh for speakers at an event,
22:22which was if we change the intro, the
22:25the one to two-minute intro that we had
22:27for a 60-minute talk,
22:29the person's net promoter score, so what
22:31people rated them in terms of how good
22:33they were,
22:34changed massively, even though the
22:36actual presentation was the same. So
22:39simply how we framed the presenter, the
22:41person hadn't got up on stage yet,
22:43changed how everything they did
22:45afterwards was perceived. And so if
22:47there's two minutes that can influence
22:49the score that you get, the customer
22:51satisfaction, the amount of prospects,
22:53the one thing to focus on is nail the
22:55hook. Let me show you the force
22:56multiplication of this.
22:58We just started reviewing uh uh content
23:01on the content team and just doing a
23:02more regular activity of seeing like
23:04what are the things that make uh content
23:05do well.
23:06And there was a video that we're like,
23:07"We think this thing is good." And so,
23:10all we did is we took the same video
23:11that got like 40,000 views. And then we
23:14just chopped out the first 3 seconds
23:16that was kind of like getting into the
23:18into the video before the actual real
23:20hook was delivered. And by snipping
23:22those 3 seconds and then just starting
23:23where the hook really was, it went from
23:25a 40,000 view video to a 780,000
23:28view video. So, you're talking about a
23:2919x improvement. So, I'm talking about,
23:32you know, 1% 2% talking 19x.
23:36That is why obsessing over the hook is
23:38so important. So, the next big growth
23:40lever
23:41that gave us the super fast growth was
23:43more. So, I talk about more,
23:46better,
23:47and new as the three primary strategies
23:51of growth. You either do more of what's
23:52already working, you do what you're
23:54doing to make it work better, or you do
23:56something entirely new. Now, most
23:58entrepreneurs love doing new stuff, and
23:59that's why it's called shiny object
24:01syndrome, and it's a cancer, and you
24:02should get that looked at. But, the very
24:04boring answer is the mundane more. You
24:08have to master more. And it's going
24:11instead of zero to one, which is what
24:13most people love doing. Oh my god, I
24:14finally got it to work. But, actually
24:16doing one to N, which is how do I do is
24:18this thing as many times as humanly
24:19possible without wanting to kill myself.
24:22And so, here's the actual math
24:24explanation of this. More is typically
24:26the highest risk-adjusted return
24:28strategy. All right? And so, what that
24:30means is
24:32if you
24:34can do something and you already know it
24:35works, the likelihood that the next
24:37thing you do works is much smaller. And
24:40so, this is why once you have a control,
24:42meaning you have um a specific landing
24:45page or ad or copy or email that you
24:48know converts, whenever you deviate from
24:51a high-converting advertisement, the
24:53likelihood that the variant is going to
24:55beat it is typically low. And so you
24:58have to try a bunch of variations cuz
24:59all you're doing is messing something up
25:01that actually already works. If you had
25:04one sales guy and he's closing at 30%
25:08well, you could try and obsess to get
25:10him to 35 or 40% and that would be
25:13material. You know, you get a 25% lift
25:15overall 30 to 40% is a 25% improvement.
25:17But you know what would be even cooler?
25:19Just hire three more guys and then you
25:22have a
25:234x or a 300% improvement. And so it's
25:26like I could get a 25% improvement or I
25:28could get a 300% improvement. And me
25:30trying to change up the sales script
25:31also has a significant shot of me taking
25:33it from 30 down to 20 because it's a
25:36change. And so here's the thing is that
25:38when you change anything, you guarantee
25:41you incur the cost of change, but you do
25:43not guarantee that you get the benefit
25:45of change. And so in each of the core
25:47four methods, you do more outreach,
25:50which is cold or warm. You go from 100
25:51reach outs a day to 200 reach outs a
25:53day. Paid ads, you go from $100 a day to
25:54$200 a day. You go from posting content,
25:56you go from posting once a day to twice
25:57a day, right? Those are how you do more.
26:00And when I talk to the most experienced
26:03advertisers that I know, the most
26:04experienced business people that I know,
26:07the most common thing we talk about is
26:08we kind of laugh in the back room of
26:09like if people just people just don't
26:11know how much more they can do. That's
26:13that's honestly the real that's the
26:16real. Is that when I when I when I have
26:18conversations with small business
26:19owners, they're like, "Hey, I don't
26:20think I can do any more
26:22ads. You know, I'm running I'm I'm
26:23already running a thousand dollars a
26:24day." I'm like, "I mean, dude, there's
26:26businesses that run like two million a
26:27day."
26:28And so you usually have so much more
26:31runway than you think you do. And
26:33sometimes you just need someone ahead of
26:34you to be like, "Dude, you can like 10x
26:36this and nothing's going to change." But
26:38they think because of whatever mental
26:39limitation they have or like, "You've
26:41never spent that much money on a on an
26:42ad before. You've never made that amount
26:44of Is it going to hurt my account?" No,
26:46they want you to make good content. "Is
26:48it going to hurt my ads?" No, they want
26:49you to spend money. "Is it going to Is
26:51it going to hurt my my outreach?" You're
26:52going to people who've never met you
26:53before. So, why would they know that you
26:54sent it to another 100 people, right? Is
26:56that there's this these perceived fears,
26:59but most of the times it's just between
27:01your ears. Tell you guys a quick story
27:02about this. So, when I had my first, I
27:05would say real business, which is my
27:07first location of my first gym,
27:09I had a mentor and he was a really good
27:11local marketer. And so, he had a
27:13strategy for his tanning salons where he
27:15would bring in, I mean, thousands of
27:17customers every single every single
27:19quarter. And what he did was he would
27:22put out flyers. He just put flyers on
27:23cars and then had like a, you know, free
27:24VIP gift card people would come in and
27:26redeem them and he flipped them into
27:27memberships.
27:28And so, I figured, okay, I'll just run
27:30the same play. And so, I did the flyers
27:33and I put 300 flyers out and I waited by
27:37the phone be like, oh my god, I'm going
27:38to get 300 people in here. It's going to
27:39be sick. And what happened? Well, my
27:42phone only rang once from the flyers and
27:45when I picked up the phone, the guy was
27:47like, hey, did you put the flyer on my
27:49car? And I was like, yeah, I did. Like,
27:51what time do I have? And then he cut me
27:52off and he was like, you damaged my
27:53Mercedes. And I was like,
27:55click. And I
27:57I didn't know what to do.
27:59And as soon as I I I I and thankfully he
28:01never called me back cuz I definitely
28:02had didn't have the money to fix any
28:03Mercedes at that time.
28:05Um,
28:06I called
28:07my mentor back up, you know, a week or
28:09two later once it was clear that no one
28:10else was going to call. I said He said,
28:13hey, how did the flyers work out? And I
28:14was like, well, they didn't work out at
28:15all, actually. You know, I was like
28:17taking some attitude with him. He was
28:18like, oh, well, what was your test size?
28:20And he didn't like he didn't take the
28:21bait. He was like, oh, what was your
28:22test size? And I said,
28:24well, what do you mean? He was like,
28:26well, like, what you test with before
28:27you like did the real campaign? And I
28:29was like, oh, why?
28:30I mean, I put 300 out. And he was like,
28:33300? He's like, you can't know anything
28:36with 300. I was like, what do you mean?
28:38He's like, I test with 5,000. He's like,
28:40and then we put out
28:425,000 a day for 30 days.
28:46And so, I was looking at his results
28:49from 150,000
28:51flyers over 30 days and comparing them
28:54to my results of 300 in a day.
29:00And once I saw that juxtaposition, I was
29:02like,
29:03"Got it. I will never make this mistake
29:05again." It was very embarrassing for me
29:08because I was on the right path, I just
29:10didn't do enough. And so, one of the big
29:12metal lessons of this is that
29:15what presents as volatility is typically
29:18a symptom of low volume.
29:20So, if you're like, "Man, I only get
29:22like, you know, a sale every week or
29:23every other week. It's kind of like, you
29:24know, it's you know, most days I don't
29:26get a sale and then every once in a
29:27while I get one." It only appears
29:29volatile because you're doing so little
29:32per day. But, if I looked at your year
29:35and saw that you closed about, let's
29:37say, 12 customers in that year, you
29:38closed one a month, for example, every
29:40every three or four weeks you get a
29:42customer, well, all I would do is look
29:44at your entire advertising activity for
29:46the year and say, "Okay, if we wanted to
29:48get 12 customers a day, we would have to
29:50do 365 times more advertising than we
29:53currently do. And if we did that on a
29:55daily basis, we would get 12 customers a
29:57day." And so, you just take your total
29:59calendar horizontally and then you flip
30:01it vertically for a day and that is how
30:03much volume is required. And so, most
30:05people just think that it's like, "Oh,
30:06they're They can't be doing more than
30:08like twice as much as me." But, in my
30:10experience, the people who are crushing
30:11it literally are doing a thousand times
30:13more than you. And that's the part that
30:15like, until you sometimes you hear it or
30:17you have someone ahead of you say it, it
30:18doesn't become real for you. And it's
30:20why I make these videos is to try and
30:21like push as much, you know, out of out
30:23of my brain and and history so that you
30:25can just get the story without the scar.
30:27Um,
30:27and that's and that's that's the whole
30:29point. Okay. So, once you're like,
30:31"Okay, I have something that's working,
30:33I should just do way more of that."
30:34Awesome. Well, the next thing, the next
30:36power lever here is word of mouth and
30:39it's not the the that you think. So,
30:41word of mouth, people are familiar with
30:43referrals, you know, customers uh
30:45tell other customers or tell other
30:46prospects that your stuff is good. But,
30:49what a lot of people don't understand is
30:50that negative word of mouth is
30:52significantly stronger and faster than
30:55positive.
30:56And so, Disney did this big study where
30:59they found that it takes 37 tragic
31:00moments to make up for one magic moment.
31:02And versus
31:05there's basically like a 5x versus 37x
31:07on
31:09if someone has a good experience they
31:10tell five people, if someone has a bad
31:11experience they tell like everybody. And
31:14so, a new business owner often will get
31:17customers pretty cheaply.
31:19And then all of a sudden costs start
31:20going up. And part of the reason that
31:22costs go up faster, cuz you can actually
31:24put math to this, which is understanding
31:26the difference between CPM, which is
31:27cost per impression, and if it's like,
31:30why is it M? It's mille, which is French
31:31for thousand, so it costs for a thousand
31:33impressions. Versus CPL, which is cost
31:36per lead, all right? And so, if your
31:39CPMs more or less stay the same, but
31:42your cost per lead has 2x, or 3x, or 4x,
31:46well, if it's not costing you more to
31:48reach those people, then it means that
31:50fewer of them are responding. And if
31:52that's the case, and you're just going
31:54to still relatively warm markets, then
31:57the issue is that instead of having
32:00positive word of mouth working for you,
32:02which should be actively lowering the
32:04amount of cost that it takes to get a
32:06new customer, you have
32:08word of mouth working against you. And
32:11so, people who would otherwise purchase
32:12from you heard something negative and
32:15then choose not to. And so, now all of a
32:17sudden you have to reach three times the
32:18amount of people because two out of the
32:19three people who would have gone and
32:22bought your thing heard it was bad, and
32:24then now you only have one person who's
32:26just heard nothing. And so, over time
32:28the percentage of the audience that's
32:29neutral or hasn't heard of you gets
32:31smaller and smaller and smaller. And so,
32:34it's way harder to grow off of word of
32:35mouth that's positive, but it's really
32:37easy to get crushed on negative word of
32:38mouth. And for whatever reason, no
32:41business owner ever claims that they
32:43have negative word of mouth. But I can
32:45tell you, half of you are below average.
32:48That's a fact. And this is why I
32:50emphasize the proof over promise earlier
32:53on so much because if I'm going to get
32:56negative word of mouth, which I know I
32:57am if I'm starting out, I want to keep
32:59that as concentrated and quiet as
33:01possible. I don't want anybody to know,
33:02right? And so of course I'm not going to
33:04charge them money because the last thing
33:05I want to do is also have their money
33:07when they're upset, right? So it's like,
33:08"Hey, I'm making this trade. You're
33:10going to get stopped. It's probably
33:11going to be not be that good. My only
33:12ask is that you give me feedback, right?
33:14Tell me how I can make this right. Tell
33:16me how I can make it better, right? And
33:17when you ask those types of questions,
33:19you get the types of answers that can
33:20ultimately create more value for the
33:21customer. And then once you get positive
33:23feedback, positive feedback, positive
33:24feedback, now you have something that
33:26people actually want. Then you can need
33:28introduce strangers to it. And of course
33:29you're going to roll into the next
33:30issue, which is, "Okay, how do I keep
33:32that consistent because now it's not me
33:33doing everything. I've got a team." And
33:34we'll get into that. Ah, this is a
33:36really good one. So, the next big growth
33:38lever is steal.
33:40Uh-oh. What am I say What am I going to
33:41say? From
33:44yourself.
33:45So, one of our portfolio companies,
33:46which is very large, hired a new
33:48advertising director.
33:49And that advertising director had came
33:51in with lots of new ideas.
33:53And so the founder, because he wanted to
33:55teach an important lesson to the
33:56advertising director, said, "Sure, let's
33:57do all of your ideas." And so he sat
33:59there, he said the scripts, he he, you
34:00know, he he recorded all these ads, he
34:02took multiple days to do it.
34:04And what ended up happening is that they
34:06ran all the ads and they didn't work.
34:09And so he said, "Hey, crazy idea.
34:11What if we use the same hook that's been
34:13working for 3 years?"
34:15And they used the same hook and the ads
34:17worked.
34:18And so, think about it like this.
34:21Nike on its second year after just do it
34:24wasn't like, "Hey, just do it's kind of
34:25old. Let's switch it up." It's like,
34:28when you find a message that converts,
34:30you keep hammering the message. When you
34:32find the ad hooks and you find the the
34:36the processes that work well for you,
34:39most times you'd be better served just
34:42continuing to reuse it because you will
34:44get bored of it far before your
34:45customers ever do. So, believe it or
34:47not, there's actually math to support
34:49this. So, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, I
34:52can't remember which one of them is like
34:53a brilliant mathematician and actually
34:54was able to prove this ratio out.
34:58And so, when you're stealing from
34:59yourself, you want 70% of all of your
35:02effort to going to basically carbon
35:04copying the thing that works. And this
35:06works across all functions. This works
35:07for a sales script, this works for
35:08product, this works for reinvestment
35:10activities, like this rule works. The
35:13second is adjacent. So, something that's
35:16just like 1° removed, right? So, it's
35:18close to the core of what you normally
35:20do, okay? So, instead of saying
35:22starting school communities is the
35:23fastest way to start an online business,
35:24right? I could say that would be a hook
35:25and it's a hook that worked. I could say
35:28um
35:28one of the fastest ways to start an
35:29online business is to start a school
35:30community, right? That would be a
35:32variation of something that we knew that
35:33those words worked, but it would be
35:34adjacent to it, not the exact carbon
35:36copy, but similar. Now, 10 is that means
35:40that one out of 10 of the things that
35:41you're putting your effort towards, all
35:43right, would be something that's
35:43brand-spanking-new, completely, you
35:45know, all out of left field. And when
35:47you look at your effort in your
35:49business, I can almost guarantee you
35:53that you have this flipped.
35:54And I only say this because I speak from
35:57experience.
35:58Um is that this is what I would do. I
36:00would spend 70% of my time on new crazy
36:02things, new ideas, all the stuff that
36:03excited me, and then 20% I'd be like,
36:05"Oh, yeah,
36:07I'll do something kind of different from
36:08what I was doing before." And then 10%
36:09I'll be like, "Fine, I'll I'll maybe."
36:11And this is this is a maybe. Most times
36:13like, "Oh, I already used that. Used
36:14that hook once. I don't want to use it
36:15again. I don't want to use the same hook
36:16that worked before in another ad."
36:20It's silly. Also, a different version of
36:22this from an advertising perspective of
36:23the 20% is use the exact same hook but
36:24you have a different background. So,
36:26it's a just like a different variation.
36:27So, it's like I could wear a different
36:28shirt, I could have a different setting,
36:30and I could still deliver the same hook,
36:31and to me that would still be kind of a
36:3320% variation. All of your competitors
36:36are copying your stuff and taking what's
36:38working.
36:39When you find something that works, keep
36:41doing it. Deviation from what works is
36:44more likely not to work.
36:46Think about it like this.
36:47If you demolish a building, so let's say
36:49we build a building and it takes us 2
36:51years to build a building, right?
36:52There's our building. Took us 2 years.
36:54Demolishing it might take
36:575 minutes. Just put a bomb, boom.
36:59Because the place of the bricks and the
37:02steel in that building, every other
37:04potentiality that those bricks could go
37:05to create not a building. But there's
37:08only one placement of that brick and
37:09steel that creates a building. And so
37:12you have unlimited options for
37:13destruction and only one for solution.
37:16And so when you do find something that
37:17works, the likely that when you change
37:19it and you move the brick and you move
37:20the you move the scaffolding, that you
37:22destroy the building is very high.
37:24Something can literally go anywhere
37:25except for the right place. And so you
37:27can have more options and all of them be
37:29wrong. So, once you're done stealing
37:31from yourself, then
37:35let's talk about emotional versus
37:36logical buyers. This is a huge, like,
37:39monstrous increase in business for me.
37:41So,
37:43have you ever heard from from the
37:44marketing world, there's logical and
37:46there's emotional buyers. I had heard it
37:47growing up and I kind of repeated it
37:49over and over again because I hadn't
37:50really thought about it.
37:51I don't actually think that's true. And
37:54so let me explain.
37:55I actually think that there's a
37:57continuum of buyers that people sit on,
38:00and you've got people who require more
38:01information, so they're high info
38:03buyers. Then you've got people who
38:04require less information.
38:06And there's two elements to this. One is
38:09their information requirement, and
38:10secondarily, how much info they have
38:13received. And so you could have a high
38:15information buyer that's further closer
38:17to this little this dollar sign here
38:18that only needs a little bit more
38:20information in order to buy. And then
38:22you have some people that just
38:23generically buy lots of stuff. And
38:25everybody loves those people, of course.
38:27But guess what? Everybody fights over
38:28those people. And so, the thing is is
38:30that the amount of low information
38:32buyers is like this. The amount of high
38:34information buyers is an order of
38:37magnitude or multiple orders of
38:39magnitude greater. Only crazy people buy
38:41immediately. It's very normal for people
38:44to want to have more information before
38:45making a decision.
38:47And so,
38:48when we think about our advertising, the
38:50reason that the direct response
38:52community typically can't grow very
38:54large businesses most of the time is
38:57because they only advertise to these
38:59people. And this pool of buyers is
39:01significantly smaller.
39:02But the reason building a brand, for
39:04example, and investing in an audience is
39:07because you're trying to move them down
39:09this line. Now, when I heard this in the
39:12earlier days of my career, I was like,
39:13"I don't have time for that. I need to
39:14make money." I get it. Sure, in the
39:16beginning you just advertise the the
39:186-in pots. But when you want to scale,
39:20you have to educate a higher percentage
39:23of the audience because they will
39:25require more to buy.
39:28The way to move people through this is
39:31something that Eugene Schwartz uh
39:33pioneered in his book Breakthrough
39:35Advertising.
39:36And he talks about the five levels of
39:38awareness. So, he has unaware people, so
39:41people have just no idea about anything.
39:43Uh the next is problem aware, so they
39:46have some sort of pain. You have
39:48solution aware.
39:51You have product aware.
39:54And then you have most aware. Okay?
39:57So, those are the five stages. Now, a
39:59customer will basically move in this
40:01direction going from unaware to most
40:03aware. And if you want to go to broader
40:06and broader audiences to get their
40:08attention, the unaware audience you
40:11typically have to go off of broad
40:13curiosity. And so, if you've ever seen
40:15those crazy like ads that are like weird
40:17articles like, you know, Arizona State
40:19blah blah blah has this new blah. Like
40:21they're trying to go after a massive
40:23audience people who have no idea what's
40:25going on. That new, you know, scientific
40:28breakthrough could lead you to buying a
40:29supplement. It could lead you to buying
40:31a weight loss thing. It could lead you
40:32to buying some sort of equipment. It
40:34could lead you to buying insurance. Like
40:35it could go in any direction, but it's
40:37the curiosity that gets them in.
40:39Problem aware would be something to the
40:41extent of like, do you wake up to pee
40:43three times a night? Does it hurt when
40:45you bend over to tie your shoes? Do you
40:46get out of breath when you play with
40:48your kids? Those are going to be problem
40:49aware. Now, they again, that could lead
40:51you to a supplement. That could lead you
40:53to insurance. That could lead you to
40:54whatever, but it's a slightly more aware
40:56person. At least they're problem aware.
40:59Solution aware is that somebody knows of
41:02the potential things that they could buy
41:04and you're helping them select between
41:05them. Product aware is at an even more
41:08micro level. And most aware is typically
41:10your existing customers. So, here is
41:12where you just make offers, right? This
41:15is why the book offers is where I
41:16started because
41:18the people who are here is the tiny
41:20audience here. And so, you just make an
41:21offer to get them to buy. But that only
41:24works for this tiny audience. So, you
41:25will make money quickly doing that, but
41:27you will also cap yourself quickly. In
41:29an effort to figure out, okay, well, how
41:31much should I allocate between these
41:33most aware, less info people and the
41:36maybe problem unaware, high information
41:38people who require more education in
41:40order to make a purchasing decision.
41:42Well, I had one of the most enlightening
41:44conversations I've had in a really long
41:45time with Ben Francis, who's the CEO of
41:47Gymshark. And then he introduced me to
41:49Chris Davis, who's the CMO of New
41:52Balance. And so, we had an awesome
41:54conversation talking about what Chris
41:56had done at New Balance and helped them
41:57just skyrocket their sales. And so, what
42:00they did is that when he took over
42:0330% of their advertising budget was
42:06going to here. It was going to the broad
42:08awareness level storytelling emotional
42:10stuff.
42:11And then 70% was basically geared
42:13towards buying shoes, saying hey go buy
42:15these shoes.
42:16What he did when he took over was that
42:18he flipped them. That he ended up with
42:2070% going to big, high-level pairings,
42:23endorsements, uh specific athletes that
42:26they wanted to recruit that they felt
42:27represented their brand, and only 30% of
42:30their advertising budget went towards
42:33actually telling people that they had
42:34shoes and that they were for sale.
42:36And so
42:38after he made that flip, here's the
42:39crazy part. It took 18 months for them
42:43to see the return on that budget. And so
42:46if you're in a rush, this isn't going to
42:48work. But if you're in a rush, you're
42:49never going to get big anyways. Keeping
42:51this ratio made this concept tactical
42:54for me. And so when I think about my
42:56marketing effort, my marketing dollars,
42:58and most importantly how I measure it,
43:00my marketing impressions, I want to make
43:02sure that 70% or more of the advertising
43:05impressions that someone's going to get
43:07are going to be around the pairings that
43:08I want of me giving something rather
43:10than asking. So when we look at this
43:12ratio, this is actually super well
43:14studied between 70 and 30% here. Because
43:17right now uh
43:19it's actually three and a half to one is
43:21the ratio that has been studied, 3.5 to
43:24one
43:26of give
43:28to ask
43:29to
43:30basically not lose audience. And so if
43:33you look at television for example, and
43:34they've already studied how many
43:35commercials can we jam into the show
43:37before people stop watching. And so they
43:39figured it out that it was
43:41every three and a half minutes of
43:43content they could basically put one
43:44minute of advertising in. If you look at
43:46your Facebook newsfeed, for every three
43:48posts you get when you scroll, you'll
43:50get one ad.
43:51And the platforms that grow the fastest
43:53have a larger percentage of this give
43:56and a smaller percentage of ask. TikTok
43:58for years had zero ads on the platform
44:01and just wanted to grow as virally as
44:02possible and they acquired more users
44:05because they had a give first, give all
44:06the time strategy. And so, the fact that
44:09they settled on this ratio and it has
44:11been corroborated, fancy word for it's
44:13worked in multiple other places, made me
44:16think, "Wow, there's something to this."
44:18And so, this makes this concept of how
44:21do I balance high information buyers,
44:23people that need more brand, people that
44:25need more education prior to purchase
44:27with me making money is that you
44:29basically start with that ratio, add
44:31patience and time, and then it becomes a
44:33snowball that compounds onto itself. And
44:36then you will get to a point in the
44:37future where you were still you're doing
44:39so much more than you could ever
44:42possibly do if you only focused on the
44:43direct response, on the less
44:45information, but you're actually still
44:47digging the well for what you're going
44:48to do next year. And so, basically you
44:50can see when a founder stops running a
44:52business and then the corporate execs
44:53come in because what they do is they
44:55flip the ratio, they basically pull
44:57forward demand from the future, they you
44:59had the the the founder dug the well,
45:01and then they just suck all the water
45:02out of the well, but then they didn't
45:04dig the next well. And so, you're always
45:05going to be ahead of demand. I'll give
45:07you even more tactics if you guys want
45:09more tactics, fine, I'll give you more
45:10tactics. So,
45:12B2B businesses and B2C businesses do
45:14this differently. And this was something
45:15that took me a really long time to
45:16figure out. And so, B2C businesses, so
45:19like business to consumer businesses,
45:21will typically
45:23do these types of pairings in terms of
45:25high information buyers by telling
45:26emotional stories, making associations,
45:29getting endorsements from athletes and
45:31influencers or organizations that
45:33represent the values that they think
45:35resonate with their ideal audience.
45:37And once they do that, they then can
45:39place the product next to those
45:41associations so that they can then pair
45:42them and then the person wants to buy
45:43the product as a consequence.
45:45That is what it looks like in a B2C
45:47business.
45:48But it took me a really long time to
45:49think through, "Well, what does this
45:50look like for a B2B business?"
45:53And so, I break this down into several
45:55tactical things. So, number one is
45:58aspirational outcomes that you have
46:01achieved or the business has helped
46:03facilitate. Secondarily, people like
46:06this person, like your avatar, that you
46:08have helped facilitate. So, just to be
46:09clear, it's stuff that you did, stuff
46:11that you helped other people do.
46:12The third is stuff that you helped them
46:15do,
46:16the prospect themselves, which you can
46:18only facilitate, at least in my opinion,
46:19in two major ways. One is that you give
46:21them free content and education, which
46:23is why I make this stuff, and the second
46:25is that you give them free products and
46:26services, which is just why the books
46:27are free, they're on my site, you can
46:29read them, you can consume them. There's
46:30a scaling road map there, personalized.
46:32All that stuff is free. Because
46:35fundamentally,
46:36it's two degrees of separation if some
46:38person does it. Alex had a big exit, now
46:40he's a big portfolio. Cool, that's two
46:42degrees of separation.
46:43There's other companies in the portfolio
46:45or other businesses who look just like
46:46mine that he helped scale, one degree
46:48separation.
46:49I used this stuff and made more money,
46:52zero degrees of separation. And this is
46:54always going to be stronger than
46:55anything else. But, it'll take longer.
46:58And so, in understanding the difference
46:59between B2C and B2B in terms of what do
47:01I do top of funnel here? How do I
47:03allocate my resources? It means that I'm
47:05spending time putting together the
47:07course in my spare time so that you guys
47:09can go consume it on uh how to make
47:11offers, how to get leads, how to scale
47:13comfort from zero to 100 million. Like,
47:14that's time, that's effort, that's my
47:17team who's behind the camera right now,
47:18that's budget that goes towards that
47:20because I'm not looking for demand
47:22today. I'm looking for those of you who
47:24are going to scale your companies in in
47:25five years hit me up. Let's say
47:26acquisition.com went public tomorrow and
47:28I got asked to for being rude, which I
47:30probably would. And then they put in a
47:31new CEO, and that new CEO says, "I need
47:34to hit quarterly earnings." So, what
47:35would he probably do? He'd probably
47:36switch to lots of direct response, uh
47:39and he'd probably cut down all the
47:41budget on the gives and the books and
47:43all the stuff you're like, "Well,
47:44there's no ROI in a book, like books
47:46don't make any money." It's like, "Yeah,
47:48not today,
47:49but they bring people into our world and
47:52when they do have the next
47:54billion-dollar company, they'll hit us
47:56up first."
47:57And that's the goal. But that guy will
47:59just say, "Well, you know what? Screw
48:00all that. I'm going to recapture all
48:02this marketing spend and effort. We're
48:03going to focus it all on these direct
48:04response ads. Tell people to buy, buy,
48:06buy." And you know what? For a quarter,
48:07it'll work. Maybe two quarters it'll
48:09work. But all of a sudden, it'll start
48:10slowly going down, slowly going down,
48:12slowly going down. And then what
48:13happens? They call the founder back up
48:14and they're like, "Hey, help help help
48:16us fix this." And then the founder's
48:18going to say, "I can't do it in a
48:19quarter.
48:20Like, it's going to take me a year, year
48:21and a half to basically right-size the
48:23ship because you sucked all the wells
48:25dry and I'm going to have to start
48:26digging again." So, the next one is some
48:27of my marketing laws. So, I'm going to
48:29give you a few of them and I'll start
48:30with the first one that you If you've
48:31heard my channel, then you should know
48:32this one. It should be ingrained in your
48:34brain, which is state the facts and tell
48:36the truth. And the reason this is so
48:38important to me is that it forces me as
48:42a advertiser, business person
48:45to change reality.
48:47And so, rather than try and exaggerate,
48:51it makes more sense to put all of the
48:53effort into doing epic stuff and then
48:55telling a truthful story rather than
48:57telling an epic story about something
48:59that was underwhelming. And I think the
49:00vast majority of marketers in marketing
49:02do the second thing. They have something
49:05normal and then they try out try and
49:06tell an exaggerated story of it rather
49:08than having something absolutely insane
49:10and just stating the facts and telling
49:11the truth. And I can tell you that the
49:12second, this one, stating the facts and
49:14telling the truth, is the best long-term
49:16strategy. And so, how do I actionalize
49:19this? All right. So, number one is that
49:20we make the truth more compelling. All
49:22right. We actually change reality. The
49:24second is that we show only what we can
49:26show. And so, I remember I was talking
49:28to you a martial arts guy and he's like,
49:30"There's all these other martial arts
49:31studios, you know, in my area. How do I
49:33stand out?" And I said, "Well, what's
49:35your you know, what's your specialty or
49:37whatever?" And he said, "I'm a double
49:38secret black belt of something." And I
49:40said, "Okay, well, how many double
49:41secret black belts?" He said, "Well,
49:42there's only six in the nation." And I
49:43was like, "Okay, well, do any of them
49:44live in your area?" And he said, "No."
49:46And I was like, "Well, why don't you say
49:47that?" Right? Why don't you say that?
49:50So, every business, if you get narrow
49:52enough, has something that's unique
49:53about it. You might have the best
49:54parking. You might have uh the fastest,
49:57you know, introduction to getting
49:58somebody to sit down. You might have the
50:00most gyms. You know, whatever it is, the
50:02most customers, the most customers at a
50:04certain price point, the most like you
50:06just need to slice the data of the
50:07business to figure out what is unique
50:09about your business. And I remember this
50:10moment in uh Mad Men, which is a uh an
50:13advertising show. It's like an old '50s
50:15show. Well, it's a new show about the
50:16'50s, anyways.
50:18And Don Draper, who's the lead
50:19character, is an advertising guy, um is
50:21pitching a client who's a cigarette
50:23company. And they're trying they're like
50:25the third or fourth in the category.
50:26They're highly commoditized. They're
50:28competing on price, and they're losing.
50:30And so, he asks them to explain how
50:33cigarettes are made. And they kind of
50:34roll their eyes. They're like, "Why is
50:35this important?" He's like, "Okay, well,
50:37first we have the plants, and then we
50:38take" And he keeps going through it.
50:39He's He's like, "And then we, you know,
50:40we let we let it sit out in the sun."
50:42He's like, "What do you mean?" He's
50:44like, "You know, to to to dry out the
50:45leaves." He's like, "So, you toast
50:47them." He's like, "Yeah, we toast them."
50:49He's like,
50:50"It's toasted."
50:51And so, that was a unique part. He just
50:55sliced down and got really narrow about
50:57one particular part of the process and
50:59was able to pull that out and emphasize
51:00it so that people are like, "Oh, this is
51:02different than other things." And the
51:05really important part about this is that
51:06maybe some of the other cigarette
51:08companies also toast it. But they don't
51:11say that they toast it. And so, the
51:13perception is still that it's different
51:15even if it is the same. And so, the best
51:18version of this is finding something
51:19that's truly unique. The second best
51:21version is to just say something that's
51:22unique about something that everyone
51:24else already does, but that your
51:25customers don't know.
51:27And so, the the correlator to that is
51:30say what only you can say. So, you show
51:32what only you can show, and you say what
51:34only you can say. So, the showing part
51:36is going to be like, "Okay, with the
51:37toasting thing, how do we display that
51:39visually?" With the super secret black
51:41belt then, how do we display that? And
51:42you could show the black belt. You could
51:43show you shaking your hands getting the
51:44certification. You could show you
51:45winning some tournament, right? If
51:47you're if you're toasting, you could
51:48show the bed of all the the tobacco
51:50that's getting toasted and the smells
51:52and the wafting through the air,
51:53whatever, right? And then you describe
51:55it in a way that only you can say.
51:57And so, to do this, you get narrower to
52:00be more unique. And so, the thing is is
52:03that you don't need to be the best in
52:04the world. You need to be the best in a
52:06puddle. It's more important that you are
52:08the best than what you are the best of.
52:11I would rather be
52:13from a marketing perspective, not
52:14absolutely. I'd rather have the 10th
52:16biggest company in the world, right?
52:18Than the first biggest company uh in
52:20Indiana. But, from an advertising
52:22perspective, it is more compelling to be
52:23the best.
52:25And I'll tell you a story that I haven't
52:26told.
52:27Um
52:28John Rockefeller,
52:30when he uh was early on in his oil
52:33empire,
52:35bid to buy the biggest oil refinery in
52:39Cincinnati.
52:40And he was the second biggest.
52:42And he ended up overpaying for the
52:46business. And the business owner of the
52:48oil refinery laughed at him and kind of
52:50laughed his way to the bank. He's like,
52:51"You completely overpaid for this
52:52thing." And so, then what John D.
52:54Rockefeller did, after he bought the
52:56second the the first biggest and he
52:58already had the second biggest, is that
53:00he then was able to say he was the
53:02biggest. And then in the next 30 days,
53:05he did over 20 M&A deals in the next 30
53:08days to consolidate the entire rest of
53:11the market because he became the
53:12gorilla.
53:13And so, he was willing to overpay for
53:16the asset to get the story.
53:19The difference in value between what he
53:22should have paid for those 20 deals and
53:24what he was able to pay by strong-arming
53:26those smaller competitors because he was
53:28now the gorilla more than made up for
53:30what he minorly overpaid or maybe even
53:32majorly overpaid for the one company
53:34that he bought. And when he recounts the
53:36story, when he tells the story again, he
53:38talks about how that competitor didn't
53:42see the bigger picture.
53:44And that was always it was such a I
53:46remember reading it in the in the
53:47letters that he wrote to his son and
53:48thinking to myself,
53:50that is powerful. He was willing to
53:53overpay for the story. He saw it as an
53:56investment in his brand, in his
53:57reputation. And so the guy who sold it
54:00just saw it as him overpaying for a
54:01product, but he wasn't appropriately
54:03valuing how much true brand value that
54:06would give Rockefeller as a result. The
54:08next big growth lever is all about the
54:11list, right? So, when I talk about the
54:14list, people immediately think that I'm
54:16talking about email list, direct mail
54:17list, and sometimes that's true. But
54:19I'll give you a hypothetical example.
54:20So, let's say I am selling winter coats.
54:24And I advertise an amazing offer on some
54:27killer coats
54:28that people love, they look amazing, and
54:31nothing comes back. Well,
54:33what could have happened? Well, if I
54:34showed my advertisement to people who
54:36live in South Florida,
54:38the likely that they buy my very
54:39expensive, really heavy, and hot winter
54:41coats is very low. It has nothing to do
54:44with my offer, nothing to do with ad
54:45creative, nothing to do with my pricing,
54:47nothing to do with anything. It's just
54:49the wrong people are seeing it. And so
54:51many smaller businesses
54:54think that marketing doesn't work, when
54:57in reality they were showing it to the
54:58wrong people. And so the first thing
55:01that you have to get right in marketing
55:02is targeting the correct audience. And
55:05so this is different by method of
55:08advertising. And so if we pull up our
55:11core four here, you want to reach out to
55:13people that you know are suffering from
55:16the problem that you solve or have a
55:17high likelihood of suffering from the
55:19problem that you solve. And the narrower
55:21the problem, the smaller the list.
55:24From a paid ads perspective, this is
55:25where the targeting by platform gets
55:27more important. And this is why some ad
55:29platforms tend to be more profitable
55:30than others because what makes an
55:31advertising platform successful is how
55:33well targeted it is. In fact, Facebook
55:36was so good that they had to roll it
55:37back because of privacy laws, but it was
55:39so effective at targeting people that
55:40people complained cuz it was so good. It
55:42felt creepy. Posting content, this is
55:44where the algorithm itself, based on
55:47This is what's crazy. What you look like
55:50and how you talk and what you say will
55:52impact what the AI serves your content
55:56to. The same works with paid ads. And
55:58so, if I want to get more women to buy a
56:02product, guess who I'm not going to have
56:04in the ad? Me. Because this is not what
56:07attracts lots of ladies, right? This is
56:09just usually a bunch of entrepreneurs
56:11who tend
56:12to have beards and like fitness or
56:14whatever else, right? But like my
56:16audience is like 89% male. And sure, for
56:19for my 11% females, keep rocking, I
56:21appreciate you. Um but by and large, I
56:23have a male-driven audience. Now, maybe
56:25it's because I talk about money, but
56:26there's tons of female entrepreneurs who
56:28talk about money and don't have
56:29predominantly male audiences. And so,
56:31it's just that my way of saying things
56:32and or the algorithm just tends to
56:34display it to dudes. And so, one of the
56:36easiest ways to make sure that you're
56:38displaying your ads to the right avatar
56:41is make sure that the person in the ad
56:42looks like the avatar. And I'll tell you
56:44a funny story. So, when I was running
56:47the Gym Launch 1.0 version, which is
56:49where we used to fly out to gyms and do
56:50the turnarounds,
56:52I found out that when I put the thank
56:53you page, this is before automated
56:55schedulers even existed. So, it's kind
56:56of wild. All right. Um I remember when I
56:59got my first automated schedule put on
57:00the thank you page, I thought I had like
57:02I'd I'd cured cancer. I was like, this
57:04is the coolest thing ever. People can
57:05automatically book. Like I don't have to
57:06call them and work the lead.
57:08Um and so anyways, the thank you page
57:10that I set up uh was just like, "Hey,
57:12text this number." And then the second
57:14version of the thank you page was, "Hey,
57:16my name's Alex. I'm going to be the one
57:18calling you." So, I put a picture of me
57:19and I said, "I'm going to be calling you
57:20from this number." So, I tried to put
57:21some visual to it.
57:23Then when I put Leila's picture on the
57:25thank you page and said, "Leila's going
57:27to be the one contacting you." What do
57:29you know? Our response rates went
57:31through the roof. People were
57:32immediately responsive. They were
57:33showing up to appointments. They were oh
57:35yeah, sure. I can make 5:00. For me
57:37they're like oh no, I don't give a
57:38right. And so if you want to attract a
57:40certain avatar, try to make sure that
57:43what is in your content, how you talk
57:46matches the way they talk because
57:47fundamentally all marketing works as
57:51long as you get the targeting right.
57:52It's like think about this way. If you
57:55walked into a room, this is how I like
57:57to visualize marketing because people
57:58people over complicate it. If I walked
58:00into a room and I got on stage and there
58:02was a thousand people in the room. If
58:03those thousand people were my ideal
58:05customers, then even if I had just like
58:08a really mediocre offer and
58:12something that they like kind of wanted,
58:14I would get some response. Now it might
58:16not be efficient. It might not get me
58:17the return I want, so I might lose
58:19money, but I might I would probably make
58:21something, right? I would get some
58:23clicks. I would get some leads, right?
58:25And so it would allow me to start the
58:26feedback loop so I can improve. But if
58:28nothing is coming through, it's
58:30typically because the wrong people are
58:31seeing it. And so one of the highest
58:33leverage ways of getting more from
58:34advertising is just making sure the
58:36right people are seeing it.
58:38Which is a perfect transition into the
58:40next one, which is how do you know that
58:42you've mastered something? Which is that
58:44masters have more ways to win. Now, what
58:47does that actually mean?
58:49They understand the many different ways
58:52that you can measure progress. So if you
58:55were to talk to an HR professional,
58:58okay? And you ask them what do you do? A
59:01lot of times they're going to give you a
59:02couple vague answers. They're like, you
59:03know, I'll payroll and I'll
59:05I'll make sure that people get in their
59:06benefits and whatever.
59:08But when you talk to someone who's a
59:09master at this and I remember the first
59:11time I had somebody who completely
59:13improved my understanding of talent and
59:15acquisition and recruiting. Um in the
59:18interview, the candidate said, oh,
59:21well what's your time to fill? And I was
59:23like, what do you mean? She's like, well
59:24the average time to fill a role. I was
59:26like, I don't know. She's like, oh,
59:28well, what's your what's your two-sided
59:29fit? I was like,
59:31I don't know what you mean.
59:32And so, she's like, okay, what's your
59:35cost to acquire talent? I was like,
59:38I don't know. And so, she had all of
59:41these different metrics that she was
59:43using to measure, which completely made
59:44sense to me. Like, I have cost to
59:45acquire a customer, I should have cost
59:47to acquire talent. I should have, you
59:49know, what's my cash conversion cycle?
59:51How quickly do I get my first sale? How
59:52quickly do I fill a role? And then, in
59:54terms of like customer satisfaction,
59:56it's basically employee satisfaction of
59:58how likely is it that the manager and
1:00:01the employee both say at day 90 that
1:00:03this is a 10 out of 10 fit. And so, when
1:00:06I started looking at that, I was like,
1:00:06oh, wow, there's a total there's a whole
1:00:08'nother level of understanding this that
1:00:11I I had no idea about. Because masters
1:00:13have a higher quality and quantity of
1:00:16metrics that they use to measure
1:00:18progress. And so, if I am trying to fix
1:00:21this function, I have nothing to know
1:00:23how well I'm doing. And so, a beginner
1:00:25will try to advertise, or will try to
1:00:27sell, and they will have binary
1:00:29outcomes. They'll just say, I didn't
1:00:30sell, or I did sell, or I got leads, or
1:00:32I didn't get leads. But, there are so
1:00:34many nuanced steps between that. And
1:00:37when you have the milestones, the
1:00:39progress markers, it allows you to fix
1:00:42things so you can keep moving the buck
1:00:43along until you get the outcome. And so,
1:00:45I'll tell you a story about this.
1:00:47So, when I was starting outbound, way
1:00:49back in the day,
1:00:51I it was a new channel for us, and I'd
1:00:53never done it. And about 90 days, or or
1:00:57or 4 months in, my executive team kind
1:01:00of did like an intervention. So, they
1:01:01came together, and it's like I was
1:01:02getting like a drug rehab, right? They
1:01:04were like, we think this is a problem.
1:01:06We think this is a shiny object. We
1:01:07think you're you're distracted, and we
1:01:09should double down on what works. I was
1:01:10like, how dare you use my words against
1:01:11me, right? And the thing is is that
1:01:14strategically, I knew we needed to have
1:01:15a second acquisition channel for us to
1:01:17sell the business. And so, I was like,
1:01:19no, it's because they could only see
1:01:22that we'd only done one sale in four
1:01:23months and 100% of my time was going
1:01:25towards this. But what they didn't see
1:01:27was all the progress that we were
1:01:28making. And so I had higher degrees of
1:01:31mastery in this. Now, to be fair, it was
1:01:32just because I had learned it along the
1:01:33way, but when it started it was like,
1:01:35"Okay, well, we have to get a list. So,
1:01:37where do we get the list?" So, we looked
1:01:38at you know, we bought a bunch of
1:01:39different lists. A lot of different
1:01:39lists didn't work. One of them did.
1:01:40We're like, "Okay, this is a good
1:01:41provider." And then we start, you know,
1:01:43like, "Oh, we got to enrich the data."
1:01:44So, we start learning how to enrich the
1:01:45data. Then we we started calling them,
1:01:46but then no one's picking up. And then
1:01:47we had to learn how call wrapping works.
1:01:49So, we get local numbers. Then all of a
1:01:50sudden people start picking up and then
1:01:51start hanging up on us. So, then we had
1:01:52to fix the the hook in the script. And
1:01:54then we fixed the hook in the script,
1:01:55people would make it a minute, but then
1:01:56they'd hang up on us. So, then we got we
1:01:57fixed the hook, and then we fixed the
1:01:58offer, and then people would then go to
1:01:59the second call, but then they weren't
1:02:01showing up for the second call. And so,
1:02:02it's like, we have to just keep moving
1:02:04the buck along the way. But if you
1:02:06looked at it two months in, it's like,
1:02:08you know, a heart surgery looks like
1:02:09murder to somebody from the outside who
1:02:11doesn't understand the milestones. And
1:02:13so, as you master something, if you
1:02:15don't know why something's not working,
1:02:16look closer. Look for the smaller
1:02:18attributes that you can actually zoom in
1:02:20on and say, "Okay, well,
1:02:22we'll get a sale eventually if we just
1:02:23keep moving in this direction." And so,
1:02:25look for directional correctness rather
1:02:27than binary. And so, this is a perfect
1:02:29example of masters have more leading
1:02:31indicators to success than beginners do.
1:02:34Beginners typically look at purely the
1:02:36lagging They just say churn is up. They
1:02:38sales are down. Revenue's down. Cash
1:02:39collection's down. Those are all lagging
1:02:41indicators. You can't If I looked at you
1:02:42and said, "Increase revenue." You can't
1:02:44do anything. If I said, "Decrease
1:02:45churn." You can't do anything with that.
1:02:46You would then have to do something
1:02:47else, and then the result would be a
1:02:49decrease in churn. The result would be
1:02:50more revenue. The result would be more
1:02:51sales. And so, we have to do we have to
1:02:54identify what all those steps are that
1:02:56are high correlates or increase the
1:02:58likelihood that ultimate outcome occurs.
1:03:00And if you liked these growth
1:03:01principles, you're absolutely going to
1:03:03love the 13 years of marketing lessons
1:03:05that I've learned. It's one of my top
1:03:06videos. Enjoy it.

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