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Inside the Idea Factory: Mike Rhodes’ AI-Powered Google Ads Hacks | #471 — Transcript

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0:01You don't ever quite know where you're
0:03going, but the process of taking that
0:06next step is what gets you towards the
0:08thing. And you learn a lot along the
0:10way. The more stuff you give away, the
0:13more you're going to get people to buy
0:15your That is the only constraint,
0:17isn't it? It's time to turn ideas into
0:19cool
0:21Welcome to Add to Cart, Australia's
0:23leading e-commerce podcast that Express
0:26delivers all you need to know in the
0:28fastmoving world of online retail.
0:30Here's your host, Bushy.
0:36What do you get when you cross a data
0:38geek, an AI innovator, an ex agency
0:41owner, and a helicopter enthusiast? You
0:44get the marvelous Mike Rhodess, who just
0:46happens to be our guest today. Welcome
0:48back to Adicart. As always, my name is
0:50Bushy and I am joining you from the land
0:53of the terrible people here in Brisbane,
0:55Australia. I'm so excited to introduce
0:58you to Mike Rhodess. He's one of my most
1:02favorite people to chat with because you
1:04never know what is going to come out of
1:06his mouth. He is a man who lives and
1:09breathes ideas. In fact, when he started
1:12up his new business after selling his
1:14agency, he literally just called his new
1:16business Mike Roads Ideas. That's how
1:19many ideas he has. This is a venture
1:22dedicated to helping businesses unlock
1:24the full potential of their data and
1:26their advertising campaigns. Mike is a
1:28former agency owner who many of us will
1:31know because he ran Web Savvy for 17
1:33years. He's also a celebrated author.
1:36He's been named in the top 20 PPC
1:38influencers and is an innovator in AI
1:41and automation. Let's not forget that he
1:43tinkers with helicopters and has a
1:44penchant for mountain biking. Did I
1:46mention he's an overachiever? I think I
1:48did. In this episode, we dive into how
1:51Mike has created and uses scripts, data,
1:55and AI to help businesses crack open the
1:58black box of Google Performance Max
2:01campaigns that he spent years
2:04perfecting. And now he's using AI
2:06scripts to do it on scale really cheaply
2:10for so many e-commerce businesses. It's
2:13a script that's caused waves at Google
2:15HQ. As Mike explains, he heard that it
2:17was actually mentioned in their town
2:18hall. It's a script that's helped
2:20agencies win new clients and it's even
2:23caught the attention of organizations
2:26such as UNICEF. Today, we explore this
2:30script as well as the future of search
2:32in the age of AI. how Mike's curiosity
2:35has driven his career choices to date
2:37and his golden rule, building things
2:40that help as many people as possible.
2:43Now, before we get into today's episode,
2:45this is the part of the show where I
2:46normally plug the newsletter, but I want
2:48to switch it up today. I want to invite
2:50you into the add toart campus community.
2:53It's a learning community with about 150
2:56people in there at the moment. Our goal
2:58is to help e-commerce professionals
3:00learn from each other and share great
3:03things. In there, you will find our
3:05inspiration library filled with articles
3:07to keep you informed and inspired in
3:10your job. You will find our tech and
3:12services directory where we list
3:14services that we hand on heart believe
3:17in and can recommend. And you'll have
3:19the opportunity to mix with some of the
3:21best in e-commerce. It's free to join.
3:23Head on over to adcart.com.au/campus.
3:27Love to see you in there. All right,
3:29let's get into this chat with Mike. It
3:31is a fascinating one. As always, a big
3:34thanks to our partners, Shopify Plus and
3:36Deliver in person for making this
3:38episode and the Adart podcast possible.
3:41Here's Mike Rhodess.
3:44>> Mike, welcome to Add toart.
3:45>> Nathan, thanks for inviting me on, mate.
3:47Good to be here. Pleasure.
3:48>> It was great. And twice in two weeks. I
3:50saw you at the e-commerce social last
3:52week in Melbourne. Thank you for coming
3:53along.
3:54>> Oh, that was pleasure. That was a great
3:56event. Congrats. sold out. 150 people,
3:58great panel. We all had a great night.
4:00Free booze. Fantastic. It
4:02>> was great. Thank you, Convert Digital,
4:03for the free booze. Love that. But no,
4:05it was awesome to see. I saw such a
4:06great mix of people and people that I
4:09was like looking around and going, "Oh,
4:10I haven't seen you for ages, Brandon. I
4:12haven't seen you for ages." Like every
4:14And I was like I I was kind of felt like
4:16I was ping ponging around the room all
4:17night, not being able to get into a
4:19great conversation. But that's the fun
4:20of them, right?
4:21>> Oh, you were the hostess with the
4:22mostest, mate. You were doing well.
4:24>> I do my best. All right, Mike. Let's get
4:26into it. I'm going to start with your
4:28LinkedIn tagline because I always do my
4:30research and I always go to my guests
4:33LinkedIn page first. And your tagline is
4:36one of the best that I've seen. All
4:38right, I'm going to read it out for
4:39everyone listening. Dad, husband,
4:42thinker, mountain biker, top 20 PPC
4:46influencer, serial founder, speaker.
4:50That's a lot. Is
4:53that in order of importance? Yeah, I
4:56guess. Well, the first two definitely
4:58>> bad husband. Okay.
5:00>> Yeah, I sort of I think I must have been
5:03thinking that when I wrote them. So,
5:04let's go with Yes.
5:06>> Yes.
5:07>> Well, Thinker is an interesting one
5:09because it leads me to your current
5:12venture. I don't know if you call it a
5:14venture or what you call I'd love to
5:15hear it from you because it is actually
5:17called Mike Rhodess Ideas. That's the
5:20name. Like that's where you're working
5:22right now, Mike's Ideas. And you've got
5:24an amazing backstory as an agency owner,
5:26an entrepreneur, author, and internet
5:29cafe owner, plus a love passion for
5:32helicopters
5:34now working at Microsde.
5:36What is MicroSt?
5:38>> Yeah, if you can tell me by the end of
5:40this, I'd be really grateful. Help me
5:42explain what it is.
5:43>> Going to give me a thousand ideas.
5:45>> Well, the bit I loved from my last 17
5:49years building webs as an agency was the
5:51conversations. Whether that was
5:53brainstorming with the team, whether
5:55that was sitting down with a client, but
5:57not just like, hey, this is what we've
5:59done, but like what are you stuck with?
6:00What's the I just love solving problems.
6:04I've always always loved that. And I
6:06didn't want to be one of those guys who
6:09sells their business and starts a
6:10consulting firm and like I just I'd
6:12never loved the word consultant. I I
6:15mean I do a bit of consulting. I'm on a
6:16couple of advisory boards. I mentor a
6:18couple of agencies, but it just feels
6:21kind of neat gray and boring and stale.
6:24And I I think I heard about it. I'm
6:26fairly sure I heard this on a podcast
6:28somewhere. And I just thought that's
6:30genius. I'm stealing that and calling it
6:31an ideas company. And because it's the
6:33ideas bit that I love. I am not My old
6:37team will tell you this. I am not an
6:38operational person. Like I'm really good
6:41at starting I'm really bad at the
6:43last 20%. So, if I can walk into a room,
6:46stand around the whiteboard with one of
6:48these for a bit and solve problems and
6:51and ask questions and chuck a whole
6:53bunch of stuff on the wall and then go
6:55right over to you guys to go implement
6:58that and operationalize it. Off you go.
7:01I'll be over here doing the same thing
7:02on that whiteboard next door.
7:04>> That's the bit that I I've always loved
7:06the most. So it just sort of made sense
7:08to not not overpromise and underd
7:11deliver by saying I'm a consultant and
7:12I'm going to come in and do all this D.
7:14I'm like I am going to bring some ideas
7:16and that's it. Like don't expect me to
7:17do a whole bunch of stuff after that.
7:20>> How do people respond when you go I'm
7:22here for the ideas. I'm not here to
7:23implement stuff.
7:24>> Well, if I was any good at marketing,
7:26we'd find out. Um
7:29but I don't really know because I
7:30haven't really pushed it super hard. I
7:33it's been very much inbound to this
7:35point and that's kind of the way I like
7:37it. So yes, I I don't really know can't
7:39answer that question. I'm very bad at
7:41answering the question like what do you
7:42do?
7:43>> Yeah, but that's kind of interesting in
7:46itself, right? When you can't you don't
7:49have a hammer and a nail. So tell me
7:51though what I am interested though is
7:54obviously with web savvy and we'd love
7:56I'd love to unpack the journey with web
7:58savvy because that was your agency for
7:5917 years really leading the space in the
8:02search department here locally but
8:07without the boundaries of web savvy when
8:10you just go out there as the I'm the
8:12ideas guy and I know you're playing
8:13around the AI space and the automation
8:16space as well as being really well known
8:18for search. How do you put barriers
8:21around the types of problems that you
8:22can solve?
8:23>> That's a really really good question.
8:24Yeah. The power of positive constraints.
8:27Like I've talked to my kids about this.
8:28Like if someone says to you sing a song
8:30like sing a country song about a guy
8:33that dies and his dog leaves him. It's
8:35like oh okay right now we've got like
8:36>> I'm not sure that narrows it down on
8:38country songs though.
8:39>> Well that is all country songs isn't it?
8:41Yeah. But but like yeah those
8:42constraints. So I suppose yes I've been
8:45known a bit for some Google ad stuff. I
8:47love teaching. I love inspiring people.
8:49So, it kind of made sense to go, there's
8:52this wonderful concept of the adjacent
8:54possible, which I picture like this big
8:56scary house, and you have no idea what's
8:59out the back, but all you can do is just
9:01open the door. And you open the door,
9:02and you walk into a room, and then there
9:04are three other doors, and that's your
9:05choice. Like, you can pick a door. And
9:07when you walk into that next room, oh,
9:09you learn a bit and there's some cool
9:10stuff there. And then there's three
9:12other doors and then there's three other
9:13doors and three other doors and you
9:14don't ever quite know where you're
9:16going. But the process of taking that
9:19next step is what gets you towards the
9:21thing and you learn a lot along the way
9:24which is a bit like life I guess going
9:25super philosophical for a moment. It's
9:27like when we look back you can see how
9:29all the dots line up and you go makes
9:31bloody obvious sense. Of course that led
9:33to that but when you're in it you're
9:35like I have no idea which way I'm going.
9:37What's next? Like where where am I
9:39heading to? But it's obvious in
9:41hindsight. And so the idea was to okay,
9:44let's go the adjacent possible to Google
9:47Ads. I had a wonderful dev work with me
9:50for 8 years. She went off and found her
9:52dream job a couple of years ago and
9:54inevitably as soon as that happens,
9:57starts breaking. So I had the time, I
10:00had the curiosity, I started learning to
10:02code again. I'd learned back in uni and
10:05as a kid, I'd tinker around a bit. I
10:07quite enjoy it. It's solving problems.
10:09When you reframe it as just it's a way
10:11to solve problems and turn your ideas
10:12into stuff, I was like, I really like
10:15this. And so I started doing that and
10:18learned a little bit of code, put a post
10:20on LinkedIn, which blew up. We'll
10:22probably come back and talk about that.
10:25But it was just like, ooh, this is
10:27really good. And this is also where I
10:30see the future of Google Ads going, of
10:34agencies going. I feel obligated. Maybe
10:38that's very egotistical, obligated to
10:40kind of share that belief and and help
10:45the agencies that share that belief to
10:47like figure out what that future looks
10:49like and to head in that direction. And
10:51so it wasn't super conscious, but that's
10:53the constraint. It's sort of like you're
10:55going from ads towards this world of AI.
10:58How do we navigate that journey? And so
11:01I've been building little things and
11:03tinkering and sharing ideas along the
11:05way. And yeah, I I don't mean I know
11:07nothing about so many types of
11:09businesses, right? I love the business
11:10of business, but I know nothing about
11:12manufacturing. I know nothing about all
11:14kinds of businesses. This little corner
11:16of the world, I've got some ideas about.
11:19So, I um I stay in my lane. My goodness,
11:22you've given me so many doors to unpack
11:24there in terms of where we can go in our
11:26conversation.
11:27But I so related to that because when
11:29you talked about the doors to open, I
11:32went through my own stuff last year with
11:34closing an agency and then I was like,
11:37well, what do I do now? And I was like,
11:41there are so many opportunities. Like we
11:42were talking about education, uh,
11:44consulting, coaching, more content, like
11:48there was so many different
11:49opportunities. And I said, "All right,
11:502024 is going to be the year of fun and
11:53the idea of just opening a few doors and
11:55seeing what's behind them." I call them
11:57boxes. I always have this picture of
11:58I've got all these boxes stacked up in
12:00the corner of my office here and I can
12:02choose which ones I open and which ones
12:04I keep closed cuz as soon as you open a
12:06box, you're like, "All right, you're
12:08in." Like, you've got to unpack that box
12:10now.
12:10>> Got to do something with it.
12:11>> Got to do something with it. So, I love
12:13your door analogy. Tell us about if we
12:15go back to the point where you
12:18transition from web savvy into this idea
12:21of starting to open the doors up and
12:23exploring different ideas. Can you share
12:27what the moment was that led you from
12:29exiting the agency game and then having
12:33this opportunity to explore new ideas?
12:36>> I guess I was pretty much building the
12:38parachute on the way down really, but I
12:40had like I said I'd shared this free
12:43script. I guess it was about a year
12:46previous so just before chat GBT came
12:48out and that went bananas on LinkedIn.
12:51So, I was sort of like, "Oh, okay,
12:53there's something here." And I'd always
12:55had a a second business off to the side.
12:57It was never big enough to really focus
12:59on the the agency always kept winning
13:01out in terms of my time and attention.
13:05But this other business, I had always
13:06taught other agencies how to do what we
13:09do. So, you know, how to run Google ads
13:11properly and that sort of morphed into
13:13some analytics and some data analysis
13:16and other bits.
13:17>> An agency teaching other agencies how to
13:19do what you do. Why not? Yeah.
13:23Okay. Basically, give it away. And
13:26because
13:28why did I do that? I think there are
13:30like digital
13:32agencies are a little bit above used car
13:36salesman in the minds of an awful lot of
13:38small business owners because every
13:40small business owner has sadly been
13:42ripped off by an agency along the way at
13:44some point, maybe more than once.
13:46>> And that really pisses me off.
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15:00When I was starting out a long time ago,
15:02when the dinosaurs were around, there
15:04were a lot of quite big companies, who
15:07shall remain nameless, because my
15:08lawyers aren't good enough because I'm
15:10allergic to lawyers, who were ripping
15:12people off. And it it just it really
15:14pissed me off. And I think that was
15:16really one of the reasons that I ended
15:18up starting an agency because this guy
15:20one day said to me, "Mate, I really need
15:21your help. I I know you keep saying like
15:23you can't help me, but I really need
15:25your help." And so I wanted to in my own
15:28little way say like here are some ways
15:31to do it. I think that's always been my
15:32mo. I just if I learn something I want
15:34to teach it. I have this like desperate
15:36need for I don't know affirmation or
15:39being useful. I just love being useful.
15:41And so if I learn something and I'm
15:43always learning new cuz I'm just
15:45insatiably curious. My mo is to then
15:49teach the stuff that I'm learning if I
15:52think it's going to be useful to people.
15:54I don't want to sit on that and hoard
15:56it. I feel like I need to teach. And so
15:59it was natural after I sold to Well, I
16:02was supposed to sit around and do
16:03nothing for a bit, but that didn't last
16:04more than about 3 weeks.
16:06>> How long were you to sit around and do
16:08nothing for
16:09>> like oh I'm just going to solve this
16:11problem and do a bit of code and oh then
16:13this and then AI is moving so fast,
16:15right? That sort of having any kind of
16:18having that time to be able to go full
16:20into that has just been such a luxury. I
16:23I get that I'm talking from a point of
16:24privilege here, but it's been so cool
16:27just to explore that and tinker and try
16:30new things. And I basically now spend my
16:31day solving problems, and I just love
16:34that. It's really interesting that you
16:38almost spin the conversation around
16:43those moments where you shared things as
16:46egotistical or, you know, wanting
16:49affirmation or whatever as a negative.
16:51But
16:51>> hold me, Nathan. hope exactly turn into
16:54a therapy session. But it struck me from
16:57the outside. We didn't have a lot to do
16:59with each other in the web savvy days. I
17:01came along along a lot of your stuff as
17:03you were building this in public and
17:05sharing your scripts so generously. And
17:08I just thought, who is this guy and why
17:10is he giving all this away for free? And
17:13it's really interesting stuff. It's not
17:15fluff. It's not, hey, reply to this
17:17LinkedIn thread with rocket fuel to get
17:20my free thing in your inbox. It was
17:23genuine sharing and I want to show you
17:25how to do this. There's a script
17:26available over here. Here's the link. Go
17:28use it. Go experiment. And it was done
17:31from a pure intention of go play with
17:34this. I'd love some feedback. I'd love
17:36to know how you're using it. Let's build
17:38this together. I'm going to be leading
17:39the charge, but here it is. Go play. And
17:42that was really refreshing for me.
17:44>> Thanks, man. Thank you. I'm sure there's
17:46a selfish angle there. I heard this line
17:48the other day on a podcast of a guy Dan
17:50Harris talking about the Dalai Lama with
17:53this phrase, wise selfishness. I love
17:55that. So, it's like I'm sure there is
17:57like I'm a marketer, right? Direct
18:00response marketer through and through
18:01for 20 years. So, the more stuff you
18:04give away, the more you're going to
18:08get people to to buy your I mean,
18:11ultimately, you know, it still pays the
18:12mortgage. So, I I still sell a paid
18:15version of that script, but yeah, I give
18:17the free one away. I give a whole bunch
18:18of other stuff away because it just
18:20feels like the right thing to do. And
18:22the LinkedIn algorithm, I don't really
18:24spend much time thinking about that, but
18:27I'm sure it helps.
18:30Yeah, the more I give away, the more it
18:31seems to do well.
18:32>> It's doing phenomenally. So, tell us
18:34about the first script that you put up
18:37on LinkedIn. That post that you said
18:40>> really took off and caught you by
18:41surprise. What was it and how did you
18:44kick it off?
18:45>> So, we were chatting internally. So,
18:48I've worked with a number of amazing
18:50people back at Web Savvy, Stacy and
18:52Calvin and many, many others who are too
18:54many to name, but we were talking about
18:56like how we would try and figure out.
19:00So, backstory, Google performance max.
19:03In the early days, we talked about it as
19:05like revenue max for Google, not for
19:08you. it spends money where it decides it
19:11wants to spend money across all of the
19:13different platforms within Google. And
19:15we kind of worked out fairly early on,
19:17huh, if we look at some numbers in here,
19:20we can work out how much video was
19:22shown. And if you go through and make
19:25sense of all of these numbers over here,
19:26which is painful to do, but you can do
19:27it, we can work out how much was
19:29actually shown in terms of like shopping
19:31ads. And then there's the rest.
19:34And then this amazing guy in Copenhagen
19:37saw the stuff I'd done and he reached
19:38out and we had a chat and he showed me
19:40this little trick that he'd figured out
19:42to work out you could work out which
19:45bits would display and which bits were
19:46searched. So now we can chop pmax into
19:49four chunks of traffic and we were doing
19:51this manually to start with and then I
19:54was learning enough code just to be able
19:56to start to automate that and I've
20:00always been really good with
20:01spreadsheets. So turn it into a pretty
20:02chart so that you can, you know, have
20:04that insight much faster and you can
20:06visually see where your money is going.
20:08The bit where I knew this was going well
20:11is I've got a few mates inside of
20:14Google. I won't name names, but they
20:16told me that so they have this like big
20:18sit down meeting every Friday. Thank god
20:20it's Friday meeting across the whole
20:22thing. Like Sundar sometimes does it in
20:25Mountain View. I've been in the room
20:26once. That was epic. I didn't get to go
20:29into that meeting, but I've like
20:30wandered around where the amphitheater
20:32is and where they have that. My name got
20:35mentioned twice in two of these Friday
20:37meetings
20:38>> in a positive way
20:40>> because something to do with the script
20:41because sort of like I think I have no
20:43idea what was said. They wouldn't tell
20:44me that bit. But obviously along the
20:47lines of oh bugger, someone's figured it
20:48out. Like this stuff that was hidden is
20:52now visible. And that script just went
20:55absolutely bananas. I mean like my
20:57average LinkedIn post, not that I really
20:59did much before then, probably got about
21:00five and a half impressions. This thing
21:02got a million impressions all told. And
21:05it just went ballistic. And so it was
21:07really easy and obvious like after I'd
21:09sold and I had the time to build out a
21:12paid version of that that does way more
21:15stuff inside the spreadsheet because
21:16again I'm a spreadsheet nerd and I like
21:18doing that with just insights into all
21:20these different areas. And I just
21:22chucked it online. I was speaking at an
21:24event in Italy, so I launched it at that
21:27and it's just gone way better than
21:29expected ever since. It's been great.
21:31>> That's amazing. And I'm not enough of a
21:35Google nerd to be in the level of detail
21:38that you are, but when you were coming
21:41up with that script, when you noticed
21:42that you were able to split the
21:45impressions across those different ad
21:48types and kind of decipher the PMAX
21:50code, were you coming from a point of
21:54I'm doing this because I know how to do
21:56it or I'm doing this because I know this
21:59is a major problem for advertisers. They
22:04need this information.
22:05>> I was doing it to like how do we make
22:08our clients results better? Like I
22:10wanted to know where it all really
22:12started was okay, we're getting great
22:14results. We're getting row as a seven
22:16and we're spending a grand a day. What I
22:18really wanted to know was if we increase
22:20that budget to 1,500 a day and then to
22:22two grand a day, what would happen to
22:25rorowaz and would the machine start to
22:28would it just take all that extra money
22:30and start to waste it on display and
22:32video? That's really what I wanted to
22:34know. Or would it assign a big chunk of
22:36that to shopping and would that high
22:38rorowaz continue? And so it was an a way
22:41for us to monitor and improve our own
22:44experiments. And then it just grew from
22:48there. And we'd also being able to chart
22:50it and being able to see that by day and
22:52you'd see this big spike where YouTube
22:56would suddenly be spending half your
22:57budget. It enabled you then to dive in
23:00and make some changes way way earlier
23:02than you otherwise would to get that
23:04thing back on track, make some changes.
23:06There's not a million changes that you
23:08can make. PMAX is kind of a bit of a
23:10black box, but there's a lot more than
23:12many people think you can make. And so
23:14it was this early warning canary in the
23:15coal mine kind of system so the guys
23:18could do what they do so well. And so
23:22you needed that baseline of these
23:25channels whether it's YouTube video or
23:27otherwise we actually don't want our
23:29money going in there because they have
23:31less ROI than say a shopping campaign
23:34where we want more money going into
23:36>> and we we don't want to ignore Pmax and
23:40stick to shopping cuz smart shopping
23:42popped up for a while and then
23:44disappeared and people sort of saw PMAX
23:46as a replacement for smart shopping.
23:47Standards shopping is still very much
23:49alive, especially given Google's
23:51announcement last week of now the two
23:53are sort of on par and PMAX doesn't
23:55steal all of the revenue. But the fierce
23:58certainly back then a couple of years
24:00ago was that the pmaxification of
24:02everything was going to continue and
24:05we've seen this with other things that
24:07Google has done where they really want
24:08to push a new thing. The old thing
24:12suddenly starts to wither and die a
24:14little bit. And so our fear was that old
24:16shopping campaigns would would not get
24:19the impressions that we would be forced
24:21into PMAX, which to Google's credit
24:24hasn't happened, at least not yet. But
24:27that was our fear like, okay, we're
24:28going to have to master this thing. If
24:31we're going to do that, we need more
24:32data. So, let's figure out a way to
24:35automate the getting of that data
24:36because doing it manually is just too
24:38slow. And that's really at the core of
24:40like really all of my scripts. I'm not
24:42trying to certainly I'm not trying to
24:44replace people, remove people, but or
24:47even to to do stuff in the interface.
24:50I'm not trying to make automated changes
24:52to Google Ads campaigns because I've
24:55seen some of the crazy ways that people
24:56misuse scripts, but it's just automating
24:59turning data into insight so that you
25:02can, you know, sorry, turn data into
25:03information so that you can get to
25:05insight much much faster. And you don't
25:07spend all of that time downloading stuff
25:10and cleaning data and reordering columns
25:13in Excel. It's just that stuff should be
25:16automated so that whenever you need to,
25:18you open up the sheet and bang, there's
25:20everything that you need beautifully
25:22presented that enables you to then have
25:24that insight, talk to the client, solve
25:26the problem, improve results, move on.
25:29>> Amazing. So, I'm going to play dummy,
25:31which I do very well here. Tell me,
25:34we're talking a lot about scripts. This
25:36might be a foreign world for some people
25:38listening. Can you talk us through if
25:40I'm say a merchant and I'm seeing one of
25:43your scripts that go up on LinkedIn and
25:45you go, "Hey, look, look at what I can
25:47run." And it has this spreadsheet which
25:49spits out where your ads being spent and
25:51the likelihood of where an incremental
25:53spend will go and the results that it
25:55will get for you. How do I as a merchant
25:58actually use your script?
26:00>> Cuz it sounds really scary, right? I'm
26:02using words like script and JavaScript
26:04and uh it is the simplest thing in the
26:07world and it's a great way for someone
26:09that's sort of not rank raw beginner but
26:13sort of advanced beginner to start to
26:16open their eyes and go oh my god this is
26:20what's possible because once you get
26:22this first little bit once you go
26:24through that door and into that room you
26:27see these other doors and you're like oh
26:28I can't wait to see what's behind that
26:30next door. So, a script is really just a
26:32tiny little bit of code. It's written in
26:34this thing called JavaScript. It looks
26:35like gobbledygook. It's just a piece of
26:37code that you don't have to change or do
26:39anything with. You copy it from my site
26:42from all the other people that give away
26:43free scripts and you paste it into a
26:46special area inside your Google Ads
26:48account and then it does stuff. And so,
26:50yes, it could make changes to your
26:52account. None of mine do that. All mine
26:54do is just go grab the data from the
26:57Google computers and dump it into a
27:00spreadsheet and then make that data
27:03useful. Turn it into useful information.
27:06Turn it into pretty charts, um, alerts,
27:09just make it useful. So again, that that
27:11time to insight instead of wasting all
27:14of that time or staring at the Google
27:16UI, which is basically a whole lot of
27:19numbers. Instead of doing that, our
27:21brains are really good at spotting
27:23patterns, and it's much easier to do
27:24that visually. So, I take all of the
27:26data, turn it into pretty charts, and
27:28go, there you go. It's much easier to to
27:31spot the problem or find the anomaly or
27:33or or see the trend when you can see it
27:36visually.
27:37>> Yeah. Awesome. That's a really good
27:38explanation. Thank you for that. What
27:40kind of changes have you seen some
27:43clients or contacts even make off the
27:46back of that initial script? On the
27:48agency side, I've had people tell me
27:50just how many more clients they've won.
27:53They've literally shown them the
27:54spreadsheet during the sales process and
27:56said, "We can tell all of this stuff
27:58about your performance max campaigns."
27:59And like, I'm in.
28:02I get people emailing me on LinkedIn and
28:04going, "I I need to send you some money.
28:06This is winning me all these clients."
28:07I've had businesses just basically say,
28:10"Thank you." Like, now I feel like I
28:12understand it. There's transparency.
28:14I've been really I mean like let me just
28:16name drop here for a moment just to
28:18satiate my ego massively. I'm really
28:21happy with like some of the names some
28:23very very big agencies you know the
28:24densus of the world but some of the
28:26businesses like we I had the UN bought
28:28the other day
28:29>> the UN
28:30>> the UN like a department of the UN but
28:32like yeah
28:33>> it is it blows my mind the number of
28:35people
28:36>> an email from the UN saying we love your
28:38script. I got an email saying the with a
28:41UN email address saying they bought. So
28:42I wrote to them and said like please
28:44don't pay. I'd like to refund you
28:45because I quite like what you do and um
28:48yeah um you uh UNICEF Hansen Body Shop
28:53like some big big brands have been using
28:56it and I'm like really they must have
28:59like people way smarter than me doing
29:00this kind of internally but it's
29:02just that's been kind of unexpected and
29:04quite cool.
29:05>> Yeah. Have you had I know we mentioned
29:08that your name has been brought up by
29:10Google, but I can imagine that they're
29:12not super stoked that you're kind of
29:15lifting some of the the veil on what's
29:18behind Pmax.
29:19>> I've had a lot of Googlers follow me on
29:21LinkedIn over the past year. I've
29:23spotted that trend, but I haven't spoken
29:25to anybody in there, so I really
29:26wouldn't know.
29:27>> Okay. And after this first script that
29:30you developed and released so
29:33generously,
29:35what other scripts or automations have
29:38you come up with? What kind of doors
29:39have you gone through after that one?
29:41>> Well, a lot of that has come from I
29:42mentioned Stacy before, my old head of
29:44SEM at Web Savvy and Trent as well. Like
29:47they they're still in the trenches.
29:48They're still on the tools doing the
29:50stuff. So I will get messages from them
29:52saying, "What about this? Could we do
29:53this?" I'm like, "Yes, absolutely. Give
29:55me a couple of days." bl um but I really
29:58wanted to build a community around it.
30:00That hasn't worked exactly the way I
30:02thought. And so when I sold it web
30:04savvy, I shut down agency savvy. That
30:06was the thing I was doing all the
30:08teaching through just because they were
30:09too intertwined. The tech stack was
30:12messy. We had no documentation for
30:14anything usual stuff, you know. So just
30:16to shut all that down and start again
30:18clean was just such a mental relief. So
30:21I started a new community on Circle,
30:24which has been pretty cool. That's where
30:25I deliver all the paid scripts and stuff
30:27and it isn't sort of like a super active
30:30hundreds of people in there every day
30:32going hey how you going GM and all that
30:34stuff but there are some some regulars
30:37in there that are sort of always in
30:38there and most of the ideas come from
30:41there or people saying could you change
30:43the script to do this I'm like
30:44absolutely if you're going to like that
30:46then loads of other people are going to
30:47benefit from that actually gosh there's
30:50a thought I haven't had in a long time I
30:52went to a Robert Kiasaki conference
30:54My first weekend in Australia 2001.
30:57>> Rich Dad Poor. Yeah.
30:59>> Yeah. Rich Dad Poor Dad. But Cash Flow
31:00Quadrant is the even better book. That
31:02was basically what started this whole
31:04business journey for me was Casho
31:05Quadrant and The E-Myth from Michael
31:07Gerber. And somebody got up and asked a
31:10question on the first day and he
31:12basically ripped him a new one for about
31:1410 minutes about how selfish it was to
31:16ask that question, not a question that
31:18was going to benefit everybody in the
31:20room. and he was an incredible educator.
31:23I learned so much from him and that has
31:27always stuck with me of like ask the
31:29question that's going to benefit
31:30everybody. So what's the feature? What's
31:33the thing that you can add to this that
31:34benefits everybody using it? Not this
31:37tiny tiny narrow sliver of yes, I could
31:39build it, but it's really only going to
31:40help you. I want to build the thing that
31:42helps 90 plus%. So, that's kind of
31:44always been like a I hadn't thought of
31:46that until now, but that's like a a loop
31:48that plays in the background of is this
31:50going to help lots and lots of people?
31:52>> I've got a feeling you're always having
31:53ideas, micro ideas.
31:55>> That is the only constraint, isn't it?
31:56It's time to turn ideas into cool
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33:05But I hear you on community. I love that
33:06you're doing it that way. We've also got
33:08circle community fraart and campus. So,
33:11it's going okay, but again, it's a time
33:14time constraint. But what we've got is
33:16we've got about 150 listeners in there
33:19and we'll throw things up. There's
33:21probably 20 posts a week kind of thing.
33:23But just enough that if people get stuck
33:24or they go, what's like-minded people?
33:27What do you think about this? Or any
33:28recommendations on this? It's nice just
33:30to have a central place that people can
33:32ask those questions for the benefit of
33:34everyone
33:34>> because running a business is a lonely
33:37endeavor often and scary and just
33:40knowing that there are people going
33:41through the same as you is just
33:44it's just a huge mental relief and
33:47someone that you can ask questions of
33:48because we tend to think, don't we, that
33:51I'm going through this. I'm the only
33:52person in the world going through this.
33:54But you forget that tens of thousands of
33:57people have been through the same thing
33:58before and will do again. But when
34:00you're in it, it feels so big and so
34:03scary. And having a community like that
34:05around you, well done building that.
34:07That's cool. That's cool. So, you talked
34:09there about people wanting to throw
34:11money at you via your LinkedIn DMs.
34:15Have you worked out how you're going to
34:17commercialize this model?
34:20>> Well, yeah. Circle. Um so I sell the
34:22scripts through circle. It took me about
34:246 months to actually build a website.
34:27You know one day I'll take this
34:28seriously and I'll do really well. It's
34:30been a really fun journey. So it is
34:32commercial. I mean that's you know my
34:33main form of income. Now
34:35>> how do you price scripts? I mean because
34:37the value of scripts when you talk about
34:39value right for an agency owner is
34:44infinity essentially when you know that
34:46it can win your business get your
34:47business through the door for the first
34:49time
34:49>> or if your team are spending even an
34:52hour a week on this every week and the
34:55way I've done my pricing my pricing is
34:57just pay once that's it there's no
34:59subscription there's no ongoing I do all
35:02the support because if someone has a
35:03problem I want to know about it because
35:06there's this whole YC thing. If if one
35:07person is asking that question, there
35:09are 10 people not asking the same
35:10question. So, I want to know if
35:12something's broken or unclear or there's
35:15a great new idea for a new feature to
35:18build. So, I've iterated. I'm just about
35:20to release version 80 next week. So, it
35:22keeps changing, keeps getting better.
35:24Where the hell was I going with that? I
35:26have no idea. Um pricing. Do you
35:29remember Base Camp?
35:31>> Yeah.
35:31>> Yeah. So they've just created this new
35:34slack killer campfire. They've taken the
35:36old campfire sort of part of base camp
35:39and re-released it. And he bought the
35:41domain for a lot of money apparently.
35:43Once.com. So his whole pricing model
35:46with campfire is once. You pay once you
35:49get the code do whatever you like with
35:50it. So for $299 you can replace Slack.
35:54I'm pretty sure my old agency now that
35:56there's two agencies and 50 60 70 people
36:00are probably paying 10 grand a year on
36:02Slack and how many businesses would be
36:04paying hundreds of thousands for 300
36:06bucks you can get rid of that Slack bill
36:08and so seeing DHH and those guys Jason
36:12Freed do that after I'd had the same
36:15idea they didn't copy me but just seeing
36:18that people that smart have gone the
36:20same way is really kind of reassuring
36:23and I really like it. I did it because I
36:25hate paperwork and I don't want to be
36:27chasing bloody credit card dropouts and
36:30and what was that tool we used to
36:32stunning and dunning and all of that
36:33stuff like I hate that stuff. So I'm
36:35like pay once I'll do the support I'll
36:38get you up and running and then we're
36:39good and you can have free upgrades for
36:42life. You never need to pay me anything
36:43again. And yeah, for an agency 400 bucks
36:46is nothing. Like there's the there's the
36:48single account version for 200 or an
36:50agency version for 400 is nothing. And
36:52then I was like, well, I've got this new
36:54thing. Agency owners, you can have that
36:56included. No, don't pay me anything
36:58extra because you've already paid me 400
36:59bucks. That's fine. Have this new one.
37:02And it just seems to work
37:06well. It should do, right? I think it
37:08should. I think that it's never price,
37:10it's value. Oh, do I want to tell that
37:13story? I won't mention names. when I was
37:15coming up and I was sort of like
37:17starting to be on stages in 2007. I
37:20remember sitting in the kitchen of a
37:24people whose names I won't mention and
37:27they were berating me saying my stuff
37:29was too cheap and they're like this is
37:31the value you offer and this is the
37:33price and I went yeah and they said it
37:35should be the other way round you'll
37:37learn haha young guy doesn't know what
37:39he's doing and I went if I ever do that
37:42come around and kill me please because I
37:44hate what you are doing you know that
37:46it's this much value and you're charging
37:48all of this for it. You know, you're
37:50ripping people off and they would have
37:52all these different ways of justifying
37:54it. We don't know who the 10% are that
37:56will actually go through the course and
37:57finish the program, but the ones that
37:59do, oh, yes, they'll do really, really
38:01well. And they ended up leaving the
38:03country for tax purposes.
38:05>> You spend more time convincing people
38:07than you do building the thing.
38:09>> Yeah. Yeah. And and hiring lawyers to
38:12protect you and locking people into
38:14contracts. And you know, there's
38:15agencies that do that. There are people
38:17on stage that do I hate that It
38:19should be an absolute no-brainer. Way
38:21more value than you pay. You feel good
38:23after it. I feel good after it.
38:25Everyone's happy. Like that's the only
38:27way to do business, right? I love it. I
38:29love it. So tell us, Mike, around
38:32obviously now that you've had time to
38:34unpack and I'm sure you've got a million
38:36ideas in the back of your head. You are
38:39on the forefront of search and AI and we
38:42know search is getting a bit of an AI
38:44upheaval. Some of it's coming through
38:46now, especially in the US where Google
38:48are doing their summaries and presenting
38:50much more information within the search
38:52results itself. Where do you see the
38:56future of search with the AI revolution
38:59say in the next 12 months? If we were
39:00having this conversation in 12 months,
39:02what does search look like?
39:05>> There's this great line from a Hemingway
39:07book, The Sun Also Rises. And the
39:09character named Mike is asked, "How did
39:12you go bankrupt?" and he says gradually
39:14then suddenly
39:17I think that's the impact of AI. I think
39:20it's slow slow slow and then bang and I
39:23think
39:25people are underestimating the impact of
39:28AI in a lot of areas massively but also
39:31overestimating it in other areas. So I'm
39:33going to split this into two halves. I
39:35think from the e-commerce side it 12
39:39months from now it won't have changed
39:41massively. I don't think we're going to
39:44start trying to buy stuff through chat
39:47bots necessarily. Chatbots are not the
39:50end interface where this all goes.
39:53Amazon tried it for years with Alexa,
39:55right? Of like that was really what
39:57Alexa was for to try and get people to
39:59buy more stuff. It just hasn't happened.
40:01Next year might finally be the year of
40:02voice, but it's going to be, you know,
40:03voice controlled AI agents and maybe
40:06Siri finally getting smart enough that
40:08we can actually use it or something like
40:09that. On theformational side of search,
40:12I think that does change quite a lot.
40:14You know, we we don't want 10 blue
40:16links. We want the answer, which is why
40:18so many of us are using chat GPT,
40:20claude, perplexity, whatever it might be
40:23to get to the answer quicker. But I
40:26think on the on the commercial side for
40:28those high commercial intent queries
40:31that this audience is probably more
40:33interested in. I don't think that's
40:35changed massively in the next 12 months
40:38but informational side will change and
40:40continue to change quite a lot I think.
40:43So if Google is going to be presenting
40:46and summarizing and not only Google but
40:48all the chat tools that you mentioned
40:50there before Claude, what however we
40:51find our information because we're
40:53already seeing that you know slow
40:56decline off Google as people use other
40:57tools to find their search even meta
40:59obviously with their inbuilt AI and the
41:01rest. Everyone's kind of getting into
41:02the search game now or the information
41:04game as you put it. From a retailer's
41:07perspective, if you were developing
41:10content today where you would normally
41:12be developing content to try and rank
41:15well in those 10 blue links like you
41:18talked about, what kind of content would
41:20you be focusing on?
41:21>> Yeah, I don't know how to do it. I've
41:23never been an SEO guy.
41:25>> Yeah. But you definitely want to be
41:27thinking of like how can I allow these
41:29large language models to crawl my stuff
41:31so that when people are asking
41:33anformational query about this stuff,
41:35they find me. My daughter was making an
41:37asai bowl the other day and she's like,
41:39"Dad, this blender's rubbish. I want a
41:41new blender." Like, "Yes, madam. All
41:44right. Oh, we got a script first."
41:46>> I Well, first thing I do is go to chat
41:48GBT and go like, "Tell me about blenders
41:51and like which brands are good." Now, if
41:54and I had to really sort of like probe
41:56it because there was one that she
41:57particularly wanted and I had to sort of
41:58like prompt it to to tell me more about
42:01that because it wasn't one of the ones
42:02that it immediately came back with. But
42:04that I think is again I'm not an SEO guy
42:07so take this with a large pinch of salt.
42:09But having your information show up in
42:13those answers on something like chat GBT
42:16if more and more people are going to be
42:18using that and they really are running
42:19away with it. Claude is wonderful, but
42:21it's used by a fraction of the people
42:23that use chat GBT each day. You want
42:27these things to to know about you. I
42:28mean, if we go really far out, and I
42:30don't know what that means, 3, five
42:32years, like really far out, there's
42:34going to be an awful lot of AIS talking
42:36to other AIs, and it's going to be APIs
42:38all the way down.
42:39some something needs to understand
42:42what it is that you do, what the
42:44products and services are there, what
42:45the point of difference is. All of that
42:48pricing, all of that will need to be
42:51transparent and programmatically found
42:54by some API crawled by some machine. And
42:58I suspect that very few businesses are
43:00really thinking deeply about that at
43:02this point. The big guys probably are.
43:04So we probably see a continuation of
43:06this. Google ads used to be Perry
43:09Marshall talks about this. It used to be
43:10an 8020 game. It moved to a 955 game and
43:13it's moving towards that 991 which means
43:16that 1% of all of those advertisers are
43:19going to reap 99% of the rewards.
43:23Yeah. Because
43:26in that programmatic world, I mean,
43:29everyone listening to this is already
43:30wearing more than enough hats. Like you
43:32got 12 hats on. running around like a
43:34chook with its head off and I've got to
43:37learn all this other stuff as well or
43:38I've got to find an SEO agency that also
43:42understands how to get cruled by this
43:44stuff as well as creating great content
43:45for humans. Now I got to think about the
43:46machine like gez I've got enough to do
43:49whereas the big guys with big teams and
43:52deep pockets should be thinking about
43:55this stuff um and should have the
43:57resources to be able to provide that
44:00information. Is that not movement
44:02towards the 991 a result of more and
44:07more budgets being put towards PMAX? So,
44:10it's almost like leveling the field from
44:12everyone because everyone's using the
44:14same technology rather than all having
44:17different strategies and little tactics
44:19and little 1enters to differentiate
44:21themselves. Is Pmax almost a leveler of
44:23the field?
44:25>> That's a really good question. I think
44:27if you think about like gins in merchant
44:30center like why would Google force
44:32everybody like oh this product isn't
44:33going to show because it hasn't got a
44:34gin or a barcode. I think that so that
44:37they can understand oh look we've got 30
44:40merchants all selling the same thing. We
44:43understand the slight differences in
44:44price between those merchants and we can
44:46see the conversion rates. We can see
44:50which ones people prefer. I remember
44:52seeing some amazing research. I think it
44:55was Creolytics out of Europe Andreas did
44:58around Amazon pricing and he showed that
45:00tiny differences in price on Amazon made
45:03a huge difference to the volume of sales
45:06like you know being 5% cheaper than
45:08everybody else if it was that sort of
45:09commodity type thing and I think that
45:13where Merchant Center is going with Gins
45:15and so on is kind of that race to the
45:17bottom which is horrible to hear as a as
45:19a retailer right but then we're into all
45:22the stuff that I know nothing about and
45:23can't talk sensibly about like building
45:25a brand, building a community, building
45:27all of that stuff around so that people
45:28have a reason to buy. I think Haley at
45:30Sheet Society has done a marvelous job
45:32of this. Ben at Frank Green again like
45:35building a movement, not just selling
45:37stuff. I know nothing about that. I
45:39can't talk sensibly about it, but I
45:41think that's a a direction we're going.
45:43I also think this news from last week
45:45where shopping is going to see a bit of
45:47a resurgence now as a campaign type and
45:51the smart money if it hasn't already is
45:53probably going to not necessarily move
45:57away from PMAX but certainly run some
46:00more experiments and test shrink and
46:03pmax and sort of move away from that
46:05black box a little bit.
46:07>> So yes, there is a shopping script
46:08coming.
46:10>> Oh nice. That's because I found that the
46:13Google announcement last week around the
46:16overhaul of Google Shopping really
46:18interesting in terms especially around
46:22integrating content things like YouTube
46:24shorts into the Google shopping feed
46:28whereas at the moment it's pretty much
46:30block price.
46:32>> Any video under three minutes will now
46:34be considered a short. That's a long
46:36short. It's a long short, but to have
46:39all of that around and they had things
46:41like AI summaries in there. So, if
46:42you're searching for a Duna and it might
46:45serve up to say, "Hey, I can see you're
46:47in Sydney, Australia, and it's March or
46:50whatever it is, the kind of dunas you
46:52might be looking for are this, this, and
46:54this to kind of guide you in your search
46:56rather than just give you what you
46:58want." So, it's going to be pretty
46:59amazing what shopping looks like in 12
47:00months time.
47:02>> It is. They will ensure their revenue is
47:05as good as possible, right? So, keeping
47:08people on that monetizable space will be
47:12very important. Um, I don't know how
47:15much the the UI of the shopping
47:18experience will change in the short
47:19term. I mean, they've tried, you know,
47:21the mirrors that you look out and try
47:22stuff on and I remember trying one of
47:24those. God, it must have been at a
47:25Google event 2018, 2019. So, that
47:28technology has been around a while and
47:29hasn't stuck yet. But, yeah. Oh, like
47:31it's gradually then suddenly.
47:33>> That's such a good way of looking at it.
47:35Um, one last thing on the AI side before
47:37we move on. You mentioned Claude there
47:40as an underrated tool, especially
47:42compared to Chat GBT. This has come up
47:46in the Adicart campus community as well
47:48around people not understanding why
47:51Claude isn't so much more universally
47:54used. What are the big differences that
47:56you see that that you see the benefits
47:57there?
47:58>> So, as a pretend dev, it's wonderful. I
48:02I just love the interface with they call
48:04it artifacts which is over on the right
48:05hand side. So you ask your question on
48:07the left and all the code pops up on the
48:08right. When I go back and try and use
48:11chat GBT when I get rate limited out of
48:13claude which happens just about every
48:15day I find the interface so so clunky
48:18but chat GBT can still at this point can
48:21still browse
48:23websites which Claude won't do and the
48:26voice I've been using the iOS app on
48:28ChatGpt for six eight months. Go for a
48:31walk, chat to it, have it talk back.
48:34There's a there's a concept in
48:35programming called rubber ducking. So if
48:37you get stuck with a big problem, you
48:38talk to something. I have these weird
48:40like 3D metallic things on my desk. It's
48:43like 3D printed.
48:45>> Yeah.
48:46>> Model. I got a couple of them.
48:48>> Can see you're holding up screen. Oh,
48:49they're cool. Yeah.
48:50>> You just have this object. You have a
48:51thing, a rubber duck that you talk to.
48:53Chat GBT is the rubber duck that talks
48:55back. And so you can like work out the
48:57issue, work out the problem by talking
49:00through it. Um, so chat DBC has that big
49:03big benefit. What I'm doing for the rest
49:06of the day when I jump off this is
49:08Claude had an announcement overnight
49:10about um how you can now control a
49:13computer with Claude. It's only
49:15available in the API. So it's a geeky
49:17dev thing where you have to like program
49:19it. But there's a couple of things that
49:21I want to be able to do in Google Ads.
49:24essentially being able to download
49:26reports that Google doesn't let you
49:28automate. There is no easy way to do it.
49:31You have to go in and set up all of
49:33these downloads manually. I want to see
49:35if I can get Claude to set that up and
49:38say just basically point it at the thing
49:40and it will take screenshots of the
49:42computer, move the mouse, click on the
49:43stuff that you tell it to click on. Once
49:46we can do that, like gradually then
49:48suddenly, right? You think about where
49:49this is going.
49:52If you're a remote worker, then 100% of
49:56the work you do just about other than
49:57the odd phone call happens through this
50:00screen.
50:04Like you are pointing and clicking and
50:06moving the mouse and clicking on stuff
50:07and solving problems and moving
50:09information around.
50:11A lot of that is going to get disrupted
50:15gradually. Then a Vietnamese villain
50:17villa now and just that's it. I'm done.
50:22That is fascinating. Ah, so much there.
50:25But we can't we've got to pull up stumps
50:27because you've got some scripts to
50:28write. But before we do, I want to ask
50:30you, Mike, helicopters. We didn't even
50:32get to helicopters. You're a helicopter
50:34pilot. Is that right?
50:35>> Uh, so I never actually got my full
50:38license cuz it's bloody expensive. But
50:41yeah, I always wanted to fly since I was
50:43six. I went and I learned to fly in
50:45Hawaii of all places, flying around the
50:47canyons of Kuwave, which is just epic. I
50:50worked for a helicopter company in the
50:51UK for a while. We had amazing amazing
50:53client list. The Queen, you know, um,
50:56Princess Die.
50:57>> Did you actually fly them?
50:58>> Okay. No, no. So, I was in flight ops. I
51:00was nowhere. you need like 5,000 hours
51:03minimum to be flying these people
51:04around, but I was the one sort of um
51:07organizing the flights and and doing the
51:09flight plans and all those hundred
51:10little things, which is so similar to
51:12Google Ads in in a way of like, you
51:14know, all the little things that need to
51:16be optimized and adjusted and and need
51:18to be right because you screw up one of
51:19those hundred things and you've got Tom
51:21Cruz sitting there in the thing at the
51:23middle of the night going, "Why is there
51:25no fuel in this helicopter?" You know,
51:27like you could really mess up in quite a
51:28>> I don't think he say that nicely. Yeah.
51:31No, he didn't. His three PAs were
51:34ripping me a new one.
51:35>> But I got through that, one of our
51:37pilots knew I wanted to fly. He
51:39introduced me to the guy that ran the
51:41army airport in England. I have to give
51:43a shout out to Major Ingram. I will
51:45never forget this man. He had 3,000
51:47soldiers under his command. He spent an
51:49hour and a half with me. At the end of
51:51which he said, "Mike, there is a job in
51:52my army if you want it, but we both know
51:55it's not the right thing for you." And I
51:56went and sat in my car in the car park.
51:58It was raining in middle Wallop in
51:59Hamampshire. And I bowled my eyes out
52:01for half an hour cuz I knew I was never
52:03going to fly the fun But he was
52:05dead right. He was an amazing amazing
52:07guy to spend that time with me to help
52:09me figure out for myself by asking me a
52:12whole bunch of questions that this is
52:13not the path you want to take. And I we
52:17had Kerry Packer as a pilot, how I got
52:19fired. And I remember Kerry Packer's
52:21pilot coming in. You he come in have his
52:24GCH after flying KP around. And I'm
52:27like, I want to be the bloke sitting in
52:29the back of the helicopter. I want to be
52:30the guy sitting there drinking
52:31champagne, not these guys that are
52:33basically posh taxi drivers. Nah, this
52:35isn't the career for me. And I pretty
52:37much left England after that. And
52:40business, yeah, the love of business was
52:42was born. Maybe one day I'll I'll do it
52:45again. I've got a mate in Sydney at the
52:46moment who's going through his
52:47commercial pilot training, catching up
52:49with him in a few weeks, mountain
52:51biking. So, I'll be asking him a whole
52:53bunch of questions. Maybe one day I'll
52:54get back into it as a um hobby. It's a
52:56bloody expensive hobby though. But um it
52:58is fun. Paragliding is a much cheaper
53:00way to kind of get my same kicks from
53:02flying. So
53:03>> maybe by that time we'll have machines
53:04flying the helicopters for us.
53:06>> Yeah. Yeah. I saw an unm like an
53:09unmanned kind of drone that you sit in
53:11the other day. Like that's coming.
53:13That's basically already here. So it's
53:15like a helicopter with no pilot. So
53:17pilots get replaced too.
53:20Mike, what's next for yourself for the
53:23next 12 months? Do you actually have a
53:25plan for the next 12 months or are you
53:26just opening one door after the next?
53:28>> I've never been a planner. I will keep
53:30wandering through those doors. Lots of
53:31walks to school, lots of mountain
53:33biking, even started doing a bit of
53:35yoga. Jesus Christ, what's happening?
53:36And lots of solving problems. I'm just,
53:38you know, people will keep throwing
53:40problems at me and saying, "Is this
53:42solvable? Can you help?" I'm like, "Let
53:43me get my whiteboard bent. Let me get
53:44back to you tomorrow and we'll see if we
53:46can solve that." I'm loving the advisory
53:48board stuff and the mentoring side of
53:50things, but yeah, I don't I don't want
53:52to be doing too much stuff. I like the
53:55ideas in the whiteboard bit better.
53:56>> I love it. And Mike, if people want to
53:59learn more, obviously your LinkedIn
54:01channel is a great way to stay in touch
54:02with what you're building in real time.
54:04But then if people want to go on and buy
54:07or purchase your scripts, best way to do
54:09that?
54:10>> Yeah, it's really hard because I suck at
54:11marketing.
54:14>> Yeah, LinkedIn's a great way to find me.
54:15Um, pmaxscript.com
54:17is where you can buy the main script or
54:19if there's you got questions or problems
54:21you want to solve,
54:21[email protected].
54:23Just reach out. I'm around.
54:25>> Mike, this has been a lot of fun. Thank
54:26you so much. I'm so glad we got to have
54:28this conversation. Me, too.
54:30>> Thanks for joining us on Adar.
54:31>> My absolute pleasure. Thanks, Anthony.
54:33[Music]
54:35>> I bet just like I did, you had so many
54:38questions in the back of your head that
54:40you were going, "Bushy, ask this. Bushy
54:42ask this." I had a heap that I didn't
54:43even get to. So Mike and I have promised
54:46that we will catch up in the new year to
54:48really dive further into some of those
54:50ideas because I had so many notes that I
54:52didn't even get to. What a fascinating
54:54guy. I love that Mike has reached a
54:56stage in his career where he is still
54:58curious and genuinely trying to help as
55:01many people as possible. If you haven't
55:04already, I think you will surprise
55:05yourself by going and using that script.
55:08Even if you're not a script person, go
55:10try it. I think you'll surprise
55:11yourself. Here are the three biggest
55:14lessons that I took away from the chat.
55:16Number one, ideas over execution. Mike's
55:19approach to business is a really
55:21refreshing reminder that not everyone
55:24needs to be an operations guru. By
55:26focusing on what he loves, solving
55:29problems and generating ideas, Mike has
55:31built a model that lets him stay in his
55:33zone of genius while creating immense
55:36value. As I mentioned in that episode,
55:38it reminds me a lot of the book
55:40recommendation that we've had a few
55:41times now called Rocket Fuel where the
55:44best businesses work where you have one
55:46visionary, which is the ideas person
55:49matched with one operations person.
55:51Those two together are a great
55:53combination, but the first step is
55:56knowing which one you are. Number two,
55:59visibility in the black box. Mike's PMAX
56:02scripts are a masterclass in turning
56:04hidden data into actionable insights.
56:08After 17 years of running a Google
56:10agency, Mike is now revealing how Google
56:13spends ad dollars across shopping,
56:15video, and display, and he's empowering
56:18businesses on mass to optimize their
56:21campaigns. It's a long stretch from the
56:23agency model. I think the lesson here is
56:25that no matter how much you know things
56:29in e-commerce never stop changing and
56:31it's so important to challenge what you
56:33know even if you are in a specialist
56:35area don't settle for a set and forget
56:37approach whether it's PMAX or another
56:39platform always be digging deeper into
56:42your data and experiment because I can
56:44guarantee you the platforms and the
56:46competitors that you're around aren't
56:48sitting still. Number three, hot take on
56:50AI gradually then suddenly. Mike's take
56:55on AI's impact on search was
56:57fascinating. I was really ready for him
57:00to rip down search to say that it is all
57:03changing and change is upon us. But I
57:06love how he framed it. He said, "Change
57:08is creeping in gradually with AI
57:11summaries, better shopping insights,
57:12smarter recommendations, but it will hit
57:15us all suddenly, and search as we know
57:18it will be forever changed." Whether
57:20it's ensuring your content today is
57:23crawable by large language models or
57:24preparing for APIdriven shopping, now is
57:28the time to start planning for the AI
57:30revolution in e-commerce. Because it's
57:32not a matter of if, it's a matter of
57:35when. search changes forever.
57:39Before you go, we'd love to invite you
57:41to join our free e-commerce learning
57:43platform, add toart campus. Meet other
57:46professionals and learn from e-commerce
57:48experts to take your business and your
57:51e-commerce career to the next level.
57:53Register to join campus at add
57:55toart.com.au/campus.
57:59Now, if you enjoyed today's episode,
58:00make sure you share it with a friend or
58:02a colleague. Or even better, leave us a
58:05review on Spotify or Apple. It really
58:07makes a difference.

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