Business RadioX ®

Joe Schab With FinQuery

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Atlanta Business Radio
Atlanta Business Radio
Joe Schab With FinQuery
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Joe Schab brings a wealth of experience to FinQuery. He has spent most of his career helping companies transition from startups to full-fledged, high-growth entities.

As COO and President at FinQuery, he is responsible for the alignment and prioritizations of investments and ensuring operational excellence.

Connect with Joe on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Recent transition from LeaseQuery to FinQuery
  • The new space that FinQuery platform is covering

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:04] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio. Brought to you by On pay. Atlanta’s new standard in payroll. Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:25] Lee Kantor. Here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio. And this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, Onpay. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on Atlanta Business Radio, we have Joe Schab with FinQuery. Welcome.

Joe Schab: [00:00:42] Thank you for having me.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:44] I’m so excited to get caught up. Tell us about Finn Query. I heard you kind of had a brand change.

Joe Schab: [00:00:50] Name change we did, we did. So Finn query. We are a B2B SaaS solution that helps companies with their largest areas of non-payroll spend. So the things that they lease, the things that they subscribe to, their software and the contracts that govern those arrangements. We recently changed our name to Finn Query to reflect the finance and technology bent. Previously we were lease Query because we focused solely on lease accounting and lease management, and we expanded our remit to include software, software management and contracts recently. And we felt that the Finn and financial technology better reflected our expanded influence within the office of the CFO and the office of the CIO in technology as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:37] But the kind of the premise is similar, right? You’re enabling your clients to get kind of a holistic view of all of the financial issues that they’re dealing with. That might be complex because they could have a variety of different, like, I guess you started in leasing, but there could be a variety of, you know, software and licenses and all kinds of financial issues that maybe it’s hard to visualize, you know, because they’re so spread out across the organization.

Joe Schab: [00:02:06] That’s right. That’s right. So going back to the beginning, so, you know, our our legacy was in leases. The you know, it doesn’t sound really sexy, but it was really quite interesting. The biggest change in the accounting industry occurred several years ago occurred in 40 years, occurred in the accounting industry when the Government Accounting Standards Board, the Federal Accounting Standards Board, changed and required that every publicly traded company, every privately held company, every government entity changed the way they account for their leases. And they made that requirement more complex. So what they used to be able to do through spreadsheets and Excel spreadsheets and Google Sheets, they really needed to have technology. And so we created that technology, a B2B SaaS solution. And we by far became the largest, most complete provider of that solution. We have over 8000 customers today along the way. So if you think about it, leases are a large, large, light item within a customer’s books and you think about the things that they lease, it’s their office, it’s land, it’s equipment, it’s their fleet. Along the way, as we were acquiring these customers and doing great work for them, they were asking us to do other things for them. And as we were evaluating those other things, we were looking at other big problems to solve for them.

Joe Schab: [00:03:22] And one big area was SaaS subscriptions. So if you think about it, you just think about your own home life. Um, you know, people are subscribing to we live in a subscription economy now, right? You think about Hulu and Netflix and all the things that you subscribe to. Well, companies are no, no different today. Companies will spend anywhere between $5000 to $15,000 per employee on their SaaS solutions. Right? So a 100 person company will will spend probably around $1.5 million on SaaS solutions like their ERP systems, like their CRM systems and the like. And those are those continue to grow. And so our our customers are saying, you know what? Managing those contracts, managing those renewals, managing, you know, whether we’re managing these these solutions in an appropriate and efficient way, we’re becoming really unwieldy. And they were managing them through spreadsheets, just like they were managing their leases through spreadsheets prior to adopting, um, a solution like lease query. And so we looked into this problem. We were facing that problem ourselves. I faced that problem myself as the as the president of the company. We were growing so rapidly that we had our employees say things like, hey Joe, I need 15 more licenses or seats to our sales, to Salesforce, our CRM system.

Joe Schab: [00:04:48] And I’d look into it, and either we did or we didn’t. Um, but, you know, it was really hard to track. And so when I went to go look for solutions, there really wasn’t a solution for it. And so we decided to enter this market. Um, and, you know, we are seeing great success in adoption. Um, we are talking to our current customers, the 8000 customers we have today, as well as net new and helping them solve this really, really big problem. Uh, and so it’s continuing to grow the customers, um, continued to report that they’re acquiring buying new SaaS solutions every single day. And managing those contracts and managing those agreements are really a big problem. One of the things that we’ve, um, uncovered is that about 44% of a customer’s, uh, SaaS solutions go either unutilized or underutilized, meaning they acquire a solution, and then they’ll only use about 40 to 44, 44% of that solution, meaning it only half of their their people are actually using the solution or not using it at all. And so our solution helps them give visibility into what their people are using, how they’re using it, so they can actually get visibility and be more efficient about how they’re spending their dollars.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:06] Now, I would imagine once you kind of decide to get into this space, this is a pretty easy conversation because everybody like you mentioned can relate to it in their own personal life. I mean, and then you look at an organization that has hundreds, thousands, you know, tens, hundreds of thousands of employees. You don’t even know, you know what? You could be paying for licenses for people who don’t even work in your organization anymore. Mhm.

Joe Schab: [00:06:36] That’s exactly right. So we really have two modules in our system today. The first is spend management. And that’s really a tool, an application for the office of the CFO to give visibility into what they’re spending their dollars on. Right. And then we have SaaS operations, which is for the IT team to help with the for exactly what you just outlined to onboard and offboard new employees and exiting employees so that you’re very efficiently in a click of a button. You know, if Joe were to leave the company, Joe’s license is shut off immediately as opposed to finding out, you know, a month later that he’s left. And now that license is still is still alive. And potentially either a it’s a security risk because Joe still has access to it, or B, you’re still paying for that license and you haven’t been able to you haven’t reprovisioned that to somebody else who’s come on board. So, um, it is a very efficient way to manage your systems. Now, to your, to your point about it being an easy conversation. It is, but it’s so new that many, many customers, many companies don’t know they have the problem yet. It’s when you have this, you have the conversation with them that they realize the light bulb goes on like, yes, exactly. That’s exactly what we’re facing. Tell us more. Oh, you have a solution for that. Tell us more about it. So it really is kind of a two pronged type of of conversation. First you have to give them the the light bulb moment and then you tell them about the solution. But it really is so new that customers have to first be told that they have the problem, and then it really illuminates the situation for them.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:16] Now, have you gotten a feel for like, you deal obviously a lot with the larger enterprises on average, how many licenses does an individual employee have like that? I mean, I’m sure this number is is a very large number, much larger than people think it is.

Joe Schab: [00:08:34] It is much, much larger. As a matter of fact, we had one of our board members. We just gave him a little assignment at. His company. Um, we asked him how many.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:45] I’d ask him to guess first and then tell them.

Joe Schab: [00:08:48] That’s right. We asked him to guess, and he came back and he said I was way off. We had four times the number of applications that I thought we had. And so, you know, the number basically varies from company to company as to how many applications, um, they’ll have per employee. Um, it could be ten, it could be 50. It all depends on the size complexity of of the organization. But it’s growing exponentially every single year. Um, and so the problem isn’t going away.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:19] Right. Because I would imagine this is a situation where people are getting enamored with some software and, and it could be important, super important software. But there’s so many new softwares coming and new things to try that somebody’s like, oh, we should get this for the team. And they buy one maybe for themselves to try. Then they implement it for the team, and then all of a sudden now you have 100 licenses and they’re like, yeah, that. And then no one’s using it and you move on to some other shiny object and you’re still paying for this license in the background because like, nobody’s pruning, they’re just adding.

Joe Schab: [00:09:53] Yeah, that’s exactly right. So what you’re describing is generally called shadow it. So shadow it occurs when um, as a as an organization you’ll have a process generally of procurement. Right. Um, where there’s an organized process where you’re, you’re buying, uh, provisioning software, there’s that general procurement. It’s going through proper channels. Then each individual department will have its own budget, and a person or department might buy a piece of software because their team might need something, or they, as an individual might need something. They put it on their company credit card, or they bill it to corporate to, to finance, um, and they use it for themselves. They use it for their department. And it didn’t go through proper channels. And so you end up to your point. You end up having all these people who’ve gone rogue, and you end up having so many more applications than you thought that you actually had. And that’s the other that’s the other problem that we solve is that we identify the shadow it that organizations have that, you know, CFOs aren’t aware of and IT managers aren’t aware of.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:00] And I would imagine that this also uncovers some redundancy, like you might have several tools doing a similar function that have just been purchased by different people.

Joe Schab: [00:11:11] Then it just then, then what you do is, you know, companies will then just have a conversation internally about, okay, which ones do we want to turn off. Which ones what, why first, firstly why do we have this going on. Second, um, can we streamline this so that we have either, you know, we use just one system or we downgrade to just, just the applications or the seats that we actually need. So it sparks conversation for efficiency’s sake. But that’s exactly how it goes, is that you’ll you’ll identify all these rogue systems. And it sparks conversation about how do we increase and improve our efficiency.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:54] Now, have you gotten to the point where you can, um, share with them, like where you’re getting a feel for, okay, once you implement our, you know, this new, uh, Finn query system, we’re going to save you X amount of like, like it shows a savings, I would imagine immediately because you’re able to kind of visualize, okay, this is it’s obvious here. Now when I look at it in this manner, I can see them all on one page. You know, I got a I can see what the issue is. Whereas these things are kind of like weeds growing, you know, without any, uh, you can’t see them. They’re hidden.

Joe Schab: [00:12:29] Right. Exactly. So that’s that’s exactly the process. So once we’ll have. Uh, we’ve onboarded a customer, and we what we call hydrate, um, the system with their data. Right? So we’ll we’ll hydrate all of their, all of their systems. So now we have complete visibility into all the applications that are being used by that, by that company. And then we, then we send the report back to them to see to show them, here’s what you’re, you’re spending your money on, here’s how many licenses that you’ve bought, here’s what you’re using. And here are your opportunities are for savings. And so we’ll immediately start sharing with them savings opportunities. And there hasn’t been one customer, not one customer where the cost of our software is is more than what we save them. So in essence, our software pays for itself because we identify, um, more savings than what our software costs. So we guarantee we have basically a guaranteed ROI on our application because we immediately show them savings, um, and where they can save and how they can go about savings.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:40] So now is this, um, kind of industry agnostic or does this work better in certain areas or, or enterprise level organizations that have certain issues, or is this pretty much. That’s a.

Joe Schab: [00:13:52] Great question. That’s a great question, Lee. Um, it’s industry agnostic. Um, we have um, we have customers in virtually every industry, high tech, manufacturing, education. So it really is, um, industry agnostic. What we find is people can companies can generally, um, track these, track these things fairly efficiently, up to about 150 employees. Once you get north of 150 employees, then it really becomes unwieldy for you to track these things efficiently on board and off board, efficiently, to be able to forecast, budget and manage efficiently. So the real it’s it’s we are agnostic as it relates to the industry, but we really focus on, um, companies that are 150 employees and larger. And our sweet spot generally is 250 to 5000 employees. That’s really where you can see demonstrable savings and efficiencies.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:56] Now, I noticed you didn’t mention government. I would imagine this would be tremendously valuable to government.

Joe Schab: [00:15:05] Oh, yeah. Absolutely. So when I, when I say organizations, companies, I’m also being inclusive of governments. Um, it’s a different animal to onboard a, a uh, to, to provide, uh, access to all of your systems. So, you know, to be honest with you, we don’t have, um, we don’t have, uh, a government systems yet. We have some nonprofits, but not government entities just yet. Now we have plenty of government entities for lease accounting. Um, but we haven’t gone into the government yet for cost savings. But to your point, um, because the sales cycle is just different, right? The sales, there’s so many more considerations as it relates to the government. But, um, it’s just a matter of time before they understand that there is, um, demonstrable cost savings to be gained here on behalf of, you know, taxpayers for sure.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:55] Right? I mean, this is, to me an obvious area of waste. Uh, I mean, just if everybody just looks at their own home and like you mentioned early with all your subscriptions and just managing those subscriptions more efficiently, I mean, everybody’s paying for something that they’re not using.

Joe Schab: [00:16:12] Yeah. No. Exactly. And I think one of the other areas that we see is valuable in our platform is in addition to the software management, we’ve also released contract management. So, um, what’s in the market today and fairly available. And you’ve probably seen it before with DocuSign and Adobe and Echosign are these workflow systems that are pre signature. Right. So as you’re negotiating redlining and agreement, um, it’s readily available. Um, what’s lacking in the marketplace and it really ties seamlessly with software management and subscriptions. Is post signature a central repository post signature for all your contracts, not just subscriptions, but all of your contracts. So we bring the value of software management to contract management as well. And we basically take the handshake from a contract lifecycle management, um, entity like an ironclad that that uses a DocuSign and Echosign pre signature. And we take the handoff and we’ve layered in, um, renewal notices, alerts, um, to the business. Because usually what ends up happening is when a contract is signed, whether it’s a subscription like what we’re talking about with like your Netflix or, you know, Salesforce, um, or, or your lease. Right. Um, it generally would go into a legal department and it would just sit there right where really the entities that are driving the business are the CFOs or the lines of business and the like, and those are the folks who want to get alerts on, hey, when is my renewal window up? What are the what are the key clauses I need to be aware of? And when do when do I get alerts on when those clauses? There might be some some sort of alert that I need for those clauses.

Joe Schab: [00:18:02] And so we’ve expanded the reach of software management, that sort of active management capability. We’ve expanded it outside the realm of software management into any, any sort of contract. So that to your point, there is no waste. Um, if you’re using our system, there’s no waste that you can experience because you are actively, um, being able to manage any one of your contracts, whether it’s software, whether it’s a lease, whether it’s an insurance firm, our contract or anything like that. So that what we facilitate, Lee, is your active management, forecasting and workflows and accounting of any of your contracts that you’re signing that that signs you up and commits you to a spend for any sort of firm, whether it’s a year or five years? Um, and it allows CFOs and CTOs to be able to really actively manage all of their spend, have complete visibility so that there are no surprises. One of the things that we talk about internally, all all the time at Finn Query is no surprises, no surprises. You don’t want to be surprised with a Netflix bill of of an increase, right? You know, same thing with, you know, any sort of lease terms or any sort of insurance or anything like that, whether it’s software or not, you don’t want to be surprised with any sort of increase in cost or renewal or anything like that. So we believe in no surprises. So complete visibility into all your large areas of spend.

Lee Kantor: [00:19:29] So now let me make sure I understand this, that within the contracts, if there’s terms that say, oh on this thing on this date, this is going to go to this price, your software can kind of understand that and give me a heads up like, hey, don’t forget, you know, June 1st, this thing’s going to cost you 50% more. Like if you don’t make this move like it’s kind of it, it reads the contracts and understands where the, uh, issues might be, uh, based on what it’s seeing in the document. And it’s giving you some sort of a heads up.

Joe Schab: [00:20:04] That’s that’s exactly right. Several years ago, we made a pretty substantial investment in artificial intelligence to read contracts and alert, um, and alert, um, people, whoever you designate, as being the point of contact to make alerts as to whenever those key clauses become, um, uh, come to terms. Right. So, so, yes. Exactly. Right. Um, if there is a renewal window that’s coming up, um, our system will give you an alert that. Okay, it’s it’s now March 7th. Um, you’re 60 days out from your renewal. Your renewal window kicks in in 30 days. Um, and there is a 5% price increase. And so it gives you that alert so that you can now proactively reach out to your vendor and actively negotiate. Eventually, part of our roadmap, Lee, is to give people analysis about whether they’re, uh, overspending, underspending, whether they have a good deal, a fair deal, or whether they’re overpaying, and give them analysis based on the the depth and breadth of the data that we have, we’ll be able to analyze, hey, you’ve got a good. Deal a bad deal. Um. And you need negotiate harder and or. Here are here are three other vendors that you might want to be talking to. So eventually providing them with a market opportunity to not just analyze whether you’ve got a good deal, but here are some other better deals that you might be able to, um, uh, benefit from. So that’s that’s on our roadmap. They’ll be coming soon.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:33] Wow, man. Exciting times for you. Congratulations. Um, thanks.

Joe Schab: [00:21:38] We’re having fun over here.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:39] Now, if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team. What’s the coordinates? Website.

Joe Schab: [00:21:47] Go to fin query. Com fin q u e r y.com. Um. Or you can reach out directly to me um at zhokhov at fin query.com. Um and be happy to facilitate any, any type of conversation and uh, be happy to help in any way that we can.

Lee Kantor: [00:22:04] Good stuff. Well, again, congratulations on all the success. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Joe Schab: [00:22:10] Thank you for the time. We enjoyed it.

Lee Kantor: [00:22:11] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Atlanta Business Radio.

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Peter Provost With Provost Studio

by

Atlanta Business Radio
Atlanta Business Radio
Peter Provost With Provost Studio
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Peter Provost is the President and Director of Design at PROVOST STUDIO, a purpose-built, cross-disciplinary design firm that creates award-winning broadcast environments, branded spaces and interior architecture for world-class organizations.

Formally trained as an architect, he has more than twenty years of experience helping companies express and activate their brands at varying scales in order to meaningfully communicate their stories, values and identities.

Provost Studio serves clients across industries, including financial, technology, healthcare, sports, retail, education, broadcast news, and media & publishing, with a client list that features Fortune 500 companies like Walmart, Home Depot, Prudential, BlackRock, and Oracle; media partners like Yahoo Sports, Time Inc, Fox, ABC, and LinkedIn; and sports-centric studios including the Carolina Panthers Video Production Facility & Studio, Cleveland Browns Football Club, Detroit Lions Football Club, the Minnesota Vikings Football Club, and the Chicago Bears Football Club.

Connect with Peter on LinkedIn and follow Provost Studio on Facebook.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Overview of virtual production and extended reality (XR)
  • Key advantages of investing in cutting-edge production studios for businesses – elevating their brand through diverse content creation
  • Virtual production shaping the future of work, and the impact it might have on traditional work environments
  • Elaborating  XR becoming a standard tool in brand storytelling and its potential to create immersive experiences for consumers

Transcript-icon

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:04] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio. Brought to you by On pay. Atlanta’s new standard in payroll. Now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:24] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, Onpay. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on the Atlanta Business Radio, we have Peter Provost with Provost Studio. Welcome.

Peter Provost: [00:00:44] Hey. Thanks, Lee.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:45] Appreciate it. I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about your firm. How you serving folks?

Peter Provost: [00:00:51] Good question. Uh, so we’re a design firm based here and headquartered in Atlanta, and we design and build video broadcast studios for companies, corporations, professional sports teams, you name it, commercial broadcast. Basically anything that’s that is on camera, seen through a lens. That’s what we design.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:15] So what’s your backstory? How’d you get involved in this line of work? It seems very niche insanity.

Peter Provost: [00:01:20] That is really what it is. No. My background, I’m trained as an architect and worked for a very long time in architecture, also worked in the experiential marketing world, working alongside brands and figuring out, you know, a company’s needs and goals and wants and how that all kind of translates into, you know, things like retail spaces and, you know, customer experience centers. And the company that I worked for actually was was also doing video production and broadcast studio set design. And I kind of got pulled into one of those projects. And, you know, as it, as it, as it were, you know, today we’ve got this practice, which is kind of a hybrid between interior architecture and broadcast studio set design.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:13] So now, how has broadcast studios set design evolved over the years like it first started out? I would imagine, as you know, this is where the networks or network television, you know, they all had something that looks kind of similar. And then now as media is evolving and now brands have media platforms and everybody is in the media business nowadays, it seems like now your business has expanded to their worlds as well.

Peter Provost: [00:02:41] Yeah, it’s pretty exciting. I mean, like what what I like to say is, you know, um, brands have kind of become broadcasters in a way. And, uh, a lot of that, uh, has to do with the maturity and development of the technology over the past ten years or 20 years, really, uh, although it does accelerate every 5 or 10 years. Um, but like as an example, when I first started in the kind of broadcast world, um, my, my background is, is in broadcast news. And so, uh, one of my first projects while I was in New York was kind of designing both the interior workplace as well as the production studios for CNN when they moved, um, all of their studios throughout the city, uh, into Time Warner Center and, um, you know, back in the day, uh, you know, the thing, like, you know, internet and how, uh, you know, how content is moved from point A to point B, uh, was really, uh, not internet based, um, cameras. We didn’t have the, the iPhones that we have today. But fast forward to today, really, that the proliferation of technology has really made it a lot easier to create, um, you know, valuable, um, branded content for, you know, not the commercial broadcast station or not the commercial broadcast, uh, clients that that I grew up on.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:09] So what are some of the kind of do’s and don’ts when an organization is building out a studio for their whether it’s their media property, for their brand or for their network, is there some things that they all maybe some commonality between all of them? And is there a way to distinguish one from another, or is it because some of them, I feel like in my head at least, maybe this isn’t true in reality, if I examined it closely that you can kind of cut and paste any kind of studio with any brand and you wouldn’t notice much difference.

Peter Provost: [00:04:42] Yeah, that’s the challenge. That’s that’s the design challenge, right? Lee? I mean that that the what you’re pointing out is, is correct. Um, in that if you go from one studio to the next, there really isn’t anything inherently, um, embedded, um, within that space relative to what the brand look and feel is, what the content is that they’re talking about. And so we kind of help bridge that, you know, bridge that gap. Um, but I think, uh, it doesn’t actually have to be all that complicated just by starting with, with good lighting. Right, starting with, uh, you know, a. That’s well lit. Starting with, you know, camera or quite frankly, your iPhone. Um, and and just getting the, the lighting, the space and the the the the video capture. Right. Um, I mean, these aren’t I mean, we’ve all seen. Right? The, the zoom calls where it’s the up, the up the nose cam or the, you know, down on the head cam. Um, these are all super easy fixes that when we start to look at what a brand’s video footprint looks like, that that’s kind of the low lying fruit, right? The second the second piece is how do we start to, um, raise the overall video production level of the of the content and the look and feel to match the brand? Right. So if it’s a fortune 500, we really want them to, to look and feel, um, like, like their brand, um, and have them walking and talking in video just as they are some of the other communication channels.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:28] Now, how do you in a world where, um, it seems with CGI, I can have the appearance that I’m broadcasting on the moon. Like, how do you kind of improve that production value or at least create signals that I am a higher level production or, you know, virtually? Is it possible, you know, to do this physically versus virtually? Like I recently interviewed a woman who built, um, one of the sets for the Super Bowl, like in the fountains of the Bellagio.

Peter Provost: [00:07:02] Yeah, yeah.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:03] Yeah, sure. So that obviously when you do that, you’re you’re signaling and your brand is and positioning yourself in a certain way and you’re saying a certain thing just by the fact you’ve taken the time and effort and money to build that out, as opposed to somebody else who can click a button, and all of a sudden it looks like they’re in front of the Eiffel Tower.

Peter Provost: [00:07:25] Right. Well, I think you bring up a good point, right? So when we’re talking about, um, talking about a space that you create video content in that, that could be both, you know, a physical thing, right? Where right now I’m in my space in my office. And this, this is a space that could be, you know, on camera. But then there’s also this thing called virtual production, um, which, you know, without overcomplicating it, uh, you know, every night we look at the, we look turn on the news and we watch the weather, the weather guy or girl, um, presenting their standing in front of a green screen. Right. So all of that content that happens in the green screen, in addition to them being on camera, which is this physical and virtual thing, is, is kind of called virtual production. And so we while we, uh, you know, design and build physical environments for companies, we also do, you know, virtual production and virtual environments, um, for, for companies, which, um, it’s kind of over the years, uh, evolved into now no longer a necessarily a green screen, but it’s but it’s LED technology and really video display technology, um, that, that that content happens um, uh within.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:46] So now, what kind of conversations are you having with your clients to, you know, kind of discern what outcome they desire and how best to leverage your skills and your, um, superpowers to help them achieve whatever it is that objective is.

Peter Provost: [00:09:02] I think the biggest. Uh, I think the thing that I can most say definitely, is that we don’t try to shoehorn, uh, a solution one way or the other. We really try to meet the client where they are relative to creating content. Um, you know, some some companies are already creating content, um, virtually. Right. So they already have a green screen and they’ve already established, um, a workflow for that kind of content. And so with a, with a client like that, um, I mean, to be honest, the design process and the creative process is the same. It’s just how it gets output to, um, you know, to the audience is is what is different. Um, I think that sometimes there’s a misconception that if it’s virtual, it’s, it’s it is more flexible. But at the same time, you still have to have someone producing and designing that content for, for you. Um, it’s it’s not, you know, it’s not something as easy as, you know, downloading a stock image. Well, it could be, I guess. Um, it’s not as as easy as, as finding a stock image that makes sense. Um, but we’re we’re really able to kind of help our clients, you know, in any mode of, uh, of production that they need. Does that make sense?

Lee Kantor: [00:10:29] Well, I mean, your background as an architect and you’re the lens, I would imagine, at least at one point in your career was through the lens of an architect. How does how do you kind of, you know, take the steps into this virtual world with virtual production and, you know, this, this kind of new reality we’re in, whether it’s augmented or or actual reality, um, how, you know, how are you helping them? How like, what exactly is the work to be done for that client who wants everything virtual and, and doesn’t care about a desk and all the stuff that you used to physically build for these people. And now they’re saying, look, just put an image behind me that makes it look like, you know, we’re a classy outfit. So that’s what I want today.

Peter Provost: [00:11:17] Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, uh, I think the first is our, our approach to design is, is is spatial. Right. That’s very much how, um, I was trained as a designer and kind of our approach to environments where, um, you know, when somebody says background, they think of it immediately as just kind of a flat thing, a flat plane behind the head. But in actuality, at least the way that we approach things, it’s it’s more 360 degrees. Right? So we’re really designing and building whether it’s physical or virtual, um, you know, 360 degree environments that you can turn and point the camera wherever you need to, um, and get a sense of place for that, for that client. Um.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:06] Yeah. So now this is kind of a mental shift, right? For your clients.

Peter Provost: [00:12:14] Uh, I don’t know. Sometimes I think the biggest, the biggest mental shift is getting kind of, um, an understanding that their current level of video production, in terms of what it looks like and feels like relative to the brand. Um, and then also, is that environment helping them, um, uh, get their message across? Because at the end of the day, it’s not about the scenery, it’s not about the lighting, it’s not about the AV. It’s really about the content and the messaging. Right. And so I think the first the first mental shift is kind of okay, do we is what we’re doing makes sense relative to those two things I just mentioned. And then um, and then the question then becomes, well, what about flexibility? Right. How do we, um, how do we create a level of flexibility in the studio, whether it’s physical or virtual, that allows us to do a bunch of different things, right. So as an example, well, let’s say we want to do, um, I don’t know, let’s say it’s a quarterly earnings report from the CFO or the C-suite. Um, and then it’s it’s basically a, you know, uh, stand up at a monitor that has some data and, uh, you know, a space that, that kind of, um, that they can present in at the same time, you want to be able to use that same space for a fireside chat, um, relative to, let’s say it’s, uh, I don’t know, it could be a training, a corporate training, um, corporate training meeting, an event that same space again needs to be able to accommodate those multiple use cases.

Peter Provost: [00:13:57] Um, but I think it also goes more beyond just the, um, you know. Pushing out content. But, you know, we have clients that are using XR. There’s um, uh, software company, um, that we’ve done, uh, we’ve done a project for that is actually using the studio to connect, uh, and train, uh, technicians across the world, across the globe. And they’re doing it in real time. Right. Um, so that’s kind of in the software world. I mean, we’re we just finished a studio for, uh, very large teaching, um, a teaching hospital where they’re using the studio, both physical and virtual, um, to create content for patient, um, pre-op and post-op care as well as doctor education. Um, there’s just a lot of different uses and reasons that that clients are kind of engaging video. Um, so really kind of to get them excited about the potential is kind of probably the second thing, uh, aside from understanding them, understanding or having this, uh, kind of self-awareness about what they’re doing and then getting them excited about how video content can help them.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:17] Now, are your clients typically are you building their first studio for them, or is this something that they’ve had something in there just it’s not working anymore. And now they’re kind of, uh, refreshing what they got.

Peter Provost: [00:15:31] Yeah, yeah, it’s kind of a mixed bag. Um, some, um, like some of the sports teams that we’ve worked with over the years, they, um, you know, let’s say they’re working in a smaller space and it’s a podcast studio, and they’re kind of going to leverage the next couple fiscal years to, um, to build an actual large scale or larger scale production space. Um, getting, getting them to, um, or helping them, uh, create sort of a flexible space that can help them grow in the future has been a huge, uh, a huge, not huge challenge, but a huge reward. But a client like that, they’ve already been doing video production, but in the new space, there’s just more opportunities and more flexibility to take, take advantage of. So I think, um, regardless of where the clients are, a lot of kind of I won’t say education or hand-holding, but just showing them the potential of what the medium can do is, is definitely part of it. Um, you know, we’ve got studios that are 10,000ft² and then we’re doing, you know, several studios, small studios, um, almost a, I want to say a broom closet, but it’s small where a c suite individual can sit down and attend a virtual meeting, but also, you know, do their podcast. Uh, these aren’t large studios. These aren’t big spaces, but they’re super critical for, um, you know, the executive team and their communication to, uh, to both, uh, the organization at large, but also relative to their audience and customers and clients.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:13] Now, how much of your time is spent educating your clients in this, um. Kind of getting the most out of this digital, uh, digital storytelling that’s so popular nowadays. You know, with the advent of so many streaming services, there are so many documentaries and there’s so much content out there that is showing, um, you know, a space in an interesting way and, and telling the stories of that organization in an interesting way. Um, I would think that this is kind of where an area where you can really shine by saying, look, if you invest some money and resources in this kind of, um, studio environment that’s flexible to whatever needs you have, then you’re going to be able to really tell a lot more stories, a lot more effectively and efficiently than if you were just kind of trying to wing this, you know, in the in your existing office space to the best of your ability.

Peter Provost: [00:18:13] Yeah. Um, well, I think it really comes down to talking to the client about this as an emerging communication channel, right? I mean, I would say it’s not emerging anymore. I mean, when YouTube came out, everybody was like, oh, no, it’s just, you know, again, I’ve got five kids, four kids, and, uh, all of them are on YouTube. And, you know, 4 or 5 years ago it was like, oh, well, that’s just kind of a tool for recreational purpose. But now at the end of the day, you know, these these clients have have YouTube channels that are becoming bona fide means of communication to their audience. And so I think it really becomes weighing the weighing how they’re communicating currently and how video as a communication channel can, can help amplify that. It’s not really in place of. But, you know, there’s just certain things that video does better than other things. And, um, and being able to have a very specific question or a conversation with them about what that means to them and their business is kind of where the rubber hits the road. Right. Um, and I would say nine out of the ten clients that we have, it’s a top down initiative, right? So we don’t really have to, um, educate or justify the communication channel, meaning video as the best way to, um, communicate that, that content. But really, um, differentiating how we do it versus somebody else does it. Right.

Lee Kantor: [00:19:52] Um, now what’s an example of, of some of the, the coolest ways you’ve seen people leverage this and maybe, maybe some of the, the, the places where you’ve really shined and taken somebody’s game up a level or two.

Peter Provost: [00:20:08] Uh, I can’t use names. Right?

Lee Kantor: [00:20:10] Just maybe just share the problem or the challenge they were having and how you helped them solve it.

Peter Provost: [00:20:14] Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think what’s what’s kind of, um, refreshing. And I do this with our clients, too. Um, we often do kind of like a before and after kind of thing, right? Where we go in and and assess their studio, take photos and, and this isn’t as a, as a way of, you know, we’re not design shaming anybody. But when you start to look at kind of the before and after of where clients have been versus where they where they are, once we finish with them, it’s it’s it’s pretty it’s pretty astonishing. But it’s also deeply rewarding. Um. I think some of the coolest stuff that we’re doing. I mean, I really feel like, uh, the, the stuff that’s happening in health care right now and how you start to leverage and how, um, whether it’s doctors, whether it’s hospitals, whether it’s, um, you know, health care organizations are leveraging video to actually help people. Right? Um, that’s extremely rewarding. Um, when I look at the potential of XR and creating immersive environments around health care, um, whether it’s content, whether it’s operating techniques, I mean, you can literally, you know, be immersed in, uh. A tutorial of what to do or what not to do when you come home from, you know, open heart surgery. Um, or I mean, quite frankly, the techniques that a doctor uses relative to that kind of a procedure are all much more, um, accessible visually. Uh, and quite frankly, the data, um, that, that otherwise, um, you know, whether it would be.

Peter Provost: [00:22:03] Uh.

Peter Provost: [00:22:04] Could be video. Well, it could be film. Uh, I mean, there could be other modes of exploring that, but, um, the fact that that technology can support the, the, the, the content is is pretty astonishing.

Lee Kantor: [00:22:19] So what’s next, uh, for your organization? I know you have offices around the country. Um, and now you’re here in Atlanta. Like, have you always been here in Atlanta? Did it start here or. It started somewhere else? And you just came here?

Peter Provost: [00:22:33] Yeah. Well, it it started actually in, uh, in Raleigh. Um, we’ve been there for about 20 years now and, uh, originally from Pennsylvania, uh, northeast, um, went to school, undergrad in the South and then went to grad school in the north and ended up raising a family in, um, in, in Raleigh. And, uh, I think one of the things that has excited me for a while about, um, Atlanta and Georgia, Georgia in particular, is, is the amount of creative, um, capital that’s here around virtual production. And when you look at virtual production in film and broadcast television, that’s I mean, that’s happening like gangbusters here in Atlanta, um, and in Georgia. But what what interests us about it is and we’ve already started doing this is building a virtual production team, but for corporate and, um, broadcast, uh, commercial broadcast clients. Right. And so the question then is, or the challenge is, how do we use these tools that are already here for film, um, to, to address the needs of the corporate and the professional sports and the health care and, you know, um, it goes on and on and on those kinds of clients, which is super exciting.

Lee Kantor: [00:23:56] Well, there’s quite a few of them here in all those categories, this pretty diverse economy here.

Peter Provost: [00:24:02] Yeah, it certainly is. And we’re we’re super excited to be here and super excited to to kind of venture on this new, uh, uh, you know, this new medium and see what it has in store for our clients. So.

Lee Kantor: [00:24:19] Well, if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team, what is the website? What’s the coordinates?

Peter Provost: [00:24:26] Uh, yeah. It’s, uh, Provo Provost Dash studio com. So you can head on over to provo-studio.com and check us out.

Lee Kantor: [00:24:37] Well, Peter, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Peter Provost: [00:24:43] Thanks, Lee, I appreciate it. Thanks for your time.

Lee Kantor: [00:24:45] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Atlanta Business Radio.

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Florencia Cirigliano With RedCoach

by

Atlanta Business Radio
Atlanta Business Radio
Florencia Cirigliano With RedCoach
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FlorenciaCiriglianoRedCoachCEO1With more than 15 years of experience in the travel industry, Florencia Cirigliano has built her career developing, launching and marketing businesses for the travel industry. She joined RedCoach, a luxury motorcoach company based in Orlando, Fla., in 2010 as the Vice President of Marketing and Public Relations where she developed branding for the new luxury schedule transportation company.

Prior to joining RedCoach and moving to the United States, she worked in her native country of Argentina as the general manager for Pasajes Express for three years.

As the general manager, she built the bus-focused travel agency from the ground up, overseeing the development and sales of bus tickets, tourist packages, corporate assistance, commercial agreements, sales network development, personnel management and overall business strategy.

She is a graduate of Universidad Austral, Buenos Aires, graduating with a degree in communications. Additionally, she has achieved two certificates: General Direction of Industry for Small and medium-sized businesses from the IAE Business School and Consumer Marketing Strategy from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.

In her free time, she loves traveling the world with her eyes set on visiting Dubai for the second time.

Follow Redcoach on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Defining and transforming the concept of public transportation with luxury at a low price
  • The benefits of traveling using public transportation vs driving or flying

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:04] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio. Brought to you by On pay. Atlanta’s new standard in payroll. Now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:25] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, Onpay. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on Atlanta Business Radio we have Florencia Cirigliano with Red coach. Welcome.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:00:44] Hi Lee, how are you? Thank you for having me.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:47] I am doing well. I’m so excited to learn about Red coach. Can you tell us a little bit about it? How you serving folks?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:00:54] So basically, Redcoat is trying to redefine the concept of public transportation, specifically in Motorcoaches. The company has been established 13 years ago. We came from Argentina, where I’m originally from, and we want to establish the concept of affordable luxury in the bus segment. Before that, there wasn’t too many options to travel by bus in a comfortable way. So that’s what we are trying to to do, change the way people think about bus travel. So we offer different routes from Florida, where we are headquartered, all the way to Antonio. This is a new route that we just started, but we covered the whole state of Florida. And also we have routes in the state of Texas.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:43] So you started out in Florida. You were working, I would imagine I’m from Florida. So, um, like a Miami to Orlando kind of thing, or Miami to Tallahassee or where were you going in Florida when you started?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:01:58] Well, the first routes we did with Headquarter in Orlando, because it’s the most central, you know, spot for the whole state. And we started doing routes between Miami and Orlando. But very soon we start serving the whole state from all the way from Miami to Tallahassee. Uh, we go through the East Coast via Orlando, and then we do it via Tampa on the West Coast. So pretty much we cover the whole states. We have routes, all major city, but Jacksonville. But then we cover all all the states.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:31] And then what is the experience like like say, if I’m in Miami or South Florida and I’m going to Orlando, are we going like, where where are we starting and where are we ending?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:02:42] So basically, as I said, we’re trying to change the way people think about bus travel because Redcoat is not your typical motorcoach. Whatever it comes to my mind when you think about bus travel, probably it’s not the best experience could be like a last resource. So what we have is we redefine the concept by removing all the seats. We tailormade it. We brought it from Argentina and the busses only have 27 seats. So imagine the size of a regular coach is 50 seats and we only have 27 seats or 38 in our business class. So basically you can sleep on the bus, you can use the Wi-Fi, the outlets. And what we’re trying to do as well is have very like short stops and everything is very accessible in a way that, for instance, Miami, it’s in Miami airport for later airport. Uh, then we go through the service plazas and it’s a quick pick up and drop off. So the time of traveling is comparable to driving your own car. So that’s how we try to elevate the experience. Not being on a bus for too many hours, but not being that uncomfortable. And be safe with cameras on board tracking. So that’s pretty much the whole experience.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:58] So when you decided to come to Atlanta, where is that the point where people can get on the bus here in Atlanta?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:04:06] So basically Atlanta, it’s very it has been request by by our customers. They want more connectivity with Georgia. So, uh, we decided to stop in downtown Marta Civic Center because we like the idea that it has connectivity to different, um, places via Martha, that that’s one of the, of the things. And then we also serve a lot of students and business people. So that will help with connectivity because it’s located, um, in downtown area.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:37] So then they go to where the the Civic Center Marta station is, and then your bus will be there at the appropriate time. So they just board it like they would like if they were getting into an Uber or something. They can just go on to the bus, they bring their stuff and then after you, yeah, they show the.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:04:54] The QR and then they get on the bus. You have a tracking app, we have a tracking. So you can actually check where your bus is like an Uber, you know, to see, uh, the location. And we have two, two daily routes. So two daily departures in the, in the at noon and at night. Because the the seats are so comfortable, you can sleep on the bus and you save money in hotel or if you have to be early, um, back home and you don’t want to stay in, in each of the places, either Orlando or Atlanta, you can do that. But also you save money because you just get to work in the morning or visit your friends or, or whatever you need to do in either Atlanta, Orlando, Gainesville or any of the destinations we go.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:38] So now, you mentioned that if I was going, if I wanted to go to South Florida, I can go to Orlando and then take a second bus from like Orlando to South Florida.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:05:48] Yes.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:05:49] We do have connections there. They’re very like 30 minutes. And it’s one that, you know, you change busses and because we we change drivers and and I’m clean them. So you get a fresh new coach and you continue. But the layover the stop is like 30 minutes.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:06] And then are, is this kind of an express where you’re going directly to Orlando in one shot or are you stopping along the way?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:06:14] So basically we our route is Atlanta. We have a quick stop in Valdosta and then Gainesville. We stop at University of Gainesville of Florida, I’m sorry, in Gainesville. And then uh, Orlando in Orlando. We do have our own station so that you can relax, go to the restroom, eat something. And it’s located like ten minutes from the airport in Marco Road.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:38] Now, is it something that if somebody uses the bus, then from that point somebody picks them up or they take an Uber, uh, to wherever they’re going or, you know, some sort of transport to wherever they’re going.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:06:49] Yeah, that’s pretty much how it works. People, uh, have someone that pick them up or they they just, you know, take an Uber or something. The train is nearby as well. So if you want to do the SunRail, that’s another option too. It’s like a couple of blocks from our station. Or if you need to connect to the airport and take a flight, uh, somewhere else. It’s like ten minutes from the airport as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:14] So who is kind of the, um, the typical rider? Is it a young person that, you know, is doing this for financial reasons, or are business people doing it because they can leave at night? And that’s pretty efficient way to get there the next morning. Who is your kind of target market for the rider?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:07:33] So basically it’s the you know, our demographic is very ample. We have the students that might go to, you know, college and want to visit friends in Florida. Uh, people, family going to Disney. Uh, we have business travelers going to conventions or meetings. So our older people, they don’t feel comfortable driving. They don’t want to go through the hassle of the airports. So that’s a great option, uh, for older demographics as well. So to be honest, it’s, uh, it’s the the range is pretty, pretty pretty big.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:08] And then you said it’s like, uh, 27 to 38 ish people on the on the bus with you.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:08:16] So basically you have a first class pass, you have a business class pass. And we have the economy option as well. For our Atlanta route, we only have the business class. And basically it’s only 38 seats that you can uh, you have there. So only 38 people there, but you have all this extra legroom and space because, uh, we remove all the seats and, and put more ample wider and, you know, reclines, um, 140 degrees so you can actually sleep on the bus. Um, you can use the Wi-Fi as well. You have power outlets. So, uh, a lot of people work there. And, you know, instead of get home and continue working, they just get everything done on the bus. But most of the people do on the bus, to be honest with you, is sleep. People like to sleep on our busses.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:08] And then, um, is there food or do you bring your own food? How does that work?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:09:13] No we don’t we don’t offer food. But people are welcome to bring their own. You have a restroom? Uh, we also have cameras on board. We have eight cameras that are, uh, surveillance 24 seven, uh, because we believe, like, it’s very important, uh, to feel safe. So we take that, uh, very seriously, and we have cameras on board in order to do that.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:37] And then I’m sure you encourage people to use headphones like it isn’t loud. Like there’s not people talking on the phone. Are you allowed to talk on the phone?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:09:47] You’re allowed to talk on the phone, but people are pretty respectful from the from the ones that have it next to them. So, um, it’s it’s a nice, safe environment.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:58] And then, um, do you cater in any way for families like people with children, like seating together, things like that, where like on an airplane. That’s not always easy to do.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:10:09] No. Yes. We do have reserved seating, actually. So before you get on your you have your already your seat assigned and it’s two and two. So you can have a space. Or if you are traveling in a first class you have just you can have your individual seat so you don’t have to share with anyone. And our children’s are are are welcome. Children under two years old travel for free and children until 12 years old get a 15% discount. And we also have discounts for students 10%. And for people older than 65, we do have 10% plus that 10% per veteran. Everything is year round. No blackouts, nothing.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:50] So, um, what’s your backstory? How did you get involved in this line of work? It’s, uh, it must be pretty interesting, because you’re kind of trying to reinvent an old, um, way of transporting.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:11:02] Exactly. Yeah. It’s been a challenge. Um, I, as I mentioned before, I’m from Argentina. I was born and raised there, and, um, it is a family business that was in Argentina for 50 years. And there was a time that we came here on vacation and we saw that there’s a there were a lot of people we saw that frustrated on the road and we said maybe something like what we have in Latin America or Europe might work here. Uh, the question would be they don’t travel by bus because, you know, people just here don’t travel by bus or because they don’t have a better option that, you know, the ones that have been there for more than a hundred years. And so at the beginning, it was kind of like a huge challenge because people didn’t quite understand the concept. Is it 27 seats? So it’s a smaller vehicle. Is it a charter? Um, but then people start trying. And to be honest, our biggest ambassadors are our customers. But it was, um, a big challenge and it’s but it’s been an amazing ride, and I feel like the whole industry is changing step by step, little by little. There’s there are some other companies that are doing luxury busses. There’s no companies doing affordable luxury busses, as we do, because we have dynamic pricing.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:12:20] In fact, now there’s even a promotion for Atlanta for $15, so you can travel from Orlando to Atlanta for $15. But in general, we have dynamic pricing. So a trip from Orlando to Atlanta could cost you $25, for instance. So we are the only ones doing that. There’s other people in other states doing luxury busses, but at, you know, triple, triple or four times the rate that we offer for the same length of trip. Um, but yeah, it has been it has been really nice because I at the beginning people were trying us as the okay. Yeah, whatever. I’m going to give it a try is the bus. I don’t know, but it’s cheap or it’s affordable or something. But then people change. Like this is, for them, a smart option. This is the way they go now. And, you know, it’s it’s been really rewarding to see that or families saying this is a life saver because now I don’t have to drive my mom to to visit my sister somewhere else. They feel safe and. It’s really nice to hear the stories of the people that traveled to be honest to, to connect them, because at the end of the day, what we do, you know, we connect people every single day.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:32] Now, you mentioned like Atlanta to Orlando or I’m assuming both Orlando to Atlanta. There’s a stop in Valdosta and a stop in Gainesville. What does that make the length of that trip? Like if I was to drive in my car, how long would that be? And then how long would it be on Red coach?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:13:50] So basically if you depend depending of of how fast. But basically if you go on red coach the whole trip, it’s um one uh seven hours and 30 minutes. But if you, if you drive, it’s probably six hours and 30 minutes. So it’s not too much because we just do quick, uh, drop off and drop off. Yeah. Pick up and drop off. You know, it’s like ten minutes stop or 15 minutes stop. It’s not like you get off or or something. Um, so. Yeah.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:28] So those stops, so those stops are just, um, so people can get on at Valdosta if they wanted to go Valdosta to Atlanta, there’s a that’s a choice too, right? Like if because the bus will be coming from Orlando. So if you’re in Valdosta and have to get to Atlanta, this is an option for those folks too.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:14:48] Exactly.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:50] Well. How exciting. So, are you looking to, um, obviously you’re going to Atlanta. Are there any other stops on your roadmap in Georgia, or are you primarily going to be in Atlanta and then use that maybe to launch to other southeastern cities?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:15:06] Atlanta and Georgia has been always very exciting hub, you know, to think about. It’s close to Florida. It’s our borders. It’s it’s organic, you know, to go there. So we’re definitely will look into other cities from from Atlanta. We want to just start to to see how people react, how, um, people from Atlanta use Red coach. And for sure, we were looking to just expand in the southeastern region. Uh, we we want to take that red coach concept everywhere.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:39] Well, congratulations on all the momentum. If somebody wants to learn more about Red coach, what’s the website? What’s the best way to to learn more?

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:15:47] So they can look at look at that, a red coach Usa.com. And then also on social media you can follow us and Red coach USA, TikTok, um, Instagram, Facebook. Those are where we are.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:02] Well, congratulations again on all the momentum. And, um, you’re doing important work, and we appreciate you.

Florencia Cirigliano: [00:16:10] Thank you so much for having me. And, uh, it’s it’s been a very exciting ride, for sure.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:16] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Atlanta Business Radio.

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Marlon Marescia With Video Marketing Machine

by

High Velocity Radio
High Velocity Radio
Marlon Marescia With Video Marketing Machine
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Marlon Marescia, Founder of Video Marketing Machine.

He began his career by leading his family’s construction business before making a significant industry shift into IT. Serving as the sales and marketing manager for a software development company, he mastered online lead generation and client conversion skills. After 12years, Marlon ventured into entrepreneurship, founding a marketing agency.

Today, he is an expert in online lead generation and video marketing, coaching businesses globally in online marketing strategies.

Connect with Marlon on LinkedIn and follow him on Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok and Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • The unfair Google Hack to rank at the top of Google using video
  • How to turn 1 video into a holistic marketing strategy, including 5 high powered marketing strategies like email marketing, blogging, Facebook retargeting ads, a week’s worth of social media, and a YouTube video
  • 3 components of an effective online marketing strategy that produce new clients
  • Why video is the fastest and most powerful way to build trust today
  • The blueprint to create a Facebook ads strategy that delivers new clients each week

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:05] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for High Velocity Radio.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:15] Lee Kantor here. Another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Marlon Marescia with Video Marketing Machine. Welcome, Marlon.

Marlon Marescia: [00:00:26] Hi Lee, how are you going?

Lee Kantor: [00:00:27] I am doing well. I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about Video Marketing Machine. How are you serving folks?

Marlon Marescia: [00:00:34] Yeah, so Video Marketing Machine is all about a strategy around video, where we use video as the kind of the focal point, and we get a video from a client, and then we use that video and convert it into five marketing campaigns. So we transcribe the video, we turn it into a blog post, post it to the blog, turn it into an email. We email it to the client’s database, we turn it into a week’s worth of social media content. We upload it to YouTube, and then we create a Facebook retargeting ad and show that video for a whole week to all of the retargeting audiences, like the client’s email list and the website visitors and so forth.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:12] So what is the video? What’s happening on the video?

Marlon Marescia: [00:01:15] We always use a teaching video. So we believe that the best way to build authority for our clients, if they’re a coach or a consultant or a health care professional or a lawyer or an attorney, is to teach. And so if you teach, you can build authority. So typically they’re anywhere from 2 to 5 minute videos. We have a script that we help our clients, um, uh, use to write that script, write the content for the video very easily, and then they just record it, uh, using an iPhone or a webcam. And then we take that video and that becomes the foundation of all that content. And so it’s high quality content because it comes from the client. It’s in their voice and it’s, you know, their personality as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:57] So it’s a it’s a shot of them, you know, like a headshot of them just speaking about a topic.

Marlon Marescia: [00:02:03] Yeah, it’s a headshot. So they just, uh, record their face and then they just talk to the camera and they just teach. And, uh, we find that that’s the most that’s the easiest video to create. And it also is we’re able to repurpose it into all those campaigns and then create high quality content and not just content that is, you know, low quality and and doesn’t really help and doesn’t build authority.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:27] And is there a call to action in that or it’s that just them educating their community.

Marlon Marescia: [00:02:33] Now, one of the things that I believe is that if you’re going to be part of the 1% of the world, right, who actually gives your information for free, and you’re servicing the world and helping the world and making it a better place. I believe that you deserve, you know, 20s 30s at the end of every video to have a very clear call to action so someone can buy your product or, uh, book an appointment to work with you. And I’ve been doing this myself, and I get about 2 or 3 appointments booked in every week from people who find me on YouTube, and they’ll book an appointment and they turn up. And you know what the great thing is? They turn up and they’re pre-sold because they’ve already watched 10 or 15 videos of me. So when they turn up, I’m like a little bit of a celebrity to them. And, um, they’re like, Marlon, so great to meet you. Love the videos. And the sales call is a different it’s different. It has a different temperature. Uh, I don’t have to sell myself. And so if I didn’t put a call to action at the end of every video, then a lot of those people wouldn’t book because they wouldn’t know what the next step is. So I’m very, very, um, strong in telling people that if you’re going to give and teach and train and give your content away for free, you deserve to put a call to action at the end of every video. And that’s what I’ve been doing for many years now, and it’s worked really well for me.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:48] Now. Is the call to action you actually speaking and saying, hey, if you want to call with me, go to, you know, WW call, uh, Marlon Comm or is it a just appearing on the screen?

Marlon Marescia: [00:04:01] Yeah. The call to action is me. I say it every time. It’s. It’s every time I shoot a video at the end, I make it up and I get into a flow of of how I say things. But, um, it’s me every time. And I say it and I always tell people to click the button. They go to a calendar or a calendar, and they book an appointment in my calendar. So I don’t tell them to fill in the detail. I don’t tell them to email me. I just have a very clear, um, action that they can take that’s click the button or click the link. Around this video you’ll see my calendar book a time. This is what you’ll get, the value you’ll get. And that’s how I make it really easy for them to book.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:36] So you have a short URL to the calendar link.

Marlon Marescia: [00:04:40] No, no I. The video is normally placed on a blog post, so the link is in the blog post. Um, it’s on a YouTube video. The link is in the YouTube video. It’s on an email. The link. Is there a Facebook ad? It’s there. So it doesn’t have to be short. It can be as long as you like, but it’s always consistent. It’s the same URL every time. And typically it’s like um, video marketing machine AI slash call. And that’s a pretty simple URL, right?

Lee Kantor: [00:05:05] And then, um, how long are the videos?

Marlon Marescia: [00:05:09] Yeah, the videos are anywhere from 2 to 5 minutes, so the majority of the videos I’ve produced over the last seven years have been very long. They’ve been probably 5 to 10 minutes. Lately I started to reduce it. I’m working with a lot of people doing this around the world. And and I think the sweet spot is 3 to 5. I think when you’re less than three, you’re not adding value. You’re just summarizing. Uh, and when you go too long, it can become a bit monotonous and boring, uh, and people don’t get the gist of it. So I think the sweet spot for me is 3 to 5 minute, five minute videos. The other reason is because we take the video and we upload it to an app called Opus Pro. That’s the URL, and that video is between 3 and 5 minutes. That app will cut that video up into 3 or 4 short videos, and then you get an extra 3 or 4 videos out of it that you can put to YouTube shorts and TikTok and Instagram and Facebook as well. So if it’s too short, like less than two minutes, it can’t create those videos because there’s nothing you’re saying that’s different from the original video.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:12] And when you’re working on the content for each video, is it something that you shoot like a bunch of videos at one time and kind of a cluster? Or is it every morning you’re getting up and doing your five minute video or three minute video?

Marlon Marescia: [00:06:25] Look, when I first started doing this, I have stages of doing videos. When I first started, I’d do it in groups of 4 or 5 videos, and I was highly scripted and it was very stressful. Then I went through a period where I was doing a video a day and they were totally unscripted. I would create an outline and I would just shoot the video and I’d do one a day. I’d go live and just do one a day, and I just got into the routine. Now what I do is I shoot 4 or 5 at a time. Um, I still have them unscripted. I have an outline that I have for every video, which is in bullet point, and I’ll just review the bullet points. Um, I know that the like the rough structure, and then I’ll just do a one take video to the camera and I’ll shoot like 4 or 5 of those in a row. It’ll take me an hour or half an hour, and then I’ll then process those videos and schedule them out over the next month.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:13] And then when you’re working with your clients, are you giving them the tools? So they’re doing this by themselves or are you kind of helping them facilitate them that each video? Yeah.

Marlon Marescia: [00:07:22] Look.

Marlon Marescia: [00:07:23] Yeah I used to do this for them all the time and I still do. So they I charge them a fee and I take the video, I create those five marketing campaigns and we do that every week. But I’ve also created an app, uh, which I actually use in my business to do that. And I’ve released that to the public and people can sign up for the app. So all they have to do now is record their video, upload it to this app, call the video marketing machine I that’s the URL and the app will take the video. It’ll create all that content or create the email, the blog post, um, it’ll create the Facebook retargeting, add the social media posts, uh, and all the social content, and then you will prove it. You just review it, edit it, approve it. It’ll also create the thumbnail for YouTube and the quotation like the quote card with an inspirational quote. And then it’ll actually post it to your WordPress blog. It’ll upload the video to YouTube and it’ll post to all your social platforms. So it normally takes about four hours for my team to take a video and create all that content with this app. It’s taken it from four hours down to 15 minutes and it does it all for you. So, um, it’s an app that I use and I’ve released it and other people can sign up to it and, um, or they can, they can get us to do it for them.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:35] So, um, the way that it works, you can just use the app and kind of do it yourself. Or if you want kind of more hand-holding, you can work with your team and they can kind of coach you through each element of this.

Marlon Marescia: [00:08:48] Yeah. So, um, if they want the app, the app is pretty cheap. It’s like $149 a month. And, um, you’re responsible to record your own video, then you upload it, but then you’re going to be accountable to yourself to make it happen. The reason people pay us to do it is they’ll pay us like 1500 a month. But what we do is we meet with them every second week. We help them create their scripts and we keep them accountable. Uh, and we also, you know, give them advice on other parts of their marketing strategy, how it can fit in. But the biggest thing with this, Lee, is accountability to do it. So the difference between me and why I get, you know, 1 to 3 appointments a week booked in my calendar from people who I don’t know but know me, is because I’ve been doing this consistently for a number of years where most people will listen to this podcast, say, great idea, Marlon, and then not do it because they get busy. And the difference isn’t because I’m great at video. I’m actually not the best presenter on video. I don’t think I’m very hard on myself. There’s lots of things I could improve, but what I am very good at is I’m very good at consistently creating a video on a regular basis and pushing it out through those four marketing, five marketing channels.

Marlon Marescia: [00:09:56] And that’s the difference. You know what I love about social media today and the world we live in is we’re all equal, right? There’s no people that have more privileges than others when it comes to online marketing. The difference is the ones who can be consistent and and do take a good idea and consistently execute it. Most of my life I’ve been inconsistent. I’ve been a perfectionist for the last seven years. I’ve really been able to overcome that challenge in my life, and my business has just exploded because of that. And I don’t do I don’t think I’m the best at anything. I just think that some things, I’m very consistent and I think that’s the secret to success, and that’s why some people will do it themselves if they have the discipline and they’ll just, you know, pay the 149 do do it all themselves, and other people will pass the 1500 because they need that accountability, they need that mentoring, and they need to, you know, just be pointed in the right direction.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:51] Now, when you you mentioned that if you’re using the app or even if you’re using your service, you’re getting multiple pieces of content that you’re getting the ability to place in a variety of ways. Is that really an important component of it, rather like to have an omnichannel approach rather than just saying, look, I’m doing YouTube, so I’m that’s the only thing I’m going to focus in on is YouTube. Like, do you need you need to have an omnichannel approach in order to be effective in today’s world to cut through the clutter.

Marlon Marescia: [00:11:20] You do. And you think about this. How many people have a YouTube channel? And it’s crickets. Like nothing, nothing happens for them. And I had a YouTube channel for years and I would record videos and nothing. They say that you should spend 20% of your time creating the video and 80% of your time promoting the video, but who has the time to spend an extra 80% of time you don’t have, right? It was hard enough to do the 20% to create the video. Where are you going to find the extra 80 to actually promote it? And that’s the problem with most people’s marketing strategies around video or anything they produce. They produce something great, they put it on their website, and no one ever hears about it. No one sees it. But the key is to to promote it. And so that’s why I developed this strategy. Because this strategy, the key to it isn’t the video like, um, the sorry, the key to it is the video. But the fact is, if you create the video and just upload it to YouTube, nothing happens. But if you create the video and you email it to your database, now you’re nurturing your database every single week. They’re getting to see you in the inbox. They may not watch it, but they see your name pop up. Now you create that, take that video, put it as a Facebook ad, a retargeting ad, and you show it to people who are on your email list, that same email list you imported into Facebook and show it to those people you, um, anyone that visits your website, you show that video to them, anyone that likes your pages on Instagram and Facebook, you show it to them.

Marlon Marescia: [00:12:41] Can you see how you’re becoming omnipresent? This small group of people, you know, you put it all over your socials and LinkedIn. Anyone connected with you on LinkedIn now gets to see these videos. They get to see that you’re an authority. And then, um, on YouTube as well. That’s how you find new people. Um, your blog post, that’s how you get indexed in Google and your, your website gets ranked. And these five strategies, anyone in themselves, you know, an agency would cost you at least $1,000 for each one of these, sending a weekly email, doing a blog post every week, uploading a YouTube video and creating that video. Um, creating a Facebook ads retargeting campaign, like all of these are a thousand each. So these five campaigns are about $5,000 a month if you get them done individually, whereas if you do them yourself or through the app or you hire us to do it, it’s a fraction of the cost. But it’s really nurturing your database. The people who could be clients, you’re nurturing them, looking after them and helping them see you as the the go to person in your industry. And that’s the key to this strategy. The video is important, but it’s what we do with the video that makes all the difference, right?

Lee Kantor: [00:13:49] I talked to so many people, they think that the the content, one piece of content is a I’m done now and that’s just the beginning. Like that’s table stakes to play is to have the content. And especially if you have a way to have consistent content over time, then sure, you’re going to win, but you can’t just rely on the content by itself in the original form to do all the heavy lifting. It has to be repurposed if you want it to be effective.

Marlon Marescia: [00:14:16] Yeah. And you know, the disappointing thing for me, because I’ve been in this industry for a long time, I’ve seen lots of apps out there that take a video and they say, hey, we’ll repurpose this into six more videos. We’ll create a, um, a quotation card out of it. We’ll they always do one thing, or they do the cool things or the fun things or the things that can. People go, ah, ooh, that’s amazing. But I’ve never seen anyone do the important things, um, in a scalable way. So I think an email to the database is much better than just a social media post. A social media post is just random, you know? Most people don’t see it, but an email to your database with that piece of content? Most. I’ve never seen anyone come up with this concept before, you know, um, turning it into a blog post and then actually uploading it to the blog. You know, that’s something people say, oh, we can convert it into a blog post, but no one actually helps you upload it. That’s where people get stuck, you know, taking the YouTube video and embedding it into the blog post because Google owns YouTube. So when you embed your your YouTube video into your blog post, that’s a signal to Google that. Wait a minute. This blog post has significant value to link back to our website, you know, Facebook retargeting ad. Have you ever heard of someone say, hey, repurpose your content into a Facebook retargeting ad? That is one of the most powerful strategies you could ever use.

Marlon Marescia: [00:15:40] Now, the reason why people and apps don’t do this is because it’s difficult. It’s difficult to create a Facebook ad. It’s difficult to get an email and then actually email it to someone’s database. You’ve got to import the database in. It’s not fun, but it’s important. Powerful work that grows businesses. See, I’m a marketing consultant and I have a marketing agency, and I used to be a sales manager. So everything I do is based on can we get a sale? And when I create a video, my attitude is, how can I use this video to make a sale? And I draw the line between the two video and sale, and I figure out, what can I do with this video? To help me get the sale. And. And that’s why I’ve come up with this strategy. Did I invent all of them individually? No. But what I did do was tie them together so I could get business and I could get appointments booked in my calendar. And it worked. But, Lee, it was very difficult to come up with and then executed over many years and get it to work. There were many times I thought, this is just a waste of time, but I persisted. And now you know, there’s a strategy that actually works, and the app just makes it a bit easier for people.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:50] Now, you mentioned several times these retargeting of Facebook ads. Do you mind sharing, sharing some advice for the listeners on okay, they they might have heard this terms, but can you explain it a little bit more what that exactly means? And maybe a primer on how to kind of do that, you know, for them if they wanted to do that themselves.

Marlon Marescia: [00:17:13] Yes. So, um, Facebook retargeting, a lot of people have heard of it. No one, very few people actually do it. And there’s a lot of people that don’t understand it. So what Facebook retargeting is, is Facebook gives you the ability to create an ad. It could be a video ad, it could be an image ad, any type of ad. But you can show it to a very, um, small group of people and you can pay as little as a dollar a day because you’re not showing it to millions of people. You’re showing it to probably hundreds of people or a couple of thousand people. Now, who are these people? These people are people who are in your database. If you’ve got a database of a thousand people, you can import that into Facebook. Facebook matches them based on their email address or their phone number. And then it creates a list in Facebook and says, here’s your retargeting audience. And then you can show an ad to those people every day of the week for as little as a dollar a day, it costs hardly any money because it’s only a thousand people. It’s not a million. The other audience is your website audience. So anyone that, um, visit your website, if you put the Facebook pixel on the website, it’s a piece of code. Every time someone hits that website, Facebook records. Oh, that’s John and it knows it’s John, because you have the Facebook app opened on your phone.

Marlon Marescia: [00:18:23] And, um, when you go to a website, it tracks that. Uh, and then the other thing is, anyone who likes your pages on Instagram and Facebook and interacts with them, that’s another audience. And there’s another, even more powerful audience. This is the audience of if anyone has watched, say, 50% of a previous video that you’ve posted to Facebook or Instagram, Facebook can create an audience of those people. Now they’re very hot prospects because if you’ve got a, say, a four minute video and someone watches 50% of it, that’s two minutes. They watch. That person is not your grandmother. It’s not your friend down the road who doesn’t care about your business. It’s not a teenager if you’re a lawyer, it’s not a teenager that is into TikTok. It’s someone that’s engaged with your content and that those people are hot prospects, that you just don’t have their email yet. You just don’t know who they are. But Facebook knows them, and you can show a video ad to them every day of the week. And what we’re doing with this video ad is video is the quickest way to build trust and authority with someone today. When they see you, when they hear you, when they hear the inflection in your voice, when they see your facial expressions, they make a judgment. Do I like and trust them or do I not? And when you educate them, what you can do is very quickly build a following of people who know, like, and trust you because they’ve seen you, you know, they’ve seen you all over YouTube, they’ve seen you on Facebook.

Marlon Marescia: [00:19:44] And so what we’re doing is creating some audiences. It’s a website audience. It’s an email list. It’s a video audience. It’s a page like audience. And those people that might be 500, 1000, 3000 people combined. We can just keep building authority with you, with those people for as little as a dollar a day. Most of my clients spend $1 a day, $30 a month. It’s more powerful than TV. It’s cheaper and more effective than TV. And yet most businesses don’t do it. And that’s why, you know, when we record a video every week, we put that new video into that Facebook campaign and, uh, it it makes a very big difference for the businesses. I say it’s a way of becoming omnipresent. You know, they say that God is omnipresent. He’s everywhere. Well, you can be omnipresent to a very small group of people if you’re showing up in their inbox every week with one email, if you’re on their Facebook feed and Instagram feed almost every day, if you’re on their social media accounts, um, if you’re on YouTube, when they go to YouTube, you become omnipresent, you become the authority, and you become the go to person that when they need help, they know who to call.

Lee Kantor: [00:20:52] And that’s an important point that you bring up, is managing the expectations of your clients in terms of your audience isn’t millions, your audience is hundreds or thousands. And we’re just going to market like crazy to that targeted smaller group in order to move the needle in your business rather than, you know, to transform you into a Kardashian.

Marlon Marescia: [00:21:16] Yes. And you know, Lee, I love this point. It’s a great point you’ve made because, you know, I will never be world famous. I don’t have the personality for it. Right? I’m I’m a I’m an introvert. But, you know, I don’t need to be to be successful in business. You don’t have to be a Kardashian. You don’t have to be MrBeast or Joe Rogan or dude. Perfect. All you have to be is yourself, because there’s a small group of people in the world that we can get access through to Facebook ads, email, that kind of thing. Who could be clients, their prospects. And if you just become omnipresent to them, you will become the Kardashians. To them, you’ll be the Joe Rogan to those people. And you know, with me, I’m amazed at how introverted I am and how many people love me and that I’ve never met. But it’s not millions. It’s probably not tens of thousands. It’s probably hundreds and maybe a couple. A thousand people that know, and they see me as the authority. And the way they clap, the way they applaud me isn’t by likes, comments and shares. It’s not by, um, calling out to me on the street. It’s by booking an appointment with me. And when they book the appointment, that is the greatest privilege I have. And when I know that they are a fan who doesn’t just adore me, but they want to work with me, and that means more to me as a businessman.

Marlon Marescia: [00:22:40] I don’t care about the adoration or the applause. And so my my goal in life with video is to become a massive deal, a big deal to a very small group of people who could be clients. And that that’s all I care about. And it’s worked for me. Lee, you know, the last few years has been very, very good for me, very good with, uh, for example, I just, um, I’m working with a new person that found me there in New York. I live in the Gold Coast, Australia, so I live in Australia. They live in New York, and they they’ve just signed up as a client. And I had one meeting with that person and I gave him a proposal and they’ve signed up, and that’s $1,500 a month with a big upfront fee. And it’s because it’s not because I convinced them on the call. They already made their mind up to work with me before the call. And, you know, I think that’s the greatest thing we could ever attain in our business career. Um, not to be a Kardashian, but to have people that like, know and trust you who after one meeting or two meetings will say, you’re the person I want to work with. And that’s why I do video and that’s why, you know, the video marketing machine. For me, that’s what I call it, has been one of the most powerful tools in my business.

Lee Kantor: [00:23:52] So if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on your team, what’s the website? What’s the best way to get Ahold of you?

Marlon Marescia: [00:24:00] Yeah. So, um, the app is a video marketing machine. I that’s where they can get the app. But if they want to have a and if they go there, they can book a demo and then they can talk to me, I’ll be on the call and they can talk to me. Um, I have a, a website, a personal website called Marlin marescia.com. And if I go there again, they can book a call. But that’s the best way if people want to learn more.

Lee Kantor: [00:24:26] Well, Marlon, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Marlon Marescia: [00:24:32] Oh, thanks for having me on.

Lee Kantor: [00:24:34] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on High Velocity Radio.

Kristin Sage With Sage Counseling and Consulting Ltd

by

Richmond Business Radio
Richmond Business Radio
Kristin Sage With Sage Counseling and Consulting Ltd
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Coach-Karena-ambassadorKristin Sage has over 15 years of experience in the counseling field. She earned her bachelor’s degree from Virginia Tech and master’s degree in Marriage and Family Therapy from the College of William and Mary.

She specializes in working with women and children/adolescents, but also works with couples, and families on a variety of issues.

Sage Counseling and Consulting Ltd is a small private practice located near Buford Road in Richmond, Virginia. They strive to provide the best counseling services to individuals, couples, and families in Virginia and specialize in working with women and children/adolescents as young as three years old!

A family systems approach is taken with all clients to help them understand their current problems and reach their counseling goals. This helps people to feel good about themselves and helps them have happier, healthier relationships by gaining new awareness and insight.

Sage Counseling and Consulting, Ltd is hosting our first annual women’s conference on May 3, 2024. Our conference called Transformed: A Journey of Healing, Health, Hope and Happiness will be held at the Sheraton Hotel in Midlothian, Virginia.

The conference starts at 8:00am and ends at 4:30pm. Registration is currently open and ends on April 1, 2024. Tickets for the conference are $149.99 for the day and include breakfast and lunch. Scholarships are available upon request.

This conference is perfect for any working mom, businesswoman or woman going through life transitions and who is thinking or wants to start thinking about how to prioritize herself! At the conference, you will meet like-minded women, make new friends, network, and of course learn more about yourself!

This will be a day of learning, strategy and pampering facilitated by women just like you, businesswomen in the Richmond area! The day of the conference, breakfast and lunch will be provided by the hotel. Morning sessions will focus on information and processing, while afternoon sessions focus on self-care strategy and application.

After self-care sessions, we will have a panel discussion followed by a VIP event where you can speak one-on-one with the session speakers and socialize/network. We will have various drawings for gift cards and prizes throughout the day and you will also receive a tote bag with goodies from our speakers and sponsors.

Please join us on May 3, 2024, and enjoy a day that focuses on you and your new friends!

Connect with Kristin on LinkedIn and follow Sage Counseling and Consulting on Facebook.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • About Sage Counseling and Consulting Ltd and their unique practices

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:03] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Richmond, Virginia. It’s time for Richmond Business Radio. Now here’s your.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:13] Host. Lee Kantor here, another episode of Richmond Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Kristen Sage with Sage Counseling and Consulting. Welcome.

Kristin Sage: [00:00:26] Thank you.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:28] I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about Sage Counseling and Consulting. How you serving folks?

Kristin Sage: [00:00:34] Sure. Sage Counseling and Consulting is a small private mental health practice in North Chesterfield, Virginia, and we specialize in serving families, young children, children as young as three and up. We see a lot of women and men, and we also see a lot of couples. So we really focus on the marriage and family aspect. Um, that’s my perspective. I’m a licensed marriage and family therapist and a licensed professional counselor. So again, just focusing on how the family and the community can impact the individual and then help the families and the children that we serve.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:11] So how are you delineating the difference between counseling and consulting?

Kristin Sage: [00:01:17] I think counseling is more sessions to help people achieve their goals, and consulting is more like, maybe you just have a problem that you want to fix, like a one time thing.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:28] So how do people initially come to you? What do they have a problem they’re trying to fix, or is it something more systemic?

Kristin Sage: [00:01:35] I would say there’s definitely some problems that they have. Usually it’s more than one.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:41] So, like, what’s an example?

Kristin Sage: [00:01:43] Um, we have a lot of people, I would say a lot of mental health issues, but then also relationship issues, a lot of couples, we see a mother and daughters, often different family dynamics. So we see people from a variety of backgrounds and just different issues.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:03] Now, if they’re not going to counseling, how are they solving these issues in their life or are they just not? Are they ignoring it? Or like lack of awareness, like like if they’re not, if you’re not the solution, what are they doing to try to solve this pain?

Kristin Sage: [00:02:17] I do feel like there’s a lot of avoidance and a lot of the couples we see, you know, things have been going on for some time that are not being addressed and they just don’t know what to do. So they come to us.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:29] So what are some symptoms that people are having that maybe they’re dismissing as, oh, this is just life, and life is hard and this is just how it is. Like, what are some symptoms that people maybe would benefit if they came to see somebody like you?

Kristin Sage: [00:02:42] I do feel like people are very stressed right now, just in general, they’re unhappy with what they’re doing, just like as individuals. And there’s a lot of pressure to be a certain way or do a certain thing. Again, maybe they have some mental health issues just on their own. And then if you have that in like a couple and both people are experiencing that, that brings like a lot to the table to try to solve. And sometimes people are fighting a lot or they’re just like going off on their own and they’re not addressing the problem. And there’s like so much going on, but they don’t know what’s wrong. So they’ll come to me and they’re like, well, I’m unhappy, but I don’t know why or I can’t get along with this person, but I don’t know why or I don’t know how to solve the problem. So they come to us to kind of figure that out, and we try to help them with strategies that can help them have good relationships with others, but also have strategies to help them feel better, I would say happier and more calmer.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:39] Now, what’s your backstory? How’d you get involved in this line of work?

Kristin Sage: [00:03:43] Um, I feel like I know a lot of people with mental health issues. I know there’s a lot of mental health issues in my family as well as a lot of families. So it’s just something I want to help people with. And I feel like kids especially, they don’t really have a voice. So I try to help them, you know, deal with issues on their own and then help them communicate that to their parents so that they have better, a better life. And hopefully things can get solved at home.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:10] Were you always self employed or did you work somewhere first and decide to then go out on your own?

Kristin Sage: [00:04:17] Um, I’ve.

Kristin Sage: [00:04:17] Done contracting for a while. I worked in nonprofit, for profit, um, like community agencies, things like that. Um, so I just wanted to do something on my own. Um, and I did that. And then I think it was like a couple years ago, I decided to, um, start, um, having some residents and counseling, um, under myself. So I have one resident in counseling, so that’s LPC track. And then I have another resident in marriage and family therapy, which is, um, like my license.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:48] So what was that like going out on your own like that?

Kristin Sage: [00:04:52] Was a little scary, but there is a need. So you just kind of like try to plan. And so like there’s some overlap between jobs, you know, trying to accrue your caseload.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:01] So how do you go out to the market to even find a client. Like it’s not like a, um, you know, like a hair salon or I would I would imagine this is a lot of word of mouth, like, like how do you even begin to open a practice like this seems very daunting.

Kristin Sage: [00:05:19] Yeah. So, I mean, you’re a credentialed with insurance companies and they, um, have like a list of providers. So if you’re, you know, having an issue and you want to see someone, you can contact your insurance company and they’ll say, oh, here’s a list of people in your area so they will contact you that way. We do have a lot of referrals from word of mouth. Um, and then I don’t know if you’re familiar with Psychology Today. It’s a website, and a lot of people just look people up online and there’s like a whole list of providers and you kind of like, read a bio and just say, oh, does this, you know, match what I’m looking for? I think like that personality would match with my personality. And then you have some sessions and see if it works for you.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:58] Now what some signals for a person who’s never done this before and you’re, you know, you’re going and you’re trying a new counselor, what is some kind of signs that you’ve got a good one or this is good, this has a good chance of working because I would imagine that, you know, getting that fit right is super important in the outcome.

Kristin Sage: [00:06:19] Um, I feel like that’s an individual choice, and I feel like you just have to feel comfortable and feel like. Does this personality and this person match? You know, me and my person and my personality. People can be great people, but they just might not fit. So I think if you’re if you’re like, oh, I like this person, I think they are a good fit, go with it. If initially, I mean, I would just ask people give a couple of sessions because usually the first session is just more of an assessment. But I would just say, like, if you’re not getting a good feeling, you’re not getting a good vibe. You’re just like, it just doesn’t feel right, then that person might not be for you. And that’s okay. And the counselors understand that. So don’t worry about hurting people’s feelings. It’s okay to find another counselor.

Lee Kantor: [00:07:07] Is there any kind of amount of time that goes by without seeing improvement? That would be kind of like, hey, this may not be working, or is that I know that’s a case by case, but like, is it like if years went by and you don’t feel better or you’re in the same place or you’re making the same mistakes, is that kind of a sign that it’s not working? Or like, how do you kind of gauge from a timing standpoint if it’s a good fit?

Kristin Sage: [00:07:36] I feel like you said. You said for a time, like looking at kind of like a timeline, right?

Lee Kantor: [00:07:41] Like, I know, like I go in there and I have an issue and then I know, like at the end of the session, I’m not it’s not going to be better. It’s not like I’m hungry and I go to Chipotle and now I’m not hungry anymore. Like I understand there’s more to it than that, but how how much time is reasonable to expect some. Change.

Kristin Sage: [00:08:03] So I think that’s a hard question to answer because everyone is so different. I would say. It’s like, what are you trying to achieve? Like what is your goal? And you have to the client has to put in the work like counselors can’t like fix the problem for someone. Um, but I think it’s like asking yourself, am I ready to make changes? If you’re not, that’s okay. But counseling might not be for you at that time, so you would just have to think like, am I open? Okay, well, this might be my problem. So you’ll create goals with your therapist, and every time you meet, you’re working on those goals. You can come and talk about whatever you want. Um, but you’re formulating those goals, and you always come back to them or you adjust them as needed. Um, so some people say they feel better, like right away after a few sessions, um, if they keep coming. Some people, it does take years because some people have like a lot of trauma. We do see a lot of people with trauma and well, everyone has trauma. But there’s different types of trauma. There’s different layers of trauma. So it depends, you know, what you’re working on in session and how you’re kind of, I think viewing the problem and like what you can realistically do about the problem.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:15] Now coming up in May, you’re putting on, uh, your first annual women’s conference. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

Kristin Sage: [00:09:24] Yes. So our first annual women’s conference is called transformed a Journey of Healing, health, hope and happiness. And it’s May 3rd, 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.. So it’s an all day event. Um, so we have a full day of speakers and strategy. Um, so around from like 8 to 9, we’re going to do a breakfast. So breakfast is provided by the hotel and we have a keynote speaker, April Spencer, who is with Nami Central Virginia. Have you heard of Nami before?

Lee Kantor: [00:09:55] No.

Kristin Sage: [00:09:56] Okay. So that’s the National Alliance on Mental Illness. Um, so they have local, state and national levels. Um, but April’s with the central or like local level. Um, so she’s going to speak. She’s going to do our keynote speech, um, and kind of speak about her story and how she came to be involved with Nami, and she’s also going to be doing a session on spirituality. And I feel like that’s a special topic, because a lot of people don’t talk about spirituality and how it kind of can help them. And if if you don’t want to go to that session, that’s okay. Um, so basically I’ll kind of lay out the the day. Um, from 9 to 12 we have sessions every hour. And you’re going to get a choice. You get to go to one out of like four sessions, if that makes sense. Um, and so you’re going to be focusing kind of on yourself in the morning, and you’re going to be going to sessions that interest you. And maybe you want more information about. And the goal for the morning is to really think about different aspects of your life and maybe things you want to change. Or maybe you think things like are going well in this area, like what’s going well and what’s not, and like, what do you want to change? And think about how one of these, um, speakers is going to help you or could help you. And all of our speakers are local business women in the area. So they’re experts in their field, and they have a lot of experience working with other women. So this is going to be like an awesome day to connect with other like minded women, talk to people, women who have there are experts in their field. And then focus on yourself.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:37] Now is there the morning? Is there a chance for me to interact? Am I going to be able to ask questions? Or is this, you know, a lot of education. They’re speaking and I’m listening. And then I move to the next speaker and I’m listening again.

Kristin Sage: [00:11:51] So this isn’t like the speakers aren’t speaking at you. It’s more like they’re going to be talking and it’s going to be more of a group discussion. And we really want it to be interactive. So there’s like some activities. There’s going to be a lot of discussion. So we really want people to share if they feel comfortable because who wants to be talked out for like an hour.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:09] Right. So then I go to sessions in the morning. Is there a lunch? Is there food involved or is this just kind of learning?

Kristin Sage: [00:12:17] Yeah. So in the morning we have breakfast and then we have lunch from like 12 to 1. And then in the afternoon we have some self-care strategies. So the morning is more like group oriented. Um, and the session in the afternoon is also but it’s more like strategy. So we’re going to be having meditation chair yoga. So it’s yoga, but it’s not going to be as like intensive. Um, I don’t know if you’ve heard of Reiki before or acupressure, but those are our afternoon sessions.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:46] And then so I’ll be able to participate in those and, and actually go through some of those, you know, and physically feel them, not just hear about them.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:56] Yeah, I feel like those.

Kristin Sage: [00:12:58] So it’s all interactive. But the afternoon I think it’s, it’s good to have those, um, sessions in the afternoon because, you know, you have lunch, you might get a little tired. So then you can go and you’re going to be wide awake because you’re going to probably be moving a little bit like nothing too crazy, but just moving a little bit.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:13] And then how does how does it end?

Kristin Sage: [00:13:15] So we also have a panel discussion, which I’m really excited about. Um, because May is Mental Health Awareness Month and we’re meeting on May 3rd. Um, we’re having a panel of licensed providers in the area. Um, and these ladies we have I’m going to be on it. My resident and then two other licensed professional counselors are going to be on it, along with a family nurse practitioner. So she’s going to speak more about the overlap of mental health and physical health. But all of the attendees for that day, they’re going to write down questions that they specifically want to have answers to. And we’re going to go over that during the panel discussion from like 1 to 315. And then after that, we’re going to have a little VIP event where attendees can talk to the speakers individually, like ask them more questions and just have some one on one time and maybe, you know, find out if they want to connect with them in the future.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:07] So is this something that a person goes by themselves, or do they bring their friends or they bring their kid? Like, how would you how would you do this?

Lee Kantor: [00:14:16] That’s a.

Kristin Sage: [00:14:17] Good point. Um, so the plan for the day, the plan of the day is for women to really prioritize themselves and think about. Themselves take time for themselves. So there you know, we don’t have any childcare. So but we’re hoping that women will take the day off if they are working. And it’s a Friday. So hopefully the kids will be in school or they will be in daycare and women can just come. Um, so we encourage women to just come by themselves if they want to or come and bring their friends. Um, because we’re hoping women will connect with other women. And I believe, like, if you go anywhere, you just never know who you’re going to talk to, who you’re going to sit by. You can make a new lifelong friend. You can make a new job connection. You just never.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:56] Know.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:57] So if somebody wants to learn more about the event or your practice, is there a website they can go to?

Kristin Sage: [00:15:03] Yes. Um, so my practice is sage Counseling for you. Com so that is our general website. If they want to register for the conference they should go to sage counseling dot ticket spice.com backslash transformed. So that’s where you purchase the tickets. But if you go to our general site you can click on a link there. And it will also take you to the Ticket Spice website. And just to kind of throw it out there, um, we do have some specials going on. We know money is tight for a lot of people, so we do have some sales. Um, if you’re really having financial hardship, we do have some scholarships. So we’re hoping, you know, whoever wants to come is able to come.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:42] Now, if somebody if a business person out there would like to sponsor it, is there still sponsor opportunities or is it too late?

Kristin Sage: [00:15:50] Yes, we are still looking for sponsors. So if they just contact me, um, through the website, that would be great.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:57] And then what type of businesses would be a good sponsor for you?

Kristin Sage: [00:16:00] I would say anything mental, well mental health and overall wellness. So it can be because we’re our we’re touching on um, physical health, mental health, spiritual health and sexual health. Um, so anything related to women’s overall health?

Lee Kantor: [00:16:15] Well, congratulations on all the success and good luck on this event. You’re doing important work and we appreciate you.

Kristin Sage: [00:16:23] Thank you. Um, and is it okay to just kind of tell a little bit about the sponsors that we do have?

Lee Kantor: [00:16:28] Sure.

Kristin Sage: [00:16:29] Okay. So doctor Erica mason is with Sleep Better. Virginia. She’s going to be one of our presenters as well. Um, she’s a sponsor. And then Nicole Formsma, she’s the owner of Rejuvenation Skin Lab. She’s also presenting, and she is a sponsor. Um, and they do a lot of, like, skin rejuvenation and just different rejuvenation for women of all skin types and backgrounds. Um, she did say that they do see a lot of women with some kind of trauma. So that’s a place to go to if you’re feeling really sensitive about your body or about your skin. And then we also have sage tides and that, um, is like kind of like a little mental health retreat if you want to get away and kind of just be somewhere near the beach.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:11] Well, Kristen, thank you again for sharing your story.

Kristin Sage: [00:17:15] Thank you. I really.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:16] Appreciate it.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:17] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Richmond Business Radio.

Jeremy Shapiro With Bay Area Mastermind

by

Bay Area Business Radio
Bay Area Business Radio
Jeremy Shapiro With Bay Area Mastermind
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Leah-Davis-Ambassador-logo1In his role as a mentor and coach to entrepreneurs at Bay Area Mastermind, serial-entrepreneur Jeremy B. Shapiro helps small business owners make the transition from “solopreneur” to “business owner” – an important distinction that many entrepreneurs can easily miss when working “in” their business instead of “on” their business.

Since 1998, through structured masterminding, one-on-one coaching, and consulting work, he has been helping entrepreneurs discover the core strengths in themselves and their business, and realize their true potential combining passion and expertise to grow their businesses and attain the freedom they deserve.

Connect with Jeremy on LinkedIn and follow Bay Area Mastermind on Facebook.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

  • Self employed vs. a true business owner
  • Most common mistakes founders make when trying to scale their business
  • How entrepreneurs can prevent the all too common “burn out”
  • The difference between working IN your business and working ON your business

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:06] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in the Bay area. It’s time for Bay Area Business Radio. Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:18] Lee Kantor. Here, another episode of Bay Area Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Jeremy Shapiro with Bay Area Mastermind. Welcome.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:00:29] Thanks so much for having me. This is great.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:31] I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about Bay Area Mastermind. How you serving folks?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:00:36] Yeah, what we’re doing is we’re helping out our local Bay area entrepreneurs, business owners and founders really connect and get together for a full day of working on their business, as opposed to the day to day work in their business. And that lets our members connect, scale and really grow together.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:51] So what’s the genesis of the idea? How did this come about?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:00:55] Well, I’ve been part of mastermind groups myself for decades. Some groups are remote. You hop on a plane and fly somewhere exotic for a few days, you know, a few times a year, other times more casual, sort of weekly, like accountability calls or get togethers. And those haven’t really served the needs that I was looking for in my businesses and the structure we put together for the Bay Area Mastermind of meeting once a month for a full day right here in downtown San Jose, lets us get into what’s really going on in our own businesses and uncover the blind spots for each other, and provide that expertise and peer advisory that comes from hanging around with like minded, growth focused, lifelong learners.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:31] Now, for folks who aren’t familiar with the concept of mastermind, do you mind sharing a little bit of a primer on what it is and how it kind of came about?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:01:41] Yeah, the topic or the idea of a mastermind really came from author Napoleon Hill when he published this Think and Grow Rich book back in 1938. One of the titles he had there, chapter ten, is called The Power of the Mastermind, The Driving Force, and this really is where he exposes this idea of titans of industry getting together and helping each other out. And this structure lets individuals uncover the blind spots for each other and provide that real peer advisory. As an entrepreneur can get lonely at the top, you don’t really have that kind of honest, candid feedback you need from customers, from vendors, from family, friends and so on. So when you’re with other folks who are also in that same boat on that same journey, you can get that unbiased, real feedback. People who don’t mind asking the tough questions and don’t mind lending their superpowers and deep areas of expertise to help you get unblocked and move forward in life and in business.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:37] Now, it sounds like you’ve been kind of experiencing several different iterations or variations of a mastermind. Tell me about how you were able to kind of pick your favorite parts, or maybe the most effective that you found, and then build this into kind of your unique spin on a mastermind, like for the person who doesn’t understand or really maybe of experienced the variety, you know, like you mentioned, there are some that are kind of leads clubs. Some are just about, you know, support and accountability. Some are really, you know, noncompetitive people trying to grow their business. There’s there’s a lot of flavors to this. And talk about how you were able to kind of cherry pick your favorite parts or best parts that you find most effective into your the one that you’re doing.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:03:23] Business owners have long had groups available to them, just like the ones you’re describing. From leads, groups and networking groups to referral groups to just networking groups and social events and everything in between. A mastermind is really special and different from that, and when we look at what the best parts are from the sort of various formats and styles of mastermind groups out there, what I’ve found really matters is one that you’ve got the right people in the room with you, right? You don’t want to be the biggest fish in the pond, as it were, and so far ahead of everyone else that you can’t get much value from the group and the experience they have to share. And on the flip side, you don’t want to be the smallest guy in the room where you don’t have much to contribute or share with the group. So you’re looking for that like minded group of folks at a similar stage of business as to where you’re at, and we are really intentional about how we curate that and how we attract the right kinds of members to our group. Second, it’s important to us that within those members we have, like I shared, lifelong learners and people who are focused on self improvement, business improvement, and want to grow and scale and be the best version of themselves with the best version of their business that they can have. So within that, when we look at sort of the weekly cadence that typically is too frequent and those meetings are usually too short to really get a chance to deep dive into the heart of what’s going on in an individual’s business. On the flip side, the larger destination groups where you’re getting away for, you know, a week, once or twice a year, maybe three times the entire business can change.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:04:47] So by the time you show up, people have sold their business, launched a new business. Things are drastically different over the course of, say, six months. So one of the best practices we found was that meeting cadence of once a month for a full day that gives us time to implement and execute on our accountability items, where we hold each other accountable. And it lets you actually make real change in the business, much more that you can make in a one week period and less than you do in a six month period. So that cadence, I found, is one of the best practices for how often to meet. And lastly, when you look at like the free groups or coffee accountability groups that maybe meet for 30 up to at the most 90 minutes once a week. Those typically have a higher turnover because they’re usually free to very low cost. And as a busy business owner, if you’ve got something recurring on the calendar showing up to talk to a few friends that you do every single week, sometimes the fires of the day become more important and so members don’t really show up. There’s not much skin in the game. It’s a very low barrier to entry. So by having an actual financial investment as well as the time investment, you’re able to find folks who find value in the group and each other and are willing to invest the time, as well as the money in being part of the right kind of group of folks just like them, who also want to grow and scale.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:02] So how many groups are you running?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:06:06] Um, so it depends how we look at that. We have, um, we have our core groups that are for our scaling business owners. Um, this past year, we actually just kicked off a founders group as well for a much earlier stage businesses. And we also have folks we work with virtually, as well as folks that we, you know, we coach and consult in terms of an actual group size. What we found is you can’t let a group get too big. That’s the point where we actually want to split off and have a new group that’s not just an oversubscribed group like you’d find in sort of one of those destination groups, like we were talking about before, those you can have more members in.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:40] So now when you’re building the group or curating the group, what are some of the at least red flags for you? Like, you know, I’m sure you don’t want people that are transactional, that are, you know, kind of jerks, like you’re trying to create a group of similarly valued people that appreciate this experience and not, you know, one to dominate it.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:07:06] Yeah, that’s spot on. Qualifying for the right people is really important. Everyone has their industry or trade groups they can go to to find more people who are just like themselves doing the same thing the same way. By consciously curating a diverse group, we get what I call the cross pollination of ideas, and this is where you get members sharing best practices in their industry with other individuals in a different industry, where they can really pivot and do something different than everybody else. So I’ll share an example I love in this space, you have an e-commerce company who’s selling purely online. They then hear about an offline retail business who’s doing direct mail. Right now you have one business who’s doing one style of marketing and a different business doing an almost opposite style of marketing. The two of them are then able to see what the other one is doing, ask questions about that, get access to resources, best practices, do’s, don’ts, and so on. So we’re looking for that range of businesses and range of superpowers and areas of expertise. In terms of characteristics, we want to make sure that our members are well read. They enjoy reading. They’re actively reading. We’re all lifelong learners. We’re all voracious readers, right? We are individuals who invest in ourselves, who go to conferences, who take courses, who are always learning and trying to be that better version.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:08:20] So we screen for that. We’re also looking for folks who won’t just get value from the group, but who are able to contribute value as well. So part of our screening process we have for our test drives is we’re looking for what are those areas of genius, or what are those areas where a business owner is seeing success that they be able to lend some expertise in the group? It’s not just about there being, you know, a linear one person is ahead of somebody else overall and able to help others up. It’s a matter that everyone has different areas of expertise and superpowers. So when it comes to marketing, you’ll have some members who have deep expertise. Others have deep expertise in sales, others in hiring and retention, and others in finance and so on. So depending on what a member needs, we’re looking for that range of skill sets and that range of superpowers that can really help to have that that lively peer advisory. And we want folks who are open to being lovingly and respectfully challenged around their blind spots and are open to seeing the opportunities others see within themselves and within their businesses.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:19] So walk me through. Um. Say, I raised my hand and I’m like, Jeremy, I’m curious. Um, how do I get involved with this mastermind group? How do I, you know, throw my hat into the ring? What do I have to do?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:09:32] What we found experientially. And this goes back to one of your questions earlier about best practices, is it doesn’t make sense for someone to join a group blind they’ve never been part of before, or had a chance to experience. On that same note, it’s unfair to a group to just tell them, hey, here’s somebody new who’s just in the group. So what we put together is our test drive process. So when someone heads over to Bay Area mastermind.com, you can start an application. And that application, even the questions that we asked during that, those questions themselves can be eye opening and can help you see some opportunities in your business for where you are and where you’re going. Once that application is in, we hop on the phone, we go over that application and better understand what you’re looking for in a mastermind group and see if there’s an opportunity to serve or to point you in a direction where someone can help you out. And if it looks like there’s there’s a good fit, we invite you to our test drive. So for a reduced fee, it lets you join us one time for a full day and really experience what it’s like to have a hot seat to to feel that joy and thrill that comes from providing insight and advisory to others and really experience that full day with us. And at the conclusion of that, if we feel that you’d be a good fit for the group, and if the group feels the same and you feel the group would be a good fit for you, then we extend the offer to join us and become a member with us longer.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:47] Tum now what is that day agenda typically, uh, how does it flow?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:10:54] The biggest thing we do throughout the day, and where most of our time is focused, is on our member hot seats. Within each hot seat, there are four main things that everyone’s going to be covering for you. If it’s your first time test driving with us, it’ll be a little bit about who you are, what you do, and all that. For the rest of our members who are returning, they’ll be going over accountability items and what’s been accomplished over the past month. And then what everyone’s really sharing, and it’s in varying formats, but there’s three major points beyond that. One is what’s working, two is what’s not, and three is where you need help. So this is where, you know, we’ve had members share, for example, challenges that they’ve had with a marketing campaign that didn’t go the way they wanted it to, and they would love some feedback on why. Or they’ll share the lessons learned from that. You might find someone else who is sharing about a new hiring process they put into place that’s working really well, and walk the group through what that looks like. And what I think is really interesting is everyone who comes into the room usually has some big question, some big ask, some big block, and they’re looking for insight on that. And they go in with the idea of success is getting an answer to that question. But where I see the biggest aha moments, I see the pens scribbling the most. I see people’s eyes go wide and the smile creep across their face. That always happens during everybody else’s hot seat. It’s when other members are sharing what’s going on in their business, what’s working, where they need help and so on that you see those sparks really ignite, and entrepreneurs take note and ask those questions of digging a little deeper. See, these hot seats aren’t just a one way presentation. They’re facilitated conversations. And so it’s a chance for members to ask questions and get that guidance they need in their own business based on the experience of others who’ve been there and done that.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:31] Now, when you started this concept, how did you get kind of that initial group together? Was it just your peers or people you’ve just met over the years? How did you kind of build this from scratch?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:12:43] Yeah, we were sort of in like the shadows for quite a while. It was people we know, people we connected with who shared this is really what they were looking for. And they’ve been they’ve been looking for a mastermind group to help them out. Generally, people who found us or knew about this had already read Napoleon Hill’s books, knew this idea of looking for a mastermind, or they heard about that concept somewhere else, and they then wanted to find a local to the Bay area mastermind group that they could join. And the Bay Area Mastermind is exactly that. So we filled a pretty unique gap that’s in the marketplace. There’s plenty of networking groups and founders groups and things like that to meet other people. But again, the focus there is usually networking. It’s not so much on the true mastermind concept of sharing what’s really going on in your business, both the wins and the failures. As an entrepreneur, it’s lonely at the top. There’s not a lot of folks you can celebrate your big successes and wins with. And the flip side, there’s not a lot of people you can share your real challenges and blocks with, and the mastermind group provides that safe environment to be vulnerable and share what’s really going on and have people celebrate your successes and help you out with your challenges.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:48] Now, having been involved with these type of entrepreneurs over the years, have you kind of learned some maybe do’s and don’ts for an entrepreneur to maybe prevent them from making some mistakes when they’re beginning to scale their business? Have you gotten any advice for those entrepreneurs?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:14:08] A lot of entrepreneurs get started because they were a technician doing something at a different business, and they decide they want to go do it on their own. Right. This could be you’re a chef at a restaurant and decide you want to open your own restaurant. You could be a plumber and decide you want to open your own plumbing company. You could be an SEO expert working at an agency and decide to open your own company and so on. Right? That’s a common path that entrepreneurs take of hanging their own shingle. What they don’t realize, though, is that at some point you think you have a business, but you’re actually self-employed, and if you step away from the business, it would fall apart and the business is too dependent on you. So one of the first areas of growth that we focus on with folks, with their earlier stage, is this idea of moving beyond just a few team members they have and actually scaling up the systems and the people so that as the founder, as the entrepreneur, as the business owner, you can really step back from the business and have it continue to grow.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:14:58] This lets you work on the bigger picture, bigger picture, vision, leadership, and the areas of life that you want to spend your time that the business should support. So to your question about some of the common, uh, things that come up, it’s often entrepreneurs being their own block, thinking nobody can do it better than they can, and not wanting to hire people to do the jobs they’re doing in the business. Um, and the second is not having the right systems in place to scale. And then the third big piece, I would say, is not having that peer advisory and that feedback to provide shortcuts and uncover those blind spots when you’re in a great peer group of other business owners, founders and entrepreneurs who’ve been there and done that, they can show you those pathways to get to where you want to get to sooner, because they found ten ways that don’t work and can share with you the one way that does. And you don’t have to go through all that yourself. You can really learn and leverage the knowledge of others.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:52] Um, do you find that people who don’t have mastermind groups or boards of advisors or anything like that, what’s the kind of the fear that’s holding them back in that area? Or are they just do they have some imposter syndrome? Do they think that they don’t have anything to share? Like, what is kind of the psychological rationale for not participating in something like the Bay Area Mastermind?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:16:16] It’s fascinating to me how many entrepreneurs truly suffer from imposter syndrome. You know, the classic example is everyone sees the duck floating effortlessly across the surface of the water, not realizing all the turbulent craziness going on underneath the water, with the feet paddling in the water swirling and everything going on, they just see the duck effortlessly floating across the water. It’s the same thing often with Entrepreneurships. The outside view from the world is that a business owner is successful and doing well, and they’re living on Easy Street, and they have no idea what’s really going on behind the scenes and just how challenging it can be to be a founder and entrepreneur. And for many founders and entrepreneurs, they know just how difficult it is, and they lose sleep over the decisions they have made or need to make and the challenges that come from running your own business. But the outside world doesn’t see that. So there is an element for sure, of imposter syndrome and thinking there’s nothing to contribute yet when we actually look at a business and look at all that a business owner has done right, there’s usually a lot of deep expertise that an entrepreneur has that they have blinders on to. As entrepreneurs, we see the mountain in front of us, of all the things we need to do and all the things we need to get done, and it’s easy to lose sight of all that’s actually been accomplished. And so in a mastermind setting, we celebrate those accomplishments, and we start each meeting off by going over one really big win from this past month.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:17:40] And when we take a look in the rear view, we can see just how much has been done. So in terms of what stops folk, stops folks from seeking out or joining a group, yes, for sure there’s a bit of imposter syndrome. And to that I’d say complete an application. Let’s talk about your business. I know there’s some wins there and some really important lessons learned, even in big challenges. And trust me, as an entrepreneur, you have a wealth of knowledge to share if you’ve made it. As far as calling yourself an entrepreneur, that’s really big. On the flip side of that, there can also sometimes be a bit of, um, believing you know it all and can do it all yourself. And this is usually the founder who thinks they can’t find the right people, who can do the job as well as they can, let alone better. And trust me, you always want to be hiring people who are smarter than you and better at you in each area of your business, and so if you think you know it all, then that generally means you’re not as open to hearing feedback from others. It also means you’re not generally open to asking the vulnerable questions about what can really help you out and getting unblocked, and that can prove challenging. So those kinds of folks don’t typically seek out that kind of peer advisory input. And they generally, if they do, um, can dominate in providing feedback and not being open to receiving any of it. And so again, that’s kind of what we screened for in that application process.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:58] Now, is there a story you can share of maybe somebody who came to the group as a skeptic or just said, oh, I’ll just try it. And but we’re not really 100%. It sold and then was able to get maybe some achievement or got to a new level, you know, as I don’t want to say a surprise, but maybe it it kind of did surprise them on the power of this kind of a group.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:19:22] Yet thematically, I find these surprises always people are coming in looking to get unblocked in one area, and the delightful surprise is that they found their their their business family. They found others like themselves they didn’t even realize were out there. And they got insight into areas they didn’t know were even challenges within the business. We all have an idea of the things that we know. We sometimes think we know. Some of the spots where we could improve in areas of things we don’t know. But the biggest opportunities I’ve found time and time again are in the areas that we didn’t know, we didn’t know anything about. And that’s really where that period advisory can help out. So yeah, to your question about like individual stories, I can think back to one of our members who joined us and, you know, was on that fence of like, hey, let’s see what this mastermind group is all about. You know, they looked at, for example, coaching, they talked to coaches, they talked to consultants. They’d, uh, talk to some online communities. And they were curious sort of where a mastermind group fit within that. And their question sort of came down to afterwards of like really seeing the difference between group coaching and a mastermind group. But the value they found was not just in the facilitation, but in the openness and willingness of other members to to challenge some of those basic mindsets. So sometimes we’ll come up. The biggest limiting factor is an individual’s mindset in terms of how much they charge or what they’re worth, or what the value is of their customers. See, so we had we had one member who joined us who had his his billable rates relatively low, but thought for himself. He was pretty high. And that sort of he priced himself mentally based on what he thought he was worth.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:21:06] And so the group lovingly challenged that and said, your prices should actually be quite a bit higher. And the response to that was along the lines of, well, when I get to X number of customers, then that will justify raising the price. And we said, well, that’ll justify it to you, but to your prospects, they don’t need you to have a certain number of customers. That’s just you getting comfortable with the idea. And so we were able to help as a group unblock that mental. Uh, limit and limitation of what his time was worth until he was able to go out there and raise the prices and like, right off the bat, that increases profitability in the business and not just top line revenue, just simply that little change we provided, you know, um, product feedback to businesses that are looking to launch a new product line. We had a member in our group who, uh, you know, when he came in, had one business model, which was successful. It was also kind of dated. And so as a group, we were lovingly prodding this, bringing the business model into a modern style, SAS, a software as a service platform, as opposed to the business model that was there before. Um, and that idea was met with some resistance. But when that member came around to the idea, a whole new business was launched. That business went on to double revenue every single year, and that became that next big business in the older business was suddenly the side business. And that’s just one of many, many stories we have of wins folks get from, you know, being part of the group and being open to the feedback and advisory from others.

Lee Kantor: [00:22:36] So if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team or get Ahold of that application, what’s the website? What’s the coordinates?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:22:45] Yeah. Head over to Bay Area mastermind.com. You can find out more about our group, what the meetings are like, upcoming events. You can submit that test drive application. And even if you’re not sure if the group is a fit for you, the application process itself will be eye opening in terms of the questions we ask, and that’ll give you an idea of what we’re looking for. And then from there, we hop on a call and go over that. And if there’s an opportunity that, you know, looks like it’s a fit for you, we’d welcome you to join us for a test drive. And if not, that’s great. We’ve got a ton of great resources that we can share with you to help you on that journey of entrepreneurship. We’ve been there before. We’ve been running the groups for quite a long time. We’re not going anywhere anytime soon. And you’re not alone on the journey. We’re here with you.

Lee Kantor: [00:23:24] Well, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:23:29] Thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Lee Kantor: [00:23:30] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Bay Area Business Radio.

Rob Lucido With Magnit

by

Atlanta Business Radio
Atlanta Business Radio
Rob Lucido With Magnit
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Magnit™ is a global leader and pioneer in contingent workforce management. Their industry-leading Integrated Workforce Management (IWM) Platform is supported by 30+ years of innovation, modern software, proven expertise, and world-class data and intelligence.

It enables companies to optimize talent and diversity goals while achieving operational and financial success. With Magnit, companies can adapt quickly to the evolution of work to grow their extended workforce with greater agility, transparency, and speed.

Rob Lucido is proud to serve as Senior Director of Strategic Advisory at Magnit. He has dedicated his career to helping organizations optimize their workforce and achieve their strategic goals.

With extensive experience in providing actionable insights and advice on talent management, recruitment, retention, and organizational design, he’s adept at delivering solutions that drive business results.

His expertise in market intelligence, data analysis, and workforce planning enables him to create customized strategies tailored to each client’s unique needs. As a thought leader in the industry, he has a proven track record of developing innovative solutions that help organizations stay ahead of the curve in a rapidly changing business landscape.

Professionally, he has over a decade of experience within the investment management industry, workforce analytics consulting with a particular focus on leadership, performance reporting, accounting and operations. He’s held senior management positions in financial operations, business operations and technology with a proven track record in Contingent Workforce Management and Financial Services, improving business processes and building high performing teams to deliver results.

Connect with Rob on LinkedIn.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Introduction to his role and Magnit
  • Where Magnit gathers their data fro
  • What workers fall under the category of workforce extended
  • Big population of contingent workers and new hires in Atlanta
  • Trends in Atlanta’s labor market

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:04] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio. Brought to you by On pay. Atlanta’s new standard in payroll. Now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:25] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, Onpay. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on Atlanta Business Radio, we have Rob Lucido with Magnit. Welcome, Rob.

Rob Lucido: [00:00:43] Hey Lee, happy to be here.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:44] I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about Magnit. How you serving folks?

Rob Lucido: [00:00:49] Yeah, sure. Uh, at Magnit, we are a third party organization that manages, really the entire non-employee workforce through software and services platforms and man, gosh, over 124 countries now for over 600 and fortune 202,000 companies. You know, really we manage what the extended workforce, which is known as, you know, freelance workers, the gig economy temp or short turn positions. And we manage that workforce across pretty much every sector in the business today. So really we kind of view ourselves as a global leader, a pioneer in the contingent workforce management space. And really at our core mission, we enable companies to optimize their talent, their diversity goals, and really helping them achieve operational and financial success through that extended workforce. And, you know, specifically for me, I manage a team in our strategic advisory department, and I have a fantastic global team of consultants. And really our objective is using our business intelligence platform, informing our clients through analytics and our leading market intelligence to customize data analysis for them, providing insights and best practices that pertain to that workforce and help them kind of navigate those hiring trends that, uh, top of mind for a lot of organizations today.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:13] Can you share a little context on, like, what for these larger firms, which I’m sure I mean, you mentioned that you work with quite a few of the largest firms in the planet or the country at least. What is kind of the ratio between their, you know, traditional employees that are their employees and their contingent workforce?

Rob Lucido: [00:02:32] Yeah. No. Great question. And it really varies from organization to organization. I think if you look at the, the, the broader economics of it, just recently, I think the most recent report around 2023, in the United States alone, 40% of the workforce today is probably that contingent labor. And so really what that workforce is, it’s, you know, it’s staffing agency, temp workers or crews working in warehousing, you know, self-employed data architects that are working on, say, like a project in it. You might have like a demand generation specialist being payrolled by like a third party payroll E and and then it can go into what we call SSW or statement of work. And that’s where you have a member or a team of, let’s say, engineering consultants working under a contract for a company, for their engineering department. And what this workforce does is it really offers greater business agility. There’s significant cost savings driven by this workforce, and you really gain an edge in talent acquisition through it. Uh, just as this ever changing workforce evolves, where individuals want to work on their own terms in a sense, and have the flexibility to move across business organizations and upskill their talent needs. And, you know, I’d say, uh, in today’s market, too, especially as we kind of roll out of this pandemic, you know, in the health care industry, a third of the industry is contingent labor these days.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:04] Now, are you finding that, um, let’s talk about young people in this group. Are they looking for more of this kind of contingent work, this gig work where they have flexibility, you know, they can have multiple projects simultaneously. It gives them a lifestyle maybe that they desire and not kind of tied to. I have to show up here, you know, Monday through Friday from X to X is that is that part of kind of why this is becoming more and more prevalent? Is that’s what the worker wants?

Rob Lucido: [00:04:37] 100%. And it’s a juxtaposition of of the evolution of this workforce because you have, you know, historical hiring practices that are are catching up to this young workforce that wants to work in this environment. You know, they they don’t necessarily want that stability of having the kind of day to day, 9 to 5 with the health care that comes with it. Uh, you know, there’s there’s benefits to this way of life. Uh, and one of that is the freedom to work where you want, when you want. Uh, you can, you know, in today’s market, a big push in recent years is, uh, the upskill of skills. And a lot of the workforce are garnering towards roles where they can continuously learn and upskill themselves for that next project. Uh, you know, that that next offering that can really enhance their well-being from a knowledge perspective as well as, you know, gain their workforce, uh, experience in that realm as well. Uh, and then there’s another lever to where, uh, you know, maybe there’s not a full time role open to companies that individuals want to work for. And the way in the door there, a lot of the times is through this kind of contingent labor taking a contract role. And companies will will use these contingent labor workforce as a kind of try before you buy apparatus, and you get a lot of better quality workers because of it. They know the business, and there’s a lot of benefits to the workforce and to the employer, employee, employer at the same time as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:10] So where does magnet fit into this equation? Like are you working with these, uh, large enterprise level organizations to help them manage their entire contingent workforce like they are working through you or you’re advising them, like where, you know, what is the scope of the work that you’re doing for these folks?

Rob Lucido: [00:06:30] Yeah, blend. Blend of both. Really. Um, we kind of take that burden off the employer to manage this workforce. Uh, we have a huge compliance department to make sure there’s no risk involved with the workers that they’re bringing on. We hold the relationships with those third party suppliers. Uh, we have a great client service team that interacts with that front line hiring manager that’s looking for this talent. Uh, a lot of times we partner with the procurement and talent acquisition teams within those organizations. Uh, at times helping them find that full time talent as well as contingent labor as well. Uh, we have so much data at our disposal. Uh, especially around pay intelligence. So allowing, you know, work, uh, work companies to really understand, you know, how much they should be paying for talent right now, what skills might, you know, increase the cost to get that talent? Uh, and so we’re a kind of one stop shop that offers that kind of full platform. Uh, and really takes the, you know, as I said before, the burden off that workforce worker industry to manage this workforce. And we hold the relationships and, you know, from end to end, uh, to really guide them through that process. And it’s a benefit not only to the employer, uh, but, you know, to their legal departments as well. Uh, you know, they don’t have to worry about who’s doing the background checks on that workforce. We help translate that as that. We help translate that as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:01] So what are some of the trade offs when it comes to hiring contingent workforce as opposed to your own employee? Like what are some of the kind of the things that might be beneficial? You mentioned flexibility and agility. Um, what are some of the things you lose by doing this?

Rob Lucido: [00:08:22] So for in today’s market you know that speed to talent right now there’s you know if you look at, you know, government releases of uh, the Department of Labor, you know, there’s there’s thousands of roles available out there, but the market is still tight, uh, because you have a large workforce that is retiring today. You have a large workforce that are being very stringent on where they’re going after roles. And a big shift in today’s, as I alluded to earlier, is that kind of shift to a skills based hiring model where, you know, historically, we’ve you know, you need that for a white collar role. You need that degree to get in the door to retain talent today. And where we help in regards to that is like a skills based advisory service. And the concept is kind of called like degree inflation today, where companies have been more willing to consider, you know, applicants that don’t have that college degree or minimum years of experience. You know, they they need that help to get that talent in the door to facilitate the needs that they have. So is this kind of shift towards skills based hiring happens? Uh, employers are really prioritizing candidates abilities and competencies over that formal education requirement. And, you know, as many industries are experiencing talent shortages today, especially in the IT and the healthcare space and skilled trades companies are really compelled to consider, uh, you know, how they source today. And that’s really how we help partner with our clients and advise them. Um, and really, I’d say I think, you know, based on recent data, 76% of employers today are using some kind of form of skills based hiring to find new talent. Um, and really, over the past year, if you look through, you know, industry leaders like LinkedIn, they’ve seen a 21% increase in jobs postings that are advertising skills and responsibility instead of qualifications today. And so that’s where our our knowledge base really helps partner with those clients to identify that talent and help them get that talent in the door.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:31] So what is kind of the pain they’re having where magnet is the solution? Where are they frustrated, um, to the point where they’re like, hey, we’ve got to bring those folks from magnet in because this is getting crazy here.

Rob Lucido: [00:10:46] Yeah, I think the. The burden that’s eased there is from a benefits perspective, companies don’t have to pay that statutory cost. So so there’s a savings on that workforce. You’re getting the same kind of skilled labor and not having to front that that statutory cost up front. So at times it’s a higher pay rate for for the workers involved. And that’s a tangible benefit to that workforce. And that’s why they kind of gravitate towards this. Uh, at the same time, the, you know, people aren’t coming in the door for the open roles that they have. And so organizations have to look elsewhere. Some organizations have their own internal to teams manage this, but I would say a large portion in the market have an MSP, a managed service provider. Just manage that business for them, uh, because, you know, their own internal talent acquisition teams and procurement teams have enough to worry about with their internal employee workforce. Uh, this kind of extended workforce, the partnership is really a benefit to both. And we just have, you know, tons of years of experience of working with all kinds of different sectors and bringing this workforce in the door. And so really that that reputation builds up. And we’re a known commodity, uh, globally to to help drive the hiring practices forward for a lot of these organizations.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:06] Now, um, how does it work from the employee standpoint or the contract worker standpoint? Are they allowed to work for any given company indefinitely, or is this something that look, according to the law, you can only be contract for X number of months before, you know, they might think that you’re an employee. Like, how does that kind of work?

Rob Lucido: [00:12:27] Yeah, there’s a lot of employment laws that kind of outline how you’re supposed to interact with this workforce. More often than not, uh, with these roles being more on the contract scale, they tend to last probably more so 18 months to three years. Uh, but at any time you can extend those workforce, uh, as needed. Um, it’s always a pipeline to that full time employee. You know, like I said before that try before you buy, you know, once that contracts up, a lot of times they’ll hire this workforce full time. Uh, they know they can do the work. I would say in the health care space, a lot of times you have, uh, a lot of traveling nurses that they’ll work 13 week contracts, and it’s a benefit to them because they get to travel from location to location if they want, for a certain period of matter of time and take on roles that, you know, they they’re knowledgeable and skilled in and have the certifications to do. And so it’s really a flexibility of of being able to work where you want, when you want.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:25] Now are certain you mentioned certain industries. I’m sure. Um, it and technology is one of them. You mentioned nursing. Are there certain industries that are kind of leaning into this more than others?

Rob Lucido: [00:13:37] You know, it’s probably been ahead of the space for for a long time. Um, but you have large biopharma clients that, that utilize this space. Um, you know, I’d say specific to the Atlanta market, you know, we’ve seen a just vast increase not only in the IT space, but in marketing and communications, um, as well as healthcare. Um, you know, data shows there’s a big influx of, of truck driver needs. And, you know, you know, that is a large growing population of contingent labor today, uh, trying to, you know, source those drivers to kind of keep that flow of commodities moving across the nation and globe.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:19] Are is your firm kind of a leading indicator? Can you get a sense of oh, I is is, uh, making a mark here like this. This is different. You know, are you able to see some of these things through your data?

Rob Lucido: [00:14:32] 100%. Yeah. And, you know, from from an employer perspective, you know, we look at all kinds of different areas, you know, PostScript and the employment process, uh, and, and proactively so, you know, when they’re looking for what are the most skills needed for today for, you know, like if we’re talking about AI, tech stocks to, you know, we go out to our pay and tell intelligence to provide those, uh, front line hiring managers and, and companies to know what they need to pay. What what is the percentage of increase on specific skills that you need to know? Um, and comparatively, you know, that’s where Atlanta is really great in the market today, comparative to those kind of similar sized metro locations, uh, you know, from a workforce industry, you know, their pay increases has been about 10% increase year over year, comparative to, you know, like Boston or San Francisco that have seen a large decrease. Uh, you know, Atlanta’s layoff rate has gone down this year, uh, comparative to the US overall. And so that’s where you’re seeing this influx of, you know, hiring trends coming into Atlanta and that contingent kind of freelance space. Um, but, you know, from a data perspective, we have, you know, the largest global contingent data set worldwide. And so I think that’s really a differentiator for us when companies work with us. I mean, we have billions of data points from hundreds of thousands of workers across, you know, 51,000 roles. And that’s covering trends across affecting recruitment, retention, staffing efforts. And and we what’s unique to us is we have a proprietary algorithm set with our data scientist teams where they cleanse, anonymize, analyze all this data and from internal and external sources. And so we use that to advise our, you know, hundreds of clients in our programs, uh, to have the best, uh, data in front of them to make informed decisions on how and why they should hire.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:36] So now, uh, regarding the Atlanta labor market, is there anything that kind of came up through your research that was like, oh, did not see that coming? Was there any surprises?

Rob Lucido: [00:16:49] Yeah, I’d.

Rob Lucido: [00:16:49] Say number one is probably the increase year over year. And we had almost a 40% increase year over year. And that’s really 60 percentage points higher than the national average. And so as I alluded to earlier, IT technology and marketing business development really were the kind of sole drivers of that increase. Um, but it’s Atlanta is unique in the sense that many people are attracted to Atlanta because of the region’s culture, the business productivity, the ease of travel with major airfares going through, uh, while the cost of living has increased, it’s still relatively low compared to other tech hubs like Austin or San Francisco, per se. And really, the benefit of land two is the cities surrounding metro region is a natural pipeline for talent, especially due to the proximity of universities like Georgia Tech or Morehouse. You know, there’s a lot of great diverse universities, as many organizations are trying to hire more diverse talent and get that talent pipeline into their organizations. That’s where Atlanta is really unique into that sense. I alluded to that. You know, the pay increase, you know, from a hiring standpoint, um, you know, not only IT and business development, but the healthcare industry is booming in the Atlanta market, and we’ve seen just an influx of RN roles, uh, in that area, especially, uh, healthcare software developers as well. Uh, and what is where businesses are more aligned to look in this area. It’s really because when you look at like a voluntary, what we call voluntary terms, and that’s, that’s workers that are leaving on their own accord from a higher from, from the metro regions. Atlanta had a 4.3%, uh, increase, uh, to 13.2, respectively. They’re one of the only metro regions to have an increase in that voluntary time perspective. And so what that says workers are staying, workers are gravitating towards this region.

Rob Lucido: [00:18:51] They want to work in the region and they’re staying longer on contracts. And so that’s what’s allowing companies to be more open. And, you know, searching for that contingent labor in region. Now, when I look at those kind of kind of two call outs that I called out earlier in the marketing area, uh, especially last year, there was a six times increase comparative to 2022. Now, rates have remained mostly flat over time for a marketing perspective. So, you know, you have roles like marketing manager and web editors who are, you know, increasingly being at risk of, you know, eyes exposure into the benefits of what it brings there. So, you know, everybody’s worried about AI right now taking jobs. And I’d say, you know, that. Well, that fear is palpable. I don’t think it resonates with the reality in the market today. That being said, you have a lot of workers that are utilizing AI technology today and partnering with AI and upskilling themselves with how to use it in their day to day. Those are the individuals that are progressing through the job, uh, for the job industry. And, you know, if I speak to it too, there are a lot of skill sets that are top of mind SQL software development, um, Java and Python and C scripts, all those workers are readily available with those skill sets in the Atlanta market, and you have a lot of folks going into the area because they have those skill sets. So it’s a booming industry, a booming location, and, you know, it’s only going to be growing in the years to come. As the metro region expands and companies and hubs start looking to, you know, really set foothold in the area.

Lee Kantor: [00:20:30] Now, how has the, um, it seems like now we’re getting a. A kind of a boomerang to the the remote workforce. Now there seems to be a return to work. Uh, companies are encouraging their employees to return to work. And then when this happened, I was it occurred to me, well, if I’m if I consider myself a remote employee, I really can’t be a remote employee. Truly, in the true sense of the word. If I have to return to work some days a week. Um, how how are you seeing that? Is that something that a big employers would like that to happen, but maybe it won’t happen? Or do you think that, yeah, it’s going to happen and then everybody’s going to have to adjust to coming back into the office every day.

Rob Lucido: [00:21:17] Yeah, it’s more prevalent, especially in the years ahead for sure. You have a lot of large institutions that are implementing, you know, a hybrid workforce where they have to be in office for a specific amount of time. Right.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:29] But if you’re a hybrid, you can’t live in Spain. You know, like you have to live in the vicinity of the office in order to come in a couple of days a week so that the idea of being remote is really well, you got to live close. That’s not exactly remote anymore.

Rob Lucido: [00:21:44] Yeah, 100%. And it kind of goes back to that. That talent shortage because you have a lot of the talent today that like the remote environment, and they’re not going to go after jobs if they’re not 100% remote. Um, now you have organizations that are offering sign on bonuses to, you know, work in that hybrid environment. Uh, you have more organizations that are being a lot more flexible at the same time as they push for areas internally that can be on site. You know, a lot of, uh, you know, like it roles, they can be remote, but then you have those client service roles that, you know, they they can be in a hub, you can work, uh, on site. I think the push back to that, that hope for a more on site flexibility is really, uh, a drop in collaborative, uh, thinking that many organizations feel has fallen off in that remote environment. And really, what’s kind of happened is while workers have enjoyed that freedom, I think you’ve seen a lot of culture impacts to business organizations that used to rely on that as a foundation of workers coming into the organization. And so that is the kind of way of thinking that is is still being ironed out today. You know, how do you drive that workforce to want to come back? What are the benefits you’re going to offer? Uh, in today’s world, you know, there’s a lot of expenses, especially in inflation of today.

Rob Lucido: [00:23:20] But but really, the affordability that that remote life offers is, you know, like child care and, you know, flexibility to, you know, not have to worry about those costs. So you have organizations that are thinking outside the box that are, you know, giving upwards of offering, uh, pets in the office to entice workers back. But, you know, having on site child care, they’re trying to find ways to entice that workforce back, uh, and taking on some excessive costs to do so. Um, you know, I think it’s, it’s more so prevalent in the, uh, financial operations markets where you’re seeing that push to drive back to the office and there’s a more willing of that workforce to do so. But that comes with an increased cost of that workforce. They’re asking for higher pay. They’re asking for higher wages to to work in an office setting. So I mean that’s going to be a trend that you see continue in the year ahead for sure. Uh, but but it’s a real challenge for organizations today to, to entice the workforce to want to work in that environment and really build back that culture that kind of got lost in that post pandemic life.

Lee Kantor: [00:24:25] But this is an area where magnet can really help, right? Like, you have so much data, you have so much information, um, and you have so many resources to really help them manage this workforce in a way that you can create these win wins for the organization and the employees.

Rob Lucido: [00:24:44] Yeah for sure. And where that is impactful for us is we survey our entire population on a consistent basis to know what the workforce wants, to know what the hiring managers want, to know what the organizations want to know what our supplier base wants. And really what the data tells us today is there has not been a drop off in productivity. There’s been an increase in productivity. Uh, you’ve almost seen an increase in somewhat burnout for some individuals because they’re working more hours. Uh, just, you know, there’s there’s not that, you know, change of pace from driving to and from the office where you’re decompressing, you’re just powering through. So there are some intangibles that, uh, some workers need to work through. Um, but what we really do to advise our organizations and say, hey, I understand you have this need. You feel that there’s this need to drive back into the office, but, you know, we can tell them, you know, you’re going to get a higher percentage of talent, a better quality of talent that’s going to be able to do this work anytime, anywhere. Uh, if you’re really, you know, cost conscious right now, you know, there’s, there’s off shore areas that have this talent readily available that you can tap into. Uh, there just needs to be a willingness and openness to understand that that work can still get done without the need for them to be in, you know, what we call butts and seats.

Rob Lucido: [00:26:01] Um, but and I think the the push there too is really cost impact where you have a lot of organizations that signed, you know, decades long leases to, uh, businesses and brick and mortar locations that are sitting empty now. So it’s a lost cost for them, and they feel that that needs has to be filled with with the workforce in there. And some organizations are mandating it. And so it’s making it harder to find that localized talent. Uh, there’s, you know, you have to look elsewhere to see what talent is willing to move. In that sense, are you going to pay a moving fee for those individuals to move families to this new location? So it’s a collaborative push for us to help partner with them. You know, we try to advise them based on what their desires are. At the same time, you know, coming from a place of what we know, they’re going to get the best talent. That’s not always remote. Uh, it’s not always, you know, in-office as well. So there’s roles that are they have to be remote and there’s roles that are not. And so that’s where we help partner with those clients to make sure that they are being proactive about what their needs are. But being, you know, practical about how they’re going to be able to obtain that work.

Lee Kantor: [00:27:14] So if somebody wanted to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team, what is the website? What are the best way to to get Ahold of you?

Rob Lucido: [00:27:25] Or for us, it’s, uh, magna globalcom. And, you know, there’s a lot of great information on there that our company provides free of charge. We have some great market intelligence platforms to understand what the current trends are in the market, and a lot of great subject matter experts to get in touch with on whatever your workforce needs are. And, you know, thank you for the time I’ve been, you know, really thrilled to talk with you and and let everyone know what magnet can do today.

Lee Kantor: [00:27:57] And that’s magnet global magnet Globalcom. Rob, I really appreciate you coming on and sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Rob Lucido: [00:28:10] Thank you. Lee.

Lee Kantor: [00:28:11] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Atlanta Business Radio.

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Leslie Licano With Beyond Fifteen Communications, Inc.

by

High Velocity Radio
High Velocity Radio
Leslie Licano With Beyond Fifteen Communications, Inc.
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Leslie Licano, co-founder and CEO of Beyond Fifteen Communications, is an award-winning public relations strategist, renowned for her ability to spotlight individuals and companies as trendsetters, innovators and newsmakers.

As leader of client strategy, she steers her team toward breakthrough work through high-concept thinking while serving as chief counsel to the company’s extensive roster of wide-ranging clients.

Connect with Leslie on LinkedIn and follow Beyond Fifteen Communications on Facebook and Twitter.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • Key milestones and challenges the company has overcome
  • Beyond Fifteen is described as a progressive and full-service PR, digital marketing, and social media agency. How has the landscape of these industries evolved over the past 15 years, and how has Beyond Fifteen adapted to these changes
  • Strategies that she have employed to ensure Beyond Fifteen continues to provide powerful and goal-driven communications solutions for their clients
  • Some success stories or notable client achievements that highlight Beyond Fifteen’s commitment to delivering measurable results
  • With the rise of digital communication, how does Beyond Fifteen balance the use of traditional PR methods with modern, digital strategies to create a comprehensive approach for clients
  • Innovations or new initiatives that we can expect from Beyond Fifteen in the coming years

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:04] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for High Velocity Radio.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:15] Lee Kantor here. Another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Leslie Licano with Beyond Fifteen Communications. Welcome.

Leslie Licano: [00:00:27] Thank you. Happy to be here.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:29] I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about beyond 15 communications. How are you serving folks?

Leslie Licano: [00:00:35] Beyond 15 communications is a full service marketing firm based in Southern California. Uh, we do paid, earned and owned media, really full funnel omnichannel marketing services, trying to bring people from the top of the sales funnel from awareness down through consideration and ultimately conversion.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:54] Now, I heard that now you’re you’ve just achieved your 15th year anniversary. So you’re you’re really beyond 15 now.

Leslie Licano: [00:01:02] Yeah, we have some big campaigns uh, to play with that this year because it is it’s pretty great. We were our name is all about that old Andy Warhol quote where once in your life everyone will have 15 minutes of fame. So we bring our clients, you know, beyond that 15 minutes to lasting recognition. But it’s a it is a real milestone. We’re we’re excited to celebrate.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:22] Now, can you talk about what got you into this line of work? How did this all begin and evolve?

Leslie Licano: [00:01:28] Yeah, yeah. You know, I wanted to be a journalist. I was a talented writer growing up and loved that way of expressing myself through the written word. As I got through school, I kind of realized, oh, journalism may not be be for me. And so on the flip side of journalism is PR, right? And it’s the, you know, helping the businesses get their stories heard, using the journalists to kind of help be that conduit, right, and to be a partner to those journalists as well. And so that was the path that I studied. And then that really started to evolve. Right. Pr has evolved a lot over the, you know, 20 years since I’ve been, you know, doing what I’m doing or 25 year, I think at this point and it’s evolved into a whole lot of digital marketing now as well. And so those skill sets just parlayed right over into, you know, social media marketing at first and then SEO services and then pay per click. And so now we’re doing full service marketing, starting with that skill set, you know, that began at the written word and began with, how can I get a client’s message translated in a way that, you know, media and consumers will see value, and also that really, you know, helps them meet their goals?

Lee Kantor: [00:02:37] Now, you mentioned that over the course of those, you know, couple of decades in this industry, things have changed. And to me, there’s been a blurring of the lines of like, where does advertising begin and where does PR begin? Or are they kind of now two sides of the same coin? How do you see kind of the difference between PR or communications company and an ad agency or a marketing agency?

Leslie Licano: [00:03:03] Yeah, it’s really just not serving people to do just, you know, one trick anymore, right? Where, you know, in past, you could just use PR that could be sort of the only, you know, thing that you’re doing, and you’d really move the needle. Now, I think there’s just so much noise. There’s so many ways to reach people. We need lots of different touch points in order to, you know, get people through the funnel to the conversion you’re looking for via sales or something else. So yeah, it’s changed. It’s changed a whole lot. Pr you know, it used to be, you know, you’re doing door drops, right? You’re bringing press kits to journalists, newsrooms. You know, we were faxing press releases. That’s just not how it works anymore. And so that that’s changed dramatically. I mean, now sometimes we’re even using social media to pitch journalists. We’re definitely using it to help identify stories on the on the digital side. You know, we began just thinking, gosh, we could get these PR messages out. Instead of having to rely on third party media, we could get them out direct to the consumer. You know, we can skip the middleman, you know? Um, and so that’s how we first started using social media, was really to kind of broadcast our message to targeted audiences or our clients messages, um, and, and quickly sort of realized, oh, that’s a two way conversation as well.

Leslie Licano: [00:04:20] And so then it becomes a whole, you know, a whole evolution. We added, um, social media advertising, you know, to be able to, uh, get to just the right person with just the right message. Uh, we still want to use the PR for that sort of broad mass appeal. Then we’re using social media to get 1 to 1. We’re layering in SEO so that we can answer the questions that people are searching and their their Google search bar. And that client can land on our, our content. The content still feels like the PR content that we did 20 years ago, right? It’s it’s high quality blogs and articles and listicles that are going to engage people. Um, so that that feels like traditional PR, but the way that we’re getting people to that content and getting people to kind of be aware of who our clients are, what they stand for, what they do, and why they’re a leader in the space that’s changed completely.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:14] Now, you mentioned that, um, this is kind of multichannel omnichannel. Um, how do you, uh, have these conversations with your clients? Are they coming to you initially with kind of looking at you with your PR hat on, or are they looking to just solve a problem of, hey, I need more clients, or hey, we have a new product launch and we’re having a difficult time kind of articulating, um, you know, what makes it different and special?

Leslie Licano: [00:05:45] Yeah, yeah. It varies. Um, so, so certainly we’ve had very specific challenges. We had a, you know, a publicly traded company overseas that wanted to, you know, meet the US market where it’s at. And so that’s a whole kind of thing in and of itself. Uh, we have people who come and say, hey, I just want to be in the news or I just want to, you know, fill my lead funnel for my new sales team. So we absolutely have people who know exactly what they want. Sometimes that becomes a bigger conversation because, again, it’s hard to do just one piece of any of this and have success. Um, there’s a lot of people who have been burned by Google ads, for instance, because they tried to do them themselves. You know, they didn’t know how to put in, you know, cross negatives or, you know, they didn’t know how to not cannibalize their own ad spend. Right. There’s a lot of things you can you can, uh, you know, kind of muck up if you’re a novice and you can just say, all right, I’m going to throw the baby out with the bathwater, and Google ads don’t work for my business. And that may be true.

Leslie Licano: [00:06:44] We have encountered times where that is the case, but more often than not, we say, let us give it a try for 90 days. You know, let us just get in there. I can see what’s going on in your account. We can see the errors that were made and how they could be, um, rectified. And we’ve had really major turnarounds that way. Um, and so, you know, a lot of times people, you know, think that they need one thing, they really need others, um, or they think, hey, it’s just an instant conversion from that Google ad. You know, people click, they’re going to come to me, they’re going to see I’m great, and they’re going to become a client. Um, and we don’t think about, okay, what about that mid-funnel content, right. The Google ads are at the top of the funnel. In the middle is all of that content marketing so that people know who you are, right? They’re not just going to, you know, shake your hand and say, okay, I’m in. Um, they need to really get a feel for who you are, what you do, why it’s important you know your stuff. You’re not just walking the walk. You’re talking the talk. Um, and that’s where that mid-funnel content comes in.

Leslie Licano: [00:07:42] And so, you know, if you’ve got someone who says, ultimately I want sales, but I just want this one top of funnel strategy, we’ve got to do some counsel in there to talk about, okay, well what’s going to pull them through. And are we going to do retargeting at the bottom of the funnel too, for the people who couldn’t make up their mind, you know, on day one, uh, which happens a lot, especially in B2B, right. If you’re doing. High ticket B2B marketing play. No one’s going to click an ad, see you and go, yep, I’m going to spend, you know, $30,000 a month on your service or, you know, whatever it is, it’s just not not how it works. They’re going to need some nurturing along the way. Um, so yeah, it’s become a more evolved conversation. We’re not, um, you know, what do they say? Like, if you sell, sell, uh, hammers, everything you see becomes a nail, right? So we can’t just say, here’s our solution, you know, um, you need it. Uh, we really have to, to do an audit and take our step back and see what’s going to make sense for each individual client.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:38] Yeah. And I think that a lot of people think that just because you’re messaging someone with the perfect message, which it might be the perfect message, they just not may not be in the mode to buy today, but they might be in the mode to buy in three months or six months. I mean, even the best product is or service isn’t going to work if the timing’s wrong.

Leslie Licano: [00:08:57] Yeah, yeah. And that’s where that retargeting really comes in. And some people, you know, experience it as creepy. And I think if you overdo it, it can be I know it was, uh, shopping for a rug recently, and I mean, the amount of rugs that are in my inbox or in my social feed right now, um, and just, you know, the fact that if I go onto any website, I see that rug, you know, it’s in the sidebar ads. Um, you know, that’s that’s sort of how the retargeting works, right? You wanted this at one point. If I expose you to it over time, you know, will you come back? Um, and there are companies that I think really overdo that to a point where it feels creepy. It feels, um, you know, just, you know, lay off already. If I want the rug, I’ll come back, you know? So we really try to time things well, too. And there’s, there’s algorithms and data in that that will help you kind of play it. Right. How many touches do I want? How often do I want them to be spaced out. And then the AI that’s integrated into some of those platforms will kind of help you like this is this is a person who has, you know, behaviorally, you know, their data shows that when they see something three times, they are more likely to swipe up to buy. And so you show it to that person three times. And this is a person who needs a week or two, you know, to mole. And if you show them something with longer stretches of time in between, um, then they’re better suited to it. And so the, you know, the advantages of AI being integrated into some of these tools, um, just can’t be understated. It’s it’s really up to the game for, for meeting people where they are, um, and, and helping to move people through.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:34] Now, um, how do you have kind of the conversation with ROI and metrics, like back in the day when they hired a PR company, they’d say, you know, I want to be on the Wall Street Journal or some big magazine, and you’d be like, well, we’ll try. And, you know, you work your relationships and contacts and hopefully that happens. What are the expectations in today’s world when it comes to, um, you know, metrics and ROI when it comes to this kind of work?

Leslie Licano: [00:11:01] Yeah, yeah. I mean, with with PR, it’s still really is about where do you want to be and can we get you there? You know, so it’s about your goals and our ability to help you meet those goals. Um, you know, we we use advanced measurement tools. We look at, you know, for, for PR, we look at a lot of the ad valuation as well. You know, if you were going to buy an ad in this publication, it would cost you, you know, X dollars, you know, but you’re getting it through earned media. And so here’s what that value is when you tally it all up at the end. So that’s that’s still pretty straightforward. Um, from a PR measurement side of things. Some of them you can tell like how much traffic, you know, came into the website from the PR. So that’s another nice metric. Um, but with the digital really the digital program is aligned to the client’s goals. So, you know, we have a big, uh, client that we basically serve as their, their full service, um, their marketing team. Right. We work almost like an in-house agency for them because we’re just we’re doing everything soup to nuts. Um, and they work through a distributor model. So their goal is to create awareness, um, and to get folks to this where to buy.

Leslie Licano: [00:12:08] And after that, you know, we can’t really track the conversion. And so they’re able though to, to use our where to buy data to see that it actually does correlate with their sales. And so now they’re really looking at our metrics of okay, you know, here’s how much traffic we drove to where to buy. And that’s going to correlate with next month’s sales figures. So that’s been a nice nice thing to look at. Um, but with folks where an immediate sale is the conversion, that’s a lot more straightforward. Um, and so really it’s about setting the CTA or the call to action to what it is that we want to measure. And then with digital, it’s it’s really straightforward. I mean, you can measure everything. You know, if I want awareness I can see how many people follow me, view my videos, engage with my content, visit my website. You know, so the measurement on the digital side is actually. Slate. A really neat thing, because then we can start making data driven decisions about what to do next, you know, based on on what worked. And we have all that data at our fingertips, which is really nice.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:14] Now, just because things are easy to measure doesn’t mean it’s the most appropriate thing to measure. How do you kind of help your client discern what is the right metric to be paying attention to, and and using that as the lever to help them get the outcome they desire?

Leslie Licano: [00:13:31] That’s a really good question. Yeah, we get a lot of folks who want followers, you know, or they want to be they just want to have more followers than their competitor. Um, and, and we definitely have to counsel away from, from those things that we kind of call vanity metrics. It’s just a number that feels really good, but it’s not going to help your business. Um, and it’s also much harder. Just on a side note tangent to get followers these days. That’s not how we consume media anymore, right? In the early days of, say, Facebook, you’d follow the brands you wanted to hear from. Now you don’t have to do that. If if I engage with that brand, if I even just linger for a moment on that Instagram video, the algorithm is going to know to serve me more of it. And so I don’t, you know, personally, I follow very, very few brands on, on Instagram. Yet I see lots of great ones and I swipe up to buy all the time, you know, um, and so I think just kind of making sure that the, the metric correlates with the business goals and that it changes as the business goals change.

Leslie Licano: [00:14:37] Right? So I think there’s a lot of firms that kind of look at this, set it and forget it program. Like we’re going to execute these five tactics on an ongoing basis. We’re going to measure these five KPIs. That’s it. You know that’s your program. Set it and forget it. Rinse, repeat. Um, and that doesn’t always work. Sometimes, you know, you find okay, I’ve got a lot of top of funnel traffic. And that’s what I was hired for. It was to generate top of funnel traffic. Great. I’m good. But if you haven’t talked to them about what’s happening next, you know, where’s it going after. Are you doing the follow through on it? You know, is it the right traffic? How can we tell? Um, then then, you know, you think you’re aligned with the business objective because you’re aligned with the initial statement that they made? Um, but really, you know, it goes deeper than that and it can shift over time. So I think staying engaged in a two way conversation about what’s happening, what it means, and what we do next, um, that should really never end. Um, in a, in a marketing engagement.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:35] Now, what’s the sweet spot in terms of an ideal client for beyond 15?

Leslie Licano: [00:15:42] Yeah. Um, you know, I think that the client that has a story to tell is pretty important. There are some, you know, heavily commoditized industries where there’s not a whole lot of innovation happening. Um, so it’s where it’s really difficult to set one brand apart from another and where there’s not a whole lot going on internally that we can kind of shout from the rooftops. Those tend to be a more difficult client. Um, for us, because there’s just, you know, there’s less to leverage. Um, the ideal client has a lot going on. You know, they’re busy. They’re they’re building relationships. They have exciting client engagements that they want to tell people about. Um, they’re innovating. They’ve got new products that have been upgraded or, you know, are exciting to the market, and they want to get those out. Um, so, so those, those clients that are, um, really feeling enthusiastic and are doing things that they’re excited about are the ones that that we get most excited about to the ones who say, yeah, there’s not really anything going on, but just, you know, I just need more business. Those are the tougher ones, you know? Um, depending on the, the industry. So we’re doing a lot in B2B right now. Um, a lot in high tech. Um, you know, that’s that’s always been a really growing market and one that we’re, um, excelling in. But we also love a great consumer brand. Um, we have a major tire brand, is one of our clients, and we started their Instagram and YouTube channel, I think, six years ago, and they’re now the number one tire brand on Instagram and YouTube with over 4 million followers, you know? So it’s really exciting, I think, to kind of span the gamut to have, you know, high tech client, to have an education, a law, a consumer product, you know, sort of really kind of mix it up, I think makes sure that, you know, no day ever gets boring and you can really apply the lessons you’ve learned across industries to helping helping other clients as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:41] Now, um, I would imagine a lot of your clients are already have some relationship with either marketing, PR or advertising firms. What’s kind of their frustration with them or where they’ve maybe plateaued in a result where they’re saying, you know what, why don’t we give at least some of the work to be on 15 and let’s see what they can do. So what’s usually that kind of point of entry for you on an initial client?

Leslie Licano: [00:18:09] Yeah, I mean it’s either not getting results. That’s a that’s a big one. Right? I’ve been doing it and paying the money month over month. Um, but I’m not getting the business result I want. That’s, that’s, you know, that’s frustrating. Frustrating. Um, the other is just a lack of new ideas. Um, and so we really drive our team, right? You can’t rest back on your laurels. There’s never a point where we can stop hustling. And our, uh, I’ll tell you a little bit about our client contracts. A lot of, uh, companies will lock you in to, like, a six month or year long contract. We’re doing 90 days, um, on a rolling out. So that means we’ve always got to earn our keep, right? We’ve always. You know, we’re really only as good as our last month’s results. Um, and if those aren’t where they need to be, then it’s really easy for our client to disengage. And we did that intentionally because we don’t ever want, um, an unhappy client. Um, but for those who are locked in and they’re sort of writing things out until they can, can switch over and work with us again, it’s often a lack of results or just a lack of fresh ideas.

Leslie Licano: [00:19:10] You know, we we do beautiful 12 month plans, omnichannel plans that, you know, big Gantt chart that shows every month the omnichannel theme, all the different buckets of earned, owned and paid media that we’re going to touch on how they’ll all work together. I mean, you spend a lot of time creating these big old 12 month plans, but they can’t be set in stone. You know, they need to be living, breathing documents that react to what’s working and what doesn’t. Um, and, you know, have that flexibility. And also, if we see something really cool bringing that to our clients, hey, here’s an opportunity you should participate in. Here’s a speaking engagement. I know speaking is not in our scope of work, but I think you should have this stage, you know, really just staying excited. Um, and, and continuing to maintain the hustle, I think is a great way to kind of keep a client longer. Terme. And what we see, uh, folks coming to us kind of coming out of, um, lacking.

Lee Kantor: [00:20:06] Now, is there a story you can share? Uh, you don’t have to name the client, but, um, maybe the most rewarding where you were able to take a client that and exceeded their expectations and maybe gave them a result they didn’t even think was possible.

Leslie Licano: [00:20:23] Yeah, yeah, I think that the tire brand is one that we’re really, really, you know, very excited about, kind of that those numbers because 4 million followers just doesn’t happen in today’s today’s market for most companies. But you know, it’s also really fulfilling to work with smaller brands too. I mean, I think about beyond 15. Is my baby right. This this business I’ve been running for 15 years is how much does it matter to me that it succeeds or fails? I mean, everything, right? And so when you’re working with a smaller company too, you know, you know, they’re looking at that as their baby too. And so, you know, especially if they’ve got kind of a shoestring budget. And, you know, I, we had a client that had six months of budget and that’s really all they could do. And they were, you know, pinching pennies in order to do it as a husband and wife duo. And we built an award winning campaign. I got the Gold Produce Award for best Media relations program and won the Bulldog PR award. Um, and it’s, you know, for a for a company that’s just two people, you know, basically being able to build a thought leadership plan program that got them in like Askmen, MSM, Men’s Health. I mean, really just got I think it was like 60 some earned media placements and a readership of over 1.8 billion. It was it was a massive, massive success, um, and an award winning program for, for these folks who have just pinched their pennies to, to only be able to do six months. Right. And so that was really exciting and rewarding too. So I think there’s just a lot that’s rewarding about the work that we do in marketing. We’re helping other people’s businesses succeed every day, big and small. Um, and so it doesn’t get much better than that.

Lee Kantor: [00:22:07] Now, if you looked in your crystal ball about trends, maybe upcoming in the next year or two, in marketing and in communications, like where does I fit in? Where where do you see the most opportunity for folks out there to leverage some of the new technologies and what’s, you know, your opinion on what’s, you know, kind of going to make it and what may be just the fad.

Leslie Licano: [00:22:32] Yeah, yeah. I mean, there’s a lot of fads that come and go. I mean, any time there’s a new social media platform we’ve got to hop to and really, you know, become experts quickly figure out who needs to be there, who doesn’t. One of the recent ones was like threads, you know, there’s a lot of hype and it’s quieted down quite a bit. Um, there’s not a whole lot of action on threads. We’re not recommending a whole lot of clients, you know, go there. So, you know, a lot of times our recommendation is to kind of be ready, you know, have your strategy built, potentially dip a toe in. But, you know, it’s better to be amazing in the 4 or 5 channels that you can really own versus to spread yourself so thin, you know, trying to be everything to everybody, um, that you barely make a dent. So, um, you know, it’s hard with so many different things coming out all the time. Um, as far as what’s impacting us most, uh, right now and expected to the the whole conversion to Ga4, the Google Analytics, um, um, shift that has been a big, uh, a big deal for kind of how we’re doing content marketing, how we’re trying to structure, um, websites and tracking. Um, also at the same time, that idea of the cookieless future, uh, you know, I don’t know how much you know about that, but the, you know, first, the GDPR came up, right? There’s all this stuff about privacy, and they’ve been saying it’s coming. It’s coming for a really long time. Um, we almost, you know, worry about being the boy who cries wolf.

Leslie Licano: [00:23:56] We’re trying to prepare for this cookieless future that we keep thinking is around the corner, and the platforms keep delaying. But that’s going to be a big one. Um, and it’s going to really mean that we’ve got to think about more privacy centric methods for data collection and analysis, which we’re already doing, so that we are ready, um, first party data collection, you know, using more contextual targeting. Um, in our advertising, thinking about consent management platforms, thinking about collecting your own data. Right. Asking people to fill out a form fill. It sounds old school, but I think, you know, getting really good at that, uh, you know, is is going to be big when this eventually does come. Um, and then, yeah, AI is a game changer for sure. I’m excited to see what the next generation brings. I think it’s really important to use it responsibly. Uh, we just did a blog on that and kind of. Uh, what works and what doesn’t. Right. And and some of the stuff that’s coming out with right now is, is not real. You know, it’ll source, um, scholarly articles that were never written. And, um, it’ll do things that could get you in some trouble. Um, from a Marcom perspective, um, so I think, you know, using it to support you, but not to do your job for you is is really important. Um, and, and just, you know, being careful there. Right? You can’t you can’t be, um, relying on it as the be all, end all holy grail of truth. You know.

Lee Kantor: [00:25:28] Now, if you were giving advice to somebody, uh, maybe an entrepreneur that isn’t ready for you today, but might be tomorrow, what are some actionable things they can do in and around communications, you know, today? What are what? Some low hanging fruit for firms out there right now?

Leslie Licano: [00:25:47] Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the way that the most recent, uh, core algorithm shift on Google, uh, impacted things really has prioritized content, uh, especially content that answers the questions that people are searching. So I think writing articles, you know, figuring out what folks are searching online that has to do with your industry and that you can really speak to as an expert, um, and then developing that content and optimizing it on your site, I think, is a really, you know, that is kind of some, some low hanging fruit, because the more that your site is seen as a powerful answer to client or to the questions that people are googling, um, the better your authority is going to be and the more likelihood you show up at the top of the search, which is a huge goal for for many, many client businesses. Um, so I think focusing on quality content marketing, um, you know, writing some pieces on, on things that you are an authority in the field on is a great starting point. Um, and then, you know, down the line or even, you know, sooner if you’ve got the resources, can do a lot with that. I mean, we, we talk about how we can take a single piece of content. We can make a whole campaign out of it if it’s if it’s strong. Right. And we could slice and dice it up for social media content. Uh, we could use social ads to drive people over to it. We could pitch it to press as a byline article, you know, with your headshot and bio on it. Um, there’s just so much you can do with it. You can send it out in your newsletters or email marketing to kind of follow up with warm leads. Um, I probably a dozen other things that we would do to sort of slice and dice content to make it go further. So I don’t think that will ever be a wasted effort, especially the way that the search engines are moving, um, to have a body of work that you’re just building that way.

Lee Kantor: [00:27:39] So if somebody wanted to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team, what’s the website? What’s the best way to get Ahold of you?

Leslie Licano: [00:27:46] We would love that. Uh, it’s beyond 15.com with the 15 spelled out. Um, so beyond 15.com. Uh, we blog, by the way, so much we do our own blogging program. Uh, I think we’re doing four for a month right now, and we have been for a decade. Um, so a lot of the topics that you’re talking about right now, we actually have articles about on our website. So if anyone wants to dig into any of that, um, it’s likely there as well.

Lee Kantor: [00:28:16] Well, Leslie, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work, and we appreciate you.

Leslie Licano: [00:28:22] Thank you so much for having me on. I really enjoyed this, uh, this call.

Lee Kantor: [00:28:25] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on High Velocity Radio.

Rachel Johnston With Sunset Social

by

Atlanta Business Radio
Atlanta Business Radio
Rachel Johnston With Sunset Social
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Rachel Johnston is the Founder & CEO of Sunset Social.

She is an entrepreneur and Georgia State University alumna. Rachel is a digital marketer, specializing in the fields of design and content creation, copywriting, event coverage, social media strategy, and social media management.

She has worked with companies in the industries of venture capital, technology, media, coaching, recruiting, finance, product-based businesses, fitness, travel, sports, food, healthcare, and more. She has also worked with various startup companies and on personal brands for entrepreneurs on social media.

Currently, she is the Founder & CEO of Sunset Social, a social media marketing agency that ignites the social presence of brands, guiding businesses and startups towards digital success.

Connect with Rachel on LinkedIn and follow Sunset Social on Facebook.

What You’ll Learn In This Episode

  • What is Sunset Social and who do we serve
  • What is it like working with their clients (mainly Atlanta tech startups)
  • Some social media marketing trends & tips – mainly for tech startups
  • What does her journey been like starting a company less than a year post-grad (or as an early 20s founder) Or just general discoveries/lessons as a founder.
  • The power of discipline in your life – work and otherwise
  • Why creating a mindset of “action and decisiveness” is important

This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: [00:00:10] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio. Brought to you by Onpay. Built in Atlanta, Onpay is the top rated payroll and HR software anywhere. Get one month free at on Paycom. Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:37] Lee Kantor here another episode of Atlanta Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, Onpay. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on Atlanta Business Radio, we have Rachel Johnston with Sunset Social. Welcome.

Rachel Johnston: [00:00:57] Hi Lee, thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be here. Well, I’m.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:01] Excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about Sunset Social. How are you serving folks?

Rachel Johnston: [00:01:05] Yes, absolutely. So Sunset Social is a social media agency that ignites the social presence of brands, guiding businesses and startups towards digital success. So our journey started in January of 2022. So we actually just hit our two year anniversary, which is really exciting. Um, and since then, we have helped dozens of businesses and startups with their social media marketing. So a couple of things that we help our clients with are social media management is definitely one of our biggest services. We have startups and businesses coming to us like, hey, I don’t have the capacity to handle this, right? And they hand it over to us and we completely handle their social media channels from top to bottom. So that is definitely our most popular service. We also help our clients with social media event coverage. If they do have conferences or other types of events that they host, as well as social media ads. So those are our three main ways that we’re serving our clients. And we actually are also launching a new service next Thursday. So I’m excited to share more about that on LinkedIn in the coming week.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:18] Now, um, what was kind of the evolution of your kind of business journey? Did you start out, um, working in firms and then spun off on your own, or was this something like right from the jump, you were like, I think I can do this.

Rachel Johnston: [00:02:35] Right? Yeah. So I, uh, launched my business. I think I registered the LLC about four months after I graduated from Georgia State. Um, so that I think that was just like a leap of faith type of thing. I was like, I knew I wanted to start a business for a while, but I didn’t know exactly what to name it, what I wanted to do. You know, all of these, um, pieces, and you think you want to make it perfect before you start, right? But I just registered the LLC, chose a name, went with Sunset Social, and here we are. So that’s kind of how we started. And then in January of 2022 is when we started to take on clients and officially launched, uh, before that in college and within my first year of business as well, I was working for a awesome marketing agency also based in Atlanta, and that taught me a lot of what I know, um, before I started my business. So I started off as an intern in college and progressed with that company and then decided to launch my own quite quickly after graduating from state. So it’s been an incredible journey so far. Lots of lessons and learning and difficulties as well as any founder knows, but it’s been incredible.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:52] Now, when you were starting out, um, what made you think like, oh, I know how to do this. I’m really good at this. Um, you know, the social media marketing element of marketing, what kind of what were some of the clues that you had that, hey, I can do this. I don’t need to be part of a bigger firm. I have everything it takes in order to be successful.

Rachel Johnston: [00:04:14] Right? Absolutely. I think that a lot of that came from my experience at my previous agency job as well as in college. Um, and I was also honing in on my skills. This is something when I talked to, um, current students and do any sort of, you know, panels or mentoring with current students is I always encourage them to network on. Linkedin is one of my biggest things that I always say, network, network, network. Your network will take you very far and also hone in on those skills. Whatever you want to do, whether it’s social media, then you need to start working on Canva. You need to start becoming proficient at Canva. Copywriting, um, different, you know, tools for posting. You need to learn more about these social media platforms and the algorithms and all of those things. So that’s something I always say to current students. And that is also what I was doing, um, during my time in school. And then before I started my business, as I was really honing in on those skills. Um, but before we launched, um, and also a lot of help from mentors, I mean, mentorship is incredible. I have a lot of awesome mentors, which really helped.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:23] Now, when you were, um, kind of learning the ropes here, what drew you to the the start up community? What what what about that was something you were like, you know what? I’m going to lean into that niche and really try to serve that group.

Rachel Johnston: [00:05:38] Yeah, absolutely. So a really cool thing about having an agency rather than working in-house at a marketing company, is we really get to work with startups and businesses of all different industries, which is really cool. So we’ve got to learn a lot of things from our clients. And as far as the tech startup space, I think a lot of that had to do with my network. Again on LinkedIn, the network I was building within my years before starting the business, and also, um, Atlanta Tech events. I’ve attended a lot of those over the years, and so it kind of just naturally became, um, an evolution. And that became our what is currently our biggest client base, our tech startups. And so I think through my network and those events, it really just naturally, um, became kind of our home. Um, and we and we love the Atlanta tech community here. We have an incredible ecosystem, I would argue, definitely one of the best in the US. I know that that is a debate. But, um, I think that Atlanta has some incredible startups that come out of it, and we’ve really had the pleasure of working with some of those startups. So, um, it kind of just came to be there. My networking.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:57] Now, when you’re working with a startup, is there any, um, difference in the marketing? Like would a startup’s marketing, especially on social media, be different than like a hair salons marketing on social media?

Rachel Johnston: [00:07:11] Oh for sure, for sure. One thing with tech startups is a lot of them don’t have a physical product or something to show, right? So if you’re at a hair salon or if you’re a restaurant, those are all physical things that you can go and take pictures of. So you’ve got to get a little bit more creative with your content for sure. When it comes to tech startups. Um, and another thing I’ll say to that is two things I’ve really noticed with our startup clients that has proven valuable. One is LinkedIn, which I will speak on LinkedIn forever. I love LinkedIn, LinkedIn is incredible, and it is a platform that a lot of people do overlook, um, for their businesses. But I have seen from my tech clients, as well as other tech startups, that LinkedIn is a valuable platform for any tech startup. I will always say that because on there you have your B2B, you have your B2C, you have your investors and the accelerators that oftentimes startups are involved in. You have all of those things on LinkedIn. And I have seen with all of my clients, LinkedIn is a valuable platform. Um, and then also to when it comes to startups and marketing for startups, especially in the early stages, startups are very interconnected with the founders, right? People want to see the founders journey as well as the startups journey because they are so interconnected. So I do always encourage my clients as well to share about their personal journeys and, you know, connect that with the business because people love to see, um, things progressing.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:52] Now, when you’re working with startups, especially tech startups, how do you help them kind of protect them from themselves when it comes to their ability to communicate, um, elegantly about their technology and, and move outside of kind of a lot of times I’ve worked with a lot of tech startups over the years, and sometimes they’re so enamored with how clever their technical solution is. They have a difficult time expressing that in, in ways of, um, the true value that the consumer will benefit from that technology. So, um, how do you kind of help them with that translation from, you know, maybe tech speak to human speak when it comes to, you know, their what they’re working on?

Rachel Johnston: [00:09:42] Yeah, that’s a really good question. Um, one thing when it comes to social media is it’s all about community. And that’s why a lot of our, our clients come to us is they’re like, we’ve got the tech voice. We’ve got, you know, all the technology. I can build the product, but I don’t know how to market it and speak on it in a way that, like you said, kind of, you know, you still want to talk about the tech, of course, on social media, but you need to add in that community element to it and speak to the people like people, and not just, oh, I have this super cool thing. Um, you need to try it out and be too salesy. You also want to, you know, build a community, right? Um, so community building is huge on social media, and that’s something that we help our clients with is kind of, you know, of course, again, we want to talk about the technology and what you’re building and how it’s going to help folks, but also to we want to add that kind of human voice to it. And that’s what we help our clients with.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:36] So what does that kind of. Initial conversation for you. When you’re trying to prospect for a client and you run across somebody that is maybe super smart, off the charts technology wise, but has a difficult time communicating their value proposition, how do you first open their mind to, hey, maybe you do need help in this area because a lot of times they think they’re the smartest person in the room, that they have everything figured out, not just what their technology is. So how do you kind of become that bridge for them to really open their mind to go, hey, you know what, your technology is great. But if you can’t communicate this to anybody, it’s not going to you’re not going to be able to grow.

Rachel Johnston: [00:11:18] Yeah, totally. That that’s a huge point. If you’re not able to communicate it online or wherever you’re marketing, then it’s not going to grow. So, um, we’ve been lucky and we have incredible clients who are really open to hearing our opinions. And I think a lot of it, too, is just having these candid conversations with our clients and talking with them and saying, okay, what do you see? But here are our suggestions, right? We can do it your way. We can do it our way. We can do it kind of in in between. Um, here are our suggestions though, of what we believe is going to work. How can we bridge this gap and make sure that we are meeting your needs? Um, but also, um, using our expertise to, you know, make sure things are performing as best as possible.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:02] Now, what has been the most rewarding part of the journey thus far?

Rachel Johnston: [00:12:07] Man. That’s a good question. Um, the most rewarding part, I think that when you start to look at even the small wins and celebrating those, it really can become pivotal, because I think, especially as a solopreneur, I have a team now. But, you know, I am the singular founder, right? So it’s a lot of the time it’s just me on the day to day. And so I’m trying to personally, um, do a better job of celebrating the little wins, um, throughout the days and also looking back at how far I’ve come, because you can get so stuck in the day to day hardships and you might have something really hard go on on Monday, and by the next Monday, you, you know, it’s it’s the past, right? So you don’t want to get too stuck on things that in the end, is this going to matter in a week? Is this going to matter in a month? Right. So I’ve tried to have that create that kind of mindset within myself and also celebrate even the small wins on a daily, daily basis. Um, and look at how far I have come in just two years now.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:15] Um, is there any kind of tips you can share for a startup or somebody who’s thinking about, you know, leaning more into the social media marketing? Because at some point you you have to tell people about what you’re working. What you’re working on. So what are some things like that are actionable that you could share with a tech startup or anybody really, when it comes to social media marketing, is there some low hanging fruit that people can do just to to gain some traction?

Rachel Johnston: [00:13:46] Yeah, absolutely. I would say, you know, if you’re at the stage where you’re not ready to hire, you know, a social media team yet to help you, I would go back to what I said about LinkedIn. Just start on LinkedIn again. Linkedin, um, will but what.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:59] Does get start on LinkedIn mean? Like what are some things I could do on LinkedIn today that will help me tomorrow?

Rachel Johnston: [00:14:05] Absolutely. I would say if you’re a brand new company, I would start that business account on LinkedIn first. So again, a lot of your identity is still going to be tied up between the startup and the founder. But you need to create that business page and start building the business separately than just yourself. Of course. Add that on to your experience, your profile, and start pushing people towards that business page and eventually creating content on there and sharing about the business. Um, because what social media platforms work best for you depends very much on each specific startup, right? If your target audience is more on Facebook, then go on Facebook. If your target audience is more on Instagram, go on Instagram. We have clients where one completely works and one completely doesn’t, right? But LinkedIn, um, is the platform that I see works across the board, um, for all of our startup clients. So I would say don’t get too overwhelmed by, you know, should I be here? Should I be on TikTok? I hear a lot of people like, do I need to be on TikTok? And they’re like, scared of it, right. Um, and so I always say, you know, let’s just start with one. If you want to start with one, let’s start on LinkedIn. Um, and I would say create that page, add that to your experience. I actually just had a call with somebody very recently, and, and she had this new company and I was like, I can’t even find it on on LinkedIn. She was like, oh, I have it. Here it is. But it wasn’t connected to her personal page, so there was no way for me to find it, um, and things like that. So I would say, just start off with LinkedIn, um, creating content on there. Um, if you’re not ready to hire a team yet.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:42] Now, when you say creating content, what does content look like for a tech startup? Like what are some of the things they should be posting?

Rachel Johnston: [00:15:50] Yeah for sure. So we usually break up, um, content into different content pillars. So you don’t want to be too salesy. That’s something I always say is you don’t want every single one of your posts to be like, look at this thing. Look at this thing. Right? You also want to educate people. So one thing with a lot of startup companies is their product or service or whatever they have can be confusing for some people to understand. It’s not like, oh, I opened a restaurant, right? It’s like, oh, I created this new technology that does X, so there needs to be an educational piece behind that of this is why this is who we serve, etc.. And so education is a really big piece of content that I would say is important for startups. Um, you obviously do want to add in details about your company, be informative and a little bit promotional, um, as well as different types of content depending on what platforms you’re on. If you’re doing reels, um, if you’re creating graphics, um, the big thing with LinkedIn, though, that is valuable, is a lot of people, again, they get stressed out when it comes to Instagram Reels, TikTok videos. Linkedin is cool because stuff can perform really well if you just post text, you can just post. You know a post about your experience this week as a founder or on the company page about the product or whatever the whatever the case may be, you can post text only posts, you can post links. Hey, we just added this blog on our website. Here you go. Um, and with other platforms like TikTok and Instagram, again, you have to have photos or videos or whatnot. So that’s why LinkedIn is also a good starting point for founders.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:38] Now, how do you manage the expectations of your clients? A lot of people, you know, they they see these, um, things go viral or they see content get, you know, thousands or millions of impressions. How do you kind of explain to your clients that your numbers aren’t going to be millions? You know, they’re going to be hundreds, hopefully, or thousands. And, you know, the it’s it’s a little misleading. A lot of the stories that are written and, uh, success stories when it comes to this are throwing out of whack what a typical especially B to B, um, social media, uh, client would, would be generating. How do you kind of have that kind of, I think hard talk with the client.

Rachel Johnston: [00:18:28] Yeah. That’s another really good question because you do see that a lot. You see these, you know, social media gurus on social media and they’re like, I went I made my client’s stuff go viral or all these things. But, um, especially when it comes to B2B and, and, you know, start up clients, you’re starting from scratch. A lot of the times these people that are going viral are usually starting on accounts that are already at 50 K plus, you know, maybe even millions of followers. Of course, your content went viral, right? So setting those expectations and just saying to them like, hey, you know, our goal is not to go viral, right? Because at the end of the day, our goal is to, uh, well, it depends on each client, but it’s to create conversions, brand awareness, whatever the goal is. But a lot of startups, the goal is brand awareness. People don’t even know that you exist. We don’t care about something going viral right now. We need to make sure people know you exist. Um, because another thing too, with viral posts is sometimes it’s not even in your target audience at all.

Rachel Johnston: [00:19:29] I’ve had a post go viral on my personal account before, and it’s a lot of the times not even people in your target audience at all. So it’s really not helping you in the long run. So instead of looking at the likes and the followers, I tell my clients, let’s look at is it converting? Are we getting reach and impressions? Do we have brand awareness? Are we growing our community? These things are impactful. Um, at the end of the day, I’d rather have one person convert and buy the product or, you know, create an account or whatever the, you know, call to action is in a given week. Then, you know, 50 K people see it and nothing happens, um, from that. So none of them are in your target audience. So I’d rather somebody in your target audience convert and, you know, see and engage with your content than something go viral. So it’s all it’s all just about setting those expectations, like you said, and having that conversation about what’s realistic. Right.

Lee Kantor: [00:20:28] But it’s also it’s kind of counterintuitive because a lot of people have that kind of thinking of the law of large numbers. If if a 10,000 people see my thing, then surely somebody’s going to buy something or they’re going to convert somewhere. And so they always think bigger is better when really more precise is better, you know.

Rachel Johnston: [00:20:50] That’s true. Yeah, absolutely.

Lee Kantor: [00:20:52] You’d rather have 100 people who potentially could buy your stuff than you would a million people who were never going to buy your stuff.

Rachel Johnston: [00:21:00] Exactly, precisely. So yeah, it’s all about just having that conversation with them. And again, my clients are incredible. So, um, a lot of them, you know, take that well and understand that and are excited to see the performance that we gain for them.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:17] So now, um, within the tech startups, is there a niche within that or just anybody that has a tech startup is a good, uh, prospect for you?

Rachel Johnston: [00:21:27] Yes. So it’s interesting. That’s kind of just become our niche and who has come to us the most. But we are open to clients with businesses of really any industry. Um, we’re open to product industries, um, restaurants, things like that. I’m definitely open to that. Um, just because of my network and the events that I go to, a lot of that has, um, resulted in us having a influx of tech startups working with us. So we do not have a specific niche in those tech startups. We’ve worked with fintech, we’ve worked with some consulting tech, we’ve worked with, um, data Femtech healthcare, all of these different, um, things. And what’s really cool about that is, again, we get to learn completely new things, um, because of our clients that I otherwise wouldn’t probably be learning about, which is really exciting, and it constantly keeps you on your toes and challenges you as a founder and as a person. Um, because we’re constantly doing new things every day and learning new things. And at the end of the day, that’s life too. So, um, it’s a really fun experience. So no, we don’t have a specific niche in the tech community. We’re open to any.

Lee Kantor: [00:22:40] So what is the problem that your potential clients are having right now where you’re the the right solution?

Rachel Johnston: [00:22:47] Yeah, absolutely. So a lot of our clients currently are I would say more so in the Seed stage series A or B. So they’re newer. Um, we also have worked with some pre seed. So very new companies and a lot of them again they’re like I people don’t even know we exist. People don’t even know um that our company exists at all. So a lot of them come to me like we need help with brand awareness. Um, and something that we do that is unique to other agencies is when it comes to our engagement. So community management and engagement are huge parts of social media management. Um, so really what that means is community management is managing your current community. So what comments are you getting? What DMs are coming in, you know, what are the likes looking like? All of those things DMs, likes, comments, all that. Mentions. So that’s community management. You obviously want to engage with people who are engaging with you, but something we do that is unique is we do an extra layer of, um, engagement and we go out of our way to find your target audience, which is not always easy. Um, but we get to do that and, um, look for your target audience, engage with them so that they see us. So that’s a really key thing that we do. Um, that helps when it comes to our newer, you know, early stage tech clients who need brand awareness or like, people don’t even know about me. And if somebody is posting on LinkedIn, for example, about how they need this solution, or how about how they are in this specific industry, and we are engaging with that. That’s creating more visibility for them.

Lee Kantor: [00:24:30] Yeah. People don’t like to be a best kept secret.

Rachel Johnston: [00:24:33] Right? No.

Lee Kantor: [00:24:36] So. So if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation about with you or somebody on your team, what’s the coordinate? What’s the website?

Rachel Johnston: [00:24:45] Yeah. So our website is Sunset Social marketing.com and I am on LinkedIn. So definitely connect with me on there. I would love to connect with anyone.

Lee Kantor: [00:24:56] Well Rachel, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Rachel Johnston: [00:25:01] Thank you so much, Lee.

Lee Kantor: [00:25:03] All right. This Lee Kantor we’ll see you all next time on Atlanta Business Radio.

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