Rick Mulready: Selling with Facebook Ads (post iOS adpocalypse)

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Facebook Ads are a great way to sell your products and services, but they can be tricky to get right. With all the changes in Facebook’s algorithm and all these iOS updates that can affect your ad performance, it’s easy to feel like you’re on a constant learning curve.

So how do you keep up with all these and still get results?

We've got the right person to answer this question—Rick Mulready, one of the top ad gurus in the industry. Rick has helped dozens of businesses grow sales with effective and targeted ads. Join Travis and Rick for a conversation about how to get the most out of your ads, whether you’re new or experienced with this platform.

Rick Mulready is a business coach, online ads expert, & host of The Art of Online Business Podcast.

This is your chance to learn the tricks and best practices to help you create killer Facebook Ads and other online marketing strategies to grow your business.

Specifically, this episode highlights the following themes:

• How to generate more leads with Facebook Ads
• How to use scarcity, urgency, and integrity to increase sales
• What your business values say about your brand

Links from this episode

• Learn more about Rick's Accelerator coaching program
• Listen to Rick's podcast, The Art of Online Business

Want to give your podcast the boost it needs to stay ahead of the competition? Check out honestpodcasts.com and take the first step toward achieving your podcasting goals!

And if you have a guest in mind who you think would be a great fit for this show, drop me a line at hello@honestpodcasts.com. 

Transcript

Rick Mulready  0:00  
Conversation over conversion, where can you be having conversations that align with your values that are going to attract the people that you want to help through the lens of your values? And then if the conversion happens after great, let's have a conversation first, and see if it's even a match to work together. This also means what podcasts do I want to listen to. What podcast do I want to be on? It's all of that going through the lens of values.

Travis Albritton  0:32  
Welcome back to the Honest Marketing Podcast where you learn proven strategies to grow your business without selling your soul. I'm your host, Travis Albritton. And today, I get to share a phenomenal conversation with one of my business mentors, Rick Mulready. Rick has been in the online marketing space for longer than most of us. He is a Facebook Ads expert, who works with high level creators and entrepreneurs to grow their online business. And within this episode, we cover all kinds of really important things that are super relevant right now. So we talked about the current state of Facebook Ads, what's working and not working within that platform talking about TikTok. We talk about, you know, how to really capitalize on the benefit of using scarcity and urgency within offers in your business but doing it in a way that actually serves the people you're trying to sell to instead of manipulating them into decisions that are good for them. And we also talked about the impact that being in alignment with your business at a values level, how important that is, especially now with your brand and how people are making buying decisions. Really being value oriented is becoming much more important than it even has in the recent past. So, Rick is a phenomenal, phenomenal entrepreneur, with so much to offer. I'm so grateful, I was able to sit down and chat with him, make sure that you stick around to the end of the episode, I'm going to share my number one practical takeaway from our conversation. Without further ado, let's dive in. So Rick, you work with a lot of high performing online entrepreneurs, especially in the education space. And I know that within the Accelerator program, which I was privileged to be a part of for a full year, you're always learning and experimenting with things that are working. And within the group running experiments, on yourself learning experience experiments, what are some of the things that you've seen that have been working recently? Because digital marketing is always changing, but as of like, August, September of 2022, what are some of the bigger trends that you're seeing that are helping businesses and business owners selling things online, really gain traction and get like a positive ROI on their ad spend and their their marketing budgets?

Rick Mulready  2:45  
It's funny, because it really comes back to, and it's really like I say, it's funny, because it really is, but it always comes back to the fundamentals of marketing. You know, I see a lot of, quote unquote really successful businesses, like from a financial perspective. And yet, when you dig into the business, they're still not really talking to their exact target customer. Because if you ask them, okay, who is your target person? Who do you want to help? Who are your people, they can say it, they can explain it. But then you look at their marketing. And it's not, it's not talking to that person. And it's like, how did you get to where you are without doing that? And so this isn't some groundbreaking thing that's like, oh this is just working right now. But it really is, I see this literally every week, in you know, talking to people coaching people, the messaging really needs to be honed in and speak directly to the people that you're trying to help. And again, that's something that we like to take for granted. You're like, oh yeah, I'm doing that. But when you really dig and dig into it, like, oh these ads over here for example, why are you attracting your, your ads are performing pretty well, but you're not attracting the exact person that you want to be? So why is that happening? Okay, so we go over look at the ads, and it's like, oh well, this right here, you're not speaking to the person that you really want to be speaking to, this one over here. So I see that a lot. So, regardless of whether it's, you know, August, September 2022, or whatever, you've got to make sure that you are doing that. And because your, your business will, mean it sounds funny even say this because it's so basic, but like your business will thrive a whole lot more quickly. When you are actually speaking to your people and solving the problems that they have. Another thing that I see working really really well is the ability to people want connection, people want to be connected with. So one way to quickly separate yourself as a business owner, in this very crowded space that we all, that we all, you know, live and work in here is the more connection that you can provide, you know, like scalable connection. And we talked about this when you were an accelerator, too. The more that you're able to have that type of interaction with your clients, your students, your members, whatever that you know, whatever your business is like. That's what they're craving. I'm not saying courses don't work. I'm not saying that at all. But what can easily separate you, from other people, and that works really, really well is how do you have that connection at scale with people, whether it's getting people having people in the community, and you know, just being able to make the opportunity available to speak with you. You know, and I'm not talking like $197 offer or something like that. But if you're at like $1,000 and up, give somebody the opportunity if they want to to be able to ask you questions. The other thing is launching people. And again, I'm not saying that launching is bad or anything like that. But number one, people like consumers in the online marketing space, like are so tired of launches. I talk to people every single day, they're like, um over launches, over launches and over launches. Do they work? Absolutely. But they're looking for a different experience. And again, connection, like how can you create a launch, if you're going to do it, where there is connection, maybe doing it within a community and that sort of thing. And then on the flip side, as a business owner, people I hear it every day, I'm like, they're like, I'm so done with launching, I'm over launches. And I'm like, I hear you. I was that way a few years ago. And I'm like, I don't want to do any more launches. So what I teach is, go ahead and do your launches and promos throughout the year, don't rely on one or two launches, but then have an evergreen system, if you will, throughout the year also, where if somebody really wants your stuff, and it's August, and you're like, sorry, I don't open up until December. They're like they're gonna go find somebody else. You know, there's also a lot to be said to, and again, this is not groundbreaking, or whatever. The whole urgency and scarcity, it works. Like, it's from a psychological perspective, people will take action when there's a deadline to do something. But do it with integrity, right, don't make up some false deadline or something like that. It will drive sales, though. You know, I have a friend of mine who you know, you would know who he is, recently has launched a new program has launched it a few times. And every time they've launched it, and they've kind of done it in cycles, right? Because it's a brand new program. And they're, you know, they're filling it as they sort of go. And it's not a cohort style or anything like that. But every time they launch it again, I say every time it's like three times, the last, I would even, I would even say 24 hours, I would say the last like 18 hours. It goes off the hook like people are getting in. And people really are, they're kind of charged on this on this topic. And rightfully so, right? Some people are like, oh no urgency, no scarcity, that is wrong, right? And then there's other people are like, no, like, I will use this because we want, because we know that more people will enroll. And so I see both sides, the way that I see it on the why I like it, if our job is to have an impact in the world, and that we know that the biggest impact that we can have is through somebody paying for your offer because then they get skin in the game then they have you know, like I've invested in this so I'm gonna take this more seriously. And if we know that, that's when the impact happens. And we know that when we create some form of urgency and scarcity, more people are going to do it. Okay, you know, it's like I see both sides, right, but it always do it with integrity. Another thing that is working really well, and I'll come back to ads here in just a second, but lucky is working really well is doing thing. And again, the funny thing is, none of this is groundbreaking, right? It's just how can I have that connection with people at scale. So for example, and this was an idea that one of our accelerators came up with yesterday, the day we're recording this. It happened yesterday. And they said, they, I don't know if it was a Google. Is Google Hangouts still a thing?

Travis Albritton  10:26  
I guess.

Rick Mulready  10:27  
Google meet, I don't even know. 

Travis Albritton  10:28  
It's Meet now.

Rick Mulready  10:29  
Google meet, alright. So they set up a Google meet. And this person is in the teaching space and creating a resource. So they send out an invite to their to their audience, and say, hey, come watch me put together this resource. So like, just come hang out with me. Like, it's like, you know, voyeuristic, if you will, like, they're just watching over your shoulder, if quote unquote, and they get to give real time feedback into the creation of the resource. And I was like, that is a brilliant idea. And so then my brain goes into, okay, how else can we do that? I'm like, how cool would it be to do that exact same topic, or the exact same strategy? I mean strategy is just like, becoming more accessible, you know? So like, how cool would it be to invite people to, hey, I'm going to put together a podcast episode, you want to come watch me put it together? Like, outline it and so forth. And I can, I'll give you know the topic. You know, I'll let everybody know the topic, you know, give them a zoom link, share your screen, and they get to give input on the episode. I'm like, that's amazing. I love it. You know, I had somebody else, one of my other members, who just about a week ago, did that sort of strategy. However, it was a little bit different, where they said, alright for $97, I will completely audit your ads and your funnel, and five of my five spots, and over the next 60 minutes, I think it was or whatever, you know, she sold it right away. And it's live. And they love it because they're watching it live so they get to learn how that person's brain is working. And so I think that's a really cool idea. And you can take that in a whole bunch of different ways. Right? And then finally, again, this is so obvious, but TikTok, I mean it's eating Facebook and Instagram for lunch. And, you know, I resisted, I'm not a big social media person. And I resisted TikTok for forever. And meaning from like, from a consumption standpoint, my wife loves it. And I would just see her laughing in the evening time and like, oh you're on TikTok again, and she would try to show me something. I'm like, okay, I just don't get it. I don't know what happened. But literally, when we're recording this, probably three weeks ago, something clicked. And I was like, oh my God, this is amazing. And I would, this is the first platform I've ever done. Or I've ever, like, consumed content on where I get off, and I'm like, I'm in a better mood. I've laughed, I've actually learned something. And I'm like, I go on Instagram. And I'm like, Oh, I feel so heavy, you know. And so I've taken the first step, I've taken the, alright, I've set my profile. I've been, I've had my profile for a long time, but I've like, put the picture in, but the description in, now the next thing, we've got topics ready to go. So I'm going to start, you know, doing that. Do I need to do it for the business? I don't. But it seems I want to be in on the ground floor here. And it's still very much the ground floor. TikTok Ads, I know a lot of people I have not running TikTok ads yet. But I know a lot of people who are and they're doing really well and it's very very effective. And I think like it's Facebook 10 years ago, basically, when it was the Wild West, and there were very few competitors and people were doing really really well. And so, TikTok is where it's at.

Travis Albritton  14:10  
Alright, so I want to circle back to a couple of things. That was a lot.

Rick Mulready  14:13  
I just went off. I went off on a big tangent there.

Travis Albritton  14:16  
I wasn't going to stop you either. I was gonna let you just keep rolling and just like spill all the beans. So the first thing I want to circle back to is scarcity and urgency. Because that is something that when used appropriately, can be really powerful, not just for you as a business owner or marketer, but also for helping incentivize the people you're trying to serve. But I can probably count on one hand or two hands, lots more than that. Lots of examples where I'm like, this isn't real. And the the biggest giveaway is if you're on a screen with a countdown and you hit refresh and it starts again at the top. Yeah, that's a fake deadline. You just put a little countdown timer on there to make me think I had to do something.

Rick Mulready  15:01  
Right. So out of integrity there.

Travis Albritton  15:03  
So when you're working with your accelerator students and business owners, and they're like, okay, how do I utilize this with honesty but also make it effective? What's that look like?

Rick Mulready  15:16  
So first of all, what you want to do in a launch is you want to give people as much, as much of the information as possible. Like, tell them everything that they need to know, you're not holding back or anything like that. You want to give them as much information as they need to make a decision themselves. Because what you don't want happening is you have that sort of urge. And I'll give you some examples here in a second, but you have that urgency and scarcity. And they're like, I got to do this. And they, they do it, they immediately regret it, you know, or the next day, they're like, emailing you. And they're like, ah, like, I just got caught up in the moment and all this other stuff, right? And so that can still happen even when you're giving somebody all the information. It's just, it's reality, right? But you do want to give people as much information as possible. By the way, just real quick, on that note, I should have meant to mention this earlier. Put your price on whatever it is that you're selling, make it visible. And I haven't done this. We're literally changing it right now. And I haven't done this for Accelerator. I haven't, I haven't done it up to this point. We're redesigning our page and stuff like that. The price is going on there. Right? Currently, the price is, it's a 12-month program, 2500 a month or one payment of 25k. That price may go up. I'm thinking about that. But anyway, the point being is like, well, I can Google, I don't google myself, honestly, Travis. But if I Google Rick Mulready, one of the options that comes up is excelerator price. People are searching for that. And I'm not giving that information. And what I find, and I hear from a lot of people as they're like, yeah, I didn't even apply because I figured working with you would be way too expensive. But then they learned the price and like, for everything that they get in the program, they're like, holy cow, I wish I'd known that earlier. You know, so anyway, tangent, put your price down there on the page, make it. Don't be afraid of it. So, integral, urgency and scarcity. Actually, if it is a actual deadline, if you have like a cohort style of a launch, and you're like, oh, I'm kicking off on, you know, whatever, September first, and I only have 20 spots, that's legit. You can have bonuses that expire, that are legitimately only available for that specific launch, or that you only make available when you do these special promotions. You can do discounts, too. But again, you want, if you're doing these things, the integrity part comes in and like, I'm only offering whatever that might be during that time. And you're, again, you're very clear about that. You're letting people know all the information to be able to make that decision. For example, you could say, you can buy it tomorrow, but you're buying it, you know, at regular price. It'd be like kind of walking into a car dealership and they're having like, whatever the president say in sale, and it's like a special price this weekend. But when that sale is over, it goes back up. You know what I mean? It's like, and it's like coming in, when president's terrible exam, like February? I think it is. It's like coming into June and being like, hey, I want that President's Day Sale. Right? Like, well, that was four months ago. You know? So those are just examples of within integrity. Out of integrity would be like an example. You just said, like I refresh the page in the the countdown timer just reset itself.

Travis Albritton  19:12  
Yep. Or if it goes all the way to zero and then nothing changes on the page. 

Rick Mulready  19:17  
Yeah, exactly.

Travis Albritton  19:17  
It doesn't do or anything. It just like, oh, it just, it just stopped. So then when you're thinking about live launches versus evergreen launches, and when we say launches, if you're not known in the info product world, this simply means there's a period of time where you're actively promoting a product or a service or an offering. And then it expires in some way, like that would be a launch. And there's different ways you can do it, whether it's a webinar, or like a, like a live masterclass or pre recorded which would be evergreen, meaning anyone come in at any point in time. That's what we mean by launches. How do you apply that to Evergreen versus live because live it's it's a lot easier, like you said with cohort. It's like, well, the class starts. It's like you're enrolling at a course at a college university. It's like, well, this is when the semester starts, we're gonna take the class, you're gonna sign up by here. Here's the deadline. And so that makes sense. With Evergreen, is it more like the price stuff? Is it the bonus stuff? And then how do you, what software do you use to track that? Is it still deadline funnel? Is there something else that you've discovered recently? Like, how are you tracking that? So that the, the experience from the person that's coming into it is legitimate and you can actually deliver on. No, this is actually a deadline. That's enforced for these reasons and X, Y, and Z.

Rick Mulready  20:33  
Totally. Yeah, I mean, of course, you can still use deadline funnel. So I use, I've been using now for a year and a half a tool called, well, it's, they've just rebranded, it's formerly 10xPro.io. And they rebranded to Kleq. It's spelled kind of weird, kleq.com.

Travis Albritton  20:55  
Very unique.

Rick Mulready  20:57  
Yeah, I don't know. But hey, but I love it. And I've tried all the platforms, right? Like, I use Kajabi for years and years. And I like, I like Kajabi, but just had some limitations. And so a platform like 10xPro has all of this built right into it. So like, I can have a sales page, for example, that has that functionality built right into it, meaning like, I can add that functionality to the page where it's like, okay, this offer, this special offer expires on Friday. And if somebody tries to go to that page, than it either redirects to a different page, maybe it's the exact same page without that special offer that was available. Or you can say, you know, to like a waitlist or something like that. So that, that tool, that platform, you know, I can I put all my courses in there, all the funnels landing pages, dashboards, order forms, has an affiliate sent, like, does all those things and, and more and more of these tools are having that sort of functionality built right into it. And there, they are based on different things, like the most common ways, like IP address, for example. So if you, you know, click on the link, and now your quote unquote timer starts. So if the offers available for four days, soon as you make that first click okay, your four days starts at that point. So it's completely doable, via Evergreen as well.

Travis Albritton  22:32  
Perfect. So I want to shift a little bit towards paid ads. Because in the world of the internet, it's always nice when you can start a little fire and then throw a bunch of jet fuel on top of it to accelerate results. And that's been the beauty of Facebook Ads for so long as you can get started for so cheap. But over the last couple of years, Facebook has seen a dramatic shift in the way their ads have not only been performing but tracking capabilities and even like interest targeting has largely disappeared. So, so kind of what's the current state of Facebook Ads? Like if you're wanting to start a Facebook Ads campaign, what are the styles of ads that are working for building custom audiences look alike audiences? Is it still complete registration? Is that still the target? Is it reach through play? Like, just kind of break down the current state of Facebook Ads and how they can still be useful. Because, you know, like with every major shift, and I know this is something you preach on often, there's always opportunity. Right? There's people that , like oh well, Facebook doesn't work anymore, and they completely abandoned it and now becomes, oh well, this is underpriced now because so many people have shifted to trying to do more Google Ads or things like that. So yeah, kind of give us a lay of hand of what Facebook Ads is up to nowadays and what's working.

Rick Mulready  23:49  
What you just described, Travis has kind of happened, you know, prices have have come down a little bit, but they've also, you know, they're on the higher side. Facebook knows it's in a tough spot, the whole iOS update 14.5 with the privacy and all that stuff. It really hurt these platforms, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Google. A lot more, I think, than these platforms realized it would. And so they spoke into trying to figure out, you know, that solution like how do we how do we take it from third party data? Meaning we can't really track very well when somebody clicks on my ad goes to an external landing page that I've created an opt in for a webinar, for example. We, the visibility into actual conversions is so much drastically less than it used to be. So Facebook is like, alright how do we make that a more first party data? How can we create that experience within Facebook? And one way there doing that as with lead ads. So lead ads have been around for years and years and years. And they used to be terrible. But I don't know what they've been doing in the back end. But fake lead ads have been working quite well. And they have been for a while. So for those people don't know, like the lead ad is basically when you as the advertiser, want to collect an email address, for example, the experience takes place within the ad unit itself. So as a user, if you're scrolling through Instagram or Facebook, and you see an ad in your feed, and you're like, oh yeah, I want to learn more about that, or I want to opt into that, you can click that button, the call to action button, and your information, like your name, and your email that's tied to the account is auto populated. Now, you can also set it so that it's not auto populated. And that is a really good thing. Now, because the reason that lead ads years ago weren't very effective, was that it would auto populate with, you know, the Facebook information, but so many people have like throwaway email addresses, you know, for their Facebook account, that the leads would be cheap, but they would literally and figuratively be cheap, right? It would be a cheap lead cost, but then they were not quality, right? That has really changed. And you've got different options. Now, when you're doing lead ads that they can be really effective for building your email list and so on. And you can also connect it to like, depending on how you're doing it with like a webinar, that sort of thing. So lead ads, absolutely. Facebook has changed, you know, it's not conversions anymore, they call it sales. Now, all that means it's kind of weird, right? But all that means is, if I do want to send people off of Facebook to a landing page, then you're choosing the sales object. They've reduced the number of objectives, and they've made it very, sort of clear on, okay if your objective is to get people to join your email list, then essentially, you've got two options. The lead ads, and the I want to send people off the Facebook over to my landing page. That would be the sales objective. It's a little bit confusing, it is. But just know that when you were sending people off of the platform, you need to like what I like to call triangulate the data. So you're gonna take the data that you see in Facebook Ad Manager, that is not going to be super accurate. What's going to be accurate that you see in there is, you know, like, click through rate, and the amount of ad spend, and the reach and all that sort of thing. But as far as conversion data, it's not going to be very accurate. So you're gonna need to look at like your email CRM. So like, oh, did all these leads, like what's ConvertKit saying, or whatever you're using Active Campaign or whatever. What is my landing page software? You're saying, as far as the numbers, and they're never going to match up completely, which is, you know, that's always been the case. But it is frustrating. You're trying to make your best guess on what is my cost per lead, and how many leads have I actually brought in. So that's when you're sending people from like the traditional way off of Facebook, click on the ad, go to my landing page. And do that. When you do lead ads, by the way, you will get much more accurate data. And just like you could, with, you know, an external, like sending people to an external landing page. You can build retargeting audiences with lead ads like so people interacting with your ad, people that clicked on your ad went to, you know, the little field where you enter your name, but they didn't complete the opt in or registration. And then also, you can build an audience of people who actually who do complete the registration. So that's really cool. And that's all first party quote unquote data, meaning what's your saying within Facebook, so Facebook can collect that data. So that's on that side. On the grander scheme, audience, larger audiences, you know, it used to be years ago where it's like, alright, let's get fairly specific, maybe a couple of 100 to a few 100,000 people. Now, we're talking millions in audience size, if you can. Your targeting ability, just like you said, Travis, is not as you know, you were relying more on the AI. We're relying more on Facebook's algorithm. It is way smarter than we are. But we're relying more on that the machine learning if you will, then our trying to specifically target. The way that we're targeting is you know, it's you can get targeted with interest targeting still, you can still do your custom audiences, meaning input your you know, bring in your email address or email list and it'll do its matching and create look alike audiences and all that stuff. Again, those audiences are going to be smaller than they have in the past because people on your email list may have opted out of tracking, right. So Facebook might not be able to, to, to show the ad to people, that sort of thing. And then look alike audiences, the quality of look alike audiences is also suffered because of that as well. So yes, you can get targeted still with interest targeting not as much as you could, you used to be able to. The idea, though, is to get as targeted as you can, while keeping the audiences as large as you can. I don't mean like hundreds of millions, I'm talking like a 10 million person audience or 5 million person audience, for example. And then once you start to teach the algorithm, the type of people that you're trying to, trying to get in front of, then you can go broad. Like if I said five years ago, all right, Travis, let's target your ads to men and women between 25 and 44. In the US, go, you would have thought I was crazy. Like, like, that's not something we used to do. But now that is a very like, that's part of the strategy, to go super broad, be very targeted with your ad creative, meaning your your, your image, or your video, specially your copy and your headline. And that way you're using the ad creative itself to speak to the people within the broader audience. And then Facebook is trying to find those people, if that makes sense. And so it's a, it's absolutely a creative game, if you will, on Facebook, testing different creative. And when I say creative, I'm talking about the ad unit itself, like the image testing different images, testing, different copy testing different headlines, that sort of thing. Nothing new, but that's become even more important now. So that's kind of like, kind of the state of Facebook ads. You know, a lot of people say, oh we don't work anymore. I can rattle off half a dozen people just in our coaching program, they're crashing it with ads.

Rick Mulready  32:30  
And here, here's one thing that I've noticed, especially after I mean, there's been this way for years, but especially after iOS is, when you advertise consistently, when you have some form of presence, whether it's a video view campaign, or just spending a couple dollars a day, or you're consistently list building, you will do better over time, because you have that consistency, Facebook, you know, AI sees that you're consistently advertising. And you're collecting, you know, the AI is collecting that data all along so that when you go for a launch, for example, and you're like I want to ramp up my spend, and you've been spending all along, you're going to do better during that launch. Like the days of just like not advertising and then all of a sudden, open the floodgates for a launch, if you will, they're gone. I mean, you can still do it, but you are not going to see the kind of results that you used to see. I think those are the those are the biggest differences. And also TikTok ads, people are, it's wide open on TikTok and the people who are in there now, they're doing really well with it.

Travis Albritton  33:46  
So yeah, it seems like a like a blessing and a curse with Facebook. Now, it's like if you've been used to doing Facebook Ads in certain way, it feels like you've lost a certain element of control. Compared to what used to be able to do, right? I want people that follow this person and like this person and live here and speak this is that you could create like this multi layered, targeting, like persona, and be really, really specific. And so it can feel like a loss that I can't do that anymore. But if you're just getting started, or you've always been overwhelmed by the idea of running a Facebook Ads, that could actually be a very freeing thought. Oh, I can, I can just focus on making a really compelling post that speaks directly to that person that I'm trying to help with my business. And then, like so it seems like the threshold for actually getting started and competing and to create profitable ads like it's actually a pretty great spot to be in right now.

Rick Mulready  34:42  
Yeah, I mean, if you're starting now, you don't know what it was like, right? In the past. So it's like, okay, cool. You're starting with a clean slate. And this should go without saying again this is one of those fundamental things you've got to have a good offer. Whatever it is that you're offering, and when I say offer I don't necessarily mean like the paid offer because oftentimes, you know, we're just sending, we're trying to build our list, right? We're trying to get people to register for an event, you know, whether it's a video or webinar or what have you. That offer meaning, okay, if I want to send people to a lead magnet to build my list, that's your offer. It better be a really good offer and how you're communicating it for people to want it, obviously. Because if it like, you can have the best ad, you know, campaign set up and all this other stuff. But if your offer is crap, like it's not going to do well, you know. So that is, that is first and foremost, the number one thing, you have an offer. In this, obviously, comes back to what I said before, knowing your person that you want to be helping.

Travis Albritton  35:44  
Yep, I'll definitely have to have you back on once you've got some more groundwork laid in your TikTok account, and we can kind of have like a good contrast between the platforms.

Rick Mulready  35:56  
Right now I have 52 followers right now. And I have zero content on there. I don't know who they are. But hey, there's 52 followers there. They're waiting, they're waiting for my, oh my God.

Travis Albritton  36:06  
Eagerly, eagerly waiting for a dance video from Rick Mulready.

Rick Mulready  36:10  
Yep, it's coming.

Travis Albritton  36:11  
So I also want to shift to something that has definitely, that both of us have definitely seen, in the last couple of years, as digital marketing has evolved away from more transactional style marketing, which is, I'm going to interrupt your attention, give me something really juicy, and you're gonna buy it, whether you have all the information or not. And then as long as that is making more money than I spend, then I scale it up and scale it up and scale it up. And that kind of became the arbitrage. Yep, we're now, your brand, the values of your business, your values, as an individual, are becoming much more important and really at the forefront of buying decisions, right? It's not just about, can this product or service do what it's promising. But also is this the kind of company that I want to associate with, or that reflects the things that are important to me. Talk about, because I know that you have really made a very specific strategic shift, not strategic in the way that you're like, trying to manipulate the marketing to, you know, squeeze out a couple extra dollars, but you've made a very intentional shift towards that. And so I'd love for you just kind of share your journey for, kind of how you came to that decision, and then how that has played out and paid off since you've made that shift in your business.

Rick Mulready  37:31  
So yeah, I like to say it's, I like to call it conversation over conversion. So where can you be having conversations that align with your values, that are going to attract the people that you want to help through the lens of your values. And then if the conversion happens after great, but it's just like you said, Travis, you're flipping it from conversion and conversion conversion to what's happening conversation. First, let's see if there's even a match to work together. And, and I say work together to and I'll come sort of come back to this, but I'll mention it now. This also means, what podcast do I want to listen to? What podcasts do I want to be on? What people do I want to allow on my podcast? And that could be you know, if you're doing videos, or whatever it might be. It's all of that going through the lens of values. And, you know, this whole journey, I think, like a lot of people for me started when, with the the George Floyd shooting. And I stayed really quiet after that. And the reason that I did was because for a long time I struggled with, and I'm still kind of like this to, where you saw all these people, especially in the online space, right? They knew that people wanted to see who was responding, if you will, and like sharing their support. But what I saw that was happening in the online space, these quote unquote influencers, that for so many people, it was performative that it was just like, yeah, look at me, I'm doing this or, you know, I'm having these types of conversations or different guests on whatever it might be. But it wasn't like nothing was changing at the core. And, you know, for me, personally, I know a lot of people personally that where this was happening, and I wasn't happy with it. And I felt like that's why I kind of stayed quiet because I didn't want to be quote unquote performative about it. Meaning like, look at me, look what I'm doing over here, whereas I'm the type of person that likes to make change internally first, and then go from there. And so it wasn't until really early 2021, when people started reaching out about Accelerator, and they were challenging me on this. Why haven't, I don't know where you stand on any of this stuff. Why haven't you talked about this? And that was sort of the, the wake up for me, not from a business sense. It was more, so people really do want to hear what I have to think about these types of things, which I've always not been super comfortable with, because I'm just a regular dude. But I also really don't take that for granted. Like, I'm very humbled by that. And so I also realized that I didn't know a lot. And I had so much to learn, and continue to learn. I also knew that wasn't going to be like, okay, it's, you know, August 1, and I'm good now, you know, I've so, I went out and found the the best diversity equality inclusion consultant that I could find. Her name is Erica Corde, she's amazing. And I started doing work with her. And the very first thing that Erica works through is values. And it really challenged me from the perspective of, because I thought I had values, I had values, but like, they were, I don't know, I kind of felt like, for some of them, they were just sort of sort of surface level, where I was like, oh, yeah, like I one of the number one value in the business and for myself is integrity. And one of the first things I learned was like, okay that's great. But like, let's take it further like, like, it's really dig into that. And so long story short on that is I worked with Erica and her business partner India for a year and a half. And I still, I still work with Erica from time to time, and you know, I took my team through trainings, and we did a lot of work there. And I think the biggest thing that came out of that was I made a lot of decisions of what I was going to stand for and what I wasn't, and a lot of things that continue to happen in the online space. I'm not standing for, I'm not standing for that. So where there may have been a connection in the past or what have you. And I didn't, all right, I'm that is not, that is not that does not align with my values anymore. Also, we said, okay, the podcast, everything basically, is gonna go through the lens of our values, everything. The types of guests I have on the podcast, where I go, and speak to when other podcasts, speak to other masterminds who I collaborate with, what what types of students that I allow in Accelerator for example. All of that, like what types of tools that we use, everything started to go in through the lens of the values. And, that's the culture I created in the business for my team as well. And that's what I preach to. Our Accelerator members is one of the big things that I teach. And it just made, like, I feel so much better about myself. Meaning like, I'm very clear on this now. And I'm not afraid to take a stand, if you will, where I feel it's the right thing to do. And that's where it's like conversation over conversion, you know, I've turned away 10s of 1000s of dollars over the past couple of years because of that, meaning like and what this doesn't align with me. And so anyway, that's kind of the the story of the values. And I would encourage everybody listening, if you don't have, like, I'm sure you have values, right. But if you don't operate your business through the lens of values that you set up for your business, do that. Take some time to do that. And then, then you're making all of your decisions, hiring decisions, who you're willing to bring onto your team, contractors that you're willing to work with. All of that stuff goes through the lens of your values. And it just, I don't know, I can't really put to words what it does for you, but it's a very freeing experience.

Travis Albritton  44:40  
Well, I imagine it creates a lot of internal harmony between, like even subconsciously, the things that matter to you and the things that you care about, and then the things that you're doing within your business. Right that it creates this alignment where you don't feel like you're working in somebody else's business. But It's really a reflection of you, especially if you're the founder, the owner, the one running it, as your business gets to take on the personality that you intentionally create for it. And so having that alignment, I imagine would, would lead to being much more engaged with the work you're doing and more excited about the things that you're doing. Not waking up on Monday, dreading the fact that you gotta go back to work, you know, and just, overall, I mean, that's, that's the whole reason, if you're an entrepreneur, like you started in creating your own thing in the first place is because you wanted to make something from yourself totally. So being able to have that, that alignment and doing the work to clearly identify, these are really the the non negotiables for me within my business and how I approach my business. I mean, I can only imagine all the positive downstream effects of that for everything that you do.

Rick Mulready  45:53  
And it's, it you also, in addition to what those things, what the all those things you just said Travis is like, you get more excited because you're attracting people who align with your values now. Because there are people who say, no, I don't know, I don't align with Rick like, okay cool, that's I'm totally fine with that. And I will say that, this is harder, I will, I will say this, this can be harder for somebody who's early in their business. Because at that point, they feel like, I got to take anything and everything to grow my business, and I get that. But I would encourage you to really try to if, number one, if you don't have values, like set those up, figure out what those are. And then try as much as possible to really be integral with your values, so that you are building the business through the lens of your values, and you're not just taking anything and everything. And I get that I know that. And I used to do that too, right? Because you're like, I gotta, I gotta make money, my business, I get it. And so it's easy for me to sit here after eight and a half years and a successful business of like, oh, I just, you know, pick and choose. I get that it's easy to do that. But my business completely shifted when we were very intentional about the values. And if I could have done it earlier on, absolutely I would have done that.

Travis Albritton  47:10  
So I think we've missed, if we went through a whole podcast interview, and we didn't talk about your podcast, which has been around for a considerably longer amount of time than this one since it's just launching. Talk to me a little bit about how that has shifted for you. And in light of you know, that value centric exploration that you've gone through and the pivots that you made there, but also just how podcasting and the landscape of podcasting has shifted. You know, how is the art of online business continue to evolve? And even before we started recording, we were talking about some different ideas and things you're kicking around and trying to innovate within it. Is the podcast still the number one driver for your business right now?

Rick Mulready  47:51  
Yep, it is. Yeah, we, we saw, I mean, the podcasts, I'm really grateful for what the show is done. I was telling to me the other day, I've actually been podcasting now for nine years. Like, I started my first podcast in 2013. And it was, I did it for 52 episodes. And then in I believe it was January, I think it was 2015 is when I started. What is now the pike is this podcast, but at the time it was called The Art of Paid Traffic. And it was, it was the first podcast that was all about paid traffic and Facebook Ads and stuff like that. And then obviously, others came along. And that's great. And it did really, really well I was very fortunate were great downloads a lot of people all over the world listening to it. And you know, talking about shifting and making a change about at this point, probably three years ago, I renamed it to the art of online business, because I was expanding on. I can still, I can still teach Facebook Ads to anybody, right. And it's still very much a part of what I do. But I don't specifically do that. And so when I made that sort of expansion in the business, I changed the name to the art of online business. And it's been, I mean, we're what's today, Tuesday, tomorrow, I think we published like episode like 626 or something. And we're hitting 9 million downloads of the podcast this summer, total in total. And so I mean, I'm really grateful for the show, and I love this format. I think how it's evolved is, you know, there was pretty much no competition nine years ago, and now everybody and their brother has a podcast, and so it's harder to stand out. You have all the big names coming. Yep, big brands coming in. You have celebrities starting their shows because they finally understand the opportunity that exists with podcasting which you've been taught came about for a long time. And so, just like you said, we're talking before we hit record, like some ideas about how to, I'm always looking for what can be done differently within the scope of an episode. Because, you know, I like most people do interviews. You know, I do two episodes a week, a Wednesday episode and a Friday episode. I like to think that I was one of the first people to do a quick tip episode. And now I see a whole bunch of people doing it, but I won't take credit for that by any means. But it's a shorter episode, right? So it's like Wednesday is my full length episode, whether it's like an hour or 45 minutes or an hour where it's either a solo episode with me or I do an interview. Friday episode is what I call a quick tip where I talk about one specific thing for like, 15-20 minutes originally, it was thought to be like, 10 minutes, and I'm bringing it back down because it got longer. And it does really, really well. Now, I think the innovation part are the different things that you can do within episodes. You know, I think one trend is people are loving the shorter episodes like 10 minutes long. And then, you know, so like, just doing different things within the episode. The other big evolution, if you will, is video. So we're on video right now, we're both recording. And so it wasn't until November of 2021. So where are we, August, so 10 months ago, 11 months ago, 10 months, whatever it was, nine months ago. I started doing video where I just basically turned on my camera like I'm on right now. On this, you know, on my podcasting mic, and this is how I record my podcast episodes whether it's obviously an interview or solo. And you know, we were talking about earlier before we hit record, YouTube finally has a podcasting section now to choose from in the Explore section. So it's been rumored for a long time that YouTube is getting into the second largest search search engine. Let's get in on the quote ground floor of doing podcasts videos on YouTube. But then also the the leverage that you create when you do a video podcast, meaning I can cut these up into social media snippets. I can do little clip videos on the YouTube channel, the opportunities like TikTok, Instagram reels, Instagram stories, all that different types of stuff that you can do. And that's, you know, the, I think the biggest innovation, I think that people who aren't doing video along with their, with their audio podcast, they really need to if they're going to take continue to take it seriously. So it's been fun to watch what's happening here in the plant in, you know, in the space over the past few years.

Travis Albritton  53:00  
Yeah, I definitely second that. Video, it used to be a luxury. It's like, hey, if you can throw some video on there. Now it's becoming more of a necessity not just because of platforms like YouTube. But simply because you can take like you said, one recording or one interview, and then now you have the opportunity to repurpose it in so many different places. If you're looking for efficient ways to create content for your business, video podcast is the easiest one to start the easiest one to scale, because you can take that same piece of content that, you know, if you're just creating like a how to video on YouTube, that doesn't necessarily translate to an audio only format, or to a micro clip somewhere else. But a video podcast is so versatile. And it's relatively easy turn on a camera while you're recording that. I think it really is a great opportunity. And the faster that people hop onto that, the quicker that we have to catch the wave.

Rick Mulready  53:57  
It took me a while it took me a couple weeks to get used to being on camera, and doing and doing the you know, like doing the actual episode. But one thing I realized is that you look at other people who do video podcasts. And it's not like they're looking at the camera the whole time. You know, they're looking off or they're looking at the person or they're looking at the screen or what have you and they're talking. And so it was that little tip that kind of like calm me down if you will. And again, I've been podcasting for at that time for eight years. So it's not like it was my first episode. But I've been doing audio for all those years and then I add video in and it was kind of weird at first but then when I realized and I you know like alright, I don't have to be looking at the camera and that's kind of weird right the whole time. But you are, you know, you can be looking around, you can be looking at your notes. It's okay. And but people a lot of people prefer to watch podcasts these days. But yeah, in the leveraging part like repurposing yet. The opportunities are endless. Blog posts, social media posts, video clips, you name it, it's there.

Travis Albritton  55:13  
So I've got two more questions before we wrap up. But first, where's the best place for people to connect with you? Where can they find the podcast? If there a course creator or have a membership in that or place where they feel like coaching and mentorship really helped them get to the next level? What's the best place for them to go to learn more about Accelerator and see if they'd be a good fit for that?

Rick Mulready  55:31  
Yeah, thanks for that. It would be rickmulready.com/accelerator has all the information about the program and so forth. The podcasts are the art of online business where, wherever podcasts are sold now, wherever podcasts are, listen to all the platforms. And the best way to connect with me would probably just two ways you can shoot me an email, rick@rickmulready.com is my email address. And, or you can shoot me a DM over on Instagram. I'm @rickmulready.

Travis Albritton  56:02  
Wonderful. All right. So you've been in the digital marketing game for quite a while. And while you've seen a lot of best practices, I imagine you've also come across a lot of just terrific advice. Is there any particular piece of marketing advice that comes to mind, is like, I really hope no one does this, because that would be catastrophic. Just like, yes, absolutely horrendous bad piece of advice.

Rick Mulready  56:26  
Yeah, to right off the bat. Number one, don't create your course before selling it.

Travis Albritton  56:34  
Amen to that. 

Rick Mulready  56:36  
Like it has been said for years, like oh, no, create your course. And then find your audience. And all of a sudden, no, no, no, no, don't spend all of, I'm going through this literally right now with a couple of our Accelerator members where they're creating some new offers. Okay, great. validate it first, right? So make sure people want to buy it before you spend all this time creating content, setting up, you know, your, your course platform software, whatever it might be. So that's number one. What you do, what you need to do there is, what are you teaching? What is the promise? Like, when somebody goes through this course, what are they going to come away with. And then you do want a kind of an outline of what's going to be in the program. That's it, that's all you need. And a price, right? That's what you take to your audience. And you're like, alright, I'm accepting X, many people, here's the credit card, you know, here's the order form, I mean, sign up. And then nothing's gonna light a fire, about course creation. And when you get people waiting, like they paid you money, they're waiting for it. So that's number one. I would say number two, and I see this all the time, and like either don't get it. People build this custom platform. Like they build this customized thing that they work with a developer on. And again, it happens oftentimes in conjunction with not having validated the offer. And I cringe because I'm like, you're spending so many 1000s of dollars, to build this customized thing, when there's so many different platforms, like we just mentioned earlier, like 10xPro, or whatever it might be. They have built in things that are enough to get you going. And then you can evolve from there. And let's see, the last little thing is, you don't need a fancy website, or anything like that, to have a very successful business. We did seven figures in the first four years. And I don't say that to brag or anything. I'm just saying, like we did, were able to accomplish that back when I thought that was what success meant. And we had the worst site in the world. And I even had the worst site in the world until November of 2021. So that's our 2020, excuse me. Yeah. That's less than two years ago, and I've been doing this eight and a half years just kind of gives you a sense of like, it's not about fancy or anything like that. So, so you asked for one and I gave you.

Travis Albritton  59:12  
That's all right. Connect with the person you're trying to serve, understand them deeply and then solve the problem that they have. And then all the other pretty things fall into place. Right?

Rick Mulready  59:21  
Yeah, it's not easy. I mean, that principle, those principles are easy. It's not easy to do it because if it were everyone would do it, but it really comes down to those principles right there.

Travis Albritton  59:32  
Yep, still gotta execute. Still gotta execute. And then my last, my last question, if you if you think back to eight and a half years ago, when you left the corporate world and started your entrepreneurial journey, knowing everything that you know now, what would you tell yourself on day one? Like what's the piece of advice you would share with your past self, knowing what you know now to really set you on the trajectory that you would hope to have gone on or if it's exactly where you are. What has lead you to this point?

Rick Mulready  1:00:01  
I think that I don't think I would change anything as far as what I've done. I would well, I mean, now we kind of all the things happen for a reason but I would change the mindset, though. I would say, right, I know the answer to this right off the bat. I would say, basically chill the eff out. It's going to be okay and that you always figure things out. That's what I would, that is what I would tell myself back then. Because I, you know, I struggle with anxiety talked about a lot in the podcast. I struggle with anxiety for years since I was a little kid. And, like, when you, I was in the corporate world, and you, you know, you leave a quote unquote secure job to build your own business. So many people think  that's more risky. That's a whole other conversation. But like, my anxiety really ramped up when I left the corporate world. And so I would go back and tell myself, number one, get a coach sooner. And number two, it's going to be okay, you always figure things out.

Travis Albritton  1:01:05  
Awesome. Thank you so much, Rick, for everything.

Rick Mulready  1:01:09  
You bet, man. Thanks for having me on.

Travis Albritton  1:01:10  
So I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did recording it. My number one takeaway from my conversation with Rick is don't forget who your ideal customer is, it is so important to overlook those basic details of who am I serving. What are their problems? What are their felt needs? How can I really make a positive impact and positive difference in their life? It's so easy to become detached from that remove from that and lose connection to the people that we're helping and serving with our businesses. Don't be afraid to consistently come back to that and say, okay let's, let's make sure we're still messaging in a way that connects and resonates with the people we're trying to serve. Let's go back and revisit the website. Let's go back and revisit our ad campaign. Let's go back and revisit our about page, whatever it is, and make sure that you are consistently communicating to the people that you're trying to reach. So you attract the customers that your business is designed to help. Now if you are a course creator, or if you have a paid membership program, and you feel like you're stuck, you feel like you need some coaching, some guidance to get you to that next level, I cannot recommend enough Rick's Accelerator program. I mentioned the beginning of the interview, I've had I had the privilege of being in there for a full year. And there are so many things that I can trace back in my own entrepreneurial journey and connect to my time there that have led to where I am today. And I truly believe I wouldn't be where I am without Rick's mentorship in that program. So if that is you, I definitely encourage you to check it out. I believe, rickmulready.com/accelerator. The link will be in the show notes if you want to check that out. And also make sure to go and check out his podcast as well, The Art of Online Business, where he talks about all things related to growing as an entrepreneur, online businesses, strategies, tactics, and has some phenomenal guests on there, and definitely in my top 10 podcasts to listen to as a business owner and marketer. Well, hope you enjoyed this episode of the honest Marketing podcast. And as always, be honest.