Carter Snyder of the Sasha Group helps us traverse the evolving landscape of media consumption and advertising. We discuss how the giants of digital platforms - like Walmart and Amazon, and dominant streaming services - are molding the way we consume media. From the rise of social media apps like TikTok, challenging Facebook's reign, to the diversion from linear TV to streaming, we examine these seismic shifts, and also share our personal experiences and the benefits of career adaptability in this fast-paced world.
Carter and I delve into how TikTok is shaking up Google search, exploring the paradigm shift in information consumption. We discuss the significance of discovering your niche, the power of authenticity, and the crucial understanding of media mix across channels. Balancing the delicate act of collaborating with existing teams while strategizing with client's budget, business objectives, and data in mind is also on our conversation menu.
We also dive into the art of managing teams and building brands and on striking the right balance between learning for growth and accommodating various working styles. We share insights on providing guidance without overwhelming team members and handling situations when performance doesn't meet expectations.
Carter Snyder of the Sasha Group helps us traverse the evolving landscape of media consumption and advertising. We discuss how the giants of digital platforms - like Walmart and Amazon, and dominant streaming services - are molding the way we consume media. From the rise of social media apps like TikTok, challenging Facebook's reign, to the diversion from linear TV to streaming, we examine these seismic shifts, and also share our personal experiences and the benefits of career adaptability in this fast-paced world.
Carter and I delve into how TikTok is shaking up Google search, exploring the paradigm shift in information consumption. We discuss the significance of discovering your niche, the power of authenticity, and the crucial understanding of media mix across channels. Balancing the delicate act of collaborating with existing teams while strategizing with client's budget, business objectives, and data in mind is also on our conversation menu.
We also dive into the art of managing teams and building brands and on striking the right balance between learning for growth and accommodating various working styles. We share insights on providing guidance without overwhelming team members and handling situations when performance doesn't meet expectations.
I'm Brandon Amoroso and this is the D2Z podcast Building and growing your business from a Gen Z perspective. Hey, everyone, thanks for tuning in to D2Z, a podcast about using the Gen Z mindset to grow your business. I'm Gen Z entrepreneur Brandon Amoroso, founder and president of Retention as a Servants Agency Electric, and today I'm joined by Carter Snyder, associate director of the Sasha Group. Thanks for coming on the show. Yeah, of course. Thanks for having me. Pleasure to be here. So before we hop into some of the discussion topics today, can you give everybody just a quick background on yourself and also what the Sasha Group is?
Speaker 2:Yeah, sure, of course. So about myself I've been at a number of VaynerX companies, have worked at VaynerMedia for a few years, servicing mostly Fortune 100 businesses. Moved over to the Sasha Group as another company within the VaynerX Holding Co. Originally designed for more challenger brands, a range of small to medium sized businesses and kind of to larger businesses, small service ad agency on both ends, both at VaynerMedia and Sasha Group, specifically focusing on all ranges of media, from social, digital, e-commerce, etc.
Speaker 1:What are some of the types of clients that you are typically working with?
Speaker 2:Yeah, some of the VaynerMedia side generally it's mostly Fortune 100, everything from large beverage and CBG clients to financial services and brick and mortar stores. So it really ranges there. And then at the Sasha Group it generally is used a bit smaller can be everything from B2B software to traditional CBG clients etc. So full service quite a range of clients. So it really just depends on the business needs. A lot of things that we focus on are building brands, growing sales etc. Everything that you'll typically find within full service agency.
Speaker 1:And what would you say is the biggest transition for you coming from? I guess one question would be what has it been like being at a company for a longer period of time that I would say you see a lot during COVID like so much hopping around, but you've been able to climb the ladder at Vayner rather quickly. What are some of the pros versus cons of that continuity? Because there's obviously some people who would have changed jobs every three months, but then what I think is more preferred is staying longer.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I've been with VaynerX since 2018, bit over five years now started as an analyst and grew up to my current role. I'd say the continuity, even within different companies in the same holding co has allowed for just a bit of the beliefs of Gary himself and other people in the organization to really seep through, and kind of the ethos of the organization has remained constant while the world and kind of the retail and social landscape has changed around us. So, while a lot of our strategies have pivoted, the ethos and kind of the mindset of what we're set out to do and even the human element of the companies remain the same. When I joined, we were around five to 600 people, I believe, and now scaled up to almost 2,000 globally and expand across offices, et cetera, regions as well. So I think, while a lot has changed in terms of scaling the business and being a very small part of that, there's been a lot that's remained the same as well and probably part of the reason why we haven't been able to grow so rapidly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it's important for places to be able to provide that level of flexibility in role and so that it's not just the same thing over and over again. But I think that industry as a whole lends itself to that anyways, because there's always things that are constantly changing. If you were still doing the same things that you did when you came out of school working at Vayner, you wouldn't be wildly unsuccessful at this exact moment in time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think one of the nice things about where I found myself is people change teams, departments, companies within the organization pretty regularly. It's not uncommon to have quite a few folks who've worked at multiple different companies within the overall agency. People move to different departments. A lot of the function and overarching belief of what we're doing is the same, but people kind of bumped around a little bit and I view that more as a strength than anything else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and at least at Electric, those were the types of team members that we were trying to find and hire and elevate, the ones that were willing to hop into a bunch of different areas and try different things. But to get more specific around media, especially in 2023, what are some of the things that you're seeing work that maybe historically did not work, and also what are some of the things that were working really well for you during COVID that are not working anymore.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think there's two big things at the forefront right now of the media landscape that I'm seeing is. Number one, changes in media consumption just on the end of the consumer, which that's not necessarily new but it's just kind of ever evolving and we can get into that in a little bit. And then the other side is the rapid expansion of some of the kind of e-commerce, e-retail platforms, things like Walmart or Amazon, even with some of their capabilities rapidly expanding and a lot of demand on the advertising side, against that which I know is a bit more in your wheelhouse. But with things like changing media consumption, we're looking at the divide between traditional and digital media, starting with things like newspaper and print coming out of the fold and TV coming in, and then now, as people move away from traditional or linear TV and into streaming, we're seeing some differences there. And then, on the other side of that as well, looking at the expansion of social.
Speaker 2:That's nothing new. When social media came in, obviously it took a lot of time away from people consuming traditional media, but even now we see a lot of apps influx. So TikToks or Eyes has taken market share away from Facebook and now, even today, youtube and TikTok are sitting right about 46 minutes a day in 2022 of average time spent for individual users likely to kind of expand this here in 23, which is all kind of to say us as advertisers have to stay on top of the consumption landscape, not necessarily vilifying, say, print ads as a place to be, but having to understand kind of the deeper nuances of what people are consuming content on, where we can appear natively and authentically and just the best face to find business results.
Speaker 1:The metrics around time spent on TikTok are crazy and also horrifying If you look at your screen time report too. For me it's more so Instagram, but those things will just suck you in and keep you there for a while.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think there was a week that I was on vacation that I got the notification that my screen time was down 80% week over week and I couldn't have been more proud. So yeah, it's sort of designed that way. The algorithms have changed a lot, from originally being social platforms where you're sharing photos with close family friends et cetera, to now more of kind of entertainment platforms. Tiktok looks a lot more like YouTube than Instagram did when it first came out. Originally they were kind of designed for, like I mentioned, just small scale sharing or seeing what your friends or relatives were up to, and now it's much more a discovery platform. There's some stats coming out saying that platforms like TikTok, instagram et cetera are being used by Gen Z as more of a search function, so people looking up recipes or tips for vacations, things like that.
Speaker 2:So there's a lot of discovery that's allowed for this shift in consumption and there's some opportunities for arbitrage, for brands or people to appear authentically but also get in front of potential consumers. So something that we talked about a bit is finding like attention, arbitrage or underpriced attention. So when TikTok first had come into the market, just based on supply and demand, there was a feel, a vast supply of inventory and of time spent. But a lot of advertisers were very hesitant, either for brand safety reasons when TikTok came to be or just a first mover problem, that people didn't want to be the first ones to move, or clients had struggles and approving plans and ultimately it allowed for some people, and especially the first movers in the ad space, to really capture a lot of underpriced inventory, and even from an organic presence. Some companies or individuals were kind of the first ones making a presence there and and they were able to to grow up their following or kind of drive drive results.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the stats around you know TikTok taking over Google in terms of search and discovery. It's pretty crazy. I mean, I don't do it, but family, friends and those I would say you know, teenage years and younger they go to TikTok to search for restaurants or they go to TikTok to search for anything. They don't go to Google anymore to look for stuff and they're also consuming the content in the short form video format versus now. I love my first page of Google results and text-based text-based results.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and for a consumer standpoint too. You know you're downloading a lot more information in a short clip with a multiple. You know I'll use your example of a restaurant, for instance. You know we probably go to Google and then Yelp and then scroll through some photos or whatnot, whereas if I can watch two or three reels or TikToks of a certain restaurant, you're probably seeing five to ten different dishes, the kind of vibe of the restaurant, the interior design, all that. So as a consumer of the content, you're probably able to download a bit more information in a shorter period of time.
Speaker 2:So I think it makes sense on on both sides, what, what people are doing and then just moving over to kind of the brand aspect of it. I think the big thing is, you know, finding that niche and finding what's happening organically on the, the platforms and appearing somewhat authentically. So that's not to say that the shake-up in the, the media landscape is is necessarily a problem, but it's just finding you know, an individual's place and and how people are consuming content. You know success on an Instagram ad or success on the open web is super variable from what we're seeing success with on TikTok. So I think a lot of the things that we just talked about now in terms of what's resonating people with people, what they're going to, platforms for, etc.
Speaker 1:Is super important to to kind of understand and acknowledge, especially when having you know a strategy for your presence, be it paid or organically when, when you're onboarding with a new client, what do you look at to determine you know the media mix across all of these various channels because you have, like, the big players, like facebook and stream and tiktok, but then you obviously have interest. You have twitter x, whatever it's being called now, etc. And how do you determine you know how you allocate budgets or which platforms you don't even touch entirely?
Speaker 2:yeah, I think you know there's a lot of different variables. One is, you know, most obvious just the, the size of the client and what they're kind of capable of spending. That that'll be the first thing that probably, you know, may make you consider certain things or exclude certain things. So that's a that's a good starting point, just understanding someone's budget and then, second to that, their, their business goals. So if their goals are more kind of upper funnel or awareness driven, you may shift more towards, you know, a certain platform. You may shift more towards, let's say, ctv or tv or certain social platforms where they're very good for awareness. They have low cpms, you can have efficient reach or scale, but they're not that great at converting.
Speaker 2:Historically, I think that's been one of tiktok's biggest challenges and something that they've been working towards is how do we become better at converting people? So now you're seeing movement within a lot of different social platforms, of having shopping resources or having different down funnel success. So I think that's that's the big kind of movement. And then also understanding a few different things like what sort of data do they have at their disposal? You know, how robust is your first party data? What's your existing marketing funnel looking like and how can we take advantage of that? So there's a lot of things to consider, rooted in mostly client business goals and just.
Speaker 1:I think the first step is taking a bit of a comprehensive approach to understanding what's currently being done, what's their strategy, what's working, what's not, and maybe finding some things that they hadn't previously thought of how do you balance working in and with an existing team and like being able to, you know, push through your strategy and ideas without stepping on toes and having there be this conflict between external agency and, like, internal resources?
Speaker 2:yeah, I think it's a. It's a fine balance and definitely there's a need for compassion everywhere. The big thing and I think something that's that's been preached within our organization was hey, at the end of the day, you've been hired for a reason, you know, whether it's through a pitch process or from a kind of long-standing relationship. There's a certain trust and reliance that you're the expert and what you're hired to do so they're, they're kind of is that, is that realization. That's a tough conversation I think of hey, you know, give us a little leeway or give us some separation. So that's one side of the coin, but I think the other is just through education, through compassion.
Speaker 2:Obviously, no idea that's jammed down someone's throat is is going to be a success. I think there there needs to be a little bit of more conversational education to go on of hey, this is our strategy, here's what we're seeing in the market, here's what we're seeing work for other people in your industry and here's why do we think it can be successful? So I think there's a little bit of a deeper approach there, but at the most fundamental level, I think you know, you, you are the subject matter expert. It's been hired for a certain reason.
Speaker 1:So I think you know, just just following through with with a lot of your ideas now at, sometimes there's regulatory burdens or there's red tape within organizations or industries that prevent you from you know executing exactly what you want, and that's a different scenario, but for the most part I think it's just, you know, good collaboration yeah, I think that realizing that you are the expert and is super important, because we've had team members in the past who they might say the right things but they don't say them in the right way and then it leaves the client to you know, second guess, even if what they're saying is completely, you know, valid and actually a great idea or strategy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like I said before, you could literally lie as long as you say it you know, confidently, and that would actually land better than if you say something, that's true, but you say it in a way that it almost as opposed to a question or it seems like you're not being assertive or know what you're talking about necessarily yeah, and I think a lot of that has to do with with general preparation as well.
Speaker 2:You know whether it's something as comprehensive as overall strategy or a yearly plan, like you were talking about, or as simple as you know, delivering a report or something I always had told people. You know you should be able to deliver this report without actually looking at the data during the call. You know you maybe not every fine detail, but you should have a good understanding of, like, what you're trying to deliver, the message you're trying to get across in the key takeaways, and I think some of that preparation ultimately takes the burden off a bit of that communication, because you're not glancing at your notes, you're not really reliant on support from others. I think the you know something communication that comes from both knowledge and preparation, but also kind of the confidence in what you're saying, doing your homework, having a few case studies or examples on hand to kind of push your thoughts, is really crucial.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the prior preparation definitely goes a long way in making sure that you're presenting a good front when dealing with the client. I want to talk a little bit about the transition for you from individual contributor to having to oversee a team, and what are some of the things that you've learned along the way things that you expected and you know went well and things that maybe haven't gone well, as, like a lot of people listening here, you know have to make that step in their career or currently you know dealing with having to manage other people and not, you know, solely being responsible just for their end work product?
Speaker 2:Yeah, certainly so. I think the number one thing is, you know, generally people don't understand the full extent of you know managing people, even on a small scale. There's been times where you know working on a project and just managing one person versus managing an entire team. I think for a lot of young people who may just be entering the industry and, like ourselves, the goal was, you know, learn as much as possible when you get in the door, provide as much value to your team, to your bosses, to kind of whoever support anyone in any way. And a lot of that, especially entering a kind of industry fresh, is just learn as much as I possibly can. And then moving into a little bit more of kind of a managerial at times, that learning component doesn't really change, I think, especially in the industry we're in because the landscape is changing around us, so complacency is really really tough. So you still need to balance that. But on the other side of kind of learning and education, you need to learn about managing people, but also individual people within your team.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of different working styles. My working style is largely different from a lot of other people, so just understanding that as you shift from kind of more micro focused on execution when you're an individual contributor to more focusing on kind of macro business goals, the team as a whole, organizational management, that sort of stuff. So a big thing for me is working to as best as possible provide the guard grails for kind of team members, especially folks that may be junior members of the team, without overly inundating them with information or requirements or kind of red tape. Really, I think providing the swim lanes and kind of guiding people where necessary has been one of the most beneficial things for me.
Speaker 1:What are some of the ways that you've had to deal with team members who maybe aren't putting in the full effort or actually delivering? Because, at least in my experience, I've been much more on the side of second chances, third chances et cetera. But at a certain point the chances have to run out and there has to be an actual end work, product and results. How do you sort of sift through that and not get taken advantage of, because ultimately, at the end of the day it's your responsibility and your issue if they don't perform but then still provide ability to improve?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say as someone who may not always have, let's say, and certainly does not have, final decision making. I think with any team or organization, when there's a problem, the first thing is it sounds relatively straightforward, but dissecting the why Is it an effort issue? Is it a knowledge issue? Just sort of getting to the bottom of that, because I think it's a lot easier to fix once you kind of understand the root cause. It's something to not even when there's an issue, but more so just on a general basis.
Speaker 2:I think for a manager I've always appreciated it Coming down to me and I've tried to carry on with that is a very simple question of how can I help you, what can I either clarify or provide? What context do you maybe not have that you haven't been looped into, that I may have through different meetings, or information that may have not worked its way down the ladder, and what can I do to help you? Generally, that candid conversation, if it's a strong employee, will help bring a lot of things to light, especially now and kind of the age where a lot of things are siloed or maybe, if you're not in the office all the time, there's some information that doesn't always move around to the ways in which it possibly could. I think that just candor and openness in terms of a conversation generally goes a long way.
Speaker 1:I think people just tend to over complicate things when more often than not you're maybe better off just treating it as if it's like a regular old human interaction or conversation and remove the fact that it is work from the equation and the right thing to do, or the obvious thing to do is very it's not complicated. At least when I first started, I didn't have some of those conversations that would have been very easy to have and would have addressed a lot of issues or help me better support the team in achieving what their goals are, because one of the biggest realizations for me is that not everybody has the same goals. It sounds kind of stupid saying it now, but my original thought was that everybody wanted to be a manager, everybody wanted more responsibility, everybody wanted to work more, and that's just not the reality.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think one of the things too, especially for junior members of teams or people that may be listening, that are just entering the workforce, is don't be afraid to ask questions. I think it's also a cliche, but there's a difference between asking a question in which you could very easily find out from Google or, through a few minutes of work, be able to demonstrate hey, I completed this task, I solved a problem, I worked through this spreadsheet. What if it's a more comprehensive or complicated problem that's presenting a barrier to you being able to complete your day's work, and it may just be a quick answer from your manager and then that opens the gates to you being able to move forth. Please do. I think there's a little bit of a hesitancy from junior members sometimes that they either A don't want to feel like a burden on others or B don't want to kind of make it known at times that they may be questioning something. So I think the transparency that you can create, especially as a manager, to open that up is really valuable as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense. So, hopping back into the media side of things, if you were like a new brand starting today, what are the three things that you're going to be doing with them first, and why?
Speaker 2:The three things, I think from a new brand, I think you really have to evaluate what your niche is, what your place is in the market. I think, especially now with tons of brands populating lots and lots of different social platforms, it's tough to be on all of them. So finding your niche and finding what you need to double down on is really important. That's more of a kind of test and learn situation. So just evaluating your business and or service and finding what your kind of core market of people are, where they're consuming content, where they're engaging with and where you can reach them. So that's a little bit more high level, I think.
Speaker 2:The second thing, especially as we're seeing, you know, cpas generally rise, a lot of customer acquisition is kind of under the headlight and that's being increasingly more difficult. I think you really need to evaluate your first party data strategy, especially for kind of new to semi-experienced businesses that may have a tough, tough time with converting customers. Using, you know, website retargeting or first party data lists, or using all of the data at your disposal where possible, is really really valuable, especially if you don't have a lot of money to build your brand, you don't have a ton of brand awareness and you may not be able to scale with ads, finding niches in the market where you can get some underpriced attention or capture on the attention you already have is probably really valuable. And the third thing and this is something that is much more in and I think, your warehouse historically than mine is just evaluating that tech stack. Because outside of media as someone who is very, very focused on media in the day to day, I know for new brands and small brands especially you know media comes later.
Speaker 2:Things like working through your email messaging, your SMS or your kind of web design and working with some of that low-hanging fruit is probably most important. I think you know a lot of the clients that we've worked with have been a bit more established and have had the fortune of having a pretty good tech stack, lots of data at their disposal, et cetera, et cetera. That probably would be a somewhat less intuitive but good recommendation, which I'm sure is an exercise that you've likely worked through with lots of your clients that have entered the market.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, you know, in my experience at least, when it comes to the tech stack, you have sort of two buckets that aren't great places to be in. You have, you know, small businesses that were just getting started out who tried to get the like Ferrari of tech stacks, and so they have, you know, 40 different solutions and they're, all you know, locked up to these annual contracts and they don't actually have anybody to deploy or take, you know, these tech stack products and make them successful. Like you know, there is maybe one app that you can download and it'll just automatically, you know, start generating ROI for you.
Speaker 1:And the first thing I look at is loyalty programs, because there's so many brands that have that stupid little widget in the bottom left corner of their website. You know, sign up and you know, like us on Facebook and you'll get 25 points and all that sort of stuff, and it's like who's actually doing this as a customer? And then, as it, integrated it all into your customer journey? And the answer is no and no. And so then you have a small brand who is spending, you know, far more money on tech than they are on like internal team and resources. But on the flip side, you've got massive companies who have Frankenstein tech stacks who, I mean, it's just a. You know it's a wildly different way of working when you're in a company who, you know, is Fortune 500 or, you know it just has so many stakeholders and so much bias and entrenched like thoughts and ideas around how things should be, and those are, like you know, the two that I try to avoid at all costs.
Speaker 1:If I'm, you know, working with a brand or at least helping them, you know, avoid that. And they both require different approaches to fixing. Yeah, I've never had an engagement before where it's like you know, great idea, but we're going to slot that in for like Q3 of next year because we're going to have to go fight this battle. Then we're going to have to go get buy-in from, you know, john, jimmy and Carla or whatever making them names at this point and then you know it's just crazy. I'm so used to. I just want to be able to do it, and that's something that I'm trying to, you know, desperately avoid in any of the companies I have is just like this paralysis analysis, so to speak, like let's just test it and let the data you know show whether or not it's working or not. And especially at that size too, you can put a lot of the lift on the tech partner because they want your logo and they want to work with you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think just building off a couple of your points on the larger business side, urgency is kind of key, being able to move at the speed of the market and getting out and testing and learning. There's a saying which has been thrown around a bit in my world recently that post-its better than perfect, because by the time that there's four rounds of review or there's feedback from quite a few people, you may have missed your mark. As we well know, means come and go in a matter of days, and if you're two or three days late, sometimes engagement kind of goes by the wayside. That's not to say that you should just be moving forth with careless abandon, but I think there's a certain fine line between overindulging oneself in review processes etc and also being careless. So I think finding that balance and kind of work within one's individual organization is key.
Speaker 2:And then, especially for the small business side, you talked a little bit about retention offers or specific programs to encourage people with discounts etc. I think being kind of weary of that shiny object in the corner, whether that's hey, this is going to drive you 10x ROAS off the go, or hey, your loyalty program, you should offer a 50% discount on the first order. That's the key to retention and driving your business. I think anyone that's pushing those kind of overarching and very kind of generalized statements it's a little weary. We've obviously been in the world in which that 50% first offer is very, very good at getting your initial sales, driving down your kind of your revenue on that first order and your margins, and then people are immediately backing out. So I think creating a strategy in which you're kind of settled for the long term and avoiding those shiny objects is key as well for small business. Let your product come through and shine, provide value to people and be patient.
Speaker 1:I think that's why it's so important to have an internal stakeholder who's responsible for general business metrics, or to work with an agency who is one. There, like North Star is not what's the cheapest CPA we can get or what's the best in-platform ROAS, because then you end up doing stupid shit like 90% off your first subscription order and, yeah, you get customers to buy it for like $10 on Facebook, but they're all trash, and then you just have an absolute nightmare of a leaky bucket, and so you really need somebody who is put to task to do the things that are actually objectively right for the business, that can dig into the cohort analysis, that isn't looking for the cheap way out with some sort of like sampling program or, yeah, like, obviously you're going to acquire a bunch of customers because I'm a product for a dollar, but what have you actually accomplished?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think the big thing is finding the right balance of short term success and long term brand growth. And that's different for every business, because some you can probably offer at a higher discount and you have better retention, but it's not always the case for certain businesses. So, understanding that balance between offering people something in short term success and kind of brand growth. So, for instance, I briefly mentioned earlier, there's a huge growth in terms of retail media. So in the last year and kind of in 2020, walmart and Amazon's ad sales growth is growing at four in ADEX of Meta. Obviously, a little bit of that comes to play with new to market entry. They're obviously growing at a higher rate because it's kind of new.
Speaker 2:But all of the big, big players are kind of investing in retail media. At this point, the trade desk is partnered up with Roundel, who services Target. They've partnered up with Walmart. Amazon also has lots of Whole Foods data. So there's a huge, huge push into kind of retail media. And at this point, the largest thing that I'm seeing is focusing on incrementality. So it's very easy to see brands or kind of retail platforms saying, hey, we're going to drive 10x or OAS, and the big question is, what's the incrementality of that and how can I support short term sales goals with long term brand growth? And that's just an extension, I think, of the promo offers that you've tried to briefly about. But there's certainly a lot to kind of dig into, and something that it seems you've been very, very focused on is kind of building brands for the long term and really being focused on providing a good product, providing a good service, and being a bit patient with some of the growth and just relying on kind of what you're providing.
Speaker 1:So I have one final question for you here before we wrap up. What are you most excited about for the rest of this year, going into next year?
Speaker 2:What am I most excited about? That's a good question. I think the media landscape is kind of at a very interesting point, partially because there's a lot of kind of moving parts. You know, streaming is surging and now it's going to be, you know, surpassing traditional TV. Different social platforms are in flux. You're seeing lots of things come and go very, very quickly. So things like threads, which made an absolute surge and I think surpassed the record for for quickest 100 million installs or something of a sort, and then has, you know, sort of taken a dip in platforms like Burial or, you know, different things that we've kind of seen come up in flares.
Speaker 2:It's just kind of the evolution of what people are consuming and what that means for kind of brands and advertisers, both to drive business results but show up authentically as well. So I think it's just a critical juncture where there's so many options vying for people's attention where that previously hadn't been the case. You know it always was in terms of, let's say, different radio stations or TV channels or etc. But there's more than just channels. There's a lot of different mediums. There's a lot of different options, let's say, for consumers to kind of spend their time and engage with stuff. So that's really, really interesting, and I think the democratization of that means less big brands and more like individual creators being able to make a lot of money and working with brands or different things like that. So I think the nimbleness and agility needs to be at an all time high when there's way more channels in which companies and businesses can kind of engage with with their consumers. So that's something that's fascinating to me and is likely to be kind of ever changing in years to come.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's like you know, having that mindset of constantly testing and getting stuck on in one way, but then also, at the same time, knowing when to go super deep and go all in on a particular you know channel or campaign that is working very well, and I think both are important, At least for me. I can tend to get very distracted, so you know it's it's a blessing and a curse and having all these new things that are coming out, like you want to test them, but then also making sure that you actually go very deep into one or two areas, versus trying to do 30 different things and you're just doing all of them very mediocre.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think you know, doubling down on what works and testing what's new or what you haven't maybe experienced or explored in the past is very, very important. And now more than ever, with everything pushing towards digital and kind of the ever evolving data landscape, a lot of the privacy regulations, etc. There's definitely a need for you know, a solid understanding of you know what's actually driving distance results and what may not be. So I think that complicates things a bit but, like you said, you're relying on kind of what works and what's historically worked, while always testing, always evolving and kind of staying within, within the times is, you know, something that's very valuable.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, analytics and attribution are another absolute nightmare that we can avoid, for this you know. Otherwise all this is going to rant of complaining for the next 25 minutes, and thank you so much for joining us. Before we hop off, Can you let everybody know where they? Can, you know, get in contact to you again? Touch with you online?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm late in, would be the best place, carter Snyder, and then I'm sure you can find the suite of. You know my company and kind of the holding company at different handles the Sasha group, vaynerx, vaynermedia, etc. But yeah, that's, that's the best place for me.
Speaker 1:Awesome Again. Thanks for coming on for everybody listening. As always, I'm Brandon Amarosa. You can find me at brandyamarosacom or electricmarkingcom and we will see you next time.