The Business Lounge Podcast with Kim & Chris

Why Your $19 Hack Won’t Buy A $72K Client & What WILL (Answering Your Questions!)

• Kimberly Ann Jimenez + Chris Michael Harris • Season 8 • Episode 10

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Want to sell $10K+ offers without celebrity clout? Start by changing the way you think about content, trust, and where your buyers consume you.

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We dig into the price-to-time benchmark (roughly every 30 minutes raises willingness to pay by about $500) and show why long form content isn’t optional when you promise big outcomes. If your feed is full of hacks and quick wins, you will attract $19 buyers. If your ecosystem is built on podcasts, workshops, webinars, and case studies, you will attract leaders who expect process, proof, and partnership.

We also reframe the classic red ocean versus blue ocean debate. You do not need a brand-new category to win; you need a blue offer in a crowded market. That could look like repositioning as a fractional executive instead of a general coach, packaging delivery in a way that removes friction, or building tools that compress time to value. Think luxury logic: people pay for status, certainty, and experience even when functionally similar options exist. At the same time, don’t nuke familiarity—iterative changes convert better than radical overhauls because adoption loves what feels known.

For creators and founders who don’t want to be the face, there’s a path: guest on targeted podcasts, write the definitive guide for your niche, or partner with a spokesperson who shares your values and has equity-level incentives. If you do prefer the spotlight, anchor your funnel with long form, support it with smart short clips, and filter with p

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➡️ Are you a Coach, Expert, or Service Provider wanting to get more Customers from your Content? 🤝 Come work with us! Text "COACH" to (866) 498-2080 or DM us on Instagram for a free strategy chat! https://www.instagram.com/kimannjimenez/ https://instagram.com/heycmh

SPEAKER_02:

When you're starting out, be really careful about going too fast high ticket because you need to work the skill set to be able to deliver on the back end.

SPEAKER_00:

You've got like the Russell Brunson level brand recognition clout, Gary Vee, Alex Hormosy, Tony Robbins. There's an expectation because of the brand clout.

SPEAKER_02:

They are interviewing Grant Cardone, Alex Homozy about 45 minutes of his time, and he was talking about how his 45-minute rate, it was$148,000 or something crazy. The benchmark is for every$500 that your offer costs, you usually need 30 minutes of time spent. Now that's not always the case, but it's a very good rule of thumb.

SPEAKER_00:

So now you're saying, well, I'm actually giving you a cost savings benefit because you're only paying me$70,000. So see how that position is gonna anchor you at a point where you could charge that because it's an implied expectation. If you're coming in as a coach for small business owners and you're posting on Instagram, again, you're gonna have to be the top, the cream of the crop to be able to say that my price tag is$72,000.

SPEAKER_02:

You can be a very lazy marketer and try to compete on price, but what's gonna happen is eventually you're going to absolutely be a race to the bottom.

SPEAKER_00:

Nonsense.

SPEAKER_02:

It's all status, right? It's what it says about you. It's about the experience of going and buying something luxury.

SPEAKER_00:

That's why we say profitability over popularity, our content to customers' mechanism, because we know that people are gonna interface with us when they're tired of doing the things that aren't making them the money that they want to make.

SPEAKER_02:

What's up, the media? It's Pim and Chris. And you're listening to the Business Cloud Podcast.

SPEAKER_00:

In each episode, we'll break down all the latest in online marketing, give you all the details on what's working now to turn your content into customers, boost your leads in sales, and scale your business fast.

SPEAKER_02:

All without compromising on what you care about. Faith, family, and freakup. And listen, it's all real, raw, and unfiltered. So let's start the show. Welcome back to the Business Notch Podcast. I'm your co-host, Kim Jimenez, and of course, we got Chris in the house. And today we're going to be answering two of the best questions that we have gotten so far since we launched the video podcast, which is super exciting. We're also celebrating a thousand subscribers on the channel, the new channel. So I'm pumped. Uh, it's good times around here, and we're gonna have a blast.

SPEAKER_00:

Even having done YouTube before to the degree that you've done it successfully.

SPEAKER_02:

Don't talk to me.

SPEAKER_00:

Starting a new channel, yeah, it's the worst. So if you guys are starting to now, I will say this though. I don't want to discourage you from doing it because what I will say is that when your messaging is really dialed in, you you can't get discouraged by the numbers because what we found was that even with like 100 subscribers, we were getting applications and we were getting coaching clients, which is kind of bizarre.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. So like I've been on YouTube for 12 plus years now, I think. OG. Um, and OG to the game. My main channel has like what 86,000 subscribers. We're on the path to 100,000. Uh, YouTube's not my main thing, it never has been. It's like a a side marketing channel. Um, and we do so much outside of YouTube that it's never been my main focus. But I will tell you this once we grow a channel to almost a hundred thousand subscribers, it is painful to start over. And you've had your channel too for a couple of years, much less than me. Intermittently, yeah. Intermittently.

SPEAKER_00:

There's a lot of playful time for sure.

SPEAKER_02:

So it's kind of been our side thing, not our main thing. Um, and starting from zero has been painful, but I will say started from the bottom now we're now we're at a hundred, what, eleven?

SPEAKER_00:

1200 now?

SPEAKER_02:

It's already. I love it. Okay. So what I do love about YouTube is this it doesn't matter how many subscribers you have, you will absolutely get clients, even if you have like a hundred subscribers, which is awesome. It's been highly profitable. And why I am totally willing to start over with a new channel. Not that we're leaving our channels individually behind, we're actually just starting this um new kind of experiment together because that's what our YouTube coach said to do. So we're we're following suit.

SPEAKER_00:

We're we're coachable. We are coachable. Can't be a good coach if you're not coachable.

SPEAKER_02:

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00:

All right, let's get let's get these questions. I'm curious. Really good questions.

SPEAKER_02:

Um, the first one about uh who's it from? Shout out and this is this is from I don't know, improv 34. His name is Ben. Ben, what up, Ben? So Ben says, What I'd like to know, in case this is something worth addressing, is what type of content should or could you create for a$19 coaching project versus an offer that's$72,000? Uh the big pricing is something I just recently heard from another influencer selling courses like that. And I just wanted to know what type of content would and could go for prices like that. How would you market it? What it should involve, and what kind of audiences this would require. So I love this question, Ben, because we have a lot of experience selling very low-ticket things like$9 offers. Yeah. All the way up to$7,200 or$72,000.$72,000. Okay. Yeah.$72,000. Yeah. So uh all the way up to like$50,000 plus dollars. Um, so we know what sells at every price bracket because we've done it. And so I think that one of the things that you first have to think about is who is your target audience? Like your question, this was really, really good. Um, for someone who is buying a nine dollar product, um, is that the end of the line? I think when when you're in coaching and when you're doing services, Chris, you usually have a low-ticket offer as a way of ascending people. Not that you're gonna make money from your low-ticket offer.

SPEAKER_00:

No, you're buying customers at that point. Well, if you run ads to it, you're buying customers. But yeah, it's it's like it's uh it's the sampler at the food court, right? It's like exactly. You know, technically, right? It's like you get them in the door.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And I think sometimes people don't understand that when they're in the online space and they're like replicating what other people are doing and they think, oh, you know, it's gonna be inexpensive. It's gonna be easy for me to compete in the market because that's the easiest way to compete is through price. It just is. Um, you can be a very lazy marketer and then try to compete on price. But what's gonna happen is eventually you're going to absolutely be to the like a race to the bottom. Like your competitor is gonna undercut you and then you're gonna try to undercut them until you have no margins at all.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, your positioning also really matters a lot too. So we can talk about content formatting because that would I think that was an nature of your question overall. Um, I would definitely be inclined to go more long form content. I think one really hyper-engaged listener of your podcast, for example.

SPEAKER_02:

But for which price bracket?

SPEAKER_00:

Uh this for the higher price tag, the highest higher price tag, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So higher price tag.

SPEAKER_00:

Higher price tag, longer form. Longer form. Vic, you're gonna have to get people to spend what is it, every 30 minutes that people somebody sends with you, it increases$500 in their amount they're willing to spend with you.

SPEAKER_02:

Exactly. So the benchmark is for every$500 that your offer costs, you usually need 30 minutes of time spent. Now that's not always the case, but it's a very good rule of thumb. So if we do the math on that, like what is it's quite a lot. It's quite a lot. Yeah. 72, let's see, times 72 times two, we have is 144. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

So that's where having a long form podcast uh would be really beneficial. And then let's say, right, let's say your target audience. So you always want to follow your person first, and then you want to think about the formatting that that person's gonna enjoy. Um so we've talked about this. One of my executive coaches is really just going nuts on LinkedIn because that's a B2B offering, right? Like that's a high, it's an enterprise solution uh in prop tech. And so these are people paying millions of dollars, right? So he's interfacing with the right person on the right platform, and then they're repurposing their podcasts with microclips, but then also the full episodes there on LinkedIn. And so that would be something that I would probably consider if I was gonna do something long term. But I do think that that's where you want to have your product suite, right? So you want to have offers that I think introduce them to you unless you're gonna be like a fractional. So if you're gonna be like a fractional CFO or a fractional CTO, whatever, then there's an expectation, right? That's where you talk about positioning. If you're positioning yourself as a coach, that's kind of conducive with a certain price tag that's not$72,000 unless you're legit like in a leak category of coaches. Yeah. Right. You've got like the Russell Brunson level uh brand recognition and clout, Gary Vee, Alex Hormozy, right?

SPEAKER_02:

Tony Robbins.

SPEAKER_00:

Tony Robbins. Like there's an expectation because of the brand clout. But if you're brand new, uh, I would say make sure that you're position you have to fall back on labels a little bit. So a fractional, there's an implicit uh understanding that like you're gonna be coming in and helping them fill a massive gap, which means we don't have this huge C-suite position that we need in our company, and you're gonna be filling that and helping us build our entire team out. Like that now, they're looking at that as I would pay$120,000 for a salary, let's say. So now you're saying, well, I'm actually giving you a cost savings benefit because you're only paying me$70,000. So see how that position is gonna anchor you at a point where you could charge that because it's an implied expectation. If you're coming in as a coach for small business owners and you're posting on Instagram, again, you're gonna have to be the top, the cream of the crop to be able to say that my price tag is$72,000. Where like I saw Patrick Bed David, right? Everybody was getting on where he charges like$48,000 for like an hour phone call with him. But it's because he's built that brand cloud to the point that he has that recognition. And so people will pay that because they've they know who he is and he has that established, you know, celebrity status, as it were.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I think I just saw in like the Stefan Graham podcast that he's doing, I forget something called. Coffee break or something like that. Yeah. Um, and they were interviewing Grant Cardone and he was talking about how his 45-minute rate for Alex Harmosy bought 45 minutes of his time and flex on each other. I'm like, this is terrible. It's the alpha flex. I know. But he was just talking about how, you know, it was$148,000 or something crazy. And then he was like, you know, we donated to the foundation. So that's not his actual, you know, personal take home. But I'm like, okay, okay, whatever. Yeah. The point is that we really need to think about the person first. And I think what you made as a point is so important. When you're starting out, be really careful about going too fast high ticket because you need to work this skill set to be able to deliver on the back end. I have no problem selling high ticket. We've sold high ticket the last couple of years. It's been a really cool experience, but you need to be able to deliver on the back end, and that's something that you work towards. Like, we didn't start selling high ticket until we had like 10 years of experience under our belt and people were asking us for it. So I'm not saying that you have to wait 10 years, but you got to put in your 10,000 hours.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, or you've already paid your dues elsewhere. Exactly. So, like I have some friends that were, you know, big time financial, you know, whatever at Google and they came out and like people sought out, sought them out because they had already established that brand positioning with their the employer, right? And so if you're walking out in that capacity and you've got that as a background, now don't assume you're just gonna be like, hey, I'm so-and-so and I worked at Google and people are gonna pay you. That's not gonna happen. But you you again, I would take that as a consideration to kind of build that portfolio of these are the things that I've done and these are the places I've been, and it will open doors where people are gonna assume a higher price tag for sure, just because of that proximity to that brand.

SPEAKER_02:

100%. So let's talk about ascension strategies, right? For a$19 offer, maybe you have uh it's an intro to your signature product, which maybe is like three to five hundred dollars if you're in services or course creation or anything like that. Yeah. And then maybe let's say that like at the very top is a thousand dollars. That's usually a good ascension in terms of 19 to maybe like a hundred to five hundred. I know I said three hundred earlier, but it just depends.

SPEAKER_04:

Ish, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Right? Ish. Uh, and then maybe a thousand dollars on the back end. So it could be a nineteen dollar rapport or a nineteen dollar uh, I don't know, some kind of low ticket course or some kind of template spreadsheet. Yeah, something like that.

SPEAKER_00:

Something recurring if you've been on the back end, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Uh a$19 intro.

SPEAKER_00:

No, like if somebody took a$19 intro and then there's some back end right there. That is recurring. That is recurring.

SPEAKER_02:

So maybe it's like$100 a month afterwards uh to the next thing. And then the next jump is maybe a thousand dollar uh coaching program or it's a thousand dollar uh elite hybrid course, something like that or service. Exactly. So when you're talking about that price tag and you know your person, you have to know that that is consumer pricing, right? You're going to attract a consumer that is very different than someone who's more on the B2B side. So be really careful. If you are going to sell high-ticket products, you want to make sure that if you have a low entry offer, it's priced differently. So at 72,000, your intro is usually going to be 2K, 1K probably at the lowest, right? Because you're what you're doing is you're filtering the audience based on pricing. Um, I'll give you another example of high ticket. Uh, one of the folks that we're looking at to consult with his low ticket is a$99 challenge, but his offer on the back end is$10,000. Now, the reason that he can go from$99 to$10,000 is because the challenge in between makes you spend about five hours with him in that$99 program.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Right. And so he's kind of breaking the rules a little bit about every 30 minutes is$500.

SPEAKER_00:

Depends on a bit of a marketer you are. And also the the promise and the transformation. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02:

But that doesn't assume that people have already consumed his YouTube content. He runs a podcast, it's long form, it's about 90 minute shows. And so they're already coming into the challenge having spent probably 10 plus hours with him. Yeah. And so they're primed. Now, when we're talking about low ticket, I feel like the amount of content and the length could be a lot shorter. So would you say that you could sell a$19 offer through short form Instagram content, stories, that kind of thing in terms of format?

SPEAKER_00:

Pure hustle game, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And then when you're selling more high ticket, you're thinking about, hey, I think podcasts is the minimum. And then from there, you're thinking webinars, workshops, things that are away that are a bridge that people can actually see you become, like not become, but see you as the authority where you could show them what is possible.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. That so okay, that this is really brings up a really good point. The higher your price tag, the reason we talked about long form and why that makes most sense is you're gonna have to uh I say this with all humility. Longer form is gonna help you demonstrate your range and your dynamics.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, that's true.

SPEAKER_00:

Um Kim and I have a really hard time. We don't sell sexy around here. We don't. Meaning, we're not selling you on how to explode your Instagram following, right? That's a sexy thing that people will buy will spend a hundred bucks a month on. Like when they just meet you. If you have a big audience and you sell a ongoing membership on growing your Instagram following to 10,000, say less. People are gonna sign up for it. Kim and I, we we focus on helping refine your offers, refine your positioning, making sure that you're thinking about the assets that you need they're gonna sell that, the sales pages that are gonna convert, right? Are you problem or solution aware? Like there's so many dynamics because we focus on marketing psychology and marketing principles and things.

SPEAKER_02:

And we sell, we help you with content. That's a huge thing that we're doing.

SPEAKER_00:

We help you with content.

SPEAKER_02:

We're very much focused on.

SPEAKER_00:

People come to us when they're ready to start, when they've done the stuff, we're like the third thing they've they come to. When they're ready to make money because they've been hustling their buns off and they're not getting paid what they're worth, then they come to us. That's why we say profitability over popularity, our content to customers mechanism, because we know that people are going to interface with us when they're tired of doing the things that aren't making them the money that they want to make.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

That's when they discover us. So when we go into these layers, right? And that's why people I read a comment a minute ago. She's like, I love that it's long form. I love that I get to spend a lot of time with you guys. Because if we try to truncate all of the things that we talk about into these little micro pieces of content, like if we just did native Instagram content and I try to tell you about problem and solution aware in a 90-second Instagram clip, it just I it feels forced. It feels like I can't really like convey my thoughts in a way that's gonna land and give you any benefit, or you're just gonna get massively overwhelmed. When people find us, it's because they're serious now about making money. And so they're gonna spend an hour with us in this podcast or in other other environments like this. And then that's when they're gonna find out, like, oh, okay, I understand the depth of that because what you're teaching is more dynamic than just, hey, you're gonna do these little hacks on the internet to grow your following and get your audience larger.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And I think that also speaks to your maturity and mastery. Okay. Uh, if I hear what you're saying, when you're an expert, I try to say with humility. So no, but this is a teachable. This is not just about us, it's about you guys. It's true. It's true. When you're an expert at what you do, it's really challenging to condense all of your know-how, like Chris said in a 90-second clip. Um, you could do a lot of 90-second clips, but it's going to take you forever to be able to actually get someone's uh eyes to perk up and their ears to perk up about transformation.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

And so I think a lot of why you see these large podcasts exploding is because the people who are leading these podcasts have put in their 10,000 hours. They are experts at what they do, and you simply cannot grasp someone's intellect and understand what they're delivering to the marketplace in short form.

SPEAKER_00:

That's why the Rogan podcast works.

SPEAKER_02:

That's what I was gonna say.

SPEAKER_00:

I was literally gonna say, it's why I worked.

SPEAKER_02:

And it's also why people are hungry for longer form, which is so bizarre because at the same time that there's short form is exploding, people are also wanting to go less with less people, right? Less deep deeper. And we talked about that in the previous episode.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Um, so for us, if you are going to sell anything high ticket, it is absolutely necessary that you have long form content. Now, a lot of people will say, well, we will just sell directly through webinars. And that is absolutely possible. You can go if you see our content to customers method, phase number three is all about ads, and you can absolutely crush it with ads. But again, a webinar is a what? A long form presentation. Um, you can convert so much more. And this is the ads gurus will tell you this. We work with some of the best people um who do advertising in the world, like really world-class uh ads experts, and they will tell you you will see conversion rates explode when you actually send ads to long form content first. That's true, and then sell people on something like a webinar because they've already primed for the sale. All you're doing is priming them for the sale.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

And so you need less priming when you're doing$19 content.

SPEAKER_03:

That's true.

SPEAKER_02:

And you could do much shorter, fast, quick, clippy things. That's why you see a lot of beginners and people who haven't necessarily mastered their expertise yet doing only Instagram content. And so then everyone just follows people who aren't necessarily experts. But if you think about our industry in the online space, I can't think of a single person who has been around who has grown their business to multiple seven figures, maybe eight figures, who does primarily short form content first. Not a single one. I can't think of one.

SPEAKER_00:

Unless they're selling for that specific thing.

SPEAKER_02:

Unless they're selling how to do that thing on that platform, meaning they're selling Instagram content. Right. But even then, the people that you're thinking about have podcasts.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So see what I'm saying? Yeah. Like it's it's very rare that's a good thing.

SPEAKER_00:

There's people that there's people that teach you how to do memberships by selling you a course.

SPEAKER_02:

Exactly. So exactly. That's what you're talking about.

SPEAKER_00:

Right. So and there's nothing wrong with I'm not like throwing shade or whatever, but like that just speaks to sometimes you have to meet the market, what what's gonna be most effective, right? Yeah. So so yeah, but to your point. I love that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

I think the last thing I would say then, um, because we've talked a lot about format, we've talked about pricing and and how to change how that affects the format. We've also talked about the audience. I think we need to talk about messaging because it's a different message.

SPEAKER_00:

It's a totally different message.

SPEAKER_02:

When you are speaking to a client who uh is willing to spend upwards of a hundred thousand dollars to work with you, they need to see a depth of understanding and they also need to see um that you can relate to their specific problems in a very different way. So when you're talking to a$19 client or customer, right? This is someone who is just a consumer for the most part.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

You're activating in them a desire for your offer that's very different than a$72,000 product or a$100,000 product, in my opinion. Um, and I think that the differences between these markets primarily are that the$19 person, if you're in our industry, they want results fast, like tomorrow, right? They want something that they can take. And we talk about this, uh, you know, we are in the season people want to do or they want to take. They don't want to actually like learn anything. They don't want to become anything.

SPEAKER_00:

Meaning they'll they want to do it with you, or do they want to take what you created and go use it? Exactly. That's what they want.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And so I think a lot of what you see in that consumer market is they want results right now. A higher, more higher ticket, more sophisticated buyer understands that there is a journey. And a lot of times, usually some bigger ambitions, too. Bigger ambitions, bigger goals, right? The the person in our industry, I'll give you an example for us, a$19 consumer who wants to blow up their Instagram in three days. Um, someone who is going to join our coaching program and is going to pay, you know, happily$50,000 to be a part of it. And that's one-on-one. We all, we have different. I say that and people freak out. They're like, oh my gosh, I can never work with you. No, we have different programs at different price points based on where you're at in your journey. But if you want to work with us one-on-one, that's the entry level. And that person, they understand that there is going to be a process, right, of becoming. They're not just there in the expect results that the first, you know, 12 days. Yeah. Um, but the way that we speak to them in a different way is we talk about proof. We talk about proof a lot, but we talk about proof from the standpoint of um sophistication and not proof from the standpoint of laziness. Does that make sense? So the the$19 consumer wants it done for them quickly. They want the hack. They want the shortcut. Nothing wrong with that, right? But the more sophisticated person understands that they've already gone through the the shortcuts, they're already gone through the hacks and they know that there is a short-term promise. They're only going to get so far with the hack. They're only going to get so far with the shortcut. Exactly. With like the quick strategy, with the buying of followers, with, you know, the hacky uh stuff that gives you short-term gain, but not long-term wealth. And so I think that that's a core difference in terms of messaging of how do you sell transformation for both people in a different way? Yeah. I hope that helps. Yeah. I don't know if that would do it to the round.

SPEAKER_00:

No, awesome question, Ben. That that was really I was super impressed with that question. We saw it come through. We're like, dang, all right.

SPEAKER_02:

Really good. Uh, we should we can do an entire episode just about like how do you desire stack and how do you build desire for your offers at different price points because I'm fascinated by that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay. The next question comes from M. This is also a very profound question. I'm like, what? You guys are the best.

SPEAKER_00:

I think it was literally what it was M. This is some some some James Bond stuff going on here.

SPEAKER_02:

It's M.

SPEAKER_00:

Q. M. Money Penny. This is Money Penny.

SPEAKER_02:

I love it. Um, okay. So let me just see if I can shorten this a little bit. Um, he said, I loved your topic on offers, and it got me thinking. Heck, this could be a future topic for you and Chris about red ocean versus blue oceans. Um, we all learn marketing to go to a blue ocean because there's less competition. Yeah. But the red ocean has all of the traffic. Somewhere I've heard that this needs to change to red ocean blue offer. And this really got me thinking of ways I can still be in a red ocean, but create a blue offer. Yeah. Now, let's explain the blue ocean, red ocean theory first so that listeners can understand what that what that entails.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So red ocean means um it's very crowded, right? I think the actual reason why is because there's blood there's blood in the water.

SPEAKER_02:

Just blood in the water because there's sharks everywhere.

SPEAKER_00:

There's blood in the water because the sharks everywhere. So that's where it comes from. Yeah. Uh a little bit of a gruesome drag. I know. It is like business, but it's a great book. Cutthroat, yeah. But anyway, so what they say is you don't want to be in a red ocean, you want to go find a blue ocean, right? Which is like an open space. And there's not a lot of competition, and there's not everybody fighting. I guess that's the why the sharks come into play, because everybody's fighting for the same customer, so it gets bloody, right?

SPEAKER_02:

They're fighting for the same fish.

SPEAKER_00:

Fighting for the same fish. Uh, and so a lot of people will say, well, you just need to go completely a different direction. In some cases, that's necessary when things get really, really crowded. But I would tend to agree, and we talk about this a lot. So you're gonna be, if you listen to the show often, you're gonna be like, oh, here he goes again. Uh, but it really comes down to problem and solution aware.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And so if you're gonna stay in that red ocean because you know it's a huge market, right? And there's a lot of money to be had. So if you're gonna go to problem aware, it could be a full-blown pivot situation. Like you're gonna have to change entirely what you do. Uh if you want to go solution aware and stay in the red ocean, it's the new thing inside the industry that nobody's taking advantage of.

SPEAKER_03:

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00:

Meaning, you're gonna think about okay, if I'm in this red ocean, how are people underserved? Uh, are the players too big in the market? So the little guys being left out, they can't afford the accessible, like, I can't afford to pay Tony Robbins and people like Tony Robbins, so I'm gonna do like group coaching so that they have access to me, and then you would never even have you would have to pay like hundreds of thousands of dollars to get one-on-one. Uh, do you want to create a tool that now people can use because the thing that people are training you to do is actually really hard to do, so you're gonna build a little tool that people can use.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, like we have with Spark.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Shameless time.

SPEAKER_00:

I like what we build, like our own AI tool. Actually, because we know you guys are consuming all this marketing information and you're learning all these sophisticated marketing principles, but you're also trying to run a business.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

So we just said, well, why don't we just load marketing principles that we teach and preach and put them into AI tools for you guys? And that's what we did.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, and hey, like I think this podcast is gonna come out the last day that we have bonuses. So if y'all are totally into going through this process and us working together to actually help you figure out your blue ocean offer in a red ocean market, we're totally game to do that. Um, and we can talk more about that at the end.

SPEAKER_00:

But the good thing too is that the GPTs that we've trained, they're built on a Try Connect Convert and helping you stand out with differentiation. Yeah. Because if you I'm telling you, don't do this, please don't do this. I'm not this is not like a shameless plug to take our specific tool, but for the love, if if you're just putting out slop content with generic AI, it's gonna all start sounding the same.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

It's you talk about red ocean, this is gonna be the reddis of red with everybody that's now the accessibility, not to mention the job displacement because of AI, entrepreneurship's gonna get really crowded. And that's just me, that's not me trying to scare you. That's just me being truthful about what's gonna happen. The people that are gonna win are what we're talking about, where you go deep, but also you have that differentiated message because you're layering in how the market is always underserved. I always tell people this. They think about like, oh, it's so competitive. There's so many people. I'm like, guys, not even Coca-Cola or Apple computers could dominate 100% of the market. Like Apple, in all of their robustness and all of their capital that they have available to them, have only captured half of the smartphone market.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Maybe less.

SPEAKER_00:

That's probably like the greatest achievement ever, right? Maybe Facebook. Facebook at one point had half the planet had a Facebook account. But even they lost grip. And then because every time somebody rises to that kind of prominence, there's always people that feel underserved. It's like, okay, Coke. Well, I want healthy soda. Look at this. Uh Poppy and Olipop exploding.

SPEAKER_02:

But yeah, and you could you could use the the logic, but there's already so many sodas. There's already so many sodas. Okay, but this is a different soda. Right.

SPEAKER_00:

Like we love soda, but I'm not drinking Coke.

SPEAKER_02:

Exactly. Right?

SPEAKER_00:

So we drink Olipops probably once a day now. Like we're probably the and we pay more money for it. Exactly. We probably pay four times more per can than what your traditional coke would cost. So when you when you're analyzing your market, this is where it's so important to have proximity to what you do and know your people and follow your people and do your insight surveys or just work in the space, even if it's on an hourly basis, just get involved in your your the ecosystem that you're trying to operate in. Because what you're gonna find is they're like, yeah, you know, I kind of wish that this existed, or I kind of wish that it didn't work this way. Like when we started the moving company, my first our first business was a moving company. We my brother and I actually started in college and then grew to a multimillion dollar company. For those who didn't know that already, um we we just went downtown in little old Athens, Georgia, one of the poorest counties in the state of Georgia, by the way, and we were starting a business there on the back of the 2008 housing crisis. What a swell time and a swell place to start a business. But we grew it to multi-millions of dollars, which is crazy. It makes it makes no logical sense with no outside funding. The primary thing that we did, primary thing, they were national van lines, there was two men in a truck. There was no logical reason why we we would have played in that quote red ocean. But what were people looking for? They wanted a new, more refined, more modern solution to moving. Specifically, we started with niche. The college kids, they didn't want the parents didn't want these 40-year-old men coming in their daughter's dorm or apartment or fraternity house, or sorry house rather, to move them. They would prefer classmates and people around their age doing it that were they were supporting their way getting through school. We also took a more refined approach. We used technology. Imagine that. We moved to use technology in a moving business. Like we just took a different approach, but we started with finding out what did you like about your previous moving experience, what did you not like? What would you wish if you could have a new service that was provided? What would that look like to you? And we literally just interviewed them on a flip phone, not kidding, on a Friday, like over the weekend, I don't remember what night it was. Come in with me. We literally just interviewed people and recorded what they had to say, just asking questions about their moving experience. We took that, we put it in marketing, we built our offer around that, and we grew to multi-millions of dollars. So I 1,000% agree because the good thing about Red Ocean is there's already what we call river of opportunity there because there's already people that are buying the thing. So it's competition is a good thing because it means they've already pre-qualified the industry for you, that there's merit there, that people are willing to pay for something like that. So absolutely finding a blue ocean within the red absolutely makes most sense. But what would you say in terms of like if you wanted to go to a full, full blue versus blue within red, how would you how what in what predicament or situation would you say no full-blown new industry, full blown new blue ocean opportunity?

SPEAKER_02:

This is a really good question. I think 10 years ago the the market was really different than it is now. Um, and I think we've seen saturation at such a degree and in most industries that even when you do create a blue ocean, true blue, a true blue ocean, uh, it requires a lot of capital and a lot of RD and a lot of uh painstaking work to get to that blue ocean. Whereas before, you know, you could argue that the blue ocean was um just a display experience or like the fact that be your unique uh makeup, like your DNA, right? The the way that you express yourself, the way it was enough to differentiate. Yeah. I don't see that as much now. Um I think it would be a very interesting thing for us to like dive in deeper and really like research more. Uh, what does that look like now? Because that book was published quite a while ago.

SPEAKER_04:

I know.

SPEAKER_02:

Um, and I feel like the the changes have been alarming since then, where it's hard for me to say, yes, it is like I can't think of a can you think of an example of a blue ocean?

SPEAKER_00:

That's what I was trying to think. So I thought um, you know, like so, for example, I think social media platforms were a true blue ocean, it was a new it was a new paradigm.

SPEAKER_02:

But that's what I'm talking about. Like we have to create such an innovative marketplace, right? That is completely different and Netflix was a blue ocean. The tech companies are having to iterate so quickly to create that, you know, like Chat GPT, blue ocean, like completely new market, right? Huge shift, yeah, totally different offer, something that is uh a new paradigm shift. Bitcoin. And I feel like we keep right, Bitcoin, we keep upping the ante where it's hard to think, and I'm not saying it's not possible, but it's hard to get a new business who's just starting out, you know, with no capital to go through that process. In my opinion, yeah, I never want to be fully in a blue ocean if I'm starting out because there's too many variables. Like I want to go to where I do have competitors and there is a clear established market because it's gonna be way easier for me to differentiate and create an irresistible offer, something different in that existing market, um, even if it's highly competitive, than it is for me to just start from zero.

SPEAKER_00:

I think regardless of how you label this. The essence of it is you're always going to build it back on the backs of what people are what they want and how they're underserved.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And if you can just follow that principle, who cares if it's a true blue or a blue within a red? Like that is futile in a lot of ways because I do think your cost outlay to go true blue, like Kim said, is going to be pretty substantial, right? So, oh, you pull this up. What does it say?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I just want to let's just look at those uh differences. I'm just asking AI. So uh blue ocean strategy focuses on complete uh competing in an existing market. Yeah. Whereas a blue ocean involves creating an uncontested market space. Uncontested. See what I'm saying? Like the lift is so real in a blue ocean strategy. Can you do it? Totally.

SPEAKER_00:

See, but this okay, okay, but it mentions as an example uh cirque de Soleil. And uh again, so is that really a true blue, or is that just an iteration on circuses?

SPEAKER_02:

So what they're doing is it it's a completely different experience. It's it's building on concepts from existing markets and then presenting it in a way that is so unique and different. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00:

See, so that's where I'm like, it's blue with and red.

SPEAKER_02:

So we're still like we're still piggybacking, right?

SPEAKER_00:

So I'm like, it doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_02:

To your point, M, to your point, yeah, I don't think it's ever truly been a red ocean versus a blue. It's been a red ocean with a blue ocean offer that has shifted the marketplace. And so you are absolutely right. And whoever told you is brilliant to make that differentiation because I think that as the more we talk about sophistication in markets, the more we realize it's about the offer and it's about the experience, more than it is about um changing the paradigm completely. Like, for example, even ChatGPT, right? What are they doing that is so revolutionary? I mean, you had Siri before you had GPT. You could ask Siri anything and it would answer.

SPEAKER_00:

It's it's next gen, basically next gen search engine.

SPEAKER_02:

Exactly. It's next gen, but it's personalized search engine. And it's personalized in every possible way. Yeah. So it's really interesting to think about this. And I think that uh ultimately we would be very well served thinking about ways in which we can become so differentiated, so unique that we are set apart in the marketplace completely. For example, if you compare like a Birkin bag versus a bag that you could just get at Target or Walmart, you know, very different. You have people who spend$50,000, maybe even more,$100,000,$200,000 for a Birkin bag, which is crazy. It functions the same way as your regular bag. You can get an all-leather bag for maybe like$200, right? And it's beautiful, and maybe it's even handcrafted in Italy or something crazy. Um, what is the price point? What's the difference? Nonsense. It's all, but it's all status, right? It's what it says about you. It's about the experience of going and buying something luxury that you can't get when you're just ordering something um, you know, from the internet or you or you're buying it at, I don't know, TJ Maxx. So it's very interesting when you create an experience that separates you in the marketplace. People are willing to pay crazy dollars because it's a Birken bag. Can you tell I don't buy luxury luxury bags? I'm like, this is the biggest waste of time and money.

SPEAKER_00:

I forget what book I was reading. This is where it would be you'd I'd be careful about going too blue. Uh I think it was hooks, I think. Anyways, regardless, the point remains. Um the the the studies had shown that the that they leverage uh about building new platforms, like true blue ocean platforms, right? Like we're talking like big tech type stuff, right? Um, was you want to when they go too far removed from familiarity. So like let's say you build uh let's say you build a platform and or you're overhauling one and you go with something that looks totally new, right? Like completely different than anything they've ever seen before. Um, what ends up happening, unfortunately, is people they they don't have that basis point of familiarity and it feels too they're not going to it's overwhelming.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

It's overwhelming when they have to learn something entirely brand new to use your platform. And so they found was that you needed to have a slight different take, but built on familiarity. Oh yeah. So, like, for example, if you built like your own community app, like we have our own app, right? And it looks very similar to Facebook, like very similar, but it has cool functions. So what happens is when people join that program, uh, they look at it and they're like, Oh, it looks like Facebook, but it has all these other cool whistles and bells that we've added to it that Facebook doesn't have, right? And so they're like, Oh, that's fun. This is like Facebook, so I'm gonna use it fast because it doesn't I don't have to overthink how to use this dumb thing. But then also cool, you're gonna see these really cool features that it has that are in addition to. So be careful because even the big tech bros, what so let me get back to my point here, sorry. What they've studies found was that if they want to do something super radical, they had to slow walk it in iterations. So they had to be like, e get this, even changing the colors if they were too radical, they had to do like one shade at a time.

SPEAKER_02:

So like five shades of changing just the color so people could get used to it because people are used to looking at it and uh finding the button that is usually red or orange or whatever.

SPEAKER_00:

So here's the thing, guys. When you do these massive brand overhauls, when you go in and you're just like, it's my logo, it's my website, and you just rip everything apart, you might actually be doing the opposite of what you should be doing because you're people that are actually following you. Now, if you're brand new and no one's in your site, who cares? Do whatever you want.

SPEAKER_02:

But like people who are actually following you.

SPEAKER_00:

People that are actually following you, if you just start throwing out playbooks and changing things and you start losing familiarity and doing something wild, you might actually lose the people that are loyal to you if you do it too quickly, right? So be careful about these blue ocean things. Like don't just go chasing these things because they're things. That's the equivalence of chasing shiny objects in a lot of ways. So just be careful about that. Um, but but ultimately, I think build upon what exists and build upon what are people saying? Are they how are they underserved? You can't go wrong there.

SPEAKER_02:

I love it. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00:

We got another one.

SPEAKER_02:

Do we have time for another one?

SPEAKER_00:

Let's go.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay. Okay, we have time for another one. This one came in a while ago. Um, and I hadn't had a chance to actually talk about it on the podcast. But um this is Ronnie, he says.

SPEAKER_03:

Shout out, Ronnie.

SPEAKER_02:

Um, all right, so I have a question that I I would be interested to run by you. Um, great at pure thought leadership, meaning developing new products, principles, philosophies that create ridiculous results for clients. But I have zero desire to talk about it outside of writing books or speaking or doing guest podcasting. I know we need content, video and written, to show off what we're doing, but the more I ask God about it, the more sure I am that I'm not supposed to be a public figure, at least not in that way. In theory, I could imagine hiring a full-time spokesperson, employee to play that role, but I worry they won't be able to muster sufficient passion and personality to be meaningful and effective.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, that's tough.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, Ronnie. Okay, I got a couple ideas just based on some of the brands that I've um actually seen. I think Sam Cart is a good example of that. Yeah. Um, where it's a it's a you know, two brothers that lead basically the the whole uh the whole brand philosophy, all of the actual uh frameworks, on all the thought leadership. And I don't necessarily think that it's impossible to hire an employee. Um they actually have a creative director that they brought in who does a lot of their video content because they're busy, you know, Sean did that too, Cam with Think Media.

SPEAKER_00:

Exactly.

SPEAKER_03:

So exactly yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

I mean, you're looking at it, right? I wasn't even in this world. I was off doing building, yeah, you know, trying to build franchises and do all this stuff all over the country and stuff. And then I just fell into this world.

SPEAKER_02:

So it's absolutely possible, especially if you're willing to bring in a partner. Now, that's going to require concessions, right? Like you can't have your a your cake and eat it too. You've got to make sure that there's concessions. So bringing in a partner is probably the easiest way of doing this because you have someone who's running alongside you, who shares your values, who actually understands your philosophy and can communicate it.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Just as well, if not better, than you can. And that is the goal. Um, having an employee is hard because you just build up a public persona. I've seen a lot of people, you know, Patrick but David is a great example of this, right? He has a team who comes and actually shares uh the stage with him. I'm not saying you need to follow that exact model, but it is hard to build up a public persona, essentially, to just then have them say, Well, peace, I'm out, I quit, I found a better job. Right. Like that is challenging. Um, so you would probably be better served bringing someone in who at least has some kind of equity in the company, um, who has some kind of that's a whole rabbit hole. Yeah, minority partner, someone who actually uh is committed to the long-term vision of the company and seeing it through. But it's absolutely possible. And something that I would really encourage you to continue praying through that God really reveals, you know, what path you should take because it's a very important decision.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Um, we've definitely seen this before. And so I definitely think you should do that. But I a thousand percent agree that person needs to have it needs to be an equity situation. Because the last thing you want to have, and that's again, that's a whole hairy can of worms. It is that's you guys have to think about this. A uh a business partnership is I there's a joke about it. It's like it's three times hard to get out of and twice as expensive as a divorce or something like that. Right? It gets it's true.

SPEAKER_02:

And you come into it thinking the number one thing you think about is how do we break up? That's the question. Yeah, yeah. That's the question.

SPEAKER_00:

So we've talked we've had these conversations. Not not, I mean, we have these conversations about like what if we don't want to do this anymore. So like we've had these conversations and you know, what will we do and stuff like that? And so I have seen people that feel they hire a marketing person that is the the voice, right? It is kind of and they're not a partner, they're just whatever. And then that person kind of feels like they have too much leverage and they kind of show up that way because they're like, Well, what are we gonna do? I'm the face of the brand, I'm this, this, this, right? And so, yeah, you definitely want to be careful and you have to really think that through. Um I I don't did did he did it mention like how that person, Ronnie, did you mention how he was showing up?

SPEAKER_02:

Oh yeah, he said he's doing uh, you know, speaking engagements and guest podcasting, which look, there's also something to be said about an in-between, right? Like something that I suggested to Ronnie earlier was like, hey, you could have someone on your team clip all of the content from the guest podcasting. That's how you show up in the interim. A lot of people do that. Um, a lot of people do that and they don't have their own show, they're not uh a you know, the public persona, but they do guest appearances and that's enough.

SPEAKER_00:

Or they're super technician oriented. So like we've had people, physical product people that have no interest at all in their and they don't want they don't want any platform. Yeah, they don't want to do social, they don't want to do blog, they don't want to do YouTube. So we tell them like just be a genius technician, right? And you're basically gonna give your product to microinfluencers, let them go nuts talking about it, let them promote it. What and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it works. Like, that's the caveat because if it's really dialed in and like you truly just want to be the genius technician behind everything, that can work, but it really has to solve a fundamental need for the right person to where they just absolutely love the product and they just champion for it.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

So you can get those brand ambassador types, and I would argue, so we've done this before, actually working on one right now that it's a side project, it's a side quest. Uh, Kim knows me and my side quests.

SPEAKER_03:

Side quest.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So I have some side quests that I work on. But uh right now, like I have no connections at all in this particular industry that we're working on building an app for. But I have a friend that does. And like he's gonna go be the massive superstar that he is. Uh, he's a professional athlete. But, anyways, that's that's the only tease you get. But um uh but yeah, so he's gonna be the one that kind of like goes in is the brand ambassador for it, and he's gonna be heavily compensated commission-wise for doing that. So we can just focus on building a product because I don't have time to go meet people in the space and build relationships and do all the things, but it's low-hanging fruit for him, and he just needs somebody to help with platform, which we can do, right? Platform meaning what we're building for him. I love it. So that's an opportunity where there's alignment there and there's a level of trust there, and you kind of have proximity to somebody who just has a unique opportunity that I wouldn't have otherwise. So, in those situations, you may not need platform at all. You could just leverage current relationships and make it mutually beneficial.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I love it. Oh, is it a rap?

SPEAKER_00:

It's a rap. It's a rap. So you see guys, I had to tell, I gotta tell you guys. So we always joke about my my ADD brain. I'm always sending Kim little like reels about my ADD brain. So I have a confession. So I don't know if you remember the Usher song, This is my confession. Oh my god. So Ken is like, you're gonna have to make some concessions. I was doing a dad joke remix. These are my concessions.

SPEAKER_02:

Just went at that. Okay, we're gonna stop it.

SPEAKER_00:

We should end it on a high note. No, everything I just said just went out the window. Everybody's gonna remember just that dad joke.

SPEAKER_02:

No, I love it. Listen, guys, we'd love to answer more of your questions in a future episode. We're also gonna be doing something cool called marketing makeovers. So we're gonna leave in the description of this video and podcast a little link where you can actually submit your marketing makeover if you want us to come. We'll be gentle, I promise. Yeah, on video.

SPEAKER_00:

I'm not gonna shred you.

SPEAKER_02:

No, no, it is not a shredding.

SPEAKER_00:

It's not marketing roasts, it's marketing makeovers.

SPEAKER_02:

Exactly. So we'll give you, you'll tell us what your marketing conundrum is and we'll give you an entire strategy uh here on the show. I think it'll be really fun. But also, if you have questions that you'd love us to answer in the next couple episodes, let us know in the comments below. We'd love to hear about you know your thoughts about blue ocean versus red ocean. We'd love to hear your thoughts on what you're thinking about content and lower uh price offers, really, and what it takes to sell those versus higher uh higher ticket stuff. There's lots of amazing questions and we're here and we're listening. So every time you send us an email, fan mail on the podcast, we got you. So if you're listening in, there is a little link that says ask me a question on any of the platforms. Just look for it in the description. It actually sends a text message to our fan mail inbox, and we can actually answer your questions there. You can tell us what you think of the show so far because we want to make this something that you really enjoy. So thank you for being here with us today. Chris, do you want to say anything else?

SPEAKER_00:

This is my consideration. Bye.

SPEAKER_02:

All right, we love you. Un beso. Bye for now.

unknown:

Bye.

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Kimberly Ann Jimenez

Host
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Chris Harris

Co-host

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