Art Of Kaizen For Entrepreneurs
A podcast that exposes how business owners found their passion to start and develop their business. We dive into how these business owners are pushing to grow 1% everyday in both business and their personal lives.
Art Of Kaizen For Entrepreneurs
The Storytelling Revolution: Transform Your Business with Authentic Engagement
Ever wondered how storytelling can transform your business? Join me, Kyle Barry, alongside Alex Haynes from A Squared Production as we uncover the secrets of crafting compelling narratives that resonate with your ideal clients. Alex shares his evolution from running a video production company to becoming a maestro of organic content creation, challenging the obsession with viral trends and emphasizing the importance of building digital trust. Prepare to explore how aligning your marketing strategy with authentic storytelling can turn those likes into genuine revenue.
Discover the art of emotional engagement over hard selling, as we discuss the profound impact of storytelling in business. Drawing insights from industry leaders like Gary Vaynerchuk, we highlight the necessity of understanding consumer avatars and infusing humor and authenticity into your content. Alex and I delve into the evolving landscape of AI in storytelling, sharing personal experiences and predictions on how AI can enhance small businesses' narratives while maintaining emotional connections.
Throughout our conversation, we navigate the tricky waters of self-worth in client relationships and the imperative of choosing the right clients for mutual respect. From optimizing platform-specific strategies to anticipating the transformative power of AI, we offer a roadmap for staying adaptable in the digital age. Listen in to equip yourself with the knowledge to align marketing efforts with your brand’s core values and foster lasting connections with your audience amidst ever-changing trends.
sell out telling stories and we say turning likes into dollars say the same thing. We run a ton of ads but we don't do organic. And that shocks me.
Speaker 2:Because we don't run ads, we do 100 organic content welcome to the art of kaizen for entrepreneurs growing one percent everyday podcast. I am your host, kyle barry. Today we're going to deep dive into the hottest topic for growing your business online organic social media. Our guest today has created tens of thousands of pieces of content and generated millions of dollars in that process. Now he's eager to share his knowledge and his insights with all of you. Welcome, alex Haynes from A Squared Production.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you so much for having me, kyle. I'm super excited to be here, I'm super excited to jump right in, and so let's hit me with those questions, man.
Speaker 2:I love it, man, and right now it's a perfect topic. You hear people like Gary Vee and other individuals getting really loud about organic social media, as well as Alex Hermosi and talking about how that really skyrocketed their business, so you seem to be a bit ahead of the curve here, alex. Let me ask this why did you start the company? Where did it really originate from? Where did that strength and that power of wanting to do this really come from?
Speaker 1:Oh man, a long, long time ago, in a galaxy not so far away, right, Me and my best friend, alex so it's Alex and Alex. We own A Squared that's how we came up with the name Got together and we loved telling good stories. We absolutely loved telling stories, and so we got together and started a video production company. We grabbed one Canon camera and a really, really good story about how we could help people, and that's how we started Almost went bankrupt.
Speaker 1:Our first year Luckily worked with a small company called Snyder Electric. At the very end of the year which is a billion dollar company, if you don't know who they are ended up creating a small fun game app for them for internal use, and it really launched us into learning to tell stories through pretty much any format. Eventually, it led us to creating a lot of videos for our clients, and then they all started asking because this was way back when, right, facebook was just becoming a big thing. Everyone's like, hey, what do you do about this Facebook thing? Can you help me? I have no idea what to do, and that's how we kind of got sucked into doing what we absolutely love, which is create content for social media. So that's a very, very short story of how we got into this game. We started this in 2010 together and since then we've helped tons and tons of clients really tell better stories and through telling great stories fun stories helped make generate a ton of cash.
Speaker 2:I mean, hit the nail on the head of the biggest value here, right? I mean, most organic social media is all about what's the next viral trend or the viral hook, or you know, kicking a water bottle or getting smacked in the face with a piece of cheese. But you went to the core of what business really is, which is the storytelling and the sales process of that. I love that. It's something that we preach a lot in our agency. Let me ask you this Do you find that that is the biggest problem when it comes to organic social is the lack of storytelling. What do you see as the biggest issue right now in the space of social media management?
Speaker 1:Wow. So it's funny because I get approached by a lot of marketing companies who all say the same thing we run a ton of ads, but we don't do organic content. And that shocks me, because we don't run ads, we do 100% organic content, because that's what we excel at. We excel at telling stories and we say turning likes into dollars. That's really all about the ROI. So we approach things so differently.
Speaker 1:We've actually had companies say, well, you're not a marketing company or something entirely different because of what you do. We're not about getting the clicks, we're about getting the money in, and so one of the biggest things we've seen are people neglect telling good stories and connecting with their ideal client. Good stories and connecting with their ideal client and, instead of like, really focusing on servicing one person and that one niche, they are doing this really spectrum broad. Let's follow the latest trends, let's do all these crazy things and we hope that we'll get people, instead of really niching down and going, hey, how do we serve one person, one client, how we change one person's world? And when we do that, we found that we have a huge resonance. We create within an online community and we build digital trust and, as you know digital trust is the first step of many steps to converting someone online into an actual sales. So that's kind of what we focus on and we actually have training. We're teaching people about that.
Speaker 1:My second book I'm working on is actually going to be how to tell a better story for businesses. Um, so I think you've actually nailed it. Uh, gary v I love gary v. He talks about this all the time, talks about just go do it tell stories.
Speaker 2:So I love that. I mean and it's a big it's hardest thing to do right from. You know, I've read multiple books on it, from story selling to the slide decks that they have on the storytelling. I can't remember the name of it. You know the little deck flyers.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So there's a lot out there that trying to inform people of how to tell stories correctly and how to get it out there, but it seems that it falls flat on the face for a lot of these agencies, a lot of these business owners and they still just push towards the hard promotion or the showing of their service instead of diving into the empathy and the emotional tieback that happens with story and stories. As you said, stories sell right. Graphics and images get people hyped up, but you don't put a story behind that you're not going to get towards a sale. So is that how you determine successful campaigns? I know in your field it's very difficult to determine success. Like you said, a lot of the agencies are looking at all the impressions or all the likes or the engagement that I got, but you talked about more of a direct ROI on the dollars spent here. Can you elaborate a little bit more on how, when you put out campaigns, how you determine them to be successful or not successful?
Speaker 1:pains, how you determine them to be successful or not successful. Yeah, that's a great question and it actually goes back to what our client wants. So this is kind of a cheat answer, I'll be honest, because someone's probably going to listen to the podcast and go, oh, I'm going to get the magic code. And there's no magic code, there's no magic bullet for marketing. You and I both know that. So it really comes down. We measure success as to what the client wants. Now you think every client wants money, but that's not actually true. Some clients actually want brand recognition, some people want ROI, some people are looking for a very unique client. They're looking for that one special person, or they're looking to make connections, or they're looking to hire people. Businesses' objectives will shift over time and our goal is to change with those objectives to make sure we nail that. A lot of times it is especially for smaller businesses. It is an ROI. Now we always tell people hey, as anyone knows, everyone wants to jump on marketing. Day one and day two they're making thousands and thousands of dollars and you and I both know that's not going to happen. It takes six months, sometimes a year, for really good organic marketing to work, and then it's learning how to convert that, and you said something really interesting I kind of want to touch on.
Speaker 1:You said a lot of businesses just do this hard sell. And in my book, in our training, we talk about this crazy person who stands in a corner of a street holding a cardboard side thing buy my stuff. Screaming look at me, look at me, look at me, look at me. I said no one wants that. We've seen them in real life and we avoid them. But people and businesses act like that on social media. They act a fool and all they say is buy my crap. I said the reality is, what if you didn't do that and you just helped people? What if you just created a community and you just helped people? What if you just created a community? What if you told good stories? What if you just were a normal person? I was like do you go to social media to be sold? No, you go to social media to have fun. So be fun with people, have fun. So back to your question, though.
Speaker 1:We look and we track things through varied means like analytics. We absolutely look at impressions. If we're getting more impressions, that's always good. We love seeing impressions go up. If impressions go down. That's an issue, right, unless we're purposely trying to get our impressions down, like, let's say we have. We've been where businesses get a million plus impressions, but they're awful impressions. They're worthless because all they're getting is looks and no buys. So I'd rather have a hundred thousand people look at our stuff and make a hundred thousand dollars than a million impressions and make no money. Would you agree?
Speaker 2:A hundred percent agree, right. And you're honing in on that consumer base by, I'm assuming, calling out consumer avatars and your creative honing in on the copy a little bit. How are you doing that?
Speaker 1:There's a lot of different ways. Obviously, we first start with our ICP client profile. That is essential. Every business should have one. Every business should know exactly what they're looking for. I love avatars because we get to name them and have fun. What is mary sue? What does bobby look for? What does johnny want? Um, where does johnny shop? Where does johnny go? What does mary sue like to buy? Who's she? Who's she dating? Is she married? Does she have kids? Right? These are questions that, once we get to know, we can really create very specific content, and I love laser focused content because laser focused content works Right. And so I think the first step in anything is creating an ideal client profile. Then you've got to understand tone, and this is really important.
Speaker 1:So many businesses are so scared of being funny because they don't want to offend anybody. Right now, in our culture, there's a fear of offense, right? We're so afraid that we're going to offend somebody and get canceled. The reality is Deadpool just came out and made a billion dollars, right? That was not a non-offensive movie. If you haven't seen it, check it out. If that's your thing, if not, that's okay. But at least do the little research. There's something to be said about having fun and being funny and understanding who your client is, I guarantee you the people who made Deadpool understood who their clients were. If you look at your ICP and you're like, hey, they don't do funny for the love of God, don't be funny. If you don't do funny, for the love of god, don't be funny. If you look at your icp and they're like, hey, they could take a joke then have some fun and make some jokes. Be a little more less rigid and focus on sales and have fun. Do some tongue-in-cheek stuff, go to the edge, have, get a laugh, get some humor and play with emotions.
Speaker 1:There's a reason why some of the best videos that if I started singing a certain song and you saw me carrying a child with big eyes, with a little extended belly, you know 100% that I'm going to ask you for $5 for a cup of coffee a day to help feed a child in Africa. You know, you can already hear the song in your head. Right, I could start humming that song in Heart of an Angel, right? You know exactly what I'm going for in your head, right, I could start humming that song in the heart of the angel, right? Um, you know exactly what I'm going for, because the emotions have been so beaten into us that, hey, when we start feeling a certain way, we've got to reach for a wallet that works. There's a reason.
Speaker 1:They do that same thing with funny. I love doritos, I love snickers. They do an amazing job at making funny commercials that get people hungry for their product and they don't take themselves seriously and a lot of companies can learn from that. If you do want to go more serious, there's some amazing car commercials out there. Uh, super bowl commercial. Uh, like a farmer comes to mind. Um, ram, I think it was ram who did the commercial. They did like a farmer. It was a old school, I think, sermon. They pulled out of nowhere and did this really cool spoken word with, like showing what this truck was and how it was a workhorse, but they tapped into emotions.
Speaker 2:And that's a big thing, right, the story, the storytelling, actually taps into the emotion, right into the emotion. Right, you know you have hit so many factors of high end agency production that, within, like, I looked at your website before here and your cost structure does not represent that. Let me be very clear for everybody listening. He's talking about topics that companies like the Harmon brothers are developing within their ads. These are the. This is the company that developed the squatty potty, the Dr Squat, dr Squat soap, the purple mattress ad, and if you call them today, it's $350,000 to make a 60 second long brand story video.
Speaker 2:So there is a vast difference in content development and content creation when it comes to individuals that understand storytelling compared to people that don't. And you're not just talking about the one base of storytelling. You bring in humor, but there's three major things that people are looking for on these social platforms and that's entertainment, education or inspiration, and in storytelling, all three of those fit. But making sure that you know your consumer avatar so that you can truly dive into it is the best way. And, to answer the question in short, you care about the return of what the client is looking to get, if that is better recognition on social because the content looks better.
Speaker 2:Get If that is better recognition on social because the content looks better, or if that is a more honed in consumer avatar that's engaging their content because you're making more finite creative pieces, or if that's a direct return on their advertising spend and developing assets that have clear call to actions and driving consumers so that they're actually making movement. You're actually building an organic social media calendar to bring in the results, like what paid advertising is doing and instead of what everyone's saying today of go broad, go broad, go broad, you're using an open audience profile of the organic to get more granular and really hone in on the consumer avatar, making it so your stuff really resonates with that ideal customer profile that you brought up. Incredible stuff, alex, I mean this is where.
Speaker 1:This is where we promote Kyle a little bit as well. He's on the other side of this, even though he's interviewed me. Oh my gosh, this guy gets it. If you have a chance to sit down with Kyle like I would spend all day with him as a marketer you get a chance to sit down with someone like Kyle or like myself oh my goodness, this stuff you're going to get as a business is going to be gold. Now let me tell you something that's really key here. I'm sure you'll agree with me, kyle.
Speaker 1:I started going into teaching and training because I want to help as many people as possible, and we always get told the following words and I cry inside when I hear this but I don't have the money, I don't have the funds, and I'm like you don't. You can't afford not to do some of the stuff we're talking about. You're going to get left behind. With Web 3.0 coming, with the huge changes of artificial intelligence hitting and changing even how we search, even this last week, this is changing. I said what will never change ever in the history of man is brand creation, tone and understanding of the good story will always be found and always be shared. That is always going to be key.
Speaker 2:And, as you're saying, with the evolution of AI, the AI is getting, especially in the copywriting and the visual effects development, it's getting to a point where it can storytell at a very, very base level but without any recognition of empathy, at a very, very base level but without any recognition of empathy, no recognition of emotional connection whatsoever. So that everybody here that's not leveraging AI and that's not developing and understanding at least how to tell a story and how to find your unique consumer that you want to dive into and hit their emotional points, to bring them into the conversation with you, you're going to get beaten by an 18 old using chat GPT at a better capacity because they're going to understand that at least the base levels of these AIs, they tell a story. They're starting to tell stories a little bit better, it's just they're missing that empathy. So I got to ask Alex is that you know, when you look at your business as a whole, do you find your storytelling to be your USP, your unique selling proposition, or is there something else that makes A Square unique?
Speaker 1:You know that's a great question. I wanted to make it more my unique selling point Over the years. Our unique selling point is we help small businesses. We are willing to work with people within budgets. We are super creative with figuring out how we can do stuff. Cost affordability is really big with a lot of local businesses.
Speaker 1:And you mentioned AI and real quick, I absolutely love, love, love, love, love what AI can do. And it's a tool and I tell people. People are like aren't you scared that people are going to use it and not pay you? I said no, and they're shocked because I said you don't understand what I can do with this tool. You look at this tool and you can put a couple screws in and you're like look, I built a shelf. I look at this tool and go cool, I can build an airplane. And they're like the vast difference of what I can do with AI versus someone else.
Speaker 1:I said look, this lets me tell stories better, faster and cheaper at a whole nother level, which I couldn't do before at a much cheaper cost. This is a huge game changer for small businesses. Um, so that's why we are shifting more into really pushing storytelling as the main thing we do because with ai, you can tell a better story for cheaper and faster you can get graphics generated. You can get a better story for cheaper and faster you can get graphics generated. You can get video generated soon. There are some things you can do where it's text to text to video and you can put that human touch where AI won't naturally do it. If you know how to do that, we do offer that training.
Speaker 1:Our big thing has been likes to dollars. That has been our unique selling point is that we have figured out how to convert people, our sales. Turning someone from a digital viewer to an actual buyer has been our unique selling point. Now we do that through telling good stories and through conversion and through psychology and a bunch of other fun things, which I'm sure, kyle, you understand as a fellow marketer, that if I explained here people would start glassing over and be like what just happened. We just took a deep dive into deep psychology and color theory and the copy and all these things.
Speaker 2:The hard thing is when you're really good at your job. That's the granular aspects that really make the difference right.
Speaker 1:Oh, hands down. Yeah, that's that's what we do. That's that our current unique selling point is likes to dollars. We're transitioning into storytelling, as we have started shifting into teaching and coaching, which is our next big thing. Um, we are really 100 doubling down on teaching people how to tell their stories love that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's a whole course. You guys, bill, you'll have a little more info in the description and at the end of this or at the end of this interview to see where exactly to find this information from Alex. But I still have a few more questions for you and one of the biggest ones that I'd really like to know is it sounds like, alex, you've got your eyes dotted, you got your T's crossed, you understand the storytelling concept around the organic. You're bringing people revenue from the efforts.
Speaker 2:What was the biggest failure or challenge you faced in building this business? Because, as business owners, we know that these challenges that we face and the difficulties is what really makes us unique and strong in our positioning and be able to hold our own in any spot that we stand. And it sounds like you've really gone to the ringer to put yourself in the position that you're at, and you enlightened us a little bit earlier in the call of the fact that you guys almost went bankrupt in the development of the business, which is a challenge all in itself. But out of all the years of you doing this, what do you think is the hardest challenge you faced up until this point?
Speaker 1:I want to first start answering this question with a little bit of encouragement to anyone who's listening. I have failed more times than I've succeeded and I'm so grateful for that, because every time I failed I've learned something. And our biggest failure, what almost shut our business down, almost destroyed me, was letting other people tell me what I was worth, and that's a lot to unpack. I'm not going to go way deep into this, but there was another company we worked for a little while. It was a nonprofit and sometimes it was a non-profit. Uh, and sometimes that's how it works. The people are supposed to be the nicest. Somehow can be the worst. Um, it just happened. This was not a great um circumstance and they said some really horrible things and because they're trying to save a dollar, they try to devalue what we brought to the table and constantly spoke negatively about what we were doing. And because it was a not for profit, because I had a passion for this very specific thing, it hit me pretty hard, like on an emotional, psychological level, and luckily I had a business partner who pulled me aside and saved potentially my life, our business. There's a lot to unpack with how dark this got so fast. As a business owner. Other people will be quick to tell you that you don't know what you're doing, that you're not worth your charge, that they could find someone better, cheaper, they could do it even better. And the reality is it's all a lie. A lot of times it's because they're cheap, or they're just not good people, or they are scared. Many years after, we ran into a couple of people who work for an industry. They actually apologized. They're like this person should have never said anything. Explain what was going on. This person was terrified that they would lose their job because of some of the things we said. We didn't realize this person was doing behind the scenes, which was 100% wrong, and we had brought a light into a situation we did not know about. Right, because we were just talking what we do, which is very, very niche. We talked about things and apparently they had been lying about certain things and, uh, they were gonna lose their job now. Um, and so they went on the attack and said did some awful things? Uh, and it was. It was hard, right. That was the biggest failure I had was letting someone else determine my worth. I still struggle to this day sometimes because I'm an emotional, I'm a creative and it's really easy for someone to say something and I'm like, oh, you don't like it, because at the end of my day, my goal, my win, is someone lights up when we do something, when someone goes, oh my goodness, that was amazing or we saw a great result.
Speaker 1:I strive for an insane amount of perfection in what we do and unhealthy in some ways, desire. Kyle is nodding his head, going yes, because I guarantee you you're somewhat like me If you're in this world and you care about people and you're broken like I am, which a lot of us are when we get into this industry. The reason we're so good at our job is because we're trying to make everyone else happy. We try a thousand times harder to make it the best for you, and part of what I've learned this is just a little free lesson to anyone listening out there who owns another company, marketing company.
Speaker 1:You know the phrase under-promise, over-deliver. That's so freaking valuable. I do it to such an extent now that when we deliver something it's so above and beyond. There's no room for complaint. The reason I've learned to do that is because we're really really good at what we do. We can't let people know how good we are, because then they expect an insane amount from us that there's just undeliverable with what the finances is. Usually that's usually the case, and so we will have, will have to really, really emphasize, for what you have. This is what we can do, and then usually over deliver, at least meet expectation. But our goal is always to over deliver and so we do that now because we don't ever want to walk in the mistake of sending someone else to want something from us that we can't deliver and therefore also hurting ourselves emotionally because we weren't able to please somebody. So that that's a really deep, probably much deeper, darker, like uh explanation that you were expecting perfect.
Speaker 2:I mean I, I couldn't, I, to hear the passion, everyone listening. He didn't just verbalize why he is successful, why he's doing good. You can hear the energy of how much he actually cares, right To a point where, alex, you're a hundred percent right. I am just like you. I'm to the point where last night I was up till 4am working on accounts because I want to see every person that I can help be as successful as possible, and you can hear that radiating through your voice as you're communicating about this. But you're 100% right.
Speaker 2:The last podcast we did too. If you guys haven't listened to that, go check it out. But the last podcast, a business owner totally separate business, totally separate category said the same thing about the type of clients. One of the biggest problems that they had was hiring or bringing on the wrong clients. Bringing on the wrong clients because, at the end of the day, there is nobody else in the world that is going to study storytelling and organic social, to the dedication that you have in your business. If a business owner that's doing X, y and Z tries to copy that, they're going to fail at whatever their core value of their business is, because that's how much you actually care.
Speaker 2:So, understanding that and walking into the scenario for any agency owner, for any business that goes and hires an agency, there's a reason that they're categorized the way that they are because they're nerds at it, they love it, that's what they do and you want to try to pull the best out of them, not abuse them, not walk into a conversation where you think you knew better. If you know better, do it yourself, hire the guy off Fiverr for a quarter of the cost and then call us when it fails. Totally understand and love hearing the emotion come from it. It just shows how much you really care, alex, how much you really have put into your business and how much you care about the clients that you bring on Anybody listening. If you want someone in your corner that actually cares about growing your business through organic, alex is your guy right. Obviously it's awesome to hear from you. Is it okay if I dive in a little bit deeper on your service and kind of ask a few questions around, kind of how you do things different?
Speaker 1:Oh no, you're promoting what I do. Oh no, please stop. Oh no.
Speaker 2:Love it. Well, I mean, there's so many platforms out there today between Snapchat, TikTok X, facebook, instagram, linkedin. All of these platforms have different designs, different structures, different consumers that are based around those platforms. Can you talk to me how important it is to make sure you're structuring your content specifically for each platform and kind of how you make those alterations of something that's getting posted on TikTok and compared to Instagram Reels?
Speaker 1:Wow, that's a great question. So there's actually two distinct answers. My first answer is how often are you creating content? Right, that's my first question. If you're not creating content, then it matters more that you're creating content consistently and just posting at the platforms. Be consistent. Number one every platform, no matter what it is, wants to see you posting regularly, creating content. You know, it's like less than 1% of the people, the population, actually create content and like 99% of the population consume. It's insane. I think it's one I could be wrong, it could be like three or five, I don't remember what it is, but it's very, very small. Less than 10% of the population rates the content everyone else just consumes. So when you create content, no matter what it is that you are winning. So anyone out there who's creating content, great job. Be consistent, post regularly. Number one if you're already doing that, like you've jumped that hurdle, and now you're looking to really leverage the different platforms, then absolutely it matters the content, and I actually have a great story about this. The content that you create is going to perform vastly differently and I'll give you an example.
Speaker 1:I did a share reel, so I remixed a reel someone else put and it was this cat dancing badly and it was like doing it's like a TikTok dance, like me learning a TikTok dance. That's what the text and I remix and I said there's a better way and I posted on every platform. So when I say every platform, let me kind of explain, because there's some platforms we just don't post to because it's not where our client is. We posted Facebook as a reel, instagram as a reel. We did TikTok as a TikTok. We did Tick Tock as a Tick Tock or our guests vertical video and LinkedIn and X. So we posted to all those platforms.
Speaker 1:On Instagram it blew up. We hit like 1500 views in less than 24 hours and we're getting likes, comments, brand new follows. It did really well for us, seeing as we don't post super often to our Instagram because we're so busy. This was a good number for us. Now some people out there are like oh, you only hit 1,500. There's nothing. Well, normally, when you're not posting a lot of content, 30 to 50 is where a lot of people see their max. So some people out there are like oh, my goodness, you hit 1,500. That is a big number. We hit about 500 times what we normally do because we post so inconsistently.
Speaker 1:I know this is going to sound weird as a marketing company that we're not posting consistently. We're working on that. We have what's called starving baker syndrome. If you don't know what that is, it's where you make a bunch of bread for everyone else but forget to eat because you're so busy. So that's what we've been fixing. So we've been ramping up our Instagram and our Facebook. So on Instagram, 1,500 plus views right Within 24 hours and it's even gone up beyond. That Did really great.
Speaker 2:Facebook 15. 1-5. 15.
Speaker 1:1-5. 15. No one liked it, no one commented, didn't get any shares. Tiktok 10. It was nothing. Now because our TikTok let me explain something Our TikTok is mostly me doing clips from our training, like training clips.
Speaker 1:So the algorithm is specifically showing our content to people who'd like that type of stuff. So we put something very different up because it did really well and it got zero, zero traction. You would think it would get as much traction as Instagram, but it didn't. So this is like that piece, that one piece of content did really well on one piece of platform X, it didn't do very well. And LinkedIn, I think we got like 50, 5-0.
Speaker 1:Now, linkedin is mostly overlooked by a lot of businesses and content creators. Now LinkedIn is mostly overlooked by a lot of businesses and content creators. Let me tell you there is a reward to be reaped if you're willing to put in the work. We do something really unique and if you check out training, we actually tell you a trick on how to turn a written blog into 10 pieces of content, and so we'll put up content more readily on LinkedIn because we're using that to generate other content, right. So we'll start with LinkedIn and so we've gotten a really great reward from interests and likes and questions which we're slowly starting to reap, slowly starting to get connections from the aspect of. We believe in the planting and reaping method of marketing when it comes to LinkedIn, and if you want information about how to do that, talk to Kyle. Kyle will tell you what planting and reaping is when it comes to marketing, because I guarantee he knows what that is.
Speaker 1:And so LinkedIn did okay, we got 5, 0, 50 views on that, but Instagram it blew up. So this is where different pieces of content, understanding who your audience is in each of those content, because the people who use Facebook aren't also the people on Instagram and the people on TikTok aren't also the people on Instagram or Facebook and the people on X are unique people group, and so what you have to do when you create content is understand who is on each platform, the type of content you should create for each platform and, of course, then understanding how it should be delivered, because each platform has slightly deliverables it needs as well, and some perform better than others, right? So, finally, when Facebook first pushed Reels and Instagram pushed Reels because they're competing against TikTok, they would give you free advertising. Free advertising. This is why everyone's like oh, you gotta do Reels on Instagram, you gotta do Reels on Facebook.
Speaker 1:If anyone hasn't noticed, facebook has stopped doing that because Facebook lost a couple billion dollars and so they now want everyone to pay them for that reach they were getting for free. And so that reach you used to get when you put a Reel up and got 1,500, 2,000, 5,000 views for free has now gone away. And so this is why Reels, even though they're super valuable at getting new people, you're not getting as big of a reach as you used to be on Facebook and Instagram that you would before. And once again, this goes back to really understanding your ideal client who they are, where they're at, blah, blah, blah, blah blah. We can really get like.
Speaker 2:I could do like a two-hour training on just this and a two hour training on just this, um, and I don't get paid. So I mean, you're hitting the nail on the head, alex is that each? The real differentiation and you hit something at the end there I'm going to bring in but the real differentiation is the consumers that are on each platform. The people that are using Instagram are not the same that are using TikTok. They're not the. There is some crossover, don't get me wrong. Most of us have multiple platforms on our phones, but if you look at where you spend the majority of your time, you get that little update on your iPhone at the end of the week of your screen time usage and you've got 12 hours a day of screen time. Go look where you're spending majority of your time and efforts. You'll find that each consumer and the platform show you this right. If we're looking at Snapchat, we're looking at a little bit of a younger consumer base of 16 to 25. We're looking at TikTok Now we're looking at a mid-age consumer base of 18 to 30. If we're looking at Instagram, instagram matches TikTok a lot on the consumer base profile of ages. They're a little bit older but their interests are different. They have more interest in high-end photography and a higher end look where, and it's more of an educational play, where TikTok is more of an entertainment play and it's fast reels and high engagement. Linkedin is a completely different consumer profile major business professionals between the ages of 25 plus. So the each type of customers leaning into one of the platforms or another because it tends to them right.
Speaker 2:As us, as business owners, I love LinkedIn. I hopped in. I see Neil Patel, I get great information, I educate myself, see some new things that are coming out Great. If I hop on Instagram, it's usually at nine, 10 o'clock at night when I don't want to educate or do anything else besides, get a little bit of a brain dump or a little bit of a dopamine injection from either watching some cool videos or something engaging, but I'm not going there for education. So we all look at these platforms different and we have to cater our messaging to those platforms so that it actually resonates.
Speaker 2:Because, as you said from the very beginning, alex, you're doing all these efforts to bring revenue back into your business and if you are doing a lackluster job on a platform, it's not only going to limit your reach, it's definitely going to limit your revenue. You're not going to see the return that you want from the platform. So it sounds like, alex, your team at A Squared had to understand these platforms. You're developing amazing creative for each of them, you're separating out the ideologies and you're developing something that not only gets that beautiful content onto their feed, but is also connecting with their ideal customer profile, bringing them into the business and closing on revenue.
Speaker 2:My biggest question now is where's it going? Where do you think this industry is going to progress to in the next five to 10 years? On the organic side, are we going to see a new platform that comes out and absorbs all the organic content? Do you believe that there's going to be a better mixture between paid and organic, which is really, it seems to be, two separate entities now? Do you find that there's going to be something different that we're not expecting to happen on this organic play in the next five years? What do you think the industry looks like in the next five?
Speaker 1:Well, that's a great question. If you asked me two years ago, it would have been a radically different answer than today, because of the introduction of ai. Ai has insanely sped up where we're going as humanity. Good, bad and different, it doesn't matter. It's changed the very nature of our world.
Speaker 1:Um, it's like, you know, when myspace was huge and for those who are listening or slightly I don't know what myspace some of the younger generations like I don't, I don't know what that is there used to be something called myspace which was, uh, you know, my younger generation's facebook, and it was huge and it would never in anyone's mind ever die or ever be replaced, ever. Right. Uh, linkedin was in its infancy. Um, instagram wasn't even a thing at the time. It was it what myspace was the place to be. Uh, and right now that's facebook and instagram. I would say that's what we've replaced myspace with, and so I could definitely see, in the next five years, a brand new platform exploding, because we've seen this with tiktok. Tiktok exploded out of nowhere and now is like so big and so dangerous in some aspects that the U S government's like, hey, we need to shut this down because of, like what all the back end stuff, and I'm not. I don't want to get into politics with it and like the good and bad of it, but let's just say that it was disruptive. We can all agree that Tik TOK came out of nowhere and was disruptive. Now there have been companies studying that. We have the smaller companies now trying to compete against Google. We have X with a new owner, right or Twitter with a new owner. Whoever thought Twitter would go away? Right Now it's X and what X wants to do could be insane. If he does it right, I think. I honestly think X could be huge because I think he's trying to create X could be huge because I think he's trying to create something very similar to a Chinese app that is all-encompassing. So there's an app in China called WeChat. Wechat is a very encompassing everything from content deliverable to buying and selling, to direct communication. It's a very all-in-one. Everyone has it. I think that's what he's trying to go with, because he keeps talking about this everything app and, depending on how he builds it and his connections to things like PayPal and the economy and financing, we could see a shift to an everything app.
Speaker 1:I think, with Google just got hit with a, that was insane, that lawsuit that just finished. If you don't know, that was insane. That lawsuit that just finished. If you don't know, google basically got hit with a monopoly lawsuit. I was looking for the word and you nailed it monopoly lawsuit, which means things are going to change. Companies like Rumble are taking on things like YouTube and, because YouTube has made certain rules right, wrong or different, a lot of new contractors are looking for better platforms and where creators go, there's money to be made, which means things will shift and I think that's what we're seeing. We're seeing a shift and no one really can say for sure where things are going to end up. I think we're going to go through a really tumultuous time or fighting over who's going to be the big dog, who's going to come out next five years.
Speaker 1:I think AI is going to also play a huge shift, because how information is being delivered is going to change. Ai just ChatGTP just put out their first competitor to Google's search engine, searchchatgtp, to such a resounding aha that Google lost money in the stock market. Because they are freaking out because AI is taking away their money. The first time ever, a company has stood up against Google and beat them at a game. Right when AI came out, everyone's like, oh, it's not going to be a big thing. And then what happened? And this is one of those moments, like we're seeing history when radio first came out, when TV first came out, we are seeing history and it's going to be the history books that you know, like it or not, chatgdp laid the foundation for what AI will be in the future and is changing the game.
Speaker 1:Now what I think is going to happen over the next five years is we're going to see an insane amount of ai development. We're going to see things dramatically change. Into five years, you and I will be able to create hollywood, full hollywood productions from one computer, from a tech script, from tech script, and that is scary and amazing at the same time. And we won't need actors, we won't need anything. It can all be done. Ai. Now what we're going to see is the concept of that homemade like with real people, and a this is produced content. We're going to have both who is like, oh, this is handmade and how valuable that is, and we'll have handmade things with real people and it's going to be considered art. Now, right, I think that's where things are going, as far as like content creation, which inevitably, is going to change how marketing is done.
Speaker 1:Now here's the great thing for someone like you and me, kyle we are master storytellers. At the end of the day, we are masters at telling good stories, and no matter if AI is how we do it, or with people, or with a bag of chips and a dog right, whatever, were reaching 100,000 people, but in the day, were you making money? And I tell people like, look. So it's not about how many people you reach, it's not about the platform, it's not about anything. It's about do people remember who you are when they leave that app? Are people willing to spend money? Are they trusting you? Can they find you and buy from you? How is your funnel? How can you convert? How easy is it for people to connect with you, get help, get a good service, get a good product and be satisfied, because, at the end of the day, that's what a business is People process, product and as long as we can do that digitally, whatever the platform, and deliver that, that's a win.
Speaker 1:So I would tell people in the next five years, get ready to be very flexible. Don't bet everything on one platform, because you're probably going to get burnt If you put all your eggs into facebook or all your eggs into instagram. There's a good chance. In five years you're going to be struggling because of something new. Right, be willing to try out a bunch of new platforms and it's going to get exhausting. I guarantee in the next five years, two or three new platforms are going to come up, pop up. We'll put a bunch of stuff and it will die within a year.
Speaker 1:It that that is 100. It's going to happen and we should be okay with that and just know that. Hey, we're doing this as a just in case. But let me tell you, the people who first started running ads on facebook or even tiktok, they got a huge reward. It was so cheap to do it and that's what we're going to see.
Speaker 1:We're going to see huge opportunities with new platforms and you should 100. Take that chance because guess what? If you're building good trust and you're building a good story, whether that platform exists or not, they will find you, because if you do good marketing right we both know that you can direct them to your website they will become a real follower of you, they will become a fan of yours and you won't have to depend on that platform. And this is huge, and I think this is something, kyle, you would agree with me. Stop relying on other platforms for your audience instead of create your own audience and create your own platform, which is going to be your product or your service. Create fans, create followers who will find you don't rely on a bunch of people just because they happen to be there. Instead, create a following.
Speaker 2:I mean, what are we really doing with these platforms? The thing is that people forget about the core value of what this is. Tiktok, facebook, instagram what are they? They are where the attention of our customers are. That is simply all it is. If a new platform comes up, it's not like a new population of consumers came out of nowhere. No, the attention is just derived from platform A to platform B, and then platform B and platform C, and we've seen it over the years.
Speaker 2:You brought up Facebook and Instagram as that core thing that took over MySpace. I'm still waiting for Facebook to allow me to put my favorite song on there, but at the end of the day, the whole thing was that they grabbed the attention of the younger consumer populace. And this is what people don't understand is that once a younger consumer populace falls in love with a platform, that platform continues to evolve. That consumer base stays with that platform. Facebook and Instagram used to be the platform for young kids under the age of 25. You can barely find someone under the age of 25 on Facebook anymore, right? Barely find someone under the age of 25 on Facebook anymore, right? And they have migrated over and now the younger consumer generation have taken over Snapchat and TikTok. It's why TikTok blew up. Tiktok had a huge consumer base of Musically and Vine that they acquired that were all younger consumers and they leveraged that to explode their initial growth. And then Snapchat is doing an incredible job now at just holding true to that younger consumer demographic and it's been building and building and building over time where they continue to rise at a consistent base comparatively to some of the other social platforms.
Speaker 2:And I mean you've hit it on the head, aaron. I mean you've hit it on the head, alex, I apologize that the structure that you're talking about is good marketing. It is the structure that is designed for. How do I take my business, my service, my goals, what I want to present in this world, and I get it out into the consumer populace and find out who it resonates with in that messaging and then acquire that customer's truly acquired right, which is why email is still a thing, right. We're talking about 40 years, 50 years down the line of email and it gone back and forth multiple times.
Speaker 2:Do we do email? Do we not know we should make a Facebook group? You should have a discord channel, all of the platforms where you don't personally have the opportunity to reach out to that customer without using an additional service. You are at the will of that platform. So I'm right with you let's make sure that, as business owners, you're on these platforms. You should be on them as they come out.
Speaker 2:Organic posting has almost no cost to it. If you're going to put the sweat equity in yourself, if you're going to do it correctly, you hire A Squared here. It might have a little bit of cost but it'll bring the return back 100%. But you get on these platforms, you get your organic content going. You make sure you're doing in a way that you're not being gimmicky, you're not being short term.
Speaker 2:You are telling the story of what you're doing in the world to develop that empathetic connection with the consumer and solidify yourself as someone they care to follow in the world and be that person that, as you said, they become a fan of you. When they're a fan, they're looking to buy from you, they're looking to engage with you and it's more than just that one-time sale. So I mean really hitting all markers on the head. Alex, let me ask you one last question about this. Then I have a fun little bonus questions before we close this out, can you give the listeners one good tip on how to stay on top of trends, viral hooks, viral sounds and things of that nature, which is something that we always see pop up. If you're talking about today with a lady kicking the water bottle or a guy getting hit with a ball, these viral hooks in the beginning of videos to grab attention seem to pop up left and right. How does your team stay on top of that and leverage that within your storytelling?
Speaker 1:Yeah, this is a super, super valuable, super expensive tip I'm gonna tell you, and the tip is don't. I know a lot of marketers are like how dare he? But no, don't, uh, don't care. Like, honestly, unless it fits, this goes back to your ideal client. Unless it fits within your ideal client, you don't need trends, man, trends are fun, like if you want to do something fun and be fun, if you see a trend you like, like, go for, like the. Uh, the dumping ice, cold water and you're doing the push-up challenge. These are fun trends. But they don't actually result in real followers nine times out of ten. So a lot of times I tell people like don't worry about it.
Speaker 1:There are a few things like trend wise I say is helpful, like getting reach. One of them is music. Trending music actually is very searchable because it's promoted, so that's a really easy thing to do. Anytime you go, make a clip. Either TikTok, instagram these are the two places you're going to find those trends really easily accessible. They'll either have like a fire icon or they'll say this is what the top 10 songs are. You can just slap those onto your video in the audio section and usually the phone accessory when you're making your content. That's a really easy win for you. The other cool thing you can do is you can look at the hottest latest um like effects they'll have like the top 10. Those are really easy things. You don't have to hunt for those.
Speaker 1:As far as like trying to figure out trends, I've actually seen companies hurt themselves trying to follow a trend versus be themselves and I was like do I talk about this, do I not? So look, the reality is that not all trends will work in your benefit, especially if your ideal client isn't for that trend. I'm going to give a great example. This is not me being political, and if, kyle, you want to cut this out, you can Right. So we all know Disney recently jumped on the bandwagon of DEI. Now, whether you agree with DEI or not I'm not going to say which way we agree or disagree with it there's a lot of aspects I think that are smart, that a lot of aspects I think are questionable because any anything like this, there's a lot of moving parts to it. Right, and they jumped on that bandwagon and they pushed a narrative with Star Wars. Right, and they've lost billions of dollars because their ideal client wasn't on board with that decision great.
Speaker 1:Another great example. This is budweiser. Budweiser did one thing and and it wasn't even like it was really weird how this all played out, because it shouldn't have been as explosive as it was and they chose a really bad time to do this, but they were celebrating women and they decided to celebrate a trans woman. I think that's correct how I said that, and I wasn't fully immersed in everything, I just saw kind of what happened. I went oh, something bad happened with Budweiser. What happened? And then come to find out you have a very blue collar, very rural type of company whose ICP is very we love our religion, we love our country, we're very pro-America, we're very X, y and Z, a little bit more conservative, and they push a very not conservative message. And we saw them get boycotted by their huge following to the tune of millions and millions of dollars.
Speaker 1:Now, do I think these companies did something wrong Because they supported something? Not necessarily, but as a marketer, this is once again marketing. This is not political. This is not being political. This is not me saying right, wrong and different. I want to be very clear about that, because everyone is allowed to have their own personal beliefs. Everyone's allowed to have their own personal values. I am talking about marketing and putting dollars in your wallet. At the end of the day, my job for a company is to help you make more money.
Speaker 1:When I see a company lose money because they made a marketing decision, we call that a bad decision. So, from a strictly marketing point of view, I cannot clarify that enough. They did not keep their ideal client in focus and they created content that was the antithesis of who they should be marketing to, because they thought their ideal client shouldn't be their ideal client anymore. And that transition didn't happen like they thought it was going to happen, and they lost millions, if not billions, of dollars Both these companies did. Now there's actually stories of people doing the exact opposite, doing the other way, and also losing a ton of money because they did not keep their ideal client in focus.
Speaker 1:At the end of the day not about politics, not about anything in general but not every new thought this is what's going on is good for you to jump on. Sometimes it's against your ideal client's base thought process. So you've got to be careful, because just because it worked for one company doesn't mean it's going to work for you, and just because you're looking for high fives doesn't actually mean it's going to get you money, and this is why, like Kyle we talked about this my goal is about ROI. My goal is about making people money, helping people turn likes into dollars. At the end of the day, if it doesn't put money in your pocket, why are you wasting time doing it?
Speaker 2:I mean just incredibly set. I mean it hits the nail on the head perfectly. The reason this question always comes up is because everyone thinks that they're using the trending aspects is going to increase your overall reach and impressions and engagement, which is correct. But is it the right reach, the right impressions, the right engagement right? Sitting on the paid ads focus side, I could run a reach campaign for every client that I have, get CPMs or cost per outreach down to $2, and I could hit 20 million people within a month and you would not see a single piece of revenue being generated from that reach campaign. So it is that would hurt so bad. So it is so bad that it is.
Speaker 2:It is a structure to the system, not only of how you present yourself into the market a lot like what we're talking about here and how you actually resonate with your ideal customer profile but also staying true to your core and your values, of where those customers came from in the first place. If your business has been a hundred percent educational from the very beginning and you want to grow it and you think the best way is to start using funny viral hooks for edgy, for entertainment purposes. You are going off the course of the consumer base that you have built and guess what? They have the loudest voices. When you piss those people off, everybody's going to know about it, right, just like what happened with Budweiser. It was a perfect example of that, right, and you put a nail on the head. I think the one thing you did highlight there that people should listen to is the trending audio factor, that audio, especially if the audio is in your category. It's very easy to run a survey guys. If you guys have an email list, run a survey what's your favorite type of music? People will answer that type of question. You can then relay that back into your content development. If they like rock, put rock in there. They like rap, put rap in there. But understanding that using that audio factor is just going to put you in a pool of consumers that love to enjoy that type of music, putting you in the right consumer avatar if you put the right music on there. So I mean, dude, from the beginning to end, alex, this has been incredible. I really think that you have a very sound understanding of not just where your business sits, which is the content creation and the social media management, but the overall business ideology of how to grow a company through digital means in 2024 and beyond.
Speaker 2:You brought up the funnel concepts. You brought up how to resonate with your unique consumer profile, how to really grab the attention of the customer in the right way, which is what we're trying to do. We're trying to leverage these platforms to find where our consumer's attention is being grabbed and then leverage that platform to grab that attention, to lean them into our funnel, into our business, into your pocket as the business owner, because you developed the right creative that resonated with them in the right way and placed it in front of the right customer. And A Squared seems like it's doing this above and beyond, alex, absolutely incredible.
Speaker 2:I got a bonus question for you. This one's a little bit off the cuff, right, but it's a little bit fun to have here at the end. But I love to ask this to marketers because we all sit here behind our computers and work behind our computers every single day. So here's your bonus question. Solar flare sends an emp across the world and we no longer have internet or power probably be out for like 18 months in in the us because of our power grid, whatever. Um, what is the number one thing that you would want to have right after that EMP goes out?
Speaker 1:Christopher Pennantonis. So this is just in general for living, or is this like? Yeah building my business. I'm just trying to understand the question for.
Speaker 2:Christopher Pennantonis, totally off the cuff, just for you. Just, I want to learn a little bit more about you specifically, right?
Speaker 1:Christopher Pennantonis. Emp happens, we lose the internet, we lose electronics. Right Yep, Right Probably a Jeep from World War I that will not be affected by that EMP. That would probably be one of my first things, because transportation is key, so I can go get the people I need, the supplies I need and get the heck out of Dodge, because it will very quickly turn into who has what situation. So I would say a mode of transportation that wasn't affected by the solar fair would be probably what I would go after.
Speaker 2:And Alex, the first thing you said is you're going to go get your people Taking care of his people, taking care of the people around him. Alex, this is awesome. How can people find you? If they're really interested in learning a little bit more about A Squared, or they just really want to understand how to do this organic social media, how do they find you?
Speaker 1:Yeah, those are great questions. Obviously, we're gonna have some links below. Obviously, I want to say first a huge thank you to Kyle for having me on your podcast. This was tremendously fun.
Speaker 1:I love when I connect with other people who are like me, who understand the value of what we do, and we love helping people. And quick shout out for Kyle Go talk to him if you want to run ads. Go talk to him about how to do these things, because he will take something I create and run with it and put the power of a thousand suns behind it is what I like to call it when you do a paid ad and blow it up even bigger than I could organically. So make sure you talk to Kyle about how to run ads, how to run ads, how to really get reach and how to turn those likes and dollars to a paid function, because I think you really help you with that. As far as finding out a little bit more about us, obviously we have our website, a Squared Pro, that's A-S-Q-U-A-R-E-D-P-R-Ocom. There you're going to find some of our services, but really what we're pushing and this is brand new. I've hinted at this you kind of know a little bit where I'm about to go. We started a brand new coaching program called Get Noticed and this is us teaching kind of like this podcast everything we know about marketing. I've squeezed my little brain into this back-end thing. It's going to be over the next couple of years. We're putting everything we know everything I know about marketing, which is very vast into a training program. That's a bunch of different levels. You can find out more about that through our website, asquareprocom. Go to courses and check out that Get Noticed coaching program and it's very reasonably priced, just like some of our other prices.
Speaker 1:Kyle mentioned we do not charge what we should charge, because we care more about people than we do about money, which is kind of backwards. But we said, hey, if we can make a dollar from a million people, that is better than making a million dollars off of one person, and so that's how we approach our business. We believe in helping as many people as we can, and if we just help a few people tell better stories, we're happy people. So check us out. And of course, you have us on Facebook. Obviously, go to our website. You can find our Facebook links there. We're on Instagram. We're on LinkedIn. We're on Instagram, we're on LinkedIn. We're on TikTok, we're pretty much everywhere.
Speaker 1:I don't think we have a Snapchat, though, so you've mentioned it a bunch of times and I'm like, oh yeah, I probably should go get one, because we do run a marketing company, probably should have Snapchat too. We do have an X. We have pretty much every platform out there that you can find us on, and we've been putting out a lot more content recently because we have transitioned from do-it-yourself services, which we still offer, to coaching and training services, where we're trying to produce incredible value and stay in incredible value to help people, even if we have to give some of that away for free, because, at the end of the day, we're just like I said, we're just trying to help some people.
Speaker 2:I love it. Alex Haynes from 8 Squared Productions. Underneath this video, guys, you're going to find a link to his website, a link to his courses. Any other criteria that we can put in there? Feel free to reach out to him to ask any questions. Alex, thank you so much for your time. I really do appreciate it and thank you everybody for listening.