The Hard Copy Media Podcast
Conversations about creativity, video marketing, filmmaking, and entrepreneurship for the working creative professional.
The Hard Copy Media Podcast
Why Most Creative Businesses Stop Growing — Skyler Mullins of Influence on How to Break Through
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What does it actually take to scale a creative business past the referral wall? Skyler Mullins, co-founder of Influence Studios, Marketing & Rentals, sits down with Colton to break down the unsexy (but very sexy, depending on who you ask) business side of running a creative agency.
Skyler shares how a SoundCloud rapper music video at 18 turned into producing thousands of TV spots for 17 different automotive manufacturers, how getting let go during COVID forced him to bet fully on the business he'd quietly been building since 2016, and how he eventually packed up his life in Washington and moved to Arizona to scale Influence with business partner Steffan.
This episode goes deep on the operational realities most creative entrepreneurs avoid: how to qualify a discovery call in the first five minutes, why "the first person to speak dies" is the best sales lesson he ever got from an automotive Chief of Operations, how to deliver pricing without flinching, and why scaling on referrals alone eventually hits a wall.
We also get into the harder stuff: the burnout, the missed milestones (including his daughter's first steps), the moment his seven-year-old told him he had enough toys, and why Skyler now treats the business as a marathon instead of a sprint.
Topics covered:
- Getting fired during COVID and going all-in on Influence
- Producing thousands of commercials for Ford, Mazda, Honda, Toyota, Chevy, Jeep, Dodge, Ram, and more
- Producing a Nike commercial and Jordan product photography
- Why the referral-only growth model eventually breaks
- Building scalable SOPs and "thinking like a big company"
- The five things to look for on a discovery call
- Qualifying clients by revenue, decision-making authority, and existing content
- Letting clients sell themselves (the PB Backdrops story)
- The Microsoft logo and the perceived value of creative work
- Why "the first person to speak dies" applies to pricing
- Sustainable growth, sustainable scaling, and avoiding burnout
- Recognizing wins instead of always chasing the next milestone
- Skyler's book recommendation: Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of Done by Jon Acuff
- Hot take: superhero movies are cash grabs
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00:00 Introduction & Meet Skyler Mullins of Influence
02:18 The Origin Story: Filming a SoundCloud Rapper at 18
04:15 Producing Spots for Ford, Mazda, Honda, Toyota & More
05:02 Getting Let Go During COVID & Going All-In on Influence
07:00 Meeting Steffan & The Move to Arizona
10:11 Why Referral-Only Growth Eventually Hits a Wall
13:44 Splitting Roles: Creative vs. Business in a Partnership
21:09 Scaling Sustainably: SOPs & Thinking Like a Big Company
23:25 The Discovery Call: Top 5 Things to Look For
28:00 The PB Backdrops Story: Let the Client Sell Themselves
30:19 The $50 Million Microsoft Logo & Perceived Value
32:18 The Best Sales Lesson: "The First Person to Speak Dies"
33:34 Don't Justify Your Pricing (Just Drop the Number)
41:18 What Skyler Would Tell His Pre-Influence Self
44:15 Scaling Fast Without Sustainable Systems
49:29 Burnout, Missed Moments & Working 30 Days Straight
55:23 LIGHTNING ROUND: Hot Take — Superhero Movies Are Trash
57:20 Book Rec: Finish by Jon Acuff & "Noble Obstacles"
01:01:21 Where to Connect & How to Follow Skyler
What's up everybody? Welcome back to the Hard Copy Media Podcast. I'm Colton, your host and the owner of Hard Copy Media. And today I've got a very cool guest and fellow large human here with me, Skylar. Woo! Thanks so much for joining me. Thanks for having me, man. Absolutely. Thanks for coming out. So uh for anybody who doesn't know, Skylar runs influence. Boy, you got like five names now. Studios, marketing, and rentals, right? This is correct. Yep. Okay. Got that one right. Yeah, you guys you guys have segmented very nicely. I was actually, I was talking to Ivan uh not too long ago about the branding. I love the different brand standards for each uh I'm gonna call them verticals of your business as well. But um you guys are killing it. Uh if you guys also don't know, they've got a beautiful studio out on the west side. Uh definitely go check them out. But uh Skylar, we're gonna talk today really more about the like not sexy but very necessary business side.
SPEAKER_01That's equally as sexy, depending on who you ask. If you ask me, it's sexy.
SPEAKER_00It can be. But I feel like traditionally creatives get into a creative business and like finding clients, booking clients, talking rates, like that side of it is always like the Achilles heel. Like nobody creatives are always already a little like insecure about it.
SPEAKER_01Either creative or your business, it's rare that you're both.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it is very rare that you're both. So uh that said, I feel like you're in a unique position to be uh a little bit of both, but definitely you you like you run the ship over there as far as the business side. So um, before we dive into some of the finer talking points, uh I you know mentioned just a couple of years ago through Arizona Filmmakers and know you guys are originally from Washington and came down to our wonderful state of Arizona. Um just like everybody else. Just like everybody else. Yeah, everybody comes to Arizona from rainy, cold, terrible places. Cold, wet and depressing. Yeah. Now it's just hot and dry. Uh except you guys did bring some rain. So we'll we'll forgive it. We'll figure it out. But uh give me, give me and the audience just a little bit of your backstory. Like, how did you, you know, get into film and media? How did you get into this line of work? How did you go from, you know, I assume working for somebody else to then running your own thing? Uh everybody tends to have the I picked up a camera and I never looked back moment. So I always like trying to figure out like when did that happen?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So I was probably about 1819 when I first started dibble dabbling uh in the creative media area. Uh I had a buddy that I played uh football with in high school, and uh he did TV productions and we were just really good buddies. And one day he says, Hey, uh, I'm gonna film this SoundCloud rapper music video. Um, would you be willing to help me? And I was like, I quite literally don't know how to use a camera at all. Like, I think that's a horrible idea. And he's like, Oh no, you just gotta stand there, like shake the camera around, it'll be cool. And I was like, Yeah, I'm like, all right, cool, yeah, sounds good. And so I went and helped him, and I was like, This is actually really fun. Like, I like I actually really enjoyed this. And he's like, Oh, cool, you want to learn how to edit? And I was like, Okay, yeah, yeah, why not? And I edited the video with him, and I was like, This is actually dope. I actually really enjoy this side of it. Um, and so that sort of was my picked up the camera another look back, and so I I basically kept on filming different things, events, high school senior photos, you name it, anything I could do to get better at the craft, I did. I would, you know, darn near pay you for the opportunity to just let me film something, let me photograph something, like let me do something and get better at this. Yeah. Um, and I just kept on doing that over and over and over and over and over and over again. Fast forward a few years, um, and I ended up getting hired as an executive producer for an automotive marketing agency. Um, by that time I had produced hundreds of videos, tens of thousands of photos, uh, and felt like, oh, this is my first like big boy job. Like now I'm actually getting paid on salary to produce commercials and produce content. Um, and so during that time, for about three, four years, uh I produced commercials for Ford, Mazda Honda, Toyota, Chevy Jeep, Dodge Ram. Um couple of brands people. It was 17 different manufacturers. Um and so I produced probably somewhere in the ballpark of three to five thousand uh TV spots for automotive. So I will toe-to-toe anybody that says they've shot more automotive than me at this point. It is ridiculous. Um, and so I did that for many, many years. Uh, and then right as COVID hit the marketing agency, which they were crushing it, we were doing about 750 million a year. Uh, they said, Hey, um, so you've made a lot of content, Skylar. Great job. Um, we were just thinking about it, and we have so much footage that, like, we don't really need you. We'll just hire an editor and just recut everything you've been filming for the last couple years and then just mix and match and run new spots, and yeah, good enough. Uh, yeah, so they let me go. And I was like, oh my god, like what am I what am I gonna do? Now, little did they know, I already started Influence, so I had officially filed for my business license in 2016 for Influence while I was still working there. It was always my goal to run my own my own ship. Um, but I wasn't ready. Like, I was like, I'm gonna just keep on stacking up money over here until like this money replaces this money, and then like I'll just make the responsible decision.
SPEAKER_00And uh spoiler alert, there are very similar responsible decisions in this line of work.
SPEAKER_01Like there never is. And I so that was the the pipe dream I had was I was like, when the time is right, I'll jump ship and do my own thing. Uh well, I was forced to do my own thing. Um, and I was like, Well, I guess I'm just gonna hit the ground running. I don't want to go back and get another job and work up the ladder and try to rebuild this, and then eventually in five years, you know, I was like, No, I'm just gonna run at this full speed, 100%. And I did. A couple months after that, produced commercial for Nike, uh, did the product photography for Jordan's.
SPEAKER_00You kind of stopped dropping these brand names so casually, maybe.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I it was just I it was it sounds horrible. It sounds horrible, but COVID was the best thing that ever happened to me. I felt like a lot of the big production companies that were already big, they already had a ton of overhead, they already had all this stuff, they came down, and I was just there to catch everything because I had nothing to lose. Yeah. Um, and so that's exactly what happened. So um one I I would leverage one client and one project for the next and just kept on doing that over and over and over and over again, uh, until inevitably scale to be one of the biggest production companies in Washington state. And I decided, okay, I want to take this to the next level. I I want to grow and expand, and I could either niche down more in the state and try to like control individual markets, or I just go somewhere else and keep growing. So we still have clients in Washington, we still have a presence in Washington. Um but I was like, I'm gonna come here to Arizona, and that's how I met Stefan. Uh well I didn't meet Stefan, but that's how Stefan came into the picture. Stefan is also from Washington, he lived about 10 minutes down the road for me. Stefan's my business partner, by the way, for those that don't know.
SPEAKER_00He'll he'll also be on in a separate episode. So we'll hear from Stefan too, so we'll we'll we'll do a little fact-checking here.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, fact-check me. Uh but I had basically hired Stefan like multiple times a week for years. Like we had become really good friends, and he kind of had become this unofficial part of influence, like as it was. Uh, and he would bring me on to a couple of his music videos from time to time. So we were like already very collaborative. Um well when I decided okay, I want to ex I want to scale and expand, I was like, I don't want to hire more employees. I need somebody that understands the business, like they understand what they're doing, they understand how to grow and scale, not just how to be really creative or make things look pretty, but like actually grow.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um, so I was like, hey Stefan, so obviously I'm way cooler than you. Um, and you should just drop your whole company and come with me. And he was like, Oh my gosh, I was just waiting for you to ask. He'll say it differently for sure. Uh no, I was like, let's just take over the world, let's do this thing. And he was like, All right, sounds great. Um, and four months after that, I had listed my house, sold my house, sold like half my possessions, literally everything, and moved to Arizona.
SPEAKER_00Damn. And then here we are. All right, geez, I had no idea that uh, you know, the the the agency first off let you go. Yeah. We we share that in common. I was also hard copy media was born out of, you know, an idea I already had for many years while working somewhere else. And then when I got laid off, it was like, well, now or never. Yeah. You know, so uh that's why I said like there aren't really safe decisions. Sometimes the decision's made for you. Uh others not, yeah. You just kind of gotta go with it. But um, you guys are still killing it. I mean, having a presence in multiple states, first off, is always very impressive. And I always enjoy talking with people that are just a few years uh you know further down the path than I am because you've probably made a bunch of mistakes that I either will or haven't made yet. Already laughing. Yeah, nope, for sure. So uh, you know, I think that a lot of video business owners, when they look at scaling, um, I'm I'm sure it's probably the same for you. Your referrals are always your best line of business. Like those are usually the like it's like a guaranteed client, usually, if a referral comes across your desk, because people tend to work with who they know, like, and trust. And if someone's already worked with you, they had a good experience, they had a good experience. Yeah, word of mouth is a very powerful, but it's not super scalable. So a lot of people kind of hit this wall where referral business is going good, it's going good, it's going good. But to really get to that next level, you need, you know, either an outbound or an inbound system or both. You need you need something bigger. So uh moving from, you know, I assume very early on, word of mouth, and I'm sure leveraging some agency connections, because uh, you know, working in any form of big marketing or an agency, you're gonna just naturally foster a lot of fantastic connections across industries. But uh, what was the first step you took from a business side to start scaling and finding more clients?
SPEAKER_01So it's actually funny because we're still in the thick of that. Um I and it's kind of funny because I'm waiting for the day that I'm like, oh yeah, it all it's all clicked, it all makes sense now. Uh because we're still not there. And I think a lot of people think that we're further along than we are, uh, and we have done really well, but I think we're still very much in a referral market for us personally. Um I just think that we've built really solid SOPs to make it more scalable than most. Um, so literally up until about a month or so ago, uh, we didn't do anything in paid advertising. Um it was literally just referral marketing. It was networking.
SPEAKER_00It was a month ago. That's insane.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so I mean, like, we don't run PPC advertising, we're not running meta ads, we're not running Google ads. We now do SEO. Like that is like the one thing that we started doing. We're like, okay, let's uh and I think part of it really relies on Stefan a little bit and then myself heavily in the marketing side of things where um like I work a lot, I am constantly selling, I am meeting people, I am making connections, I'm at networking events, I'm at B and I's um I'm a I'm a director for B and I Arizona, so I've just am constantly like how do I meet more people? How do I make more connections? And then the clients that I do have going back to them, hey, what's on the horizon? What are we doing? Whatever. Uh and not just like the company, but the people. Um, because a lot of times when you're talking to executives, like they're they know other executives. Um so I've gotten a prime example of that is when I did that Nike commercial, one of the uh producers on that commercial uh was good friends with like all of Jordan. So they're like, Oh hey, you did really good on that. You want to do this thing over here? So we just leverage those connections so often that it has carried us. Now I realize it's not scalable, right?
SPEAKER_00Eventually, eventually, the the six degrees of Kevin Bacon map business does kind of hit a wall.
SPEAKER_01It hits a wall, and we definitely have started to see that more so or not, you know, the machine can't only work when Skylar works or when Stefan works. Um the machine's gotta work when I'm sleeping, when I'm not here. One day my goal is is that I just own John.
SPEAKER_00Like I don't I don't have to making the sales calls, you know, doing the outreach, you know, 100%. Attending the networking events constantly. Like, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I think that's a goal for a lot of us because like I'm in a very similar boat uh where I I've found the most beneficial way to find new clients is in-person networking events. 100%. Which are just physically limiting. Yeah. You know, that and everything's on the last Thursday of the month. So it's like, and there's only one of me. So like, you know, I gotta like cycle through which one I'm going to because they're all on the last Thursday of the month, it seems. So like physical networking events are a limitation. Referrals are fantastic. They're they're my favorite way to find new clients and to get new business. But at the end of the day, that does still require somebody calling, texting, emailing, you or I directly, and then like that's still you are the bottleneck in that process because you know, you could be on a shoot, you could have other calls. Like, there's there's only so many hours in the day until you've unlocked the 25th hour of the day, which I've heard if you like shotgun seven seven Red Bulls and then you know.
SPEAKER_01There's been a couple times we found that 25th hour. Uh, but it's a lot, it's a lot. I think the one thing that's really helped us is a lot of creative agencies are they're we're all small, but there's not a lot of support. Usually it's a person or two. Um, and I feel very blessed that we have more than a person or two. So um, like I this is gonna sound horrible, but like I haven't been on set in a long time. Like, I I don't typically have to go to set anymore. Like the creative team does that. So Stefan's managing that. Ivan, Jay, everybody else is they're taking care of the shoots while I'm making sure that everyone's paycheck's taken care of.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um so that has definitely helped where I can focus more into bringing in new clients. I can focus more on winning in the business side while everybody else is focused on making sure that anything that goes out is going to bring more referral opportunities. If our content sucks, then it doesn't matter how hard I sell, we suck. So um having both sides, I think that's why Stefan and I work together so well is that Stefan has always been the creative guy. Like he is always shot better than me, he has always been a better, like just storyteller. Like he is good on the camera side of things. On the flip side, I'm really good on the business side of things. So, you know, the idea of like things like symbiosis thing. Yeah, it's a very good symbiotic relationship where he's really good on creative, I'm really good on business, and so and fourth, we have a really good creative business, you know. Um, where again, most times you're either creative or your business, but you're rarely both. Because there's both of us, we kind of are able to tackle both sides.
SPEAKER_00Well, that's yeah. That makes a lot of sense too for why you've been able to, again, from the outside looking in and achieve so much uh relatively quickly. Uh because you guys are able to kind of divide and conquer the work. You're making me jealous because right now it is uh for for my side of things, it is literally all me. I'm the business guy, I'm also on set. You know, so I'm doing I'm doing both roles constantly. Yeah. And that's why, you know, I was so looking forward to this conversation because uh figuring out how to scale is like the never-ending problem, especially early on when like the idea of taking on you know, like payroll, like not just like contract gigs where like you know the money's coming in and then you're paying someone, but like you know, full-time payroll is like, oh my god.
SPEAKER_01You know, it's incredibly stressful, and I take that so seriously. I you know, I think the one thing that Steph and I are both on the same pages is that, and not to sound like a total like douche. I don't know, I might want to say douche, I don't know. Yeah, I know you're a lot of class on this. Yeah, I don't want to sound like a total douche, but like we both have the mindset that we will quite literally run laps around anybody. Like that's our mindset is that we will do what it takes when it takes to get something done and be successful. I have multiple like on salary staff, and I'm like, I feel personally responsible for their well-being. So if that means that Skylar's gotta work 80, 125 trillion hours a week, like I will because like I have people to take care of, even outside of my own family. I gotta take care of Stefan's family, I gotta take care of Ivan's family, I gotta take care of everybody's family. Yeah, um, and so I do take that really seriously. And so sometimes there are months, especially when we got the studio.
SPEAKER_00That's that that can be a whole episode in of itself. That is a lot. That's a lot. You know, I mean Rich and I are still trying to crack that nut right now. Man. And it's every time I sit down with the numbers, I'm like, why how did I get here? Yeah. Like, who am I to be dealing with this kind of numbers?
SPEAKER_01It was a lot, it still is a lot. I think we've we've certainly figured it out. Like we are we are now in like, okay, how do we scale this? How do we grow this even more now? Yeah. But uh we have just always been like, you know what? If we need to hustle and go find one off work, something that's not retainer, we'll go find a commercial, we'll find a music video, we'll f we will find that work because we don't see any other option. So I think that's like you know, it's kind of funny because people are like, oh, how do you grow and scale? Blah blah blah. You work harder, get up and anybody else.
SPEAKER_00You figure it out. Yeah. That's so uh when I got laid off and started hardcopy media, I was fortunate enough to have some stock from Apple way back when that I sold to help be my like startup nut like that. Bought my FX6, that bought my lenses, you know, all that. Um, but then I also had my severance, which at least gave me a little bit of runway to like figure things out and get some consistent income coming in. Um, but like especially early on, and I mean I still feel this way, like being an entrepreneur and like seeing your bank account balances and the business accounts and all that, you're like, okay, cool, there's money in there now, but like if I don't keep going out there and finding. Yeah, what about next month? What about this? And like, even if you build up a nice little reserve, you're still like that that could go real fast if we uh hit a hard dry spell. So it is a it is a constant, I don't want to say like negative stressor, I think it can be a very positive stressor. Uh uh, but also the way that you just described, you know, how you and Stefan run things, I think is part of the reason why you guys are so successful, not just in how you obtain business, but in how you work with other people. Because leaders that always put the team first and the well-being of those around them first will naturally have more teams come to them.
SPEAKER_01I think that's that's something that you know it's actually kind of funny because we've been building out all these SOPs for influence. Um and when we first started doing it, there were internal comments that are like, this feels like a big company. Like this these are rules for a big company. And I'm like, yeah, for sure. Like it we have to think like a big company if we're ever going to be a big company. Yeah. Um, and part of those like foundations, these pillars is like we are collaborative and we take that so seriously. And I personally, especially like as a producer, that's all I do is produce nowadays, produce and direct. And so I'm like, I have that, I truly feel that mindset of like you treat the PA like the director.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Like you treat everybody good. If you treat everybody good, then they're going to want to work with you. And even if you don't ever work with them again, they will always have something nice to say. When you come up in conversation, they will always be like, hey, Skylar was like so cool. He gave the the keys to the kingdom, he gave you whatever. And I'm like, that's the way I want people to see us. Yeah. Not as, oh, they're the new guys on the block and they're they screw, they like grow really big and no, I don't want to be that guy. I would love to see people see the success that influence has, but also feel like we're incredibly approachable, that like you can collaborate with us, you'll see us on set. Like we're not. There's there's plenty of attitude and ego in the film industry. I know, news flat spoiler alert! Ah, right. I don't want to be that. I don't want to contribute to that, and I don't want anyone on the team to have that sort of mindset where we're better than anybody, or that whatever, like no, like let's just all be.
SPEAKER_00Well, I mean, the best thing you can ever do on a on any creative project is hire people that are smarter than you or better than you.
SPEAKER_01My literal life motto is I don't have to be the smartest person in the room. I just have to surround myself with them.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Just just just hire them, get them on set. Um, all right. So then it sounds like right now you guys are just starting to kind of put the gears in motion for a more sustainable scaling strategy. It sounds like a little bit of a little bit of SEO, maybe some paid ads in the future. Yeah. Um, a lot of networking events, BNIs, um anything else that you guys are doing right now, the scale that you know maybe the average creative hasn't thought of?
SPEAKER_01I think the big thing that we're trying to really think about is we've we have grown really fast. Um and I think that when you're in growth mode and you are just running at 5,000 miles an hour, there's a couple things that happen. One is uh because we scaled really big, really fast, we took on a lot of expenses, we also took on a lot of revenue. I mean, we we have genuinely scaled from like two years ago having no clients to our goal this year was to do a million a year. So I'm like, that's a lot of change internally, externally, everything. So two things. One, how did we do it? I think is what we're trying to identify most is we ran so fast with our hands in so many things. I mean, obviously you brought that up, we have multiple verticals. How do we scale everything? How did we scale everything? How d like and I think that if you were to ask me genuinely, I would say, great question. Like I don't know that there's any one thing post-mortem to like figure it out. Yeah, we're we we've kind of come to the point now where we're like, okay, we did grow. Yeah. We are winning. But like, how did we do that other than running at 5,000 miles an hour? Because 5,000 miles an hour is not scalable. Like that's not sustainable either. Business is a marathon, not a sprint. And we just sprinted really hard for the last couple years. So let's let's turn it into relay mode here. Let's figure out how we did it, put together really strong systems so that we can duplicate it over and over and over again. So that's I would say uh the biggest thing that we've been focusing on. Um so that when we are scaling, we know why we're scaling. It's not uh a magic. Oh, hey, look, the number went up this month. You're like, oh but yeah. If if Skylar works 20 more hours this week, we'll probably make more money. I'm like, that it's just not, I don't want to do that no more.
SPEAKER_00And then don't even get started in going into like figuring out your mix divided hourly rate and all that other stuff, because that's just a whole rabbit hole that nobody needs to go down. Especially an entrepreneur, like respectfully, like we constantly work. Like too much. Yeah, too much, entirely too much. And even when you're sitting on the couch at the end of the day, your mind's going, wait, shit, did I do that? Yeah. Let me set a reminder for now.
SPEAKER_01You know, you spotted the CEMA really quick.
SPEAKER_00All right, so I want to get into uh another kind of nitty-gritty topic, uh, the discovery call. So, you know, like you said, you do a lot of selling and clearly you you must be good at it because you guys are targeting a million dollars a year. I congratulations.
SPEAKER_01I'm a little biased, but I think I've got it down pretty good.
SPEAKER_00I I I'm sure you probably do. Um, so give me like your top five things for what a creative needs to be looking out for on a discovery call and what they should be doing to help steer that client towards hopefully a successful, you know, closed deal, but also like a successful creative partnership. Because there are definitely discovery calls I get on where I'm like, ooh, there's some there's some red flags here. Like I can make you a sick video, but I'm not sure it's gonna help your business. So kind of walk me through your process there a little bit and kind of like give me some pointers for you know, not just myself, selfishly, but also anybody watching or listening, uh, to have better, more successful discovery calls.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So I think one of the first things that I really try to identify is are they even a target client to us? I think that as creatives, there's been plenty of times where I have a conversation and I know very quickly you're not in market. We are not in the same, like, hey, yeah, I'm I'm a HVAC company, I've got one truck driving, you're not my client. Immediately. I know that you're not because you haven't done anything thus far. And the like where influence positions ourselves, I know that the cost to do business with us, our minimum level of engagement, is likely more than you've ever spent on anything. So I think identifying, don't waste your time, you know, you'll sometimes be pleasantly surprised, but you can't be you you can't scale on virality, right? Yeah. When someone's like, Oh, I want to grow on social media, I just need things to go viral. Okay, great. You're gonna do that every time? Like, no, every now and then you'll hit a home run.
SPEAKER_00There is nothing more frustrating for a marketer than having someone come to you and just go, I just need to go viral. Yeah, okay, yeah, sure. Okay, what's your game plan for that?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, nothing goes viral on accident. So I think that's one of the first things is just determining. I've done sales for so long that I feel like it's so hard. I don't even know that I could say, oh, if you do this, this, and this, then you'll know that they're your ideal demographic. Like I couldn't say that. But I think that when you've done it enough, you just know right off the jump that either you're going to be selling or you're going to be selling, you know.
SPEAKER_00So are there are there like, you know, because we have all this data nowadays, you know, especially if you guys are, you know, looking up anybody on, you know, LinkedIn or anything. Um, are you looking for a specific like revenue size in business or like do you have any target personas that you know you're going after? Or like how deep does this go beyond just Skylar's gut?
SPEAKER_01Um, yes, short answer. Yes. I'm for and then now this is just for influence, right? Everybody's going to be a little bit different based on how much do they charge for their service and what kind of things are they doing, you know. Uh the list gets long. But for us, we have found that A, I want to be having a conversation with the decision maker, obviously. I don't want to be talking to the front desk lady pitching video ideas. Yeah. Um, I want to be talking to a decision maker. I want that business to be somewhere between two and five million dollars a year uh in revenue because I know that at that point they likely can afford us and or they are looking to potentially have something like that in-house.
SPEAKER_02Yep.
SPEAKER_01Um, and those are the two really, really big ones. From there, I'll also look at what are they doing now? Like what what available public media is out there? Are they doing something on social media? I'll look at their social media. How much like oh wow, these posts are trash, they have to know that. Like, they're people aren't stupid, like people are not married to their ideas a lot of times if it's bad ideas. So I'm like, okay, their content sucks, they're doing a lot in revenue, they don't have somebody internally, but they could. Now I feel confident that now it almost feels like I don't have to sell myself. Like they already know that they needed something like this. And I think for us too, we have a really solid reel. We have really good work to show. So, and this is where like my douchebaggery does come out because I'm like, I'll stack our content up against anybody. Like, I feel very confident that we make good stuff. So I'm like, okay, I don't have to worry about them thinking our video content or photography content is good. That's sold. Now it's about connecting with them as a person and being like, hey, wouldn't it be super sick if you could do this, this, and this, and this? Yeah. Where and and I think a lot of that honestly doesn't start with selling, it starts with listening. I I let people sell themselves more than not, um, where they're like, Oh, I really want to do XYZ and be like, oh, that'd be so cool. Like, if you did blah blah blah, yeah, that's what I was thinking too. Oh man, what a great idea. I prime example of this, and and Brian, if you're watching this, you he'll get a kick out of this, and now you know the the gig is up. But we just signed a new client um called PB Backdrops, and they make backdrops, but obviously, but their goal is to do these really elaborate uh trade show displays. Like it's not just like a photographer, I mean they do have photography backdrops, but their goal is like like they do the booths for like Nintendo or like Live Nation. Like they're doing these big elaborate things where like it's not just a backdrop, right? Yeah, and so he's talked about wanting to do something for like the Kentucky Derby, and so he's like, how cool would it be if we like we had a horse in the studio and like it looked weird at the I'm like, oh that's so sick, and then you could dress as a cowboy, like oh yeah, this would be awesome, blah blah blah. And he's like, I also want to do stuff in Vegas. I was like, okay, well, what if we used your backdrops to make it look like you're on a casino floor and then we brought in a slot machine and you're like pulling it, and you're like, Are you tired of gambling with your backdrops? Like, how cool would that be? And he'd be like, Oh, dude, that's such a great, yeah. And so at this point, I haven't sold him anything. He doesn't even know how much we cost, but now he's already in the mindset of like, this guy gets it. Like, and it wasn't that I got it, it was his idea. You were it was his idea. I just fostered his own idea. Like, I now everybody's got great ideas. This guy's got great ideas because it was his idea. Yeah, so I think that talk less, listen more. Um, there's a good YouTuber, content creator, agency owner guy that I watch pretty regularly. Uh oh gosh, Chris Dell. Okay. Um, The Future, if you ever heard the future. Um, and he's really good with sales. Really good with sales. Specifically in the creative area.
SPEAKER_00He's the he's the same guy who's got the bit on uh when he's breaking down a student who's like talking about logo design. Yes. And he's like, okay, so you want it faster, so you value time. Yeah. But no, I want it fast and good. So you do you value quality or do you value time? Yeah. You know, it's like so it comes back to that thing where like you're not paying me for the logo, you're paying me for the years of experience it took me to be able to do the logo. Yeah. You know, like the Nike logo was drawn on a napkin by a you know a designer and handed to them in 10 minutes. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01You know, like so it's it's all about the perceived value, yeah, right. It's the same same guy talks about going in uh the gentleman that designed Microsoft's logo charged Microsoft $50 million. And he said it took him about two weeks to like come up with a concept. Right? And it wasn't because his time was like worth 50 million, like if you were breaking it down by an hourly rate. Yeah, it was what is it worth to this company? Yeah, what is the problem that I'm solving? And so I think we also look at that, and I think that was a big shift too. Was I don't sell us as a cheap agency, I don't sell us as dude, you're gonna make so much money if you work with like that's not the point. If you were really truly like, I just want to make a bunch of money, we're probably I don't want to say we're not the agency for you, like we're not gonna make you money, but like it's so much more than that. Yeah, if you're just ready to make money, well, go run Facebook ads.
SPEAKER_00Like go go do whatever like you can you can make money with an iPhone and a really good targeting campaign on Facebook.
SPEAKER_01Sell more, join a B and I. I I mean there's lots of different things you can do to make money. If you're looking to increase brand visibility, let's have a conversation. Like, we're gonna help you grow your brand to a whole nother level, like, and that's guaranteed. But I'm not gonna I'm not gonna dish you some BS number and be like, oh, you hire us, I'm gonna double your revenue. Like it's just those kinds of conversations. Every single business has heard that at some point. Yeah, like I don't want to get on a sales call, sell you hard. Uh, and this is actually kind of I think really helps coming from that automotive agency as we learn how to sell cars. Cars are one of the hardest things to sell because when someone comes on the lot, they're like, I'm just looking, just looking. Yeah, like you've dealt with a pushy salesman every time. Everybody has. And so, how do you break the barrier? How do you get to people? And uh the chief of operation of that company said something to me, and I'll never forget it, and I still use it today. It's the first person to speak dies. That's and it sounds so extreme. But I mean that's selling cars, yeah. Like that's right. That that was the whole thing. Is he's like, okay, you know, when a car salesman takes a sheet to a customer and says, All right, so these are the three monthly payments we've got for you based on what you're you know, approved for your credit. Go ahead and circle the one that makes the most sense to you and we'll get that started right away. And the person looks at it and they're like, Oh, geez, I mean, I was really hoping for less and blah, blah, blah. And the first reaction is from be like, oh, well, you know, like, well, this is why we charge what we charge for the cars, and yeah, and and well, and and the place down the road, they charge what uh and it's like just mouth vomit. Like you're just like trying to explain and sell services. Yeah. Instead, it's which which one do you want? You don't you don't say anything. You don't have to justify your pricing. And I think that's something for us that we do is when someone's like, How much is that commercial gonna cost? I'm like, oh well, my guess is it's probably gonna cost somewhere right around 10,000.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And they're like, oh, geez. Uh well, and if I immediately like, well, that also includes post-production, and it's also gonna cover the cost of the copyright of the music, and we're gonna we're gonna bring this. And by the way, we provide lunch on set. Uh I'm like, they don't care. They don't care what you're provide, it's the number.
SPEAKER_00The client will never care that you provide crafty for your crew. They don't care the client, also most likely won't provide crafty unless you've got a really awesome client. I got a couple of clients that are so good about feeding me and my crew, and they are my favorite humans.
SPEAKER_01We so we require it. It is a thing for us at least.
SPEAKER_00I mean, I I as a human being personally require it. Like, if nobody feeds my crew, like I will I will absolutely bend over backwards to grub hub something to the set. Like, no, it's you take care of your crew because they're the ones taking care of you. But 100%. Um No, I think that you you touched on a lot of really great points there. So if I were to break it down, you know, make sure you're talking to a qualified decision maker first off, somebody who has money to spend and also has the authority to spend that money. Um make sure that you are listening more than you're talking. You want to know what problems they're trying to solve, what frustrations they're facing, you want to know their ideas, you want to know how they see things so that you can kind of feed off of that and help better balance ideas around and and you know just get that relationship going. Um and then you also want to make sure that you're you know not shooting yourself in the foot on second guessing yourself on price, which I feel like, especially for creatives, is insanely hard because we're all like, oh my god, I got paid to do something with a camera. Oh my god, my life is so good. But like that's that's only true in so far as like I still got bills to pay, I still got mouths to feed.
SPEAKER_01People forget like you're doing this for a living. Stephen, even Stefan and I, when we very first got together, Stefan and I butted heads where I was like, I don't think we should do anything for less than a thousand dollars. And he was like, What? Like, how's that's a lot of money? Like, that's a what businesses can just confidently write thousand dollars? I'm like, dude, lots. Lots of businesses.
SPEAKER_00Thousand dollars is not a lot of money for a lot of businesses to do that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I'm like, no, listen, we're we are not doing anything for less than a thousand dollars, like doesn't matter what we're doing, that's that's the rate, blah blah. And then we we grow from there, and then we just continue to raise our pricing and whatever. We got to dress for the job we want, not the job we have. Like, and he's like, Oh good. And then quickly we found like, oh, okay, yeah, we're good. You'd be so surprised when you give somebody a number that everyone's afraid to give a high number or give a number above what they are what they are so confident in being able to receive, yeah, that I think that limits growth.
SPEAKER_00I I do think that there's and this is probably the biggest tip that I could give to any creative talking about pricing too, is that you can't let whoever you're talking to smell blood in the water. Like, if they sense, like if you say, Yeah, for this project, you're looking at $40,000. And that sounds like, hey, for this project you're looking at like, I don't know, $40,000. Like, if they think that it sounds like a lot of money for you, they're gonna be like, oh, I don't know about that. Like, do you know what you're doing? Like, it sounds like maybe you've never invoiced for this much money before. You know, so that's like I think one of the most successful tips you can have is like when you talk pricing, like you're just dropping facts. Facts. This is the thing.
SPEAKER_01There is no or best offer at the end of it either.
SPEAKER_00This I have I mean, I mean I've had clients come back to me and be like, hey, like this is like 1500 more than we're you know, we've got a lot to spend. Like, where can we cut a little fat? You know, or like where can can we work on this at all? Yeah, and like, yeah, I'll I'll work on you. Like, yeah, sure. Well, we know I can go without a PA. You know, like we can we can figure out something. Sure. You know, we can cut our post-production time or pre-production time, whatever it is, you know, like we can figure something out. Like, it's not, I don't think, overly rude to ask, as long as they're not like Facebook Marketplace offers or something where it's like would you take half of this budget?
SPEAKER_01And sometimes scaling it's kind of funny because sometimes scaling looks like a creative offer. Like we've gotten plenty of times where businesses come to us and been like, hey, I know that you told us it was gonna be five thousand a month for some social media videos. Uh we can do less than that, we could do three thousand a month, but what if we throw in XYZ service? You know, like we're we're literally doing that right now. There's a coffee shop that wants to work with us. And they were like, hey, uh we can't really swing you guys as full ray, but we don't want to shortchange you. We really want to work with you guys. Um, so what if we do this price, but we also give you and your entire team uh just a free access, unlimited coffee tab. You can come and get coffee anytime you want. And we have another location in downtown Phoenix.
SPEAKER_00Uh and we think it'd be a really good thing.
SPEAKER_01Well, it gets better. They were like, what if you know we have a whole building there that we don't really know what to do with? So what if we give that to you guys and you guys could have a second location? You can have a photography studio or a podcast studio in downtown Phoenix, and it's right next to the coffee shop, you get free coffee all day. And I'm like, okay, cool. So we didn't get the 5,000 we wanted, but now they're offering us.
SPEAKER_00They're sweeping the hell out of the deal with you know.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, they're like, hey, but how would you like a second studio?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. You know, and I'm like, We've already had first studio, ah, yes, but what about second studio?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and I'm like, okay, yeah. That makes a lot of sense. Okay, now I'm listening. So I'm like, don't be afraid to take creative deals either. But I think at the same time, you shouldn't be you shouldn't feel apologetic. Like, no, never apologize for your prices.
SPEAKER_00You know, I think that that that comes with age and experience and understanding the true time and cost that goes into things. Like, there's so many variables that nobody ever sees. You know, when like when you charge for a day of filming, the client never sees like the day before of prep, then the you know, waking up four hours early to pack the car.
SPEAKER_01You know, well they don't know how much anything costs. Yeah, they don't know how to do that. They're shocked when they're like, oh, by the way, all this camera equipment on set today is $200,000. And they're like, and I'm like, yeah, so no, we can't film your video for $500. We'll never make our money back.
SPEAKER_00I love it when I get somebody that asks me to do something for literally less than the price it would cost them to rent one of my cameras from like Lens ProtoGo or something. You know, I'm like, I can literally show you what you asked me to do this with, like, you can't even access the tools and I literally just did that the other day uh for a podcast client.
SPEAKER_01Uh this lady reached out and said, Hey, I want to do 27, no, 27 podcasts, each podcast to have three cut downs of each of the podcasts, and then a few highlight videos of the event this podcast is happening at. So it was like total all the deliverables, it was 108 deliverables. Jeez. Uh and they were like, My budget is $4,000.
SPEAKER_00And I was like, You needed to provide this. This isn't just post. This is like recording, filming, post, yeah. And post. That's like how much just the post for that would cost.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, no, no, no. And so I was like, okay, cool. That does not work. And they're like, well, I feel like it, you know, the last guy, I was like, well, here, let me break it down for you. And I like took the time to like break it down. I was like, hey, based on what you're asking, we would make 47 cents an hour. No, we cannot work for 47 cents an hour. I don't know who we I was like, if your guys are really that good the before, I was like, let me know who they are. Like, I have a full-time job for them. Yeah. Like whoever's working for 47 cents an hour, that's crazy, dude. Yeah. So I I'll sometimes take the time to like break it down, but yeah, don't be afraid of that either.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, don't be afraid to say no. I definitely am at the point where I only break down things by baseline items. You know, if people really want to like break breakdown, which I have had some CFOs like ask for before final approval and things at occasion, I'll get like real nitty-gritty with it. But like for the most part, it's just like, hey, this is the price range you're looking at, depending on you know the final variables. Uh and that's like that's that, you know. Yeah. Uh, and that works infinitely better. But all right, so we've talked about scaling, we've talked about discovery calls. Um it sounds like you guys are about to be scaling even more, which I'm very intrigued by and excited for. Um rounding things out here. What is something that you think that past you, maybe even pre-influence you, could learn from where you're at today? If you could go back and tell yourself, hey, do this, what would you what would you perhaps, what's a lesson that you could have learned sooner?
SPEAKER_01I think a couple things. I think a big one is I did well, number one, I didn't have a mentor when I got into this. Um I didn't have anybody that taught me the ropes. I dropped out of film school. I didn't so I don't I didn't graduate with a degree in TV and media. Like I I I graduated from YTU, YouTube University. Um so there was a lot of mistakes. Uh there was a lot of learning um that had to happen to get to where we're at today, and still so much more learning to to come for us to get where we want to go. Um I think one of the things I struggled with in the beginning was not understanding the power of collaboration up front. It was very much just me. Like I would bring on creators as I got bigger budgets. I was like, okay, I can hire a DP, I can hire a PA, I can, you know, whatever, as I got really where I what I thought was like big budgets at that point. Um, but I felt like there was a lot on me to just figure it out. I think that if I would go back, I would say be more collaborative, be more open, talk to more people, network with other people in the industry. I think that being in the Seattle market, very different than the Phoenix market. It is not a sense of like a spirit of collaboration. Um, there are the like good old boys' club in regards to like it's the same DP, it's the same AC, it's the same AD, you know, like just like you know you're getting that crew. That it's on all the big commercials that come to town, it's not as big of a market, his here. So it's like imagine if you went on set and it's like every set you saw David, and every set you saw it was this, it was like that every time. And so I think that pushed me to be more like, okay, well, I'm gonna have to make the opportunity for myself, which is fine. It got me where I was here. But I think that if I would have been more collaborative, if I would have networked with more people, um it's also kind of hard to say because I'm here now. So I'm like, if I would have done something differently, like Would you still have ended up here?
SPEAKER_00I wrestle with that all the time 'cause people have asked me, What would you do differently? And I'm like I'm not sure 'cause I can only see the path that led me here today, and I'm pretty friggin' happy where I'm at. Yeah. But like I don't know what I would have done differently.
SPEAKER_01I th I think one thing, if there's one thing we've learned recently, uh, and I don't even know that we struggled as much, but I like I feel like for other people that are trying to do what we're doing is we scaled really fast um without sustainable processes along the way. So there was a lot of like, I don't know if you call them mistakes, but missed opportunity to blueprint it. Um where we were like, okay, we were doing this thing and it made a bunch of money, this is great. There's no way we can continue to do that. We gotta pivot. We gotta like, there's something's gotta give. And so I think everyone wants to make a bunch of money, everyone wants to be successful yesterday. Um, but nobody knows what it takes to get to that point.
SPEAKER_00And so I feel like nobody ever sees all the you know sleepless nights, the all the failed attempts first, like yeah, you know, there's uh behind every overnight success, there's years of hard work. A hundred percent.
SPEAKER_01So I think almost just breathing. Like, if you if I could go back and tell first starting Skylar, they're like, hey, by the way, this is not a sprint, like this is a marathon, like this is not a good thing. Yeah, I I'm let's see, this next year it'll be year 11. This was year 10, a decade I've been doing this. So I'm like, if I could go back 10 years ago and say, hey, you got time, I think that would mitigate the the last decade of me just like running at 5,000 miles. Yeah. I'm like, I can't wait to get right. I and I don't know that I ever will. My wife always says, like, you never will. I'm like, okay, we're just we're all so close. If we just do this one more thing, and she's like, oh yeah, sure, whatever, bro. And she knows she knows just as well as I do that we're gonna hit the next thing and then we're gonna be like, and now we can do this. Yeah, and like, oh, now we can do this.
SPEAKER_00It's a never-ending selection of achievements because like uh what's the expression? Like, it's your obligation to achieve them. So like when you get there, you're just like, damn, well, on to the next one. On to the next one. Yeah, no.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's like, uh, who is it? I think it was it Ryan Reynolds, Matthew McConaughey, one of those hot hunks. They were saying, My my hero is me in five years.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's a McConaughey quote.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and it's like and then in five years, my hero is me in five years, and then he just keeps on doing that. And I think that's kind of how it's been, but I also think it's important to like recognize the wins too, and I've sucked at that my entire career. Is I'll get to the next point, and I'm like, okay, sick, but God, we're so far from the next one. Okay, what are we doing to get to the next one? Like, we don't like look back and be like, wow, this is crazy. Like, anyone else seeing this? You know, like we don't, we never, none of us ever do that.
SPEAKER_00You're gonna stop, reflect, enjoy, and then centurize on the next thing.
SPEAKER_01I think it'll it'll lead to less burnout because there's been plenty of burnout moments where I'm like, you know what? I think I'm gonna go get a job at Burger King. This is I could go flip burgers right now and sometimes make more money.
SPEAKER_00I mean, how a lot every once in a while there's a job post that comes across LinkedIn and I'm like, how much is that salary? Yeah, like hold on a minute. I can just talk in and talk out. 100%. No, but I think that the idea of it being a marathon, not a sprint, uh definitely going back and stopping to celebrate your wins, even if you felt like it was always your obligation to achieve them. Like, uh I think that is also a uniquely entrepreneur thing where you know we we in a healthy way want to continually grow.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, not to the point where like it becomes unsustainable in of itself, uh, or we start to compromise either our values or the people around us, but like you always want to keep growing. And so once you achieve another growth phase, you're like, cool, what's the next one? You know, and that's very like that's very par for the course. I've heard that from a million different entrepreneurs.
SPEAKER_01Well, it I think that it it's a blessing and a curse because we're at these size now where I feel like when you're first starting, you can make mistakes. Oh, yeah. Like your whole life, you know, yeah, you're trying to grow a business, and yeah, you're making money, maybe it pays your bills mostly, maybe it doesn't. You know, like you're figuring it out. There's so much less pressure today. Like, there's no room for mistakes. Like, I'm I'm responsible for everybody. Like this is a multi-million dollar machine that it's like if that comes crashing down, it's not just you. We're all screwed. You know, like this is this is not good. So I think now it's harder, even more now than before, to stop and be like, nice. Because it's like, okay, well, I can't I can't let off the gas anymore. Like, so I think if I would have built a system that was a little bit easier to do that, not looking at it as a sprint, grown sustainably, don't not growing outside. There's plenty of times that we've overleveraged ourselves. And again, because Stefan and I are like, we're gonna make it happen. We've just ended it, we're like, why do we do that? That was so stupid. Like we like we are just making more work for ourselves. And then we're like, Oh, you ready to do it again?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, you know, so no, I've uh I've gone twice this year working more than 30 consecutive days. And it's always at the end of those 30 days, I'm like, damn, I really just kind of let everything pile up all at once, you know. Yeah where I said yes to like one too many jobs in the span of something, and I'm like, Oh, I'm never gonna do this again. And then like after like 10 days, you're like, I could I could do that again.
SPEAKER_01I can do that again. You know, I I think it's different now for me. I'm a dad, I've got two kids and a wife, and there was a stint of about a year, and I feel like it really put it into perspective for me, where I was just genuinely working a lot. I was I was saying yes to everything I possibly could. Um, and we ended up doing a pilot series for Amazon Prime, and it required that I was flying two to three times a month to somewhere else in the country, and I was gone for nearly a week at a time. So I I will never forget two things. One, I miss my daughter's first steps. That sucks as a parent. Like I'll never leave that down. And there was another time where I was flying out, it was late at night, I flew out early in the morning, and I'm getting my kids ready for bed, and I'm giving my son a hug, and I was like, Alright, buddy, I'll be back in a few days. And he's like, You're leaving again? And I was like, Yeah. I was like, But I'll it's only a couple days this time, I'll be back soon. And he was like, Why do you always gotta go travel for work? Uh and I was like, Well, who else is gonna buy your toys? And he looks now, mind you, he's seven now. I think he was five or six, like it was a year or two ago that he said this, but he was like, Dad, I have enough toys. You don't have to go. Oh and I was like, nah, for sure, fuck me. Like, I was like, No, you're right, like I suck for sure. I was like, in my head, like you're doing it for the right reasons and you're providing and whatever. But I think that in the creative world, it's like art, you're always the starving artist, no matter how far down the line you get. And then you look back and you didn't celebrate the moments, you didn't realize that wow, this this sucks. Like in some areas, like people see the success, people see that it's working, you see the the big bank account, whatever, and then you realize like what did it take to get there? And so I think that's something we're looking at now. We're like, I'm I still work a lot, but I haven't flown in over a year. I September of last year was the last time that I flew. I was like, okay, I'm not gonna fly anymore unless I need to fly. Okay. And so Stefan will fly more. He's cool with flying, cool. Uh, the rest of the gang, they'll fly, cool. They were just in Florida. Um, but I'm like, unless I need to be there, I'm gonna, I'm gonna stay home. I stopped working weekends. I'm like, I'm not, listen, I need at least a couple days to spend with the family, even if we're not doing anything. Like, we're just around, you know, we're sitting at the house watching a show or like literally doing our own thing in the house. At least I'm not working.
SPEAKER_00There is bliss to just be with the people that you love. There really is. Um, no, I think that's an excellent point. And I I don't have kids, yeah, uh, but I do have a wife, and we could do a whole separate episode on the uh ridiculous working conditions. She loves everything you do. Yes. Uh on how grateful we have to be for our spouses because they put up with a lot of shit. Like a lot. Like we're gone a lot, we work weird hours, we're occasionally working on weird projects and frustrated over dumb things. Like, there's a lot that they have to put up with in order for us to be able to do this. But um, I do think that that is one lesson I've absolutely internalized, not just from you know, our time talking here today, but uh from other entrepreneurs that I've seen and talked to over the years, is not sacrificing all of those moments for just building faster, knowing full well you're gonna get there anyway. So, like from day one, like, yeah, I still work weekends, like I've got a weekend shoot books before the end of the year, but like I don't work every weekend. You know, I try very hard to work Monday through Friday, to book only gigs Monday through Friday. I know very well that like yeah, I travel probably 25 plus times a year right now. I'm on a plane. Uh, but like that won't be sustainable in the long, long term, you know. So I do really appreciate those insights because it is something that I have to remind myself sometimes in my own journey that like, yeah, I'm growing a little bit slower, but like it that's by choice. And it's because I'm trying not to be a few years. You're still gonna get there.
SPEAKER_01And it is that it's that marathon, not a sprint. And I think it's kind of funny because I look back on that the pilot series that I was traveling so much for, yeah, that I'm like, it like it was shelved.
SPEAKER_00Like I was gonna ask what the show was, but yeah, no, it got shelved.
SPEAKER_01It was called Charisma. Uh, and it was really fun shooting it. It was all about exotic manufacturers. Like, if you were part of the 1%, how would you live? And so we got to drive cars, like unreleased supercars. We got to stay at these exotic hotels, like the London, like we got to eat at the most like we went to a dinner one night, and for me, Stefan, and another producer, it was $8,600.
SPEAKER_02Oh my god.
SPEAKER_01Totally comped by the restaurant. It was the most amazing thing in the world. We're having a time of our life doing it, but then I look back and I'm like, like, I traded my life, like a year, a year and a half of my life, and like missing my daughter's first steps, and my son being like, I don't even need toys, bro. Like when you're when your child is like, I got enough toys, you could just stay home. I'm like, that's how you know. Like if a kid is even like, no, I don't even want the toys. I'm like, that's how you know that there's something like you went, you went, you took the wrong path at some point. That's like that's a good kid too, though. Like let's be honest. It's a good kid. He's a good kid. He is a good kid. So I'm like, I I think going back, tell Skylar that. You know, tell other people that are trying to get to this point, is like it's it's a marathon. Yeah like don't don't take it so seriously. We all die in the end, you know.
SPEAKER_00Like the the the the story ends the same way for all of us. Okay, we're all taking a dirt nap at some point.
SPEAKER_01Some point.
SPEAKER_00Um all right, very good, very good. Well, we're almost at our time here, so I want to end with our two two kind of lightning round questions, which are give me a hot take in the creative industry. All right, something that, you know, might be a little controversial, might get the people going. Okay. Uh, and give me something inspiring, educational, like what's something that people should go check out, uh, or something that you've recently checked out that kind of you know either sparked a little creative spirit in you, or is something that you would like learn something and be like, oh my god, wow.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Okay. Hot take. I'm gonna go a little goofy with it. I think I know even more hot, I know. Superhero movies are trash. I say it every single time. I and I think it's because I'm on the business side of it that I see that all the Marvel movies are just cash grabs. And people buy it every single time. So my hot take is I'm like, Iron Man, don't don't care. Literally don't care. Superman, don't care. Batman, don't care. Avengers, don't care. Uh that is my hot take, and every single time someone's like, oh, like, oh, did you watch the new whatever? I'm like, no, and I never will. I literally don't care about superhero movies. They've just been done time and time and time again. It feels like every time they come out with a new like superhero movie, it's like Fast and Furious 35. I'm like, okay, we get it. The world is gonna end, and then they save it. No, I'm all I'm I'm over. So that's my hot take. If you like superhero movies, you suck.
SPEAKER_00I have I have one friend who I I'm gonna need to soundbite this and send to because he's just gonna I can already Excuse Skyler. Yeah, I can like sense the disturbance in the force already. Um because I don't think that all I don't think that all superhero movies suck, but I do think the vast majority of them suck. They do, um, and they are the same story over and over again. So no, it's that's a it's a good hot take. Yeah, that's my hot take. Um Alright, and then what like what's something inspirational, educational, like what's what's something you've either uh seen or consumed or read or watched recently that's kind of got you going?
SPEAKER_01Um I this is if you know me, you've heard this. Um I am a big, big consumer of knowledge. Uh like I'll be in the shower and I'll watch a business podcast. I'm driving down the road, listening to an audiobook. Like I do that regularly. Um, but there's one book that I think that everybody on the planet should read, and it's called Finish: Giving Yourself the Gift of Done uh by John Acoff. If you've never read it, you're missing out. The premise of the book is how to finish, like how to complete tasks uh and achieve your goals, but sustainably. Um, and I'll give you a good example, uh, and this is a really good one for creatives, is there's a topic in there called noble obstacles, is what he calls it. Is I didn't achieve what I wanted to achieve because XYZ and it's hidden behind this noble cause. Oh, I called out of work today, I didn't finish that edit today, but because I was hanging out with the family. And it was like, okay, well, you can't hate on them for that. But then it was like, but actually you stayed home and played video games, your family was just in the house. You know, like did were you actually not achieving your goals? Yeah, like were you actually hanging out with your family? Like, hang out with your family. I just went on a whole tangent about that, right? Like hang out with your family. Yeah, but people are people are never going to say that you know they suck. Nobody wants to admit that they suck. Um, and I think that's something for me early on where I'd be like, oh, you know, I'm not where I want to be because you know, oh I I was really sick that day. No, I wasn't, I just didn't want to do anything. I was lazy and I called it the common flu. Like I that's what it was. And so it's really, really good. And also about just achieving your goals sustainably. Everyone would rather say they lost 100 pounds once than saying they lost 10 pounds 10 times, you know, like those achievable, measurable, trackable goals as opposed to saying, I want to be the biggest agency in Arizona, I want to be the biggest production company in Arizona. Well, like how about you start with Glendale? Like how about you start with like in a five-mile radius of you? Like, how about you start here before you attack here? You know? Um, and so after I've listened to it multiple times now, and I tell everybody it's so fast. They literally have an audible book. It'll take you four hours to listen to it. The author is the narrator too. Oh, that's right. So he's a really funny guy. Like he reads it in a really like creative way. Like it's not like I love that.
SPEAKER_00I'm a big audio book person, you know, because I just I I do enjoy reading. Majority of my bookshelf is all non-fiction, which drives my wife crazy because she's like, please God, read fiction. Yeah. Um, so I started to branch out a little bit, but Audible is like my number one way to consume books. Like, it is the perfect thing, like walking the dog, going for a drive, like whatever it is, like Audible is my favorite.
SPEAKER_01So I I for a long time had Audible, and I would just get a new self-help business book, $100 million leads, finish, uh, Green Light, Matthew McConaughey. I'm like, I'm just like every month I would just get a new book uh and I would just listen to it. I'm like in the shower listening to a book. I'm whatever. I'm on the computer listening to a book. I'm just even if you can't like physically read it, I hate physically reading. I don't have like I do not have the time to sit down and just it also like it puts me to sleep.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'm like I I will conk out. Yeah. It could be the middle of the day.
SPEAKER_01I'm gonna be like consuming content is definitely a digital experience for me at this point.
SPEAKER_00All right, sweet. Well, uh Finish by John Akoff. John Akoff. Uh I'm gonna have to look it up because I think A-C-U-F F.
SPEAKER_01Acuff. Akoff? Acuff. He says, I think he says an ACOF.
SPEAKER_00I don't know.
SPEAKER_01You say, if you type in Finish, it's a New York Times bestseller. You'll you'll you'll get it.
SPEAKER_00I'm gonna look it up after this because I have not read it. Um but uh I do I do enjoy uh a good self-help book or a good entrepreneurial book. Uh very much so. So well, thank you, Skylar, so much for taking the time to chat with us today. Um I really appreciate it. I love, like I said, I love learning from folks just a little bit further along the path than myself, and uh really appreciate you being an open book about things here today.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. It is my pleasure, it is an honor. Thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. Well, thank you all as well for spending a little time with us today. Whether you watched or listened, I really appreciate it. If there is any guest industry topic, whatever that you'd like to see us cover, please let me know down in the comments below or shoot me an email to hello at hardcopymedia.com. And you know, I it it's come on guys, I gotta ask. Like like, share, subscribe, you know, all the algorithm things. Uh, we gotta keep those those algorithm gods happy. So if you found any part of this informative or useful, or there's any creative in your life who might have learned something from today's discussion, please uh share this with them or give us a like uh or a comment or a share or anything down there to you know help bump us up the algorithm. But uh thank you so much again for spending some time with us, and we will see you in the next one.