Latest / The High Ground / Why You Don't Need a Full-Time CMO Yet | ft. Simon Dell

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Why You Don't Need a Full-Time CMO Yet | ft. Simon Dell · The High Ground

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  My guest today ran a marketing agency that he'll
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  happily tell you he ran terribly. Then he took
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  everything he learned and built one of the biggest
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  fractional marketing networks in Australia. He's
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  mentored over 300 businesses and he's seen every
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  single marketing mistake there is to make. This
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  is an honest conversation about what's actually
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  working in marketing for normal businesses from
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  someone who got it wrong before. Before we get
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  started, over 90 % of people watching the podcast
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  aren't actually subscribed and we release conversations
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  like this every single week. So make sure you
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  subscribe to the podcast down below. Welcome
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  to the podcast. Thank you. Thank you for having
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  me. You're actually the first guest since we've
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  rebranded the podcast. Okay. Which is very exciting.
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  I feel honored. Bit of a privilege. So let's
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  get straight into your story pretty much. You
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  know, you started off in the marketing industry,
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  actually marketing beer. Yes. Which is obviously
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  a bit different to where you are now. So how
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  did you get into that? Yeah, I was in sales in
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  the beer industry for a long time. I'd actually
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  gone from hospitality roles back in London, working
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  in bars and nightclubs and things like that.
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  And that takes its toll after a while. There's
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  only so many 4 a .m. finishes that you can do,
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  no matter how fun they are sometimes. So I sort
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  of transitioned from running hospitality venues
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  to working in sales for what was Bass Brewers
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  at the time. So that was one of the biggest breweries
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  in the UK. famous because it's the it's the oldest
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  trademark and the oldest trademark logo I think
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  in the world or something like that so so I went
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  from I went from that sales did sales for about
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  five or six years and then when I'd moved here
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  I was I into Australia I continued in sales and
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  then sort of within a year of being here transitioned
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  into a marketing team so yeah that was I didn't
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  even want to think when that was, what year that
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  was, because that makes it sound so long ago.
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  And I think the sales background was super helpful.
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  I think anyone who goes into marketing or anybody
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  who goes into anything really should spend three
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  or four years trying to sell something because
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  it really helps you in everything that you do
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  in life. I think even if you're just starting
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  a business full stop, understanding the fundamentals
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  of sales and how sales works. And like you said,
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  having that hands -on experience just makes it
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  so much easier. It's being able to communicate
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  and talk to people who are perhaps, you may have
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  met 30 seconds ago. Yes. And being able to sort
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  of adjust your approach and your pitch depending
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  on who they are and what they need. And being
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  able to do that sort of on the fly as you talk
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  to them. And so I think that's one important
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  part of sales. And I think the other important
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  part of sales is really, really, really understanding
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  your product. Understanding what it is that you're
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  selling, the ins and outs of it. I think as soon
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  as you do that, sales becomes so much easier.
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  Oh, 100%. I found, so we've just actually done
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  a rebrand. We're Bordaria now. And previously
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  we were Adonis Media. Previously, you have the
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  agency model of, you know, you come to me, you
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  want lead gen, we'll do you lead gen. You come
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  to me for a website, you'll do a website. But
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  that's not how marketing actually works. You
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  know, you need a full system there. Yeah. So
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  before when we had, you know, just we'll do anything
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  you want, it was a bit like, oh, yeah, like we
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  can help you. Whereas now it's like, this is
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  what we do. This is the impact we can have on
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  you. When you're selling, it doesn't come across
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  as selling. You just actually believe in yourself.
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  You believe in your product. You believe in what
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  you can do. Yeah, absolutely. And I think the
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  other challenge with selling a lot of the time
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  is that, and this goes from whether I'm walking
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  into a pub in East London 25 years ago or whether
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  you're talking to a tech company in Brisbane.
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  Most of the time, they don't know what they want.
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  Most of the time, they have no idea. They have
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  a problem, but they don't know how they want.
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  to solve it or how it should be solved you know
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  and i talked we talked later on about diagnosis
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  and things like that but the first challenge
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  i think in any sales process is to understand
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  the problem they think they have yeah not necessarily
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  the problem they do have but at least the problem
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  they think they have and then you can talk to
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  that and and introduce what you do and how you
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  can help them and things like that. What they
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  think they have is usually never what's actually
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  the problem. I often use the analogy of going
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  to a mechanic is that if something's wrong with
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  your car, all you know is that there's a light
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  on. But you don't know, if you're not completely
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  savvy with what cars do, you know there's a light
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  on, you know there's a problem. For you to then
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  go into the mechanic and go, it's this thing
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  in the car. is deluded and stupid because it
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  might not be that thing in the car. You know
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  there's a light on, but it could be one of a
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  number of different things. So your job is to
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  then give it to the mechanic and ask the mechanic
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  to go and see what the problem is and trust that
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  the mechanic's going to do the right thing and
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  tell you what the problem is to stop the light
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  coming on. So that's how I kind of see it from
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  a business perspective is that most businesses
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  have got a light on. They think they might know
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  what the problem is, but invariably it's not.
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  It's not what they think it is. I love that analogy.
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  That is like spot on exactly what it is. And,
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  you know, you have people that they might go
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  to like somebody that does a website and then
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  they're like, oh, yeah, you need a new website.
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  When it's not actually, you know, the website
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  could be a multitude of different things and
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  having that full revenue system. So how did you
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  end up getting into CMO? Because you founded
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  that within 2020. Yeah, that's a long story.
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  It depends how long we've got here. So I got
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  into marketing. I then got out of marketing.
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  I didn't get fired from working with Lion Nathan.
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  It was one of those kind of ones where they suggested
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  I leave. One of those conversations. It actually
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  offered me a job in Sydney. They were like, hey,
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  we think you should go to Sydney or we think
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  you should leave, which was probably a fair assessment
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  at the time. And if I'd gone to Sydney, they
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  were offering me a job sort of in the marketing
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  and branding team, which, again, on reflection,
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  I should have taken. I can't change my mind 20
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  years later. So then I kind of went out, ran
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  an agency a bit for myself, did a terrible, terrible
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  job. That's a whole other story, Mike. That's
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  a whole other story. Which is something you speak
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  very, not proudly on, but quite confidently on,
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  that you ran it very bad. Oh, it was terrible.
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  Not a lot of people can come out and say that
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  they ran that business terribly. I can make a
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  long list of all the things that I've done very
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  badly. I always say to people, I was in a band
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  in the UK. So this would have been early 2000s,
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  late 90s. We were just terrible. I still have
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  the music and I still listen back to it sometimes.
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  It's on my iTunes and every now and then it comes
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  on rotation. And I'm just like, oh God, it's
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  terrible. It's really bad. And funnily enough,
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  I still talk to one of the band members. He's
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  still a friend of mine. He's in the UK. And we
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  joke about how dreadful we were. But I think
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  that's a fantastic self -actualizing kind of
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  thing that you can do is accept that you are
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  not good at certain things or that you've done
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  something extremely badly because that's the
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  only way that you're going to get any better
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  at something is to admit that you were bad. But
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  yeah, that business was just... What were some
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  of the things that you would categorize as running
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  it terribly? I went into business with the wrong
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  people. So I had business partners. Now, that's
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  not a slight on them. It was just not the right
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  people. We were not the right people to be together
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  running a company. So I think that was number
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  one. The second thing was believing that the
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  more staff that you had, the better your business
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  was. I kind of had this thing about we wanted
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  a big team. You know, it was that sort of egotistical
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  kind of, hey, we've got 15 staff and all this
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  kind of stuff. And the main mistake there was
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  going, hey, let's hire someone and then fill
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  up their capacity rather than wait until you've
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  got almost too many clients. and too much work
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  before you hire someone. So there's a balance
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  between doing that because you obviously don't
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  want to piss off your clients. But yeah, I kind
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  of had this obsession with having staff. And
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  all you need when you've got that big team is
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  one or two bad months and you're dead. You're
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  in a lot of pain. And we were. And it wasn't
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  so that we had the bad months because we were
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  kind of consistently growing. But what we had
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  was two or three clients that were very, very
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  slow in paying us. Yeah. So that was one. And
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  then we had one client that just point blank
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  refused to pass. And at the time, it was about,
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  I think, $40 ,000, which doesn't seem a huge
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  amount. But all of a sudden, that put a complete
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  sort of spanner in the works in terms of cash
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  flow and paying people and all that sort of thing.
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  And then you spend a lot of time trying to chase
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  that money. And that's just, you know. And then
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  at that point, I realized we weren't ever going
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  to get it. So you're then going, shit, we're
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  in trouble here. Yeah. Honestly, there was a
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  category of... There was a category of things
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  that we did, you know, wrong. Sorry, different
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  categories of things that we did wrong. You know,
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  people, financial management, all this kind of
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  thing. We produced some great work and we had
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  some really great people working for us. And,
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  you know, I was very proud to say that a lot
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  of them have gone on and still doing really,
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  really good things in very senior roles. But
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  yeah, it was, yeah, it was a fuck up. But I feel
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  like a lot of those things that you've pointed
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  out are quite common in business. Just like very
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  common. And especially with the cash flow, I
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  feel like in the marketing industry, it's very
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  common for people to say, oh, I'm not going to
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  pay you that then. We still see it now. You know,
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  we still have people who are just going to go,
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  you know, we have a big client in Sydney that
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  just doesn't pay us. I mean, they do pay us,
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  but they're slow and they're late and we chase
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  them 10 times and then they pay us. And we've
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  tried. you know, in this new business to move
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  everybody into a system where they're either
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  paying up front or they're on direct debit or
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  all those kinds of things. And that has kind
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  of helped massively. And we put security deposits
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  in place. So if they don't pass, they lose their
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  security deposit. So that has been super helpful
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  and has really, you know, soften the blow of
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  people being difficult, but it still happens.
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  Yeah. And sometimes you just go, I mean, we've
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  had one client that has, we've worked with now
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  for, Must be coming up to about ten years now.
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  Maybe eight years. Never paid us on time. Ever.
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  Ever. And we just sit there and go, but they've
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  paid us. You know it's coming. We know it's coming.
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  You know it's coming. They have always, always
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  paid us. But never on time. Yeah. They're usually
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  the clients that don't, you know, they're not
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  the ones that are nagging you. You know, they're
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  very easy. It might be a bit late, but it's like,
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  you know, it's coming. We've had them for a long
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  time. And every now and again, we get new work
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  from them. And every now and again, we go, hey,
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  we're going to send this invoice and it will
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  disappear into a black hole of not being paid
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  for three months. But eventually it will find
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  its way into our bank account. I think that's
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  one of the hardest things, even when you come
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  in any business. Like even just speaking to our
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  clients, they have problems with also getting
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  paid. Yeah. You know, it's a very common thing
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  in every single business. Yeah, absolutely. And
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  I think it's only going to get worse. You know,
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  changes in terms of how people are paid, you
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  know, payday super and stuff like that. You can't
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  not pay people their superannuation now. I did
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  some, I went to try and help a business out two
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  years ago, small hospitality. It was pubs and
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  pubs and bars. And she hadn't paid the staff
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  for six months, their superannuation. She was
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  like, oh, well, get round to it. They don't mind.
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  They're all right. And I'm like. Can't do that
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  anymore. Yeah, that's illegal. That's not. And
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  I understand why it's illegal. I understand that
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  those changes had to happen. Yeah. But that's
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  going to hurt a lot of people and that's going
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  to cause some problems. Yeah. So when you're
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  running, you know, a team of 15 plus and cash
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  flow gets tight, what are the kind of things
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  that you used to do? You just didn't pay yourself.
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  The money came from somewhere else. You didn't
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  pay yourself. You didn't pay the landlord. Yeah.
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  Anything else that you could not pay. I have
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  to say, in all that time, I always paid the staff.
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  Yeah. But again, I was late paying superannuation.
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  You know, I was late paying the tax office. The
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  staff always got paid, but somebody else who
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  I owed money to didn't get paid. Yeah. And then
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  when I got out of it, I sat there and just went,
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  oh, I have all this debt and I can't get rid
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  of this debt and shit. And that was where it
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  all sort of fell apart. I was given warnings
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  and it was just that kind of belief that all
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  of a sudden you have a good month, right? And
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  you just go, oh my God, how much do we build?
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  Like we build $100 ,000. That's fantastic. And
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  then next month we build $120 ,000. This momentum
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  is never going to stop. And you have that optimistic,
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  almost delusional. Because you set the bar so
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  high now that it's like, oh, it's incrementally
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  increasing. It's not going to drop. I, I, um,
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  SEMO, my current business, we had a month back
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  in about four years ago where we built something
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  like 300, 350 something thousand dollars, right?
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  Which was about $60 ,000 up on the previous year.
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  It was just, it was going in this, it was going
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  like this. And we were all sort of going, Hey,
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  this is awesome. Oh my God, this is fantastic.
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  It's never going to stop. And we just kept hiring
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  people. I was, I was making the same mistake
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  again. I kept hiring people. I was going, yeah,
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  we need, let's get more people in doing this,
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  this. We had our own in -house videographer.
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  I'm like, we need an in -house videographer.
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  But, and then it just, and then the wheels just
• 13:51
  fell off completely in the space of two months.
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  Contracts that we had ended, we knew they were
• 13:56
  going to end. Like, I don't know whether we were
• 13:59
  just completely delusional or something that
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  someone was going to go, hey, yeah, let's carry
• 14:02
  on for another six months or something like that.
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  But they just ended and all of a sudden they
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  dropped off a cliff. And that was at the same
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  time. I'd gone through a marriage separation.
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  And so that was all happening at the same, it
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  was, yeah, it was. A time. A time. That was,
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  yes, that's the best way of describing it. A
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  time. Yeah. But previously it was just going
• 14:21
  like that. And we was going, hey, let's just
• 14:23
  keep going, throw fuel on the fire. Let's keep
• 14:25
  growing, keep growing, keep growing, keep growing.
• 14:27
  But it doesn't work like that. Yeah. And I've
• 14:29
  learned that lesson and now I plan for that.
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  Yeah. You know, not to say I'm not still going
• 14:34
  to make the same mistakes again, but at least
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  I know this. At least aware of the mistakes I'm
• 14:39
  making this time. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's
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  the biggest thing is being self -aware and those
• 14:43
  mistakes and improving from there. You know,
• 14:46
  you're never going to be able to improve and
• 14:48
  learn and grow if you don't make mistakes. No,
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  absolutely. Absolutely. I think that's, you know,
• 14:52
  that's how people play sport is that you, you
• 14:56
  know, consistently make mistakes and they talk
• 14:58
  about, you know, Federer and, you know, Tiger
• 15:01
  Woods and basketball players about how many shots
• 15:03
  that they actually miss and all those kind of
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  things. So you don't, You know, you're going
• 15:08
  to have to make mistakes. You're going to have
• 15:09
  to miss at some point in order to get better
• 15:12
  at hitting the target. So then you left that
• 15:14
  and then doing CMO now. Yeah, I kind of. So that
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  went on. The agency sort of went on for about
• 15:20
  six years, seven years. And I got out just as
• 15:24
  my first son was born. So he's 10 now. So that
• 15:28
  was 2016. And I kind of just. When I left, I
• 15:32
  was kind of fortuitous. I say this to everybody
• 15:35
  who's sort of moving into a consultant role,
• 15:37
  and I say this to all the CMOs who want to come
• 15:40
  and work with us. When you leave a job, when
• 15:43
  you want to go and be a consultant, you're going
• 15:45
  to live and die by your network, who you know
• 15:48
  and all those kind of things. And I fortunately
• 15:50
  left that role, and I think three people sort
• 15:53
  of emailed me in the first week and said, hey,
• 15:55
  we're looking for someone to come and work a
• 15:57
  day a week, two days a week. Can you help us
• 15:59
  out? And I was like. yeah absolutely so i i kind
• 16:03
  of went into all these sort of small consulting
• 16:05
  roles and that worked out really really well
• 16:07
  and that went on for a couple of years and then
• 16:10
  people kept coming to me asking me to do things
• 16:12
  that either i didn't want to do or i didn't have
• 16:15
  the skills to do someone had come to me going
• 16:16
  hey can you do a big salesforce integration i'm
• 16:19
  like oh you're in digital marketing can you do
• 16:20
  salesforce like no but i'd met my my current
• 16:24
  business partner i'd been introduced to him through
• 16:27
  somebody and he was like yeah i can do that.
• 16:29
  I said, we'll go along. He went along, met the
• 16:31
  client, came back and goes, Oh, I don't know.
• 16:33
  Let's just quote them $10 ,000 to do that. And
• 16:35
  we did. And the client paid it and we were like,
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  okay, right. That seems, that seems like a, so
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  he came on board. We had another year or so where
• 16:43
  we were doing just little consulting jobs. People
• 16:46
  were coming to us. We weren't really trying to
• 16:50
  find any work, but it was just the network and
• 16:53
  people were going, Hey, we need someone to do
• 16:55
  this. And so we were just taking all these things
• 16:57
  on. Eventually got an office, which I swore I
• 17:01
  wouldn't do, but we got another office again.
• 17:04
  It was above another agency in West End, and
• 17:07
  they were charging us like 500 bucks a month.
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  And we were like, hey, okay, that seems reasonable.
• 17:14
  And yeah, and then we were just sort of doing
• 17:16
  these small jobs. Another couple of people that
• 17:19
  we knew came to work with us, you know, one or
• 17:23
  two days a week. Both of them mums that just
• 17:25
  wanted a bit of flexibility in there. their work
• 17:28
  life. One was heavily pregnant. She was like,
• 17:32
  hey, I've got about three months. Can I come
• 17:34
  and do some work? And she did. And then I think
• 17:37
  that was then COVID hit. So that was February,
• 17:40
  March 2020. And Simo was born out of COVID. And
• 17:44
  I've told this story quite a few times, but we
• 17:47
  had Rebecca in the office and she was pregnant.
• 17:50
  And it was February or March and she was due
• 17:53
  to give birth, I think. june or july but she
• 17:56
  kind of she was one of those women who got because
• 17:58
  she got big so they can't really say that about
• 18:02
  a pregnant woman but it was one of those she
• 18:03
  was she was big right she was she got pregnant
• 18:06
  like she was big early yeah right and not she
• 18:09
  wasn't big the baby was big um and so she just
• 18:12
  kind of sat at her desk and did did this work
• 18:16
  which was largely social media email marketing
• 18:19
  facebook those kind of things And a client had
• 18:23
  rung us up, a client that we worked with for
• 18:25
  a couple of years, rung us up and said, hey,
• 18:26
  my marketing manager's just left. I don't have
• 18:29
  anybody to do this. And Rebecca sort of overheard
• 18:36
  the conversation. She just went, I'll go and
• 18:37
  do it for her. If it's a day a week, she goes,
• 18:39
  I'll go and do it. It was a chocolate manufacturer.
• 18:42
  So I think Rebecca was like, it's chocolate.
• 18:45
  The benefits? Yeah, the benefits of chocolate.
• 18:47
  So Rebecca went to the client. Client loved Rebecca.
• 18:50
  Client came back to us and said, hey, can I have
• 18:52
  Rebecca one day a week? Can I hire her from you?
• 18:54
  And we were like, yeah, okay. We had no framework
• 18:59
  for that. We had no contracts, paperwork, anything.
• 19:02
  because we were selling services at the time
• 19:04
  instead of people and she came back and we went
• 19:07
  okay and the interesting thing and I'm this is
• 19:09
  what I'm actually doing a podcast this afternoon
• 19:11
  for myself about the difference between how you
• 19:14
  how you price yourself versus the customer's
• 19:18
  expectations of what they should be paying and
• 19:21
  if you get that wrong at the start, you fuck
• 19:24
  the whole relationship. You're never going to
• 19:26
  get that relationship back, no matter how much
• 19:27
  you try and claw it back. And I'll give you an
• 19:29
  example because I'm talking a lot here, sorry.
• 19:31
  No, go for it. We had a client approach us last
• 19:34
  week, a couple of weeks ago, and they were like,
• 19:36
  hey, I need this. And I introduced them to one
• 19:38
  of our consultants who lives on the Sunshine
• 19:40
  Coast, who has a background in that particular
• 19:42
  area and has done for about 30, 40 years, 20,
• 19:45
  30 years. And I said to him, go and talk to the
• 19:47
  client. I trust him to have a conversation with
• 19:49
  the client. Go and talk to the client, see what
• 19:50
  they want, see if he can help. And he's going,
• 19:52
  yeah. Had a great conversation with the client.
• 19:54
  He put a quote together. Then he sent the quote
• 19:56
  through to the client. And the quote was about
• 19:57
  $9 ,000. And I kind of almost had a heart attack.
• 20:00
  I was just like, why? Why the fuck did you lead
• 20:02
  with a quote for $9 ,000? Because it was a sole
• 20:06
  trader. So I'm sitting there going, there's no
• 20:08
  way this guy's got $9 ,000 laying about to invest
• 20:11
  in. strategy and what i'd gone what i would have
• 20:15
  gone in with a much lower figure say two two
• 20:17
  and a half something like that but i'd have built
• 20:20
  the remaining amount into follow -up support
• 20:23
  services coaching mentoring whatever so that
• 20:28
  i'd reach that amount but not in one go yeah
• 20:30
  because then the client goes oh yeah two and
• 20:32
  a half grand that seems reasonable and i'm happy
• 20:34
  to sign up for six months um whereas well i haven't
• 20:37
  got nine thousand dollars so that's where you
• 20:40
  kind of go not only to our point earlier on where
• 20:43
  you're trying to understand what it is that you're
• 20:45
  trying to diagnose the mechanical failure of
• 20:47
  the client's car you've also got to sit there
• 20:50
  and go how much money has this client got to
• 20:53
  fix this problem because if they don't have nine
• 20:55
  thousand dollars they're going to be driving
• 20:56
  back out of the lot with a with the light still
• 20:58
  on in their car you know and that's the last
• 21:00
  you're going to see of them there's no way you
• 21:02
  can go from quoting nine thousand dollars to
• 21:06
  two and a half thousand dollars expectation there's
• 21:08
  no way you can meet in the middle because the
• 21:09
  client's going to think well i'm getting half
• 21:10
  the job here they're not going to do what they
• 21:12
  had originally quoted and now i don't feel comfortable
• 21:15
  about it so i don't know we've gone off on a
• 21:17
  tangent there but i don't know i don't know how
• 21:20
  we got to that but that was but so that the point
• 21:22
  of that conversation was when the client said
• 21:24
  to us hey we want to use rebecca a day a week
• 21:26
  i had to sit there and go what was a sensible
• 21:29
  margin for us to make selling rebecca versus
• 21:32
  what Does the client expect to pay? So we kind
• 21:35
  of met somewhere in the middle and the client
• 21:37
  was like, yeah, that's fine. And we sat and went,
• 21:39
  okay, well, that margin's not great. But the
• 21:41
  thing for us, it was just repeating revenue.
• 21:44
  And that client was with us for about two years.
• 21:47
  So that's where the model can work for us is
• 21:51
  this smaller margins and just this repetitive,
• 21:55
  you know, contract just going on and on and on.
• 22:00
  We're not getting the $9 ,000 up front, but we're
• 22:03
  getting it over the space of a year or potentially
• 22:06
  even longer than that. And that also happens
• 22:09
  the other way around. So when we first got into
• 22:12
  this model of revenue systems, we had our first
• 22:15
  client come on and he was like, you know, we
• 22:17
  want everything. We were like, okay, you know,
• 22:20
  we can do this. This is fine. looked at scope
• 22:23
  of everything and pricing it up and everything
• 22:26
  and it should have been well over like 15 grand
• 22:28
  like well over and because he was the first person
• 22:31
  to come on we've seen this as an opportunity
• 22:33
  to you know to really showcase what we can do
• 22:37
  so we did all this work for six grand a month
• 22:42
  right because it was recurring which was still
• 22:44
  good you know we still got paid definitely under
• 22:47
  what we should have got um and then it hit a
• 22:49
  point where it was like all right we need to
• 22:51
  you know up this now because we've doubled your
• 22:54
  revenue in nine months it's 12 grand and then
• 22:57
  from that point he was then like well you know
• 22:59
  you were doing this for six grand why am i paying
• 23:01
  12 grand now this doesn't make sense um so that
• 23:04
  also works yeah other way so that's where so
• 23:07
  that's where you go from six grand you have to
• 23:09
  sit there and go i can't you can't go from six
• 23:11
  to twelve right because that's going to just
• 23:12
  Kill it. You have to sit there and go, hey, six
• 23:14
  grand, but here's an additional service for two
• 23:17
  grand. Or here's an additional service for one
• 23:19
  and a half grand. Or how about we do these three
• 23:21
  additional services. You kind of, you know, you've
• 23:25
  almost, or you just sit there and go, hey, we've
• 23:27
  made our bed. Now we've got to sleep in it here.
• 23:29
  There's not a lot we can do. But it happens at
• 23:31
  all levels. I was doing some coaching for a guy.
• 23:35
  Again, it was a sole trader. He was a tradie
• 23:37
  down on the Gold Coast. And he came to me going,
• 23:39
  I really want your help. Just a bit of coaching.
• 23:42
  And I was like, oh, I don't want to drive down
• 23:43
  the Gold Coast. And he was like, no, he said,
• 23:45
  let's just do, you know, a Zoom meeting once
• 23:47
  a month. I'm like, hey, that's fine. And he goes,
• 23:50
  oh, look, can I? I just said to him, hey, we
• 23:53
  had a long conversation about how much. I just
• 23:55
  said, look, just give me 200 bucks and I'll sit
• 23:57
  in a Zoom meeting for 60 minutes and that's that.
• 23:59
  And I like the guy. I was like, hey, that seems
• 24:02
  fair. It would be below what I would normally
• 24:05
  charge. But I was like, you know, I like the
• 24:07
  guy. And I must have. coached him for 18 months
• 24:12
  and there was one month because i had access
• 24:15
  to his zero i knew how much money he was making
• 24:18
  um and there was one month he made fifty thousand
• 24:20
  dollars right and he had no staff or he was using
• 24:23
  contractors so he cleared himself about 30 35
• 24:27
  grand that month as a tradie so a couple of weeks
• 24:32
  later i said to him hey look i'm gonna put my
• 24:34
  price up now to 250 bucks never spoke to me again
• 24:38
  never fucking spoke to me again For an extra
• 24:44
  $50. For an extra $50 for someone who'd been
• 24:47
  mentoring you for 18 months. So I was just like,
• 24:50
  yeah. Look, it is what it is. It's just like,
• 24:53
  you know, you can't predict these things. So,
• 24:57
  yeah. Yeah. Well, clearly he wasn't in your ICP
• 25:02
  anyways. No, look, he wasn't. But I often get
• 25:06
  a lot of these people where I just go, hey, if
• 25:09
  you just want to talk to me and I'm going to
• 25:11
  kick you about for 60 minutes, I'm happy to do
• 25:13
  that. Yeah. You know, and, you know, I've done
• 25:15
  that. I did. My favorite one is the guys who
• 25:18
  were he's a mural painter. So him and his wife
• 25:20
  are this mural painting business. He's going
• 25:21
  to do schools, schools or cafes, whatever. Fantastic
• 25:24
  artist. And, yeah, I'd just gone into them and
• 25:29
  said, look, guys, just pay me by the hour. We'll
• 25:32
  catch up. Because I can't really talk for longer
• 25:35
  than an hour anyway. I'm just like, no. Clock
• 25:38
  out, yeah. I've said everything I need to say
• 25:41
  in an hour. There's nothing I can say beyond
• 25:42
  an hour that's going to either land with them
• 25:45
  or it's going to make any difference. So there's
• 25:47
  no point in me talking for more than an hour.
• 25:49
  And it was just really simple stuff with them.
• 25:51
  I said, where are all your leads? How are you
• 25:54
  managing through these people that are looking
• 25:56
  for quotes? Who's chasing up the quotes? And
• 25:58
  we just put some systems in place, and the system
• 26:01
  was just a spreadsheet. And within about six
• 26:05
  months, they'd gone from doing seven or eight
• 26:08
  grand a month and barely surviving, and they
• 26:12
  were six months ahead planned, and there wasn't
• 26:15
  a month that they weren't making 20 grand. That's
• 26:17
  awesome, yeah. So it was largely 20, 25 grand.
• 26:20
  There was a month they were making 30 grand.
• 26:22
  Really, they got to capacity because he couldn't
• 26:24
  paint any more walls. Yeah, only so many walls.
• 26:27
  There's only so many walls he could paint in
• 26:29
  30 days. But they were, you know, they were looking
• 26:34
  forward to actually having a holiday. They were
• 26:36
  going to have a couple of weeks off for Christmas
• 26:37
  and, you know, and all those kind of things.
• 26:39
  So I was like, you know, my work here is done.
• 26:42
  I can't. There's nothing. there was nothing we
• 26:45
  could do beyond that because at that point they
• 26:47
  were like they needed to hire staff to paint
• 26:50
  walls and they weren't going to do that and i
• 26:52
  was like hey as long as you guys are making 20
• 26:54
  25 grand a month it's a family you clearing they
• 26:58
  could clear 300 grand a year it was they were
• 27:01
  you know still picking up the kids from school
• 27:05
  still having that quality family time. He wasn't
• 27:08
  working. I mean, he was working long days sometimes,
• 27:10
  but, you know, she had that flexibility and all
• 27:13
  that kind of stuff. So for them, to me, that
• 27:15
  was a success. 30K a year, family unit, you know,
• 27:19
  watching the kids grow up, having money to go
• 27:21
  on holiday. Yeah. You got that freedom. Yeah.
• 27:24
  Yeah. So for anybody who doesn't understand,
• 27:27
  can you explain what a fractional CMO actually
• 27:30
  is? Okay. Good question. Because is it a consultant?
• 27:35
  Not really. Yes. No. Is it a part time member
• 27:38
  of staff? Yes. No. It's hard to look. Essentially,
• 27:42
  it's you having a person in your business that
• 27:45
  is doing the job. Normally, you would have a
• 27:48
  full time person doing the job, but you only
• 27:51
  really need them for a day, two days a week.
• 27:54
  So often people have CFOs that come in maybe
• 27:57
  twice a month. do things and all that kind of
• 28:00
  stuff for a cmo fractional cmo is is much the
• 28:02
  same so it's having that sort of skill set that
• 28:05
  senior skill set for project management strategy
• 28:08
  direction um but only having them a fraction
• 28:12
  of the time yeah hence the hence the name um
• 28:15
  But I would say it goes beyond a bit. It goes
• 28:17
  beyond just being a consultant because I always
• 28:20
  find consultants are consultants. I always find
• 28:23
  short term. They walk in, tell you to do something,
• 28:25
  give you a plan, walk back out again. Yeah, they're
• 28:28
  not actually there guiding you, helping you,
• 28:30
  putting things in place. What we try and have
• 28:32
  is the fractional people that we look for or
• 28:35
  try and place are there in not full time capacity,
• 28:40
  but they're there. They're part of the team.
• 28:42
  Yeah. They're turning up to meetings. They're
• 28:46
  going into the office. They're part and parcel
• 28:49
  of the team, which is how when I was a consultant,
• 28:50
  I was operating. So I would go and be in the
• 28:53
  office with the client. And I'd often say to
• 28:56
  the client, hey, I'm here for eight hours, six
• 28:59
  hours. I'm here for six hours. Never there for
• 29:01
  eight hours. I'm here for six hours. I'm going
• 29:04
  to do other work while I'm here. So I'm billing
• 29:07
  you a fee to help you out for a month. But I'm
• 29:11
  here, I can be in the meetings with vendors,
• 29:14
  suppliers, management, whatever. I'll be in all
• 29:17
  the meetings, but I'm going to take other calls.
• 29:20
  And most of the time, clients were happy with
• 29:22
  that. They were like, oh, we weren't expecting
• 29:24
  you to be completely focused on us for six hours.
• 29:28
  But then what they would do is they were expecting
• 29:30
  me to answer the phone other days or reply to
• 29:32
  emails. So that's kind of that fractional. That
• 29:37
  fractional, I think, you're still invested. You're
• 29:39
  part of the team. You want to see success. And
• 29:43
  there's an argument that most fractional marketing.
• 29:47
  people fractional cmos should be good enough
• 29:49
  to eventually do themselves out of a job the
• 29:51
  business should grow so well that they go hey
• 29:54
  we need a full -time person in here now so you
• 29:56
  know that that that was a very long -winded answer
• 29:59
  but that's kind of where i see it it's not a
• 30:01
  consultant it's not a part -time person i think
• 30:03
  it feels it's someone who's more invested yeah
• 30:06
  and somebody who becomes part of the team and
• 30:08
  more integrated into the company than just a
• 30:10
  consultant. So you got into doing that through
• 30:14
  Rebecca, kind of seeing that kind of model, that
• 30:17
  framework, and just expanding it. Yeah, and it's
• 30:20
  funny because, again, like you said earlier on,
• 30:24
  is that you go out and you try and be all things
• 30:26
  to all people. And someone says, hey, can you
• 30:29
  do this? And can you do that? The interesting
• 30:31
  thing we're finding now, I think it's... it's
• 30:34
  an advent of ai and people using ai is that that's
• 30:39
  that fractional cmo role is more an executional
• 30:44
  role than it is a strategic role and i think
• 30:47
  this plays to the huge the shift that's going
• 30:50
  on in industry and and our business and lots
• 30:54
  of businesses at the moment where i had someone
• 30:56
  say to me oh i've got this specific way that
• 30:59
  i do marketing strategy and i've trademarked
• 31:01
  it and it's this kind of you know it's my proprietary
• 31:05
  strategic framework and i just went just you're
• 31:10
  smoking crack because there is nothing that you
• 31:13
  can create from a proprietary sense that isn't
• 31:16
  being replicated by chat gpt or claude or whatever
• 31:20
  there's no there's no there's nothing proprietary
• 31:22
  strategy anymore you know i can sit there and
• 31:26
  i've done a 27 page strategic document With me
• 31:31
  and Claude just having a chat with each other
• 31:33
  and being plugged into the company's data and
• 31:36
  figures and things like that. So I find now that
• 31:41
  there's the need in businesses is not so much
• 31:45
  people saying, hey, I need strategy. I need to
• 31:49
  know what I should be doing. That's relatively
• 31:52
  easy solvable problem. The thing that businesses
• 31:57
  miss is the. Actual executional capacity on a
• 32:03
  consistent basis. So this podcast is a good example.
• 32:09
  I had someone approach me two months ago going,
• 32:11
  I want to start my own podcast. And I'm like,
• 32:13
  yeah, we hear that every month. You probably
• 32:15
  hear that every month as well. There's a graveyard
• 32:18
  of a million dead podcasts out there. But he
• 32:23
  was in an industry that he was very well -known,
• 32:26
  well -respected. And I was like, hey, it's probably
• 32:29
  a good idea. But I said to him, this is all about
• 32:32
  consistency. There's no point in doing one or
• 32:33
  two because every podcast, 99 .9 % of podcasts
• 32:37
  die after episode three. Something like that.
• 32:39
  Whatever the stat is, right? Businesses lack
• 32:42
  the consistency to execute stuff internally.
• 32:45
  And that's where I think the opportunity is now.
• 32:48
  So having someone like you in a business that
• 32:51
  says, we're going to do a podcast every week
• 32:53
  is absolutely imperative. The AI is not going
• 32:56
  to do that. You know, there's... Somebody's got
• 32:59
  to set this equipment up. Someone's got to book
• 33:01
  the guests. Someone's got to brief the guests,
• 33:03
  make sure they know where they're going. If a
• 33:05
  guest doesn't turn up, someone's got to rebook
• 33:07
  that. The AI is not going to do that. That person
• 33:10
  that can confidently execute a strategy and plans
• 33:15
  is massively valuable, I think, in the business.
• 33:19
  And whether that's in marketing or whether that's
• 33:21
  in finance or operations or sales or whatever,
• 33:23
  that's what I think is going to make the difference.
• 33:26
  moving forward. So what are your thoughts on
• 33:28
  AI and the way things are going? I probably would
• 33:32
  have. I was a bit standoffish. I mean, I do chat
• 33:36
  GPT. I've moved to Claude. I use Claude a lot
• 33:39
  now. So I was a bit standoffish about three,
• 33:41
  four months ago. And then I started another business,
• 33:44
  which we'll talk about in a sec. But I've used
• 33:48
  Claude. It's a retail business and it has an
• 33:52
  e -commerce arm to it. I've used Claude to...
• 33:56
  Claude uploads everything onto the e -commerce
• 33:59
  site. It double checks the weights, dimensions
• 34:02
  of every product. It writes the descriptions
• 34:05
  for every product. It takes things in and out
• 34:08
  of stock as they're there or they're not there.
• 34:10
  It flags when there's a problem with something.
• 34:13
  It doesn't always get everything right. It took
• 34:16
  some stuff out of stock. It shouldn't have taken
• 34:17
  out of stock the other day, but you know. I can
• 34:21
  literally get a supplier invoice arrive. Give
• 34:24
  it the PDF of the supplier invoice. As long as
• 34:26
  that invoice has the barcodes on it, it's in
• 34:29
  stock, creating new products even in the space
• 34:32
  of five minutes. I started using the design side
• 34:35
  of it to say, hey, can you design me an A1 banner?
• 34:39
  I've given it the logos. I've given it everything
• 34:42
  it needs. And now it's just creating. It created,
• 34:46
  I think, 10 shelf talkers for the retail that
• 34:52
  I then sort of put in. plastic stands get the
• 34:55
  staff to put in plastic stands and they put on
• 34:57
  the shelf i did that each doing each one in about
• 35:00
  two minutes following a template bang bang bang
• 35:03
  bang bang and i've in the last few weeks just
• 35:07
  gone this is disturbingly easy yeah you know
• 35:16
  and i'm looking at it now just going that's a
• 35:18
  full member of staff there that was doing all
• 35:20
  of that and isn't doing that now because claude's
• 35:22
  doing it i'd actually left it I shut the laptop
• 35:26
  down, but I left it earlier on building a style
• 35:29
  guide for all of my point of sale and everything.
• 35:32
  And it was just doing that happily. And it's
• 35:36
  not the AI slop that you see, you know, the posters
• 35:38
  that you see. That everyone's straight chat GBT.
• 35:42
  Yeah. A prompt that says, make me this poster.
• 35:45
  Yeah. And it's, and it looks terrible. Yeah.
• 35:47
  But I've, I've created these, these posters and
• 35:51
  these point of sale and all this kind of thing,
• 35:53
  which is. absolutely spot on um in terms of design
• 35:57
  and look and feel and i'm just sitting there
• 36:00
  going i could have i could have asked i've got
• 36:03
  i've got graphic designers that work for me jess
• 36:06
  who's my main marketing person is a 10 years
• 36:09
  graphic design i could have asked her to do it
• 36:11
  could have taken me a couple of weeks to get
• 36:13
  it back from her because she's busy i've got
• 36:16
  it done in two minutes and to a spec when i was
• 36:21
  doing A1 call flutes the other day that I could
• 36:24
  send to the printer and the printer was like,
• 36:25
  yeah, this is fine. We can print this. But the
• 36:31
  difference is, could anyone do that is the question.
• 36:36
  I've come from a background in marketing for
• 36:38
  20 odd years. So I know when things look good
• 36:41
  and don't look good. I know when design is good,
• 36:45
  design is shit. There's still this kind of taste
• 36:48
  and knowledge element that you can't rely on
• 36:50
  the AI for. And that goes from design, looking
• 36:54
  at data. you know, operational set, whatever
• 36:57
  it is, it can churn this stuff out. And the strategic
• 37:04
  document it did for me the other week, I read
• 37:07
  it through and I was like, everything it's saying
• 37:09
  is right, but it's kind of missing the mark somewhere
• 37:12
  along the line. Yeah, it's missing the whole
• 37:14
  point of... Yeah, it's like pointing out all
• 37:16
  the things that need to be fixed. And it's right,
• 37:20
  but as I went back to it and said... you're kind
• 37:23
  of missing the bigger picture here where's this
• 37:26
  product trying to get to and the thing it had
• 37:30
  kind of missed was the nuance in the the creative
• 37:32
  and the nuance in the messaging because it had
• 37:35
  seen all the numbers were this it was like don't
• 37:37
  do that campaign and that's campaigns not running
• 37:39
  properly and that's return the roi is terrible
• 37:41
  etc etc etc so it solved all those problems but
• 37:45
  it just hadn't quite got the the nuance of the
• 37:49
  fact that the the creative the messaging was
• 37:52
  off and it it didn't know how it was supposed
• 37:56
  to be right so that's where i then go okay well
• 38:00
  at least my 20 years of experience is now good
• 38:03
  for something here it's coming into play it's
• 38:06
  teaching it's it's having that dialogue with
• 38:09
  the ai going what about this what about that
• 38:11
  you know but if i turn around and say hey go
• 38:14
  and look at these six competitors and do an assessment
• 38:16
  analysis or SWOT analysis of all these six competitors
• 38:20
  Bang, it's done it in 10 minutes. Which would
• 38:22
  have maybe taken somebody, you know, half a day.
• 38:24
  I just would never have done it. Oh, yeah. Because
• 38:27
  I'm lazy. And this is the thing I also find is
• 38:30
  that, you know, people go, oh, it's allowing
• 38:32
  me to move quicker. It's allowing me to do more
• 38:34
  work. But it's also allowing a lot of people
• 38:35
  to do things that they would never have done
• 38:37
  in the first place. So you talk about those ChatGPT
• 38:40
  posters, the AI slop, and people criticize them.
• 38:44
  And I just go, yeah, but I saw a guy, I saw a
• 38:47
  food truck do one the other day. And people would
• 38:51
  go, oh, he should have asked a graphic designer.
• 38:52
  I'm like, he was never going to ask a graphic
• 38:54
  designer. Graphic designer was going to charge
• 38:56
  him hundreds of dollars that he wouldn't have
• 38:58
  been able to afford. And now he's got this cool
• 39:01
  little thing that he can share on social media
• 39:03
  and tell everyone about his food. So I think
• 39:06
  to a degree, it's obviously helping people move
• 39:10
  faster and more efficient. But it's also democratizing
• 39:14
  design. It's allowing people to do things they
• 39:18
  just couldn't do before. you know and just say
• 39:21
  hey i need to create a poster for my kids dance
• 39:23
  recital you know on thursday people would just
• 39:28
  never have done that you know or they would have
• 39:30
  tried to use canva and it would be okay or even
• 39:34
  before canva what would have you done yeah you
• 39:37
  know you might try to use word but yeah i think
• 39:42
  it's ai is is doing a lot of things and i think
• 39:45
  we're all still kind of We're all still trying
• 39:47
  to work out how it's going to affect us. But
• 39:51
  where I see it from my benefit is it's allowing
• 39:54
  me to do a lot of things, a lot of analysis,
• 39:56
  a lot of small jobs that I would have paid someone
• 40:02
  else to do, but also that potentially someone
• 40:05
  would have taken a week to turn around. It's
• 40:09
  now been turned around. I 100 % agree with you.
• 40:12
  I think AI with the efficiency side, it's just
• 40:15
  making everyone so much more efficient. And even
• 40:18
  in terms of like our platform, Derek, the CTO
• 40:22
  of Bauderia, he built the platform from the ground
• 40:25
  up. And for him, he already has a fundamentally
• 40:28
  understanding of software and how, you know.
• 40:33
  how it should be written and he's built it himself.
• 40:35
  But now utilizing AI, he's able to get things
• 40:38
  done that would have maybe taken a couple of
• 40:40
  weeks done in a day. And then, but because he
• 40:43
  has the understanding of it, he's able to go
• 40:45
  back and say, okay, there's this bug, you know,
• 40:47
  I know how to fix this. I think that's one thing
• 40:50
  that I'm seeing is there's a million different
• 40:52
  vibe coders out there at the moment. And, you
• 40:54
  know, they're creating stuff to replace Slack
• 40:57
  and then, you know, to save $10 a month. But
• 41:02
  then they actually aren't factoring in the fact
• 41:04
  that they need to upkeep that and they need to
• 41:06
  continuously improve that. And that's a lot of
• 41:08
  time that's taken up there. And I think the biggest
• 41:10
  challenge will be we're all using it relatively
• 41:13
  cheaply now. I mean, I might pay $150 a month
• 41:16
  for Claude for however much capacity I'm getting.
• 41:20
  But if we've learned nothing from Uber and Netflix
• 41:24
  and all these kind of startups and businesses
• 41:27
  is that the price you pay at the start is not
• 41:30
  going to be the price that it, And it will go
• 41:33
  up rapidly. So suddenly you're going to get to
• 41:35
  this position of, whilst the tradie might be
• 41:39
  using it for their books or whatever now, and
• 41:41
  all of a sudden then it's going to get to $1
• 41:42
  ,000 a month. The tradie's going to go, don't
• 41:46
  know, don't know. I don't necessarily want to
• 41:48
  spend that anymore. But then again, I think that's
• 41:51
  where the opportunity lies for a lot of businesses
• 41:53
  is they go, hey, we can still do that. And well,
• 41:56
  we've got our subscription over here, so we can
• 41:59
  help you execute these things. I think no matter
• 42:02
  what, there are going to be these people where
• 42:06
  you've got these people who are using AI and
• 42:09
  then this huge section of people who are not
• 42:12
  using AI. And they'll want help from the people
• 42:16
  that are. They won't be going to the AI. They'll
• 42:19
  say, hey, can you help me do this? The best thing
• 42:22
  to capitalize on right now is AI. If you can
• 42:25
  understand AI and teach other people to do it.
• 42:27
  It comes back to the whole thing, like even when
• 42:29
  websites became a thing, Derek, when he first
• 42:33
  started doing that, because he couldn't afford
• 42:34
  to pay, I think it was like 500 bucks for a website
• 42:36
  back in the day. He couldn't pay that. Yeah,
• 42:40
  didn't have the money to pay that. So he went
• 42:42
  and learned how to do it, was then answering
• 42:44
  people's questions and was like, hey, if you
• 42:46
  do this, this, this, this, give everything there.
• 42:49
  You know, people are lazy. People want to pay
• 42:51
  to get things done. So they would be like, hey,
• 42:54
  can you do this for me? Here's the money. The
• 42:56
  thing is, for me, it's like, you know, I'm not
• 42:59
  a graphic designer. I wish I had been. And my
• 43:03
  father came from a design background. And I wish
• 43:05
  at some point I'd sat down and gone, hey, I should
• 43:07
  learn graphic design. But I'm just not that.
• 43:10
  That's not my creative output. But I know what
• 43:15
  looks good. So if someone comes to me and says,
• 43:18
  well, like last night I did a little poster for
• 43:22
  our local rugby union club. And I was like, hey,
• 43:25
  in two minutes I turned around this thing and
• 43:28
  sent this back to them and said, should we just
• 43:30
  share this everywhere? And it was that. So we're
• 43:34
  executing these things and doing these things
• 43:36
  that we've never been able to do before. So we're
• 43:38
  allowing ourselves to be more efficient and we're
• 43:40
  allowing the club to be more successful and attract
• 43:42
  more players and make more money and be better
• 43:45
  for the community. So in that sense, I'm like,
• 43:47
  you know, there's where we can benefit from these
• 43:52
  things. So, yeah, I think we're still in a stage
• 43:58
  where we're not all sure how this is going to
• 44:01
  affect us. Are we all going to wake up one day
• 44:03
  and go, shit, where's my job gone? Yeah, yeah.
• 44:06
  Do you think it'll go that way? God, that's a
• 44:10
  hard question. There's so many people out there
• 44:12
  who've got these predictions of... how things
• 44:15
  will operate. I think there may be some sort
• 44:18
  of inflection where we go, hey, people are losing
• 44:21
  their jobs. So how do we protect lifestyles and
• 44:27
  incomes and people still want to go on holidays,
• 44:31
  people still want to buy a car? What are we going
• 44:34
  to do that's going to allow society to continue
• 44:40
  on when people are losing their jobs? Is it that
• 44:46
  more jobs will, you know, AI will create more
• 44:48
  jobs? Maybe. You know, there doesn't seem to
• 44:51
  be a shortage of jobs in healthcare. You know,
• 44:54
  maybe some other sectors will boom and people
• 44:57
  will sort of shift into those. Maybe we'll move
• 45:00
  back to the fact that, you know, in couples and
• 45:04
  families, only one parent needs to work. And,
• 45:07
  you know, I can't even begin to say I have any
• 45:12
  idea what it's going. It's a bit unpredictable
• 45:15
  at the moment. It is. I think the amount of money
• 45:18
  that these has been invested in these data centers
• 45:21
  and all these kind of things, somewhere along
• 45:24
  there is an inflection point where things either
• 45:27
  go incredibly badly or, you know, something turns.
• 45:32
  Yeah, I think there's going to be, it's hard
• 45:35
  to say because it's so unpredictable, but I have
• 45:37
  a feeling that it's going to have a little bit
• 45:39
  of a recession within the AI because. You know,
• 45:43
  we have all these people that are vibe coding
• 45:44
  and there's about 20 million on different slacks,
• 45:48
  for example, that you can have. When you have
• 45:50
  all that fragmented tools, you know, you end
• 45:53
  up paying probably about six to 10 grand just
• 45:56
  on tools that you're not even utilizing. So I
• 45:58
  think on the software side, I think businesses
• 46:01
  are going to try and transition into one system
• 46:06
  where everything's in there. They've got full
• 46:08
  control, full governance over. All the data,
• 46:11
  everything's in there. And then I think on the
• 46:13
  AI side, because Claude, they're adding watermarks
• 46:17
  into Claude. So people that are just copying
• 46:19
  and pasting that, you know. And when we go to
• 46:22
  LinkedIn, LinkedIn have just added AI slop button
• 46:24
  into LinkedIn. Google are just negatively affecting
• 46:27
  pages that are just written purely by AI with
• 46:30
  no human oversight. So there's already that sense
• 46:33
  of recession there. But I'd argue, how can you
• 46:36
  tell? Because one of the clients, sorry, one
• 46:39
  of our... consultant said to me the other day
• 46:41
  she goes i need to remove all the m dashes from
• 46:43
  this because it looks like i wrote it and i say
• 46:46
  i did write it i say but i wrote it with my input
• 46:49
  you know and she's like oh but you know it looks
• 46:51
  like ai i said well it is ai that's that's you
• 46:55
  know that's not detracting from the it's not
• 46:57
  detracting from what i was trying to achieve
• 46:59
  with the document that i've sent you yeah everything
• 47:01
  in it is my opinion and my ideas and all these
• 47:03
  things just somebody else has written it so this
• 47:06
  is i i write books as well i write fiction books
• 47:09
  and there's a big argument about how you how
• 47:12
  much you should let ai interfere in what you've
• 47:15
  written so i every chapter i write i then i then
• 47:20
  give it to claude and go tell me what you think
• 47:24
  and it will tell me what it thinks right and
• 47:26
  sometimes it's right sometimes it's wrong and
• 47:29
  i just ignore it But what it does is it picks
• 47:31
  up grammar issues where you go, hey, you've used
• 47:33
  this word twice in the same sentence. I'm like,
• 47:35
  shit, yeah, okay, I can't know. You've used the
• 47:37
  word she too many times in a particular paragraph.
• 47:41
  Okay, I've got to rewrite that back. So it's
• 47:42
  picking things that a human editor might pick
• 47:44
  up. Yeah. But that doesn't mean to say I don't
• 47:47
  want it going through a human editor to read
• 47:49
  as well. Yeah. So I think, to me, the best of
• 47:52
  both worlds is have a human editor read it and
• 47:54
  then have Claude read it because they're both
• 47:57
  telling me different things. Yeah. The human
• 48:00
  editor is much better about understanding structure
• 48:03
  and plot holes and things like that and about
• 48:06
  whether it's an engaging story. You know, Claude's
• 48:09
  just blowing smoke up my ass saying, hey, this
• 48:11
  is great. Yeah. You know, and I'm like, yeah,
• 48:13
  but is it? And then you ask, is it? And then
• 48:16
  it's like, oh, actually, you got there. Yeah.
• 48:18
  So it's often coming back to me and going, oh,
• 48:21
  this was a mistake I made earlier on. I'm really
• 48:22
  sorry. Was it? I got it to do some shelf talkers.
• 48:27
  I was sitting with one of the staff and I said,
• 48:29
  hey, look, we're just going to do these shelf
• 48:30
  talkers. It's going to take me 30 minutes to
• 48:32
  do these. And it did six of them. And as the
• 48:35
  last one came out of the printer, I looked at
• 48:37
  it and just went, Claude, where did you get the
• 48:39
  price from? And Claude just went, I made the
• 48:41
  price up. I'm just like, why did you make the
• 48:44
  price up? He goes, I made the price up of all
• 48:46
  of them and the descriptions. I mean, it got
• 48:49
  the descriptions pretty well. But it made the
• 48:51
  price up. But you have access to the back end
• 48:54
  of the Shopify systems. Why have you made the
• 48:57
  price up? And he was like, oh, yeah, I should
• 48:59
  have gone and looked in Shopify. It's like sometimes
• 49:04
  it's like working with Mike because I've got
• 49:06
  a 7 -year -old and a 10 -year -old, two boys,
• 49:07
  right? So the 7 -year -old, the 10 -year -old,
• 49:12
  I digress from the story here, but this is what
• 49:14
  it's like working with AI sometimes, right? I
• 49:16
  take the 10 -year -old to school this morning
• 49:18
  at 7 .15 because he's got band practice. The
• 49:21
  7 -year -old wants to come with me because he
• 49:22
  obviously can't stay in the house alone. The
• 49:24
  school's four minutes away, so he's like, I'll
• 49:27
  jump in the car. So we load all the car up. They
• 49:29
  were staying at their mum's the night before,
• 49:31
  so they'd arrived with me that morning. So stuff's
• 49:33
  come out of her car, gone into my car. They've
• 49:36
  watched their iPads for about half an hour. We're
• 49:38
  taking them out of the house. We get to the school.
• 49:41
  My 10 -year -old, who's sitting in the back,
• 49:44
  goes, ah. I forgot my shoes. And I'm just like,
• 49:48
  oh, Jesus Christ. How can you walk out the house
• 49:50
  without your shoes? And he thinks it's hilarious.
• 49:53
  My seven -year -old thinks it's equally hilarious.
• 49:55
  I'm trying not to laugh because it is hilarious.
• 49:58
  As frustrating it is, I'm like, ah, look, it's
• 50:00
  eight minutes out of my time to go there and
• 50:02
  back again to go and get his shoes. So he gets
• 50:04
  out, goes into band practice because he doesn't
• 50:06
  want to be late for band practice. And he's taken
• 50:08
  my seven -year -old shoes because they're not
• 50:12
  much different between the pair of them. And
• 50:13
  he can wear my seven -year -old shoes. So he's
• 50:15
  gone to band practice in my seven -year -old
• 50:16
  shoes. We'll go back and get the 10 -year -old
• 50:18
  shoes, bring them back to school. The seven -year
• 50:20
  -old would then go down to the hall to swap the
• 50:22
  shoes out while the 10 -year -old's in band practice.
• 50:27
  Go back to the house. I pull up in the driveway,
• 50:29
  open up the garage. The seven -year -old runs
• 50:32
  in. He's not in any shoes. He grabs his Crocs.
• 50:35
  He puts his Crocs in and comes running out with
• 50:37
  the 10 -year -old shoes. We go all the way down
• 50:40
  back to the school. Seven -year -old gets out
• 50:43
  of the car, runs down to the hall to take the
• 50:46
  new shoes to the 10 -year -old, only to realise
• 50:50
  when he's got to the hall, he's picked up two
• 50:52
  different shoes. Oh, no. So he then runs back
• 50:56
  to me and goes, I've got the wrong shoe. And
• 50:59
  I said, what? He's picked up my partner's, her
• 51:02
  training shoes, which were in the garage as well.
• 51:05
  He's got one of hers and one of the 10 -year
• 51:09
  -olds. And I'm trying not to be angry with him,
• 51:14
  but I can't be angry because it's hilarious.
• 51:15
  Because all I can think of now is my 10 -year
• 51:18
  -old doing band practice, playing his trombone
• 51:20
  in one shoe. And I'm trying not to go... Anyway,
• 51:25
  my point of that is, that is what it feels like
• 51:29
  dealing with AI sometimes, is that they're picking
• 51:32
  up the wrong shoe. All the intentions are good.
• 51:36
  They want to help. But every now and again, they're
• 51:38
  just going to pick up the wrong shoe or forget
• 51:40
  their shoes completely. But if you keep reminding
• 51:43
  them and you keep training them and eventually
• 51:45
  you kind of get to the point where they're remembering
• 51:48
  their own shoes and they're efficient enough,
• 51:50
  you know, most of the time my two are loading
• 51:52
  their bags up and everything into the car themselves.
• 51:55
  But that's kind of how I feel it is with AI.
• 51:58
  And that's kind of how I feel it is with staff.
• 52:00
  You know, they're never going to get everything
• 52:02
  right day one. You've got to just keep drilling
• 52:06
  it into them, training them. And eventually what
• 52:08
  you want is. team members that are better than
• 52:10
  you at everything. Yeah. So anyway, that was
• 52:13
  a, gone off on a complete tangent there about
• 52:15
  my sunshine. No, that's all right. So in terms
• 52:19
  of marketing mistakes that you see, what are
• 52:21
  like the top ones that you see? People are very,
• 52:24
  it's not more of a mistake. It's more of a, there's
• 52:26
  lots of little mistakes. People do stupid things
• 52:28
  in marketing or they just don't do any marketing.
• 52:31
  The two things I would say is number one, they
• 52:33
  forget to do any marketing when they're busy.
• 52:35
  So all of a sudden then there's a downturn and
• 52:37
  they go, shit, we need to do some marketing.
• 52:39
  Life doesn't work like that. You need to be doing
• 52:41
  stuff all the time rather than just panicking
• 52:45
  when things are down. And then the other idea
• 52:49
  that I forgot, the other idea I've now completely
• 52:51
  forgotten because I've gone off on a tangent
• 52:52
  about that one. Yeah, it's not so much doing
• 52:55
  little things wrong. It's just, it's always the
• 52:57
  last, it's always the last thing on a company's
• 53:00
  mind. Yeah, and the first to get cut. Yeah, and
• 53:04
  they don't understand, they don't understand
• 53:06
  that marketing, I think marketing has a, Marketing
• 53:09
  has a marketing problem, right? Marketing has
• 53:11
  a branding problem. It's not marketing, it's
• 53:14
  growth. Yes, yes. The question isn't how are
• 53:18
  you marketing your business, it's how are you
• 53:20
  growing your business. And when you ask that
• 53:22
  to people, they're like, ah, yeah, I don't know.
• 53:25
  So how do new customers find out about you? What
• 53:28
  about the old customers who haven't bought from
• 53:30
  you in the last year? What have you done? That's
• 53:32
  the thing I think the mistake people make. They
• 53:35
  think, ah, we'll just have someone doing our
• 53:36
  social media. Well, that's no good because...
• 53:39
  Is that actually growing the business? So that's
• 53:44
  the mistake I think all businesses make one way
• 53:47
  or another somewhere along the line that they
• 53:50
  don't put enough importance in marketing because
• 53:55
  they think it's marketing. They think it's the
• 53:57
  coloring in department. They don't sit there
• 54:02
  and go, ask that bigger picture, how are we growing
• 54:04
  our business? Where's our new clients coming
• 54:06
  from? So we've got a boozy, Corporate lunch on
• 54:12
  Friday at Blackbird. We've got 60 people coming
• 54:15
  along. If you're free, there's a spare ticket
• 54:18
  if you're not doing anything Friday. That's an
• 54:22
  opportunity for me to stand up in front of people,
• 54:23
  in front of 60 people and remind them who I am
• 54:26
  and talk to them. And I'm not going to stand
• 54:27
  up in front of them and say, oh, here's everything
• 54:29
  we do. Here's a PowerPoint presentation. I'm
• 54:32
  just going to be there and be present and talk
• 54:34
  to them and hope they have a good lunch. then
• 54:40
  hope that they go out and talk to us about their
• 54:43
  clients. So I think that the answer to your question
• 54:48
  is people, the biggest mistake businesses make
• 54:50
  is confuse growth and marketing and think that
• 54:55
  marketing isn't important. Growth is important
• 54:57
  because if you don't grow, you die. And I think
• 54:59
  a lot of businesses need to sit there and ask
• 55:01
  that honest question is how are new people finding
• 55:06
  our business? How are new customers finding our
• 55:08
  business? Because if they can't answer that really
• 55:11
  quickly and really simply, then they're going
• 55:13
  to be in trouble. And if they're not in trouble
• 55:14
  now, they'll be in trouble later. And if the
• 55:17
  answer is word of mouth, then eventually they
• 55:21
  will still be in trouble. Yeah. You cannot be
• 55:24
  reliant on other people talking about you. It's
• 55:29
  great. It is. And it's organic. And when people
• 55:33
  come to you and say, hey, so -and -so said you're
• 55:35
  awesome, the sale's done. you know they want
• 55:39
  to work with you but you can't that's not you
• 55:43
  can't be reliant on that because what i say to
• 55:47
  everyone is that at some point at some point
• 55:50
  word of mouth will stop even if it doesn't stop
• 55:53
  permanently what if it stops for two weeks what
• 55:55
  if people stop talking about you for two weeks
• 55:56
  or what if people stop talking about you for
• 55:58
  a month and they're like yeah actually that would
• 56:01
  be really bad so what are you doing to to stop
• 56:05
  that happening How are you nurturing the people
• 56:08
  that are talking about you? How are you nurturing
• 56:10
  your customer base so that you're still front
• 56:12
  of mind, so that they are still talking about
• 56:14
  you? So that's the big mistake, is not understanding
• 56:19
  that marketing equals growth and thinking marketing
• 56:22
  is a bit of social media or I need to be more
• 56:25
  of an influence. It comes back to the mechanic
• 56:27
  analogy as well. It's that people don't understand
• 56:32
  generally how things work underneath the bonnet
• 56:34
  of a car. So if you sit there and go, well, we're
• 56:37
  not going fast enough. We need to drive faster.
• 56:41
  That's not how it works here. Your car can't
• 56:46
  go that fast. You've got something wrong with
• 56:48
  the car or you've only got three wheels. So we
• 56:51
  can't just sit there and put our foot down on
• 56:52
  the accelerator and sit there and go, hey, we're
• 56:54
  going to go faster. That's not how things work.
• 56:57
  So everything has to be right. And that's where
• 56:59
  marketing is like. Yeah, okay, we're going to
• 57:02
  make sure that all the wheels are pumped up,
• 57:04
  that the engine's got oil in it, that we've got
• 57:07
  petrol to go far enough, we've got the right
• 57:08
  driver. I'm taking this metaphor way too far
• 57:11
  than it needs to go, but that's my point. Marketing
• 57:14
  is a lot of those things, but the eventual thing
• 57:17
  is that we want the car to go faster. I think
• 57:20
  another thing which kind of piggybacks off the
• 57:23
  growth side of stuff is seeing things long term
• 57:27
  and putting that into... to place of three to
• 57:31
  five to 10, you know, where do you actually see
• 57:34
  yourself? I think a lot of business owners are
• 57:36
  just working in the now. And this also comes
• 57:38
  back to the leads type of thing where they're
• 57:40
  like, oh, it's a slow period. I need more leads.
• 57:43
  Well, you don't need more leads. You need a system
• 57:46
  in place that makes that predictable so that
• 57:49
  when it's winter, for example, and you're selling
• 57:51
  pools, you can still be selling pools in winter.
• 57:55
  Or you sit there and go, hey, it's winter. We're
• 57:57
  not going to sell any pools for two months. So
• 57:59
  let's not worry about it. Let's sell so many
• 58:02
  pools in the other 10 months or the other nine
• 58:04
  months that it doesn't matter if we don't sell
• 58:06
  any pools in three months. Because our business
• 58:08
  has that system in place. It has that process
• 58:11
  in place. It sits there and accepts that there
• 58:13
  are parts of the year and parts of the days that
• 58:16
  things won't sell. And the interesting thing
• 58:19
  is, despite the fact that I know this and I've...
• 58:23
  I've worked with the Queensland government. I've
• 58:24
  coached 350 businesses, mentored 350 businesses
• 58:28
  in the last eight, nine years. I'm spending Thursday
• 58:31
  doing exactly that same with five different businesses
• 58:34
  on Thursday. And I still have my own side business
• 58:38
  now, which is in its third week. And I'm sitting
• 58:41
  there going, why is it not successful after three
• 58:44
  weeks? Why is it not? Where's the money? And
• 58:48
  I will panic. I will still panic. I know I'm
• 58:52
  doing everything right. These are the things.
• 58:53
  I'm following a process, follow a plan. And I'm
• 58:56
  following a roadmap from some people I knew in
• 58:58
  Mackay and their business. And I looked at their
• 59:01
  roadmap and they were really hitting their stride
• 59:04
  month 12 to 14. And I'm like, no, I want to week
• 59:09
  three. I think everybody has that. You know,
• 59:11
  that's that instant gratification. And it comes
• 59:13
  back to like the gym when people go into the
• 59:16
  gym in January and they're like, whoa, I'm going
• 59:18
  to be pumped. I'm going to be, you know, lose
• 59:20
  20 kilos. And then it gets to like the third
• 59:23
  week of January and it just dies off. Why would
• 59:26
  not achieve the gains in three to four weeks
• 59:28
  when you sit there and go, this is a six month,
• 59:30
  12 month process. Yeah. And I drum that into
• 59:35
  myself all the time. But somewhere always deep
• 59:39
  inside you, that person inside isn't listening,
• 59:41
  you know, because that person inside is an idiot,
• 59:44
  you know, and you just have to sit there and
• 59:46
  go, okay, I need to put idiot Simon aside and
• 59:48
  just really kind of, you know, which is why I
• 59:53
  think it's often really good to have business
• 59:55
  partners and coaches and mentors who are sitting
• 59:58
  there slapping you, just going, stop being stupid.
• 1:00:01
  There's a plan here. Okay. Month one, you might
• 1:00:04
  only make. $40 ,000, $60 ,000, $40 ,000, $50
• 1:00:08
  ,000, right? Okay, month -wise, fine. But then
• 1:00:10
  month two, we're going to make $60 ,000. Then
• 1:00:12
  month three, we're going to make $70 ,000, okay?
• 1:00:14
  And by the time we're hitting next year, you're
• 1:00:16
  going to be doing $80 ,000, $90 ,000, $100 ,000
• 1:00:18
  a month. No. Yeah, no. But you still beat yourself
• 1:00:24
  up, even though you've said the same thing to
• 1:00:27
  350 other businesses. Yeah. Yeah. It's a struggle.
• 1:00:33
  Yeah. Coming into that, you say that business
• 1:00:37
  is lonely as fuck, which it is and can be very
• 1:00:41
  hard. How does that kind of look? How does business
• 1:00:45
  look for you when it comes into that? Look, I've
• 1:00:48
  it has been I think it has been lonely. I think
• 1:00:52
  that was what caused a lot of the problems in
• 1:00:55
  my first business, because I don't listen. I
• 1:00:58
  didn't listen to people. And I, to a degree,
• 1:01:00
  still don't. But I do now like listening to people,
• 1:01:04
  even if they've got a differing opinion to me,
• 1:01:05
  because that helps me reinforce and challenge
• 1:01:07
  my beliefs. So I like to have an argument with
• 1:01:11
  people about why things are working and things
• 1:01:13
  aren't working. But yeah, it's a struggle because
• 1:01:17
  you're the only person who's lived that fully.
• 1:01:21
  So when someone comes in and goes, why don't
• 1:01:23
  you try this, this? And you're just like, I've
• 1:01:24
  already tried it. What are you talking about?
• 1:01:26
  You know, you get frustrated with people because
• 1:01:28
  they haven't lived the challenges that you've
• 1:01:29
  lived. But I think you've kind of got to get
• 1:01:32
  past that. And I've got a friend of mine who's
• 1:01:35
  staying at my house tonight. He lives on the
• 1:01:37
  Sunshine Coast. He'll come down every fortnight.
• 1:01:39
  And I said to him, hey, I want to talk to you
• 1:01:41
  Tuesday afternoon. I want to ask you why. I want
• 1:01:47
  to ask you whether we should do this or this,
• 1:01:49
  this or this. And I know he'll sit there and
• 1:01:52
  give me an honest answer. Now, whether it's the
• 1:01:54
  right answer or the wrong answer, this is the
• 1:01:57
  thing I think all business owners should do is,
• 1:01:58
  number one, Have this network of people that
• 1:02:01
  you talk to, right? Even if you're going for
• 1:02:04
  coffee, going for lunch, playing golf, whatever
• 1:02:06
  it is, going to a Broncos match, whatever the
• 1:02:09
  things that you want to do, do that with them,
• 1:02:12
  even if it's a barbecue on a Saturday afternoon
• 1:02:14
  and talk to them about the business. You will
• 1:02:17
  never have that. There's no light bulb moment.
• 1:02:20
  There's no enlightenment. There's no suddenly
• 1:02:22
  where you go, aha, this is, you know, it's again,
• 1:02:26
  anyone who believes that, you know, is. is deluding
• 1:02:29
  themselves. The idea that J .K. Rowling wrote
• 1:02:33
  Harry Potter and smashed it out in five days,
• 1:02:35
  which I think the story goes that she was caught
• 1:02:39
  on a train and she came up all these characters
• 1:02:41
  while she was stuck on a train for five hours
• 1:02:42
  one day and she went home and wrote the books
• 1:02:44
  in two weeks and then blah, blah, blah, got a
• 1:02:46
  book deal. That shows you a microcosm of those
• 1:02:49
  five hours she was sitting on a train, right?
• 1:02:51
  She'd spent years trying to work out what it
• 1:02:54
  was that she was going to write. after she'd
• 1:02:57
  written the first book a guy an agent for her
• 1:03:00
  spent two years trying to sell these books into
• 1:03:03
  people so there's this you know i'm paraphrasing
• 1:03:06
  the story there but there's this huge amount
• 1:03:08
  of work that goes on in all of these things so
• 1:03:11
  for you to believe that you're going to get this
• 1:03:13
  light bulb moment all of a sudden your business
• 1:03:15
  is going to be transformed it's just that's not
• 1:03:17
  how it works If you talk to lots of different
• 1:03:19
  people and go, hey, this is what's happening
• 1:03:21
  in my business. This is what I'm doing. I'd love
• 1:03:23
  your input. I'd love your opinion. What will
• 1:03:26
  happen is you'll get lots of differing opinions.
• 1:03:27
  You get lots of people suggesting things, having
• 1:03:30
  ideas. And what you do is you take those pieces
• 1:03:33
  away, the bits that you go, hey, that makes sense.
• 1:03:35
  I like that bit over there. They've given me
• 1:03:38
  10 ideas. The other nine of them, you know, but
• 1:03:41
  that one. i really like so let's take that idea
• 1:03:44
  from there that idea from there that idea from
• 1:03:46
  there and you start building this puzzle of how
• 1:03:50
  the business should look by taking key things
• 1:03:54
  key ideas key suggestions from whether you're
• 1:03:59
  listening to a podcast or whether you're talking
• 1:04:00
  to a friend or whether you're you know sitting
• 1:04:03
  in a meeting or watching a tv show you just Taking
• 1:04:08
  in as much information and learning and asking
• 1:04:10
  and talking to people and having conversations
• 1:04:14
  is, I think, what makes business easier, improves.
• 1:04:19
  When you sit in a bunker or a silo and don't
• 1:04:22
  have a conversation with anyone, don't talk about
• 1:04:24
  anything, don't explain what your problems are
• 1:04:26
  to anybody, that's when it will fail. And avoid
• 1:04:30
  that at all costs. So go to a lunch, go to a
• 1:04:35
  networking event. You know, because all of a
• 1:04:38
  sudden you might have someone who's just giving
• 1:04:40
  you a little tidbit of information at one of
• 1:04:42
  those events where you go, actually, that's really
• 1:04:45
  useful. Yeah, that's pretty good. I'm going to
• 1:04:47
  take that. You know, if there's somebody out
• 1:04:49
  there that's deciding between a fractional CMO
• 1:04:53
  versus in -house, sorry, an agency, what's like
• 1:04:57
  the pros and cons, I guess? Look, the three things,
• 1:05:01
  that's quite a simple one, actually. Hiring someone
• 1:05:04
  yourself. is the cheapest option yeah um but
• 1:05:09
  you'll only get the skills that that person brings
• 1:05:11
  hiring agency you'll get all the skills that
• 1:05:14
  are involved in that agency which is often multiple
• 1:05:16
  different skills most of the skill sets but it's
• 1:05:19
  the most expensive option um but it's easy to
• 1:05:22
  switch on and off and you know those kind of
• 1:05:24
  things and you know you can sit there and go
• 1:05:26
  hey can you guys do this and you know and to
• 1:05:29
  a degree i would say agencies are probably a
• 1:05:31
  little bit more reactive and able to react quicker
• 1:05:35
  you know there may be other solutions are the
• 1:05:38
  solution in the middle which is that fractional
• 1:05:40
  option is having i think the best of both worlds
• 1:05:44
  there's definitely you know not going to lie
• 1:05:47
  but there's definitely negatives in that but
• 1:05:49
  you can sit there and say hey i just want someone
• 1:05:51
  one day a week i want them to come in my business
• 1:05:53
  i want them to be part of the team you don't
• 1:05:55
  really get that from an agency they they don't
• 1:05:57
  they're still a bit sort of standoffish some
• 1:06:00
  agencies do but you know largely by and large
• 1:06:02
  they don't i want someone to come in this office
• 1:06:04
  be part of the team i want them long term i want
• 1:06:06
  them on for the next 12 months i want them from
• 1:06:09
  day one through to day three six five i want
• 1:06:12
  them to manage all this through and i want them
• 1:06:14
  to feel that they're responsible again agencies
• 1:06:17
  are like oh it's not our responsibility you were
• 1:06:19
  still making those decisions yourself etc etc
• 1:06:21
  so i think that to me is the that's the cost
• 1:06:24
  then sits in the middle of having an agency or
• 1:06:26
  having you know your own member of staff but
• 1:06:30
  again it's it's flexible you can get the skills
• 1:06:32
  that you need so i think that's really for me
• 1:06:34
  it's that it offers that flexibility um generally
• 1:06:39
  a better price point than an agency um but again
• 1:06:44
  the the downside is you're dealing with that
• 1:06:46
  person and their and their individual skill set
• 1:06:49
  but we have people who have a strategic person
• 1:06:52
  from us and then that person works with a graphic
• 1:06:55
  designer or works yeah they have people in their
• 1:06:58
  network that they'll reach for it's like a remote
• 1:07:00
  team effectively you know um so you you do to
• 1:07:04
  get this in look it's it's preference a lot of
• 1:07:07
  clients come to us going hey we're researching
• 1:07:09
  all the options here yeah and at the end of the
• 1:07:12
  day i think with marketing it's very much down
• 1:07:14
  to personality and and that kind of match do
• 1:07:17
  they understand my business are they a good fit
• 1:07:19
  are they going to be honest with me but at the
• 1:07:21
  same time you know understand my way of thinking
• 1:07:26
  I always find this a bit different from CFOs.
• 1:07:29
  I mean, you don't really want your CFO to have
• 1:07:31
  a personality. You want them to look at the numbers
• 1:07:34
  and be, you know, we don't need them colouring
• 1:07:38
  the numbers in any way. We need them being completely
• 1:07:41
  honest and, you know, yeah, and very sort of
• 1:07:44
  stoic about things. Whereas you want your marketing
• 1:07:47
  person to be creative. Again, it shouldn't really
• 1:07:50
  be a marketing person. Hire a growth person.
• 1:07:52
  Yes. I agree. Sit there and go, hey, we're making
• 1:07:55
  a million dollars a year. We want to make $1
• 1:07:57
  .5 million a year. Show us how we're going to
• 1:07:59
  do that. Accountants can't do that. HR people
• 1:08:02
  can't do that. Operational people can't do that.
• 1:08:05
  To a degree, salespeople can't do that because
• 1:08:08
  salespeople still need a funnel of leads. The
• 1:08:11
  only person who's going to transform your business
• 1:08:13
  is a growth person. Yep, I agree. I would probably
• 1:08:20
  say I'm a little bit... against the agency model
• 1:08:23
  which is why we moved away from that just because
• 1:08:26
  it is what we find with clients is they'll they'll
• 1:08:28
  go to the agency they'll say i need a website
• 1:08:30
  because tim down the road told me i need a website
• 1:08:33
  and then they provide a website and then the
• 1:08:36
  client's like well why am i not getting any leads
• 1:08:38
  this doesn't make sense and you know you need
• 1:08:40
  that full system you need everything we we had
• 1:08:43
  it last we had it two weeks ago a lady just said
• 1:08:46
  i can't afford to pay anyone to do any marketing
• 1:08:48
  because we've spent so much money on the website
• 1:08:50
  And I just kind of want to smack my head on the
• 1:08:52
  table. What the? Anyway, I said to her, so you're
• 1:08:58
  going to have a nice new shiny website. No one's
• 1:09:00
  going to go to it. And then she didn't email
• 1:09:02
  me back, surprisingly. One of my good friends,
• 1:09:05
  before I met him, he had engaged a marketing
• 1:09:09
  person to do the website. Now he's in the construction
• 1:09:13
  industry. his goal is to double his revenue and
• 1:09:19
  exit his business. So they told him, oh, he needs
• 1:09:23
  a new website. Now, to an extent, I agree, he
• 1:09:27
  does need a new website because his website's
• 1:09:29
  about 10 years outdated, not been updated, you
• 1:09:32
  know. But that's one part of the puzzle. That's
• 1:09:36
  one piece of the puzzle as to actually grow,
• 1:09:38
  and especially if he wants to exit his business
• 1:09:40
  within, you know. Website agencies sell websites.
• 1:09:45
  SEO agencies sell SEO. The one thing I always
• 1:09:48
  said about us is we're very agnostic. We're not
• 1:09:51
  selling anything in particular. We're trying
• 1:09:53
  to understand what your problem is and then we'll
• 1:09:56
  find people or services or solutions that match
• 1:09:59
  that. And that will come from our network, which
• 1:10:02
  is how we make our money. But we'll match you
• 1:10:06
  with the solution that is going to change your
• 1:10:09
  business rather than... match you with a solution
• 1:10:12
  because we have a website developer sitting in
• 1:10:14
  the office that we have to sell yeah yeah so
• 1:10:16
  that's that's i i find that challenge with agencies
• 1:10:19
  is i find that challenge with big creative agencies
• 1:10:22
  as well it's like oh you need a big creative
• 1:10:23
  idea do you do you or do you just need to tell
• 1:10:28
  more people about what it is that you do you
• 1:10:30
  don't need a fancy you know i've seen people
• 1:10:34
  creative agencies win awards for pizza campaigns
• 1:10:39
  for pizza restaurants that then shut down six
• 1:10:41
  months later because they didn't have enough
• 1:10:43
  customers. Yeah. But they had a great creative
• 1:10:46
  campaign. Yeah. Doesn't keep the lights on, unfortunately.
• 1:10:49
  No, no. So for anybody watching, what's your
• 1:10:53
  biggest piece of advice that you can give them?
• 1:10:56
  Oh, God, you put me on the spot there. Look,
• 1:11:00
  I think it's the old one about really understanding
• 1:11:05
  your customers. And I'll explain that with a...
• 1:11:09
  I'll explain that with a story. I did a coaching
• 1:11:11
  session. This is probably a good four or five
• 1:11:12
  years ago with a guy. And I can't remember the
• 1:11:14
  business, but it was a relatively successful
• 1:11:16
  business. I think he had 30, 40 staff, you know,
• 1:11:19
  and I think it was a manufacturing distribution
• 1:11:20
  business. So, you know, every week customers
• 1:11:24
  would bring in, they'd order from him. They'd
• 1:11:27
  all pick and pack it. They were manufacturing
• 1:11:29
  it. It was all sent out to the customers. And
• 1:11:32
  I remember sitting in this meeting with him or
• 1:11:35
  this coaching thing. and I was with another mentor,
• 1:11:41
  and they were getting all incredulous that all
• 1:11:44
  this guy did as the CEO, he was the one making
• 1:11:49
  all the sales calls every week. He had 30, 40
• 1:11:51
  staff. He could have had someone doing the sales
• 1:11:54
  calls. And everyone was like, why are you doing
• 1:11:58
  the sales calls? The whole don't work on the
• 1:12:01
  business, don't work in the business, right?
• 1:12:04
  Which is the... shitty management phrase that
• 1:12:06
  everybody you know parrots out every time you
• 1:12:10
  know and i've heard that phrase so many times
• 1:12:12
  and and i'm very much like no fuck it work in
• 1:12:16
  the business if you want to work in the business
• 1:12:17
  work in the business right if if it genuinely
• 1:12:20
  the business is better with you working in it
• 1:12:22
  work in the fucking business and that if you're
• 1:12:24
  happy doing that work in the business right um
• 1:12:28
  otherwise work on the business um But he was
• 1:12:32
  making the calls every week. He'd make 80, 90
• 1:12:36
  sales calls every week, outbound ones. So he
• 1:12:39
  wasn't answering the phone. He was picking up.
• 1:12:42
  He had a list of customers, and he'd pick up
• 1:12:43
  the phone, and he'd ring every one of them every
• 1:12:45
  week. All right? Everyone else was doing everything
• 1:12:49
  else. Someone was doing the finance. Someone
• 1:12:50
  was doing the operations, everything. But he
• 1:12:52
  would go. And we said in that mentoring thing,
• 1:12:56
  why are you doing that? And he was like, I like
• 1:12:59
  doing it. And it was no more complicated than
• 1:13:03
  that. He was just, I really like doing it. I
• 1:13:05
  like talking to the customers. I get to understand
• 1:13:07
  the customers. I understand their business. I
• 1:13:09
  know what's happening. I know when everything's
• 1:13:10
  shifting, changing, all those kind of things.
• 1:13:12
  He goes, I can then react to that quickly. So
• 1:13:17
  I think my piece of advice would be know your
• 1:13:20
  customers. Talk to them every day. Talk to them
• 1:13:24
  every week. Call them up every week. Now, I know
• 1:13:26
  people listening are not going to do that. Then
• 1:13:30
  took that advice to a guy who did staging for
• 1:13:35
  real estate agents. So he had all the furniture,
• 1:13:36
  a big warehouse full of furniture. And I'd said
• 1:13:39
  to him, let's pull up a database of all of the
• 1:13:42
  real estate agents, because it's real estate
• 1:13:43
  agents who book their staging companies. It's
• 1:13:46
  not the owner of the house. Pull up a list of
• 1:13:49
  all the real estate agents that have bought from
• 1:13:51
  you in the past, bought from you in the last
• 1:13:54
  two years or three years, but haven't. ordered
• 1:13:57
  from you in the last 12 months and we pulled
• 1:13:59
  up this list and there was about 120 130 people
• 1:14:02
  on this list it might even be more than that
• 1:14:04
  it might have been 405 whatever it was but and
• 1:14:06
  i said who's who's called them who's rung them
• 1:14:09
  up do you know why they're not ordering from
• 1:14:10
  you yes well some of them have moved agencies
• 1:14:13
  real estate agents move a lot um some of them
• 1:14:17
  have moved agencies some of them have moved to
• 1:14:18
  suburbs where they don't spend money on staging
• 1:14:21
  etc etc i'm like so you know that and he was
• 1:14:25
  like oh no no i just You know, just know a couple
• 1:14:27
  of them. And I'd said to him, pull up that list
• 1:14:32
  and call them up. He goes, okay, yeah, we'll
• 1:14:34
  give them a call next week. And I'm like, no,
• 1:14:35
  no, no, no, no. You give them a call. You pick
• 1:14:39
  up the phone and say, hey, it's the CEO here.
• 1:14:42
  Just checking in to see how you are. How's business
• 1:14:44
  going? You're not making a sales call. You're
• 1:14:47
  just making a how's things going call. And to
• 1:14:53
  his credit, we got him doing it. It took some
• 1:14:57
  time, but that's where you kind of go. That's
• 1:15:00
  the difference between those businesses that
• 1:15:03
  I think are still succeeding and still going
• 1:15:05
  to ride the waves of any, you know, recessions
• 1:15:08
  or anything like that is that they are still
• 1:15:10
  very much engaged, understanding their customers.
• 1:15:13
  And it's not doing surveys. It's not going, hey,
• 1:15:16
  let's send through a Google survey. It's what
• 1:15:18
  they all say. It's picking up the phone and calling
• 1:15:23
  them. Just go, how's things going? What's going
• 1:15:26
  on? And it's building that relationship. And
• 1:15:28
  that's going to keep you top of mind every time.
• 1:15:30
  And it's one of those ones where I just go, I
• 1:15:33
  know I have to do that myself. Me too. Because
• 1:15:36
  it's me. I can sit here and say, this is what
• 1:15:40
  you need to do. But I've got, for example, 800,
• 1:15:43
  850 consultants now at our books. Right? And
• 1:15:50
  realistically, they're our customers now. But
• 1:15:53
  I need to pick the phone up and call all of them.
• 1:15:55
  Yeah. I just don't know whether I want to make
• 1:15:59
  150 phone calls. But I could make, the point
• 1:16:04
  is I could make 10 a day. Yeah. You know, and
• 1:16:07
  just say, hey, let's have a chat. Just compounds
• 1:16:08
  over time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And just gradually,
• 1:16:11
  let's go, let's call the ones that I haven't
• 1:16:12
  spoken to for a while. You know, that's the ones
• 1:16:14
  that I haven't got a relationship with. Let's
• 1:16:16
  say, hey, how's things going? You know, I'm not
• 1:16:18
  calling to sell anything, just calling to see
• 1:16:22
  how you go. That's my final piece of advice.
• 1:16:28
  Awesome. Well, thank you so much for your time
• 1:16:31
  this morning. No, thank you. It's been a, it's
• 1:16:33
  been a long, I feel like I've spoken a lot, but
• 1:16:36
  I guess that's kind of the point of the podcast.
• 1:16:37
  Normally when I'm on the other side of it, I'm
• 1:16:39
  trying to, yeah, I'm trying to get them to speak
• 1:16:42
  a lot. Yeah. Yeah. That's good. Amazing. So where
• 1:16:45
  can everybody find you? Look, I'm on LinkedIn.
• 1:16:49
  Simon Dell on LinkedIn. Simon at CMO .com. I'm
• 1:16:54
  pretty easy to find. There are some other Simon
• 1:16:56
  Dells out there. um bizarrely one of our clients
• 1:16:59
  who i mentioned who who's our first person to
• 1:17:01
  use rebecca um she completely different side
• 1:17:07
  conversation here she um she she left her husband
• 1:17:10
  uh about four or five years ago and started dating
• 1:17:12
  a guy called simon dell who lives here in brisbane
• 1:17:16
  and i've met him and me and him have had a photo
• 1:17:17
  together and i said yes must be awkward with
• 1:17:20
  two simon dells in your phone she goes yeah she
• 1:17:22
  goes i have to make sure i uh send the right
• 1:17:24
  text message to the right one so anyway oh i
• 1:17:27
  couldn't imagine so yes but there's you can you
• 1:17:30
  can generally find me there's also a guy in the
• 1:17:31
  uk called simondale who photographs mice so random
• 1:17:36
  absolutely and there's a there's a simondale
• 1:17:39
  that runs five star hotels in southeast asia
• 1:17:42
  no i know them all i know them all i know them
• 1:17:45
  all i know them all Everyone should go say, where
• 1:17:48
  are the other people that call the same name?
• 1:17:50
  Where are they? And just say hello to them. I
• 1:17:53
  had like, at one point, I had five of them on
• 1:17:54
  Facebook. It was like, I'd make a comment and
• 1:17:57
  then Simon Dale says, Simon Dale likes your comment.
• 1:17:59
  Well, three Simon Dales have liked my comment.
• 1:18:03
  Anyway. Amazing. I'll link all those down below
• 1:18:07
  for you. And make sure you subscribe to the podcast
• 1:18:10
  because we share conversations like this every
• 1:18:13
  single week. Amazing. Thank you very much.