#365: How To Measure Up To Verne Lundquist w/ Joshua Kennedy
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
clients, day, people, business, vern, question, big, performance, shit, talking, agency, deal, sweat equity, called, podcast, sales, happy gilmore, website, pay, marketing
SPEAKERS
Law (60%), Speaker 3 (27%), Eric (7%), Speaker 2 (2%)
Law Smith
0:02
So you're ready. Oh, soldier. Okay. Did you know The Killers? is a Christian rock band? Yes, you did. What? You didn't want no sweat equity podcast and streaming show. The number one comedy business podcast in the world. Pragmatic entrepreneurial vice with Ron dog Tagu man, we're talking with no condoms. We're talking. Eric's wasted I'm trying to catch up to him. This is a silly, silly episode. If you liked this episode, she liked this episode. Listen to us on Apple podcast, Spotify. Your mom's Walkman? Vimeo We're big on Vimeo. I don't know if you know that. We're gonna be on only fans soon. I forgot to start posting us over there. Yeah, get us on only fans in this episode is sponsored by Squarespace the best CMS Content Management System drag and drop. Website creator out there you want to make a website without you just want to generate leads. You want to get contacts. Squarespace is where it's at. Hey, you want to go to our website? Sweat equity. pod.com. And look at that. What Eric beautifully made. I did that. You did that. You want to go to trinco works.com. The I beautifully made that. Yeah, you want to go to law Smith. works.com in progress. I made that with my two little paws. You can do it too. We figured it out on the fly. We made probably over 200 sites now. I mean, I'm my cup is runneth over with come. Look for the description. You didn't know the killers were in a Christian rock band. No, you didn't know that.
Eric Readinger
1:51
All right. I'm saying I didn't know that. Oh, I don't really care either. But
Law Smith
1:56
all right. Let's get up with Josh. Joshua Kennedy. Oh, it's about my sweat equity. Sweat equity. About Nice.
3
Speaker 3
2:22
Christian rock. works in the weather sections, which is interesting.
Law Smith
2:26
Well, is he Jewish? Do they control the weather? Hey, I'm firing hot. I'm pretty drunk. Alright.
3
Speaker 3
2:34
Alright. It's a no so anyway, we're just just up here. Moving stuff out of the apartment. So coming to get this is my first time in New York. So yeah. Sort of a free trip to New York. Come check it out.
Law Smith
2:45
What are your thoughts as a bushy eyed 30 year old? How old
3
Speaker 3
2:51
are you? 30. So I'd say it's, it's dirtier than I anticipated to be honest with you. So it's no Tampa?
Law Smith
2:59
Well, it is no damper. You're the summer in Manhattan kind of sucks. Because it's two reasons. So like, you have no breeze. At some point during the summer in New York City. You have no breeze so like all the buildings because they block all the wind. And so like in the middle earning the giant heat rays. It smells like this and trash and just like I remember going out with my buddy and just being like, Can you feel the energy? I'm just homeless smells
3:29
everyday is the diarrhea. Right?
Law Smith
3:31
Is it like that yet? Or is it still kind of?
3
Speaker 3
3:34
I mean, there are definitely some there's some corners that were not the best smelling for sure already that I've noticed
Law Smith
3:40
and you're not you're in the you're the nice part. You're not even like the Lower East Side. I know. You're not an Alphabet City area shit.
3
Speaker 3
3:47
We rolled through Harlem by car to get here so I got to see. Yeah.
Law Smith
3:53
All the black people. Is that what you're talking about? The quote
3
Speaker 3
3:57
happy was a happy gilmore that we watched the other day quite an economically diverse crowd that we have here today. So that's an
Law Smith
4:03
Happy Gilmore that finds it happy. I don't remember that one. I think I've seen that movie. 100 times I don't I used to worship the altar of Sandler. I don't I don't ever I think he made that one up. That's an A DVD extra
3
Speaker 3
4:16
or is it Vern Troyer is his name the CBS Is that is
Law Smith
4:21
that many me? Vern George Clooney needed for like many who I piss next to one time? Yeah. I picked next Verne Lundquist at a LA Rams reunion when my dad was attending. That is the worst. And I'd had nothing to say to him and I was like, Vern, what's up, man? What do you do?
4:44
name drop,
Law Smith
4:44
so
Eric Readinger
4:46
I peed next to Vern luck. I can't think of a nerdier I know. I like person ever
Law Smith
4:54
like Verne Lundquist name comes on this show. Like you'd have To throw in whatever story you got, what what's your version story? Well,
Eric Readinger
5:06
I shit next to Vern. No, lawyer. No. Okay. Shit on Verne Troyer. How was that rest his soul?
Law Smith
5:13
Was he in the tiny, tiny stall? Is there like a tiny urine
5:17
that's covered him.
Law Smith
5:19
Vern Verne Lundquist was paying it was all USC it out at the Coliseum because that's where the Rams used to play. And then I did one of those things. I had nothing to say to him, but I wanted to talk to him. And I was just like, What are you doing now? The SEC like thing and that's pretty rich in my head. And he's like, Oh, he's like, where do you go to school?
2
Speaker 2
5:39
I have a national contract. Every contract is where do
Law Smith
5:43
you go to school? And I was like all burden he was. I hope you go and then he walked out and I was like, yeah, no, this nailed it. I'm the worst in the story for sure.
5:52
So you're the worst than an hour or two.
Law Smith
5:55
I'm I'm not gonna take better than you are right now. If anybody's watching on video, that's for sure. This is a ton of different kinds of shirts from the record mines. shirt you cut into a tank top like Florida trash.
6:07
Nipple alert.
Law Smith
6:09
Or my exposed my rubber legs. Yes, sir. Josh was just watching us. We have been asked him anyway, we going what's what's going on? What's new? Why do you want to come back on the show? I don't I don't know why.
3
Speaker 3
6:29
I say I think we've done a couple of times. I think one thing is that the business is evolving. So if it was kind of a series about doing doing like the evolution of the business, I have more more to pipe in on that. So I can definitely talk about that.
6:41
Can you give us a quick recap? Yeah, there's no beginning hosting or beginning of the new season.
Law Smith
6:48
Yeah, you have to do like a recap. Like Umbrella Academy three comes out.
6:52
I have a little skip.
Law Smith
6:54
After watch the first two again, like the boys, I kind of forgot everything that happened.
Eric Readinger
6:58
That's worth three watching. Okay, so recap on your business. Go ahead, Josh.
3
Speaker 3
7:03
Yeah, no, I think the last time we touched base I was in Asheville, North Carolina visiting with my friends. Were there some like a cameo from toilet paper? Toilet paper or roses or something like that in the background? Maybe both?
Eric Readinger
7:14
Oh, the weed man showed up. I remember that. Yeah.
Law Smith
7:18
You're like, This guy's a shaman, man. He's cool. Don't worry about it. He does Ayahuasca journeys for everybody here.
7:26
I pay in full time.
3
Speaker 3
7:29
So yeah, I was in Nashville with a friend. And he's HR starting to build and like trying to bring on people to help out with the company and doing more of the business development stuff. And I think now it's a lot more about like scaling clients, I've got a little bit better model for like, how I want to run the business and things like that. And even like some of the partnerships and strategies that we're starting to run, it's been like, definitely a lot more mature than they were back then and stuff. So got a lot more on like on the technical business side to speak about. So definitely some good progress there.
Law Smith
8:00
Have you realized the clients under $10,000 that were dogshit. And they promised the most and they take the most out of you?
3
Speaker 3
8:07
A lot of times, a lot of times, yes, that is the case. And for
Law Smith
8:11
a lot of businesses I'm we're speaking to the audience in this show. 10,000 isn't a big client at all. Like they wouldn't even scoff at that. But when you're starting out, a lot of people, I did this too, I chase bad deals, and you spend a lot of time. It's like chasing a girl you're not even interested in. Like when you were in high school, you're like, I'm pretty sure I could get her late, I could get laid by her. She's a seven, and then she rejects and then you're like you spend all this time and now now you're pot committed. And you're like, I didn't even want this in the first place. When you really retrospect I'm in too deep. So my worry with you is that you're going to placate to the smaller guys, because you want to make the deals you want to build on on that. And it is a fool's errand.
3
Speaker 3
8:56
Yeah, no, I completely agree with you. One thing that I'm cautious of. So what I would say too, is that I've been able to say no to a lot of the clients, the smaller fish that I know are not worth it. So most powerful word in business, for sure. So I have a better understanding of what to say no to just from experience running the clients that I have. So I can kind of do a little bit of due diligence and then say like, okay, is this client going to work out for us? Is this a good fit? And then just say no, before I go into that, what I can say though, is sort of the growing pains of the businesses I think anytime you do when you take a $3,000 client because we work a lot on a performance basis is like when you scale them to five 5k 7k Plus, it's like I do get a little bit nervous around those numbers because the smaller clients are not used to forking out that much cash on a month correctly and growing the program. It's almost like you're being punished for the growth if that makes sense.
Law Smith
9:45
If you if you've got to potty train them. It's the anti Biggie Smalls. It's not no money, Mo Problems. It's Yes, Molly smalls small littles It was already burned to stop, don't rip, just don't rip it. But at large do you're like, hey, I need an accounts, I need accounts receivable to hit me, or our accounts receivable get hit every, every 30 days and like, we can't do that we do that or 90 in here like, this is bullshit you just walked through but
Eric Readinger
10:21
that Okay, real quick though Did you describe what it is your company does?
3
Speaker 3
10:24
Yeah. So just to revisit what I do Sorry,
Eric Readinger
10:28
I totally remember for the new listeners out right,
Law Smith
10:32
that's that's that's called setting the table in our business. Yeah.
3
Speaker 3
10:36
So it's a performance marketing company. So we work with DTC ecommerce brands. And we basically have a bunch of different partnerships. So some of those are like publishers can be like traditional PR, so you're nodding off
Law Smith
10:47
like you're on heroin. Like an old jazz player, your heads to pay attention,
10:55
I was paying attention, you're just looking at me,
Law Smith
10:57
I thought you're having a stroke or something you're like, kind of just
3
Speaker 3
11:02
I didn't realize I was doing it, honestly. But you're reading the previous notes from the previous
Law Smith
11:07
performance marketing is explained
3
Speaker 3
11:11
performance. So we actually drive new customers for DTC e commerce brands on performance basis, primarily through different partnerships. But the key is, basically is that we have technology that's able to track it. So then we can basically tell where we influence the sales. So it's kind of like ad tech, but but global, if that makes sense. Yeah. And
Law Smith
11:28
what's DDC? We have to, we have to, we have to take it all out.
3
Speaker 3
11:33
So direct, direct consumer, so we don't really work with like any type of like services, like no lawyers, no insurance, like no health insurance, any of that kind of thing. No
Law Smith
11:41
professional services, product professionals, just products, which, which are trickier. And I think, because you have way more layers to deal with that are out there, externalities to you. So they're, you're dealing with shipping issues, that's not any of your problem warehouses, right? You're dealing with logistics, none of the warehouses has any of that stuff cascaded back to you. And they go, Well, we don't have money because we had we had a guy steal a truck, and you're like, I don't that has nothing to do with me.
3
Speaker 3
12:10
What I do, yeah, what I can say is that I've seen it happen with, like, not specifically my clients, but other clients, like inventory concerns, especially with like, everything that's gone in the past year or two, with the supply chain being backed up a lot is that oh, boy, what are basically, which I could use a little bit to my advantage, but they're paying traditional agencies rather paying however much money, the 5000 or 10,000 that we talked about, but they're not able to sell any more products, right, because their supply chain is backed up. And then they're kind of like crunched in or locked into like a relationship that they're paying for but not able to generate more revenue. So thankfully, we'd be able to protect against that. And I haven't had any clients with that. But it has been an issue that's coming up.
Law Smith
12:46
sure that what you're dancing around a lot of the although the growing pains you had and what you're dancing around is assessing risk. Right? You when people trust you, that's how you get them in sales. Sales is trust, right? But when you're talking about from your side, okay, this guy's thrown out a lot of promises. I don't know if he has the liquidity, or you know, anything to pay. Or he may just not pay on time, because he's one of those fucking guys. You know, the guy who has to haggle like everything.
Eric Readinger
13:20
Right. It'll pay you when I'm satisfied with results.
Law Smith
13:23
You're like, No, this is a pretzel, Stan? Like, lights on dog. Yeah, like the friend that has to haggle. Oh, is that $1.25? Pretzel? I want it for $1.15. Right? And they're like, No, this is a flat corporate, this is target. We can't change this. That kind of guy. There's a lot of those guys in small business, that you deal with client wise. How do you assess risk? Now? What do you what are the temples you look for? When you're when you're talking to new clients from this past experience? So
3
Speaker 3
13:59
yeah, well, I mean, that's, that's a good question. I mean, one of the things is, like, just looking at their website would be one of the first things to do and just like see if they're carrying inventory, right? If there's anything out of stock, because if something's out of stock on the website, right now, that's not good for us, because I'm trying to drive traffic and your customers, but if they can't make a purchase, that's what's the point of me working with them. That's one. And then two is just just ask questions about their previous. So what I find with the type of work that I do is either they have had a previous agency that they worked with, that has that, that you know, they're outsourced to, or they try to do it internally and they have no idea what they're doing. So those are the two basically eventualities or situations I run into so trying to figure out just asking questions about the program and about their, you know, what their economy, you know, their website and sort of process and all those kinds of things are basically the two ways I do it. So we're,
Law Smith
14:49
we were the rebound boyfriend for everybody that had a bad experience with an agency or they tried to do it in house, way too overwhelmed. And it's like Yeah. And then you realize you're in marketing agencies. Let's just call yours an agency and it's not but you're, you're different. You're an entity of that umbrella. Let's say. Everybody comes to you. These clients come to you. I said this in an interview today I go, look, and I played it right. It was fine. new material, new material. Do you know all my materials recycled? Do I do I only play? I only play Scrabble with my friends that text a lot because they can't spell shit.
15:34
Okay? What were you saying? You said in an interview today,
Law Smith
15:36
I'll probably beat your ass dude.
15:42
You Up was okay.
Law Smith
15:44
Um, what was that talking about?
15:45
I don't know. I'm asking you.
Law Smith
15:49
Man, we shouldn't smoke before this. So marijuana why? We know that nicotine did. You got me addicted to gum? Um, that to yourself? You realize that every the people that hire you hate what you do? It's like, or like, you've got to you had a rat problem in this place. You hate the rat guy. But you hate you hate what he does. You don't like you don't like rats, and you don't like exterminating rats. And the guy's probably pretty creepy. So you don't like him? So you're already coming into like,
16:26
because they didn't do the trick.
Law Smith
16:28
Shout out. But I'm saying like, we used to get people that come into us with this weird energy of already like fuck you. Right? I've already been ripped off. I've already been beaten up and thrown down the stairs by my dad for it's
Eric Readinger
16:39
mad at his phone because it's not right. Work in the wet and
Law Smith
16:44
push it harder. That works the way you're gonna break the glass on this thing with your
16:50
for lunch, though. Hate it.
Law Smith
16:52
So people come in with this. Let's call it S D energy. This small dick energy. Yeah, spinning around. See, I like that comedy is about contrast. I don't know if you know that. So people are coming in with this weird energy, like, you've already fucked up, because you've already you, you imbibe what this field is that I already hate? I'm already confused by it. Do you get a lot of that coming into it? For sure. Sure. You are on a public forum? So? So there's no way you're gonna say yes.
3
Speaker 3
17:28
No, I think that there's definitely from previous agencies. So there's, there's certain agencies in our industry, I'll say that have a bad reputation. So anytime that you know that they're associated with that particular agency, and you're talking to him, you know, that they're gonna have a bad taste in their mouth from what they do. So, like you mentioned, we're kind of under an entity within the agency life, but we're not exactly an agency. And really, the biggest ways to mitigate that I found is a the performance base. So we're only charging on the customers that we're referring. And then sort of like basic contracts, we're not trying to get you into a six month or 12 month thing, it's more of a written contract. So those two things are more like performance aligned. And so we have less like they, they are able to trust us a little bit more, because there are lower barriers and barriers to working with us.
Law Smith
18:12
You say last last for you. You're cute boy. I mean,
Eric Readinger
18:16
I lost. How do you do the pricing? Sorry.
Law Smith
18:20
So the pricing,
3
Speaker 3
18:24
the pricing, really prints? Sorry? Yeah. variable. So depends on it depends on the vertical to be honest with you. But typically, how I do it now is I'm going to offer either either a, like a CPA cost per acquisition, which is just straight percentage of sales, or I'm gonna offer a hybrid, which is gonna be a lower retainer, and then a lower percentage as well. So I'm good working with either or like to give them the option of either. That's good.
Law Smith
18:49
So it feels like you've you've solidified your sales pitch, more or less, because now you have an answer. Like you've got PR reps on you. Yeah. No, that's good. That there's a maturity level to that, like, I think is,
2
Speaker 2
19:06
like very much more presentable. No offense.
Law Smith
19:10
No, but it sounds like you had to skill maybe that shaman worked out for you sounded bad
19:16
what I said, Hey, man, meant to be a compliment.
19:19
prompter? I'm really reading, right? Hey, perfect.
Law Smith
19:22
You can read prompter? I can't do that.
2
Speaker 2
19:24
Rich people read from prompter. That's good. That sounds like a T shirt.
Law Smith
19:29
Rich people read. I don't know how to spell prompter. Rich people.
19:35
This will never happen. Oh, I do have that cricket. We can make our own T shirts.
Law Smith
19:40
Cricket Wireless.
2
Speaker 2
19:42
No, the cut to make T shirts.
Law Smith
19:46
Okay, I'm down. I got it. I got all these ideas like is this like, talk to the him man? Like every dude has been like we should be we should make a bar. And we should do a T Shirt Company.
2
Speaker 2
19:58
I'd never have said I wanna I have a bar I've done both
Law Smith
20:01
multiple times let's focus in on a bar mere above it. It'll be called the influence in this downstairs bar will be called under the influence.
Eric Readinger
20:12
I'm gonna go I'm gonna go back Hold on, and take the time to put to put cricket noises under because I don't have my sound You don't sound bad thing right now I'll definitely forget but I want to go back out
Law Smith
20:28
to our old friend Shannon Sorbo for that joke my whole life. Yeah.
2
Speaker 2
20:34
He's who to write emails to then.
Law Smith
20:38
Okay, let's let's let's write this ship Eric next question
2
Speaker 2
20:44
do the so what's your day to day like? How's that looking?
Law Smith
20:51
Yeah give us the breakfast lunch dinner what's going on?
3
Speaker 3
20:53
So so like today I had a client call Have you seemed your
Law Smith
20:57
days yet? Have you seen them?
3
Speaker 3
21:01
As in like, are they the same every week? Or like as I have like,
21:04
pirate day
Law Smith
21:05
every every good project manager ops person that's come on this show is talked about the meteor days. And don't remember Nick. Nick snap. Six Sigma suit that
Eric Readinger
21:21
was like five years ago. Was one of the first episodes I was ever on. I guess you don't remember. No, I know. It's cool. I remember his name.
Law Smith
21:30
Let's go. No, Joshua, question for you. Do you theme your Do you theme your days?
3
Speaker 3
21:39
I'm not to the point yet where we think we theme our days. I'm open to suggestions but I haven't seen too much Monday.
Law Smith
21:45
Get your shit together day Tuesday. Act like you got your shit together. Friday, continuous improvement day. All your meetings on Tuesday to Thursday, in the afternoon. That's the best I got so far.
Eric Readinger
21:58
What does that mean? You mean plan plan your week is what you mean not seeing your day notice even seeing your day? What a
Law Smith
22:05
theme your day. It's an ops philosophy that you have to that people naturally do when they have a small business. So you so you own a bakery? Right? year ago? Hold
2
Speaker 2
22:16
on a second. You don't need to go metaphorical. Yeah,
Law Smith
22:19
yeah, I do. You own a bakery. You're a Cuban Baker. See, if you own a Cuban bakery, you're making all those big baguette style Cuban loaves of bread. You get up at 3am. That's your deal. You're a great baker. That's what you do. Then you start your own bakery, then you have to figure out alright, this day is an administrative day after I'm done with the actual baking, the actual service that actual work work. I have to do, there's always at the Minister of LDL, that that's right. The J of something, I'm sure I wasn't questioning, it was just your Italian is really working for you. That's what it was. And so, so you have to theme your days when I when I had to coach a lot of Salon, like a stylist that wanted to have their own salon. They work their big days or Thursday or Thursday through Saturday. That's your money making days. Now if you can fill your other days, great servers, but every Sunday and Monday until you don't have to do it. Those are your social media days. You can schedule out all your social media, you can schedule you can do all your ad administrative, you can do your marketing. Those are the days that you can cluster together because everybody's at work on Monday. No one's really coming in but you could also be doing it from your salon and take in anybody that needed someone on a Monday. So you're filling in a gap. My point being that was theming their days these are the money making days these are my feet 12 hours a day selling retail that's called take home in the business Yeah, you don't know about it. Do you? Do you even know that
2
Speaker 2
24:03
man? Let's go Let's garbage garage after this bro.
Law Smith
24:06
I'll open a salon right now. I don't even need to cut hair. I'll fucking just wax that shit. It will just be commissioned won't be rental it out won't be booth rental
24:15
views like pulling air.
Law Smith
24:18
I'm pretty drunk. I'm not gonna lie. I know. Josh, your thoughts? That's how you answer you just go to go go on a big rant and then just go your thoughts?
3
Speaker 3
24:29
Yeah, no, I think I there's definitely a flow though that I have for sure during the week. There's not much. PAISLEY Tuesday, Thursday is where most of the work is done. But in terms of dividing the division of responsibilities right now at people that are pretty much execute, executing a lot of like the client management stuff and all that
Law Smith
24:45
how many people on your team
3
Speaker 3
24:48
right now just shoot like two or three people? Very so small, small team, but they kind of do more of the project management stuff and client management and I'm focused mainly on the conferencing and the business development and that kind of Thinking kind of like the content marketing side of things, and then also chipping in, you know, on calls and all that and just kind of overall strategy. So
Law Smith
25:07
you need to come in like, Oh, let me slide in, say hi for five minutes and then slide out. That's a template change
25:12
this change that change. Oh, what was Alex talking about Tuesday?
Law Smith
25:17
Let me a little bit. Let me just elaborate on that. And I gotta go. I gotta cut out that. It's always a baller move.
2
Speaker 2
25:23
Right? Yeah, don't not change nothing guys. Leaving.
Law Smith
25:27
Yeah, you come in and you come in and say a bunch of big planets. Hey, we go bigger. We go home. That's how we roll in performance marketing. All right, I've got a two o'clock I just got to cut out and then you just you roll out on a rolly? Rolly set chair. Yeah.
25:43
Make one of your employees carry you out.
Law Smith
25:45
So you're doing agile project management. What are we talking? We talk in Asana, we talking right. What are we talking? Let's get?
3
Speaker 3
25:51
We do Asana. Is that what we use project management stuff?
Law Smith
25:54
I used to use Asana. Yeah, I use it. It's okay. Yeah, it's okay. If you use it correctly. Yeah, I would say I would ask your people that use it. If you use it correctly, from the get go. It'll save you eons in time. Like it'll save you so much time in the back end.
Eric Readinger
26:15
You know what, improve Asana for me
Law Smith
26:18
having clients on your asana that
Eric Readinger
26:21
but how about just like a save or a send button? Like, submit? That's got that not what I'm talking about. Like you create a task. Would you like to make it a big thing over it? Never feels like it goes.
Law Smith
26:39
That you can add like a prompt. Do you want to send this kind of thing?
Eric Readinger
26:44
No, just something that is more definitive of when you've completed what you're trying to do.
Law Smith
26:49
Oh yeah, you can have you can have it do like grant to show me this shit. You know when on the asana you use if you complete a project it shows like a rainbow and unicorns Oh
Eric Readinger
26:58
no, I know that I'm saying like creating things doesn't matter we can worry about this. Oh, I thought I was fucked up the nitty gritty I'm not sober
Law Smith
27:08
wow it's sad then this is getting treacherous you're treacherous you did this I'm naughty by nature treacherous. Give me that. You know you love that. I'm
27:18
gonna have to do so many facts after this.
Law Smith
27:21
I know you love that pun. Take
27:22
me way more time.
Law Smith
27:24
I'm trying to get this Taurus. Alright. So aren't you glad you came back on?
27:31
She was nice enough to come on at the last minute.
Law Smith
27:33
This might be more damage. And and yesterday we rescheduled because Eric had like ballet practice or something and had to reschedule on the fly. What was going on? Let's bring it all out. Do you do HR meetings like this? Where you just get it all out there?
Eric Readinger
27:48
This isn't HR my own house? Yeah, I just thought I didn't want to do Monday's your Garfield case of the Mondays. What
Law Smith
27:56
do you want for me? All right. All right. I'll be od about it. That's fine.
3
Speaker 3
28:00
Oh, man, you know, gentle podcast the Monday that's all it is? Yes. I
28:06
seemed my day that I wasn't going to be a podcast.
Law Smith
28:09
Now. We got to get out of this house. That's that's probably part of it. We'll get a studio soon. And probably one of those kosher places. You know, is inflation is getting rised up. Yeah. So everybody's now being very speculative. All that stuff. How do you How are you going to make your business recession proof that for mentioning hair out of nowhere? Yeah, no. Big question
28:33
later on with that.
3
Speaker 3
28:34
I think I can actually use that I can I think I can pivot pretty well. With you. So I think I think it goes down to the performance basis thing, right? So like, what you tend to see is like, I kind of look at like agencies as like blind, the blind dating kind of thing, right? So like, you can go off reputation, you can get referrals, but you don't really know what it's like until you're working with them. Or
Law Smith
28:56
to bolster that metaphor. A lot of people aren't good at dating. They're not very good at asking questions. Right? Like, I've done a lot of those those. Man I swiped right on so many trans dudes, what am I? Good job? Not for me. But good. You know? I'm saying, See,
29:14
ya be right back. If you like him.
Law Smith
29:17
Don't act like you don't know. You're not gonna like
29:19
creep me out. Touch me. Feel my armpit.
Law Smith
29:23
Okay. It's even funnier when you motionless. I don't have to
29:27
let you finish. Just finish on me.
Law Smith
29:32
But like, but I used to go on these dates. And I go, Oh, you saw as a comedian. You want me to entertain you this whole time? That's insane. Or what drives me nuts is a woman can't carry conversation. Like, I've got to take the lead on all this all the time. I'm not always on like I am. Right now.
29:52
You know, I've known you for a minute.
Law Smith
29:56
It's not always crashing. Not a lot of
Eric Readinger
30:00
I feel like I get all of your quiet time.
Law Smith
30:03
I don't know, I think you're just you're tough audience and one
30:07
should be. Thank God. Yeah.
Law Smith
30:09
All right. So, back to this, I think, I think that's a good metaphor it is dating, because you're,
3
Speaker 3
30:15
it's dating. So you don't really know what you're into until 36 days, you typically meet a sales team who has a refined pitch, right? They sell you they show you their
Law Smith
30:24
fancy slides and sales, AIDS, marketing, marketing, hate sales. Yes.
3
Speaker 3
30:28
Right. Right, exactly. And then you feed it into your marketing team. And they're managing expedition, all that kind of stuff. So again, the solution to all that is the performance basis. So we have software that tells us, we can tell is this the first time the customer is coming to you? Is this a repeat purchase? What whoever this is, and so in a reset, like in a recession, people say, okay, I can you can go to this company, that they might have a good reputation, you don't know what it's like working with them. They're asking you for six month or 12 month commitment they're trying to engage you on the first day,
Law Smith
30:55
right? Literally getting engaged, the metaphor works very well. So you're getting Indian Indian parents trying to matchmake? You can't say any of this stuff, but he wants to. All right, go ahead. Do you see the Indian parents had sued sued the kids for not delivering a kid? That's pretty Indian? That's the most Indian should have average? I
31:18
don't know. I mean, I don't know.
Law Smith
31:19
I mean, that we have to get Krishna Reddy back on the bike. But you know, Alright, are we gonna
31:24
last for your kids?
Law Smith
31:26
On here? All right, go ahead.
3
Speaker 3
31:29
For a second option, which the first one is getting engaged, locking you in 3000 $5,000 Plus retainer every month for six months or 12 months, the way that we work is we only get paid out pretty much on new customers, or we, you know, we know if it's a new customer, and we're not going to lock you into long term contracts. So for someone who we don't really know what the future is going to hold, it's uncertain. We don't know what people's purchasing habits are going to be like. So why don't you work with someone who's not going to lock you into long term engagement and also going to show you proof of sales.
Law Smith
31:58
So for for a empathizing, where you're at analyzing risk of the client is going to be way more important. That's gonna be that, once you figure out that key, what's your metrics? What's your index for figuring out the risk of these clients because you are paid to play, right? That's gonna be that's gonna be your kind of guiding star, that's going to be your north star for everything. That's how you don't fuck yourself big time because your cash flows come in, depending on the wellness of that that brand, right? And how healthy they are. And I'm only getting, I'm getting kind of fired up, because I've been there where people promise you all that shit. And then I get mad. I'm getting into that. On time traveling to the point where I would go, I should have vetted this personnel a lot more.
Eric Readinger
32:44
How do you do that? How do you establish your deliverables?
3
Speaker 3
32:49
Yeah, well, I mean, part of it is what the expectations of the client are, right?
Law Smith
32:52
He wants to know, the recording software use. So
32:54
no, no, he's having trouble with
Law Smith
32:57
it. That's not it. Google Data Studio doesn't
Eric Readinger
32:59
kick. I'm just curious, because if it's performance based, I mean, are you get like, are you getting, like, revenue data from last year, and you have to make it a 15%? Gross, how's it you know, how
Law Smith
33:11
and the bigger you get, the more you're gonna have to figure out how to check that that number isn't juked, because I know you can put tracking in, but it's in their entities, right?
3
Speaker 3
33:20
Well, so it's both typically we have access to their analytics. So if we set it up properly, we're able to see how much revenue to drive through Google Analytics to is that we're operating out of their own, like their own software, right, that is connected to their site. So the the way that we get screwed really is if we build up a program to like, let's say, hypothetically build a program to $500,000 a month, then they could say, we don't want to work with you anymore. And pretty much collect all those residuals, basically, because we've done it. Now that's the situation is very real, to be, you know, work with us. And maybe at that point, we have to come up with a longer contract. So we can protect ourselves a little bit more. But like at least just trying to get the business in the beginning. It's more about just getting the business going and started to build the program. But yeah, so it's there. It's the software is connected directly to their website, or in their analytics accounts. And we're also using our own software called affluent, which is basically taking all the data from all these different places, all the different networks where our clients are working with the different software platforms and pulling in place.
Law Smith
34:14
So like your tech stack check. of sorts.
34:18
I'm not I'm not familiar, like
Law Smith
34:20
it's aggregate. It's aggregating all the info you need from their tech stack all the apps that we use.
34:25
Yeah, for sure. Yeah.
Law Smith
34:28
So I'm interesting. What
2
Speaker 2
34:30
you're doing kind of scary. Isn't it scary that they could just There you go.
Law Smith
34:34
That means our show. We have to go lightning round. And we'll ask what should we ask the same question? No, I haven't. You've already asked it. I know, but it changes. Some people have different answers, but
Eric Readinger
34:45
I don't you know, I'm gonna be honest. I don't think I like a 13 year old question. I said it.
Law Smith
34:50
Rough. Well, I'm sorry. Look, Ryan Sickler, Ryan Ryan Sickler podcast copied it the honeydew
34:59
let's Let's make it okay.
Law Smith
35:02
Why? Because you don't like thinking about 13 year olds because your past Yeah, yeah. You know, let's go with this. What is the hardest time you ever laughs This is a Pete Holmes question I'll steal from his podcast
3
Speaker 3
35:16
what is the hardest time what you ever laughed Okay, the most the most immediate the honestly the most immediate thing that came to mind was like when I was in elementary school and we were in like fourth and fifth grade and there were two flies having sex on the table and someone was doing a live commentary over that. And that's
Law Smith
35:36
good. That's perfect. That see this is a fun question. That's better way better. That's ours. I don't want to steal it. But that look, everybody's seen that are the lizards going on it with a shed? I'm breaking stalling apart. I'm Thor. I told my kids I'm Thor and they have to address me that on Father's Day I
35:54
forgot that they're gonna be so disappointed and
Law Smith
35:57
then when my daughter got angry and it started raining behind me I go you did? I go you made these clouds happen and you're blaming them for the way she bought it? Yeah. them in the Jews. All right. Well, so appreciate you coming on. We'll we'll have you back on when we're more sober. Maybe. Or maybe more drunk. I had more fun.
36:18
Let me know ahead of time so I can kind of join you.
36:21
Do that's a good call.
Law Smith
36:23
Deal. Deal. We'll do boozy episodes. I like that. I like where your head's at. Maybe we could do a live one in the listeners drink with us. Sure. That always needs no. All right. You said it like a mom. Sure. Maybe five. All right, buddy. Thanks for coming on. We'll have you on. Some probably August, let's say August to see them. See it.
