The Most Valuable Marketing Conversation You’ll Watch in 2025

For any brand of a decent size, this is 100% way to stay ahead of everybody right now.

>> Orin John, also known as Orin Meets World, is a creative operator that's held leadership roles across marketing, products, and brand. He's helped scale startups and legacy brands alike. And as

a creator himself, he's built a personal brand that drives real business value.

That's the best part about the creator income. I make way more money than when

income. I make way more money than when I was an executive. We used to live in the same house. We drive the same cars.

You know, I would like scream from the rooftops how big of a generational opportunity that is that like the window is not going to last forever. people

just ignore.

>> In this episode, he shares how creators actually make money and the systems behind content creation at scale.

>> If you can't turn your creative ideas into something that is like a process or actionable, then you're going to burn.

>> We dive into platform strategy, brand positioning, influencer campaigns, and how small teams can build a content machine that punches way above their weight. Everyone on the internet is

weight. Everyone on the internet is improving at what they create every day.

I'm such a better creator than I was 6 months ago or even a year ago. So, if

you're expecting the same thing to work, it's not. You must be leveling up at the

it's not. You must be leveling up at the same time. People get stressed by that.

same time. People get stressed by that.

It's like, well, strive for [ __ ] greatness. If you're building something

greatness. If you're building something today and want to supercharge your content, this episode gives you the playbook. I'm going to tell you

playbook. I'm going to tell you something. I've not said it. I guess I'm

something. I've not said it. I guess I'm just going to put the juice on the camera right now. One of the most valuable things most creators don't do, the business in itself.

[Music] >> So, what is the key to great content in 2025? That is a great starting question.

2025? That is a great starting question.

You either need to be making content that's ultra valuable that people are going to bookmark and stick with or content that's as entertaining as television. Basically, those are your

television. Basically, those are your two options.

>> So, value or entertainment.

>> And then the best do both.

>> The best do both. Which one do you think is the less saturated path right now?

>> I still think it's value mainly because niche expertise the value that's an all-time high. And whether you are like

all-time high. And whether you are like a doctor, a surgeon, a marketer, whatever it is, like literally sharing like the exact things that you're doing.

And every single person is like willing to now engage with this valuedriven content that didn't exist, frankly, like five or six years ago. Even if you go on TV, you weren't hearing like foremost experts in their field or people with a

super niche application like go deep into it. Like, and that's right there. A

into it. Like, and that's right there. A

good example is we had a knee doctor and he's literally just yapping about knee problems. No production, no anything.

views are just going crazy because so many people have those knee issues and they now have someone to talk to about it, relate to it who's a professional. I

think there's just so much room there.

>> Yeah. Something that really really surprised me when I first started doing the podcast, when I did my first podcast, very much so based on the individual and I started realizing that topic was way more important and I'm starting to see in some of the big

podcasts is valuedriven, very niche specific aka like a doctor. No one knows who they are. The name isn't even in the title thumbnail, but they're just going deep and those are actually the ones that are performing better.

>> Yeah. instant credibility if it is a doctor, if it is whatever. So there's

that kind of value. Like I kind of map out all the different things that will help someone succeed. You know, you kind of have to then narrow down to what you have and you really look at okay like credibility. Is there innate credibility

credibility. Is there innate credibility in like what you've done or even like that guy does his video in the doctor like blue outfit immediate win, right?

Like if you're not a doctor and you want to sell something on the internet, you should probably get one of those. But

then you look at things like all right like hotness helps. Hard to argue. Also

original looks if you just look oddball that helps. sold whatever stops the

that helps. sold whatever stops the scroll and then your production value or lack thereof or you like there's every one of those things like compounds and if you do if you have all of them if you're the perfect mix of everything you

have like a way bigger potential but if you're not if you have any amount of those you can still stand out >> I think what you're really backing into we talked about it actually a lot in the Caleb episode is just like positioning I

think finding and knowing and owning your position is at the core the top of the pyramid for content >> yeah whatever your position is because again if you are you know 21 years old and you're just beginning your journey

as a junior art director or whatever.

That's also really interesting to other people on that same journey or people that are just a couple years behind you who are 17 who might be like I don't want to follow some unk to tell me about this. I want someone who's like kind of

this. I want someone who's like kind of right one step above. Something really

interesting on the value side too and this is a mistake that I had made in the past and I made sure on this chapter I was very I took a long time to think through it. Value verse entertainment

through it. Value verse entertainment for people listening. If you're doing entertainment, you could be in your 20s, you could be doing some random [ __ ] do content that you know is going to age well. So from a value perspective like

well. So from a value perspective like what you're doing, what I'm doing, like I'm going to want to be sitting across the table in 20 years and learning from people that are more intelligent than me in certain topics.

>> So for me, the entertainment is just it's a risky route. Like I know a lot of people that have crushed it on that side and now they're 32 years old and they're like, "Do I want to be doing these slap dick videos?"

dick videos?" >> Completely. And I think it's more of a

>> Completely. And I think it's more of a you don't want to live in the not in one of those zones. I think the bigger problem is like a lot of people don't actually entertain or don't provide value and wonder why it doesn't work.

They're trying to promote their message or they're making content about their brand. It's not entertaining and it's

brand. It's not entertaining and it's not valuable. There's kind of no room

not valuable. There's kind of no room there. And so I think getting pigeon

there. And so I think getting pigeon holed will happen to anyone who doesn't evolve, right? And even content

evolve, right? And even content creators, look at the previous generation of like gurus or anything like that. A lot of them didn't evolve.

like that. A lot of them didn't evolve.

They tried to keep doing the same thing.

Whereas I think what's smarter about the generation we're in is like we know the algorithms change. We know content

algorithms change. We know content changes and we're willing to roll with the flow. I'm not going to be like,

the flow. I'm not going to be like, "Hey, guess what?" You know, I'm going to keep doing the style because it was what worked three years ago.

>> Yeah. Another big thing that I talked about a couple episodes ago that you're saying, you nailed it on the head. And

ironically, I was just talking to my buddy yesterday who sold his company for a hundred plus million dollars. He was a big marketer. He doesn't know what's

big marketer. He doesn't know what's going on now. If you don't know about what's going on in the here and the now, you are extinct in as little as like four to 6 months. And for me, like

that's what drew me to you when we spoke the second time we were outside Lighthouse. I was like, "This guy is so

Lighthouse. I was like, "This guy is so [ __ ] deep in the game. You are so deep in the game." And I'd love to know from a content perspective, what are you doing from a time block and a

consumption to get all these ideas?

You're an idea machine.

>> Yeah. And so I want to hit that in one sec, but first I want to kind of address that first point of just like of just relevancy and staying relevant.

So, I left my job maybe a year and change ago and the first thing I noticed like five or six months in was like, "Oh, I can't actually talk about this the same way of like being super deep in

marketing performance content because I'm not running a 12 person, 14 person team. I'm not at a brand trying to do

team. I'm not at a brand trying to do 100 mil a year." And so, my I'm not sharp anymore. It's part of the reason

sharp anymore. It's part of the reason why like I recently went back and started working part-time because I was like, I need to be in the mix so we can have the conversations on that level and so I can make good content. And then

time blocking to to get there.

Everything just has to be intentional.

Like your life is a schedule. And I feel like when you're an executive, like I was coming from the world where my life is blocked out 30 minutes to an hour a day, the entire day into the late hours.

We're talking to China at night. And so

like it's every day is half hour increments. And if you go from that to

increments. And if you go from that to not having a schedule or you've never had that, that's where it's hard. But I

just was like, I need to approach my work life in the same way. But now I just have a wider breath of projects and I have less like political corporate [ __ ] to deal with. So I can fill those slots up with what matters. But

even like my scroll time is actually like blocked off. So for instance like I do a lot of work in the beauty niche. I

have multiple time periods blocked off every week half hour about two or three times a week specifically to scroll beauty content to be like I'm building my reference list for ads for organic

for strategy and I'm not ever scrolling any of the rest of the time. I don't

ever waste my time doing it, but I know like I have that broken into a half hour period. And I think if a lot of people

period. And I think if a lot of people are just intentional with what you need to do to achieve the goals and then block time for it, you have a lot of time in the day. For all the creatives out there, I feel like it might be against your general nature to to do

stuff like that, but time blocking is definitely huge. I want to get a little

definitely huge. I want to get a little bit more granular on that. Do you have different like trap phones that are feeding into the algorithm? So, you have different phones for different.

>> So, I have two phones with multiple accounts on. It's not the different

accounts on. It's not the different phone print cuz you can have multiple accounts, but I do have two. And then I because I have so many. So basically I am scrolling for myself. I have one dedicated time a week where I'm like I'm scrolling for me. I'm looking at other

gurus. I'm looking at people in

gurus. I'm looking at people in different niches. I'm trying to build my

different niches. I'm trying to build my own like library, right? And then I have I've had clothing brands forever. So I'm

looking at that. I have beauty. Now it's

actually a little easier. Before I

started working where I am now where I'm really focused on beauty. I was doing like five or six niches. So it was kind of a nightmare. But now I'm really just going back and forth between my stuff, fashion stuff, beauty stuff. So I have accounts for each. Like the real hack

around that is to set up Tik Tok and Instagram, follow only people in those accounts from a new account and then only scroll and browse that content and be conscious of like, hey, I want to scroll a little faster a few days cuz it's going to show you shorter videos or

I want to really watch everything a few days and it'll show you longer stuff.

The algorithms are good at that, but like having those accounts to log into and have that history is like how you build a feed. You want to build a feed that's similar to your customer. Like

what influencers do they follow? What

brands do they follow? What does their feed look like? That's how closely you want to mirror it.

>> Makes a lot of sense. I guess my other one big question. So different phones, different accounts. What is the backend

different accounts. What is the backend system to make sure you don't lose track of any of this? Are you using notion?

>> So I have a big master notion. Basically

my creative toolkit. This is one of the concepts I feel like a lot of creatives miss that are like super useful. It's

basically like your bookmark organization. So every Sunday for now

organization. So every Sunday for now years I basically it started off as you know Sunday people get Sunday scaries those kind of things anxiety I would combat that by kind of kickstarting my week and I usually basically would just

organize my bookmarks everything I bookmarked on Instagram Twitter anything I put in my Safari I would basically put in this master notion doc and it's now like years old and so I now have like that's a weekly time I have every week I'm usually like watching TV or whatever

and I'll organize that and uh but now I basically have this huge doc and it's literally has all these breakdowns so it's like is this a is this for a campaign. Is this for a launch? Is this

campaign. Is this for a launch? Is this

a tool? So basically has a selector for like what is this for? And it has like notes and it has the link. But now I can go and I can be like launch content and like just click the button and then here's all my launch references and there's like hundreds and then I have it

now a new column with like I've tried it or I haven't tried it. So then if it's something where I've actually acted on it, I can know if it's something I I want to experiment or if I want like a proven winner. And so I have this like

proven winner. And so I have this like basically this huge doc and it's just the most valuable thing I have, right?

because now I can go make a creative strategy for a campaign or a thing so much faster than if you have to go find all those references and I'm adding to it constantly. I just encourage every

it constantly. I just encourage every creative if you think like that and now I'm even I'm crazy so I don't want to put it out there for everyone but I have the same thing for every photographer, every agency I come across that does good work. Every creative director I

good work. Every creative director I have like a separate doc that's just them. So when people are like, "Oh, we

them. So when people are like, "Oh, we need to hire for this campaign." I'm

like, "Oh, yeah. Let me just go browse through. There's hundreds of people on

through. There's hundreds of people on the photo list and I have location on there now. A VA helps me put that in

there now. A VA helps me put that in there." But it's like, "Okay, now we're

there." But it's like, "Okay, now we're shooting in Paris. Great. I actually

have 15 people in Paris whose work I know I love." If you're like just obsessive about cataloging all the things you come across, like your life as a creative will become so massively easier over time.

>> Yeah. I think especially with AI coming so fast, I feel like curation and taste are going to trump absolutely everything. And just, you know, it's

everything. And just, you know, it's like from the book Atomic Habits, like just like readily having available all these ideas neatly put in one spot gives you a crazy competitive advantage against everybody else.

>> Yeah. Well, operators and EQ as well, I feel like are really important. And so

by EQ, I mean like just the inter relationships between people because the one thing I've noticed is like it's actually easier to get cool stuff than ever, right? You can get served to on

ever, right? You can get served to on social media. You can ask chat what the

social media. You can ask chat what the right brands are or what photographers you should consider. It'll probably give you pretty good answers. But then it's that whole like, oh, okay, I'm in Paris.

I need to convince a good photographer in Paris to drop whatever they're doing to work with me because the client or whoever want needed to shoot last week and we're on a budget and they want to see my creative vision and I am savvy

enough or have the right following or funny enough or interpersonal enough to be able to get that to happen and I'm willing to do the work to be like I'm going to connect these eight dots. Like

that's the toolkit that separates like creative director, creative strategist, brand owner, marketer who's like a powerhouse.

>> Yeah, I think there's so many different new tools. I I recently started using

new tools. I I recently started using this this tool called Poppy.ai. AI and

it basically is what you're talking about in notion and then you have backend the rules and a bible it's one click and then it could potentially if you want to if you're meeting with someone in 30 minutes and you have all of your ideas aggregated it can spit out

like a little mini speck or brief to pitch >> I've seen some people use it to like summarize yeah basically do that exact thing that's I mean that's savvy all these things are going to help save you time so now the alpha is going to be on like all right I'm the actual one who

puts the shoots together I have pre-existing relationships I already have a light relationship with all those people because I send a lot of DMs and I'm funny That's going to be what separates people from the stuff that just AI can do.

>> What do you think is the most underutilized place where to find inspiration or good content ideas?

>> Um, prints and magazines. I have like my house is like a library and I grew up like that. My my father was an English

like that. My my father was an English teacher and we sell books everywhere, but like I have so many like I buy lots of magazines on eBay and weird sites.

Like I have all the the B magazine from Korea. I have all the Chrome Hearts mags

Korea. I have all the Chrome Hearts mags from like the '9s and stuff which are amazing. Yeah. Even things like Popeye,

amazing. Yeah. Even things like Popeye, whatever. all the monle like the

whatever. all the monle like the stereotypical stuff, but like having a lot of print references I think is super useful cuz even just like that ability to scroll through them and then you'll notice they're not on you want stuff that's not on Tumblr and the aggregation

accounts on Instagram like you want stuff outside their algorithm and there's a lot of that in print and a lot of the good ideas that come from it and you'll see that world is so wide if you look at like the past 20 years of what's been released and there's so many stores

or whatever whenever you travel just going and hunting that down like I'll go to Casa in New York and like blow hundreds of dollars and be like bring back stuff I've never even heard of the title. I think that's the most

title. I think that's the most underrated thing to do. And you're also just doing it in an analog fashion. But

I think it's just getting off algorithm means your ideas won't look like other people's.

>> It's so funny that you just said that that you would spend hundreds of dollars on a magazine for an idea. Just curious,

what's the most amount of money you would spend on something for a good idea to get good content?

>> Oh yeah. So I I have this pretty mapped out. I'll spend a thousand bucks is

out. I'll spend a thousand bucks is around my like if it makes a banger video, it's worth $1,000 to me is kind of what I've aggregated, which is like a pretty I actually feel like that's a low sum. But you kind of look at like, okay,

sum. But you kind of look at like, okay, what does a brand deal get you? And then

what do things get you towards momentum or clients or whatever and like obviously I'd like to do it for less but if I see something I'm like it's a thousand bucks and that'll be good. That

makes sense. I think a lot of creators look at it that way. Especially creators

who unbox like I'm unboxing Bautga or this scent or this whatever brands too.

One of the things I always talk about when I do like brand workshops is I'm like hey you're everyone wants to cut the budgets for their team. They don't

want to do shoot budgets. They want to do content in the low. And I'm like all right $100 the $100 budget like that you need a list of what are things that are under $100 will make your video pop.

vintage camcorder, like printer, silly string, whatever it is, like make that list and then you're pulling from that.

But if you don't have that list to start with, you're like, "Oh, I have I have no budget. What am I going to do?" I think

budget. What am I going to do?" I think it's a really crucial exercise. We're

going to get deeper into content. We're

going to go both long form and short form. I want to start with short form. I

form. I want to start with short form. I

would love to just know your process on short form in a sense. What are the important elements of a short form video to really get it to stick?

>> Yeah. So, hook number one is basically like how do you get people to stop? I

think it's talked about endlessly online but still super important. And then just the value like my starting point for everything is just like how do I make the most valuable content for my target demographic that they are going to want

to share in their work slack as like 100% every goal for my content like revolves around that for my content that's centered towards businesses. I

have some other content that's centered towards more consumer and then my goal for that is how do I start a conversation in the comments. So, I

think it's really basically like hook and goal are really the two things I think make the most sense. And then as you then look at how you build it out, it's like how do I retain people through this? Like where would I lose them

this? Like where would I lose them inside the narrative of this video?

Whether it's 30 seconds or a minute and a half, like how am I continuing to keep people's attention? This is why you see

people's attention? This is why you see green screen creators have it pretty easy because you can put graphics behind you and swap them in a certain amount.

>> My man is crushing on the green screen.

You were the number one. You're the

Michael Jordan of green screen.

>> Yeah. And this look and you get pigeon holed like, "Oh, my green screen creator. That's why I started doing a

creator. That's why I started doing a lot of blo vlogs and like other content so I could have a bigger toolkit. But

like it's great because again you can view look at something and watch it. So

it's intrinsically more interesting for somebody to be like I'm going to look at this image and take that in while this guy's talking. And so um but I do look

guy's talking. And so um but I do look at that like what's your hook and what's your goal? And I have my goals are like

your goal? And I have my goals are like dead center for every video. So if I'm going to go make a video about art direction it's like how do I make a good enough video that it gets shared in work slack. if I'm make a video about pans or

slack. if I'm make a video about pans or whatever, it's like how do I make a video that's good enough that people are going to be arguing in the comments about whether like this pan or that pan.

And so I think like having those those two barometers has really helped me where like I don't make content with really any other goal.

>> So I would say you're probably more of a valuedriven creator and then you kind of sprinkle in the entertainment.

>> Yes. Exactly. And I think that having the duality of both is great. I use

humor just like a lot. I'm not like saying I'm like a comedian, but I throw a lot of humor in there. That's like

>> You're lowkey funny, bro. You're lowkey

funny.

>> Yeah. Know that's that's like a useful thing, right? because you have to have

thing, right? because you have to have something right either you're like I'm not some people watch you just because you're beautiful I'm not that dude you know right so like I got to use humor to the advantage uh and then like and then also just like establishing like a

relationship or credibility like I I like to feel like people know like I do ads or whatnot but they are very be like this guy is 100% dedicated to giving me value like if you look at all my content you're like all he does is just give

away stuff for free that helps me and once you build that up over time like I was keeping them for a while and then stopped because it lost track there's like hundreds if not thousands of people that are like, "You really changed my business. You impacted this. I launched

business. You impacted this. I launched

this because of you." And that energy just like perpetuates. You can feel that in the comments in the thing. And if

someone has that perception of you, that's like a weapon in its own way that I feel is like so valuable.

>> Yeah, man. I love these comments I've been getting lately, like how is this not behind a payw wall, like that puts puts a smile to my face. And I'm in the same I think bucket as you where focused unequivocally on value and respecting

the audience's time. And then secondly, I'm trying to get better in just like showing my personality more, but I'm just so laser focused on the value where it's just hard to [ __ ] do.

>> That's why I'm always like if I if the video doesn't have something funny, I'm like typically not posting it. But it's

just hard to be that funny on demand is the other thing. Like sometimes it's easy. Like I wrote a video last night

easy. Like I wrote a video last night about rebrands and like 30 minutes and have like five jokes in there and it was just like it was natural. It came. But

then sometimes you're there and you're just forcing it. But like I'm trying now not to post if I don't have that. Cuz

like with the way value content is, I can't sprinkle in like personal anecdotes or even if I go do vlog content, it's like what I did in a day.

Like no one cares. They're there for the value, right? So it's like within that

value, right? So it's like within that context, how do you dial it up a notch?

We're going to go back to that day in the life. No one cares. We're definitely

the life. No one cares. We're definitely

going to circle back to that one. I want

to just tie a bow on that short form content. Focus on the hook first 3

content. Focus on the hook first 3 seconds. Keep them reeled in. And then

seconds. Keep them reeled in. And then

the ultimate goal, you mentioned shares.

Saves are another big one. Do you have any different kind of strategies from uh how to get people to push hard and talk in the comments? Because for me, that's always the weird one for me. Like I'm

trying to do like a CTA to initiate a conversation and I never know what to say.

>> CTA doesn't work, right? So it's more about make a take that people are have to argue about or have to have an opinion about. And this is an

opinion about. And this is an interesting one I think and talk a lot about this cuz I feel like we were basically like almost neutered as a generation where you couldn't have an opinion. If you said something was bad,

opinion. If you said something was bad, it's like, oh, oh, you can't say that that's bad, you know? And then if you say something is good, you're just like, oh, they're just a shill, right? And so,

everyone's in this weird middle ground where you can't really have an opinion.

And so, I feel like it's actually stand out if you have an opinion. And it's why content series like like I make and a lot of people that copy my content make where it's like this is good or this is bad or you're buying this for this reason, you're buying it for that reason or here's what this says about you is

like it identifies a thing where someone's like, "Well, that's wrong."

And they want to talk about it or where they're like, "Oh my god, I feel so seen. I agree." And so I think it's like

seen. I agree." And so I think it's like just having takes that are at that level. But we've been basically educated

level. But we've been basically educated to not to have everything be so neutral.

And I think that's where you get that standout as a creator is being like, "No, this is wrong." And here's why.

>> You just solved the problem for me. I'm

done. The CTA, it's just always so weird, confusing, and cheesy. So coming

out of that, it's just they always say like just make a hard stand on one thing and then that's just going to create the comments.

>> Well, my CTA and all the videos that is tell me why I'm brutally wrong in the comments. Like I'm encouraging you like

comments. Like I'm encouraging you like [ __ ] on me. Tell me why this is terrible. That's what I literally say

terrible. That's what I literally say and and it's good and people feel the complete license to I mean look I've gotten like death threats because I I called someone's mattress you know like the wrong mattress like so like people take it way too seriously but like still

like that's the point is spark the conversation like you are a conduit as a creator you are a conduit for value in someone's life or for a conversation someone's going to have or you're just pure scroll entertainment and like and

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>> I want to back into just a 30,000 foot view on just content as far as buckets and formats.

>> Yeah.

>> How do you look at like your holistic content strategy? Yeah. So, I've worked

content strategy? Yeah. So, I've worked a lot on this over time. So, I basically I wanted to have a toolkit. Like one of the original things reasons I started content is I wanted to be good at it as a CMO. I wanted to be like I know how to

a CMO. I wanted to be like I know how to task it. I know how our team can create

task it. I know how our team can create it. And so I wanted to create a lot of

it. And so I wanted to create a lot of different styles. And then now, same

different styles. And then now, same thing. I want to have everything in my

thing. I want to have everything in my toolkit. So I've done interview content.

toolkit. So I've done interview content.

I've done like the trade show and had figured out how to get that to pop off.

I've done carousels. I've done vlogs.

I've done the oneshot content. I've done

skits. So my whole thing is I'm experimenting at least once a week. Like

I did a skit last week with another creator. It's like an experiment. But I

creator. It's like an experiment. But I

look at it as like you have all these tools to with which to share your message. And that's really important

message. And that's really important because people consume content in different ways. For instance, like I

different ways. For instance, like I don't watch any talking videos, green screen videos. It's hard for me. I've

screen videos. It's hard for me. I've

got like severe ADD. So, if I'm going to sit there and watch something for 60 seconds, it's going to take a lot. I

consume a ton of 9-second content, the caption over the thing, like all day.

That's my feed or carousels. And so, I feel like that's something worth noting as a creator, especially for me as a green screen primarily creator, is like, okay, not everyone consumes like that.

So, I need to match that with vlogs where they can just follow along or carousels where they can just read it.

They don't have to listen. And then my available market of the message I'm trying to share spreads. So that's my literal like exact format is I'm doing

basically four to five green screen or talking value videos a week. Maybe one

or two of those slots will go to a carousel. I don't love carousels as a

carousel. I don't love carousels as a format cuz I think it's really easy to be saturated but I'll still use them.

It's good bottom funnel content and then I will do two travel or like vlog pieces where it's just me talking and I'm in the videos but I'm talking over footage and that's like a great that travel content has been huge for me. And like

even just going to places like I'm like I'll do like oh the three things I saw at Airwan this week or like I'm going to this new Matty Mat opened a burger joint here's why I like the design whatever.

So that content is really crucial and then I kind of do one big like I try to make one like viral top of funnel video every week whatever format that is.

>> So looking at from a content formats perspective and content buckets or topics perspective you went through the content formats. What about how do you

content formats. What about how do you look at like topics in general? So I

have a four-pillar strategy where basically like there's four topics I'm focused on at any given time and I will rotate them in and out as they like fail or perform. So for instance, I used to

or perform. So for instance, I used to do packaging content a lot like cool packaging that no longer kind of resonates. I think like that era of that

resonates. I think like that era of that being exciting is done and so that kind of phased out. But like right now my my buckets that I'm talking about are like marketing ideas. I don't want to do any

marketing ideas. I don't want to do any like this brand did this or this playbook because there's so many other creators doing it. So I'm like here's an idea about marketing. And then I'm doing art direction content. I'm one of the only creators who like is and can kind

of do that. So, that's like a big one for me. And then the travel content is

for me. And then the travel content is like the third pillar. And then just like basically what I call shopping content, which is just like talking about brands and why we buy. And those

are like my four current pillars. One of

those at some point it'll be like the travel content is kind of flopping. I

should sub that out for something different or, you know, or this or that.

But I think if I have more topics than that, it's too much. It's like my my content's too wide. But that four is kind of the perfect number. And I can stack multiple videos on each of those in any given week. But those are like my north stars. I evaluate that basically

north stars. I evaluate that basically every month.

>> You said two really interesting things there. One, so many people are doing it

there. One, so many people are doing it and you're off it. And then two, to start, you talked about just the maniacal testing. Ironically, on the

maniacal testing. Ironically, on the drive here with Jake, we were talking about like how we're doing these teasers. And they're actually ironically

teasers. And they're actually ironically starting to pick up steam from a a views perspective, but we're already thinking about how do we iterate off that and what's the next thing. For people

listening out there, you need to think about the next thing before the current thing runs out. And I think people like you want to drain it and you want to get all the juice that you can get out of it, but if you're not thinking about the next thing, you're done.

>> Yeah. Well, look, I obsess about this for like look at the end of the day like what I do now is essentially I'm like I'm a creative strategist. And so I'm obsessing about my content, brands content, content for people that are in cut 30. I'm like really thinking about

cut 30. I'm like really thinking about how do you stay ahead around that? And

you just have to like build the hard part is people will obsess about that but won't have like a toolkit. That's

why I think the sk like the scheduled time we talked about is so crucial where I'm like I am adding to this toolkit. I

am solving the worry in the back of my head by building this list of what comes next so I know I always have something like in the hopper.

>> Yeah. I can't like for me just like doing some research on you and talking to you more. I'm going to go so do it so deep and just organizing my ideas and thoughts. I think it is one of the most

thoughts. I think it is one of the most under like people don't do that quite frankly which is and it's but it's crazy like I look at like I organized my vacation in Italy cuz I take photos and I was like organizing my here's every illustration here's the colors I liked.

Here's the just logos and stuff and like cool I might not use that tomorrow. It

took me 40 minutes on a flight to put it all like on a Miller note board and but like I'm going to come back to that at some point where I have some sort of heritage project to be like oh I actually have 50 references no one else has like it's just crazy like why and

also you look back at in 20 years you'll want to look back at your life like here's all the things I found interesting here's all the you talk about teaching or value for the next generation like I'm going to just release that toolkit at some point and

be like here you go and it will be like not as valuable as like you know virtual Abau's free thing but like hey let's get as close to it as we can An interesting thing that I want to bring up. I think it's not many people

bring up. I think it's not many people do it. If it's kind of my thesis, I'd

do it. If it's kind of my thesis, I'd love to know your thoughts on it is I love how you have the topics. They're

changing based on probably your passion as well, what's working, what's not. For

everybody listening to you on the format side, I feel like you can stay with the format a bit longer. Aka like you with the green screen like you should ride that out for >> you have to add other ones in.

>> Yeah.

>> Adding in other ones. I think another big thing it's how I look at a lot of my life decisions as well is I look at it under a rubric where it's low, medium or high lift from a resources perspective and then low, medium to high impact

>> completely.

>> And for us on my brand side on iconic side, we did this whole entire exercise and we kind of labeled all the different buckets based on that rubric. And then

we know on a 20 post allocation, we know 10 of the 20 posts is going to be this bucket and then we know how to kind of manage those those resources. And then

we have a small resource allocation to do what we're talking about. It's just

to take new swings, try new [ __ ] >> I think that's exactly for especially for brands you should look at is you only have so many hours, right? So it's

really just that breakdown of like the high, medium, low lift. I found at least with my content, even the short and quick stuff, all my lift is like kind of the same. It's basically takes me like

the same. It's basically takes me like kind of the same amount of energy or juice to do all the good content styles.

But I think that's just where I'm at as a creator because I haven't been able to on short form at least outsource a bunch. my YouTube as a whole as a whole

bunch. my YouTube as a whole as a whole process. But then short form like I'm

process. But then short form like I'm still doing the majority of it.

>> For people that are just starting out with minimal resources, definitely do that rubric because I think that's you look low, medium, lift, high impact.

>> Yeah. And also then don't feel the need to like you don't have to post every day. You don't have to like there's so

day. You don't have to like there's so many things that people are preaching at where it's like these things help, but like consistency of what you can achieve over time is like it's just it's just a matrix of like all right, if I can post every day versus I can post twice a

week. It's just like all right, I might

week. It's just like all right, I might get to my goal in 6 months versus a year, but like as long as you're headed towards a goal is all that's matter.

>> Yeah. I think a big thing with that as well too, we always have the conversation. Let me ask you that first

conversation. Let me ask you that first I guess. What's what do you think? Is it

I guess. What's what do you think? Is it

quality or quantity? I think it's quality. And I think on TikTok, again,

quality. And I think on TikTok, again, it's that barometer of like there some multiplier, but if you have to pick one, you pick quality, right? Like if you make one really impactful video, I'm like you have Caleb on here. Caleb makes

one YouTube video a month basically and they're super high quality and he's will get the results of that of if he made four shitty ones, right? And I think then you'd rather stand by the quality one you make. And so I think that like if you have to choose one, it's that.

But like in the real answer in today's age is like I make a pretty good video every single day. And that is not and I've done that when I had an executive job and I'm doing that now and I have a million things going on. It's not

actually that hard. And I think that a lot of people you don't have to limit yourself going one way or the other. But

if you did have to, I'd pick quality.

>> Good to know. Yeah, I think a big thing in relation to that. A lot of people say it was the same thing in Caleb's episode was quantity, which then informs quality, and then obviously quality, then you want quantity and quality. I

think a big thing for people out there listening, especially, you know, we're really focused on creators, creatives, and then obviously entrepreneurs and operators. for the entrepreneurs and

operators. for the entrepreneurs and operators out there that are starting to do more content. I think a huge thing and I've had this problem is just not burning out and just making sure you're not overdoing it. Like agreed these long

form right now like dude I have a lot of [ __ ] going on right now where I'm like >> these launch once every two weeks and I think they're high quality and like we're not upping that cadence until other thing comes off the plate >> completely.

>> So don't get burnt out. I think

consistency is what it all comes down to.

>> Especially if you're a founder. So one

of the brands I love to call out around this is Perl. like a UK men'sswear brand where the founders's in the content it's like one of every 10 videos and like that's a great cadence like get someone involved build that there's other concept too around oh the founder has to be the person from the brand in the

videos that's like just not true at all I don't even think it matters who it is as long as they're interesting and somewhat charismatic where it's like all right it could be your chief science officer it could be literally the social media person but they're like equipped

you could hire a creator whatever it is is just having a voice to represent your brand and it does not have to be the founder and in many cases like knowing some of these founders it really shouldn't be whether it's their personality or just the time value.

>> Do you think a brand can win on social without some sort of face tied to the brand?

>> Yeah, I think there's you can win on social in a thousand different ways, but I do think it is a extremely for most brands that have done other stuff and are wondering why they're plateauing.

That's the easiest way to take it to the next level.

>> So, let's take that back. Forget brands

that are scaling and potentially plateauing. Let's start from the start.

plateauing. Let's start from the start.

What's your view? Is it one channel at a time or kind of be everywhere at once?

>> Yeah. So, it's like test test wide. But

I think with a brand, with any new brands, like find one thing that allows your business to function. And you may have to test your way into that. But for

instance, like you may find like, hey, my business is like started to grow to start on Facebook ads and organic didn't matter as much cuz I nailed meta or vice versa. But like you need to be on the

versa. But like you need to be on the hunt for one channel and then you begin to build other channels. Now I don't think that doesn't mean you don't test wherever you go. Like when I'm talk to people about posting content, it's like if you made a short form video, you're

doing yourself a disservice by not posting on literally every network you possibly can because you spent all the time making the asset. You should at least and you look at the compounding effects when people go, "Oh, I didn't post on YouTube shorts." You're like,

"Yeah, maybe you would have gotten 600 views. Oh, you're 100 videos in so now

views. Oh, you're 100 videos in so now that's 60,000 views or whatever that looks like." Like that compounding

looks like." Like that compounding effect in terms of your brand halo like is an actual thing. So I encourage people to go really wide in their distribution. But really, you're just on

distribution. But really, you're just on that hunt for like what is the one thing that will scale my brand and then if that one starts to work, you begin working on adding the next one in.

>> I'm going to tell you something. I've

not said it. I guess I'm just going to put the juice on the camera right now.

This is a mind-blowing and I'm gonna actually give the numbers and do a YouTube video on it. We were posting with iconic one time a day on three channels Monday to Friday and we did these 45day

tranches and we upped it from like once a day to twice a day. We upped it from two channels to four channels and then we added one on the weekend. And then we added two and if anybody goes to iconic right now they see all the posts bro and every 45day window when we were

incrementally doing it especially when we went on wider channels bro we went on Google Analytics G4 we'd see the traffic coming from social we'd then see the conversion rate we'd

then see the AOV of everybody listening hundreds of thousands of dollars just coming in from just posting more on more channels literally bro well then there's the scale concept so this is something I talk about cuz I work a lot with bigger

brands I'm trying to get them to wrap their head around is like the scale concept is even bigger. There's the I need to get started. If you talk about scale, they people get overwhelmed. But

then there's the hey, if you actually have a budget, like if you're spending tens of millions of dollars on marketing every year and you're like, you know what you can do with that from a volume scale. If you're like, hey, we have good

scale. If you're like, hey, we have good ad concepts now. We're multiplying this by language. We're multiplying it by the

by language. We're multiplying it by the way people look. We're multiplying it by region. You're getting 10, 15, 20

region. You're getting 10, 15, 20 creators like on your roster on Tik Tok.

You're reposting that content. All

that's going into your performance funnel. like you're in the scenario

funnel. like you're in the scenario you're in where you're like, "Hey, this is gonna smash." And people get overwhelmed. They're like, "That sounds

overwhelmed. They're like, "That sounds crazy." And you're like, "No, it's just

crazy." And you're like, "No, it's just a math equation. This is just process."

And it is the 100% for any brand of a decent size is the way to stay ahead of everybody right now.

>> Yeah, man. I hope for someone out there that has tens of millions of dollars, you should just give it to Orin and he can get way better dollar value. These

brands are ridiculous like what you can do. It It's crazy. You look at shoot

do. It It's crazy. You look at shoot costs and stuff like that. So, a lot of like my life ends up in shoots. like

I'll be hey okay you're doing creative strategy for this shoot you know you're doing like we're how do we get the best assets out of this or that and you look at the budgets on some of this versus what's possible they're just like stuck in the past right in terms of like what's available with cameras and

whatnot and there's just alpha I'm always looking for like what is that area of alpha especially if you're someone who feels like you're ahead you're like I'm always see things but ahead of time you're like okay I see this thing and I'm ahead of it how do I then make money off it or how do I

inform people like how to do that and this is right now that is like 100% in shoots where you're still paying crews and gear and scenarios that like like you could be doing this setup that we have in here, you could spend $50,000 on it if you want to and it'll look exactly

the same. That's what a lot of brands

the same. That's what a lot of brands will do if they want to execute it. And

if you are one of the people that can do that at the lower level, it's like all right, how do I maximize the in between of those dollars? Like where does that give me a ton of leverage as a brand?

Does it give me a ton of leverage as an agency? And then where do you build it?

agency? And then where do you build it?

>> Yeah. People are blown away for everybody listening. This started the

everybody listening. This started the first six or seven episodes was two of us.

>> Yeah.

>> Now it's three of us. And when I give the names when I come off the set, people are like, "Wait, it's two of you." And it's you guys are bringing all

you." And it's you guys are bringing all of your own equipment. You could do so much for so little now. That's why I can never do like some of these agencies with big budgets. I'm like you guys are just literally lighting money on fire.

It's absolutely unbelievable. And and

even you look at people I've made all this content about like social shows.

Just the idea that you can create basically like a little mini TV show on social media. It's a really good brand

social media. It's a really good brand strategy for brands trying to establish themselves. And the comments are always

themselves. And the comments are always like, "Oh, if you have a budget, if you have a blank, I'm like I've been on these shoots. Like it's not even FX3s."

these shoots. Like it's not even FX3s."

I used to say it's FX3. It's FX30s. It's

like it's a $2,000 camera like and a lens and literally it's like it if it's a two person they're taking the camera on the tripod and then they're just moving it to the other corner and there'll be like maybe a softbox or two and it's a one or two person shoot. I'm

like these are not that is attainable for basically anybody who's not just starting from zero. Yeah,

>> you are uh a big consumption guy. You

got these blocks. I'd love to know those TV shows for brands. Spin off a bunch.

What are a bunch that are doing really well for people out there to listen?

>> Yeah. So basically there's a brand called Alexis Petar who they're a jewelry brand and they basically built this series around like socialiteike characters who like are in New York and basically it's a like a drama and they just happen to be often wearing the gear

of Alexis Petar but they have like celebrity guests like it got so popular with their audience that their audience was like great I can consume this 90minute drama a 90 secondond drama multiple times a week. So that's one.

Bape has another good one. Bape has an instore show. Anyone in store should be

instore show. Anyone in store should be doing something like this where it's like hey people pick out of a fishbowl like a color and they have 90 seconds to make a fit. There's a countdown timer like on top of it and then they're running around and it's influencers and

somewhat well-known people and they run around the store grabbing stuff and then they show the fit at the end and they have like a ranking scale and they have little effects that come up. They'll pop

the item up when it does it. So, there's

some production involved. But again,

it's got a timer. It's got an objective, you know, and that's where I talk about with brands is like, hey, how can you do in 90 seconds? How can you do Hot Ones or MTV Next or Cribs? Cribs is like the default format. I want to see your

default format. I want to see your apartment, right? Like that is a known

apartment, right? Like that is a known thing. thing. I would just go back and

thing. thing. I would just go back and look at all that vintage TV and be like, "How do we do our brand version?"

>> Yeah. I got to give a shout out to this young buck, the school of hard knocks, you know, >> bro. That kid is killing it, bro.

>> bro. That kid is killing it, bro.

>> And he's just I mean, it's super simple.

It's amazing.

>> Again, it's repeating an existing format that works and then look at how do you use that for your brand or for you as a creator. That's why I encourage a lot of

creator. That's why I encourage a lot of new creators who are coming at this now too to be like, "All right, like if you do feel like your thing is saturated, may maybe or may not be, like what is your concept for it?" Like how do you launch a show instead of launching just

a social media presence? And a show doesn't mean you have a huge production, but a show can mean you're sitting at the same set every day. That set's in your house and you are doing things in a repeatable format that make people feel like they're tuning in to HGTV or

whatever. I do think a very key thing

whatever. I do think a very key thing you said there to draw out is repeatable format. Making sure whether it be the

format. Making sure whether it be the time, the aesthetic, the branding, making sure when people see it, they know that it's you. That's another thing that we're working on right now. We're

working on like the color scheme of everything. you've done a good job with

everything. you've done a good job with that cuz even when I look at like even with the thumbnails all these things that come together to like add up to that and I think that's a huge thing for creators cuz you look at all the biggest creators they have a format where they're doing a thing like the biggest Tik Tockers like Nar Smith cooks

something from scratch Thor that guy he chops wood and then they're doing it to talk about something else or engage a goal like have you see them you're like oh they're in the kitchen or they're in the forest or they're in wherever they are they're doing the action and they're making content in and around that and

they have their outfits like they'll always be kind of relatively looking the same and like there's a reason for that it's because it works. question for you and then for everybody in the comments.

Do you think we should have one branded I call it the octagon, one place where we shoot all the time or do you like the diversity in some of our locations? I do

think I think have it there. Well, on

YouTube it's one of those where like YouTube is like seasonal. I feel like you have a set, run it until it's kind of getting dull and then run the next one. But I'd say yeah, for like three

one. But I'd say yeah, for like three out of four of them, like don't be afraid to break that mold if you're in somewhere cool. But I think that helps

somewhere cool. But I think that helps make it. I think I don't know if I

make it. I think I don't know if I shared with you when we were sitting down before, but that fashion neurosis YouTube channel where she's literally on like a therapy couch and that's the entire vehicle. It's a normal podcast.

entire vehicle. It's a normal podcast.

It's the same as this. But because one person is on a couch and one person's in the chair, it has this completely different feel and dynamic. And I think that will lose its allure after like a year, it will play its course just like any YouTuber wants to update their set.

But like then you can think about how do we do the next version or the next version. I think it's a very good way to

version. I think it's a very good way to think about YouTube and short form.

>> You a fashion creative director over here by season. We're doing we're pl we're planning our seasons out. That's

also how YouTubers think, right? Every

YouTuber is like, "Oh, like I need to upgrade my set. I need to move my apartment." That's why you see these

apartment." That's why you see these guys moving [ __ ] so much, right? Is you

get all the content from moving and then you have like a new thing cuz again, I think it just people want that. They

want some level of familiarity and then it meets its peak. That's why I have to give a shout out right now to Lighthouse. I'm a proud member of

Lighthouse. I'm a proud member of Lighthouse. It's in Venice. It's an

Lighthouse. It's in Venice. It's an

amazing space for creators to work. I

had seen your stuff before on the internet obviously, but I saw you speak there and then we spoke and we started going back and forth. You know why I love that place, bro? I do content there. There's 60 places to shoot

there. There's 60 places to shoot content there. It's endless, bro.

content there. It's endless, bro.

>> The the environments, it's the first thing I thought when I walked in.

Literally, I'm like, "Oh, there's like 30 places you can shoot video." And

that's crucial. That's how I've built my house now. Like, thankfully my wife is

house now. Like, thankfully my wife is like equally as unhinged. But like I have so many environments like in the home and we converted our whole garage and there's this office space and like we're putting a drop down full green screen like in the foyer. Like it's like

it's so good. And but then once you like embrace that and you're like, "All right, cool. This actually makes my life

right, cool. This actually makes my life genuinely easier." I think the tie a bow

genuinely easier." I think the tie a bow on this part a huge thing for everybody to take out of this thinking about top of the funnel, middle of the funnel and bottom of the funnel. These TV shows guys are great top of the funnel brand awareness and you're selling but you're

not selling.

>> Exactly.

>> That's the whole entire thing and awareness, man. The top of funnel

awareness, man. The top of funnel concept is so important. I was ranting about this on Twitter the other day cuz I'm dealing with it with like multiple projects right now. But like top of funnel is like it doesn't matter. It all

that matters is the views and because the way the algorithms work, if you see someone's content on Instagram, you like it, they show you more of it. to give

them the ability to like something from you, whether you sell it, whether the brand's integrated, whatever it is. But

then to achieve top offunnel content, most brands be like, "Well, we just need to make our existing content about our products better." You're like, "Guess

products better." You're like, "Guess what? Look at the top ofunnel content

what? Look at the top ofunnel content that works. It's literally concepts." If

that works. It's literally concepts." If

you're like, "Oh, we're recreating Mean Girls or whatever." Or it is skits like, "Hey, we're doing something that is really funny or it's a show like a format like that or it's just amazing

visual execution, the 3D, you know, some amazingly shot campaign that's everything hooked. There's not really

everything hooked. There's not really any other ways. Ironically, that stuff at the end actually I think actually performs the least. But if you're trying to position yourself as and what's the hardest part, that's the easiest one to get brands to buy in on because basically if you're like, "Oh, we're launch a TV show." They're like,

"Jesus." Or if you're like, "Hey, we

"Jesus." Or if you're like, "Hey, we need to do conceptual." A lot of brands don't think that conceptual content works for them. I guarantee the conceptual content works for everybody.

Like if you're trying to like, "Hey, we're going to make a campaign. It's

going to be themed around a thing and we're going to go all in on it, you know?" And you'll see a L'Oreal group is

know?" And you'll see a L'Oreal group is doing that like with like everything.

They're basically building these themes and these like campaigns and then they're really running it. They're like

pushing it through all their influencers through they're bringing it to the retailers. They're like, "How do we get

retailers. They're like, "How do we get this as wide as we can?" I think because they saw so much success with Sarah doing stuff like that. And then if you then you tell them to be like, "Hey, we're going to do skits." They're like, "Well, humor isn't or this isn't a lifestyle brand." So you hear these

lifestyle brand." So you hear these arguments and it's funny every brand think that they're unique. I'm like,

"No, this is the same exact arguments that every single brand has around this." So you end up with okay, the

this." So you end up with okay, the beautiful content is what we can do. And

to your point, it works the least, but at least you can get people to sign off.

>> Yeah. I mean, a great example of that for people that have not watched the episode with Ryan Bartlett from True Classic, their whole identity is all about slapstick comedy and that's their top of the funnel.

>> Should be and that's also like what do that is a brand aimed at bros?

>> Yeah.

>> What like what are bros going to share in the group chat? That's like should be the number one goal of what a company like that looks like. And guess what?

You probably have the best chance with slapstick comedy. Yeah. I should take my

slapstick comedy. Yeah. I should take my own advice, but iconic probably six, seven years ago when Trevor Wallace wasn't Trevor Wallace. We branded a character called Dennis Gallagher and he was like a loser and he revived his life through our motivational art. Got

hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube and it's smashed.

>> Amazing.

>> It's I should probably take my own advice on this one here, guys.

>> I want to wrap up a bit on the content side. What do you think is the biggest

side. What do you think is the biggest myth you still hear about content?

>> Not that saturated. You know, I just think you still hear you're going to hear everything is saturated for for years and years and years. Or the other biggest myth, probably the biggest one, is like, "Oh, it's the algorithm or Instagram isn't giving me reach or whatever." You hear this complaint like

whatever." You hear this complaint like all the time, like I have this following. And it really is, it comes

following. And it really is, it comes down to like better content. I've looked

at this, I go through peaks and waves like anyone else. And I'll look at my week and be like, "Oh, I only got 30, 50,000 views in these videos. They

normally get 100, 200." And I look at it, I'm like, genuinely, this because the content's not good. And every single time I come out of that and try something new every single time, and I've probably gone through that peak and valley at least a dozen times now. I

came out the other side. I made better stuff and I came out the other side. And

so I think people get so dejected when you're just like, guess what? Everyone

on the internet is improving at what they create every day. I'm a such a better creator than I was 6 months ago or even a year ago. So if you're expecting the same thing to work, it's not. You have to be leveling up at the

not. You have to be leveling up at the same time. Then people get stressed by

same time. Then people get stressed by that. And it's like, well, what else?

that. And it's like, well, what else?

Like strive for [ __ ] greatness. I

think a big thing in relation to that, too, is understanding who your ICP is, ideal persona. And sometimes it's not

ideal persona. And sometimes it's not about views. Like for us, like when

about views. Like for us, like when we're doing very granular, valuedriven business stuff, it sometimes doesn't hit. But I do know that as a

doesn't hit. But I do know that as a part of my ICP, people that really care about it, more elevated business people, they're watching that and they're getting a ton of value. So don't be blinded by the views.

>> I think about that all the time because I have a rule that if I don't have a flop every week, I'm not experimenting enough. But also, the thing is my flops,

enough. But also, the thing is my flops, quote unquote, like my videos with the least views are often designed for that, but they are idea based videos. this

marketing idea thing. Like I had one about how like HR needs to deal with creators was what I did the other week.

I have one a while back that was about like how trade shows should could not suck and like conferences and even another one about quiz brands, brands like um Ilmaki and stuff that are all like AI quiz. And so those are videos

that didn't do well and those are the three videos I can identify that have brought me like serious inquiries from like absolutely major people like because that's the ones who those resonate with. Like that quiz brand

resonate with. Like that quiz brand video has the least amount of views. It

was a sponsored video and it still got like like CEOs of multiple beauty companies being like, "Wow, like I I need to think about this. Like is this really the tool they used to build this?" Like in the DMs and you're just

this?" Like in the DMs and you're just like that was an action point for them while not having the views. And I'm just like this all that really matters is the results. Are you getting where you want?

results. Are you getting where you want?

If views were the only focus I would just be making consumer content. Guess

what? Consumer content does not get me brand deals. And so marketing content

brand deals. And so marketing content does. And I think uh it's really worth

does. And I think uh it's really worth thinking about that because you'll get in your head around views.

>> It's so crazy. Um it's the same thing from a product perspective. like the

more elevated and from a a taste perspective, the better art I think in my mind actually does not sell well >> because people don't have necessarily have taste nor do they want it. And also

a lot of purchases are like comfort purchases versus tasteful purchases, right? And I think that's a huge thing

right? And I think that's a huge thing in psychology that we don't talk enough about.

>> Uh if you had to bet on one platform in 2025 to build a content moat, what's the best choice?

>> I think it's YouTube just because YouTube's hard and so if you want to actually do something and you're willing to learn thumbnails and packaging, like you've come out the gate and crushed it.

It's rare. You know, we suck the first four videos, guys. The first four videos, just ignore the first like five or six minutes, but give it a chance.

I'm telling you, give it a chance.

>> Oh, no. The first four videos, like, yo, most people suck for like a 100. Like,

that's still coming out the gate and killing it. So, I just feel like that's

killing it. So, I just feel like that's the number one platform. Yeah.

>> And I don't want to give everybody a false sense here. We I don't even know if you know this. I had someone follow me around for 24 hours a day for 18 months. We had a web series. We got

months. We had a web series. We got

kicked off YouTube. That was in 16 or 17. And then we had a podcast with 15 20

17. And then we had a podcast with 15 20 episodes. You've been through the rigor.

episodes. You've been through the rigor.

>> I've been through it. I did suck when I restarted doing this again. But yeah,

for everybody out there listening like we didn't give a fair shake to let's say Oliver from Mad Rabbit, Manny from Slate. They're good episodes, but now

Slate. They're good episodes, but now you know what you do, but you get better all the time. But I do think that is the biggest moat because it's hard. You

can't publish as much. And so you kind of only have one shot, maybe two shots a week to start. And people get det.

They're like, "Oh, I get these instant dopamine on short form video." And you don't get that on YouTube. But it's

still the mode. I look at it like I'm really the only marketing creator like you there's like what's his name on the future is personal brand Kane is like social media Caleb's doing doing some stuff in the kind of brand world but

like when I look at on a wide basis to showing up in search that makes a lot of videos I'm kind of it in marketing which is just such a crazy concept to look at when you look at the size of these niches and then how little content there

is created on it and then how much kids are willing to consume like my audience on here is like 20 to 27 and that's just such a miracle audience that is no not going to watch my videos on Tik Tok, you know.

>> So, you have a different a younger audience, >> younger audience on YouTube than I do on uh Tik Tok and Instagram. And also,

they're watching on TV. That's the other thing I've seen. People will DM me like me on their TV, like whenever I do Sunday episodes. And so, like I get a

Sunday episodes. And so, like I get a bunch of those DMs and I'm like, "Oh man, I'm really on like the thing in your like you're eating lunch. This is a common like you're eating lunch, you're doing whatever, and you're watching TV and I'm on the TV." That's a very different consumption experience.

>> From a positioning perspective, I do think one of our modes is production value. And I am seeing more and more

value. And I am seeing more and more like we don't get a crazy amount of audio listens. I think that our viewer

audio listens. I think that our viewer appreciates the aesthetic that we put on. Yeah. And all the tags are all

on. Yeah. And all the tags are all >> Well, I think that's what they want.

People want the way I look at this now is I really think about consumption habits. Target consumption habits is the

habits. Target consumption habits is the most underrated marketing concept that people don't think about. But I the watching a YouTube video at lunch or watching a YouTube video at at night or

having YouTube as an app on the TV is the most underrated consumption look because what do people want for that?

Like even when I look at my top YouTube videos, they're art directionction videos. I can talk about art direction

videos. I can talk about art direction in a nuanced way that's hard for like a newer creator. So I have a moat there,

newer creator. So I have a moat there, but also really it's just a visual showcase of the brand. I'm giving you 20 minutes of like Stu's greatest hits of the content they've made. And so you get to watch this visual thing. You have a guy who's entertaining and like valuable

talking to you. You feel like you're learning something, but you're consuming that like an episode. And when I look at like why content like some of the content that does really well like the represent guys or Marcus or Minted, that is lunchtime guy consumption content.

like I'm just going to watch these cool guys who I aspire to be like live their lives for 20 minutes. And I think that is just a wonderful consumption thing that like people should understand how girls consume versus guys consume and older versus younger, but the younger

guys are doing that on YouTube.

>> Do you think that day in the life kind of behind the scenes content is still doing well?

>> No, I don't. I think it's a well, especially from the start now. I think

building in public for anything, especially if you're like a fashion brand or some [ __ ] is like actually a negative signaler. Like only people that

negative signaler. Like only people that are doing it are whack. Espec if you're established and you've been doing it for a minute, great. But like if you're new, you're doing that. Like it's not a look.

If you're doing a traditional business, I still think it's great. The people

that are popping off now is like I started a coffee shop. I'm opening a burger joint. And so it's kind of like

burger joint. And so it's kind of like almost like a HGTV plus business. Like

that's working really well, but traditional businesses. I think if

traditional businesses. I think if you're doing that with any like CPG or or fashion, like you're kind of behind the curve. And then for the for the

the curve. And then for the for the people that are doing it against like episodic, like who already have big established brands, that's good. But

you'll notice they're kind of doing other things like really like the represent content is really like fitness motivational content, right? And that's

a massive niche and it's to a lot of extent that's the same thing with the minted content and that's an amazing thing but you're not it's not really a day in the life really it's like getting into the soul of what their customer wants to see.

>> Makes a lot of sense and I want to further validate like you literally have little to no competitors especially in that first bucket that you talked about from an art direction perspective like nobody is doing that for people out

there. I mean, just the common theme in

there. I mean, just the common theme in life, the harder it is, the less people do it, the less competition. And anybody

that does YouTube, they just get so they don't see the views to start. Well, the

art direction one's interesting is the reason they don't is like anyone who's a good art director is inherently tasteful. And so for them to make that

tasteful. And so for them to make that content that's to have it perform, it has to be somewhat cringe. And I don't care about getting art director work.

I'm an entrepreneur. I have other stuff going on, but it's a passion, so I love to talk about it. So I don't care about if it's like cringe in the eyes of that community, but the people in that community will never execute it. So,

it's a moat and then anyone that's trying to and doesn't know what they're doing is going to kind of flail. And

there is that example probably in every type of business or every type of thing.

Well, most good people mix. They just

don't package it right. It's not

interesting. It's not visual. You have

all this ultravalue content. People are

always like, "Oh, this video of someone driving a truck got 700,000 views, but this entrepreneur sharing his deepest secrets got like 600." It's like, yeah, cuz it's not presented in a compelling fashion. People don't feel like they

fashion. People don't feel like they want to sit down and have that conversation. Like, value alone on

conversation. Like, value alone on YouTube pales in comparison to value and entertainment.

As far as that goes too, we can talk for probably 10 hours and I'm probably going to bring on someone to go super deep on the YouTube side. But for people that are new on YouTube, you should be spending 50% plus of your time on

prepackaging. And by prepackaging, guys,

prepackaging. And by prepackaging, guys, idea, title, thumbnail, beginning of the video. Um,

video. Um, >> if you don't know design, like get a designer to break down why thumbnails are good or bad. Cuz I'll see people that will copy it, but then like faces aren't brightened or like they don't understand type. I'm like, you have to

understand type. I'm like, you have to have someone with a design background.

You know, >> the less elements the better on thumbnail. We'll leave it at that.

thumbnail. We'll leave it at that.

Unless you're a female audience, cuz you notice the female thumbnail that crashes that crushes is the ones with like all the different stuff in the background that's all like busy with like the things calling them out. Like you look at Grace Beverly's thumbnails or some of the pop culture. So again, it's just like what does your audience consume?

Make those thumbnails. You know,

>> I stand corrected because I had no idea that would work. I don't know.

>> But yours but yours is like exactly like the simple thumbnail. If you're doing like male business driven content, 1,000% the [ __ ] way to go, right?

>> Yeah. Even for us, like I was looking after the fact, like one of our thumbnails has very big bold lettering on the hat and it's just one more thing that draws attention away from what the actual thumbnail is. I wish we would take that one off, which we probably

will.

>> Are you AB testing thumbnails at all?

Yeah.

>> Crazy crazy AB testing. I want to talk a wrap up a little bit on the positioning side because a lot of the content has to go with the positioning. What would you say is the most brilliantly positioned brand in the marketplace? I think Grunes

is a really brilliantly positioned brand because they basically I love position against. So there's different types of

against. So there's different types of positioning. Position against is

positioning. Position against is basically where you're like there's an existing big incumbent and we are an alternative and and our entire identity is wrapped up in being an alternative to this big massive thing. And Grunts is an

excellent example of this where like AG1 is a big honking business that has marketed its way to success and they're like hey guess what the user experience still sucks. we are just going to be

still sucks. we are just going to be like we have this huge TAM we just have a superior user experience that these guys will probably never copy or if they do it'll be too late and we're just going to hammer that and so I've loved the way that they position that and then they're like you know what we're also

going to widen the TAM we're like they you know what they suck at positioning kids will never consume AG1 so we are going to say we are going to be a we're going to be able to get the kids and we can get that as a like a an entry point so even if you're an adult and you are

don't use AG1 or you do you we're going to get your kid and then we're going to upgrade to you why shouldn't you ingest your greens that way so I feel like they've done just a absolutely absolutely incredible job with that.

David is another one. David is another one where like their value prop was unassalable. They were like we are going

unassalable. They were like we are going to on metrics. Like you look at their trucks, they run trucks in New York City. It's just the calories, grams of

City. It's just the calories, grams of protein. They're like you will never

protein. They're like you will never beat our metrics as un unassalable and then we are going to present ourselves as a work of art with the whole David theme to to be around that. Those are

two brands that are both new that are just the most excellent positioning I've seen.

>> For context, guys, it's David Protein that actually just launched and initiative the same exact thing though.

It's just all about how many calories.

>> Well, you notice they hired a creative director. This woman's super talented.

director. This woman's super talented.

She did like the locker scene with the COD unveil. And you look at like that

COD unveil. And you look at like that brand going from launch with a value proposition, hammer Tik Tok shop. Tik

Tok shop was a huge part of their adoption strategy, then like widespread distribution, and then okay, now we actually hired a creative director and we're doing like fun campaigns to go along with like launching product as marketing, which is what they did like

with the COD. They are that is a the level of sophistication and simplicity inside that operation is uh legendary.

>> Yeah. from a kind of like a counterculture us against them mentality. Another good example is

mentality. Another good example is probably Poppy that went against Pepsi and Coke.

>> That whole category all pop and Poppy is just again position against with a product of that nature. Now those are just huge CPG. If you to succeed, you have to be taking a massive swing like that. If you're not taking a massive

that. If you're not taking a massive swing in CPG, the volume isn't there to ever make you any real money. And then

in other like other companies, another good position that I actually love to talk about, I have never talked about in the pod is Satoshi Nakamoto in fashion where it's like they just took a popular pop culture term that people are obsessed with and then turned it into a

ultra expensive fashion brand. Like and

the brand the only reason that brand succeeds is because of the brand name.

And if they it has a different name, it would just not be where it is. And it's

just a genius bit of like I recognize this thing going on in society. It's a

Japanese brand. We're going to use this inherent credibility that associates with it and we're going to execute at the highest most luxury level and it was a kind of a masterclass in what a name can do for a company.

>> I think from a positioning perspective something that a lot of people do is they play the price game and I think if you're a new company if you don't have economies of scale it's a very dangerous game and I feel like a lot of people especially in the health and wellness

space they're getting into this super saturated space you need to really differentiate yourself through through some sort of unique position like stuff that you talked about.

>> Yeah. Well, I think I I talk about this actually I haven't released it yet, but I'm doing a video about where it's like we had little tree culture. People used

to spend their extra money and be like, I'm going to get an Air1 smoothie. I'm

going to get this fancy snack. People

would basically be buying dopamine. It

was a generational thing. So, that's why we saw these cool new snack and beverage brands. And then there's now it's like

brands. And then there's now it's like the little luxury culture where it's like, yeah, I'm going to get a I'm going to buy a Jolie shower head and it's $400 versus $100. And now you see that across

versus $100. And now you see that across everything. Like I got a tool kit for my

everything. Like I got a tool kit for my son the other week from this brand called Tinker. And it's like they just

called Tinker. And it's like they just made like a very aesthetic, also very userfriendly toolkit. All the handles

userfriendly toolkit. All the handles and stuff are kind of like oxo grips. So

my son can like grab a hammer or grab a nail. Same thing with an old person and

nail. Same thing with an old person and I want just because it looks good. It's

not like a big DeWalt set or whatever. I

can slide it in somewhere and I have like an aesthetic house and you're like cool. They basically just upcharge the

cool. They basically just upcharge the ability to take an existing thing, add kind of relatively minor innovation, but like that is a market. And so I do think that there's if you are going to like go a premium positioning with a premium

look at a slightly higher price is such a better move than trying to just undercut someone by 10% in the market.

Like that just isn't a winning strategy.

>> Yeah. You can always go down on price.

It's tough to go up.

>> Amen.

>> Always can go downstream. We could

literally go probably 20 hours on content. We're going to dive into

content. We're going to dive into influencer marketing.

>> Pop this jacket off real quick.

>> Yeah. Pop that jacket.

>> All right. Cool. So, let's hop into influencer marketing. When you hear

influencer marketing. When you hear influencer marketing in 2025, what comes to mind?

>> Like always on creators and then like creators on staff at companies. By

always on, I mean like, hey, you have creators on staff. they're just making content for you in these longer term relationships. But yeah, I mean this is

relationships. But yeah, I mean this is like the era of influencer marketing.

>> I know that you have working with Gail Blaster in the past and then obviously you work with all these beauty brands. I

want you to give context for the listeners and I I'll be able to layer on top with Iconic.

How much free stuff are these big brands sending out?

>> Uh so much, right? As much as you can.

Literally as much as you can find addresses for people that are relevant, right? Because like look, here's this

right? Because like look, here's this the there's these metrics called I bet called EMV, which is like earned media value, which is basically value you get from like people just posting your content without spending, you know, money or paid behind it. And you look at

um in some of these niches, like how much content is just being made casually, and you're like, "All right, cool. I get this 100,000 view video, but

cool. I get this 100,000 view video, but the compounding effects of all these smaller videos and all these things like really move a brand forward, especially when you're at retail." Like that was the biggest thing about working at Jel Blast is like we were in Costco, we were in Walmart, we were in Target, we were

in all the hardware stores. So you need to push just volume awareness. the only

goal is volume awareness. You can't

track or attribute anything at that scale because there's so many locations where you can buy it. So, it's just a has to be a cultural like awareness level. And so, the idea is like get

level. And so, the idea is like get these in as many people's hands as possible so that they see them. And if

you see people having fun with it, whether that's on the internet or that's in person for the cost of what that takes and someone's buying into the ecosystem, that had like a huge value.

But yeah, I think this is it's scaling it up as high as it can go. And then

also like how do you want to find the people that you pay? Would you rather have it be people that support your brand organically or like you started in some relationship and then you pay them because the content was successful or you just want to hunt for like random people on the internet that you want to

pay max dollar for?

>> You said something in an interview that really resonated with me and it was a strategy that I formerly did at scale and I stopped doing it because I listen to the numbers guys.

>> We have probably sent out it's probably at about 8,000 canvases and keep in mind canvases are significantly more money than a pair of socks or beauty.

>> No attribution. All I did was just look at the true cost of goods and I would just bake that in to a line item on my marketing budget. And people have to

marketing budget. And people have to look at it as a they're getting content, b they're getting distribution, c they're getting social proofing, d per what you said, there's no better way to see if they're a good creator to work

with on a bigger scale than just give them free stuff and just see what happens. Yeah. The other one um multiple

happens. Yeah. The other one um multiple brands I've worked with uh prior to this beauty era we're doing was like this was the was the buy it store. They'd be

like, "Hey, we're going to recruit, you know, 100, 200 creators that, yeah, like for every campaign, every month or whatever, we're going to gift card them to wherever we want to boost sales, Target, Sprouts, whatever." So then you

get the purchase, so there's volume and you get the posts that come from it. And

then some of the content would be like at the location. That's another strategy that's like s you're baking it in the marketing budget. You're like, "This is

marketing budget. You're like, "This is how everyone's like, how do you support retail? How do you attribute it?" Hey,

retail? How do you attribute it?" Hey,

like attribution is a extremely hard thing to quantify, but it becomes like significantly easier when you're looking at like overall lift and you're doing these like campaigns that are like at a high level. But a lot of it's common

high level. But a lot of it's common sense, too. Like how do you get multiple

sense, too. Like how do you get multiple assets for the for a lower cost, you know, and then how do you compare that to, you know, traditional media and how do you know what doesn't work? Like

we've run this magazine ad if we cut it off for 3 weeks, does anything change?

There's just so much of these budgets. I

feel like you can move to some of this where the numbers are amazing. the

numbers of giving stuff away of like DMing relationships giving stuff away and then graduating that where the numbers of like intore purchase gift card stuff is like so is actually the economics are kind of amazing compared

to any non like meta Tik Tok spark ad stuff like any other type of advertising and I think it's just it just getting the conversation between executives is just complicated because a lot of people in charge of these budgets don't

understand modern media >> there's so many different ways that you can use it as a weapon as well too I've talked about it in the past is if you're a brand and you have a big following, you could use that as leverage against the influencers that you're seeding

product to, i.e. repost it on story, repost it on feed, do a co-branded post, and really sell them on the distribution that you're going to give them. Another

thing that I think people sorely underestimate is the fact that you just need to be looking at just your true cost of goods and just say, "Hey, this cost me $10 and I'm going to spend >> x amount >> x amount per month."

>> But also the if you want to get super quantifiable with it, just start with Tik Tok shop. start with Tik Tok shop affiliate be like we are going to get and send to as many people that create videos on affiliate and we're going to be on shop and we are going to track it and then you actually get a very numbers

driven version of this that a lot of brands have a lot of opportunity to scale so like that's number one like start there attributable and then build it to other networks and then B the the thing that I've gotten brought in to work on almost the most when I was doing a lot of packaging content was packaging

for influencer boxes because I'm like hey how do you want to guarantee post rate people will send out a thousand packages they'll get 45 posts and get discouraged and you're like well what did you send them and oh we just put this in a random box with whatever. And

I was like, "Okay, cool. Say that there was a $2 cost package on that that was looked viral." Like I always looked at K

looked viral." Like I always looked at K beauty for this, like Korean beauty, cuz they have all these crazy PR packs because of how big their influencer culture is. Like there was one, I think

culture is. Like there was one, I think it was like a Maybelline one that was like sticks of dynamite and you like pull the things out of like they're so intricate. One of them was like a

intricate. One of them was like a computer with a floppy disc, but like you look at the cost to actually get those made in China. You do a,000 2,000.

It's dollars, not tens of dollars. But

even if you're doing tens of dollars and you're sending a hundred kits and you want to have max open rate, it's like all right, I sent 100 mailers. I want to get 60 posts. The quality of the way that mailer looks and the concept behind that and does that tie into your other campaign. Then can you do a giveaway

campaign. Then can you do a giveaway based on that? That's banging content.

Like it becomes a campaign strategy in itself that you can engineer into success, guys. That's why we do this

success, guys. That's why we do this podcast. I think that's just so valuable

podcast. I think that's just so valuable and people don't even think about that.

I've seen a significantly different I love it how you're looking at like it's a DTO to an open rate from a post rate perspective. If you do a handwritten

perspective. If you do a handwritten note and customize it to that person, there is they feel a a they have to post it.

>> Wait, when I get that I mean I get this all the time someone's like, you know, thank you so much. This content man blank and I'm like, you know, you makes you smile. You think differently, but

you smile. You think differently, but all it's about that. Yeah, that

relationship like did it make you smile?

Did it make your kid smile? If my kid loves the thing that comes in the mail, it's a wrap, you know. Yeah, it's coming on content. You mentioned uh Tik Tok

on content. You mentioned uh Tik Tok shop. I am not on Tik Tok shop just for

shop. I am not on Tik Tok shop just for whatever reason that just it has not worked for us as a brand. Attribution is

very hard on the influencer side. Tell

us more just about your experience with Tik Tok shop.

>> Tik Tok shop is a combination of it's like a gift and a curse, right? So for

instance, when we were working on it on gel blaster, we would get kicked off constantly because it was a blaster product, right? So we just have this

product, right? So we just have this like on and off on and off thing. But

then I I have so many people in my life that like live and breathe Tik Tok shop.

What people don't understand about that back to that scale conversation is that when you look at a good brand on there, you look at brands that are really crushing it on there. Tart, a few of these others, they are getting so many organic posts from Tik Tok shop like as

an added benefit. So even take away the economics like a brand like that is getting 3 to 5,000 posts a month or actually they have more than that.

They're doing 3 to 5,000 active affiliates. That means active people on

affiliates. That means active people on Tik Tok that post their product every month. You can look at places like Kalo

month. You can look at places like Kalo data and like hunt this down and the data will be okay.

>> I want you to go very granular and give people as much context as possible. This

is everything done through the platform or they paid through the platform.

>> All right. So so let me let me break this down. So if you are a brand you

this down. So if you are a brand you want to hunt down what's called affiliates. Affiliates are creators that

affiliates. Affiliates are creators that post links on Tik Tok shop to products.

So they'll make a video about Lacroy.

They will link Lacroy inside the video.

Then they get a commission on that.

There's different structures for it. And

a lot of creators make a lot of money doing this. Now, what you want to do as

doing this. Now, what you want to do as a brand is you want to hunt down those creators and get them to join your program and promote your product.

There's two kind of ways to do this within Tik Tok's back end. So the first way you have is basically you can create a always open program. So basically you can recruit affiliates and they can just join or anyone who finds it can join.

They can get sent product and if they meet certain parameters and they can make it for your brand. The other one is >> embedded in Tik Tok shop or go >> embedded in Tik Tok shop. It's just

open. they are in a affiliate, they can go see that. And if you want to be an affiliate now, I think you need 5,000 followers. It used to be lower. And then

followers. It used to be lower. And then

you can go join that program. And

there's places like Creators Corner that train people to do that that are amazing. And then you have the level

amazing. And then you have the level like above that, which is, hey, if you want to get actual good creators, they're not just going to go join your open program or necessarily even respond to a DM. You have to go hunt them down and be like, "Hey, I know you make good content these other people. I want you to make content for us." And you're

probably going to pay them. Might pay

them a retainer. You might give them some super high percentage. And then Tik Tok allows you to create basically programs where you add people manually at higher percentage rates. And so you kind of have these two things. You want

to recruit people into that. But then

once you're in there and it's working and people see volume and they see you can make money and sell on it, you begin to do more and more of it. And so

there's a bunch of different like agencies and services or you can do it yourself. I forget some other software.

yourself. I forget some other software.

All the software names are really weird.

So it's like hard to remember off the top of your head. There's another good like tracking hunting down autodm software that works for this. But you

just basically want to scale that as high as you can as long as you're getting the economics. You know, you have the economics because if you're doing if you're making sales and your commission is 20 25%. Tik Tok takes a very small amount. It's not like a big distributor and you've built in your

margin like or your fulfillment cost. If

you're selling anything with a decent AOV, 30 bucks, 50 bucks plus, you probably have some margin there, then your goal is just as much scale as you can. But at the same time, you're

can. But at the same time, you're getting all these posts, these thousands of posts which are generating likely millions of views. And so you have all that EMV as well, which trickles over into Amazon purchases, retail purchases, your websites, just brand awareness and

value. So, not only do you have this

value. So, not only do you have this trackable, scalable marketing by seating influencers, you have this huge lift effect that comes from it. And I just think it's one of the most underrated tools like possible for scaling any

brand that sells a product where the economics of shipping and logistics allow you to actually do it >> and you can control within this platform if you wanted from an attribution perspective like they could get just on that purchase.

>> Oh, just on that. That's all it is. So,

literally if they purchase if they click the link from that video and bought it, that's when you get your attribution.

>> So, the affiliates don't get LTV. they

go come back and buy more.

>> Doesn't matter. But it doesn't matter because affiliates make a lot of money because these videos that do well, look, it's all shots on goal. You go to these affiliate pages, they'll be posting five, 10 videos in a day. One every four days pops off, but if it drives 100K in

sales or a 20k commission like one I like to look at, there was a also a Maybelline, sorry for my bros. I'm deep

in beauty. There's a Maybelline video by Jeffree Star. Don't Google Jeffree Star.

Jeffree Star. Don't Google Jeffree Star.

And and where he went ultra viral. It's

like a reaction video for him for a product and he drove it was something it was like 5 or 600K worth of sales because of how ultraviral that video went. You look at the chart of their top

went. You look at the chart of their top affiliates. There's a lot of affiliates

affiliates. There's a lot of affiliates that drove 20K, 50K in sales. They're

getting that 20% commission. Then

they're making 10K in a month. It's

amazing. And then you have Jeffree Star who just like probably made six figures like off a single post. And you see like, oh, this is the ability you have.

It's all about shots on goal, right? You

didn't know he was going to go viral versus anyone else was going to go viral or that video type or this video. You

can't necessarily pick it. You have less control. It's why brands don't like it.

control. It's why brands don't like it.

But then you have this massive potential of what can happen to your product. And

I think it's just it's un it's untapped in the way that Amazon was untapped.

maybe a few, you know, years ago before they started whippling fees and everyone was on it. Now, like we have that same alpha on Tik Tok shop.

>> Guys, if you have not watched the episode with Kent 2024, biggest Tik Tok shop in the world's Neurogum. Great

episode.

>> Yeah. And I'm like I'm just obsessed with it. I work on it. I make creative

with it. I work on it. I make creative for it. I do briefs for it. I'm not like

for it. I do briefs for it. I'm not like running some big brand on it, but I have many friends that are. And so I just love it because I just want as many people as possible to take care like take advantage of that like scenario.

It's just an amazing like thing to exist. And I look at it every day and

exist. And I look at it every day and wonder why like every project I'm on, how could I convince them to do more?

>> What's so crazy is I would imagine there is definitely somebody that's watching this video right now that has influence may or may not be on Tik Tok. If they

are on Tik Tok even more and they're not even selling stuff on Tik Tok shop and they're integrated into their videos, it's free money. You should be doing it.

>> Yeah, exactly. People are making it about the other thing I thought was like if you're running influencers or seating and then they've been posting free stuff and they're not on a on a Tik Tok shop.

There's a whole like cottage industry of management there dedicated to onboarding those people on the Tik Tok shop and then having them link the product and being like hey guess what you're already posting this to get 600,000 views like don't you like make money at the same time and that's where it makes useful be like hey we're doing retainers or we're

doing whatever but like that is a whole thing if you're seating and you're not on shop you're like this is free money for them and for you just connect the dots but there's always worries about like you know again control what does this mean for our retail environment

people will always find a reason to not do the hot new thing at the time when they're supposed to and they'll talk themselves out of money So, you have 10K to spend on an influencer budget. What

do you do?

>> Uh, I think you try to find I would try to be like doing five people that are a 1K and then doing two posts each with them and like kind of hunger gamesing it at least internally to be like, which of these people can I develop a long-term thing with a little bit cheaper? But I

think the biggest alpha in influencer right now is going into like the emerging where it's like, hey, cool.

You're now broken, they just broke 100K or whatever it looks like. They haven't

gotten a bunch of brand deals yet, but they've done one or two and they kind of make content that gets the same views or is just as good as these big influencers. Like now that's the biggest

influencers. Like now that's the biggest alpha, but it's the hardest to find because people really don't want to hunt for them. These agencies necessarily

for them. These agencies necessarily don't want to hunt for them. So they're

not like cutting down the edge that's not as nimble. I think you have the biggest upside. So I would look for

biggest upside. So I would look for that. But again, the multiple posting I

that. But again, the multiple posting I think is crucial. You do one post with an influencer, you really don't know what's going to come out the other end.

My biggest recommendation on that is always like, can you redo their biggest piece of content like with them with your brand integrated? So, a good example is Reformation, the dress company. They took all these big

company. They took all these big creators and they said, "Hey, go remake your best video ever, but you're wearing Reformation." And that was the campaign.

Reformation." And that was the campaign.

And that's a genius thing for them to get placement. They have a little bit of

get placement. They have a little bit of different goals. But it's the same thing

different goals. But it's the same thing I did when I did like a I did like a Red Flag wallets video. And I had a wallet video. I'd be like, "Hey, can you just

video. I'd be like, "Hey, can you just do this again?" And then just like put us like in like a prominent thing and like market as sponsored. Like there's

stuff like that makes a lot of sense for the brand. So that's how I would look at

the brand. So that's how I would look at it is like spread your shots out. Do

multiple posts with each of them. Remake

some of their best content versus go let me get the biggest influencer I can for 10 because if you do one shot like that, you just don't know where it's going to go. You need time to figure out like

go. You need time to figure out like where it hits. Makes a lot of sense.

Looking at it from like a macro perspective and obviously there's different outliers, aka you, someone with a bigger following. Where would

that sweet spot where you think you get the most value on a per follower perspective? Is it at 10,000? Is it at

perspective? Is it at 10,000? Is it at 50,000? 200,000?

50,000? 200,000?

>> Well, it's interesting. What I've

noticed in my niche is like the budgets don't go up as you continue to grow.

Basically, you get to the top. Like if

you are on a couple hundredk, let's say 3 400k combined between Instagram and Tik Tok in the like marketing niche, like I'm not getting any more money at a million followers than I was at that 400. Like there's capped out. The brands

400. Like there's capped out. The brands

just aren't going to spend more. And

also, you're not getting necessarily that many more views up there. Like it's

like the way that virality works. And so

I think it's really like finding people that are getting to that spot. So in

marketing, I think it's really like you just got over 100K or like who's kind of hot right now. Like for instance, like I'm on a streak these last like two months. This is a great time to to get

months. This is a great time to to get me. The previous two months before that,

me. The previous two months before that, I was like still I was obviously like my content was like figuring it out, but even then it's hard to predict it with timing and stuff like that. It's kind of I know it's a hard answer. It really

varies by niche. Um but it comes down to really consuming like what does your audience consume? Like having that

audience consume? Like having that algorithm, are these people showing up a lot and just being online? I would say for me it's a fast raise to get to 10,000 followers. I think that you have

10,000 followers. I think that you have way more legitimacy just having 10,000 plus. And then for me what I found and

plus. And then for me what I found and my girl who's done agency big clients and spread it across 50 girls at once.

She's getting more value dollar for dollar.

>> Smaller >> smaller.

>> Yeah.

>> I think that's the again I look at it like there's a certain amount of it's different when you're in consumer good.

for like B2B stuff, it's like if you don't have really 100K, I feel like the credibility isn't there where it's like, okay, this person in promoting that, I feel like there's like more risk necessarily unless they have a really tuned in audience. And you'll see it too, like the videos just aren't as good. Now, if you want to nurture that

good. Now, if you want to nurture that relationship to then have a bigger thing, that's really where it's at. Like

I remember like Particle is one of my first sponsors. I still do video with

first sponsors. I still do video with them like almost every month. My rate is like not significantly higher than it was cuz they've just stuck with it for that long. And so there's a big they've

that long. And so there's a big they've gotten a huge upside by being early. And

I think there's a lot there's a lot to be said for that if you're looking at a longer term influencer plan.

>> So let's just say for B2B guys you probably have to be 100,000 plus for credibility and then B TOC I would say >> yeah 10 yeah >> maybe even lower but I think 10 and it really depends on the quality of the content like I look at there's people making good videos that have less than

that and it's just where you want to catch them in their arc also are you willing you going to spread this across a few and try to get some hits and understand that's how it works or are you looking for sure things and you're always going to feel like a sure thing is the bigger creator whether that's

right or not. a huge thing that I think is going to make its way back and I can make some analogies back to LA Fairfax 2016 2017 with companies like Pink

Dolphin going back to I call them COIs back in my finance get uh finance days center of influence these people that have let's just call them seating lists basically that have these owned seating

lists where they have access to a narrow persona and at any point in time they can hit 10 people 20 people 50 people 100 Those people are going to have a lot

of value for anybody that is going after >> I used to coach this for people that were on teams and stuff and I was like, "Hey, I know you're about to do a bunch of manual research and a bunch of manual outreach and it's going to absolutely suck and it's going to turn you into the most valuable person whenever you go to your next job and I'm not going to want

to lose you, but like that's going to be true cuz you're going to walk in there with that rolodex." That's the same conversation I had about the stuff I have all the same thing. Every

influencer's ever posted any brand I've worked with like is in a list, you know?

And I know what that list is. It's

parsable by category. It's part of that thing that you organize. And guess what?

But whenever I go anywhere, I know where the here's the hitters. And then the bigger you get that, the more valuable you are. So, I could not agree more. And

you are. So, I could not agree more. And

that's why it's like everyone doesn't want to work these manual jobs or do whatever anymore, but like yo, you work in influencer outreach for a year or two and you actually track who had results or not. And then you go walk into like a

or not. And then you go walk into like a leverage conversation to have one of those jobs. Like you're basically

those jobs. Like you're basically working your way from a 90k job to a 200k year job off a list >> and it creates insane amount of additive value and leverage on collaboration. I

can give you two examples. one with

iconic with legends the athletic apparel like you know how easy that was for me just like guys I work out in LA people don't even know this David protein yeah I sent out to 40 people right out the gate because that was right in my wheelhouse and it was a win-win for me

too it was not >> Peter Hall RX Bar I like the product win-win for all but same thing I had that organized by three or four big pockets and being able to at any moment

deploy that by vertical and or another big one too >> is by geography like saying like retail.

>> Yeah. Saying like, "Hey, I already know right now that if I wanted to blow up a brand in Boston, Miami, New York, Scottdale, >> the pop up, the launch event, the man."

Yeah.

>> Yeah. Crazy. Um, I want to tie a bow on the influencer side. What's the biggest waste of money you've seen in influencer marketing?

>> Man, there's some of these agencies. I'm

not going to call some of them out specifically, but man, I walked into a scenario where brands are spending millions on influencer, paying top dollar for all these people for bad posts with like weird briefs without the right CTAs. And people will their big

right CTAs. And people will their big agencies will go blow a bag. They will

go be like, "Hey, this is 75,000. This

is 12,000." Like, and then you'll see the difference them in small agencies.

Agency I always like to call out that I loved working with this agency Cavel KL where I worked with them. I was as a creator and I've worked with them. I

hired them after that cuz I was like, man, they the briefs so much attention to detail. The feedback was actually so

to detail. The feedback was actually so good. Everything was organized in a way

good. Everything was organized in a way that it was just relentless. And I was like that difference between like, oh, just pay 75,000 bucks to the biggest person you can, which is like what some of these big agencies do. That [ __ ] was like offensive to me seeing what some of

those are. So, it's really just like are

those are. So, it's really just like are they tactically in the weeds like helping make great videos. And one of the callouts that one of the things I appreciated most about the Cavell stuff is uh I did some stuff at Jailbuster with them. We did these videos that went

with them. We did these videos that went viral on YouTube shorts with a creator, smaller creator to the point of your upside and they were video game recreation videos with Jel Busters.

They're recreating a kill shots basically and with and the guy would do like dramatic falls or whatever like tricks and they in their feedback I remember in the brief they were like hey can you put the video game sound effects and then can you put the little targets

like on the video and here's the PGs for the overlays. And then when they added

the overlays. And then when they added that, it was one of those things like I had never thought of and just looked amazing and just added so much to the production of this and like I think helped ensure that video go from a couple hundredk to like a couple million. And it's just like when you

million. And it's just like when you need people that are in that in the weeds and really comes down to your rep and the experience they have and how they treat influencer >> little co-creative direction by an agency. That's pretty rare.

agency. That's pretty rare.

>> I'll take it. Well, they were looking this was the thing. This was they were in all these briefs like doing that level of stuff and we were doing it was like a 70 influencer campaign, right?

But like that's the ones like you can just tell they're like obsessed with success.

you called it out and I it's just so embedded in my world and my business partner Jeff Cole on Instagram for Iconic. He's one of the most talented

Iconic. He's one of the most talented digital designers in the world. It's

I've become accustomed to it. This guy

is a master at creative briefs. What are

the most important elements of a creative brief references? So, it's like what are you actually showing people to create and then thinking through how that creator is making it their own. Cuz

you can make an amazing brief but if you don't then if you then go to a creator and here's this brief and it's not like the stuff that they do or doesn't incorporate their best qualities. I feel

like there's a personalization level to a lot of briefs. And then the ability to just say if you want to say no to the brief, okay, just send us something back that you're stoked on. I think is another good one. But on the same way, I'm obsessive about the briefs and the

ideas. And I think all the other good

ideas. And I think all the other good thing about a brief is like having it be wide. Like here's a concept, here's a

wide. Like here's a concept, here's a campaign, it ties into what we're doing as a brand, but like do your own interpretation of it. I feel like creators don't like to be pigeonhold.

And if you are pigeonhold, you make bad content.

>> I agree. Keep it super macro. tons and

tons of ideas and just say pick any and all these ideas and sprinkle just your personal sauce on it.

>> And on UGC, so I actually spend more time now on UGC briefs and influencer briefs just at least this last few months. The other crucial one on that is

months. The other crucial one on that is like elevation where it's like if you have a good UGC creative, say it's like a male creator and you want to spread it. Okay, I'm going to do a female

it. Okay, I'm going to do a female creator. I'm going to do a older guy,

creator. I'm going to do a older guy, younger guy, black guy, white guy, Asian guy, whatever it is, you're going to spread out. I'm going to get more

spread out. I'm going to get more demographics. It's an easy win for a

demographics. It's an easy win for a performing ad asset. But then if you're like, okay, how else do you update this or how could you make this work on organic? It's always about elevation

organic? It's always about elevation where I'm like, "Hey, okay, instead of doing this, you know, get ready with me routine in your house like you always do. Can you do it in public or in a car

do. Can you do it in public or in a car or on a subway? Can we give you a little extra budget to go like light it like that or have that extra element like or go get a luxury hotel?" It's like, how does $400 elevate that asset like

significantly? I think is one thing I'm

significantly? I think is one thing I'm always looking at when you're taking an existing brief and like adding it on that people don't think about. Same

thing with props. It's always like a previous project I worked on, they built like a prop box and we were working on that constantly. like what can we send

that constantly. like what can we send creators in this box that's going to cost us sub$100. It'll make the video pop, you know, and it's like reflective jacket or like this mirror. One of them had like a mirror like vanity that look crazy. And like you just start to add

crazy. And like you just start to add those into your briefs and now now you're [ __ ] cooking. Stealing this

idea. I'm adding an extra 5 to 10% of overall seating budget to give people and just say, "Hey, you could spend x amount of money how to make this video better." That's a great idea.

better." That's a great idea.

>> Can we also do people do that? Are you

that guy who does this?

>> Oh, like we're people definitely do this and I'm not the only person doing this.

Yeah. But yeah, it's Well, also a lot of the good us the strategists are really making there's like the Twitter people and then there's like the people that and there's some people that are valuable on there and there's like the people that are really making stuff pop.

Like we're all like on group chats and [ __ ] like everyone's trying to share our success especially if you're also a creator. There's like a lot of that but

creator. There's like a lot of that but yeah like even you look at but we have one where like I know one brand that bought like 10 or 20 of their best creators Osmos when they came out and we're just like here you go $400 for us and your production value is gonna be like amazing, right? And then the

creator's [ __ ] stoked. It's like

little stuff like that goes so such a long way. Hey, I mean I even think about

long way. Hey, I mean I even think about that like I'm a constant like you'll be on my Christmas list. Like I'm a constant giftgiver, right? And like

every holiday I'm just sending stuff like I sent everybody like blank studio stuff my friend Brandon's brand like nice stuff an entire Christmas I bought like 70 of his things. Like even this now I have my own brand. I send out a ton of that. It's like that stuff goes

so far whether you're as a brand or as a person just on building up that little rapport that like leads to more relationships. I love that. I do the

relationships. I love that. I do the gifting too. I think the one huge thing

gifting too. I think the one huge thing though is in conjunction with them creating the content. I think that's genius. I've never heard or seen that.

genius. I've never heard or seen that.

Um, >> got alpha on here, brother. Yeah.

>> I I I want to wrap up on the influencer marketing side. What are kind of the key

marketing side. What are kind of the key KPIs that you're looking for a good influencer outside of following account?

>> Um, yeah. I think it's really just like consistent views. Like I would basically

consistent views. Like I would basically I always look at the bottom. I encourage

people to do this with me too where like you're getting me as an influencer. It's

like, all right, look at their outliers.

Are you going to make a video that's like their outliers, their viral videos?

And your answer is you're maybe you are, but you're probably not. Then you're

looking at, okay, so what is their like what's their ceiling? What's their

basement? Like what's that? What's the

bottom look like? that and for me like that's you're going to get 30 to 50,000 views. That's like the bottom view range

views. That's like the bottom view range of what I put out. It's like okay are you stoked with that for the price range and if you're stoked with that then like that is perfect for you. But I'm always looking at that being like you got to look at the bottom because a lot of sponsored content is going to end up on

the bottom. And if you're stoked on the

the bottom. And if you're stoked on the bottom then run it. When you really look at a lot of creators especially in that marketing space their bottom's bad. If

it's a bad video it's thousands of views, 10,000 views. And so I think for anyone to be like basically obsessed with how do I get people where I know the minimum the worst result is a result that I'm happy with and and anything else about that is value and then as a

creator being like how do I not how do I kind of minimize those losses on branded content to see people have that standard and I'm looking at their other sponsored posts. People always look at organic

posts. People always look at organic being like look at these organic posts they do. It's like nah what were their

they do. It's like nah what were their branded posts that crushed and who put a bunch of spend behind it. you know, like I sent out I did an anthropic claude video and they put a bunch of spend behind it and I show that a lot being like, "Hey, this is a good video. It did

pretty well organic and they put a bunch of spam behind it because it works and like here's why it works. This is why we should do a similar brief." So, I think there's a lot of it's like, you know, looking at that.

>> I want to touch a little bit on that.

You basically talked about whitelisting there where people are just boosting your posts.

>> White list everything. If you're running already ads, like white list everything.

Yeah. Yeah. We should dive a little into I'm going to go super super deep on another episode, but whitelisting for people out there listening is you could do it chop it up a bunch of different ways, but for creators out there, >> if a brand whitelists you and puts spend

behind it, it just allows their end consumer to see it from a different POV.

So, you could see, you know, ads from Iconic, you could see ads from Orin, you could see ads from Orin and Iconic, and it's just a different in stories, it can be in explore. This is pushing it to more places, but it helps them. I always

like I literally just did this with a brand where like they want to add white listing to them more budget and I was just like cool just add it in there because I I I want them to get max value and guess what you have as a creator your best ability is to get brands to

come back to do another video with you again or for other brands to be excited to do a video with you because of the sponsored post you did and if you're not achieving that then you're like not getting max value out of your brand deals. And so I'm always like hey put

deals. And so I'm always like hey put the spend behind that. I want you to like that's another shot on goal. If it

got to your results organic, awesome.

But if it got to your results organic and it got there unpaid, or if it didn't get there organic, but it got there on paid, that means I'm going to get another shot. And the value, like the

another shot. And the value, like the time to dollar value of brand deals is like ridiculous. And so, you want to get

like ridiculous. And so, you want to get that other shot. And guys, keep in mind as well, too, when you do that, you're obviously getting more impressions and views to your profile and building your audience. And from a leverage

audience. And from a leverage perspective, you get one of those clients, two of those clients.

>> Yeah. The brands are not going to probably want to be the first person to do listing. Once you get a couple

do listing. Once you get a couple underneath your belt, you can just point to that.

>> I can't push it. I can't recommend that comment more because it's so funny.

People, how do you get more brand deals?

I'm like, I actually got a lot of my first brand deals cuz my friends, I go get my haircut at this place called Jack Henry and I like them. They're really

nice guys. They're local in my neighborhood. And I made a video about

neighborhood. And I made a video about them unprompted, no money, no anything.

And they were like, "Hey, can we whitelist this?" And I was like, "Even."

whitelist this?" And I was like, "Even."

I was like, "Sure, for free. Cool. I've

never done it. Let's try it." They ran the [ __ ] out of that video. They ran

that video to the ground.

>> Free haircuts.

>> Yeah. And then but like the brand the other brands were then like oh this guy does that and all of a sudden I got all these brand deals. So I'm actually thankful for the free thing and I encourage a lot with creators. I'm like

hey if you haven't added white listing on or you're trying to budget at $5,000 when you have you know $25,000 followers I'm like just get the deals and get the deals and let them run with them and it will be get way more deals. I get more

deals than anyone in my space because I do more deals than anyone in the space.

It's like that simple. And if you're a creator too, you can chop that up a million different ways. you can throw it on the front end and get more money up front. With probably smaller, more

front. With probably smaller, more medium brands, you can get a percent of the spend, a percent of the sales, and then looking at the rights. So, it could be for 3 months, 6 months, a year.

What's really crazy, we talked about this off camera last time, is just like you could get like a percent of sales and like an ad could crack and like they could keep it up for a long time and you could just print money every single month.

>> Yeah. And that's where people start to realize how much influencers really make. You're like, "Oh, there's some of

make. You're like, "Oh, there's some of the little things." Then you have some of these like unexpected like there's like unexpected five figure in your lap like stuff that happens kind of all the time which is you know again unpredictable all these things but is

like a truly amazing byproduct of just taking the time to negotiate some things like you mentioned >> guys the last segment of this video is going to be how Orin makes money and it's probably more than you think so stay tuned guys we'll get to that next question actually you pseudo answered it

but let's just see if we have any other things that you think are huge is what should a creator deliver beyond just the posts itself to be truly valuable to a brand Yeah. So, I think it's like doing

brand Yeah. So, I think it's like doing whatever it takes to achieve the brand's goals. And so, I look at it like if I

goals. And so, I look at it like if I make a post and it is amazing and it's going to crush and work for them, great.

And it's what we scoped, awesome. If

it's not going as well, it's like, okay, can I put it on other networks? Like,

maybe they didn't pay me to cross post, but I'm on Snapchat, I'm on YouTube shorts, I'm on Tik Tok, I'm on Substack, I'm on LinkedIn. If is it going to help them achieve their goal? And if I can continue to post it more, then I'm going to go above and beyond and do that. Same

thing with I have the email newsletter is one of the most valuable things most creators don't do. My email list is 40,000 people now. I email them every week. I have someone that works on that.

week. I have someone that works on that.

That's a business in itself, but I will 100% hammer a brand deal if I think it's going to help get that another time and I'll just do it organically or throw it in. Now, also, if they want to, then I

in. Now, also, if they want to, then I also sell all those things basically all a cart where it's like you can also add this on and you'll get a whole more like much more dedicated portion of it. But

it's like do whatever it takes to help them achieve their goals. Like, as long as you're stoked on it. Now, if I went back and forth with a brand 40 times, we made a whack video because of their insistence, I'm not going to do any of that [ __ ] right? But like, if we're all

incentivized to win together, like, go do it. This goes back to posting on all

do it. This goes back to posting on all channels. So you just have more leverage

channels. So you just have more leverage points.

>> I'm doing Substack right now. It's my

new one. 30 days of posting on Substack videos.

>> Yeah.

>> See if it works. I mean, there's people doing it and they're pushing video and I was like, I already have the video and it takes me another two minutes.

>> I'm seeing some crazy I saw some with Substack. I s also saw with a Patreon.

Substack. I s also saw with a Patreon.

I'm seeing some crazy numbers and you see that Joe Buttons Patreon thing doing 20 mil. That was that was that was wild.

20 mil. That was that was that was wild.

>> I I don't necessarily believe that, but either way, it's like a even if you're in double digit millions, you're [ __ ] killing it. Yeah.

killing it. Yeah.

>> All right, let's move on. Let's go to partnerships collaborations and licensing. I'd love to know what is your

licensing. I'd love to know what is your philosophy on what makes a brand partnership actually work >> if your customers get excited about it and you can make good content around it.

I think people over complicate it or this is too much or that's too much and also brands do a little bit too much but really just comes down to those things.

That's why I think I like the represent does a ton of licensing right with all the metal bands and all that and maybe some are true collabs now too but like their customer base loves it. Their

customer is stoked on it. That's the

number one metric is like they go that [ __ ] looks sick and if you can create that then that is like exactly what you want to do. I think from a licensing perspective, I've been in licensing for like 10 years. You have to be very careful. For anybody out there that's

careful. For anybody out there that's looking to kind of sprinkle and go into licensing, >> it gets to a point where sometimes you cross the chasm and you're looked at more of a licensing company versus a brand company. It's so hard to kind of

brand company. It's so hard to kind of stay on that line. Kith has done it very well. I think Represent is at kind of

well. I think Represent is at kind of like the max cadence. I would kind of slow down.

>> I think they added it though. Like they

had a good brand. How do we take it to the next level? And they added it with licensing. I I agree. They're like

licensing. I I agree. They're like

pushing it to the limit, but like they push everything to the limit.

>> Yeah. Yeah, I think another good idea, another good brand that's doing licensing very well is Truff. Those are

my buddies and they do one or two times a year. It's based on the marketing

a year. It's based on the marketing calendar, based on the schedule that >> you're working like a campaign. I like

to look at when you're planning your product road map, it's like cool, you have genuine new releases. How much can you do that? Once a year, twice a year, and you have expansions to your existing lineup, like I can add more SKs or variations or flavors or colors or whatever it is. And then it's like this is just another tool to have in that

toolkit to fill up that calendar, right?

And so to your point, I think the Truff Thing is genius where it's like, "All right, they're only doing so many releases, but they can add to the release calendar a non-core product twice a year." That's a wonderful way to increase the amount of SKUs they have.

>> What do you think is the most underrated value you get from a great partnership?

>> It's just access to that other audience, right? I don't think that's it's

right? I don't think that's it's underrated. I think that's like the

underrated. I think that's like the biggest rated one, but you know, when we were like a fandom, like I a friend of mine works really extensively on like video game licensing. So he does all the licensing and stuff for Pudgy Penguins who are like on licensing fire. And it's

just like hey you get if McDonald's people know who Pudgy Penguins is that's a huge win for that community like an overstated win. It's like and then you

overstated win. It's like and then you got to think about how wide is your TAM and to available market and like how do you get the new parts of it excited in a new way and I think partnerships is one of the best ways to get into that.

>> Really really interesting on the last episode with Brian Garop. I always

thought that you wanted to go after someone that basically had the same persona as you but he was he had a very different answer. It was more about net

different answer. It was more about net new.

>> Yeah. Agree. Well, and also knew you can't access it another way. Like that's

why video game licensing I think is so popular because you get this gamer culture that just isn't aware of any other culture outside of it. And so the only way to tap into it is actually you tap into that culture. I think that's an interesting one.

>> In the past when you've done different partnerships, how do you usually structure them?

>> And so typically partnerships like brand to brand or what do you mean?

>> Yeah, brand usually paying a licensing fee or if you're just or if it's together, it's really like okay, are we jointly paying for it or is one person paying for it? And then kind of from that there's economics that trickle down. So, if like one person's funding

down. So, if like one person's funding the whole thing, then usually it's like a payment back or something like that.

Or if you're sharing cost, then it could be a split. But there's a bunch of different models for that.

>> One of my favorite models I just want to to bring up something I've never heard anybody do, and every time I bring it up, they like it. I do a window one and a window two. I'm in a single unit drop ship business, but what I do on window

one is we split it 50/50 under the notion that we're both going to hit or organic. There's going to be no paid

organic. There's going to be no paid against it. So, if they're going to hit

against it. So, if they're going to hit their email, their socials, etc., they should eat the same. And then I flip it to a licensing where it's like 10%. You

run because I'm gonna go and you go paid. I'm run paid.

paid. I'm run paid.

>> That's super smart. Yeah. So now you got another person being like, "That's good."

good." >> Yeah. It's a good one. That's a good

>> Yeah. It's a good one. That's a good one. Take that one. It's a good one. I

one. Take that one. It's a good one. I

want to dive right into the money play.

I think that for me, you know, I've been dabbling on the creator side. I've been

an operator for the last 10 years and I'm going obviously all in. Everybody

here sees on the creative side. And

you're someone that I think has a really interesting >> skill set on both the business and the creative side. You've made a great life

creative side. You've made a great life for yourself. So many people know you

for yourself. So many people know you from the big social media presence.

Let's just get to how do you make your money?

>> Perfect. So I uh a couple ways. So

creator money and creator money is now is the most. So brand deals, creator related stuff is like the number one income source now. It used to be a little more split up, but now like that's the big one. And then on addition, we have info products, we have

cut 30, which is also pretty big, but I have partners and it's a business. We

have employees, we have it's a whole thing. So there's the info product piece

thing. So there's the info product piece on top of that. And then I still work for brands like I am I'm the creative director at a private equity company that they understand it's not a full-time thing and I do these other things and they understand the value that comes with that as well. So I still

have like working but that's also anytime you work at a brand and you are a serious creative professional that's more of an equity play than like a salary play right before that I was doing a bunch of creative consulting. So

basically I was doing guest creative strategy creative direction like workshops. I wanted to go to this

workshops. I wanted to go to this position because I was able to consolidate. I have to manage all those

consolidate. I have to manage all those things into I'm focused on one portfolio and that's like a useful thing for me to be able to be focused while still having that. So those are really the three

that. So those are really the three buckets. But the brand, the creator side

buckets. But the brand, the creator side is like expansive because we have a newsletter, the hyper newsletter. It's

our I have a partner in it. We work on it together. He writes a lot of it. He

it together. He writes a lot of it. He

is a creator in his own right. But we

basically have that business. It's a

separate entity. We monetize it separately. We will probably sell it

separately. We will probably sell it separately at some point.

>> This is specifically a newsletter.

>> Just a newsletter. And there's brand deals inside the newsletter. and we do these big branded reports and we've done like some other kind of creative stuff.

We've did a big YouTube series with this brand air we're about to do a second season of so we're like making some content but that's a business unit that then has payroll and all that stuff that we're on there. YouTube makes like is a smaller amount of it but there's ads on

every YouTube video. There's the IG and Tik Tok ads which is the lion share short form is the lion share because that's like really good money and then the info side.

>> I want to break that down so everybody in the creator space could really understand this in a deep way. I had an amazing conversation after we spoke with Kane for like two hours and just understanding your business model and his business model while we're

developing ours was absolutely [ __ ] amazing. I love you for this. And now

amazing. I love you for this. And now

he's sharing it with you guys. Okay, so

let's just first start off with at the top of this flywheel for everybody here listening. The number one most important

listening. The number one most important thing is content distribution%.

>> None of this works unless you have what we talked about in the beginning of this a content machine and you slowly build your distribution >> and capture like this. a lot of this wouldn't work. The email list is kind of

wouldn't work. The email list is kind of like a hinge of a lot of this that I think people don't quite understand because we sell info off the email list.

We sell sponsorships on the email list.

I have retention on that. I can push to basically like anything. And then I if a platform goes up or down, people still live on it. Yeah. So, I think looking at we're going to look at it in three different buckets. The first one is

different buckets. The first one is quote unquote sponsorships, which could be on social media or newsletter. The

second one is your continuity play with Cut 30. And the third one is your

Cut 30. And the third one is your creative director. in that first bucket,

creative director. in that first bucket, the sponsorships. I think for everybody

the sponsorships. I think for everybody here listening, again, going back to what we talked about in the beginning, >> the fact that you have all of this distribution and you have the newsletter when you're going and talking to brands,

you have so many different things that you can sell into him and different levers that you can pull. If this

doesn't work, you can hit it here and here.

>> Yeah, completely. And that look, it's literally I just did a do a couple videos with Framer, which I really like as like a platform. I try to do the brand deals with people I use and like, but it's like, hey, short form wasn't the right. I was like, I don't even know

the right. I was like, I don't even know how I can tell this story kind of correctly. and you've seen a lot of

correctly. and you've seen a lot of other short form that did it really well, but like on YouTube, I actually my audience is perfect, so let's do this YouTube deal and it's an easier investment for them. It's a format I feel comfortable with. Like I love having that toolkit to your point.

>> Yeah. And what's crazy about that too is I mean it's obviously your time to create the content and the ad read, but it's free. You own it all. So you could

it's free. You own it all. So you could just crossell everywhere.

>> Exactly. And that's what that's how we structure the deals, right? So we send I have like a base rate. Everyone wants an Instagram reel. Instagram reel is my

Instagram reel. Instagram reel is my most popular thing. It's also the most expensive thing. It's the most

expensive thing. It's the most impactful. And so basically it's a core

impactful. And so basically it's a core thing of an Instagram reel. You can also buy a Tik Tok, but I only really want people to get a Tik Tok if they're going to whitelist. And so we'll include like,

to whitelist. And so we'll include like, hey, Tik Tok and whitelisting is like one thing. So you get one of those cores

one thing. So you get one of those cores and you build a package off that which is like, okay, now it's extra money for do you want LinkedIn, do you want email, do you want like YouTube shorts? And

then YouTube's kind of its own separate beast. But a lot of people will combine

beast. But a lot of people will combine a short form and YouTube. But I think that's in the brand's best interest is like if you're going to get somebody reach as far into their following and their bag and create as much continuity as possible. And like most of my deals

as possible. And like most of my deals are multiple networks like YouTube and short form across multiple posts because then it's like look I want to take shots on goal. If one doesn't work I want to

on goal. If one doesn't work I want to go extra hard making sure the next one works and we want and then people take a couple times to resonate and then I I will have told multiple stories about your stuff over time and you can add any of those or run any of those. I feel

like that really creates a world with the brand where they can like really act on it. What is what would you say is the

on it. What is what would you say is the single most kind of uniform element across all the companies that you've worked with where there's success? What

is the reason why it succeeds?

>> We make video we make value video. So

basically I'm always like especially on Instagram it's like we're going to make a video that is savable and so basically I'm going to make a guide. This is a like I did one with paperless pro that was like like a event marketing guide where it's like hey here's a common types of events brand should consider and I break them all down and here's how

you would use paperless pro if you were to enable those events and they have like a tool platform for event management and that is a saved video.

Like I look at saves as the metric number one for me where it's like I'm trying to get high hundreds to thousands of saves on these because that's a for especially for SAS or the kind of things I sell more complicated things the purchase point isn't right there. The

purchase point is in a month when they were like oh we need a CRM and it was like oh I'm going to go back in my bookmarks for that one video or hey remember that thing that they shared in Slack two weeks ago like that is where my value lives. It's like someone is

trying to solve that problem right now.

we just gave them a solution or when they go to solve that problem we are one of the references and so and I basically build that framework with brands around that we're like I will get hundreds of brands I guarantee hundreds of brands

will save or have shared this like pay me nothing if we don't get 500 combined of those two things and those people will all have intent >> from a creator and you're kind of I would say you're mostly geared towards

B2B obviously you do you know >> B2B is a funnel play yeah >> for creators out there looking to get into B2B which platform do you think holds the most amount of value >> uh Instagram Because Instagram is like I think what

people don't understand is that most executives of major companies VP and sea level executives are on Instagram casually browsing and they are DMing to a group chat or to a Slack channel their teams being like why aren't we doing

this for business creation in their niche. This is a common like user action

niche. This is a common like user action that happens all the time and that is that doesn't happen on other platforms. They're probably not on TikTok on LinkedIn. They're not consuming content

LinkedIn. They're not consuming content in that same way. And so I think there's just a huge proportion of that's happening there. Plus, all of the people

happening there. Plus, all of the people that are like active decision makers in companies are in the age where Instagram is their best focus.

>> How long have you been doing the newsletter for?

>> Oh man, I've had it combined with Clayton for probably 16 months, I think, and we've been doing a total probably two years.

>> Wow.

>> Actually, you know what? Sorry. I

started I had the newsletter before I started doing short form. So, it's

longer than that, but I combined it with Clayton about halfway through that process.

>> So, what would you say is the single best piece of advice for a creator looking to get their first social media sponsorship deal?

>> I think you need to do content that you do do any deal. do something with somebody. Do a free thing. Do a thing

somebody. Do a free thing. Do a thing with a friend. Do a thing with whatever.

Make sponsored content so people can see that you do sponsored content because if they don't do that, then they won't never know. The other biggest thing,

never know. The other biggest thing, which for some reason no one seems to understand, is put your email in your bio. Put your contact for that in your

bio. Put your contact for that in your bio. I get that question all the time.

bio. I get that question all the time.

How do you get so many brand deals? I'll

go to the bio and be like, "Hey, you don't have a contact." That's step number one is if anyone did want to reach you, they wouldn't be able to.

Yeah. I double tap it now. Now it's like written in the bio and it's on the bit.ly list. Yeah. It's so funny you say

bit.ly list. Yeah. It's so funny you say that because I formerly know funnels obviously from my direct to consumer business, but I'm just learning now about kind of DM automations and really optimizing

>> optimizing the funnel. Like right now I have a Hooie link on my Instagram and I was told that I'm an idiot and there's certain types of links that it >> you don't trigger and all the other.

>> Yeah. All all this type of stuff that I never actually know and I'm learning about it now. It's absolutely

mind-blowing. Let's go into bucket two.

So this cut 30 is a continuity play. Why

don't I give you the floor on that? What

is that?

>> Oh, perfect. So, Cut 30 is a program where we teach brands and creators to either make content for the first time or make better content. It's a 30-day community. I feel like any course in the

community. I feel like any course in the modern era like kind of needs to be community based or you can just learn the value for free basically. So, we

will in 30 days people come in, they pay $1,000 and we they create it's about 15 pieces of content with us and we cover the whole gambit. You create talking videos, you create vlogs, you create oneshot videos, you create carousels and

then by the end you begin to form a strategy. And so, we've run a lot of

strategy. And so, we've run a lot of people through this, like thousands of people now. And I do it with two other

people now. And I do it with two other creators, Alex Garcia from Sweat Equity and Colin Lanforce. We have a team of people that work with us underneath it.

And we feedback every post, every piece of content that people put in there gets feedback by somebody. And so you will basically make all this content and we're going to work there to help you improve it. And we just have a wild like

improve it. And we just have a wild like so many creators have come out the other end or brands who come out the other end like just making better or more successful content. And so and we run

successful content. And so and we run that in 30-day sessions. I think it's like nine times a year roughly eight to nine times a year. What's really

interesting, this is what we spoke about when we were at Lighthouse for his bucket two and three, cut 30, the continuity play, and then his quote unquote job as being creative director and this PE firm. Going back to what we

said earlier as well, this is informing you on what is working for bucket one, the sponsor deal to grow your audience.

>> And this is the hardest part about this is now when I sit down with anybody and they try to argue about an idea I have, I just know innately like I've like I have before my career was like, "Okay, I could be wrong or right." Now I'm right.

I'm just right. I see we have a hundred creators roughly 70 to 100 creators every month in clut 30 and I know and they're brands and creators of all sizes so I have a complete list of like what is okay we're changing this regularly okay carousels are working this is

happening Instagram and Tik Tok I know probably more than anyone on the globe between the brand work and that like what is working and not and so it's really hard for me to like take any push back from anybody on anything because I'm just like you just you would have no way you could have the scope of

knowledge of what I have on these really specific things for everybody here listening to this podcast I am never going to have a guest on here that is not deep in the game this is why I love these convers conversations and I think by any means possible you have to stay

in the game or else again like we said four 6 months you'll have no idea what's going on >> well if you're enabling people to win you learn even more like the other part of that is I have a group chats with like people that come out of that or different like and a bunch of those more successful creators and we're all sharing and I'm the person who

encourages that typically there's a few other people from collab also really good at getting people together but like if you're the person who's then the conduit let's get all eight of us on a chat and you have a question like bring it up or you want to what rate should I do at this brand deal like if you're the

person putting all those things together and then you're getting the value of the information scene and you're the connector. It just gives you so much

connector. It just gives you so much more benefit in life.

>> Completely agree. We give them value here. So for the creators listening, a

here. So for the creators listening, a really good action steps on how to make money. I would say first and foremost,

money. I would say first and foremost, by any means possible, get a deal so you can use it as leverage and point to that. Focus on content and distribution

that. Focus on content and distribution and then create some sort of flywheel where you're learning fast because that's going to ultimately feed into the other stuff.

>> Yeah. Other creators your size. get

group chats with other creators your size who or like one level above you and just like or start to get to know them.

So you guys are sharing info. We would

not be anywhere near where we're at if I didn't. I convinced most of my friends

didn't. I convinced most of my friends to become creators and most of them are like 100k plus now. And then also I have a bunch of friends who are big creators and we are talking about it constantly and that's like extremely helpful. Even

people always like how do you stay so up to date on marketing? It's like Jordan Ashman and I have a chat where we're constantly sharing the links we come across that you might find interesting about marketing campaigns. So I can think about that and so I now have a multiplication because we're completely

different. Jordan's all sports. Ashman's

different. Jordan's all sports. Ashman's

kind of way more like like CPG. I'm way

more like aesthetic. And so all of a sudden we just have all these perspectives in one place.

>> Good friend group. Good chat there. I

would say a big thing too looking at this from like a macro perspective like I said just analyzing what you're doing, what Kane do, what Kane's doing, what other people are doing too, is you guys have a really really healthy balance from a predictability perspective where

you have continuity. Continuity for

people listening is just money coming in every single month through these courses and then you have kind of the one shots on goal through the sponsorships. Some

of them might be more long-term, so they're more continuity. And then you have an opening to take a home run swing, too. Yeah. Like right now in

swing, too. Yeah. Like right now in bucket three, that's feeding the flywheel and you're learning and learning more. But at any point in time,

learning more. But at any point in time, you have all of this income as a >> That's the best part about the creator income. We didn't change our lifestyle.

income. We didn't change our lifestyle.

That was the other big thing is like the lifestyle. I make way more money than

lifestyle. I make way more money than when I was an executive >> and our we used to live in the same house. We drive the same cars. We like,

house. We drive the same cars. We like,

you know, already we're pretty decent off. But that could really have changed.

off. But that could really have changed.

Like maybe we go on some slightly nicer trips. But what I've done with that is

trips. But what I've done with that is we hire people. We got employees to cut 30. I have people to help. We have

30. I have people to help. We have

editors. I have management. We have like I'm willing to invest in the creative career. And I also know that if

career. And I also know that if everything else went sideways, like I'm not all of a sudden I have this like the Miami penthouse or whatever it is, you know? Like I think people get really

know? Like I think people get really caught up in that. And if you have goals and you look at the size of the prize, like it's absolutely huge. But look,

that's the best part. I could work probably an hour or two a day just making content and have a wonderful life and not have to do anything else. And

knowing that if I ever got sick or anything or that or god forbid like a health issue, I could do that. It's like

a you get that weight off your shoulders even though I may not have 10 million in the bank. You know, it's like you can

the bank. You know, it's like you can know that you have this sustainable thing as long as content keeps going.

>> He will have 10 mil in the bank.

>> We're getting there.

>> All right, we're going to go to the last part before quickfire. Let's go to your team. I'd love to know just the whole

team. I'd love to know just the whole entire team behind this for anybody trying to create a content machine. What

does a team look like?

>> Yeah, so a lot of part-time and then uh bringing on one more more full-time. So,

I have management. So, uh this company DMG that manages me. So, they help negotiate all the deals. I don't

negotiate any of those. Invoicing the

details of that. They also do some strategy with me. And so there are there's help there. There's an editor for YouTube. There's a shooter for

for YouTube. There's a shooter for YouTube. So boy Eddie comes to my house

YouTube. So boy Eddie comes to my house every week or sometimes every two weeks and we'll shoot YouTube and short form.

So I have like additional support on that. He'll shoot stuff for brand. He'll

that. He'll shoot stuff for brand. He'll

travel with me sometimes. So basically

we have yeah the support from the management. Uh I have accounting support

management. Uh I have accounting support and like like fiscal support who helped like do my P&Ls and all that every month. Editors. I do have like a VA

month. Editors. I do have like a VA assistant stuff putting stuff into docs adding everything like doing kind of manual items behind me and then a graphic designer again this works across

also I didn't mention inside these buckets but like I have brands I'm like part partial ownership in but don't spend a ton of time on but like a lot of these things are serviced on that and I'm now hiring I'm not giving those enough attention so I'm hiring one

person dedicated to just brand support and then the next hire so that's the seven I believe that we have core and then the next hire is a CRM person I think we talked about separately where I want after I saw Gary Ve's team about

basically helping manage his relationships and sending DMs and like helping get on with other creators. I

was like, "Oh, I'm actually leaving a lot of money and reach on the table by not doing that."

>> Shout out Uncle Tyler. Yeah, Gary has >> the man Gary's going to have a massive team that's just going to be firing away at any >> I saw Tyler and I was like, "How do I get like 19-year-old that like immediately, you know?" Yeah. That goes

back to what we talked about before is just people that have the lists and the relationships and the economy that we're moving towards from a an offline relationship economy, it becomes absolutely [ __ ] huge. Quick question

to tie up on the team side. So, what

does your day look like from an allocation perspective? Time allocation.

allocation perspective? Time allocation.

>> Yeah. So, I basically I only try to make content at night or besides I have Eddie comes once a week like on a big block on Wednesday. So, that's actually later

Wednesday. So, that's actually later today. So, I basically only try to make

today. So, I basically only try to make content like kind of after hours. I try

to spend as little time like recording that as possible. So basically I will have like a standup every day where either I'm meeting with people or I'm assigning stuff to my team. So that's

like mandatory in the morning. Then I

have usually a couple hours of meetings related to like the PE stuff where we're just working through things and then I'm doing like big blocks on basically it's briefing and strategy and then one or two days a week I'm in LA either on shoots or in meetings or doing whatever

but really it's that core of like the standup. Uh I'm building lists

standup. Uh I'm building lists throughout the day. It's a lot of how my content gets done. Like at the end of every week on Friday I have a list of like even topics we talked about here.

I'll make a list after that's all goes in the big video topics list. So Fridays

I'll just go through that and be like I'm picking what I'm going to do next and that's goes for YouTube too. I'll

just like build these big lists but really it's yeah it's standups couple meetings during the day big blocks for briefing scrolling strategy and then a day or two in LA.

>> What's the one non-negotiable action step you need to take every week?

>> Uh I have to put the references in the [ __ ] in the list like because again if you're behind you're just behind right it's forever and it's and then then the ultra high value. It's so much easier for me to make a brief if I'm just if I'm just on top of it or like to do any of these campaigns and then now

like one of the next offers I'm working on is I'm gonna try and scale that and uh I'm like cool now that my toolkit will enable 100 other people makes it 10x as valuable you know.

>> All right, last section we going to hit the quick fire. What is the most in demand position in marketing today?

>> Uh creative strategist, creative director 100%. Basically the person that

director 100%. Basically the person that is going to say I'm briefing the ads.

I'm briefing the influencer. I am I am briefing organic and then actually can pull it together with the relationships is like I get hit up every single week.

People want to call the creative director but I think they're actually more junior than that or younger a little more savvier. It could go either way but people are hitting me up for that job every single week.

>> What is the most important skill to have as a creator?

>> I think organization. I think you have to be able to if you can't turn your creative ideas or the type of video you create into something that is like a process or actionable then you're going to burn out.

>> That is a legendary answer that I was not going to expect. How many times should you test a content concept before giving up?

>> I say six. I actually talk about this all the time. Yeah, it's like four to six. But if you do not give a concept

six. But if you do not give a concept six tries and you have no idea if it's going to work or not.

>> What's one thing brands should ignore doing on social media?

>> Reposting stories of people to tag them.

Uh is definitely one. Think there's any other good ones off the top of my head, but posting every day because you feel like you have to.

>> What's an emerging trend in content types for 2025? So you're seeing it on TikTok especially is just the people raw talking to camera posting like a lot a day. Five times, 10 times a day. Just

day. Five times, 10 times a day. Just

doing like quick little yaps or skits with no production, no captions, no nothing is like very happening right now.

>> Is information or ideas more valuable for content in 2025.

>> Uh in 2025 it's ideas. It was

information in 2024, but I think we're basically reaching the peak of ideas this year as well. Like there's so much like the key format of this year, a format a lot of people popped off with.

If if I was doing X, this is how I'd do if I was running social media for blank, if I was starting this brand, it's an amazing way, I actually think, to go from here's how this person did it to now showing your own ideas and becoming employable, but that content is like reached peak saturation. So, I think

we're looking at what comes next. And I

don't know what that is yet.

>> What's the biggest biggest mistake brands make when they try and act like a media company?

>> Trying to act like traditional media as opposed to acting like modern media.

Like, act like a creator in their team.

Don't try to act like, god forbid, like Puck or like any of these like or you know the New York Times or any of these traditional media rooms or hiring people from traditional media. The worst hire you can make in business today is anyone that has worked at a major publication.

>> The most underrated element of a brand photo shoot >> the behind the scenes basically. Yeah. Yeah. No, because like

basically. Yeah. Yeah. No, because like look, a lot of the content that goes really good like uh is the okay, here's how they set it up to like here's what the result is. Um or how they capture that or the carousel you're telling the story of who was on the shoot is like

oftentimes does just as well as the campaign >> and being intentional about it. For

sure.

>> Of course.

>> Um you recently said Instagram and Tik Tok are the highest leverage platforms in 2025. Why?

in 2025. Why?

>> Uh because again, you can get views. You

will show up, make your first video, and you will get a probably 100 views on Instagram and 400 views on Tik Tok out the gate with nothing. So that is a validator. They're basically giving you

validator. They're basically giving you a free audience that you would basically had to pay for any generation before this. You'd have to go on TV or buy an

this. You'd have to go on TV or buy an ad. There was no way you would get 100

ad. There was no way you would get 100 or 400 eyeballs. And even better, if it is any good, that will become a,000 eyeballs. If it's amazing from video

eyeballs. If it's amazing from video one, it can become a million eyeballs.

We've had multiple creators in Cut 30 who've gotten 40,000 to a million views on their first video because it was really good. And so the ability to go

really good. And so the ability to go from nothing to that amount of audience is like I would like scream from the rooftops of how big of an opport generational opportunity that is that like the window is not going to last

forever on that people just ignore.

I completely agree with you. You can

just post on either one of those and you're going to get 200 300. You're

going to get it three four times and then the fifth video is going to be a thousand. It's going to give you some

thousand. It's going to give you some sort of little outlier every fifth video and then it's about incrementally growing it and then you just hit a home run.

>> And if you're great, we were testing this the other day with some brand stuff. I was like, "Cool, let's just

stuff. I was like, "Cool, let's just start a new account. We're trying to determine if a brand was cooked or not like this account and created a new account, hit a banger video and it was like 40k right away and he was on IG and I was like oh like you truly can from nothing if you like know what you're

doing like hit something.

>> Is SEO still worth the long game in 2025?

>> Man, I think I it depends how I don't think so. I depend how AI SEO is going

think so. I depend how AI SEO is going to function and I think it's too early to really lean into it yet. But like

getting all in on that and then the other side of SEO, I don't know what's going to happen to it. And it was already questionably worth the value unless you were really a killer at it or you really had something that had a special like search impactful category.

If not, it's changing so fast. I think

you kind of got to wait this one out.

>> Guys, Orin's bag is so deep that I had to cut a section on SEO. I I watched a you know, you know what you're talking about in SEO, >> man. I was so deep in SEO for so long.

>> man. I was so deep in SEO for so long.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, because I had multiple brands where SEO was everything. Um, and I haven't worked I

everything. Um, and I haven't worked I had a client brand, my friend Matt, I used to work for this guy who runs a brand called chlorophyll water where I like convinced him like don't launch this brand until you own number one for chlorophyll because he was going to do this whole big Tik Tok seating campaign.

And it took like 3 months. We got number one for chlorophyll. And then guess what? He gets to go to retailers with

what? He gets to go to retailers with like I have this big viral campaign. I

have all this traffic and I have nowhere to send them. And you can tell that story with Google Analytics and Tik Tok analytics. It was beautiful.

analytics. It was beautiful.

>> For people listening for SEO, I think two things. One, it is a super super

two things. One, it is a super super long game. It's going to take you 9

long game. It's going to take you 9 months minimum to see anything big. What

this does though is because there's a brand actually in my space that's been in the space for 20 plus years, they have all these backlinks from third-party artists that come on the marketplace. What that does is that just

marketplace. What that does is that just lowers your cost to acquire a customer you're getting in organic sales. I

completely agree with you. There's some

AI SEO companies that are raising like a [ __ ] ton of money. Yeah, I don't think we see how that's going to play out. We

see the consumer habit changing like in mass and so I think it's just like making a long-term investment in that right now is like look might eat my words on this will be willing to be wrong but I think it's like I would just wait it out for like a year I'm with

you. All right last three questions that

you. All right last three questions that I ask everybody favorite book or podcast and why?

>> Uh I am a huge fan of um there's a Steven Presfield book called the Afghan campaign. Steven Presfield is he wrote

campaign. Steven Presfield is he wrote this book called The War of Art which is like really impactful. It's like a self-help book for creatives, but he also wrote a bunch of like non-fiction about he wrote Gates of Fire, which the movie 300 is based on. But I like the Afghan campaign because the Afghan

campaign is a book about Alexander the Great trying to conquer the world and how he keeps failing in Afghanistan much like how the US failed in Afghanistan.

There's a lot of parallels to it. But

you kind of get this portrait of this guy who's like accomplished all these things and brought these things together who like still can't solve this problem.

That's a book that was really impactful to me.

>> Entrepreneur or brand that you want to give flowers to and why? I I really feel the the House of Errors brand like opened up kind of a new era in street wear and like street wear content and like elevating stuff from the beginning of a brand. I think that they've done

like an incredible job. So would want to give them their their flowers. I'm

trying to think if there's any others that that one in particular I always just think back to like they just from so early just did things so well.

>> Favorite content creator that you want to give flowers to and why?

>> Oh man, that's a really good one. I

really like Beimma Williams. I'll talk about he has this collab lab series and what I love about what he did is that he created the brand with the basics like the core basics of branding. He used

color. He used his outfit. He used the way he like accentuates like the core element like of his brand like the topics used to generate a conversation.

And like I see purple I think of him and and the way he's like brought that throughout it. I think he's done an

throughout it. I think he's done an excellent job.

>> Guys, you can't make this up. On the

last episode with Brian Guffalo, CEO of Skull Candy. We all we talk about the

Skull Candy. We all we talk about the whole entire time.

>> It's a great Yeah. Super interesting

creator. Great guy.

>> Bro, you are a gangster. I had so much fun. I don't even know how long we went

fun. I don't even know how long we went for. It probably was a very long time.

for. It probably was a very long time.

Where can they find you? uh or meet world on on all social media. It's that

simple. OM let's go.

>> What's up, guys? If you guys got this far in the episode, I would assume that you enjoyed it. If you got any value, it would mean the world if you hit the subscribe button, give it a like, post a comment, tell a friend. We could keep

going bigger, bigger guests, bigger locations, more value. See you in the next episode.

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