00:00.87 bizzyweb So this is our our our next episode but depending on how we release this, we've been doing this for a while Dave and like we're finally if you'll excuse the term dialing it in I've figured some interesting things out. Do you want to you want to. 00:07.24 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Um, yeah, if who I like it. 00:19.97 bizzyweb Want to try something out. Okay, do you have a good dad joke. 00:21.90 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Regale me? Yes, oh my goodness I don't know if I can do them on Command anymore. My kids are old enough that they're not asking for one man. 00:29.37 bizzyweb All right I got one. So do you do you know the difference between a hippo and a Zippo One's a big fat animal and the other's a little lighter. 00:33.82 greg Um. 00:35.32 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb I Do I do but I'll let you say it you? yeah oh look at that sound effects. Oh starves. 00:48.20 bizzyweb I Found the sound effect button. So I think we've just completely ruined our chance of keeping our audience now that we can do dad jokes and have a rim shot at the same time. So. 00:50.67 greg But but I won't be just. 00:59.45 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb There goes the podcast emmy. 01:03.12 bizzyweb Yeah, shoot well in the meantime. Ah it's the beginning of the year it's time for renewal pitchers and catchers are reporting to camp and sooner or later we will be unburied from all the snow. 01:18.34 bizzyweb So it's a good time to start thinking about what to do next. So one of the things that I think is really interesting that we do at busy web is we offer Ah so ah, marketing game plans and strategies and help people lay out. What are they going to do and how are they going to do it. 01:20.66 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 01:34.45 greg Development to. 01:37.25 bizzyweb And what's it really going to take to accomplish their goals and one of the things that you and I struggle with all the time is sometimes people don't want to do that and so that's the purpose of our podcast today episode today is we found an expert on strategic thinking. It's ah our our guest has ah been trained in blue chip companies like Pepsi Conagra Nordic track and miracle air for the last fifteen years he's worked with private and emerging businesses. Um, and he's worked in a broad range of different industries. But ultimately. Small to mid-sized software and and saas businesses and yeah, just an all around great guy who's gonna help us really sort of define the case for what is the real value of strategic thinking. It's your friend and mine. He has the mustache of my dreams. 02:35.76 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Drag Good to see you. 02:36.34 bizzyweb Greg pomerants. 02:37.63 greg Hey guys nice to be here. So. 02:41.69 bizzyweb So tell us a little bit about ah you first of all because we want to establish your modified credentials I did a little bit of an intro but tell us a little bit more about pomerants and associates. 02:48.80 greg Um. 02:50.87 greg Um, so my background I mean you did a nice job mean I spent 6 years in sales before I went and got an Mba and so I did that and then I did work for the big boys for a long time and. 03:08.11 greg I enjoyed it to a point when I was at Miracle Air eventually we sold the company and I was part of the sale and and unfortunately the wrong guys bought it and you know they hire a new president. Next thing you know he wants his own team. That's the way it works in corporate America so off I went and as I was. 03:11.47 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb And. 03:26.84 greg Trying to figure out what I was going to do next. My friends started calling me to say hey can you help me and it was all about strategy and how do you go to market and this was you know 2005 or something like that. 03:39.98 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb The head. 03:42.26 greg World was changing back then because digital marketing was was actually becoming a thing in a hurry. Um, but that doesn't mean you didn't need strategy. You need didn't have to know who your customer consumer or client or partners were and so it just changed on some of the things that you were doing. 03:48.69 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yep. 04:01.90 greg And so for the last fifteen plus years as you said tri be I've been working primarily with family owned businesses privately held companies I do a lot of new product introductions and a lot of go to market strategy and for a long time and over the last few years I finally fought. Myself because I didn't want to be that fractional cmo because I personally don't like the title cmo. But what I found is in small companies. You could do a great marketing plan for someone and they simply couldn't execute it. They didn't have the people to do it and so now I also. 04:22.93 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 04:36.41 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Stare. 04:37.94 greg Spend a significant portion of my time as that fractional cmo where I can help do the strategy and then help execute the strategy. 04:45.98 bizzyweb So I Want to start like any good sales guy with an objection that I had trouble handling I once ah met a guy. We had a really good Conversation. He really did need a ah marketing strategy which we were prepared to execute for them and he said no. And I said what do you mean?? No and he said I'm not going to pay you to learn my business I was sort of dumbfounded by that because it really didn't have anything to do with me have a paying me to learn his business. It was paying him to get him out of the hole he was it. 05:19.22 greg Right. 05:22.80 bizzyweb So if you were in that situation. What's the difference between paying somebody to learn your business and helping them move forward. 05:29.96 greg You know what I have found is many people similar to the person you're talking about. They simply think marketing is common sense I know what I've always done. It's work. It's allowed me to get to this point and why do I need somebody to help me and my. 05:39.87 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb And. 05:48.77 greg Answer is almost always the same thing. It's a simple question are your sales growing. No how your margins doing Well they're not as good as they used to be so why? Do you think you want to keep doing the same thing that got you here. When your sales are flat and your margins are getting constrained and that will often get them to think. 06:09.71 bizzyweb 1 yeah and one of the things that the famous and Nba coach Pat Riley is known for is is coining the phrase the disease of more that once you start getting successful everybody thinks it's because they did it I think there's a there's a there's a converse to that which is the disease of complacency that really trying to think about those questions that you just talked about like why are my margins flatlining. Why am my sales not growing um oftentimes they aren't. 06:36.97 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb So one. 06:47.55 bizzyweb People aren't just equipped to understand that to to really take the the next steps to look at what? um I don't even know what the hell I'm saying Dave a spark there trigby starts rambling and can't shut up. 06:55.96 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yeah, well let's put a little posi pause in here six six forty five 06:56.63 greg And. 07:06.80 bizzyweb Um, yeah. 07:08.60 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right? right? Let let me peek in and maybe maybe I can go back? Um, so Greg as you as we as we talked just for a second there I it it occurred to me that maybe companies don't really know where to start and. By thinking too tactically too soon they put aside a whole massive opportunity to really think about the right things so tell tell us a couple of the questions that you do to kind of Elicit. What. People need to be thinking about from the thirty Thousand foot perspective 07:43.30 greg Yeah, that's a great question Dave and it starts with who your customers and you know whether they're clients or customers. It doesn't matter. It's the same thing but who are they and have they changed. 07:50.20 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 07:56.40 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yeah. 08:03.10 greg Then do you know how they want to buy. You know we all know that the sale of anything has changed because there's so much information on the internet. You've gotten research everything I don't care if you're buying a car or you're doing work for a B to b. 08:05.65 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb And. 08:13.21 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yeah, a. 08:22.87 greg Business and you need to find a part. You're doing all that research and so for your business you really want to understand who your customer is how they buy. How do they want to buy where do they get their information and then you can start to figure out. 08:24.30 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb The. 08:36.30 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 08:41.19 greg How do I influence all of that. 08:41.83 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right? And that's mostly like for I mean the shining example of lots of research is business to business right? because you're you're probably making a decision on a several hundred thousand dollars arrangement or. 08:48.71 greg Great. Yeah. 08:57.22 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb At least bigger than going to Amazon and grabbing that new pair of socks that you were looking for. Um, so so do you walk them through that exercise to say okay, well let's let's think about give me your past 5 clients and how did they find you is is that kind of what they do. 09:12.85 greg You know I kind of start. Yes, and no I mean I start with tell me about your business today where are you and you know I will always preface that conversation by saying you know you'll probably quickly realize I'm not from minnesota. 09:14.83 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Or what you do with money. D. 09:30.44 greg Because I'm going to ask really hard questions and wait for the answer and you know they will laugh kind of like you did Dave and then when we do it, they'll look at me. It's like oh my gosh you were right? You aren't from here. It's like yeah I know I grew up on both coasts. Um. 09:34.49 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 09:43.36 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Who. 09:46.97 greg But it's really about asking those hard questions that people don't like to address to think about to answer then you can start figuring things out so you know if you're going to do a marketing plan that is always the first step and. 09:51.54 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Huge. 09:58.95 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 10:03.47 greg You know tricky that goes back to your question you know business owners don't want to pay you to learn about their business. But if you don't understand what they're doing. How do you ask? the right questions and it's all about getting them to talk. 10:13.29 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 10:14.72 bizzyweb And I yeah and I think I think that's sort of deal you you sort of immediately get into somebody who's who was really scared of change and they think that somebody's going to come in and and give. Their own version of a 9 patented 9 point plan and then if you don't subscribe to it. You're you're an idiot but that's not really the case. 10:38.87 greg No, it's not because when you're not invested a hundred plus percent in the business. You think about it different the business differently right? and. 10:49.20 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb In it. 10:52.61 greg You know I don't even know how many businesses I've worked with in different industries and different distribution systems and different types of customers. But that amalgamation of all that stuff I've been exposed to so many different things and you guys have with the clients that you've worked with too where. 11:06.69 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 11:10.58 greg You can use something that you did five years ago all of a sudden becomes relevant today and the business owner has never thought in those terms because they've never had to. 11:18.10 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Me. 11:22.81 bizzyweb What? Ah, what is really the value of of having a full strategic plan done is it is it just simply a roadmap or is it tactics or is it a combination of both. 11:35.49 greg Um, oh it's definitely combination and so if you're gonna do a strategic marketing plan. You start with that situation analysis that I gave that I mentioned a minute ago and then it's like what are my objectives and literally three four and they've got to be numeric. 11:44.15 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 11:53.88 greg You've got to be able to measure them otherwise it doesn't matter now that Numeric objective could be on new website by specific date. But that's numeric. 12:02.43 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yeah, and even if they do right I think this is going to be really fun because this is a conversation that that we have all the time with our client. So um I need a website. Um, let's let's even role play that out right? so. 12:03.13 bizzyweb Yep. 12:08.51 greg Right? Yeah I'm sure. 12:16.91 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb I'm I'm I'm Dave you're Greg and I'm I'm calling you and saying yeah I need a website Greg I don't know where to start. So so what do I do? Um yeah I just judge do I just find the best Seo company or what you know what? the heck is Seo or whatever what? where do I start. 12:31.84 greg You know who is who's your customer. What do you want him to see what do they need to know what day to date. Do they What? how do you want to lead them through the process of wanting to buy from you. It's all about what's in it for them. 12:34.93 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 12:46.37 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Ah, so that's that's yeah, yeah, so what's in it for my my customer right? and so in in backing out of our of our little role play here for a second. That's one of the things that I'm constantly trying to remind my customers about is like. 12:51.44 greg Correct correct. 13:02.63 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb I'm looking at your website right now and it says you've been in business for 23 years and you do this and you do that and I do this and it doesn't say a word about who your customers are. 13:11.70 greg And and there's probably one half make testimonial at the back of the site right right now 13:16.40 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right? And that's just Mike Smith says you're the best people ever right? right? right? and and I think that is where most people get so messed up especially in marketing. 13:23.31 bizzyweb It's not even Mike Smith it's Mike S from many from minnea from Chicago. 13:35.66 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Because it's super easy to focus on tactics because it's there in front of you. You're looking at a website or you just Google for lead generation strategies and it says well you should do Seo or you should do Google ads and so you get caught up in tactic itis. And yeah. 13:50.72 greg Well you get right? and you also never build a brand. Okay, so. 13:55.24 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Oh my? Yeah and that's the next thing that we definitely need to talk about because brand is one of those things. That's the least understood in business I think and probably 1 of the more important things that you need to have under control before. 14:07.33 greg Right? And there's a I went to business school at northwestern and there's a professor named Tim Cawkins there who wasn't there when I was there I've met him twice but he worked for 25 years in corporate America before he went back and became a professor so I have a lot of respect for what he has to say. Because he's been there. He's been in the same shoes that I was in at 1 point in time and Tim just defines a brand as how do your goods and services meet the want needs and desires of your customer That's what a brand is and how do you build that. 14:41.45 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A a. 14:45.56 greg And it's every touch point and so you know in the background Dave you've got a screen and you've got hubspot and Google and that is constantly reinforcing the busy web brand and I love that okay I was on a call this morning. 14:52.32 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yeah, right. 15:02.51 greg And there were 2 guys and they had a nice background for their Zoom meeting and the popups as far as how they were branding. Their affirm was different for each one of them marginally different little but that's not going to build a brand because I'm not sure which is right. 15:10.00 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb In interesting right. 15:18.38 bizzyweb Ah. 15:20.59 bizzyweb Interesting. 15:22.58 greg So it's every touch point it's when you you build a brand by not just advertising but how the phone is answered. You know how your emails does everybody have the same signature and things like that. Um on your emails I mean are your marketing emails that go out how consistent are they in. 15:28.15 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Um, right. 15:33.50 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Like mini. 15:42.40 greg Positioning and you know the look tone and feel I mean so all that gets encapsulated and incorporated rather into the brand. 15:52.34 bizzyweb What's the most important tactic that a company can focus on why. 15:57.40 greg Do a strategy because without a strategy tactics are just going to lead you down to what you've already done before you know if somebody comes and you know someone comes to to one of the 3 of us and says I really need to do Seo. 16:05.70 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 16:14.46 bizzyweb Why. 16:16.46 greg It's like okay well I don't do seo so I will say great call busy web and you guys are going to say okay, but what's the strategy and all they want is leads but you know so story about leads I mean thirty years ago is working for Nordic track. 16:21.14 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Um, right right. 16:33.43 greg And this is you know back in the old days of Pony Express and home phone lines and things like that. But we would send out these little postcards and it would cost us a nickel a lead but when you look at the cost per inquire cost per lead. It was a nickel when you looked at the cost per order. 16:44.18 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 16:53.38 greg Was $600 which doesn't work when you're selling a $300 piece of equipment and in the same thing is true. What we did that thirty years ago the same type of quality leads that you can generate electronically today. It's the same strategy. 16:53.59 bizzyweb Yeah. 17:12.31 greg And you still have to make sure that you're going to get a payoff for and I don't think a lot of business owners think about that. 17:12.37 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Um, right on and that's part part of the fun of talking about strategy is that you start getting into. Ramifications of any decision that you make and that helps you decide which way to go. So if if you were you know doing doing the nordo track mailing and you're like okay well yup, it's just going to be ¢5 a lead. That's what most marketing companies would stop at right? Especially if you're looking tactically. 17:30.29 greg Right. 17:44.30 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Like well we have a guaranteed seo program and if you just sign up for $55 a month are people in Pakistan are going to help you with all of that or whatever you know and so is that actually going to help you no having having those ¢5 leads is going. It's going to take 3000 of them to actually turn into one customer and you might just be flooding the market and or flipping your cost per click on advertising upside down by loading it up with junk. So yeah. 18:11.80 greg For sure and you know and you might be better paying more for those leads. You get a better qualified lead so instead of paying a nickels than a dollar or more whatever it is but now at least you're getting someone that might be closer to buying from you. 18:19.98 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb So right. 18:27.61 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right? right? right? are in the right people I ran into this this morning with a prospect I was talking to them and we were looking at what their their competition was doing for advertising. 18:30.39 greg And just throwing an email address in there. 18:43.22 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb They were spending a fair amount but it was all on their own brand keywords and they had a very unique name. So why on earth would you pay Google to display your own website when if people were already looking for that name. They'd find your website for free. 18:57.81 greg Much great. So. 19:00.92 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb So that comes back to our magic word strategy. Are you doing things that actually mean something to your customer. 19:07.73 greg Well there's that and you know take that I'm gonna take a slight tangent here. But you know you have all these leads and you get them. But sometimes there's other ways that you can leverage that type of information. So 3 or four or five years ago I had a client that had people. Actually making physical sales calls in I think 7 states and so they were doing a lot of work online but I went in and I said okay how many within the asis any isc codes I just look at a data review and in those states there are about 6000. 19:29.10 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A a. 19:46.56 greg Possible prospects and they were selling to universities and hospitals and things like that. So there may be 6000 prospects they were selling about 500 um feed on the street and so sometimes just doing the digital marketing. 19:50.22 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 20:06.66 greg Isn't always the only thing to do and so in that case we were able to put together a program to use private label products that had nice gross margin and they were able to provide those salespeople with an a really good opening sales pitch. 20:07.27 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 20:25.92 greg To go into these these prospects you know something they never would have thought of doing So I think we also also have to be really careful about how much energy we've put solely into the digital space versus just using. 20:29.10 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Ah. 20:40.91 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Gip. 20:43.41 greg Analysis and thought come up with other ways that you might be able to go to market to drive revenue quicker. 20:47.94 bizzyweb Which I think begs the question. What's the value of a lead and there's 2 answers to that if it's a good lead. There's a tremendous amount of value to it if it's a bad lead. There's a tremendous amount of harm associated with that. 21:03.39 greg Um, agree. 21:06.19 bizzyweb So it's not lead generation for the sake of creating rote numbers of people to call you know back in back in the dark ages of the internet time in my life that Dave and I like to refer to as college there were there was a company that literally. 21:18.33 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb His. 21:25.23 bizzyweb It was the weirdest thing literally. Um your your phone number would be printed in a book and then they would give the book to everybody. That's not helpful anymore. 21:32.41 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yeah, you right? unless you need to prop up your Tv or something. But. 21:39.66 bizzyweb Yeah, and I forget what I forget what it was called. It was yeah yeah, so just getting lists isn't It isn't helpful if they're not prepared to buy and if they're not. 21:40.73 greg Or you or you or you got a kid that isn't sitting high enough at the table. 21:46.40 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right? right? for. 21:54.35 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb In here. 21:58.17 bizzyweb Ready to buy I Heard an interesting statistic earlier in this this this year is in any particular industry. Um only two percent of your target markets are in a position to buy right now. So what marketing does. 22:11.51 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 22:12.24 greg Wow. 22:15.73 bizzyweb Is handles is perhaps the other ninety eight to become the 2 and that's not, you're absolutely right? Greg it's not just digital. 22:18.38 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 22:25.83 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Ah, this this just occurred to me and I promise I'll keep it g rated but um I think maybe what we're talking about and and a good analogy for this might be It's kind of like dating right? So if. You approach dating by just saying I'm going to get a list of every member of the opposite sex in my town and I'm just going to start calling them It's not going to turn out that way. Not even that right? So I'm I'm going to an Seo company and I'm I'm going to get or I'm I'm going to buy a list of of every viable candidate. 22:46.69 bizzyweb Well let's be progressive anybody that you're interested in. Yeah. 22:57.70 bizzyweb There you go viable candidate I like that. 23:00.35 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Um, there see? Um, but what we're kind of talking about in this branding thing is maybe figuring out what your most viable candidates are actually looking for and maybe spending some time and brushing your hair and ah presenting the right brand And. Perhaps learning good conversation techniques so that you can get a date and find and meet somebody. 23:22.34 greg Well, you know I totally agree. So think about I said nordic track thirty years ago I mean back then we were doing flashy brochures or you know promotional offers things like that and it would work. 23:29.36 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb In it. 23:38.58 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 23:41.18 greg Today it's about talking to your prospect in a way that develops a relationship where they want to buy from you instead of just giving them a promotion to try to convince them to buy from you. 23:50.48 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yep. 23:53.95 bizzyweb And it's interesting. How even that market has changed thirty years ago you were selling exercise equipment. But if you ask peloton what their business model is they'll tell you they're a content company. 24:06.46 greg Um, right? um. 24:07.20 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 24:10.68 bizzyweb So let's get back to the the topic at hand which is a strategic thinking. So if we're gonna hire you Greg to do strategic thinking. You're not just gonna look at marketing tactics. You start the the important thing is revenue right. 24:23.11 greg Um, well, it's revenue and margin you know I mean ultimately, it's like what is it that you want to sell and why and if you go out and spend all this money trying to drive revenue for this product or this category. Whatever hour however business wants to describe it is that the best use of their money because sometimes they may have a different product that they can market and or go to market in a different way where they can make money. We had a client had a client once where it was an engineering company and they wanted to. Market a product and sell it direct and I kind of put the example together to say you know you'd be better licensing this thing because the cost of shipping is too expensive. They're shipping steel and. 25:15.21 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Dip. 25:18.25 greg You know I mean I worked at Pepsi shipping water is really expensive. That's why they're botling plants all over the country. Okay, and so they were they were better off in my opinion to license their technology to other for other metal manufacturers around the country that could do the product. 25:21.93 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 25:37.51 bizzyweb Um, so. 25:37.98 greg So it's a little bit. It's It's never an either or it's about what are you know the the cost of goods matters the shipping matters and so that all has to be incorporated. 25:40.94 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Ahead. 25:49.70 bizzyweb Yeah. 25:54.55 greg Into what your decisions are because part of that marketing plan if you will is financials and you got to address all that stuff and trick me I'm sorry if I just went down a rabbit hole there. But. 25:55.84 bizzyweb Um. 26:01.85 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Um, well that's perfect. Yeah. 26:02.39 bizzyweb No, no, not at all. So I think that's the that's really helpful. So ultimately what you're really trying to determine in the first part of the process is what's a a. What's a revenue goal but also what's a profit goal. 26:18.65 greg Right? And what and what do you want to? do you know? where are you going with your business I mean if your business is you know we're gonna be keeping this thing for the next fifteen years that's 1 thing but it's like you know my kids don't want to be in this again I work with family owned businesses. 26:35.93 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 26:38.10 greg My kids don't want the business. Um I need to figure out how to sell the next five years then let's talk about how you do that and I'm not doing exit planning in any way shape or form but you know how do you make sure that you're getting your ebid because that's all based on Ebida right. 26:52.78 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb The middle. 26:54.43 greg So how do you get your E but up up in a way. 26:57.11 bizzyweb So I know what e but it is but for the sake of our Dave could you could you roll that out a little. What is what is e but ah. 27:05.99 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Are you asking me trigby to prove that I might know. 27:07.94 bizzyweb No I know I know I'm try. It's an important business term that I think is is a people don't always know so what? what it? Yeah so what? what? what is E a. 27:15.38 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 27:16.79 greg And it's and it's scary coming from a marketing guy that he might know what that is you know. 27:21.21 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Affect that. 27:25.32 bizzyweb For our listeners. 27:29.70 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb It's earnings before interest taxes depreciation and what's the last a ah amortization. Thank you? Yeah yeah, so. 27:37.49 greg And characterization right? But think about as margin you know? so you you but you sell a business based on the margins that you make and there's a multiple off of that. So the more that you can take care of that get that margin up and marketing can be part of that. 27:39.65 bizzyweb Amortization. 27:44.82 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. And. 27:54.37 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 27:56.25 greg You know it's not just an expense but can help you improve your margins done correctly. 27:59.14 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right? And don't even get me started on people that that expect or that look at marketing as an expense because that's exactly like saying I need to run a marathon what I need to do is stop eating. 27:59.32 bizzyweb Stop. 28:13.70 bizzyweb Yeah, so Greg so we've we've got our profit margin and and profit margin and overall revenue goals set. What's the next thing you look at. Okay. 28:25.16 greg The distribution system you know. So if you're men I'm sorry so if you're a manufacturing company. Let's say in most cases you're going to have a distributor out there or you're going to have you know. 28:31.16 bizzyweb Why do you go there why do you go there second 28:44.61 greg Um, somebody else is going to be selling the product for you Independent reps. Whatever the case may be and you need to know how how to motivate those sales the salespeople that repping agency or that distributor so they're selling your product. You know you didn't do distributor and so I've done a couple of beers in my career as a consultant and that has to go through a distribution network. So There are beer distributors. Well there are some beer distributors that will literally just take a beer put it on the shelf in their inventory. But they know it's a competitor What some of their other beers are so they don't really want to sell your product they're killing it from the market and so understanding how your distribution network thinks and how do you motivate them. 29:27.13 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 29:28.50 bizzyweb So. 29:38.83 greg Want to sell your product. 29:39.32 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Sure because that's that's the way you're going to have people pull along instead of just pushing so you know not only are you pushing it out to the world and doing your thing but you're also finding partners to engage and to help you level up. 29:56.00 greg Right? So I had another client where my role was to talk to the salespeople and then basically write project recaps of big company of work that they had done and so they were working on water treatment centers on facilities and around the world and so I was. 29:56.19 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb And get even more customers in. 30:10.35 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 30:15.96 greg Interviewing multiple people involved in the project and then writing a recap that then became I'll call it a sales sheet but it's something that's on the on their website that says here's how our products were Used. Um. And I was talking about salespeople and distributor salespeople to make that happen. 30:36.43 bizzyweb So that's second unless is distribution. What's third because we haven't even gotten to marketing yet which I think is fascinating that when we you're hiring a strategist. 30:37.63 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Cool. Yeah. 30:52.17 bizzyweb We have yet to get to marketing So I mean I'm in current I'm I'm intrigued to see what's next. 30:54.46 greg Well, it's all part of marketing because how do you go to? it's It's how do you go to market and you need to understand what the distribution system is so I I understand how you go to market you know pricing is also part of it. But that's also an inherent piece of the product mix and the marketing mix. 31:03.79 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 31:10.58 bizzyweb Say more about this because I think this is really critical. 31:12.74 greg Um, you know so again, let me just use that same story of a 2 step distribution process um having many let me stop. Let me ask a question how many times have you gone on to a site and. 31:13.81 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yeah. 31:30.33 greg You're looking at it's like you can't get a price because you have to get the price from the distributor okay happens all the time in be in the B Two B world and sometimes in the B to C world. Um, and so with pricing it's understanding the competitive set. 31:34.70 bizzyweb Yeah I don't like our. 31:49.20 greg Which we haven't talked about that's also part of what you need to do here but understanding where you fit into it and understanding if the price that you're selling to the distributor which then ends up to the customer that the margin structure is correct. So if you're selling beer. Distributors gonna want to make 25 to 35 points. The retailer is going to want to make 50 points 30 to 50 points depending so you got to be able to structure all of that in a way that as you go to market as you develop your strategies. 32:15.30 bizzyweb And. 32:22.99 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 32:25.77 greg All of that gets incorporated into it does that answer the question trig me. 32:27.99 bizzyweb Yeah, yeah I Guess what? what? I what I I think is so fascinating is that marketing permeates so much more than just a couple of people talking about a website or looking at colors and fonts. 32:42.99 greg And it's you know and back then he used to be you know television advertising mean for years I've asked the question after the super bowl to a prospect. What's your favorite ad and they can tell you exactly what the favorite ad was on the super bowl and then just ask them. 32:56.62 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb And. 33:00.75 greg But who paid for that who is the sponsor that ad in 45 to 75% of the time they will have no idea who the advertiser was and that's what I call a $10000000 mistake you know and that type of mistake happens. 33:13.90 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Oh yeah, for sure. 33:20.35 greg Not just on the super bowl but in all type of different marketing programs. 33:22.21 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Well and I think again kind of tying back to our strategic theme if you don't think enough about who you're trying to reach and how you're going to get there. It makes it really easy to just kind of fumble around in the woods and waste money waste time waste effort and miss out on sales. 33:45.97 greg Well right? and it's the right sales because you want to get the sales that you don't have to discount all the time to get them. You want to get good customers. You want to have customers become advocates for you. Um, you know so that all gets together and it's all. 33:49.96 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 34:01.98 greg Me to your point. It's all part of marketing marketing is not just you know how do I do Seo or what kind of direct mail should I do or you know what kind of sales sheet do I have to give a sales guy. 34:11.42 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 34:14.29 bizzyweb I've been thinking recently that um, really good companies have the same sort of customer experience model as a restaurant. So if you go to a restaurant. You're going to talk to a host. You're going to talk to a server you're going to talk to a bartender. There might be a table buser but all of those people are trying to give you a really great experience in one way and another and the goal is the customer experience and all those are are working some of them are in. 34:43.70 greg Um, I mean yeah. 34:47.60 bizzyweb You know sales some of them are in execution and some of them are are in delivery but ultimately everybody is trying to make sure that you have a good time. 34:53.17 greg So to build on that if you go to Trader Joe's and you're checking out a trader Joe's and they see that you've got something where it's like oh it's a bad cucumber in the package and ring a bell and they send someone to get you. 35:05.67 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 35:11.36 greg Another one before you check out. They don't even ask you to go get it I mean that's all part of the brand and the customer experience at Tjs and it's kind of cool. 35:17.86 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 35:21.22 bizzyweb Yeah, so I hire you I've done this this strategic ah thing. What do I get do I is it to just sort of pontificate but you or do you do you give me a real document. Okay. 35:35.82 greg You get a real written document. Ah so starts with that situation analysis. We agree on your key issue on on your objectives numerical objectives then we identify what issues key issues you have to overcome. 35:39.11 bizzyweb What all goes into it. 35:51.83 greg To achieve those objectives. That's the hardest part of a marketing plan from there. You do strategies tactics financials. You got to make sure that you can afford everything and then you have a feedback mechanism loop back up to the top so that you can see what's working. 36:06.38 bizzyweb Okay, that's what. 36:10.10 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Edit. 36:11.75 greg The only I can tell you anytime you do a marketing plan I know with 100% certainty it's wrong because life gets in the way things change. You can't get a product a salesperson quits. Um, whatever. 36:17.12 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb If phrase 5 36:22.34 bizzyweb Um. 36:28.82 greg But at least this way if you've got those feedback loops you can revisit it on a regular basis to make sure that you're doing the right things or you know things change and you have to make you have to cancel a program or something but it. 36:43.34 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 36:47.90 greg It's it's It's a way to track progress I Think if you don't have a marketing plan that allows you to do that. You're wasting your time. 36:56.16 bizzyweb What's the biggest disappointment you've ever had in your career when you've found somebody who's gotten a great opportunity to take a great bleat forward and then then they just didn't. 37:06.39 greg Um, ah wow I helped start a business maybe four years ago which was preventative mobile dentistry into senior living communities. 37:20.90 bizzyweb All right? So say say that again because that was a lot of words. Yeah. 37:22.16 greg So you think so preventative dentistry that would go on a mobile basis send a dentist and a hygienist into a senior living community think assisted living nursery you know nursing homes things like that. Um. 37:25.36 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb So here. 37:35.63 bizzyweb Okay, got you. 37:40.75 greg Medicare does not cover dentistry and you really need good teeth because as you age your teeth get bad. It's just unfortunately fact of life and if your teeth are bad. You don't eat. Well, you don't smile. You don't socialize as much. 37:41.77 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 37:49.99 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 37:58.30 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb And. 38:00.17 greg And it can start this little spiral downward and all of this is known and been published I when I work with startups I will often do both a sales and marketing function because again, if you remember I said I started as a sales guy and so I was out initially. 38:12.56 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Great. 38:19.72 greg Ah, put together the strategy we are with the founders and they went out and found some senior living communities that we could that agreed to let us come in and validate that this concept would work now once you're in you have to sell not only the resident. But quite often. The residents children who are going to have to pay for it and you have to sell the staff and all those facilities are understaffed every single one of them. This was such a cool concept and I use my personal contacts of people I know. 38:39.12 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 38:39.37 bizzyweb Let her. 38:56.85 greg That own some of these facilities communities. Um, and we were making really good progress and once I started doing that then I met some people who are involved leading age Minnesota is one of them. But some people that were really um, tied in deeply. To the senior community and so I eventually pulled myself out and had them get involved because they could open more doors than I could and to me it's always about what's right for the client not me and unfortunately the whole thing fell apart. 39:30.60 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Was it an operational issue or was it a marketing thing or did they not think about the customers or what what was the. 39:32.40 bizzyweb Ah. 39:39.20 greg Ah I think they were not willing to invest in the marketing to the children who are paying for some of this. Um I think they didn't want to invest enough money to. 39:45.40 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Ah, bring it here. 39:54.40 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 39:58.40 greg Really try to validate it in a few spots because you know there were a couple of dentists here and there that were doing things on a one off basis. But you know we were able to get in some pretty good sized organizations and if we had validated it there. We could have been off to the races. 40:06.00 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 40:14.71 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Sure. 40:17.39 greg So I opened the doors. Um, and I was told the and it wasn't the people that I um that came in that I turned over to it was the founders and how they did it. 40:31.34 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Sure? Well and ah that that part of what probably happened and and correct me if I'm if my assumption is wrong, but they they probably got caught up in you know, trying to attack too many fronts. As as possible or more more fronts than they should have so they they tried something for a week and like oh crap I can't do that and so they pivoted and then they didn't give it enough time to actually invest properly in getting real results. 41:00.31 greg Um, yeah I think they got the the the founder got some really talented people involved who are both dentists and business people. Financial people. Um. 41:04.50 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 41:16.40 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Sure. 41:16.65 greg But didn't want to spend the money and neither be spent nor was he willing to bring in additional partners and lower his ownership which you is not uncommon and so it's. 41:23.26 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb He bright. 41:27.82 bizzyweb Which I would make the argument that that especially when you're in a startup mode sales and marketing is as important as your infrastructure and you do have to invest in them. 41:38.15 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yes. 41:41.35 greg What you do and you also have to learn from what you're doing because some things work and some things don't work as well as you want and so you want to tweak it so you know you're constantly a startup. You're constantly evolving and how you're gonna go to market. 41:59.76 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Got it. Ah, 1 thing that we've mentioned a whole bunch that we haven't talked much about the ramifications of it are sales. So as we're looking at strategy and driving revenue for a business. What does your strategic plan. Do to help empower sales teams or or how does that work to like is that where the rubber hits the road or you just throw it throw it over the over the over the top of the fence and say here here guys. Good luck here's here's your call sheet or what do you do with those guys. 42:29.33 greg Marketing is irrelevant if it doesn't sell anything I mean it's It's about nothing happens until something is sold. People have said right? And so. 42:40.66 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb So right. 42:44.86 greg Everything in marketing in my opinion everything that I do is all about driving revenue you know and driving revenue revenue in an affordable way for the organization and so they are not separate they are in intrinsically tied sales and marketing. 42:59.16 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Note. 43:02.91 greg And I think anybody that looks at it differently has spent too much time working in large market marketing organizations in the package goods world. 43:07.64 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Been too siloed and was like oh yeah, it's all sales fault that we didn't hit our our revenue goal. 43:16.10 bizzyweb All the marketing with salespeople are saying ah, it's the marketing. The leads are bad. They start court quoting Glen Gary Glen Ross 43:16.41 greg Um, been there. 43:20.22 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Um, right right. 43:24.22 greg Yep, yep, no, it's all about sales. Um, period. 43:29.24 bizzyweb Well I'm just surprised that the dentist people found the ah way to keep the chair steady with the car in motion whether they keep the chair steady. Well the because you said it was mobile dentistry. 43:33.98 greg Say it again. 43:40.15 greg Yeah, but they would come in and then get a conference room or something for the day. 43:44.92 bizzyweb Oh I Yeah I thought they were loading him in the back of a car like you do with went through O wash. 43:49.48 greg There there is an organization. There is an organization that has a and I think like an RV that they'll drive up and they literally got a mobile dentist. Yeah, but you know this was just the preventative stuff so it was it was anything more serious then you have to go to the dentist. 43:56.24 bizzyweb Oh really. 43:57.79 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Um. 44:01.16 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Sure sure. 44:06.41 bizzyweb Ah, yeah, kind of reminds me the the person that came in and and told told me that they wanted help launching their online tattoo parlor and I said oh okay, great. Ah, where are you going to do the tattooing and the girl looked at me like I had 3 heads and said. 44:25.23 bizzyweb Well when you get a tattoo you can have it anywhere on your body and I said well yeah, but where are you going to actually do the work and she looked at me and she went ah anywhere on the body. It's like. 44:36.80 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb The map. 44:40.47 bizzyweb But where is the work going to be completed wherever the cut she likes you you old man. You don't understand you brought tattoos. So um, all right? So that was the that was the the worst. What's the what's your ah. 44:55.64 bizzyweb Best success story from having after creating a strategy. 45:06.45 greg Um, you know? ah I had a ah client in the internet of things space and it's being able to open up new. 45:23.97 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here here. 45:24.13 greg Industry segments ah was just thrilling and so at one point I went to god it was it called farm farm fest. And they literally take a field in Southern Minnesota and they cut down whatever is growing there and it's a um, a trade show in the in the agricultural industry you know and I'm sitting there in my little 4 door car and I'm driving in and I can feel whatever is cut down hitting the bottom. 45:49.40 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 45:59.19 greg My car as I'm driving through it's hitting the oil pan or whatever and I get out of the car and one of these guys is getting out of pickup and he looks at me goes. You're not from around here. Are you like? no I'm a city boy but what was cool is I was able to help them. 46:07.78 bizzyweb Yeah. 46:07.82 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb You. 46:18.39 greg Figure out how to open up new industries. So if you think about it I went to a turkey farm and we were gonna be able to measure how much feed was in a turkey bit and. 46:23.25 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 46:34.99 greg The way they measured at the time was they literally would knock on the side of the turkey bin and they were listening to when it got up that sound changes. That's where okay so we need X amount of feed and what we put together to put a monitor inside the bin and what I initially didn't understand is that. 46:38.80 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb And. 46:52.28 greg Corporation wanted to keep their guys off a ladders. It was a safety thing but we were able to figure out how to monitor this monitor this so that they could make sure that the turkeys are always having feed and the right feed at the same at the right time during whatever the thirteen weeks or twenty weeks are that the. 46:55.40 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Ah, yep. 47:10.66 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb A. 47:11.60 greg Birds are grown but being able to to help ah an organization open up understand how different segments worked. That's always fun for me is it gets the invest to give mind going. 47:26.21 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Here. 47:29.37 greg And then it turns into real business for somebody else which I just love. 47:33.63 bizzyweb Well Greg thank you for all your expertise today if somebody wants to hire you or wants to learn a little bit more about what they could do for you. You can do for them excuse me what where can they find you. 47:47.38 greg So I've got a website. It's pomerants dash a SS o c and you can get a rough idea of what we do? Yeah I know you like the ass I know that trigby um pomerants with a z um. 47:56.48 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Yeah, and pumerins with a z. 47:57.50 bizzyweb Yeah, so. 48:03.78 bizzyweb Yep. 48:04.63 greg Or you can give me a call. Um I'm in one of those books that you were talking about earlier. 48:07.93 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Oh I'll I'll grab it off of my you know I'll grab it off of my kids chair and I'll older. Yeah. 48:08.14 bizzyweb No, the one then everybody's in yeah I will time travel back to 1998 and get that. 48:18.66 greg Yeah, well we don't have to throw them out anymore. So that's a good thing. 48:21.46 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Right. 48:21.58 bizzyweb You know? Yeah, it's just it. It's add how much I have to explain to people who are under 30 48:27.25 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb You amazing! Thanks for your time to me Greg and I can't can't wait to dig in on another strategy with another client so that we're working on together. 48:27.59 greg I Know the feeling. 48:30.96 bizzyweb Yeah, thank you Greg. 48:36.74 bizzyweb Absolutely. 48:40.22 greg I'd love to love to work with you guys. Thank you so much for including me and you know let's hope next year is a good year for all of us. 48:44.75 Dave Meyer_ BizzyWeb Absolutely.