Staying One Step Ahead: Expert Tips to Protect Your Business from Dirty Competition

Kasim: 00:00:11

The dirty competition.

Kasim: 00:00:12

Here's what I see.

Kasim: 00:00:14

I think that there is a recession coming and there's a lot of dead

Kasim: 00:00:17

wood that's gonna be burned off, but dead wood doesn't just fall by

Kasim: 00:00:21

the wayside and cause no problems.

Kasim: 00:00:23

Right.

Kasim: 00:00:24

I think what we're gonna see is a lot of these little agencies that

Kasim: 00:00:26

are, inefficient or inexperienced, they're gonna do exactly what you

Kasim: 00:00:29

said earlier, which is clutch at life.

Kasim: 00:00:31

And that hole we run your ads for free thing.

Kasim: 00:00:34

We're seeing a little bit of that too.

Kasim: 00:00:35

I'm seeing some of my clients getting outbound outreach from folks saying, we'll

Kasim: 00:00:40

run for nothing, and then there's some performance based kicker on the back end,

Kasim: 00:00:44

or only pay after 90 days or whatever.

Kasim: 00:00:45

And my comment to them has always been, there's nothing more

Kasim: 00:00:48

expensive than a cheap resource.

Kasim: 00:00:49

But I'm curious how y'all are protecting yourself and if there

Kasim: 00:00:52

is a way to protect yourself.

Kasim: 00:00:53

Half of my audiences are agency owners.

Kasim: 00:00:54

What are you doing a batting down your hatches?

Kasim: 00:00:57

Because as the death rattle ensues we're just gonna see a lot of, you know, that.

Kasim: 00:01:02

playing below the belt.

Kasim: 00:01:04

And I don't always, sometimes with clients, I'm like,

Kasim: 00:01:06

all right, God bless you.

Kasim: 00:01:07

I'll see you.

Kasim: 00:01:07

I'll see you in 90 days when you come back and they've broken

Kasim: 00:01:10

everything that you're doing.

Kasim: 00:01:10

But I, I'm curious if you have a better narrative than that.

Kasim: 00:01:13

I think for us we've expanded our offers.

Kasim: 00:01:16

So like I said, three, four years ago, it was just as management.

Kasim: 00:01:19

Now we do a full audit and a three month plan.

Kasim: 00:01:22

We do the ads management, we do consulting, coaching,

Kasim: 00:01:24

training, all that kind of stuff.

Kasim: 00:01:26

Because what we've realized is there is no one type of client

Kasim: 00:01:29

in, in terms of life stage.

Kasim: 00:01:31

There are people that are just starting their e-commerce store and

Kasim: 00:01:33

they wanna know how to get started.

Kasim: 00:01:35

There's people that are scaling to a hundred K a month, 500 k a

Kasim: 00:01:38

month, and they've hit a plateau.

Kasim: 00:01:39

We can help all of them, but at different levels, and for us, there's

Kasim: 00:01:42

different values there as well.

Kasim: 00:01:43

And what I find is the ones that are penny pinching to find the

Kasim: 00:01:47

cheapest agency, they're not really our best prospect anyway.

Kasim: 00:01:51

Mm-hmm.

Kasim: 00:01:51

So we know when that conversation goes down that way.

Kasim: 00:01:53

Now I've been in the agency game since 2017, so we have a good

Kasim: 00:01:57

reputation, especially with people that know me and know the agency,

Kasim: 00:02:00

and they know we've found over time.

Kasim: 00:02:03

They know what our agency are capable of and therefore if we're gonna

Kasim: 00:02:06

charge them a fee, that's maybe double what the other agency's charging.

Kasim: 00:02:10

That comes with the results we've created.

Kasim: 00:02:12

So that for us, gives us a bit of leeway and a bit of comfort.

Kasim: 00:02:16

I also train up agency owners and, and a lot of these agency owners

Kasim: 00:02:19

are doing 10 k, 20 k a month.

Kasim: 00:02:20

They don't really have big case studies or a brand or anything like that.

Kasim: 00:02:23

And what I'm saying to them is get a foot in the door, offer out, show them

Kasim: 00:02:27

your expertise, whether it's free or it's a hundred dollars or a $500 thing.

Kasim: 00:02:31

Give them the plan of exactly what you are going to do for them.

Kasim: 00:02:35

Some, you know, even if they take that away and say, oh thanks, I'm gonna

Kasim: 00:02:37

take this and run it myself, most of 'em won't, but they'll be blown away

Kasim: 00:02:41

by the fact that you haven't just told them, you know what you're gonna do.

Kasim: 00:02:45

Go into their ad account, their funnel, critique it.

Kasim: 00:02:47

I'll use the something called the advertising call for.

Kasim: 00:02:49

There's only four things we care and, and look about.

Kasim: 00:02:52

Look at their products or their service, their audience that they're

Kasim: 00:02:56

targeting, the offer and the funnel.

Kasim: 00:02:57

Without even looking at anything.

Kasim: 00:02:59

If I look at those four things, I can know whether the business is A, ready for

Kasim: 00:03:02

Facebook ads, and B, ready for scaling.

Kasim: 00:03:05

and you know, you mentioned offer if your offer and funnel is off, it

Kasim: 00:03:08

doesn't matter what else you're doing.

Kasim: 00:03:10

You're not scaling on Facebook, right?

Kasim: 00:03:11

Like, you have to get those things narrowed.

Kasim: 00:03:13

If your offer's really good, but your funnel's funnel is poor, you'll fumble

Kasim: 00:03:16

your way through, but you're gonna hit those high CPMs and things like that.

Kasim: 00:03:19

So we already know that from the off.

Kasim: 00:03:21

So when a client comes into us, we do that analysis.

Kasim: 00:03:23

It takes us about 20 minutes.

Kasim: 00:03:25

We give back analysis check sheet.

Kasim: 00:03:28

Like when you take your car into.

Kasim: 00:03:29

A garage and they give you like a 92 point safety checklist or something like that.

Kasim: 00:03:33

We have a checklist so we can give that back to the client and say, these

Kasim: 00:03:36

are the red items you have to fix.

Kasim: 00:03:38

You don't fix these things.

Kasim: 00:03:39

It doesn't matter which agency you go to, you're going to suffer.

Kasim: 00:03:42

So we are there as consultants, you wanna take up our offer, that's

Kasim: 00:03:45

fine if you don't go to the next person, but give them this plan.

Kasim: 00:03:48

Go for your half price agency offer.

Kasim: 00:03:50

So we kind of build that trust and authority in what we do, and we're

Kasim: 00:03:53

trying to train agency owners.

Kasim: 00:03:54

So take that route, be the expert, but be the guide, be the friend.

Kasim: 00:03:57

Even if you don't get the business, guess what?

Kasim: 00:03:59

If it doesn't work out, they'll come back to you as well.

Kasim: 00:04:01

So I'm just trying to get people to understand.

Kasim: 00:04:03

You're not gonna close every single client.

Kasim: 00:04:05

First of all, think about their life stage.

Kasim: 00:04:06

Are they just starting?

Kasim: 00:04:07

Are they growing?

Kasim: 00:04:08

Are they scaling?

Kasim: 00:04:09

And then think about how you can get your foot in the door to get your

Kasim: 00:04:12

expertise into the head regardless of what conversations they're having.

Kasim: 00:04:16

Cuz you know, if you prove to them you can, just quickly look at their

Kasim: 00:04:19

a business and give them the pointer.

Kasim: 00:04:21

You're gonna build the trust and then it's the law of reciprocity and

Kasim: 00:04:24

they'll want to come back and give you some money or whatever it is as well.

Kasim: 00:04:27

So that's the kinda way we're tackling it as well.

Kasim: 00:04:29

I love that man.

Kasim: 00:04:30

I really appreciate that paradigm too.

Kasim: 00:04:32

That approach is just very integrous.

Kasim: 00:04:34

You know, you take the high road and, and then let the chips fall.

Kasim: 00:04:38

TMB Brees, you've got something you've been working on.

Kasim: 00:04:40

Am I allowed to talk about it or is it still in the lab?

Kasim: 00:04:43

You can talk about it.

Kasim: 00:04:44

Well, can I just add to what Debe saying?

Kasim: 00:04:46

Yeah.

Kasim: 00:04:46

I wish you would.

Kasim: 00:04:46

Sure.

Kasim: 00:04:47

I'm a global interviewer, by the way.

Kasim: 00:04:48

I don't know if y'all picked up on that.

Kasim: 00:04:50

Like I'm not good at, so you're gonna have to, if you don't self-advocate here,

Kasim: 00:04:52

you're just not gonna get your bit in.

Kasim: 00:04:54

You are brilliant at this.

Kasim: 00:04:55

You kind of like, I, I, I watched your videos and I'm just like, Oh, you

Kasim: 00:04:59

p pull this all together so easily.

Kasim: 00:05:01

Cause I know it is John, isn't it?

Kasim: 00:05:02

Who's your big, big brain.

Kasim: 00:05:04

He's the, yeah.

Kasim: 00:05:04

Yeah.

Kasim: 00:05:04

He's the big, big brain.

Kasim: 00:05:05

I truly do really get a kick outta talking about this stuff, so, I get excited

Kasim: 00:05:09

and I think, that resonates with folks.

Kasim: 00:05:10

Maybe, maybe that's what I do well, I love it how he talks like 4,000 miles an hour.

Kasim: 00:05:14

Then you're like, you still talk pretty quick as well, but I'm like listening

Kasim: 00:05:17

to your videos, I'm like, This is like a far hydrant of amazing content.

Kasim: 00:05:20

And now I just, there's no well, we'll talk about the tool in a

Kasim: 00:05:22

minute, but like, yeah, it's, people can go through your content and

Kasim: 00:05:25

just go over and over and over, just let getting great content from you.

Kasim: 00:05:28

to add to what Tepe is saying, and I think that we see this

Kasim: 00:05:30

from a performance Agency.

Kasim: 00:05:32

So I know that this is not a plug for myself, but the way we run

Kasim: 00:05:34

things is we, we spend the ad spend.

Kasim: 00:05:36

So instead of we say, we'll spend client money, we spend our own

Kasim: 00:05:39

money, and then we only make money when the client's making money.

Kasim: 00:05:42

Um, yeah, which is crazy by the way.

Kasim: 00:05:43

Like you just strapped on a cape in my eyes that you're putting

Kasim: 00:05:46

your money where your mouth is.

Kasim: 00:05:47

You've got some coones there, man, that's huge.

Kasim: 00:05:49

Well, a lot of qualification and I'm making sure that I can win.

Kasim: 00:05:52

the table stacks my favor.

Kasim: 00:05:54

And then I play easy bets, basically.

Kasim: 00:05:56

one of the things that we often look at and explore, and it's, it's been,

Kasim: 00:06:00

we've done like a bit of a rebrand more recently as well, is to kind

Kasim: 00:06:03

of like try and pull on something we always talk about with ads.

Kasim: 00:06:06

It's like to say there's an identity behind.

Kasim: 00:06:09

Dealing with your brand, so it's like you are an agency that want to keeps

Kasim: 00:06:12

your client, then I would try and identify what it is you do that's so

Kasim: 00:06:15

special and build an identity around that build, like give your client

Kasim: 00:06:19

status as a result of being your agency.

Kasim: 00:06:22

You know, like, so they feel like proud to wear your agency as a badge

Kasim: 00:06:26

almost of honor, so to speak, to say, this is who we get to work with.

Kasim: 00:06:30

and sometimes like to incorporate that into a deeper levels to

Kasim: 00:06:32

sometimes use your own language or.

Kasim: 00:06:34

Use terminology.

Kasim: 00:06:35

I know Ralph does had tier 11, so you kind of work through the tears and that's

Kasim: 00:06:39

like a really clever strategy I think.

Kasim: 00:06:41

Cause you feel like Right, I'm on the ladder.

Kasim: 00:06:43

Like coming off this ladder is actually quite a big painer disconnect potentially.

Kasim: 00:06:46

Right.

Kasim: 00:06:47

As well.

Kasim: 00:06:47

But I was gonna ask you Depeche about this as well.

Kasim: 00:06:49

Like Cause we have like a consultancy piece from Tan Time.

Kasim: 00:06:51

We don't do a huge amount of it, but we, kind of toying with the idea of

Kasim: 00:06:55

having like , from time time, like an off-ramp strategy to say if you

Kasim: 00:06:58

don't wanna work with us any longer as an agency for any reason, like

Kasim: 00:07:01

we're lucky cuz we're spending our own money so we don't get it very often.

Kasim: 00:07:04

But if there was that and people were like, oh, we wanna go in-house or

Kasim: 00:07:06

something having like an off ramp.

Kasim: 00:07:08

Service, you know, to say, okay, cool, we'll help you train up

Kasim: 00:07:11

your own internal team and we'll help you get that all into place.

Kasim: 00:07:13

you do that or is that something you just have haven't explored or cause

Kasim: 00:07:17

that would for me would be like, oh, if you're an agency, you'd still

Kasim: 00:07:19

trust you even on the off ramping and then be like, oh, you're now our

Kasim: 00:07:22

consultant around that piece as well.

Kasim: 00:07:24

I mean, that's exactly why we did it.

Kasim: 00:07:26

Cuz when I start the agency, we got to this silly place where within

Kasim: 00:07:29

three to six months we're scaling.

Kasim: 00:07:31

we've gone from spending 20 k a month to a hundred k a month and because we're

Kasim: 00:07:34

percent of ad spend, our costs have gone up for the agency for the client.

Kasim: 00:07:37

And we got to this silly phase where, We'd run the agency account for three

Kasim: 00:07:41

to five months, we'd lose the account because now they're paying us too much

Kasim: 00:07:44

and they're like, oh, well for a 10 or 15 K a month they could bring in two,

Kasim: 00:07:47

three media buyers and do it ourselves.

Kasim: 00:07:48

Yeah, of course you can.

Kasim: 00:07:49

You can't.

Kasim: 00:07:50

But that's the mentality.

Kasim: 00:07:51

then I figured out, okay, rather than fight that, what if we just went with a

Kasim: 00:07:55

flow and said, alright, offboard us from a media buying point of view, but keep the

Kasim: 00:07:58

strategy like this is what I can bring.

Kasim: 00:08:00

And it became like a fractional C M O type of thing with the added

Kasim: 00:08:04

benefit of the whole agency, like the.

Kasim: 00:08:06

Analytics, the insights, the creative, the media buying reports, we

Kasim: 00:08:10

provided all of that, and it enabled.

Kasim: 00:08:13

Brands look at us differently from the point of will, and we'd have that

Kasim: 00:08:16

conversation from the start, which was, we'll run your ads for three to

Kasim: 00:08:20

six months, but there's also an option where we can also help you hire, embed,

Kasim: 00:08:24

train, and take me to buying in house.

Kasim: 00:08:26

And that became so much more attractive.

Kasim: 00:08:28

So that product itself, as I mentioned earlier, that's a blue

Kasim: 00:08:31

ocean I think, not just for Facebook ads agencies, but for everyone.

Kasim: 00:08:35

No, that's genius.

Kasim: 00:08:36

Yeah.

Kasim: 00:08:37

It's really clever to have that.

Kasim: 00:08:38

Cause it's, it's trust in the piece where they're like, oh, we're even considering.

Kasim: 00:08:41

It's like, well, there's always this, service we have for you.

Kasim: 00:08:43

And then you'll be like, right, well, I'm still wanna follow everything and all

Kasim: 00:08:46

the guidance you, you provide as well.

Kasim: 00:08:48

cause it's a pain, right?

Kasim: 00:08:49

If there..

Kasim: 00:08:49

Let's say they start paying us seven and a half K a month, and in five months

Kasim: 00:08:52

time they're paying 30, 35 K a month.

Kasim: 00:08:54

That's painful.

Kasim: 00:08:55

It doesn't matter that they're making five 10 x more than they

Kasim: 00:08:58

were three, five months ago.

Kasim: 00:08:59

It's still a pain to say.

Kasim: 00:09:01

I was paying this and now they're charging that.

Kasim: 00:09:04

In reality, we're not really doing that much more work.

Kasim: 00:09:06

So I can't say difference in, let's not tell people that depends.

Kasim: 00:09:10

Let's irrelevant.

Kasim: 00:09:11

Yeah.

Kasim: 00:09:12

The fact of the max is broke up there.

Kasim: 00:09:14

I don't, I didn't hear that.

Kasim: 00:09:15

Yeah, but I mean, look, let's be honest, there's magnitudes of scale.

Kasim: 00:09:18

When you start getting to the higher ad spends with Facebook, guess what?

Kasim: 00:09:21

It becomes a lot more stable and predictable, believe it or not.

Kasim: 00:09:24

So it's easier for us to predict what's gonna happen.

Kasim: 00:09:26

No, Google's much harder as you spend more.

Kasim: 00:09:28

Oh yeah, yeah, definitely on the Google side.

Kasim: 00:09:31

But you know that, that's the crazy thing.

Kasim: 00:09:32

So if you are now spending, let's say three, 400 K a month with us,

Kasim: 00:09:37

the team is a bit more dedicated.

Kasim: 00:09:39

Cuz guess what?

Kasim: 00:09:39

When things go wrong, the magnitudes of the wrong become bigger.

Kasim: 00:09:43

But at the same time, that's my point.

Kasim: 00:09:44

When people are like, well why do you make 'em wrong?

Kasim: 00:09:46

I'm like, cuz you get to call me.

Kasim: 00:09:47

You know, 2:00 AM on Sunday.

Kasim: 00:09:50

That's right.

Kasim: 00:09:50

And yeah.

Kasim: 00:09:51

And that's actually really worth something because if I'm not charging,

Kasim: 00:09:54

if you're spending half million dollars a month, I'm not charging

Kasim: 00:09:56

you a fee for half million bucks.

Kasim: 00:09:57

You know, you, you don't want a part-time firefighter there.

Kasim: 00:10:00

Well, that, that's like such a valuable piece.

Kasim: 00:10:03

I think that's like a, a piece that falls into that identity.

Kasim: 00:10:05

Like, oh no, when I'm at this level with you guys, then I have you on

Kasim: 00:10:09

speed dial, like Right, exactly.

Kasim: 00:10:10

And, and, and that I feel like, do I get that with other people?

Kasim: 00:10:13

Probably not.

Kasim: 00:10:14

and, oh, I don't trust it.

Kasim: 00:10:15

Yeah.

Kasim: 00:10:16

So I feel like there's these sorts of things that build into that

Kasim: 00:10:18

identity and that status piece.

Kasim: 00:10:19

It's like, cool.

Kasim: 00:10:20

I know that I feel love to someone and they've got my back

Kasim: 00:10:24

and I know that I can call them.

Kasim: 00:10:25

And yeah, stuff will happen from time to time, but I know that they're just in

Kasim: 00:10:29

the end of the phone call if I need them.

Kasim: 00:10:31

That's a huge piece I feel like, but no one really taps into.

Kasim: 00:10:34

We've been on the receiving.

Kasim: 00:10:35

Hopefully they never watched this video.

Kasim: 00:10:37

We've been on the receiving end of this in, in the worst way.

Kasim: 00:10:39

We had a client that we love dearly.

Kasim: 00:10:41

They were with us for a couple of years.

Kasim: 00:10:42

They grew so big.

Kasim: 00:10:43

They're like, you guys, we have to take this in house.

Kasim: 00:10:44

They hired their own media buyers, took it in house, and then, I don't remember

Kasim: 00:10:47

the, the timeline, but it wasn't long.

Kasim: 00:10:49

It was like eight weeks later something exploded and they

Kasim: 00:10:52

didn't call their media buyers.

Kasim: 00:10:53

They called us.

Kasim: 00:10:54

I'm like, so wait a minute now, you know, like, you get what?

Kasim: 00:10:56

And now they've been with us for years and we helped 'em out and we fixed it.

Kasim: 00:10:59

But if I had what Depe is talking about, Then, you know, at least I'd continue to

Kasim: 00:11:04

be able to, to profit from that client.

Kasim: 00:11:05

And then they could call me maybe with a little more integrity and, you know,

Kasim: 00:11:09

not with their tail tuck between their legs, but it was, it was interesting

Kasim: 00:11:12

to be on the sitting end of it.

Kasim: 00:11:13

So I think it's a good question, Tom.

Kasim: 00:11:14

And asking for referrals.

Kasim: 00:11:15

That's a great one as well.

Kasim: 00:11:17

Yeah, that's exactly right.

Kasim: 00:11:20

It's difficult for them to be like, I'm off now, I'm not gonna use them anymore.

Kasim: 00:11:24

And you tied them in psychologically.

Kasim: 00:11:25

Yeah.

Kasim: 00:11:26

Tom, tell us about what you're building.

Kasim: 00:11:28

Ah, yeah, man.

Kasim: 00:11:29

Okay, cool.

Kasim: 00:11:29

So we have been building in the background a piece of software

Kasim: 00:11:34

that we are very proud of.

Kasim: 00:11:35

So what it is, is that you can connect your YouTube account or YouTube channel

Kasim: 00:11:41

to our tool, and we call it the X-ray.

Kasim: 00:11:43

So what it does is it, It takes in all the data from your YouTube channel

Kasim: 00:11:47

x-rays it as in terms of like, finds all the important figures and then

Kasim: 00:11:51

allows you to finally get to grips with some analytical data that's

Kasim: 00:11:55

useful from a content standpoint.

Kasim: 00:11:57

So nothing to do with SEO or getting videos ranked or being suggested

Kasim: 00:12:01

videos and that type of stuff.

Kasim: 00:12:02

It's much more to do with What are your audience actually like?

Kasim: 00:12:05

what themes of content teams to resonate with your customers, and

Kasim: 00:12:09

how long are people sticking around on some videos versus other videos?

Kasim: 00:12:11

and you can benchmark all your videos against each other for certain time

Kasim: 00:12:14

periods or look at the intros of your videos and the middle section

Kasim: 00:12:17

of your videos and see if you've got right retention drops anywhere,

Kasim: 00:12:20

or see what your videos are doing from a subscriber standpoint.

Kasim: 00:12:23

And then also we call these magic moments if there's like a peak.

Kasim: 00:12:27

In retention at any point in your video, we analyze it and give

Kasim: 00:12:29

you links to the highest peaks across the whole of your channel.

Kasim: 00:12:32

And it allows you, well, you've seen it, haven't you?

Kasim: 00:12:34

It allows you to then just see what content actually works and what people

Kasim: 00:12:39

like and what people enjoy from you.

Kasim: 00:12:42

And so it just guides you and it is like, so, like it is just so obvious about

Kasim: 00:12:45

what's the next video you need to create?

Kasim: 00:12:47

Either redo great content you've already got, but maybe

Kasim: 00:12:50

with a week intro or something.

Kasim: 00:12:52

Or keep doing more of a certain topic cuz you didn't realize that your

Kasim: 00:12:55

customers absolutely love that content.

Kasim: 00:12:57

we're kind of building out and everyone seems to absolutely love it and

Kasim: 00:13:00

get so much from it, which is cool.

Kasim: 00:13:01

And yeah, that's kind of something that we're focusing on right

Kasim: 00:13:03

now and it still needs to be.

Kasim: 00:13:05

polished up a little bit, but right now it's performing really well

Kasim: 00:13:08

and it just, they were gearing up.

Kasim: 00:13:09

where it takes us is to say, right, if you can isolate like three or four videos

Kasim: 00:13:13

from your channel that are just like the best performers especially in terms

Kasim: 00:13:16

of lead gen and things, then you just put a little bit of spend behind them

Kasim: 00:13:19

a specific way when you run your ads.

Kasim: 00:13:21

And my word like.

Kasim: 00:13:22

It's so exciting to see Jake, these people that can create great content,

Kasim: 00:13:25

have good products, maybe not great offers, but still they're able to kill it.

Kasim: 00:13:29

So they just produce these great videos back in the past and they just put a

Kasim: 00:13:32

little bit of ad spend and it just drives leads and sales every single day for them.

Kasim: 00:13:36

And these are not big, big brands.

Kasim: 00:13:37

These are kind of people that have a good YouTube following,

Kasim: 00:13:39

but haven't really figured out the Dara response bit just yet.

Kasim: 00:13:42

So it's a great way of introducing those people into like the world

Kasim: 00:13:46

of paid advertising to drive.

Kasim: 00:13:47

Profit at scale.

Kasim: 00:13:48

so far so good, man.

Kasim: 00:13:49

Like it's working really well.

Kasim: 00:13:50

And we'll put a link in the description maybe or something