Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
We share our thoughts and ideas on how to grow a business.
So what we're noticing is
the most engagement and views
we're getting is on our how
to style content instead of
the content about our agency.
I think that's been a
good learning for us.
Actually.
A lot of the people that seem to be
watching our videos are other freelancers,
consultants, agencies, just like getting
more insight on what we're doing.
And I don't think there's anything wrong
with that
to
just doing that.
And not call it Double Your Agency,
just call it the Growing Convert
podcast or show, or like, marketing,
what we, we threw around some ideas,
like, you know, marketing strategy.
And we also had been kind of inspired
and, and been thinking about Rand
Fishkin's old Whiteboard Friday videos
from his Moz days many, many years ago.
Half of the audience is probably
not even old enough to know this.
Were you even alive then?
Okay, this is going to be kind
of a fun, special episode.
We just actually got done
recording another episode.
We started having this conversation
and felt like this itself
should be a public conversation.
We started this, we're showing for
those of us, you guys listening, we're
actually just showing our YouTube page.
So you can just go to, uh, youtube.
com at grow and convert slash acro click
on videos to see our list of videos.
You see our episode one, um, of
this series, which we called, uh,
Double your agency or doubling.
Our agency was published.
It says three months.
I think beginning of January,
I remember, right, right.
We started this basically at the
beginning of this year, which is 2024.
Our hypothesis, and you can go back
and watch that video episode one.
Was basically our thesis behind this
was look, we're already doing bottom
of funnel, SEO type stuff for ourselves
and some other channels to get leads.
What can Benji and our
team is executing that?
What can Benji and I specifically
do to grow the brand name more?
And, you know, and, and
that has various benefits.
So we can hire more writers if
they know about us, but also like.
We know that in general for this
type of hire of like an agency,
there's like a longterm trust thing.
And so beyond people like Googling
something that could indicate they
want an agency, which we are doing,
we're attacking that channel.
What can we do something
like, just like everybody just
associates, grow and convert.
And knows the brand or whatever
and our thesis was we or just knows us
personally I think that's a huge benefit
of video is people Getting to know us
before ever working with us or talking
to us and just kind of how we think
and Our culture and stuff like that
And so we had liked doing those videos.
And if we scroll down further, there are
some videos we had done before where,
you know, like it says like one year ago
and a lot of these videos, they're just
like, you know, various videos of, of
how to do this, like how to write your
first week blog posts, like, et cetera.
Um, this new one has like a
certain kind of look and feel to
it, the thumbnails and all this.
Here's what we're noticing.
The idea was this build in public,
we're going to, you're going to track
our growth as we double our agency.
We were saying, look, everyone, a
lot of people have done this build
in public thing from zero, but most
people don't do it when the company
is already like a million dollar, you
know, kind of revenue type company plus.
And so we'll talk about these
operational challenges and that'll
get us in front of those people.
But let's look at the view counts.
Maybe the last few that all
have been around like a month
or a half or a few months ago.
Well, we've noticed that some of
the highest viewed ones are not
about our agency and its growth.
Specifically episode 10 content
strategy for a new business.
We basically said like, you
know, how do we do this?
We're creating a content strategy
for a new business, et cetera.
466 views, which for us is a lot.
We're not Mr.
Beast.
And then, um, episode seven, it was with
David on our team of how do you update
your existing content to reclaim SEO
rankings that went down 417 views in
two months, but then look at some of the
other ones, um, of just our own story,
like the March recap, only 157 views.
That's like 25 percent of the views
of how to create a content strategy
or the February recap, that's been
two months getting out of the day
to day of the business, only 226.
So like kind of half the views, our
latest episode that's on the page now
was, um, a breakdown of like how to write
good content, breaking down writing.
That's only seven days old and
almost is already at 400 views.
So what we're noticing is the most
engagement and views we're getting is
on our how to style content instead of
the Build in public double our agency
instead of the content about our agency.
So we're now having this
moment of like What if we?
Reposition this series to just doing
that and not call it double your agency
Just call it the Grow and Convert
podcast or show or like marketing.
What we, we threw around some ideas
like, you know, marketing strategy.
And we also had been kind of inspired
and been thinking about Rand Fishkin's
old, uh, whiteboard Friday videos
from his Moz days many, many years
ago, half of the audience, probably
not even old enough to know this.
Were you even alive then?
But, um, you can Google like
whiteboard Fridays or something.
Um, and we could call it, you know,
we could do a shout out to him and say
marketing strategy Fridays or something
like this and just have it be how tos.
Because I don't know, Benji,
what do you, what do you think?
I guess what I've been reflecting
a lot on is when we started this,
the idea was to talk about a lot of
what was going on in our business.
Like, what were we learning
as we were growing and sharing
those learnings with people?
And I think we, like,
if I had to reflect on.
What worked and what didn't work.
Again, I think people are enjoying
the learnings that we share
and that's always been true.
So when we put out new blog posts of us
learning something new or creating a new
strategy or like finding some different
tactic that we didn't think would
work, that does work and showing how it
works and getting in the details of it.
I think people really
appreciate that kind of stuff.
And to me, when I look at a lot
of the topics, it's more about
just like us and our learnings.
And I think there is a shift maybe like
a month ago or a couple of months ago
where we had this conversation and we
started to talk more about what are
the problems that people are facing in
their business and how can we share the
learnings that we've had kind of going
through those same challenges and sharing.
Basically what we've learned from our
experience trying to do the same thing.
And I, I think that's, that to me
is, it seems to be what's resonating.
Like when we're sending out an email and
it's some topic that a lot of people find
challenges with such as, okay, like you're
starting a content strategy from scratch.
Like, what do you do?
Like, like what, what's the
first few blog posts that you do?
Or today's topic was you're
hiring your first blog post.
Marketer, like, how do you even think
about doing that as you grow a business?
There are so many challenges that you need
to figure out beyond just the strategy
component, there's the hiring component
budgets and all this kind of stuff.
And I think going forward, it'd
be more interesting to kind of put
ourselves in the shoes of people.
In marketing teams or at the beginning
stages of their company and talk
through some of the challenges that
we've personally faced in our careers,
whether it's at grow and convert
or otherwise, and just kind of like
have open conversations about it.
And so I don't know that that's kind of
what my, where my thinking is now, just
like where I kind of want to take this.
I think this whole YouTube
channel has been an experiment.
Like, like you said, this
series was an experiment.
Our prior videos were an experiment.
I think just from a big picture
perspective, I've been fascinated
with just experimenting with YouTube
because I think YouTube will continue
to get more integrated into search.
So I think Things that I'm
thinking about YouTube SEO.
Is there a way to attack that, that
can one help grow our business, help
grow the brands that we work with?
And how does that relate to the things
that we're already doing in content?
But then also just beyond the SEO
component, how do you grow a YouTube
channel or how do you grow an audience
on YouTube that people are interested in?
And.
Yeah, this whole channel and this whole
series has been an experiment doing that.
And I think we just need to continue
iterating until we figure out what works.
And so just thought we'd have kind of like
a talk through this while we're thinking
about this and talking about it, just kind
of debating, do we keep that double your
agency branding if we don't really want
to talk about our business so much and
really just want to help people and share.
Our learnings and advice.
I don't, I don't know
what the right answer is.
The funny thing is even though those
videos the ones where we like do our
updates even though those counts are
much lower I've enjoyed doing it There's
something about like me too having to
report on monthly growth that like forced
us to really like take it seriously
What is this logistically gonna mean?
Like what do we
do?
Maybe we still do these monthly updates
just to keep holding ourselves accountable
to the goal Like again, I think you're
right Coming up with a goal for our
business and then having everything be
focused on that goal of just trying to
double the business, I think has aligned
us in our thinking around how to do that.
And I, and so far it's going
well, like we're kind of on track
to do this and I want to keep
holding ourselves accountable.
But I think beyond that goal, if we're
thinking just as you have YouTube as a
marketing channel and just how to get the
most impact out of this, I just don't know
if this series is what's going to get us.
to that goal of getting exposure
from YouTube and growing our channel,
our audience, our viewership.
And so I kind of just want to
experiment with trying some other
ideas on, on YouTube and seeing if
we can just keep growing the channel.
And so, yeah, my idea would be,
let's keep doing monthly updates.
Let's either test out a new series
that we come up with, or just some
new content types, whether it's.
Just straight up asking, answering
people's questions to try to rank for
common questions people have around
different marketing topics, whether it's
yeah, trying to do like more SEO oriented
videos and like, what does that look like?
Or if it's just, let's talk about
interesting marketing topics
and let's do it on a weekly
basis and try to build a rhythm.
So people that people know to come
to our channel on a specific day
and there's going to be something
interesting that they can learn from.
Yeah, I don't know the right answer.
Like here, here's one hypothesis.
There's been a lot of people that have
been successful with some kind of like
follow our journey from X to Y at least.
I think so.
I mean, I guess I don't know that
for a fact, but I just see a lot of
them and I've heard some interviews
with people that have done that.
I wonder if there's a couple reasons
why we're seeing those update, like
our February update or April update.
Have less view counts than the others.
Number one, those businesses that
I've seen be successful with it,
their business, like their customers
are other businesses like them.
For example, a SAS product that
is useful for other SAS products.
So, like, um, a ProfitWell or
a Stripe style SaaS product is
used by other SaaS founders.
So if you have something like that,
you can be like, here's how I'm
growing my SaaS product and who's
listening is, is your customers.
That's not true for us.
Other agencies or content
writing slash SEO freelancers.
Are not our audience or target customer.
They are, but for different products.
So it's for the course, that's true.
Our customer or, or to
become part of our team.
I think that's been a
good learning for us.
Actually.
A lot of the people that seem
to be watching our videos are.
other freelancers, consultants,
agencies, just like getting more
insight on what we're doing.
And I don't think there's
anything wrong with that.
But if we're trying to use YouTube to
grow either a client base or just get
in front of more marketers in general,
regardless of if it's like people that
would want to do content with us or not,
to me, that's, that's kind of what I
think I want to do with this channel is
just, you know, Share advice and learnings
and marketing and try to just broaden
out from just content marketing to just
like marketing strategy in general.
Like how do you grow a business?
How do you think about that kind of stuff?
How do you, how do you think
about growing a content team?
What are the dynamics
between marketing and sales?
There's like, we, we've just
had a lot of learning throughout
our careers that we could share.
Even, even you on AB testing and stuff
like that, I think really be interesting,
like your thoughts on that kind of stuff.
I just feel like there's not a lot
of good marketing content anymore.
Right.
I think from a big picture, if I think
about what's the one blog or person
or resource that I would go to for
marketing advice, or just like, that's
interesting or like talking about new
stuff, I can't think of one, which is sad.
Like, I think if I rewinded to like
2010 to 2014, There were so many
people doing very interesting things,
having like, really unique blogs, and
unique takes, or like, like we said,
Ran Fishkin doing White Bird Fridays,
like, a lot of that's like, lost now.
I don't, I don't know what
happened, but I just feel like Well,
everyone just has the same format.
So, I, I, I'm not sure, I kind of
agree with you, and kind of disagree.
Like The agree part is, I think
what, what you're maybe speaking
to is like everybody's show is I
interview other people, that's it.
And, and so there's not, there's
like, you, you get some learning,
but, but clicking on those
episodes I find is like gambling.
It's like, maybe there's like some
good nuggets, but then otherwise
you're just like, who the hell is
this person they're interviewing?
Like half the time you're
like, I'm not sure.
Or it's
just too tactical.
That, that, I think that's
what I, Don't like anymore.
Everyone has become
obsessed with tactics here.
Here's this one LinkedIn
template that you should use.
And it's like that kind of stuff.
Like that doesn't help most people.
Like what helps most people is thinking
about how to solve hard problems.
Like thinking, thinking on the strategy
level, thinking at the big picture level.
That, that I think is what's missing.
Like, I don't know anyone.
I don't, that's where I don't
know a resource where I could go.
How does someone think about solving
this problem in their business?
That would be interesting.
You're right.
Like
here, you're clarifying
some more things to me.
Here's, here's kind of the
landscape of marketing video and
audio content as far as I'm aware.
And I'm not necessarily the expert.
I don't consume a ton of it to be
perfectly honest, but like from what I've
seen, there is the infinite amount of
like, I interview other people, podcasts.
There's just too many of those.
We're not doing that.
We tried a few of those episodes, by the
way, like we tried that with our clients.
And
like, look at this, they're like, well,
not the clients, but if you keep going
down, there's some that we did, we
did one with Dave and we did one with
Brian Dean.
Those got decent look like decent views.
And so there's, there's definitely
something there, but I think, I
think what's missing is going.
Deep on different strategy topics.
Yeah,
hold on.
So, so let me finish, let me finish.
So there's a couple of these
like common frameworks.
So there's the, I interview other
people type stuff, marketing content.
And then the other one of, of like
a single brand or a single person
doing in depth stuff is maybe like
you said, too tactical is one, right?
It'll be like this particular
LinkedIn template or whatever.
Number two, if we talk about, forget the
interview content, like one or two people,
the host constantly doing new stuff, the
other one is just like, Pontificating.
I've seen a few of those podcasts
where like, I like this guy or
whatever, like they seem smart.
And then each new episode is
just like random pontification
of like current events.
And to be honest, we did a little bit of
that and some of it worked really well.
We have this old post on
commenting on current events.
And it has like 1.
4 thousand views, which
is pretty good for us.
Um, and then there is the brands.
There are some brands that do
just like, it's not interviewed.
I'm not interviewing my friends.
You know, or whatever it's not
tactics, but they do just really
beginner level, like YouTube SEO.
It'll be like the hub spots or
whatever's of the world that are
just doing like You know, just like
basic, like introduction to digital
ads.
I don't know if they actually have
that, but like, yeah, like the advice
in there is not that interesting.
It's like just general topics, just
purely trying to rank for stuff.
So
this is more like do what we did
on text format of growandconvert.
com blog posts of just like in depth,
how to accept a couple differences,
obviously the format number
two, not just content marketing.
That we're going to expand to just
like marketing and then we're going
to try to like live a little bit more
on the strategy level of what CMOs and
all think about, like at the strategy
level, like how should you think about
allocation, budgets, hiring, et cetera?
Um, that makes sense to me.
I feel like that has a nice
Venn diagram, like overlap of.
Things we have direct expertise on,
which has been our brand is like,
we're talking about stuff that
like, we literally see everyone's
GA accounts of like a bajillion,
you know, current former clients and
prospects that we sometimes don't
even end up working with or whatever.
Um, we have people telling
us that in our course, like
hundreds and hundreds of people.
Yeah.
Well,
I think the difference is we try
not to comment on things that we
don't have direct experience in.
So a lot of, I think
a lot of people share.
In theory, here's how
something should work.
And we're not doing that.
All we're, all we're doing is we did this
thing and here's how it did work for us.
Or here's what didn't work for us and
just sharing our own personal experiences.
I like our accountability.
So I wonder logistically,
what does this mean?
Like we don't have to change our Apple
podcasts or Spotify podcast feed.
Right.
And YouTube, thank God.
Our channel is not called
at double your agency.
It's just called agro and
convert, which is perfect.
It's as general as it can be.
The only branding is really
just in the video intro itself.
Like maybe we get our editor to
create us a new intro, but like
really nothing else needs to change.
Like even, even like the images
and stuff, the images are totally
neutral.
And then maybe we just
keep the challenges.
We still do monthly updates, but
maybe we, we feed them into a larger
video where we say April has ended or
like, you know, like may has ended.
This video is on, you know, like, um,
hiring and building your marketing team.
But also at the end, we're going to
do our, like may update or something
like that, or maybe they're separate
videos, but we just don't call
the series doubling your agency.
We call it something else to double
down on the branding of this is,
Like a marketing strategy show.
Yeah, and then and then maybe we can
ask the audience from this video like
what would be some ideas for names like
so some that we threw around is just
Um, like I have said in the beginning,
just call it the growing convert show.
Like, because if we're using it,
if the ultimate goal of this was
to just do top of the funnel brand
recognition, marketing, just call the
thing, the growing convert show, and
then people will just be like, have
you listened to grow and convert?
Like there's this grown convert episode.
You know what I mean?
That that's one, it has an argument.
It's, it's not the coolest, most creative.
It's a good argument.
It has an argument about that.
The other one again is, is, is a nod.
So then the other one would be
just double down on the use case.
So we call it something,
something marketing strategy,
the marketing strategy show.
And then the CMO types or
whoever we're talking about here.
Just know like this is
about marketing strategy.
And then I like the Rand Fishkin nod
where we can literally give him credit
and say, Hey, shout out to you, man.
Like you're one of the OGs is,
is putting the word Friday in it.
We have released basically every
single episode or literally
every single episode on Friday.
to try to create this rhythm.
His was called whiteboard Fridays.
You said that one of your previous
companies, you guys would literally sit
around and watch it together on Friday.
Yeah, we had a scheduled meeting on the
calendar in the business, in a boardroom
every single Friday and our marketing team
would go in there and watch these videos.
And it was always interesting.
It always helped create discussions.
I, it was like, that was like a really
cool thing that we did at that company.
And I always thought those
videos were super valuable
and I learned a ton from them.
And I would love to get to the point
where there were marketing teams that were
looking forward to watching these videos.
Every Friday, like I just, that was the
idea about doing some rhythm because
I think there's something to be said
about getting people to come check
something every single week, knowing
that they're going to find something new.
Yeah.
So then that would be build
that into the name, right?
Um, marketing strategy Fridays,
that would be, you know,
options two and three, right?
It's, it's at growing convert or
growing convert marketing strategy
Fridays or something like that,
where you're just like, it's
literally built into the name people.
Yeah.
Like you find it on Friday,
which creates that kind of
expectation or kind of rhythm.
And Friday is kind of a good day
because you know, a lot of people
don't are not doing their like
regular work as much on Friday.
They're looking for a distraction.
Um, so I'm curious if people have
ideas, we'd be curious a few things or,
or just either either other ideas
that for videos, like, okay, if
there's something that we haven't
thought about that you think would be
really interesting that we could do.
Yeah.
So I'm open to that too.
Yeah.
Questions to the audience.
Number one, what do you think about
our double our agency positioning
and right now, was it compelling?
Is it not compelling?
Number two, um, what do you think about
us repositioning to like a, we, this whole
show is us to sharing our experience,
ideas, and thoughts on marketing strategy.
We don't interview other people.
It's not an interview show.
You know, we don't talk about random
current events unless it applies to
marketing strategy or something like that.
Right.
Um, we, we, we do that.
And number three, what are
your ideas for a name of the
show or a branding of the show?
Um, and, and I'll give you the,
the seedlings of it is like
just the grow and convert shows.
It's just about our
brand, um, or in the name.
Number two is just some sort of
marketing strategy type title.
And number three is mentioning the word
Friday in it to sort of give, you know,
a clear indication of the, of, of when
to expect it or any other ideas you have.
Be curious to.
If you like this video,
don't forget to subscribe.
You can also get the audio
only versions of these shows
wherever you get your podcasts.
And you can follow us at growandconvert.
com slash newsletter for any articles and
updates for when these videos come out.