WEBVTT NOTE This file was generated by Descript 00:00:00.204 --> 00:00:02.176 Matt: Hey John, welcome to the WP Minute. 00:00:02.226 --> 00:00:03.306 John: Matt, thanks for having me, man. 00:00:03.426 --> 00:00:04.356 Great to meet you finally. 00:00:04.866 --> 00:00:09.366 So for folks that don't know, you have, run an agency for quite some time. 00:00:09.396 --> 00:00:11.796 You don't do that specifically anymore, but now you have this 00:00:11.796 --> 00:00:16.776 sort of like turnkey solution, productized service done for you. 00:00:16.776 --> 00:00:18.576 Service called Editor Ninja. 00:00:19.206 --> 00:00:23.676 explain like, is that more of like an agency with Editor Ninja, or do you 00:00:23.706 --> 00:00:28.216 like really look at it as, productized done for you kind of service? 00:00:28.426 --> 00:00:30.436 John: it kind of depends on what your definition is. 00:00:30.436 --> 00:00:33.376 Of those, I would say it's definitely, I would say it's probably more of 00:00:33.376 --> 00:00:36.586 a done for you service, but when I, but I message it as an agency. 00:00:36.616 --> 00:00:38.776 We don't do any strategy or anything like that at this point. 00:00:38.776 --> 00:00:42.526 But so we're, I mean, I, I say we're a production shop, so we come alongside 00:00:42.526 --> 00:00:45.916 agencies and marketing teams to help them produce more on-brand content. 00:00:47.026 --> 00:00:50.866 So kind of an agency, kind of a done for you service, kind 00:00:50.866 --> 00:00:52.186 of a productized service. 00:00:52.816 --> 00:00:54.106 I don't know, somewhere in there. 00:00:54.307 --> 00:00:56.107 Matt: what year did Editor Ninja start? 00:00:56.146 --> 00:01:00.836 John: Editor Ninja started in, about five years ago, middle, spring-ish of 2020. 00:01:00.996 --> 00:01:05.196 so it, it was kinda a side project for a while alongside another agency that I had. 00:01:05.646 --> 00:01:09.236 I went, I start, I formalized Editor n Ninja at the end of 2021. 00:01:09.236 --> 00:01:12.686 Started 2022, so we launched January 7th, 2022 is when I 00:01:12.686 --> 00:01:13.946 launched, like the initial kind of. 00:01:14.401 --> 00:01:16.801 Designed pickle esque, productized service. 00:01:16.831 --> 00:01:20.041 and we went from nothing to a thousand MRR the day that we launched. 00:01:20.671 --> 00:01:23.481 And, and then, yeah, it was a side project that started taking more 00:01:23.481 --> 00:01:25.251 and more of my time through 2022. 00:01:25.281 --> 00:01:29.331 I sold my other agency September of 2022 and went full-time on Editor 00:01:29.331 --> 00:01:30.951 Ninja a little over two years ago. 00:01:31.041 --> 00:01:32.121 January, 2023. 00:01:33.062 --> 00:01:37.742 Matt: So, looking at the pricing page of Editor Ninja, there are two letters that 00:01:37.742 --> 00:01:39.302 gets everybody's attention these days. 00:01:39.302 --> 00:01:40.202 That's ai. 00:01:40.202 --> 00:01:43.792 I see two, 50 per AI article. 00:01:44.272 --> 00:01:44.932 I wanna get to that. 00:01:44.932 --> 00:01:46.552 We're gonna hold the AI stuff for a moment. 00:01:46.552 --> 00:01:49.582 What was the name of the agency you ran before? 00:01:49.682 --> 00:01:50.762 starting Editor Ninja. 00:01:51.102 --> 00:01:53.712 John: Previous agency was called Credo get credo.com. 00:01:53.772 --> 00:01:57.852 So basically did lead generation for marketing agencies, really focused on 00:01:57.852 --> 00:02:02.572 SEO projects, content marketing, Google ads and Facebook ads are kind of the four 00:02:02.572 --> 00:02:04.612 main that we kind of like focus down on. 00:02:05.077 --> 00:02:07.927 And, sending them to agencies, paying us for leads. 00:02:07.927 --> 00:02:10.117 And we got kind of a cut on the backend. 00:02:10.597 --> 00:02:12.857 So I built that for, about seven years. 00:02:12.857 --> 00:02:16.937 So I, I used to work, full-time in SEO and kind of digital marketing for an 00:02:16.937 --> 00:02:19.967 agency in New York and then for Zillow for a couple of years, I got laid off from 00:02:19.967 --> 00:02:24.677 there, September of 2015, went full-time on it was called Hire Gun at the time. 00:02:24.677 --> 00:02:27.947 Rebranded it to Credo about four months later, and basically built 00:02:27.947 --> 00:02:29.507 that over the next number of years. 00:02:29.557 --> 00:02:31.297 the reason why I started Editor Ninja. 00:02:32.377 --> 00:02:35.227 Burning out and when you burn out, you start a new company, I guess, 00:02:35.227 --> 00:02:36.217 or at least that's what I did. 00:02:36.737 --> 00:02:39.467 basically Credo got to the point where like it kind of hit about half a 00:02:39.467 --> 00:02:42.827 million in revenue and I just couldn't get it past, get it over that hump. 00:02:43.187 --> 00:02:44.777 And I'd been working on it for so long. 00:02:44.777 --> 00:02:47.237 I like had a business partner who then stepped away from the 00:02:47.237 --> 00:02:50.477 business and just, I just didn't have any energy left on it, man. 00:02:50.477 --> 00:02:54.287 So I got fortunate enough to sell it to a, a micro private equity company that 00:02:54.287 --> 00:02:55.907 owned one of our largest, customers. 00:02:56.222 --> 00:03:00.032 And, yeah, and Editor Ninja was just like, I needed something to kind of reinvigorate 00:03:00.032 --> 00:03:04.352 me on work and kind of had this idea and had been blogging for a long time and 00:03:04.352 --> 00:03:06.712 knew a lot of content agencies and, yeah. 00:03:06.712 --> 00:03:09.832 And so just, and I, I know Russ from Design Pickle and was like, 00:03:09.832 --> 00:03:10.852 I wonder if this could work. 00:03:10.852 --> 00:03:12.862 Like that model could work in this space. 00:03:14.272 --> 00:03:16.582 So I launched it and just decided to see what it could be. 00:03:17.011 --> 00:03:19.231 Matt: Do you remember specifically that burnout? 00:03:19.231 --> 00:03:21.271 Because I think it hits everybody, right? 00:03:21.271 --> 00:03:23.121 Like, hits me multiple times a day. 00:03:23.631 --> 00:03:26.911 I just wanna like end, you know, all the content stuff that I do. 00:03:27.461 --> 00:03:31.181 but I think it, you know, sort of varies depending on whatever, like 00:03:31.181 --> 00:03:34.691 those, it's, it's internal stress, but external stresses in, in terms of like. 00:03:35.186 --> 00:03:37.856 It's tough running a business that can get you going. 00:03:38.226 --> 00:03:42.696 it's tough building the workflows, finding the product, like optimizing this thing 00:03:42.696 --> 00:03:44.736 and repeating that year after year. 00:03:45.036 --> 00:03:48.306 So I think these things can be, you know, dealing with clients of course. 00:03:48.486 --> 00:03:52.986 So I'm wondering, like, do you remember how this sort of like creeped into 00:03:53.016 --> 00:03:54.276 to your entrepreneurial journey? 00:03:54.376 --> 00:03:55.006 early on. 00:03:55.250 --> 00:03:57.050 John: So this was like, this was true burnout. 00:03:57.050 --> 00:04:01.970 Like it took me two plus years to recover from it after I sold that agency. 00:04:02.370 --> 00:04:05.160 for me it was basically like, I'm a growth guy. 00:04:05.280 --> 00:04:06.210 I mean, I'm a marketing guy. 00:04:06.210 --> 00:04:08.040 It's like it's what I do and I spent. 00:04:08.640 --> 00:04:12.540 Years and hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to get the thing 00:04:12.540 --> 00:04:14.700 to grow, and it just wouldn't. 00:04:14.700 --> 00:04:17.580 And basically what I realized after the fact was like we had, and 00:04:17.580 --> 00:04:21.090 part of it was like we had so many agencies wanting leads from us, and 00:04:21.090 --> 00:04:23.250 I couldn't, I couldn't fulfill it. 00:04:23.370 --> 00:04:25.770 Like I, I couldn't figure out how to generate more leads. 00:04:26.190 --> 00:04:28.770 What I realized after the fact, after I kind of came out of the 00:04:28.770 --> 00:04:31.740 fog of, you know, all of it was. 00:04:32.430 --> 00:04:36.540 The economics of that business shifted under my feet through the pandemic, 00:04:36.750 --> 00:04:38.250 and I didn't, I couldn't see it. 00:04:38.430 --> 00:04:41.910 I didn't realize it, so it just got so much more expensive to generate leads. 00:04:41.910 --> 00:04:43.290 People were so much more skeptical. 00:04:43.290 --> 00:04:44.670 It got so much more competitive. 00:04:44.670 --> 00:04:48.390 I mean, every Tom, Dick and Harry like has a lead generation 00:04:48.390 --> 00:04:49.680 company even at this point, right? 00:04:49.680 --> 00:04:51.480 So like everyone was saying like, we can do this. 00:04:51.480 --> 00:04:53.430 They're promising the world, they're charging nothing. 00:04:53.430 --> 00:04:54.210 They couldn't deliver. 00:04:55.290 --> 00:04:59.100 And I was, I just, I was just frustrated, you know, constantly frustrated. 00:04:59.100 --> 00:05:00.150 We tried a bunch of different things. 00:05:00.150 --> 00:05:03.150 I launched a course which added some, like thousands of dollars in revenue. 00:05:03.150 --> 00:05:06.120 We launched a low end like lead offer, like all this stuff. 00:05:06.810 --> 00:05:09.240 But it was, it was, I was just doing all these things really 00:05:09.240 --> 00:05:10.410 just to keep the business steady. 00:05:10.990 --> 00:05:13.090 and it just wouldn't it nothing like. 00:05:13.585 --> 00:05:14.515 Nothing grew it. 00:05:14.635 --> 00:05:16.735 And I just, I couldn't do it anymore. 00:05:16.735 --> 00:05:18.385 I was just so, I was so done. 00:05:18.835 --> 00:05:22.915 So yeah, so I got fortunate enough to, to sell it and then moved 00:05:22.915 --> 00:05:24.355 full-time onto Editor Ninja. 00:05:24.655 --> 00:05:28.285 and yeah, it, in the time between like selling Credo and moving full-time 00:05:28.285 --> 00:05:30.715 onto Editor Ninja Che, GBT launched. 00:05:30.805 --> 00:05:34.255 So it, like, it changed the game, but we can get into that. 00:05:34.596 --> 00:05:38.076 Matt: And I definitely wanna get into the chat, GPT and AI stuff. 00:05:38.276 --> 00:05:42.956 I think for the folks in the WordPress space, oftentimes like the challenges 00:05:42.956 --> 00:05:46.496 of running a business, whether it's like a small freelance agency space, 00:05:46.556 --> 00:05:52.436 business or a small plugin, we really kinda like fall in love with the process, 00:05:52.586 --> 00:05:55.526 which also makes it really hard to. 00:05:56.801 --> 00:05:58.271 The process, the technology, the community. 00:05:58.271 --> 00:06:01.961 We just, you know, I think a lot of people just like romanticize this space 00:06:01.961 --> 00:06:03.221 because we've been in it for so long. 00:06:03.221 --> 00:06:05.441 We've been building this business for so long, whatever. 00:06:05.861 --> 00:06:09.851 And, it's hard to recognize when things aren't growing, 00:06:09.851 --> 00:06:11.741 when that failure is happening. 00:06:11.741 --> 00:06:13.931 We kinda feel it, but we aren't recognizing it. 00:06:13.931 --> 00:06:14.801 Or the burnout. 00:06:14.801 --> 00:06:14.951 Right. 00:06:14.951 --> 00:06:17.141 It doesn't, failure and challenges. 00:06:17.141 --> 00:06:19.061 I just wanna make sure there's two distinct paths there. 00:06:19.511 --> 00:06:21.461 So do you remember like this distinct. 00:06:22.586 --> 00:06:24.836 Inflection point in your journey where you're like, oh yeah, this 00:06:24.836 --> 00:06:26.006 is, this is actually hitting. 00:06:26.006 --> 00:06:29.216 Was it like you looking at the balance sheet going, oh, this is not like 00:06:29.216 --> 00:06:32.786 working as a business, or was it like something else that was happening? 00:06:32.989 --> 00:06:34.609 John: I would say it's much deeper than that. 00:06:34.609 --> 00:06:38.659 I'd say it's actually when what you want it to be and what you want it 00:06:38.659 --> 00:06:41.359 to mean in your life isn't reality. 00:06:41.869 --> 00:06:44.539 What I mean by that is like, so there are, I mean, there are a lot of, I know a lot 00:06:44.539 --> 00:06:47.509 of developers, I know a lot of the, like the, you know, big WordPress like, you 00:06:47.509 --> 00:06:52.399 know, plugin creators and all that, and a lot of 'em, they're like, yo, I'm happy. 00:06:52.399 --> 00:06:54.649 Like, this thing's making me 150 KA year. 00:06:54.649 --> 00:06:56.209 I don't have to deal with anybody else. 00:06:56.209 --> 00:06:57.499 Like, it's pretty automated. 00:06:57.499 --> 00:06:59.209 I can build some features and all of that. 00:06:59.209 --> 00:07:00.829 I can do a little bit of marketing when I feel like it. 00:07:01.429 --> 00:07:02.149 And I'm good. 00:07:02.299 --> 00:07:02.779 Right? 00:07:02.869 --> 00:07:05.899 And if that, if that's you, like, awesome, guess what? 00:07:05.899 --> 00:07:07.309 You've won, like you've won the game. 00:07:07.519 --> 00:07:13.369 But if it's at 150 KA year and you want it to be at 15 million a year and 00:07:13.369 --> 00:07:15.049 you have no idea how to get it there, 00:07:17.119 --> 00:07:18.859 probably time to burn the boats. 00:07:18.919 --> 00:07:22.039 You know, and, or, or not even not burn the boats in terms of like, go 00:07:22.039 --> 00:07:25.459 all in on it necessarily, but like, might be time to, to do something else, 00:07:25.459 --> 00:07:29.689 to like, you know, to shut it down or to realign your expectations, right? 00:07:30.199 --> 00:07:33.439 Because, because Credo was like half a million-ish a year in revenue, which was 00:07:33.439 --> 00:07:37.909 great, but I wanted it to be 5 million a year and I couldn't get it there. 00:07:37.999 --> 00:07:41.959 And so that was like, that disconnect is what really, like did it for me. 00:07:42.049 --> 00:07:46.429 You know, I'm not like, I'm, I'm not happy just making 150 KA year. 00:07:46.429 --> 00:07:49.099 You know, I wanna be way more successful than that and like that 00:07:49.099 --> 00:07:50.809 vehicle wasn't gonna get me there. 00:07:51.094 --> 00:07:56.614 So Editor Ninja might, you know, at least like the, the possibility of it 00:07:56.614 --> 00:08:01.834 getting there was way more attractive than the, you know, the, the reality 00:08:01.834 --> 00:08:03.544 that Credo was not gonna get me there. 00:08:03.802 --> 00:08:08.722 Matt: So as a former agency owner for a decade, like I totally can 00:08:08.722 --> 00:08:12.892 see like where systems break down or you have no systems at all. 00:08:12.942 --> 00:08:17.502 there's no process, there's no optimization of like finding clients, 00:08:17.562 --> 00:08:22.392 pre-sell clients onboard, clients start to build a project, iterate on the 00:08:22.872 --> 00:08:24.702 support, launch, all of this stuff. 00:08:25.407 --> 00:08:28.677 I think this is what's so appealing about a product I service or simply 00:08:28.677 --> 00:08:32.247 just like working on the business instead of working in the business. 00:08:32.247 --> 00:08:38.937 To use a cliche phrase, but I'm curious how much like going into 00:08:38.937 --> 00:08:41.457 Editor Ninja versus Credo I. 00:08:42.192 --> 00:08:46.062 Where you felt like, well, if I make this like a product I service, or I at least 00:08:46.062 --> 00:08:50.262 build these systems around it, I'll, I'll, I'll be able to be happier and, 00:08:50.712 --> 00:08:53.302 and more, successful with this business. 00:08:53.302 --> 00:08:56.812 Like when you went into Editor Ninja, how much of that was on your mind? 00:08:56.812 --> 00:08:56.842 I. 00:08:57.310 --> 00:08:58.930 John: Yeah, it's kind of a combination of that. 00:08:58.930 --> 00:09:01.210 And I would actually say that productization is much more about 00:09:01.210 --> 00:09:04.330 how you deliver the thing rather than like how you price it and all of that. 00:09:04.780 --> 00:09:08.770 Productization also does not, and this is a common misconception, is productization 00:09:08.770 --> 00:09:14.290 does not cut off the possibility of doing custom work as well, right? 00:09:14.530 --> 00:09:17.170 Like, 'cause we have, you know, we have our pricing set out, but we have 00:09:17.170 --> 00:09:19.660 people that come to us and they're like, Hey, I need a quarter million 00:09:19.660 --> 00:09:21.310 words a month for the next four months. 00:09:21.940 --> 00:09:22.690 I'll quote that. 00:09:22.690 --> 00:09:23.230 That's fine. 00:09:23.230 --> 00:09:23.500 Right. 00:09:23.500 --> 00:09:28.150 And like, you know, and, and we, we've had some of those and so I can do that. 00:09:28.150 --> 00:09:31.780 And so I basically, I have like an enterprise like offering, right? 00:09:31.780 --> 00:09:35.230 It's like you have something big, something custom, let's chat about it. 00:09:35.770 --> 00:09:39.490 So, but for us, but productization is all about just how you, how you deliver 00:09:39.490 --> 00:09:43.180 it at scale, but also like your pricing should mean that it's profitable. 00:09:43.610 --> 00:09:45.980 I think for a lot of agencies though, it's two things. 00:09:45.980 --> 00:09:48.140 One is they need to define. 00:09:48.560 --> 00:09:50.450 What they do and who they do it for. 00:09:50.450 --> 00:09:52.490 And I'm, I'm, I'll be completely honest, Matt, I'm going 00:09:52.490 --> 00:09:53.420 through this process right now. 00:09:53.420 --> 00:09:57.700 It's like we've gotten to, mid to high six figures a year with Editor Ninja 00:09:57.700 --> 00:09:59.290 right now in just about a couple years. 00:09:59.290 --> 00:10:01.840 So I've kind of gotten to the point where Credo got to, and so now 00:10:01.840 --> 00:10:05.730 it's like, okay, who do we best serve and what, what do they want 00:10:05.730 --> 00:10:06.840 and what are they willing to pay? 00:10:07.455 --> 00:10:09.825 So I'm, I'm literally going through that right now over the last couple 00:10:09.825 --> 00:10:12.225 of weeks, talking to a lot of like agency owners and marketing 00:10:12.225 --> 00:10:13.695 leaders and, and that kind of thing. 00:10:14.235 --> 00:10:16.545 so there, there's that, like you need to focus down on like what 00:10:16.545 --> 00:10:17.865 specifically do they wanna buy? 00:10:17.895 --> 00:10:19.125 How do they wanna buy it, right? 00:10:19.125 --> 00:10:20.805 And then how can you deliver that at scale? 00:10:21.255 --> 00:10:22.785 But for a lot of agencies, I. 00:10:23.295 --> 00:10:25.905 They need to differentiate themselves from others, right? 00:10:25.905 --> 00:10:30.405 If you're just a WordPress agency working on, you know, B2B websites, like you're 00:10:30.405 --> 00:10:33.255 not differentiated at all, your pricing's gonna become a race to the bottom. 00:10:33.555 --> 00:10:35.925 You gotta figure out who do you provide the most value for, 00:10:35.985 --> 00:10:37.395 and then your prices can go up. 00:10:37.795 --> 00:10:41.245 and so really for most agencies, it's not about cutting cost necessarily. 00:10:41.245 --> 00:10:44.845 'cause what I see is, especially a lot of small agencies, they, they 00:10:44.845 --> 00:10:47.935 can't, they can't cut people and keep delivering work and all that, right? 00:10:47.935 --> 00:10:48.985 So what happens? 00:10:50.110 --> 00:10:52.870 You need to raise your prices so you can get that margin in place. 00:10:52.870 --> 00:10:54.490 And that comes through messaging changes. 00:10:54.490 --> 00:10:57.130 It comes through targeting people that have more budget, that kind of thing. 00:10:57.130 --> 00:11:01.060 And I, I get the like, but I wanna help the little guy like, yeah, me, me too. 00:11:01.060 --> 00:11:03.010 But like they, they don't really have any money. 00:11:03.010 --> 00:11:06.400 And, and I mean, you and I both know, like the people that have the, the 00:11:06.400 --> 00:11:10.180 lowest amount of the, the least money they are gonna be, they're gonna want 00:11:10.180 --> 00:11:12.670 the most, they're gonna need everything 'cause it's their last dollar. 00:11:12.670 --> 00:11:13.570 It has to work. 00:11:13.960 --> 00:11:15.520 And they're, they're gonna be the quickest to churn. 00:11:16.090 --> 00:11:16.450 So. 00:11:17.545 --> 00:11:19.735 As much as like, I wanna help out the little guy as well. 00:11:19.735 --> 00:11:22.645 Like the big guys are the ones that can pay the value it the most. 00:11:22.985 --> 00:11:27.275 and so, you know, you kind of gotta pick which one you wanna focus on. 00:11:27.742 --> 00:11:30.142 Matt: Alright, we're kind of like halfway through the episode right 00:11:30.142 --> 00:11:34.492 now and I want, and I realize I haven't defined what Editor Ninja is. 00:11:34.492 --> 00:11:36.472 So what is Editor Ninja? 00:11:36.472 --> 00:11:37.462 What's the value prop? 00:11:37.462 --> 00:11:37.492 I. 00:11:37.736 --> 00:11:39.836 John: Yeah, so we're a content editing and writing company. 00:11:39.936 --> 00:11:42.876 we started just focusing on editing, so companies that 00:11:42.876 --> 00:11:44.346 are already producing content. 00:11:44.376 --> 00:11:48.846 so it usually means they're producing 20, 40, 60 plus articles a month. 00:11:48.896 --> 00:11:52.196 we've, we have some that are doing more than that and they. 00:11:52.606 --> 00:11:55.756 Either have like one in-house editor and they can't handle all the 00:11:55.756 --> 00:11:58.576 volume, or they sign on a big client and they can no longer handle the 00:11:58.576 --> 00:12:01.126 volume or their editor left and they can no longer handle the volume. 00:12:01.576 --> 00:12:02.806 Those are our best customers. 00:12:02.806 --> 00:12:05.086 People that come in and they're like, we've never worked with an editor before. 00:12:05.086 --> 00:12:07.336 I'm like, I don't, I don't know if we're the right fit for you. 00:12:07.336 --> 00:12:07.576 Right? 00:12:07.576 --> 00:12:10.366 Like, go hire a couple freelancers and, and, and then come back to us, right? 00:12:10.366 --> 00:12:14.176 So we're kind of that middle stage between like freelancers and like having someone 00:12:14.206 --> 00:12:16.966 or someone's full-time in-house, and then usually the ones that have someone 00:12:16.966 --> 00:12:18.586 full-time in-house then need the support. 00:12:18.946 --> 00:12:19.636 That we offer. 00:12:19.946 --> 00:12:20.606 so we do that. 00:12:20.606 --> 00:12:22.466 It's a lot of like marketing, blog articles, service 00:12:22.466 --> 00:12:24.086 pages, that sort of thing. 00:12:24.446 --> 00:12:28.226 I layered on writing, so blog article writing mainly, about a year ago. 00:12:29.151 --> 00:12:32.031 Just 'cause we, we were getting requests for it and, and agencies kind of want 00:12:32.031 --> 00:12:33.561 it all like in one, in one place. 00:12:33.561 --> 00:12:38.061 So we offer human written and also, AI generated with a heavy, like human 00:12:38.061 --> 00:12:40.071 like editing layer on it as well. 00:12:40.371 --> 00:12:41.421 We offer that as well. 00:12:41.471 --> 00:12:43.721 and that side of the business has actually grown really well. 00:12:43.751 --> 00:12:44.652 So at this point, like. 00:12:45.171 --> 00:12:48.411 We mentioned at the start product, I like, you know, started as kind of a 00:12:48.411 --> 00:12:52.041 product eyes, like on demand, you know, unlimited, like the unlimited model. 00:12:52.091 --> 00:12:55.451 editing got us to, to a certain point, but it was tough. 00:12:55.481 --> 00:12:55.871 Churn. 00:12:55.871 --> 00:12:56.861 Churn was really high. 00:12:56.931 --> 00:13:00.621 and so kind of what we've settled down to is like, we'll do that on like, you 00:13:00.621 --> 00:13:02.481 know, a significant volume of content. 00:13:02.531 --> 00:13:05.361 but a lot of people want an editor to work directly in their, in 00:13:05.361 --> 00:13:06.651 their already established services. 00:13:06.651 --> 00:13:08.481 So we have what we call a dedicated editor. 00:13:08.481 --> 00:13:09.081 So basically it's. 00:13:09.526 --> 00:13:10.456 Kinda an hourly model. 00:13:10.456 --> 00:13:11.926 You buy by a chunk of hours. 00:13:11.926 --> 00:13:14.086 And then if you go over that, then we basically bill by the hour. 00:13:14.276 --> 00:13:17.246 and then on the writing side, you know, very, very similar sort of thing. 00:13:17.306 --> 00:13:20.276 So you give us the brief, you give us the keywords you're going after, 00:13:20.366 --> 00:13:21.716 give us the style guide, all of that. 00:13:21.906 --> 00:13:25.656 and then we go and, and write it and put it to our human editing layer as well. 00:13:26.103 --> 00:13:29.013 Matt: Alright, so I have to admit, for all of my WordPress career, 00:13:29.013 --> 00:13:33.003 going back to my agency and then working at Pagely and podcast hosting 00:13:33.003 --> 00:13:37.023 company, and now at Gravity Forms, I often hear marketing teams, clients 00:13:37.023 --> 00:13:39.693 and myself say, I need a writer. 00:13:39.723 --> 00:13:41.343 I need somebody to create content. 00:13:41.343 --> 00:13:42.273 Put it on a page. 00:13:42.273 --> 00:13:46.623 And hopefully that helps us rank an SEO and informs our customers 00:13:46.623 --> 00:13:47.823 and our potential customers. 00:13:48.303 --> 00:13:52.323 I never hear anybody ask or look for, I need an editor. 00:13:52.968 --> 00:13:53.748 To assist. 00:13:53.868 --> 00:13:57.558 So what's the value prop to get somebody to say, oh, I need an editor now. 00:13:57.558 --> 00:14:00.798 Like you spending time convincing them they need an editor, or are they 00:14:00.798 --> 00:14:02.173 coming through the doors these days? 00:14:02.704 --> 00:14:06.604 . John: Yeah, I mean, they do need words on a page, so like, I wouldn't, I, I wouldn't 00:14:06.604 --> 00:14:10.384 say that that's not a, a thing, and that's actually part of why I, I launched the 00:14:10.384 --> 00:14:14.644 writing side, but on the editing side, basically what it comes down to is I. 00:14:15.529 --> 00:14:17.839 Is your content, is it correct? 00:14:17.869 --> 00:14:18.859 Is it updated? 00:14:18.919 --> 00:14:19.889 Is it, yeah. 00:14:19.889 --> 00:14:21.089 Is it, is it correct? 00:14:21.089 --> 00:14:22.079 Basically is the big thing. 00:14:22.079 --> 00:14:23.189 Like is it on brand? 00:14:23.189 --> 00:14:25.979 So are all of your headings formatted the same? 00:14:25.979 --> 00:14:29.529 Like, you know, is it free of typos, like are commas where they should be? 00:14:29.529 --> 00:14:30.099 All of that. 00:14:30.099 --> 00:14:35.319 And really those are the details that when you're writing you really don't see. 00:14:35.589 --> 00:14:38.169 But those are the ones that can make or break. 00:14:38.494 --> 00:14:41.374 basically the, the performance of that content, not necessarily 00:14:41.374 --> 00:14:42.784 from like a ranking perspective. 00:14:42.784 --> 00:14:44.524 And I think too many people are still too focused on like, 00:14:44.524 --> 00:14:45.874 is it going to rank in Google? 00:14:45.874 --> 00:14:49.354 Like, yeah, that's important, but like if it ranks in Google and then they come and 00:14:49.354 --> 00:14:52.834 it's unclear what you do and it's unclear what the, your arguments are, unclear what 00:14:52.834 --> 00:14:55.924 you're trying to say, and you've got typos and unfinished thoughts and all of that. 00:14:56.279 --> 00:14:57.779 That content's not gonna convert for you. 00:14:57.779 --> 00:14:58.979 And so it's basically worthless. 00:14:58.979 --> 00:15:01.199 So that's where an editor comes in and basically about like, Hey, this, 00:15:01.259 --> 00:15:02.549 this doesn't really make sense. 00:15:02.699 --> 00:15:04.169 We should have an internal link here. 00:15:04.259 --> 00:15:05.729 We should get an expert quote here. 00:15:05.729 --> 00:15:06.719 Like that sort of thing. 00:15:07.009 --> 00:15:09.979 and that's where content really like, goes to the next level and shines. 00:15:10.009 --> 00:15:13.819 'cause anyone can crank out like a bunch of generic crap with AI these days. 00:15:13.819 --> 00:15:14.179 Right? 00:15:14.389 --> 00:15:19.699 So what stands out is the stuff that's actually like first person, you know, 00:15:19.699 --> 00:15:23.389 it's, it's, it's clear what you're trying to say, has experts in it, all of that. 00:15:23.389 --> 00:15:24.829 And that's where an editor really comes in. 00:15:25.112 --> 00:15:28.612 Matt: Again, I'll use the editor ninja page as a, a learning device. 00:15:28.662 --> 00:15:31.752 for the, for the listeners, one of the things I really like is 00:15:31.752 --> 00:15:34.542 you just can't go to your pricing page and just sign up, right? 00:15:34.542 --> 00:15:37.212 There's no, just like, buy now, put your credit card in. 00:15:37.212 --> 00:15:39.702 It's, have a call, have a discussion. 00:15:40.362 --> 00:15:41.742 Why, why do you have that? 00:15:41.742 --> 00:15:43.392 And not just a quick sign up. 00:15:43.726 --> 00:15:45.856 John: Because people wanna know who's doing it for them. 00:15:46.196 --> 00:15:48.476 and a lot of people have, I mean, everyone thinks that they're 00:15:48.476 --> 00:15:49.646 a special snowflake, right? 00:15:49.646 --> 00:15:52.946 Like, I've talked to enough people at this point that I'm like, I, there's nothing 00:15:52.946 --> 00:15:55.676 that you're gonna come to me with, with content that I haven't heard before. 00:15:55.856 --> 00:15:57.866 I mean, I've been in the space for 15 years, so like. 00:15:59.501 --> 00:16:03.071 But people want to, they, they want to know, like specifically 00:16:03.071 --> 00:16:04.181 like how does this work? 00:16:04.181 --> 00:16:05.621 Who am I gonna be working with? 00:16:05.621 --> 00:16:06.581 What is my pricing? 00:16:06.581 --> 00:16:07.721 Like, that sort of thing. 00:16:07.991 --> 00:16:13.181 We have had various, like self signup options in the past, but we just got 00:16:13.181 --> 00:16:16.241 a bunch of junk and it was a bunch of spam and it was low quality stuff and 00:16:16.241 --> 00:16:18.401 expectations weren't set and all of that. 00:16:18.401 --> 00:16:22.841 So we just decided, hey, let's just, let's make it a sales led motion. 00:16:22.841 --> 00:16:24.551 Let's actually talk with them about what they need. 00:16:24.551 --> 00:16:26.201 And then basically we have these different like. 00:16:26.606 --> 00:16:28.496 Kind of modules or elements of what we do. 00:16:28.496 --> 00:16:32.366 So like the writing plus editing, we have a few that they're like, we need articles. 00:16:32.366 --> 00:16:36.866 And usually it's like we need 20 some articles over the course of a quarter. 00:16:36.866 --> 00:16:37.256 Right? 00:16:37.256 --> 00:16:38.876 Like I, I thought it was gonna be neater. 00:16:38.876 --> 00:16:40.886 One of my hypotheses at the start was like, people are producing 00:16:40.886 --> 00:16:44.336 like four or eight or 12 articles a month, and so that's like kinda the 00:16:44.336 --> 00:16:45.656 consistent editing that they need. 00:16:46.196 --> 00:16:47.336 What I've found is actually like. 00:16:48.221 --> 00:16:49.511 It's more spiky than that. 00:16:49.511 --> 00:16:52.271 So they'll do a bunch for like three months and then they'll kind of back off 00:16:52.271 --> 00:16:55.691 for a few months and they'll do more three months later and, and that kind of thing. 00:16:56.441 --> 00:17:01.871 And, but in bigger enterprises, they're also producing other 00:17:01.871 --> 00:17:03.221 content that they need edited. 00:17:03.221 --> 00:17:05.981 So if they're like, Hey, we need, so we have one, one customer in particular, 00:17:06.011 --> 00:17:07.301 I'm thinking of that they need like. 00:17:07.646 --> 00:17:13.826 24 articles within a quarter, but then they also have about another 15,000 00:17:13.826 --> 00:17:17.006 words, a quarter of content that other teams are producing that th that this 00:17:17.006 --> 00:17:18.206 team was responsible for editing. 00:17:18.206 --> 00:17:19.886 So like, we're just gonna send that to you as well. 00:17:20.006 --> 00:17:24.706 So we kind of create like a custom package for them, you know, so, and yeah, so 00:17:24.706 --> 00:17:29.766 it's, it's not as like, as tight as like, You know, 4 95 a month for X article for 00:17:29.766 --> 00:17:31.776 X words per month, that sort of thing. 00:17:31.776 --> 00:17:35.136 Like, then you get into like rollovers and if they've only used like, you 00:17:35.136 --> 00:17:38.616 know, 10,000 of the 15,000, then they're like, well, I'm not using it, 00:17:38.616 --> 00:17:40.026 so I'm just gonna cancel completely. 00:17:40.026 --> 00:17:42.906 I'm like, but you are using 10,000, like, let's go down to 10,000. 00:17:42.906 --> 00:17:43.176 You know? 00:17:43.176 --> 00:17:43.686 I'm like, what? 00:17:43.716 --> 00:17:44.946 Why are we just quitting? 00:17:45.456 --> 00:17:46.386 And it happens all the time. 00:17:46.386 --> 00:17:48.936 So, yeah, I'm, I'm constantly trying to like, overcome that and so we 00:17:48.936 --> 00:17:52.776 find putting together like the custom package, Based off of like our product 00:17:52.776 --> 00:17:56.676 eyes, like delivery and like pricing is what works best for most people and 00:17:56.676 --> 00:17:59.856 especially as we go up market, as we go to like bigger companies, we're mainly 00:18:00.096 --> 00:18:03.426 focusing on companies that are doing two, two and a half million plus a year. 00:18:03.696 --> 00:18:04.776 It's kind of who we're focusing on. 00:18:04.776 --> 00:18:08.406 If you're smaller than that, like we, we can do great work for you. 00:18:08.406 --> 00:18:10.356 We just know that you're probably gonna churn out in three to 00:18:10.356 --> 00:18:12.571 six months when you decide that content isn't what you want to do. 00:18:13.626 --> 00:18:17.076 Which is fine, but it's just also reality of my business and it costs us 00:18:17.076 --> 00:18:21.036 as much to onboard someone that pays us 500 a month and sticks for four 00:18:21.036 --> 00:18:25.986 months as it costs us to, to, you know, onboard someone that is paying us $5,000 00:18:25.986 --> 00:18:27.396 a month and stays for three years. 00:18:27.666 --> 00:18:29.706 So it's a matter of focus at this point. 00:18:30.074 --> 00:18:33.674 Matt: I'm gonna try to find the best way to phrase this, but I like what 00:18:33.674 --> 00:18:36.514 you said about, you know, people who are, you have a certain, you know, 00:18:36.574 --> 00:18:40.444 million dollar, multimillion dollar threshold that you look at to say, 00:18:40.444 --> 00:18:41.854 this is the right client for me. 00:18:41.854 --> 00:18:42.244 When I. 00:18:42.919 --> 00:18:46.129 You know, somebody could be doing a quarter, a million dollars 00:18:46.129 --> 00:18:50.089 a year, and they're like, I need four blog posts a month. 00:18:50.569 --> 00:18:51.469 Like, I need that. 00:18:51.739 --> 00:18:55.519 Like, why wouldn't you be a good fit for Editor Ninja? 00:18:56.029 --> 00:19:00.049 What, what do you think they're missing in their business that 00:19:00.889 --> 00:19:05.329 makes you want to work with a multimillion dollar revenue per year? 00:19:05.519 --> 00:19:06.239 business. 00:19:06.834 --> 00:19:09.414 that, you know, the smaller companies though, they need content. 00:19:09.414 --> 00:19:11.364 They, they're, they're missing something. 00:19:11.364 --> 00:19:12.324 What's the something? 00:19:12.453 --> 00:19:13.653 John: it's a great, it's a great question. 00:19:13.653 --> 00:19:15.603 One I've been thinking about a lot recently actually. 00:19:16.263 --> 00:19:20.193 And the reason is because the person who's doing quarter million 00:19:20.193 --> 00:19:22.953 a year, they two things, one. 00:19:23.928 --> 00:19:27.408 They don't yet know what works to grow their business because if they did, they 00:19:27.408 --> 00:19:28.788 would be at two and a half million a year. 00:19:29.418 --> 00:19:31.398 So they're trying out a bunch of things. 00:19:31.728 --> 00:19:35.928 And also kind of depending on who the company is, they're compet, 00:19:35.958 --> 00:19:37.368 who they're competing against. 00:19:37.368 --> 00:19:39.378 Like usually, I mean, especially like in the WordPress space, let's 00:19:39.378 --> 00:19:40.338 just talk about the WordPress space. 00:19:40.578 --> 00:19:43.638 They're competing against post status and WP Beginner and all these sites 00:19:43.638 --> 00:19:46.008 that like content is their business. 00:19:46.098 --> 00:19:49.908 Four blog articles a month isn't gonna do anything for you. 00:19:50.448 --> 00:19:51.378 You need like. 00:19:51.843 --> 00:19:54.633 400 blog articles published and four articles a month is gonna 00:19:54.633 --> 00:19:57.633 take you a hundred months, seven years, something like that. 00:19:57.813 --> 00:19:59.113 Six years, seven years, yeah. 00:19:59.113 --> 00:20:01.523 To, to produce all of that, content. 00:20:02.363 --> 00:20:04.613 It, it, it's just not gonna be effective for you. 00:20:04.883 --> 00:20:06.563 You know, there, there are other channels that are gonna be more 00:20:06.563 --> 00:20:09.773 effective for you to get you to a million, 2 million a year than content. 00:20:09.938 --> 00:20:11.768 And so what we see is people will come in and they're like, I 00:20:11.768 --> 00:20:12.998 need four blog articles a month. 00:20:13.208 --> 00:20:13.868 We'll do it. 00:20:13.868 --> 00:20:16.598 And then after a few months they're like, I'm not seeing an uptick in traffic. 00:20:16.598 --> 00:20:18.098 I'm like, yeah, 'cause you're not doing enough. 00:20:18.098 --> 00:20:19.718 You also don't have the budget to do more. 00:20:19.778 --> 00:20:22.088 And so they turn and they're like, oh, we're gonna go try ads. 00:20:22.388 --> 00:20:24.788 So I've just seen this time and time and time again. 00:20:24.788 --> 00:20:26.888 And here's the thing, Matt, I do it too. 00:20:27.788 --> 00:20:28.898 I do it with my own business. 00:20:28.898 --> 00:20:31.058 We're like, you know, five, 600 KA year. 00:20:31.058 --> 00:20:34.418 It's like we've gotten like a lot more Google ads at at one point. 00:20:34.418 --> 00:20:36.788 And when we try LinkedIn ads and we'll try con like. 00:20:37.628 --> 00:20:41.243 We're, we're like an A, DHD squirrel, you know, versus co versus 00:20:41.243 --> 00:20:43.913 companies that are at like, I call my 6-year-old that as well by the way. 00:20:44.153 --> 00:20:47.723 versus like companies that are at like two and a half, three, 5 million a year. 00:20:47.753 --> 00:20:51.203 Like they know what's worked to get them to that point and 00:20:51.203 --> 00:20:52.403 they have a defined budget. 00:20:52.403 --> 00:20:54.233 They're not like, ah, we're gonna try this thing. 00:20:54.233 --> 00:20:56.033 And like, how cheap can I get blog articles? 00:20:56.033 --> 00:20:59.183 They're like, Hey, we've got a hundred grand a year to 00:20:59.183 --> 00:21:00.443 spend on content marketing. 00:21:01.058 --> 00:21:04.508 And it's gonna be some combination of like, content being like shorter 00:21:04.508 --> 00:21:07.088 blog articles, top of funnel stuff, middle of funnel stuff, 00:21:07.088 --> 00:21:09.188 downloadables, like, like all of that. 00:21:09.308 --> 00:21:13.388 And they, and they usually have someone and, and really like, it's 00:21:13.388 --> 00:21:18.278 that revenue line, but also they have someone in charge of content. 00:21:18.278 --> 00:21:22.298 So it's not a founder that's like doing 12 other jobs, but like they have a 00:21:22.298 --> 00:21:26.558 head of content or a content manager or someone like that, that it is their job 00:21:26.558 --> 00:21:28.268 to use content to grow the business. 00:21:28.793 --> 00:21:31.823 And so if they have that person, that person is focused on that thing. 00:21:32.273 --> 00:21:33.773 On that thing specifically. 00:21:34.013 --> 00:21:36.323 And so they're gonna be much more reliable, they're gonna have a 00:21:36.323 --> 00:21:39.413 better strategy, they're gonna be much more communicative versus 00:21:39.413 --> 00:21:42.233 like, we'll get ghosted by founders for like two months, right? 00:21:42.233 --> 00:21:43.103 We're still producing account. 00:21:43.103 --> 00:21:47.423 We're like, Hey, you're still paying us, but you're also not telling us what to do. 00:21:47.423 --> 00:21:50.843 It'd be like having a full-time developer and then, or or a part-time 00:21:50.843 --> 00:21:52.673 developer that you're paying a retainer. 00:21:52.903 --> 00:21:54.193 And not giving them any work. 00:21:54.253 --> 00:21:55.153 It's the same thing. 00:21:55.153 --> 00:21:58.303 So especially like more like technical founders and that 00:21:58.303 --> 00:22:02.053 kind of thing, they, they just, they don't know how to value it. 00:22:02.053 --> 00:22:04.603 They don't know how to like, you know, give direction and all that. 00:22:04.603 --> 00:22:07.513 So once a company gets bigger, they have someone who actually does. 00:22:07.573 --> 00:22:09.193 So that's why we're focusing down on them. 00:22:09.313 --> 00:22:11.863 Plus those bigger companies are willing to sign longer term contracts. 00:22:11.863 --> 00:22:13.633 They willing to, you know, pay more upfront. 00:22:13.883 --> 00:22:16.163 they recognize they're gonna have to give more feedback from the start. 00:22:16.163 --> 00:22:18.233 Like they're not trying to like abdicate it and be like, just 00:22:18.233 --> 00:22:19.463 go do my content marketing. 00:22:19.463 --> 00:22:19.703 Right? 00:22:19.703 --> 00:22:22.163 They're like, you are a piece of our production puzzle. 00:22:23.865 --> 00:22:27.075 Matt: Using myself as another prime example of, running an 00:22:27.075 --> 00:22:31.005 agency, trying to find ways to do product or productized service. 00:22:31.335 --> 00:22:33.855 I think one of the things we fall into is like as soon as you get to 00:22:33.855 --> 00:22:39.285 the bigger, well, not everybody, me specifically, you could fill in the lines. 00:22:39.795 --> 00:22:42.375 as soon as you go into the, into the bigger clients, there's, 00:22:42.615 --> 00:22:45.315 there's more people, there's more departments, there's more staff. 00:22:46.125 --> 00:22:50.265 And oftentimes I found that there are more requirements, like more demands anyway, 00:22:50.775 --> 00:22:54.865 where, you know, you might have a brand, that you're working with that has like a 00:22:54.865 --> 00:22:57.595 whole YouTube side of the marketing team. 00:22:57.595 --> 00:22:57.775 Right? 00:22:57.775 --> 00:22:59.575 We have a, a team who just does YouTube. 00:22:59.575 --> 00:23:03.655 We have a team who just does TikTok and Instagram reels and, and things like that. 00:23:03.655 --> 00:23:05.515 We have, we have writers on, on staff. 00:23:05.515 --> 00:23:06.955 That's why we're hiring you for editing. 00:23:07.870 --> 00:23:11.770 And what I've found is, you know, multi-layers of, of management and, 00:23:11.770 --> 00:23:16.030 and marketing, they, they eventually go, well, can we bring on, bring 00:23:16.030 --> 00:23:17.530 on Editor Ninja into the room? 00:23:17.530 --> 00:23:21.010 I, I wanna make sure that we're all on the same page and I found 00:23:21.010 --> 00:23:22.450 that there's just a higher touch. 00:23:22.480 --> 00:23:22.660 Right. 00:23:22.660 --> 00:23:25.060 You're, you're charging more 'cause you're probably an agency. 00:23:25.510 --> 00:23:26.770 So how do you wrestle with that? 00:23:26.770 --> 00:23:29.770 Like, has that happened to you when you start working with those bigger customers? 00:23:30.220 --> 00:23:34.360 I go, you know, we're glad that you do editing and you do writing, but we, we 00:23:34.360 --> 00:23:37.960 need you to be on the all hands meeting at least once a quarter, whatever. 00:23:38.050 --> 00:23:38.230 Ha. 00:23:38.290 --> 00:23:40.180 Have you run into that and, and how do you deal with it? 00:23:40.415 --> 00:23:40.705 John: Yeah. 00:23:41.410 --> 00:23:42.040 Yeah. 00:23:42.500 --> 00:23:43.790 You know, it's interesting. 00:23:43.790 --> 00:23:47.480 We've actually never been asked to like get on a call with our YouTube 00:23:47.480 --> 00:23:50.750 person, get on a call with our LinkedIn person or something like that. 00:23:51.380 --> 00:23:57.230 Mainly because the person that has hired us is, is the strategist. 00:23:57.230 --> 00:23:57.680 Like I. 00:23:58.115 --> 00:24:00.545 We are just, we are purely a production shop. 00:24:00.545 --> 00:24:02.135 Like we don't do any strategy. 00:24:02.135 --> 00:24:05.615 We are not your content marketing agency that's putting together your 00:24:05.615 --> 00:24:09.395 keyword strategy and optimizing your SEO and all of that. 00:24:09.395 --> 00:24:11.735 Like, no, you give us the requirements and we do it for 00:24:11.735 --> 00:24:12.965 you and we send it back to you. 00:24:12.965 --> 00:24:15.725 And we do it on time and we do it well and we charge a fair price. 00:24:16.145 --> 00:24:19.355 So yeah, we've actually never been, never been asked for it. 00:24:19.355 --> 00:24:21.245 I think that's kind of what you have to do as well. 00:24:21.245 --> 00:24:23.585 Like if we did say that we did like. 00:24:23.585 --> 00:24:27.715 Content strategy or keyword research and that sort of stuff, I'm sure 00:24:27.715 --> 00:24:30.625 we would get these requests for, you know, for, for the other areas. 00:24:30.625 --> 00:24:34.375 But we haven't just because we, we unabashedly say we are 00:24:34.375 --> 00:24:35.965 a production shop, you know? 00:24:36.595 --> 00:24:40.435 so, and, and, and this is what I've seen from like successful. 00:24:40.715 --> 00:24:43.895 Productized services like Design Pickle and Super Side, and you 00:24:43.895 --> 00:24:46.745 know, a bunch of those is there like, or even like, you know, design 00:24:46.745 --> 00:24:47.855 Joy like Brett had design Joy. 00:24:47.855 --> 00:24:51.335 I don't know Brett personally, but like, you know, he does, he makes a lot of 00:24:51.335 --> 00:24:53.645 money and he's like, I don't do calls. 00:24:53.645 --> 00:24:55.325 I don't do like any of this stuff. 00:24:55.475 --> 00:24:58.295 You add requests to a Trello board and I get it done for you. 00:24:58.445 --> 00:24:58.565 Right. 00:24:58.745 --> 00:25:02.165 It's like just, you have to set those expectations really tight. 00:25:02.450 --> 00:25:06.170 And I'm just, I'm far enough into my journey of like running agencies 00:25:06.170 --> 00:25:08.690 and working at agencies and all of that, that like, I'm willing to say 00:25:08.690 --> 00:25:10.460 like, we do that, we don't do that. 00:25:10.700 --> 00:25:15.220 and I heard, so last week I went to, I bet a lot of the people that are listening 00:25:15.220 --> 00:25:18.940 to this, maybe you yourself, have heard of Alex Homo and, and acquisition.com. 00:25:19.630 --> 00:25:22.660 So I went to the, one of their scaling workshops last week in, in Las Vegas. 00:25:22.660 --> 00:25:23.200 It was great. 00:25:23.890 --> 00:25:26.380 One thing that Alex says I really like is. 00:25:26.740 --> 00:25:31.420 You're always gonna leave money on the table, and the more your business grows, 00:25:31.420 --> 00:25:34.270 the more money you're gonna leave on the table because the opportunities 00:25:34.270 --> 00:25:39.070 are gonna be bigger because you are interacting with more successful people. 00:25:39.700 --> 00:25:46.540 So it comes down to are you focus is actually the volume and size 00:25:46.600 --> 00:25:50.050 of quote unquote opportunities that you're willing to say no to. 00:25:51.265 --> 00:25:54.565 So like someone asked me for a strategy or they asked me to like 00:25:54.565 --> 00:25:58.375 consult with them on SEO 'cause like that's my background and they're 00:25:58.375 --> 00:26:01.225 willing to pay me whatever per month. 00:26:02.695 --> 00:26:07.255 Me saying no to them to focus on Editor Ninja is leave is like that. 00:26:07.255 --> 00:26:08.995 That is money that I could have made. 00:26:09.175 --> 00:26:12.715 But I am choosing to say no to that easy short-term money to say yes to, 00:26:12.715 --> 00:26:14.005 like the bigger, long-term money. 00:26:14.785 --> 00:26:19.345 So you just have to be really, you have to be really clear about what it 00:26:19.345 --> 00:26:24.325 is that you offer and really clear on what it is that you don't offer and 00:26:24.325 --> 00:26:28.795 recognize that people are also gonna ask you for that thing that you don't offer 00:26:29.065 --> 00:26:30.775 and you have to get good at saying no. 00:26:31.750 --> 00:26:35.140 And, and it's not like a like, oh no, I don't do that. 00:26:35.170 --> 00:26:35.590 Right? 00:26:35.590 --> 00:26:39.490 Like, it's more of a like, you know, that's not something that we offer. 00:26:39.540 --> 00:26:43.470 I have some people that I could refer you to, and if you want 00:26:43.470 --> 00:26:44.760 me to refer them to you, great. 00:26:44.790 --> 00:26:46.350 I refer you to them. 00:26:46.350 --> 00:26:47.550 Great, I can do that. 00:26:47.610 --> 00:26:49.350 But that's not something that we offer. 00:26:49.350 --> 00:26:50.310 This is what we offer. 00:26:51.030 --> 00:26:53.670 And if that loses you the deal, it loses you the deal. 00:26:53.670 --> 00:26:56.700 And honestly, like if you hear enough of those, like this 00:26:56.700 --> 00:26:57.750 is why I layered on writing. 00:26:57.780 --> 00:27:00.900 'cause I had people asking me like, can you also write for us? 00:27:00.900 --> 00:27:01.650 Can you also write for us? 00:27:01.650 --> 00:27:02.340 No, we don't do that. 00:27:02.340 --> 00:27:03.270 No, we don't do that. 00:27:03.750 --> 00:27:08.040 And I lost a few big deals with like agencies doing six, eight, $10 00:27:08.040 --> 00:27:12.780 million a year that they didn't sign on with us because we didn't write. 00:27:12.810 --> 00:27:15.390 And then we had a few others that signed on with us and churned because 00:27:15.390 --> 00:27:17.220 the writers that they had weren't good. 00:27:17.550 --> 00:27:20.850 So I'm like, why don't we just bring all this in-house and offer it as kind of 00:27:20.850 --> 00:27:22.230 like a fuller, you know, a fuller suite? 00:27:22.260 --> 00:27:24.480 'cause that's what these bigger like clients seem to want. 00:27:24.830 --> 00:27:25.610 and it's worked very well. 00:27:25.610 --> 00:27:28.910 We've tripled in the last, like 12 months, so like, it's worked very well. 00:27:29.350 --> 00:27:32.470 but it needs to be a very strategic thing. 00:27:32.810 --> 00:27:34.730 and so for us it was like we're writing, we're editing. 00:27:35.240 --> 00:27:38.000 We're writing, you know, and then like we also have our dedicated editor, 00:27:38.000 --> 00:27:39.380 like offering to work in their systems. 00:27:39.380 --> 00:27:41.090 So we can also like upload it. 00:27:41.420 --> 00:27:45.500 And if you give them the, like the Canva templates and all of that, like they could 00:27:45.500 --> 00:27:47.030 create a featured image for you, right? 00:27:47.030 --> 00:27:50.090 They could schedule it like, you know, like we can do these things. 00:27:50.090 --> 00:27:53.750 So we're kind of like expanding, but it's not expanding from like production 00:27:53.750 --> 00:27:57.230 to strategy or from production of content to web development. 00:27:57.530 --> 00:28:02.030 It's, we're fulfilling more of the full, like the full need of content 00:28:02.030 --> 00:28:03.890 production, if that makes sense. 00:28:04.372 --> 00:28:07.542 Matt: Alright, I wanna pull you into this, debate that's been going on recently. 00:28:08.112 --> 00:28:10.482 Sort of crossed over to more than a debate, unfortunately, 00:28:10.482 --> 00:28:14.392 but, the $5,000 website, this is something, or a $5,000 client. 00:28:14.692 --> 00:28:18.272 This is something that, you know, I started this podcast like 15 years ago, 00:28:18.272 --> 00:28:22.202 is like the $500 website and like, how do you, you know, make money with that? 00:28:22.202 --> 00:28:25.892 But over my time, especially working at, at Pagely and, and 00:28:25.892 --> 00:28:28.742 selling into the enterprise, the concept of account-based marketing. 00:28:29.607 --> 00:28:31.797 I've heard a lot of other agency owners talk about this as well. 00:28:31.797 --> 00:28:33.597 Agencies that do, you know. 00:28:34.407 --> 00:28:39.397 Six figure deals at minimum to get into, you know, web development for, for a big 00:28:39.397 --> 00:28:43.567 brand, you know, going downstream and selling something for like 5,000 bucks, 00:28:43.567 --> 00:28:45.787 10,000 bucks just to get in the door. 00:28:45.997 --> 00:28:48.567 And then you branch off, into account based marketing. 00:28:48.567 --> 00:28:52.707 Especially if this, you know, organization has many brands where many 00:28:52.707 --> 00:28:56.367 divisions that you could potentially sell into, kind of feel the same 00:28:56.367 --> 00:28:59.367 way with, small businesses too. 00:28:59.367 --> 00:29:00.762 Like, I think I. 00:29:00.972 --> 00:29:01.962 Small businesses. 00:29:02.022 --> 00:29:04.302 It's not that they don't have the money, it's just that they have to be 00:29:04.302 --> 00:29:09.822 a lot more reserved with the, the cash on hand to invest into like building 00:29:09.822 --> 00:29:11.532 a website or hiring a freelancer. 00:29:12.072 --> 00:29:15.522 So I'm getting, what I'm getting at here is like your take on account 00:29:15.522 --> 00:29:19.332 based marketing or, or account based selling, maybe selling at a lower 00:29:19.332 --> 00:29:25.152 dollar and then adding on the services later without saying like nickel and 00:29:25.152 --> 00:29:28.932 timing somebody, but like, here's the offer, here's the entry offer. 00:29:29.742 --> 00:29:32.022 It's valuable, we're doing the work for you, but you know, 00:29:32.022 --> 00:29:33.972 eventually you could grow this way. 00:29:34.282 --> 00:29:36.562 and it's a lot easier to sell to the customers you already have, 00:29:36.592 --> 00:29:39.352 obviously than acquiring new customers. 00:29:39.352 --> 00:29:42.572 So your thoughts, account based selling and you know, finding 00:29:42.572 --> 00:29:43.682 those opportunities that way. 00:29:43.682 --> 00:29:43.712 I. 00:29:44.094 --> 00:29:45.384 John: No, I'm not fully against it. 00:29:45.384 --> 00:29:48.114 I would say that is great if it is done strategically. 00:29:48.894 --> 00:29:52.494 So like us for example, you know, someone that comes to us like choose 00:29:52.494 --> 00:29:55.074 the example, like someone doing a quarter million a year in revenue. 00:29:55.914 --> 00:29:57.564 They're never gonna go. 00:29:57.774 --> 00:29:59.214 It's not, they're not Disney, right? 00:29:59.214 --> 00:30:03.624 They're never gonna go to, you know, 40 articles a month, 400 articles a month. 00:30:03.654 --> 00:30:04.554 It's just not gonna happen. 00:30:04.554 --> 00:30:05.964 It's just, it's just not there, right? 00:30:06.024 --> 00:30:09.474 And like, I know what my customer acquisition costs are, so it's literally 00:30:09.474 --> 00:30:13.314 gonna take me, you know, nine months of creating four articles a month 00:30:13.314 --> 00:30:16.764 for them, for us to be profitable on that based off of like my cost 00:30:16.764 --> 00:30:20.394 of delivery and my acquisition costs and time spent and, and ops costs and 00:30:20.394 --> 00:30:21.804 like all that, all that stuff, right? 00:30:22.044 --> 00:30:24.534 So if they churn before nine months, I've lost money on that. 00:30:25.204 --> 00:30:27.094 So there's not that chance for expansion. 00:30:27.184 --> 00:30:30.484 But if it's like, Hey, and, and we've done this quite a bit and 00:30:30.484 --> 00:30:33.754 we're like trying to get a lot better at it, is like agency comes to us. 00:30:33.754 --> 00:30:35.884 They're like, we have these three clients that we, like, we 00:30:35.884 --> 00:30:37.954 don't have coverage for anymore. 00:30:37.954 --> 00:30:40.624 Like our account executive left, or our account manager left, or 00:30:40.654 --> 00:30:42.244 editor left, or something like that. 00:30:43.074 --> 00:30:45.894 We'll start there, but I also let them know from the start. 00:30:45.894 --> 00:30:50.124 I'm like, Hey, let's start there, but in 90 days I wanna have a conversation 00:30:50.124 --> 00:30:52.134 about getting all of your accounts right. 00:30:52.374 --> 00:30:53.904 That is, that is fine. 00:30:54.064 --> 00:30:57.004 and if you're a bigger company, I mean, I know Page Lee Paley sold, right? 00:30:57.004 --> 00:30:59.194 Paley got acquired for like a lot, a lot of dollars. 00:30:59.194 --> 00:30:59.524 Right? 00:30:59.674 --> 00:31:01.894 I mean, I see Josh driving is driving his supercar, so like 00:31:02.074 --> 00:31:03.004 sold for a lot of dollars. 00:31:03.034 --> 00:31:03.364 Awesome. 00:31:03.364 --> 00:31:04.624 Like, I mean, phenomenal. 00:31:04.624 --> 00:31:05.554 Like I celebrate that. 00:31:05.554 --> 00:31:06.844 That's absolutely incredible. 00:31:06.844 --> 00:31:07.894 I'm so happy for you guys. 00:31:08.224 --> 00:31:12.424 But, You can probably, you have the funds to do that. 00:31:12.424 --> 00:31:17.314 To do that play strategically to lose money for 90 days, 180 days, even like 00:31:17.314 --> 00:31:21.604 a year on an account like that because you know that it's going to grow and you 00:31:21.604 --> 00:31:23.074 have the infrastructure built to do that. 00:31:23.254 --> 00:31:24.064 That is great. 00:31:24.064 --> 00:31:24.394 Right. 00:31:24.574 --> 00:31:27.964 But like to use your example, if someone box it $5,000 for a 00:31:27.964 --> 00:31:31.054 website, don't lower the price. 00:31:31.324 --> 00:31:33.274 Thinking that they're gonna bring you a bunch more work. 00:31:33.274 --> 00:31:36.154 If it's like one website for an s and b, right? 00:31:36.154 --> 00:31:37.594 Like the price is the price. 00:31:37.804 --> 00:31:39.694 That what I told people was like, the price is the price. 00:31:39.934 --> 00:31:43.384 If you need a, if you need a lower price, we can talk about that. 00:31:43.384 --> 00:31:47.014 But you can't get $5,000 worth of work for 2,500 bucks. 00:31:47.374 --> 00:31:50.254 You can get $2,500 worth of work for 2,500 bucks, right? 00:31:50.254 --> 00:31:51.514 Let's trim back the scope. 00:31:52.129 --> 00:31:55.099 So, but if you need all of these things, the price is five grand. 00:31:55.129 --> 00:31:59.269 You know, if you pay up front and can give us six months to do it, 00:31:59.269 --> 00:32:00.889 maybe I can lower that to 4,500. 00:32:00.889 --> 00:32:01.009 Right? 00:32:01.009 --> 00:32:02.959 So you can like make some concessions like that. 00:32:03.439 --> 00:32:07.009 But yeah, at the end of the day, like this stuff has to be strategic. 00:32:07.009 --> 00:32:10.159 So I'm not saying that like we're not gonna go back down market to, like, I 00:32:10.189 --> 00:32:13.039 used to message a lot more and I'll see if someone comes to us and they're like, 00:32:13.039 --> 00:32:15.829 Hey, I need four articles a month for the next like, you know, six months. 00:32:15.829 --> 00:32:17.179 So it's like 24 articles. 00:32:17.719 --> 00:32:19.249 I can work it so that it works for me. 00:32:19.249 --> 00:32:21.229 So I can recoup a lot of that cash up front, like. 00:32:21.229 --> 00:32:22.639 To, you know, totally fine. 00:32:23.219 --> 00:32:26.519 like, I'm not gonna turn them away, but we've actually just recently started 00:32:26.519 --> 00:32:29.459 messaging bigger, you know, bigger numbers for editing and bigger numbers 00:32:29.459 --> 00:32:31.169 for writing and, and all of that. 00:32:31.799 --> 00:32:34.619 Because if someone comes to us and they're like, they're doing 10 million, 00:32:34.769 --> 00:32:37.319 an agency's doing $10 million a year, and we're talking about four 00:32:37.319 --> 00:32:38.999 articles, they're like, I need 400. 00:32:38.999 --> 00:32:39.869 Can you handle it? 00:32:40.109 --> 00:32:43.559 So some of it is just like the messaging of it that I want bigger companies 00:32:43.559 --> 00:32:46.889 to say like, oh, this like Editor Ninja works with bigger companies. 00:32:47.219 --> 00:32:49.439 And then you're still gonna get the little guys that are like, well, I 00:32:49.439 --> 00:32:51.179 only need four or I only need eight. 00:32:51.439 --> 00:32:53.269 Okay, let's, let's chat about that. 00:32:53.269 --> 00:32:53.599 Right? 00:32:53.899 --> 00:32:57.079 you still get, like, when you niche down, you still get the people that 00:32:57.079 --> 00:32:59.509 like want it to be a good fit for them. 00:32:59.599 --> 00:33:02.629 And then it's just up to me to be like, okay, are we a good fit or not? 00:33:02.629 --> 00:33:03.769 Do we have that capacity? 00:33:03.769 --> 00:33:06.199 'cause if we only have capacity for like four articles at that point, 00:33:06.469 --> 00:33:09.319 and we're trying to like scale or, or we have someone that like, 00:33:09.409 --> 00:33:10.579 you know, could you use more work? 00:33:10.579 --> 00:33:12.379 Or we're trying to get them trained up, or something like that. 00:33:12.379 --> 00:33:15.859 Like, I might sign that on once again strategically because it's, 00:33:15.859 --> 00:33:18.019 it's furthering my business, right? 00:33:18.239 --> 00:33:18.449 but. 00:33:18.689 --> 00:33:22.799 If I'm messaging that we're gonna turn away our best clients, our 00:33:22.799 --> 00:33:25.289 best prospects aren't even gonna contact us because they're like, oh, 00:33:25.289 --> 00:33:26.369 you just worked with little guys. 00:33:26.369 --> 00:33:28.919 I'm like, oh, we actually wanna work with the big guys, so we have 00:33:28.919 --> 00:33:30.119 to message the bigger numbers. 00:33:30.509 --> 00:33:33.389 Matt: We've been teasing the AI thing throughout the, throughout the episode. 00:33:33.829 --> 00:33:36.829 you sell your agency, you have the idea for Editor Ninja, 00:33:36.829 --> 00:33:38.209 you're about to embark on it. 00:33:38.659 --> 00:33:38.989 Chat. 00:33:38.989 --> 00:33:45.289 GPT comes out more commercially, like more, end user ish, and people 00:33:45.289 --> 00:33:47.869 are talking about, man, I can now just make blog posts with ai. 00:33:47.869 --> 00:33:51.409 I mean, there were other competitors out there prior to, to like chat GPT 00:33:51.409 --> 00:33:55.459 becoming more like of a household name, but now specifically people 00:33:55.459 --> 00:33:56.779 are signing up and doing this stuff. 00:33:57.424 --> 00:33:58.264 What went through your head? 00:33:58.264 --> 00:34:02.284 Did you like, have to rush and like, think about repositioning the, the, 00:34:02.474 --> 00:34:04.154 the offering, the, the service? 00:34:04.574 --> 00:34:06.884 What went through your head when, when chat PT came out? 00:34:07.290 --> 00:34:08.340 John: Yeah, so. 00:34:08.640 --> 00:34:12.630 After I sold Credo in September of 2022, then I basically realized I was 00:34:12.630 --> 00:34:16.140 super burned out and like kind of worked very little for that next quarter. 00:34:16.770 --> 00:34:20.160 And then I was going full-time on Editor Ninja, actually Chris Lima, 00:34:20.160 --> 00:34:21.450 who I'm sure you've had on the show. 00:34:21.450 --> 00:34:24.360 And I'm sure everyone listening to this knows Chris was my, was my mar, 00:34:24.390 --> 00:34:25.740 was my business coach at the time. 00:34:26.100 --> 00:34:28.470 And I was like, Chris is, we were talking early January. 00:34:28.470 --> 00:34:29.730 I'm like, Chris, this thing isn't growing. 00:34:29.730 --> 00:34:31.380 And he's like, you know, you actually need to work on it in 00:34:31.380 --> 00:34:32.370 order to make it grow, right? 00:34:32.370 --> 00:34:33.870 I'm like, Hmm, fair point. 00:34:34.090 --> 00:34:37.480 but before I like started working on it full time, I went to a. 00:34:37.480 --> 00:34:41.015 Ma a small like private mastermind in Costa Rica with 00:34:41.015 --> 00:34:42.245 about 80 other entrepreneurs. 00:34:42.725 --> 00:34:46.835 And when I told people what I did or what Editor Ninja did, they were like. 00:34:47.605 --> 00:34:49.075 How does AI affect that? 00:34:49.105 --> 00:34:50.635 Like literally every person. 00:34:50.635 --> 00:34:51.625 That was the next question. 00:34:51.955 --> 00:34:53.845 And at first I'm like, I don't know. 00:34:54.025 --> 00:34:56.485 By the end of that week I was like, okay, here's what's gonna happen. 00:34:56.745 --> 00:34:58.485 you know, the next like three to six months people are 00:34:58.485 --> 00:34:59.415 gonna be figuring it out. 00:34:59.415 --> 00:35:01.395 Then we're gonna see some interesting use cases. 00:35:01.615 --> 00:35:04.945 and then we're gonna see some companies launch, like around specifically using ai. 00:35:04.945 --> 00:35:07.315 And so I suspect within a couple of years, most of the content we're 00:35:07.315 --> 00:35:10.375 producing, we're producing and editing is gonna be produced via ai. 00:35:11.230 --> 00:35:12.430 I was a hundred percent right Matt. 00:35:12.640 --> 00:35:15.490 We went from like 80 per percent, 80, 90% human written. 00:35:15.560 --> 00:35:19.790 and then, you know, the balance AI created to now that is flipped. 00:35:19.790 --> 00:35:23.180 It's like 70, 80% of the content we edit is generated, 00:35:23.210 --> 00:35:25.800 is at least, drafted using ai. 00:35:25.830 --> 00:35:28.592 And then probably a human or subject matter expert has worked with it. 00:35:28.920 --> 00:35:30.450 And then it comes to us for editing. 00:35:30.540 --> 00:35:31.800 And the editing is like. 00:35:32.055 --> 00:35:34.605 Removing, like it's humanization is what people call it. 00:35:34.605 --> 00:35:37.635 It's removing of, you know, the, the words that AI loves to use. 00:35:37.635 --> 00:35:40.305 It's making sure like commas are in the right place, everything's formatted, 00:35:40.305 --> 00:35:43.295 and, you know, paragraphs aren't too long and all of that sort of thing. 00:35:43.295 --> 00:35:46.175 So it's all like formatting, copy, editing, proofreading, that sort of thing. 00:35:46.175 --> 00:35:46.775 We're not seeing that. 00:35:46.805 --> 00:35:50.315 We don't see as many typos as we used to see, or your and your, there, there, like 00:35:50.315 --> 00:35:54.125 all that sort of stuff like that, that, that's not really like needed anymore. 00:35:54.425 --> 00:35:56.825 But it's just like, does this read like a human wrote it? 00:35:57.690 --> 00:36:00.060 and so that's a lot of what we're doing, these days. 00:36:00.060 --> 00:36:01.260 And it's, it's fine. 00:36:01.260 --> 00:36:05.730 Like the work is, it's just different work from like a human writing it. 00:36:05.940 --> 00:36:11.230 We also see that, people are relying on editors a lot more to do, like some of 00:36:11.230 --> 00:36:14.410 the work that writers were doing that they didn't really recognize that even 00:36:14.410 --> 00:36:16.000 like more junior writers were doing. 00:36:16.645 --> 00:36:19.825 In terms of like logic and organization and that sort of thing. 00:36:19.825 --> 00:36:23.515 So the editing is like kind of a hybrid between like writing and editing, which 00:36:23.515 --> 00:36:26.695 is why we charge more for it 'cause it's more work and it's a different skillset. 00:36:27.185 --> 00:36:29.465 but that's, that's totally, it's totally fine. 00:36:29.465 --> 00:36:31.625 Like, I, I think AI is great. 00:36:31.625 --> 00:36:33.245 I mean, I use it as a thought partner. 00:36:33.245 --> 00:36:34.925 I use it for like, drafting of ideas. 00:36:34.925 --> 00:36:37.865 I use it for working through like logic and that sort of stuff. 00:36:37.895 --> 00:36:40.685 But it's like me going and doing the work, and this is the other thing 00:36:40.685 --> 00:36:41.945 that people don't realize about. 00:36:41.955 --> 00:36:45.375 Like ai, they're like, oh, I can go and create like a hundred articles, right? 00:36:45.375 --> 00:36:47.175 I'm like, yeah, but that's still you doing it. 00:36:47.205 --> 00:36:49.005 Like it's still gonna take you a lot of time. 00:36:49.215 --> 00:36:50.720 And then once you have those a hundred articles. 00:36:51.475 --> 00:36:53.120 Are you gonna go through and edit all of 'em? 00:36:53.120 --> 00:36:54.890 Like editing is where the magic happens. 00:36:55.050 --> 00:36:57.660 that's what Brian Clark from Copy Blogger told me a few years ago. 00:36:57.660 --> 00:36:59.280 He's like, editing is where the magic happens. 00:36:59.280 --> 00:37:02.310 And so if you think that you can just go, like, create a bunch of, bunch 00:37:02.310 --> 00:37:04.920 of blog articles with AI and publish 'em and they're gonna rank, they're 00:37:04.920 --> 00:37:06.480 gonna drive results for your business. 00:37:07.315 --> 00:37:08.875 You're wrong, basically. 00:37:08.925 --> 00:37:13.095 and so what we've found is people be like, they'll launch like an AI content 00:37:13.095 --> 00:37:14.985 creation offering or some of some sort. 00:37:14.985 --> 00:37:17.445 We, we had one agency that we were working with in legal space 00:37:17.445 --> 00:37:18.645 that they were signing on agent. 00:37:18.675 --> 00:37:22.365 They were signing on lawyer clients and redoing their website 00:37:22.365 --> 00:37:24.465 and creating new service pages and that sort of thing, right? 00:37:24.465 --> 00:37:27.225 Personal injury, attorney, Boston, Massachusetts, like that sort of thing. 00:37:27.465 --> 00:37:29.805 Creating all that text with ai and now they're like. 00:37:30.365 --> 00:37:33.185 We have a quarter million words a month that need to be reviewed 00:37:33.185 --> 00:37:34.265 and humanized and edited. 00:37:34.265 --> 00:37:34.535 Right? 00:37:34.535 --> 00:37:36.125 And they had no way to scale that up. 00:37:36.125 --> 00:37:37.115 So they just plugged us in. 00:37:37.115 --> 00:37:39.845 I mean, literally within a week we are cranking out 20, 00:37:39.845 --> 00:37:41.315 25,000 words a day for them. 00:37:41.815 --> 00:37:45.745 so that, that's what we see happen with people and they'll come to us scrambling. 00:37:45.745 --> 00:37:47.545 They're like, we have so much content that we need edited. 00:37:47.545 --> 00:37:49.855 I'm like, good thing we are here and we can do that for you. 00:37:50.492 --> 00:37:51.992 Matt: Alright, getting close to wrapping up here. 00:37:52.292 --> 00:37:55.292 It's interesting that you found like this, this shift. 00:37:55.712 --> 00:37:59.342 And it's interesting where like the market went where they were like, oh, we need a 00:37:59.342 --> 00:38:01.652 writer, content writer, let's hire John. 00:38:01.652 --> 00:38:03.032 And then suddenly they were like, well, you know what? 00:38:03.032 --> 00:38:05.942 We can make all this content with, with ai, so let's just 00:38:05.942 --> 00:38:07.352 keep the content in house. 00:38:07.352 --> 00:38:10.592 And then they realized, oh wait, now we need somebody to edit the content. 00:38:11.132 --> 00:38:14.402 This is like, we should have just kept John, you know, as the writer to begin 00:38:14.402 --> 00:38:17.852 with, but hey, you know, you're, you're doing well with, with obviously Editor 00:38:17.852 --> 00:38:19.832 Ninja and the editing services part of it. 00:38:20.747 --> 00:38:26.987 But I'm curious, like how you see this, affect the market at a ai, how it affects 00:38:26.987 --> 00:38:29.687 the market at a greater volume, right? 00:38:29.687 --> 00:38:35.567 For either the freelance writers out there or like insert AI to any task based job. 00:38:36.257 --> 00:38:38.747 Like how does the market survive this? 00:38:38.747 --> 00:38:44.687 What's, what's your take on how AI is, is reshaping this workforce, I 00:38:44.687 --> 00:38:46.007 guess, for lack of a better phrase? 00:38:46.476 --> 00:38:50.136 John: Yeah, it's, it's tough, honestly, like I've seen a lot of, 00:38:50.446 --> 00:38:53.177 you know, freelance content writers and, and that type that have. 00:38:53.326 --> 00:38:57.286 Have gone back in house or they've just like really struggling to find clients. 00:38:57.286 --> 00:38:59.896 Like, it's just, it is just a, it's a bloodbath out there. 00:39:00.296 --> 00:39:02.036 I think there's two things. 00:39:02.036 --> 00:39:05.396 One is if you're kind of a, it's tough for juniors. 00:39:05.396 --> 00:39:08.366 I don't know what junior people should do in this. 00:39:08.366 --> 00:39:11.786 in this case, honestly, they should learn to use AI to do, to 00:39:11.816 --> 00:39:13.406 do better work and do it faster. 00:39:13.796 --> 00:39:17.096 you know, and just, just realize they're kind of getting into the volume game. 00:39:17.316 --> 00:39:19.686 people that are more senior need to lean into being more senior. 00:39:19.696 --> 00:39:22.666 If they need to specialize, they need to lean into being more senior that, you 00:39:22.666 --> 00:39:24.676 know, AI can't replace a human brain. 00:39:24.676 --> 00:39:27.736 Can't really replace a human strategist and also say that like, 00:39:27.736 --> 00:39:30.946 Hey, I'm also using AI to, to make myself more effective, you know, 00:39:30.946 --> 00:39:32.266 to make my work more effective. 00:39:32.266 --> 00:39:37.276 But just because my work is more effective doesn't mean that it's less valuable. 00:39:37.481 --> 00:39:40.421 Like to them, so like to the enterprise. 00:39:40.421 --> 00:39:45.431 So I, I actually hold more firm on pricing than a lot of other people do. 00:39:45.551 --> 00:39:48.371 And I say like, Hey, like I, I try to go much more towards 00:39:48.371 --> 00:39:49.991 value pricing than like hourly. 00:39:50.021 --> 00:39:51.611 Like I, I don't like hourly. 00:39:51.771 --> 00:39:51.831 I. 00:39:52.041 --> 00:39:55.611 Simply because if you're a more senior person and you can do work 00:39:55.611 --> 00:39:59.931 faster, you're basically being punished for doing work faster. 00:39:59.931 --> 00:40:02.391 You're doing better work and you're doing it faster than a junior person. 00:40:02.641 --> 00:40:05.191 and so you're being punished for, for being more efficient. 00:40:05.241 --> 00:40:07.641 so I very much try to go towards like value pricing where it's like, 00:40:07.641 --> 00:40:08.961 all right, we have this campaign. 00:40:09.606 --> 00:40:14.196 And I can do it, or you need this strategy and I can do it for X dollars. 00:40:14.226 --> 00:40:14.616 Right. 00:40:14.836 --> 00:40:18.586 and if you're, you know, a more senior person then, and you can do it in half 00:40:18.586 --> 00:40:21.616 the time, then you used to be able to guess what, you just got a hundred percent 00:40:21.616 --> 00:40:25.256 pay raise because you can take on twice the projects, you know, but also like. 00:40:26.331 --> 00:40:29.871 You're not gonna be able to do that with kind of the bottom of the market and 00:40:29.871 --> 00:40:33.741 people that are nickel and dimming you on like per word, or you know, per hour. 00:40:33.741 --> 00:40:34.851 Like that sort of thing. 00:40:35.121 --> 00:40:36.261 You gotta go at market. 00:40:36.261 --> 00:40:37.881 You gotta target bigger enterprises. 00:40:38.042 --> 00:40:40.742 Matt: John Dougherty, editor ninja.com. 00:40:40.742 --> 00:40:42.692 Where else can folks go to say thanks? 00:40:42.769 --> 00:40:44.389 John: Yeah, editor ninja.com 00:40:44.389 --> 00:40:47.599 and then also LinkedIn is where I hang out primarily these days. 00:40:47.669 --> 00:40:49.659 I, I quit Twitter, a while ago. 00:40:49.659 --> 00:40:52.179 I actually logged in there yesterday for the first time just to post one for 00:40:52.179 --> 00:40:54.879 the first time in like four months to post one thing and then log back out. 00:40:54.879 --> 00:40:55.479 I'm like, I'm done. 00:40:55.759 --> 00:40:58.219 I'm on Blue Sky as well, but LinkedIn is where I'm primarily 00:40:58.219 --> 00:40:59.359 talking about business stuff. 00:40:59.579 --> 00:41:02.369 and also Editor Ninja has a YouTube channel that I'm really, I'm starting 00:41:02.369 --> 00:41:03.539 to get like rocking and rolling. 00:41:03.539 --> 00:41:06.009 So, I mean, as you can see, I've got like a good camera. 00:41:06.009 --> 00:41:06.789 I've got a good like. 00:41:06.789 --> 00:41:08.164 Po, microphone and all of that. 00:41:08.164 --> 00:41:11.134 And I actually, did a lot of video editing when I was in high school and college. 00:41:11.134 --> 00:41:14.494 Actually went to college initially to do that, didn't get into the program, so went 00:41:14.494 --> 00:41:17.764 into writing web development, but I love video, so I'm doing a lot more of that. 00:41:17.764 --> 00:41:20.944 And I think there's a, a big space for people to kind of do, for 00:41:20.944 --> 00:41:23.824 someone to do a lot more content around, like agencies and pricing 00:41:23.824 --> 00:41:25.144 and signing clients and all of that. 00:41:25.144 --> 00:41:27.574 And that's what I've done for a long time, especially with my last agency. 00:41:27.574 --> 00:41:28.994 So, feel free to find us there. 00:41:28.994 --> 00:41:32.024 Just search Editor Ninja on YouTube and give us a follow.