Carnie Tricks to Corporate Triumph: Jesse Wroblewski’s Secret Code to Brand Success

Speaker A: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to Open Source Growth, where we dive deep into the minds of the world's most intriguing and innovative marketers, founders and CEOs. Today, um, we have a guest whose unique approach to marketing and branding has not only set him apart, but also earned him a cult like following in the industry. Our guest today that we speak of is Jesse Wroblewski, the mastermind behind to Commoditized and the author of Marketing for Super Villains. Jesse is on a mission to rescue brands from the quagmire of commoditization and propelled them to new heights of distinction and leadership. With over 20 years of experience as the CEO and founder of generations beyond, Jesse combines analytical and scientific marketing expertise with a flare of creative differentiation that is nothing short of revolutionary. He's not just any marketer, he's a brand differentiation expert who believes in transforming brands from interchangeable to irreplaceable. His passion lies in helping businesses stand out in an overcrowded market, ensuring that they reclaim their unique identity and leadership position. His journey is shaped by personal experiences and influences from iconic figures like Riedel Yankovic and the Insane Clown Posse, which have molded his distinctive approach to tackling the madness of the marketing world. Today, Jesse will take us through his incredible journey, sharing insights on how brands can avoid the race to the bottom range, reclaim their market share, and connect with their audience on a deeper, more authentic level. Get ready for a conversation filled with groundbreaking strategies, innovative ideas, and a whole lot of inspiration. So, without further ado, let's welcome the man, the myth, the legend, the super villain marketer himself, Jesse wrote. G'. Day. G'.

Speaker B: Day.

Speaker A: What's going on?

Speaker B: I don't think I can live up to that intro, but.

Speaker A: Well, you know what, We've got the audience hooked, so we need to try a little bit.

Speaker B: So thanks for having me.

Speaker A: You are so welcome. So, guys, if you're watching the video here today, before we even get into Jesse's story, you'll see, like a whole bunch of carnival, uh, memorabilia, uh, carnival games, carnival, everything behind him. And you're gonna think, hang on, we're talking to a marketing expert here. Oh, wow, he's even got the sledgehammer. He's rolling forward.

Speaker B: So this is, this is for the, uh, clients that don't.

Speaker A: Some people have people who knock on doors, others send angry legal letters. Jesse has a massive hammer. Um, does the client get projected from, like, the lever that you hit with the hammer and they get launched directly at the bell and then they go bing. When they do pay like, how does it work?

Speaker B: That is correct. That is correct. And every stage is a late fee. How much late fee we're gonna charge?

Speaker A: 5%, 10%, 25%. Wow. So I guess for those interested in this, um, carnivals have unique psychology and they have unique marketing and sales pitch. And apparently carnivals and the carny culture have optimized the sales funnel. And Jesse, I want you to, to tell me about your fascination with carnivals and carnies and, um, why your room is filled with all this crazy stuff.

Speaker B: Yeah, so I became fascinated with carnivals because like you said, it's, it's basically everything we do as marketers hyper focused into this tiny little, you know, a, uh, marketing funnel may take a month, two months, three months to get someone to the end of the funnel where a carnival is basically minutes, right. And there's a secret code of the carny. And, you know, for anyone that says, you know, I can't apply a sales funnel to my, to my business or it doesn't really work for me, Carnivals by and large were manned and woman by what they call undesirables and unemployables. Right. And ex cons, freaks, geeks. So you have kind of this, this roaming traveling family that created this incredibly succinct sales funnel that's hyper focused. So I have a video that basically goes over the secret code of the carnival. But I'll go through a couple, couple quick things, see if we get any, uh, any bills and, uh, lights turning on. So if you think about a sales funnel and you think about walking past the carnival, initially you have the carnival barker and he has a script which is usually referred to as patter. And that's kind of the thing. Step right up, step right up. That kind of get your attention and brings you into the sales funnel. If that carnival barker does his job, he gets you over to the ticket booth. And I never noticed this before, but now that I pointed out, I realize every carnival I've ever gone to, the ticket taker is usually elevated. For whatever reason. I never really even noticed it, nor questioned it. And then I realized throughout history, that was a sales tactic, a qualification tactic, because when you paid for your ticket, the ticket taker would actually peek over into your wallet to see how much money you had. And if you had a lot of money, they would do a secret little signal to qualify you. And somebody else, a member of the carnival family, would come over and literally tap you on the back with chalk on their hand. If you ever hear someone say, you know, he's a mark, or he's our mark, he's our target. That's where the term comes from because they literally mark you. So now that you're qualified as a bonafide prospect, you're marked. And as you walk through the carnival, you may see people walking down the midway holding giant prizes, teddy bears. And it turned out that those people actually worked for the carnival. And they were employing a tactic known as social proof that, hey, if this guy can win something, I could win too. Let me go spend some money. And then going further down the funnel, my favorite one is at the end, it's, you always leave your mark with enough money for bus fare, meaning after, uh, you clean them out, you never want to clean them out for everything. You want them coming back, but at first you want them to have enough money to take the bus so as the book says, so they can go home and kick their mailbox instead of sticking around and trying to kick you. So they knew to let everybody leave happy, even though they have the ability to completely clean, clean you out. So a lot of fascinating sales tactics that are all hyper, you know, focused in, uh, creating a sales funnel by probably the most uneducated, undesirable people in, uh, American history.

Speaker A: It's really interesting, um, when you started the explanation of how carnival culture worked, you said, like, criminals, undesirable, nerds, geeks, prisoners, all that sort of thing. Sounds a lot like the shady parts of the Internet as well, in a really bizarre way, you know. And, um, you know, I know that the Internet marketing history, you know, in the very early 90s, and you've obviously been there, really, from the dot com border, which I want to talk. Talk to you about in a moment as well, of course. Uh, but it's really interesting that, you know, against all odds, if you looked at it, there's no MBAs, there's no marketing degrees, there's no professional salespeople with a professional sales program. Basically what society would consider a bunch of degenerates just banding together, uh, to create like the ultimate sales funnel. Like you. It's, it's actually quite inspiring when you look at it that way, because you would never believe that they'd be able to achieve it. And, you know, it's like anything through iteration and through rinsing and repeating. How did this carnival go? Etc. Etc. They got better. Um, it's super, super inspiring. So now, Jesse, 1999, what happened that year for you?

Speaker B: So I was working in a hospital. I thought I wanted to be a physical therapist. And Then I realized once I started working that I was literally getting paid to walk people in circles in slow motion for eight hours a day. And the worst part of that for me was eight hours of small talk, um, every day of my life. How you bring kids, what do they do, what's the weather like? Over and over. It was mind numbing. And I had minored in art in college, but there was really no industry. I didn't want to go and work in New York City in Manhattan. So I didn't, I didn't really pursue it. And then I got a AOL disc the mail with like 40 free hours of this thing called the Internet. And I hopped on and all my, all my weird kind of offbeat interests were represented on this thing called the Internet. I could find fan sites about Evil Dead movies and fan sites about the insane clown Possum, all these weird things. And I was like, wow, every, literally everybody's represented and there's a, there's a future here. Um, I think this Internet thing's going to stick around for a while. So I just started, ah, I started a, uh, a vocational school for nine months, took every course they had to offer and I hit the ground running just uh, trying to sell websites to people that had no idea either what they were or if they even needed them. Wow.

Speaker A: And that's how Generations beyond got started.

Speaker B: Yep. Right in my mom's basement. Just uh, you know, I was working, working a day office job and I would steal their photocopier and I would photocopy off site flyers and I would stuff envelopes and mail them out.

Speaker A: Wow.

Speaker B: And that's how it all started.

Speaker A: So like, let's talk about Generations Beyond. So that's a full service marketing agency which you still have today. In those very early days in you know, the early 2000s when the Internet was kicking off like you were there in that original dot com boom. How was it like selling websites back then?

Speaker B: It was uh, well the process was you would sell a website to someone and you would launch it and they'd be like, it was like, you know, you never see them again seven years before they would need an update. Right. It was just so, so unimportant to their business. But it was kind of like a thing that everybody, you know, kind of wanted. Everybody wants social media. Ah. At the time everybody wanted an nft. They didn't know what the hell it was. Now everybody wants AI even though they have no idea what it really does. So yeah, you, you get, you would have gotten the right population and like, yeah, I need a website. Yep. And you build something really cool and you know, six people would see it over the course of a year. But, uh, yeah, that was, that was kind of the, the, the, the, the first step.

Speaker A: Wow. And how did you get those initial customers? Was it just through flyers? Was it through door knocking? Um, because at the end of the day, right, the Internet was new, so the way you would acquire customers wasn't through the Internet. My assumption. So, yeah, from what I'm seeing here, like, Internet marketing wasn't even really a thing yet. So, like, this is pre Frank Kern, when you got started into, started in this game.

Speaker B: Yeah, pre, pre Google.

Speaker A: Like pre search engine. Like, there's probably AltaVista and Ask Jeeves kicking off at that point. Google was probably starting to become new in about 2001, 2002. Um, so how did you acquire those first customers? Was it just flyers? Was it direct mail? Was it networking events? Like, what did you do to build, you know, your first $100,000 in revenue?

Speaker B: Yeah, so the first, first client I got, believe it or not, is still a very close friend and a client today. And that was from one of those bootleg flyers that I made at my, at my day job. Um, but yeah, I mean, it was just, it was just a process of being the guy. You know, when someone hears, you know, you know, everyone was talking about dot com back then, you hear IPOs and people going crazy. The second the conversation came up, it was a very small world. Like, oh, Jesse, you know, talk to him. He's a website guy. I don't know what websites are, but I know that's what he does. Right. So it was, it was a lot easier. If you want to talk about the world of becoming commoditized back then, there were so few people that soon as the, soon as the buzzword came up, you know, I was the only guy that they ever even heard of that didn't.

Speaker A: Yeah. Isn't it amazing though, like, when you're the, quote, unquote, the guy for a very short period of time, it really helps you gain that initial traction in your career. It's funny because I can even resonate myself that I was one of the very first, like Facebook specific marketers in my regional town of Geelong. And I was an expert well before people even started using Facebook pixels and meta pixels and they started doing ROI based campaigns or they started to influence, uh, people started to run, you know, Facebook ads through, you know, direct response advertising principles. A lot of the time it was just like licks shares and clients and lick shares and likes all that stuff. Right. So it's. It's really special when you get that opportunity to be the guy. I can totally relate. So we're talking early 2000s. You're building websites, and, you know, you've been in this game for 20 years. I want to know about your journey from being just the guy building the websites through to building, like, a full service agency. Because I think before we get deep into that conversation around how you've gone and pivoted to building, decommoditized, um, I think it's important for us to really unpack your journey here so the listeners really understand, like, what led you to this point? When did you arrive at that of 50?

Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. So I was probably. And I would say it was overall a mistake. Right. So a lot of clients, you know, they started coming to me, and those six, seven years went by and they came back and said, all right, we got to redo my website. And I hear about this thing, you know, called Google. I'm hearing about social media. And I always said, you know, no, not for me. Don't want to do it. I just want to be the website guy. Um, and a couple things would happen. I would either lose the deal because someone would go to a full service agency that could do it all, or I would design a beautiful website, and then they would hire an SEO person. They'd say, jesse, help this SEO guy. And I'd have to get him logged in and teach them all the things. Then they'd go in and they'd ruin the website because back then, SEO form, uh, and function did not match. Ultimately, they get fired. And then the client would come back to me and say, jesse, make the website beautiful again. And I'm like, I'm spending all this time nurturing some SEO guy that I don't even know, and then I'm cleaning up his mess. Why don't I just bite the bullet and offer it? Um, so I went from being the guy when websites came up to not being able to say no if you had a computer virus. Oh, Jesse works on computers. Go see if he can do that. Sel. Uh, you know, whatever. So I started becoming watered down, as far as the expert goes. And I was just the computer guy, one of a million computer guys. And I started building a, uh, staff, and I took out a rent and a lease and built, uh, a headquarters. And before I knew it, we were the biggest we've ever been, and we were making less money than we ever made. So Our sales were up here and our profits were in the dumpster. So at that point I said, all right, I was under the impression there was this huge economy of scale and more is better, more services, more employees, more clients. And it just wasn't the answer. So it was a major, like, smack in the face, like everything you've been striving for for the past 20 years. Wrong. Um, go back and retool. Yeah.

Speaker A: Wow. And I think this is really relevant for those who are listening to this podcast that are a services based business owner, not necessarily a software based business owner. Because with services, it's a bit like software actually include software. There's never like an end to what you can offer and deliver. And because you've got a unique set of skills, you have this tendency to believe, well, we can keep pushing, we can deliver this as well. Oh, we've got a friend who can deliver this. And you start to on sell other things. And the complexity of your operations can really, um, take its toll because at the end of the day, and this is probably something we can both jab on in a second, but simplicity scales really well. If you've got a really defined set of one, two or even three services and you've got really modular offerings, um, which you can then essentially tailor a little just to get the customers the right outcomes, it's so much easier to scale your professional services business in that way. So let's just do some numbers here. When you were running, um, generations beyond, and I'm assuming it's still running today, and you're still heavily involved. Yep. So at its peak, like how many clients were we actively servicing, how many staff members and how many different services were you running?

Speaker B: I'd say peak. We had about 300 clients, uh, 22. 22 full time employees. Um, and we were just. One of the things that caused us to run into trouble was we had a salesman. We've tried hiring many, many salesmen. We actually hired a salesman that was very relationship based. So he would go out, kiss baby, shake hands, I'll mow your lawn for you. He would just like, he would just nice you to death. And then people felt obligated to be like, all right, what can we do together? And we would literally do anything just to nurture this guy's relationships, because that was, that was his thing. Right. So you had mentioned, you had mentioned offering these services as service providers. People come to us to solve problems and it's kind of like a dopamine rush. When we were able to solve it and they say, well, you know, I know you don't do this, but I also have this problem and it's so hard to be like, I can solve it for you, but no, I gotta be disciplined and only offer my set suite of services. So, yeah, I mean, we, he, he definitely got, uh, he definitely got his kicks from being liked and being able to provide services, favors, whatever you want to call it, to anyone in his network. And it just ended up sinking us as far as letting everybody through the door. Yeah, we do anything you can think of.

Speaker A: Uh, wow, that's interesting. So you, your growth approach was really. Well, we're offering so many services. Why not mow the person's lawn, so to speak, or wash their car or take their child to childcare and do whatever it takes to get the deal over line. And it's interesting how that for you was kind of like the beginning of the end of like, we've got to do things differently.

Speaker B: Correct.

Speaker A: Wow. Isn't that fascinating? So 300 clients, 22 full time employees. There's some big numbers there. If you just do the back of the envelope math, we're talking like a multi seven figure business right here and less profit than you've ever had. So are we talking that you would be breaking even or were you losing money at that point?

Speaker B: So our profitability was below 10%, so we were taking home less than 10% of these huge numbers. We were, wow, bringing in. Um, so yeah, like we, we, we hit a, we hit a major milestone and my business coach was like, he, like, I feel so bad for you. I want to, you know, I want to go out and celebrate, but I know you don't have any money in the bank. Like, congratulations on reaching this, but I'm sorry you don't have anything to.

Speaker A: You know what, um, thank you for being so vulnerable here. Um, Jesse, because of the fact that I think a lot of people who might be listening to this podcast may be thinking, you know, oh, it's going to be better on the other side. You only know what it's like on the other side until you arrive. And like, I can happily share with you, um, and the listeners here, like, we've doubled the agency in, you know, the last 24 months and it's been awesome. Right? But I can tell you that I had a lot more money when I was a, um, solopreneur. I was crushing it, you know, um, I was living it up like Jerul. But you know, through the, through the baptism of fire, which is business growth, you often need to just experience what it is. And as you said, you know, if you, maybe if you did things differently and if you had modular services and very defined offerings, which were profitable, and you had a very clear, um, client that you would only let through the door, maybe that could have been different. And I'm assuming this was the epiphany you reached which has led you down the path of decommoditized. Is that a bad assumption?

Speaker B: Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, to sum up your. Sum up your thoughts, you know, great saying, top line is vanity, bottom line.

Speaker A: Emblazone that on your arm, everybody.

Speaker B: I was chasing that vanity, like, oh, uh, I need to grow bigger. I need more employees. It looks better, it sounds better, but what the hell am I doing? It was just insanity.

Speaker A: Yeah. And isn't that fascinating? You know, like, we're all sold this idea of big business m, more revenue, whatever. But, like, if you can be more profitable as a 2, 3, 4 person business and you're able to live a really good life, you know, have a really amazing work life balance, have the car you've always dreamed of, have the house you've always dreamed of, and, you know, be able to enjoy your day to day experience like you would never want to escape it. Like, that is what success truly is for a lot of people. And having the right amount of money and the right amount of, you know, the right amount of opportunities and abilities to grow. And like, I think there's, uh, you've got to be really careful when you allow society to dictate what you must do with your life. And that must always be, like, inwards to out. So tell me, what made you develop to commoditize? Like, what was it? How did it get started? Because you've gone in a radically different direction to, like, a generalized, one size fits all marketing agency to a very niche, a very polarizing, like, Challenger brand. Um, and I cannot wait to unpack, like, your expertise here today. This is gonna be so damn exciting. So they just tell me more. I want to know all what happened.

Speaker B: How'd it go?

Speaker A: Let's go.

Speaker B: So it probably, it probably still wasn't a logical, um, decision right when Covid hit, it was like, all right, whether it was logical, emotional, did some soul searching. We took a hit like everybody else. We scaled back a little bit, uh, which is probably a good thing for profit. Profit margin. Um, but in doing my soul searching, I was like, you know what? I've been doing this for so long. Let's pretend Covid completely wiped everything out. What would I do? If I had to start over again based on my, uh, my past 20, 25 years experience. And I went through everything, I did, and I realized that my favorite and most rewarding, not only for me, but I made the most money for my clients, were typically a very, very boring product that I was able, given the liberty to inject life into and create a personality, right? So I started working with a, uh, bunch of positioning coaches, and I basically said, hey, I want to turn boring products into exciting products. And they said, you can't call your clients boring. Like, no one's gonna self identify as a boring person, right? So I'm like, all right. That's kind of what I do, though. I don't take exciting things that make them more exciting. So, like, you can't call it boring. You can't call it. So I was searching and searching. I said, you know what. What about, you know, I felt like I was becoming commoditized, right? No one could tell the difference between me and the next guy. Specifically, specifically, without my headquarters anymore. What if I come up with a way to do the opposite? I'll decommoditize, uh, businesses. I don't have to call them boring, but if your business is like everybody else's and you're racing to the bottom, let's come in and get you to reclaim your leadership position. So that was kind of the. The mantra behind decommoditized.

Speaker A: That is epic. And it's epic. I love it. Like, it's so interesting. Like, Covid did so much good for us spiritually, I think, as people. Um, personally, you know, I wasn't a huge fan. I was in Victoria, right? I was in the worst lockdowns on the planet. Like, I was stuck indoors, man. I couldn't move 5 km from my house. Like, it was effed up. It was next level cooked. But the thing was that it enabled you to reflect and identify what was important. It's kind of like a holiday in many ways. Like, I just came back from Paris and, um, the UK and, um, the Netherlands. And it's amazing how it enabled us to get distance from our problems when often we need to travel, you know, 25, 000 kilometers in one direction to achieve the same outcome.

Speaker B: So, yeah, I made kind of, you know, you. You had said this before about what society, you know, falling through the trap of what society expects success to be. Right? So I kind of. One of my favorite movies is Fight Club. Oh, yeah, right. And at the end of Fight Club, at the end of Fight Club, Tyler Durden Says, you know what. What would you actually be if you didn't have to lose those 10 pounds that society makes you feel like you got to lose? No one gave a shit about the car you drive. You know, your work is no longer your. Your work. And then we kind of like, got that, you know, we didn't have to worry about everybody put on ten pounds because of the epidemic and quarantine. Nobody was driving anywhere. So you didn't have to worry about, you know, how people perceive you. And a lot of my friends, they started going a little. A little batty because they, they had this time. They always said they were going to pick up an instrument or learn language, and they just weren't motivated. They didn't know what they were truly meant to become. So I kind of drew that parallel during it. A lot of people, I'm sure, like, you benefited tremendously from it. You know, it might have been a little scary at the time, but. Yeah, I mean, what would you be if you didn't have all these responsibilities? I agree.

Speaker A: It's actually, you know, what, um, thinking about it and getting back to, like, what Covid did for me, I'm just realizing, holy shit, it was the most transformative part of my life. Like, I left a. I left a relationship that wasn't serving either of us. I met my beautiful wife. I got back into jazz guitar.

Speaker B: Um,

Speaker A: I started thinking about what I can do. My business, you know, it doubled over the period of time. Obviously, I spent all my money to keep it afloat. And, you know, I had to really, you know, salvage a lot of things, my personal savings, to keep it going. And, you know, there was a whole heap of failure and misery and all that sort of stuff. But if you think about it, um, like anything that Steve Jobs would say, you know, things only make sense when you connect the dots in reverse. And, um, yeah, it's amazing how you managed to have that, like, that, that true business breakthrough all the way along. And funnily enough, it wasn't through a coach. It was through your own reflection, um, which is epic. So tell me, um, Jesse, like, what do you do at Decommoditized? Like, if someone was thinking, okay, you're a brand consultant, you help people differentiate or die. Um, you help them position themselves in a crowded marketplace. Like, if I'm, say, a software company or a high ticket services business.

Speaker B: And.

Speaker A: And I came to you with something really boring. Like, it's like I have a time tracking app, um, which helps, you know, accountants, um, properly bill their hours. Like, I'M going to give you something really embarrassing and really boring here. Give me the, give me the decommoditized treatment right here, right now.

Speaker B: So there are a lot of business books out there and they very, you know, kind of off the cuff say, you know, know, in order to be successful in business, you got to differentiate. And that's the end of the chapter, right? They tell you to run out, find your, find your differentiator, and then somehow succinctly tell the entire world about how you're completely different from your, from your competitors. And, you know, they kind of leave it at that. And while it's, it's, it's definitely a bit of art, ah, there is science to it. And I tried everything I could not only to read everything on the subject available, but also take from my experience and almost codify or create a process and say, all right, there's a million ways to differentiate. And sometimes that's worse, you know, when you have a million different choices. Um, I chose the top 12 ways. Brands throughout history, both large and small, have successfully differentiated themselves. And people say, you know, hey, when I hear the word different or differentiated, that has a connotation of like, different meaning odd and weird. Do I have to be outlandish to be differentiated? I'm in a very suit and tie, buttoned up, uh, industry. And the answer is absolutely not. You know, in the universe of differentiation, there's Rolex, there's Tiffany, there's Steinway. These brands that are very buttoned up have successfully differentiated themselves. And you may not even consider them, quote, unquote, differentiated, but when you think of jewelry, Tiffany's is head and shoulders above, above, you know, anything else. Uh, and when you really dive into, you know, how they accomplish that is through successful differentiation. So, yeah, I mean, I have something, it's a free download on my website called the Universe of Differentiation. It has those 12 planets. And when I work with my clients, it is absolutely kind of a back and forth, uh, communication. Uh, we figure out through their brand history and their current state what planets kind of resonate with them, and then we figure out who lives on those planets. So if they're trying to go after the elevated, you know, amazing, uh, you know, affluent crowd, but there's only college kids that live on the planet they chose. Those aren't going to match up. So I tried to bring as much science into. All right, this feels good, this feels authentic. And not only that, this has a huge upside opportunity, um, based on the audience segmentation associated with that differentiator. So I'm using a lot of words, a lot of marketing buzzwords to kind of like negate all the other marketing buzzwords that are thrown around. But I hope that makes sense.

Speaker A: No, no, no, it totally does. Like, I think what's really special here about you and your process is that you've broken it down in a really easy to understand way and you've, you've essentially, you've codified it and you've developed processes and systems to arrive at results that truly push the needle forward for a business. Right. And I think that's really, really important to demonstrate, uh, here on today's call because, well, today's podcast. It's not a call, come on. Um, but like, it's so important because of the fact that a lot of time branding creatives get a lot of flack for just being like, oh, ah, they're just developing pretty pictures. Like I'm sure that there'll be a software CFO or CTO listening to today about how do they go about differentiating themselves? And they're probably going to be looking for, oh, well, let's just use the Tiffany Green and our software is going to be different and everyone's going to think we're expensive. Like there's more to it than that, like in terms of being able to identify those customer segments and um, you know, get all that market intel. Like, what is your process?

Speaker B: So we have a four week process that we call the doa, the Differentiation Opportunity Analysis. And you know, it's a four week, pretty intensive, uh, pretty intensive program. We go through brand history, um, and ultimately we end up with that differentiator and that audience segment and that, that, that kind of kickoff campaign. And then people always ask, you know, when you get to the 99 yard line, there's always friction. You know, people hate change and you're, you're creating some pretty drastic change within, within the brand. And they say, how do you know, how do you get over that, that final hurdle? And it's very important that, you know, during the beginning of our, of ah, our consultation, I tell people I am, I am really, really good at branding. I completely suck at reading minds. So if you feel, you know, we have, we have 12 options here. If you feel that being funny or approachable doesn't really fit well with you, let's uh, get it out in the open in the beginning, right? That way we don't go to the 99 yard line and I present you something and you go, yeah, we're really not funny people. We're not comfortable with that. We gotta go back to the beginning. So it's a process of, you know, to use your word, getting everyone to trust each other and become vulnerable and say, you know what, that sounds like a good idea, but something inside it just doesn't feel right. Let's go to another planet and kind of investigate. Um, and then from there, once we kind of get comfortable, the data, we just basically present the data. Hey, here's what everybody else is doing and here's what, you know, someone similar or someone in a, in a different vertical, utilize this tactic, utilize this audience segment. This is the growth they've experienced.

Speaker A: Well, it's almost like the Picasso, you know, um, bad artists copy, great artists steal. And you're able to take those ideas from, say, another industry and another business which has targeted a very similar consumer, um, and brought them across. It's a lot like the old, um, what's it called? Blue Ocean strategy approach with Morbon and Kim. That's really, really cool. I should reread that book. Thanks for reminding that book exists. I keep on forgetting about it. It was one of my favorites.

Speaker B: Yeah, Yeah. I mean, I made sure, you know, I read a lot of marketing books, so I made absolutely sure that anything in my book had never been referenced in another marketing book. Because you pick up marketing books and it's like, oh, here's, you know, don't squeeze the Charmin. And here's, you know, this example, that example. So I made sure they were completely new examples. Um, so each planet, uh, in the universe of Differentiation has a example. Everything from the world's most hated band to G.I. joes to Metallica, uh, Metallica created Whiskey. Etc, so it's all completely new stuff for, uh, any of the marketing veterans.

Speaker A: Well, that's a book that I cannot wait to get my hands on. I need to still send you my address so I can read through it. And yes, I'm sure I'm going to give it some mad praise because if it's anything like the way you speak, I am going to be enthralled the whole time. I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be having so much fun there. M. So tell me about it. Like, obviously marketing for super villains. Um, when did you start writing it? Uh, what was the process? What, what compelled you to do it?

Speaker B: Yeah, so when Covid hit, I needed a activity. Uh, so I had a shipping container, a 20 foot shipping container dropped in my backyard. And I was like, you know what? I'm gonna turn this into a super villain. So I had no idea what I was doing. No idea what I was doing. I was out there with an angle grinder cutting holes in this thing, installing doors and sheetrock and electricity. Um, so I made my. I made my super villain lair slash studio. And I was like, all right, now I'm gonna take all this pent up stuff. Half of its cynical visions about, you know, my past 25 years and the torture I went through and uh, you know, some new, new marketing advice. And I'm gonna create some type of video series, right? I'm gonna do 13 episodes just to kind of figure out my way of thinking. So I did that, had fun with it. Did a second season called the uh, the marketing super villain hall of Fame. And then I was like, all right, time to write a book. So I started using, using a lot of the video content and then crafting an overall narrative and uh, throughput. And a year later I had a, uh, had a book.

Speaker A: Wow, that is amazing. Another incredible Covid project which just eventuated from like a visual. It's just like, it's just layers and layers and layers of the onion getting peeled back to realizing, hang on a minute, I can write a book. How cool.

Speaker B: Yeah, there's a, uh, there's a time. Three time lapse videos of me changing the shipping container from this ugly metal thing until like a pretty nice supervillain, uh, lair. So if you're interested in that is this.

Speaker A: Are you in the supervillain lair as we speak?

Speaker B: No, my supervillain lair is in the backyard. Um, I could take you out there. Um, but uh, yeah, it's decorated similarly. Much more supervillain.

Speaker A: That's exciting. So I guess where, I'm really curious to know in regards to decommoditized, obviously you've got your own language about what a brand should be. And I think what's really amazing here, as a copywriting geek myself, I really love when you develop like a brand set of language which is uniquely you now you hear words, um, like super villain. And you hear words in your, um, in your sphere, like using m. Things like manifesto. Um, you know, you've got like a whole suite of things of uh, which essentially orbit around your, you know, your life force. So tell everyone about super villains. Like, and why is there this fascination with comic books? And how does that intertwine with differentiating yourself in the one world we live in?

Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. So, uh, half of it is, you know, if anyone's been in the marketing arena, it's enough to drive you out of your mind. And turn you into a super villain, right? So there's a, there's a stat out there that, you know, 85% of people will outright reject a new idea on site, right? So as marketers, we're agents of change. That's what we do. No one hires you to say, hey, you know, we have marketing going. Just, just keep it going. Like, you know, maintain the status quo. They always hire us to usher in new ideas. And at the same time, 85% of the people that hire us are like, whoa, whoa, whoa. We don't, we don't want that much change, right? So just, just being in this industry is enough to drive someone over the edge into, uh, into the world of super villainy. But the real parallel is if you're a brand entering a market or you're a challenger brand or a brand new entity, there's usually always a name brand in that vertical, right? And that name brand, that mega brand is like a superhero. They have huge public favor. Everybody knows who they are. They usually have big muscles, which in marketing equates to big budgets. And time and time again, people come to me and they say, hey, we want to be like that guy. We want to, you know, we want to act like him, look like him, uh, achieve their same success. And to do it, particularly when you're under resourced, try to outspend them, try to do more social media than them, try to do more SEO. It's a recipe for disaster. M And much like if you think of your typical super villain in a movie, they usually don't have a ton of resources. They're usually not the big buff guy, they're usually the small, scrawny guy. They have to use their brain to outwit the superhero. And there's a lot of parallels here with, you know, don't do what everybody else is doing and try to be or act as if you're the mega brand, you're not the mega brand. So one of the biggest things you can do is think and act the way the big brands are. Not do something that's completely, you know, out of left field, completely. Differentiate yourself, reposition the category for yourself and state your claim. So I thought of like all, if you think of everything that we do as marketers, what's the biggest, you know, superhero power, you know, superpower that you can do, bring, bring to the game and level the playing field, have that mic drop moment and that's proper differentiation.

Speaker A: So if you're a startup right here, right now, just say you, you're just say You're a software company, right. Like what are the first three steps you must take in order to carving out an appropriate brand strategy? So differentiation isn't just something that happens by chance, but it happens by scientific precision. What are the, what are the first three steps anyone can take?

Speaker B: Yeah, so I mean there's, there's no one size fits all. It's a process. Right. So if you're a startup versus someone that's been, you know, has some market data, it may be a little different. But particularly with, with software. And I know, I know this isn't software, but I'm going to draw a parallel. I think depending on who your audience is. Software is unapproachable. Yeah, right. Especially you know, for websites and marketing. People don't run to like, oh, you're a marketer, I want to talk to you, I want to talk about websites. They're usually intimidated because they don't know what we know and they don't ask the questions that they want to ask. So I use the term unapproachable. Right. It's this thing that you know, they need and you know, you don't have this true honest relationship. So if you think about Priceline. Mhm. Right. They're this online going to compare prices, book, book, uh, you know, travel arrangements, which isn't very sexy. Um, but they, they brought in William Shatner. William Shatner, the price master, whatever, whatever he was to make it, all of a sudden that became like a Persona and it became approachable, right? That, that, that nameless, faceless database of plane tickets all of a sudden became like, oh yeah, William Shatner, I love him, he's funny. The commercials are funny. It kind of breaks down walls and gets people more comfortable to approach you versus maybe a travel agent where you don't know the right questions to ask. If you never use one before, now there's a human there and I don't know how to say no because I don't want to hurt their feelings. So I think approachability and again this is if you are selling high level B2B stuff and you know, they know what they need and they know the language, obviously a different differentiator. But I think software where typically people end users use 5% of the hundred percent of options that your software offers, you know, keeping it simple, making it approachable is uh, is a huge uh, difference.

Speaker A: Keeping it simple and making it approachable, that is gold. And the Makeweb founders, their avatar, obviously they'd probably be thinking, oh wow, that could change my life now does it now, I'm curious, um, when a business ascends to different levels, and obviously your business is ascended to different levels too. You know, you've worked with like the mum and dad shops with their websites, and you've also worked with enterprise customers. Um, and I'm assuming you've done this both with generations beyond and also decommoditized. How do you, how do you position differently, um, in a situation like that? Where, where do you go when the brand is like, so established? Like, well, give me an example of how you've taken something really established and maybe not turned it on its head, but have you done things differently so they still achieve their organization goals?

Speaker B: Yeah. So while it's a challenge, you get a lot of benefits. Right. So an established brand has usually a big budget and big budgets just fix so many. If you have. Not, not that it's going in my pocket, but if you have the ability to truly create a narrative at the drop of a hat because of your, your bank account, it makes everything so much easier. So again, there's no hard and fast rule that says, hey, you gotta, you gotta kind of inch into it and then, you know, get everybody comfortable versus, you know, hey, something's coming on July 1st. Be prepared for July 1st. And then, boom, you turn everything on its head. So there's a lot of ways, a lot of ways to do it. And unfortunately, I don't have an answer that's a one size fits all. Um, but you know, if you are, if you are a small business, to be completely transparent, being differentiated really, really needs a budget to get that narrative out there. So if you're, you know, the, the local web guy and your customers are coming to you and they only really, they're only going to look at two or three other web guys, you know, differentiating yourself, that that message might get lost on them. Um, so know, know your audience, know the sales flow. Um, keep your eye on the ball of where the sales are coming from. Differentiation is great. Um, but when people are only comparing you to one other person, you may not have to differentiate that hard. You know, just gotta, yeah, you know, be nicer, have better customer service. All the, all the basics of, uh, business, it's when, when there's a slew of competition, that's where differentiation.

Speaker A: You know what, Jesse? Like, I love that sort of transparency here because I totally agree. Like, if you're just the local marketing guy or the local web agency or the local services provider and you're, you know, you're pre seven figures A year. A lot of the time it just comes down to, are you more approachable, are you kinder, do you provide people with the right services and solutions? Do you sell them better? And that's all it is in the very beginning. But then when you really want to go from, say, seven figures all the way up to like eight figures, that's when the differentiation play comes in there. Because you're trying to change the way people buy and change the way people approach an industry versus just getting to the buy in the first place. Yeah. And you know what? I really appreciate that because I think that a lot of people out there who are, uh, say, like services business owners, um, doesn't matter if they own like, say, a psychology practice or a marketing agency like myself or, um, how do I say that? Um, you know, you could be a physiotherapist, you could be an accountant, a lawyer. Like, just getting the product right in the very beginning takes care of a lot of your problems. And then when you've got that quote, unquote market share or that market cap, um, conversation arise, that's when someone like you can literally be wheeled into an organization and radically transform things.

Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, a majority of small businesses, I'll play a little game with them, I'll take out a card, I'll write something on it, and I'll, you know, go around the room. You know, where do you get most of your business? Where do you get most of your business from? And one by one, referrals. Word of mouth referrals. It's referrals. Right. So when you're, when you're primarily using referrals, your marketing doesn't have a huge impact on your business. It's when you want to get past the referral pool and use your marketing to actually start getting cold leads, people coming in. That's where your branding, your marketing, and potentially your differentiator comes in. Yeah, but right now it's all coming because you're a great person, a great service provider, and it's all. And nothing wrong with that. Um, you'll get to a point where you're like, I want to be able to control referrals. I want to be able to control the amount of work that comes in. And that's where, you know, you can start to look at things like marketing different. You know what?

Speaker A: You are so.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: I've never thought of it that way in the sense that, uh, you know, when you're that initial services business and you're just trying to get your first, you know, first ten clients, uh, you know, past like your first like six figure year as like a freelancer. It is the literally just referrals, word of mouth, friends. And everyone's trying to help you out along the way in the very beginning too. And they really do look after you. And it's as soon as you start getting to that point where it's like, I can't scale up my referral lead. So I'm not getting more than 10 or 15 referrals a month. I need, I need some real like I need a shot in the arms worth of uh, you know, growth juice and I need to be spending some money on some advertising. That's when you do really need to start considering like, okay, I need to, I need to get out into the market. I need to come with the right message, I need to come with the right offer. Uh, I need to come with the right sales flow. I need to determine how I'm going to ascend someone from a marketing qualified lead to a sales qualified lead. I need to understand how I'm going to sell them. Is it a 2, 3, 4, 5 touch point sale? Um, what's my process for follow up? Can I do this while still running all my other business, um, that I have to do as a, as you know, as a founder? Like I, you've really just blown my mind on a lot of these things today. Like, no, because it's just, it's true though. Like um, and you know, and I love talking to other marketing professionals that have a completely different skill set to myself. Like I'm very T shaped. I'm a direct response copywriter. Ah, I'm a media buyer. Like that's really just realty like branding, positioning, um, product development, all that stuff that advertising, like, it all comes under like many different, um, aspects of the marketing umbrella and it's just so, so cool to hear these certain things. Now I've got an interesting question for you. This may not be something that you may want to disclose here on the podcast, but I'm really, really curious. You've worked with enterprise and you've worked with small business. And I think a lot of the people who jump onto this podcast want to know how you acquire customers because again, at the end of the day, software companies, entrepreneurs, CMOs, they all tune in here to figure out how do I get more customers, how do I get more leads? What are you doing to generate leads for yourself? When it comes to number one, let's go with small business owners or the smaller size customers and then number Two, what are you doing to do the, to generate leads to acquire, say, your larger and your enterprise clients? Curious to know.

Speaker B: Yeah. So, I mean, it's a never ending process, right? So I don't know, I don't know many people that say, hey, ah, I'm gonna go write a business book. I just want to, you know, I don't really care what happens. I just want to get stuff out of my head. You know, I wrote the book because, you know, that was kind of the next, the next step, the next iteration to kind of grow my expertise, grow my client base, grow my network. So it's, it's a never ending, you know, how can I level myself up? Uh, how can I level up and you know, everyone. I don't think I've ever met someone in the marketing field. This is what we do, you know, and you say, you know, what thing is working? Never an answer. It's what things. Yeah, cool, right? It's always a combination. Always a combination. There's never, ah, a magic bullet. And you know where I think as marketers, incredibly guilty of being undisciplined and not taking our own medicine. Um, but you know, I do, I do everything from time to time. This morning we had an all hands, like, okay, back on the email, back on the email campaign. Here's our list. Here's what we're going after. Gonna lead with me doing, you know, speaking at their organization and then kind of you squeeze in, you know, a plug for the agency. So it's, it's always, always, uh, uh, an iterative process. What can we, where can we be where everyone else is in. I get 35, 40 emails a day. Hey, we'll do your website design for $4 an hour. Like, how do you send out a message that competes with that? Right? Um, yep. So, you know, it's, it's always, it's, it's, it's a, it's a mini differentiation process with, with every marketing piece you put out there. Because especially now with the Internet with AI, people are able to put out thousands of marketing messages that are probably pretty crappy. Um, you just have to get, you have to say something that they're not saying and they're all following the same textbook. So it's a little exercise in marketing.

Speaker A: I just love that it's, you know, you have your team with your, you have that meeting with your team. It's like, okay, cold outreach. We're doing this with our email marketing campaigns. Here's a bunch of lists. This is what we're Going to do. Have you experienced? Because I've read. No, I don't know, I haven't read it. Million Dollar Consulting by Alan Wise. And he was the guy, from my understanding, who really championed the idea of writing your own book as your, as your ability to open up doors in large organizations. Um, have you used the book in this context and how has it been working?

Speaker B: 100%. So with, with Generations beyond, it's kind of a secret tactic with Generations beyond. Right now it's positioned as, you know, we're repositioning a little, but still the catch all agency, Agency. And we forever were saying, you know, we got to level up our clients. We got, we're punching, you know, below our weight. We got to get bigger and bigger clients where decommoditized. Really, you can't really take advantage of our services unless you're $5 million and above. Right? So that's kind of like the secret, you know, let's get them through the door here and like, okay, here's your, here's your plan for how to differentiate. You need a commercial to get that message across. I have an agency over here though, you know, um, demonstrating and iterate and execute on that. So it's kind of been, it's, it's the, it's been the big worm on the hook that kind of feeds everything else down there.

Speaker A: I love that. I love that. So realistically, in terms of your funnel, which is actually awesome to disclose here, that you have used decommoditized as your ability to develop those strategy engagements with the right people who can actually afford your services in your large full service agency. And by being able, just to be able to do a lumpy mail, send that book out to the organizations and then, you know, call them up, be like, hey, it's Jesse. I'm just curious, like I sent my book out. Um, did you enjoy it? It's like, do you think it might be worthwhile to have a meeting? And then bang, you're already in there with the uh, mid market companies.

Speaker B: Yep, yep. Yeah, that's the name of the game. That and public speaking, right? So you get in front of 400 people at a time and uh, you know, something about being on stage just, just levels you up.

Speaker A: Bit like that party operator who's at the ticket booth, right? You can see inside everybody's wal. Come full circle, everybody.

Speaker B: How much does the ticket to this event cost? All right, they're all good. They're all good.

Speaker A: Exactly. You know, the more expensive the event generally, the higher quality the client Right. Um, now that's actually awesome. And I think there's like a massive gold nugget there in the sense that if you could provide such immense value for free plus bit of lumpy mail plus or you know, or an email where you've got some form of permission marketing to get your beautiful high value item out to someone so they can read it and consume it and then talk about you around the office. Like what an incredible way to land mid market and enterprise customers, guys.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I mean I'll quote Blair ends from win without pitching. You know, he says, and I was, I think many uh, people are guilty of this. You know, everyone feels the work is the reward for the relationship. Right. So you go out, you make all these friends, they give you some work and they'll hey, I got a buddy that needs this, take good care of him. And you know, you start doing work for all this network of friends of people you have relationships with and that isn't sustainable after a while because you got to give this guy a deal and if you screw up and this guy gets pissed off at you because you're screw his friend, he says the relationship is the reward for the value you provide. Right. So if you're the only person in the world that can solve this problem, you know, people will gravitate towards you and that, that creates the relationship. Not, hey, I'm going to go out to a networking event, I'm going to have some beers with these guys and hopefully it leads to work. Yeah, the work comes first, the value comes first and then the relationship comes from that which is a much more sustainable way.

Speaker A: I totally agree with you there. Like, I think that um, with business that friendship should be formed out of good business. Business, um, shouldn't be formed out of friendship. That's just my personal view. Like don't get me wrong, when you take on a business partner, like I don't have any business partners. Like the closest thing I have in our business to a business partner is my wife. And essentially, you know, it's because of the fact that that's just the way things are. You know, you work with your wife every single day, uh, she writes amazing copy, etc. Etc. And um, you know, it's, it's really exciting and we love it. But like, I've got no issues with people getting into business with friends. I think that's actually a really positive thing because at the end of the day, um, who's got your back like your best mate? Not many people do. Right. Um, but when people get it wrong with customers it's like, oh, I do work for a friend. You've got to cut. Like there's a social expectation of you cutting a deal. Then you, as you're right, the next person that knows you is going to cut you a deal and things like that. Like, I'm not sure about you, but if you're a small business owner or a um, or any type of business owner and you've got a friend who wants to pay you for your services as, as that friend, don't you think paying full price or if not overs on top of what you should be paying is the right way to treat your friends? You know what I mean? Because at the end of the day, you know that person that impacts that person's life, their livelihood, um, their ability to connect with the universe, um, and to be able to take part in the world. So yeah, I agree with you there. Um, the relationship is the reward of the work for sure.

Speaker B: There's a, uh, kind of an inside joke amongst car dealers when they say, you know, hey, when a family friend comes in, how much of a discount do you give them on the car? And the joke is, you know, you charge them 10% more because they're going to be such an entitled teen in the ass because they think they know you always drive friends and family more.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's interesting. I actually have a friend, um, a funny story, I could tell this another day, but one of my best friends, his brother in law is uh, a dealer principal at a um, car dealership. I won't name names just to keep everyone clear, but you know, my best friend is always scheming to figure out, you know, how he can get the family and friends discount, um, based on the dealership that he's working at and the car that he can potentially buy and him, and he's such a crazy motoring enthusiast nut he's just looking at it, it's like, oh, if he moves across to BMW or if he moves across to Mercedes or he moves across to insert European car here, I'll be able to get this car at which is normally 200,000 Australian dollars. I'll be able to get a 20% off. It's gonna be $160,000 and I'm gonna have this sick car and then I can flip it in a year and make 20 grand. And you just hear it and you're like man, oh it's, it's hilarious because like at the end of the day, right, like if your life is your work and the Other thing you've got is cars. Like, you're gonna have to figure out a way to make it exciting to keep yourself sane. Um, that's crazy. Now, I'm really interested to know your thoughts on this because I know, I know your time is super valuable and I don't want to, um, take too much of it up because I know we've gone nearly for an hour now. Beautiful. Um, with 2024, everyone at the end of 2024, I remember when generative AI came on the scene. Um, those large language models like ChatGPT. I remember the first time I opened Chat GPT and I, I. It's almost like I saw the, the green code of the Matrix. Like, glows gloss over my eyes and I'm like, this is it. This is the big one. Um, yeah.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: How have you seen 2024 play out for you so far? Um, in terms of the impact of AI in marketing? And, um, I'm just keen to hear your thoughts and what's going and where are you moving with it?

Speaker B: Yeah. So it's a. I think it's a big divot right now. Right. So I think it's taking, taking a lot of work, a lot of jobs away from, um, people like us. But my, my overall long term game is I'll liken this back to, I think, 2016. I went to a trade show, I wrote a screenplay, and I was trying to sell it some real nerdy.

Speaker A: What, you had a screenplay? This is the onion that never keeps on. This is the forever expanding onion. Like these layers and layers and layers and layers and layers. Oh, no. He's gonna pull something out from underneath. I can just see. Oh, it's gonna happen.

Speaker B: Here we go. I'm multifaceted. So I wrote a, out of the, uh, out of the box comic book called Rockabilly Road.

Speaker A: Wow.

Speaker B: And been doing it for about a decade. And I had never even met my partner who lived in New Orleans. Uh, we were working together for 10 years and we're like, you know what? He built the car from the, from the comic book. An actual car. I'm like, you know what? You did that. I'll come down, we'll film a sizzle reel. I'll write, you know, a 90 minute feature, and we'll see where this thing goes. And, uh, that was my adventure for a year or two.

Speaker A: Wow. That's crazy.

Speaker B: And I could, I could send you the, send you the sizzle, uh, with that sort of.

Speaker A: Dude, I am fascinated. You got me so curious. Of course I want to See the Sizzler reel? That's amazing. Wow. Oh, wow. So back to, back to AI, as you were saying. So you went on a, you went on a Roadshow. It was 2016. You went to sell,

Speaker B: went to sell. There was this nerd, nerd, nerdy guy talking about analytics at a Hollywood trade show. And he's going through all these PowerPoints. And he says, in 2016, something happened in humankind that has never happened before. And he went through, he's talking about TV analytics. He said people, for the first time noted in human history, people were willing to pay more for less. Then what the hell does that mean? So if you go to your cable company and they have 200 channels and they're going to charge you 100 bucks a month, about 50 cents a channel, people now are willing to pay $5 for one channel because it's all curated for them, right? So we're approaching, we're approaching content tipping point where people are willing to pay more for curated stuff and get rid of all the crap that they don't want. M. Right? So I'll pay five bucks for the BBC channel rather than paying 100 or 200 channels. So I kind of reflect that as to how we as humans are taking in content where it used to be, you know, you, you know, for lack of a better term, you swipe, swipe left on the crap. Now it's getting so abundant that people need help. Like they don't know what to watch. You know, you sit down at Netflix and you spend half an hour trying to find something to watch because there's just so much stuff. So we're getting to a point in human population where people like really, really need a filter in their lives to get all the crap, all the crap content. And that's kind of reflective in becoming a commodity, right? When that, when a market gets saturated, all of a sudden there's too much content. People can't tell the difference between one special thing and one running mill thing. So if you liken that to AI and AI's ability to create content in mass, right? Imagine if people now are really hypersensitive to garbage content and people are using AI to create garbage content times 20 because it's so easy, I think in the long run it's actually going to damage brands and people are going to have to figure out ways to say, all right, here's the white noise, here's all the thousands and millions of social media posts. We need an expert to craft something that's completely different. That chat GPT could never craft because that's what, you know, 90 of the Internet is. So I think there's going to be a dire, dire need for real human created content. Truly different stuff, which AI is synonymous with efficiency. It is not synonymous with innovation. Mhm. So I think that's where we have our leg up as marketers and creators.

Speaker A: You're so right, because I just did a bit of a mental exercise just then, right? Like I've seen some amazing, like, AI generated images of like, you know, these like, essentially like evil mansions in the most picturesque locations on the planet. Like, you've probably seen it on your own Instagram or Facebook feed. It's like AI generated photo of, you know, exquisite mansion with like views of the Eiffel Tower or whatever. Like, you know, the, you know what, you see it. Everyone's seeing this crap on the Internet, right? But like, if you showed me like a, an AI generated video of say, slash from Guns N Roses playing like classical music, I would not care because it's not real, it's fake. You know, give me a recording from the 1950s of Miles Davis blowing his trumpet, which has all the wrong notes, it has all the mistakes. It has, you know, John Coltrane potentially hires a kite on tenor saxophone, right? Like, give me the grit, the raw and the uncomfortable things which make the music great. And it's interesting because if you know anything about music, the reason why music tastes and feels so good and sounds so good is because of the fact there are moments in time when the note is out of tune and then it's back in tune instantly. Because have you ever heard like people play like electronic instruments, like you know, like synthesized pianos when they first started, when they first came onto the scene because they didn't have the, you know, slightly out of tune and then. Perfect.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think, you know, there was a big Hollywood strike about AI in Hollywood, but I think, you know, we experience that in Hollywood. How many rom coms are there? They take the rom com formula, they tweak one thing and then it's a new rom com movie, right? And it's like how many, how many iterations of the same movie have we seen without AI? I think we need, you know, we all crave that new innovation, right? And to draw a parallel, you know, I know nothing about music, but I'm a movie guy. You know, people are, ah, taking motion, smoothing off their television. Their film is never going to die because of the imperfections in the actual film. It's just so much more of a richer Experience compared to this picnic. This perfect 4K motion, smooth transfer. Like people prefer the imperfect film. And I don't think that'll ever die. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, if, if there is a place for AI and if a robot can do what you do, it might be time for you to evolve. Right. You shouldn't be doing menial tasks that robots can do. Right. Let the robots do that. And now's your chance to evolve and to do something that a robot could never do. Exactly. Yeah. It's, it's, it's far from prime time. Ready. It's, you know, very flashy. Very flashy, but still not ready for human, ah, consumption on a, on a daily basis. Ah, great question, great question. I usually have my bookcase in my, uh, in my super villain layer. I could look over my shoulder, um, definitely win without pitching by Blair ends. Um, I would say How Magicians Think, uh, by Josh, Joshua J. And number three, Change my life. I mean, there's a lot of, A lot of lessons to be learned in Cyclone. Not a business book, but Cyclo. Yeah. Much, much, much better ending. Okay, cool. That's it. Uh, no, I mean, I, you know, I am incredibly grateful. I've been on many, many a podcast and people just, they just. I don't know why they're doing it. Probably because everyone else is doing it and they just, you know, trudge through it. They're like, read through their questionnaire. There's no life. It's almost like being interviewed by AI So this was not only not only great on a business perspective, but really enjoyable, really engaging. I'd love to return the favor and, and figure out a way I can help you. Um, so you have a super villain on your side on your speed dial if you ever need some dirty deeds done. All right, so my only pitch is my book, which is available on Amazon Marketing for Supervillains, available in hardcover, softcover, and the Kindle ebook version. Um, and I, at heart, am a frustrated filmmaker. So if you like your business videos with some explosions and lasers, I overproduce all my videos. So I am marketing supervillain on Instagram, marketing Supervillain on TikTok and decommoditized on YouTube. Thanks for having me. Super villains unite. Thank you, thank you. I, um, just started a couple months ago, so it's a good, good compliment. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, just. Just having that fourth, you know, that, that foresight and the forethought just makes all the difference in the world, man. So great, great job on your end hope you have success with the, uh, this episode and your whole, uh, whole podcast. Okay. Perfect district, here we come. Said descript. Here we come. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Awesome. Great. Awesome. Um, usa. Usa. Uh, so I think we're linked. I think we're LinkedIn together. Are you. Are you active on LinkedIn? Okay, okay. I mean, nobody. Nobody makes money with books anymore, so, yeah, it's. It's, uh, a lead magnet. Yep, yep, yep. All right, so I. I was gonna say I'll see you on LinkedIn, but we'll just. We'll converse via email. I want to keep in touch. Very, very, very fre. All right. Awesome, brother. Great job. I'll talk to you soon.