How to Ship 500 Ads a Week Without Killing Quality

speaker-0: Hello, hello, hello. A little bit of a different scenario. You can see I am not in my normal place. I am here in Mexico at the Digistore Club 24 event.

I'm looking out my window at a beautiful ocean, beautiful pool. But the only thing I want to do more than go play outside in the sunshine is jump into creative operations with heavyweight, our very own Colin Chung. This guy has done over half a billion in sales. He's written copy for Agora, News Max, Barton Publishing, Paleo Hacks, Jim Quick.

And Jay Abraham. He's built and managed copy teams at over six companies and coached multiple riders to seven figure launches. The guy is a machine. And today he's sharing his insights on how to build creative teams.

So without any further ado, let's jump in. speaker-1: Well, this is fun because we're gonna talk about creative teams and creative teams at scale. And it's very meta because I'm on your creative team, Colin. So this is really fun to be able to ask you questions about this and see what's working and what's not working.

So maybe we start with just the big question, like when when teams are at scale, what makes creative teams break? speaker-2: I think once you get past two copywriters, maybe even three, it's not so much about the creative stuff anymore. I mean it still is. It's always is.

But you have to add on that extra layer of management now. And that extra layer of management requires operations like looking at stats, looking at performance, looking at output. And I don't think most copy chiefs are at that place or they they came up through the ranks and ne they never got management experience. I think part of my success is I started at a corporate job at eBay at their call center in Vancouver and I got five years of management experience.

So I knew how to run teams already. And a lot of it's kind of basic. It's just like basic people management. And I think I I I I hesitate to say that most copywriters are unprofessional, but we are.

We we tell dirty jokes in the writer's room and we're not exactly corporate or speaker-0: Creatives aren't known for being politically correct. speaker-2: making that switch is probably something that a lot of copy cheese don't make. And and you've probably all heard the horror stories about copy cheese at other companies and like they're just running the department in a really weird way. Sometimes drunk, sometimes high.

We don't know. speaker-1: That's what makes it exciting. speaker-0: Yeah. Absolutely.

Keep everyone on their toes. Yeah. So it sounds like in your experience, a lot of copy chiefs are graduating up through just being a really good copywriter. Yeah.

And then earning that seniority and knowing what is good copy and then coaching that way. But there's management skills beyond just chiefing copy that that are oftentimes missing and that's what's gonna break a team. Is that right? Yeah.

speaker-2: Yeah. And another thing to add to that is like you see this outside of advertising, a lot of creative people don't know what their magic sauce is. So another thing that does give me a lot of advantage is for five years I was the main teacher for John Carleton's Simple Writing System. So I've done a lot of coaching and teaching as well.

Trainings in my blood. Like within the first year of ebay, I was the department trainer. And I trained the entire department. There was like maybe a hundred and fifty FTEs that went through me.

So that entire department was trained by me. And that requires someone who's somewhat left brain and can break down and dissect how they got that creative idea. Like I I know some really great copywriters, but you ask them how they got the idea was like I was drunk one night and I just wrote for ten hours straight or whatever, and that's how I made twenty million dollars. speaker-1: What is this magic sauce you're talking about?

Like specifically and why does that matter that they can diagnose or talk through how they got to this script? speaker-2: Especially at TNT where we're putting out five hundred ads a week, we need to actually replicate that quality. We have to be able to requ replicate that quality, ⁓ n and quantity of ads. So if you don't have a system, you don't have some sort of way to analyze what we do and how the ad is, it's hard to coach a copywriter to that level.

And that's something that you, Kira and Christy and John do extremely well, my creator strategist. All three of you are very good at breaking down how ads work and why they work, and then you can teach that to the other copywriters. speaker-1: Yeah, well maybe maybe before we dig into this further, we could just kind of step back and talk about the agency at a higher level. Like what does our creative team look like at large?

Just so anyone listening has some context. Like, is this a two person team? Is this like how many writers are on this team? speaker-2: We got eight copywriters, three strategists, ⁓ we got two creative producers, whole bunch of editors.

Like we're we're getting fed a lot of data. The first thing anybody coming to T quickly recognizes is we get access to all the data. And that is such a dream for every copywriter. And like when I got to TNT and started seeing that, I started realizing that most of my clients were they say they understand data and how to analyze data and how to use data for copywriters, but like I quickly became disillusioned with that because I'm seeing what TNT is doing and we really dig into data.

And with that data, we decide how we improve our creative. We're we're a data driven company. And I I think a lot of Direct response companies want to say that, but I've never seen the way we analyze data elsewhere. speaker-0: Yeah, it's usually at like a higher level.

You mentioned ⁓ I mean, how great would it be if there was twenty million dollars at the bottom of every bottle of wine. You I'd go get plastered so I could write a twenty million dollar promo. But speaker-1: I feel like that is now the theme for this interview is getting wasted. speaker-0: It could be.

It could be. I don't know. Yeah, we'll see once I get back out to the pool. I might write a twenty million dollar promo today.

But tangents aside, the idea there being that you can do that and write that promo and then I think to your point it's kind of like a well, I'm not really sure. You know, I had a couple of glasses of wine, it was flowing, I spit it out and and that's not very systematic. So in terms of the creative volume that we have to output, you know, for our clients and to maintain that quality, we do need to maintain systems. To ensure that there is that quality at volume and not just these one off things that, you know, if we could if we could write a $20 million promo after drinking a bottle of wine or getting smashed off half a bottle of scotch, then we wouldn't need to write 500 ads a week because we'd all have a bunch of money.

But you know, it's it's it's just a different game. And I think like we're talking about copywriters that do these long form promos and financial or health or or whatever, but you know, the ⁓ our business is quite a bit different. And so the systems ensure the maintenance of quality. And ⁓ knowing that you have built a bunch of teams at ⁓ a number of companies, what do you feel like is the the messiest version that you've come into and given structure to implement these systems so that you can get quality up and keep things systematic so that the company actually performs better?

speaker-2: all the companies I've built copy teams from, they were at the stage where it was the founder and maybe one other copywriter who did all the copy and they finally realized we can't do it all by ourselves. So I was the guy that proposed the idea. You you guys need a copy team. I'll build build one for you.

So it wasn't so much a mess in the sense of ⁓ there was already something existing and it was replacing it. It was like nothing was existing. And I just built something that made sense to me because I have that mix of ⁓ left brain and right brain. I knew that they needed a team, I knew they needed systems, they needed project management and they needed a rhythm in terms of like what was produced on a weekly basis.

speaker-0: So you got them at that inflection point and not necessarily as they were already trying to expand, but they didn't really know how to expand. They brought you in to to do the expansion. Okay, that's fair. speaker-1: So if you're if you're building it then, what are you looking to do first?

Is there a theme with all these teams you've built where you're like, Okay, first I've gotta get this person or I've gotta do this to build the team out? speaker-2: Like a lot of my previous ⁓ the companies I worked with, they were a little wary. So like they needed someone to find what I call diamonds in the rough. So copywriters that were on the cheaper end but had a lot of potential.

And that requires someone who has trained a lot of people, coached a lot of people, know how to see that particular spark. That way I can get them copywriters that are not on the higher end and then I can coach and mentor them towards high performance. But ultimately it is finding the right copywriters first. And then it's a lot of interviews, ⁓ talking to each different department and seeing what their copy needs are, and then building out exactly what amount of output they need and then just building a system around that.

speaker-1: So how do you you mentor writers through the diamonds and the rough? How do you get them from okay, like mediocre but has possibility and talent to all star? speaker-2: A lot of micromanagement at at the first two months. That's really it what it is.

You've been through my micromanagement cure. So you know, first two, three months, it's like you're reading every line of copy and leaving a lot of feedback. ⁓ ideally you want to jump on those one on one calls with them. ⁓ we have weekly one on ones.

We talked about what kind of ⁓ where what where the copy is, what needs to be changed. and trying to get them to reiterate ⁓ speaker-1: Yes, I have. speaker-2: my thought process back at me. And then eventually it gets to the point where they're writing and thinking like me.

And then feedback slows down. And then I kind of expect them to come up with their own ideas. And I see that they can start after they've adopted my mindset, then they can start bringing back their own creativity and their sense of ⁓ copyisms, if you will. speaker-0: Yeah, Kira, this reminds me of what ⁓ John was saying in terms of cloning yourself.

Yeah, shout out to ⁓ John Belkowicz's episode. If you t if you take a a look at one of our previous episodes about ⁓ creative strategy with John Belkowicz, he was describing the same thing of really trying to almost download your mind. And we we were talking about it in the in the sense of training Claude, but also doing that so that you can pass it off. To other people on the creative team so that they're able to think like you, much in the way that you're describing here.

So it sounds like that's that's super aligned. speaker-1: Yeah. And I wonder what that is if you've identified what that approach is for you, where it's like, okay, these three elements are most important when I'm mentoring because I need them to have this mindset. Or is it just customized for each writer?

speaker-2: It's customized for mo ⁓ each writer, but for me I tend to focus on structure and mechanisms because most copywriters are creative people, the right brain people. So they don't think in structure and mechanisms. So if I can get them to think the way I think left brain wise, then add that to their right brain creativity, it creates a powerful combination. And then finding other copywriters that are similar to me, it's a easier on ramp, I guess.

But then for those writers, I need to force them to stop being so left brain and go take a walk, do something you like, and let the actual right brain stuff come through. It that one I'm not not as good at coaching at. We had a copywriter who's very right brain here that I could not turn around. But ⁓ you know who I'm talking about.

Like Christie did a really great job of turning h ⁓ this copyright around. And that's because I think Christie has that more of that emotional psychological understanding of really far right, really creative types peop people. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. I I do wonder because we talk about right brain and left brain people all the time in our one on one chats and just if you feel like that is something that people really can strengthen and work on in their careers so that they can really tap into both sides, even if they are extremely right brained or extremely left brained, ⁓ what you've seen personally from working with all these writers.

speaker-2: Yeah, you can absolutely tap into them. ⁓ it it may not be the way you want it to. I think for that particular copywriter I'm referring to, I still don't think if we sat this person down, they could name the structures. But because we've worked so hard on it, it goes into subconscious and then it's it can be brought back up, but not in a conscious way.

So like I don't think this particular copywriter can ever be that analytical. But that's okay. We don't care. We s we're getting the results from this.

speaker-0: We've ta we've touched a couple of themes about management. And one, you said like being able to evaluate each line of copy. ⁓ and then we talked about the left brain, right brain approaches. I'm just wondering, like, and and maybe the answer here is is is bespoke for each individual, but I'm thinking like what a creative person actually needs that like the business first manager that's focused on output and results, ⁓ you know, or just leaders in general just really don't understand that you feel like you has been part of your sauce as you say it for the ⁓ success of your creative teams.

speaker-2: It is what that d l i i i it's w that last five minutes that Kira and I were talking about. It is digging those weeds and I don't think business types and managers want to deal with that stuff. It's too murky, it's too creative, it's too frustrating. It i it is it takes one to manage one, if that makes sense.

I think every single writer on our team has creative pursuits outside of T and T. We're all very artsy or aspirational artsy. If you talk to any copywriter, like even big name ones, like John Carlton wanted to be a rock guitarist, Jay Abraham I don't know. No, Dan Kennedy wanted to do write novels.

⁓ like there's always that artistic pursuit somewhere hidden in ⁓ these creators and we're all really copywriting because it pays the bills and mix money. Really we want to be writing film scripts and music and art. And management doesn't understand that, right? A a lot of people in management speaker-0: I think they're just thinking about it like productized output.

speaker-2: Exactly, exactly. And like this is completely of side tangent, but like what we saw in the last five years of AI, it's like it's basically extended going, Hey, we can't manage these creative types, let's see if we can replace them. Right. And they're finding out very quickly that it's not doable.

Like the sh like when w when it comes to art art, and and I'm gonna separate art art from like what we do at the ad agency, it's like the creative stuff that you need from that is just so bad. Bonkers and sideways. Like nobody like Lemony ⁓ N Lemony Snake is a really great book series that I think is a great example. Who the heck was asking for a really mean asshole uncle to abuse two children for 13 books?

Right? That is just a weird USP that somehow worked for that book series. And that's that's art art. Like you get the weirdest USPs and sometimes they just hit and they work.

Now If we go back to the agency stuff, obviously it's not as creative. So like we're we have formulas and systems that work. And I can see how AI really helps us keep working. And to the point that we need to have those systems, I also want to emphasize that like about two to five percent of our ads are wacky ideas.

And those wacky ideas have a low success ratio, but they become the new format and structures that could become million make millions for us. And you have to allow that. Cause if your portfolio mix is all like systematic stuff that already works, we're never coming up with new ideas that could line. Exactly.

We we need the assembly line for most of it, but we also need to let the creatives do the weird wacky thing once in a while. And that's how we come up with new formats. We have someone on this podcast who has come up with three format structures. That are now million dollar winners for us.

And it's because she comes up with wacky ideas. And you have to let her do it. speaker-0: That's you, Kira. Your face your face was saying like, is he talking about me?

Last time I checked, I'm not a she. I had checked my pronouns. I am not a she, so I'm pretty sure he's talking about you. speaker-1: That makes me think though about as we scale as an agency and so you're building these repeatable systems and you're figuring out how do we do this with many eight writers and strategists, but how do you keep those creative types, like the fire burning, so they can have those wild ideas when there's also systems being kind of thrust upon them that are important.

Yeah. Like how do you balance all of it? Cause I feel like we are in the middle of it right now and trying to sort it out. speaker-0: Yeah.

Could I take that for a second? Like trying to interpret what you've already said. I just want to see if like I'm following because if I was gonna answer that, I would say it's maintaining enough of a ratio or you know, we use the word balance, but like enough of a ratio of those wild creative swings so that your job doesn't feel monotonous and boring because you're just going through the systematized stuff. speaker-2: Yeah, go for it.

speaker-0: So let's say for every ten ads you create, Kira, you're gonna have one, maybe two of those wild swings. That are you thinking about it like that, Colin? Please fill in the the gaps because I'm sure I didn't get it all, but it's something like that, right? speaker-2: It's also related to ⁓ something that you've driven a lot at this company is like we need to have a port proper portfolio mix.

So we have ten percent net news, fifty percent verticals, and forty percent horizontals. Mm-hmm. So it's like making sure your portfolio mix for each brand slash funnel is correct. And ensuring that of that ten percent net news, like maybe two to five percent of it are wacky ideas and s the other bit are like proven formats and structures.

So that's the business answer for the port feeling mix. But like from a personal coaching answer, encouraging them to do the really creative stuff on their own time. Like one of our writers is like a lead musical singer. So he additions and he gets roles in musicals.

We have another guy who writes comic books. We have songwriters on our team. We have people who are writing fiction, screenplays. I I want to speaker-0: Jeremy Hunsicker, who was like the the like ⁓ step in lead singer for Journey for a while.

I mean, that guy's an animal. Yeah. speaker-2: Yeah. So let them get that crazy wild energy out and say sum it for just a few bits of the portfolio that they can use at TNT.

But yeah, like the the thing was the systematic stuff is like you still require a lot of creative micro decisions. And that's the stuff that we need the the creative mind for. speaker-1: Maybe we can also talk about, you know, outside of formats, maybe we could also talk about just like systems and helping getting buy-in from those creative types as you scale to use systems that make everything easier as a whole, but might make their day-to-day a little bit trickier, right? They like the creative just wants to write the script on a blank Google Doc and Right.

You're developing systems that will actually like work long term. So how do you communicate with creatives so that you can speak their language and get them to buy into systematic changes that are good for the company, but maybe like a little inconvenient for the creative minds. speaker-2: I think every writer who does well at TNT has that moment where they realize that this is more of a game than a creative endeavor. And if you copy the right formats faithfully, you're gonna get more success here.

This actually might be a better question for you, because you had that moment a year ago, maybe a bit longer, when you were like, ⁓ this is a game. I just have to copy this format and my ad spend will go up. What what was it? for you that made you finally click.

speaker-1: Well, I was paying attention to my ad spend and I wasn't happy with the number and I was attempting to be super creative, which was encouraged, thankfully. And I love that that's encouraged in our agency. And I was just shooting for all these wild ideas that were fun, but they weren't they weren't performing. And so I was tired of losing and failing and decided I wanted to win for once.

And that's when I just realized it was a game and I just needed to play the game. speaker-2: Yeah, so that that that's that's the thing about ⁓ commercial advertising, writing, like not not creative creative writing is like you do recognize that it is it is a metrics driven type of creativity. So you and it is a winnable one. It's not pure luck.

Like like if I were to write a literary novel and try to win the game, that would not work because you're you're banking on a really unique, weird idea that the market may or may not like. Whereas with copywriting, you know what the market wants, you know what works on them, and there may be disconnects sometimes, but when you're on target, you're on target speaker-0: Yeah, it kind of goes back to your comment about art art, right? It's like you hear the you hear the the comment that art is subjective.

I might look at a painting or a sculpture or whatever and think like this is ugly, this is stupid. And you're gonna look at it and you're gonna see some kind of beauty because you have some knowledge or perspective that I don't have that tells you something about the story behind that piece of art. And so with our business, it's very much not subjective. It's very objective.

There are numbers for everything. How long did they retain? Did they click? Did they buy all of the you know?

So yeah, yeah, making clarifying that division a little bit. speaker-2: And we're where we're also hitting like a baser emotional like the d like the things we sell are hitting a base primal emotional need of the market. It's not like some highfalutin intellectual things. Like at the end of the day, our you know, our base primal needs are like, am I attractive?

Am I feeding my family? Am I worthy? Am I doing like it it's not it's not something that's touching a subtle nuanced thing about your personal psychology that art art does. speaker-1: Let's talk about how we've talked a lot about how we are data driven and then we have all these creatives.

How do we combine it so that we are successful as an agency and for our the brands that we work with? How do we combine the performance side with the the creative in a way that's useful? speaker-2: So every cell or pod in agency language, we have a performance manager and every Monday we have what's called a best ads call where we look at the data from the weekend. ⁓ the writers are on this call and we look at ads together.

We do post mortems on them and we try to figure out what worked, what didn't work. And we can assign specifically sorry. Why? Yeah.

speaker-0: And why. And ⁓ of course modem, yeah, it's like we don't want to just say it worked, it didn't work, we want to know why on both sides. speaker-2: Exactly. You you you have hypotheses and theories as to why it didn't work, and then you scientifically figure out, well, what do we do next?

How do we test it? ⁓ and that defines the next iteration of the ads. And that's that's kind of our workflow here. We we look at the data, see what worked, didn't work, why, and then we create another iteration of ads.

The creativity is more of a problem solving creativity at that point. speaker-1: So what type of tension, if there is any tension, have you seen exist between performance and creative? And how do teams work through it so they get the best output possible? speaker-2: Oof.

This is if if I can be really honest and maybe a yes a little too transparent about T and T is this is something we're still working on. We're always gonna be working on. speaker-0: I've been here seven years, guys. I've been here seven years, and it's it's an ever-evolving game because as the team grows, it changes.

So it's it's like you think you've nailed it, and then you add in, let's say, another cell or pod to ⁓ your point about in ⁓ you know industry agency language, or just a couple more copywriters, or some extra video editors, some flex resource, anyway. Like you nail down the machine and then it changes, and then the whole thing kind of like breaks, so to speak. And so it is tough to maintain. But it it it just it cycles through of like we got it and then it changes a little bit and then we gotta fix it and then we got it and it's just continuous.

It's been my experience, but not not to cut you off, Colin go ahead. speaker-2: No, no, no, no. It's good. That's a really good answer.

I I also want to add the tension as in ⁓ just the budget. And not I I don't mean money wise. I mean like depending on how much a particular brand is spending per month, we only guess so get so many testing slots. So now the tension becomes all right, we only got that many slots.

What do we want to test? So now you have to really think Intelligently and strategically, well if I test these things, then I can't test these things. So now you have to think through which are your strongest tests and which will give us the best data so we can make the next series of tests. speaker-0: It requires an important level of intentionality that some people just might not think about.

And, you know, we we we really try to steer away from that whole old adage, you know, of throwing spaghetti against the wall to see what sticks. speaker-2: Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ and like that and that's why I said like this is something that TNT is gonna constantly working at because we've we've also seen the other side of it the last few months, ⁓ where we ⁓ worked with a few clients and we study a few other agencies and they do the spaghetti on the wall thing.

And they're doing a lot more output than us. But like once we dug into how their thought process was like, it was like, You got you guys don't have any strategy at all, do you? You're just you're just throwing stuff. speaker-0: Volume for the sake of volume.

speaker-2: Yeah, volume for the sake of volume. And I think for some agencies and some companies they can afford that. But we as an agency and the type of clients we have, where we we realized very quickly within a few months that we cannot do that. And strategically thinking is what we're good at and what we need to lean into.

speaker-0: Yeah, I think it was the decision that it doesn't make sense for us. Not that not that we can't do it because we did it and it just didn't make sense. And so, you know, to go back to the idea of layering in the intentionality, it's like that just strengthened our position on having that intentionality. Not not not like mince your words or put words in your mouth, I guess, but you know, to just reinforce that there there was intention there.

It was a learning experience. Hey, we're gonna try to play that game. And volume for volume's sake doesn't really makes sense when we can be more intentional. It's like, okay, if you're gonna throw a thousand ads a week, you know, we do like five hundred across the agency, let's say.

And if you've got one brand and you're doing a thousand ads a week, like, you know, you're just throwing things out there. And as long as profitability is there, like you're you're okay with it. Right. But it's like your intentionality is so low that you're just banking on the fact that like, ⁓ I've got a it's almost like the hamster wheel analogy, right?

It's like we're on this hamster wheel and we don't know how to get off of it because we don't have intentionality, but we need to produce that amount because you know our hit ratio is this, and that's how many winning ads we need. But we know that if our hit ratio is this, then we need to produce that many, which is a thousand ads a week. And it's just like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's way too much work.

It's way too many resources. It doesn't make any sense. And so, ⁓ you know, I think that's why we decided like that game's not for us. speaker-1: Well, how do we while we're talking about cre ⁓ thinking strategically, how do you create this culture of strategic thinking that can be systematized?

speaker-2: Well that that you you would have referred to John's episode for that. speaker-1: No no no no no. We okay, we will refer to that one, but also how are you, Colin, doing it as speaker-2: You know, for me at my level as ⁓ more of a people manager is just holding people accountable, being that enforcer, making sure people are actually tracking stuff and testing. I play bad cop.

That that's part of my job as the manager. It's like, are we doing this? And checking in and going, Hey, why haven't we done it? And doing the disappointed dad face.

speaker-1: Hope I don't get that face tomorrow when we chat. But is there something that at a cultural level like we're doing to make that shift? Because I've seen that shift happen and I know, you know, John has created trainings to help lead that, but it's a lot it's larger than one person. speaker-2: It's selling it to leadership.

It's having leadership reply, saying that's what we want to. It's recognizing the resources that we have and whether we to to what Jared was saying, like, a thousand ads doesn't make sense if like it eats up all our resources for one client. We we need to be very c intentional on how we manage those those resources and how we s put where our energies are for each different client of each different brand. We we have to be efficient.

We can't just throw up all these different ads for the sake of throwing up ads. So it it comes down to business numbers as well. Like we can't hire a million editors. It's We can't hire a million copywriters.

It wouldn't make business sense for us to do the speaker-1: Okay. And I mean, while we're talking about volume, we are still producing, you know, thousands of ads per month, right? So it's so how do you maintain that quality? You know, let's say we are being very strategic about what we're testing as an agency, but it's still high production and high volume.

So how are you as director of creative helping maintain this level of quality with every ad? How is that possible? speaker-2: Well, on one level, I have three amazing creative strategists and they reveal every script. And then we have a wonderful director of production, post production, who has editors that review the the final video output.

Another thing that we're doing that that is very smart is we do have proven formats and structures that we replicate across different brand ⁓ and funnels. So we have an idea of what is proven and works and we can replicate it and there is a there is a go to what it should look and feel and sound like. speaker-0: Yeah, it sounds like we have a good cross-departmental quality control system. So to quickly touch on the feedback system, like how are you ensuring, and this is one thing I really like that you do is your weekly updates on ⁓ output and creative strikes, but like the feedback system that gives data back to your team so that they actually understand how they're performing.

Because earlier in the episode, you mentioned like we're very data-driven, and most copy teams out there in the world. ⁓ creative teams, copy teams, like they don't get the data back, the the the the granular level that we give it to our team. So how are you ensuring that they understand that data and they're able to really absorb the granular level and aren't just looking at surface level things like how much ad spend it was, but beyond that so they can understand how to iterate and and anyway, speak to that.

speaker-2: Yeah, ⁓ this is basically the first two weeks of your training here at T. We ⁓ show you Edge. That's our so proprietary software where we gather the data. ⁓ The moment I personally saw Edge, I was just so blown away because as so for context, I was a freelance copywriter from two thousand eight to twenty twenty two, twenty three.

And a large part of my income was royalties in order to get C why I was how much I was making royalties wise, I needed the data. Like, clients are also so squirrely about it. They wouldn't share with me. And maybe they'll send an Excel spreadsheet once in a while.

The moment I came to TNTA, I realized, hey, the moment you throw up an ad on Thursday or Friday and on Monday you can log in, you can look up that particular ad to see the data, I was like, what is going on here? This is every single direct response copywriter's dream. Cause you're You want to see how well your ads do. And so the first two weeks, I am breaking it down for them.

So in your first two weeks here as a copywriter or whatever, we're like we'll we'll go through every single metric and like what we're looking for. We can break down the ad by three second ⁓ engagement rate, 10 second engagement rate, and then we can talk about CPMs, what affect the CPMs, what affect the s ⁓ click-through rate, what affects the conversions and ALV. Because we have all that data because we are also locked into the client's funnel. And at each one of those different metrics, you can figure out what part of your ad worked or didn't work.

Having that data and training copywriters how to read that data really helps them define what their next test and iteration should be. speaker-0: Yeah, it's a lot of training around the ⁓ story that the data is telling you. speaker-1: The great thing though is it happens so organically through our agency just by the conversations we have on a weekly basis multiple times with the performance team. So writers who are new, just like you pick it up just from our regular meetings and pick it up quickly.

⁓ so you can make more informed decisions, which is just so nice as a writer to have all that data and have all that access. So I wonder if you could speak to incentives and how to motivate writers and How do you view system that encourages writers to like overdeliver and give a dam and like show up and boost that performance and give it a hundred ten percent so they can get ads fen and get ROAS up? And how do you create that, I guess, that culture of motivation that's extrinsic because it's already speaker-2: We think we did something really cl but what it was important for me that we did our bonus structure this way.

Our bonus structure is based on total agency spend, but there's also a bonus for if your particular ad is doing well for the first 90 days. And this is important to me because at most direct response companies, it's purely your ad, your royalties. So now you create this really hyper competitive environment where your top copywriters are getting all the royalties and everybody else is like feeding off the scraps. And that creates a almost a toxic environment in a sense and also a defeating environment.

Here at TNT, we want people to write really good ads and get a bonus, but we also want the entire team to recognize if we do well together as a team. we're all getting bonuses as well. ⁓ and that way I don't mind if I write some iterations for somebody else's ad and somebody writes iterations on what my ads. Because now we're helping the entire team get a bonus on top of the individual one.

Yeah. speaker-1: I think it's that shift in mindset has been really clear even over the last year of going from like even more individual focused to team focused. I think that's been something that you've focused on and you can really see that actually happening in how the team operates, which is great. ⁓ so we're talking about incentives and what motivates people, but there's also, you know, when you're managing people and humans, humans are messy, as we know.

We're hot mess sometimes. So how do you handle speaker-0: Rising tide raises all boats. speaker-1: Managing people and the insecurity and burnout that's very real for everyone in every profession, definitely in agency life. speaker-2: Probably a lot of like soft management things that I've picked up, but also because I was one of them, a creative.

So I I I don't know if I can articulate it so much as I know I do, I just don't know how I do it. And this really comes back to the whole point of like why you want you you need a a creative to manage creative because you do need that empathy, that understanding of what a creative is. goes through and it does require a lot of reassurance, a lot of compliments, a lot of recognition. ⁓ and when they're stuck to have the necessary tools and suggestions for what they can or can do to like get back on track.

And a lot of that is just counter to intuitive. I remember early in my freelance career, my wife is very much practical and left brain. She She was an administrator at a school. And she would always ask me, All right, so you're you're behind.

So how many hours would it take for you to get catch up in it? I would never be able to answer that because I don't know. And that's that's that's a clear case where you take someone in management trying to manage creative. It doesn't work that way.

It does require you to say, Hey, go watch a movie. Go go do something else. Cause your brain's not gonna work the way you want it to work. Managing creatives is just weird.

speaker-1: You can share an example and you don't have to name the person, but someone who was struggling with maybe it's underperformance or burnout or whatever insecurity and you help them turn it around. I'm just curious about like what specifically you did to do that. speaker-2: It was it was what I just said, like, hey, go do that thing you really like doing that has nothing to do with work. speaker-1: So giving space, giving space to do the things they love and knowing that it will come back around.

speaker-2: Yeah, it it sounds simple, but it's really difficult to do because from a business point of view, like if you were like just a pure executive type of manager, you'd be like, What what are you what are you doing? You are you basically giving them free PTO? No, I'm not. I'm I'm encouraging them to find their groove again.

But you can't say it that way. speaker-0: Well, maybe it's important to say it that way because, you know, to come in from the business perspective, it's like at the end of the day, it is a business. And so if I'm thinking about it like a business owner who's is most of our audience, you know, I want to know, all right, yeah, I'm doing that, but at what point do I start pushing? At what point do I stop giving space and say, Hey, it's time for results?

You know, I can't just say, Hey, you what I'm watching movies. Yeah. I just want you to binge out on the Harry Potter series for like a week and then come back. It's like, you know what I'm saying?

⁓ to your point about the speaker-2: Yeah. It's intuition. I'm sorry, I I don't have a a quantitative answer for you. I I wish I did, but like through the year speaker-0: Not necessarily in duration, but is it like is it something that you look for?

Any kind of insight? speaker-2: Okay, so as a freelancer, during my freelancer years, I got so much work that has subcontractors. And you're gonna have subcontractors that burn you and some that don't. And so you quickly build a gut for who's a flake, who's a diva, and who's actually gonna deliver for you.

And I think over the years I've just figured out intuitively who's actually needs that. break to get back on their feet and who is basically gonna flake out for good. And you kinda just know. And I wish there was a good answer for that.

But like the people that are at TNT, the people that aren't, I kinda knew where they were at and why I needed to let them go. speaker-1: Yeah. Well, I think it's you as a people manager learned how to read people very l well over the years. You can read the person to know if they're the diva or if they're just truly burnt out.

Well, on the opposite end, as we start to wrap up, it would be hard to skip over talking about hiring, especially when talking about building out a creative team. And so I know this could be a entire podcast where we focus on hiring. I'm gonna think of the right question to ask you so we can cover it. But speaker-2: Yeah.

speaker-1: How do you identify great creative talent, maybe like the diamonds in the rough before they prove it when you're hiring? speaker-2: So my hiring process is really extensive. not ⁓ it's not as extensive as it is at TNT, but when I was a freelancer and I was hired to hire people, which is something I have done, I make the copywriters go through a ring of tests. Some of those tests is purely me know wanting to know if you have the skill set or not.

But I also did two really interesting tests. One is explain a really difficult concept to me in simple terms, under five hundred words. And that just for me is I I need to know that you're a intelligent person, but you can also explain things simply. And that's really important in advertising, especially for what we do, which is health supplements, where we're talking about like the physiology of how a body works.

The other test that I do that's really weird is like, hey, just write 500 words about your favorite thing, like what you're passionate about. And to me, that shows whether you are a 360 thinker. A lot of people write about meditation or their dogs or like their favorite ⁓ hobby, but they don't they they're not able to articulate it. And for me, if you can't articulate you I'm not questioning whether they're passionate or not, but I need to know that you're you can articulate your passion because what that's what I'm paying you for.

And if you can articulate passion, you can transfer that energy to copywriting and advertising. And then there's like a whole bunch of other tests, like just like people tests, like how do you handle feedback, how do you handle management, how do you handle good clients, bad clients? But yeah, like you said, it it it this could be a podcast episode by itself. speaker-0: So to try and give the audience some quick tactical stuff that ⁓ I know we could again do a whole episode about probably these next three questions, but I wanted to just if you could do some quick rapid fires of like what are some non negotiable traits?

I see this and I will not hire the person. speaker-2: The diva thing, a hundred percent. Like I I've had copywriters who were mad at me for this whole application process. They like figured out who I was doing the job for and they emailed the person saying, Hey, I'm amazing.

You should hire me. What is this bullshit? speaker-1: Sounds like something I would do. speaker-2: It depends on how you do it too, right?

But like if there's a clear system for hiring, you're skipping it, ⁓ in a really rude way. ⁓ you're not doing yourself any favors. Some other non negotiables. Going back to those written tests.

I want to know that you have interest in hobbies outside of marketing and copywriting. To me that's important because it shows that you are someone who likes learning new things. And if you're like there's so many and this this is not new, but like This has been in this world for like twenty years now, but like we we as an industry has sold copywriting as this like business opportunity. You make it make six figures working from home.

And it attracts a lot of people who are not necessarily creative nor interesting. And those people don't tend to do write interesting copy because they're in it purely for the money and they're not actually creative people. You can figure them out quickly by the way they write and the way they act, if that makes sense. speaker-0: Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. So then this next question might overlap with your previous answer, but what are some immediate red flags when hiring? speaker-2: Yeah, that does overla yeah, the the the the divas, not being able to take feedback. That that's another one.

I like they they speaker-0: Yeah, when I man, when I hired for the creative department back in ⁓ well, it was like twenty nineteen to twenty twenty two that I ran the department and it was n hands down. If like you can't take feedback, bye. There's the door. Yeah.

speaker-2: Yeah, yeah. What else? How they handle clients. Like one of my two of my questions when I do the ⁓ verbal interview is name your best client slash project and what was great about it.

Don't name it, but tell me about your worst clientslash project and what made it worse. Those two answers really tell me are they reasonable people? Are they do they recognize the business needs? of the client and if the client was toxic, are they how did they handle that?

I mean I guess that's a red flag, green flag. It's whether or not they know how to handle business people. Cause y at the end of the day, copywriting is for business. And if you don't know how to handle business people, you're not gonna do well.

speaker-1: Yeah, and all of our writers are interacting with our clients to some degree. Right. We have creative calls with our clients. So that's important skill set to have.

speaker-2: Everybody at TNT understands the economics of our clients. They understand the economics of our agency. Some copywriters literally never understand the whole economic system of a funnel and why it works or why it doesn't work. Those copywriters don't last long.

Because at the end of the day, what makes you a great copywriter is probably because you're also a marketing consultant and you understand the business side of it. speaker-0: Yeah, more more full stack marketer than just commoditized copywriter. speaker-2: Yeah. Yeah.

speaker-1: Well, I do think we should have an episode about hiring at some point where we go in depth. But ⁓ for now we'll leave it there. And I do w want to ask you real quick about your take on AI because I feel like speaker-0: The spicy clothes. Yeah.

I was waiting for that one. This is gotta be a space. Bring it out, bring it out. Spill the tea.

Come on, Colin. speaker-1: What's your real speaker-2: I don't think it's spicy. ⁓ you already had an episode with John, and I will repeat what he says. AI is stupid and it lies to you, right?

So you gotta be extremely careful. speaker-0: Man, can I cut you off real quick? I saw this great video yesterday that was the day before what doesn't really matter, but it was somebody like chatting with Claude on their phone and it was like, Hey, I've got a doctor's appointment. It's this far away.

Should I walk or should I take the car? And it was like, you know, like thirty meters away or something, you know, whatever, like a a hundred feet away. And it gave it just this bizarre answer about why you need to leave early and make sure to get in the car. Gonna be traffic and all of this stuff.

And it was just like, you didn't even recognize that it's a hundred feet away. You should have just reckon, you know, told me to walk. Anyways, just like the dumbest stuff that still comes out of AI. And I use Claude, I love Claude, but like that was one example of just even right now, it's still stupid.

So sorry for the diversion, but I thought that was so fun. speaker-2: No, it's correct. So, like, again, I don't think it's a spicy take, but like the reason why our copywriters and strategists are so good with AI is because they're already good at copy and marketing. So you can they they need to spend hours training it with bots and agents and skills to think like them before they can use it properly.

My brother sent me a YouTube video yesterday where ⁓ everybody is regretting laying off all the software engineers. And they're regretting it because it just writes out code that makes no sense. The people who are good with AI are already good at their jobs. All AI does is helps them do their jobs better.

But ⁓ what what's gonna happen is in five years, or we're already seeing this, if we don't backfill the juniors, we're gonna have all these really good people using AI, these seniors retired in 10, 20 years. speaker-0: Here's my take. speaker-2: And we have nothing to backfill. And that's really scary future.

That's that's my take on AI, where it's like, and we're already seeing it with software engineering, but when you think about it, medical, legal, all these different industries who are using AI to ⁓ replace junior their juniors, we're gonna have a problem in ten to twenty years where we don't have juniors who did the grunt work, who worked, you know. Did all the hard work of learning through and building that intuition and experience to become good. Ultimately, yeah, AI is great if you're already good.

But if you're not already good, it's not going to help you do any better. So if you are a junior copywriter or if you're junior anything using AI, stop. Like learn how to do the thing manually first. Learn how to make mistakes, learn from your mistakes.

Then you can use AI to help yourself get better. speaker-1: Well that was pretty spicy. speaker-2: Was it? Was it?

I don't know if it is. I feel like this is what a lot of Stacy and outside of LinkedIn bros, I don't s I think most people are thinking this way and realizing it's a mistake. speaker-0: Well, nah man, I would say like at least what's getting the most attention right now is definitely the take that like AI can replace I mean, I saw a guy, he's an agency owner and he's really good at content, has multiple businesses, but one of his biggest is his agency. And he literally posted a video walking around his office showing a bunch of empty desks and in place of where people would sit, there were Mac minis.

And I still think it's bullshit, but the idea that he's trying to sell is that like, ⁓ yeah, I just fired two hundred people, look like zoom in on a Mac Mini, like that used to be someone I've just got agents working twenty four seven, you know, da da da da da. And it's like a lot of people are still promoting this idea that AI's gonna do all the work. I think the zeitgeist is still in the camp of this is gonna be revolutionary and and it's gone on long enough. I think People are starting to shift towards what you're saying.

And so you you might be more in that bubble. And so you're not feeling like it's too spicy. But I think it is still spicy to say, you guys, AI is stupid and it's not gonna replace everybody. Like we need it to enable people.

And this is, you know, what me and Kathy, and I think we've even said it multiple times on the podcast, was even in, you know, one of our first episodes of 2025 in review. It's like AI blew up. It's not gonna replace everybody. It's a tool to enable people who are already good at what they do.

And people still don't want to admit that because they want to believe that they can have a magic wand that does all of the work for them. speaker-2: Yeah, yeah, we all want a magic wand, but that's basically not being an adult. speaker-1: Yeah. So don't wanna be an adult.

I don't wanna be one. Okay, as we close, my last question is what will separate top creative teams from mediocre creative teams over the next, let's say, like two years, not that far out. speaker-2: If we're gonna use the theme of this episode, it is just going back to basic business practices, like being a good people manager, being able to manage creatives, and recognizing that managing creatives is a completely different ballgame from managing run-of-the-mill nine to fives.

You can't just make them do work. You you kinda have to manage it in a way that only a creative person knows how to manage creative people. We can talk about systems, we can talk about data, but at the end of the day, we are in a people business. As fortunate or unfortunate that is, you need equal speaker-1: Depending on the day.

Yeah, well let's let's do a game called Fill in the Blank. So the future of creative isn't better ads, it's better blank. People speaker-2: Yeah. Depending on the day.

It's people. Yeah. speaker-0: Stuff. speaker-1: Okay.

Great. Well, I wanna thank you, Colin, for sharing so much about how to build creative teams because it's been really fun to hear you talk about it after actually experiencing it and seeing the results of our creative team growth and how you've helped all of us grow as creative writers who can be messy at times and you've helped so many of us grow and increase our performance and become better at our skills and in our careers. So thank you for this interview, but also thank you for helping so many of us writers.

And speaker-2: Thank I'm touched. Thank you. speaker-1: Creatives. speaker-0: Absolutely.

Thanks again for being on Colin. Thanks for all the transparency, like diving in deep to the details of how you make the magic happen here in TAT. Thanks again. There you have it.

That's a wrap on our episode with Creative Operations with Colin Chung. I hope you got some insights out of this. And if you liked what you heard, please leave us a comment. If you got any questions about any of Colin's insights or anything that we went over, you just want more clarity or you want to drop your opinion, throw that in the comments.

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