Well, you guys have some of the most important
superpowers in the business world, in the branding
world. And so I really appreciate what you're
up to. I've got a lot of that experience, but
I don't have the systems. And so I once worked
with, I don't know if you know Lance Hoke, but
of Signal Genesis. He has a pretty similar type
of system. Forgive me if I compare. any kias
to lamborghinis um right you know i don't want
to say who's we're right in the middle we're
nice nissan nice ford somewhere in there right
um and well i think that the importance is like
there's just so many there's billions of people
who need help so it's like lance can't do it
by himself yeah i think we'd all be down to try
to do it by ourselves um and the abundance mindset
is like well let's let's see what compounds and
adds to it so i haven't used the system in years
um but because of him um it was his fault i got
featured in fox and because i got featured in
fox it was fox's fault that the conservatives
were like here have some money um and the investors
didn't care anymore about anything else other
than hey congratulations you're on fox now we'll
take this seriously and i was like this is so
stupid but okay um like at the same time it works
in our favor so i'm a i do value the the publicity
side of things. And I also am huge into the world
of advertising. Um, and most people hate advertising
and that's because they think it's a money socket.
It is if you don't reverse engineer, but if you
reverse engineer, it's like the best thing you
can possibly do for a brand. Um, and so it's,
and I say that tongue in cheek, um, it, if you're
a local gas station, you don't need a website.
You don't need the advertising. You need good
service, right? And everybody else will find
out what you have. But every business is different
in terms of what they need. But the majority
of my audience greatly, greatly, greatly wants
what you have and are preparing for it. Where
I have a challenge on that is most of them are
not prepared for the scale they think they are.
As I've seen so many companies, Austin, implode.
at the stage of, oh, we're going to go big now.
No, you're not. You're not even close to ready.
And so I always, I'm like the e -brake for most
founders who are alpha and like, screw you guys,
we're going big. And I'm like, no, you're not.
I'm stopping you. Or you're firing me. Take your
pick. Which one? Are we going to save your life
long -term and put a break in this Lamborghini?
Or are we going to, or are you going to drive
off and I'm going to warn your team, get out
of the car before they do? So that's my... difficult
role, if you will, as what I do. So my audience,
I can't wait to dive in with you. I would love
to ask you if you'd be willing to do a 40 to
60 minute live session within the next couple
of months. That way we can pick an actual topic.
We can dive far more extensively into what it
is that you're up to and how it can help the
audience. Today we can record some pre -show
stuff and some of this can also pull in as bonus
footage if we want to. But I also want to make
room for you to ask questions and like observations.
Love it. And I think you're 100 % on it that
different businesses need different things. Like
we kind of look at our, we have a couple others
growing, but our two main ones are like CPG products
and personalities. That's what we've lived on
for a long time. A personality can step in there
and just get on TV and they'll get the attention.
They need some kind of offer, but they need a
lot less than a brand needs. A brand probably
needs product in the warehouse before they can
go and get a bunch of media coverage. Yes. There's
a lot that goes to that. And so, again, I love
the clarity that you guys have as well. This
is super rare. We are a starter stage. We love
to bring on people who are newer with their visions.
But when I see these types of visions that are
well articulated and well designed, you've got
great UX and UI going on, whether it was AI created
or not. You guys understand certain principles
about how to... how to build a brand and how
to position and i love this too you're the number
one communications firm for purpose -driven brands
uh purpose -driven is so aligned with what we
do we've got a program called uh organize latinas
.com that's opportunities for latinos um and
i traditionally work with a lot of people from
central so i live in ecuador um so we work a
lot of people from central south america and
um there's a whole workforce down here that's
the world's completely unaware of and doesn't
know how to tap into. And they don't know that
virtual assistant things like they're starting
to get that. Oh, there's opportunities, but they,
they still think they're limited by language.
And then you've got signal Raptor over here with
what you're building with that too. And, and
yeah, all this, all this stuff really just intrigues
me and brings me back to like, wow, you guys
are building it. Well, you've got a bold, I want
to be careful. I say it's a bold claim about
how much you guys are making per month. it's
not public knowledge so um i i take it with a
grain of salt but i also don't think you're the
i shouldn't say i don't think yeah i have no
reason to doubt what it is that you've what is
it you guys have accomplished where you're at
where you're going y 'all aren't trying to um
mudsling all over the place in your branding
you're very focused on what you do how you do
it um why you do it the way you do it and so
kudos to you guys We've gotten a lot of help
to get where we are. We're about to hit 10 years.
It's kind of that 10 -year overnight success
thing. A couple of things happened. One, we got
some specific help. I'm sure you've probably
heard of them, Cardone Community. We did one
of their things two years ago, and we actually
started hiring in Brazil about two years ago.
And both of those were catalysts for the growth
we've seen over the past two years. And like
that, it's not slowing down. And we're looking
at two acquisitions, one that would double our
agency size, similar size agency. And then the
other one is a pretty large following, which
could do wonders. Like the total follower count
between all the accounts on this business is
about 20 million. And so that would be like,
I don't even know how to manage that. Right.
So we have some cool opportunities and it's cause
that like, it's just following all the lessons
that everybody teaches, like have a mentor. We
have a mentor. We have a couple of communities
we're part of. We've gotten, we've hammered down
on messaging, made sure the website works. in
most places right yeah that's been a brutal like
two -year design process to get to where it is
still going yeah i see it i wish ai was where
it is now when we started that i know man it
has changed everything yeah and like i'm on the
open call train right now and so on at nights
i'm on the mac studio at home uh have you tinkered
with uh with perplexity's computer yet No, we
started on some of the cloud stuff. I'd use both,
by the way, just so you know. I'm agnostic, right?
It's like, no, no, no. I got all the tools are
tools. We have subscriptions to just about everything
in some capacity. I'm loving the Grok API. I
split test the Grok chat, GPT, and Anthropic
APIs for open call. And performance -wise, I
agree with everybody else. The Anthropic one
is definitely the best. But it's literally 10
times the cost API tokens -wise as the Grok is
right now. I'm like, the Grok is not much. And
I think Grok's better than ChatGPT on the API
front for 4 .1 versus 5 .2. I haven't tried 5
.4 yet. Yeah, dude, it's wild what's going on
in the world. I love it. It is. And I love that
too. Like those elements. In fact, we're launching
the AI marketplace this week for first -class
business. And we're keeping simple. One, we're
in a far more humble position as a company. You
know, we're not Grant Cardone. We don't have
hundreds of millions of dollars to invest towards
stuff. When you said you're learning through
Cardone, you meant Grant, right? We did one of
the Cardone Ventures programs. The Brandon Dawson
side of it. We did the 360 and we essentially
doubled our business in 90 days. I'm super glad
to hear it too, Austin, because I tend to use...
grant cardone as the poster child of how not
to lead yeah not in a way of of shaming him it
often feels like it and if he's got an inferiority
complex and he absolutely would hate my show
all of my episodes but if he's got the true leadership
role and vibe of like oh wait a second i have
shortcomings too and yeah i can't overcome those
then whatever i say about it could absolutely
serve him and his audience but i don't i don't
i don't tend to go into that circle um but i'm
glad to see you benefiting from that circle because
i'm a big fan of the book as a man thinketh by
james allen and that's what i know about it yeah
oh and as icing is it's like a pamphlet it's
so short um and one of his premises that he teaches
in it is that the rich man who's rich is wealthy
because of his virtues associated with making
money um you know he's diligent he's persistent
he's you know counts as he understands the math
and the logic and blah blah blah but you know
he might be suffering on the home front and he
might be divorced um you know his wife might
leave him his kids might have a different distant
relationship from him and it's the vices of his
life that drive that reality meanwhile the poor
guy the guy who doesn't have financial victories
uh well you know what he's inconsistent with
work and he's unreliable and he doesn't want
to go in he doesn't want to put in the extra
hours and at the same time the community loves
him and his family loves him he's got a great
relationship with his wife and so uh james allen
teaches us that your virtues like if you could
focus on the virtues and not judge the man but
look at How do I align with the virtues of both?
Then you can create a more holistic success for
your own life. And so I tend to, you know, for
the sake of public figures, point out some of
Grant's flaws in terms of his absolutism and
his superlatives. And hey, I'm going to get right
to that. And then three hours later, he hasn't
revealed anything about what he said he was going
to get to. And that's unethical. And FCC will
come after him eventually for that. But that's
not again, I feel somewhat bad sometimes because
I don't mean to paint him as a Hitler. Right.
I don't mean to villainize him as much as I hope
that he will optimize because he's got millions
of people that he's helping and he's doing a
lot of good things in that process. But it I've
seen a lot of people suffer through those programs
and I haven't. seen a story like yours. I've
seen people who I know that have gone pretty
big with him, but at the cost of, they don't
sleep very well. Um, they're, they're not, they're
not really liking their, their hustling and grinding
it out. And, um, it's not creating the holistic
life that they have wanted to achieve. Um, and
so, but that's also just cause entrepreneurship
is hard too. It's not Grant's fault. um it's
what do we do with the mentorship that we get
and the people that we get so you give me hope
and you give me a little bit of an inline and
it's like if you if you hate me too then that
will get me further from um grant but if you
end up liking what we do then maybe some of what
we say or do rubs off on that organization a
good way because we all man we got eight billion
people to help in this world you know and grant's
not touching the surface of that i'm not scratching
the surface of that um you know not yet but can
we I think if we all pull our, our great minds
together and our great hearts together, then
yeah, I think we can. But that's where it comes
down. So I gotta be careful not to, not to make
rain. As we've gotten like deeper into business
over the years, like everybody has the backend
so to speak. And everybody at that level knows
each other. Like the coach that we started with
was David Meltzer. um is very much on the other
side um but him and grant know each other uh
pretty well because they speak together a lot
and uh it's good to have multiple perspectives
but yes the thing that i appreciate about grant
is that he does have the personal fruit stuff
like the family stuff is like solid there um
despite his beliefs um sure but the the brand
inside of it is like business systems and like
that it's also a place where like if you're not
ready for it like i would never recommend somebody
go that route when they're like three or 500k
it's like uh probably probably get the basics
down um but i know there gosh there's so much
there is and with your scale where you guys are
at i haven't been there personally i've gotten
to be behind the scenes on it um and so it's
it's really neat and it's so cool i hope you
guys enjoy the ride hang on to the family um
you know keep that part sacred we uh we used
to be jake larson's right hand man at video power
marketing uh videopower .com you know what uh
i don't know him but i've seen the brand uh i
think i don't know if heather talked to him at
some point or I've seen documentation somewhere.
I don't know if that was a sales process or somebody
we were looking at working with. He's my favorite
mentor in life by far. He's a family man. He's
always cared deeply about me and helping me on
things. I can't thank him enough for all that
he's done. We were mission companions in Uruguay
years ago. Later on, he calls me up and he says,
Jackson, you're the most critical person I've
ever met in my life. I need your feedback. I
was like, that is the worst thing I've ever heard
somebody tell me. I was like, I don't want to
give you feedback. You're right. I was awful.
And so he's like, no, no, no. I'm launching this
brand and I've got a baby duo and you're the
only entrepreneur I know who will shoot me straight.
Should I do this? And so the founder of YouTube
had asked him to represent YouTube ads before
it launched. He was one of 10 ambassadors. And
they were the reason why if the ad sucks, you
should be able to skip it in five seconds. And
so he went on and launched a brand. Ryan Dice
put him on stage, called him the YouTube addicts
for the world. And the rest was history. I joined
him a couple of years later and he's like, you
know, I'm helping him with infrastructure. And,
and, and I basically begged him for a job. He
flew me out, said yes. And he said, how do we
do this? I was like, I don't know. But here's
what I think we should do. You be mom of the
company and I'll be dad of the company. Everybody
needs to love you, Jake. You got a great charismatic
personality. I'm going to make sure people are
accountable. And when they get mad at me. you
got to have my back. And if we have to fire some
people, we have to fire some people. But my goal
would be to make them executives. So we agreed
to that. We went in the room. We had two interns,
70 ,000 people a month coming to his brand. And
I told them, I said, guys, Jake needs to be doing
three things. He needs to be playing golf. That's
where he's meeting with executives and getting
deals. Two, he needs to be speaking on as many
stages and podcasts as possible. And three, he
needs to be playing the jazz piano at those events.
When Jake does that, people fall in love with
him. um everything else operationally we have
to learn how to maintain you all have to teach
me how to help you guys do that and so um jake's
after that you know he's he says uh jackson watch
this uh video from this guy named uh russell
brenson and one of our clients johnny dumas entrepreneur
fire you gotta watch this episode they'll teach
you about these things called funnels this is
2013 or so and it's good Yeah. So I'm watching
the potato gun thing and I'm taking like 90 screenshots
in this thing. I'm like, holy freaking crap.
Why didn't I get to learn this from my startups?
You know, we did all things the hard way. But
yeah, we so that that gave me an introduction.
And then he said, now take this playbook thing
that Dan Martell gave us. He's another one of
our clients. You know, and so I so I was like,
yeah, OK, $2 ,000 course for free. Sure. You
know, procedures, resource templates. Got it.
All right. And then. We had Ryan Blair come on
board and he brought Lewis Howes. Lewis Howes
came on board, then Michael Hyatt, then T. Harv
Ecker, then Billy Jean and all these funnels.
I was there, dumber than dirt for digital marketing
stuff, learning and opting in and seeing that,
but helping with the infrastructure. I didn't
even know what an integrator was and I was doing
that for him. And it was such a great... It was
all these, these companies spent $10 ,000 minimum
on YouTube ads. They were spending a hundred
thousand on Facebook. Um, you know, they were
spending 50 ,000 on traditional marketing. Um,
and so watching how they made the decisions,
how learning all the little acronyms, like what
was AOV and how does lifetime value work and,
and figuring out attribution and all that stuff
like it, it gave me an inside peek. into things
that were like, I mean, we were, our NordicTrack
campaign, we spent 15 ,000 on ads and they made
$430 ,000 in sales within two weeks. And that
was through direct conversion. And I asked Jake,
I said, yeah, so Jake's at a conference. You're
going to love this. We did a conference speaking
on stage and somebody says, Jake, is that ROI
or ROAS? And his slide said ROI. And he thought
about it and he goes, ROAS. And this dude almost
like slammed his journal shut, like pissed. And
I saw like 15 people in the audience that were
so upset because Jake was wrong about it. And
I'm taking pictures and I'm going, what the heck
is ROAS? I'm like, I had no idea. And so, but
it got me intrigued. And so I started learning
about attribution. And I went back to Jake after
like a week of research and because we didn't
have AI. And I was like, hey, Jake. there's a
phone number on that ad. Do we know how many
people called in and bought? Because that's probably
what everybody, nobody was clicking on YouTube
ads back then. And he said, we don't know how
to track that. And I was like, you've got to
be kidding me. That's over half the sales. Yeah.
Oh my gosh. Easily. Like probably 80%. And, and
then I was like, what about, okay, okay. New
scenario, Jake. I saw the ad on my phone, but
I decided to go to my computer. Yeah. Can we
track that? No, we can't. I'm like, we couldn't
track anything. And I was like, this is crazy.
I was like, what are we doing? Anyway, that the
whole process just lit my mind on fire with like,
oh, my gosh, we're promoting a 32 to one return
on an ad that probably got a 300 to one return.
And we can't see it. And so we can't claim it.
I was like, no, we got to fix this. And so I
got really obsessed with fixing attribution models
and realizing just how stupid attribution models
are. Now, I would say like entrepreneurs are
addicted to cocaine. I mean, conversions. And
until they stop with that addiction, they're
not going to understand the value of awareness.
And Austin Holmes, publicity for good, champion
of awareness and branding and positioning. It's
like, no, no, no. Like we we want to have that
and the conversions, of course. We also want
to have a balance of our messaging that continues
to cultivate new relationships while nurturing
for those exist. So, yeah, I'm hook, line, and
sinker excited about what we do. That's what
we're trying to do with Raptor is trying to bridge
that gap between the conversion tracking and
the actual brand management. And it is a massive
gap. AI is making it easier. Well, it's still
not. Here's the challenge on that, though. From
my professional opinion on it, which take it
with a grain of salt, I think it's the greatest
trap. that entrepreneurs fall into because, and
this happened, I'll give you the example of Laserway.
Laserway was super addicted to it. They had eight
locations. They had spent a hundred thousand
dollars on their YouTube channel before working
with us. They came in and we told them the same
thing we told every client. Okay. For three,
three months, first month is implementation.
Second month is optimization. Third month we're
scaling. We almost always did it in three weeks.
Oh my God. Did not take that long to figure it
out with these budgets. Here we are in month
three and we tried everything. We're like, oh,
my gosh. And so we changed the ad, the offer
to 75 percent off Groupon style. And that completely
exploded the ability to kind of start to expand.
But we couldn't expand the ad budget and we couldn't
figure out why. OK, we're hitting the entire
market based on the. uh cost per acquisition
that the client wanted to hit and i was in the
middle of this attribution study right at that
time and so i jumped on a call with todd the
founder and jake and i said okay guys listen
i said i think my hypothesis is we are being
way too stingy with proving cost per acquisition
and here's how i'll prove it to you todd todd
have you ever bought um a kickstarter or crowdfunding
thing before and he said yes and i was so grateful
to ruin my whole pitch um and uh i was like okay
on that kickstarter that you purchased when you
went to the kickstarter page there was a was
there a video on that page and he said yes there
was a video i said would you have bought if there
wasn't a video at all no never okay next question
was the video next to the call to action Or did
you have to click on the video in order to get
to the call to action? No, it's next to on those
pages. I said, so in other words, Todd, me as
the founder of that Kickstarter campaign, I have
no provable evidence whatsoever that that video
influenced your conversion. But you're telling
me that you wouldn't have bought without the
video being there. So the same is true with people
who are coming to your YouTube ads. You don't
know who's coming in, seeing it, and then just
come straight in as a walk into your office because
they happen to be near it. You don't know who's
sharing that with a friend and the friend decides
to go because of it. You can't see those things.
So if you keep your cost per acquisition where
it's at, you're going to cannibalize your own
brand. And he said, well, what do I change my
cost per acquisition to? And I said, you're the
founder. That's your call. I can't make that
call for you. You have to decide how aggressive
you want to get with it. So he ended up cutting
it from 125 down to 75. He made a pretty aggressive
move. And within two years, they were at 40 locations
nationwide. I don't know how much that had the
full impact. I never did ask or find out. But
Facebook advertises on TV and on radio. Google
advertises on TV and radio. Geico, Allstate,
all these brands that are crushing it with billions
of dollars. All of them understand the power
of branding and awareness. And sure, some geeks
trying to figure out how to put all the attribution
stuff together. But at the end of the day, they
don't allow that to hold themselves back. Thank
you for being here today. I'm really happy that
you tuned in to Vision Pros Live. I'm looking
forward to seeing your reactions as these episodes
continue to move forward. This is going to get
more and more fun. We'll have more and more engagement
as well. We'll invite people to participate in
the show and thank you for giving us your time
and attention. Have an excellent time building
out your vision and becoming a vision pro yourself.