1 00:00:03,880 --> 00:00:05,960 Hello and welcome to another episode of the Winning with 2 00:00:05,960 --> 00:00:08,000 Shopify podcast. Anyone's not seen before. 3 00:00:08,000 --> 00:00:10,200 My name's Nick and hosting the show for a few years now and I'm 4 00:00:10,200 --> 00:00:11,880 super excited that you've decided to listen to today's 5 00:00:11,880 --> 00:00:13,080 episode. Whether you've been a subscriber 6 00:00:13,080 --> 00:00:15,160 for a long time or it's the first time that you are joining 7 00:00:15,160 --> 00:00:17,280 in, if you haven't already, please hit the subscribe button 8 00:00:17,280 --> 00:00:19,640 and also leave us a review. Even if you think it's rubbish, 9 00:00:19,640 --> 00:00:22,000 just hit the five stars anyway. Why not share the love? 10 00:00:22,600 --> 00:00:24,480 Obviously, if you don't think it's very good, I would love to 11 00:00:24,480 --> 00:00:27,160 hear from you. 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I've been talking to so many 19 00:00:41,040 --> 00:00:43,280 brands about so many of their problems and actually some of 20 00:00:43,280 --> 00:00:46,280 the episodes we've been doing recently about TikTok and a few 21 00:00:46,280 --> 00:00:48,800 other topics have been specifically because brands in 22 00:00:48,800 --> 00:00:51,160 the Growth Hub have been asking for that. 23 00:00:51,280 --> 00:00:53,080 So check out the Growth Hub, it's completely free. 24 00:00:53,080 --> 00:00:57,200 Just to go to wwspodcast.com and hit Growth Hub and fill out the 25 00:00:57,200 --> 00:00:58,600 form. We'll get you into the Growth 26 00:00:58,600 --> 00:01:01,120 Hub as fast as we can. Now, today I caught up with 27 00:01:01,120 --> 00:01:03,760 Michaela from True Cable, and I've got a whole load of notes 28 00:01:03,760 --> 00:01:06,800 on this pad right here about the things we spoke about. 29 00:01:07,120 --> 00:01:09,040 Again, these lists are really gaining traction now. 30 00:01:09,040 --> 00:01:11,640 And I've had more emails about the funny things in the list 31 00:01:11,640 --> 00:01:13,200 saying, Nick, can you tell us the full story? 32 00:01:13,200 --> 00:01:15,240 Because you only did something that sounded a little bit more 33 00:01:15,240 --> 00:01:17,200 political correct in the actual recording. 34 00:01:17,200 --> 00:01:18,720 But yeah, if you know the full story about any of these things, 35 00:01:18,720 --> 00:01:21,360 let me know. And we spoke about reviews, team 36 00:01:21,360 --> 00:01:25,640 personalities, how to snatch customers, interesting way of 37 00:01:25,640 --> 00:01:26,920 putting in it, but it was quite funny. 38 00:01:26,920 --> 00:01:28,800 And Michaela made some really good points about it and 39 00:01:29,000 --> 00:01:31,320 creating a product quiz so people can find the product that 40 00:01:31,320 --> 00:01:33,920 is perfect for them. And how to find out what level 41 00:01:33,920 --> 00:01:37,000 of customer knowledge customers have to then decide what kind of 42 00:01:37,000 --> 00:01:40,240 content to create. AI versus a human touch when it 43 00:01:40,240 --> 00:01:42,560 comes to content. Some very interesting points she 44 00:01:42,560 --> 00:01:45,240 shared with us on that, how to create a content machine and 45 00:01:45,240 --> 00:01:49,040 process where the entire team are now writing content, the 46 00:01:49,040 --> 00:01:51,520 whole of your business creating content, especially the 47 00:01:51,520 --> 00:01:54,080 technical people. We spoke about how they use SEO 48 00:01:54,080 --> 00:01:56,480 and e-mail as their main 2 channels to drive everything, 49 00:01:56,480 --> 00:01:58,240 which obviously, you know, you don't have to pay for any 50 00:01:58,240 --> 00:02:00,920 traffic from SEO and e-mail just costs the same price as an 51 00:02:00,920 --> 00:02:03,520 e-mail subscription. So super lean marketing and she 52 00:02:03,520 --> 00:02:06,040 shares how they achieve that. We spoke about click through 53 00:02:06,040 --> 00:02:10,080 rates on e-mail, AB tests they're running, saying no in 54 00:02:10,080 --> 00:02:12,720 your sales pitch, in your marketing and in your content, 55 00:02:14,040 --> 00:02:16,360 customer justification for why they're buying their products, 56 00:02:16,360 --> 00:02:18,280 especially if it's a business product justifying it to their 57 00:02:18,280 --> 00:02:20,560 boss. We spoke about the data and KPIs 58 00:02:20,560 --> 00:02:24,480 and metrics that they monitor on a regular basis and also how 59 00:02:24,480 --> 00:02:27,560 marketing changes so quickly and how on earth do you keep up with 60 00:02:27,560 --> 00:02:29,080 that? Obviously, you need to click, 61 00:02:29,080 --> 00:02:30,720 subscribe and listen to this podcast. 62 00:02:30,720 --> 00:02:32,400 Anyway, I'm joking, but over to today's episode. 63 00:02:32,400 --> 00:02:34,800 I hope you enjoy it. This is certainly not one to 64 00:02:35,000 --> 00:02:37,560 miss. So Michaela, welcome to the show 65 00:02:37,560 --> 00:02:38,880 and most importantly, true cable. 66 00:02:38,880 --> 00:02:40,280 Welcome back. How are you? 67 00:02:40,960 --> 00:02:43,160 Yes, thank you, Nick. I'm doing great. 68 00:02:43,200 --> 00:02:45,280 Yes, it's Friday, so happy to be here. 69 00:02:45,400 --> 00:02:46,800 Yeah, thanks for. Having me it is indeed. 70 00:02:46,920 --> 00:02:48,600 It is indeed. And we were just joking that 71 00:02:48,600 --> 00:02:51,280 we're both like got Friday feeling ready to go home at some 72 00:02:51,280 --> 00:02:53,840 point in the next few hours. And there's a couple of really 73 00:02:53,840 --> 00:02:56,040 long words in my questions that I probably won't use. 74 00:02:56,040 --> 00:02:58,560 But anyway, it's so good to have you back. 75 00:02:58,920 --> 00:03:01,160 Not you personally, but it's so good to have true cable back on. 76 00:03:01,480 --> 00:03:04,480 And we obviously had you guys on back in 2021. 77 00:03:04,840 --> 00:03:07,840 So if anyone can pause this episode right now and e-mail me 78 00:03:07,840 --> 00:03:10,880 and remind me of anything we spoke about previously, I will. 79 00:03:10,960 --> 00:03:14,400 We'll personally send you a well done on e-mail and a thumbs up 80 00:03:14,400 --> 00:03:17,520 and a selfie if you can do that. But for anyone that doesn't 81 00:03:17,520 --> 00:03:19,920 remember that episode, that hasn't come across true cable 82 00:03:19,920 --> 00:03:23,560 before, give us a bit of an overview to what you guys do and 83 00:03:23,560 --> 00:03:27,080 kind of how the business first got started would be amazing. 84 00:03:27,840 --> 00:03:31,760 Yeah. So we got started back in 2015. 85 00:03:31,760 --> 00:03:34,440 So I was not here at that time. I've been here for about 3 1/2 86 00:03:34,440 --> 00:03:37,080 years, but 2015 is when we started True Cable. 87 00:03:37,080 --> 00:03:41,240 So we're coming up on 10 years, but we're in the low voltage 88 00:03:41,240 --> 00:03:43,520 industry. So we sell anything from 89 00:03:43,520 --> 00:03:48,960 Ethernet cable to coax cable connectors, tools and then fibre 90 00:03:48,960 --> 00:03:51,240 optic as well. So that's kind of the industry 91 00:03:51,240 --> 00:03:53,360 that we're in. Amazing. 92 00:03:53,360 --> 00:03:56,520 And I'm going to dive straight into a branding question because 93 00:03:57,080 --> 00:03:59,680 something I asked a few brands recently in a similar space to 94 00:03:59,680 --> 00:04:03,480 you here in the UK, obviously Ethernet cables as a thing are 95 00:04:03,760 --> 00:04:07,280 they're not very exciting and a lot of data stuff. 96 00:04:07,840 --> 00:04:11,200 I, I don't mean to be rude, but I'm just going to say like, if 97 00:04:11,200 --> 00:04:13,640 you're doing your job really well, no one knows you're there. 98 00:04:13,640 --> 00:04:16,320 So my question really is like, you guys actually have a really 99 00:04:16,320 --> 00:04:20,000 fun and very educational brand. It teaches a lot of people about 100 00:04:20,200 --> 00:04:22,840 what's going on. But like, how do you create that 101 00:04:22,840 --> 00:04:25,280 on a product that itself? You're like, I could buy these 102 00:04:25,280 --> 00:04:27,440 on Amazon, Walmart. How do you make it fun? 103 00:04:27,440 --> 00:04:29,560 How do you build a brand around that kind of product? 104 00:04:30,480 --> 00:04:32,640 Yeah, we actually say it all the time. 105 00:04:32,640 --> 00:04:34,600 Like we don't sell a sexy product, right. 106 00:04:34,600 --> 00:04:37,840 It's not fun to market like it's, it's a tough product. 107 00:04:38,720 --> 00:04:44,800 I would say our people, we work together and our our people are 108 00:04:44,800 --> 00:04:46,560 fun and exciting. If you were to come to like one 109 00:04:46,560 --> 00:04:50,000 of our marketing meetings, you would see the energy and I think 110 00:04:50,000 --> 00:04:52,160 that's what kind of helps us build that brand. 111 00:04:52,280 --> 00:04:54,960 Obviously people by people as well, and you guys are in a very 112 00:04:54,960 --> 00:04:56,400 kind of business to business space. 113 00:04:56,400 --> 00:04:59,120 It's you probably don't get too many orders from someone going, 114 00:04:59,360 --> 00:05:01,680 oh, I just need a new Ethernet cable to go from my router to my 115 00:05:01,680 --> 00:05:04,920 laptop or my TV or something. And obviously, as you say, I 116 00:05:04,920 --> 00:05:07,920 think people by people, How do you, how do you bring that 117 00:05:07,920 --> 00:05:12,160 across in marketing that like on the website, in advert copy, in 118 00:05:12,160 --> 00:05:13,760 e-mail? How do you bring the people to 119 00:05:13,760 --> 00:05:15,120 the front like you? Do you literally sort of say 120 00:05:15,120 --> 00:05:18,280 like this week in the highlight is is this team member going to 121 00:05:18,280 --> 00:05:21,400 be on a live webinar or how do you bring that to life as a 122 00:05:21,400 --> 00:05:23,920 business? Yeah, that's a great question. 123 00:05:24,520 --> 00:05:29,240 So I think for us, we definitely are big on, we want to show our 124 00:05:29,240 --> 00:05:32,000 customers that we are real people behind true cable, right. 125 00:05:32,360 --> 00:05:36,440 So for example, customer success, if you were to call us 126 00:05:36,440 --> 00:05:39,520 and you needed help or you had questions, you're going to get a 127 00:05:39,520 --> 00:05:42,240 real person on the phone. And I think that that helps 128 00:05:42,240 --> 00:05:43,760 build that trust with our customers. 129 00:05:43,760 --> 00:05:46,680 And we do that same thing when it comes to marketing, right? 130 00:05:46,680 --> 00:05:49,040 If you were to leave a review, we're going to answer every 131 00:05:49,040 --> 00:05:51,240 single review. We read all of them. 132 00:05:51,240 --> 00:05:53,360 We listen to our customers. If you give us feedback, 133 00:05:53,360 --> 00:05:55,760 somebody in the company, whether it's marketing or customer 134 00:05:55,760 --> 00:05:58,880 success, we're, we're listening, we're, we're taking that 135 00:05:58,880 --> 00:06:00,560 feedback and we're making improvements. 136 00:06:00,960 --> 00:06:03,240 Without our customers, there is no true cable, right. 137 00:06:03,240 --> 00:06:05,960 So we want to hear our customers feedback. 138 00:06:05,960 --> 00:06:08,480 We listen and I think that that's something that's special 139 00:06:08,480 --> 00:06:10,760 about our company and that's something that's special about 140 00:06:10,760 --> 00:06:14,640 our brand is that we are listening to our customers and 141 00:06:14,640 --> 00:06:17,240 and making that feedback, taking that feedback and then making 142 00:06:17,240 --> 00:06:18,960 those changes. Yeah, yeah. 143 00:06:19,000 --> 00:06:20,320 I remember working with a company years ago. 144 00:06:20,320 --> 00:06:21,680 I don't know if they're still running, but they're called 145 00:06:21,680 --> 00:06:23,840 Crucial. And I used to buy RAM for 146 00:06:23,840 --> 00:06:26,480 laptops back in the day when you could take a battery out of a 147 00:06:26,480 --> 00:06:29,360 MacBook and just change the RAM. And it's the first thing you do 148 00:06:29,360 --> 00:06:32,440 is you buy a Mac and instead of paying Apple for the better RAM, 149 00:06:32,440 --> 00:06:35,200 you buy it from Crucial. But I remember that firstly, 150 00:06:35,200 --> 00:06:37,040 they would always send you a little booklet, which is like 151 00:06:37,040 --> 00:06:40,000 literally just two sides of how to get the battery out, how to 152 00:06:40,000 --> 00:06:42,320 take the RAM out, put the new RAM in, put the battery and turn 153 00:06:42,320 --> 00:06:44,480 it on, enjoy. And it was like, that was really 154 00:06:44,480 --> 00:06:46,680 useful. But also when it's when live 155 00:06:46,680 --> 00:06:49,480 chat had first come out. I'm a little bit older than I 156 00:06:49,480 --> 00:06:51,600 look and I remember like going on their website the first time 157 00:06:51,840 --> 00:06:54,520 and live chat just popped up going like, hey, what laptop 158 00:06:54,520 --> 00:06:56,120 have you got and how much RAM do you need? 159 00:06:56,120 --> 00:06:59,640 And I was like, oh, hello, yeah, I've got this laptop and I would 160 00:06:59,640 --> 00:07:01,560 like, how much can I have and how much is it? 161 00:07:01,560 --> 00:07:03,280 And they were like, click this link, Sir. 162 00:07:03,280 --> 00:07:04,400 Let me know if you get any issues. 163 00:07:04,400 --> 00:07:06,320 But that's the one for you. And it costs this much. 164 00:07:06,760 --> 00:07:10,360 And he also said like an Apple would charge you $1000 for this. 165 00:07:10,360 --> 00:07:13,880 And actually it's only 200 from us to use our RAM upgrades. 166 00:07:14,160 --> 00:07:17,080 And so I think that kind of personal relationship, I mean 167 00:07:17,080 --> 00:07:19,720 how much do you guys do kind of earlier in the sales journey as 168 00:07:19,720 --> 00:07:22,040 much as the reviews and things are so useful to find out what 169 00:07:22,040 --> 00:07:24,480 customers do doing and what they think, How much do you kind of 170 00:07:24,480 --> 00:07:26,560 inject that in earlier in the journey as well that 171 00:07:26,560 --> 00:07:29,120 conversation? Oh yeah, absolutely. 172 00:07:29,120 --> 00:07:32,560 So I for us, especially when acquiring like new customers, 173 00:07:32,560 --> 00:07:34,040 right, I don't know if you've seen. 174 00:07:34,040 --> 00:07:36,520 So we have our cable Academy and then we also have our YouTube 175 00:07:36,520 --> 00:07:39,760 channel that brings out a lot of personality, especially with 176 00:07:39,760 --> 00:07:42,640 like our technical team, because we create video content showing 177 00:07:42,640 --> 00:07:44,440 how to use our products in the real world. 178 00:07:46,160 --> 00:07:47,400 And our technical team is amazing. 179 00:07:47,400 --> 00:07:49,960 They have a great personality, they're funny. 180 00:07:49,960 --> 00:07:52,360 And I think that's kind of what draws people into true cables, 181 00:07:52,360 --> 00:07:54,920 watching those videos. We're helping them in the 182 00:07:54,920 --> 00:07:55,920 beginning of their journey, right? 183 00:07:55,920 --> 00:08:00,000 A lot of customers or installers are trying to learn how to 184 00:08:00,000 --> 00:08:03,880 install this cable. And So what we do is we create 185 00:08:03,880 --> 00:08:06,400 the content to show them, right? So we're showing them how to 186 00:08:06,400 --> 00:08:09,920 create, how to how to do these installs with our products so 187 00:08:09,920 --> 00:08:12,680 that once they learn how to do it, they're like, oh, OK, I know 188 00:08:12,920 --> 00:08:15,200 I've seen this brand. And then that's how we get them 189 00:08:15,200 --> 00:08:18,480 to then eventually purchase. So that's kind of how we 190 00:08:18,480 --> 00:08:20,520 snatched them up in the beginning of the customer 191 00:08:20,520 --> 00:08:23,440 journey is, is we're looking for, what are these customers 192 00:08:23,440 --> 00:08:27,400 searching for in our industry online and then creating content 193 00:08:27,400 --> 00:08:29,200 surrounded around what they're looking for. 194 00:08:30,080 --> 00:08:32,799 Absolutely. And I love that because it's 195 00:08:32,799 --> 00:08:34,520 what we do a lot in my agency here. 196 00:08:34,520 --> 00:08:37,880 And it's almost become ausp of a marketing agency saying to the 197 00:08:37,880 --> 00:08:40,760 client, like who actually is your customer and what do they 198 00:08:40,760 --> 00:08:43,159 really want? Because you sell products and I 199 00:08:43,159 --> 00:08:45,520 land on your website and there's Shopify collections, there's 200 00:08:45,520 --> 00:08:47,080 product pages. I love to use the phrase 201 00:08:47,080 --> 00:08:49,280 marketplace, like don't be a marketplace. 202 00:08:49,280 --> 00:08:51,640 The marketplace just lists products and they might have 203 00:08:51,640 --> 00:08:54,240 quite a good filtering system, but that's what Amazon does. 204 00:08:54,240 --> 00:08:56,040 The value add is Amazon's delivery. 205 00:08:56,040 --> 00:09:00,600 Amazon reviews Amazon loyalty points, you know, the free 206 00:09:00,600 --> 00:09:03,040 delivery through Prime or and all the TV that comes with it, 207 00:09:03,040 --> 00:09:05,280 etcetera. Like the value adds are not the 208 00:09:05,280 --> 00:09:07,440 way they lay their website out, which actually means all of you 209 00:09:07,440 --> 00:09:10,440 little brands that are not as big as Amazon, you guys have got 210 00:09:10,440 --> 00:09:12,160 a real edge to bring that personality in. 211 00:09:12,160 --> 00:09:14,960 But I love the fact you use the phrase snatching up those 212 00:09:14,960 --> 00:09:17,920 customers almost like you're like, kind of like they're on a 213 00:09:17,920 --> 00:09:20,440 journey to get to Amazon at some point to buy all their kit. 214 00:09:20,440 --> 00:09:23,040 And you're like, no, no, no, no, we'll snatch them and bring them 215 00:09:23,040 --> 00:09:26,120 into our universe and go actually it's, you know, forget 216 00:09:26,120 --> 00:09:28,400 the pricing and everything else. Tell us what you're trying to 217 00:09:28,400 --> 00:09:30,560 achieve, not what you want. And I think it's such a 218 00:09:30,600 --> 00:09:33,520 certainly an IT, an infrastructure, It's so much 219 00:09:33,520 --> 00:09:35,720 more powerful because you, you must be able to advise and 220 00:09:35,720 --> 00:09:38,520 actually push like way more of a bundled solution. 221 00:09:38,520 --> 00:09:41,000 So if someone says, oh, I'm trying to buy an Ethernet 222 00:09:41,000 --> 00:09:44,320 because the Internet on my laptop's really slow and you 223 00:09:44,320 --> 00:09:46,640 guys say it's not an Ethernet you need, you need this device 224 00:09:46,640 --> 00:09:49,320 that does whatever and that changes things and it costs 225 00:09:49,320 --> 00:09:51,520 more. But I can solve your problem, 226 00:09:51,600 --> 00:09:53,320 not just give you the product you think you need. 227 00:09:53,320 --> 00:09:55,880 It must be quite a powerful kind of tool for you guys. 228 00:09:57,120 --> 00:09:58,960 Absolutely. And we've even taken it a step 229 00:09:58,960 --> 00:10:00,320 further. If you were to look at our 230 00:10:00,320 --> 00:10:03,440 website, we have like an Ethernet cable Finder and a 231 00:10:03,440 --> 00:10:05,280 connector Finder, right? So if a customer is coming on 232 00:10:05,280 --> 00:10:08,240 and they don't know exactly what they need, they can go through 233 00:10:08,240 --> 00:10:11,200 this quiz and it'll, at the end of the quiz, give them exactly 234 00:10:11,200 --> 00:10:13,160 the products that they need for their installation. 235 00:10:14,240 --> 00:10:18,120 So we're here to help them and we provide those tools. 236 00:10:19,600 --> 00:10:22,120 Nice, nice. And I think the quizzes are so 237 00:10:22,120 --> 00:10:24,160 powerful. I've had clients make them and 238 00:10:24,160 --> 00:10:26,400 no one's used them before as well because there's a whole 239 00:10:26,400 --> 00:10:27,680 different we were able to wear that today. 240 00:10:27,680 --> 00:10:29,520 There's a whole different topic of trying to get someone to 241 00:10:29,520 --> 00:10:31,360 engage with something rather than just buy the products. 242 00:10:31,360 --> 00:10:35,040 But I think certainly that that quiz, I guess if something that 243 00:10:35,160 --> 00:10:39,120 I'm going to assume that that you guys know this for sure, but 244 00:10:39,120 --> 00:10:40,800 I'm going to assume that actually a lot of people don't 245 00:10:40,800 --> 00:10:42,560 really know what they want in your space. 246 00:10:42,680 --> 00:10:45,200 And that's part of your most powerful kind of marketing tool. 247 00:10:46,080 --> 00:10:48,720 Yes. So we have obviously a a tonne 248 00:10:48,720 --> 00:10:51,320 of different Ethernet cables and if you don't know exactly what 249 00:10:51,320 --> 00:10:53,840 you need for your installation, they're all used for different, 250 00:10:54,320 --> 00:10:57,520 some are outdoors, some are indoors, some are risers, some 251 00:10:57,520 --> 00:10:59,920 are plenums. So it's it's hard if you don't 252 00:10:59,920 --> 00:11:02,880 know the industry and you're not a professional installer and 253 00:11:02,880 --> 00:11:05,720 you're just trying to do this in your own home or you know, 254 00:11:05,720 --> 00:11:08,600 you're a small startup business and you're putting it into your 255 00:11:08,600 --> 00:11:11,400 new business. Yeah, most people don't know, 256 00:11:11,400 --> 00:11:14,120 right. So we try to provide those tools 257 00:11:14,120 --> 00:11:17,520 for those customers that may not know exactly what they need. 258 00:11:18,120 --> 00:11:19,320 Maybe they don't want to call us, right? 259 00:11:19,320 --> 00:11:20,560 Maybe they don't want to do a live chat. 260 00:11:20,560 --> 00:11:23,080 So we created these tools so they can just go on like 261 00:11:23,080 --> 00:11:24,720 self-service, they can go through. 262 00:11:25,520 --> 00:11:27,680 It's like our technical team is walking them through it. 263 00:11:27,680 --> 00:11:29,320 Our technical team built it out for them. 264 00:11:30,040 --> 00:11:33,200 So it's, yeah, put that together just to help our customers 265 00:11:33,200 --> 00:11:34,520 figure out exactly what they need. 266 00:11:35,320 --> 00:11:37,520 Yeah, yeah. And I wonder, I don't know if 267 00:11:37,520 --> 00:11:40,320 you're using AI already, but I do wonder it's in the IT space 268 00:11:40,320 --> 00:11:43,480 where AI almost has an opportunity at some point in the 269 00:11:43,480 --> 00:11:46,280 future where you can almost kind of talk to the AI and say, yeah, 270 00:11:46,280 --> 00:11:50,320 we've got 2 Wi-Fi routers, We've got 92 machines to connect up 8 271 00:11:50,320 --> 00:11:53,760 phones, a buzzer system on the door that calls one of the 272 00:11:53,760 --> 00:11:55,720 phones. And the AI kind of goes, cool. 273 00:11:56,080 --> 00:11:58,120 These are three components that could be a game changer for your 274 00:11:58,120 --> 00:12:00,400 infrastructure, actually. And this one you could also buy 275 00:12:00,400 --> 00:12:03,000 to monitor what's going on, which tells you what's wrong and 276 00:12:03,240 --> 00:12:05,240 plug me into it and I'll tell you what you need to change. 277 00:12:05,480 --> 00:12:07,600 But have you guys used AI at all at the moment? 278 00:12:07,600 --> 00:12:09,400 Is that something that's that's kind of come into play? 279 00:12:10,080 --> 00:12:13,560 So for those quizzes, no, they were hand built by our technical 280 00:12:13,560 --> 00:12:15,080 team. I will say the. 281 00:12:15,080 --> 00:12:18,800 Marketing team. The marketing team, we do use AI 282 00:12:19,640 --> 00:12:22,200 just to help streamline some of our processes. 283 00:12:22,200 --> 00:12:26,320 But where we kind of struggle, we're not necessarily struggle. 284 00:12:26,320 --> 00:12:29,600 But the challenge with AI is, especially in marketing, we want 285 00:12:29,600 --> 00:12:33,240 to keep that human touch. So we will use it for some 286 00:12:33,240 --> 00:12:36,640 projects, but we're always tweaking it and we're never 100% 287 00:12:36,640 --> 00:12:41,000 using AI for any of our marketing projects. 288 00:12:41,760 --> 00:12:44,400 Like I said, we want to keep that human touch when it comes 289 00:12:44,400 --> 00:12:46,600 to our marketing. So we will never fully use AI, 290 00:12:46,760 --> 00:12:49,480 but we will use it for some things, you know, analysing data 291 00:12:49,480 --> 00:12:54,720 or things like that. But yeah, it's used, but not for 292 00:12:54,720 --> 00:12:56,080 like those quizzes and things like that. 293 00:12:56,640 --> 00:12:57,920 Yeah, yeah. Now it makes a lot of sense. 294 00:12:57,920 --> 00:13:00,960 And obviously I work a heck of a lot of my time and so did my 295 00:13:00,960 --> 00:13:04,040 team in SEO and discussed the other day. 296 00:13:04,040 --> 00:13:07,000 And I sort of said to my team, like, show me one thing that has 297 00:13:07,000 --> 00:13:09,800 been written by AI that we've not tweaked. 298 00:13:10,240 --> 00:13:12,600 We've purely checked and not tweaked, but is live on a 299 00:13:12,600 --> 00:13:14,160 client's website. And everyone was like, oh, 300 00:13:14,160 --> 00:13:15,840 there'd be loads. And when we started looking, we 301 00:13:15,840 --> 00:13:17,720 were like, no, we had to change everything. 302 00:13:17,800 --> 00:13:20,440 Not change everything, but every single thing we had to do 303 00:13:20,440 --> 00:13:23,520 something to whether it's a mess description, on page description 304 00:13:23,800 --> 00:13:27,560 and copy, that sort of thing. But I think, yeah, we're using 305 00:13:27,600 --> 00:13:29,880 AI for similar things, I think to what you're saying as well. 306 00:13:29,880 --> 00:13:34,200 Like if we're analysing data and you say to AI, here's 10 CSV 307 00:13:34,200 --> 00:13:36,800 files, match up all of this stuff for me in a Google Sheet, 308 00:13:36,800 --> 00:13:40,960 Go and use like ChatGPT for Google Sheets Waggon, which is 309 00:13:40,960 --> 00:13:42,720 awesome by the way, everyone best. 310 00:13:42,720 --> 00:13:45,280 Like I don't know what it costs, but it's like $15.00 a month or 311 00:13:45,280 --> 00:13:49,040 something absolutely insane. But I think it speeds up that 312 00:13:49,040 --> 00:13:50,120 process. But you've got to be so 313 00:13:50,160 --> 00:13:53,040 prescriptive to AI. Like it can think for itself, 314 00:13:53,040 --> 00:13:55,600 but it needs all of the ingredients to do any thinking. 315 00:13:55,600 --> 00:13:57,920 It doesn't have the experience we do where you sort of say, 316 00:13:58,200 --> 00:14:00,480 hey, could you do this for me? And it goes, ah, I've done this 317 00:14:00,480 --> 00:14:02,280 100 times before. We've done this for 10 years. 318 00:14:02,560 --> 00:14:05,440 Actually, what I think you need is this AI doesn't do that. 319 00:14:05,440 --> 00:14:07,680 It just goes here's the result and it's wrong because it 320 00:14:07,680 --> 00:14:10,920 doesn't understand the why. Well, we tried it with our 321 00:14:10,920 --> 00:14:13,720 blogs, right, because it takes a lot of time for our technical 322 00:14:13,720 --> 00:14:17,240 teams to write our blogs and we want to, you know, free up a 323 00:14:17,240 --> 00:14:20,080 little bit more of their time to be able to help out customers 324 00:14:20,080 --> 00:14:25,040 and work on product development. But we tried it out and it just, 325 00:14:25,080 --> 00:14:27,560 the information just wasn't exactly what our technical team 326 00:14:27,560 --> 00:14:31,880 wanted to share. So yeah, we, we've kind of gone 327 00:14:31,880 --> 00:14:35,880 away from using AI for blogs and our, our technical team is still 328 00:14:35,880 --> 00:14:38,440 fully writing those out for, for everyone. 329 00:14:40,000 --> 00:14:44,440 It's just we focus on quantity or sorry, quality over quantity, 330 00:14:44,440 --> 00:14:47,000 especially when it comes to like our blogs and we want to make 331 00:14:47,000 --> 00:14:49,760 sure we're providing correct information. 332 00:14:50,120 --> 00:14:53,080 So yeah, we, we did try it out for blogs, but we, we moved away 333 00:14:53,080 --> 00:14:56,040 just because our technical team wasn't well, they weren't happy 334 00:14:56,040 --> 00:14:57,040 with it. So. 335 00:14:57,960 --> 00:15:00,600 Absolutely, absolutely. And I'm going to go. 336 00:15:00,600 --> 00:15:03,160 I know we had five points to talk about and anyone listening 337 00:15:03,160 --> 00:15:04,520 will not be surprised by this at all. 338 00:15:04,520 --> 00:15:05,680 I haven't touched any of them yet. 339 00:15:06,240 --> 00:15:07,880 We're kind of taking around a couple of them, but we've not 340 00:15:07,880 --> 00:15:09,200 spoken about them. And we'll come back to him in a 341 00:15:09,200 --> 00:15:10,080 SEC. But you've just mentioned 342 00:15:10,120 --> 00:15:12,520 something that I think really interesting and actually quite 343 00:15:12,520 --> 00:15:15,440 empowering is your technical team write a lot of the content 344 00:15:15,440 --> 00:15:18,160 for the website. And it sounds obvious when I say 345 00:15:18,160 --> 00:15:20,960 it like that, but I mean, I've met thousands of brands over the 346 00:15:20,960 --> 00:15:23,640 years and hardly any of them really connect up. 347 00:15:23,640 --> 00:15:25,760 Actually like the experts to the marketing bit. 348 00:15:26,200 --> 00:15:28,400 It's normally like, oh, you're the marketing team, you write 349 00:15:28,400 --> 00:15:31,040 the content and the marketing team are like, but we, we can 350 00:15:31,040 --> 00:15:33,600 market things, but we need to know the things to market. 351 00:15:33,600 --> 00:15:36,480 So like we need you to write the technical guide and then we can 352 00:15:36,480 --> 00:15:38,760 push it out and get customers to engage with it and generate 353 00:15:38,760 --> 00:15:42,320 leads as a real, you know, new sales as a as a result, it 354 00:15:42,320 --> 00:15:44,640 almost sounds like you've got almost the complete company. 355 00:15:44,640 --> 00:15:48,240 Are all content writers second after all of their first day 356 00:15:48,240 --> 00:15:48,680 jobs? Is it? 357 00:15:48,680 --> 00:15:50,720 Is it literally like that? Yeah. 358 00:15:50,720 --> 00:15:54,560 So technical and marketing work extremely close together. 359 00:15:54,560 --> 00:15:59,920 So we do have, I have somebody on my team who, who does SEO for 360 00:15:59,920 --> 00:16:01,840 us. And So what he does is he'll go 361 00:16:01,840 --> 00:16:03,640 through and he'll search the Internet, right. 362 00:16:03,640 --> 00:16:06,000 And he's finding those topics that we're either not ranking 363 00:16:06,000 --> 00:16:09,240 for keywords that customers are searching that maybe there's no 364 00:16:09,240 --> 00:16:12,320 content out about. And we'll put all that together 365 00:16:12,480 --> 00:16:14,640 in like a Google doc and we'll go to technical and we'll say, 366 00:16:14,640 --> 00:16:18,360 hey, here's the things or the topics that marketing needs for 367 00:16:18,360 --> 00:16:21,200 SEO purposes and technical. Then we'll be like, OK, well, 368 00:16:21,200 --> 00:16:23,720 here I can write something about this or I can do a video about 369 00:16:23,720 --> 00:16:25,480 this. I can, you know, create a, a 370 00:16:25,480 --> 00:16:28,200 mock install about this and we can, you know, show how to do 371 00:16:28,200 --> 00:16:30,720 that. So, and then from there, our 372 00:16:30,840 --> 00:16:34,480 actual content creation studio room is in Kansas City. 373 00:16:34,480 --> 00:16:37,880 So we travel two to three times a year and we go out and we 374 00:16:37,880 --> 00:16:41,240 shoot all of our content. And then the technical team will 375 00:16:41,240 --> 00:16:43,320 then create those blogs, add the videos. 376 00:16:44,200 --> 00:16:46,120 So yeah, we work very closely together. 377 00:16:46,240 --> 00:16:48,560 Technical is the ones that are writing the blogs and then 378 00:16:48,560 --> 00:16:50,920 marketing will take it from there and add any additional 379 00:16:50,920 --> 00:16:54,360 keywords or SEO that we need. But yeah. 380 00:16:54,360 --> 00:16:56,840 Sounds like the dream set up. I wish if any of my clients are 381 00:16:56,840 --> 00:16:59,480 listening, guys call me like we need to, we need to chat. 382 00:17:00,160 --> 00:17:03,800 But I think, as I say, it's so important to have that 11 383 00:17:03,800 --> 00:17:06,079 exercise we did years ago, which it was very different for your 384 00:17:06,079 --> 00:17:08,480 brand, but for anyone that's listening that like you stock 385 00:17:08,480 --> 00:17:10,880 other brands, so you have like a merchandising team. 386 00:17:11,319 --> 00:17:13,640 I've spent a lot of time at TJ Maxx over the years and they 387 00:17:13,640 --> 00:17:16,839 won't be saying this TK Maxx, we call them in the UK, but TJ Maxx 388 00:17:17,000 --> 00:17:20,400 out in the US has spent a lot of time with the UK and European 389 00:17:20,400 --> 00:17:23,760 teams here saying, look, why don't you buy this at this time 390 00:17:23,760 --> 00:17:25,200 of year? Because three months after, if 391 00:17:25,200 --> 00:17:27,720 you buy it in January, I know by March, April, people are 392 00:17:27,720 --> 00:17:29,320 starting to search for it on SEO. 393 00:17:29,320 --> 00:17:31,000 And so let's get it all on the site. 394 00:17:31,520 --> 00:17:33,080 And they sort of said, oh, but that creates a warehousing 395 00:17:33,080 --> 00:17:34,560 problem. So next thing you know, the SEO 396 00:17:34,560 --> 00:17:37,000 guys explaining how much more warehousing space we need. 397 00:17:37,400 --> 00:17:41,120 And it was just random projects, but it was like, OK, when people 398 00:17:41,120 --> 00:17:43,440 are looking for prom dresses, now we're number one for prom 399 00:17:43,440 --> 00:17:45,920 dresses like a month in advance. We've got loads on the shelves 400 00:17:46,080 --> 00:17:49,400 and we're calling them prom dresses, not like party dresses, 401 00:17:49,400 --> 00:17:51,400 going out dresses, etcetera, etcetera. 402 00:17:51,400 --> 00:17:53,920 And if you were to search for like a maxi dress or a maxi 403 00:17:53,920 --> 00:17:56,080 skirt, we're like, hey, is this for your prom? 404 00:17:56,080 --> 00:17:58,200 We've got a whole prom category actually, because we know 405 00:17:58,200 --> 00:18:00,880 January is the biggest month, even though prom seasons like 406 00:18:00,880 --> 00:18:04,360 May to July, people are looking early and it's like getting 407 00:18:04,360 --> 00:18:05,880 inside customers heads, I think is so key. 408 00:18:05,880 --> 00:18:08,600 But so it's awesome you've got your teams linked up like that 409 00:18:08,600 --> 00:18:11,040 because I think certainly with SEO you have that data which 410 00:18:11,040 --> 00:18:13,360 your SEO person does, finding those keywords and seeing, OK, 411 00:18:13,360 --> 00:18:15,440 people are talking about this, let's take a step back and have 412 00:18:15,440 --> 00:18:17,960 a deep breath. What do we want to respond to 413 00:18:17,960 --> 00:18:20,720 that search, that question, that query with? 414 00:18:21,400 --> 00:18:23,720 And I love that you mentioned as well, like almost doing my job 415 00:18:23,720 --> 00:18:25,440 for me here explaining how important SEO is. 416 00:18:26,000 --> 00:18:28,200 But I think the thing you mentioned really, really clear 417 00:18:28,200 --> 00:18:30,920 there as well is like, if there's no content about it, but 418 00:18:30,920 --> 00:18:33,200 people are looking for it, it's hard to find those 419 00:18:33,200 --> 00:18:34,960 opportunities. But when you do, it's like just 420 00:18:34,960 --> 00:18:36,520 strike. We need a good we need that 421 00:18:36,520 --> 00:18:40,080 content process to just strike and get it all set up quickly. 422 00:18:40,880 --> 00:18:45,040 Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, SEO is SEO in our blog 423 00:18:45,040 --> 00:18:47,800 content is well, I guess that's the first question, but we can 424 00:18:47,800 --> 00:18:49,680 get in a little bit later, but yeah, let's. 425 00:18:50,480 --> 00:18:52,200 I mean, if that's the answer to the first question, so for 426 00:18:52,200 --> 00:18:55,040 anyone saying I'm going, what is this first question, the first 427 00:18:55,040 --> 00:18:58,400 question was supposed to ask Michaela, which marketing 428 00:18:58,400 --> 00:19:00,440 tactics have shown the highest ROI? 429 00:19:00,680 --> 00:19:04,840 Is it SEO by any chance? Maybe it might be. 430 00:19:05,280 --> 00:19:08,840 OK, no spoilers. Go and tell us. 431 00:19:09,320 --> 00:19:11,280 There's 2. So it's our content marketing. 432 00:19:11,280 --> 00:19:13,520 And then our e-mail marketing is extremely big as well. 433 00:19:13,520 --> 00:19:17,640 So content marketing, that's our cable Academy with our blogs and 434 00:19:17,640 --> 00:19:20,120 our YouTube videos. I already dove into that a 435 00:19:20,120 --> 00:19:22,800 little bit. But yeah, we're looking for 436 00:19:22,800 --> 00:19:24,880 those topics that our customers want. 437 00:19:25,480 --> 00:19:27,880 What are they Googling? You know, what are they looking 438 00:19:27,880 --> 00:19:29,480 for? And we're creating that for 439 00:19:29,480 --> 00:19:31,560 them. Maybe there's content out there 440 00:19:31,560 --> 00:19:34,680 already about it, but we're going to do it better. 441 00:19:34,760 --> 00:19:36,840 We're going to you know we're going to show them how to do 442 00:19:36,840 --> 00:19:39,800 with our products. We have created a catalogue to 443 00:19:39,800 --> 00:19:41,920 where everything works together as a system. 444 00:19:42,240 --> 00:19:44,680 So we're going to show you how you can purchase everything with 445 00:19:44,680 --> 00:19:47,640 us and you can do your entire install just by shopping at True 446 00:19:47,640 --> 00:19:51,640 Cable. So that is one of the first ones 447 00:19:51,640 --> 00:19:54,880 and then e-mail marketing that one is extremely huge for us 448 00:19:55,160 --> 00:19:58,000 especially with repeat business. So we're sending out weekly 449 00:19:58,000 --> 00:20:01,120 campaigns. We have a tremendous open rates. 450 00:20:01,880 --> 00:20:04,240 Our customers are actually engaging with that content. 451 00:20:04,280 --> 00:20:07,480 We in those emails we're sending out, you know, our blogs that 452 00:20:07,480 --> 00:20:10,320 we're, that we're doing, customers are reading them, 453 00:20:10,320 --> 00:20:12,240 they, they want to see the new blogs that we're putting out 454 00:20:12,240 --> 00:20:14,560 every week. We're showing them new products 455 00:20:14,560 --> 00:20:18,680 that we're launching, the new videos, things like that. 456 00:20:18,680 --> 00:20:20,720 So our customers are engaging with those. 457 00:20:20,720 --> 00:20:22,440 And then we also created flows, right? 458 00:20:22,440 --> 00:20:25,600 So like abandoned cart, we're sending out reminders like, hey, 459 00:20:25,640 --> 00:20:28,680 you started a cart last week, just want to remind you that 460 00:20:28,680 --> 00:20:31,640 it's there. And that is also probably one of 461 00:20:31,640 --> 00:20:35,000 our highest ROI's when it comes to marketing. 462 00:20:36,200 --> 00:20:38,240 Awesome, awesome, right. I'm writing down a couple of 463 00:20:38,240 --> 00:20:40,840 questions cuz I think there's some, there's some really good 464 00:20:40,840 --> 00:20:42,680 mileage in some of the things you've said here actually. 465 00:20:42,680 --> 00:20:46,080 And again, topics we get asked about a lot from you guys 466 00:20:46,080 --> 00:20:49,200 listening at home. And 1st I'm going to say is your 467 00:20:49,200 --> 00:20:51,440 finance director must love you guys. 468 00:20:51,600 --> 00:20:54,080 SEO and e-mail are like two of the most cost effective 469 00:20:54,080 --> 00:20:56,120 channels. It's not meta ads, it's not 470 00:20:56,120 --> 00:20:59,520 Google ads, it's not like let's get the biggest, most world 471 00:20:59,520 --> 00:21:02,360 famous influencer we can find and oh, they cost $1,000,000 a 472 00:21:02,360 --> 00:21:05,120 minute. You know, which is not, not, 473 00:21:05,120 --> 00:21:08,440 that is not a made-up fact. There's there's one influence 474 00:21:08,440 --> 00:21:10,480 that one of our clients work with and it was 8 minutes cost 475 00:21:10,480 --> 00:21:12,440 $8 million. Cool. 476 00:21:12,800 --> 00:21:15,200 But yeah, there's a very lean way of doing things, which is 477 00:21:15,200 --> 00:21:17,880 quite, very organic, which actually feels like you as a 478 00:21:17,880 --> 00:21:20,360 brand, as a business and as a team, you're not trying to like 479 00:21:20,360 --> 00:21:22,520 force things on people. You're just going, hey, you need 480 00:21:22,520 --> 00:21:24,040 this. We'd love to, we'd love to help, 481 00:21:24,040 --> 00:21:25,960 we'd love to chat. And it feels like that in terms 482 00:21:25,960 --> 00:21:28,560 of your channel mixed up, your channel mix at the same time. 483 00:21:29,680 --> 00:21:31,720 Yes. So especially to the website, 484 00:21:31,920 --> 00:21:35,440 most of our traffic is organic. Now don't get me wrong, we do 485 00:21:35,440 --> 00:21:39,320 paid ads like that is something that we definitely do, but we do 486 00:21:39,320 --> 00:21:43,680 a darn good job of organically getting customers to the 487 00:21:43,680 --> 00:21:48,120 website. So yeah, I'll ask our accounting 488 00:21:48,280 --> 00:21:50,960 team today if they do love us for that, for that reason. 489 00:21:51,600 --> 00:21:53,280 Well, Christmas is coming, so you can ask about Christmas 490 00:21:53,280 --> 00:21:55,600 bonuses as well. A really good thing to put on 491 00:21:55,600 --> 00:21:57,920 the agenda, but, but I think it's it's certainly a good thing 492 00:21:57,920 --> 00:21:59,600 to do. And I remember, again, I can't 493 00:21:59,600 --> 00:22:00,920 remember exactly who we had in the team. 494 00:22:20,800 --> 00:22:23,000 And even in those first 30 days you can meet a load of 495 00:22:23,000 --> 00:22:25,600 influencers and start promoting your product. 496 00:22:25,800 --> 00:22:27,720 So there's no excuse. Go and install the app, start 497 00:22:27,720 --> 00:22:30,280 the 30 day trial and give it a go yourself and see how you get 498 00:22:30,280 --> 00:22:32,720 on. Which my memory is terrible as 499 00:22:32,720 --> 00:22:34,280 to what I did yesterday, let alone three years ago. 500 00:22:34,800 --> 00:22:36,600 But I remember when, when you guys were before, I remember a 501 00:22:36,600 --> 00:22:38,800 real focus of our episode as well was around content. 502 00:22:39,120 --> 00:22:41,440 So it's really cool actually to hear how that's evolved over the 503 00:22:41,440 --> 00:22:44,920 last sort of three years and or nearly 3 1/2 years now, but how 504 00:22:44,920 --> 00:22:48,280 it's evolved and still such a close part of close part of what 505 00:22:48,280 --> 00:22:50,920 you guys do. I'm going to ask a slightly 506 00:22:50,920 --> 00:22:53,440 sneaky question and feel free to say I'm not answering this. 507 00:22:53,440 --> 00:22:56,040 It's our secret sauce. But you mentioned that e-mail 508 00:22:56,040 --> 00:22:58,360 and abandoned carts and like a, hey, you've left this in your 509 00:22:58,360 --> 00:23:00,840 cart. What would you say for you guys 510 00:23:00,840 --> 00:23:03,960 is like a really good punchy call to action? 511 00:23:04,040 --> 00:23:06,880 Like is it your cart's there? And it's just a kind of like, 512 00:23:06,880 --> 00:23:09,520 you know, go and have a quick look, a very subtle thing. 513 00:23:09,720 --> 00:23:11,240 Do you find it works? And then just like pick up the 514 00:23:11,240 --> 00:23:13,480 phone and talk to one of our guys internally or like you put 515 00:23:13,480 --> 00:23:16,120 some really complicated bits of kit in your cart yesterday, like 516 00:23:16,560 --> 00:23:18,520 come and have a chat with us. Or have you seen this technical 517 00:23:18,520 --> 00:23:20,440 guide where these those items exist? 518 00:23:20,440 --> 00:23:23,520 Like how does it, how does it work best for you guys if you 519 00:23:23,520 --> 00:23:27,040 found it in a band and basket? Yeah, that's a good question for 520 00:23:27,040 --> 00:23:29,600 CTA. So I'll, I'll say this, we do a 521 00:23:29,600 --> 00:23:33,640 lot of A to B testing. And just recently, this is not 522 00:23:33,640 --> 00:23:37,040 just for emails, this is for the website as well. 523 00:23:38,240 --> 00:23:42,560 There are certain words that increase conversion rate. 524 00:23:42,560 --> 00:23:45,160 So we do a lot of A to B testing and that's kind of how we've 525 00:23:45,320 --> 00:23:49,040 found our secret sauce. What those words are, I'll keep 526 00:23:49,040 --> 00:23:52,480 to myself. However we do, we do a lot of A 527 00:23:52,480 --> 00:23:55,480 to B testing. We definitely started honing in 528 00:23:55,480 --> 00:23:57,760 on that this year and that's something we'll continue to do 529 00:23:58,480 --> 00:24:02,600 moving forward. But A to B testing and finding 530 00:24:02,600 --> 00:24:05,080 those, those words that are our customers, because it's every 531 00:24:05,080 --> 00:24:06,880 customer is different, right, Depending on what industry 532 00:24:06,880 --> 00:24:09,160 you're in, it's not going to be the same for every industry. 533 00:24:09,160 --> 00:24:12,480 So figuring out what those words are and what our customers want 534 00:24:12,480 --> 00:24:14,800 to see. So yeah. 535 00:24:15,720 --> 00:24:18,680 You know, it's good and I mean AB testing we to be honest, we 536 00:24:18,680 --> 00:24:19,800 haven't done enough episodes on it. 537 00:24:20,000 --> 00:24:22,920 If I'm completely transparent, it's been the biggest focus for 538 00:24:22,920 --> 00:24:26,160 our team for two years now is whether it's like running, which 539 00:24:26,360 --> 00:24:28,880 I've kind of always done like 18 years now been running two ads 540 00:24:28,880 --> 00:24:32,240 on Google ads side by side and going like right, use the 541 00:24:32,240 --> 00:24:34,920 experiment feature in Google ads now like 50% of impressions 542 00:24:34,920 --> 00:24:37,280 here, 50 here. This one gets less clicks, but 543 00:24:37,280 --> 00:24:38,720 more revenue. Brilliant. 544 00:24:38,720 --> 00:24:40,960 Less cost, more revenue. That's exactly what ROI is 545 00:24:40,960 --> 00:24:43,840 better over here, but doing it on websites where it's you're 546 00:24:43,840 --> 00:24:47,000 selling on the landing pages 4 DPC where it's like, all right, 547 00:24:47,000 --> 00:24:49,720 if I give more product information, do I increase 548 00:24:49,720 --> 00:24:51,880 conversion on desktop and or mobile? 549 00:24:52,400 --> 00:24:54,200 And if I give less information, what happens then? 550 00:24:54,400 --> 00:24:56,240 And you start to learn it. Your customer's like, I just 551 00:24:56,240 --> 00:24:58,000 need this thing add to car, buy it. 552 00:24:58,000 --> 00:24:59,720 It's all cool. And we just got the right three 553 00:24:59,720 --> 00:25:02,400 bullet points at the top there. You know, I guess for your 554 00:25:02,400 --> 00:25:05,440 customers as well, Like if it's a replacement product, more 555 00:25:05,440 --> 00:25:07,360 likely to go, I just need a replacement Ethernet. 556 00:25:07,360 --> 00:25:08,800 I'm already a customer. I've got the kit. 557 00:25:08,960 --> 00:25:11,200 I just, I set fire or I cut through it or something, 558 00:25:11,200 --> 00:25:12,760 something's gone wrong and I just need another one. 559 00:25:13,560 --> 00:25:16,920 But then actually digging down into like more detail and where 560 00:25:16,920 --> 00:25:19,240 people want more, I guess something you guys have probably 561 00:25:19,240 --> 00:25:21,840 tested is like when in the customer journey to put in front 562 00:25:21,840 --> 00:25:25,440 of them a here's a piece of like more explanative content around 563 00:25:25,680 --> 00:25:28,600 how the system works, the kit, the wider thing, because you 564 00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:30,720 it's always hard in in e-commerce, isn't it? 565 00:25:30,720 --> 00:25:33,400 You don't want to interrupt that buying journey and go, I know 566 00:25:33,400 --> 00:25:35,400 you're about to add to cart and give us your credit card number, 567 00:25:35,400 --> 00:25:38,360 but read some fun stuff. It's like, no, no, not now, not 568 00:25:38,360 --> 00:25:41,520 now, just get the purchase, but. Yeah. 569 00:25:41,680 --> 00:25:44,640 And it's been a challenge I think for us because we have two 570 00:25:44,640 --> 00:25:49,280 different types of customer bases and I think trying to to 571 00:25:49,320 --> 00:25:51,080 feed both of them has been challenged. 572 00:25:51,800 --> 00:25:56,960 We do a pretty good job of it right now, but that is a focus 573 00:25:56,960 --> 00:26:01,320 for moving into 2025 is how do we kind of market those two 574 00:26:01,320 --> 00:26:04,280 different customer bases and give them what each of them 575 00:26:04,280 --> 00:26:06,760 need. Absolutely, absolutely. 576 00:26:06,800 --> 00:26:09,000 And I think it's not unique, is it? 577 00:26:09,440 --> 00:26:11,600 We've have quite a few clients of ours that are like, we do a 578 00:26:11,600 --> 00:26:12,920 lot of wholesale. We want to go direct to 579 00:26:12,920 --> 00:26:14,680 consumer. How do we market to both 580 00:26:14,680 --> 00:26:17,400 audiences or we, we do loads direct to consumer, but actually 581 00:26:17,400 --> 00:26:20,400 wholesale sounds fun. You know, one order $200,000, 582 00:26:20,400 --> 00:26:22,240 say, hey, it's great. You know, if I could get two of 583 00:26:22,240 --> 00:26:24,160 those a year, great. I'll bump the revenue up quite 584 00:26:24,160 --> 00:26:26,040 nicely. So I think certainly having the 585 00:26:26,040 --> 00:26:28,520 two audiences is a challenge. And what you don't want to do is 586 00:26:28,520 --> 00:26:32,000 have a retail customer go, what's this kind of volume? 587 00:26:32,000 --> 00:26:34,880 I just, I just need like 4 Ethernet cables for my small 588 00:26:34,880 --> 00:26:37,920 business office versus someone who's like, I need 20. 589 00:26:38,080 --> 00:26:39,840 Are you going to give me some sort of discount? 590 00:26:39,840 --> 00:26:43,000 Like, you know, I need this, I need this kit for an entire St, 591 00:26:43,640 --> 00:26:47,680 you know, of offices. But I mean, how, how important 592 00:26:47,680 --> 00:26:50,080 would you say is like product diversification for you guys? 593 00:26:50,080 --> 00:26:52,360 And that was the long word, by the way, my notes, everyone a 594 00:26:52,360 --> 00:26:55,160 long word for a Friday. But how important is that? 595 00:26:55,160 --> 00:26:57,880 Would you save for then drilling down to like, these are our best 596 00:26:57,880 --> 00:26:59,400 sellers versus are not best sellers. 597 00:26:59,960 --> 00:27:02,160 And the, you know, the alternative would be having a 598 00:27:02,160 --> 00:27:04,400 really small, small product range where it's just like we 599 00:27:04,400 --> 00:27:06,320 just have three products. Yeah. 600 00:27:06,960 --> 00:27:10,200 So I'm obviously not in product development, I'm in marketing. 601 00:27:10,200 --> 00:27:13,640 But what I can say, and it goes back to our same thing in 602 00:27:13,640 --> 00:27:17,240 marketing, right, we focus on quality over quantity. 603 00:27:17,480 --> 00:27:20,840 So when we first started out back in 2015, we were just 604 00:27:20,840 --> 00:27:24,880 strictly bulk Ethernet cable. You can go on the website and 605 00:27:24,880 --> 00:27:26,440 kind of see what that looks like. 606 00:27:26,440 --> 00:27:29,880 But we've expanded since then. We've gone into Ethernet now, 607 00:27:29,880 --> 00:27:33,960 tools, connectors, coax, fibre and, and we have a lot of plans 608 00:27:33,960 --> 00:27:38,600 to continue increasing our catalogue going into 2025. 609 00:27:39,280 --> 00:27:41,400 But we're not just throwing any products out there. 610 00:27:41,840 --> 00:27:44,400 Every single product goes through testing with our 611 00:27:45,200 --> 00:27:47,560 technical team. And I can tell you right now, if 612 00:27:47,560 --> 00:27:49,480 they don't like it, we're not selling that product. 613 00:27:49,720 --> 00:27:53,400 And it'll go back. It'll go back, we'll try again 614 00:27:53,400 --> 00:27:55,680 and we'll recreate and then we'll test again. 615 00:27:55,680 --> 00:27:59,120 And if our technical team says no again, we'll go back to the 616 00:27:59,120 --> 00:28:03,880 drawing board. So quality over quantity, 100% 617 00:28:03,880 --> 00:28:07,160 when it comes to product development, we're not just 618 00:28:07,160 --> 00:28:09,240 going to put a product out there because we want to get a sale. 619 00:28:09,240 --> 00:28:11,360 We're going to put a product out there because we actually truly 620 00:28:11,360 --> 00:28:12,960 believe in it. Yeah. 621 00:28:13,000 --> 00:28:15,160 And you guys are obviously playing the long game there of 622 00:28:15,160 --> 00:28:18,040 going even if sales are really slow on day one, we believe in 623 00:28:18,040 --> 00:28:19,240 this product. We know we're going to get the 624 00:28:19,240 --> 00:28:22,000 reviews long term and then in five years it could be a best 625 00:28:22,000 --> 00:28:24,360 seller. But like it's you guys must have 626 00:28:24,360 --> 00:28:27,120 been trading for nine years now as well, which is a really 627 00:28:27,120 --> 00:28:29,760 amazing amount of time. I you always staggered by the 628 00:28:29,760 --> 00:28:33,520 stats of how many Shopify stores start and stop in like 6 months. 629 00:28:34,560 --> 00:28:37,320 Yeah, certainly during COVID it was a particularly bad thing. 630 00:28:37,320 --> 00:28:40,320 But I've certainly found that over the years, like saying no 631 00:28:40,320 --> 00:28:44,200 in sales conversations or even in marketing can also be really 632 00:28:44,200 --> 00:28:46,280 powerful. So do you guys ever like 633 00:28:46,280 --> 00:28:48,800 actually push content out to say like, look, you all you guys are 634 00:28:48,800 --> 00:28:50,480 all our customers, you're all asking for this. 635 00:28:50,480 --> 00:28:52,560 But actually there's a reason we're not going to do it. 636 00:28:52,560 --> 00:28:54,600 There's a reason we're not going to change the product or build a 637 00:28:54,600 --> 00:28:56,320 new product or provide that ourselves. 638 00:28:56,960 --> 00:28:59,240 Do you guys ever go to market almost with like a no marketing 639 00:28:59,240 --> 00:29:01,760 strategy rather than a yes yes strategy? 640 00:29:02,920 --> 00:29:05,160 Absolutely. Especially like if somebody 641 00:29:05,160 --> 00:29:08,160 comments our technical team. So if it's like a technical 642 00:29:08,440 --> 00:29:10,920 comment or somebody's asking a question, our technical team 643 00:29:10,920 --> 00:29:12,800 writes it out for us and we. Actually. 644 00:29:13,960 --> 00:29:18,000 We post it but absolutely like if there's a reason for 645 00:29:18,000 --> 00:29:20,280 instance. Not that I don't know how 646 00:29:20,280 --> 00:29:24,320 familiar you are, but like CAT7 and CAT8, there's, there's 647 00:29:24,320 --> 00:29:26,560 certain reasons that we don't sell that and our technical team 648 00:29:26,560 --> 00:29:31,200 will will tell them we have videos on CAT5V versus CAT6 649 00:29:31,200 --> 00:29:33,880 versus Cat 7 and and why we don't have those products. 650 00:29:34,480 --> 00:29:37,000 So yeah, we are fully transparent with what we're 651 00:29:37,000 --> 00:29:41,680 carrying, why we're carrying it. Like I said, we listen to our 652 00:29:41,680 --> 00:29:43,160 customers. So on our website we have a 653 00:29:44,400 --> 00:29:47,360 product questionnaire. So if our customers want to send 654 00:29:47,360 --> 00:29:50,920 us feedback or give us ideas of like what they want to see, new 655 00:29:50,920 --> 00:29:53,400 products being launched, they can fill out that questionnaire 656 00:29:53,400 --> 00:29:55,040 and send it over. And our technical team reviews 657 00:29:55,040 --> 00:29:56,320 it. And that kind of helps us guide 658 00:29:56,320 --> 00:29:59,400 product development. So we know what our customers 659 00:29:59,400 --> 00:30:01,480 want and we're getting it straight from the source. 660 00:30:01,960 --> 00:30:04,840 So yeah. And I guess another thing as 661 00:30:04,840 --> 00:30:07,040 well is given your type of product, you're going to get a 662 00:30:07,040 --> 00:30:10,960 load of business purchases. And if a small customer comes 663 00:30:10,960 --> 00:30:13,480 along, someone like me, small team, I buy everything for the 664 00:30:13,480 --> 00:30:14,880 team. Like it's my credit cards, my 665 00:30:14,880 --> 00:30:16,920 decision. It's a very different equation 666 00:30:16,920 --> 00:30:19,280 to when it's like, OK, I'm the finance director or the buying 667 00:30:19,280 --> 00:30:21,640 group director or something of a bigger organisation. 668 00:30:22,120 --> 00:30:24,960 And actually I need to justify to someone why I've bought what 669 00:30:24,960 --> 00:30:26,840 I've bought. And it's a lot easier to justify 670 00:30:26,840 --> 00:30:28,920 if they get a bit of content from you and go, well, I spoke 671 00:30:28,920 --> 00:30:31,520 to these guys actually, and I wanted to go like cat A or, you 672 00:30:31,520 --> 00:30:33,960 know, CAT50, let's go in the future slightly. 673 00:30:34,440 --> 00:30:37,240 But yeah, I wanted to buy the best number I could. 674 00:30:37,440 --> 00:30:39,160 And they told me actually it's a marketing gimmick. 675 00:30:39,160 --> 00:30:41,080 I don't, we don't need that at all. 676 00:30:41,280 --> 00:30:43,640 So I've gone and saved us like 80% actually on our. 677 00:30:43,640 --> 00:30:46,840 So I told you, I do know about about different cat cables, but 678 00:30:46,840 --> 00:30:49,760 I think they're, yeah, saving a bit of money actually by going. 679 00:30:49,840 --> 00:30:52,600 And we don't need to invest in the biggest in the best. 680 00:30:52,720 --> 00:30:54,840 We just need the one that's right for us. 681 00:30:55,640 --> 00:30:58,680 Yep, absolutely. Cool. 682 00:30:58,680 --> 00:31:01,600 Cool, cool. And let's talk about data then, 683 00:31:01,600 --> 00:31:03,800 because obviously marketing revolves around data. 684 00:31:03,800 --> 00:31:06,960 And there's always this argument between the creative people that 685 00:31:06,960 --> 00:31:09,760 came up with the whole like some idea that made it all work in 686 00:31:09,760 --> 00:31:11,680 the 1st place anyway. So we can't ignore them. 687 00:31:11,680 --> 00:31:13,680 And there's always a bit of an argument between them and the 688 00:31:13,680 --> 00:31:16,080 data people who say, like, proof to me, it's going to work, 689 00:31:16,080 --> 00:31:18,320 otherwise you can't do it. And there's always a little bit 690 00:31:18,320 --> 00:31:22,000 of push and push and pull. What sort of metrics do you guys 691 00:31:22,000 --> 00:31:24,880 as a business, as a Shopify store, as a marketing team, what 692 00:31:24,880 --> 00:31:28,000 kind of metrics and KPIs are you just constantly gripped to, you 693 00:31:28,000 --> 00:31:29,920 know, is there a particular one or two that are like more 694 00:31:29,920 --> 00:31:32,160 important than anything? How do you guys monitor? 695 00:31:32,920 --> 00:31:38,280 Yeah, I would say it truly depends on what marketing we're 696 00:31:38,280 --> 00:31:39,640 looking at. Is it social media? 697 00:31:39,640 --> 00:31:41,920 Is it e-mail? Is it, you know, SEO? 698 00:31:42,480 --> 00:31:45,000 But what I will say is when I first started at True Cable and 699 00:31:45,000 --> 00:31:48,200 moved over to the marketing department, we were obviously 700 00:31:48,200 --> 00:31:50,720 still a little bit younger. So the the biggest goal was just 701 00:31:50,720 --> 00:31:54,160 to push content out to get, you know, our brand name out there. 702 00:31:54,560 --> 00:31:57,760 And I think now we're at a .2024. 703 00:31:57,760 --> 00:32:00,880 I really, really challenged the marketing team to look at data 704 00:32:00,880 --> 00:32:03,440 and look at analytics and let's guide our marketing strategy 705 00:32:03,440 --> 00:32:06,000 based off of that. And so that's what they've truly 706 00:32:06,000 --> 00:32:08,200 been focusing on this year and they've done a tremendous job 707 00:32:08,200 --> 00:32:10,040 and that's something we'll continue to do next year. 708 00:32:11,640 --> 00:32:13,640 We're a lean team. I've said that a couple of 709 00:32:13,640 --> 00:32:16,600 times, I believe, but we're not you. 710 00:32:16,680 --> 00:32:18,920 You may look at our website and think we're a huge company, but 711 00:32:18,920 --> 00:32:20,880 we're truly not. I can name every single person 712 00:32:20,880 --> 00:32:23,440 that works at True Cable in every single department. 713 00:32:23,440 --> 00:32:26,560 So we are a small team. So one thing that we're really 714 00:32:26,560 --> 00:32:29,200 focusing on, especially this year and next year is just 715 00:32:29,280 --> 00:32:32,800 prioritisation, right? What, what marketing strategies 716 00:32:32,800 --> 00:32:36,040 are really working well for us and let's let's focus on those. 717 00:32:36,600 --> 00:32:39,200 So I know you mentioned you were asking about what data and KPI's 718 00:32:39,200 --> 00:32:43,480 we're looking at, but it truly just depends on what what we're 719 00:32:43,480 --> 00:32:44,920 looking at. Is it e-mail marketing? 720 00:32:44,960 --> 00:32:48,760 Is it social media marketing? A couple I can name off is 721 00:32:48,760 --> 00:32:51,120 obviously for emails, click through rates. 722 00:32:51,600 --> 00:32:53,960 How often are our customers actually clicking on our 723 00:32:53,960 --> 00:32:56,440 content? What content are they clicking 724 00:32:56,440 --> 00:32:59,000 on the most, Right, because we want to obviously give them what 725 00:32:59,000 --> 00:33:03,360 they're looking for, social media engagement, views, things 726 00:33:03,360 --> 00:33:07,920 like that. Website conversion rates 727 00:33:07,920 --> 00:33:09,960 obviously is what I'm looking at heavily. 728 00:33:10,800 --> 00:33:13,280 Yeah. Those are just a couple that 729 00:33:13,280 --> 00:33:16,480 we're looking through fairly often on the marketing team. 730 00:33:17,280 --> 00:33:19,520 Awesome. And what I love is it's not just 731 00:33:19,560 --> 00:33:22,560 probably what I would probably put in there is somebody who 732 00:33:22,560 --> 00:33:25,720 works purely on search is like, right, we spent that, we got 733 00:33:25,720 --> 00:33:27,280 this ranking, how much money have we made? 734 00:33:27,640 --> 00:33:29,840 I love that you guys actually again back to the ethos. 735 00:33:29,840 --> 00:33:31,920 The first thing you told us is like, we want to help our 736 00:33:31,920 --> 00:33:35,360 customers and actually you're focused on where are we engaging 737 00:33:35,360 --> 00:33:37,280 with them? Are they opening our emails, 738 00:33:37,280 --> 00:33:39,920 reading our content and are they engaging with us on social? 739 00:33:40,120 --> 00:33:43,080 Because you know that if you do that, you're going to be front 740 00:33:43,080 --> 00:33:45,600 of mine when they're like, I need something, these guys sell 741 00:33:45,600 --> 00:33:46,520 it. I'm going straight to them 742 00:33:46,600 --> 00:33:48,720 regardless of, you know, not specifically true cable, just 743 00:33:48,720 --> 00:33:51,720 any, any brand of that stage. But I certainly, it's 744 00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:54,240 interesting you say about the teams that focusing on analytics 745 00:33:54,240 --> 00:33:57,480 and analysis, the amount of businesses we've come into and 746 00:33:58,400 --> 00:34:00,200 we've actually taken on. And I shouldn't, I won't name 747 00:34:00,200 --> 00:34:02,000 any names. I shouldn't say too much about 748 00:34:02,000 --> 00:34:03,920 this because I don't want to look bad. 749 00:34:03,920 --> 00:34:07,120 But certainly a few brands we've taken on recently as clients in 750 00:34:07,120 --> 00:34:10,320 the last few weeks, a lot of them don't even have GA 4 set up 751 00:34:10,320 --> 00:34:12,960 or they're on Shopify and GA 4 is there, but it's not recording 752 00:34:12,960 --> 00:34:15,000 revenue or product views or add to carts. 753 00:34:15,480 --> 00:34:17,480 And we kind of come in and go and like, Oh yeah, you know, 754 00:34:17,480 --> 00:34:18,920 here's our pitch, we can change this change. 755 00:34:18,920 --> 00:34:22,440 This doesn't take long, but then once we get the data, then 756 00:34:22,440 --> 00:34:24,960 there's kind of phase two kicks in, which is trying to train the 757 00:34:24,960 --> 00:34:26,320 marketing team at the client as well. 758 00:34:26,320 --> 00:34:28,320 Like you guys need to be looking at this. 759 00:34:28,639 --> 00:34:31,000 You know, you keep throwing stuff at the wall to see what 760 00:34:31,000 --> 00:34:33,400 sticks, but then you don't see what's actually stuck. 761 00:34:33,400 --> 00:34:35,520 You don't see what customers are actually using, clicking on, 762 00:34:35,520 --> 00:34:37,679 engaging with. And we certainly had one 763 00:34:37,679 --> 00:34:40,520 situation recently where we did acro test with the client and 764 00:34:40,840 --> 00:34:43,320 the result came back and I was like, surely this is one of the 765 00:34:43,320 --> 00:34:44,800 best. It's my idea to launch this 766 00:34:44,800 --> 00:34:45,880 thing. So trying to be biassed. 767 00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:48,920 I was like, surely this is the best bit of revenue uplift we've 768 00:34:48,920 --> 00:34:52,199 ever seen. It's like 3 times as good, Three 769 00:34:52,199 --> 00:34:55,800 times every dollar you make here on version A, you make $3 on 770 00:34:55,800 --> 00:34:57,640 version B. We're rolling it out and they're 771 00:34:57,640 --> 00:34:59,200 like, oh, I don't know, the conversion rates dropped. 772 00:34:59,360 --> 00:35:01,400 I'm like, yeah, I don't, I don't care. 773 00:35:01,400 --> 00:35:03,480 Look at the average order value. This is perfect. 774 00:35:03,600 --> 00:35:06,040 Less orders to send out, you offer free deliveries, less 775 00:35:06,040 --> 00:35:08,880 deliveries paid for, less customers to manage with three 776 00:35:08,880 --> 00:35:11,520 times the revenue. Like literally buying 3 products 777 00:35:11,520 --> 00:35:14,040 instead of 1 and they're like, Oh yeah, but we were trying to 778 00:35:14,040 --> 00:35:15,200 improve the conversion rate on this. 779 00:35:15,200 --> 00:35:17,240 It's like just banging my head against the wall. 780 00:35:17,240 --> 00:35:20,160 Like come on guys. If it's not to grow revenue, 781 00:35:20,160 --> 00:35:22,600 what is the I can make your conversion rate incredible If we 782 00:35:22,600 --> 00:35:25,840 start selling products at a pound each, it's not, it's not 783 00:35:25,840 --> 00:35:28,000 going to help. So I think it's an amazing 784 00:35:28,000 --> 00:35:30,040 journey you're on, but there must be some Rd bumps in that 785 00:35:30,040 --> 00:35:32,320 sometimes as well. I think with the team and you 786 00:35:32,320 --> 00:35:33,800 know, we're going to sit into too much detail because 787 00:35:33,800 --> 00:35:36,040 obviously some of them will listen to this as well, but they 788 00:35:36,040 --> 00:35:38,160 sound amazing. And sometimes you'll, yeah, 789 00:35:38,160 --> 00:35:40,600 you'll find that someone's like, wow, look at this one step. 790 00:35:40,600 --> 00:35:42,360 And my point being is no, no, you've got to look at the whole 791 00:35:42,360 --> 00:35:44,320 picture. You know, look at the whole, 792 00:35:44,520 --> 00:35:46,400 it's great people are reading that article, but we're just 793 00:35:46,400 --> 00:35:48,560 giving them the answer and it doesn't involve any of our 794 00:35:48,560 --> 00:35:50,480 products. So we're getting traffic. 795 00:35:50,480 --> 00:35:52,960 We're giving away, you know, content for free and then 796 00:35:52,960 --> 00:35:54,440 they're leaving and not buying anything. 797 00:35:54,680 --> 00:35:56,400 I've also seen that where it's like we thought it was 798 00:35:56,400 --> 00:35:57,600 successful. There's no conversion. 799 00:35:58,320 --> 00:36:01,440 Well, in that, yes, I guess two things to go off of that. 800 00:36:02,040 --> 00:36:04,240 That's something we've worked with like the technical team on, 801 00:36:04,240 --> 00:36:05,720 right? Because they'll come up with 802 00:36:05,720 --> 00:36:08,720 ideas and like, oh, this is a content that we want to push out 803 00:36:09,280 --> 00:36:11,360 and we look, you know, in the back and then we're like 804 00:36:11,560 --> 00:36:14,440 nobody's searching for that. So maybe one customer had that 805 00:36:14,440 --> 00:36:17,560 question, but is the time that you're going to spend writing 806 00:36:17,560 --> 00:36:20,040 that article for one customer that may not ever purchase, is 807 00:36:20,040 --> 00:36:20,960 that worth it? Right. 808 00:36:20,960 --> 00:36:23,600 So, and that's, that's a battle because we want to be able to 809 00:36:23,600 --> 00:36:26,800 provide all content that we can. We want to give all answers that 810 00:36:26,800 --> 00:36:31,320 we can, you know, so it's a struggle to figure, you know, to 811 00:36:31,360 --> 00:36:33,880 find that balance, but I feel like we do a fairly good job of 812 00:36:33,880 --> 00:36:37,160 doing that, providing the the main information that's needed 813 00:36:38,840 --> 00:36:40,040 that will also help the business. 814 00:36:40,040 --> 00:36:41,720 So. Yeah, absolutely. 815 00:36:41,720 --> 00:36:44,440 And we do the podcast as well. Every episode we're like, what 816 00:36:44,440 --> 00:36:46,800 are people looking for on YouTube, on Google? 817 00:36:47,200 --> 00:36:49,360 What other episodes are out about this? 818 00:36:49,360 --> 00:36:51,760 Which ones have the most likes, the most reviews? 819 00:36:51,760 --> 00:36:53,640 Like we look at that engagement and go, right, let's do an 820 00:36:53,640 --> 00:36:57,360 episode on this, for example. But you always get that one 821 00:36:57,360 --> 00:36:59,440 where you're like, this is going to be fun for our existing 822 00:36:59,440 --> 00:37:00,720 listeners. It's not going to gain any new 823 00:37:00,720 --> 00:37:02,320 ones. You put it out and go, oh, look, 824 00:37:02,520 --> 00:37:03,960 we've gone viral. How hilarious. 825 00:37:04,360 --> 00:37:07,760 I was not expecting that. But obviously you guys, you're 826 00:37:07,760 --> 00:37:10,040 doing a really good job of it. And it sounds like it's evolved 827 00:37:10,040 --> 00:37:13,680 so much since I last spoke to to some of the team at True Cable. 828 00:37:14,080 --> 00:37:15,960 But that also comes with challenges, doesn't it? 829 00:37:16,360 --> 00:37:17,600 There's challenges around scaling. 830 00:37:17,600 --> 00:37:20,800 You don't want to scale too fast if you, if something's not 831 00:37:20,800 --> 00:37:22,720 working and I say it's the clients all the time, if 832 00:37:23,040 --> 00:37:25,640 something's not working, we definitely don't want to scale 833 00:37:25,640 --> 00:37:27,320 that. You're going to, you want to 834 00:37:27,320 --> 00:37:30,240 scale a solution, not a problem. What kind of challenges have you 835 00:37:30,240 --> 00:37:32,120 guys come up against with with scaling? 836 00:37:33,200 --> 00:37:38,840 Yeah, especially in the marketing team, digital 837 00:37:38,840 --> 00:37:42,200 marketing moves fast. You have to stay up to date with 838 00:37:42,200 --> 00:37:44,680 trends and things are changing constantly. 839 00:37:45,480 --> 00:37:50,800 So I for the marketing team specifically, we really focus on 840 00:37:50,880 --> 00:37:54,480 or the biggest challenge is our pipeline is completely full. 841 00:37:54,520 --> 00:37:57,240 We have so many projects that we want to dip our hands into. 842 00:37:57,240 --> 00:37:59,600 We have, you know, so many different things that we want to 843 00:37:59,600 --> 00:38:04,440 do and we just can't do it all. So the biggest challenge is 844 00:38:04,440 --> 00:38:07,440 coming together as a marketing team and saying, hey, what's 845 00:38:07,440 --> 00:38:10,880 really, you know, impacting the bottom line here? 846 00:38:11,240 --> 00:38:14,360 What can we truly focus on that's going to to grow this 847 00:38:14,360 --> 00:38:18,240 company basically. So really the, the word we've 848 00:38:18,240 --> 00:38:20,120 been using this year is prioritisation. 849 00:38:20,200 --> 00:38:24,000 We have to prioritise our projects and we have to do those 850 00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:25,720 that are going to help the business 1st. 851 00:38:25,720 --> 00:38:28,080 And then we can get to some of these other projects where they 852 00:38:28,080 --> 00:38:29,680 sound cool. Maybe it maybe it'll help the 853 00:38:29,680 --> 00:38:30,880 business, right? But we just don't know. 854 00:38:30,880 --> 00:38:33,680 But we do know that, you know, these, you know, XY and Z, this 855 00:38:33,680 --> 00:38:35,280 will actually really help push the needle. 856 00:38:35,280 --> 00:38:38,880 So let's focus on those first. So I'd say that's probably the 857 00:38:38,880 --> 00:38:42,720 biggest challenge is just because we are a lean team, we 858 00:38:42,720 --> 00:38:45,800 have to prioritise a little bit, a little bit more than maybe 859 00:38:45,800 --> 00:38:50,560 bigger companies just because we just don't have that many people 860 00:38:51,280 --> 00:38:54,240 to help. So now as the business grows, 861 00:38:54,240 --> 00:38:56,800 the marketing team grows, right. We grew last year, we're going 862 00:38:56,800 --> 00:38:59,280 to continue to grow this year and then also next year. 863 00:39:00,240 --> 00:39:02,520 So we'll we'll continue to do that, but we will always be a 864 00:39:02,520 --> 00:39:05,560 lean team. So prioritisation will always be 865 00:39:05,560 --> 00:39:07,400 extremely important for the marketing. 866 00:39:07,400 --> 00:39:11,080 Team and I think that's I usually use the phrase like no 867 00:39:11,120 --> 00:39:14,040 idea is a bad idea. I now don't believe in that at 868 00:39:14,040 --> 00:39:15,320 all. I actually do think there are 869 00:39:15,320 --> 00:39:17,640 ideas we could quantify as a bad idea. 870 00:39:17,960 --> 00:39:19,680 And I think it's as you said, it's a prioritisation. 871 00:39:19,680 --> 00:39:22,040 What is the North Star? And I think you mentioned the 872 00:39:22,040 --> 00:39:24,080 phrase bottom line, I couldn't agree more. 873 00:39:24,080 --> 00:39:26,640 It's what actually pushes the business and actually going back 874 00:39:26,680 --> 00:39:28,760 to what you were saying about AB testing as well. 875 00:39:28,840 --> 00:39:31,600 It's like whenever, like even with the podcast, whenever my 876 00:39:31,600 --> 00:39:34,000 team are like, hey, Nick, we should, we should do this. 877 00:39:34,000 --> 00:39:36,400 We should send out a short version of the episode and a 878 00:39:36,400 --> 00:39:37,640 long 1. And I'm always like, all right, 879 00:39:37,760 --> 00:39:39,040 we'll do. And we literally if anyone wants 880 00:39:39,040 --> 00:39:41,800 to go and see on our YouTube channel, we put out, I think it 881 00:39:41,800 --> 00:39:45,040 was either 3 or 4 short versions that were like 6-7 minutes long. 882 00:39:45,360 --> 00:39:48,120 And we put out the main version. The main version's getting like 883 00:39:48,120 --> 00:39:51,560 1 to 5000 views a week. And the short version, I think 884 00:39:51,560 --> 00:39:54,520 the best one was about 80. And I was like, we tried it 885 00:39:54,520 --> 00:39:56,000 guys, we tried it and it's not working. 886 00:39:56,000 --> 00:39:57,640 So we we might have actually taken them down now. 887 00:39:57,640 --> 00:39:58,840 I think they might still be there. 888 00:39:59,640 --> 00:40:01,720 In fact, if they're not there, I'm going to make sure they are 889 00:40:01,720 --> 00:40:03,200 there at the time of this episode going out so you guys 890 00:40:03,200 --> 00:40:06,120 can go and see the difference. But yeah, short versions don't 891 00:40:06,120 --> 00:40:07,720 work on YouTube. People want to watch the whole 892 00:40:07,720 --> 00:40:09,360 thing. And so that's been fascinating. 893 00:40:09,360 --> 00:40:12,520 Like just an example of like little tests that you do to see 894 00:40:12,520 --> 00:40:14,960 what happens. But certainly with the amount of 895 00:40:14,960 --> 00:40:18,080 content you guys write as well, some of it must be like, right, 896 00:40:18,080 --> 00:40:21,120 we wrote this bit of content and we've had like 10 hits on it 897 00:40:21,120 --> 00:40:24,320 from SEO this week. But we think we're going to get 898 00:40:24,320 --> 00:40:26,800 10 hits a week for 10 years now. That adds up. 899 00:40:26,800 --> 00:40:27,920 There's quite a bit of content actually. 900 00:40:27,920 --> 00:40:30,080 And it's going to help, you know, if we can release ten of 901 00:40:30,080 --> 00:40:32,640 those a month, like actually it does start to work and start to 902 00:40:32,640 --> 00:40:35,680 build the, the overall profile. Say, going back to exactly what 903 00:40:35,680 --> 00:40:37,920 you're saying about analysis and analytics, you guys must have 904 00:40:37,920 --> 00:40:40,360 the same thing of going, look, we're willing to try it, but as 905 00:40:40,360 --> 00:40:42,200 you say, let's prioritise what we think is going to be the 906 00:40:42,200 --> 00:40:44,360 biggest thing based on what we've done previous. 907 00:40:45,400 --> 00:40:49,680 Oh, yeah, we're big on throwing things at the wall and seeing 908 00:40:49,680 --> 00:40:52,640 what sticks. Our CEO says that all the time. 909 00:40:54,000 --> 00:40:57,400 Yeah, we, we will try anything once, right? 910 00:40:57,400 --> 00:40:58,920 If, if we all are like, hey, let's give it a shot. 911 00:40:58,920 --> 00:41:01,240 And we all agreed to try it. Yes, absolutely. 912 00:41:01,240 --> 00:41:03,040 Because you'll never know if you don't try, right? 913 00:41:03,440 --> 00:41:07,160 That's with anything in life. But yeah, absolutely. 914 00:41:07,160 --> 00:41:09,240 We, we love to try new things because I think that's what 915 00:41:09,240 --> 00:41:11,560 makes us different. We're we're not afraid to try 916 00:41:11,560 --> 00:41:13,840 new things and, and we're willing to take those risks. 917 00:41:13,840 --> 00:41:16,680 So, and that's something I'm, I'm grateful for to be a part of 918 00:41:16,680 --> 00:41:19,560 a company that allows us to take those risks, right. 919 00:41:19,720 --> 00:41:23,080 I'll go up to, you know, my boss or the CEO and say, hey, like, 920 00:41:23,680 --> 00:41:26,280 here's an idea we have. And, you know, they're like, OK, 921 00:41:26,280 --> 00:41:27,960 Michaela, like let's give it a shot. 922 00:41:28,160 --> 00:41:30,680 Check analytics and, and, and we'll see how it is in a year. 923 00:41:30,680 --> 00:41:32,680 And if it works, great. If it doesn't, then we move on 924 00:41:32,680 --> 00:41:35,800 to the next. So yeah, that's a huge part of 925 00:41:35,800 --> 00:41:37,080 true Kim. I think that's what makes us so 926 00:41:37,080 --> 00:41:38,680 successful. Yeah, yeah. 927 00:41:38,680 --> 00:41:40,680 And you have to have a good business in the 1st place. 928 00:41:40,680 --> 00:41:43,040 They don't you, because all this stuff costs time, it costs 929 00:41:43,040 --> 00:41:45,200 money. So we've quite a few clients, 930 00:41:45,200 --> 00:41:47,160 especially on Giga Lads, for example, where we say, right, 931 00:41:47,160 --> 00:41:50,480 10% of the budget. So if the target's 5 to one, 932 00:41:50,480 --> 00:41:53,280 we're going to add another 10%. So we're going to make it 5.5 to 933 00:41:53,280 --> 00:41:55,120 one. Now we can use 10% of the 934 00:41:55,120 --> 00:41:56,360 budget. It's a really simple bit of 935 00:41:56,360 --> 00:41:59,640 math, 10% of the budget we can now whack into testing and we 936 00:41:59,640 --> 00:42:01,200 can actually spend it on whatever we want. 937 00:42:01,520 --> 00:42:05,200 But we've got to achieve that 5.5 first to then know we've got 938 00:42:05,200 --> 00:42:07,760 that extra room to play with. And every time we find 939 00:42:07,760 --> 00:42:10,080 something, it's like you go from being the finance director's 940 00:42:10,080 --> 00:42:12,600 worst nightmare of like, why are we spending 10% of our budget in 941 00:42:12,600 --> 00:42:13,960 this thing? It doesn't work to suddenly 942 00:42:13,960 --> 00:42:15,720 like, how much could we spend on that thing? 943 00:42:16,240 --> 00:42:17,440 And it's like, yeah, we could spend more. 944 00:42:18,160 --> 00:42:21,440 Yeah, absolutely. Cool, cool. 945 00:42:21,880 --> 00:42:23,160 Well, look, I really appreciate your time. 946 00:42:23,160 --> 00:42:25,440 OK, It's been great to chat to you and we'll bring things into 947 00:42:25,440 --> 00:42:28,080 land here. But most important question, if 948 00:42:28,080 --> 00:42:30,920 someone's listening to going, you guys sound awesome, like I 949 00:42:30,920 --> 00:42:33,320 want to see the business, see your social media and everything 950 00:42:33,320 --> 00:42:35,200 else is going on. What's the web address? 951 00:42:35,200 --> 00:42:37,680 What are your social handles? How can people reach out and see 952 00:42:37,800 --> 00:42:38,800 see the amazing work you're doing? 953 00:42:39,440 --> 00:42:43,120 Yes, truecable.com, you can search us up on TikTok, 954 00:42:43,120 --> 00:42:47,040 Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, and then definitely YouTube. 955 00:42:47,040 --> 00:42:48,560 Check it out. That's where you'll see all of 956 00:42:48,560 --> 00:42:51,680 our faces on there. You'll see our content. 957 00:42:51,680 --> 00:42:54,200 And then, yeah, if anybody's interested in our cable Academy, 958 00:42:54,200 --> 00:42:57,120 that's on our website as well. Amazing, amazing. 959 00:42:57,120 --> 00:42:59,440 And one of my team did make a joke earlier because my surname 960 00:42:59,440 --> 00:43:01,320 is Truman. Nick, if you've got some sort of 961 00:43:01,320 --> 00:43:02,880 shareholding in true Cable, I don't. 962 00:43:03,080 --> 00:43:05,920 I do love the name, but I don't it's one of my one of my team 963 00:43:05,920 --> 00:43:08,280 were asking like have you you're running a second business we 964 00:43:08,280 --> 00:43:10,640 don't know about. But no, I used to have a company 965 00:43:10,640 --> 00:43:13,680 called True Line, though, which was very similar to true cable. 966 00:43:14,360 --> 00:43:16,120 Anyway, Michaela, I really appreciate your time. 967 00:43:16,120 --> 00:43:16,960 Thank you so much for joining us. 968 00:43:16,960 --> 00:43:18,360 It's been great to chat and I really appreciate all the 969 00:43:18,360 --> 00:43:19,520 insights you shared with us today. 970 00:43:20,080 --> 00:43:21,200 Yes, yes. Thank you, Nick. 971 00:43:21,200 --> 00:43:23,680 It's been a pleasure. Awesome and for everyone 972 00:43:23,680 --> 00:43:25,800 listening at home, make sure you check out Growth Hub. 973 00:43:25,800 --> 00:43:27,680 Please come and join in. It's awesome. 974 00:43:27,680 --> 00:43:30,040 We've just rebuilt it and we've got so many events and things 975 00:43:30,040 --> 00:43:31,040 coming up. It's completely free, so 976 00:43:31,360 --> 00:43:33,080 definitely check that out. And if you're listening for the 977 00:43:33,080 --> 00:43:34,720 first time, please hit the subscribe button and leave us a 978 00:43:34,720 --> 00:43:36,520 review and we'll be back again next Friday. 979 00:43:36,520 --> 00:43:37,480 Hope you can join us then.