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‘Badass Marketing‘ experts Mike Doherty, and Angela Dunz, emphasize the importance of distinguishing between organic and paid search and stress the need for marketers to stay informed and engaged. They caution against falling for exaggerated promises and “get rich quick” schemes while underscoring the significance of building brand awareness through multiple touch points.

Stop Falling for Get Rich Quick Schemes

We highlight the significance of understanding clients’ needs and expectations in marketing and sales. They emphasize active involvement in the process and differentiate by offering valuable solutions. The duo also stresses the importance of comprehending buyer personas and avoiding assumptions about direct conversions.

Mike discusses how marketers effectively target emotions and unmet needs to drive product sales, employing tactics like retargeting and omnipresence. He emphasizes the importance of understanding clients’ language and expectations for successful campaigns.

In their discussion, Mike Doherty and Angela Dunz of Badass Marketing focus on understanding customer needs, creating buyer personas, and ensuring effective marketing efforts. They stress the need to communicate in the target audience’s language and measure the return on investment of marketing endeavors.

Key Takeaways:

• Be aware of exaggerated promises and conduct thorough research.
• Educate clients on the marketing process and manage their expectations.
• Help clients understand their value proposition and their clients’ unmet needs.
• Develop buyer personas to gain insights into the target audience.

Key Questions:

• What subtle cues indicate someone might not be telling the truth?
• What problem does your product or service solve?
• Do you think the lack of market research plays a role in clients seeking services and solutions?
• What pain points and unmet needs does your target audience have?

Badass Marketing – Discussion of Marketing Topics. Trending, shifting, evolving topics and peripheral changes in the world of business and effect marketing. We will touch a little bit on sales. The focus will be Digital Marketing.

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0:04 – Mike Doherty – Strategic Growth Marketing
Good morning and welcome to another edition of Badass Marketing. I am joined by the ever so lovely Angela Duns. Angela, how are you this morning?

0:13 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Oh, I I’ve had better days. Thanks for asking.

0:18 – Mike Doherty
I heard do you have? Is your car back?

0:23 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
five hundred dollars later.

0:27 – Mike Doherty
just park in a bad place, or.

0:29 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
well, actually it’s an illegal toe, so I’m gonna have to fight it. And I think, you know, yes, it’s, it’s interesting. The construction here is causing problems and they’re getting really happy about towing cars, so.

0:44 – Mike Doherty
There you go.

0:45 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
I just walked six blocks with my groceries.

0:49 – Mike Doherty
Nice, nice. We will move on from the programa to a topic that is near and dear to my heart is all. All those lovely promises that Marke has made to you get you to sign up for their services.

1:08 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes. And it’s not just marketers that are saying things that are unrealistic and exaggerated. So it would be interesting to, yeah, we should address all of it, Mike.

1:23 – Mike Doherty
Okay, where would you like to start?

1:25 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Well, I really want to start specifically with marketers. So, you know, be thinking in your own mind while we’re discussing this, when marketers say this. What is it that makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up and tells you? No, probably not.

1:47 – Mike Doherty
I think that excuse me, the number one thing that is a red flag to me is when the seo folks promise to have, you know, give me A Number one ranking on Google,

2:04 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
For how long?

2:06 – Mike Doherty
never says and it also never said, it also never says number one ranking on what keyword, right? Because you know, I can rank a really obscure keyword at number one immediately because it’s just an obscure keyword, you know, it’s a long tail obscure key word that clearly I can get you the number one spot. But if it’s keyword that no one ever uses, what’s the point? Like, So, you know, will that drive traffic to you? And unfortunately, I don’t think that the average person who receives these types of solicitations is thinking that in depth.

2:43 – Mike Doherty
So they’re like, all right, you know, I sell bookkeeping, so I would love to rank number one in book. Except that’s not gonna happen,

2:49 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Right?

2:53 – Mike Doherty
That’s not what they’re promising you. If they are promising you that, I can assure you that, you know, they’re lying, what they’re promising is some obscure word you know, and and depending on, you know where you are and what the competition is with, what you’re trying to rank for will determine how fast you climb up the Google search rankings. So if you are trying to rank for bookkeeping, Larks Burg, which is a city here in Northern California, and there’s not a lot of other people who have that, then yeah, you have a good likelihood of maybe ranking towards the top or even number one, assuming that you don’t have other competitors.

3:31 – Mike Doherty
But you know, if you’re trying to rank for bookkeeping, San Francisco, I can assure you you’re not getting the one number one slot overnight,

3:39 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes,

3:39 – Mike Doherty
you know,

3:40 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
and you certainly are not gonna stay there for any length of time without an unlimited budget.

3:40 – Mike Doherty
So. Yeah, I mean, I mean, this is, you know, this is Seo. So we’re not even talking about paid search, we’re talking about organically where they’re promising to organically get you that spot, right? Because paid is different if I, you know, with paid depending on my audience and depending on where they are. I can get up to the top because I’m paying for it. If I’m willing to spend more per ad word than somebody else, then I can rank at the top. But that’s a pay to play. What I’m referring to is the promise is that, you know, the Seo, the, you know, non pay to play, we will rank you to the top.

4:22 – Mike Doherty
For me, that’s always a red flag. Like, yeah, you know, clearly, you know, they’re preying on people who don’t really understand how Sel works.

4:32 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
And so there are a couple things that come up in just this 1st scenario that we’re talking about, you know, let the buyer beware, it’s good to do a little bit of research and really the problem is exaggeration. It’s, it’s promising something that, you may not be able to hope to ever have.

4:54 – Mike Doherty
Yeah, I mean, you know, it’s this simple, SEO is a long term play. If you can’t wait for Seo to kick in, then. You do ads right so you know if you wanna rank towards the top you pay for it you you do it through ads um if you wanna rank organically and rank consistently because we know that something like eighty five percent of the people ignore ads because they know their pain placements and you wanna rank organically you do it through SEO a six month to twelve month endeavor um if you’re consistently working it consistently making sure that the key words that your audience is looking for are you know words that you’re targeting those types of things so you.

5:37 – Mike Doherty
It’s really about Not like you said buyer view, but it’s because most people don’t understand the difference between an organic ranking and a paid search and all those types of things, and they take advantage of that, you know, we will rank you number one, well, you know, not organically and not overnight.

5:55 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Exactly. Any other pet peeves on the top of your list, like Doty?

6:02 – Mike Doherty
you know, I, my, my next one is just sort of the, the general get rich quick, you know, we’re gonna solve all your problems overnight. Whether it be Seo, whether it be paid advertising, whatever, whether it’s a shiny new platform, anything where you can get instant traction suggests that you It’s not a long term play. So you know, if even if they get you that instant traction, it’s probably like you said, whether or not there’s any staining power to it. You know, to grow your businesss, that’s a long term play, you know, you have to consistently work it, you have to provide relevant content, you have to understand your audience, all those types of things just do not happen overnight.

6:48 – Mike Doherty
So anybody who’s promising you sort of the get rich quick, we will fix it and you know, you’ll be rolling in cash, you know, buyer beware or just don’t do it, just don’t go there.

7:01 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
If it sos. Too good to be true. It probably is. And you know, there are a lot of small business owners that get to a point where they’re a little bit trouble in, a little bit of trouble for cashflow, and they want to leave these things. You know, myself, I would rather do something that was a gradual build or a slow burn but was consistent for building businesss. And it’s really hard to get people into that mindset.

7:29 – Mike Doherty
I mean, I would love to, you know, get rich quick, do it fast kind of approach, except that just, you know, we know it doesn’t work.

7:37 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Sustainable.

7:39 – Mike Doherty
So, you know, I, I’m not opposed to the concept, it’s just, it’s not a real concept, it’s not something that works, you know. Marketing and brand awareness is about constantly being in front of your target audience, not once, not twice, but consistently. So, you know, you can get that big bump maybe once or twice, but that’s not about developing brand awareness. Just because somebody’s seen your Ad once or seen you once, that doesn’t mean that they’re gonna, you know, remember your brand.

8:09 – Mike Doherty
So, you know, we always talk We always talk about brand awareness,

8:11 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
are short.

8:14 – Mike Doherty
just being about, you know, creating multiple touch points to stay in front of people so that your top of mind.

8:21 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes. Yes and it really takes about twelve to twenty seven touch points be before people even know who you are staying top of mind is definitely the long game.

8:35 – Mike Doherty
Yeah, I mean because you know, you think about the, the funnel, right? The 1st is just developing an awareness that you exist, right? And then, you know, as you begin to move through the p, the, the funnel, whether it’s, you know, through repeated, you know, exposure on social media, those type of thing, you know, you go from awareness to understanding, they know what you provide, they’re interested your services and then you work them through the funnel. But the, the initial stage is always awareness, you know, like I didn’t you.

9:03 – Mike Doherty
Haven’t or I didn’t even know, you know, and we have a client You know, a retailer on, on, you know, a prominent sort of merchant corridor here in San Francisco. And the thing that we always are sort of surprised at because we’ve been there a year, we’re always surprised that people like, oh, is this a new store? I didn’t know you were here. And it’s like, no, we’ve been here for a year, you know. But they’ve walked past us and they didn’t have any need, need or what have you? Or for whatever reason they walk past without looking at the sign, you know.

9:34 – Mike Doherty
So no, we’ve been here a year, but obviously we have to work harder at creating brand awareness so that, you know, people are aware like, yeah, no, we are here, we’ve been here, so.

9:46 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes, so do you think there’s any key words or you know, what are some of the more subtle cues that that really tip you off when somebody is telling you something that might not be true?

9:59 – Mike Doherty
Guarantee. I guarantee. You’ll have the number one spot. You can’t guarantee that there are so many factors that, especially if we’re talking organically, right, there are so many factors that go into, you know, websites are ranked and we know that the Google algorithms and, you know, we’re primarily focused Google at this point, but we know that the algorithms, whether it be on Google or Linkedin or, you know, Facebook or Instagram, whatever it may be, you know, there’s algorithms that, you know, measure all kinds crazy things, half of which we understand, half of which I think are just magic.

10:37 – Mike Doherty
You know, just like, you know, however somebody’s feeling that day, but the reality is, you know, if you guarantee me a spot, yeah, that’s a red flag that, that right there, you know, and then, you know, the time frame, like we will rank immediately, like those kind of promises you said earlier. If it’s too good to be true, it probably isn’t, and that pretty much will hold true in these types of offers.

11:03 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes, so are there any other words that that sort of like make you go? Oh.

11:17 – Mike Doherty
I’m trying to think of another example, you know, that one seems to be very top of mind, where, you know, it’s just what they’re promising and what they’re, you know, what they’re able to deliver, what they’re realistically able to deliver. The key point, you know, I mean, I think any any one of the platforms is they’re all going to tout that. They’re the magical solution, right? You know, we’re big fans and advocates for Linkedin, and so we will tout Linkedin as you know, this is what you should use, But that’s today based on certain factors that could change tomorrow.

12:00 – Mike Doherty
You know, we love to trash for our clubhouse here with we seem to do on a regular basis. But you know, you’re on a really hot platform and it’s hot for a while and then tomorrow it’s not hot, you know, And we have a long laundry list of brands that have come and gone, right? I mean, most of us started our early web career on Aol and Aim, right? And That was a big communication. I remember for the longest time. We did a lot of marketing through Yahoo groups and Yahoo was a big platform.

12:30 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
It was, for quite something, a fairly good run.

12:34 – Mike Doherty
And they were our primary platform till they weren’t right. So, so, you know, the reality is these platforms will come and go.

12:41 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes.

12:42 – Mike Doherty
So anybody who promises, you know, instant access on one platform. And you know, without belaboring the point, you know, in our mind, building on social media is building on rented land. You just, you know, you can’t control things, you know, we’re like, you know, if you’re in this for the long haul, build an email list.

13:03 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes. Yes, well, and the other thing is somebody can make you promises about doing really well on a certain platform. Is that where your people are?

13:15 – Mike Doherty
You know, and I mean, the other thing is, I think that sort of the idea of like, you know, we will take care of everything for you, right? We have clients that would love us to do that and we would love to do it on their behalf, but the reality is we don’t know their businesses the way they know their businesss, right? We may think we know what their target audience is and then when we talk to the clients, they’re like, oh no, our target audience is over here. You, you know, you can’t set it and forget it when it comes to marketing, if you’re gonna pay money to anybody, right, you need to stay engaged, this is still your money going out the door.

13:51 – Mike Doherty
You need to stay engaged, you know, you need to understand what the messaging is, they can help you with all that and you know, that’s money well spent and we support that. You know, do not think that you can hire a market. Person and then like just close your eyes and hope for the best. Because they don’t know your business the way that you know your businesss. So if you’re going to spend the money, make sure that you also are prepared to commit to the time. Because they need your input.

14:18 – Mike Doherty
They need to know, you know, what are your customers talking about today, What are your customers concerned about? We can help you with getting those sentiments and getting and collecting that information, but we’re gonna go back to you, Mr. Business owner or, or, you know, m the business owner and say, look, here’s what we’re seeing sentiment wise, does that align with what you’re seeing? You know, is that consistent with the target audience that you’re going after? You know, so you know, this idea of that, like, you know, oh, you don’t have to do anything.

14:48 – Mike Doherty
And then guess the last thing that I think drives me crazy again. And this really just comes from, you know, not knowing people’s businesses, but the, the people that are out there, like I’ll get you ten to 20 leads a day.

15:02 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Oh, my God.

15:05 – Mike Doherty
You know, these are people who are on the phone, you know, like I get those phone calls all day long and it, you know, most of the time if I’m lucky, my phone screens them and because it’s an unrecognized number, but if indeed they, I am silly enough to pick up the phone, then I either hang up or I share a few quality explicit and then hang up. So this is not how you market your businesss by outsourcing, you know, your 1st point of contact to a 3rd party, right? That just generally doesn’t know your business.

15:33 – Mike Doherty
So this idea of like, you know, somebody is going to get you ten to 20 leads a day.

15:39 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
And Do you need ten to 20 leeds per day?

15:39 – Mike Doherty
You know. I mean, you know, I don’t know that that’s a bad thing. I wouldn’t mind having ten to 20 needs a day, but the reality is, you know, unless you’re one of my networking partners that understands my businesss, understands my target audience, understands what I like to do and what I don’t like to do, right? Because you and I are big networkers and referrers and, you know, we spend spend a considerable amount of time with our networking partners, understanding their businesses, understanding where an ideal referral is and we’ve sent them along referrals and like, yeah, that wasn’t it.

16:16 – Mike Doherty
So, you know, we need that feedback to make sure that we understand well. That was a potential client, but it’s not a potential client they want, right? So you really, you know, if you’re going to do that, you know, you really needed to be engaged. I mean, I guess the biggest thing is, you know, the idea that you can sort of outsource your marketing and just be oblivious to it, you, you, you have to remain involved, you know, we’re big on measuring things, you know. What are the Kpis, what are those kinds of things?

16:48 – Mike Doherty
So, and if you’re spending money, there needs to be an Roi. So if you’re spending money with the marketing team, you have an expectation of an Roi, but if you’re not helping them craft your message and understand your businesss, they’re never going to get there, right? And that is not the marketing Money’s that is, if they’re, you know, not pushing back on you and requesting this information, but if they’re requesting this information and you’re ignoring it and you’re still paying them and then you’re wondering why it’s not working.

17:17 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
I was in a coaches and consultants meeting one time and one of the discussion points was the whole idea is our job is not to tell the client what they want to hear. Our job is to tell them what’s realistic and to educate them a little bit on some of those things, and we may not be who they choose. But we should at least tell them the truth.

17:41 – Mike Doherty
Yeah, I mean, and you know, having been in a lot of those sessions as well, you know, a lot of people will take that to the next level was I won’t even tell you what to do. I’m going to work, help you work through the process for you to figure out, you know, if as a coach, you know, there’s a coach and a consultant, the consultant tells you what to do. The consultant you hired me, I have the expertise, you should do this and you’re paying me for that advice. So if, if you’re hiring a consultant, they will tell you what to do.

18:15 – Mike Doherty
If you hire a consultant and they tell you what to do and you don’t do it, why are you spending the money? A coach, on the other hand, is supposed to help you through the process so that you understand what you should be doing and you determine what is the best course of action for you. They’re going to offer input, they’re going to offer advice, of course they are, but the reality is the difference between consultant and coaching is coaching is helping you develop the skill sets so that you can figure out what is the best course of action.

18:50 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
informed choices, and that is a great place to be.

18:55 – Mike Doherty
I mean, you know, for us it’s like walking them through the process, what is your value statement And and, you know, and then we’ll break that down and you know, okay, so how do you differentiate? Does the customer? What is the customer willing to pay for? What is, you know, the outcome that they’re hoping for? What are the emotional elements to what you’re promising and, and what you’re promising to? People don’t buy products, they buy emotions, right?

19:21 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes.

19:22 – Mike Doherty
you know? So I want to feel happier, I want to feel more successful, you know, And that’s how we sell you our product.

19:28 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
more confident about my businesss.

19:29 – Mike Doherty
Do you want to be successful, right? What does that even mean, right? That’s just not even tangible. But you know, how many people buy into that marketing line. Do you want to be successful? I want to be successful, you know,

19:43 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
It means something completely different.

19:44 – Mike Doherty
it doesn’t necessarily mean that every product that comes along is going to get me there.

19:50 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Well, I do have a really big pet peeve when it comes to marketing.

19:54 – Mike Doherty
Okay is not something we do.

19:57 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
the whole word lead generation or the phrase lead generation makes me insane. Every time I hear it, I just go. There are so many times that people expect something to be a direct conversion. There’s no definition. What does lead generation really mean? Does that mean that you have a prospect, does that mean that you have a relationship, does that mean that you have a inst client, you know?

20:29 – Mike Doherty
And the answer is yes, it it does, but it’s where you set the expectations.

20:34 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes, yes,

20:35 – Mike Doherty
you know, it’s like,

20:36 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
you know.

20:36 – Mike Doherty
so I have this potential for you, but you know, and, and a lot of times what we’ll do is like, this is a hot lead, this is a warm lead, this is a cold lead, you know, So we’ll, we’ll try to quantify it or qualify it for you saying, you know, here’s, you know, what we’re handing you, we’re not handing you. They’re going to like sign on the dotted line tomorrow, but they’re interested in a service like yours. You need to do more work. So, you know, I do think all that is encompassed in lead generation, but it’s really about what is your expectation.

21:06 – Mike Doherty
When it comes to regeneration. So if your expectation is that I’m sending you clients that close tomorrow, that’s a, that’s a set of expectations. And if that’s all you’re interested in, what’s important for me as your networking partner is to understand that’s all you’re interested in is the types of clients that can close tomorrow. Because I will have other prospects that I know either are, are in a longer sales cycle or I know they aren’t that far in their, their selection process that, you know, they’re not ready to make a decision or you know, since they don’t even know you, they’re not going to go down that path tomorrow.

21:42 – Mike Doherty
So from uh, you know, a networking perspective, you know, I need to understand what your expectations are around the generation.

21:53 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
And so one of my pet peeves is when you link the word lead generation to Linkedin is something that I try to stay away from because I think it sets up the wrong expectations. Linkedin is much better used as a relationship building tool,

22:10 – Mike Doherty
Fox.

22:10 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
as a relationship nurturing tool for driving traffic to some place that someone is much more likely to make a purchase like decision. We don’t want to be sold on Linkedin, so it’s really hard to call what we do on Linkedin lead generation. Of course it is, but in many people’s minds I think it sets up the wrong expectation. They are thinking is a client.

22:37 – Mike Doherty
Yeah, I mean we’re using Linkedin as A network building tool may or may not lead to prospecting, but you know. I am constantly bombarded with, you know, messages from people that look to connect. I connect. And then the 1st immediate message after connecting is they’re trying to sell me something. I mean, I don’t know them, you know, I, you know, I’m pretty. Liberal with accepting. I’ve actually been lesss liberal lately, but I’ve been pretty liberal with accepting these types of invitations and But the reality is, as soon as you hit me up with, you know, a sale without any other.

23:26 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Michael Oh, no.

23:44 – Mike Doherty
Come back. You came back to the light.

23:47 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
You’re back. That was I don’t know if that was my end or your end, but everybody, I’m so sorry.

23:58 – Mike Doherty
Step back from the light. Don’t go into the light. Not time yet.

24:02 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
So what were you saying you were talking about?

24:04 – Mike Doherty
I was saying something really deep and profound, for sure.

24:10 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
You’re going to, of course, repeat it for us.

24:13 – Mike Doherty
I mean I would assume what I was saying is,

24:17 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
We were saying you were getting much pickier about who it was you were connecting with on Linkedin and yay,

24:17 – Mike Doherty
you know. If the 1st thing you do is solicit me with something, I’m not interested, right?

24:27 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
yes, I mean.

24:28 – Mike Doherty
And I find that sort of an abuse of the networking process.

24:32 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
It is a huge abuse because I mean, they are assuming that you don’t already have somebody that you would prefer to work with for whatever that service is.

24:42 – Mike Doherty
I mean, you know, you think about this, right? So we’ve all been to live networking events, you know, I’ve never met you that the likelihood of me walking up to you, like buy my product. Are you? And go away, right? So you know, like if it doesn’t work in the real world, why do people think it’s going to work online?

25:02 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
It’s even worse because there’s even less of a relationship there.

25:08 – Mike Doherty
And I’m you know, you know. Some people if you’re gonna do cold calling clearly it’s a numbers game and you know we’ve all been through some form of sales in our life and we’ve all been through the you know you need a hundred noses to get to it yes and I’m at my ninety ninth no so it’s kind of happen anymore you know I mean so those kinds of you know but I can but that’s not how we develop businesses right the way well I mean the reality is you know my product is not for everybody so I can easily get a hundred notes by asking the wrong people if they want to buy my product.

25:28 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes. not sustainable ones.

25:49 – Mike Doherty
versus taking the time to understand what their needs are and whether or not I have a solution that could solve their needs, you know? So our approach, because people always say like, well, what do you offer? And I’m like, well, what’s your, what do you need, you know, what’s going on, tell me, you know, tell me what’s going on and I can tell you whether or not we can help you. But you know, what’s the point of me selling you something when I don’t even know that you need it,

26:14 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Great.

26:16 – Mike Doherty
you know?

26:16 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
And that’s why I like to ask the questions what have you tried in the past to solve this problem? You know, what really opens up a different kind of conversation. And so I do have another big pet peeve. I have a competitor and she has a done for you service, and she is an extreme extrovert. She works with.

26:41 – Mike Doherty
You don’t like her because she’s outgoing.

26:46 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
I, I’ve gotten several clients from her because one of the things that If she works with an introvert, it’s really hard for her to write things in a style that would seem congruent and authentic to an introvert. You know, extroverts will say things in a certain way. I mean, it’s the same thing, but They’re going to say it in a little bit different way than an introvert will, you know, and then when you meet that introvert and they say it in their own way, there’s a disconnect. There’s that cognitive dissonance thing.

27:20 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
And so done for you, service has to, it really hass to fit the person that you’re doing it for. You can’t just say, you can’t just check off all the boxes. It, it has to have a certain tone and a certain understanding of who that person is. I’m just very leery of when somebody says, Oh, I’m gonna do this all for you and it’s gonna be great.

27:42 – Mike Doherty
right, and that Sort of piggybacks on what I was saying earlier about like the idea that you, the um, entrepreneur can just then step away and not pay attention, right? You have to be engaged, you have to understand, I can’t tell you how many of our clients in this, you know, so this should go over big with our clients, but how many of our clients will just figure it out. And like figure what out, what, you know, figure out what your business is. You should be able to convey that, you should be able to articulate that, you know, and we do have clients that we’ve had for years and years and we have figured it out and we do know, but when they 1st come in the door, you know, we’re on a learning curve as well, so we need to understand what your businesss does, you know.

28:27 – Mike Doherty
There’s a very good likelihood that whatever you’re doing, you know, is in a competitive landscape. So we need to understand how do you differentiate from your competitors. Hopefully it’s not simply by price that you offer something else of value to your clients that makes you a prefer preference. To the other competitors. But we’re always asking these types of questions like what problem are you solving? Why is this different than the way all the competitors in the marketplace solve it?

28:56 – Mike Doherty
You know, why do people come to you? Because very often we’ll ask that question, why do people come to you? And they’re like, What? What do you mean? And I’m like, they picked you for a reason. So, we will spend a fair amount of time figuring out buyer personas, and we’ll go back and talk to existing clients and say, Okay, whyy did you go there? What were you feeling? What feelings does this company bring to you? Because we’re looking for, you know, marketing words, and we’re looking for emotions when, you know, somebody’s working with this client.

29:27 – Mike Doherty
So, we’ll go through the whole development of a buyer persona or multiple bio personas to understand what people are feeling during the process, what people feel afterwards. Hopefully they feel a little warm and fuzzy and that’s what we want to convey. But you know, diving into buyer personas to understand who is your target audience and anybody who is telling you that you, you know, you can sell to everybody. That’s a huge mistake, right? You have to find your niche.

29:59 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes, for sure. So any other pet peeves for you.

30:06 – Mike Doherty
I have a How many days do you have?

30:07 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
I know what you do.

30:09 – Mike Doherty
I have lots of pet peeve.

30:12 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Okay, let’s narrow it down to marketers.

30:15 – Mike Doherty
Now I mean, you know, the biggest pet pe, I mean part of my pet peeve and this was never my intent when we started this conversation, but I guess I’m going there anyway is one of my pet peeves and this is not marketers, but it’s the clients themselves where you know. Will take the time and we try to take the time to educate our clients as to the process. You know why we go through this process and what we expect of the come and you know, so many clients will come to us and they don’t tend to be clients that we want to work with, but who come to us and just like, well, just take care of it, you know, and they no longer want to participate in the marketing of their own businesss.

31:00 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Oh boy, yeah, that’s, that’s really tough. And on the flip side of that, Michael, one of my pet peeves is. A P I’ve, I’ve gone to a professional, I’m looking for advice, I’m trying to find out if we’re a good fit and they’ll, they’ll tell me, oh, this is what you need. And then I ask them, well, you know, how does that work and what’s the process and what can I expect from that? And they can’t answer me anything. They all they can say is this is the one that you need, this package, this service, whatever it is, and there’s really no discussion left open for that.

31:39 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
So you know, on both sides, when people’s expectations are that you’re gonna take whatever service that you’re told to take or that you’re gonna buy something, and then there’s magic that happens in there someplace.

31:54 – Mike Doherty
And I think that’s the difference between sales and marketing. Sales has a product, an existing product. And they go out to the market and they’re like, do you want it, do you want it, do you want it? It’s a numbers game and they, you know, the more people they ask, they get to their hundred nose or whatever they need to get to, you know, because it’s a numbers game.

32:16 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes. Oh.

32:17 – Mike Doherty
You know, I have developed this lovely widget. I have no idea who needs it, but I’ll just ask everybody. And you know, by a numbers game, a certain percentage of people were like, Oh yeah, I needed that. Which is a very different approach than developing the solution based on your clients needs.

32:38 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes.

32:40 – Mike Doherty
You know,

32:40 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Is the magic thing right there?

32:43 – Mike Doherty
because people come to us and What are you selling? I’m, you know, I don’t sell anything. We develop solutions based on what we, you know, see and based on the feedback that we get from our clients of what, what they’re seeing in the marketplace, what are the unmet needs, you know, where can they differentiate? So, you know, we don’t sell anything. In theory, we sell, of course, but we don’t sell. What we do is we develop solutions to meet unmet needs in the marketplace, which is very different than you know.

33:17 – Mike Doherty
I have developed a link roller, do you want one? And if you ask enough people, there will be people who want to link roll, right, clearly will want to link roll, so that’s sales. An existing product that you already have that you have no intention to modify. And like this is it take it or leave it, You know what I mean? And maybe I know if there’s 20 of these in the market, maybe mine is a little no it’s got a lovely blue handle or maybe it’s twenty cents cheaper than the others but that’s sales which is different than what we’re talking.

33:50 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes.

33:52 – Mike Doherty
We’re talking marketing, We’re talking about understanding who your clients are, understanding what their needs are, understanding what their expectations are, or helping them understand what their expectations are, which is a big piece, right? We’re talking about that with our clients. Like, you know, you may want to rank number one, I would like to rank number one to, but the reality is this is how it works and this is what you can expect. If that works for you, we can move forward.

34:17 – Mike Doherty
If that doesn’t work for you, good luck because you know, we’re not gonna engage. If you know, you have unrealistic expectations,

34:28 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
So there’s a number of things that have really come up here. And one of the, and expectations seems to be one of the biggest themes that we’re talking about. And when we were talking about the onboarding, we were that was managing expectations from the get go.

34:46 – Mike Doherty
Hey.

34:48 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
It’s so interesting how it all weaves in together. And I really think that language is a really important piece of this. Also, you know the communication, the exact way that you are both listening and delivering information when you’re in this marketing process and whether people are really Understanding what it is that you do, you know, solutions instead of a sale, you know, very different.

35:17 – Mike Doherty
And it also goes back to like the buyer persona, because not only is language important, but it’s important to understand the buyer’s language, right? Because you may have a very technical term for whatever you develop, but if the client doesn’t know that, right, what they. We optimize websites with search engine optimization and Ada compliance and all other kinds of things. What our clients says. Build me a website. All of that is encompassed in building them a website. But they’re not searching Ada, they’re not searching Seo, they’re searching build me a website.

35:58 – Mike Doherty
So. In addition to having the right language, is understanding what is the language that your client is using so that they understand the messaging. So, you know, if you are promoting a product to a big audience, you know, make sure they understand the language and again a lott of it will come back to they don’t care about the exact nature of the product. What they care about is the outcome. This is going to save me time. This is going to make me happier. This is going to make me prettier.

36:28 – Mike Doherty
You know, it’s amazing because I spend way too much time on Instagram and based on some recent scrolls in Instagram, I can lose lots of weight. I can have beautiful skin, and I can eliminate all my grey hair. You know, those are very lovely things. I don’t think any of those are true, but you know, but those are like the outcomes that people are promising because people wanna look better or wanna feel better, you know,

37:03 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
you more calm.

37:03 – Mike Doherty
want to be more attractive.

37:05 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
I see that one all the time. I must be terribly stressed when I’m on Instagram.

37:10 – Mike Doherty
When I’m on Instagram, apparently I have grey hair, which is You know, it’s, it’s funny though, like there’s so many that and I have sick plans, so I’m the only two A ads I get is for the, you know, get rid of your gray hair, get rid of your black heads, and then we can fix your plants. So that’s what I see on Instagram these days.

37:28 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
And I’m absolutely sure that I need a whole new wardrobe.

37:34 – Mike Doherty
Yeah, I probably do, but it’s kind of funny. But you know, when you look at those Instagram ads, it is clear they are targeting emotions and they’re talking. The outcomes are Promising you a better life, right? You’ll have better skin, you’ll look younger, you’ll feel better, you’ll have those wash for board abs you’ve always wanted.

37:56 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Oh, my. If you didn’t have them when you were 18, how are you gonna have them when you’re 50?

38:02 – Mike Doherty
You won’t, but you’ll pay for their products, so that’s all. That’s all that really matters. You know, So you know, those and, and I would believe that those are actually very successful campaigns because people want those things, right. We can go back to whether or not once they receive the product that they’re expected. It’s what’s always interesting for me. And because I’m a marketing person, is I go watch these Instagram things and then I immediately go over to Customer reviews.

38:37 – Mike Doherty
And then like, sort of like the disconnect between what they were promising and what they got. And in many cases the disconnect was on the expectation. You know, what do you mean? I don’t have six pack apps from just doing this one thing, you know, and still eating everything I’ve ever eaten and never exercise. You know, the client’s expectations were probably a little off and they ignored that. But it is interesting to look at what they promise and then what the customers review says.

39:12 – Mike Doherty
And it was, and mostly it’s a disconnect between expectations. Like we talked about, they just assume that there was going to be a magic fix.

39:20 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yikes, yeah.

39:22 – Mike Doherty
I can’t scroll through Instagram without like, Oh my God, I need that. There’s so many things that Instagram is willing to fix for me, you know what I mean?

39:30 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes, so if you need solutions, go to Instagram. So I have two questions for you. I hope I can remember both.

39:37 – Mike Doherty
Okay.

39:37 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
so. Seriously, Mike, do you think that some of this is a lack of market research on the part of the person who is looking for services and solutions?

39:54 – Mike Doherty
What I, I don’t think is market research is, you know, we are small business owners and as small business owners we have to wear many hats and we’re wearing hats that we probably have no expertise in. You know, the thing that I always talk about is this this person who is a great pie baker, right? And they work in a place and they build pies and like they have the best pies. So then they leave from, you know, being a really good pie baker to like opening it up their own place and it’s not successful.

40:32 – Mike Doherty
They have no expertise in business, they have no expertise in businesss planning, they have no expertise in marketing. They were a good pie maker, right? And they’re still a good pie maker, but understanding that launching your own businesss. Are some additional skill sets that you need to have, you know, in your group, because if it’s not you, that means you have to either hire someone or, you know, have some sort of outside outsourcing. But you know, a lot of times that great pie maker is not any less of a great pie maker.

41:06 – Mike Doherty
But they didn’t have the marketing skills or they did, you know, and the part of not having the marketing skills is just not knowing what questions to ask. So it’s our job to walk them through the process. You know, you’ve talked to me and we’ve had these conversations and the 1st thing I’ll ask you is like, okay, what’s your value proposition which is. And the immediate response is what? I don’t even know what that is. And then I’ll look and then I will. And then I will walk through the value proposition like, okay, what needs do your clients have, right?

41:40 – Mike Doherty
What are the unmet needs? What are they looking for? They’re looking to be happier. They’re looking to be thinner. They They’re looking be prettier, whatever it might be, right?

41:50 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Marketers are really asking questions that get deeper than the superficial thing that people are looking for.

41:58 – Mike Doherty
Well, typically marketers are selling the outcome, not the product, right? I, I’m gonna be happier, I’m gonna be thinner, I’m gonna be, you know, my, my world is gonna be, oh, so much better because I bought those products on Instagram,

42:12 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Hey.

42:13 – Mike Doherty
you know, so a good marketer and, and, and they are not bad marketers who are doing this because I, I guarantee they’re selling a product and that’s their job. U. You know, whether or not they have hot, happy customers and repeat orders is a different question, but you know, they’re doing their job, they’re tapping into the emotions that people, you know, the unmet need that they have, they want to feel prettier, they want to feel thinner, they want to feel younger, they’re tapping into those needs and they’re successful.

42:39 – Mike Doherty
That, you know, that is good marketing. The problem is that, you know, the expectations from the clients are different. And they’re probably not having a good customer experience or a good customer journey because it probably doesn’t satisfy. Those are much bigger issues than anything that you’re going to buy on Instagram is going to solve for you. You know, the marketers are doing a good job. They just, they’re tapping into the unmet needs,

43:04 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
That’s what they’re hired to do.

43:06 – Mike Doherty
right? For our clients especially if they’re startups or you know the clients is we’re gonna help that pie maker understand the process right we will start with okay it what do you know about businesss okay and we’ll start at the very basic okay let’s do a breakeven analysis how many pies do you need to sit out sell to cover overhead and when we crunch all those numbers we come up with a number and we like is that realistic can you sell five hundred pies a day and they’re like no I really can’t okay all right we need to figure out what that means do we go smaller do we do it part time what does all that mean right and then we’ll start down a discussion With marketing, okay, what are the unmet needs of your clients?

43:51 – Mike Doherty
They’re hungry. Like, okay, well there’s probably more to that because they have other options,

43:54 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
They don’t have time to bake.

43:57 – Mike Doherty
right? So, you know, we’re doing the the five Wiss of or the fishbone analysis of, like, okay, what are the unmet needs? They’re hungry, well, they have other options, why would they select yours? Because they like the look of the product. They like, you know, they’re looking for a dessert, they’re looking for something sweet. So you get the need to become more and more specific. But we’ll walk them through that process so that they’re like, Oh okay, this is, it’s not just about, you know, putting it out there and they will come.

44:26 – Mike Doherty
It’s about understanding what it is that they’re looking for when they seek out your product. Or seek out your solution, whatever it may be.

44:39 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
So are you ready for the 2nd question?

44:41 – Mike Doherty
Sure.

44:41 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
This one’s much deeper, so you know.

44:45 – Mike Doherty
I love deep, because I always have an opinion, so it

44:49 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Marketing, in my humble opinion, is going through a huge shift right now. You know, we’ve seen an awful lot of marketing that markets through association with a certain lifestyle or with a certain quality. And so our expectations are some sort of lifestyle change, you know, you drink Pepsy And you’re gonna be rich and famous or whatever those expectations.

45:16 – Mike Doherty
But that’s not new, that they markers have always promised that.

45:20 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes, but do you think that marketing is going through any kind of a change to get away from some of those? Over inflated lifestyle associations and going more towards core problem that they’re solving with their product or services.

45:42 – Mike Doherty
Well, I mean 1st of all, they’ve always done it that way, so that aspect of it isn’t new. I think what’s interesting about marketing retargeting? Presenting an Ad when you’re like, how many times it’s like almost scary, how many times you’re, you like I swear I’ve talked about stuff and I see an Ad when I hop online,

46:05 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Oh,

46:05 – Mike Doherty
like who Like my phone’s listening in to me,

46:05 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
my God.

46:08 – Mike Doherty
right, you know, and I wouldn’t be surprised,

46:09 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Oh, yes.

46:11 – Mike Doherty
but you know, a lot of what we’re doing is in the marketing is retargeting, so you know, what’ll happen is so one of our clients is a tequila client, so I am online looking at tequila stuff all day long. What do you think the ads are that are being pushed to me? They think I’m trying to buy tequila and actually what I’m doing is market research,

46:38 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
right?

46:39 – Mike Doherty
they think, so I get tequila ads all the time because, you know. Based on my activity online,

46:46 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes.

46:46 – Mike Doherty
one would suggest that. I am a over. In Biber of Ag products. And while I do drink my share, it’s quite not up to the level that one of the one thinks based on my search history. So, you know, retargeting, right? So going at touching the client when they are looking for something immediately. And a lot of times what will happen is we will visit a website in the next couple of days, we’ll get pop ups from that website, like I know you looked at it, what, what do you want to buy it now? And that’s retargeting.

47:22 – Mike Doherty
So that’s a great opportunity to reach clients because they’ve generated or demonstrated an interest in this particular category. I think the other thing that is, I mean when it comes to a shift in marketing, is really omni presence of marketing and,

47:43 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes.

47:43 – Mike Doherty
you know, and every space age movie that you’ve ever seen where like You know it, the ads are as you’re walking by and that’s happen, that’s turning into reality, you know, where they’re gonna be low, you know, because our phones say, Hey, are you hungry? Because two blocks from where you are, is this right? So the marketers know where we are, they know what time of day it is,

48:05 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Thanks.

48:07 – Mike Doherty
they know, you they know where we’ve been, so you know, we really have the ability to target this messaging at the time potential customer is probably about to make a decision. And it really, you know, so I think it’s just ever present. I think it was there before, but it feels like it’s even more because now, you know, it used to be. That if you wanted to market to me, you bought an ad in a newspaper, which I may or may not look at once a day. Okay, Now I have a cell phone glued to my hip at all times.

48:40 – Mike Doherty
That makes me readily available for any marketing messages you want to send me.

48:44 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Hey.

48:44 – Mike Doherty
So I get texts, I get phone calls, I get, you know, pop all those types of things. So they’re really the omni presence of marketing and An omnichannel.

48:53 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
an omni channel.

48:55 – Mike Doherty
you know, whether it’s my phone, whether it’s online, whether it’s a billboard, those types of things, it, you know, there’s just omni presence, omni channel. So there’s just, it feels like there’s a lot more marketing bombarding us every day.

49:09 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes.

49:10 – Mike Doherty
You know what I mean? So I think that’s what shifted is there’s just so many more ways to reach us and our consumption has changed. I, I don’t know about you, but when’s the last time you read a newspaper?

49:23 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
I was a die hard. I was a holdout on a physical newspaper, but it’s it’s been three or four years.

49:29 – Mike Doherty
yeah, I’m, I would say mine is a lot longer, but I, I, but what I realized was. I want to say 15 or more years ago, was that what I was reading in the paper I had read online the day before? You know that the news cycle, you know, to get it. Paper publication was about twenty four hours behind so I’m like I read this yesterday online you know and at some point I’m like why don’t I just read it online because I don’t need to wait for it you know I you know I do read a lot of news online and and that type of thing um you know so our you know It used to be you would get a letter and then you got a phone call, then you got an email and now we get text.

50:16 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
And I prefer the text. I do.

50:18 – Mike Doherty
it’s, you know, and tomorrow there’ll be something different, right? But there’s, you know, all, you know, it’s the delivery changes, the medium changes, Those are those types of things and, and a good marketer is aware of those changes and aware of You know, where people are and what’s the best place to reach them and then and I hopefully no think this goes without saying. And then what we do is we seek their permission or we get them to opt in, so we’re not spamming them, you know, so Do you want to get text messages?

50:50 – Mike Doherty
Some people like, guess it’s my preferred platform, you know, I would prefer that, I, you know, I will routinely be a lot happier and a lot more responsive to a text message than, you know, if somebody gives me a voicemail or, you know, wants to chat me up somewhere, like, just send me a text because I can access it when I have the time, right,

51:09 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
And you get the full amount of information.

51:09 – Mike Doherty
I can respond to it. And I have control of it, right? So if I have a conversation Not unlike the one we’re having, you know, like we will go down different paths. Whereas if I have a limited amount of time, I really only want to respond to what they need versus exploring other options.

51:33 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
We’ve talked around this whole topic in a lot of different ways, and I really want to kind of bring it back to a focus for small businesss. So let’s talk about some of the main points, you know, because a small business is not likely to use you know five six seven different channels to do things so they really needed to kind of focus on where their people are And what their pain points are and what results they’re looking for. So do you have any words of wisdom for a small businesss and how to, how to bring this back and educate marketers a little bit and educate the small business people on what they should be looking for or what they should be running from

52:21 – Mike Doherty
I mean, you know. Once you have your value proposition and I’m a advocate, you need, need that. But you know, I would say then the buyer personage is understanding your clients, understanding where they want to be reached at, understanding what it is that they’re looking for, what it is that there are unmet needs. So, you know, I would say once you have your value proposition, to really think about building buyer personas that, you know. What is the Who is your client? Where are they?

52:54 – Mike Doherty
Where do they hang out? Are they on Facebook? Are they on Linkedin? Do they want to get a text, do they want to get an email, those types of things? So I would say the answer to the question is buyer personas, build these buyer personas so that you can understand and like everything else we build, these are not a, set it and forget it. These are always living documents that as you get more information you might update the profile, you know, but definitely create profiles of your targeted clients or your target audience.

53:27 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
That’s an excellent answer, you know, and small businesses really need to educate, you know, It’s just like going to the Dr., you really have to advocate for yourself a little bit when you go to the Dr., so when you go to the marketer, you should be prepared. To answerer a certain couple of questions and and it’s our job to set up expectations correctly and have timelines that might be realistic about things.

53:56 – Mike Doherty
You know, what I would say is if you go to a marketer and they aren’t asking these questions, find another marketer. You know, I mean, we don’t expect you to go in with the questions, we expect you to expect that there should be questions. So. We need is for you to understand that this is a process, and when you’re engaging a new marketing person, they should be asking you what are their customer needs, who are your clients, What’s your target audience? They should be asking you a bunch of questions to further identify and clarify who’s the right audience for what you’re trying to do.

54:35 – Mike Doherty
If they just want to give you a solution without asking you any of those questions, they’re in sales and run.

54:44 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
You know, I’m, I’m sorry to say this, but there are a lot of website builders that will build exactly the type of website that you ask them to build. Without asking any of those questions.

55:01 – Mike Doherty
You know, and you know, having built a lot of websites, a lot of times we do ask those questions and the clients like, No, no, no, just figure it out, right? So, you know, that’s not necessarily our fault because we did try that approach and the clients like, No, I want this and, you know, make it look like that and we’re like, Oh, you know. What feedback do you, does your target audience give you that makes sure you think this is the right approach? But you know, sometimes the clients like they know what they want or, or they think they know what they want and you know, we try to maybe open up the dialogue and they’re like, nope, this is what we just build us what we want and we’re like, okay, we’ll build you what you want.

55:44 – Mike Doherty
We as a rule don’t tend to, you know, those types of clients aren’t our clients. So we tend to sort of suggest they find another home. That’s not necessarily the marketing person or the web builder’s fault. Because a lot of times the client will just go in the, I mean the, you want one of my pet peeves since we’re, you know, folly remembered one After all this time my biggest pet peeve is the client that comes to us with the I don’t know what I want,

56:05 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Please.

56:12 – Mike Doherty
but I’ll see it when I see, I’ll know it when I see it.

56:16 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
There’s a crap shoot.

56:18 – Mike Doherty
And I’m like, Yeah, you, goodbye, go away. What that means to me is that I’m gonna do lots and lots of rework, trying to figure out what it is that you may or may not like, do you like this? Nope, All right, we try something else. What about this? No, you know, we don’t go down that path and we don’t play that game. So, you know, when the client comes to us, we’ll ask them those questions and if we’re still getting feedback, like I don’t know, I’ll, I’ll know it when I see it. Like, yeah, we don’t have time for that.

56:50 – Mike Doherty
So you know, engage You know, if you know what you want, cool. If you don’t know what we want, we will help you through that process. But you know, we won’t do unlimited,

57:00 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
It is a process.

57:02 – Mike Doherty
unlimited revisions until you figure out what you actually do want.

57:06 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
right that gets you into that eighty twenty thing you know you’re spending eighty percent of your time on something that’s not giving you your best return.

57:14 – Mike Doherty
And they’re not necessarily ever going to be happy because because you’re not delivering what they want.

57:18 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Who know want?

57:18 – Mike Doherty
They don’t they want, but they do know what they don’t want, and that’s seem to only be able to develop.

57:25 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Do any feedback.

57:26 – Mike Doherty
Either you want or be open to the dialogue to figure out what you want. Versus let’s just create, you know, unlimited versions until we get lucky and we again, that’s not our idea of a good time.

57:41 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
And sometimes your market can’t wait that long for you to figure out who you are and what it is that you do, you know, And I’m gonna, I’m gonna tell everybody right now, you know, this whole process of trying to figure out who you are, what you have to offer, who you serve, how you’re gonna deliver it. It can be painful sometimes.

58:01 – Mike Doherty
Well, but it, you know, I would concur. It could be painful, but it’s less painful if you do it up front.

58:10 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes,

58:11 – Mike Doherty
If you figure all that out,

58:12 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
benefit is huge.

58:13 – Mike Doherty
like don’t even build the product, don’t build the solution until you’ve reached out and like, you know, what are the pain points, what are, you know, is this the pain point they’re willing to pay to solve?

58:24 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes.

58:25 – Mike Doherty
You know, those types of questions. I mean, you know, if you look at any kind of like tech guides as like, don’t even buy, don’t even build a product, build a minimal viable product and go out and see what the response is, it’s, you know, a very agile approach to product development, which is, you know, here’s something unique, go talk to your client or go talk to your prospect to actually ask them what they want versus coming up with something on your own, like here’s what I think the world needs.

58:53 – Mike Doherty
The world probably doesn’t need that, but your client does have needs, and if you can solve those needs and they’re real, you know, you can deliver value, then they’ll buy from you all day long.

59:05 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Exactly so. Any any parting words that we want to share anything that can tie this all up in a nice neat little bowl.

59:13 – Mike Doherty
Yeah, I mean two things. Number one, if you engage with a professional, that does not give you the excuse to then stop thinking.

59:27 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
That’s good.

59:28 – Mike Doherty
Need to be, you know. There’s an Roi involved, you need to make sure you’re getting a return. The way to get a return is to figure out what’s working, you know, you may try things that may not work, but as long as you’re learning from that, that’s fine. But there needs to be some sort of Kpi, there needs to be some sort of Roi measurement to understand with with what you’re doing with this professional, is it working, is it worth the money that you’re spending on this professional? You know, so my, that would be, you know, you need to be engaged and you need to measure the process.

1:00:00 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
It is a little bit of a dance, you know. You need to find out, you need to educate yourself and the other person needs to educate themselves on you and your business and your personality.

1:00:13 – Mike Doherty
A lot of our clients are experts in their technologies. That’s different than being experts in the market. So,

1:00:21 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes.

1:00:21 – Mike Doherty
you know, what we try to do is work with them to get a better understanding of the marketplace that they reside in so that we can offer a proper solution that meets the needs of their potential clients and understanding who are those potential clients between,

1:00:36 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
That’s of advantage.

1:00:38 – Mike Doherty
you know, buyer personas. And I guess that would be my other last point would be the buyer personas that they’re amazing tools if they’re done right, you know, they are an investment, they’re time consuming, you know, we, we’re talking like like this is like, old school where like you go out and you talk to people and you get feedback and you you know you ask them how does it make you feel why did you buy that why did you spend money would you have bought it at you know if the product sells at fifty nine dollars ninety nine you know would you buy it at seventy nine dollars ninety nine cents now that’s too expensive right sort of get their sentiment right collecting this buyer sentiment and collecting all this information so the second piece is before you do anything, before you build a product, before you go out into sales and start trying to sell me another lint roller.

1:01:28 – Mike Doherty
Do you know, create these buyer personas, Spend the time to understand what the unmet needs are and that people, people are willing to solve, pay to solve, right? There has to be payment because a lot of people will do things for free. I do things for free all the time. But when you ask me, you know, you and I, we were forever trying new tech products. What do you think, What do you like it like that? And we, I try a lot, but the conversion I I, I would say it is less than 20 %. We like, okay, now I’m ready to crack open the wallet and actually buy this product on an ongoing basis.

1:02:03 – Mike Doherty
You know, so, but there is stuff I’m willing to try, sure. And then there’s some things that, like, once I try it and you know, I’m going to say Jet Chat Gpt is one of my, you know, oh my God, moments. Whereas like as soon as I couldn’t use it or like, oh no, I need to buy this, you know, I needed to have, you know, the premium version because I needed access to it all the time, you know, coz it delivers value to my business. So. So understanding really these buyer performance, I think that they’re hugely helpful in understanding your marketing, understanding who your target audience is.

1:02:40 – Mike Doherty
We’ve had the discussion again before about sort of the kitchen remodel and looking at three prospective types of clients where the family of four hass different needs than the single individual in their 70 alone, right? So depending on who you’re targeting and if you’re trying to target both, you can’t target those two groups with the same messaging.

1:03:01 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Right.

1:03:01 – Mike Doherty
You have to develop more messaging that resonates with them and then you need to understand the language that they use, those types of things.

1:03:10 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yes, and bio personas are not set in stone, they will change over time, so yes.

1:03:14 – Mike Doherty
They’re living documents absolutely. We go back and we, we, you know, and you know, we will come up with a, a theory and like a lot of times like six months later, like, well, that changed, guess what? They’re not on clubhouse anymore.

1:03:28 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Or they’re back on Twitter.

1:03:31 – Mike Doherty
Somewhere who knows where they are? I’m sure Elon will run them off soon enough. But yes, they may be on Twitter for now.

1:03:38 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Well, this was a fantastic discussion. Mike Um, thank you so much for your insights. And what are we going to talk about next week? Se?

1:03:48 – Mike Doherty
Sure, we can always talk about Seo. Seo is fine. Yeah.

1:03:51 – Angela Dunz ~ LinkedInBadass.com
Yeah, okay, next week’s discussion might be a little bit passionate. Both of us have some very distinctive ideas about Seo and optimization on different platforms, so tune in next week for Seo.

1:04:07 – Mike Doherty
Thank you.