175. How to Build an Audience That Begs to Buy Anything ft. Sabri Suby

23:58Sabri Suby:If you literally know what you want and you just go in there and you're like, I want to buy this immediately. It does not matter. It takes time. So it's the same thing. The higher the ticket, the more of a pull sale it needs to be and less of a push. So most people get caught up in push where it's like they're kind of making hard offers to people. They're trying to incentivize people to buy right now, where the opposite is true, the higher the price that it is that you want to send. There's all these hoops that you need to jump through in order to qualify yourself to even get into a position. And so that's just, you know, relative on the price scale of whatever you sell, the higher the price, the more of a pull sale and the more exclusive and the more friction that needs to be involved.

24:40Sabri Suby:And the lower the sale, the less friction and the easier that you want to make it for people. On the topic of friction, are there any practical things that somebody listening to this, whether they're selling a physical good or something digital, that they can incorporate into their sales flow? Or let's just take somebody in the digital space. If they're selling a online course or they have digital products that they're selling, what are some ways that they can either create friction or other ways within the sales flow that they can generate a more qualified buyer? So for instance, if somebody needs to fill out a form in order to speak with your sales team, there should be legitimate qualifying questions with that.

25:20Sabri Suby:For instance, in my business, we legitimately have qualifying questions in order to qualify for specific products. And if you go through that and you don't have any money, we're going to save your time and just say, unfortunately, it's not a great fit right now. Please go and get a free copy of this book. This will help you get to the stage that you want to. Or you might want to work with our agency. Unfortunately, you're not a great fit based on the information that you've given us. However, we also have a course that you could go through and you could do it yourself and implement a lot of these tactics.

25:53Sabri Suby:So that's the first thing is having actual qualification criteria that you're not afraid to tell people on the front end. Most people can't do that because they haven't generated enough demand for whatever it is that they're selling. So they're trying to restrict flow when they don't even have enough flow to begin with. So the first sign of a shitty marketer is that their prices are low because if their prices are low, that means they don't have the skill to generate enough demand that they can increase their prices in the price equilibrium. him. So you want to first do that on the front end. And then also the things that you can do beyond that is that once you're on the actual call is even if they do seem like a great fit on paper is still qualifying them more and going through that whole process.

26:40Sabri Suby:And that's not like a fake qualification. This is legit. If you want to run a good business with a good reputation and have customers stay with you for a long period of time, you need to be doing this stuff anyway. If you don't do this, you're going to be onboarding a bunch of shitty clients and your life's going to be hell. So then on the phone call, you want to further put friction in there of being like, okay, cool. Like we only work with X amount of clients per month. If we were to extend an invitation for you to join our programs or work with our agency, would you have any problem in giving us a video testimonial that documents all the results we're getting you?

27:15Sabri Suby:Oh, yeah, I don't want to do that. No problems. And it's probably not going to be a great fit. yeah forcing them to take the extra step because like how serious are you about working with us correct um and most people are just saying yes yes yes yes yes all the way through where you want to actually test the person right so the moment that you stop going from a sell frame and you're like i need to sell this person and you're like i need to serve this person i need to qualify and see whether or not that the right fit and literally asking them simple questions like okay cool. I've read all of this, right?

27:49Sabri Suby:What makes you a good candidate to work with us? You make them sell themselves. 100%. Go back to your book really quick because I've been hit with the ads. I'm sure many of us have been hit with the ads. We sell like crazy. What is the entire idea there? When did you start to write this book and then say, you know what? I'm going to give it away if people just pay for the shipping and handling. Was that to build brand? Was it after you had made a certain amount of money and you were thinking about your marketing for the year and you're like, okay, I could spend$25 ,000 or$50 ,000 to print a bunch of these books and have them ready to rock and roll.

28:22If it means that someone gets into our ecosystem, maybe they, you know, look at a program, maybe their business grows and they learn a bunch from my free content. And then they eventually work with King Kong. Talk to me a little bit about your book.

28:34Sabri Suby:Yeah, sure. So I would love to say it was like some brilliant orchestrated thing with all the things that you just explained, but it wasn't. It was a situation where, you know, I started my business from my bedroom, making 150 cold calls per day. Very, very quickly, once I got enough money in my bank account, I started to deploy that capital to actually demand generation, writing ads and funnels that have people coming to me. I outgrew my first office, outgrew my second office, all within their lease terms. It sounds like a fun thing. It wasn't super fun. It was very stressful. And so I had way more demand than I could probably service.

29:12Sabri Suby:And basically, I was turning it down clients left, right, and center. And they would basically say to me, do you know another agency that does good work? That's not going to light my bank account on fire that you can refer to me. And I did a bit of research. I sent people to a few. It always came back to bite me on the ass because they weren't good operators. And I was like, Hey, I am turning down thousands of people every single year that want to work with me. And I have nowhere to send these people. So I took the time to write a book and basically I was like, cool, I'm going to launch with this book and I'm going to give people everything.

29:49Sabri Suby:It's not going to be a thinly veiled lead generation for them to come in and then work with my business. I'm going to open up the vault and literally give all these people everything. There's not even going to be a pitch in the book anywhere for them to work with me. I'm just going to give all the secrets away. and that's what I did. I didn't think it would take off as much as it did where we've sold over a million copies and yes, there's been a lot of goodwill and brand that's come as a result of that and a lot of great opportunities but in the beginning, it was like how do I serve people, how do I send the elevator back down to people and help them and I realized early on that it doesn't cost any more to make your marketing valuable in itself than it is if you just go out there and you make hard offers to people.

30:38Sabri Suby:But you get the whole benefit of building brand and all the goodwill that you create in the marketplace from helping people. And most of the people that go and get that book for free are never, ever going to work with me. They're never, ever going to give me another cent. So it's not like there's a huge amount of people that read that book and then become clients. Of course, that does happen. But in the beginning, that wasn't the focus. Hope you're enjoying this episode real quick. Want to let you know about an awesome free product that we got linked in the description. It's our personal brand kickstart.

31:07What's in it? Okay, we got five prompts for you. It's going to help you define your personal brand, get clarity and start posting content that really resonates with your audience. It'll literally take you less than 10 minutes. And it's been super apparent with all the guests that we've had on our show. They have really strong personal brands and it's allowed them to scale their businesses. So go check Check it out, top link, and let's keep it rolling. Do you recommend business owners who are selling a product or a service that is extremely expensive? Do you recommend them having a lower tiered thing or a free thing that they can give to them or offer them to keep them in the ecosystem?

31:46Is that a strategy that you've seen worked for you and other people?

31:51Sabri Suby:100%. I think that the first product that you sell is free, right? It's free for you, but it does cost the prospect their time, which is the most valuable currency that they've got. And so, you know, any given market, only 3 % of a market is looking to buy right now. Yet most people, their whole business is orchestrated around putting out offers, ads, and content that only serves the 3 % of the market that's looking to buy right now. Then you have like, you know, a further 17 % that realistically are kind of in information gathering mode. They're open to buying, but they're not in the market to buy right now.

32:33Sabri Suby:And so when you put out free content, you have, you know, what I call a high value content offer, which is a free report or a PDF, or it can be a video training that you give people for free. and then I like to think about it as all markets exist around one universal problem and you want to have different products and services to help people wherever they're at on that journey. So for me, my business is centered around the number one problem that all businesses face, which is how do I get more customers? And so I need to have free YouTube content. I need to have a book. I need to have low ticket offers.

33:13Sabri Suby:I need to have courses. I need to have agencies. I want to have something that is a product suite where I can meet my customer wherever it is that they are. What were some of the things that you noticed about yourself that you maybe had to change as the business was rapidly growing? You mentioned like you're breaking through two different leases. You're trying to get into a bigger building. You're hiring a shit ton of people. What were things that you noticed? You're like, man, I have to change this? Like this specific thing needs to change or we're going to be fucked moving forward and that you changed it and obviously continue to grow into this amazing business that it is today.

33:45Sabri Suby:Fulfillment operations. It's very easy to when you're a skilled marketer is to make an offer and to get people to buy. It is a different beast to build an organization with 100 plus people and management and leadership and fulfilling on that service delivery at scale. Like that's why most agencies never get to any significant scale because it's like playing business on nightmare mode, right? You've got all these human beings in there. You're executing on all these different things. And realistically, it comes down to your leadership ability. In the beginning, when it's a small team, it's a lot easier than once you start growing and there's multiple tiers of management.

34:26Sabri Suby:But in any single business, the constraint of that business is the founder. You talk about in a book, I believe you said the founder needs to inject a fire onto the team in certain areas. How do you do that at scale when you have that many fucking people and you're dealing with so many different like little groups and personalities in the company and keep, you know, keep yourself fresh. Go into this group like, OK, today I need to work on ops or today we need to work on fulfillment. What does that look like as someone who's growing a business? I'd love to know. Sure. Well, the first thing to understand is that the potency of that energy and fire is the most intense at the top.

35:10Sabri Suby:So it starts with the founder. You can't project out something that you don't have within yourself. So the first thing is like, am I sold myself? What is the problem that we're solving? What is the mission? What is the vision? Because unless you wake up every day and you know exactly where it is that you're trying to go to and what that goal looks like, and you believe it down into the marrow of your bones, you can't transfer it to your management team. So that's the first step. And then every rung of management in a company, that potency gets diluted. So if you're starting at 50%, you're not at 100%, that bottom, they're getting nothing.

35:52Sabri Suby:They're just getting water, right? They're not getting that high frequency potency. So you need to first of all, be very aware of yourself. And you need to look after yourself, your energy, your body, you need to work out, right? Because it's whoever has the most energy makes the most money. And all of the people that I know, all my billionaire friends, it's no coincidence that they all spend a disproportionate amount of their time now focusing on health and energy. And then so you need to make sure that you as a vessel have enough energy to give out. And then you need to have a very clear vision and mission statement for your company because you're not going to be interacting with the people that are frontline employees a lot of the time.

36:34Sabri Suby:So when they come into the company, just as we spoke about what does the onboarding process look like for clients? What does it look like for your employees? What's your employee funnel like from the ads that you run to recruit talent to then how you interview them to what their onboarding is going to be like? Are they very, very clear on your mission and vision statements? For me, I've got LED signs all around my office with my vision and mission statement constantly going everywhere and burning into the retinas of people's eyes that work out of these offices. I've got them printed on the walls.

37:05Sabri Suby:I start all of our meetings with basically staying what our vision mission statement is, what the goal is that we're all going after. So no one wonders, what are we trying to do here? Like, what is the goal here? And then making sure that you're spending the time and energy with your management team and you're injecting that fire and that heat into them so that then they can pass that on to their team members. And the bigger the company gets, the clearer the vision needs to be. I'm ready to go get big right now. I might do a PR tonight. Going to go hit a bench. Britain's co-founder, Monday morning meeting.

37:47I'm like, dude, 6 a.m.? Fire me up. Let's go. I'm ready to go, bro. Let's go. I love it. I want to go back to something you said. You said that the way you operate your business, your main focus is getting your clients more customers. And that is what they want. They want more customers. But I was watching a video last night and it like light bulb moment for me. You said, do not sell what the person needs, sell what they want. Can you go into that theory? Because I think a lot of people when they're first starting out, they're like, I know you need this. I have something that can help you. But if they market it that way, people are like, what the heck?

38:26I don't actually want this. So can you talk about marketing in a way for something that somebody wants versus you providing something that they need, but actually then giving them what they need?

38:36Sabri Suby:This is the biggest sin that I see all businesses commit, right? They think about what is convenient for me to sell. What would I like to buy? They don't start with what is the market absolutely starving for, right? So say, for instance, with my programs, the thing that I know that all everybody wants is they want to know a repeatable, predictable way to generate high quality leads on autopilot that come into their business and buy with the least amount of friction possible. That's what everybody wants, right? So that's exactly what it is that I sell because that's what the market is starving for.

39:10Sabri Suby:But then once you get involved in the program, then you figure out all the other things that it is that you need, right? We talk about mindset. We talk about your health. We talk about systems, operations. We talk about all of these other things that need to be in place. But I spoke about that on the front end. No one is going to come and buy it because you need to sell what is sexy, what people want. Like everybody wants to be rich. Nobody wants to get rich. And so they want easy button solutions. They want, you know, six pack abs with doing the least amount of work. So you would be stupid if you tried to sell them, hey, you're going to be working out for five hours a day.

39:52Sabri Suby:Like you need to sell what it is that they want and then give them what it is that they need. And you're going to have to be tough if you're going to be stupid. So if you're going to go down the road of like, oh no, I want to sell everybody what it is that they need. Those people have a very hard life. We speak to business owners all day long that are on the verge of bankruptcy. They're really, really hurting. They don't have a system in place to get customers. And they've been trying to sell people vegetables, right? When people want the brownies, sell them the brownies, bro, and then just give them what they need.

40:25Sabri Suby:And it's not like, it's kind of like a Trojan horse tactic, but it's in a positive way. Because if you have the best product in the marketplace, then it is your moral obligation to get that into as many hands of the people as possible. And so you want to think about if somebody buys a product or service of one of my competitors, then I am doing them a disservice because I know those other products aren't as good as mine, because I bought them all, I've studied them all, and none of them are as good as mine. so if you know that yours is the best then you need to make it the most enticing and then once you've gotten them on board then you provide them the education of like these are all the things that you need to do to get this outcome right and you've studied it all and you know it all on the topic of that i think back to when i was in high school this guy named mike chang six-pack shortcuts do you remember this shit i don't know if you got hit with these ads in melbourne this fucking guy was everywhere dude i remember sitting there mike chang wasn't telling me to eat chicken rice man no he was telling me about that fucking six pack that we all wanted i was like dude how do i get this six pack i want to be like this guy can you talk to me about all of the different funnels that you've seen be really successful like what are the core things that you notice when people come to you and you're like oh my god this is absolutely awful really quick fixes that you notice right off the bat whether it's copy whether it's content that's usually terrible.

41:50What are a few of those things that people can implement right away?

41:53Sabri Suby:Sure. I think first of all, it's picking the right type of funnel for the price point that you're selling at. Most people are going to optimize for what is the easiest for them to have the money flow into their bank account. So they're like, yeah, I'll just create this course. It will be$400. I'll send them to a landing page and I'll get people to buy that. And then every time they buy it, it's$400 in my bank account and I don't have to do anything. and it's like, bro, that's not how it works. That's not how the economics of online marketing work anymore. In order to run that, you're going to be at break even or probably at a loss on the front end in order to get a customer into there and then you're not going to have any money.

42:33Sabri Suby:Where instead what you could do is you could take that$499 course, you could repackage it, put more valuable in it and you could sell it at five grand per month. You could put a sales call in there. And instead, you'd be making a shitload more money. So the first thing is like getting the economics right. If you don't get the economics right, it doesn't matter how good the marketing is, right? Because the economics is the expectation of how much is it going to cost me to acquire a customer? How much is a customer worth to me? And how much profit am I going to make over the entire lifetime of that relationship?

43:09Sabri Suby:Then once you've got the economics in place, then it's like copy, Like most people's copy is just horrendous. And now you've got like chat GPT and you go all these AI platforms. People have got just AI slop when it comes to copy. It's not how you say things. It's what you say. So the first thing is understanding of like, again, coming back to what is it that I want to say? Well, in order to know what it is that you want to say, you need to do the research. You need to figure out what people are buying in your marketplace emotionally, irrationally, and in high, high quantities. And what is it that they are starving for?

43:47Sabri Suby:That's the first thing that you want to focus on is what is my market starving for? Not what do I have to sell? No, no, no, no, no. You put what you've got to sell aside and you go out and you do the research and you say, what is it that they want? Forget what I've got. Forget the business, the different price points, the economics. No, no, no, no, no. I'll put that all over here and let me just figure out what it is that they want. And the way to figure out what it is they want is where is the money flowing right now? Then once you know what it is that they've got, you better be selling that and not some other shit.

44:19Sabri Suby:So then you go, okay, I know what it is that they want because I've seen like the most ordinary funnels with the most basic copy, but they are selling something that people are starving for. And these guys are making money hand over fist. Where on the other end, I've seen people with all the bells and whistles in their funnels. They're saying everything in the perfect way, but they're not saying the right thing. And these guys are struggling to make ends meet. So they're the kind of levers. Then you go from like the headline, the price points, the copy, all of the objection handling in it, the flows off the back end of it.

44:53Sabri Suby:But in terms of the 80-20, right, the 20 % of inputs, it's going to get you 80 % of results is first doing the research and finding out what people are buying in the marketplace and to sell that. Keep it simple. Yeah. Yeah. The people with the most complex funnels have the least amount of money in their bank account.

45:16When I came across you for the first time and I went through your funnel and I bought your book, you had one of the most lit VSLs I've ever seen, but it was really long. And I want to know about your thought process when it comes to VSLs? Are you still in the belief of it should be like a, you know, 30 to 45 minute video? Like where are you at on VSLs specifically? In 2025?

45:43Sabri Suby:Yeah, sure. So your VSL should be as long as it needs to be in order to make the sale. And so in terms of when people are like, oh my God, who's going to read all of this copy? Who's going to watch all of this video, the person that's going to do that is the buyer, right? Because the buyer's got questions. If you're not a buyer, you're not going to watch a short VSL, right? You're not going to watch a long VSL. So the whole thing is you want to make sure that questions are answered, right? Education is provided. And again, the higher the ticket, the more education that's involved. If you're going out and you're spending a huge amount of money, then you're going to do a proportionate amount of education around that.

46:32Sabri Suby:If you're going to go do a Pilates class and the first class is free, you're just going to say, where is the location? What does the fit out look like? This looks good to me and you're going to go, right? So the higher the ticket, the more education that's involved, but it can't just be long for the sake of being long. It has to be educating as well and it has to be entertaining. So the way that I think about it is I know my prospect. I know them intimately. I know them better than they know themselves. I know the questions that they're thinking about that's keeping them up at night, tossing and turning at 3am that they don't even tell their partner about.

47:06Sabri Suby:So I know from the feedback that I get from my clients is that they watch all of that thing. And I have like, you know, I'm running VSLs anywhere right now from 20 minutes, well, from four minutes, all the way up to 36 minutes. And then that's just what you see on the front end. Then there's still another multiple series of videos that go out on the back end to educate people. That would be like in an email sequence you're saying? No, there's this like thinking about what is the whole series of steps that someone goes in in order to buy. Email is one of them. But oftentimes once you book a phone call, then like what happens?

47:46Sabri Suby:What's the page that you land on? I booked a phone call. Now what? right? So understanding like 70 % of all B2B transactions, like of the research is done before they initiate your sales team. Think about you guys. Do you guys duck calls from your friends, from family members? Yeah. Right. I know I do. Like I'm so busy. Oh no, I can't speak to this person right now. Then if you look at contact rates, contact rates to get a lead on the telephone across all industries are in the absolute toilet right now. And people do not want to speak to salespeople. So that's going to become more and more apparent with robo calling, AI, all of these things that are going to make it easier to call people.

48:32Sabri Suby:It's going to be harder and harder to get people on the telephone. So then the VSL becomes infinitely more important because you're not even getting to open up that conversation. So people are doing more research than ever. And that's why like producing organic content and having YouTube and all of that kind of stuff is more important is because people want to see so much information that you prove that you are who you say you are before they reach out before they do anything. So unless you have that stuff, you won't even get the opportunity to enter that conversation. In this new era of all the AI content, dude, I saw the craziest shit today.

49:08I saw this dude who was looked like he's in his mom's basement and he's like moving his hands. And it was like a gorgeous girl. And it was like he had like a video. It was like a video of a girl and it was like moving with him and he was like smiling and shit on Twitch. Craziest shit I've ever seen. But in this new era of AI, what do you think is going to be the route? Obviously, you just stated it. A VSL is going to be super important. If people aren't picking up the phone, will it be done via DM? Or do you feel like people are so on edge with DM being like, oh, is this not? Is this you? is this a sales rep?

49:37I want to know if it's actually Sabri that's hitting me up. Like, what do you think that process is going to look like?

49:42Sabri Suby:Yeah, I think that like, there's going to need to be more and more content that people consume before they feel like that they're ready to do business with you. And then I think the things that we take for granted, the in person events, you know, seminars, all of that, they're going to see a huge resurgence as we move into this AI slop world where you're going to have custom VSLs based on every single person. You're going to be able to literally say their name in the VSL, talk about their problems to them specifically or using AI. I've already seen this stuff. So that's where it's all going. And then once it goes fully in that direction, people are going to want to speak to humans even more.

50:26Sabri Suby:So I think that as much as you can humanize things, that's what's going to make the difference. Everything is going to be perfectly set at the perfectly time, completely customizable. And then the things that people are going to appreciate more is like the raw organic stuff. I think I'd kind of freak out if like, yeah, they're like, Kostas, your sales funnel is messy. It's already happening, dude. One of the biggest offers online is like numerology.com. And if you put your name is, they do like a reading for you based on your birthday and stuff. And they just keep saying your name. This was three years ago where basically they went through the effort of recording like the four and a half thousand most common names.

51:07Sabri Suby:And then based on your name being in that, that would intersect that into the VSL like that they were doing a palm reading for you. Right. And now all of that stuff has changed because you've got 11 labs and AI. Like it's only the beginning of how wild it's about to get. I thought we were safe with unique names. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. I was just sprayed in. Stop. There's a pretty unique name. Are we in the 4 ,000? Yeah. I don't think we would be bad. I will say going back to your BSL though, I was laughing because I remember watching it and I remember watching it in bed and it was fucking, it wasn't quite 3am, but it was like probably 10, 30, 11.

51:39I was like, this motherfucker got me still watching. Like I'm tapped in. I'm minute 32. And we're like, we're still here. I was just so impressed with it. I do want to talk about your content flywheel because you brought this up to us on the pre-show call and you're thinking about content differently than most people. And I would love to hear your take on what is your content flywheel look like right now? And how does it look organic and then to the paid side of things?

52:07Sabri Suby:I obviously produce organic content for my YouTube. I do that for several reasons. One of them is obviously just to provide value to my marketplace, regardless of whether or not they choose to do business with me. And it also is a way to get more reps in to also make better ads and to make VSLs. It used to be once upon a time, I'd shoot a new VSL, you know, every six to 12 months and then launch it. How good are you going to get at only doing something twice a year? Right. So now where things are at also organically, it's you're getting to get organic reach based on your ability to tell a good story, to retain people's attention and do all of those things.

52:50Sabri Suby:And I solely believe that that is definitely the future. But where most people do is they kind of stop at that. So the way that I approach it is I put out organic content to help my audience. Then I take the sawdust, right? I take the scraps of those videos, the ones that are the outliers and that do very, very well. I'm like, this is resonating organically. then I take that, I clip that up, chop it up, syndicate it across all of short form and then get typically 20 to 30 times the views on short form that I do on long form. Then I take the long form and I insert three to four call to actions in that video.

53:34Sabri Suby:Maybe it's a 12 minute video, maybe it's a 20 minute video. And then I run that and I use that as the paid engine on my ad side. So not only am I getting to put out organic content and get all of the goodwill and all of the source from that, then I get it as the raw material for my short form. And then it also feeds the ads engine that I then run as well and bring in more customers that all funnels down to my core offer. Could you talk to me a little bit about the metrics you're trying to pay the most attention to with paid ads? Like, is it click through rate? Is it someone's watch time? And then you're like, okay, if they watch half of this video, maybe I'll send them to another video that I think they might enjoy.

54:14What does that look like? And has your philosophy evolved over the years?

54:18Sabri Suby:Ultimately, it comes down to what is the end outcome that you're trying to drive? Like, so why am I putting out this, this ad, right? Is it to drive a transaction? Is it to generate a lead? Is it to get somebody to book a call? And then whatever that metric is that we're optimizing for in the algorithm, that's the thing that we're going to be paying the most attention to, right? So first of all, it's like cost per result. We're going to look at that. And then we're going to look at what's the hook rate of the video, right? I.e. how many people are actually watching that and then staying beyond three seconds, beyond 10 seconds to watch the rest of it and looking at the CTR on it.

54:55Sabri Suby:But they're kind of like the big metrics that we wonder. It's like you guys said yourself, oh, you know, you're running like a 26 minute VSL. Yeah, we run that as an ad as well. And you better know that I've tried five minute VSL, six minute VSLs, eight minute VSLs, 12 minutes, 15, 16, 22, 24, 36, all of the different lengths, right? And it's crazy. Like I'm running an ad right now that's an hour and nine minutes and it's crushing. And so the whole thing of like, oh, we're living in this thing where there's short attention spans. Yeah, there are short attention spans, but if something is interesting to you, if it is valuable to you, that's why people watch three-hour Joe Rogan episodes.

55:39Sabri Suby:That's why people binge watch an entire season of Netflix. That's not because they're short on time. It's like, why is long form absolutely crushing it right now? Why is this three-hour podcast doing exceptionally well? If you find something that is interesting to people, they will pay attention. Okay. So you're running a one hour and nine minute VSL ad. What do you know about how to keep someone's attention like off of an ad, not even organic content? Like, what do you know about keeping people's attention that the average person doesn't because An hour and nine minutes is crazy. I wouldn't have even thought to even think about running an ad that long.

56:25It's clearly crushing for you.

56:27Sabri Suby:Yeah, I think that the first thing that it comes down to, again, is understanding what to say. Think about you guys, right? Like whenever you've bought something and you're in the information gathering mode, if someone was to articulate very, very clearly to you the problem that you'll have that you're looking to solve, and it's like everything that they say hits a hot button. And it's like, oh, my God, this is like, this is what I need, man. This is what I've been researching. Like, you're not going to click away. You're like almost like, let me not touch anything because I don't want this ad to disappear because this person is speaking directly to me.

57:02Sabri Suby:So that's the first thing that you need to understand is like the people that you're targeting, you need to be saying the right thing to them. And then it's obviously you need to have it in an engaging way. There needs to be strong hooks. There needs to be lots of cuts that go through changing of scenes to keep people engaged. But one, if you can articulate the problem that they're experiencing better than they can themselves. and then two, in the actual ad itself, you can start to prove that you have the solution to this by actually helping them solve that problem right in the ad. So the ad in itself needs to be valuable.

57:39Sabri Suby:It can't be a 36-minute pitch video where you're just talking about selling them. It has to be like, this is the problem that you've got and then explaining it very, very intimately, all the visceral details of it and then being like, and this is how we fix it and then just start helping them fix it on the call. So like in the actual ad, sorry. So they can watch it and be like, fuck, this person knows what the hell that they're talking about. Like, this is amazing. Like they're actually providing value to me right now in the actual ad. This is wild. So that's the thing that you need to really be focusing about.

58:14Sabri Suby:And in terms of retaining people's attention, you know, I am still, like I would say, like I've been, like I made the decision at the start of the year to kind of get more serious about organic content. So I don't feel like I'm in a huge position to speak about that professionally yet. I think that in the next 24 months, I'll be in a completely unrecognizable place in terms of organic content. And then I think I'll have more qualifications to be able to speak in it. But yeah, I'm learning from like people that are at the top of the game in organic and figuring out how to apply all of that into my market.

58:49You mentioned that you have a group chat with some of the most popular YouTubers on the platform, like ARAC and some of these other guys. What have been a few of the key learnings that they've told you that you could share with our group today that could really help them crush the organic content? By the way, I think that you can't fucking talk about it because your videos are elite. Like they really are so value driven. And you're generating so many organic views that people would have to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for. So kudos to you for jumping into it because it's really high quality stuff.

59:20Sabri Suby:Thank you. I think the first big thing is to speak at like a fifth grade reading level and understand that like most people that are on social media and on these platforms are like mice on crack. They are like they're so distracted. You've got a video there. There's all the sidebar videos are going there. and you need to first speak it a way that's not going to alienate anybody in your audience in order to dumb it down. If you look at like the New York Times bestselling books over the last 20 to 30 years, 80 % of them are written at a sixth grade reading level or below. And so the first thing that people say is that they're like, oh yeah, my audience isn't dumb though.

1:00:06Sabri Suby:Like I don't need to speak at a fifth grade reading level because I'm going after of smart people. And it's like, okay, cool. Well, do smart people read books? Yeah, they do. All right. Terrific. Well, 80 % of them that are in the bestsellers are written at this reading grade level. So it's just like not using convoluted language and really, you know, intense vocabulary that somebody's like, I don't understand that. The moment that somebody doesn't understand it, you've lost them. They're going to go click onto something else. So the things that I look at is it's very difficult because I'm not in the entertainment slash spectacle world that a lot of these YouTubers that I speak to are, right?

1:00:46Sabri Suby:Where they're sneaking into places, they're lighting Lamborghinis on fire and they're doing this outrageous shit. And then on the other end of the spectrum, you've got like the talking head business community, which is like so boring, just put me to sleep already. And so I'm trying to basically be in the crossroads of those two intersections where I'm making things that are entertaining to the masses that still provide a lot of value to them. So it's the constant balancing act of retaining people's attention and then making it so once they've watched the video, it's not like I just consumed a bunch of empty calories, fast food that I'm not better off, and then providing them with enough value through that process where they're like, I was entertained plus I learned something from that.

1:01:30Sabri Suby:And I think that like that's the chasm that I'm trying to master because I think that it's very difficult, but the rewards are there for doing so. But ultimately, what you need to understand is that whatever it is that you're doing, you can hook somebody's attention in the first video. But if you don't provide them a good experience with watching that video, the next time your face shows up in the newsfeed, they're not going to click on the next video. So you've got to clickbait them because that's what the platform is. It's a click and watch platform. It's not a watch platform. It's a click and watch.

1:02:06Sabri Suby:So what is, again, it comes down to the same things in marketing. What do people want to click on? What is it that they want to watch, right? Do they want to watch me just sitting at a desk talking about growing their business or do they want to watch me going in and trying to find the most mysterious luxury Rolex that I possibly can and taking you along for that journey? That's a lot more clickable than the first option, right? And then how do I package up the veggies in that video where you still watch it and you still get the education, but you also get entertained throughout that process. If someone wanted to start on the organic journey and, you know, start posting long form and short form, but maybe they weren't as fucking well-spoken as you, maybe they don't have like the business acumen that you do, they don't have the team to be able to film, shoot, edit, repackage everything.

1:02:54Like what advice would you tell that person if it's just maybe a solo business owner and they know that, you know, creating content on the internet could generate more sales and more leads for their business, but they're a little bit newer to content creation and they don't have maybe a team that they can rely on. What would you tell that person?

1:03:10Sabri Suby:Yeah. Like my opinion on this has recently changed. I would previously have told that person not to do it. Right. And I would say like, don't worry about putting out organic content until until you're at multiple millions per year, just focus on crafting ads, putting together an offer, and just run traffic to it and get that to convert profitably. Forget organic content. It's all noise. However, now with the way things have changed with the platform, I think TikTok completely changed the game. It's not about the amount of followers that you have at all. It's purely how good is the content that it is that you're putting out.

1:03:49Sabri Suby:And then obviously everybody is moved to adopt those same principles. It's happening with YouTube right now. You see people on their first upload can crack 200 ,000 views, a million views, multiple million views if the video is good enough in itself. So now I think that it does make sense to produce organic content. And the way that you want to do it if you don't have a team is everyone has got a phone. Hopefully they've got an iPhone and they're not on an Android. And when they use that, that's the thing that they should be using. They shouldn't worry about like doing a high polish edit or anything like that.

1:04:24Sabri Suby:They should commit to just putting out one video per day. And it should be, it doesn't matter how shit it is. Like I'm going to do it come hell or high water. I'm going to post a new video every single day. And it's like anything. And after you get enough reps in, you are going to get good at that. You're going to think, okay, if I start the video like this, the video gets a lot more views than if I start it like this. then once you do that and you do it for three months and you've got 90 uploads you're going to be able to look at that 90 pieces of content and figure out what does well and what doesn't and you're going to start to see patterns in the matrix of like okay now i'm starting to understand how this goes then after you've done that for a year and you put out 365 pieces of content you are going to be good and then then and only then do you start going up like the value ladder Then you're like, maybe now I'll get a videographer, right?

1:05:19Sabri Suby:Then you get a videographer and then you start. Now I'll get a full-time editor and I'll start doing these things along the way. Because the internet has basically made it so easy for people to start businesses, most people's news feeds are littered with gurus. They don't know what the fuck that they're doing. And because they do not know what the fuck they're doing, people think that they do. They sign up. They have a bad experience. And then they become extremely skeptical. and then when it comes time to buy your thing, they're not just going to go to your landing page and funnel and buy anymore.

1:05:52Sabri Suby:They're doing the Google sniff test. They're going to your socials. They're clicking on the footer. They're going to TikTok, Instagram. They're going to be sussing out what it is that you're doing. So unless you do have content, then all of your ad performance is also going to suffer because people are going to be highly dubious and highly skeptical about what it is that you're doing. So you want to start with anything. Have it down and dirty. Have it super ghetto to begin with. shoot on your iPhone. Most of the content anyway, is shot on the iPhone on these platforms. And that kind of raw, uncut organic thing is the thing that's actually doing the best anyway.

1:06:28Sabri Suby:So don't look at it as a limitation, look at it as an advantage and just get going. When you think about it right now for yourself is YouTube when you go sit with your team, is that really where you're trying to put a lot of focus? And then you have these clippers that are going, hey, put on shorts, put on TikTok, put on Instagram? A hundred percent. Like the short form is the top of the funnel junk food that brings everybody people in, right? It's the$1 cheeseburger that's going to get people into your world kind of thing. But in terms of actually building influence, it's time on brand. And so the best time on brand platform right now is YouTube.

1:07:02Sabri Suby:That's where people are consuming. That's where most people consume the podcast. That's where most people consume content. We're in a place where this year is the first year that YouTube has getting more time on screen than Netflix on television devices. So that is the platform that you can build a lot of deep connections and goodwill with people. And I'm extremely bullish on YouTube. I think that that is definitely the future. And I think that everything starts from there. And then you look at the short form clipping and what are all that you need to be present on all of those platforms 1000%.

1:07:39Sabri Suby:But if you just did short form, and you didn't have any long form, it's kind of, it's almost worthless. I've seen a lot of people that have millions of followers on short form, and then they put out an offer, and it's crickets, they don't make any money. And it's because they don't have any long term relationship with those people. We've noticed that as well for the pod, if someone is just on Instagram, it doesn't convert at all. It's kind of it's really insane. It's like mind blowing, which is why we're super excited for this episode in particular, because you've been crushing on long form and you also just have so much game to give out.

1:08:13So I think like you got that recognizable fate. I'm really excited for this one. When it comes to content strategy, as far as coming up with ideas for long form. How do you go about that with your team? Because I've also noticed that, you know, you've seen a couple of the formats that you've done have success and you've repeated them in a different way so can you talk about how you come up with ideas and how you think about content in this in the form of like formats and how that can be utilized like or how someone can think about having a format and being like this does well let me do it again and repeat it yeah i'm still like

1:08:52Sabri Suby:a student of the game and learning this process. But one of the things that has become extremely apparent from hanging out with a lot of these big YouTubers is that even still today that I need to be spending way more time on ideation and idea selection more so than the execution. I think that my team is doing an exceptional job in terms of like the executional side of things and the editing and the pacing and all of those kind of stuff. But realistically, like you need to be spending the most amount of your time, the 80-20 on ideation. And the more people that I see that are crushing it on YouTube that I'm hanging out with, that is apparent in all of their teams.

1:09:33Sabri Suby:So even for this quarter, that's a big emphasis for me and my team is this like, you know, locking ourselves in a room and coming up with ideas of that where we think are going to bang, where it's like a lot of the time, the way that I was doing it and a lot of creators do it is they're just like, they'll come up with five ideas and they're like, yeah, let's just run with these. And then they run with them. And then it's like all of this time and energy and resources to produce that video. But it's like inherently, if that idea was way better, it would just do like a hundred X the performance.

1:10:04Sabri Suby:So the way that we're thinking about it is, yeah, one, what is, what is interesting? What is, what would we click on? Right. What, what, what would get us involved in the world? And then thinking about, okay, what are the business lessons and takeaways from this interesting idea to be able to execute on this to kind of make it fascinating. So that's the way that like there's no short, easy answer. There's not like some chat GPT prompt that you can put in that's going to give you it all. Then once you ideate in terms of buckets, you think about, okay, what's the bucket of content that I'm going to produce?

1:10:40Sabri Suby:Like one, like those brand videos that we produce on Rolex and Hermes and all of these, that's like we call them IRL videos, like out in the real world looking at, you know, these use cases, that's a format, that's a bucket of content. And then we think about what's all of the different types of videos that we could produce in that bucket and you're testing formats, but you'll notice that on YouTube, the videos that do the best are basically creators that take television shows and they basically put them on YouTube. Like Beast Games is just a game show. Like a lot of these videos, that's just what they are these these creators have literally just lifted what has worked on television and then they're just bringing that to to to youtube okay going back to a brayden bringing up how you have this you know text message thread with a bunch of top youtubers i feel like in the world of business there's like different levels and almost like doors that you unlock as soon as you reach a certain level or you meet a certain individual and your network grows It's like, oh, shit, I have access to individuals that I can ask questions to or network with and I can get connected with somebody else.

1:11:50And the game almost becomes a little bit easier because the network grows and the people that you can go ask questions to, it becomes like you level up and you open up the story like, oh, shit, like I didn't know about this beforehand. And can you take us back to as you were coming up, maybe one of those doors that you opened, somebody that you met and allowed you to go to the next level in business?

1:12:16Sabri Suby:Yeah, I think that I don't buy into the idea that you need to get to a certain level where those doors start to open. I've always been incredibly curious. I've always networked with people. Every city that I go to, I'm like, yo, I'm in Athens. If you want to connect, slide into the DMs. Or I might know certain people that I was never afraid to basically send them a DM and to start a conversation. And it's still something I do to this day. And it's something that I've always done. So it's not something that you need to defer to. You get to some certain level and some door's going to open and it's going to bring you all this opportunity.

1:12:59Sabri Suby:I can't say there's been any really of those opportunities that have presented themselves to me. They've always been something that I have created. I guess I was, I guess maybe let me rephrase it. There's been times where like we've had guests on the podcast and we've had conversations and through that conversation, it created like an aha moment for us of like, oh shit, okay, we should operate our business this way. Or we didn't think about this beforehand. And it has completely changed the way we think about the show and our business. And I'm curious to know if you have had any of those like encounters early on in your career where you had maybe a specific conversation with an individual and he's like, and it kind of changed the way you thought about how you operated your business.

1:13:42Sabri Suby:Yeah, sure. So let me talk about the networking side of things and then I'll transition into that. So the first thing is like, if you're watching this right now and you want to network with people and you want to get these doors open to you. The first thing that you need to understand is that people only want to network with people that are going to provide value to themselves. And most people look at relationships with what is it that I can extract from this person. Instead, what you want to do is whatever the lane that you're driving in, whatever the world, the niche is, is to become absolutely world-class at that, that people would want to network with you because you are a person of value.

1:14:24Sabri Suby:And then that's going to make those doors lubricated and they are going to swing open because people do want to associate with you. And most people look at it through the other lens. They're like, what is it that I can take? Like, who is it that can help me get to the next level rather than thinking about who can I help? Who can I help get to the next level? Right. So say, for instance, like, you know, some of the doors that I would like, definitely like conversations with Eric, you know, has changed the way that I operate from a content standpoint. And, you know, I remember he sent me through like a brief of their pre-production of what goes into making their videos.

1:14:59Sabri Suby:And the thing was like 27 pages long. And I'm like, oh, like, like, okay, like, okay, there's a different level here, a different level of planning in order to execute videos that are pulling in 30 million views that goes into it. And a lot of these YouTubers make it look like there's not effort, but these guys are like, they're hard workers, man. They're at it. It's like, this is, they're in the major leagues. They're professionally going after it. And it's like anything in life. Whenever I turn over a rock, whenever you see somebody getting some outcome that seems desirable and the human brain always comes up with excuses of why they are able to get that outcome.

1:15:42Sabri Suby:And every one of those people have gone through a season that you haven't seen. And when you look under that rock, you can see all of the mountain of work that goes into getting that outcome. So I think that that's been the case in any systems. Like, you know, the people that I hang out with that are doing a billion dollars in revenue, once you start hanging out with them and seeing like what it is that they've got going on and the stuff, it's just an enormous amount of work or reps or volume that's gone into or planning and work that get them to that stage. So that's been the same with organic content.

1:16:16Sabri Suby:Like it looks like all fun and games on YouTube and people just putting out videos that suck in 30 million views. But then you actually figure out, okay, like, wow, they're literally four weeks of pre-production planning out absolutely every single minute detail. And then it's like a monster edit and you go to their offices and there's 16 editors in the back room and they're maniacally focusing on every single thing. And they make it look effortless on the front end. But there's an enormous amount of work that goes into absolutely everything to get the outcome that it is that they want. And that's true of everything in life, I think.

1:16:50I think you're so right. And it's something that we've realized too, from the people that we've been blessed to speak with on this show. You see something that seems so easy. And then when you chat with them and you lift open that rock, you're like, oh my God, there's so many there's so many details that go into this process before you became like forward facing and you started making this content was this a conscious decision and you talk to someone or you know were you like okay i probably should be on social media and what was that first platform look like that

1:17:21Sabri Suby:you ended up hopping on to yeah so i you can go on to my youtube channel and you can look at my earlier videos that are just absolutely horrendous. I started like just documenting in the beginning and like documenting sales meetings and like the way that I was kind of running the company. And it started from a place of first, like, I wish that I had a camera crew when I was cold calling 150 people from my bedroom to get my first clients. I've got a few videos of it, my wife sitting beside me and me cold calling people. But I wish I had filmed everything. And I wish that I could show it to my daughters when they get old so they can understand like what has gone into it.

1:18:04Sabri Suby:And so it started from a place of like, let me document the climb. Like, and then it was about, you know, I was already doing$10 million in revenue at the time. Then I was like, I'll start producing videos on YouTube. And it was just documenting what I was doing. And then as that's evolved over the years, it's just become apparent that people don't want to do business with faceless corporations. They want to do business with individuals. And it's why Elon Musk has more follower than Tesla. Jeff Bezos on Amazon, Zucks on Meta. People want to do business with people that they know, like, and trust.

1:18:42Sabri Suby:And that's just going to become more and more and more apparent. So I think as the years have gone on, my opinions and my investment into these platforms have become more and more serious because I understand that that is the main thing. I think the most underpriced asset right now in the world is attention. We're in an opportunity where we can basically start a television network for free. It's like these companies, It's like NBC or Fox comes to you and they're like, Sabri, we're going to put all the infrastructure in. We're going to put the satellites up, the studio. We're going to pay for absolutely everything.

1:19:19Sabri Suby:And then you just produce content. We're going to pay you to produce the content. And then in addition to that, it's also going to grow your business as well. And you're like, okay, so what's the downside of this? And they're like, there isn't any. And you're like, okay, well, how much do I need to spend to get this all set up? And they're like, nothing. and it's like there's this there's so much opportunity in terms of attention if you think about like everyone getting connected to the internet it does not matter where you go I just got back from Greece Italy Dubai India I can go to the most remote village in India and there are people glued to their phone and I can go to Beverly Hills and it's the same thing so you have more and more people coming online, spending more and more time on these platforms.

1:20:10Sabri Suby:And the amount of people that produce content, yeah, it's increased, but it hasn't gone up no way near as much as the actual demand for this content. So that's why I think that attention is the most underpriced currency and asset right now in the world. So I'm just kind of retweaking and pivoting my business to make sure that I'm buying up as much of that asset as possible. I thought you were going to go the route of i could go to the most remote village and they're still recognizing me the internet daddy yeah well it does it happens i was in bali recently in the bathroom and a guy walked out and he's like sabri and i was like i was walking out of the bathroom and he's like put his hand out to shake me i was like i haven't washed my hands yet bro and he's like oh no no it's okay and i'm like man it's just like why i'll give you a fist bump oh um speaking of of of attention.

1:21:01I'd love to know about your experience on Shark Tank and how much attention that did bring to your personal brand. Did being on the show give your brand quite a lift or was it not as much as you maybe initially thought?

1:21:14Sabri Suby:I think what it does, it drives credibility and validates you right now. It's so easy. You just need an iPhone. You can start recording content and uploading it to YouTube is there's lots of questions in people's minds of like, why? Why should I listen to you? So if anything, I think it just validates that attention. But I can still say that YouTube and time on brand, right? It might be like what you see in Shark Tank is some of these pitches go for two hours. Then they take those two hours and they cut them down to a seven minute pitch. And then from that seven minute pitch, each shark might be on screen for 30 to 45 seconds at a time.

1:21:56Sabri Suby:Where it's like, there are YouTube videos that I've put out that have got millions of views that go for an hour. So time on brand is obviously bigger on those. I'm still more bullish, I would say, on YouTube than I am on traditional television. And I think that if you look at most major networks and everything right now, they're cutting down on all of these things. They're cutting down on shows. People aren't wanting to advertise as much on these because they know where the attention is flowing. but there was definitely a big brand lift of validating who you are as an individual to be in a position to be on something like shark tank could you see shark tank coming to youtube i can okay i feel i feel like that's what's gonna happen man it's beating disney beating netflix well you because you bring up that a lot of the most successful youtube formats are being pulled from tv and i don't think i've seen shark tank on youtube it could be a really interesting youtube series, I think.

1:22:52Yeah. I mean, Hermosi is taken. That was a TV. The profit. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And he's taken a business owner. He's like, OK, we're going to actually fix everything in the business. That's a brilliant model. And we've seen it work on TV before. I think you should bring Shark Tank. God, fire me out.

1:23:06Sabri Suby:You might be working on that. Oh, OK, OK, OK. What are some of the things that you noticed with these business owners that were running a circus and the ones that were actually running a business? Is there a few things you're like, Jesus Christ, this is very easy. And I see this time and time again, you guys just keep messing it up when they would come on to Shark Tank or businesses that would get pitched to you because I'm sure you get pitched all the time. In terms of when, what's the difference between people that have a legitimate business versus a circuit? Yeah. Even if they have profitability, what are the things that then, okay, great.

1:23:38They're profitable. I'm now interested. Yeah. What causes you to want to invest? Yeah. They're already profitable though. I don't want like someone that it's in profitable, like they're profitable. Then what?

1:23:47Sabri Suby:I pay very close attention to the words that come out of the mouth and the story that it is that they're telling to us sharks and also to themselves. I'm a big believer on betting on the jockey, not the horse. I know how hard business is. I've seen businesses come and go. I've seen them fail. I've seen businesses that are in an incredible season. Everything's working. Cool. I want to see what happens to you when shit starts to fall apart, when the fire gets so hot that it starts to melt. I want to see how you react in those situations, how quickly that you can pivot? Are you the type of person that comes up with excuses to outside resources to why you haven't been able to achieve all the things that it is that you want?

1:24:27Sabri Suby:Or are you the kind of person that just rolls up your sleeves and gets it done no matter what? So that's the biggest thing that I look for is what are all the hurdles that they've already had to overcome to get into this position right now? Because I don't want to hear like, you know, we launched the product. Everything went well. We're super profitable. There hasn't been any bottlenecks and you should invest. And I'm like, okay, that sounds a little bit suspicious. And first of all, if you haven't gone through any trials and tribulations, what are you going to do when shit does get hard? What are you going to do when the market gets flooded with competition that are all underselling you on price?

1:25:04Sabri Suby:Then what's going to happen? So I'm really looking at that founder and their ability to be able to react under pressure and solve problems beyond anything else. And then I'm looking at what's the story. What do I believe the TAM is? Where could I add value to this investment? Are there things that I could do to help them realize that future quicker and just pull them into that reality? Or are they going to need a lot of help and handholding along the way? So I want to make sure that if they've gotten some success that it hasn't just been luck. Like they haven't just put out some TikTok videos, got some organic virality, made a bunch of sales, then got a bit of press.

1:25:46Sabri Suby:I want to know, can you spend money to get a customer? Because if you can't, then you just have a hobby, right? You need to be able to actually spend money to acquire a customer repeatedly, so that I can then put more money in and we can multiply that money. So they're the kind of big things that I'm looking at in a lot of these investments. What are some of the fires that you've had to overcome with your company or before you've inserted King Kong? What are some of those things that you had to overcome and that you can tell our listeners that they can really save them some years and some bullshit?

1:26:20Sabri Suby:Yeah. Yeah. How long do we have? The first thing I would say is like the biggest thing that I got my teeth kicked in on in the beginning and why I deliver it with so much passion now is selling things that the market does not want. So the first business that I sold, where I was selling products for was an online water filter company. And I never forget, I kind of fell down the rabbit hole like digital marketing and I learned SEO and I cut my teeth. I got this business, page one, position one for every single water filter related keyword that there possibly was in Australia. I got the product into 300 different retailers around the country and we still weren't selling a huge amount.

1:27:07Sabri Suby:We were selling but it wasn't satisfactory to where I wanted to be and it was because I was selling something that the market was not starving for. There is a big belief in Australia that the tap water is completely healthy and fine to drink. So it's like you're pushing this big boulder up the hill of something that people don't want. And you got to be tough if you're going to be stupid. I think that was a stupid business to launch. I think the times have changed now. I know it's definitely different in America. Like most of y 'all don't drink tap water. You either buy bottled water or you have water filters.

1:27:41Sabri Suby:But like Australians are like, this is the highest quality tap water in the world. And most people just drink it, right? And so then you find yourself in a convincing argument rather than having a compelling offer. And that was when I learned the most important lesson I've ever learned in business, which is a compelling offer is 10 times more powerful than a convincing argument. You do not want to be trying to convince people to buy. You want to have an offer that they would be willing to crawl across crushed glass on their knees to get their hands on. And that's the wind in the sails. That's the jet engine that propels you forward.

1:28:21Sabri Suby:And if you have a bad business in a good market, you will do well. If you have a good business in a bad market, you will not do well. So learning that you must remove your emotion. You must look at what the market is starving for and just sell that. You do not need to reinvent the wheel. it's like we all have that one friend or that person that we meet at a party and they're like oh I've come up with like 15 business ideas but all of them have been taken people have been doing them so now I've come up with the most brilliant business idea I'm gonna launch like left-handed basket weaving for dogs this is a brilliant business I've looked online no one's doing it.

1:29:10Sabri Suby:And it's like, you're going to have a very hard life if you go that. It's very often that you don't want to go to markets that don't have any competition. You want to go to markets where the money is already flowing and you want to have a better offer that delivers the outcome quicker to the prospect, ideally at a higher price. And you want to have better marketing and you want to shave off a piece of that pie because it's already been validated that it is a good business. So that's the biggest overarching thing that if you want to have a business that's doing very well, that's the framework that I strongly encourage you to use.

1:29:45What about when it comes to a creator led business? This has obviously been something that's getting a lot more attention with you know, Feastables and Prime and you worked with ARAC on a video where you're like, we're making crocs when i think of crocs right and correct me if i'm wrong i don't think of like the market being like i fucking am starving for this or am i completely wrong because crocs has a a super loyal like fan base and if eric was to come out with crocs or like i fucking need that so how do you think about from a creator-led business if a creator is listening to this and they want to launch a business, physical product, how do they think about finding something that maybe makes sense to them, is authentic to their brand, but also is something that the market is starving for?

1:30:36Sure.

1:30:36Sabri Suby:So this is a great question. And it's very, very timely. I think that we're in like the first, you know, surge of creator led brands. And a lot of these things are going to crash and burn and die. And then there's going to be like the second wave, which I'll dive into. So the first wave is basically I have the eyeballs. I've got the attention. Where in this attention, what are the products that most people are buying, right? How do I just sell them that, right? Is it energy drinks? Is it chocolate bars? Like what is something, or maybe it's coffee. That's what I can sell. Everyone drinks coffee.

1:31:16Sabri Suby:I've got 5 million subscribers. Let me launch a coffee brand. Most of these businesses are going to zero. They're going to die a horrible death. It's because these businesses, these creators are realizing that running a business is not easy. It's not like a one-time event. You just create a video on your YouTube channel and be like, I'll launch this coffee. Everyone go buy it. No, no, no, no, no. It is a grind. You need to build a team. You need to constantly promote it. It needs to be in every video. And in order to do that, it has to first be something that you are passionate about. So this first wave is more so of like, they're sitting down in a room with these business executives and they're doing all these Venn diagrams and looking at audiences and products that are doing well.

1:32:01Sabri Suby:And they're like, I've got it. We're going to do chocolate because that's what all the children are buying. Right. And so then they launch those things, but there's not a huge amount of authenticity behind why it is that they're selling those things. And people are getting more and more cluey to those things. And I think that it's already apparent with things like Prime where it's like they've had a banger launch. And so that destroys brand equity. Huge. So the first thing that I like to look at from a lens, like I like to look at it through the framework of something called EcoGuy, right? Like what is it that you love that you're irrationally passionate about?

1:32:46Sabri Suby:Is a part of your life that you just love no matter what, right? And once you've got that, then it's like, okay, well, what does the world need? What is the market? What's the TAM? How big is this audience? And then what can you be paid for and what are you good at? So say for instance, if we take the Crocs example, right? Like Eric loves fucking Crocs. Like he just wears Crocs all the time. It's something that he's irrationally passionate about. So cool. You're already wearing Crocs in all your videos you're wearing it and you love it. And you can't get a Crocs brand deal because they don't do brand deals.

1:33:18Sabri Suby:Cool. How much does Crocs do in revenue? Well, last year they did close to$6 billion in revenue. Alrighty. Cool. So that is something that you love that people are paying for, right? Does the world need shoes? Yeah, they do need to wear shoes. People are wearing shoes. People working from home, they're wearing more of these sandals and like relaxed, like, you know, shoes than ever before. And then it's like, well, what are you good at? Well, you're good at making videos. You're good at telling stories. How do you thread this into that story arc? So I think that like, that's the second way we are going to basically be in a position where these creators, we're going to really want to know that this is something that has a lot of tie in to the creator that we're listening to.

1:34:05Sabri Suby:It's like Joe Rogan's always talking about saunas and hunting wild elk and the UFC. So it's like if Homeboy launches a sauna company, you don't need to know whether or not he likes saunas. He fucking loves saunas. Like that's all he talks about is saunas. So it's like there is so much authenticity to him doing it. He can be like, hey, I've owned six different homes and in all of the homes, I've had a custom built sauna. And all of these custom-built saunas, they always, like, they had this thing that was really good, but then this thing wasn't so good. And it was always not hot enough or the seating wasn't good.

1:34:41Sabri Suby:So I have gone out and I have consulted with the best sauna experts on planet Earth, and I have made the best sauna in the world, right? You're not going to question his integrity of why he's doing that. Because you know that he loves saunas, right? And he's gone through all of those things. So I think that that's the thing that people are going to start to question. And it's like with the Andrew Hubermans and all of these people, they're going to be like, hey, tried every single protein supplement that was on the market. They all have fillers. They all have all of this crap. I couldn't find the one that I wanted.

1:35:14Sabri Suby:So I just created it. I created this product. This is what I take. And it's really good. Is that going to sell? Of course, it's going to sell because there's a story that makes sense and they're passionate and they can keep talking about it and keep promoting it in a way that feels authentic and it doesn't feel like a brand read. So interesting to think about all of the creator led brands because I've watched, I love watching those videos on YouTube when someone breaks them down, like why this specific one failed. Why do you think that we've seen that with prime? Like, why is it going down in sales?

1:35:46I, I've tried it. It didn't taste very good. I wasn't a fan of what it tasted like, but I'm just curious from a marketing perspective, like you, in theory, have two of the biggest marketers in the world. Some of the people that have the most eyeballs on them. Why do you think it is that people bought it once and then didn't continue?

1:36:03Sabri Suby:Yeah, I think that the product's got to be good, right? And Prime tastes like trash. Like it feels like if you pour it on the ground or melt a hole in the ground, like it's just like it does not taste good. I think that, yeah, they have a phenomenal rise. They had a very good quarter, very good story, kind of ties into what you could imagine them launching, the biggest TAM meeting up with Congo brands, doing all of those kinds of things. But then it's like, is it a product that those people would genuinely want to keep drinking themselves? Is it a great product? I don't think it is. And I think that's, you can get attention, right?

1:36:43Sabri Suby:The first sale that you can make, you do not want to be in the order business. You want to be in the reorder business. So you want to use that attention to introduce people to a superior product that people are like, man, this is insanely good. And then it goes out and you get the virality where, you know, they were in the order business. They were in the order of like promotion, running these big fights, big events, like streaming stuff that they were doing to push an order. And it worked. They got lots of orders, right? But then if the product isn't good, you're not going to be in the reorder business.

1:37:20Sabri Suby:And that's the business that you got to be in. And I think that most people, while attention is the most underpriced commodity, so is trust. And you need to make sure that you deliver on that trust and deliver on that product. And I think that what we're going to see is people that use their platform and all of these free eyeballs that they've got, this attention, and then they go, okay, we can go direct to the end consumer, cut out the middleman, or we don't need to spend money on advertising. And what we're going to do is we're going to take our marketing budget and we're not going to just pocket it.

1:37:58Sabri Suby:We're going to put that into the product to make an actual superior product that is legitimately 10 times better than anybody else. And then they're gonna use their trust and their reach with their audience. And then they're gonna have a superior product. And then that's the flywheel that will just take off. But most people are leaving out the thing of investing and making a superior product or putting the amount of money in R &D to actually create something that is gonna be innovative. They're missing that piece so that they get the orders and then they crash and die. And you see that. Like there's so many brands out there.

1:38:34Sabri Suby:You're just like, bro, why are you launching this? Like the Rock Skincare Company. It's horrible, horrendous. It doesn't make any sense, right? And you go look at that video on him, which is arguably the most identifiable male celebrity on planet earth. And like the launch video has like 180 ,000 views or something. Bro, there's no tie-in. Like you're a masculine, full on alpha man that talks about like crushing weights and stuff. And then you're launching like under eye patches. Protein powder, what do you have for him, dude? He had success, I believe, maybe I'm wrong, with the Under Armour shoes.

1:39:15Like I believe he put out weightlifting shoes. And I'm like, that would have been a lot of time. Makes a lot of sense. That makes sense. Good cross.

1:39:20Sabri Suby:And then they make money and then they're like, awesome. They have all these business guys in their ear being like, we're going to roll out a suite of brands, right? But I think that that's where we're at right now. We're at that stage in the life cycle of creator-led brands. And you can already see it that a lot of them, the smoke is starting to form and there's going to be a lot of people that are very skeptical. I think someone that comes to mind when you say that, I'm not sure if you're familiar with Nick Bear and BPN supplements, but that's like the perfect example. He was like, I couldn't find products that didn't have all this extra shit in it.

1:39:56So I literally made it. And then, I mean, his content is also just like next level, like the BPN YouTube channel plus his own personal YouTube channel is just phenomenal. But they literally made like some of the best supplements on the market. And it's, it proves, I think, your exact point. Do you have any desire to make a physical product at all? Or are you kind of just in the digital landscape?

1:40:20Sabri Suby:I've got, I've got physical books, and whatnot. So but in terms of like, and I've got lots of businesses that I've invested in that sell physical products and whatnot. But yeah, in terms of me, and like, again, it's not about what can I sell? It's where are my customers and how can I better serve them to help them solve this problem. They don't care whether it's physical or it's digital. It's where are they and where do they want to go and how can I bridge that gap for them as much as possible. And that's the lens that I look at. Like in a perfect world, what my clients want is that they want to press a button and they want money to show up in their bank account.

1:40:59Sabri Suby:And the further that I get away from being able to do that, the worse my product or service is. This will be kind of fun. Okay. If you look at us and we have a podcast and it's within, you know, creator, the creator economy, business landscape, personal brand. Where do you, where, if you were to like consult with us via a couple minutes, where, like, what would you say is like the best business for us to go into? and like how could you see us leveraging the audience that we have with the podcast into some sort of, you know, digital product? Maybe not, maybe physical, but what advice do you have for us personally of like where you could see us having success?

1:41:43Sabri Suby:I think I always like to start with the end in mind, right? So like for you, it's like, what does that dream outcome look like? Like what is it that you would love to be doing every day that you would wake up and be like, I can't believe that I get paid to do this? What would that look like? for you guys? I think the thing that fires us up the most, or at least one of them, is like sitting down with amazing people like yourself and being able to have conversations. And we've been doing it for four years. And, you know, we're still reinvesting every dime that we make back into the show. And so getting to a place of where we could make a great livable wage, like sitting down and having conversations as one sector of our business would be amazing.

1:42:25I'll tell you what fires me up, though. You know, I drink a caffeinated beverage every day. I've told people this for years. We didn't do it because you're not here in person. But with every guest that's in person, we do this thing called the one handed crack. And so we start off the show where you got to crack open a can with one hand. I give a score. It's like a viral challenge. Everyone across the world sends me these scores and I score them on my Instagram story. I think that every caffeinated beverage in America is just pure shit. It's either got way too much sugar or it's like literally just going to give us cancer.

1:42:53So I've been on the hunt trying to think of how much money I'm going to have to invest. We were just in Texas, like interviewing with Christian Guzman. They have an energy drink. It's funny because he's like, dude, energy is so hard. I'm like, bro, you're in the fucking energy game. That's really hard for me to like hear you say that because you're in the game, right? Like you're doing this thing. But I think that there is a market there for a healthier beverage. I know the weight shit is very difficult, the shipping and all that stuff. I'm curious what your thoughts are on just like beverage CPG as a whole.

1:43:20Do you think Braden could have success with the energy drink? I know I could have success with it, but I'm just curious.

1:43:26Sabri Suby:The way that I look at it first is both of those things that you just said, they're both on the other side of you having enough reach to turn those both of those dreams into a reality, right? Like if you had enough reach, then the brand deals would pay you an enormous amount of money to be featured in your podcast. and you'd be able to interview people, fly all over the world in a private jet and go interview the best people in the whole world because you have the most valuable thing that everybody wants, which is the eyeballs and ears, right? So the same thing goes with the drink, right? It's like, if you build it up where it's like, you know, you're pulling multiple millions of listens per episode, you've got the eyeballs and ears, and then you've got the platform to put it out.

1:44:15Sabri Suby:so that's the first thing to realize is that everything that you want is on the other side of like that reach that it is that you're going for so then the question becomes down to how do we get that reach okay well who has that reach right now all right well diary of a ceo just took the number one spot for podcast we've got rogan on there who are the platforms the podcasters and producers that are absolutely murdering it right now what is it that they're doing where how do they get distribution? How do they test thumbnails, titles? What are they doing short form? How many clips are they putting out per day?

1:44:53Sabri Suby:Is it on clipping accounts? Is it on the main account? What do the hooks look like? What's the pacing? Reverse engineering where success leaves clues. And then doing an audit of those channels and going, okay, cool. They've got these two clips channels. They're putting out three clips per day on that. They're putting out the long form. I've seen on the long form that they test, you know, I'll go listen to all of the Stephen Bartlett interviews to find out what it is that they're doing. Okay, cool. I know this chick that was head of his content just left. Let me go pay her$10 ,000 for a consulting call.

1:45:27Sabri Suby:Pay her the$10 ,000 for the consulting call. Then get the blueprint of what are the inputs that are going to get you to the outputs. And then go, okay, what do we, this is exactly what we need to do to trend us in the right direction. we're not doing nowhere near enough we're putting out like two to three clips per week these guys are doing that per hour right they're doing that per day whatever it might be and then that then you start to look at it through okay well how do we put out that many clips okay if we need to put that many clips that means like we need to get great guests on on average on each podcast we're going to get 15 good clips from each podcast.

1:46:07Sabri Suby:We don't have a lot of money, so we're going to have to use Opus AI or all these other platforms to clip this shit up for us so we can get it out. And I'll hire some people in other countries to post this all day long. And then you start to get the roadmap of what are the inputs to get to the output, right? Most people are focused just on the outcome where it's like being more obsessed on what the inputs are. I think you guys have had, you know, you've got a lot of good guests coming on the show. That's the reason that I agreed to do the show. And so it's like thinking about like, if you can just keep doing that and then make sure that you put a disproportionate amount of effort also on distribution once you do have that and clipping the shit out of everything and really pumping it out and doing the best edits and just figuring out what the best people are doing and doing that.

1:46:55Sabri Suby:Because if you do do that, you'll get to where it is that you want to get to. But you can't look at the people that are on the top of the hill and just be like, it'd be awesome to be on the top of the hill without doing what it is that they're doing. Just have all the focus on, let me replicate what it is that they're doing to get to that outcome and then back into that. And then I think that you guys will be able to do all of those things. I wouldn't even worry about what's the business I can launch? How do I monetize it? That's all noise right now. The land grab is the attention and getting the audience.

1:47:26Sabri Suby:and it's like if you can get enough brand deals right now that can kind of keep you afloat and keep you doing the thing that's the main thing because you guys are probably two or three episodes away from going you know into a different atmosphere if you do all the clipping and you do all of that kind of stuff right and you do enough volume and you commit to doing that for for a year and you don't worry about how do i monetize this i think that that will take care of itself. I love it. I got one more question for you that was awesome is if you could go back and chat with your 18 year old self before you went on this journey, what advice would you tell yourself?

1:48:06Nothing that would change the journey. But if you could go and talk to yourself, what would you say?

1:48:09Sabri Suby:Yeah, this is a difficult one, because I often say I would tell them nothing because I'm happy with where I am. And I did like a flap of the butterfly wing, I could end up in a different galaxy to where I am right now. But I would just like buy all I would just say that all the people that it is that you look up to, they are no different to you, right? And just to have absolute belief and conviction in yourself that you are the kind of person that can make all of your dreams a reality and all of the people that you're looking at at their chapter 10 or you're looking at people on the summit of the mountain, they all had a climb and look at where they went on that climb and to take bigger risks and to put, there's going to be multiple inflection points throughout your career and just put all the chips in.

1:48:57Sabri Suby:Just keep putting all the chips in all the way and constantly reinvest in yourself. Do never ever think there's going to be some opportunity, some out, some like thing that is outside of your power that is going to give you a big unlock. That is a myth. I have not had a lucky break. I have had lots of intense work in private to be rewarded in public, right? A lot of people look at the accolades, they look at the shark tank, they look at the fastest growing company in Australia, all of these different things, right? But they don't look at the training room, they just look at the trophies. And so I think that in anything, I just say that like, you got this, just go all in on you, forget everything else, and just have 100 % conviction that you are that special person that can get it done.

1:49:51This has been one of my favorite episodes of the 505 podcast. Ladies and gentlemen, episode 176 of Sabri Subi. If you're still here, please drop us a comment. Leave us a like. Subscribe to the channel. We'll see you guys all next week. Peace.