Why Use Digital Media

Episode 919: Why Use Digital Media, with Mark Smith

Why use digital media for your business? Listen and learn from Mark Smith about business development and why use digital media.

Why use digital media for your business? Listen to some essential insights from our guest, Mark Smith, on why some businesses need digital media to help them grow.

Mark Smith is the Business Development Director of The ChannelPro Network, the premier resource for growing IT service companies. Mark was the Founder of Windows NT Magazine, with a reach of 1.5M unique enterprise IT professionals in 160 countries. Mark sold Windows NT Magazine to Penton Media for $100M. EH Media has helped customers generate thousands of leads, and Mark teaches these marketing automation techniques to MSPs through his online mentoring program called Recurring Profits Mastery.

What you will learn from this episode about why use digital media:

• How Mark helps media companies launch new products and do business development
• Why use digital media to help grow your business
• Why Mark chose podcasting and video over other media channels
• How Mark found success as a media professional by niching down in the IT industry
• The process and timeframe Mark followed to develop his webinar and online course
• Mark’s N.A.T.I.O.N. framework and how you can use it to generate traction within your market
• The obstacles that entrepreneurs have to overcome to make progress as a media company
• The litmus test (pyramid) Mark developed for his guest funnel
• Why use digital media now and leverage the benefits as early as possible

Resources:

• Website: IoTPlaybook.com
• Podcast: https://podcast.iotplaybook.com/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/IoTplaybook
• LinkedIn:
  • https://www.linkedin.com/in/markhoustonsmith/
  • https://www.linkedin.com/company/iotplaybook/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/iotplaybook/
• Need more insights on why use digital media for your business? Ask the experts

Additional Resources:

• Sell With Authority by Drew McLellan and Stephen Woessner: https://amzn.to/39y7x13
• Predictive ROI Free Resource Library: https://predictiveroi.com/resources/
• Stephen Woessner’s LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/stephenwoessner/
• Listen to a related podcast on why use digital media from our guest, Robert Rose

 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Full Episode Transcript

 

Get ready to find your recipe for success from America’s top business owners here at Onward Nation with your host, Stephen Woessner.

 

Good morning. I’m Stephen Woessner, CEO of Predictive ROI and your host for Onward Nation, where I interviewed today’s top business owners so we can learn their recipe for success, how they built and how they scaled their business. In fact, my team at Predictive ROI. Well, if you’ve been listening to or to the show for a while now, you know that we have constantly or consistently been rebuilding and expanding our resources library on PredictiveROI.com. 

 

So you can now download free practical and tactical guides for everything from how to create your ideal client avatar to how to land your dream clients, and even our new B2B podcasting for Profit Secrets e-book. And there’s a lot of other success strategies that we have compiled from the very brilliant insights shared by our generous guests.

 

Just go to PredictiveROI.com/Resources and everything requested. We will send it right to your inbox.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Mark Smith’s Introduction

 

Before we welcome today’s very special guest, Mark Smith. Let me share some additional context around why, when Mark said yes, I was over the moon excited for Onward Nation. So what do I mean by that? Well, in full disclosure, Mark Smith is actually a client of ours at Predictive ROI.

 

Now, I did not invite Mark to be a guest so that he could be a testimonial for Predictive ROI. That is not the nature of this conversation. The reason why I did ask Mark to be a guest on our show is because Mark is a media expert and you know that over the last what has it been, 12 to 18 months?

 

We’ve been talking about how business owners moving into or stepping into 2020 can turn their company into a media company and why they should do that from a strategic perspective. In addition to that, the insights that you’re going to hear from Mark and how he teaches around the topics of Trojan Horse Drain 25 sponsorship and then tying all of that together with a guest funnel.

 

So if you’ve ever thought about having a podcast, a video series, something where you’re inviting a guest to be part of your content, how can you then leverage that property to make it an exceptional business development opportunity for you, while being helpful to your audience? So with that said, without further ado, Mark, thank you for joining me on Onward Nation.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: The IT Guy

 

Oh, hey, I appreciate it, Stephen. I really do. You know, I didn’t start off as a media executive. You know, years ago, I was the IT guy and the guy that, you know, your company and friends would call when something broke. Okay. And, I remember being in a small company. It happened to be a media company, but I was the IT guy, right?

 

And a guy came to me and said, hey, we really ought to look into this windows and T thing, because that time we were using NetWare in Unix, and I know for those of you who might be technology, you might remember those words NetWare and Unix. They’re kind of obscure at this stage. But at the time, I, you know, I said, well go get a magazine.

 

So he came back to Barnes Noble and said, there is no magazine for windows NT. What? And he said, why don’t we launch one? I’m like, what’s an IT guy going to do? But literally that night I was woken up in the middle of night by the well, I felt like if I didn’t launch Windows NT magazine, I would literally get struck by lightning.

 

So anyway, long story short, I did have to go to Microsoft and sit there in the lobby as a technology IT guy had to pitch Microsoft because there was no list. The only list available was Microsoft itself. I remember waiting in the lobby and rubbing my hands on my, because I didn’t want to have that first handshake be this cold and clammy thing, right?

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Learning Publishing and Media

 

But anyway, I did get an opportunity to pitch Microsoft and believe it or not, they said yes, and there’s a whole backstory there. But bottom line is we launched the magazine and over a five year period, I had to transition from the guy who didn’t know anything about marketing and sales to I better learn this whole thing called publishing and media, or I’m doomed.

 

But anyway, five years later, the magazine sold media for $100 million. So, it was a very successful deal that launched me big time into a whole media thing. So I remember, now that was publishing 1.0, and I helped even transition at 2.0, 2.0, being email newsletters and websites and all that stuff. Because when we launched 1.0, it was a magazine.

 

It was things. Well, now here I am and, you know, I’m, I’ve been around the block and I, you know, I’ve got as much hair as you do, Stephen. And so I like if I gotta keep up and what does publishing 3.0 look like now? And I thought, you know what? I’m looking at all these guys who are building a new media company using podcasting.

 

Now, you may not look at it as a media thing, but as a media professional you’re creating a media company. Absolutely. So now how does the media guy with, you know, 25 years experience. And what I do today through my company, High Value Publishing, is I help media companies launch new products and also help them do business development.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Launching a New Media Company

 

So, you know, cases in IT help increase their market value. So I’ve been working with this company called Channel Pro. Their niche is business owners. So they’re part of the channel. Okay. And a lot of technology is sold from Microsoft and big companies. When you’re talking about small to medium businesses, they don’t sell it directly. They sell through the IT channel.

 

Right. So if you’re a small company, you may not be able to afford your own IT guy. So you outsource to one of these channel pros. Okay. Well, we’re seeing a trend in our market, a $500 billion market opportunity for IoT. And it’s got me as excited as I was back in the day with windows NT. To be honest with you, I haven’t been excited about technology as much as, again, back windows in TI.

 

So I’m looking at the IoT thing and how do we take advantage of this? So I thought, well how do I do it the last time? Launch a new media company. Therefore, the IoT playbook was born. But I don’t want to launch a print magazine the way I did in 1995. What’s the modern equivalent of that? So I thought about podcasting and even video podcasting, but I don’t know how to do that.

 

So I went on Amazon like I do, and I picked up this book called Profitable Podcasting by let’s see who’s the author again. You’re funny. Yeah. And, this guy Stephen, I don’t know who this guy is. And I’m reading this, but there’s things that as a media company, I was looking for. One of them was this Trojan horse idea.

 

The idea of inviting someone to become a guest as a very, non salesy way to start building relationships. I go, man, what a great idea that is. I mean, I can totally use that idea. So anyway, I’ll shut up now and you could. That’s my question. Okay. So why go down the path of.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Building A Following

 

So you’re building out something new. You mentioned podcasts. You mentioned a video podcast. But why go down that path? I get the fact that it’s different from the print magazine and so forth. But why did you? And this sounds like I’m trying to steer our audience toward you should be into podcasting that that is not the case Onward Nation.

 

But I just want to get a little bit more into the lens because there’s a litany of media options available or channel options available. So why did you settle on that particular channel? One of the things I really loved about it is when you go into a new market, you might not be the expert. Okay, so then some people then say, well, I can’t pursue this market because I’m not an expert, but how do podcasters deal with that?

 

They simply interview experts, by association. They become experts. And actually, over time, you pick up the lingo and the methodologies and you get a really amazing bird’s eye view of people who are really making a difference. So I thought, hey, I can do two things at once: launch a media company. Even though I’m not an idiot expert very rapidly, I’m going to become an IoT expert because I’ve done this over and over and over in technology markets, where I’ll give you an example.

 

I didn’t know anything about enterprise storage, but I started interviewing people who knew that subject. Pretty soon, Microsoft and HP were paying me $5,000 per location to show up and make an enterprise storage roadshow. Okay, why were they so willing to do that? Because I had built up a following, and I’d interviewed enough people and I showed enough expertise and was able to break down essentially the business models that people were using to make money and be successful at enterprise storage.

 

Would you also argue, too, that there was that it was niche? That’s correct. Yeah. And I as an agency owner, which I’m, you know, own an agency, at first you might just say, I’m going to grab any kind of cleaning that pays the bills. The problem is to be really good at a market. You kind of have to marry the market.

 

You got to know it really, really well. And so if I go to New Market, there’s no way I can guarantee results. And there’s a very good chance that I’m not going to get the results from my clients that I want. However, if I niche down and so to speak, marry that market, I can literally guarantee results because I just know it so well.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Teaching a Master Class

 

Okay, as I’m doing with my clients now in the channel Pro and IoT space, we literally guarantee results for certain things like, you know, webinars and and online summits and marketing funnels and things like that. And that’s really the beauty of niching down, because not only can you speak the lingo, not only have you developed some subject matter expertise because of all the interviews and so forth, you just know the cast of characters, you know the players, you can make introductions, you just know the landscape better than somebody just stepping into it.

 

Right? That’s right. And so even when you’re thinking about building a list, right. And if I could figure out building a lead magnet and then getting people to sign up for a masterclass. But why? How am I going to teach a master class? I’m not an expert. No problem. I found people, you know, as I got better, better marketing, I know how to do the marketing that’s now become my learned superpower.

 

I certainly was born with it. However, I could partner with a real expert, launch a webinar at the end of the webinar, offer a masterclass for a thousand bucks and see if people will buy this class. And if they do, then actually go create the class. And I’ve done this over and over again, where we created a master class for $1,000, where the class did not exist.

 

When I made the offer. Okay, had I done it the other way or I paid a guy a bunch to create a master class. Then I offered it. Nobody bought it. I’m out. You know, I’ve risked all that money and lost it. But I flipped it around and said, hey, here’s a guy he can teach you.

 

Literally his step by step process for achieving these results. If you want similar results, here’s my masterclass. Okay, I know you just piqued the interest of many Onward business owners, so break that down again is for or break that down some more about offering a course like Pre-Selling. Of course it’s essentially you’re like pre-funding the development of the course right.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Putting The Offer Together

 

That’s correct. Yeah. So I first did this with a magazine called Campus Safety Magazine. Now I have zero background on campus safety okay. But they were doing these webinars and again a media company, and there was this one particular webinar that they came to me and said, Mark, holy mackerel. This active shooter webinar we’re doing is, you know, for obvious reasons, just look at the registrations on this.

 

I got all shot. I thought, well, I called up somebody I knew who was an expert in active shooter, who’d been teaching it for years to police and whatnot, happens to be a brother and my brother in law. I said, do you teach this thing? Yeah. How would it take to put together a master class on this goes well, we would teach, run, hide, fight.

 

We teach this and this and this and I go, okay. And I’m taking notes. And so literally every sign up for the webinar, we made an offer. Hey, how would you like this class ? And I also found out from the media company, what’s the number one thing he said was every time there’s an active shooter, our audience, the campus safety professionals, get hit up by school administrators and other people.

 

Hey, what’s the plan if an active shooter ever showed up on our campus, do you have a plan? And these guys, like, I have a plan. So the offer was, hey, here’s a class. It’s relatively cheap, but it will take 90 minutes. You will have a plan, literally a PowerPoint template you can fill in with your own school information and you could have something to present.

 

Wouldn’t that be amazing? Oh, people signed up like crazy, but it also had a but it was taught by a guy who really, really knew what he was doing. All I did was put the offer together, you know, and then once we sold, I mean, right away, it was clear that people wanted to buy this. So then I brought in the expert, he shot the whole thing and one day paid him and now moved on.

 

And so what was the timing in between? Because this might be another critical component for our audience as far as the timing between webinar to when you actually had to deliver the course, like how much time did you actually have? So it was a webinar for two weeks of marketing. And then, you know, then I also actually was less than that was one week of marketing and selling the class.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Brining in An Expert

 

Then I brought in the expert and we promised we would deliver it within six weeks. Six weeks seems to be, I’ve done this both ways. One where I deliver the class in six weeks and people are willing to pay for two. I dribbled the class out one module at a time, over a six week period. Six seems to be, reasonable period.

 

It’s also a number that you. And that’s why you’re going to see a lot of six module master classes, six week master masks. But there’s there’s some marketing reasons for it, psychological reasons for it. Like if I said a 20 week class, people go on and out for 20 weeks. They’d think 20 is better than six. It’s not.

 

If people could do it in six minutes, they would pay because they really nobody really wants to sign up for a class. They want to sign a result. They want the result. They want the transformation at the end. And this particular case, the promise the first was just a I will get you a plan. Plus that first level of training, you need to, you know, to get that result, which is having a plan.

 

I’ve done other ones where a class was on how to teach and offer. You know, a lot of these guys were struggling with pricing and packaging of an IT offer. So I brought in a guy, and we came up with the cloud five master class. And you know that there was a whole reason behind a cloud service offering, packaging it, five user bundles at a time.

 

And that’s all it was. It was teaching that thing over a six week period. But people did it. They had a lot of moments. They literally took the material, created an offer, and many of them sold it before the class was over. 

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: The Different Variations

 

Okay. So looking back on these different variations, this is fascinating. Did you see any difference in whether it was to wait six weeks, get the entire thing or, a module at a time over the course of six weeks, or duration of six weeks?

 

Any difference from a sales or conversion perspective or were both very appealing. Actually, dribbling it out live over six weeks actually sells better because what you do is you. Well, I’ll tell you why. Because they position the live group coaching people like in our market anyway. They like the thought of a live person. They’re who could then answer my questions after the fact.

 

It’s now DIY. You take it at your own pace so you have to sell. Hey, you could binge watch this thing, but you’re not getting the benefit. So then you have to add in the group coaching part or whatever you’re going to do. Because people want that component. Well, what if I have questions about my own business, how this applies, right.

 

And also life creates urgency and scarcity, right? You see urgency. Hey, the class is starting on December 1st. Okay. I got to get in. There’s logic. Or instead of me saying it’s closing is closing like a false scarcity thing or false urgency, this is actually real urgency. The class is literally starting on that day, so there is an advantage of doing it live over.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Learn More About Copywriting

 

I think the other cool thing is you’re getting feedback as you teach it. So you’re perfecting your masterclass, right? Because you are getting that feedback loop so that that is really valuable. Okay. So I’m really curious about, at some point here and I think it will be after you, Onward Nation. But I want to also get your perspective, you know, again, through this lens of yours, like the obstacles to getting this started because my guess is for Onward Nation business owners, they’re tracking with you thinking, all this sounds awesome.

 

But then there’s going to be some obstacles. But before we get to that, you really, in a very interesting strategic way, took the word nation and broke that acronym down with some really, really cool, you know, definitions or the way that you broke that down. 

 

Could you walk us through that? Because I want our listeners to be able to hear that.

 

Right. So one of the problems that I see, and, you know, one of the things that I think every entrepreneur should master over time is copywriting, okay? Because heck, you could download a funnel from Clickfunnels, you know, and all of a sudden you put these strings, these two pages together and you launch it to the world and then want, want, want, want nothing happens, right?

 

Like, well, why? Well, those of us who’ve, you know, spent the time and energy learning copywriting have figured out that there are a bunch of column cheat sheets, there are frameworks out there to use. And so I had to even create one for myself, for my own podcast, for people who are guests to come on and like, okay, what are the questions we’re going to ask on this podcast?

 

So I even came up with one for you, Stephen. You know that based on Onward Nation, you’re trying to build a nation, okay. And you’re trying to give them that cornerstone content, those pillars that will help them build their business out. Well, one of the things I thought of, if I were going to be asking somebody, you know, if they’re ready to launch a podcast, is I would walk them to this nation framework that I came up with.

 

And number one, I’d say, hey, so what market niche are you? And that’s the n and equals niche. And a lot of times people say, well, I’m not in any niche. I’m in a niche of anybody who will pay me money. Well, that’s not a niche. And as I said before, going super broad and horizontal is a recipe for disaster.

 

It’s frustrating for you because you’re learning more scratch and frustrate your customers because you can’t. Really promising results. I’m in a very narrow niche IT business owners. We’ve done it enough to where I can really narrow it down. The second thing is the avatar and aspiration. 

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: The IoT Playbook

 

Okay, so who does that guy look like that you’re targeting, right. So my guy is, you know, he’s 40s or 50s, has been running an IT business for a while, and he aspires to create more recurring revenue because he knows that a break fix shop has no market value at all.

 

Literally could work 20 years in a business and it’s worth zero when he tries to sell it. So he’s trying to create recurring revenue but profitable recurring revenue. And so now with the IoT playbook, I’m teaching him new business models that, quite frankly, are highly profitable 80% margin and create recurring revenues like, ooh, that’s pretty neat right. So he aspires to have that kind of a business testimonial.

 

That’s the T of nation, right? So what? Give me a result. Well I’ll give you a result of by the way, you know, I know Stephen, you teach about, you know, getting sponsors and even in your book you say, well, wait for your 100th episode. Well, I got my first sponsor before I launched the podcast, and it was for a company called My Devices.

 

And they’re an IoT company. And, you know, we got this launched. And again, because we know this niche really well, we were able to say, hey, we guarantee you 100 qualified people register. Well, we actually got a 300. And believe it or not, before the webinar ended, he had 16 sales calls booked before the end of the webinar.

 

Us. Yeah. Well, and there’s a reason why because he followed the framework and he followed a framework and a very coachable, great guy and a great product, to be honest with you. So, so during the webinar. Right. So then we have the Eye of Nation which is instructing and inspiring. Okay. So if you teach something you can’t solve the problem with you and I like we get so into a subject that we might teach a lot, but 1 to 1 idea would be to teach something like a copywriting framework like Nation.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Starting on the Framework

 

So I teach and I’m inspiring people because if they don’t know copywriting, they’re staring at a blank screen, like, what do I say? Okay, but if they had a framework going, oh, I should go through this order then. Oh, is the offer okay, what is the offer I’m making today? Like later on this podcast, we’re going to make an offer for someone who may want to, understand what a guest funnel looks like or understand what a framework looks like.

 

And then again, you always gotta you always gotta, as Stephen Covey would say, begin with the end in mind. So what’s the next step? Hey, you got me all excited on this podcast. What do I do now? Next step. So there’s nation, niche, avatar, testimonial, instruction and inspiration. What offer I’m making now and the next step. You know when you first shared this with me?

 

You know, I loved it right away. And of course, I’m biased because I love the word nation, Onward Nation and so forth. But, you know, aside from just taking the personal out of it, it is really, really smart because as you said, framework. But there’s so many business principles that are built into it. And it’s also a stepping stone.

 

Everything from the very, very beginning of the niche all the way through the next steps. Its buyer journey is a business strategy. It’s content. It’s brilliant, Mark. All thanks. I would just really ask myself if it was really given to me last night in the middle of the night, as I was thinking about doing this podcast? Okay, so let’s think about some obstacles here.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Following the Nation Framework

 

Yeah. Okay. You know, I again, I know that you have been around the block and I know that you’ve received a pushback. So let’s say that someone within Onward Nation is thinking, okay, I’m tracking Mark. I’m understanding this. I’m understanding the power of turning my company into a media company. I understand the power of content.

 

This is making sense about, you know, I’m going to have some sort of cornerstone content, whether it’s a podcast or video or whatever. I get the nation thing, but I’m not really sure. Just like how to get started. I’m just what are some of the obstacles that you think that somebody is going to have to get over in order to really start to make progress here?

 

Well, first of all, you know, if you’re thinking about starting your own podcast, you may be thinking, well, wait, what do I want to offer at the end of that? Right. So some way of following the nation framework, what’s my next step? Okay. So one of those things is, oh, I might need to create a master class or something like that.

 

Well, I just gave you the recipe for that. Right. And you’re actually going to find your people that you’re going to want to create a master class for from your podcast guests. Okay. Some of them are going to stand out, as happened to me. I heard a guy speaking on stage, Skai Louis Alvarez, and he was talking about Niching in the cannabis cannabis business, as he called it.

 

So I was talking to him and he mentioned, oh yeah, by the way, I have, you know, doubled my revenue in the last 90 days by offering this IoT service. I’m like, wait, what? How did you do that? Right. And so, anyway, I had to reschedule a meeting with them, spent an hour, and I was floored by the end because he said, yeah, I found and I discovered it by accident, but one of my clients was a senior center.

 

And, you know, there’s a whole story behind that which I have which we now have a webinar and sell his masterclass on. But he just I basically got him to tell me the stories about how he discovered this thing, about offering an IoT managed service. And there was my inspirational launch of the podcast, which quite frankly, has one overarching purpose.

 

Yes, I get to interview great people who then walk through. I have my own framework. Stephen. Right. I’m following my own recipe. It is my playbook format, which I go through in the interviews, but essentially just like to use the word recipe a lot. I use the word playbook a lot. Okay. And it’s literally what’s the playbook for this.

 

What’s the playbook for this? Am always asking that question. So I literally got Lewis to break down the playbook for going from I don’t have an IoT managed service to. I’ve got 190 days later with three specific managed services that anybody can sell, even if they’ve never sold IoT before. And that is the masterclass. So I created the masterclass literally by just walking, you know, literally putting Lewis there over a six week period as he’s breaking down the business he’s already doing.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: How to Drive Traffic to the Masterclass

 

So what’s great is he had the testimonial. He was an expert. I, he, I just, you know, created the masterclass by pushing him forward. And that’s a great example of how our audience of business owners can find a subject matter expert, they can follow your playbook and they can go about creating content and an offer that is monetizable.

 

They can do that at low risk, right? That’s correct. So that’s the way to overcome the objection. But now you’re saying well okay. But the next problem is how am I going to run, traffic to this masterclass offers a week in and week out basis that isn’t hey buy my class, buy my class, and we’re just keep running the same old webinar which I could do.

 

Or what’s one of the obstacles my market has is they’re like, well, Lewis might be a unicorn. Yeah, he got this one guy and he’s making over $1 million selling it. Managed services. But he might be unique. All right, well, how can I overcome that? How about a podcast where I interview person after person week after week?

 

And what do I want to have happen? I want to have my honest listeners over to go. Wait a second. This guy’s making money. This guy’s making money. Wait, this guy is making money with this stuff. Dang. And they experience FOMO, the fear of missing out. They’re like, shoot, I’m the only guy left who isn’t making money with it.

 

I got to get in. And then I provide the next step, which is to go to free Diet class.com, where you can get a free class taught by Lewis and I on how to do it without free classes. The auto webinar, which then leads to the masterclass right now. So I created the masterclass first. Again, not because I was the expert, but I partnered.

 

Now I’m creating the podcast by interviewing other experts. And now, as it turns out, there are a lot of other sponsors, a lot of technology companies, including Microsoft, who’s a sponsor, who say, hey, I want this whole new thing, this channel, right? I’m creating a new category of people, which I call IoT MSPs, IoT managed service providers.

 

So I’m saying, hey, there’s this new emerging category and these are the people that get it, because what’s the problem experienced by the vendors? Well, they got a little prospect, one person at a time. Lots of one-on-one coaching to find those people who are ready to actually sell IoT. And I’m grooming those people.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: How the Traditional Marketing Funnel Works

 

So now I’ve got another sponsor, and these people are willing to pay me to reach this audience that I’m building up in this brand new category of service providers. Yeah. Because you’re, you’re not offering them skills. You’re not even offering them skills. You’re offering them something even better than skills. I don’t even know what SQL is other than SQL server sales qualified lead okay.

 

There you go. Right. So but you know, in the traditional marketing funnel sounds right. The sort of the not the way top of the funnel. But once somebody ops in and sort of kind of prequalifies a little bit, you become a marketing qualified lead. But then that has to go over to the sales team.

 

Let’s test that person’s interest. Do they have the financial wherewithal to buy whatever, blah, blah, blah. And then they become an SQL. But what you’re offering prospective sponsors is something even better than that. Because going back to your end of the niche, you’re offering them sales qualified leads that match the niche that is a brand new category, which means the people that are in that group are even more valuable than just the traditional marketing funnel as well.

 

That’s correct. In fact, as it turns out in this webinar that Lewis teaches about how he created these three managed services, there is a product behind that. And again, when we teach in the webinar, we’re not super product heavy, because if I did that it engages a different part of their technologist brain, not the part that says why do I need to do this or not?

 

Right. So at the end we reveal, hey, by the way, all three of these services can be done on a box called domains. That was not even sold in this market before I actually found it over in the consumer space, because it’s licensed by a little company called BestBuy and is used to manage IoT in 60,000 homes.

 

And when Best Buy doesn’t want to do a truck role, every time somebody Netflix goes down. So they are able to login and manage all of this IoT in someone’s home. I just grabbed that box and brought it over to the IoT world, and you can have this now for only 19 bucks a month. Now, a lot of people are like, wait, I’m selling a $480 service, and I’m paying these guys 19.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Mapping Out The Journey

 

Yep. Well, that’s pretty cool. That’s good math. Okay, so guess what? I had my beta class masterclass people and almost signed up 26. I didn’t give them leads. I didn’t give them scheduled calls. I gave them 26 customers without them having to pick up the phone. Yeah, and that’s where that’s where the strength of your niche and really any that’s where that just has so much value for your model.

 

Right. And, you know, part of the thing too is then mapping out the journey from, okay, I don’t have an IoT, you know, managed service to I do have one. What are those steps that someone needs to go and put them into a diagram? With one piece of paper? Well, the same thing is true for your sponsors.

 

Like, okay, so how do they solve the problem? Do they even have a journey mapped out? So if they don’t, I can show. Well, let me show you the journey. We have to take somebody cold out there and Facebook attracts them in, engage them, nurture them and turn them into a customer. Would you like to see what that journey looks like?

 

Absolutely. And I sure, bro. Okay, so that you’re not even in my market, right? So what I do though, is before I do that is your Trojan horse funnel. So your Trojan horse idea, which I turn into a funnel. Right. So one of the cool things is if I was trying to sell sponsorship and if I were to just go to somebody I don’t really know, some technology vendor who has to be advertising it.

 

And I go, hey, I’ve got something, a new podcast for you to sponsor. So my first conversation is about sales, like, okay, well, that’s possible, but if I invited them to be a guest on a podcast, that’s a lot cooler and sexier, right? Yep. On the other hand, so I can invite them in and and I can there’s some things I can do on the front end just to see are they ready for this?

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: The 4 Levels of the Pyramid

 

Okay. And so I actually had created, you know, something for my market. I could share that on the screen if you’d like. That would be awesome. Okay. What I found is that sponsors in my market are one of four places. Okay. So they could be a brand new IoT company and they barely got off the ground.

 

Maybe they got some funding. They don’t even have any customers yet. They’re just an idea. Okay, so Mark, hang on just one second. So you’re going to have to, for Onward Nation listeners who are just listening to this in audio form, you have to kind of describe this visually in Onward Nation, we will put this in, into the show notes to make sure that you can track along with the video side of this as well.

 

So sorry to interrupt, Mark. Good. So I want to find out where they’re at right now. I can ask these questions pretty easily. And I found a litmus test question. But so there’s a pyramid. It has four levels. On the bottom level I call a prototype. So the problem these guys are experiencing is they got a product.

 

Maybe they got some funding to create it. They don’t have many customers yet. So what’s their problem? Well, super high burn rate. You’re paying your developers. You’re paying engineers and you’re trying to land that first customer. So you’re burning stuff pretty quick okay. And so you need to get those first set of customers so you can get some projects and proof of concepts out there.

 

Okay. But eventually you could land in every product is a one off thing. Right. So that’s the second level project level. The third level is what I call the playbook level. That’s where you’ve got a repeatable process that you can literally hand a recipe or a playbook to a channel. Partners say, here’s the way to sell this thing.

 

Here is the problem it solves. Here’s the marketing material. Here’s everything you need. So for my audience, my perfect audience is the guy who’s already had a playbook level or at a project level, but trying to break out of that prison of selling one off. Okay. By introducing if I can help them create a playbook, I can then put it in front of the audience.

 

My audience wants a step by step recipe. They don’t want to have figured out that here’s how to do it right. And then the fourth level on the pyramid is what I call a platform. That’s like Microsoft or, you know, where they’ve got an Azure platform or Amazon who has AWS, where people are coming to them to adapt their software to their platforms.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: The Playbook Level

 

Okay. So the big companies have that, but really my niche is the guys who are at the project level but ready to break forward or the people who are at the playbook level. Okay, so if I put a prototype out there, that’s fine. But honestly, if I were to give them 20 new partners tomorrow, it would break their business, right?

 

They’re not ready for it yet. They’re not ready. And even a project guy. So how do I get, let’s say, project people ready to be playbooks? Whether it’s consulting services that are right, I can charge them a significant chunk of change to help them get ready. So consulting falls in there if they’re at the playbook level and truly are there.

 

And here’s how I know. There’s one question I ask. So and I’m telling you, I’ve asked this of some of the biggest technology companies ever, okay. And they said, oh yeah, we’re ready. Well, what do you say? Well, look at my website, Nick. Okay. I’d like to have a guest there? But I’d like to invite you along with a partner of yours.

 

Do you have a partner in mind? If they go in five seconds, like, yes, I do, and I could introduce you tomorrow. Then they’re ready. They’re at the playbook level. If they hesitate, if there are crickets going on in the background, as if they are 30s of silence, because I don’t break the silence after I ask that question, then I know they’re not ready.

 

I don’t care who they are. And some of the biggest channels, you know, distributors out there, multi billion companies, have a 30’s of dead air as I asked them that they weren’t ready. Wow. So even though their website said they were ready, they weren’t ready. So now, you know, there’s an opportunity there. But that litmus test question and what’s great about having a sponsor come on with a partner, it doesn’t feel at all.

 

It feels like a regular interview because I’m getting a partner to tell me that. Well, tell me your background. How did you find these guys? Well, what’s it like? You know, and how did you sell this thing? I’m going through the whole playbook, but from the partner’s perspective, and really all the sponsors are doing is providing enough clarity on their offer.

 

And then to make an offer at the end. So this is so smart because let me give this back to make sure I’m tracking with you. Yes. I think what I’m hearing you say is that you’ve got the pyramid in mind. Obviously, you’re letting the pyramid drive your guest list and then during the interview, because you’re using the Trojan horse as a strategy during the interview, that’s where they’re qualifying pre-qualifying or excluding themselves, or I should say excluding.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Screening Pre-Qualified Prospects 

 

They are showing you through that conversation where they’re at the pyramid. And then that’s what’s helping you drive the next steps. Am I tracking with you? That is correct. And so what I do is now I have a prospect list that I had a VA build, and the prospect list was built from people who had spent some money in this channel.

 

So the technology vendor has gone to a show and they bought a booth that tells me, hey, they’re already spending money in this market, right? So pretty easy to find. Go to an event like an IoT event, see who all the sponsors are, write them down and find their contact information. Okay, then what do you do where you send them into a funnel?

 

And this funnel, which I’m showing on the screen. The first thing is, if you need further qualification, people like, hey, where are you at? Like in my case, I need to know if they are a partner or a vendor? And then on this authority amplifier page, what I do is I teach them something. Hey, listen, if you come on and you’re a guest, here’s what I’m going to ask you.

 

I’m going to ask you, that I use this framework of questions. Call the playbook. First we’re going to talk about the problem you solve. Now we’re going to talk about El, the loss that your clients could experience if they don’t solve that problem. Hey, what does your avatar aspire to do? Like if this problem, if you could solve it for them.

 

What? What good happens? Y equals what happens if someone said yes to your solution? Give me a testimonial. B is the business model. And this is where a lot of these technology guys make mistakes. They go too quickly in their technology stack and they lose. People go, oh, that was interesting. But they don’t take action. People in my market really want to know, how am I going to actually make money by selling this guy’s stuff?

 

Oh, is the offer they make to their client the second oh, and play in playbook is the offer I’m making right now in this video in the second part of this guest funnel. Okay. And the offer I’m making is for a free strategy call. Okay. And then the K is called to action. So what you need to do is click below.

 

Schedule a meeting with me and fill out the application. Then we’re going to hop on the phone together to see if we’re a good fit and go to the next level, which is now. I can see if they are qualified, and set up a guest application. If you know, if they are truly qualified to be a guest, they become a guest.

 

If they’re not, I can now offer them a done for you marketing service to help them get ready. And, all that good stuff. This is absolutely brilliant. And what I love about it is the strategy behind it, but then how you broke it down. In not only, you know, bite sized chunks for our audience, which I’m super, super grateful for and how you stepped everybody through it, but also just how you’ve operationalized it.

 

I think that is really, really smart. So I know that we’re quickly running out of time, and I want to be conscientious of your schedule because I know how compressed it is. But this is super, super smart. 

 

But before we go, before we close out, I know we covered a lot, but is there any final advice that you want to share with Onward Nation business owners? Anything else you think we ought to cover? And then please tell our listeners the best way to connect with you, Mark. 

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: Final Advice from Mark

 

Right. So if you’re thinking about launching a podcast, this is all because you have a passion to serve your audience. Right? And when I say you marry a market, I meant it seriously, like you are.

 

You are invested in this market and these avatar, these people that you want to serve. And so you spend the time you’re willing to hop on a phone and really dig through the obstacles. And honestly, you can build your business by helping other people build their own farm. Okay? And that really is why we do all this stuff.

 

Why, you know, we spend those sleepless nights trying to figure all this stuff out because there’s an audience we want to serve. We really have a passion for helping these IT guys build a successful business so they can experience what I did. I mean, I was able to build a business and sell it for a decent sum of money, and I would love them to experience the same thing.

 

It could be life changing for business owners. Phenomenal. Best way to connect with you, Mark. 

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business 

 

Why Use Digital Media: How to Connect with Mark

 

Right now would be the IoT playbook. Okay. And what I would recommend people do actually, is go to IoTPlaybook.com. And we’ll I’m sure we’ll put those in the show notes, but I want them to actually go through this funnel.

 

Because then they can experience for themselves what I’m talking about. You know, you know that you know that it’s there, now, I want you to not just go through it to be because you want to become a guest. Hey, by the way, if there’s anybody listening who wants to be a guest, you have to be a technology company.

 

Go through it. I’d love to have you as a guest or you’re an IT business owner. Something like that. But even if you’re not, I want you to experience it. But now you’re aware that you’re actually in a funnel and be aware of the points and stuff like that. Plus, I’m going to have a walk through. I think you and I talked about doing this, go to guest funnel.com and we’ll just have a walkthrough of this whole thing.

 

And that’s what I, that’s what I love about all of our Onward Nation guests. And you did this in spades in this conversation Mark. And that is the generosity of it all. There’s no sales pitch here for Onward Nation listeners. And you were so transparent and so generous with your expertise and then, you know, giving them the opportunity to to walk through a funnel, knowing that they’re in a funnel, but being able to to put the hat on as a business owner and being able to walk through that experience to think, okay, this is exactly now I can take this framework using your word.

 

And now I need to get smart about my own copywriting so I can do this for my own nation. It is really, really smart. This was hugely valuable, Mark. Oh I appreciate that. Yeah. So no matter how many notes you took and I took a bunch and I hope that you did do or how often you go back and relisten to Mark’s words of wisdom.

 

Again, I sure hope that you do. The key is that you have to take this generosity, this book of knowledge, the playbook, literally the playbook that he just gave you. Take it and apply it into your business right away and accelerate your results. And, Mark, we all have the same 86,400 seconds in a day. And I am grateful that you said yes.

 

And I’m grateful that you were in full on mentor teacher mode to help us move our businesses onward to that next level. Thank you so much, my friend, I appreciate it. Thanks for the opportunity. 

 

This episode is complete, so head over to OnwardNation.com for show notes and more food to fuel your ambition. Continue to find your recipe for success here at Onward Nation.

 

Ask the experts for more insights on why use digital media for your business