The Unstoppable Marketer®

Gaining 9.5 Million Followers & Scaling Brands w/ London Lazerson (@londonlaz)

May 16, 2023 Trevor Crump & Mark Goldhardt Season 3 Episode 14
The Unstoppable Marketer®
Gaining 9.5 Million Followers & Scaling Brands w/ London Lazerson (@londonlaz)
Show Notes Transcript

In this episode, we interview London Lazerson, a renowned content creator with 9.5 million followers on TikTok and a multiple thriving businesses. 

Join us as we dive into his secrets for content creation and scaling businesses. @londonlaz jumps into his creative process, engagement strategies, and valuable advice for aspiring creators. Gain insights into building a personal brand, leveraging social media, and achieving entrepreneurial success. Don't miss this opportunity to learn from one of the industry's legends. 

Please connect with Trevor on social media. You can find him anywhere @thetrevorcrump

Trevor:

Yo, what's going on everybody? Welcome to the unstoppable Marketer Podcast with me as always the co host who cut his hair. Mark goldheart. How are you? Mark goldheart? who just had a baby? I just had gratulations baby girl tell us about it

Mark:

baby girl Baby Anna. Baby Anna is here. She's healthy. She's a dream of a baby. I mean, how long ago? Thursday, so she's fine early by versus first kid. Yeah, no. Third, third, third, first girl, get a TV or something, bro. So we have calmed down to little boys. And they're alligators. They're just little monsters ever since birth to I mean, they're great. I love them. But they are a lot. Go and Anna came into her life and she's just been so mellow. which either means she's going to be a handful later or maybe she'll be mellow her whole life. I don't know. But for now we'll take it. It's been great.

Trevor:

Ah, she's the youngest. If you have you guys might have more

London:

new species. Yeah, or whatever. It's called in 2023. Yeah, species.

Trevor:

Yeah, exactly. Term is species. Species

London:

species. Yeah.

Trevor:

Do you like girls? Awesome. A girl is amazing.

Mark:

She's great. It's funny, I think the first moment because everyone says it's different. Like if your girl dad or boy dad, right? Yeah. I think my first moment of realizing the difference was with both of my boys. It was like they were born. They put them on the weight scale. Right. And like, I just like snapped a picture and sent it straight to my family. Yeah, you know, just there's the baby. Yeah. And then with Anna, I was like, Ah, maybe I should crop that.

Trevor:

Maybe I should put a filter on

Mark:

that. Yeah. We'll wait till she's done up and ready.

London:

In the case that she looks back on the photo and says Dad, why'd you wedding foot wedding? Yeah.

Mark:

Yeah, I don't want her little naked. Baby photo photo out.

London:

Oh, I see. I see what you're saying. Let's just penises are okay. Yeah, the other stuff.

Mark:

Like two boys like whatever. You gotta keep it somehow, like, my little girl wrapper up like, oh, with my boys. I don't even think about it. Just like, here's the here they are. Here's my boy. It's

London:

funny. Actually.

Trevor:

Wait, when was your when was August born? What year? 2020? Yeah,

Mark:

he was a COVID baby.

Trevor:

I mean, also, you know, we're like three years, like, you know, the the world is changed to you know, makes you rethink the stuff you put online as well. That's true. Yeah.

Mark:

And online. And because I don't post those online. It's just like a family. Right, like family group text and like, Yeah, but still, it's just funny. Like, it was funny that like, it was just a natural thing that happened. Yeah. I wasn't thinking about it. Just like dad protective dad

Trevor:

mode. Yeah, let's, let's dress her up. And we'll she's gonna have some good protective breadmaker. Nice. That's exciting, dude. Well, congratulations. And we're happy. You're here.

Mark:

Well, I'm happy I'm here. Yeah. Yeah. And we have a wonderful guest.

London:

Yeah, sorta. Yeah, he's a find out.

Trevor:

He has been hearing this mysterious voice. I wonder if anyone else you will see the title the podcast and know exactly who it is. But you know, okay. So I will formally introduce our guests. London, London, London, London, London Lazar person who is a massive, massive content creator here. Based out of Salt Lake City, wannabe. Wannabe want to be content creator escapes me has 9.5 million followers on Tiktok and 140 plus million likes that he bought it all? Not at all. He's getting their numbers up. Yeah. What's up, dude?

London:

Guys, I was I was pumped. You know, I love I love the crossroads of content creation and marketing. Because everything I've built is with standard marketing practices. And it's something I don't see many creators do. Yeah. You know, you see? And I mean, there's there is also the demise of that, right? Because of my marketing mind. Sometimes it's totally authentic. Sometimes it's hard to build an audience, you know? But yeah, guys, I was I was pumped when you when you hit me up.

Trevor:

Yeah, I was telling mark. Well, I actually posted I posted something on LinkedIn, actually the other day saying, hey, like, I'm like, 40 for 41 on people I asked to be on the podcast. I always think that people are gonna turn you down. Yeah, and I don't know why. I mean, I met you one time. I don't know if you remember this, but you and me met. We are the founders of in

London:

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's very brave. Yeah. Match. Yep. Yep. And

Trevor:

we try to introduce to you anyways, and I was like, Dude, we gotta get this guy on the podcast. He'd be great. We've had a few like a handful of content creators on before and those episodes are so awesome. Yeah, let's get him on and I was telling him you know, so I had like my I had like my speech ready for you, dude. So I'm like, like, usually what I'll do is I'll be like, I got I got ammo, right? I'll like my ammo is like, Yo, dude. love what you're doing. We'd love to have you on this podcast and I'll send that out. And then my next my next thing is like, if I don't hear back from me in a minute, I'm going to be like, Hey, we're like, we're not just some dumpee podcasts like, we're top 10 books, and I'll toss that out there. So you're like, Okay, you know, and then my next thing is like, I'll find like our best performing clips on social Yeah, then I'll send smart marketing. And then the next thing is like, I'm gonna send you our best episodes. And that's usually it and I'm like, message you. I'm like, Yo, dude, love to have you on the podcast. I'm like, getting ready to send the other things in like you just like, Yeah, let's do it. Like, what a stud, dude.

London:

I think the thing that got me ahead in life in so many ways, not to be, you know, boastful, but please do though. My dad told me when I was really young, he said, If you never asked, the answer is always no. Because it would always bother me when the waiter would come to the table, and he would ask for extra things. Or, you know, we'd be pulling up to a basketball game, and he'd asked for VIP parking when we had nosebleeds tickets, you know what I'm saying? And more often than not, the girl has a tail, it'd be like, yeah, you can park here. And that kind of wrap my head around. What you were saying is like we get in our heads, so often to ask people, people things, and in the worst case, I say, Yeah, or you don't respond. We never talk and you never knew what you lost. I never knew what I lost. And we move on. Totally. So I am a huge advocate of don't beg, ever, but don't ever be afraid to shoot your shot. Because the worst thing I can say is no. Love it. And I've people tell me no all the time. So

Trevor:

yeah, well, we appreciate you coming on. So what I want to do is I want to open up the floor a little bit just cast like a little background on you. Who's London? How did you get started? And then we're going to kind of jump into it. And I have a feeling that this is going to be a really so?

London:

Um, I have a you know, out of out of foundation? I am. I tried to do I try to take the unconventional route in pretty much everything I do. And this started, when I almost became the real life, Billy Madison 2015, I was going back to college. And the admissions lady was like, hey, everything looks good. You're ready to go. You just need to take a math test. And I was like, Yeah, for sure. So I go take this math test, and they get the results back instantly. And she's like, you know, we've got some good news. And I'm like, no way that I just pass that math test, because I'm like, half stupid, like, I am so bad at math, just so bad at math. And in my head, you know, trying to be confident I pass this test and she goes, we don't offer your math level here. You are going to have to go take it at one of these high schools. But she said there's good news. Well, the good news is that they had this program where I could go back to the high school,

Trevor:

the good news, you don't have to pay because you're going to high school.

Mark:

The good news is you are going back to high school.

London:

Yeah, the bad news is you're still gonna get bullied now. So in that in that moment, it was just so crystal clear. And I don't think many people have this opportunity where it's so crystal clear that they don't belong to somebody or to something Sure. You know what I mean? There's, there's like so many entrepreneurs and marketers who are stuck at their dead end job. And nothing crystal clear will ever happen to them where they have to quit, right? Where they say, okay, the decision is made for me, I'm going to quit and build something right? Even though everybody in our jobs are always thinking of side hustles. Right. So the one of the hardest thing I had ever done at that maturity level was look that admissions lady in the eye and withdraw all of my application, all of my deposits right then in there. And I knew that I had always known that I wanted to take an unconventional route and not do college and try to build something for myself. I just didn't know what it was going to look like. And that was the perfect moment where it was decided for me not going back to high school. Sure what I'm just not, I don't care how stupid I am. I'm setting foot in a high school. Right. And, you know, they fought really hard to keep me right. I mean, and this is why we can talk about, you know, the revenue from attendance and things like that. Conspiracies is college for the business owner for the student, right.

Mark:

Industrial Educational Complex. Yeah, we could get into the fun which fires

London:

me up I mean, but I'm, I'm okay to see both sides. You can get a great education and you can meet, you can meet your future business partner, your future wife, there's so many valuable things that cause that constitutes can

Trevor:

come from education. Sure, yeah.

London:

But when you're in the moment trying to withdraw trying to make your own decision and they already have some form of money from Yeah, it is difficult anyway. Got away from that never looked back.

Mark:

Now which university was this? UVU okay.

London:

I mean, at that time that's like the bottom of the totem pole. I think

Trevor:

you've used come up more,

London:

I think I think it's Yeah, I think it's cool. Now bottom of the totem

Trevor:

pole would be like more like slick. You know, they wouldn't even take me

Mark:

to college. So there's nothing wrong though.

Trevor:

I did slick, good slick. For my associates,

Mark:

dude, save some money. Hell yeah. Go to college.

Trevor:

I also got a FASFA from it too. So I actually made any money. I was so

Mark:

poor, I had to go to sleep. I never took a language in high school. Oh, so I had to go and take sign language. From Wow, I'm there. Yeah,

London:

I mean, this is another point of that's a perfect point about college. Yeah. Like, you, Oh, you didn't take a language? Well, here's a easy route that you can do just to get that credit and pay us but you're not gonna learn anything? Oh, yeah, I don't I don't remember any sign language? No, that's what I'm saying. It's like, a sign language is extremely valuable to our society. But did you ever show interest in that? You know,

Mark:

Oh, dude, I was just I was the guy who just like got by, by the skin of my teeth every time you know, see, see plus, that was my grade every time High School, beginning of college. Yeah, that's how I did one of

London:

my hot takes kind of went semi viral on LinkedIn about college that was donco only. Okay, here's my hot take about college, only go to college if somebody else is paying for it. And that is something that I feel confident in getting behind. Because there are a ton of ways for kids to get their college paid for. And there are a ton of opportunities by not going to college. So you can kind of get the best of both worlds. You want to go to college, work your ass off to get the scholarships and have somebody else pay for it. Sure. Other than that, it's not too worth it to me. So this idea of being unconventional, just started, you know, with quitting quitting college. And I had always wanted to start a business and was going to the business, not the business school, but the entrepreneurship program or whatever. And so I was like, that's just that's where I'm going to start. And started my first business couple weeks after that is called STICKY SOUNDS who's a Bluetooth speaker that worked with GoPro mounts? Oh, nice. So we were riding GoPros IPO GoPro was super popular back then. Everybody wanted one. Everybody had one. And so we were like, what if we could offer this insane accessory and the exit strategy was get bought by GoPro. Yeah, I knew nothing about marketing. I didn't even know what advertising meant. I didn't know people spent money behind Facebook videos. I had no idea what an ad was how it got fed to you. That people filmed ads, right. I literally knew none of this until I was about six, seven months into my business and we weren't having any sales. Yeah. You know, again, I'm like this semi stupid person who has the ability to take crazy risks. Yeah. And sometimes that creates like society's greatest villains, right? I don't think I'm a villain yet. But I've just always been a risk taker. And that's what got me started in marketing was that absolute failure, like we had funding that I went to knock doors on in rich neighborhoods to get finally we got a guy to commit a couple $100,000 to the product dev fees. I was 21 just so stupid, just so stupid, but such a big dreamer that I just was going to do whatever it took, you know. And so that got me started into marketing because I just failed, right? That led to a creative director position at an ad agency which led to building my social media. Yeah, so that's kind of me in a nutshell, sporadic, unconventional but will risk everything to make my life better and the lives around me better.

Trevor:

Like so you're at this ad agency? What what happened at the ad agency that made you like, what did the ad agency inspire you at all to get into content creation?

London:

No, but it refined it. Okay. So from 2015 Even while I was building my business on the side, I was always filming YouTube videos, always doing Instagram posts, always trying to build some form of of an audience. Okay. And the ad agency showed me how to do that better. So for example, right from 2015 to 2018. I had been making weekly content if not close to daily, and just nobody ever wants vlog style for you already know, posting it. Oh, but for your Yeah, just about me. So, the vlog here in their storytime, you know, just setting the phone My car and telling a story. Yep. To Action Sports to comedies to sketch comedy, you know, just anything that I thought of like you were

Mark:

dressing up and doing a sketch. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Are these still up? You want to scroll back? Most of them are up. Amazing. It's gonna get a social clip of actually, I don't know,

London:

it's a dark, dark, dark place down there, don't ya do it, do it on your own discretion. But. So, right. That's like a three year stint of I really want to be a content creator, I really want to be a full time YouTuber was the dream. Yeah. But you know, it's not making money. So got this position, the ad agency and started seeing online behavior, what gets a click? What gets a purchase? What happens after the click? Why do people stop on videos? And why don't they stop on videos? And just kind of inherently I was just downloading all this information on how to get people to watch my videos. Yeah, because I was doing it for my clients. And I remember there was a turning point when I was on the phone with a client. And I was literally telling him everything he needed to do to catch a break organically and in everything that he needed to do to catch a break with paid media. Yeah. And that was one of my best clients. So I go, Wow, maybe I do know something.

Mark:

Sure. Maybe I should do this for me. Yeah.

London:

So I'm directing this commercial. This is the best part. And an actor that the producer had hired shows up and we're kind of talking shop and I go Yeah, so what do you do other than act and he goes home, I'm gonna take talker. And this was February of 2020. So tick tock, and musically emerged the summer prior, nobody had had it through the rest of the year, then slowly, people are having it now Mike had heard of tick tock, maybe once I saw their corny ads of like girls dancing, whatever, that was my knowledge of tick tock. And I just am like laughing as in his face, almost like it made me laugh out loud. And he goes, Yeah, I just said, a million followers. And I'm like, wait, what? So to set the stage even more, the 100 days prior to this conversation, I had done 100 sketch comedies in a row, filmed audio lighting, every day, every day 100 100 in a row scripted, different themes. I was making fun of influencers.

Mark:

Now, are you scripting the whole thing did anyone working with you

London:

know, scripting, shooting it by myself, and probably 80% of the time I set it up on a tripod, get all the shots, editing, and then posting every day? And how how much time was this? per day. So my schedule was nine to 559. And this I wrote about on my LinkedIn if you want to, yeah, I scroll on my LinkedIn. It was a schedule I set for myself just for 100 days to try to get out of my job to try to make my Instagram blog and my YouTube blog. So work at my job nine to nine to five, and work out on my dreams, five to nine. So in that five to nine, I was shooting, scripting, shooting, editing, and I didn't understand batch content creation, or else I would have just shot it on the weekend. I did this every day, every single day for 90 days. So now this kid is telling me he shakes his ass on Tik Tok, and has a million followers. And I'm like this stoic, you know, oh, gee, real content created in my head. I wasn't right. Right. And it just did not make sense. This is that moment when you're like, I

Mark:

got a milkshake. I can shake that.

London:

Yeah, I could do that. It's that moment when you realize, you know, you're almost part of the big joke. You know, you're part of like The Truman Show where? Here I am doing my absolute best to entertain people. And here this kid is shaking his ass. Yeah. So it was just mind blown. I don't think up until that point, I had met somebody with a million followers on social media. So I was just so intrigued, right? Because I was trying to reach that. And I get on his profile. And again, I'm just so distraught. I'm like, Are you kidding me? How is this possible? But that took my mind from maybe tic TOCs just where the attention is going. Like, how does this kid already have a million followers? Yeah, I didn't know there's a million people on tick tock. So that was February of 2020, March of 2020. I said, I'm going to do 100 Tic TOCs in a month. And I'm going to prove this kid wrong. That you know, I can do it too, but it's not hard. It's just kind of this vendetta almost even though me and this kid are super close. Now here. You can love each other. Yeah. But I'm like, I'm going to do this as a vendetta post 100 times. So zero followers.

Mark:

How many followers does he have now?

Trevor:

Like 1.8 or something? So you want yeah, big time.

London:

Rather than his face. Here's

Mark:

kid 9x Remember that?

London:

Yeah. Yeah, it told you now. If I saw beginning March 1, or whatever it was somewhere in there, I just said three videos a day. Let's do this. Picked up the nine to five, five to nine, roll again. And did 100 100 videos just random, anything I could think of. Not dancing, no dancing, no trends, just sketch comedy, storytime, Tesla's stuff, whatever I can think of that. Yeah, at the end of the month had had 100k. I'm like, I knew it. I knew it. This is where the attention is. This is where it's going short form content that the agency that I was working at, we were already doing short form content now. I started to see it more organically. Yep. So

Mark:

and when did you start seeing short form content? Take off, right, because you worked at this background knowledge that maybe the listener doesn't know. Yeah, but good knowledge. You worked at chamber media, which is one of the premiere kind of video production agency. Yeah, one of the bigger

Trevor:

Harmon brothers style. Yep. Stuff like raindrop.

Mark:

So yep. Those types of agencies. And that's all long form. Really? high production? Yeah, like million dollar type videos. And they're five minutes long, right? sometimes longer. Yeah, totally. So when did you start noticing, oh, shoot, like, these aren't hitting the same way they used to? Or at least, maybe like the cost effectiveness of it, perhaps going down? Yeah. And you saw this opening was short form? Like, when did that happen?

London:

It's a good, it's good question. So I started the agents agency, right at the end of 2018. And what was going on is we would build these huge videos. I mean, yeah, like you said, over the course of a year, there's companies are spending a million dollars on these videos, right.

Mark:

And disclaimer, I still think they're worth it in certain situation a lot for a lot of reasons. So I'm not saying they're not worth it anymore, but not where there was, there was a shift in the there's a shift in in behavior and what people

Trevor:

want how we consume. Yeah,

London:

there's just an opening, right. And so here's what happened. This was my first because again, my my marketing and advertising knowledge is still very limited. Like I had learned it since my first business, but it's still pretty limited. This, this was a dream job. For me, I knew that if I could get in at an agency, I'd be able to build anything and sell anything I wanted after that, the stepping stone for me. And not to downplay my performance agency, but it was definitely a stepping stone, just like everything I do. Like, if, if what I'm doing now isn't a stepping stone to something better. Why am I even doing it? Right, right. So we had this client who again, had spent like, $75,000 on one five minute video. And we call them anchor videos, Hero videos, you know, whatever, staple videos, and it absolutely flopped. Again, it was more top of the funnel, but nothing was trickling to the bottom even. And the president of the company goes, Hey, London, like we were about to lose this client. Can you just film a little just a little something for free on your own time or whatever? And I go, Yeah, fill in this little thing in my kitchen. And can you say what company it was? It was for Joe? Joe? Dark chocolate Joe Joe's dark chocolate. Like a big Costco brand now. Yeah,

Trevor:

I know the owner of that. Yeah, he's from here, right? Yes. From the alpine area. So we did. Yeah. Joe. Joe. Joe's Have you

London:

chose not so good? Yeah, it's pretty good. And it's like what is very natural, very healthy gender fluid.

Trevor:

He married a he? Yeah, exactly. He married a covey. Gluten Free he married a covey nine free cage free.

Mark:

I'm all I'm all about making sure everything I eat has dairy and as

Trevor:

I have that type I'm just kidding. It might not have that time. I can't remember though. I'm

Mark:

the raw milk guy who's

London:

have dairy in it. It's an apple.

Mark:

Thanks for me sorry.

Trevor:

Yeah, all right. Proceed. Something in your kitchen.

London:

So you Joe Joe will judge as the mom or something yeah to cancer.

Trevor:

I don't know that part. Definitely the mom

London:

and I just filmed this ad it was kind of I was already doing a ton of video on my own obviously had those skills of editing, edit this little thing together crop it square, which was starting to happen already. crop it square, give it to our ad buyers, they start running it crushes the long form $75,000 ad, this free piece of content that had zero script zero planning. I did some product shots. You know,

Trevor:

but you weren't your Speedo. I was bought made. Yeah. Okay, so that x Yeah.

London:

Yeah, dang it. So my whole career is a sham.

Mark:

Just a little twerking.

London:

Yeah, it was like a little twerking to really cool product shots, twerking, and you know, me eating it. torquing and

Trevor:

little melted chocolate on the chest, you know?

London:

And that was my first sight. And so I remember the conversation. Me and the President had was like, this could just be like a little secret offering we did Go kind of behind the scenes so we get the group

Mark:

menu if you see your menu. Oh, will sell out burger there.

London:

Yeah, the Flying Dutchman. Yeah, well, I've never heard of that. It's just meat. Oh, it's so stupid. I have a friend that eats it. It's Patty cheese patty. The Flying Dutchman is so good. I'm like what?

Trevor:

I get the pickled peppers. Have you heard of the peppers? Yeah,

Mark:

on the menu, Animal Style animal style.

London:

Okay, well, that's not secret, bro.

Mark:

It's not

London:

that's not a secret secret. 15 Okay, that's that's novice bro. Flying Dutchman The Flying Dutchman? I've never heard of that one. Yeah, well, you say to some of the employees and they go what? And you go yeah, you ain't a real one.

Trevor:

Must be new on there.

London:

Yeah, what are you new? Go ask your manager.

Mark:

$20 an hour minimum employee here and you can't even

Trevor:

man those Yeah, those guys are making like 100 grand managers now like no, I think more more like they're making six figures.

London:

Plus they have to though those busy workers. I always hype up the drive thru guy. I'm like, dude, bro show you work harder than 90% of Americans. Almost like really? I'm like, Yeah, and you you burn more calories just at your job than 90% of Americans.

Mark:

In another life. I'd love to be like an in and out manager.

London:

I see him with the hat though.

Mark:

Amazing. Not only that, I would eat a burger every day. I never get sick of burgers. Like I could literally eat a burger every day of my life.

Trevor:

I messed up dairy. I managed a Cold Stone Creamery.

Mark:

I was like, You can't eat ice cream every day. That's badass. I did when you get sick of it. I can't eat ice cream every day. But meat

London:

I don't hamburger

Trevor:

anymore, but I didn't work.

Mark:

Well. What would you do in your alternate life later liver,

London:

you're Are you really I am Larry King.

Trevor:

You're bought into him now that he got caught doing

London:

now I had to I had to cancel my subscription.

Mark:

You just got all me Oregon diet. I don't remember where we picked this kidney. So you

Trevor:

Okay, your boss? He's like, Yeah, offer this secret menu.

London:

So he's like, every time we had a sales call, I'll set one up for you. And you just kind of pitch them as a little tack on like $7,000. tack on. Everybody started buying it. Every single person. I mean, it was it was just crazy. Totally. We were selling it for way too cheap, by the way, for sure, obviously. But pretty soon, we had three or four clients that just wanted short form content. And they said aren't London like, you know, this was kind of your baby? Yeah, take it and run and ended up managing that department. You know, by the end, we were doing several$100,000 months can vary consistently. I have some short form, just in short form. So no long form. I had about 50 employees under me that were split into teams. Each team had 10 clients, something like that. And

Mark:

what was the final quantity? For each client?

London:

It varied, but it was pay us a retainer for X amount of months for X amount of deliverables. Yeah. And you know, there was graphics in there. Just creative. I mean, again, now it sounds standard. But I thought I was Steve Jobs. You know, five years ago? Sure. I was like, This is crazy. Everybody's just saying yes. I think that's actually the beauty of where

Mark:

you're like Screw you. UVU. I can do math. I manage 660 people.

London:

Yeah. And the cool thing about that is and the thing that I want to tell everybody listening, is that if you can just find if you can just Okay, so you have your product. And if you can just figure out how to get people to say yes, that's like, that's part of the sorry, that's the hardest battle is getting people to say yes. And once you get people to say yes. For example, the last two years, one of my products sold like hotcakes with the tic toc stuff. And now it's not. Yeah, but because I've had that experience where I can get time and time again, people to just say yes, and just pay me almost immediately. I know I can do it again. So we're starting to pivot and we're starting to see more yeses versus more nose. But I feel like so many people are just okay with scraping by and they don't look at their product and go why aren't people saying yes to this? Instead? They're just trying harder to make people say yes, sales is so easy, especially in marketing. It is so easy when you have the right product. It is so easy. Since the beginning of time people have needed marketing advertising and video production, right? Sure. So why like try so hard to get somebody say Yes, right. So if you can just get to a point point where you can get multiple yeses. You're on your look, you're on the right track. If everybody's saying now look at your products, right, get your pricing, don't just say, Oh, they weren't the right one, that might be true. But after two years of doing that, and you haven't made good money yet, so

Mark:

we love talking about that, right? Like product. There's only so much you can do in advertising, right? There's only so many levers out there. And sometimes you think there's going to be this like magic silver bullet that you get. And it's just like, boom, I am a millionaire now. And sometimes you are sitting on a goldmine just because you don't have the right advertising. But totally, like, you need to do some inner reflection as a company. Yeah. 2% 100%.

London:

I see, like, all, you know, video production agencies ad buying agencies, and yeah, it's the same library, everybody's doing the same thing pitching the same thing. So why would they say yes to you? And notice somebody else is the struggle. So again, it's how to get people to say, Yes, look inwards, look at your products. And so that set me on a whole new path. This, you know, just having so many teams under me management leadership, it was just kind of skyrocket, right? And,

Trevor:

and remind me during this time, you're, you've got 100,000 followers, right? Plus, you're not okay, so do we, this was 118 to 2020. We took a little setback of it, just managing so building the

London:

department, the short form department was 2018, it's 20. On a per van, we start having the obvious conversation, which wasn't too obvious to the owners of like, hey, please show me a revenue sheet. And I want to compare what I'm doing to you guys. type thing. Yeah. Even though it's their company. That's fine. But I want a little bit more. I want a little bit more. Yeah. You want me to have skin in this game? Give me something. Yeah. Give me an offer. And that's just when it went. So South, got completely pushed out of the agency simultaneously? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Mark:

Maybe we should cut out in the name. So I didn't know the story was going that's up

London:

to you. No, no, by the way, me and the owners are all we're good. Yeah, you're good now? Oh, we're totally good. Yeah, we talk all the time. It was just this, maybe maybe a little bit of a power struggle, right. I mean, I think about my own company by some hotshot rising, and he's taken over the company, by in terms of people that work for him. Right. And we're all the revenues coming. I mean, I would like to think I'd offer him something. And so that led me to just figure out how I'm going to build my own life, which so I'm almost thankful for. For that, in a lot of ways. It didn't workout. I, I can't imagine life outside of an ad agency right now. I just can't imagine. So. Thanks, guys.

Trevor:

It's crazy. It's crazy. Hill, I want to hit on that. Because there's so many of us who lose a job or, you know, you get, you might get replaced by AI, or you're getting Yeah, whatever it might be like, so often, people get rocked a little bit right here. You are, like, you know, you're probably feeling at the prime of your life. Look what I'm doing. Like I built this thing that's making x amount of million dollars a year. I'm invincible. This company can't live without me. Yeah. And then all of a sudden, the next thing you know, it's like, they're slowly pushing you out and somehow living without you. Yeah, right. Yeah. And you think that you know, sometimes you think that it's the end of the world or whatever, you know, and you're feeling really down, but nine times out of 10. If you've got the right, as cliche and cheesy as it sounds, attitude, like,

London:

it's 100% The grass is greener, like,

Trevor:

I know, the grass isn't always greener. But if you've got the right attitude, like, it's always going to push you into the next best thing yet, right? Very rarely have I ever seen somebody where if they had a really good attitude, and they were a go getter, get pushed out, get fired, get laid off, whatever it might be, job becomes obsolete, and they take a step back. They're always taking a step forward when they've got the right out. 100%.

London:

Right. They've got that they've got that chip on the shoulder. But my quitting story is even better. I accidentally clicked on Good Morning America. Amazing on accident. Let's hear it. I don't think I've told this story in a long time.

Mark:

And I'm assuming there's a clip of it.

London:

100% Yeah. Google London. Laz. Good Morning America. And in there, I say, you know, Tiktok well, I'll get to it. But okay, so we have come to these crossroads where maybe I wasn't the best fit for the agency anymore. And, and on my end internally to I was like, I can't be here anymore. If I'm not. If I'm not walking away with a massive check when you guys sell, uh, not going to build this for you. I need to build my own thing, right? Yep. And so there's this perfect crossroads. I mean, talk about destiny. little sliver of destiny. You You have my tic tock blowing up. And then you have upper management, not wanting me there, right? It's just perfect. So I told the President I was like, the, and he was kind of naive to the situation. Because again, tic tock still wasn't popular. Sure, yeah. And he goes, this is 2020. Yeah, this is summer 2022. He goes, somebody told me something like you have half a million followers on Tiktok. And I was like, that's 100k. Yeah. And he was just, he was just, again, that same. I think that same feeling I got from that kid who told me he had a million I think you got for me? Sure. He was like, How is this possible? Like, what's going on? super supportive, right. And I go, Yeah, and I just want to be upfront, if this thing hits a million, I'm quitting on the spot. Yeah. And he's like, Well, damn, you know, I think it kind of made him happy that I was just a weird situation. So it hits a million in September. And since we already had that discussion a couple of months earlier, he, you know, once he's like, okay, let's plan your exit. I need two months out of you. Right. We need a train your replacement, yada, yada. I was like, perfect. Perfect. Perfect. Let's do it. And like that next weekend. Good morning. America wants to interview me. Yeah. And tick tock, tick tock. How not to do the agency more now. Nothing. Yeah, just tick tock. Is the drama of the agency. Yeah,

Trevor:

we heard that there's some inner workings, the small company in Salt Lake City.

London:

Please tell us have you been mistreated? And so, I mean, yeah, back then. Like you had a million followers on Tiktok? Not many. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know what the pool was. I wish I did.

Mark:

But no idea.

London:

So it's a million. And we're planning this quitting that weekend. Like, literally after that conversation where we started planning. Get on Good Morning, America. And they wanted to talk about how creators on Tik Tok are making money. And if it can replace your job, and just one of the first things I said was like, Yeah, I quit my job. Because I'm starting to see some traction over on my tic tock is just such an offhanded comment. That was the header. That was the only piece that made the interview. That was the whole point of Good Morning. Good Morning, America talking to me. So now I'm an idiot. And I'm such a loyal person, almost to my demise where maybe I speak too soon, because I'm scared if somebody finds that thing out. So I call the honors. And I'm like, hey, they would have never seen Good Morning America who watches that? Yeah. First off, none of the employees are gonna see it.

Trevor:

Right. They don't even know what it is. Yeah, like your grandma. Yeah. And then she,

Unknown:

you quit your job? Where's the stability?

Trevor:

You know, are you sure about this?

London:

This tip tap app is Chinese. Anyway, and yeah, that was just kind of an epic story where it just we the best part about the Good Morning America thing is he shortened my what period of training or whatever, to your two month

Trevor:

chain? Yeah, he

London:

was like, let's just get just in case that comes out. Right. Because the next Monday, I got in front of the company and told them I was exiting. Right. So it was kind of, again, you talk about making decisions for me. I tried to be so decisive and so calculated in everything I do. But it seems like just this conversation, I'm hearing myself be like, damn, some of these decisions were really easy. Yeah, you know, and maybe maybe that goes to say, if you're listening to this, that maybe some of the decisions that have been made for your life, you just didn't even notice. Totally, you know what I mean? The the things that led you to a greater place, maybe there's things that were pushing you that way and I'm always looking for things to like, kind of steer my ship formula. But that's that. So anyway, Marketing School. All right. Well, um, so

Mark:

he leaves the agency Luke kalamarez crying in the corner. Yeah.

London:

No, we never talked about Luke on podcast.

Trevor:

All right. So okay, so you leave the agency and now you were full fledged, you're full fledged content creator. What?

London:

like soccer? My favorite quote is crap. I'm blanking now. It's you either you either live long enough to die a hero, or what's the what's the Batman quote? Harvey? Yeah,

Mark:

yeah. Long enough to become the villain or die. Oh,

London:

yeah. You either die a hero or live long enough to become a tick tock a nice, that's that's my tagline. Because it's so true. It's like everybody's becoming a tick tock. Yeah. So you either die here.

Trevor:

Yeah. So what's what's some of your biggest like, I would love one thing I talk well, we talk a lot about two brands and one thing so Mark and I we We've owned a small marketing agency. Yeah. One of the biggest

London:

buying creative or what's the bottling? Both? Yeah,

Mark:

well, like post production post production. Yeah, we're

Trevor:

not, we don't film No, like graphic design,

Mark:

video editing,

Trevor:

just take everything and then we should have graphics. So the

London:

company makes them and then they produce good for you.

Trevor:

So one of the things that we would recognize when we were running ads and like really, really in depth in deep, you know, doing that, you know, like, Phil, full focus was that the there was a strong correlation with brands who are succeeding who had strong organic and personal brands, like entrepreneur, they were crushing it big time. What, what are some thoughts or some tips that you have for individuals, like whether that might be a business owner or the brand themselves? On getting started? Because I still think even though we're even though tick tock, like, you're saying, like, Hey, you live long enough, you're gonna be a tick talker. Right? Like, there's still brands who are utterly terrified, and individuals who are terrified of that what what are some thoughts initial tips you have?

London:

I love this question. Because there's this whole there's a philosophy behind the question. And I think in the, you know, the 1900s, if you look at the 1900s, like pre internet into internet, like early internet, off, it was offer creates clients, I think was the kind of statement who has the best offer. Right? Are you talking about digital marketing? Who has the best offer? They probably have the most clients? Sure. I think it's totally flipped on its head. I mean, I hear some of these offers that these ad agencies are making and for whatever reason, they have a ton of clients. It's gone from offer creates clients to clout creates clients. And those are kind of my three C's. Yeah. So in the early days, I told my I had about $400 a month to hire an assistant, manage my email, send out contracts like DAGs, the whole nine yards. And I said, I said, just to find the I said, to find it. If I get views, I get clients. That is it. That is simple, simple, simple, simple, simple. And you know, we didn't understand the complexity or the depth of that statement before it happened. Sure. So my whole focus went away from outbound sales, running ads for myself, grinding LinkedIn to make the most entertaining most viral content possible. Klout creates clients. Let's do kind of the opposite of what somebody who wants clients is and make all this content for free. In hopes that I catch some eyes because yeah, tick tock was obviously dude, you would not believe the the amount of money people were willing to spend to test tick tock, year and a half ago. Yeah, it was. It was so sad. Some of these checks that were cut. Anyway, look, Travis Barker, look at that ad. It's crazy. I couldn't believe they did that.

Mark:

Interesting. They they got a lot. Uh, they got a lot of guts, dude. They do. They do. That's why they're okay. Yeah, they don't care about anything. That's why they say

Trevor:

I will say this, though. They are they have never been in the black.

London:

They're in the red. What? Yeah, profit profitable wise, and

Trevor:

they've not saved yet to be profitable.

Mark:

Yikes, they're not profitable. Like, talk

London:

about that? Well, okay

Trevor:

to get much money they put in marketing.

London:

Right. But if I'm the owner, if I'm the owner, you know, you talk about stepping stones. These companies don't go don't make profit for a reason. This guy is this guy could be using this ng X for 100

Trevor:

million dollars. You know, yeah, you don't need to. It's an

London:

engine. Yeah. Right.

Mark:

Yeah, I think the CPG space is a little different. Yeah. And in E commerce, like DTC? I don't know. Because the whole conversation right now. venture backed. Yeah, like E comm. And how bad it's gone. Like, it's not a good track too much of it? No, not at all, like Honest Company. Right? They were like a billion. I think they're all the way down like they're down 90% from their top valuation. It's like, it's a bloodbath out there. Also,

London:

just all this valuation stuff. I it's almost like, yeah, it's almost like we don't want to actually be valued this, we just want an article to say that we're valued this. It's so backwards, right? Like I would rather I would rather have a million dollars cash. And let everybody know that then have everybody think that I have 100 million cash, you know what I'm saying? But also perception is reality. So

Mark:

Well, I think what you said, right, it's like Cloud. Yeah, right. Cloud gets you clients cloud gets your business, but like that's a way of generating clout, right? But there's a huge risk factor in it. It's like trying to shoot off a rocket ship with a fuel system.

Trevor:

Yeah, if you can't personally write the same thing, right? Like, hey, I've got cloud, I've got all these views. You start doing stuff. This is this will be interesting how you're going to tie this it back to because we wrote one tangent and then it arrived. Yeah. Anyways, it'll be interesting, right? Like, there's this cloud, right? You get the views, and then you start getting clients and then if they don't see the value from it, then you don't get that. Yeah, you don't get repeated get read up. We're at spreads because DDC founders talk to DTC founders. Yep. Hey, all I saw you use London. Yep. Didn't work. And that's worked

London:

both ways. For me, I'm sure now you, you create relationships that kill it. And those always make new relationships, you unfortunately, that's the price of business, you're gonna pay somebody off. You piss somebody off, and you don't get the next guy, you know, and that's fine. But yeah, and again, I hate the word cloud, because it's this fake perception of somebody's wealth, but

Trevor:

it's so true. And it's true. It's so true. I mean, dude, I do not have a lot of followers. So me saying what I'm about to say is really stupid followers. It doesn't mean it's really stupid. When I'm talking to someone who's got $9 million. I've got like, 36,000. Okay, that's simple. But people take me more serious.

London:

Oh, dear dad. So if you want to get into this, I don't want to talk about this. It's so bad. For example, just true.

Trevor:

Right? You and I'm doing flyers. You must be important,

London:

dude. Right? Exactly. Today, I get this. I went with Luke to Lifetime Fitness. I was on his guests past, they make you sign this contract that you're a guest and they gave you you gave them their your email, your phone, whatever. I get one of the first emails from a sales rep. His name's Devin. And Devin is like, hey, London, you know, template. Hey, London, would love to talk about potentially working with each other, literally. And this is with years of contacts. I've done this so many times. It's bad. But I go, Hey, how are Hey, could I trade one tick tock for a year of lifetime? Here's my tic tock. And he just wrote me back right before this meeting. Let's talk about it. So it's like, you can literally turn your cloud into whatever you want. It's so bad. It's so sad. And but you see, I would hope nobody ever perceives me as somebody that takes advantage of that. Sure. You know, because I don't I don't try to but it's like, love lifetime. It's way too expensive. But they also have way too many things that I wouldn't use. So I'm like, shoot my shot. Yeah, you want to tick tock? Because even if I got them to signups, was it worth it to give me a free? I don't know.

Trevor:

Totally, probably 100%. So you're at probably more than what a year's worth of Yeah, yeah, totally payment?

London:

I'll do I do things all the time. But yeah. Again, if you never ask the answer is always no. And I always say, hey, if there's any way I can help you with your marketing efforts, and use my tic tock, give me what I want for free, totally written, you would not believe what whoever and like I wrote KTM for a dirt bike. They said no. Yeah. You know, right. It could have been like, five bite. Yeah.

Mark:

No, I don't think you're abusing it unless you're treating people poorly. True. Right. Like, that's,

London:

like, first thing you do?

Mark:

I mean, you know, if it's a reciprocal business transaction, like I don't think there's anything moral about it, or a moral or immoral? Well, it's not a moral issue is what I'm saying. I agree. Like, hey, I'll do this for you like your trading services, which is a value, right? It's like it really just comes down to like, Are you being good to people? Totally. I try to be that's how people abuse that I think about try to be I think it's actually interesting. A lot of the influencers I know, a lot of people judge them thinking that they're like, horrible people. Yeah. Right. Like, like normal people.

Trevor:

Totally. Well, here's why influencer I've met has always been quite genuine. It's very true. I have I have met I'm sure they're out. I have counsel that I've been like, Man that fits. But yeah, I think I've met I meet more people like you who I'm like, these people. Wow. Like, this guy could be a massive dick. Totally. Yeah. And he's only just a little dick. Yeah.

London:

You know, I have one. Yeah.

Mark:

Well, in fact, I saw London Fashion Place Mall. They're going around two years ago.

London:

You just when I was just playing a bird? Yeah. doing pranks. Yeah. Like you

Mark:

were you're there with the some guy following you. And you're like, you're just like asking that

London:

was my first and last time doing that, by the way, was it? Yeah. But he was going you

Mark:

were going on? I was buying something at keels. And I remember seeing to go around normal. I know that guy. Yeah. So I just watched for like, minutes. Yeah, of him going around. And he was pranking people. But like you were you were still like, talking to them afterwards. Like if they were like that. You're like, it's all right.

London:

To the public stuff, man. I'm too nice. And just too nice. Like this one. So the prank was I would go hey, do you know where the witch store sells? Like booby traps. They'd be like Which booby traps? I'd be like, yeah. These two guys break into my house every Christmas and I set up movie traps. I was playing off the Kevin McAllister thing. And they're like, What? They're like, some people were so nice, like you should call a cops. And I'm like, no, no, no, it's fine. It's this thing we do every year, they tried to break in my house, and I tried to trap them. And you know, they didn't get it, but like the hook was, hey, people think I look like Kevin McAllister. So let's go primo calling market. And this chick got so mad when she saw that when she saw the camera camera. And so I'm like, Yeah, I can't do this. Yeah. But yeah, I think I think it's true. And you'll you'll, you'll run into him for sure. But I think the thing about influencers is there's this, I feel like the found the founding fathers of influencers and content creators were so boastful in the amount of money they're making, because it it can be crazy, right? I remember my first just glimpse into what a content creator makes. It was just numbers I could not perceive. For example, one of the first articles I read when Logan Paul was doing Snapchat, I think at the time is Dunkin Donuts paid him 50 grand for one Snapchat, and I was like, making 25,000 at an editing job. And I was like, that's not a year. Right, right. 25,000 a year he did one Snapchat selfie video for 50k.

Trevor:

Right? disappeared in 24 hours or whatever. Yeah, exactly.

London:

I'm like, that's not right. Someone's math is off here. Either I'm an idiot, or the person that wrote this article is an idiot. But one of us is wrong. And that creates such a crazy perception of others. And so I think, unfortunately, my brand and who I am, is yours, of these influencers, boasting the money, the products, they sell this, just this traction that they can generate, when in reality, the standard content creator probably isn't clear in six figures. You know, even at my level, like, especially if you look at tick tock centric influencers. I would love I would love to have a conversation with somebody and just pick into their business and just call them on their bullshit, because most of it is if you're a tick tock, right, based, it's really hard. It's really hard to make money just on tick tock. It's totally, they're totally. And so my marketing background helps so much. That's why I think this ad agency so much, because it's like, because of how many clients I had to sell there. It's so easy selling now, because of how I priced my pricing there. I can price it here. And even when I get on the phone, and you know what to expect, like imagine you guys have a brand and you hear about this London, last kid in Utah? And you're like, Yeah, let's take a call. But he's one of those domestic talkers right that regardless of your saying it, there's that subconsciousness like, he's a TIG talker, he doesn't know anything. But I want to work with him because he's funny. That is the preconception of every single person that gets on the phone, or that's how I treat it. Because it really takes the wow factor up a level when I can speak when I can do marketing speak totally. And they go. What did you do? And I was like, I was marketing, Director marketing at an ad agency. Oh, that's crazy. Yeah. And how can we work together? Well, you can make content or use my ad buyer or both. And sure, you know, I don't think there's any other influencer in the world who knows what an ad buyer is. That knows that there's a person that does that. Yeah. I mean, I have yet to meet one.

Mark:

Yeah, no, yeah, you

Trevor:

definitely have a lot more people who like, like content creation will like the people who are really winning oftentimes, content creation was their first stepping stone into this markets. Content Creation, for sure is marketing. Oh, right. It's just different. It's just a different piece of it, you know, you very rarely do you get, which is kind of funny, because as marketers, you go to school, you get your master's degree, you work for these companies, and you can't, nine times out of 10, they cannot figure out how to grow the way even though they learned the five P's of marketing, and they did all this and that, you know, but it's really funny. Like, I would always talk to influencers, like when I was talking, you know, I used to be a CMO at a DTC company influences all the time. And that's what I would say I'm like, you know, it's really funny. Like, I spent like my entire career trying to learn what you're doing and I can't do it. So congratulations, you know, well,

London:

there's so much luck to it. It's like your personality with the market with the type of content your mind with how much you can with how much you can produce. Here's the thing I was destined to be a big tick talker regardless of anybody was gonna like me because I was doing three videos a day for a year and a half. I didn't miss a single day. I miss a single day so it's like I say this all the time. You are going to you are going to see something from me regardless if you liked it. That was totally my my idea that hopefully, you know you fell in love with the personality and right, bought something

Mark:

that goes back to just marketing principles. Like you said, it's impressions. Its touch points, like how many touch points can you generate with your audience and the more touch points you generate, the more interest you will end up creating. So And then another point you made that I love is we talked about that all the time, which is marketing to marketers. Something that you identified really early on is where the audience was going, not what marketers were saying, but where the actual consumer was going, which was to tick tock. And that's a different ballgame over there. Right? Which 95% of marketers could not figure that out? No. Didn't recognize that until like, last year.

London:

It's too late. I see a lot of ad agencies switching their whole entire offering to Tik Tok. I'm like, You guys are stupid. It's turning on its head right now. What people don't realize is photos are about to make a massive, massive comeback and long form video, I would say within the next two years. Tick tock is going to be this. Well, okay, so it's kind of like all these all these rocks are like are the funnels all caught up in different pieces, and now it's starting to form and you're starting to see that tick tock is going to sit at the top of the funnel for probably ever, then we're so Tiktok isn't you're not going to convert any more followers on Tiktok. I don't think what's going to happen is Holy shit. I love these guys. I love their stuff. I saw him on Tik Tok. You know, and you post frequently so I keep seeing you on Tik Tok. And then maybe one day I swipe over on your profile, click the Instagram. There's the conversion. Get you get see if you have good photos. If you have other good higher quality content, then maybe I give you a follow there. If not, again, I see you on tick tock, then I'm like, let's check out these guys YouTube video. And then I go Holy shit, they've got these huge episodes like they're clearly bringing value. That's the bottom of the funnel. You know what I mean? Tick tock is such an a discovery phase. And, you know, it's, it's about to flip on its head. So I always when I talk to founders of agencies, or I talk to other agencies, I say, hey, just be careful switching up your offering don't go all in on tick tock just like it might be too late. The money, the real money, the millions of dollars was made a year and a half ago.

Trevor:

That's actually like, probably some of the most valuable words spoken in the podcast. Right now. For anybody who's listening. Like that's a really, there's still tons of value and Tiktok 100% tons of tons of value. You have to do tick tock, but I think you're right that the boat of changing everything up. You've missed that boat if you haven't already done it on your wrist.

London:

Like I look at it this way. If I can get you to watch, if you can see me seven times on tick tock. I need you. The seven times you see me on Tik Tok will lead to a follow on a more follower centric platform. That's what I want. So if I can get you to watch a couple of my videos on Tiktok top of funnel, I don't care about your follow there. And that's easy for me to say because I've already built so big but I don't necessarily care about your follower there. I care about your follower on YouTube and Instagram where you're actually going to know me. You watch one of my YouTube videos that's 1010 to 30 minutes long. That's like watching 300 of my tiktoks Totally in one sitting

Trevor:

well and and not only that, but Tik Tok. Like if I'm following on Tik Tok, I'm not seeing you on Tik Tok

London:

usually, right? Like so many things. But

Trevor:

if I, if I'm following you on Instagram, I will see you on Instagram, or YouTube or YouTube as long as I spend a decent amount of time like I'll find you there. Yeah, totally.

Mark:

I mean, I think it's even for the Creator themselves. It's better to be on YouTube and Instagram because it's better monetization for Korea.

London:

They're bought into you not? So yeah, I think I think that's the difference. You know, I've launched several products on my own tic tock trying to push myself trying to push it myself and it you know, if you're pushing products on tick tock as an influencer, it's, it's kind of difficult. It's a difficult game. And I think I figured it out. We're actually about to launch something pretty sick. Which I guess we can break it here. I've been wanting to say it on on Instagram. Now that we actually have the plan. I try not to talk before I walk around

Mark:

podcast exclusive.

London:

Exclusive. Remember that horn? Damage, where's the hard? Okay, so I've had this kind of conundrum where I'm like, I have audience I get a lot of views. How do I push something that's valuable to a new on comer? And not even necessarily somebody who's actually invested in me, right? Because again, tick tock is top of funnel. They're not invested in you there. But they see you all the time. So I'm like, Okay, if they're not invested in me, they're How do I push a product that you could potentially find and by? And also, how do I create a brand so this is what I'm wearing? This is our first iteration. It's very different now but this is called small brain. Okay, so my my tagline since the beginning was small brain big dreams again, playing off the stupidities. Gonna say

Mark:

going back to the UVU. Math. Yeah, exactly. That

London:

mother ever.

Trevor:

That's the name of the collection, whatever that math class was the math. Rafi. No, don't be like math like 810 or something.

London:

Anyway, so small brain. Really cool. Really cool. A company that we are in the midst of building the brand brand identity, but our first product drops in July. And it's this buy a t shirt. Get a mind game. Okay, so small brain. Imagine the website, you have our collection of clothing, which this first one's called cerebrum. Our next one is called open minded. REM cycles and other one deja vu things to do with the mind. Right? And then we're just doing like wacky designs. Like, you can see this. Nice, yep. Yeah, nice. So just kind of small brains, you know, wacky, wacky designs. But again, nobody, nobody on planet Earth is gonna go. Wow, this is a cool new tech talk, I saw a cool shirt by there's just none of those people out there. I wanted to make this brand competition based, but with crazy reward. Right to spark somebody's interest the minute they see our videos on the for you page. So you buy a shirt, you get what's called a mind game. And these are puzzles that you that come with the shirt, first person to solve the puzzle and submit video in full video and photo evidence wins five to $10,000 depending on which is depending on which brand or which puzzles if it so the first one is a five care this again, this launch is in July. It is a 500 piece completely pink puzzle. All pink are kind of brand logos pink. Yeah. So not only do you get a cool shirt,

Mark:

hopefully you've got to solve it just by the puzzle pieces. But it's all pink. It's just one color. So you get the shape of

London:

a jigsaw puzzle, right? Yeah, sorry. Like a, like a square jigsaw puzzle I'm saying though,

Mark:

because there's not an image on it.

Trevor:

So the only thing you're looking at is like the shape that it puts together.

London:

No, I don't care how you do it. First. First person to do it, I guess. $5,000 Have you done it? We just ordered samples. We ordered a 25 piece sample and I mean, I like we did it easily. But I was like, Damn

Mark:

5500 p 500. piece. Yeah, so

London:

you know,

Trevor:

I'm gonna buy that for my grandma. Peggy. She listens to this. And she's gonna grandma Peggy. Peggy is gonna first customer. Yeah.

London:

So anyway, the idea that the theory behind that is you're scrolling on Tik Tok. Hey, did you know if you solve this 500 piece pink puzzle, you get$5,000 Go to our website. That's a little bit more digestible to interact with me then. Hey, my name's London lungs, and for the last three years, designing merchandise to sell to you, everybody and their dog is doing that. Yeah. So I'm really excited about small brain and the mind games.

Trevor:

And the reward money is probably what a normal Brad would spend an ounce. And you're not Yeah, exactly.

London:

Exactly. So that's, that's cool. That's kind of the idea. Yeah, I mean, we're gonna take a loss on this first one, we haven't sold a single shirt, which is fine. I'm just putting up the money. Right. So hopefully you get it. steamrolled. But even imagine even the ads behind that. Like, I imagine if mischief ran ads on their big red boots probably would have sold more. Oh, for sure. You know, even though that went crazy viral. But what I'm saying is, once we do start there is an ad play right here, right? Yeah, like $10,000 bounty to first person to solve the, you know, encoded Rubik's cube or whatever it

Mark:

is, right? Yeah. That's exciting, man. I'm excited about that. And there's so many levels of the mind games, right? Like, first is like Jigsaw then you could do what you just said, like the Rubik's Cube. Totally, then you could get into like throwing Pete Morse code. Environment.

London:

Did we want to do a Morse code? Children's Book. So you get this, you know, a children's book or something illustrated and has a story, but it's all it's all Morse code and yeah, first person to decipher it and resend us back the book with the word you know, something like that. I mean, again, I'm just spitballing. But yeah, there's so many sided for the

Mark:

sample via Wasco. Eventually, yeah, first person to complete the trip.

Trevor:

Versus hallucination. Yeah.

London:

Yeah. Yeah, guys, it's been really amazing. This

Trevor:

has been awesome. I love that we got that little sneak peek and we appreciate you coming on. And thank you so much for your time, guys. Yeah. Any, any other questions we want to like, end with? I feel like I usually end with a question. But I feel like you answered my questions. I'd ask one more did ask

Mark:

one great ones. No, I would say

Trevor:

that was his final one right here.

Mark:

Yeah, finally, is good. What's your number one advice?

Trevor:

I'm liking this so far.

Mark:

For a brand making an ad right now what would be the one thing you tell them for a brand making

London:

an ad? Yeah. Don't don't I don't know if this is gonna be good. But this is something that I always expressed the brands that we need to be bold and we need to we need to do something that you feel horrible about to be quite frank. You're now the only one A brand's like liquid death pop up. I bet all the guys in that marketing room were like, This is the worst idea we do this and they they break ground, they really break ground. So be bold for example I we manage a supplement companies tick tock so we were posting their content and making weekly content for them. And this week, I just made memes. I just typed literally typed in on Google meme sounds on tick tock, you know, there's like the Alpha Sigma memes. It's like, you know, the transitions. We just did that. And they're so weird and out of pocket. And who knows, maybe that will be the one but it's really tried to be bold.

Mark:

I liked that. Yeah, I liked that. I liked that a lot. Because I think sometimes we get too formulaic. And the way we approach advertising and people, especially in the AI Yes, right. We actually, can

London:

I say last thought about AI. Yeah. I wrote this on my LinkedIn. But I think I'm shadowbanned because I got served 22 people, I wrote them, don't worry. The dude, I think AI is gonna get so good that it will replace jobs here and there. But I actually think now imagine this, you guys are marketers with client work? Imagine turning in your work that was done completely by AI, I think people will notice the difference between a human touch and an AI touch. And I think it'll get to the point where AI is not cool. I think the programs you could probably type in, Hey, make a graphic with these requirements. It'll make it perfect every time. I don't think that'll be cool. I really don't. I think people are gonna say, oh, no, those. That agency just uses AI. Yeah. Well, you know what I mean?

Trevor:

Yeah, I think you get those. I mean, you're you're you're seeing that with tick tock stuff. Right. Like something formulaic thing is what made me think of Yeah, being formulaic. Yeah. I mean, you like tick tock trends or videos like for me, like things that used to go like on Instagram, I used to get millions of views on specific videos that I would do. And then if I were to do that, today, I'd get 100 views. Right, right. And I think like, I think that just happens with anything right? Like I think you're spot on now. Well, it depends on what happens with AI and how AI develops. Right exactly. But I think you're right in the sense that humans will start to be like, That's AI and

London:

like I got to tell Jay I even though it's perfect I know you get

Trevor:

back there Yeah, you know and so I think more personal touch is going to definitely start to come into play but there will be a time in a season where AI will be too close amazing. Yeah, amazing.

London:

You use as a

Mark:

tool for sure. Yeah, it's obviously hard to like predict the future but we already saw this transition from Instagram like Instagram influencers right how to change their entire game because they became a formula it was right like are pretty is pretty simple. Yep, here's the perfect preset the perfect filter the Edit I'm in this place I'm in this place I'm doing this thing and then tick tock is where like I'm in my kitchen in working doing something silly or just like hanging out and then that caught on and everyone loved it. Yep. Ryan Olson Instagram influencers start changing their tune, right. They started doing more videos, they wanted to get more real they started posting more stories. Right. And it wasn't so formulaic, like we talked about, and I think AI same thing, right? Is what's the race between AI and human content creators?

Trevor:

Yeah, very true. Yeah.

Mark:

And the race like you said, it's probably going to be this. How do you create always be creating like a different angle as a person that AI might not be doing? Or how do you make sure that they they know, it's you? Yeah, they know human touched it.

London:

Let's just the emotion of it. Like when I get back, like a logo work, you know, from small brain, and I just can kind of feel the energy that my guy put behind it. And I just imagine if I got the same logo, the same identical from an AI you knew as an AI, but I knew as an AI, I'm just like, I don't know, I'm already turned. I'm not turned off it. I will use it. You know, mid journey. I go crazy on mid journey and obviously chat GPT. But yeah, I'm just making that little prediction. Like, it's not going to be cool. It really isn't.

Trevor:

Your developer. You're like Designer comes back. He's like, actually, I've been building.

London:

Those bids are any idiot.

Trevor:

Gotcha. All right. Let's end there. I think that that's I feel like we have to end every like, I feel like the last few episodes. We've ended with some sort of AI discussion, which is strange for everybody. You know, so it's the rage. Yeah. Well, thank you London so much. Where can where can people find you?

London:

Only fans? Yes.

Trevor:

Yep. $90 a month.

London:

I it's discounted, right? Yeah. Okay, sweet. It's 999. Yes. Awesome. Now, last and last on everything. Awesome. Everything cool.

Trevor:

Amazing. Kailyn and thank you so much. Go follow London doing amazing things. I'm actually super excited. Don't

London:

follow me. It's

Trevor:

yeah. Yeah. Thank you, for everybody for being you know, okay. We'll see you guys Whoa. Thank you so much for listening to the unstoppable Marketer Podcast. Please go rate and subscribe the podcast whether it's good or bad. We want to hear from you. Because we always want to make this podcast better. If you want to get in touch with me or give me any direct feedback, please go follow me and get in touch with me. I am at the Trevor Crump on both Instagram and Tiktok thank you and we will see you next week.