How to Monetize Blogs through Social Media?

So a beautiful Sunday evening here in Vancouver and welcoming all of you to the Askavyaria show. I'm with one of my favorite Vancouver celebrities. And yes, he is a celebrity because it's not only the Vancouver circle. I think everybody in Toronto, Montreal, everywhere in Canada has heard of Ricky Shetty who lives in Vancouver. And what I loved about him when I met him the first time was that he proposed to his wife almost in front of a thousand people. How did that go? We have to start with that story.

Sounds good. Hi, everyone and thanks, ABHI for having me on your show today. It's quite an honor.

Of course, of course. How did that happen?

Sure. Yeah.

Let's jump right into it. I did a flash mob proposal with my wife. So I'll quickly share with you the backstory. So we've been dating for about a year and she had gone to the Philippines on a family vacation and I pretty much knew I wanted to propose and we talked about marriage and we both felt ready to take the next step. So when she came back from the Philippines, I made this decision to propose. And I didn't want to just do a small proposal. I wanted to go big and grand and express my love in the fullest.

Right.

So I organized a flash mob through social media. So I basically. It's kind of a funny story, but while she was in the Philippines and boarding the plane, I blocked her so she wouldn't see what I was doing. And basically I mobilized my social media network and I said, hey, is anyone free at the airport? On January 1, 2011, can you come and help me out? I'm going to do this big flash mob. And I got so many people coming and helping me out. There was about 50 or 80 of my close friends and family members. And we did this flash mob to Bruno Mars, Just the Way youy Are. And at the end of that song, I got down on one knee and we had all these signs saying, will you marry me? In multiple languages. And I asked her to be my wife and she said yes, of course. And it made the front page of the province.

It made the front page of the province.

Wow.

Which is a local Vancouver newspaper. Made the Sun, CTV Global. So it became a overnight viral sensation.

So that's what happens when you follow your heart, right? And it all based on love. I remember what I did for my. How long have you been married for?

So actually we're coming up to a fifth anniversary.

Fifth. Oh, okay. That's a recent idea.

So coming up on July 1, 2016, will be five years of wedded bliss.

Awesome. Awesome. So mine was way, way earlier than that. And I remember we were in India and I wanted to propose to Divya. What I did was that I asked a friend of mine to actually go across to NASA and NASA actually had stars. You know, you could name a star after someone, but named a star after Divya. And you know, obviously she was ecstatic and everybody was like, wow, this is the best proposal ever. Till I saw what you had done. And I've not shared this with her, but when she sees the show, I think she'll realize that somebody has upped the up the this.

And you know, but every proposal is so special and unique, right? Even if it's like a romantic dinner or even if it's like just you and your spouse on the. Your fiance on the beach. I think every proposal is so unique and special.

Right.

And it doesn't have to be grand.

It just.

It happens to be our personalities who are a little bit more going. But, you know, I never want to discount any proposals.

But you know what? No, but I think yours was brilliant. And I think. You know what, let's give it out to the viewers, people who are watching this. Let us know what you think about this proposal. And if you propose to somebody in a crazy, wacky way, give us your comments on this section right now. Okay. Now, getting into the show. You know what? I know Vancouver. You know, you're a mini celebrity in Vancouver. Everybody, almost everybody knows you. You know, I remember meeting you through your conferences and you do about three conferences now every year.

Yeah.

So, yeah, for work I put on conferences, I put on workshops, I put on events. I do some Internet marketing as well. So I do a little bit of a hybrid of offline and online marketing.

Which is your most popular conference in Vancouver?

Last year, I put on three major conferences.

Three of them.

Yeah.

One was the Social Media Mastery one, which you attended.

Social Media Mastery. I remember that, yeah.

And then I did a Blog Mastery conference, and then I did Internet Marketing Mastery conference. So there's three within three conferences within the span of five months. And one was a one day, second one was a two day, and third one was a three day. And the three day one was definitely a lot of work in terms of logistics and coordinating all the speakers. And I prefer in hindsight the one day or the two day. The two day was just a little bit much from an organizational standpoint, but also from an attendee standpoint because they're long days and it's hard for people to Take off a day off work and also to commit if their family commitments and all to commit like a 9 to 5, 9 to 5, 9, 5, 3 days in a row. So yeah, in hindsight, I'm probably not going to do another three day one, but who knows? I never want to say never, but I'm probably going to stick to the one in two days.

Right.

So how many of them are you going to do in 2016?

You know what, I'm kind of in transition from conferences, so I'm still making that decision of whether I want to keep doing them. But lately I've been doing more and more Internet marketing because the ideal situation for me is having the time freedom, the money freedom and the location freedom with conferences. I don't have any of those really.

So you can't really go to Miami and do a conference.

Oh, I mean, I could. Of course I could, but still, it's still location dependent.

Right.

And what I'm really focusing now is location independence.

Oh, so online.

Yeah, like where you're, you're, you know, you're flying around and just working from a lot, you know, working from a laptop anywhere. And that's where I'm aiming to, you know, get most of my income.

Right.

Right now it's been, yeah, the conferences primarily. And the other thing I could do is actually online conferences.

Right.

So I'm looking to that model. So basically just running it online, people, speakers could be, you know, in their homes or in their home offices and people could be watching from anywhere in the world. So I'm looking into that model now. But I'm still running my localized events as well here. So, yeah, it's kind of up in the air of the.

So no data yet?

No, not at the date.

But I remember you gave me the opportunity and I remember I was, I was, I was in India, had to go back for a conference, but Ricky had invited me to speak. So we sent a video clip of the presentation and the video clip was played while I was in India and I was speaking at a conference in person. There was a video clip of mine being played, thanks to you, to all these people. And I got a lot of comments because of it.

Yes.

And so you know, that open mindset that you have, you already done something online with me in India there. So I'm sure a lot of people will be open to that coming their way as well.

Yeah, it was quite ingenious because like we were trying to figure out times and dates and it wasn't gonna work. So at the Internet marketing Mastery Conference. You had that great video and, you know, everyone just got a little glimpse of you. So I'd love to have you speak at one of my live events as well.

I would, I would love to. I would love to. So, you know, I don't know how from being a hotelier and a travel agent, I became a social media person and then I became a speaker. And so last year I spoke at almost about 24 conferences. And I don't want to. Like you said, there was a time I said I want to speak at 100 conferences, but after 24, I realized you actually lose a lot of. You don't have a lot of time for yourself. So 24 was perfect. I've got the next six calendar right now, so I'm very comfortable, looking forward to it. I remember growing up I was not a very confident person going up on stage, but the family used to push me back and forth and now this is what I feed off of.

Right.

So coming back to your Internet marketing part, what kind of Internet marketing do you do?

Yeah, so I've tried a few different things online. So everything from, you know, blogging, that's something I'm well known for.

Right.

Blogging, social media marketing.

So you're known as in Vancouver as the daddy blogger.

Yes, exactly. We can definitely go into more of that. But yeah, it's a blogging, social media. I have different products, online blogging courses. I also have a membership site, so that was to get residual monthly income. And I also have my own book published as well.

Right.

So that's on Kindle. There's a digital version and a print version and I also do some Skype coaching. So I've kind of like, you know, put my feet in a few different Internet marketing areas. But really I think my focus is on social media blogging.

So people actually, entrepreneurs, budding entrepreneurs, seasoned entrepreneurs, small businesses, all kinds of people can actually come to you and for advice on coaching one to one or group coaching or. So what's the site that they should go to when anybody is watching this show? Because, you know, the idea with this show is to reach out to the Asian audience that, you know, watches the show more often.

Yes.

For them to understand what's happening in North America. Like what, what's unique about your thing is that you did not go out there. And this is what I, what I truly feel that you did not go out there and say, let me do something what everybody else is doing. You had kids, you, you, you, you're raising your kids and you said, I Am your stay at home dad.

I'm a work from home dad. So my office is just over here and I work with the kids around.

Right.

And I absolutely love it.

So that's, that's what I noticed with the first or second time I came to your house.

Yes.

That you are okay with. You know, some dads are not patient. So you actually are a daddy blogger. You know, you just didn't make it because it's cool, but you made it. And that's what you're known for in Vancouver.

Yeah, absolutely. Like, you know, there are a lot of careers people can choose. You know, you can choose a traditional 9 to 5 job or you can choose like an entrepreneurial job where you work, work, work, work, work. You can be a stay at home dad where you're not working, your wife's working. For me, I really wanted, I mean, I think work has purpose, so I definitely work and I build up a career, but I don't want to be stuck in a cubicle. It wasn't, it was never my personality. So I love that freedom of working from home and having the kids around. Obviously there's also challenges. Right, what kind of challenges? Well, distraction. Having kids around while you're trying to focus is a very difficult thing to do. And I'm sure you, you've had the same issue with having two daughters at home. And mine are really young, so I got a two year old son and I have a three and a half year old daughter and I have another one on the way. So they're gonna be three kids in a five. And that's why I have a little bit of the gray hair. It's definitely stressful and I don't mind being very real and vulnerable with that because there's the stress factors, there's the, you know, having patience with them when they're wanting attention, but you're trying to really focus on what you're doing. So they're trying to take time and I'm trying to invest time in my business. So there's that tension, but I still choose that tension over a 9 to 5 job because it's way more rewarding having that tension and having the kids around rather than being at the office.

So yeah, I know what you're saying. So basically what you're saying is that everything that you choose in life will come with some kind of stress, tension, all of that. You obviously choose this tension because you're with your kids.

Yes.

So it's a marvelous experience for the kids. We'll ask them, interview them and they've grown up a little bit.

Sure.

How was it growing up with your daddy working with you at home? I'm sure it's a, you know, it's a very enriching experience for them seeing you at work. Because I like to take my, my daughter wherever I can. She comes to office, she comes for my shoots, so she knows what, you know, her father's up to, what she does. And hopefully she wants to do something similar. She learned the ropes because I truly, truly believe so. I did my MBA from the University of Strathside because. Not because I thought it was a prestigious university, but more because my grandfather, who I talk about on almost every video, was a decorated army officer, spoke, read and wrote 14 languages. Everything had to be perfect according to him. I was grateful to have him in my life. And I did my MBA from Strathclyde International Business. All of that just. I did it after he died because it was one wish that I had to do that. But what I'm doing right now is completely different. So I did not realize I did so education is great, but education and what you love is what you want to do. Not just education for the sake of education and therefore the kind of careers that, you know, I'm sure your kids for sure will choose their life and their careers from the heart because that's what they see their father doing.

Yeah.

And I think that's the best form of parenting we can do, right? Modeling.

Modeling.

So I'm not going to tell them be this and this and this. I'm just going to live my life with passion, purpose, and hopefully they'll be able to see that and replicate it. But if not, they can do whatever they want.

Right.

Like, I don't care whether they do Internet marketing or conferences. Like they can be whatever they want because that's, that's that true. Joyous parents. To see them really find themselves and discover themselves and be themselves and, you know, thrive in that.

Right.

You know, there are a lot of people in India because it's India, Canada connect. It's happening more and more.

Yes.

There was a time about 10, 15 years back when, you know, when, when I know my wife and I fell in love with Canada and we started exploring more of Canada. It was still seen as a smaller country, you know, not so much happening. And then Vancouver especially, you know, stepsister, step city. It's a kind of a thing, I would call it, I used to call it a small village and all that. Now the kind of startups coming out of here, Canada is Making noise, you know, new prime minister, new, all of that and all that. And I know a lot of people from the Internet marketing and startup community are looking at Vancouver and back and forth and you know, what kind of synergies can happen. Because today for sure, entrepreneurs are saying that, well, we can have a co founder sitting in Vancouver and the other guy sitting in India or whatever. So if there are people in India or Asia or Dubai or wherever this show goes, looking to connect with you, to advertise with you, or to sponsor their startup products on your, in your conference, what is the best website they should go to?

Yeah, I mean to connect with me.

You'Ll obviously be putting up something.

Yeah, just Daddyblogger.com I do have a lot of like, you know, like 10 or 15, a lot of websites. But I have about 10 or 15 different websites on the Internet. But daddyblogger.com is the one I'm known for and that pretty much links to everything else I do as well. Because there's a conference website, there's a membership website, there's a product website, the book website and then and the kind.

Of Skype coaching you do. So if there are people, you know, because our idea is through this show to connect people from different parts of the world to this part of the world and keep it more real time. Like I always say that it used to take about six months for the information from North America to reach India. It takes about two months. Now through this show we want to make it real time.

Right.

So what kind of coaching can people expect from you or take from you or sign up?

For sure. Yeah. I mean I'm like, even though I promote myself in terms of like the blog and social media, I'm here just to help. And if I can help you in any way, whether that's to coaching or consulting, I'm happy to do that. But I definitely do a lot of consulting on social media blogging locally, usually for localized companies. But obviously the principles are very similar. I can do it anywhere in the world and my specialty is really blogging. So I teach people about things like how to make a blog, how to market a blog, how to monetize a blog, how to build up that brand online and how to find out your target market. Because I can share with you a little bit of how I did that with mine. So with like daddyblogger.com it's a well known site, it has quite a lot of hits per month and it's a well known brand. But at the same time it's very highly localized right now. So I'm really focused on not every dad in the world or not every dad in Canada or not every dad in this province, bc. But I'm really focused on Vancouver, entrepreneurial new dads, and especially dads under five who have kids under five, because that's me.

Sure.

And usually, like one tip I'd give people is usually the people you're trying to reach are very much like yourself, of course. So I'm trying to reach other dads who want to hang out with their kids, who want to have a strong marriage, who want to be family oriented. And I think that's the message that's really resonated with a lot of people because I think at the heart of, I know you have, you're very much a strong father, strong husband and strong family oriented.

Right.

And I think that's why we connected. Right, of course. And that's why I think the other dads I know you interviewed, like Tyler Basu, another, he's a young dad, entrepreneurial, and he has a brand new child and.

Right.

You know, those are exactly like, he's kind of like my avatar. Avatar is like kind of your, your perfect person you want to reach.

Sure.

Would be someone like Tyler Basu or Ty so Wong or some of these other people you're interviewing on your show.

Right.

So following your passion, making it a success and helping others and all of that. Tell me, when people see social media, Internet marketing, fortunately, unfortunately, the people that who want to get onto it want to see everything instantly.

Right.

So. And I know there's no instant soup when it comes to this, but through this show, we're trying to give next 100 days of success in terms of, you know, what kind of tips we can give so that they can see something tangible in 100 days. What would be the top three things you would say?

Yeah.

Assuming that the people who are already watching are to a level. They already have their blogs.

Yes.

They already know what they want.

Yeah.

They want to take it to the next level. And I remember one Internet masterminds seminar that I attended at Matt's place where you'd be given some tips and I'm sure you've done many of these. So what would be the top three things so that people can take away something. And we're going to link these up as 1, 2, 3 in the show.

Yes.

So they can take away these three, implement it.

Yes.

And find some success and come back and thank you or come back to you for book, for, you know, for the 4th, 5th, and 6th?

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, there's definitely a lot more than three, but I can boil it down to three, if you like. But it's like I said, building that brand, bringing out your target market, your ideal read, and then it's all about marketing.

Right.

And we can talk about monetizing after as well. But I think it's.

Sorry, I just go back a little. So would you say the first point is to understand your audience and which ones you want to go after, and would you choose that from your heart, or would you actually go and search and see how many people in this province are looking at these keywords?

Yeah, we can definitely dive deeper into that. So when you're figuring out any company, any business. I'm just talking primarily about blogging, but this. These principles apply to any business, right? So like Nike or McDonald's or. Yeah, yeah. Like, we're smaller companies, Internet moguls, right?

Yeah.

But you probably know who your target market is for you.

You're. You're the best brand in the world, right? For me, Internet moguls is the best brand. Nike. Nike is the best brand.

Right, right, right. But I think all these brands that are successful, they have the exact same principles that makes them successful, Right. Or similar principles that makes them successful. They have a strong brand, right. Internet moguls. Danny blogger, Nike, McDonald's, Apple.

Right?

Strong branding. They know who they're trying to reach. They know their client, right? So, like, Apple is trying to reach a much more defined audience than like a PC market or a Microsoft market.

Right.

They're trying to reach a much general audience. But Apple is looking for the geeks, the nerds, the Apple enthusiasts, right? And they found them. And these people are willing to stay overnight because they love their products so much.

Right.

And that's, you know, like they've done it really well. They're one of the most successful brands in the world for a reason, of course. They really know what they're doing.

Right, Right.

And they figure out who their market is.

So you're saying. So is there a technical tip that you would like to add to this.

Technical tip is things like demographic psychographics. Right? So things like.

Can you explain psychographics?

Yeah, sure. So demographics are things like, you know, the age, the gender, even the political affiliation, the religious mindset, the sexual orientation. So where they live, how much they make, how many kids they have, how old are the kids? Is it like teenagers? Or is it like kids under 5? Or are they single, are they married, are they divorced?

Right.

So all these things make up like, I guess, the demographics.

Right.

The psychographics are a little bit more not as defined. It's like more like personality type or buying style or like lifestyle or like, you know, like a little bit more internal stuff.

Right.

So the other stuff is more external. And I would say the psychographic stuff is more like, how do people make a buying decision? Is it because they're loyal to the brand or they do. They do impulse buying or are they.

Doing it because their buddy is doing it?

Is it their wife influencing it?

Right.

So do they want to keep up with the jones?

Right.

So those are more the psychograph analysis people have to do. And that's a lot harder.

Right.

Because the demographics is simple.

Right.

38 years old, married, have two kids.

Right.

Live in Burnaby.

But that hard work needs to be done. And how close can you get to defining your audience?

90% think of one person. My one person is like Tyler Basu.

Right.

Watch that show as well, because he is in his 20s, he's a married dad, he has new kids.

Right.

So I just look at one person. Your target market is one person.

Okay?

Right.

Because if you can reach that one, they're gonna be other people like Tyler. So I'm trying to reach Tyler Basu, but there's multiple Tyler Basu's in everywhere in the world because there's new dads who are being formed every day of the week.

You know what, Ricky, by saying that, look at that one person and then multiply your demographic.

Yes.

You have made a very strong point on the show today. Because the thing is, most of the people that it could be large companies, mid sized companies, single individual that you work with or I work with, we at interim mostly work with hotels and travel companies. But the biggest thing that is missing in this world, you know, I won't make it a very general statement with clients is they're looking for clarity. They want to know themselves, who we are.

Yes.

So demographics, psychographics. And then when you mention the point that look at that one person who is your ideal demographic and then find more like that.

Right.

That I think is one of the key takeaways from the show to look at that. Because once you find that clarity and assuming you have a great product and you put in the hard work behind it. I learned something today. So I learned something today.

I'm glad a lot of people did it. Yeah, it's always about the one person. You know, at the end of the day, if you can help that one, you can help the many.

Right, right.

And so that's point number one. So what would be the second?

So once you figure out your branding, your target market, then it's all about the marketing, right? So even with Apple, right? Like, I love using Apple, then I love going back to us, right? So like, okay, so now Apple's defined as target market. So have. And now how does Apple market themselves?

Right?

So there's multiple ways that Apple or yourself watching or you and me can market ourselves. Things like email marketing, social media marketing, video marketing, which you're doing right now.

Right.

There's podcasting.

Right.

There's doing interviews right now, where we're doing this interview. Or marketing as well, of course, because I'm going to share with my networks. Are you?

Absolutely.

And then there's like, guests. Like, if you're a blogger, there's things like guest blog posting. There's things like running a contest. There's obviously, like, public speaking, right? So if you're speaking on a stage, which you do, what I do, that's definitely a form of marketing as well. There's networking and, you know, there's like, traditional marketing. Things like direct mail for me, even my car, I have like, checkout daddyblogger.com in my car. So I go with the full blitz marketing.

You have a tattoo? Not yet.

I'm not really a tattoo kind of person, so no tattoo yet, but who knows? I'm open.

I know. Daddyblocker. Com.

So another key point.

We have 15 websites, so there'll be a lot of tattoos there.

There are a lot of different tattoos, but really that's the one website that I'm most known for. The other ones, you know, they have different degrees of, like, traffic, and some of them, they hardly get any traffic. But I think the reason I'm successful with my other businesses is because, like, the Persona of daddy blogger, I'm just, like, wanting to be a good dad. And that's really my heart at the end of the day. And I think people can see that, and that's why they're willing to connect with my conferences and other online.

Tell me if. You know, I'm just thinking crazy, if you were to get a tattoo done, you know.

Yes.

And I've not got a tattoo yet, and I know I want to get one done, but that has to be something which is me. If it's. If it's an alien concept, you're going to get bored, right? So if one of your companies had to be your tattoo on your wrist where everybody could see and you could See every day and with a huge possibility of getting bored. And you know, which would, which website would it be?

You know, kind of ironically it can't be the Daddy blogger logo because I'm actually getting more kids.

Right?

My daddy Blogger logo. That's kind of a funny story. I'll share that too. My original daddy Blogger logo had me and my daughter on a bicycle.

Oh.

Then we had two kids. So now we upgraded from a bicycle. So it's me, my daughter and my two kids in a car.

Okay.

So we operated from a bicycle to car and now we have a third kid coming.

Right.

So my logo minivan and we're going to be doing a lot of travel as well. So maybe on an airplane. So I don't, I'm actually glad I never got that bicycle or the car or the minivan logo because who knows right?

Who knows, right?

So I, I do a little bit more permanent, especially with business because you don't know if Internet moguls is going to exist 5, 10, 20 years. I don't know if my site's going to exist in 20 days down the line, but I know I will. So I'd rather not have a tattoo this. I know but you know, maybe my wife's name because I think we're gonna put that to us part after my kids names. Maybe a heart because I think like that's the foundation.

But you know, I'm just thinking just as marketers and we're talking once you get that minivan logo and everything you can actually and because with your travel, you doing a lot of travel videos and we're going to just talk about that.

Sure.

And you're the daddy. You're the perfect. You know, I'm just thinking we're just becoming the perfect brand for a family minivan. So take this concept and let's go to Honda Odyssey and you know, have them sponsor your trips throughout.

Yeah.

And I actually how marketers should think.

Yeah, no, and I do and I have. So I, I do work with a lot of car companies so I do a lot of car reviews and perfect. Honda Odyssey. I worked with Lexus, Toyota, a lot of the big brands and what I do is I usually do like a one week car review. So they'll give me a car totally calm, totally for free. Only for weeks, not, not indefinitely. I'm still waiting for like keep it for a year.

You're getting there.

Yeah. I mean I'm good with have trying out different cars because I really like variety. So I get bored. I have a Civic Right now.

Right.

So I get bored of driving my Civic. So. And I have connections with most of the major manufacturers.

Right.

And a lot of them have a media fleet. So basically you approach the media fleet or the PR company. So usually like, it wouldn't be like, for example, let's use Lexus.

Right.

I worked with Lexus quite a bit. So I don't approach Lexus directly. I'll approach a PR company for Lexus and make an agreement there. And I'll usually I'll shoot out an email and it's a good tip for any bloggers who wanna.

Yes, yes.

Wanna maybe do some car blogging. But usually I shoot out an email saying, hi there, I'm Ricky Shetty, I'm from Vancouver, Canada. My blog is daddyblogger.com and I love writing about products and services from a father's perspective. And I love doing car reviews.

Here's the link to my blog.

And I usually have videos or blog posts of previous cars I reviewed and then usually things like social media following. And usually when I say I worked with like Lexus and Toyota and Honda before, I'm able to leverage those sponsors to get new ones.

Of course.

And usually I just say, would you like to work together? I leave the conversation open, leave the ball in their court and the worst they can say is no, of course, yes, yes. And you know, car companies are multi billion dollar companies so they can definitely afford to, you know, lend out a car and they spending so much money on marketing and for me, sometimes they'll actually pay as well, but most of the time it's just a, it's a barter, more or less.

Right.

They give me a car in return for review.

Right, right.

So there's no hard cost in their part. Maybe some wear and tear in the car and usually they give me a full tank and I give it back a full tank.

Right.

So it's actually more strategic for them than it is for me. Like I'm happy getting that free car for a week.

Right.

But they're even happier because they're reaching my target market, which we talked about, which is their target market.

Right.

Because they're trying to reach families and I already have that strong relationship with families.

Right, right.

No, that makes sense. So that is another very cool tip that is that, you know, once, once you have the correct audience and like I said, I learned how to make the correct audience for your blog, once you have that, then you market strategically reach out to the people who want to reach out to these people and they cannot Directly. And even if they did directly, they would not have the heart felt relationship with them. Now, since one blogger already has it, the car company feature that I think the car company should come and you know, come on. Because, because we know your brand. Not only because I'm a fan of yours personally, but I know your brand. I think car companies should be lining up and giving you a car saying here's 2016, this is your car for the next four years.

Yeah.

And review it every month and let us know how it goes after three months, six months over there. Exactly.

Yeah.

I mean like for a car company, like it doesn't, like again, it doesn't cost them anything.

Right.

So I think it was more error on my part. Two is for not asking for like the one year.

Right.

Usually ask for the one week. And usually if we do a road trip, then I'll ask for the two week one.

Right.

But. But why not ask for the one month or the sixth or the nine or the 12 months?

No, exactly. I'll tell you what, another thing, what happened was Daniel Craig, not James Bond, but Daniel Edward Craig, who's known as the guy for online reputation management for hoteliers. And he's based out of Vancouver, celebrity in his own right. My dad introduced me to him saying, you have to follow this guy's blog. It's been a few years now. We've become friends. And before I started my speaking career, I used to speak at conferences every. Every month. I used to love it. They used to send me flight tickets, they used to put me up at the hotel and everything. And this is one time we were having mercy. And he says, I said, how come you get paid for these conferences? And I don't. He says he just had to casually say. He said, well, I mean, you ask. I said, no.

Yeah.

And the next conference was with this company out of uae, I think for Doha or Qatar or somewhere. A huge travel technology company. They send me a mail and at that time I would. I was full of it. I was like, it's too much. It's worth my time. Send them an email. They send an email as a, like, my charges are $5,000 for that one day and I do not travel economy. I swear to God I said that. And I asked my secretary, are you sure we should send this out? Because we just, this is about two and a half, three years back. We. She came to me and she said, we're just building the brand, so you sure we want to ask for money? I said, $5,000 and business class, if it's not happening. I am not traveling. It took 10 minutes for them to revert back and say, I, we are so sorry. It is, it is. We should have mentioned it is business class. And regarding the $5,000, it's a Saturday. Allow us to get back on Monday. Monday morning, 12 o', clock. I've got that. Amazing. Is $5,000 for one day or two days? I said I'm coming for two days. I don't mind speaking the second day as well. We got that $5,000.

Wow.

Since then, 50 to 70% of the conferences till date are paid. So it's all about asking, right?

Yeah. And I think it's all about confidence building.

Right, right.

So if we have the confidence, we're going to ask more. I think part of it is we just don't have the confidence to ask. And sometimes they don't even know that you want it until you ask. Right. So if you don't know, if they don't know, if you don't vocalize it, they don't hear it. Sometimes it won't happen.

You know, we work with so many brands right now. We work with about 550 odd brands in different parts. How difficult it is for a brand to make a connect with the audience. Here's. There's somebody who's already got that connect how easy it is for them to have influencer.

Yes.

Going in and making that.

Yeah.

So, okay, we discovered the second point and I'm sure, I'm sure the audience is going to be thrilled because these two takeaways were learning from digital marketers. That's what the show is, right?

Yes.

To get more than what we can give to the show individually. There was a time I used to do it alone, but I realized that there's so many experts who need to share that information. What's the third point you would give? So these two points, anybody implementing them in the first hundred days, I can, I mean, I can guarantee that they will get success. What would be the third point?

And I just want to finish in the second too, about the marketing. So basically when you're marketing, you have to figure. And especially social media, that's the hot marketing. You know, those are the platforms to use right now. So you got to figure out which platform your readers or your audience or your clients, your followers are on. Right. And that would be another key point I was going to make because there's the Facebook, there's a Twitter, there's LinkedIn, there's Instagram, there's Pinterest, there's Google. There's even things like Periscope and Mirror. So there's so many social media platforms. The question you have to ask is, where is my client? My client isn't on Pinterest because I'm basically trying to connect with dads. You're a dad. Are you hanging out on Pinterest much? See, there you go. If you're a dad watching, you're probably not hanging out on Pinterest much. You know, if you're trying to reach teenagers, where are they hanging out? You know you almost have teenagers, right. Where are your daughters hanging out? Is it Facebook or at best Snapchat?

Right.

There's things like Snapchat and now, you know, Periscope and blah. You know, the younger generation are connected to those kind of the live stream apps or the kind of instantaneous, you tweet it out or you send it out and it's gone.

Right?

Right.

It goes to the Right.

They love that. Yeah. Who would have thought this would be a multi billion dollar company doing this?

Yeah.

So, so, and Vine. Vine is another big one that the teenagers on.

Right.

So you got to figure out again, if you know your avatar and your avatar is like a teenage girl who's in high school, who's 15 years old, who lives in Vancouver, BC, Canada, where is that 15 year old teenage girl hanging out? Probably Snapchat.

Right.

Probably Vine.

Right.

So then maybe you could allocate your marketing resources to, to target more vine and Snapchat and these other platforms. So one of the key things I would say is like figuring out who the target audience is, where are they hanging out is the big other big thing.

Right.

And then reach them there. So I don't want to spend my energy, effort or time on Pinterest.

Got it.

But I do want to spend it on like Facebook because a lot of dads on Facebook.

Right.

I use a lot of YouTube marketing. So a lot of my dads on YouTube and I know you do as well.

Right.

And that's why I'm so glad we could do this interview because we can reach my dad demographic and your demographic through video marketing.

Video marketing, that's key. So what would be the third point?

Yeah. So again, going back to blogging. So a lot of people ask me, okay, how do I monetize my blog?

Yes, that's the question.

Right?

How to make money?

Can I make a full time income blogging? Right. There's all these questions around that, but I think when people ask that question, it's the wrong question because first you gotta make your blog, market your blog, monetize your blog. If you don't have the make part, right, the foundation, what's gonna happen? The whole thing's gonna crumble. No one's gonna read it, no one's gonna follow it. Sponsors are gonna, aren't gonna, aren't gonna like pay for your content, right? So it goes back to my first point, which is the brand targeting your ideal customer, your reader, your follower, right? Once you've got that down pat and you start marketing them, and that's where you build up your following, your readership, that's when the money's gonna come in. And that's the whole monetizing angle, right? So these are the three ways that I feel you can monetize on a blog, right? First is having your own products and services to sell.

Okay?

So you're selling something that you've created, okay? It could be things like online products, it could be ebooks, it could be print books, it could be even a physical product, or it could be service. Things like coaching or even if you're like a masseuse or something, you do massages, right? So figuring out what is your product or service, maybe, I know with a lot of, maybe beginner bloggers or maybe intermediate bloggers, they probably don't have their own products or services yet. So what do you do? You sell someone else's products and services, right?

You already got the traffic, you got.

The traffic, you got the readership, and you don't have the products. So you just basically leverage someone else's products to sell to your audience. And that's called affiliate marketing, of course, and affiliate marketing is so hot nowadays, is obviously Amazon, which is the. The biggest affiliate marketing company in the world, this commission junction. So if you don't, especially with things like marketing, of course, and affiliate marketing is so hot nowadays, is obviously Amazon, which is the biggest affiliate marketing company in the world, this commission junction. So if you don't, especially with things like digital products, info products, then you can go on like commission junction to find them. And pretty much in every niche, every industry, you'll find products on there. A lot of the big Internet marketers you'll see, they'll use a commission junction and basically link from your website to there, and then you'll get a commission, right? It could be anywhere from like 10, 20, 30, 40, 50%, even higher. Like some people give you even up.

To 100% commission on the first sale or whatever.

Exactly, on the first sale, because they only care about the back end. Because you sell the product, give away the whole commission, but your goal is really to make more profit in the back end.

Right?

So, so, so that's the second wave. And the third big way the bloggers make money is advertising on sponsorships. And most of my income comes from sponsors. So basically what I've done is I build up my audience. And at first I was reaching a lot of sponsors, right? I'd be reaching like companies. And I say, can I review your stroller, your car seat, the latest gadget, the latest toy, the latest clothes?

Right.

I'd be probably for the first three to six months of my blog, into the first year, that's what I was doing. It was a lot of like sweat equity on my keyboard, doing the copy and paste, finding out who's the, the marketing manager, the PR manager.

Right.

Sending out those emails, and I did it really well.

So you went through that hustle the first time?

Yeah, it was tough because I would do all that sweat equity and, you know, startups, because anyone having startup company, you'll put in the time, effort and energy, but you won't see the return.

Right.

So you'll spend all this time, even all this money, and there's no roi. And that's when a lot of people give up.

That's when they give up.

Because who wants to spend a lot of time, energy and effort and money and you don't see anything coming back? You.

Right, right.

So at that point, when you're about to give up, don't.

Right.

Because there's gonna be a breakthrough on the side. And if you can push through that barriers of like, you know, the time and the money and nothing, you're not seeing the return because as an entrepreneur, you're going to go through a difficult time. You've done it.

Right.

I'm sure in the early days of Internet moguls, you've probably gone through that, of course. And now you're here where you're at, because you didn't give up.

Right.

And so many people give up too quickly.

Right.

Right before they about to.

And you know, even now, you know, even now that we, you know, we've been working for, every year has been a new challenge and that re forces you to think of the basics. You, you know, there are times you want to give up again because every time the scale becomes bigger. Yeah, the, the risk is bigger, the stakeholders are many. So, you know, you, you relive that, the experience sometimes, and it only gets harder in a different way. When you started, you were on your own. Now that other boards of directors and this, this. So it always gets harder. But, you know, like my dad always says, if it's getting harder, why don't you build stronger muscles to lift that weight? So, so, you know, to work out more, maybe get up on time, read more books, meet more people.

Yeah.

You know, get, get that. Like I mentioned in my shows that it's very important to clean your mind three days, three times a day. And Isabelle that I interviewed a few days back, she said, she calls it brain sweep. So if your brain is cluttered with so much, you need to quieten down.

Yes.

Five, ten minutes a day and then restart. And we make this happen twice a day at Internet moguls. We have 150 of us. And I'm sure a lot of kids that work for us, and I call them kids because they, you know, 15 years younger to me, at least most of them. So they maybe don't like what we make them do, but a lot of them do. And they love the fact that, you know, because you have to restart, you know, a few times a day because the brain gets cluttered and you just can't go. And that's when you come back and say, you know what? I'm not giving up.

Yeah.

It's so easy to, you know, to fill your brain with stuff and say, I'm working hard, I've got so much stress and I'm giving up.

Right, right.

Yeah.

And you know, like in this day and age 2016, we're very much go.

Go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go.

Right, right.

And we're on the go all the time. We're even like going to the fast food restaurants because we don't have time to eat even we're walking and eating. We're trying to do multiple things at once.

Right.

But I think we need that rest. I call it the Sabbath and I think we need that weekly Sabbath. So for me, it's a Sunday. Usually I'm going to church in the morning, I'm hanging with family, try not to do any work. Maybe not doing any work, but as.

Little work as possible.

But the mental, the mental break.

Right.

And we also need that daily, like the time some people like meditate or just take time off Y, etc. For me, I do something called floating. I don't know if you've heard of that.

I've seen a few floating centers happening in Vancouver. Yeah, it's not caught up so much in other parts of Asia yet. What's it, what's it about?

So floating is this hot new trend, because like I said, we're the go Go people. We're looking for rest, right? And sometimes it's in a bathtub, right? We're just resting, relaxing in a bathtub. And now there's this huge phenomena internationally and especially in the western countries because we have all the penny we can spend. So we're looking to where we can spend it to relax, right? It's kind of funny, it's kind of ironic. So we spend money and North Americans spend money to hang out in a bathtub and float on Epsom salt. Basically all it is is water, Epsom salt, and you're basically floating. So it's not like a bathtub where you're just in normal water, but the salt concentration actually makes you float, right? And it's such for me, I really love it. I've been doing quite a bit. I've done it already a couple times this year. Like we're in January right now and I've done it twice since the last two weeks.

You know, I. It's about what, 15, 20 years back as I was, I always wanted a huge television in right in front of my tub and I wanted to play my. I'm a huge video gamer day, right? So I wanted to. And yesterday I met somebody who had a humongous 42 inch television nicely framed in his right outside his tub. And the PlayStation remote. I was.

Must be Jamil from Third Eye Productions.

No, no, it wasn't Jamil.

He has one too.

Oh ye. I know Jameel's got an awesome studio, but this was somebody else. I don't know if you want me to name him on the show, but it was the coolest pad that I'd seen. So we shared these three tips and I'm sure that, you know, everybody who's watching this show has got something that they've taken back with this because like I said, I learned especially when you told me about that thing about Tyler Basu, take that one person and multiply. Because that is one thing which has stuck with me. So, you know, I thank you very much. I learned a lot today. And my last question before we, you know, wrap up for now, we want to be coming back. Ricky, you have to be ready for us. Absolutely. When are you coming to India?

Good question. I'm actually going traveling this year.

Isn't that nice?

So, you know, last year I took a lot of like self reflection and trying to figure out what's really important to me, right? Is it the house, is it the mortgage, is the Car is the material. Is it my business? And really, I realized those things weren't important to me. And I know some people are seeking that. They're like, I want to hit six figures this year. I want to eat. If they already had six, I want to hit seven figures this year, right? And that's all they focused on. I want to hit the six figures. I want to hit the six figures. I want to hit the seven, right? Some people, like, okay, I live in. I'm renting now. I want to own a place. Some people, like, okay, I want a condo now. I want to own a townhome or a home, right? Other people, they're just, like, trying to, like, accumulate stuff. Like, I have a Civic now. I want to upgrade to a Mercedes or a BMW, right? And I was one of those people. I was trying to hit the six figures. I was trying to move from my condo to my townhouse to a home. I was trying to upgrade from my Civic to a BMW. And I was just like, I had a big eye awake, you know, eye opening. Because I just like, is that really going to make me happier? Because there's this whole saying that, you know, the richer you are, they say unhappier, but no, I know happy rich people. I know poor rich people. But if you keep seeking and yearning for materialistic things, I don't think that's gonna make you happy, right? And there are a lot of poor people seeking for materialism, too. And there are a lot of rich people, and there are other people that are just content regardless of financial status. So for me, I really value experience, and I'm doing a lot of experience locally. But I realize there's a. The slack in terms of travel and taking my kids to explore the world. And for me, before I got married, I'd actually done a lot of traveling. I've been to over 50 countries.

I worked 50 countries. This was five years back.

That was in my 20s. So now I'm 38 right now. But in my 20s, I actually backpacked around Europe. I worked in Japan teaching English. So that's how you get the Tokyo rookie handle. And then I traveled through Asia, and then I studied in Australia, and I went to Australia, New Zealand, and I traveled to North America. So I'd done all this traveling, and that really enriched my life and opened up my mind about cultures and about helping people and making a difference in this world, transforming it, right? That was me in my 20s. And then I think I lost some of that when I.

You heard that song, I have a Girlfriend, every town.

Okay, yeah, I didn't have that. I just had my wife. I'm happy with that. And that's all I want. Happy with the wife, the kids. So right now in Vancouver, I've made this decision that I want to make a difference, not on a localized level, on a global level. And I want my kids to experience life their fullest. The modeling part, right. So we're actually heading out in this big, epic journey for one year, heading from Vancouver, from Mexico to Panama, across to South America. And we want experience life the fullest. So we're making some decisions about, you know, like either we're going to sell our plate, rent it out, airbnb it out. You know, my wife's actually going math leave. So we're still going to get a salary coming in there. I have my online businesses which bring some money in as well. So, yeah, we're gonna explore the world and we're gonna write all about it on our blog called familytravelbloggers.com family.

So we're gonna link that familytravelbloggers.com and it's gonna be more video, right?

Absolutely. Like, I do a lot of video news with dads and I love to do one with you about, you know, your travel journeys with these kids and if you a lot of like parents. Because I think we want to teach our kids.

Right, right.

And one of the ways we can teach our kids is not through a traditional education, but through experiential education.

Sure.

So. And that's the next interview. So anyway, yeah, check out daddyblogger.com and also familytravelbloggers.com Perfect.

It was lovely talking to you. We learned a lot and I'm sure that once this show reaches, reaches out and people are going to come back. Last question, Last thing we want to share through the show is a lot of startups watch this show and they are going to be sending in their startup business plans and ideas and say what they want to do. Could be somebody housewife starting a blog or could be somebody wanting to start a billion dollar company. So we invite startups to come on this show, send us comments, send short videos on what they want to do, and we're going to discuss that Internet moguls team is going to make. We get about 18, 20 queries. We're going to make, you know, shortlist them into five and then discuss some with you and then come get back to them through this show with free advice. You said these should be your first three steps because your foundation is everything. So we're going to help startups through this show and once we get in those queries, we'll get, you know, we get in touch with you again.

Absolutely. Yeah. Like I like I keep saying throughout this whole interview, my whole goal is to help and give back. Perfect. And I'd love to connect with your audience and even if you have any questions to do a blogging or social media, happy to help out any way I can.

Excellent. Excellent. Thank you very much for your time.

Thanks, Avi.

Good.

Great interview. Thank you.

You. Thank you. Thank you very much for watching the Ask Kavyaria show live from the home of the daddy blogger Ricky Shetty.