Building an Agency with an Entrepreneurial Mindset, with Kevin Urrutia

Hey, everybody, and welcome to this week's episode of the Agency Accelerator Podcast. First of all, I hope you are having a fantastic, productive week, and I hope this episode is going to help you do that even more. This is a bit of a winding episode because we're talking about everything to do with being an entrepreneur and all about having the right mindset, thinking about succession planning and selling your agency. And I'm excited to have Kevin Yarutio with me and he runs Voy Media. But as you will hear, he. He has his finger in many pies and has started a whole number of businesses. So we explore what drives him and some of the lessons that he's learned and some of the advice that he gives to you to make sure that you maintain that winning mindset. So let's get on with today's episode. Accelerate your agency's profitable growth with tools, tips, and value added interviews with your host agency owner and coach, Rob DaCosta. Hey, everybody, and welcome to the latest episode of the Agency Accelerator Podcast. We are getting inside the mind of an entrepreneur today, and I am really excited to have with me today Kevin Arutia. And Kevin's done lots of things, so my introduction is not going to really do him justice. But Kevin started out as a software developer, then he moved into E commerce, starting Chester Travels, which I believe sells super suitcases. And he grew that business to one and a half million dollars in just 18 months. He also then started a home clean home cleaning business, which he grew to $3 million. And now he runs a digital agency called Voy Media. And if that wasn't enough, he's also the co author of Digital Marketing Made Easy and Key Concepts of Digital Marketing and a podcaster too. So welcome Kevin. That sounds like that you don't have enough hours in the day to do all of those things.

Hey, thanks for having me. Yeah, super exciting. I've done a lot of stuff, but mostly kind of what we were talking about earlier. It's just in the beginning I just. That's what I wanted to do is be entrepreneur and make things. And that's sort of like the mindset I've always sort of had when I was like, younger and sort of doing things. So. Yeah.

Yeah. So just before we jump into this questions, so let me just tell you, I've just got a new cleaner and the. The new cleaner has started her business during the pandemic. So she's being a bit of an entrepreneur. And I was telling her about my typical day because, like, like you, I've been Self employed for a long time. And she said, what, what drives you and what motivates you? And I thought that was a really interesting question. So I thought I'd start this interview off by asking you what drives you and what motivates you?

At least for me. What drives me motivates me. I think it's. For me, it was always like, I've always wanted to do my own thing. And that has always driven me. It's like that concept of, hey, I'm my own boss, I have my own things, and building my own, like products or companies, at least for me. Like, I don't know, it's like I always think about it, as in, well, growing up I would always like, see people and I'd be like, what makes them different than me? And I was like reading, reading about them was like, this person's a normal person. And I was like, I can be that person. I've always think I could do it. And that sort of hozoe driven me where I always thought like, oh my God, this person must be super smart. But I'm like reading it, I'm like, no, like this person just doesn't. He knows a little bit more than me. But I could do it too. And that's sort of like by my mindset of like, if they could do it, I could do it too. And it's like that as that simple as that. It is. That's sort of what always drives me.

Yeah. So are you running lots of businesses concurrently at the moment or is that story I gave you just a bit of your sort of linear timeline?

Yeah, it depends like some. What I'm. What I'm focusing on right now is mainly Void Media, which is the marketing agency. But back then, like when I was starting my other companies, I had a, like all those things that I was like thinking about. Like the made the maid cleaning company was first. So I started that one right after I quit my job in San Francisco. I was there for about two and a half years. Then I was like, I gotta go do my own thing. And then I started the cleaning company. And while I was doing the cleaning company, that's kind of when I thought of idea to do like the outdoor gear company, which is Montum. And that spun out of still running the cleaning company, but using the sources, the resources that I had, like the income that was coming in for the cleaning to like get the inventory, the. To hire the staff. And then from there that started the outdoor, the luggage company. And that's sort of all these sort of things kind of were built around the same time within like a five year span. But in the beginning, like anything, everything was like a mess. Like, you know, we're all working on things at the same time and then as things got bigger, we sort of like spun out. People like, okay, hey, this guy that works for me at the cleaning company, he's pretty good. Let him just run the outdoor gear company because I just don't have time. So that's kind of how it happened. And eventually it's like stuff that's split and then you're saying, okay, like separate slack channels, slept with email channels. Like, we can't have employees doing this and this because then like people get too confused on what is the responsibility. But yeah, in the beginning it's, I tell people like we just did everything at once because the cleaning company is providing a lot of the cash flow to fund stuff.

Yeah. And I guess when we're starting out and we're younger and naive, perhaps a bit more naive, we probably are, you know, I'm more willing to take those risks. So. So let's just talk about some of the hurdles to growth because a lot of our listeners are sort of in one of three phases that are in startup mode, they're in growth mode, or they maybe are in advanced growth. What are some of the hurdles that you see reoccurringly for smaller businesses as they grow? What are some of the things that our listeners should be mindful of in that journey of growth?

So journey of growth. I think one of the biggest things, it really depends for service based businesses like mine. I've like, I always tell people, like my companies aren't too complex, they're service based. If I grow.

And I think most of my listeners are service based as well.

Yeah, yeah. Honestly, one of the biggest hurdles to growth, at least for the cleaning company and even for Way Media, is just having great employees that are trained up to do the work that you want them to do. And I think that's very hard on the industry that you're in. For cleaning, for example, cleaning is very easy. So we would get a lot of people saying, hey, I'm a cleaner, right? Anybody can clean, I could clean. You could clean. I not the best cleaner, maybe you're a great cleaner. But that sort of quality of cleaning is hard to sort of get right. And I think for cleaning it's even harder because you know, everybody's definition of clean is different. Like a bachelor's clean is different than like a married person's cleaning. So it's like we gotta account for all these things. So at least for us, making sure that we have like a checklist in place and getting them trained up. And we know for, at least for the made company, we know we're always gonna make mistakes. So you should always have that mindset. So for us it's like, hey, look, if something's not right, here's how you can contact us so we can make it right, so they can get that great experience. Because I think service based company is all about the experience. Even though like you might not like it. Hey, here's how to get a refund, here's how to, we're going to come back the same day to fix mistakes for you. So I think having that sort of system in place allows yourself to growth because you have a great experience. And now at least for us here in the US we have a lot of Yelp. Yelp and Google reviews are so important for growth that that's sort of how you build momentum and that's how you get more people to, to come. And again, that applies to a lot of industries as well.

Yeah, yeah. And I think that's good. You know, reviews online are so important and you obviously don't want to have a bad one, but have a good one if you can get it. What's your feeling like right now? We're recording this in October 2021. We are all kind of hoping that we're coming out of a pandemic. We've all learned to work differently. How do you think finding people has changed because of that?

Oh, that's very tough. At least for it's, it's, for us it's been interesting because my background, Rob, is like programming. So I always kind of done remote work. Even when I was in college, I had like a, it wasn't in my bio, but I had this company called One Tiny Bit, which is like a software development company. And we were developing apps for people in like, you know, New York, California. When I was in upstate college in Binghamton. Right. It's like nowhere. So this remote concept was always similar to me. So when I went to work in San Francisco, it kind of went away because like, oh, like people just work in an office. And then pandemic, I was like, oh yeah, this is how I was working when I was like 18 or 19, right. In college. Like this makes sense. So for me and Wilson, who's the other founder, we thought it was like very similar. But I think for other people, at least for us, and we've been Hiring for. At least for Void Media, it's been like a hit or miss either people. We've had people join in like a week. Quit saying, like, I just can't do remote because I'm so used to the office. And we could see that with the way they're struggling, like, hey, get on camera. Like, I don't want to be on camera. I'm like, you just have to like, just get on. Like, what do you, you. This is how you look. Like, you can't change it. You're like 25 years plus. Like, I can't change how I look. So it's, at least for us, that's been difficult to find these people that we know can work autonomously without having to be like, I don't want, I. I really don't want to have a company where I'm like, time tracking you. Like, that's not what I want. I don't want to be doing that. And some people are like, okay, maybe we do a time track. I'm like, that's not fun for me. Like, I don't want to check in time logs. Like, I just want to trust you to say, like, you're going to do your work. And finding those people is tough, but again, once you find them, you know that like, you know, like anybody. I think, I believe that when you work for something, people just want to do their best work. No one wants to go to work and be like, yeah, I'm going to be. I'm going to want to do anything today. Of course there's some. But not like in some fields or industries that we're probably in, at least for programming. Like, you want to be like the best programmer out there. You want to make the rest code. You don't want to just go to work and like, write nothingness.

Yeah. And is. Is like in the, in the UK at the moment, there's a real skill shortage in the whole marketing agency field. And so it's tough to find people. I mean, it's been that way for a while, but it's even worse than ever at the moment. Is that true in the US and are you finding that the pandemic has actually meant you can look further afield for people?

Yeah, I mean, for us, we have such a shortage of finding great marketers. I think one thing that people realize is, like, everybody can do marketing. It's kind of like any skill, or not like any skill, but, like, there's people that, you know, you go to Google Ads, you get certified, you go to Facebook ads. You get certified and people like, yep, I'm a Facebook ads marketer. Okay, like, that's like the basics of like Facebook ads. But then there's people that truly understand how marketing works, as in what you're talking about growth, how to understand growth, how to understand your profits and margins, how to understand hiring, how to understand inventory. That is all part of marketing. And you're sort of seeing this mesh of things that actually make a growth marketer someone that truly understands the business. And at least for us, one of the hardest challenges that we find is people that can understand like, yep, this is how you upload an ad on Facebook from like, that doesn't make you a marketer. You need to understand how do you the data, what's the click through rates, how do you optimize the images, how do you the copy. That's still a shortage of people truly understanding the fundamentals of marketing. And there's only a few people that can do that because they actually spend the time to go back and read like Ogilvy, go read these great books of authors that have done it before. That, at least for me, is a shortage of those people. And I always tell people, those marketers, they're great and they probably have their own business or they have their own company, they're not going to be working for me. So it's harder to find those great people.

Yeah, but it's a good point that you make, which is I always feel like everyone in a business needs to have a bit of a commercial head on their shoulders. They need to understand the difference between delighting the client and over servicing. They need to understand the difference between profit and loss. They need to understand the difference between. I always facetiously say to my clients, are you running a business or a charity? Yeah. Because if you're over servicing your clients by more than 10 or 15%, then you're running a charity. Yeah. And I think often it's because the team, the younger team members just want to do a great job for their clients. When the client says jump, they say how high? But they, they don't have this commercial now about them.

Yeah. And that's so true. It's. And it's something that we always struggle too with the agency. It's. You probably have this too, Rob, where I'm like, okay, client wants like an extra thing. It's like, do we want to charge them? Do we want to delight them? It's like this battle between should we charge them because we, we need the profit, but should we just like get them upset. You know, it's. As an agency owner, you always want your customers to be happy. And it's always a battle of like, all right, fine, we'll do a free landing page. Because I know it's going to make them happier. I know they're going to stick again. But I think it's so important to realize, okay, how much money are you making? And it's funny because I always say that too. I'm like, I'm not running a charity either. It's so funny because I always do say that to like. Well, he said it to Wilson. I'm like, dude, we're not running a charity. We need to make money.

Yeah, for sure. And I think the thing. I mean, this is a whole other topic that we could just talk about for hours. But I think one of the things is that if you make a conscious decision to over service a client because you want to delight them and you want to help them, the key to that is to make sure the client understands that it's an extra on top of what they are normally paying for. So that when you don't do it next time, they're not disappointed because they understand you were kind of helping them out.

It's so funny because we always try to say that too. And we're just like, I hope they understand that this costs us money. We're like, I don't know if they will understand that because they think it's free, right? It's every client's like, okay, this is just free. I'm like, you do it once, they expect it free every single time.

It's just like, I've written before, Kevin, about. I wrote a blog or an email or something called can youn? Just that dreaded term that clients use. Hey, Rob, can you just do this for me? Can you just do that? And in their mind, it's five minutes work, but of course it's two hours work. And, you know, so we just have to be really mindful about that. So, any other hurdles? So we talked about, like this, the agents. I'm just starting my agency. I've got to the point where I might want to hire some people. And we discussed that as a big hurdle to finding the right people if they've got any other thoughts around, like those early stage hurdles to growth if you cast your mind back to your agency or your cleaning business or travel or so on.

Yeah, I think the biggest hurdle, again, like, is still what I think people get over people sometimes get stuck with is like, they think that they need to be doing all the work, all the service. I think that is something that early on for me was something I was like, oh, yep, I don't want to be doing that because if I'm doing all the work, all the servicing, then I'm never going to grow like a business. And that's something that a lot of people get stuck in. And for me, the realization was when you look at a bodega or like a street corner, you see like the owner of that business there, like doing the cashier stocking. I'm just like, okay, like these people are quote unquote running a business, but it's actually like a full time, harder job. I was like, I don't want to be doing that. So getting out of that mindset I think is so important and very helpful for businesses, at least for me. Like, yeah, people come to Void Media and they see me. I'm on podcasts, I'm on YouTube, I'm on everywhere. And people was like, oh, I thought I was gonna work with Ken. I'm like, not gonna work with me. You're with my team. But like, they've been trained by me. They've been doing stuff. So I think that's sort of like a big hurdle that people need to get rid of. Because again, like, I understand that you want to do the service, you want to do the work, because you're the one that knows everything, but at a certain point, you just can't scale and grow the business. And I think ultimately you want to grow your business and you don't want to be the one managing the, you know, marketing. But again, it really depends. If you do want to do that, then great. But then go and find somebody that's going to be like a COO that's going to help you actually grow the business. Because it's too hard to do both at the same time when you think about growth. And you also need to be thinking about servicing your clients.

Yeah, for sure. And it's interesting, isn't it, that an entrepreneur is, I always say that the spark that got their business going, but they also become the roadblock to growth in the end because they kind of got to get out of their own way and they've got to realize that other people, they need to let other people do the work. And other people may not do it as well as them or in the same way as them, but that's okay.

Yep. Yeah, that's so true. And that's something that you always going to have to at least find processes System saying, hey, this is how we're going to do things. Like even for us, we're, I think for us too, like we're always updating our internal system, internal processes, depending on the employees we hire. Okay, it seems like this person made this mistake. How do we avoid that? That way the client is upset. Next time, okay, let's do a roadmap call, let's do a biweekly call. Let's do this type of call, invite them to Slack again. You as a business owner is how do you optimize your company so you can actually bring on these people to service more clients and again, keep delighting them with the great experience that you want to provide them?

Yeah, for sure. I mean as tedious as it might be for an entrepreneur, documenting your business processes so that you can replicate yourself and replicate the service that the client, the experience that the client gets is so, so, so important. And so now this, this agency's grown. They maybe have got, say they've got 10 staff. What, what are. I keep putting you on the spot by asking the same question, but I'm just interested to hear your experience of being there yourself. What are. When I've got to that size where I have delegated, maybe I've got a COO and I'm getting stuff off my plate. What are the next hurdles to get to that next size? That sort of one and a half million dollar revenue target?

I think the biggest one us to get that has gotten us over that hump. It was having, at least for me, was a great sort of sales process. I think as like small business owners, entrepreneurs, at least for me, like I never wanted to do sales. I was like, oh, sales is scary. Like, oh, especially me, I'm a programmer. I went to school for computer science. I never, never by the way. Oh, nice. Yeah, I never, I always thought like sales was a weird thing. But then you realize that like you would read books, like I read tons of books and realize like a sales is just a process for your prospect to understand what you're truly selling or have to deliver. And I think for us, like in the beginning was very just me talking to them. But then once I kind of document that process, okay, this is the email we send out. This is the follow up email. This is the calendar link. This is like, hey, you set an agenda on the first call. Here's what I talk about. Making sure that the prospect knows that, okay, these guys are professionals. Like we're not going to just randomly talk about stuff. And I think for that sort of helped us. Um, another big one too, honestly, is just having a salesperson and moving your. It's. I tell like my friend calls. I'm not sure. You probably heard of this too, right, Rob? But like, as a founder, you always gonna inherently close more than like a sales person. My friend calls like a founder bonus where like, you just. You're. They're talking to the founder, so they're gonna like, want. They're attracted to you. You're probably charismatic. Talk to them. You know, your service in and out. So any questions they have, there's none of like, hey, let me go talk to my founder. Hey, let me go talk to the boss and see if we can do that.

Right.

And I never got. I never knew about that until like I hired a salesperson and then they would email me like, Kevin, like the person on the call said this. I was like, this is the answer. I was like, but I guess they don't know it, but. Because I know it. So that's sort of interesting.

Yeah. I mean, sorry, go on.

Yeah, but that's sort of like a big one is having a great sales process and always updating it. I think again, our sales decks probably update maybe every three, four months and. And even like our salesperson's like, why are we always updating? I'm like, because every month I'm like, looking. Listen to your calls. This is how we can make it better. I was like, okay, we didn't close this month, so this is how we're going to close again. And it's always having that entrepreneurial spirit inside your business to grow each part of it. We literally just updated our deck yesterday. I was like, okay, this is good to go. Let's pitch this right now.

Yeah. I mean, listen. And who is ever going to tell you, give you the best feedback about improving things as your clients and your prospects? So we should all constantly, you know, listen to the feedback that we get and listen between the lines and help that improve us. It's really interesting. I don't know about you, but I. When I meet a lot of my clients and I ask them how they get their business, they all rather proudly tell me that it will come through referrals and word of mouth. But as I say to them, that's no. That's no sales process. That's just luck. That's just opportunity. And that's only going to get you so far. And when you want to grow beyond, you know, a certain size, you've got to have a sales process in place.

Yeah. And I Think that's so true. Like, people always say, referrals, word of mouth. I'm like, that's so unpredictable. At least for us. We're doing cold outreach, we're doing cold calls. We're doing podcasting, we're doing YouTube videos. It's everything, like, to get people to, like, know our agency and then say, yep, great, you found us one way. Now let's sort of lead to the way to work with us. Start doing your marketing, your Facebook ads, your Google Ads, whatever it might be. And again, that's the only way to have predictable growth and revenue, essentially, for your company, especially as you get bigger, you have 20, 30 people. That payroll is just like, okay, like, we need business.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. And like you say, the problem about referrals and word of mouth is you have no control over when they come in, and you also have no control over the quality or the fit for your. For your business. So you've got to do something, you know, more than that, right?

Yeah, for sure. And even for me, like, we've got a lot of referrals, and most referrals are just like. They're like, kind of not looking for it. Kind of looking for it. So it's like, the sales process is always a little longer for referrals, even though people think it's easier. I'm like, when someone's, like, searching for it, they're like, okay, yep. I. I'm like, kind of like marketing. They're in the market. They're like, the demand is there, where referral. It's kind of like, kind. Let me go talk to people and, like, you know, cool, let's go connect another month where I'm like, all right, are you gonna work with me or not? Right? Yeah.

Yeah. And, you know, I always. I always sort of teach my.

My.

My community that you don't want to be qualifying those people with your time, because your time is your most precious commodity. You need some other processes to qualify people in or out, because you want to. You want to be talking to the people that have demonstrated they've got a need. They understand what you do. They've got a budget. They've got a time scale. They've got a problem that you can solve. Those are the people you want to invest your time in. I just want to pick up on one point that you said a bit earlier, which I think is worth reiterating, and that is that when you're growing a business, any kind, you have to make a choice at some point is, am I building the brand being me or am I building the brand being a brand and therefore I can replicate me through other people and through the service that we deliver. And I think that that's an important judgment that people need to make because otherwise they stay in of freelancer space forever more kidding themselves that they're growing their business.

Yeah, and that's so funny because like, it's something that we always fight. Like so much of Void Media is based on my personality, Kevin. Like everybody knows me. But again, I also have Void Media as a backing. So for me, we're the way I've thought it. I mean, like, for me, I like someone like Gary Vee, where, hey, you have Gary Vee, which is the guy, but then he also has VaynerMedia, which is everything that runs behind him. And that's sort of the way I've emulated where some people are just like Kevin.com and like everything's the brand. Right? Like you have like, I don't know.

Like, like me, really?

Yeah, yeah. Someone like yourself, right? Which is just like everything's your name. Where for me it's like, yes, I'm like the face of the company. But everything still goes to the branded avoid media. And I think that's super helpful to sort of distinguish that. But again, it's not perfect. And it's something that I think about too. Something my co founder Wilson's like, like the thing we think about too, because you have to think about it, let's say five, ten years from now, you want to sell the company when what are you selling? Am I selling Rob? Am I selling Kevin, or am I selling the brand? And that's something that early on you're not thinking about it. But you know, anything 10, 20 years from now, you never know what could happen. You want to sell it, like, and that's something to be thinking about. And again, going back to my original businesses in the beginning, when you have like every company with one bank account, one P&L, that's a nightmare. And then when you want to sell it, it's like, all right, is this expense for this company or this company? And then you realize when you want to sell a company, you don't make these mistakes anymore. Like, you're like, okay, everything's a little bit separate now. But I think for any sort of business, I still personally think that, like, having your own personal brand is great in the beginning because that's going to get your clients, that's going to get your referrals as you become bigger. Okay, start separating It. And that's sort of what kind of what we did. And. And at least for us, you kind of separate. You separate that too. Again, with a sales process. They come in for Kevin, but they email me, but I say, hey, great, go talk to my salesperson. And then they realize, oh, wow, it's not just Kevin, it's the company of that Kevin has or Wilson has. And that sort of helps establish that. And we've got a lot better at that within the past year because, oh, like I said, like, I just recently got a salesperson, like a year ago. And like, I was doing all the sales calls and like, it felt very like, yep, I'm working with Kevin's company. And then once I see, like, Kevin the salesperson, it's very weird. Like, I'll join in a sales call, like, oh, my God, the CEO's here. I'm like, hey, what's up? I'm like, I'm not saying anything, but, like, they get so excited. I'm just like, this is so weird because it's like myself, I was so used to just these calls and talking to these people. But again, in the beginning, that helped the growth of the company because they didn't want to come work for work with Void, because they did talk to me, and that was super beneficial to growth. But then eventually I was like, this isn't sustainable for me. I'm getting on calls like, six times a day. I'm like, exhausted in the day. I'm like, I can't be doing that.

Yeah, I really like that concept of the founder bonus. That's a good one. I haven't heard it like that before. You sort of. The next question I wanted to ask you, which you've already answered, the first part of it actually is, if someone hopes one day to sell their agency, what advice would you give to them besides what you just said, which is build a brand, don't build it on you, but what other advice would you give them?

Yeah, so I haven't sold agency yet, but some things that I've sold a previous company before, again, have a separate bank account. One thing that I think that's important for people to think about too, is sell your company when it's, like, on a high versus, like, on a low. That way you can just, like, get the highest valuation as possible. And you're not like, questioning these, like, numbers. What does this mean? Why is it as a lull and like, that's something I've learned from my other companies where you want to sell it when it's its peak? You say, yep, like, even though you're not ready. And again, if you want to sell a company, it's something you need to think about at least for like a year, because you're not going to find a buyer instantly, especially if you have an agency doing, you know, anywhere between 5 to 6 million. Because an agency is like a lot of people. And you need to say, like, I've heard stories. My friend Josh sold an agency and he said he sold it, and within like six months, the founder was like, yeah, like, I can't run this because I've never. I've never done an agency before. So he, like, took it back, but it was like a weird, like, mix. So ideally, you want to work with a company that has bought an agency before. So they know, like, kind of what you said. They know the struggles. They know what it really is. Like, when I talk to other agency founders, I'm like, okay, you've done an agency. Like, you know the struggles, you know, the good and the bad. And I think it's so important to think about.

Yeah, I can say, relate to that story. When I sold my agency, we sold. We actually sold to a big US Company in, in Minneapolis. And they weren't a marketing agency and it was not a poor. It was not a good match. And after two years, which is I was tied in for two years, they offered to sell me the agency back for a pound. And I said no, thanks because. Because they killed the brand and they just wanted me to take the people and the responsibility. I also think another really good point that you made is sell on a high. And I would extend that to say sell when you, the owner, are feeling really positive and not feeling burnt out. Like, I sold my agency when I was feeling tired and burnt out. And I'm sure that would have impacted the value that we got for it, rather than, like you say, selling it. Selling it on a high. So let's just. Just a couple more things. I just wanted to get your thoughts on what makes a really good entrepreneurial mindset. What's the kind of right thought processes someone needs to have if they want to have the sort of success that you've had.

I think for entrepreneurial mindset, I think it's being willing to just try new stuff, which sounds easy. You all have friends that you tell them a new idea and they're like, this isn't going to work. I'm like, you haven't even heard the idea yet. I was talking to a friend recently and I was like, hey, you should do, like, security guard for, like, people. And she's like, no, this is why it's gonna. I'm like, why are you so negative? And I think it's so simple. But being open to ideas and open to stuff and willing to try things is so important for entrepreneur mindset. And I have tons of friends, and I'm just like, at least for me, I'm like, hey, I want to start a cleaning company. They're like, kevin, what are you thinking about? You're like a computer scientist. I was like, yeah, but, like, this could be fun to do. And they're like, like, why would I ever do that? You don't even clean. I was like, that's fine. Like, I think another. Another thing that entrepreneurs get stuck in is. Or at least like people that want to do businesses is they think they have to do that job, that they're like, signing up for cleaning. I've never done a cleaning company. I've never cleaned before. My outdoor gear company. I started a hiking company. I was. I was. I hiked, like, everybody, quote, unquote, heights. But I wasn't an active hiker. But I can research what are trekking poles, what are backpacks, how to. What are people looking for? My luggage company. I was never a traveler. I've never sold luggage before. But I knew about manufacturing. And again, it's. You hear it all the time, like, oh, follow your passion. Which is. I think it's great if you're, like, super rich because you can do whatever you want, but as an entrepreneur, like, you're just looking for opportunities to make money and then go ahead. Once you make money, then go follow your passion, then go do whatever you want and waste money. Even for me, marketing, like, I was never went to school for marketing, but I understood how to market because of my businesses. So that's sort of like, oh, this is actually interesting to me. Being open to stuff I think is super important. I like reading about entrepreneurs, at least for me. I personally love reading about startups. Love reading about Elon Musk, like, Marc Andreessen, early entrepreneurial guys. That stuff excites me. Like, when I'm feeling kind of in a lull, I'm like, okay, I got to read, like, entrepreneurial book because it's going to excite me. And I really like reading about these journeys from, like, building stuff. I don't really read fiction, but. But that's sort of like, at least for me, what I think is important and sort of what helps me.

Yeah, I think that the piece of advice about you don't have to be able to do the job is a really important one because I think a lot of time people think I have to be able to do everything. I can't possibly delegate unless I could do it myself. And that just isn't true. I think the other thing I would say to this is to and it kind of goes in hand with your be open minded and try new things is don't be scared of failing.

Yeah.

Because you know we need to fail. I can't tell you in. I mean I've been running this business for nearly 50. Well, I'm in my 15th year now and I in terms of like it's whole other topic in terms of me getting into the online world, I can't tell you how many failures I've had. A lot more failures than I've had successes so far. But that's part of the journey that gets you to the next stage.

Right. And that's so funny because if I tell people all the things that like I wake up to for the agency to the cleaning company and you think about all the failures, you're just never going to get done. Like I like you probably had this too where you wake up, you're like wow, that was a crazy, that's a crazy thing that's going to happen today because like someone just quit out of nowhere. This client just complained about this. I'm like, oh my God. Like you can't possibly think of everything but you just take it and be like, okay, let me try to figure out how I'm going to fix this today. And just having that mindset of let's get it done. And again, a big thing too is working with teammates or having a co founder that it's also like that because that's going to make it so much easier than again having someone that's like stressed out or you know, freaking out.

Yeah, for sure. Really quick question before we end this because I'm conscious of time but I know Voymeda works in the digital marketing space so I was just interested to ask you what kind of trends do you see coming down the line in the whole digital marketing world?

Yeah, for me, the biggest trends. The biggest trends that I see, at least for me, is that marketing is getting harder, which is good because the entrepreneurs are getting more savvy, they just know more, they understand more. Where before you probably know, Rob, dropshipping was so big where anybody can go online and that made marketing easy. But again the quality of products was down. Now with everything Being much harder, much more difficult. I think the quad entrepreneur is getting there where it's like they truly understanding everything now from business to marketing to having a great quality product. At least for me, it reminds me of like 15 years ago when, like, there's all this great product and then, like, there's this weird space in e commerce time where, like, dropshippers came in and it's like everybody was a marketer and like, you have all this weird stuff online now that's going down. I'm seeing, like, great quality product. I'm like, okay, wow, this is actually a new invention. Where before it was like, another person selling a T shirt, another person selling another mug. I'm like, when is new stuff going to be out there again? So I'm seeing that happen again, which is exciting because I'm like, great for us as marketers, we can work with innovative products again.

Yeah. I mean, you know, the success of anything like that is the ability to market it. Right. Because we, you know, almost no one's operating in a vacuum with no competition where, whether you're, you know, running a business like your agency or a coaching practice like mine, we're all competing where there's a lot of noise. And so we've got to be good at finding ways through that noise. So, Kevin, if people wanted to reach out to you and find out more about you and your journey and Voymeda, where would they go?

They can just email me kevinoymedia.com or just go to voidmedia.com you can find me there. But that's pretty much the best way.

Okay. And I need to ask you one question I've forgotten to ask you, which I ask all my guests. And this is really important because we're just heading towards 100th episode, and in 100th episode, we're collating all of this into one episode. So if you could go back in time and give your younger self one piece of advice when you're just starting out in business, what would it be?

One piece of advice. What would I give? I would say again, I would say, just go do it. Like, don't be scared of failure. Like, I think that's the biggest thing that I would give myself is in the beginning, I was very scared of, like, you know, even kind of being on camera. That was very scary for me. I was like, oh, my God. Like, people are going to judge me for how I look, how I talk. But eventually it's like, you know, once you get out of that mindset, it's over. Like, you could do whatever you want. It's like, hey, go. Like you can't change yourself. Just go and do that. And that's one of the biggest things where I see people. I'm just like, yeah, like, for me, it took me a while because I've got a coach, everything to do, like mentally, like mentally prepare yourself for this stuff. So I think that's probably one of the biggest advice I would give myself.

Yeah, feel the fear and do it anyways is a good piece of great stuff. So we will include your link with your email address and your website in the show notes. But I just want to end this by saying thank you so much much for joining us today. I know that the listeners will have got some good nuggets from that and I learned this term of a founder's bonus, which is really good. I'm going to use that again. So thanks for joining us today, Kevin.

Thank you, Rob. Thanks, guys.

So Kevin's an interesting guy, isn't he? I hope you found that episode useful and you got some ideas and thoughts and maybe ways of looking at your business slightly differently. If you did enjoy it, please consider leaving a review on Apple Podcasts and share this with your colleagues. And as ever, I hope you have a great rest of the week, a brilliant, relaxing weekend, and I'll see you next Thursday for the next episode of the Agency Accelerator Podcast.