The Power of Niching! EP #003

The power of niching. I niched into broadcast television equipment manufacturers, Sony, Canon, Corner, you name it. And used to just get so much business because I was in that one niche and it has been a real flag in the stand, North Star for me. But I also experience a lot of videographers at all stages often being very nervous about the idea of niching. So I want to just set the record straight when I say niching. Your video business is absolutely critical for financial success. What I mean specifically is talking to one audience at a time so that your message resonates with them. But you know, Andy, you and I were on a call this week with the guys in the VBA group and like there was a lot of concern about. But I'm going to miss out on the fun stuff if I just do one thing. So, Andy, I'd love to throw to you, mate. You know, what's your view on niching?

Yeah, absolutely like it. I suppose in this market there is just straight off the bat there's a lot of, there's a lot of fear around niching. A lot of people can focus on the cons to niching and that is, it's usually driven by like the fear of missing out. There is a fear of.

Not being passionate about an industry and then them feeling incongruent as an identity kind of thing. And then as creatives, they go like, well, I have to be passionate about an industry and if I'm not, you know, if I don't live and breathe that industry, it just won't feel good for me to grow in that industry. I'm going to feel like a fraud. There's that conversation. But the pros for me, fire away, become senecing and like, you know, and if you look at it as a, as a business terms, when it comes to selling, perception is a really big deal when it comes to selling. Positioning is a big deal when it comes to selling. And selling. Selling is essential to growing a business. But niching immediately tenfolds the perception and the positioning of any brand because in order to niche and to make us to take a stand in any industry, it requires character. There's like kudos, points straight off the bat that just gets handed to you because in order to do that it requires a conscious decision to serve and help a particular demographic. And sometimes the fact of even doing that can sometimes be perceived as value. That in itself is like, oh, wow, okay. And yes, that there is the, you know, there's the initial thing of, you know, when you niche into an industry, people like, what.

What?

You. You're now helping builders, or you're not helping dentists, or you're not helping lawyers. And people are afraid of that perception of how will they be perceived if I actually niche into an industry. But it's actually not. Nothing happens. Like, people just go, cool, like, that guy's doing that thing now, and then they just carry on in life. Like, that's. That's kind of there.

Well, Andy, you're not. You're not speaking as one who hasn't done this, right? Like, you. You. You're the builder's man, right? What was that?

I want to hear.

What's that? What's that journey? What was that journey like for you?

Yeah, so, like, the. I started at expansion media was a. I started out as a videographer, just a generalist. I took on anything and everything. I started out shooting weddings and then eventually moved into corporate and sort of. It kind of grew from there. But the kind of defining moment for me when I decided to niche was when I was running Facebook ads. And I remember a moment when our calendar link was just pinging off. Like, I was looking at my phone. We're, like, getting book lead, book lead. I'm like, I looked at my. I looked at Christina, my partner. I said, oh, my gosh, we've, like, cracked the code. Like, I'm here at home working for my office, and these people have been booking into my calendar. Like, this is amazing.

And at that point, I was like, okay, my life is going to change. Like, I'm just, like, I'm going to be sending it now. And I took about 30 sales calls, 40, maybe even more. 30 or 40 sales calls, and I closed about all of those.

And I remember going, this is not scalable. Like, I had to. Every call that I got on, I was having to. They were like, in a different industry, a slightly different niche, different requirements, different problems. And those who were getting close to. Or, yes, were then trying to push me down on price. And I'm like, I just don't even want to win this anymore. Like, this is. This sucks. Like, I'm in a position of, like. And they. They. I. I feel like I had a lot of value to give, but they. They're trying to push me down on price. And I'm like, I don't want to be the guy that gets pushed down on price. Like, I. I want to own the frame. And it's a privilege for you to be working with me because I've got a ton of experience here.

So how.

How do I Get into that position. It's, it's for niching. And I, I have that now. I, I, I, I, I literally have, like I said on a sales call to this guy yesterday, I said, we have the best brand in Australia for the construction industry. And he goes, yeah, yeah, there's, you know, you know, and I just kind of said that it is, it is debatable. But he was kind of like, well, yeah, that's right. Like, of course. Like, you know, I think what it.

Does right, is it gives you, it gives you the ability to make those claims and stake that, that flag in the ground, right. And be like, this is what we're excellent at. And then all of the work and the testimonials speak to that too, which I think is something that gets lost a lot with like show reels and portfolios where it sort of touches lots of different things and you kind of don't get a great sense of it. Whereas if you go, you're a builder and here's a whole bunch of problems we've solved for builders with the stuff we create, do you want us to help you as well? It's like clearly a no brainer for them to have further conversation with you. So it just, it makes so much sense.

Yeah, I think it was, I can't remember who it was, but I feel like it was Elon Musk that said the bigger the problem you solve in a nutshell, the bigger the paycheck. And from hopping around from industry to industry, what I realized was that the big problems are not in the shallow end. The big problems are in the deep end. And it takes time to get to the deep end. And a lot of people hop from industry to industry and they never spend the time to get to the deep end to truly understand the pain points of an industry. But once you get to a point when you can understand the pain points of an industry, because we come in going, well, do you want video content or do you want come in running a brand story video? And then you go, okay, here you go, you give them that. But what I learned was in that process, the problem actually isn't the video. The problem is creating a client acquisition machine that predictably produces high qualified prospects for these guys to convert. But also track like that's, that's actually the key problem that we solve for them. So if I was a generalist, I would not have the time to figure that out or work that out. But now, because we've spent the time in that niche and work that out, we can now get paid for that. Build a system around that, build processes around that, Bring people into that. Before you know it, you've got a good business.

Yep. How many sales calls drive you down on price?

Now, I'm not gonna lie. You still get it. You still get it because the, the, the, the quality of builders fluctuate because you get some, you know, your top 20% of the guys that you're going after, but there's still a majority of who are still kind of still a bit price sensitive and you just tweak your offers to that and you, you systemize it. So if you, they do come on, it doesn't hurt the process as much. But yeah, my experience is, is niching into industry and I know, Matt, you would be a stylistic nation for yourself. Caleb would be more geo targeted niche because you'd be focusing on an area. So I'd actually love to hear like from your guys then. So I'm niched in, specifically into an industry, which is great because I can, you know, we have clients all over Australia, but maybe you can talk a bit about that, kind of like niching into your targeted area.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, when I jumped on with Dan, we, we went through this process of going, well, who, who do we speak to? Who do we help the most? Who's the most valuable clients to us? Because as you said down at the start, like, if you, if you're talking to everybody, which most videographers do, they go, you know, it's all about me. I'm so creative and I can do anything, then it's no, how do I get retainers?

How do I get retainers?

Like, oh, come to me, because I could help you no matter who you are.

I feel like people are kind of that. I feel like that's me going, hey.

I'm creative over here.

But we'll get to that.

Yeah, we'll get to that, though.

But if you, if you're speaking everybody, you know, no one's going to resonate with it. Right. Unless you've got a really specific message that you, you're, you're giving. We. I'm based in Bendigo in Victoria and town of a hundred thousand.

And I think it's 99,000 last time I checked. You're not.

Don't be giving me that nonsense.

It's 99,003. Since you spawned your three children recently.

Yeah, that's, that's right.

Yeah.

If anyone from Ballarat's listening to this, don't, don't fight me. We're bigger, but so bendigo we think we're. Well, there's not enough of one industry right around us. And not that that needs to be the case because Andy, you know, your, your clients are everywhere. You've worked with clients in, in the States, for example. But we worked out that the people that we work really well with, that we connect with that, that, that have the right budgets were regionally based businesses. So we have niched into remarkable regional businesses we call them and we know all about them, like, and they cover a couple of different industries, like heaps of different industries, but they all share really similar things. They all have really similar things in common. They all have a marketing team of one to three people and we know those people and their pain points really, really well. They have the opportunity, the time or the, the, the history to become video experts because there's just so much on their plate. Right. I could talk for ages about regionally based marketers in, in regionally based companies. So we, we serve them really well and we, everything that we do. Like I've got a podcast that is targeted at remarkable regional businesses. That's what it's called. And we've got, you know, all of our marketing is going into how do I connect with and show more content to regionally based businesses. But you know, likewise to Andy, similar to Andy, you know, our, our regional businesses span from regional New South Wales to regional Canada. Canada. That's right. To, to Victoria to, you know, everywhere around the place. So it doesn't really lock us in, but it does. When a regionally based business gets onto our site or into our kind of ecosystem, they feel at home and they're like, these guys are going to get me. I'm going to work with these guys because I know regional people. There's a connection there and that's what we've built. Right? That's the idea of niching is you have, when someone lands in your ecosystem, they go, I'm in the right place because I can see me here.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I love that. I don't question.

What about you, Matt?

I was just gonna, I was just gonna ask what, what would you say qualifies as regional? How do I know I'm regional definition of regional Australia?

Because I check this out because I was looking at some grants recently. I'm like, I was thinking about getting some alpacas. Different story. I'm like, can I get a government grant as a farmer if I get alpaca short side? Yes, you can. As long as you've got five and you produce wool. But Anyway, I discovered a little shortcut.

Around this that you could just like claim them, that they all live on your render farm.

Ah, I see he's here. I'm glad you're here.

I'll see you guys next week.

So technically, anywhere outside of a metro city area in Australia is regional. So outside of the major cities and I think that that's it. Perth, Darwin, Adelaide, Amber, Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, anything outside of that is regional. So it's interesting that your, your niche is remarkable. Regional businesses. And you'll go, how do you do that in Bendigo? It's like, well, that's where I live. But your clients come from even Canada as far I feel, I think the truth is in this, in this, the reality of the niching space is the opposite happens to what you perhaps hear will happen, which is like no one come to me. But yeah, Matt, we'd love to hear from you because you're obviously, you're the odd one out and that you don't niche into a specific industry or geographical area because you are in, in the big city.

Yeah. And it's interesting, like, the idea of niching originally terrified me because I was like, we don't work in one specific industry and we don't have a specific sector or geographic location. We work to looking at it. You kind of to niche into a style or an approach. It becomes the kind of work you're known for. So for us, we're in Melbourne. There's a lot of options as far as video production. There's big agencies, there's small one man bands and everything in between. And so how do you stand out from that? What do you, you know, how do you attract your ideal clients and what do you get known for? And for us, it's our approach and that the creativity now as a top level sounds completely, you know, stagnant and everybody's creative. But it really is echoed through the way we as individuals deal with clients and projects all the way through to the actual end result. And everything between those two bookends of that process is fun, exciting, creative. It's just. It's got the kind of balloon tree magic to it that we just. It's kind of unquantifiable. But it's. It's really, really clear at any point in the process, you're getting a balloon tree production video. So as far as like the niching and going out to a market and trying to attract those clients, it means that all of your marketing falls into making sure that that's front and center and it Will deter some people. Like, we are not everybody's cup of tea. Some really, you know, like, just take a law firm that are typically a bit more stuffy or uptight or a bit more sort of by the numbers. We'll probably bounce a whole bunch of those off us because we are coming across as much more, you know, open and relaxed and casual and bright and colorful and it not jive. And that's totally cool because we probably won't produce the kind of work that they want and vice versa. Stylistically, niching seems like it's a bit of a weird, odd sheet, but it also has helped really shape and narrow our focus because everything we put out there ideally attracts the kind of work that we want to create, which is that fun, exciting, humor, parody type stuff that we are extremely good at. And to kind of circle back to what we were talking about with Andy when, like, you know, you have a client comes to you and goes, hey, we're the greatest brand, brand story video producers in the construction industry. We can do the same thing. We know how to take boring corporate stuff and turn it on its head and make it really fun and engaging for a massive event. Internal stakeholders, your marketing, whatever it is. And here's 13 years of experience. They go, wow, you guys are incredible at doing that. Why would we go anywhere else? Stylistically, niching doesn't on the surface seem like it's as obvious, but we found a lot of success in it and we get a lot of satisfaction from producing really fun, silly stuff too. So it's a win. Win.

Well, you've got some clear language around it though, too, right? You say you niche into fun, humor and wonder. Is that still the language that you use to communicate that?

Yeah, and I think it's, you know, we sort of tacked on things like engaging and entertaining as well, depending on the context. But, you know, it. I think the trap that a lot of small businesses or people, videographers starting out, and they're like, we love telling stories and we're storytellers, is like, that doesn't talk to the way you do that. That and it's the way you do it in construction will speak very differently to that industry. The way you do it for a regional business speaks very differently. The way we do it through fun, humor and wonder and sometimes puns kind of speaks to our approach and our sense of humor and our sensibilities that people get it or they don't. And if they get it, they're locked in. And it's like, yeah, it's clear we're going to get along really, really well. And so a lot of that language around niching and shaping your offer and communicating, that becomes so clear because I think for all of us, people bounce off it if they go, yep, this isn't for us. But also that's great because it's then cutting down the amount of volume or leads that are just never going to go anywhere in the first place. So by focusing that and having a really clear, targeted approach to the way you communicate what you do and who you do it for just means that you save yourself so many headaches down the track going, no, actually, we can't help you, or, sorry, this isn't quite a good fit. That all gets filtered out through the power of niching, which is. I mean, arguably it's its greatest superpower. One thing that has really helped in the stylistic niche, and I think it applies to a lot of other niches as well, is is having, like, a really clear customer or client Persona. And, like, who are you talking to? It's not just, like, people in construction, but it's Bob the Builder. He's great. I've seen a lot of his stuff. He does good, good work. Not quite up the road with his equipment, but it's fine. But, you know, like, we. We have a North Star of a guy who got us our first. Like, we've done three Back to the Future parodies now, which is, like, blows my mind that that even happened. But it all became possible because of this one guy, and he was our connection in, and we got along really well, and it was that. That relationship. So now we sort of filter every idea we have in terms of marketing or approach or who would find this interesting through a version of him? And it's like, would he find this fun and funny and interesting? Great. Then it feels like it's aligned with the way we're doing it, because the work we got through him was the best work we've ever done from a, like, satisfaction point of view and results as well. So having that really clear idea of who you're talking to, name, age, interests, hobbies, pain points, all that sort of stuff really helps kind of get clear on that niche factor as well.

So I wanted to move this conversation into money, which is a tricky subject for some videographers because a number of calls I've had where they go, well, you know, I asked them, you know, what. What do you. How much do you want to make? And they're like, well, you know, I don't do greedy. Not too Much. I don't want to be a millionaire or anything, but of course that I'm very proud of the fact that I love the fact that business can create, you know, funds and capital and you can do really cool stuff with it. But money and bank is the result of niching. Niching, well, separates you from virtually all of the competition. And I think back to my days at Sony. I used to get a lot of stick people asking the question, why is this guy Dan Lenny launching yet another Sony camera? And I wasn't the greatest filmmake. I wasn't the best filmmaker out there, but I knew my market and I knew my audience. They associated. This is a true story. Sony senior management associated the successful launch of the Sony A7s 10 years ago because of Dan Rennie. Internally, they coined the phrase Dan Rennie style. And so then Rennie then got the FS5, the FS7 and a bunch of other cameras to launch. And what I would do is just, just lean into that. But that then got me an incredible relationship with Zeiss Lens, incredible relationship with Atomos, a credit relationship with all these other suppliers. Conor Tripods, because I was in with this one. And so I think that's the power of niching is once you're in that environment and you were at a builders conference thing in Brisbane a few weeks ago and you picked up loads of work because you're the guy that's in the room because you get invited in because you're a specialist. And I think you said you had like at least two calls the next day off the back of that one meeting, Andy, where you went down to Brisbane and hung out, had some drinks with some builders.

Yeah, that event I, on the tail end of that, got two calls pretty much booked in the next day, closed one of them, and since then I bought two more.

The other thing I was going to add that before I asked you that question was as a result of being niched into the space I was in when I was still shooting, I was able to command pretty, pretty significant rates for the work we were doing because they wanted me. At which point I'm like, okay, well, I come with a certain price tag and you guys know this, but my thing was always business class travel. So I was like flying around the world business class. And I was always asked the question, is this a business class flight? I'm like, yep. Okay then, Rennie, you know when you set your stall out as an expert in a niche and you should turn around and say, we are the very best in this space for doing this. Because here's the thing, virtually no one will challenge you on that.

They might whinge and moan, but they won't challenge you. And people believe what you tell them. And you can back it up because on your website Andy, there's nothing but films for builders. And the only thing that matters is that other builders see that and go, I want what that guy's got. And so can you talk a bit about how going niche into builders has impacted your ability to price what you do as a service compared to perhaps what you might have been doing when you were like a general videographer?

It's completely transformed because one of the things that happens when you decide to niche into an industry is you create, pretty much you create your own framework of how you complete your work. So that in itself inherits value. So we're not giving them a video, we're giving them this signature framework which has been coined by specializing in an industry. So just there's already value within that. But if we just talk like the most plain terms, if we just talk numbers, I would say that since niching into the residential construction space expansion media has will probably be close to just over 3xing in top line revenue.

And that's in a short period of time, that's only in about 18 months.

Give or take. So it's like I'm seeing past seven figures and I'm like yeah, I'm, I'm. Those numbers don't scare me. I can actually I've reverse engineered the numbers to get to 85k, 100k business and how many clients we need to put that on board. And I've got the systems and the processes to back that and it doesn't really scare me. So the, and yeah, yeah, sorry per month. So that. Which creates a seven figure business.

But yeah, the reason I say that is some videographers are like aspiring to make six figures a year. And I think that's why this is worth laboring is that this isn't just like hey, we like niching. This is like has a, an astronomical impact on your ability to provide value and therefore receive the value in return. Correct.

And like the, the thing about like man, I just. So it's like this, this is my take on it, right? So like yes you can sometimes if you're just a generalist, right, you, yes you can. And a 50 grand job for example, right. But the question I have to that as a business owner, right, just because you got landed a 50 grand job, can you generate another 50 grand job? In three weeks time, predictably. Do you have a process to deliver on that if it does come through? And can you build a system around that so you can bring then train people to run that consistently and in a way where you can like, like take your hands off the steering wheel of it? And, and if the answer is no, then you don't really, like, you don't really have a business. You're just an expensive freelancer. And I think it's like, it's a distinguishing point. It's like, do you want to be an amazing freelancer or do you want to run a business? Because a business requires systems and processes and like even the selling, I'm getting to the point where I'm thinking of bringing in somebody else to do the selling for me, which is what I've always wanted to do. Because even the way that I sell is repeatable. Like the things that I say aren't by chance. It's kind of scripted in my mind. It's ingrained into my mind. I don't even have to, I could do it half asleep because I do it that many times. But that's what you want. That's like, you know, and my, my lens is I want to build a business where I can have other people thrive in it and they feel like they're moving towards their goals and we're helping our clients win. They feel like they're winning and everybody wins. But then I'm, I'm able to create a business that runs and creates profit. Right? It creates profit and then allows me as a creative that hard on the creative to then focus on the other projects that I really want to do. If money wasn't a factor, I'll just be shooting fun doco stuff, fun creative films just for myself and that's it. Money is a factor. We got bills to pay, we've got kids to feed, we've got countries to travel to. That's the reality of it. So we need to fund that with the resources. Yeah, that, that's a, you know, conversation I like having in the niching space is how predictable can you, can you then resell your, your product in a way that you can forecast in 12 months time and keep in mind as well, like not a lot of video production businesses can, can sell or can exit. But when you niche this conversation about exiting because then it opens up a whole nother conversation about mergers and acquisitions, like that's something as a generalist you can't really have. Somebody will just hire you as a creative director and that's it. But if you've got a business that's a machine and spits out profit on the other. On the other end, that's attractive to other, you know, private equity companies. So it just opens up another world. So it's. Yeah, it's a game changer.

How about you, Matt? Have you noticed that being a specialist in a particular area gives you some.

Some.

Some elasticity with the kind of budgets you work with and the kind of things that you can do with that?

Yeah. I mean, it instantly opens up a pathway to trust. When you go, hey, this is a really wild idea and it's going to cost, you know, a bit more than what you said you might have, or, you know, the budget conversation comes up, you can then point back to all of the examples of we did this for this much or we did this for this much, and you've got those runs on the board and that reference point. So it becomes a much easier conversation. I also think, too, to that predictability of being able to go, we need to turn over 50k months, or whatever it is. It becomes so hard when, as a generalist, it's sort of like trying to go on a road trip, right. If you go, I want to drive from Melbourne to Bendigo, you can get your map. It's very clear where you follow the road and how you get there. If you go, I want to go on a road trip from Melbourne. And then you're like, where do you go? What do you do? What direction do you head first? And sort of like, you can still drive and go on a road trip, but it's completely aimless and you're not going to quite have any destination or goal to get there. So I think even stylistically, you can be like, this is. It's quiet. So how do we bring more business in? We can lean into the stuff that separates us from anywhere else and double down on that and know that it's just dialing in our offer to make sure that people know what we're amazing at this thing, and then the fish will bite on the hook. Right. So it's definitely. It positions you as an expert in a space, and for us, it's taking bland, boring ideas and making it something far greater than it ever has any right to be. But if you're really good at that and can take those ideas and anybody else that comes in on that journey and they buy in and trust you, you do get to sort of say, hey, well, we're the experts in this, and write your own check in a Lot of ways. It's not to say, you know, we don't have people squeezing us on price and stuff, but you're coming from a place of, or a position of power and authority. And not just of course we can help you. We can do TV commercials and live streams and it's like, no, we, we do this really well and this is what will solve your problem and it's going to cost you this. Do you want to do it?

Yeah.

So yeah, that's what we found. What about you, Caleb? I'm imagining it's similar in your space out there in the game. The 99,000.

Yeah, 99,003. Yeah, the. I was actually you made me think of one video. I think I saw you on your LinkedIn. You finished it with like, there's lots of fish in the sea, so don't settle for a catfish.

I actually watched that video but it kind of, I was like following that fishing analogy on like the idea of niching is that you reduce the pool of people that you're looking for. That's the kind of, the idea, that's that you want that to have people come in and go, oh, this guy's not for me. Because that means that there will become people coming in. You're not fishing for a cat. You're not. You're fishing in the wide open sea and you get a catfish, you get a marlin because that's all you're fishing for. That's like that. You know, you know, I might be taking the too far there, but so for us, like we know our audience so well that they're either executives or marketing solo marketers within a company because that's regional businesses don't ever have any more than that. And so we understand their experience and what we've done is add on strategy as a, as a service to all the videos that we create. And what we harp on about is that we're not the, we're not the production company that you need to hold our hands and tell us what to do and, and lead and manage us and try and fit that into your marketing strategy. We speak marketer because we help remarkable regional businesses perform on the world stage with strategic video. You don't have to, you know, we going to be your video production partner that will align a video strategy to your existing marketing goals so that you can trust us that to achieve an outcome rather than just make you a pretty looking video because nobody cares, nobody cares about a video. They want the outcome that the video is going to achieve for them. Like Andy's brand story videos, the builders aren't, you know, there'll be an element of vanity and there is in nearly every client, but they're not generally coming to them going, I want a video because I think video is cool. I want a video because it's, it's just, how much fun would that be? You know, they're spending 30 plus K on video because they think, they believe that it's going to get them more business or it's going to get them more leads, more of their ideal market is going to see them, they're going to stand out. You know, there's a long list of desires that, that they have, but they want that outcome. So that's how we position ourselves right in original niche. We say, look, we understand you, we understand the pain points you're experiencing and we're going to come alongside you. So when they're comparing and we always get it like we, we send a quote for even, you know, 10, 15k and they'll come back to us and say, look, you know, the next, the next option to you is like half your price. But we're going with you because we know that it's going to be an easier process and we're going to be able to trust you. So when we're always more expensive, but we still get plenty of work because the people understand that they're not comparing us to another video production company because we have niched into knowing exactly who our audience is and what they need.

I think one of the other powerful things like on the, on the back end of niching, it's like one thing you actually don't consider and one thing we didn't consider.

Was when it comes time to start marketing outbound leads, it's actually more cost effective to spend money advertising when you're niched in, if you're a generalist in order to find an ideal client and if we're just talking ad spend in order like our client acquisition leads at the moment.

I think it's under $20 for a lead. Like, it's, it's bonkers as, as a generalist, like you would be, you know, you got, you got quality control, that, that's an issue. But then you've also got like, it's hard to even in your ad copy, like how do you target the person, like who is it, you know, up being a generic. So you end up having to spend a lot more to acquire a lead. And so that becomes an issue when you're trying to scale or when you when you're then trying to, you know, if we're having a low quarter, you need to increase the top line. You try to scale that. You run these ads, you then pull in these average leads and then you can't say no to them because you need the cash flow. And then you end up saying yes to non ideal leads and it ends up slowing you down even more so in the long run. So it's. Yeah, true. Yeah, it's an interesting. And I, I only say that from experience because it was.

Yeah, man, it's. It was. It's painful at times if you're sort of just attracting anyone and everyone from startups to people wanting to. I had a company selling mattresses willing to spend like 20 grand on ad spend with their videos. And then I remember jumping out of that meeting and then I had a conversation if somebody who was wanting to start a fashion brand and had just ordered like. And I'm just like, oh my gosh, the turbulence, like my neck's spinning like this. I'm like, this is, this isn't healthy.

I just wanted. Before we wrap up, there was something we were talking about the other day, Andy, on, on the call inside the, the free Video business accelerator group that we, that we run. And for anyone who's watching or listening to this, you know, someone on this page will be a link to that. You should come and hang out. It's a free group. We get together, we chat, help you iron out some of your business. But we had a guy on the other day and he was like, oh, but you know, I really love like all the variety I get. And you were great, Andy, because you went, look, dude, are you telling me that every single day you pick up a camera, it's a super fun job. And it's not like everything you do in life that has some sort of value exchange at some point gets monotonous. And I think that there's a consensus out there that the freelance videographer is like somehow got all this variety and only ever does fun stuff and is always seeking to just do more fun stuff. But the truth is it doesn't, it doesn't happen like that. So what do you say? Quick, wrap up. So we wrap this episode up. What do you say to someone who's like that chap we were talking to the other day, Andy? We'll say his name, we'll call him Bob.

He was just really fixated with having fun. But I think you raised some great points to him about the fact that are you having fun every day? There's a misconception. I think that niching suddenly all you ever do is the one thing.

Yeah, yeah, that's right. And to your point, you do anything like. Yeah, you do anything long enough, the fun eventually is like diluted and then it kind of gets watered down a bit. But what I would say is the fun shifts when you niche. When you're niche in like initially, your fun is getting creative and creating the video and like, this is really cool. And you create a system and then you do that enough. Like, I'll be honest, the brand stories today, that don't excite me that much.

It's cool. It looks really cool.

But the fun for me now has shifted now to growing a business, to. To building a team, to becoming a better leader myself and, and like just even personal development as a business owner and just, just learning new business opportunity. The fun shifts as you evolve. You know what I mean? It's like a kid. Like as kids we enjoyed playing on the playground and swinging on the swings, but we grew up, our fun changes. And in business it should be the same as well. Our fun should be shifting onto bigger and better and more challenging things. Because you know, what is fun? Fun is playing. But there's also a sense of a reward system in there as well. So the thing about niching and moving forward is there's a slight challenge in there, but there's also a rewarding system within that. And, and it's. It becomes this new gamification of business. Yeah. I mean, just trying to put that into a nutshell, it's like, I don't know, it's like there's a sense of, there's a bit of. Is it naivety? Like just. They're being a bit naive to just think that it gets boring. Like you actually think about it and, and, and are open to it. You might actually find that you'll have more fun.

Good. How about you guys? Yeah, well, it really enables access. Right. Like it, you. I think something you mentioned earlier, Andy, about, you know, or actually, Dan, when you're saying, you know, people go, and I don't want to make that much money and just. I'm not greedy, you know, I think I said that to you on our first call back. You know, it's what everyone says that doesn't make you much money.

Money's not important.

Yeah, no, no. I'm here for the, the good times and the laughs. But when you actually get into it and dive into it, you're like, I can't do this forever if I'M not making money and not because I'm greedy. It's because that is. That is what is required to provide for my family. It's what's required to have freedom to actually be able to choose to do the things that I want to do because my needs are covered and I've been able to produce some reliability. And so, you know, there's. There's a maturing that you need to get to in order to understand that. I need to shift my goal posts here and realign what I'm trying to achieve with actually building a successful business. Because if I'm building a successful business, I'm going to be able to build reliability and there's a level of safety there. But like you say, Andy, that's what the transition I made was from I'm a. I'm a filmmaker to I'm building a business that creates videos and it achieves value. There's a value exchange between me and our clients. And I love that. Like, that is where. That is exactly where my fun comes from, is being able to see the team be amazing and see the results that we're getting for clients, but then know that I've built something that is actually gonna sustain my life and provide me the opportunity to have fun and it doesn't have to be connected to the work I'm doing.

Very neat.

Well, you know, businesses need fuel. You know, Matt, you're sitting in your brand new, literally brand new office. Do you have a team of five? Well, you know, everyone loves working with you, but they need to be paid every month, and that's a big responsibility, which needs fuel. So how important is. Is doing something that generates the right kind of fuel in terms of tying into that niche?

Yeah, it's hugely important, and I think it is. It's a North Star to make sure the fuel is good fuel. It's like we could just to make ends meet, do anything and everything just to kind of pay the bills and keep the lights on. But then the team and the work we produce wouldn't be nearly as good as it could be because we're not feeling inspired and excited by it. So, you know, the idea of everything being fun, while that's what we put out and we say, hey, everything we produce is fun, humor, wonder, whatever. We also do some pretty dry material. We do some pretty dense dry training stuff. But it's like, it's through conversations that have started because there's an alignment in the way we go about things. So it helps to make sure that even if the work is less inspiring than, you know, a big crazy commercial or something like that. The relationships that we've built and can maintain through doing that work is what fuels us because we know we need to make certain amount of revenue every month to keep the place going and only we can only rely on the relationships we do have to keep us going and then try and bring in new business to support that. So finding a way of working with people, an offer that really connects with people, and then really just reinforcing those relationships by great experiences, great customer service, making them feel like they're one to one and not one of many clients just just further strengthens your position as the best place to go when it comes to video. No matter what niche you're in, it just means that you can start relying on those clients and their jobs to come back and you can then grow and scale a business over time as those relationships compound and you get more and more and more of them under your belt.

Excellent gents. I think that's a great place to end this episode. We'll see you all next week.

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