To Sell or Not to Sell With Matthew Strunk

Welcome to the Agency Journey podcast where we connect with agency leaders to uncover the hidden systems and processes that drive their success. Now, let's dive into today's show.

All right, welcome into another episode of Agency journey. I'm Gray McKenzie, and this week I've got the pleasure of bringing on Matt Strunk, who is the founder, the CEO of BitMoto, Strunk Media Group and Auto Sigma. And we'll dive into all three of those entities. But, Matt, thanks for jumping on, man. I appreciate you joining me.

Absolutely, Gray, man, thanks for having me.

So what came first? I just said you were founder and CEO of three different companies. What was the first one?

Bitmoto. So I actually started working in car dealerships back when I was 18, just selling cars. And I was freelancing on the side doing digital marketing stuff, SEO, ppc, things of that nature. And I went to the dealer principal, I put together this awesome pitch. I'm like, oh, I'm going to sell these. I need to not be doing cars, I need to be doing something else. And I put together and said, you guys are so far behind. You should be doing X, you should be doing Y, you should be doing Z. And guess what? I can do that for you. And he told me to go pound sand. But then a few years later, he was like, damn it, you were probably right. So he let me build it out and that worked pretty well. I took over the auto group. That went well. And then back in 2015, I was like, you know what, There's a lot of dealerships, especially new franchise dealers across the country that could use this because if you don't have 50 stores, you can't have a whole marketing department. And we started Bitmoto, which was supposed to be like your outsourced Internet director, which really, it's just a digital agency. Right. But that was our niche. That's our bread and butter. That's our sweet spot. And Strunk Media Group came after that. And really that was, you know, I'm still trying to decide if it was a good, good decision or not. But that was kind of the non automotive diversification, which during COVID was great, but it also leads to some fragmentation as far as focus and things of that nature. So Strunk Media is more of a regional digital agency. And then Auto Sigma is the newest one, which actually spawned out from Bitmoto because we were trying to make it so we could offer like a product, a productized service offering that wasn't just trading time. And then it worked well enough that we actually spun it off into its own SaaS platform. So that's the newest one.

Now are the first do Bitmodo and Strong Media Group. Is that the same entity and two different front ends for it?

It is, yeah.

So we've got the dealer like the auto Focus side.

Exactly. Yeah. Just basically two different brands. @ some point we might, we might split it off, but that would really just be from, you know, exit perspective. Just trying to clean things up and.

Right, that makes sense.

Yep.

So I'm assuming. Well, actually I'm not going to assume that. What are the main services on both sides? Is it still out of the SEO web dev side?

Yeah, so Bitmoto is definitely more of like, you know, you own a dealership and you want a turnkey solution where you get assigned an actual automotive Internet director. So I was the first one when we were a startup. But now we only hire guys that, you know that have worked in a car dealership. Like you've actually worked there totally.

At this point in the business, is that a totally separate team who's working on that or you?

Because it is.

We're building out. Our backstory was run an agency, built a project management software on the side and for a while, you know, we cannibalize our best people from the agency. Yeah, software side initially helped help scale that out, but now you've got totally separate teams.

Yeah, there's still some blend in the beginning. Exactly. Right. That. Right. You're like, oh, you're also going to like steal you and you're like, crap. I still have like an agency you to run too. But yeah, we're small teams. We only have like 4 FTEs right now and we use a bunch of outsourced labor. So we have like 10 FTEs that are subs. But yeah, we're building a full team. So we're hiring client success managers, web developers, support personnel, things of that nature. And we're really trying to keep it separate now.

That's awesome. What's the Auto Sigma site? What's the URL?

Yeah, autosigma.com so that's a U T O S I G M a dot com. So Auto Sigma.

Perfect. We'll put that in the show notes. Anyone who's in the marketing in the automotive space obviously ought to check that out and see if that's a good fit. And I'm assuming. But I could be wrong. If this was us, there would not be an actual agency program like built up and streamlined and standardized yet. But are you guys already rolling that out? I know obviously you've got Bitmoto as your first client.

Yeah, great question. So that, that is a big, big part of our strategy. Rolling this out. So we don't have a super polished like what you're, you know, it's not like the HubSpot agency program where it's like you know, come in and get. No, but we do have agencies that are currently, currently applying to, to be enrolled. So our strategy is that we sell direct to dealers and so the dealer might be using it, but they're probably using someone else for PPC or something like that. Right. And we don't want to do that at Auto Sigma. Like we're not an agency, we're not going to do that work for you. We're just going to do the tech. And then basically if a guy from a dealership or an individual from a dealership says hey, I want someone to do my Google Ads, I know it integrates but it's not seemingly working the way I want to. With insert big provider then we can say well check out our certified agency list. Like these guys, it's turnkey. Everything they do, it's plugged in perfectly and they know what they're doing. And then basically have that reference, that referral chart going on.

That makes sense. Yeah. Anytime you can spin that into Win Win.

And then Bitmoto starts with B so that's on the top of the list.

That's awesome. So you guys have gone through. I guess I'll back this up a little bit. Where do you spend most of your time right now?

Oh my lord. So for me I've been fortunate enough to, to separate out of the day to day with the agency like for, for, for the most part. And I actually started that hand in hand with some acquisition stuff that was going on, which is a whole nother story. But it was really trying to separate, separate myself. So it's like no, here's an agency that runs itself, here's the leadership structure. Like if I die, it doesn't matter. If you buy, it doesn't matter. Like really trying to make it marketable. And then I shifted all my attention on Auto Sigma. So I wear a few hats there. My number one hat is VP of sales and marketing stuff. And then also I'm the head of product still because we don't have that depth yet. So those are kind of the two areas I spend the most amount of my time with.

That makes sense. So on the agency side, which I'm assuming Bitmoto would be the more attractive at first agency to purchase, I don't Know, obviously that depends on what top line revenue and margin looks like. But niche, like really clearly focused. What did those, would the acquisition side of things look like?

Yeah, that. So, you know, I've received all these emails. Everyone does, right? You get the thing saying, hey, this is so and so from private equity firm. How would you feel about it? You know, and most of them are like just, they look like garbage. And it's kind of like these just bulk emails and then you, you know, it's just really not worth it. But I had this one guy reach out and it was, it felt like a true organic email. Like, you know, Gray emailed me and it like, it was like, hey, my, you know, I'm currently looking at acquiring agencies that you know are in this size range and I'm going to roll them up. So I want to roll up, you know, 15 different agencies and then obviously from an exit multiple, once you can get the EBITDA to a certain threshold, you can be able to command a much more attractive exit price. So it's, you know, the strategy made sense where it's like, all right, if you can integrate 10 of these agencies and then get to a 5 million a year in EBITDA and exit for 12x now because it's more of a strategic buy. Like, I get the play. So we started talking and seemed legit. I was trying to be so savvy. You know, I've never been through an exit or anything like that. So I was vetted. The financial ability, like, can you actually buy this thing or are you just some dude on the corner? So he had proof of funds for at least the down part of it. He was definitely trying to leverage some outside financing, but he had a strong down equity injection, which I think is what people look for. And that's when we went through the process. And for him, you're spot on. I mean, Bitmoto is if you go to any agency masterclass or one of these consultants, they're going to say you need to have a really focused niche. You really have to have something different. You have to have a unique value. Like that's just Bitmoto, like it checks every single box. It's perfect. And that's what he wanted. And at the time, since it was still it's Drunk Media Group with a dba. Bitmoto, it's one company, right? So now it's like trying to separate years of financials where it's like you're sharing resources and it's like you can get close, but I can't definitively Tell you how much of my controller's time was allocated for Bitmodo purpose. You're still just kind of stab it in the dark. So he was going to acquire the whole thing. Strong Media Group, Bitmoto, everything. And then I was going to spin off the software and start Auto Sigma. So that was my play. I get a nice capital injection. I basically have my Series A, basically handle, you know, seed, seed round handle. Like, I mean, I'm funded, you know, I'm funded and I'm ready to roll. And I'm gonna sell that for half a billion dollars and we're good, you know?

Yep.

But yeah, that definitely, that was interesting. We went through all the due diligence, this, this and that. And then because of COVID it was right, during COVID a lot of the banks, like all these external finance, finance people were like, choke, right? Because they're just like, oh, God. All these small businesses are being shut down because of COVID So they basically tightened up the restrictions of. Of the loans they were giving out and the financing they were doing. So his financing fell apart, deal crumbled, you know, so, you know, I was like, oh, that sucks, because I just spent all this time and energy, you know, and. And again, you. You hear it from people, right? They're like, make sure you focus on your main. Like, this is still your company. Like, don't let the wheels fall off. But, you know, it's real hard to. To keep that balance because you're like, you know, I get that I won't, but oh, my God, I'm gonna exit and I'm gonna, you know, go on a cruise as soon as I'm like, you start thinking all that silly stuff. But so that ended up falling through. And that definitely gave me insight of like, if Bitmoto is super attractive to acquire. Right? Or anyone that has that super niche agency. When we had that strong media stuff, which is nice, it's got decent cash flow, right. But it's not attractive. I wouldn't want to buy it because it's kind of like, dude, it's your name. It's like you got this hodgepodge of somewhat focused clients, but that's just not what people want. So that's when I realized that guy was going to take it because it was a part of it, not because he wanted it.

Right.

You know, and I always use the analogy that it's like, you know, hey, hey, Gray, I want your. You know, I want five goats. You know, and you're like, all right, cool, I have five goats. We gotta Take my chickens too. And it's like I don't want chickens. He's like, well they're kind of go with it. And I was like, all right, I'll take it. I'm gonna kill em then. Cause I don't want them. You know, that's what it felt like. Like he was gonna buy it and then just cut off the strong media side. Cause it was just a distraction. So I was like damn man, like I should really separate these. They emailed me and it like it was like, hey my, you know, I'm currently looking at acquiring agencies that you know, are in this size range and I'm going to roll them up. So I want to roll up, you know, 15 different agencies. And then obviously from an exit multiple, once you can get the EBITDA to a certain threshold, you're gonna be able to command a much more attractive exit price. So it's, you know, the strategy made sense where it's like, all right, if you can integrate 10 of these agencies and then get to a 5 million a year in EBITDA and exit for 12x now because it's more of a strategic buy, I get the play. So we started talking and we seemed legit. I was trying to be so savvy. I've never been through an exit or anything like that. So I was vetted the financial ability, like can you actually buy this thing or are you just some dude on the corner? So he had proof of funds for at least the down part of it. He was definitely trying to leverage some out outside financing. But he had a strong down equity injection, which I think is what people look for. And that's when we went through the process. And for him you're spot on. I mean Bitmoto is if you go to any agency master class or one of these consultants, they're going to say you need to have a really focused niche. You really have to have something different. You have to have a unique value. That's just Bitmoto. It checks every single box. It's perfect. And that's what he wanted. And at the time, since it was still, it's Strunk Media Group with a dba. Bitmoto, it's one company, right? So now it's like trying to separate years of financials where it's like you're sharing resources and it's like you can get close, but I can't definitively tell you how much of my controller's time was allocated for Bitmodo purpose. You're still just kind of stabbing in the dark. So he was going to acquire the whole thing. Strong Media Group, Bitmoto, everything. And then I was going to spin off the software and start Auto Sigma. So that was my play. I get a nice capital injection. I basically have my, you know, Series A, basically handle, you know, seed, seed round handled like, I mean, I'm funded, you know, I'm funded and I'm ready to roll. And I'm going to sell that for half a billion dollars and we're good, you know.

Yeah.

But yeah, that definitely. That was interesting. We went through all the due diligence, this and that. And then because of COVID it was right, during COVID a lot of the banks, like all these external finance, Finance people were like, choke, right? Because they're just like, oh, God. All these small businesses are being shut down because of COVID So they basically tightened up the restrictions of the loans they were giving out and the financing they were doing. So his financing fell apart, deal crumbled. So I was like, oh, that sucks, because I just spent all this time and energy. And again, you hear it from people, right? They're like, make sure you focus on your main. This is still your company. Don't let the wheels fall off. But, you know, it's real hard to keep that balance because you're like, you know, I get that I won't, but, oh, my God, I'm gonna exit and I'm gonna, you know, go on a cruise as soon as I'm like, you start thinking all that silly stuff. But so that ended up falling through. And that definitely gave me insight of, like, if Bitmoto is super attractive to acquire, right? Or anyone that has like that super niche agency when we had that strong media stuff, which is nice, it's got decent cash flow, right? But it's not attractive. Like, I wouldn't want to buy it because it's kind of like, dude, it's your name. It's like this. You got this hodgepodge of somewhat focused clients. But like, it's just. That's just not what people want, you know, so it's like, that's when I realized, like, that guy was going to take it because it was a part of it, not because he wanted it.

Right?

You know, And I always use the analogy that it's like, you know, hey, hey, Gray, I want your. You know, I want five goats, you know? And you're like, all right, cool, I have five goats. We got to take my chickens, too. And it's like, I don't want chickens. It's like, well, they're Kind of go with it. And I was like, all right, I'll take it. I'm killing them. I want them. You know, that's what it felt like. Like he was going to buy it and then just cut off the strong media side. Cause it was just a distraction. So I was like, damn man. Like I should really separate these if I want to do this right? But. But then you fast forward and like a month later, because I was talking with M and A brokers, they get this lead from a. A massive automotive player right in the space, which, you know, I, I can't tell you who it is, but a big player. And I'm like, yeah, obviously I know who that person is. And like, well, they're looking to acquire Automotive Place. Oh shit. Well, I'll tell you what, I was just about to exit. I'm in that mindset. So. So we started having that conversation and they wanted to acquire everything. Auto Sigma, Bitma everything. And, and they were willing to step up to pay for it because Auto Sigma was pre revenue really. Right. Um, and it wasn't even, it wasn't even fully done through, through the initial development phase. So. So I was kind of stuck. Like, do I exit for likely less money than if I just do it myself and go through the effort and all that kind of stuff? But it's a really dumb multiple when you think about an agency exit. You should not pay that much money for an agency. You just wouldn't. So we basically went through that deal and that one got. Man, that got to the very end. But at the end of the day, I think what ultimately distracted that was still, you kind of want Bitmoto, you really want the tackle, right? You really want the tech Bitmoto you're good with. And then you got the Strunk media schmut kind of like dragging along. I don't mean to call it that per se. Obviously it's a lot of good clients, a lot of good people working there, but from an acquisition perspective, it's not attractive. So. So that, that kind of took away from it a little bit and then they ended up getting involved in like a really big merger. So it was kind of like, hey, let's merge the like a billion dollar company. Oh, and by the way, on the agenda, like let's make sure to talk about acquiring the small. Like no. So I got pushed to the bottom of that list. But. But definitely an experience. Definitely a learning experience.

I mean, super common. Obviously the majority of deals don't actually wind up happening in the M and A space. We did the same thing and we went through it twice. Neither time was with. Was the equity. Both times were private acquisitions to get rolled up, the larger plays. And after the first time, said, I'm not going to do another one without taking earnest money upfront. We're not going through this again without getting paid for it and seeing real dollars down and they're going to have money in. And second one didn't get as far. But of course, I didn't follow through and do that.

Yeah. Yep. You're like, never will I ever. Okay, let's do it. That's fine.

Right, Right. Exactly. So learning. It's all a learning process, but it's so easy to get swept up in. I think in a lot of cases, there's some. Often there's like, hidden burnout or it's not even really burnout. It's just like, hey, this might. This would feel good. Like, for that amount of money, I would trade. Even though there's parts of this that I really enjoy, there's enough stuff here that I dislike that I would trade the problems that go along with it.

Yeah, man.

In order to exit. And then, you know, it's easy to talk yourself into. Okay, here's the story that I want to roll with.

Yeah. I remember when we were going through that. You know, we were going through it and, like, logically, like, if you're talking to a broker or, you know, a finance consultant or something like that, you know, if you're a younger guy or, you know, woman or whoever, and you're like, hey, I'm thinking about selling my business at the age of 30 or something, it's like, why, like, are you dying? Are you sick? Like, why would you do that? You're going to milk more money out of this thing over the next 30 years.

Yeah.

Unless there's some, like, sort of fire, it's like, crashing right now. But then no one wants to buy it anyways if it's crashing. And you're right, I think it's. I think it's secret burnout. Maybe like that little shiny stuff on the side. Right. You're like, well, if. If I do that, I can go start a Laundromat now.

Or, like, whatever it is.

Big idea, you know, like, so, yeah, it's definitely. I would agree, like, it's easy to say, but trying not to get hung up in it, you know, it's okay. I always. I always like choices. Right. Like, I want to be able to make a decision. Do I go left? Do I go, like, do I go left, Do I go right?

Right.

And with the acquisition deals, it's like, you know, you do the loi and you gotta go through due diligence. Like it's really not anything real until you get to a purchase agreement. And even then you gotta sign it or you gotta negotiate it. Right. And in my mind, I'm like, all right, well, let's get to the point where I can be like, are you. Do you want to do this? And if you say yes, it actually happens, as opposed to if you say yes, you just have to wait like three months of pain and agony and being like torn apart and, you know, doing stress searches and stuff.

Well, there is. Yeah. And even if you get to the FedEx finish line on a deal, there's still like, you still have a true up afterwards. And there's a negotiation of, hey, I know that you had closed deals for annual contracts, but actually we don't want to give you credit for. You didn't service nine of those 12 months.

Exactly.

Credit for exactly three. They're still negotiating. It's not an easy process to go through so much.

And I was working with my M and A attorney on it, and he said even though our dollar amount wasn't like a hundred million dollars or something like that, he said that the complexity of X in cash, earn out equity, all these moving parts, employment agreement, part of the earnout tied to just exist in there. But because of that, how do we make sure that they don't just fire you because they feel like it? So you have to make sure it's for just cause. He's like, your deal is no less complicated than a quarter billion dollar acquisition. So your attorney fees and all the legal fees and everything involved, it's the same price because I still have to go through all the same effort, but it's just for. So it's kind of. Yeah, it's, it's definitely an experience, you know.

Yeah. But I said Todd Taskey on the podcast here a couple months ago, who does M and A in the. And does a good amount in the agency space. We've had some shared clients who, who've gone through the process, which is basically going through the same thing, you know, like that $3 million, you know, the agency who's doing his benchmark. He's like, you're not doing ebitda. It doesn't make sense to work with us because there's zero money for us to make. Exactly. But just the complexity of these deals winds up being pretty similar. If you want to do It. Right. Whether that's an agency that's doing $2 million in top line revenue or $20 million in top line revenue.

Exactly.

A couple more moving parts, but it's all the same fundamental problem.

Exactly. Yeah, man. So I'm gonna do what you did, and I'm gonna tell myself that if anything ever comes up again, I'm not doing it until you put down some money, make this thing real, you know, Then we just.

We got a pinky swear here.

Exactly. Yeah. Like I'm. You promised. You promised me. Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, I think the secret is like. Or the trick. If you're, you know, entertaining the exit and you get prep, like actually preparing for it and get, you know, for me, it was nice to go through it because now I know exactly what to expect. So if it's like in five years, 10 years from now, I want to exit, I know what to do for the prior three years to like really tee it up and get everything organized to get. To get it really. Where when they're doing due diligence, it's a no brainer, like, hey, we need all this stuff. And you're like, oh, no, that's fine. It's all organized that way already.

Right.

You know, and it's like, wow, like, you guys are on top of it. And then where you guys come in, obviously, like, they want to see, are you. Your processes, do you have your structure? Like, is this a. Is this something that can live without you? You know?

Right. Well, yeah, I think both of those are a big piece. And it's helpful to go through that process and just realize, oh, here's the things that I need to have in order. And that's kind of a wake up call of, we did not have all that stuff in order the first time we went through it. Like, hey, let me steal all your books. Well, here's our books. But in terms of how things are coded and everything, this is not. It's not the way that we should have presented things the first time through. That was a really valuable learning lesson.

Yeah, man. For sure.

One thing I thought that would be helpful to dig into is on the Bitmodo side because of obviously everyone's worried with a niche agency, hey, how am I going to find clients? Easier if I can say yes to anybody.

Yeah.

What's your client acquisition? What does that client acquisition engine look like today?

So the first thing you said there definitely resonates where you're like, just trying to grab dollars, right? You're like, but gray, this Guy wants to give me money, I'll just do this one and I'll go back. But it's actually opposite. Like, you get pulled around in all these different directions. You're just like spinning your wheels. With Bitmoto, you're just like a machine. You just stay focused. You get these referral engines and everything else. But as far as business acquisition, like, probably a lot of agencies, at first it was all just referral, word of mouth. Right. It's funny, I feel like a lot of agencies really stink at doing sales and marketing for themselves, even though they sell, like, marketing services for other people. It's like you go to a carpenter's house and their trims hanging all over the damn place. They don't keep care that keep, you know, keep their place upkeep or upkept. But for us, we've really moved into more of a thought leadership strategy. So probably similar to you and these podcasts, that idea of, like, you know what, how can we become that leader in the space? So that way it's like, you know, hey, you think in automotive, you think in digital market, like, oh, that's right, those guys, like, I remember seeing that podcast or going to that, you know, that event. Oh, that's right. They spoke at the NADA convention. That guy really sounded like he knew what he was talking about. Like, I think thought leadership is the way to go. Coming up with some sort of strategy, like a cornerstone strategy, and just building content around that to drive inbound traffic is what we're trying to focus for the next phase of our lives.

What are those? Is it partnership stuff or do you. What are the mediums that you guys are doing that through? Is that blog, email, podcast, video?

Yeah, so I do better with talking. I don't like. I'm not, you know, I don't like sitting down, just writing some kind of article. So unfortunately, and fortunately for the beginning, like, a lot of the stuff's gonna come from me and some of our top leadership team guys. So we're thinking podcast is what we've been working on. So trying to start a podcast, doing some, like, vlog stuff, like video type of stuff. And, you know, for me, I think the strategy we're gonna try to employ, and hopefully it works, is like the value prop for working with us outside of the software, which now other agencies can buy. So that's technically not our super value prop. I mean, still is, but the other one is just that ip, right? Like the idea that if Susan understands car dealerships really well and understands digital really well, and she knows how to drive down your cost per sale and really knows how to improve your bottom line. That's just invaluable. Right? What are you gonna do? You need Susan. Right. Because she's just the smartest person there is with that. So as such, I think we're going to really try to just train and educate other people in the field. So even if you work at a dealership. Great. I'm going to show you all the secrets we use at Bitmoto. Screw it, you can steal them. You don't need us now. But again, just to build that authority that we're the ones teaching you that. So that way it still ends up working, I think.

Yeah, that makes sense. I think you've got the nice thing about podcasts and I'm a big fan of both tier thought leadership. I'm going to get on, I'm going to do a solo episode, I'm going to talk for 20 minutes about. Here's how you streamline whatever your internal meeting or your internal scorecards or whatever it is, agency ops, teaching stuff. But you've also got the ability to expand your network, talk to other people who are influencers in that space and pull people in and feature their story. And I think you got this whole stair step model where you can take somebody who's got a slightly bigger audience than you, reach that audience, take that person like AI, this person, go talk to the next person, work your way up through these weird artificial social status ranking skills that we have.

Yeah, you made E5 rank, you know, exactly.

Right. So service lines with Bitmodo is everyone come in, when they come in, do they go straight to a retainer? Are you selling a discovery project first or what's that model?

Yeah. So for Bitmoto, straight to retainer, um, for, for the strong side, we've been, we've been exploring like selling the actual strategy session, right. Like getting paid to do the proposal. Before you would just spend all this damn time and be like, yo, check out this strategy. And it'd be like, all right, cool, thanks. We're going to just like, what? But I've been, I've been amazed at, at how many people will pay for that. You know like when you say it's cost you $7,000 for me to put together this, this blueprint, this roadmap, whatever you can call it, right? And it's the stuff you would do anyways. But it also kind of, I think increases the value, like the perception of the value. Because it's like, oh, this isn't Just some proposal. They put together a blueprint. For me, this is special. But for Bitmodo we really focused on. Even though there's that human capital that we're selling and just the intellectual part of it, we really have streamlined that because we only sell new franchise car dealers. The benefit of niching down is, you know what your problem is that you're solving. Right. So you can kind of scale it out more. So we have abc, like package abc, pick one. So that way we can really get to discovery call to pick your package to. Let's get going on this.

And right.

It's pretty streamlined.

Well, what's cool about that. This is one of the things that Todd mentioned, we're talking about agency valuations is you got from the software side to the agency side, you guys are building a ton of recurring revenue into the pipeline. And that's a huge piece. Obviously profit margin, growth rate and all that stuff factors in, but the percentage of that revenue that's referring revenue feels like, hey, there's some stability here. Obviously, as long as churn not, not out of control. Yeah, that's a pretty, that's a really valuable asset to have. That's.

Yeah. You know, during the acquisition. Yeah, you're absolutely right. Like, it's like, hey, you do X in revenue, but how much of that is mrr? Like how much of that's repeatable? Because that's like what you're going to keep. And one buddy, it's funny he calls it, he's like, you and your damn cell phone bill. I'm like, what are you talking about? So you sell a cell phone bill every month. You get paid the same damn amount. How hard is that to run a business when you know exactly what you're gonna make every month? It's like he's in construction, the carpentry and all that stuff. And then it kind of resonates with me. I'm like, man, so you just are hunting for your next lunch every day. Yeah. You're like, oh, I just finished this kitchen. I made a home run.

Right.

Oh, crap. I need like jobs lined up.

You know, you do have to line it up with how you deliver value. I mean, that's one of the things in our business where I, I'm, you know, our goal for this year is we want to get our recurring revenue to about 30% of our top line revenue. But we're making a big impact for agencies in a very short period of time coming out of them, streamline their processes. Same thing as doing a kitchen. Like you Go in that you could put that on a payment plan, but it's like, hey, let's get paid for the value when we're delivering the value.

Yep.

Versus on the agency side where you've got deliverables going month after month after month. It makes a lot of sense. So it's not that every agency should go to retainer. You have to understand your business and say, hey, what business am I actually in? Yeah, but you also have to look at the reality of the marketplace and say, yeah, well, there's a reason that recurring revenue businesses go for a higher multiple than if all of your money comes on everything else was the same.

Exactly. That and contracts, which is also tough. When you start out, you're just like, hey, Greg, give me five grand a month. And we're good, we're good. Are you going to do that? All right, good. Actually, I'll send you a quick word, dog, and I'll say, you promise? And then we're good. That's a contract. And no, they want. When someone's buying you, they want to see a contract and they want to see a term and they want to see cancellation penalty. Yeah, everything. Exactly, exactly.

Outside of. You guys have your secret weapon that's not so secret. Now you're trying to make it not so secret in Auto Sigma. Outside of that, are there any secret kind of tech tools or recent tech tools that you've been really loving?

That's a great question. So not so much. I mean, we probably reinvent the wheel too much because we have developers and software engineers and stuff. So we're always like, oh, we can make that. You're like, hey, I want to send an email blast out to like a customer. Like, you're like, oh, I got to just build that. And you're like, dude, just go. There's like mailchimp and stuff. Like, stop. You're like, oh, yeah, okay. We used to try to build everything. Like, oh, we need an analytics dash, awesome dashboard. Like get API data this, this and that. And then you realize how hard it is to maintain all those API keys and oauths and stuff. And you're like, God, I wish there was someone like, oh, there is. There's Ninja Cat or there's Google Data Studio. Like, you know, that's great. But so I think not so much, you know, with the automotive world specifically because they have to use the OEM approved website providers, you're kind of limited and hand locked on the tech you can use for your efforts because you're kind of like, hey, here's the schmut we have. Make it work and you kind of just augment it. But we've been using teamwork CRM, I think you and I were talking about. ClickUp is a pretty cool one, but those things are invaluable. Right. You're just trying to stay organized and keep up with everything. And then we use Google Workplace for all the share drives and all that stuff. But that's about it from a tech stack perspective.

Keep it simple, do it work and yeah, I mean, it's easy to get lost on stuff. That's awesome. Well, I'm excited to watch, especially on the Auto Sigma side. I'm excited to watch the traction that you get there. Appreciate it, man. What are you guys. So in terms of staffing right now, are you guys hiring or recruiting for any positions?

Oh, yeah. Yep. I mean, it's a tight market, but for basically everyone. Strunk Media, Bitmoto Auto Sigma. We're looking for account people. We're looking for web developers, content writers, graphic designers. You name it, we're probably looking for it. Sales reps, even just the full gambit.

I'm on the Bitmodo site right now. We got the career page, so we'll link this up in the show notes. Any other place that you'd point people to learn more or go fly.

Yeah, so we've been using. You have those career pages we've been using. As far as tech stacks, we've been using a platform called Jazz hr.

Familiar with that at all.

And that pushes like via zip recruiter and all that stuff. So we have a bunch of positions listed on Indeed and everything else through there. But you know, really, if, if you, if you have, you know, any of those skill sets, just drop us a line. You know, even if it's not posted on there, like, if we're not, it looks like we're not actively hiring. We are like, we're always looking for. For good team members.

Awesome. We'll make sure we. We link that stuff up. Yeah, man, this has been really fun, man. I appreciate you coming on and walking us through your process, going through acquisitions, how you think about building the. The agencies. Appreciate you coming on and sharing that, man.

Dude, absolutely, man. Thanks for having me. It's always fun. You know, every time I get to pull the mic out, I'm always like, oh, this is going to be a good day.

You know, that's awesome. Well, it's been a blast. I appreciate it.

Oh, man. Thanks for listening to the Agency Journey podcast. Visit agencyjourneyinsiders.com to join the podcast community, and be sure to subscribe for future episodes.