This is a recorded interview (Biz My Way series) where Mike Muse interviews entrepreneur Reggie Miller about millennial entrepreneurship and running a digital agency. Reggie explains why he saw digital as a lasting trend (early eBay experience, "wild west" environment), describes how creators often undervalue their work and the role of word-of-mouth, and recounts pivoting from entertainment/music clients to more traditional/corporate clients — a transition that took him about 1.5–2 years. Key themes: recognizing digital opportunity, proving value through work/case studies, pricing/starting low to build reputation, and intentionally shifting client focus for growth.
Questions this video answers
About a year and a half to two years.
Chapters
What's happening, America? I'm Mike Muse, and I am the SBA's my brothers keeper, millennial entrepreneurial champion. And I am so excited to present to you this video series on millennial entrepreneurship. Millennials see entrepreneurship differently, and we want to give you the tools that you need to be successful. I am so excited to present to you six millennial entrepreneurs that come from a wide spectrum of industries, from fashion to digital to music to agencies. The list goes on, and through their stories, they' how you can do biz your way on your terms, on your agenda, on your platform. Welcome to Biz My Way. I know you, right? I've recognized your work. I've been a big fan of yours, a big admirer of yours. But for those who haven't had the pleasure to be an admirer of yours, tell us who Reggie Miller is and what separates him from the basketball player.
About 4 inches first separates us. But, you know, I'm a. I'm an entrepreneur. You know, I start businesses, I try to keep them afloat.
You are one of those guys that we talk about. You're one of those guys that we dream about and we aspire to, to create something and be successful out of nothing, really. So we're always trying to look for the next trend, identify a trend. How did you even recognize that digital was going to be the next trend?
For me, it didn't seem that crazy. I knew the space was going to continue to grow. I knew it wasn't going anywhere. And once again, I kept hearing from a lot of people, Like, I would take meetings with marketing people, and they would say, well, you think the Internet's going to be around that sounds crazy to me. I like the fact that people were being innovative and they were, they were creating all the time. They're still doing that. But, like, even at that time, it was like, you know, I was. I was taking a lot of meetings, a lot of big companies now, like, you know, I was at ebay when there was 30 people in a room probably no bigger than this room, you know, all of these guys, and they, you know, they knew they were onto something, you know, and I knew they were onto something. And I didn't know where my place was in, and I was still trying to find my place. I knew I was in an environment that was like the wild, wild west. So pivoting was huge. Like, a lot of my clients after the whole dot com bust was entertainment clients. It was the. It was the movie companies, it was the record labels. And I didn't have A lot of, like, large Fortune 500 corporate clients. So it was easy when I found out how much time it would take for other marketing companies, not necessarily digital marketing companies, just other marketing companies, how much time their employees spend to get certain returns. And I was dealing with music clients, and I was like, oh, my God, they're making 100 times what I'm making. And I'm using the same amount of work. So then you realize that, like, I'm devaluing myself. And then you realize where that industry couldn't pay for that. So there's more than that industry could.
Bear as an owner of a digital agency, right? Like you're owner of an agency. So how do you get people to see the value in your work? How do you get people to see the value of your brand? Because that's what a lot of money entrepreneurs face, right, is getting people to understand the value of their brand. So how did you. How were you able to do that? And how are you able to do it today?
Working hard and continue to prove people wrong shows value. You always gonna think you're valuable. It takes time for other people to see that value, you know, and then that has everything to do with not giving up on yourself. How many people was like, you know, Kanye's crazy, but the stuff he was saying in his first interviews, if you look at where he's at now, that guy doesn't sound that crazy. He has a direction. He's gonna. He doesn't care what anyone else is saying. He doesn't care what you believe about it. He's like, you, you have to see it. Someone's like, case studies. He's gonna prove it to you. And I think that millennials, you know, that's on a Gen Z. It's like, you have to prove it.
But how do you go about assessing the monetary value? Because that's also a big question that we have is, look, what I do is untraditional, right? It isn't the norm, right? So that's what millennials are creating. Non traditional careers and non traditional companies and non traditional entities. So in this non traditional space, how then do I put value on it?
That's difficult in any industry, like in any space like it, especially a space that's unknown. You know, you're gonna. And especially if you're a creator, you're gonna lowball yourself. You're always gonna. Creators always lowball themselves. They always lowball their monetary value. And then you hit a point to where, like, you know, if you're wildly successful as far as like, maybe people want something you have. If you start running out of time, you can start putting more value on it because you only have so many hours in a day. But I always believe in starting low because your best tool is word of mouth. So the more people that are consuming whatever you have is going to make you more valuable.
A lot of times, as millennials and as entrepreneurs across the board, especially when you get into industries that are cool, get into industries that are sexy, right? Like, oh, my clients are sexy. Right? So how then do. When you recognize that sexy may not be paying the bills anymore, Right? And then I need to go to something more traditional that may not be viewed as sexy. How was that? How did you reconcile that, too? And when you decide to say, you know what, it's been fun dealing with this demographic, but now I need to go after this demographic.
It's a transition that probably took probably a year and a half to two years. So it wasn't an overnight transition. And one of the things is, you know, it's one of the things that I had to deal with as my own personal, like, my likes, like, I love music, I love entertainment. So I had to pretty much say, you know what? I'm not going to take these guys as clients anymore. I'm just going to resort back to being a fan. Before I was even in this whole industry, I'm going back to being a fan. So I look at music and I consume it completely different than when I was in it. And I like it like that. Now I'm just back to being a fan because if I'm going to grow my business, I knew I had to step out of that and move into an area that I wasn't familiar with. But at the same time, it was the biggest growth opportunity for me.
Reggie, man, you dropped some amazing jewels today. I just want to thank you for your time for one, embracing your crazy and knowing when to go from being a fan to actually being understanding what your value and worth is to go after more of the dollar. So cheers to a successful ride, man. Thank you, Steve Jobs of Digital Agency.
