Video streaming can deliver sales; with Howie Zales of Viridity

Hello and welcome to this episode of The Unnoticed Entrepreneur with me, Jim James, here in the UK. And today we're going to the Big Apple, to New York, to meet Howie Zales. Howie, welcome to the show.

Hey, Jim, how are you?

Look, I'm really excited because you and I are going to talk about how you have managed to build a business from being a sports cameraman into having both a course and now a multimillion dollar business in video, how you've got that noticed using podcasting. Why you never engage in political tweets, and also some tips from you about live streaming for entrepreneurs. So Howie, just tell us a little bit about your business first. So my fellow unnoticed entrepreneurs have the opportunity to know you better.

Sure. Again, my name is Howie. I have 2 businesses focused in the television production world. HJZ Productions is my first business. I started in 2000. We hire sports and entertainment TV crews around the United States. And then my other business, Veridity Entertainment Services, or VES. We do livestream hybrid events, virtual events, any type of event that's streamed over the internet, even sporting events.

Howie, I think let's talk about Veridity, although you've mentioned it second, because that's a product that you built really out of the COVID right? So just tell us, you managed to innovate and create a new business in spite of COVID Just tell us. The genesis of that, and then talk to us because Viridity could be confused with other words that mean something to do with masculinity. So how did you come up with a name like Viridity that's so memorable and also I think means so much?

Yeah, I went to a mastermind and one of the lessons at the beginning of the day was not to be very reactionary in business and in life. And what they meant by that was if something in business goes really bad and you react very quickly, you get into that hot zone, that's called being in the red. Conversely, if something happens really good, you get a great contract, you react very quickly and you get very happy, you're in the blue zone. But if you stay kind of even keeled for if things go up and down, you're clearer focused, you make better decisions. It's called being in the green zone. And that kind of describes me. I'm even keeled no matter what the scenario is. And we looked for a word that meant green. That did not mean money because that would be obnoxious. And we wanted it to kind of flow with entertainment services. And my wife found the word viridity, which means green.

I love that. And plainly being calm and collected is why you're so good, for example, on the camera with the sports. I can see behind, for those of you who can't see, Howie's got NBC Sports behind there. He's got some big game tickets as lanyards there as well. Howie, let's just look at live streaming first because more and more Businesses can use it, I think now, right? Jim, just tell us what's the opportunity that you see for entrepreneurs when it comes to live streaming and what are the barriers to using it?

Yeah, I can only say for myself, but I think people rather watch a video. I mean, look at the explosion of TikTok and things like that. People rather watch a video than read a long sales pitchy email. To me, that's super annoying and delete it right away. So if you're someone that's offering a service or can offer tips to people out there to try to get them into your funnel, do a 90-second video once or twice a week. And I think it would serve you much, much better than spending money on having someone write a sales pitch email that most people probably won't read.

Video creation though, Howie, for many people is even more daunting than writing a newsletter or a sales mail. What would be some advice that you would give and what do you do in terms of using video? Like, can you explain some tools, for example, or some techniques?

Sure. Start simple. If you don't have any experience, start simple. You can get something called the Lume Cube on Amazon or any store, and you can put your mobile phone right in it. You can sit it right on your desktop. It comes with a light and a microphone, and you can just practice by talking right into it. And recording it as a selfie. And that's a good way to practice and to live. You can livestream right from there to any of those social platforms. Have a good background. My background is peel and stick wallpaper, maybe cost $30. But the good keys are you want to look good and sound good. And what I mean by look good is you want to be well lit. You don't want to have one face in the shadow or your entire face in the shadow and the background be brighter than you are. You want to be well lit and well heard.

So with the lighting, you mentioned like this Lume Cube and with the microphone, so you're all set. What is that, $50 to $100 or something?

Yes.

Okay. And then what about the platform? I'm kind of picking your brains because this is your expertise. Do people livestream into LinkedIn? Is that your experience is good or onto Twitter? Is that worth doing? What's your experience there?

Yeah, you can livestream right to LinkedIn. You just have to make sure your account is set up for that. You can livestream to Instagram, you can livestream to Vimeo if you have a Vimeo account, and then send that out to multiple destinations at one time.

Right. In fact, Riverside that we're using now also has the option to livestream to Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter as well. So I guess the overall message, Howie, is that livestreaming is no longer the preserve of big companies, is it? What we used to call OTT, right? The over-the-top broadcasters. Now it's in the home or in the office.

And something that we're just getting into this year is shopping livestreams. So if you have products to sell and you can line up 10 or 15 products, we can do a livestream. And basically a person could be watching right on their mobile device, iPad, computer. And when a piece of item comes up in a little box, as you're showing it off, a person could buy right from the screen. And that's just another form of easy live streaming with the help of a few different apps out there that could bring your sales to next level.

Oh, wow. Can you mention an app that, you know, Harry, where you could live stream and have the shopping cart a bit like QVC, the old Barry Diller?

It's like QVC, but for live streaming. Yeah. The one we use, it's called Firework and it works great. And feel free to contact me and I can put you in touch with the right people.

Okay, Hari, that's wonderful. Really, it's transformed, hasn't it? Now a business of any size, as you say, can have global distribution.

And I think livestream shopping is going to be a $250 billion business. Wow.

And of course in China, it's massive as well. So perhaps we're learning something from them as well. With your Verity business, VES, obviously that's a little bit different to you as a production crew and usually building out a course. I believe, to teach people how to become coaches, a TV sports course. How have you as an entrepreneur built your brand and how are you getting people to come to you? Because you've got a reputation, of course, but we all need to grow beyond the personal brand. How are you doing that?

Yeah, my personal brand is based on my personality. Both companies operate off my personal brand and each business is run by one person. Laurie runs HJZ, Jen runs VES, and I float between the two. But they have the same personalities I do. And all 3 of us treat the clients the same way. And people know that's what sets us aside from other companies. And part of how we go about getting clients is through lead generation and things like that.

Yeah. So tell us about lead gen then. What are you doing there, Howie? Because before we started recording, You are sharing some insights that you got from your mastermind, which I'd love you to share again about staying in the zone and what that's like. And yet, how are you managing the sales process with such a lean team?

So I hired a business coach about 2 years ago. And one of the best advice that he gave me was stay in your lane, do the 3 to 5% of the things that you're good at that will help move the needle and outsource the rest. So one thing that I'm not good at is writing. We think I battle a little undiagnosed dyslexia. And so if I send an important email out, I'll never send it out without my wife proofreading it. So email sales is not my strong point. Connecting with people over email for the first time, it's not going to happen. So I hired a company that goes in and does the lead gen, that does the first beginnings of the sale and reaching out. And then if it's determined that they're a good fit and we're a good fit, then I'll take it from there. But it's just a way to help move the needle without wasting a lot of my time.

And how does that work with this lead gen company? What do you have to give them for them to be effective? Because we've all been approached by people on LinkedIn saying, I'll get you this many leads a week or this many leads a month. And a lot of the experiences with those lead gens are frankly, not that great. So I'm wondering how you're managing to get the kind of efficiency and effectiveness from the team.

Yeah, I broke it down real simple. This is the type of people or the titles of the people who are my current clients. So go after those same types of people with those titles. And I made sure that they have a complete understanding of what I do and what we're searching for. I gave them a glossary of terms. So if those terms come up, they'll know how to use them and know what they mean.

Oh, how interesting. And then do they like get data for you and put it into your CRM, for example? Do they do harvesting of contacts? Do they keep those or do you get to keep them and somehow put them into your CRM?

Yes, I do get them. I have a weekly sales call with them and anyone that I have the meeting with, Yes, I get all their information.

Okay. So that's great. It's a really efficient way of generating leads. Would you mind sharing what volume of leads they're giving you and what sort of cost per acquisition there is on that?

Good question. I think the goal is to have 10 actual meetings a week with people.

Yeah. So it's quite a high volume actually. Right.

And so far out of those 10, maybe 1, maybe 2 of them get passed on to me.

Yeah. Okay. So that's the usual sort of 100 to 10 to 1 ratio that so many of us have in sales.

But I don't have the time to have 10 meetings a week or to set up those 10 meetings a week.

Yeah, no, that's right. So it's wonderfully efficient. When we were talking beforehand, you were also talking about your podcast, which is how I originally reached out to you because you had a show and you can tell us the original name. And the role that a podcast has been playing for you and VES.

Sure. My original podcast and my wife came up with the name, The Unexpected Entrepreneur, because I was a camera operator traveling the world for over 20 years. And I always had a business on the side, but never thought of myself as an entrepreneur. I was the camera guy that had a business on the side. And so we came up with The Unexpected Entrepreneur and I I did about 20 shows. I just wasn't getting the listeners or viewers because we did it with video that made it worth it. And then I kind of stopped it, did some research, figured out what I was doing wrong and basically niched it down. And what do I know best? I know television sports. I did it for 20-something years and I also have a course. And what better way to drive audience or drive future clients to the course than people that would listen to the podcast. So I came up with the name TV Crew Talk, and I interview people in the business just like me, camera people, audio people, replay people that have traveled the world and do the biggest events and sell the business to the younger generation of people that are just coming up that are going to college for television. And then hopefully those people will contact me about the course and The primary sponsor of the podcast is the Broadcast Sports Course. So there's no money exchanging hands, but that's the primary sponsor and that's who gets a commercial or promo within the podcast.

So that's wonderful. And with the podcast, what sort of frequency are you doing then, Harry, to make that worthwhile? Because there's this trade-off, isn't there? But you do it so often, it becomes quite a burden. But if it's not frequent enough, then you don't get the consistency for the listeners.

Good question. I publish a new one every 2 weeks, and in the week that I do the publish, I do it on Wednesday and I publish the video portion of it. And then the following Wednesday I publish the audio-only side of it. And then there's something coming out every week with a reason to publicize it, but I don't have to do it every week. Okay.

I'm interested to hear that you're doing video separately to audio. What's the difference, do you think, in terms of audience engagement between doing the video and doing the audio, or is it just the video on YouTube and the audio on the podcast distribution?

So part of several reasons I do the video. One, I'm in TV and I'm selling TV, right? So how could I not do it? I also own a business that its primary function is live streaming. So how do I not do that. And then the third thing is I'm interviewing some people that have the coolest jobs on the planet. I could be at a party with doctors, lawyers, surgeons, and no one wants to hear anything about what the Yankees locker room looks like, or what does it feel like to be on the sideline of a Super Bowl? So I'm interviewing some of the coolest people that have some of the coolest jobs in the world. And they always have pictures. I have pictures of me at every event in the world. Which we show off and you can only do that with video.

Yes, that's right. So that's a limitation of audio only is all those visual elements, as you rightly say. You know, Howie, that's fantastic. So you've managed to build this business through a combination of outsourcing, some of your own content production as well. If there was one piece of advice you'd give to someone that was starting out in their entrepreneur journey from the getting noticed perspective, which is what this show is about, because otherwise there's a piece of advice, as we know, as entrepreneurs. What would you say has been really moving the needle for you? What's a recurring something that you think works in terms of getting noticed?

Yeah, I think to get noticed, you need to put yourself out there. Social media definitely helps. And you just need to treat people the way you want to be treated. It's a very small world. People move around from company to company. So if you have a bad relationship or something bad happened between you and a person at a company and they go to another company you were trying to get business from, they're never going to hire you. So you got to treat every relationship like gold. And one of the things that I stay away from is social media and politics. I never get involved because That's a good way to isolate 50% of potential clients.

Okay. That's wonderful. So this idea that, as you say, every relationship is golden. And in this era of sort of mass personalization, retaining that personal connection is something you've obviously done really well. So Howie Sails, joining me from New York, cameraman turned professional livestream operator, course builder. Thank you so much for joining my fellow unnoticed entrepreneurs and me on the show today.

My pleasure.

So you've listened to Howie over there in New York and me, Jim James, here in the UK. And of course, as always, I'll put all the details in the show notes. And until we meet again, I just encourage you to keep on communicating.