Know Your Market—You Need To Get Clear On What You Stand For

Hey, it's Mark Podolski, the Land Geek with your favorite niche real estate website, www.thelandgeek.com. and before I introduce my guests from down under in Melbourne, Australia, who is probably right now eating Tim Tams as I speak, my favorite biscuits in the whole world. I'm so jealous. I want to just mention to you that if you haven't done so already, register for the free web class on flight school. It's awesome. Also go to the link.com and download for free the passive income blueprint. My last plug, I promise. And we're going to get to my guest. If you're not automating your Craigslist ads, go to posting domination.com the land geek. I'm filling in for Scott Todd today. In case you don't know me, it's Mark Podolski, the Land Geek. Let's talk about today's guest because he, he's kind of a brilliant marketer and a futurist. Tim Reed from Tim, I'm sorry, From Small Business BigMarketing.com is the founder and host of Australia and New Zealand's number one business and marketing podcast, the Small Business Big Marketing show, which can also be found on all Virgin Australia domestic and international flights. So this guy knows how to get things done. So having launched this hit program seven years ago and with well over 300 episodes under his belt, regular ranks on itunes above the Australian stock exchange, Alan Jones, Tim Ferriss, and even outranks Harvard Business School as the number one business marketing podcast. I have a feeling we're going to learn something from Tim Reed today. Tim Reed, how are you?

Mark, it is an absolute pleasure to be here. I never thought you were gonna get to me, but I thought you're gonna introduce me and then say we haven't got any time for him. The show's over. But I am well and little known fact, the one wonderful chocolate biscuit, the Tim Tam is actually named after me.

You know what? Immediately as soon as I saw you on Zoom, I knew there's something about this guy that just, you know, really is just likable. You get that a lot, Tim. Like people just meet, you're like, you're a likable guy. You want to go out for a beer at a Tim Tam and like.

Yeah, well, Tim Tams don't mix chocolate and beer, both good things, but would never ever consume both at the same time, you know.

Right, that's true, that's true. So let's talk about you. Like how did you become the biggest marketer down under.

I'll take that, I'll take that. Look, you know, how do I answer that in a succinct way? I was in market. I was in corporate marketing for about 22 years. I was trapped in the corporate cubicle working on really big brands, learning a lot. Was an advertising guy. I was the marketing manager for the Australia's biggest travel agent. Got sick of the whole corporate thing and decided that what I needed to do was. I love sharing my marketing knowledge with the smaller end of town Mark. And when I did that, when I was in corporate, if I did meet a small business owner and give them some marketing advice, they really listened and they took action and they were appreciative and I liked that. So I left corporate and I started my own marketing consultancy. And what I did, and I think there's a real learning here, is I started a podcast. Now, I'm not suggesting everyone go and start a podcast, but what that did for me was position me, rightly or wrongly, as an expert. Fortunately, my podcast had found, and my show is called the Small Business Big Marketing show, and it finds that intersection between educating people around marketing and entertaining them. And I think therein lies a little bit of magic, is finding what you, your intersection. And for me, that really worked because there's a lot of marketing shows out there, a lot of marketing podcasts, but I would argue that many just educate. And I think as human beings we like to be entertained. I don't mean become a stand up comedian, but you suggested I was likable. I think, you know, it's important in marketing to be likeable. People buy from people and, you know, so at the end of the day, podcast became successful. Seven years later, I'm still doing the show. It's on Virgin Airlines around Australia and internationally out of Australia. And the brand continues to grow. And you know, to just to wrap that up, someone's gotta be the most helpful in your industry. And I've decided that's gonna be me. For small business owners and marketing in Australia. So there you go.

And marketing is so big and so competitive. I mean, there's got to be, you know, hundreds if not thousands of marketing podcasts, right? So when you first started, how did you break through the noise? How did you differentiate yourself as this, this expert, this, this guy that is sticky you want to keep coming back to. And I know you mentioned the, the entertainment aspect of it, but I would think that marketers as a crew are pretty entertaining people to begin with. They're creative. No.

Maybe this is Generalization. But, you know, it's two questions there. The first question is how. For me, it was a podcast. How did I break through the clutter? I started to podcast. And again, I'm not here saying every small business owner should podcast. What every small business owner should recognise, and let's talk mindset here is that the marketing world's changed. Right. The landscape is now favoring those with modest budgets, not big budgets. And what that allows us to do, if you really understand that, is that you can now go and create your own media platform that might be a podcast, it might be a YouTube channel, it might be a blog, a forum, a Facebook page. Whatever platform you choose, you can now own that media. And I think that's incredible. I think it's incredible that you and I have both got our own shows. You know, that wasn't going to happen 10 years ago. That was a lot harder to make happen 10 years ago. Now we can both confidently stand up and say we have our own show. I'm very proud. I call my show the Small Business Big Marketing show, not the Small Business Big Marketing Podcast because despite it being a podcast, it just elevates it a little bit more. And I just find that incredible that we can do that. And so what the mindset shift is, is that for someone marketing something, sure. Go and continue to buy 30 second spots on the local radio station that, that's leasing space from someone else. You get this, you're a real estate guy. Sure. Go and buy an ad in the local paper that's leasing space from somewhere else, from someone else. Continue to do that. But also understand that you can create the media platform now, have complete control of it if you are consistent, if you create engaging content. Therein lies the challenge. You're gonna win. Go to win.

Yeah, I mean, it's, I, I think it's, it's really one of those things where what you said really rings true, is the consistency showing up every single day or every single week so that your audience begins to know you're going to count on you. Like I'm, I'm guilty of not showing up consistently, let's say, for live streaming. Right. Why? It's a good, you know, I probably just because I don't deem it as important as, let's say the podcast or Frontier Properties or some of the other things, you know, loan geek or some of the other things that I'm working on at that moment. And the day gets away from me and I feel like, oh, now I'm in. I got three Kids, now I'm into family time and I don't want to live stream during that time just because of like privacy and this and that. So I have like this little window of time to do it and if.

I miss it and I get that now. And I think the trick there is to set expectations with your audience. If you happen to have said to your audience, your tribe, your people, hey, I'm going to be live streaming every day and you're not, then that's disrespectful. If you haven't set that expectation, say live streaming. Streaming is one of those things I'm going to do every now and then. That's cool.

Yeah. So I think, thankfully I haven't set that expectation. I think. But you're right. I mean, being consistent and actually being, you know, one of those people that, you know, if you say you're going to do it, you're going to do it and then that lose that trust. So for you, Tim Reed, what, you know, besides not being consistent, not showing up, like, what are some of the other mistakes you see new marketers making today?

Oh, wow, where do we start? Consistency. Thinking they need to do everything. Thinking that they need to be, you know, on Facebook, have a podcast, do videos, have a website, get a brochure, do business cards, go to networking events, run some ads, you know, like my view, and I'm going to talk to your audience, that is the small business owner, even maybe the solopreneur, the micropreneur. My advice, choose a platform like the ones I listed earlier and own it. Like, own it. Like I've owned podcasting in my space for seven years. People go, why don't you do video? Why don't you blog more? Because podcasting's been really good to me and I don't need to, right? So I'm owning that. So there's a mistake there. Another mistake around doing it all is that, you know, there is this new world of outsource. It's not even new anymore, but the ability to outsource stuff and get off. I say get off the tools. I mean, if you are going to podcast, for example, please don't get stuck in the minutay of editing and uploading your show notes and doing all that stuff that you can be paying someone a lot less money for than what you're worth. So figure out what your hourly rate is and then go and employ people who are significantly less than that to do the kind of process driven work. That's why. Because, Andrea, so many small business Owners hurting, because the cost of doing business here is astronomical. So I'm like, guys go and offshore some stuff. So that's another mistake. One other mistake that I see, you know, people starting off in business make is not respecting marketing. You know, marketing from. I've interviewed 334 successful small business owners on the Small Business Big Marketing show, and I can tell you that one thing that links them all is that they respect marketing. They see the power of it. It's like oxygen for business marketing if you get it right. So don't kind of put marketing off. And just to wrap all that up, Mark, you know, marketing, such a broad term, you know, it's like, what is marketing? I would just say marketing is everything. And everything is marketing, from the business card to your website, to how you present yourself, how you dress, how you talk, the copy on your brochure, everything. So respect the power of marketing.

No. And, you know, it's so funny because, you know, sales gets a bad rap, right? Like, you can't go to Harvard Business School and take a class on sales. Now you can take a class on marketing, right? But not on sales. Now, I think the two go hand in hand. You got to generate interest, and then once you generate that interest, you have to have a lever in place to then follow through and exchange that value, right? But what's interesting about marketing, if you don't have the right mindset, is that if. If you're not having that exchange of value, like what you said, right, you're edutaining people and you're giving them that value for free. And now all of a sudden, they get to know you after a few podcast episodes, they know you, they like you, they trust you. What happens is, I want more Tim Reed, right? And then once I get more Tim Reed, I want more Tim Reed. And I'm like, well, what? You know, and then you just send out an email and say, hey, you know, I'm gonna have this live event. I'm gonna sell ticket. And, you know, I would give me time read, you know, live and in Melbourne, and it's like a big deal. And now all of a sudden, you've monetized it. But you really, you know, it's just a fancy word for saying, look, I've created this value and. And now I'm exchanging it, Right?

Is that.

Is that how you see it?

Yeah, yeah, it is. And that you talk about marketing and sales. I mean, I'm a fan of sales because it's a critical success factor. I'm not very good at sales. That's why I spend a lot of time on marketing. And the type of thing that I spend a lot of time on is what I call helpful marketing. And helpful marketing generates warm leads. So therefore, the sales process becomes a whole lot easier. And, you know, for example, I'll give you the example of helpful marketing again, my podcast. So then people call me, and I get phone calls from people saying, hey, listen, you don't know me, but I know you. I feel like I know you. I've been listening to your show for three, four, five years. Do you mind if I call you Timbo? My name's Tim, but I call myself Timbo. So there's that warmness in their approach. So all of a sudden, the sales models flipped. Instead of me cold calling, I'm getting these warm calls from people that I don't know, but they feel as though they. And that in itself is pretty cool. And again, you know, people don't ring you up and say, you know, love the ad you ran on the radio. It just doesn't happen, you know, but they're going to ring you up and say, love that episode you did at the podcast. So both marketing and sales, mission critical. Don't stress if you're not good at one, but good at the other, you know?

Yeah. So if I'm a small business owner and I come to you and say, here, Tim, here's a million dollars. Will you. Will you consult with me? And you say, yeah, you know, I'll do it. And the first question might be, you know, you get to know my business a little bit. And then I say, tim, look, I only got. I got a. You know, I got a small marketing budget, and I can only hit one platform today.

Right.

Is there a platform that you'd say, okay, with a small marketing budget? This is what I would recommend you do as a small business owner. Or is the question bad? Does it just. Is it so dependent on your business? It's a bad question. So what would be a better question?

Well, first of all, a million bucks is a lot of money. I think it is. Over here. It is. Is a million bucks still a lot of money in Phoenix, Arizona?

It is. It is. That's how valuable you are, Tim. I just assumed.

Yeah, correct. You know, I think because there is so much you could do, there are certain fundamentals that you want to get in place. So there's a great marketing concept, sort of Marketing 101, which says, get your message right first before you worry about where to put it. Right. So I see A lot of business owners say, I'm going to get on Twitter, I'm going to get a fandangled new website. I, I'm going to start an amazing video strategy. And I'm like, that's cool, that's cool. But what are you going to say? Let's go back and put those ideas on ice for the moment and figure out what you're going to say. So that's around getting your pitch right? What do you do? I can say I'm a marketing guy. I actually prefer to say I show small businesses how to be resistible and people go, oh, they sort of stop for a minute and go, he shows small businesses how to be irresistible. I'd like to be irresistible. How do you shape, how do you make small businesses cool? I'm glad you asked. And then I can go into some detail about explaining that in a more, in a more rational way. But I've kind of hit them up first with an emotional kind of pitch. So it's getting your pitch right. It's about understanding your brand. So as someone starting out, get really, really clear on who are your people. Right. Many business. Another trap we fall into as business owners is that we want to appeal to everyone. But I would argue that trying to be everything to everyone, you end up being nothing to no one. You got to stand for something. So get clear on what it is you want to stand for.

Yeah, I remember Dan Kennedy, I remember Dan Kennedy saying, you know, if you're not, if you're not offending somebody by noon, you're not working hard enough.

Totally, totally. And that's, and that's being, that's a bit of showmanship in there. I don't know whether we need to offend people. But you know, I openly say I have a thing called an editorial mission. And that editorial mission shapes what I podcast about, what I speak about on stage, what I write about in my blogs, what I talk about, what interviews I accept to do. My editorial mission is, it's a three question approach. What have you got to offer to who and what outcome can they expect? So my editorial mission for the small business big marketing show and brand is marketing tips and tricks. That's what I've got to offer for who Small service based business owners, what are they going to get to generate more inquiry? So that middle bit, small service based business owners, people are going to be listening to me, who I know listen to me, who own, who are product based marketers, who are industrial marketers, who aren't small service based business owners. But I'm not alienating them because they still like what I've got to say, because marketing principles apply right across the board, no matter who you are. But when I'm speaking and thinking about who I'm speaking to, it's small service business owners. So going back to that idea of get clear on your brand, who are you talking to?

What?

Understand these people at an emotional level. Demographic is okay. Understanding how old they are, where they live, their gender, their income, their education, status, that's kind of interesting, but it doesn't tell you a lot about those people. What does tell us a lot about a person is what keeps them up at night? What problems have they got that you can solve, that your business can solve? How do they feel about your industry at a more emotional level? I keep using this word emotion quite purposely, Mark, because emotion is a very powerful way of getting inside a person's head and into their heart, you know, so that's what I would do with your bloke with the million dollars. First and foremost, I'd start by getting clear on their brand, understanding them. And then at some point I'd say, yeah, I'd get a website, tick the website box, a good website. Get all your other little marketing touch points in place that you need, whether it be signage or stationery or whatever, and all those kind of fundamentals, and then start to look around as to, is this person going to be good on video? They're going to be a good audio sort of podcasting person. Are they better off as a blogger? Should we get them on the speaking circuit because they're really great presenters, or maybe should we just run an advertising campaign? So long answer to a good question.

Which you actually created yourself. Because I started off with a bad question, but, you know, basically the way you rephrase it was, you know, know your market. That's. That's the. That's the question, right? If you can't do marketing, if you don't know your market, and the only way to know your market is to actually, you know, know, start talking to prospective customers and finding out what you said, what keeps them up at night, right? What are their fears? What are their ambitions, what emotionally, you know, connects you with them, and then you can speak to them in a way that creates value. But if you're talking about apples and they're interested in oranges, it doesn't matter. If you're the greatest marketer in the world, you're talking to the wrong people, right?

You know, imagine. You're absolutely right and imagine Writing a letter to someone. Imagine I said to you, hey, Mark, go and write a letter to someone. Where? And you'd go, yeah, but to who? Oh, good question, good question. Can you write it? To my 60 year old aunt who lives on the coast and is having trouble sleeping at night. Now, you know what, I don't know why she'd be having trouble sleeping because she lives on the coast. But you're right, but now you know what you could write in that letter, right? So getting clear on who your people are, once you're clear on that, and I mean at a deeper level like I just described, then a lot of your marketing can fall into place.

Yeah, it's, it's, it's brilliant. It's, it's so, it's so. It seems simple, but it's not simple. I mean, to really delve deep into somebody's psyche, right, isn't easy. Like, you can't just talk to one person. You got to talk to a lot of people, you got to read. I mean, it's just getting that those fundamentals, asking those questions over and over and over again and finding out, you know, what they want.

I mean, whilst I always get scared when people say it's not simple, because you and I right now, talking to business owners who are trying to grapple with their marketing, just make. I'm going to say it's not as hard as you think it is and start, start. Don't be overwhelmed by the fact that we've covered a lot of ground in this chat and there are various things that you should do. Just start. Because Again, of the 334 successful business owners that I've interviewed, another thing that links them all is their ability to be productive and to avoid perfection. I really admire that in all these people that I speak to. I just think, wow, you really just took action, didn't you? You didn't wait for it to be perfect. You didn't wait for all the ducks to be in a row. You actually made a decision, this is what I'm going to do and we'll fix it as we go. And I really like that. I really admire that.

Yeah, it's great. I mean, it is all about taking massive action. All right, well now, Tim, I'm gonna call you Timba. Hey, is that too, is that, is that a bad boundary? Did I cross a line?

Look, we've stared at each other in the eye now for about 33 minutes. So you know, I know your brother.

All right, all right, Timba, here we go. I don't even know what I'm saying. I got. I gotta listen to the podcast now, so. Yeah, yeah. All right, so I'm gonna ask you for your tip of the week. A website, a resource, a book, something actionable where the art of passive income listeners can go right now, improve their businesses, improve their lives. I mean, you've already given tons of tips, but do you have like, one?

My tip the week for your listeners. They are right now either holding it and using it, or it's in their pocket or handbag and it's their smartphone, right? Yeah, yeah, totally. There it is. And like, you know, this thing that I'm holding, an iPhone 6S in my case, this is a marketing machine that we all take for granted. Poorly named phone. Who uses the phone? This is a video camera. It's got a stills camera, it's got a voice recorder. It's got the ability for social media marketing, the ability to do email marketing. I mean, this is an incredible device. And my tip of the week is to understand just how much marketing, helpful.

Marketing.

You can do. If as a small business owner, I'm going to use a real estate agent as an example, that. Call that a good. That a good kind of example to use for your people, Mark?

No, I think it's a great example. Yeah.

So a real estate agent right now could go outside into their area, into the suburbs that they represent, and you call them realtors, don't you? Not real estate agents, but a realtor could go out into a suburb and stand in front of a home they've just sold and do a selfie video of talking about why that home sold for a certain price. They could go and stand in front of a street sign in a suburb and talk about why this street is incredibly popular. And houses always sell well. They could go and interview a customer, a client whose home they've just sold, and get a testimonial all on their iPhone. And, you know, you could go and do your first podcast interview using the voice memo function. You could upload all that to YouTube within a heartbeat. So I just think this is incredible. People hesitate around all this marketing because they think they've got to get a fancy microphone or a fancy video camera or. No, they don't. One of the things we all laugh about, the fact that Apple brought out iPhone 7. It's like, big deal, right? It's just another. It's a better camera, that better camera and better microphone from a small business owner wanting to market themselves. That's actually a big deal for everyone else. It Isn't. Who needs a better kid, needs a better camera. So my tip is to understand just how powerful a marketing tool your smartphone is and start using it. And I'll finish that with a little story to show the power of it. I speak at a lot of conferences in Australia and in some countries around the world each year, and I got asked to emcee a very big awards night, one of the biggest business awards nights in Australia, earlier this year. It was in 10 cities around Australia. And I was up against a couple of other MCs who are a professional MCs. I'm not a professional MC. I'm a guy who loves small business. And these other two guys were celebrity. They were. They were TV people. I'm not a TV person. And I thought, I'm just not going to get this job. I mean, they've got. I don't even know why they're asking me. I had a moment where I thought, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to go down the street to the shopping center near where I live with my son. I'm going to sit in a cafe with the shops, all the small businesses behind me, and I'm going to get my son to film me for a minute talking to the client. The client. I just said, g', day, client. I didn't know the client. I was being booked through a speaker's bureau. I said, hi. Hi, client. My name's Tim Reid. I'm really honored that you thought about me as someone who could emcee your upcoming business awards. And here's why I think I'd be a good choice. Now, Mark. I had a crow on the roof of the shop across the road going, I couldn't get rid of him. I had noise. I had car noise. I had people walking past. I shot it on my iPhone. I sent it to the client. I got the job. And they said, that video was the reason you got the job. It showed that you cared. We got to see you as a person, how you present. And I've got to tell you, the video wasn't that flash. It wasn't that polished. So it was just good content. So appreciate the power of your smartphone.

Great tip. And I love the authenticity story, too, and how the power of authenticity over, you know, professional polish is what people really want. They want real people. They want to connect. So Timbo Reed. Phenomenal. Phenomenal. So my tip of the week is. Learn more about Timbo at small business big marketing.com small business bigmarketing.com I will have the link in the show notes and Timbo, are we good, mate?

I'm good. I reckon we've covered a lot of ground, I don't think anymore. And we will start to send your good people maybe not to sleep, but into overwhelm and I don't want to do that. And thanks for having me, buddy. Thanks for being a fellow podcaster. I always like to speak to fellow podcasters and I wish you and your audience all the best.

No, I thank you and thanks for taking time out of your very busy day and or actually, what time is it right now?

It is 9:24am My day has begun.

So your day, your day is beginning. It's only 3:24pm in Pacific Standard Time. And so at some point today I will, you know, in honor of you, have a Tim Tam. Because now I can get them here aren't it's they have them like in these specialty shops.

So you're a simple man, a man of the people and that's why we love you.

I really am. And my kids love them. And you know, I feel, I feel special. Like, hey, I know something you don't know. Yankee, right? To my neighbors, like, try this. Like, oh my gosh. For those of you don't know who Tim Tams are, they're like the Australian Oreo cookie. Like they consume millions of them.

Biting the diagonal corner right? So you hold a Tim that way and you bite the top right and the bottom left and that becomes a straw from which you can suck your.

Coffee through Tim Tam Slam. Yeah, it's on YouTube. All right, so go to the landgeek.com learn more about me. I want to thank the listeners. And look, the only way I can get the quality of guests like a Tim Reed, who has the biggest marketing show arguably in the planet, or at least part of the planet, is if you subscribe, rate and review the podcast. It really does help. It takes about 20 seconds, but please do so. If you haven't learned about lonegeek, just email support at thelangeek. Com and we'll get you a free demo of Loan Geek. I want to thank Tim Reed from smallbusiness bigmarketing. Com again. Thanks everybody. Let freedom ring.