Gaining Momentum Through Comprehensive Marketing Strategies with Joshua Ramsey on Episode #0133

Intro [0:00]

EA Interviews Episode 133. Inspiration, transformation, success stories, and the Imperfect Action Round seven days a week. Join Mario Fachini for today’s Expert Authority Effect Interview. 

Mario Fachini [0:13]

You have a company but are you doing the marketing proper? Have you thought about hiring, you know, maybe you get someone out of school, maybe you get someone out of college, maybe you hire this big fancy agency. But what if you don’t have the budget for that? Maybe you get the receptionist, maybe you get the person answering the phones, maybe you get you. I don’t know what your situation is. If you have a brick and mortar place or virtual business, it doesn’t matter. What are you doing with your marketing? This is near and dear to my heart and that’s why I’m excited to have Josh Ramsey here on the show today because he has a great concept with the Fractional Chief Marketing Officer. So instead of hiring a giant agency or some overpriced person that just got out of college that may or may not know what they’re doing, he delivers results. He’s an author. He’s a speaker. And he’s a show host. And he’s going to get you results. And that’s why I’m excited to have Josh Ramsey on right after we thank our sponsor. 

SPONSOR Rosh Tips [1:11]

Winning With Google in 2020? Of course you want to. I’d advise Google search advertising and YouTube specialist Rosh Sillars. Download the free Winning With Google in 2020 Guide at EAInterviews.com/RoshTips. 

Mario Fachini [1:26]

Here is Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Josh Ramsey. Josh, how are you doing today? 

Joshua Ramsey [1:31]

Hey, I’m doing great. How are you? 

Mario Fachini [1:32]

I’m feeling great. I’m excited for you to share with Expert Authority World because what you’re doing is so needed. And I don’t think many people realize that. How did you even get into it? 

Joshua Ramsey [1:44]

You know, back in the 2000s – I guess that’s the right way to say it -I was selling media, actually. So I was working for companies selling newspaper, transit, advertising, billboards, things like that. And kind of wanted to get on the other side of the table because the retention that I was seeing as a sales guy was not very good. And mainly I found that it was because of the bad ads that were being written. So I transitioned into the agency world and started an agency in 2009. And my focus, even today, is to write better ads to explain what I call the inside reality better to the public. 

Mario Fachini [2:25]

Why is that important for a company? 

Joshua Ramsey [2:28]

Well, you know, you have two sides, two concepts. You have the inside reality and the outside perception. The inside reality is who you are. A lot of times at my conferences that I teach nationwide, I talked about back in the day, whenever I met my wife, when I went out, I would go out just a couple times a month. And I would go to a birthday party or, you know, a casual party and drink one or two beers, but what do you do? You pull out your phone and take a selfie. So what I wasn’t showing on my social media is that I was engaged in church and I was engaged with my family and my nieces. And it so happened that I realized all of this around 2010, 2011 after I got married that my, my wife said, “Hey, you know, one of the things that drew me to you was your social media and you posted some pictures of your nieces.” And then it kind of dawned on me, my inside reality was that I was a nice guy. I was a good guy with good intentions. But my outside perception was I went to some parties and had a couple of beers. It didn’t mean I was a crazy guy. It’s just that I lived life and casually drink. And that became my outside perception. So realizing that, I applied the same methodology and principles with companies today. And my focus on doing that now with companies is, we take what they’re good at and we make that the public. The public can see that better. So that’s what we focus on and that’s a route principle of what I teach and what I do. 

Mario Fachini [4:01]

That’s a great analogy you brought up about how we display ourselves personally. Why do you think companies have such a problem showcasing it professionally? 

Joshua Ramsey [4:12]

You know, the worst people to write marketing in the world is the business owner. Because you know so much about it that you live it, you read it. So even for myself, being a marketing guy, a PR guy, it’s hard for me to write material for myself. So even the book that I just wrote, it was hard because I had to take a lot of material and then work it down. But then I work it in such detail that when someone walks in, they have to be wanting to know that information. They have to want to start at the beginning before they can get to Z, right? So you have to start at A before you get to Z. But I’m the guy that’s like, “Hey, man. I already know this. Why don’t you know it? Like, why are you not already there?” So I have to slow down and start bringing it. That’s why business owners, oftentimes, they are the best knowledge bank but they’re the worst officer of that knowledge bank. 

Mario Fachini [5:02]

What’s one of the best things they can do to start bringing that out of them and showcasing it easier? 

Joshua Ramsey [5:08]

Well, that’s where I guess I kind of – I point to myself. But the more direct answer is to find someone that can help you start to scribe that message. So a lot of times – 

Mario Fachini [5:23]

So don’t try doing it on your own? 

Joshua Ramsey [5:26]

I’m sorry? 

Mario Fachini [5:26]

Don’t try doing it on your own? 

Joshua Ramsey [5:28]

Yeah. Absolutely. So I will say that there’s two ways to do it that I would recommend if you are trying to do it on your own. And that is wordsmithing. Take words, put them down, and just kind of rework them, and then bounce them off people that know at least a little bit about your business. But then I use a methodology quite often that’s called the whiteboard method. The whiteboard method is essentially you throw a whiteboard up on the wall and you start writing out ideas. Write out concepts. And as you write those concepts, the rule of the room is that no one gets to make fun of anybody and no one gets to laugh and poke fun. It’s all about being original with content, with your ideas with what you’re going to do with marketing. Let me back up for a minute and explain another principle, which is strategic messaging versus tactical marketing. These are two different elements. Strategic messaging is what you say and how you say it. But more importantly, it’s what’s perceived by the audience. The tactical marketing is the platform you share that message. So we’re on a tactical marketing center right now that you provide. And people come to you for the strategic message. So people that tune in like the strategic message but you use the tactical platform that you have right here to share that message. So the whiteboard effect, you have to identify and break it down. Are we focusing on the strategic message or the tactical marketing of how we’re going to present that message? 

Mario Fachini [6:59]

So It sounds like the strategic approach is why you’re doing it. And the tactical is the steps you need to take to achieve it. 

Joshua Ramsey [7:08]

Yeah. So strategic is your message and the tactical is how you share that message. Right. Right. 

Mario Fachini [7:14]

Well, that’s a lot easier way to understand that then. “Okay. We’re going to do some LinkedIn and Facebook and then we’ll try this and then we’ll try this and then we’ll try this.” It’s like, how do you decide what works? And so many people are just piece mailing and throwing stuff against the wall. 

Joshua Ramsey [7:31]

Yeah. Yeah. I say it with all respect at conferences. But if you come to one of my conferences, you’d hear me say, “Any idiot can buy radio. All it takes is a credit card.” You know, just go to the radio station and give them your credit card and be like, “Hey, put me on the air.” But what are you going to say that’s going to drive consumers to want to engage with you in the conversation? And that’s really where a lot of people fail. So coming back to your initial question, it is how do you write that message? And it becomes wordsmithing it. Writing it down and figuring it out. And that’s where we kind of then move into a transition of the four steps of engagement. And it’s interrupting the audience and then engaging them. The third step is the education side of when they want to know more. And then the last one is an offer. An easy to take, easy to grab offer that people can say, “That’s something that I can hang on to. I can engage with and learn more about it.” And then it allows us, as the business owners or the marketing executives, to be able to market to them again more and more. 

Mario Fachini [8:41]

So you’re saying that the offer is important. You shouldn’t just keep saying stuff over and over and never ask for anything? 

Joshua Ramsey [8:47]

Well, you don’t have to throw out the offer if you don’t want to. But if you’re trying to make revenue and business then it would probably be smart to throw out a well-placed – 

Mario Fachini [8:57]

I see a lot of companies that do that where they have – you know, I don’t want to say they have a great message but it’s above par. They might spend a big budget on a commercial or YouTube ad or whatever the case is. It’s like they’re doing a good job. Everything’s very, very professional. But there’s never that call to action. And it’s just like, “Wow. They’ve got a good [inaudible [00:09:20] life, don’t you? 

Joshua Ramsey [9:21]

Yeah. Well, you expect people to put a good message out there. And fruit should fall from the tree. And it’s going to fall right into my bucket. 

Mario Fachini [9:31]

I’m here. I showed up. Yeah, you could put the millions over there. 

Joshua Ramsey [9:34]

Yeah. You know, why is things not working for me? 

Mario Fachini [9:39]

So let me ask about, it sounds like you definitely have a great game plan on how you help people. But let me ask you about the who, who are you really looking for and who do you really help? 

Joshua Ramsey [9:51]

Well, back in 2009 when I started my company, I had little to nothing. I mean, I floated alone from my parents to basically buy a computer. And after that, I just did the guerrilla tactic of door knocking, cold calling, and trying to get my foot in the door to speak at conferences. And after working that angle one of the things that I still am passionate about is working with small business. Don’t get me wrong. If a client comes to me and has a big company and they’re trying to maneuver the waters, there’s a saying out there that says, “What got you here won’t get you there.” So whatever I did in 2009, I can’t still apply those principles in 2019 or 2020, right? I’ve got to adapt. I’ve got to be agile to the marketplace. So I have to continue to grow and develop. So the clients that I work with are just people that, honestly, they want to grow. They want to figure out how they can scale and how they can fix their message so that they’re helping people and they’re explaining it well. Just a short example if I can just throw this out there,I had a conversation today with a new client that just started with one of my packages. The package is called a Premier Starter Package. And we were talking about where she’s at in the marketplace and what she’s trying to do. And I had the experience of actually buying her product before she actually came back to me. So it’s been a year that we’ve known each other. But I told her, I said, “One of the best things about working with your company was truly that you made it so simple. Like, working with you, just your people, your approach, how you work, how you get things done.” I was working with five contractors moving into a house. They were one to five. And it was a nightmare with four of the five. But she was that fifth one that things were just smooth. So I told her, I said, “Why are we not talking about that? Why are we trying to pitch people with pictures of these bathrooms that are gorgeous? But that’s not at the end of the day what they always want. They want not only a gorgeous bathroom but they also want the smooth process.” So that’s where we went to the innovation. And we started talking about that. And what I experienced with her and explained to her in the same scenario, what you and I’ve been talking about, she’s innovated her company but hasn’t explained it to the public. She keeps pitching on the same platform of, “I can build you the best bathroom, the best kitchen out there.” But everyone else says that so it becomes a platitude. So what I talked to her about is we change our message, we change our philosophy, and we talk more about the experience that people have in working with us, how we make it smooth and easy for people to work with us. And then as we do that, then people come to us. And it’s not now just based on price. We’re overcoming their objections before they even have the objection. And we’re educating them on why our system is smooth. We can do anything and everything anyone else can do but they can’t do what we do. And that is treat you the way you want to be treated, keeping things simple, smooth, we have a process that we work through. And it makes it a phenomenal experience for our clients. 

Mario Fachini [13:17]

It’s essentially like you’re foreshadowing the future and future pacing them, like you’re saying, and they can hire anyone. But when they choose you, you’re telling them the experience they’re going to have, not just the end result. 

Joshua Ramsey [13:32]

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That’s it. We want to paint that picture. The best storytellers out there have the biggest audience. They follow the best storytellers. 

Mario Fachini [13:43]

I want to pause for just a second because this is a great Expert Authority Insight. And for anyone listening, think about your customers and what Josh is saying here. A lot of people get focused on the end-result but think about the steps they go through. And it sounds like that’s what you’re doing and just focusing, and then bringing it to light. Not hiding it until, hopefully, they call you. I like that. That a great insight. Because if you’re taking them through the process before they go through the process, they’re more likely to call you to go through the process, right? What’s the biggest success story you’ve had from any of your clients taking them through this process? 

Joshua Ramsey [14:37]

Oh, man, off the top of my head. I would say that there was a pest control company I worked with years ago. It was a full blown process. It wasn’t just that particular element. But it was one of many. I mean, I’ve used a lot of analogies. But when you’re building a marketing plan, you don’t want to just focus on your digital plan. You have to focus on your messaging, like we talked about. You have to focus on a bigger picture. So with this particular company, we had to work on the innovation of their company and really focusing in on what did they do better. And what we were able to do is explain that through a series of videos. And really hitting the hot buttons. So by shooting those videos and then breaking them down into sizzle reel, so to speak, and then rolling those out over a period of time through social media and other strategies and tactical marketing. We were able to build a good audience for them. And then it built a leverage point. So in my leverage point that I’m talking about, let me just use a for instance, when we publish material, sometimes it’s not a direct ROI. It’s an indirect ROI. So business owners focus on, “Okay. I want to know if I spend $10,000, what am I going to get back? Like, where’s my return on that?” And sometimes you have to look at it and understand that you have to build authority. And as you build authority, people will likely come to you for that authority. So then you create a following. That’s how you get repeat and referral business for a lot of companies. So when we look – 

Mario Fachini [16:28]

So it’s a longer game. It’s not that immediate ROI. But if you do, let’s say, a video this week, a video next week after a year, like you said, you have that content library. You know, what do you think about this? I’m going to ask you a question about that consistency. Do you think there’s – how much of a degree do you think there is that people are watching just to see how long you’ll keep it up for? 

Joshua Ramsey [16:57]

Man, that’s a loaded question. I’ve never been asked that before. I don’t know. We’d have to probably have a longer conversation about that. Ask me that one more time slightly different and see if I can give you a good answer. 

Mario Fachini [17:09]

How many people do you think are watching just to see if you’ll keep it up? 

Joshua Ramsey [17:18]

I think that that goes back to commitment consistency, right? I think people want to know if you run a podcast, and you run it for three months, and then you shut it down, Why did you shut it down? Is there a good reason? So look at your resume. And again, I mean, I’m open to feedback on this. I don’t know everything. But if you look at a resume and if you’re trying to hire someone based on their resume, if you see a gap in employment, you’d kind of ask them why. Right? So in business, to me logically, and that’s a lot of what I base my strategies on is logic and human buying behavior. I would say there has to be a reason as to why you did one thing and then you stopped and then you redid it. So for instance, I ran a radio show for a long time. But the commitment that I had to give of running one hour a week, prepping for that, then running it, then cleaning the audio and publishing it was a lot of – 

Mario Fachini [18:15]

It’s a fair amount, isn’t it? 

Joshua Ramsey [18:16]

Yeah, it is. It’s a lot of work to do that. And when you’re doing it all yourself, you don’t have a huge production team, which was where I was at. I had a small production team but I was doing the bulk of the work. It was overwhelming at times. So I did the show for about three or four months and then I had to hit pause because business grew. So as business grew, I had to say, “Okay.” 

Mario Fachini [18:37]

What kind of first world problem is this? 

Joshua Ramsey [18:40]

Right. So I’d become agile. So part of my agility in the marketplace that I talk to clients about is running my own podcast, or doing podcasts with a great host like you and being able to share my message with your audience, and trying to work at different angles. So again, there has to be a reasoning as to why people have done something. But also, the marketplace demands different things. And if you try something and it doesn’t work, maybe you shift away from it. So it depends on, I guess, the business and the brand. To answer – come back to your question, what’s the business, what’s the brand, what’s your long term goals. And sometimes your long term goals have to shift. They have to change based on the industry, competitors, and your vision as a CEO. 

Mario Fachini [19:28]

There’s this quote that goes something to the effect of don’t hang on to a problem just because you spent a long time making it. And there’s a graphic and it’s kind of graphic. It’s someone holding on to a rope and their hands are bleeding. and it’s like, you can just let go and it might be the smartest decision. But so many people hang on, again, just because you made it. You know, don’t judge me just because I sin differently than you. I heard that after church one day. I was like, “Holy smokes.” 

Joshua Ramsey [19:59]

Yeah. I’d say don’t spend good money after bad money. So if you go buy a whole bunch of postcards, let’s say, and you stick them in the corner of your office, don’t go pay for postage if you realize that those cards all have typos on them. Don’t go pay for the postage. You just got to wash that money. So yeah, I’m with you on that. I just say it’s slightly different, right? 

Mario Fachini [20:20]

So you were talking about building up that library of content. And I was kind of asking because I noticed some interesting things. So cool. We’re live. This is public. And I can’t say too much because it’ll be too obvious. But let’s just say I’d notice some things the first few months, the second set a few – let’s do a quarterly. Every quarter, I’d noticed some big differences. And three to six months into it, it was like, “Oh my gosh. Your show is doing really well.” And it was like it was doing well four months ago but I suspect people are watching to see if I keep it up. And when you’re talking about that content library because it’s a great idea. I love what you’re sharing. But I also know and the smart way to do it is, you should crank out 10, 20,30 videos in a day or two. You can maybe release one a week. So you can essentially do three to six months worth of stuff in a few days. But that’s where it’s a matter of you don’t need to do it weekly. You just do it one or two times. It’s like, “Wow. You’re really sticking with this.” But when you’re doing it live weekly, it’s a different scenario. And I was kind of curious but also curious what you would say. And so, what was the end result with the pest control company? You started making all the content. You’re saying it wasn’t immediate. What did they find after six or 12 months of this? 

Joshua Ramsey [21:44]

Well, the immediacy that happened was not just the publication of information. But it was also tracking and getting down to the fine details of their cost per lead, cost per sale. So we were able to track from generating leads. And we just tracked initially lead generation from over $250 per lead. And they needed to have that much, much lower to say the least. We got them down in the matter of three years. The final number three years later came down to $45 – under $45 leads. We took them from 250 to 45. But it became the direct ROI and the indirect ROI by building that confidence. And at least having that confidence there of the community so that people go online and they look for you. Do they find you? Are you out there? Are you noticeable in different mediums? So sometimes that can be sponsoring your little league team. Sometimes you don’t need to do that. You can do it other ways. Again, that becomes the vision of the CEO. But that commitment consistency pays off in the end. And sometimes it’s very direct and sometimes it’s indirect. But I’ll kick it back to you with this last thought and you’re kind of hitting the same thing we’re talking about here. But if you have two people in front of you and you’re trying to make a decision. And one of them has a successful podcast like yours. And he’s been doing it for a long while. And then you have someone else who hasn’t done that podcast or done it very little and not as well. Who would you hire? If all things are equal, except for that, that’s where your indirect ROI can flow for you. And that’s where your brand and your commitment and consistency can really boost your opportunity. 

Mario Fachini [23:42]

You’re making this real easy for me to segue into the authority. I noticed you – congrats on the new book. 

Joshua Ramsey [23:50]

Thank you. 

Mario Fachini [23:51]

Why do you decide to do that? That has nothing to do with digital. That’s physical. 

Joshua Ramsey [23:55]

I get to hold it up and be like, “Hey. Yay.” 

Mario Fachini [24:00]

It’s not digital, though. Why would we do something that’s not online? 

Joshua Ramsey [24:06]

Well, you know, I mean, there’s something to go along with when you’re at a conference and you’re teaching a conference, and people want to come up and touch something and making that physical purchase. And living in a digital world that we do, oftentimes – I love the old saying and I love it and hate it, I guess, is the right word. You’re selling snake oil. And that’s why one of the things that I’ve built for public consumption is the largest library of SEO in the world. So if you’re wondering anything about SEO, I’ve created one library, one spot, where you can go see that information and have free access to it. And I probably got offline and offbase of what you’re asking but – 

Mario Fachini [24:54]

No, no. Please tell me what that that is. I want to make sure it’s in the show notes on EAInterviews.com. Give me the web address there. 

Joshua Ramsey [25:03]

So you can go to Jrcmo, ChiefMarketingOfficer.com, so Jrcmo.com. And you’ll see Tools. And under Tools, it says SEO definitions. So what I did is I created a full library of every element of SEO that’s out there. Now, there’s other strategies that may exist or you may have one element of SEO that applies to your website but not your best friend’s website. So if you’re not in eCommerce, you may not need certain elements of SEO. But I created this full library for just business owners and people out there that want to know what do I do. And is this snake oil? And the answer is, it’s not. The funniest thing that happens to me when I teach conferences is I have ad agency people show up in the audience. So I open it up to Q&A, typically, and I generally have the one person in the audience that says, “Well, Josh. You just spoke about how you can see results online.” So right now we’re talking about digital marketing. So they say, “You can see results.” I will say from the stage, “You can see results in the first month to three months. You don’t have to wait six months or a year.” So this ad agency person stood up and said, “That’s not true.” And I said, “Why do you say that?” They said, “Because I’ve never seen it happen. I said, “Just because you haven’t seen happened doesn’t mean it’s there.” And they wanted to go back and forth. But I showed him an example of what I call extreme. I’ve kind of coined this, but extreme long tail keyword phrases. And extreme long tail keyword phrases are essentially 15 to 20 words that people search for. And I take that when we talk about SEO and improvement, we talk about all these other elements and rabbit holes we can go down. I equate it simply to this to sum it up and kick it back over to you. Most of us have lived in the digital brain frustration where we say, “I’m looking for this particular product and it’s got to exist.” So you start doing a search and your search gets longer and longer with words. And at some point you realize, “Man, I wrote a whole paragraph to try to find something.” And that’s where I tell business owners to start, “If you’re trying to rank your website online, start with those long tail keywords where someone’s frustrated and they’re trying to find what you offer. And they can’t figure out how to say it. So they use these extreme long tail keyword phrases. And that’s where you start.” And that’s where you start to see impact in the first 30 days of working on a website is when you focus on those types of phrases. It starts to make your website found by search engines and that’s how you start to climb. 

Mario Fachini [27:55]

Because if you’re trying to compete with Los Angeles Pest Control, Houston, New York, Chicago, what others, another big city, pretty much any major city, Detroit, there’s a few competitors, isn’t there? When you have – I don’t know – 15 words or more in the search query, there’s probably not a whole lot is there? 

Joshua Ramsey [28:20]

You know that they are there but you want to outrank your competitor. When you look at digital marketing – which is, again, the segment that we’re talking about right now – when you look at digital marketing what you want to be able to identify is you want to outrank your competitor. So let’s just say you sell play sets or outdoor furniture, you want to rank for the keyword outdoor furniture. And if you live in Detroit, like using the GO that you just named, you want to rank for outdoor furniture, Detroit. Well, my question that I pose out there, the rhetorical is, how do you get to position one? You got to start somewhere. You have to start ranking position 100, 90, 88, and so forth to be able to get to position one. And then I carry that on to say, “If Google spends so much money -” and I’m just going to use Google as a coin right now because I am a Google partner. So I know quite a bit about how they do search functions and paid functions. So if they spend that much money, if Google spends that much money into search marketing, what are the odds that they use that same technology in their organic search features? The answer is, it’s got to be a lot. Wouldn’t you agree? 

Mario Fachini [29:43]

It’s definitely high especially with all the new devices and phones. And I’ll leave it there. There’s a lot of stuff, you know, toasters. 

Joshua Ramsey [29:53]

So that’s where I say, if you look at the similarities and then you start to look at case studies like I have for 15 plus years, then we start to identify that the trends are the same. And I’ve seen this time and time again. So when you start ranking, Google is tracking visitors on your site. So if we rank and we can get a visitor to find us organically and have a good experience, then Google acknowledges that. It will increase our ranking. So Google cares about one thing, the same way that as business owners, we should ultimately care about one thing and too often we get lost. That one thing is user experience. If we have a good experience, what happens? It goes back to what you and I talked about in the beginning, trust, authority. They look at us and they commit to that business, whatever that business is, they commit to them because they say that person is the authority and we trust them and we build that commitment. So as business owners, we look to commit to our clients. And all this just goes in this big circle. And I think people get lost in it. They get lost in, “Oh, I’m going to throw a message up on LinkedIn,” like you said earlier. 

Mario Fachini [31:10]

I kind of like LinkedIn. Let’s pick on Twitter. 

Joshua Ramsey [31:13]

Oh, I like LinkedIn. But the purpose isn’t the tactical platform, like we were talking about. It’s not the tactical platform. 

Mario Fachini [31:20]

Yeah. They’re all good and they all have their purpose. But what you’re doing, I mean, you can’t be putting -I love LinkedIn for the articles and the longer form but you can’t do that on Twitter. However, Twitter, the things going a million miles an hour. If you’re doing a post once an hour all day, you’re not going to pull that off on LinkedIn without agitating people. So they all have their purpose. And I actually like Twitter. I don’t want to pick on them. But it’s just – 

Joshua Ramsey [31:45]

Well, all the platforms can be good. 

Mario Fachini [31:48]

Absolutely. 

Joshua Ramsey [31:48]

It’s just what’s your strategy? Right? 

Mario Fachini [31:50]

Like you said, you need that strategy. So you’re talking about the authority. Is that one of the reasons you wrote your book? 

Joshua Ramsey [31:57]

It is, ultimately. Yeah. I mean, again I go back to my core belief, which is I want to help business owners. Whatever that looks like, I want to help business owners. 

Mario Fachini [32:06]

Whether it’s online or offline? 

Joshua Ramsey [32:08]

Yeah. Yeah. All of it. So for me, creating the book was a simple step to take a lot of the knowledge base that I have and start to share it with the public. So I share the book a lot of times for free at conferences. And sometimes there’s a small charge. But for me, I look at it as a marketing sunk cost. So just talking about my inside reality as a business owner, I look at it as a marketing sunk cost. Because I’m never going to – I could be wrong and maybe I hope I am wrong. But I don’t expect someone to say, “Hey, I found your book. I read it. And now I want to hire you.” That’s not really what to expect. So it’s indirect. 

Mario Fachini [32:47]

It does happen.  

Joshua Ramsey [32:48]

I’m sorry? 

Mario Fachini [32:48]

It does happen. I can tell you after I published my first book, it will happen. 

Joshua Ramsey [32:55]

Yeah. I look forward to that day. But I didn’t publish with the intent like I would run a radio ad or a television ad. I run those for direct ROI, typically, unless it’s a branding campaign. But I wrote the book really to help business owners just grasp some good ideas on how can they grow, how can they get to that next level. Again, what got you here won’t get you there. 

Mario Fachini [33:24]

See, and that’s what I like. Because I know you’re looking to add value. And if you’re going to do it, that’s the best way to do it. Because there’s a lot of books out there where it’s completely – it’s basically a sales letter that they printed in a book. If that’s what they want to do, God bless them. That’s not what I teach. But I will say there is a happy middle ground where you can do some things intentionally without a doubt. Say, “Hey, go check out, you know, at the end of the chapter, put something in there. Check out this – have those all offers and call to actions.” And it definitely works. But you can still have the thing 95 percent all value. Even still have the whole thing 100 percent value add. But it’s just having some of those call to actions in there. Well, if you’re bridging that gap from the – if you enjoyed this chapter, check out the free downloadable resources. 

Joshua Ramsey [34:23]

Yeah. If you don’t mind, I’m going to go back just a little bit in our conversation. You said, what type of client is good for you? And my response to that is, an educated client. 

Mario Fachini [34:32]

There you go. 

Joshua Ramsey [34:32]

Because if they understand what I do as a Fractional Chief Marketing Officer, or if they work with my ad agency, and they understand what’s going on, it’s an easier faster conversation to the future. So if they read — 

Mario Fachini [34:45]

It’s not a training call. It’s how can we implement this for you. 

Joshua Ramsey [34:49]

Right. Right. So then what happens when they don’t do that is that when they don’t have that education, then they come back and they need to be trained, say, six months or a year later and asking questions that I’m good with answering. Don’t get me wrong, I’m good with answering that. But it becomes a longer conversation that business owners oftentimes get frustrated with. And that’s why I typically make business owners sit down and work with me for 30 days before they just say, “Go do it.” Because I want them to understand the principles and the methodology that I’m going to be working with and implementing for that business. And that’s the goal that they understand. Five inches of water while I’m swimming 50 feet deep. They don’t have to go as deep as I do. So the book becomes a platform of education so that they understand my philosophies, my methodology, my principles. And as they understand that, they will either agree and want to hire me. Or, they will disagree, thus, we don’t work together and no hard feelings. 

Mario Fachini [35:57]

Yeah. That’s a great point because when you get people coming onboard just, like, out of nowhere, you get an email or a call and it’s, “Okay. I’m ready to go.” Well, where’d this come from? Well, they’ve been following you for three, six, nine months. Usually, it doesn’t take longer than that. And I’m thinking my own stuff. But that’s what you’re talking about with the videos, the books, all the good value added stuff. I’ve also had the people where it’s like the two month project becomes an eight month project and it’s six months of training. Intermittently every four-and-a-half days through six minutes at a time and it’s – I don’t recommend that either. So I have one last question. This is what I call the wheel of whatever. And I do have a wheel. It’s in the process of getting painted right now. But this is I just ask a question and it could be something like, who’s a celebrity you’d like to have dinner with, an entrepreneur you admire from, like, maybe Shark Tank or something. But I see something behind you there. And I got to ask about this. Question, what is the significance of the guitar? 

Joshua Ramsey [37:12]

It kind of goes back to what we talked about earlier. But I knew you’re going to throw some type of curveball at me but I can handle this one. 

Mario Fachini [37:19]

No. This isn’t a curveball. I got some other ones if you want me to go there. 

Joshua Ramsey [37:24]

Maybe the next time, right? So back in the day – well, I guess it’s still going on. But the show called Shark Tank, there’s something on the Shark Tank called the Guitar Buddy. And I wanted to learn to play the guitar. So I bought the Guitar Buddy. And this tools, a lot of people know what it is, but you hook this tool up to the neck of the guitar and it teaches you how to play the guitar. It tells you this is how many times you strum. And I can play the guitar with the Guitar Buddy. But, ultimately, the goal is that you remove the Guitar Buddy and then you have the hand motions down and you learn the music and so forth. So that’s the ultimate goal. Well, over the years, like I talked about, so many business owners tell me, “You know, you’re selling snake oil so just sell me on the snake oil, Josh.” And I look at them and I go, “This is not snake oil.” So I got frustrated with it and said, “There’s got to be a better way to explain what this is.” So the frustration – and I’m coming back to the guitar and why I have it with the Guitar Buddy – but the frustration became if you want – if someone, an agency, comes to you and says, “You need to AMP your website.” The business owner goes, “What’s amping? Is that even something?” Well, it’s not snake oil. Amping is a legitimate piece of SEO. But some companies don’t need it. And it’s very expensive to do through a whole website on every page. And the majority of websites don’t need it on every page. Unless, you’re a news publication, you typically don’t need it on the entire website. But the question becomes, how many pages do you need it? And do you even need it? But then we’ll say that you hire that company to AMP your website. How do you know that they did it? Oftentimes, business owners have no idea. So I created the tool that teaches you the same way a Guitar Buddy teaches you how to play the guitar. This tool that I built called Your Digital Marketing Plan is a tool that allows business owners to have that type of Guitar Buddy but have it for SEO. So what it does is it takes snapshots before you have any SEO done. And then it takes a snapshot afterwards. So instead of you going to an adage and say what should I do and they tell you AMP the site, that becomes a strategy and a question of does that SEO guy really know what they’re doing or do they not? This tool allows you to see firsthand from a third party program, do you need it or do you not, what’s there, what’s active or what’s not. Then when they’ve completed it rather than you go, “Oh, okay. I guess you did it. And here’s a check.” Instead, you can run the report again and see if they actually completed the work or not and what the effect was. That becomes key. That becomes you knowing for sure that you’re paying for a service and you’re getting something from it, something was actually completed. And I think that if I had one message out there in the digital world, that would be the one message is that, following that type of philosophy, whether you use my program or you build your own, that type of mentality, that type of understanding, gives you something tangible in a world that too often people think is not tangible at all. They think it’s snake oil. And that’s why I have the guitar. That’s why I believe in the Guitar Buddy. And that’s how I took that mentality and that idea and general principle to reality in the digital marketing world. 

Mario Fachini [41:04]

That’s fantastic. Where can people get the tool? 

Joshua Ramsey [41:08]

They can go to Jrcmo.com and they can learn more about it through the SEO crest and then they can email me. The Jrcmo.com website, we’re in production. It’s growing very quickly. But they can also go to YourDigitalMarketingPlan.com and they can get information there. And just email and I can show them all the details ,all the information, and help them out. We typically custom fit for every client, for every customer that wants it. We custom fit it, custom tailor it so that it’s not a one size fits all. You don’t have to pay an extraordinary amount of money if you only need six elements rather than all 80 elements of what SEO is. 

Mario Fachini [41:51]

Well, I appreciate you for sharing that because it can be a black hole plain and simple. There’s a lot of things. You know, there’s that quote, I think it’s from an old movie. It’s like, I know my advertising – I know half my advertising is working, but I just don’t know what 50 percent – 50 percent of my advertising is working. I just don’t know which 50 percent. It’s like when you can track it and measure it, that’s huge. So I’m glad you made that available. And I got to modify this. But the host is a cool guy so he said he’s going to let me. I said, I have one more question then we’ll go to the sponsor. I have, like, 1.5. You said AMP the website. What is AMP the website? I remember when I was learning about SEO citations and all of that stuff, the NAP, the name, address, and phone number. The only thing I can come up with is AMP would be address, metadata, and phone number. 

Joshua Ramsey [42:47]

Nope. 

Mario Fachini [42:48]

Awesome. I’m wrong. Tell me the answer please. 

Joshua Ramsey [42:50]

The great thing about Your Digital Marketing Plan, that tool is that you can go into the search feature and type in any idea. If an SEO guy tries to throw something at you, a curveball, and you’re wondering what it is, you can type it into that toolbar and see every crest. I actually created an icon for every element of SEO. So it’s not just descriptions but there’s actual crest that goes with each one. I love soccer. I love the real football, the European League, La Liga, and such. So I created crest based on kind of that theme. Side note, sorry. But amping is actually called Accelerated Mobile Pages. So what you look for whenever you see AMP pages, if you search for news articles on your phone let’s say, so this is mobile, Accelerated Mobile Pages. What Google does is it caches your page. So you have to essentially build a page and you submit it to Google. Google accepts it. And I’m simplifying this. Please understand for those experts out there that are going to try to email me later and say you’re wrong. I’m simplifying. So you submit this page to Google. Google accepts it. It caches that page. And then when a user is looking for that content and they go to that AMP page, what they’re able to see is that content of that page. What it does is it loads all the other content behind it as you’re on that page. So it speeds up your experience online. So on general website, if you’re – well, just let me back up. So if you do a Google search and you want to know if a page is amped, look for a little circle, and it has a lightning bolt. If you see that next to the page, that’s an AMP page. If you don’t, it’s not. One last thing, if you would. If you’re a business owner and you’re thinking, “Okay. I need to go AMP my website.” Sure, if you’re getting a lot of visitors on mobile. But also be careful and only AMP your pages that are high entry. Meaning the first page that they come in, you want to AMP those pages because they are found higher in the search rankings. And that will help your user experience and help your overall website. 

Mario Fachini [45:07]

Well, I appreciate you for telling me the answer and sharing it with Expert Authority World. It sounds very akin to a CDN, a Content Delivery Network. But I know that’s more for the images and the rest of the data. This is the initial ones on the heavier load pages. 

Joshua Ramsey [45:27]

Right. Right. It can be. I mean, again, that – the reason that you get five different opinions when you ask five different SEO guys about your website is, two of them don’t know anything that they’re talking about. And one of them is just flat out lying to you. And then the other two, they have a difference of opinion. Their strategy is different based on their experience and what they’ve done. And that’s why you get five different opinions. 

Mario Fachini [45:53]

Okay. But overall, the end result is it’s a better experience for the end user. 

Joshua Ramsey [45:59]

Absolutely. Absolutely. 

Mario Fachini [46:01]

All right. Well, you got me all intrigued about this now. I’m wondering where the lightning bolts are at. It’s a little game I’m going to play later. All right. Sponsor. We’re going to thank the sponsor and come back for more fun. 

SPONSOR Rosh Tips [46:13]

Winning With Google in 2020. I have no doubt you want to for your business. But who do you trust? And where do you start? I’d advise Rush Sillars. Not only was he Episode 22’s featured VIP guest but he’s also a Google specialist with search, advertising, and YouTube. And I had him put together this free Winning With Google in 2020 Guide for you to get started with right now. Go to EAInterviews.com/RoshTips to get your free download now. Once again, that’s EAInterviews.com/ RoshTips. 

Mario Fachini [46:49]

All right. We are back with the Imperfect Action Round. Josh, are you ready to take imperfect action? 

Joshua Ramsey [46:56]

Sure. Let’s see that. All right. I got 60 second – I got three questions for you, 60 second answer rapid fire. The first one is, what is in your experience the fastest path to the cash? 

Joshua Ramsey [47:12]

Creating an enticing offer. 

Mario Fachini [47:17]

That’s a good one. That’s a good one. Number two, what is the biggest problem you see your prospects making and the fastest way they can fix it? 

Joshua Ramsey [47:27]

The biggest problem that people have and the biggest way they can fix it. Better messaging. Working on the engagement of messaging, first and foremost. 

Mario Fachini [47:38]

Number three, what is the best way to maximize customer lifetime value? 

Joshua Ramsey [47:48]

Treat them the way you want to be treated.

Mario Fachini [47:52]

Excellent. 

Joshua Ramsey [47:53]

Am I too short my answers? I wanted to – 

Mario Fachini [47:55]

No. Those are good. I was thinking of that one earlier when you were talking about the acquisition and reducing the cost. I almost said you’re going to love the question I have for you later. But what are some books you can recommend to Expert Authority World that have made a big difference in your business and life? 

Joshua Ramsey [48:15]

How to Win Friends and Influence People. Influence, The Art Of Persuasion is another good one. 

Mario Fachini [48:23]

And that’s Dale Carnegie on the first one. 

Joshua Ramsey [48:26]

Yeah. Yeah. And then Seven Habits of People – Effective People. So yeah, those are kind of staples and core books that I even go back and try to review yearly, if at all possible. 

Mario Fachini [48:41]

Where can people learn more about everything you have shared and have to offer? 

Joshua Ramsey [48:49]

They can go to Jrcmo.com, my website. And they can get even my cell phone on that website. They can reach out to me directly on my cell phone. But yeah, Jrcmo.com is my website. And all the information that I can share is there. We’re about to launch probably the beginning of January. We’re going to launch a strategic messaging or strategic tactical room. So the strategic marketing room is essentially going to be a free resource to people to pick up blogs, more information, more content, writing tools, methodology, and principal tools. So there’s going to be a lot of information coming in January of 2020. That information is going to be loaded into as another resource and additional resource to business owners. 

Mario Fachini [49:38]

Excellent. Well, it’s been an absolute pleasure. I’ve learned a lot. And I know Expert Authority World has also. Thank you for sharing with us. 

Joshua Ramsey [49:47]

Hey, thanks for having me. I appreciate the time. 

Mario Fachini [49:50]

All right. Expert Authority World, we have another great episode today. I’ll see you on tomorrow’s. And as always have a great day and God bless. 

SPONSOR Pipedrive [49:57]

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www.EAInterviews.com [50:12]

Hey, thanks for listening to today’s episode. I hope you got a lot out of it. I know I sure did. If you haven’t done so already, I invite you to subscribe to the show. And also be sure to check out EAInterviews.com for complete show notes, the full interview video experience, links to the resources we mentioned, and more. Have a blessed day and I’ll see you tomorrow.