[00:00:00] Speaker A: From day one. Get a project manager. I did not have one from the beginning and I feel like that kept me stuck in a specific phase of the business for quite some time. My quick pitch is that we are proactive strategic partnerships. So if you're looking for a long term partner that is proactive, that gives you ideas, that helps guide you along the path that you're not just constantly checking in on or you're like requesting ideas from them or you're forced to be the idea generator even though you're a business owner and you have other things to worry about.
[00:00:26] Speaker B: Welcome to the Entrepreneur's Lockbook Podcast. I'm your host Zachary Bernard. You can find me on social at Zack B. In each episode I bring on experts from various industries for you to learn about their strategies and insights driving external business growth. The Entrepreneur's Lockbook podcast is sponsored by we feature PR where we're dedicated to helping entrepreneurs build their thought, leadership and business by getting them on podcasts and launching their own podcasts. Today we're joined by James, CEO of Ohana Marketing, a full service digital marketing agency that specializes in helping businesses scale through Google Ads, social media management and fractional sample services. Jim's has actually been in the marketing space for over 10 years. He's founded a company back in 2021. He's based in Portugal, but he's originally from New York and he brings a very unique perspective to digital marketing by blending the creativity aspect with his strategic marketing expertise. His agency focusing on being a trusted long term partner for enterprise clients and businesses, offering them personalized holistic strategies that build trust and, and excellent growth. And what's really interesting about his approach is he does it on a fractal CMO basis. So filling that like crucial gap where like a lot of businesses they need that high level strategic help but they're not really ready for someone to come in full time in house here. But yeah, James, it's absolutely great to have you on the show.
[00:01:45] Speaker A: Welcome aboard. Thanks Zach. I'm not really sure what, what's left to say, so thank you for the introduction. I appreciate it.
Yes, advertising in business consultancy, but everything else is extremely accurate. So thank you for that.
[00:01:58] Speaker B: To put it really, really simply here, but what I like to always do with this show because we obviously like to interview entrepreneur business owners. I'd love to hear like if you had to rebuild your company from scratch, you were starting back in 2021, that's obviously like when you launched it, if you had to rebuild it from scratch, knowing everything that you Know what is the one thing that you would implement from day one that you feel a lot of entrepreneurs get wrong when they go about starting a business.
[00:02:24] Speaker A: That's interesting. So from day one, I would definitely get a project manager. From day one, I did not have one from the beginning and I feel like that kept me stuck in a specific phase of the business for quite some time. So I would have had one immediately. Even if I wouldn't have made money in the beginning or I would let at least less, I still would have done that so that I could focus on sales and growth. And that would have kept me out of the business enough to where I didn't get stuck in that phase.
[00:02:50] Speaker B: I love that because I feel like so many people get stuck with that. Like, they try to do like everything themselves. They do sales, marketing, project management.
But like your approach would be to get someone that can handle like the fulfillment basically, like clients, and then you can focus on what's actually growing the business essentially.
[00:03:07] Speaker A: Well, yeah, I mean, I had somebody that was providing ad management. I was working and I was providing overall strategy because that's where my, my strengths are. But then I was also managing the relationships of the client media buyer and doing all the sales. I was. Yes. So it was just, it kept me.
I was grinding really hard for a while.
[00:03:25] Speaker B: So, yes, like, I feel like when you start, like, I feel you obviously have to like wear all hats, like do everything, but like one point you need to start sacrificing like your margins to. In order to actually scale. Like if you have like 90% margins and you're making like 50 grand a month, you're probably doing something mean, not incorrectly. But you could definitely be getting to that next level by like hiring people.
But going back to like what I was saying with like your approach, because I think that's like really interesting that you have like the approach with like fractional like CMO services. Because I've seen like a lot like fractional CMO CFOs and I think that's like a new trend that we're seeing like in this space. But you've actually been doing that for like a little bit previously before that trend started, like popping off here. But I'd love to hear, like, could you walk me through what that typically looks like in practice? Because obviously you're not going like in house full time becoming a CMO for someone. You're doing it more like a fractional basis, which I think is pretty interesting.
[00:04:23] Speaker A: Yes. So I started.
I've always provided more than what I Charged. And I found that I was giving a lot of my time to clients and to be honest, the majority of them didn't either understand the value or appreciate it. So I was starting to get a little frustrated and I was like, okay, I need to segment this and I need. Because I don't want to stop providing this type of value because it's, it was where I found passion in doing what I'm doing. So I wanted to continue thinking about strategy more, more so on a macro sense as opposed to like, okay, I'm going to change this budget and you know, change these headlines and there's this, you know, okay, that's a great strategy for like micro. But I really wanted to focus on the growth and this, the, the goals of the client, where they're moving to, how I can help them. And it felt like I was actually a part of their business.
And this is why I guess I started doing it because I wanted to be more involved and I, I like, I, I like doing thousands of things right. So working with marketing gave me this opportunity to be able to kind of work in a part in many different businesses and I got to learn how different businesses function, how they are operating in this all, all this experience, you know, accumulates over time, which is quite nice. But yeah, I really and just wanted to provide, continue to provide more, but also find a way to not over provide.
And when I was just doing regular ad management because then I would spend like three or four calls a month with some clients and then things would never get done. And it was just like, I need your time, I need your time. And it's like, all right, well like, you know, I need your time too. So I found that people pay you for your time, then they respect their own time and your time better. So I figured that the fractional CMO would be a pretty good aspect.
It would be great to be a CFO if I had those skills, but you know, more of a creative, creative thinker. So the CMO works out pretty well for me in terms of. And you wanted to like how I'm doing this?
[00:06:13] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean I, I'd love to hear like about your approach doing it because it's obviously a bit different from just having a lot of clients just doing like ads management because you're, you're actually becoming like a, a growth partner in a way with those companies.
[00:06:26] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean I've worked with a few like so in practice, how this translated to value. With one client, for example, I helped them reposition and redesign their products. Their main product. And what we did was I had them send it to me and I was looking at, you know, for example, at the time we were only getting people that were buying it in rural areas in the United States and we couldn't get metropolitan cities where the population density is much higher, the opportunity for growth is much bigger. So we were trying to figure out a way to get that done. And I realized that if they had taken the product and used it in the bathtub, for example, as opposed to like a tub outside, they would be able to close clients who had apartments with, with, with bathtubs. And with this they changed the repositioning, they changed the offering, which I helped them come up with. And the use cases that went with that and that product sold became the number one selling product. And it helped increase sales by 30 that year alone.
Outside of the actual like normal growth that they had. And they've been a partner with me for three or four years now and I've helped them to go through a brand.
They went through like rebranding new, a brand new URL, new website. But we had, we were able to transition the old account data to the new account without sacrificing sort of like lull in sales or anything like that. So this was when I really started wanting to segment more because once I saw how this affected the company, this is what made me get excited. So like, along with creative direction, I'm working on, for example, like static image, ad strategy, commercial concept ideation. I'm working on a, with a client now. We have a project going where I'm helping them to come up with a commercial. So I'm going to find like a local person here. They're going to send me the products and I'm coming up with the script. And this is something I really enjoy doing creative briefs for designers. So I hop on a lot of, I do this a lot. I hop on a lot of calls with clients and their creative teams and I come up with a creative strategy, help them to what types of creatives to use, like how did we design landing pages.
So this is one big area that I'd like to do a lot. It seems to be a big need because I think creatives are the biggest block we have with clients in terms of moving forward is just getting deliverables. So if I can just like, because I'm really proactive, I like to push clients, which some people appreciate and the ones that do stay with me for a very long time. But I like to push if something's not getting done. I'm like sending them direct texts. I'm like, hey, I need this from you.
Yes. So that works quite well. And when you're getting paid to tell them this, it's appreciated more as opposed to like you're just an ad management guy telling somebody what to do inside their business.
So I like having that, that influence and then like social video, creative direction for performance, just kind of like helping them. Like, okay, you need brand videos, you need product videos. Are you posting these here? Like, let's get them up. Like we need to redo design that strategy entirely.
Product strategy is something I really enjoy doing that I don't get to do enough of. But if somebody watches this and they need the products redesigned or like optimized, like I would love it. So like I like giving like hands on feedback to help improve the product's positioning, it's perceived value. So I'm like working with one woman now in, in Colorado, helping her reposition her website for this high end like product that she has because it's still patent pending. But I'm like working on helping her reposition it. And it's something I have a lot of fun doing. Creative collaboration, like bundling packages, like how to sell your service. I find that one of the biggest issues people have is they don't understand their own value well enough to even come up with a, an offer. So that's like, oh, I'm just offering, you know, I'm a plumber. Okay, great. And then you know, what is the, you know, the stage five offer there? Like how can we make it so that people come and they want to just work with you? So I like coming up with the offer and like the brand, but messaging framework for that.
Otherwise it's like business strategy calls. I hop on a lot of strategy calls with clients. Like, okay, we're thinking about the CRM. Like currently our sales team is doing this. How should we optimize our sales to get better, to do better with the leads, for example, or how can I provide you better feedback? So I help them implement systems to get that done.
These are probably the main areas in which I'm offering. I have other areas, but these are probably the most like.
[00:10:32] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean I can hear that you're like a big creative person but you're, you're taking that strategic component to like the creative component component to be able to really maximize like the outcome. I mean just like the, the example they were talking about like the bathtubs. I mean that's, that's a really Good idea. They didn't think of that. They could literally just expand in the city by trying to like not frame their product just for like outside bathtubs and stuff like that, like hot tubs. So I think that's really interesting. So that's somewhat. Goes into like your approach just being like really creative as a whole, to be honest with you.
[00:11:03] Speaker A: Yeah. Their competitors started advertising the same thing like a few like a month or two later. So it became, you know, it works.
[00:11:10] Speaker B: When they do that.
[00:11:11] Speaker A: Yes. Which I was quite excited to see. But yeah, I mean, I mean creative strategy, I mean ad management, that's ad management. But if there's no creative strategy there, then you're basically just like hoping numbers are going to work. But the creative is what drives everybody. You come to a website, it's not just black and white and everyone's like, okay, cool, this is the same as everybody else. I'm just going to make a decision. So it has to be really kind of like focused on the point.
[00:11:34] Speaker B: Yeah, that's fair. So another thing, somewhat like shifting gear, because we've obviously talked about like you, your background, like who are, et cetera, but we haven't touched too much onto the like actual company. And one thing that I thought was like, really interesting is like anyone in your team, like exclusively, they're going to be like mid senior, senior level, like marketers, because there's going to be a lot of marketing agency. They hire junior people just coming out of college. Like no real word, like SP experience. They'll just do social media management. But you're like somewhat focusing on those people that already have that experience being partner of your team. And I'd be kind of curious around like what is like your philosophy around like hiring those type of people and is there like a specific impact that you've noticed when it comes to like results delivery for clients, et cetera?
[00:12:17] Speaker A: Yeah, of course.
I think that it's really important to when you're hiring somebody, you understand their background and like what drives them. And generally when people like, oh, I'm going to do this as a career, right. They go to school, which is fine, and then they start working for agencies and they get stuck within these patterns and then these patterns kind of determine how they choose to work. And not many people have the growth mindset in order to think, okay, this is a part of things. I'm going to use it as a base to learn how to do things differently. And I've tried hiring people before. They had this type of mentality where they were they were working in agencies or they were admits or juniors and it never, they never pushed themselves, they were never independent enough. And I found that when you work with people who are experts, generally there's a level of independence and ambition that comes with this. And when you're working with somebody, even if, even though they are more expensive, which is fine, the, the lack of time I'm putting into managing a person who has skills that they develop themselves by putting themselves out there and just getting to a level where you become an expert because you can work in an agency and become very skilled, but putting yourself as a freelancer, working in different markets, understanding how each business functions differently, whether it's e Comm or B2B SaaS or just like straight up Legion, there's a lot of different components and most agencies focus on one vertical. So only hiring somebody that's like a mid or that has only agency experience only, I think limits the capacity and the potential for the type, the growth that you can provide for each client. And having that perspective provides more value to the clients so you can charge more. And it also allows me to know that I can trust that what they're doing is being considered from multiple angles and I don't have to like micromanage. So the lack of micromanagement and the trust that I have that things will get done independently.
[00:14:07] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:14:08] Speaker A: Is really reassuring and allows me to kind of focus on other things.
[00:14:11] Speaker B: And I'm assuming that's probably like a big selling point. Like a lot of people, they come to you like we're not going to be just given to like an account manager, like junior level. I just got into this space. Like we're actually working with experts. They actually know what they're doing. Like they're going to give us a good advice.
[00:14:25] Speaker A: Essentially 100%, yes. I mean, when I explain this alone, I'm like, well, if you're going to hire somebody with five, six, seven years of experience or even 10, you're going to spend maybe twice as much as you're going to pay. So like I'm able to charge like certain retainers because I offer two, like three packages, right. The cmo. And then I have a standard which is basic agency management. I mean, the level of the management stays the same, but it's like the quality of the service, what's involved. And then I have a strategic partnership which allows me to blend both the CMO and the ad management. And this is where I can like upsell that value because they get to speak directly to the ad manager. And with me and the operations manager, my partner. So then this way we're able to really, I mean we have great customer service reviews. It's for an agency. Right. I mean I think we've probably one of the best customer service rated agencies that I've seen.
[00:15:17] Speaker B: Yeah, that's fair. I love that. And like another thing that I always like to ask anyone that comes on the show that we've started doing recently is when it comes to like building a business, I mean one of the things you have to do is differentiate yourself, like be like different. Because there's thousands of agencies offering the exact same services and you obviously want to be different in like your industry. And one thing I'd be curious to hear is how do you go about like somewhat differentiating yourself like marketing yourself? Like everyone has a like different like secret sauce or anything like that. But I'd love to hear and you share with our audience how you go about making yourself different or just have a key differentiator when it comes to like your marketing.
[00:15:53] Speaker A: Yeah. So I mean usually my quick pitch that I give to potential clients is that we are proactive strategic partnership. So if you're looking for a long term partner that is proactive, that gives you ideas, that helps guide you along the path that you're not just constantly checking in on or you're like requesting ideas from them or you're trying or you're forced to be the idea generator even though you're a business owner and you have other things to worry about.
What I'm providing is a trusted secure partnership where you know that your marketing is being taken care of, that you're given ideas that you don't have to devote your, the time you're, you should be focusing on growing your business into thinking about like what type of creatives you should be making. Like you don't have time to do this or you should. So this is just like allows me to really that I'm. Yes, of course I'm providing ad management. Ad management is ad management. But it's like what comes with it and the level of expertise that comes with it that is really kind of like once you start working with us and things are working, it doesn't, I mean there's no reason to leave and I do not impose contracts either, which is quite unique. So it's a month to month engagement and I have clients for years that choose to work with me every single month because what I'm providing is, is very high quality.
So I do not like force that. And this allows Them to consciously make that decision to be my partner. And I think that that is something that's quite unique because it's a very human model. Like if you like working with me, we're working together, you own all of your materials. I'm not charging. I'm not, for example, like owning the platforms and then you have to pay me ad spend. I'm not going to pirate your materials after, like it's. It's your business. I have no interest in owning your assets. I just want to help you grow.
[00:17:29] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:17:30] Speaker A: So I think it's more of a human model style that's can help like long, like provide the security of knowing that this is taken care of. I can focus on other stuff.
[00:17:40] Speaker B: Yeah, I thought that was interesting. You mentioned like owning like the asset, like pirating it. Because I've seen like email, like E commerce, like email marketing agencies, for example, seeming like, oh, you're like, we own like all your flows, like pay us if you want to keep them and stuff like that. Which I. Which I always thought like unethical in a way, to be honest with you. Well, no, not at all. But I like the approach that you're doing like month to month. Like we take a similar approach like our company and it somewhat helps you because if clients stay with you for a long time, you have a really good retention rate. It means that you're doing something correctly. Like they choose to stay with you because you're delivering a great service and a great like results from your services. So that does speak a lot to your services. And I think that's probably like a big selling point when it comes to work with new clients. You're like, I mean, we have clients strictly month to month. Been worked with us for three years. We're probably doing something correctly that they still like us as people here.
But no, I love that and just like parting thoughts because I was like really curious. That's a monkey, right? Like your logo here.
[00:18:37] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:18:39] Speaker B: How'd you come from like that inspiration, like Portugal or is like totally unrelated?
[00:18:43] Speaker A: No, it's. I like, it's like more sentimental, like.
Yeah. So I told my wife, like I used to call my wife like and my daughter like my monkeys. But my wife was like, like my monkey, that thing. So I was just coming up with the logo and ohana means family. And I figured that everyone my age would have seen Lilu and Stitch. So I figured that, that like ohana means family. So ohana means business then marketing means business.
And then I figured that they would make that the Correlation.
So then like the monkey would essentially be like part of my family and then with the Atlanta. So just be a focus to keep in mind that I need to use my company as a tool to build my family, not my family as a tool to build my company.
[00:19:24] Speaker B: I love that because I know like a lot of companies don't have any meanings behind like their name, Logans, everything like that. So I think that's really interesting here. But yeah, really appreciate you coming on the show here, Jameson, for like anyone that wants to get in touch with you. I know we obviously have your website, your LinkedIn, so anywhere people should look at. Do you have like any like freebies, lead magnets that you don't want people to check out? Anything that comes to mind there?
[00:19:47] Speaker A: Yeah, you can reach out to me on my website. Generally. I, I'll do free audits, so I'll go through your entire account, look at everything, make sure it's working and if you're doing a great job already, then I'll just give you a few pointers and then if you choose to work with me and have me take over, that's fine. And if there's a lot to be done, then I'll, you know, it would be great to take over and work with you. But generally that audit comes with recommendations, et cetera. So it's really quite a lot of value in, in one. So that would be probably the most value that I can offer.
And then yeah, otherwise I'm offering like. And one thing we forgot to talk about is I'm offering Yahoo and Google DSP management, which is like billboards, things like this. And I have a free month of service for that. So like if you join me the first month, I'll do that for free.
[00:20:29] Speaker B: Love that. And your website, ohana means business.com, right? That's the one.
Cool. You heard that people on that means business.com if you want to learn more about this company here. So, dear listeners, if you've enjoyed this episode, don't for to subscribe. Check out James here and you can also find more
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[00:20:55] Speaker A: Thank you. Z.
