Marcus Sheridan on Building Trust Through Content

Marcus Sheridan [00:00:00]:
Don’t know if you remember that, movie, A Field of Dreams, Lee, but the big theme on that movie was build it and they will come. Right? And I always say, when it comes to marketing and when it comes to content, just if you start producing the content, the market will tell you where it’s supposed to go.

Announcer [00:00:19]:
Influential and thought provoking minds in marketing, sales, and business, the business of marketing podcast.

A. Lee Judge [00:00:29]:
Welcome again to the Business of Marketing. I’m a Lee Judge. You know, nearly every piece of content on my website is a result of a question that a customer asked. There’s no better source for what customers need to know than other customers like them who have asked questions. And my guest today is one of the biggest evangelists of this concept. He’s taken four words, they ask, you answer, from a book to training and perhaps an entire movement. And I think there’s something else too we’re gonna talk about today too for that. He’s a master communicator and engaging keynote speaker.

A. Lee Judge [00:01:03]:
So I’m excited to have him on the show today. Welcome to the show, Marcus Sheridan.

Marcus Sheridan [00:01:07]:
Alright, Lee. Let’s go, man. I’m all about this. This is overdue. So I’m pumped to be with you, with your audience. I’ve always loved your stuff. Plus I’m excited for you and your book. So it’s great, man.

A. Lee Judge [00:01:18]:
Yeah. You know, it’s funny because we, we work in the space of sales and marketing and training people on content and we both consume each other’s content, but we have not met each other.

Marcus Sheridan [00:01:28]:
That’s true. Right. It’s at work sometimes, I guess. Right?

A. Lee Judge [00:01:31]:
Yeah. It’s like I see you every day. I’m I’m saying, hey. That’s a great point. I agree. Let’s go further. That’s you know what? One day we have to have a conversation. So this is finally that day.

Marcus Sheridan [00:01:40]:
Mhmm. That’s right. That’s right. I’m looking forward to it.

A. Lee Judge [00:01:42]:
So I got a story to tell you first, Marcus. Nearly every service technician that comes to my house, they asked me what I do. And I say, well, I create content for businesses. And they say, well, that might not work for me because I’m an HVAC company or I’m a plumber. And then I tell them your story about your pool company and where, you know, and how that happened. So catch us up on that for those who don’t know the story. And this, this will understand help listeners understand why I tell this to every service person that comes to my house. Tell us about the pool company and how it got to where you are now.

Marcus Sheridan [00:02:14]:
Yeah. And I’ll give the the very fast version here. I started a swimming pool company in Virginia in 02/2001 called River Pools, And we were struggling to grow it, and we’re, just chugging along. And 02/2008, the market collapses, and it looks like we’re gonna lose a business. And it was during this time of of just great fear and a lot of stress that I I started to really research how buyers were changing and how the world was evolving. And we were becoming a much more digital buyer. And I could see the influence that online content was having on the buying decision. So I started studying these phrases that were newer at the time, like inbound marketing, content marketing.

Marcus Sheridan [00:02:53]:
These are newer phrases. Right? And so when I read them, I said to myself, okay. So basically what you’re telling me is if I just obsess over my customer’s questions and I’m willing to address them online, especially on my website, I might save my business. So I said, well, shoot. There’s one thing I can do is I can I can really focus in on these questions that I’ve been hearing for years as a as a pool guy, because I was the one selling the pools? I can focus in on them. I can address them. And, I brainstormed every single question I’d received, over the years. And I came up with a couple hundred questions, and then every single night, I’d get home, man, after a long day’s work.

Marcus Sheridan [00:03:31]:
And I would write out an article that addressed that question, that worry, that fear, that concern that people had about pools and ground fiberglass pools, anything like that. And make a long story short, we became the most traffic swimming pool website in the world. And in the course of doing that, we we our brand took off so much that we started manufacturing pools as well. And so we became the fastest growing manufacturer of fiberglass pools in in The United States. And, in 2020, I actually sold the manufacturing, side of the business. But I still own the original River Pools, which is one essentially one of the franchisee locations in Virginia. So I still own that. But it’s been an it’s an amazing ride.

Marcus Sheridan [00:04:10]:
And, you know, as I was going on this journey too, like, I was like, man, this is working. Everybody should be doing this. So I started writing about it. And as I started writing about it online on a personal blog, that’s what led to me eventually becoming a full time speaker, having, in my coaching company called Impact that helps companies now. Do they ask you answer?

A. Lee Judge [00:04:33]:
Okay. So they ask you answer is in, like I know there’s a second edition of that, and we’re gonna get into where it’s going next. But first, I wanna ask you, you know, you and I both regularly stand in front of audiences and teach the concept of driving business through content marketing. How is it that there are companies left who still don’t realize the power of educating prospects through content?

Marcus Sheridan [00:04:57]:
You know what? That is it’s just one of those oddities. But there’s also a reason why most businesses fail. There’s also a reason why most businesses are very average, and don’t turn a great, profit and don’t eventually just win big. And that’s because they haven’t become a known and trusted brand, which in my opinion is the goal of every business. You must become a known and trusted brand. And what I don’t think a lot of people realize is just how much research buyers do today before they reach out to a company and fill out that form on the website or make that phone call or walk through the door, whatever it is. We, as buyers, do not like surprises. We wanna feel like we know what we’re getting ourselves into.

Marcus Sheridan [00:05:57]:
There’s two numbers that I wanna share with you in your audience that are are so significant. First one, which I talked about in the first two editions of the ask you answer, is the average buyer, b to b, b to c, doesn’t matter. So there’s no exceptions to anybody’s listening is roughly 80% through that buyer’s journey by the time they reach out to a company. So in other words, they’ve done roughly 80% of their research. They are far along, and you’re catching them, in most cases, at the tail end, not at the beginning, at the tail end. That number, if we go back twenty five years when the Internet was just getting started, that number is probably 30%. So today, it’s roughly 80 ish percent. Where’s it gonna be over the next five, ten, fifteen years? So we know the buyer’s vetting us.

Marcus Sheridan [00:06:46]:
We know they want this information before they reach out. They want their questions answered. They want their concerns resolved. They’re obsessed with this stuff, and so they’re gonna learn from someone. The question is, are they gonna learn from you, or are they gonna learn from somebody else? Now the other number that I think is so significant, and then I’ll shut up for a second, is 75% of all buyers say they would prefer to have a seller free sales experience. Mhmm. That’s a stat from Gartner. Seventy five percent of all buyers say they would prefer to have a seller free sales experience.

Marcus Sheridan [00:07:19]:
What’s this mean? It means that we don’t wanna talk to a salesperson until we are ready, until we feel like we’re informed and we’re not going to make a mistake. And so there’s two types of businesses in this world. Types that hear those two numbers, they complain about it, and they say, jeez. I wish it was like it was 1995. And then there’s the type that says, that’s opportunity. And that’s every trend. It’s an opportunity if you’re willing to see it as such.

A. Lee Judge [00:07:53]:
Yeah. On those two things, I I wanna tell you a story that I’ve experienced recently was I was trying to get my security system fixed, and I was googling, searching for instructions on how to do it myself or who to hire. Every video I came upon that was good ended up being one company out of Florida. Mhmm. They had an instruction for every model, for every case. They just had a whole library. And so I then I realized, well, they can’t come fix it because they’re not in my area. Made me think about you because it was at some point you’re in Florida, I think, and you couldn’t sell pools to California early on.

A. Lee Judge [00:08:33]:
So I’m like, you know what? They’re where Marcus was years ago. They can’t sell to me. The funny part was when I finally got someone local to come to my house to look to work on it, he couldn’t figure out something. So he Googled it and guess who whose instructions he took.

Marcus Sheridan [00:08:50]:
Man, that company should be making a cut.

A. Lee Judge [00:08:53]:
Yeah. I said to him, said, you’re you’re lucky that they can’t service me because I learned from them. They’ve already helped me work through some problems. I I like know and trust these guys, but they’re in Florida. So if you could create this kind of content, you have a lot more customers. And you’re speaking to the the the journey of the customer’s journey of doing the research. You know, know, as long as we’ve been speaking on this topic, I remember saying on from stage 65 and then 70, now 80 Yeah. Number keeps going up.

A. Lee Judge [00:09:21]:
Keeps going up. That’s it.

Marcus Sheridan [00:09:23]:
It it just keeps going up. We’re info voice is what we are. We’re obsessed with information, and we want to feel like we’re getting a good value. And again, we just don’t want surprises. We don’t want to make a mistake. We have the information. So therefore we’re going to use it.

A. Lee Judge [00:09:42]:
Yeah. Well, let me ask you this. So this is somewhere where we something we both talk about. I wanna get your take on it. In the book that I just released, I have a diagram about what I believe it takes to become a trusted adviser for your customer, and I explained it as the intersection between influence, experience, and authority. When a person conveys these things to a prospect, they become a trusted adviser. But what’s your take on what it takes to become your customer’s trusted adviser?

Marcus Sheridan [00:10:09]:
Oh, I’m I’m I’m glad you say that, and I like that, I like the that, little framework there that you mentioned. I think it makes a lot of sense. Definitely vibes with me. So in the newest version of they ask you answer, which is releasing in, April, I talk about the the the book is built around the four pillars of a known and trusted brand. K? The four pillars of a known and trusted brand. And here’s the four things if, like, if you want to become that known and trusted brand, AK advisor, give you four four simple steps, and it’s gonna sound very basic. It is, but an application you see most companies fail. Number one, you gotta be willing to talk about online what others in your space are not willing to talk about.

Marcus Sheridan [00:11:01]:
It’s one thing to say what everybody else is saying. It’s another thing Talk about the stuff that everybody else is afraid to talk about. That’s a major trust driver. Number two, you gotta be willing to show what others in your space are not willing to show specifically through video, just like you just said. So you gotta be willing to say what others aren’t willing to say. You gotta be willing to show what others aren’t willing to show. I could give so many different examples of this, but just one really quick example of that is, you know, when we started manufacturing pools, we were the first manufacturer in the world that showed our entire methodology of manufacturing. A series of eight videos, average ten minutes long each.

Marcus Sheridan [00:11:44]:
So we basically produced a movie that would teach you how to manufacture a fiberglass pool. These manufacturers would call me up and they were like, Marcus, what are you doing showing all this, man? It’s like, there ain’t no secret sauce. There ain’t no secret sauce. It’s all just thousand island dressing anyway. Right? Stop thinking you got a secret sauce when you don’t. So number one, talk about what others are not willing to talk about online. Show, number two, what others aren’t willing to show online with video. Three, sell in a way others aren’t willing to sell online.

Marcus Sheridan [00:12:14]:
And hopefully, we get a chance to talk about that one because that one is a big, big one, Lee. And then finally, number four, be more human than others are willing to be with your brand. And what as we see this rise of AI and technology, the companies that maintain that very human connection while taking advantage of these technologies, they’re the ones that are gonna jump ahead. So talk about show, sell, and be more human. Those are the four pillars of a known and trusted brand.

A. Lee Judge [00:12:46]:
There’s there’s last two I wanna talk about. The selling part. Go ahead and go deeper into that, you mentioned.

Marcus Sheridan [00:12:52]:
Alright. So, man, this one I’m fired up about. Okay? And I mentioned that stat of 75% of all buyers would prefer to have a seller free sales experience. So what does that mean? Well, if you’re gonna take advantage of that trend, and again, that’s how you have to think as a business owner. How do I take advantage of the marketplace where they wanna be? When we say they ask, you answer. It’s like, not just what they ask, but they behave. Well, you need to meet them in their behavior patterns. Right? How they wanna learn.

Marcus Sheridan [00:13:22]:
You meet them how they wanna learn. So they want control, which means self-service is the future. What I mean by that is allowing, especially your website visitors, to do things with essentially tools on your website that in the past they would have had to have done with a human interaction with a salesperson. Mhmm. They don’t really want to talk to a salesperson, again, until they’re good and ready. So there’s different types of self-service tools. I’ll mention a few here.

A. Lee Judge [00:13:53]:
Alright.

Marcus Sheridan [00:13:54]:
In the book, I talk about five majors. So one would be self assessment. Self assessment is when somebody does an interactive, like an interactive quiz or something like that where they essentially get a a score or like a readiness score.

A. Lee Judge [00:14:11]:
Mhmm.

Marcus Sheridan [00:14:12]:
There’s a really good, tool out there, for this, and it’s called ScoreApp. Alright. By, Yeah. And, Daniel Priestley.

A. Lee Judge [00:14:23]:
Yeah.

Marcus Sheridan [00:14:24]:
Great great tool. Very inexpensive. Very effective. Okay. So you give somebody a score. So for example, in my case, let’s say if I was HubSpot, I might say I might have, an interactive tool that says, does my organization really need tool like HubSpot? And then it gives you an actual score by the end of of one to a hundred, and you say, okay. At the end, you’re like, you’re an 89, which means, oh, you’re high on the need on the need score. That’s just an example.

Marcus Sheridan [00:14:55]:
There’s a million that we could do here. Okay. Second one. So that that was that was self assessment. Seth, second one is self selection. Self selection is whenever there’s a buying experience, people have choices. And oftentimes, they’re debating between the choices. So could you give them some type of interactive experience where they answered a series of questions, and at the end, you gave them, based on their answers, a recommendation of which choice they should make.

Marcus Sheridan [00:15:24]:
So like in my case, if you go to my swimming pool website, Lee

A. Lee Judge [00:15:27]:
Mhmm.

Marcus Sheridan [00:15:28]:
There’s a tool that allows you to essentially figure out, should I get a fiberglass, a vinyl liner, or a concrete in ground pool? Those are the three types of pools. Well, I only sell fiberglass. And so I want you, before you reach out to me, to know which type of pool you want.

A. Lee Judge [00:15:45]:
Yeah.

Marcus Sheridan [00:15:46]:
So therefore, I’ve got this great interactive experience where you answer these questions, and it gives you an honest assessment. And every single day, I recommend to people on my own website with this tool, You should not go fiberglass. You should go vinyl. You should go concrete. You see, that’s ballsy. Most companies aren’t willing to do that. I’m gonna do that because I’m gonna be the trusted adviser. So that’s self selection.

Marcus Sheridan [00:16:13]:
Right? When you make a recommendation to somebody. Third one would be self pricing, and I’m hot on this one. You know, Lee, because I’ve been talking about this one for years. I’ve been talking about this one for years. When you’re a buyer and you’re on a website and you’re looking for cost and price information, you cannot find it, you get frustrated, you get pissed, and you move on. And you move on until you find what you were looking for. And whichever company is willing to talk to you about cost and price, generally speaking, that’s who you’re gonna call. That’s who you’re gonna give your trust to.

Marcus Sheridan [00:16:43]:
And companies constantly, they like to make these arguments as to why they can’t talk about cost and price. They say things like, oh, every job is different, and it’s a very customized solution or there’s a range to it. They say things like, I don’t wanna scare my competitors away excuse me, my, potential customers away. What scares them away is when they can’t get any information, by the way. That’s what scares us. The number one reason why we leave a website is because we can’t get the answer we’re looking for. That’s the number one reason. The number one answer we’re looking for that we cannot find on websites in the world is roughly how much is this baby gonna cost? The thing about it is Lee, people don’t need an exact price.

Marcus Sheridan [00:17:23]:
What they wanna know is am I in the game, baby? Like, can I even, can I even afford this? Like, give me a sense. You know, if I said to your audience right now, how much do you think the pool cost and inground swimming pool costs? Most would have no idea. Many would say, I guess it probably cost about 50,000. True? That’s pre two that’s pre 2020, baby. You’re gonna spend, in most cases, a hundred thousand or more on an in ground swimming pool. So pricing estimator, self pricing tool is the future. So I predict every service based business, at least 90%, especially in the b to c market, especially when it comes to things like home improvement, plumbers, electricians, landscapers. Just go down the list.

Marcus Sheridan [00:18:14]:
Roofers

A. Lee Judge [00:18:15]:
Mhmm.

Marcus Sheridan [00:18:15]:
Are gonna have some type of, self pricing tool on their website in the future. Now I’m so into this and believe in it so much, and I know it’s a megatrend that I developed a tool called priceguide.AI. So what priceguide.AI does is it uses AI and allows you to very quickly create a pricing estimator, key phrase estimator Mhmm. Not quote tool. It’s an estimator tool. And so somebody goes on there, let’s say, to your website, and they’re like, how much, you know, would it cost to, you know, remove the trees in my yard? Let’s say you have a tree removal company. Okay? And so then the estimator, again, using AI is gonna say, alright. So if you’re a tree removal company, here’s a series of questions that you’re probably gonna wanna ask.

Marcus Sheridan [00:19:08]:
And you can modify the questions, and then it gives you just built into the AI. It gives you a place to put in your price ranges for each one of the variables. Like, for example, what size trees are you gonna remove? Is it small, medium, large tree? How many trees do you wanna remove? Do you wanna, take the stumps out? So it’s like, boom, boom, boom. It’s gonna give you the questions that you generally gonna ask. And then once you give it the variables and you edit it, modify it, then it’s gonna give you the code. You put it on your site and bam, you’ve got a working price estimator. Now this is what’s wildly. This is crazy.

A. Lee Judge [00:19:40]:
Mhmm.

Marcus Sheridan [00:19:41]:
We have now I’ve got, nearly, couple hundred now, users of this tool. Alright? It’s only been out for about six months. It does soft launches, and I’ve been watching it. What’s crazy is when somebody puts it on their site and really brings attention to it, especially from their homepage, on average, their website immediately, the day they put a pricing estimator tool on there, produces three times 300% more leads than they were previously getting. 300% lifts and leads. Come on. Let’s go.

A. Lee Judge [00:20:13]:
Customized for any any particular different kind of business?

Marcus Sheridan [00:20:17]:
Any business. And the b to b, b to c, the AI helps you do it. The problem is a lot of people are like, I don’t think I can do that. I’m like, yeah. You can. Because

A. Lee Judge [00:20:24]:
They don’t want to do it.

Marcus Sheridan [00:20:25]:
Yeah. It’s just yeah. It’s like they’re they’re not seeing the forest through the trees because it doesn’t matter really what what you offer. If I came to you right now, like, I remember I had this, insurance agent. One of me said, yeah. This estimator wouldn’t work for me. I’m like, so you’re telling me people don’t wanna get a sense for what their quote is gonna be before they talk to you? He’s like, no. They they probably wanna know that, but it’s just you just can’t use a tool like that.

Marcus Sheridan [00:20:52]:
It just would never work. Like, an insurance is just you know, you gotta send it out. There’s too many variables. I said, I’m gonna say, hold on.

A. Lee Judge [00:20:58]:
Be stuck in how things have always been done.

Marcus Sheridan [00:21:00]:
That’s right, buddy. So I said to this person, I said, alright. Let’s say I came to you in real life, and I said, can you give me a sense for roughly how much? I mean, I’m not gonna hold you to a number, but can you give me a range as to how much I might spend on, you know, x y z commercial insurance or x y z home insurance or whatever? And he said, yeah. I just have to ask you some questions. I said, okay. What are those questions? He said, I’d have to ask you this. I’d have to ask you this. I had to ask this.

Marcus Sheridan [00:21:24]:
I need to know this. I said, great. You just built your pricing estimator. You just built it. Right? It’s so self pricing, is phenomenal. I gotta tell you one other story about self pricing tools. This is crazy story.

A. Lee Judge [00:21:36]:
I wanna connect some dots here real quick.

Marcus Sheridan [00:21:38]:
Yeah. Please.

A. Lee Judge [00:21:38]:
So we talked about the customer journey and that they want to do their own research Yes. To, like, 80% before talking to somebody.

Marcus Sheridan [00:21:46]:
Right.

A. Lee Judge [00:21:47]:
We talked about putting your pricing on your website. I wanna connect those two dots because if a person is researching, part of the research is how much will this thing I need cost me.

Marcus Sheridan [00:21:58]:
Yes.

A. Lee Judge [00:21:59]:
And if they are doing their research, say they’re 60% through their buying journey, that last 20% before they call you could be, how much will this cost me? And if they can’t finish their journey on your site, it isn’t like they’re just leaving you. They’re finishing their journey somewhere else. They’re diverted to anybody who can answer that last part to satisfy them. So the customer journey starts on your website perhaps. They won’t be satisfied until they get some answers that you’re looking for. Pricing is typically one of those. So I want marketers to hear, if 80% of the journey is on their own and they need pricing, it only makes sense to include pricing in the journey.

Marcus Sheridan [00:22:39]:
Yeah. It’s it’s the it is listen. I’ve got more data on this literally than any person in the world. I have for a decade of my life, a big part of it has been dedicated to helping companies be more transparent online to win more trust, generate more leads, and ultimately, more revenue, more financial peace. And the number one traffic, lead, and revenue producing content across the board over the course of ten years, not even close, it’s cost price content. Cost price content. It is the number one question that people have in the market. You know, in in in the book, I talk about there’s basically five subjects that every buyer wants to know.

Marcus Sheridan [00:23:27]:
It doesn’t matter the industry before they reach out, and we call this the big five in the book. Five main subjects. It’s not the only ones, but this this drives the economy of search. First one is, how much does it cost? K. So cost is number one. Two is what we call problems, negatives, objections, fears. We’ll just call those problems, but anything that’s a fear of buying the thing, you know, is the pool going to crack? Is it gonna pop out of the ground? You know, is it gonna look ugly? Like, those are fears. So number one is is caused.

Marcus Sheridan [00:23:56]:
Number two is problems. Number three is comparisons. We’re obsessed with comparing things online. One product versus another product. One company versus we we love to compare. So in the fourth of the big five is reviews. I mean, just think about how many times you’ve researched reviews online. The thing about reviews is we wanna know the good, the bad, and the ugly, not just the positive.

Marcus Sheridan [00:24:14]:
And then finally, number five is a big five. Is this what we call in the book best or best, most, top. Once again, think about how many times you’ve gone online and searched best such and such or most such and such. Anything that’s just like a ranking system works or any extremes, we love to research online. So cost, problems, comparisons, reviews, best. Those are what we call the big five. And if you wanna become a known and trusted brand, if you wanna talk about what others aren’t willing to talk about online, these five subjects, businesses shy away from them, but they gotta lean into them. Cost being the fundamental one.

Marcus Sheridan [00:24:48]:
And and I would say this, to Lee, just to kinda wrap up this this cost conversation a little bit. Like I said, with all the data we have, it’s the number one, traffic lead and sales, revenue producing content theme, across the board by far. Number two, when somebody adds a pricing estimator like a priceguide.ai to their website, if they highlight it strongly on their home page, almost immediately, we see a three x in lead generation, 300%. I mean, just across the board. The other thing about price is, let’s say, there’s different levels of how you will do pricing on your website. So level one, there’s level zero, which is when you have a call for quote or or get pricing, and it just gives you a form. And that just pisses people off. Okay.

Marcus Sheridan [00:25:43]:
So that’s level zero. Now level one would be when you have, a page on your site, which everybody should have, which is like a pricing page. And then on that, you want to really address five things. You want to teach the reader, listener, five things. What drives cost up for that particular product or service? What drives cost down for that particular product or service? Why are some companies expensive? Why are some companies cheap? And then finally, roughly, where do you fall? So those are the five main elements of a of a pricing page. In the new book, I talk about the perfect pricing page is what it’s called, and there’s, like, 12 total elements. But those are the five majors right there. And if you do that, you’ll be in the top 5% of your industry because most people haven’t done that.

Marcus Sheridan [00:26:31]:
So that’s level one. Level two is when you have a great pricing page that explains what I just said, plus you have a great pricing video that explains it and shows it well. Alright. So that’s that’s level two. Level level three is now when you have a pricing estimator on your site and they’re able to get a price range. And then level four would be they could get an exact quote on your site. So those are the four different levels. Now I don’t suggest that somebody, necessarily gets or or gives their buyers an exact price.

Marcus Sheridan [00:27:10]:
I understand this is oftentimes impossible to do because once you talk with them, you know, there’s, like, these other variables. If I price a swimming pool, for example, which I have a a a swimming pool pricing, estimator on the river pools and spas website. I was the first manufacturer in the world that had that, by the way. We don’t set the end price. The dealer does. But we could still come up with the estimator. And it’s incredibly powerful. And it it it we give a range like your pool’s gonna be 80 to a hundred and 20,000.

Marcus Sheridan [00:27:45]:
So it’s it’s it’s a it’s a big range. So you can you can do it safely. But I couldn’t say your pool’s gonna be a hundred 20 thousand because what would happen is then we’d go out to the site and we’d say, oh, jeez. They need a retaining wall. Homeowner didn’t realize they need a retaining wall. That’s an extra 20,000, and they would get all annoyed. So I I agree if you’re listening to this. Most people aren’t necessarily gonna have a an exact price that they’re gonna give.

Marcus Sheridan [00:28:10]:
But you should absolutely give a price range to address the question of just give me a feel, how much is this gonna cost?

A. Lee Judge [00:28:21]:
You know, I think there’s something else in there too that we can use internally. So you’re definitely answering the customer’s question about pricing and helping them along their journey. But something that we did recently, I think, and I’m just realizing this now, helped us internally because when a customer so for us to get some context here, we do a lot of subscription work. They subscribe to do, like, podcast, which is ongoing. They may subscribe to video series. It’s ongoing. But one of the questions our customers often asked was, hey. We have this series for, say, a podcast.

A. Lee Judge [00:28:55]:
We wanna do one video. Can we do that? Their question was, can we do a one off, and how much was it? And I’m realizing now what that did was those questions allowed us not to just create an article on it or content. It allowed us to realize what other product lines we needed to create.

Marcus Sheridan [00:29:12]:
That’s right.

A. Lee Judge [00:29:13]:
So we ended up creating a, like, a produce with you version of our podcast service that allows them to do more of the work themselves if they want to. That’s why they have teams who just don’t have all the skills or the understanding how to do it. We have cases where we have large corporate clients who have ongoing podcast, but they need some video of their executives. Like, hey. We gotta get our CEO to do this or, you know, some SME to do this. We need one shot. How does that work? Can we do just one? And so we ended up spinning off a new product of a one time recording session and explain all how that process goes, but those products came out of us out of the questions that they asked. And our answer was, now we have a new product line that’s been successful because we responded to the customer’s questions.

Marcus Sheridan [00:30:03]:
You know, that’s really smart. One thing that I try to constantly remind businesses of I don’t know if you remember that, movie A Field of Dreams, Lee.

A. Lee Judge [00:30:14]:
Mhmm.

Marcus Sheridan [00:30:14]:
But the big theme on that movie was build it and they will come. Right? And I always say, when it comes to marketing and when it comes to content, just if you start producing the content, the market will tell you where it’s supposed to go. Let me give you another example because that one you just gave is great. I’m gonna give you another one just as, like, a kind of a random one, but hopefully it makes sense to your audience. So I’m an avid fisherman. I’ve got a pretty successful YouTube channel called Saltwater Fishing University. This this channel is all about offshore fishing and, you know, we’re we have a growing following. I have an offshore fishing boat in North Carolina.

Marcus Sheridan [00:30:54]:
It’s a full business. It’s full brand, whole nine. K? It took me two years. When I started this channel, I thought what people wanted to see was us catching big fish. That’s what I thought. Eventually, once I produced enough content, I realized wait. Wait. Wait.

Marcus Sheridan [00:31:16]:
Wait. His this is actually what the market wants. They wanna see how hard it is to run a commercial fishing company as well as a charter fishing company. They wanna know what’s the story, what’s behind the scenes to to successfully do this and not like lose your life savings while you’re doing it. That’s what people are interested in. And so it’s like, I would have this like amazing video that was, like, we caught these fish and was just awesome. Like, this is a great video. Wouldn’t perform.

Marcus Sheridan [00:31:52]:
But I would do a video where we’re talking about how much we were struggling with some of the expenses we were having with the boat. And all of a sudden, everybody’s watching. Everybody’s commenting. Everybody’s talking. So the market will show you what your content is supposed to be if you listen well enough. What you just said there is the market told you it’s like, so there’s some different packages that we could be offering with our services here because they keep asking about it. They asked, you answered. Right? Very smart.

Marcus Sheridan [00:32:25]:
That’s business one zero one. Super smooth. Same thing. But a lot of people think you gotta have this perfect content plan. You gotta know everything out the gate. That’s why they have a failure to launch. You know, it’s this quest for perfection, which has, you know, Lee, perhaps

A. Lee Judge [00:32:38]:
Never happened.

Marcus Sheridan [00:32:39]:
Is it? Come on now. That’s never gonna happen. We’re all just figuring this out anyway. So So that’s a very, very important point that you’ve made.

A. Lee Judge [00:32:46]:
So I wanna ask you, kinda pivot a little bit and talking about still talking about content creation, but I noticed that you are very purposeful about the content you create. A lot of talking head video of you talking directly to your prospects, your customers, same as I do. I wanna get your take on and I and I know we may both be a bit biased in this. I know I am. But getting executives, executive led content, getting your executives, your your SMEs, your technicians who are actually building the thing to get on camera and talk to prospects and tell them not a sales pitch, but their stories and help them understand the company. What’s your take on that?

Marcus Sheridan [00:33:27]:
Yeah. I’m glad, trauma, honestly. If you remember, I said there’s four pillars of a known and trusted brand. Four pillars, be more human than others are willing to be. And I think it’s it’s now the fiduciary. It’s like the responsibility of CEOs to get over themselves and especially get on camera. Yeah. Because people wanna connect with a person.

Marcus Sheridan [00:33:47]:
It’s like, you know, what’s the bigger brand? Elon Musk or Tesla? They’re both big brands. Elon’s way bigger. And if you if you just go across the board, you know, it’s like is Kylie Jenner the bigger brand, or is her makeup line the bigger brand? It’s like she’s way, way bigger. And we’re we’re seeing this again and again. If you look at, my coaching company called Impact. Okay? Which is bigger? Impact or Marcus Sheridan the brand? Who’s that? That’s not even close. Right? You look at your situation, Lisa. Like, your name is much bigger than your company in the market.

Marcus Sheridan [00:34:30]:
If we did a Google Trends search, right, it would be, like, way more people searching you than your company name. So this is the choice that you have to make as an entrepreneur. It’s like, am I gonna allow my personal opinions to screw up smart business decisions? Because if your personal opinion is like, video is not my thing, or I just don’t really wanna be on camera. It’s like, well, yeah. But just signed up to do this thing called business. In business, you gotta win trust. And to win trust today, that person wants to see you. They wanna see who’s behind the scenes here.

Marcus Sheridan [00:35:03]:
Who am I doing business with? This is a big part of it. So I think this is gonna continue to be a really significant trend. People wanting to know the people behind the brand. I think it matters a lot. And you you could tell those stories on a multiplicity of levels as well. You know, my coaching company’s got a podcast, and we bring on all these different employees of, like, team members, which, you know, it’s like we’ve had probably twelve, thirteen different team members from my coaching company that’s on there acting as a subject matter expert. What’s interesting too, Lee, is a lot of CEOs are almost hesitant for their team members to get on camera to use LinkedIn because they’re afraid that their brand’s gonna grow and that people are gonna head hunt them. It’s like, come on.

Marcus Sheridan [00:35:52]:
If somebody wants to leave, they’re gonna leave anyway. So give them every every reason to feel supported and to feel like, man, my my boss loves me so much, but they’re helping me grow my brand as well. I mean, to me, that’s what it’s all about. So I I think you make a really, really good point. We gotta get in front of we gotta get in front of the camera. We’ve gotta get we gotta understand that the personal brand in many ways is the future much more so than the company or the corporate brand.

A. Lee Judge [00:36:23]:
Yeah. I’m glad you mentioned the employee too because content master, probably even before we officially launched, began when I was a marketer inside a company creating content. And I began interviewing the sales team because I knew that if I could get them to answer their objections on film.

Marcus Sheridan [00:36:41]:
Yes.

A. Lee Judge [00:36:42]:
And when they’re at home sleeping, they could be on the website answering those same objections. Yes. And there was a whole lot of why, why should I do this, or, you know, maybe corporate worrying about their brand. But the result was that customers were able to continue their journey, talk to or hear from salespeople, not talk to them because they don’t want to talk to them yet. They could hear from salespeople. And the best part was the sales team had better experience with the customers than marketers did. They had frontline experience. They knew the objections.

A. Lee Judge [00:37:15]:
They knew the words the customer used to describe things. And the language that the salespeople used in the video they created was much richer both to the customer and even to SEO than what marketing could create. And that was just when it was just sales. Now we need sales, HR Leadership. Leadership, everyone to be creating video.

Marcus Sheridan [00:37:38]:
You were ahead of the game on that. That’s why you and I, you know, we we we think very similarly. Right? And, what’s what’s weird is for us, this is obvious. At least it’s obvious. Of course, it’s like, yes. And and that’s the thing too. When people wherever people have told me it’s like, when they read, they ask you answer. It’s always been like, I just didn’t get until I read it.

Marcus Sheridan [00:38:01]:
I was like, oh, of course. It’s obvious. Because really what we’re saying is you could almost call this golden rule marketing. Market to others as you yourself like to be marketed to. Pretty basic. That rule has worked pretty solid for about two thousand years. Promise, it ain’t going away anytime soon. And so, you know, when when companies push back on me and says, no.

Marcus Sheridan [00:38:27]:
No. No. No. We can’t do that. I’m like, yes. But if you were the buyer, would you appreciate this? Well, yeah, I would. But and it’s like, no. No.

Marcus Sheridan [00:38:35]:
No. Treat them as you yourself would wanna be treated right now. No. Wait. Wait. Wait. I understand. It’s like you’re like, well, I can’t talk about cost.

Marcus Sheridan [00:38:43]:
No. No. You can. You just can’t give an exact price, but you can talk about cost. So let’s talk about cost. Let’s see what we can do. Like, oh, I can’t mention such and such competitor. Really? You can’t? Or you just can’t say anything bad about them? Because we don’t wanna say anything bad about them, but we can certainly talk about them.

Marcus Sheridan [00:39:00]:
So, like, these are the things that we can do. So you have to look at it from what can we do versus what can’t we do. That’s easy, and that’s the lazy person’s game right there. You know what I’m saying?

A. Lee Judge [00:39:11]:
So we’re gonna wrap in a second. I got two more questions here. The first one is talking to marketers. So these are things that we know, and you you said it’s the golden rule. How do you convince their their management? How do you convince leadership that content marketing, we know it’s the long game. We know you don’t see results in two, three months many times. How do you convince tell a marketer what’s what what would you answer to a marketer who says, market is how do I convince my boss that content marketing is important?

Marcus Sheridan [00:39:39]:
Man, this is one of the most significant questions any marketer can ever ask. I get two primary emails from people around the world that have read my my book. First one is the is the business leader, you know, that’s saying, hey. You know, we really need to get more trust, get more leads, etcetera. I think they ask you answer is gonna help us do it. Second email is from the frustrated marketing leader that says, I believe this stuff, Marcus, but I just can’t convince my team. So what I’m about to tell you isn’t necessarily a feel good story or answer, but it’s just the truth. And that is that is this.

Marcus Sheridan [00:40:23]:
There’s old phrase that says, you can be a prophet to the world, but nobody will listen to you in your hometown. It’s very true for a lot of marketers. You might be one of the greatest marketers in the world, but yet because you’re at the company, because they’re so familiar with you, when you bring new ideas, sadly, oftentimes they don’t appreciate them like they should. Whereas they go to some events, some conference, or some hack like me comes in and gives a workshop, and then all of a sudden, it’s like, oh my gosh. Why are we not doing this? And you look at your boss and you said, what? You know, what the age are you talking about? I’ve been telling you we should be doing this for the last five years. I see that all the time, Lee. Because I, I have taught probably on a global scale, probably about 300 workshops around the world. So I do keynotes and I do workshops, trainings.

Marcus Sheridan [00:41:15]:
Okay? Just did one this week. I got another one next week. Billion dollar company I’m going into next next week. K? And marketing team, this is a perfect timing that you asked me this. So this is a billion dollar company, huge brand. Head of marketing really wants to be more transparent online, wants to do more content. They get it. CEO, sales team, leadership team, don’t totally get it.

Marcus Sheridan [00:41:43]:
So what’s the solution? Solution is I’m coming in, and I’m going to help paint the picture because I’m not from their hometown. Because of that, they’ll see me differently. And it’s it’s sad, man. It’s not fair. It’s not fair to the marketer, but that’s the truth. This which is why I also tell folks let me give you another example of this real quick, man. Somebody hears me speak and says, I wanna take this back to my team. I’m like, woah.

Marcus Sheridan [00:42:09]:
Woah. Woah. Woah. Don’t go tell your team about this. Like, what do you mean? Because they’re just gonna, like, rain on your parade. Go to your CEO. Give him or her say to him or her, would you be willing to read this book because I believe this is very important to our organization. CEO’s gonna say, sure.

Marcus Sheridan [00:42:28]:
And then you say, okay. I’m gonna follow-up with you in two weeks. Let’s have a conversation about what you read. You don’t tell them your opinion of it because it needs to feel like it’s coming from them. I know it’s just human psychology here going on. Right? And so now they read it and you meet with them again and you say, okay. You’ve read the book. Tell me, what are your sentiments? But you don’t say, hey.

Marcus Sheridan [00:42:50]:
You know, I read this book for this pool guy, and he says, we should talk about five things, and one of them is cost and price. So let’s talk talk about cost and price on our website. That doesn’t work, man. It doesn’t work. So I know it wasn’t a very good answer, but that’s the those are the answers, dude.

A. Lee Judge [00:43:06]:
That’s a great answer. And this is absolutely not a sales pitch to the listeners, but the answer is you may not be able to tell your boss, hire Marcus or I to come tell your boss.

Marcus Sheridan [00:43:17]:
That’s exactly right. And I say bring out Lee because he’s the man. You’ve been listening to him for a long time, and you’ve got this great way about you. What, you know, has been fun for me just talking with you is, like, I see so obviously why people trust you. Because interpersonally now, outside of your videos, but interpersonally, you have a great energy. You’re come across as extremely, not just knowledgeable, but warm. I can tell you never probably ever recommend someone something that you yourself wouldn’t have bought if you were in their shoes. Not and that’s, you know, that’s integrity.

Marcus Sheridan [00:43:56]:
It’s all that is, but it’s it’s a beautiful thing, and it’s easy to pick up on. But that’s that’s the power of of media. Right? And this experience and I know your listeners feel the same because they feel like they know you even though you haven’t met them.

A. Lee Judge [00:44:10]:
You know, one time, Marcus, I had I went in to meet with a client, and I had spoken to one person to the VP of marketing of a bank. And he had been spreading my videos within his company. I didn’t know that. I just knew I was talking with this one person. So I get to the office. I walk into the boardroom. There are four other people there that I didn’t expect to be in the meeting, and they’re debating which one of my videos they like the best. I had like star power in the room when I walked in there.

A. Lee Judge [00:44:41]:
That’s it. I didn’t have to sell anything.

Marcus Sheridan [00:44:43]:
The media created. I had

A. Lee Judge [00:44:44]:
to guide them because they have been consuming content for me amongst the circle of buying group members for months, and I had no idea. So that’s that speaks to the power right there.

Marcus Sheridan [00:44:54]:
That’s right.

A. Lee Judge [00:44:55]:
And not to and thank you for the compliment, by the way, but it made me think about a story where before I took my last corporate job, one of the jobs I almost took was being a consultant at Accenture. And I turned down the job at Accenture for this company I went to work for. Months later, I gave them the advice. I was the employee doing what you said doesn’t work. I was trying to give the advice from what I knew. Boss wasn’t hearing it. They said go get an Accenture consultant to tell us. And I’m thinking if I had taken that job, they’d have been calling me anyway.

Marcus Sheridan [00:45:34]:
Isn’t that wild, man? That’s wild.

A. Lee Judge [00:45:37]:
That is wild. So to wrap it up, Marcus, you mentioned that your book now has a third edition, the title change. I wanna know one, about the book and two about what you’ve learned about book titles.

Marcus Sheridan [00:45:48]:
Yeah. And this any marketer is gonna love this. You’ll appreciate this because titling has never been more important than it is right now. Right? Especially in this, like, attention economy that we’re in and and people are just quickly scrolling. So we gotta grab them. We gotta hook people in very, very quickly. So all of our titles matter, whether it’s your webinar, whether it’s the book, you know, whether it’s the guide that you’ve got, whatever that thing is. And so they ask you answer, it’s been a pretty successful book.

Marcus Sheridan [00:46:17]:
It has sold over a hundred thousand copies, which puts it in the top 1% of all business books. But honestly, I believe it had the IP, the hutzpah to be a million copy book. And to me, to a degree, it should’ve done better. One of the reasons why it didn’t do better is because nobody walks by it on the shelf and says, I want that, unless they’ve heard me speak or unless it’s a referral. You see, I learned from Rory Vaden. So Rory, r o r y, Vaden. Hall of fame speaker. He wrote the book Take the Stairs, and he’s got a great company called Brand Builders.

Marcus Sheridan [00:46:59]:
They one of their specialties is helping people, launch best sellers. And he said, he had made this mistake himself when he, when he had written a few books. And he learned this later with some of his work with clients, and it’s proven to be true again and again. So any great title should pass the I want I wish test. So the person should be able to see it and immediately say, oh, I want that. So in other words, I wish I had atomic habits. I want a four hour work week. I wanna win friends and influence people.

Marcus Sheridan [00:47:30]:
Do you see the pattern? Yeah. It’s pretty easy to see once you hear it. Right? Now there’s, of course, gonna always be exceptions. But the problem that most authors have is they give the how as the title and not the payoff as the title. So they ask you answer is the how. But again, nobody’s saying I wish they ask you answer. I want they ask you answer unless they were told you need to read they ask you answer. You feel me? Right? Okay.

Marcus Sheridan [00:48:00]:
And so this is why the title of this book is called Endless Customers.

A. Lee Judge [00:48:06]:
Endless Customers.

Marcus Sheridan [00:48:07]:
That’s right. What is

A. Lee Judge [00:48:08]:
the release date? How’s

Marcus Sheridan [00:48:10]:
It’s coming out, the first, April. So that’s a %, like, it’s happening. It’s it’s done. It’s out of my hands at this point. And you can go to endlesscustomers.com if you’re listening to this right now, and you can get it. There’s a bunch of, like, with preorders. There’s a bunch of bonuses that you can get, with it. So it’s endlesscustomers.com.

Marcus Sheridan [00:48:30]:
But it really talks about where’s all this content going in the AI game. What’s the future of websites? You know, what’s the future of digital being that, especially with search now changing to I mean, there’s just so much going on here. Right?

A. Lee Judge [00:48:44]:
Yeah.

Marcus Sheridan [00:48:44]:
Yeah. So it’s exciting times, but scary times for a lot of people. I’m pretty stoked about it. And so it’s a very, it’s a it it is on the front edge of really the whole content game and how to become that most known and trusted brand in your market. And if you want a a clear system that shows you how to become the most known and trusted brand in your market, again, go to endlesscustomers.com.

A. Lee Judge [00:49:11]:
Endless customers Com. Mark, Marcus, I can’t wait to read it. I love your concept on title. I’ll tell you why off camera. Because this is about you. I’m not gonna plug my book here, but it’s about you. What do you do?

Marcus Sheridan [00:49:24]:
Plug your book, bro. I wanna hear it.

A. Lee Judge [00:49:26]:
Here’s the funny part. So I’m thinking, okay, what is Marcus gonna say about titling? Because my book is in the same place, yours is out of my hands. It’s about to be released, into February. And I’m like, does this title stand up to what Marcus is about to say or or it’s gonna blow me out of the water? It does Marcus. It does.

Marcus Sheridan [00:49:44]:
Good. Good. Good.

A. Lee Judge [00:49:46]:
The book is called Cash. And so to answer your question That’s

Marcus Sheridan [00:49:50]:
great. It does.

A. Lee Judge [00:49:51]:
What do you want? Yeah. CASH. That’s something that salespeople want. That’s what businesses need to operate is CASH. And it’s an acronym for communication alignment systems and honesty, but the title is called CASH.

Marcus Sheridan [00:50:04]:
Man, it is it definitely passes that test. Well, good job. It it what what folks don’t realize listeners is I told him beforehand, I’ve changed the title, and there’s a reason for it. There’s a system behind titles. And he said, okay. Well and I didn’t know that I didn’t know the title of his new book yet. So he said, let’s save it until the end. And so that was real.

Marcus Sheridan [00:50:24]:
What he just says, like, he did not know what I was gonna say, and I didn’t know what his title was. It worked out pretty good, man. So the work out is good.

A. Lee Judge [00:50:32]:
Would I have to handle?

Marcus Sheridan [00:50:33]:
I wish I had more cash.

A. Lee Judge [00:50:35]:
More cash. The fun part is how would I have handled that if it didn’t pass the test?

Marcus Sheridan [00:50:39]:
You’d be like, well, fingers crossed. Fingers crossed.

A. Lee Judge [00:50:43]:
Exactly. So, Marcus, final details, how can we reach you other than the book and your website and your company? Tell us real quick.

Marcus Sheridan [00:50:48]:
Yeah. Make sure you connect with me on LinkedIn y’all. If you’re listening to this right now, I’m dang good follow on LinkedIn just like Lee is, and that’s you can, message me there as well. Marcus Sheridan dot com. Obviously, I speak around the world on these subjects, sales marketing, leadership, communication. It’s my jam. And if you wanna win trust with your audience, whether it’s one to many, one to one, one to your team, I will show you exactly how to do that.

A. Lee Judge [00:51:13]:
You absolutely will. He’s a great follow. I love to follow his content myself. So excellent. Thanks again, Marcus. I hope you stay well. And to the listeners, if you’re listening to the podcast and want to see Marcus and I video this podcast and others are available in the podcast section of contentmonster.com. Once again, thanks for listening.

A. Lee Judge [00:51:32]:
Thanks, Marcus.

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