A lot of small business owners are excellent at the operational side of running their business, but get STUCK when it comes to marketing—especially in creating a strategy that aligns with their core values, and compels their target customer to take action.

Founder & CEO of Box Out Marketing, Tyler Garns, shares some of his “Secret Sauce” for creating a strategy that works. In his former role of VP of Marketing at Infusionsoft, Tyler produced massive results, helping to grow the company from $3M to $40M in just a few short years, then continued his journey to help businesses grow with a combination of marketing experience + technical skills to achieve better marketing results.

Today, Tyler shares some absolute gems worth hearing.

3:21 – The benefit of learning in a fast-paced environment
8:44 – Why having a marketing strategy is so important
11:53 – Creating the freedom we want
17:34 – The power of simplicity
19:05 – Common marketing misconception
21:01 – Why you NEED a compelling offer
23:17 – Finding the right conversion model for your business
29:32 – How core values define workforce

Website:

https://www.boxoutmarketing.com/author/tyler-garns-8/

Full Episode Transcription:

408

01:42:36.600 –> 01:42:44.940

Todd Staples: Well, I am really excited. Tyler, welcome back to your second podcast with me. It’s really great to see you, buddy.

409

01:42:45.510 –> 01:42:48.630

Tyler Garns: Well, thank you. You too. Yeah, it’s good to connect. It’s been a little while.

411

01:42:54.990 –> 01:43:13.350

Todd Staples: So I’m, I’m excited because it’s actually been a couple years since we’ve really connected again and now you’ve been making some shifts in your own business. And I just, I’ve always thought you have one of the most simple and clear and

412

01:43:14.700 –> 01:43:27.270

Todd Staples: Superb way of teaching people how to come up with strategy teaching how to execute on marketing and setting up processes and systems to do that. So I’m ready to hear what’s the latest and greatest that you’re working on.

413

01:43:27.900 –> 01:43:32.100

Tyler Garns: Well, thanks. Yeah, and appreciate you having me on the show. Yeah, you know,

414

01:43:33.150 –> 01:43:44.400

Tyler Garns: We’ve been in this marketing game for a long time in some form or fashion. I’ve been doing, you know, online marketing since 1999 on it and

415

01:43:44.940 –> 01:43:52.830

Tyler Garns: And then you know with this business box out marketing started in 2014. And you know what, one of the things we realized early on.

416

01:43:53.580 –> 01:44:04.170

Tyler Garns: Is that most business owners need a lot of help with marketing strategy and we’ve helped with that through our fold, you know, done for you agency services.

417

01:44:05.010 –> 01:44:10.410

Tyler Garns: But one of the things that has been frustrating for me is that we can only help a certain number of people that way.

418

01:44:10.800 –> 01:44:22.500

Tyler Garns: And so we’ve been shifting our model. And I think that’s one of the things obviously as well that you know on on your path podcast, you’re probably talking about a lot is, you know, this need to kind of reinvent yourself all the time you know this.

419

01:44:22.530 –> 01:44:32.940

Tyler Garns: continual learning right is just part of the process. If you stay stagnant, you’re going to die. So, you know, we’re re envisioning and reinventing the way we operate.

420

01:44:33.750 –> 01:44:41.880

Tyler Garns: And part of that a big part of that is to be able to help more people, but in helping more people. We also need to come up with a way to help them with.

421

01:44:42.420 –> 01:44:44.010

Tyler Garns: With the strategy portion

422

01:44:44.400 –> 01:44:54.780

Tyler Garns: And simpler, faster way. So we’ve been developing a lot of different models I created this whole like basically triage system that was way too complex to teach to other people, but it but it’s actually really good for internal

423

01:44:55.080 –> 01:45:00.690

Tyler Garns: You know, employees to learn like, hey, when someone has this problem then ask this question, and if they answer this way, then do this thing. Right.

424

01:45:01.620 –> 01:45:07.530

Tyler Garns: And so then that way you can teach people, or at least give give people a way to

425

01:45:08.490 –> 01:45:21.510

Tyler Garns: To figure things out the right way without having to have experience. You know, I’ve got years and years and years of experience to rely on. But when we go hire someone new. They don’t have that. And so we kind of built that internally but externally, we’ve got now.

426

01:45:22.590 –> 01:45:29.970

Tyler Garns: You know, a system that in the future. We’re going to release as as marketing strategy school that’s not even close to being ready yet, but

427

01:45:30.480 –> 01:45:42.060

Tyler Garns: But this simple process and system for developing marketing strategy is really key because you know when you’re a lawyer or a doctor or a roofer or whatever you are

428

01:45:42.900 –> 01:45:53.760

Tyler Garns: You’re trained in your craft, not in marketing strategy. So it’s so easy to get it wrong. And it’s so easy to see what other people are doing and go oh that’s working for them. Let’s try that. And it’s wrong. And it doesn’t work.

429

01:45:54.180 –> 01:45:54.540

Todd Staples: Yeah.

430

01:45:54.750 –> 01:45:56.640

Tyler Garns: That’s, that’s a big part of our focus right now.

431

01:45:57.600 –> 01:46:05.790

Todd Staples: So I want to, I want to get into some of the details of that. But before we do that one thing. I also want to point out for people watching and listening.

432

01:46:07.290 –> 01:46:13.080

Todd Staples: One of the things that I think is amazing about marketing is in order to be a good marketer, you have to do good.

433

01:46:13.650 –> 01:46:23.940

Todd Staples: Like you actually really have to help people. And that to me has always been where you have shined and I think it’s like it comes from within somewhere. So maybe you can share a little bit about

434

01:46:24.240 –> 01:46:30.480

Todd Staples: Your, your personal beliefs, your, your values that have led you into marketing.

435

01:46:31.200 –> 01:46:40.500

Todd Staples: And maybe shine some light on the fact that it is such a beautiful thing to do when you do it right. I think sometimes people bucket sales and marketing and that’s in pushing people to spend money right

436

01:46:40.860 –> 01:46:45.480

Todd Staples: It’s like totally not what it’s about. If you do it right, so maybe you can share a bit about that.

437

01:46:46.230 –> 01:46:53.910

Tyler Garns: Yeah, absolutely. And that that’s actually part of the strategy conversation we can get there in a minute. But, um, you have to have a good product, right, you have to have a good service.

438

01:46:54.360 –> 01:47:02.430

Tyler Garns: Like you said, you have to do good in the world. And if you’re not, it’s not going to be a lasting success if you’re able to have immediate success. It’s not going to last.

439

01:47:03.330 –> 01:47:09.510

Tyler Garns: But yeah, a lot of what drives me comes from my upbringing. My dad was had his own business.

440

01:47:10.410 –> 01:47:24.600

Tyler Garns: I saw him go to work in jeans and a t shirt and be able to manage his own schedule. And then I saw the guy next door every day suit and tie same schedule miserable all the time. And I said, I don’t want that.

441

01:47:25.080 –> 01:47:36.060

Tyler Garns: I like doing. And so, um, you know, I, I knew early on that. That was kind of the path. I wanted to follow, but as I grew up and got older and got into

442

01:47:36.180 –> 01:47:44.880

Tyler Garns: You know, marketing and sales world and working with business. I realized then. Looking back, how much of a struggle. It had probably been for my parents.

443

01:47:45.960 –> 01:47:57.990

Tyler Garns: To run and grow their own business. And so then I just became very, very passionate about helping people like them, you know, here’s a photographer. He’s a photographer for 40 years phenomenal, he’s a he’s a

444

01:47:58.500 –> 01:48:05.100

Tyler Garns: In particular industry. He’s very well known world renowned you know photographer commercial photographer.

445

01:48:05.790 –> 01:48:08.580

Todd Staples: What can you say what do you what is niche is.

446

01:48:08.880 –> 01:48:16.530

Tyler Garns: Yeah so. So if you ask him like, hey, what do you specialize in. He would say, you know, hard to light reflective objects and

447

01:48:16.650 –> 01:48:19.260

Todd Staples: Believe that that this photographer speak. I love it.

448

01:48:20.130 –> 01:48:27.600

Tyler Garns: But that comes down to like shooting cars a lot of cars and high tag and perfume bottles and things like that so

449

01:48:28.500 –> 01:48:39.990

Tyler Garns: You know, if you’re just the average person, you would never think like that that’s really hard. But if he takes just a moment and pause you realize it’s extremely difficult because reflective objects will reflect anything

450

01:48:40.320 –> 01:48:41.670

Tyler Garns: In the background. The photographer.

451

01:48:41.700 –> 01:48:43.200

Todd Staples: The camera camera. Yeah.

452

01:48:43.890 –> 01:48:56.970

Tyler Garns: Everything. So there’s an art to concealing all of that and lighting the car or the item in a creative way that just makes it like really pop right so he had for years, you know,

453

01:48:57.450 –> 01:49:04.830

Tyler Garns: Clients like Honda if you walked into a Honda dealership, you know, a lot of the photos and the brochures and the facts books and everything were all taken by him.

454

01:49:05.880 –> 01:49:11.460

Tyler Garns: And he worked for years for Motor Trend doing like cover shots for for them and things like that so

455

01:49:11.910 –> 01:49:22.740

Tyler Garns: That that’s what he did. But again, whether it’s photography or being an insurance agent or a realtor or you make and sell widgets online doesn’t matter. It’s all the same challenge of

456

01:49:23.160 –> 01:49:36.060

Tyler Garns: growing a business when you are an expert in your craft. But now you have to learn marketing and sales and internet stuff and technical things and whatever, it’s all pretty overwhelming. So I became really passionate at

457

01:49:36.540 –> 01:49:44.760

Tyler Garns: In this idea of, like, I want to help those people not have to be burdened by all that extra stuff, but even more so.

458

01:49:45.060 –> 01:49:55.530

Tyler Garns: Allow all the new tech and and strategies that are available to them to be able to actually create the freedom that they want, because ultimately that’s what it comes down to. We all start our own businesses because we want freedom.

459

01:49:55.980 –> 01:50:10.800

Tyler Garns: Right freedom in our lives, or we want freedom to do things the way we want in the business, etc. And so many people get stuck in the process of trying to build a business that they actually get buried by the business instead of creating the freedom that they set out to create

464

01:50:33.750 –> 01:50:41.520

Todd Staples: So I love that vision and that mission for helping people helping make it easier. It’s interesting that you were sort of

465

01:50:42.420 –> 01:50:52.740

Todd Staples: I mean, you saw your dad living a life that he enjoyed right and actually being able to set a schedule. What did you see him like really experienced some of the pain and frustration around the business side?

466

01:50:52.890 –> 01:51:01.320

Tyler Garns: You know, my, my dad’s type of guy that I don’t think he ever really showed that my mom would would be a little more visually stressed and

467

01:51:02.430 –> 01:51:12.750

Tyler Garns: You know she she would she would stress over you know finances and things like that a lot. My dad. I think he’s internal optimist always was, like, hey, everything’s worked out to be fine and

468

01:51:13.200 –> 01:51:20.460

Tyler Garns: Also, when you’re the one in control. I think it’s easier right like he’s in control of his future running the business. She’s at home like just dependent on the income.

469

01:51:20.970 –> 01:51:29.220

Tyler Garns: Oh, yeah. Another she dependent. She could have gotten a job or whatever. But they had made decisions about her staying home as a as a mom and everything so

470

01:51:30.720 –> 01:51:33.240

Tyler Garns: But but yeah I he

471

01:51:34.530 –> 01:51:49.230

Tyler Garns: I never saw that from him, but I know like you know there were stressful times and I know there were times when he would sleep at the studio because he’s working all night and you know there’s long days, and as long nights that every business owner goes through. Yeah.

472

01:51:50.370 –> 01:51:51.000

Todd Staples: Well, that’s

473

01:51:52.230 –> 01:51:53.220

Todd Staples: That’s a

474

01:51:54.270 –> 01:51:58.560

Todd Staples: That’s a I can see the motivation, because I’ve experienced some of that on my own journey as well. Right.

475

01:51:59.460 –> 01:52:10.140

Todd Staples: But let’s let’s dive in the strategy, a little bit right so you I’ve been actually years ago guys probably 10 years at this point we’ve done some mastermind weekends together and things like that.

476

01:52:11.400 –> 01:52:25.710

Todd Staples: And strategy is something you you have to figure out where the leverage is you have to figure out unconventional ways of thinking. Sometimes, a lot of times when you hear someone like you, because I do think you’ve. Very good. Are you present and teach this.

477

01:52:26.820 –> 01:52:34.650

Todd Staples: It seems so easy. Sometimes when you hear an expert explain it, but there might be some counterintuitive approaches you know what most people

478

01:52:34.920 –> 01:52:46.590

Todd Staples: Don’t naturally operate or they don’t actually think in certain ways maybe talk about some of that that you’ve seen, you know, running the whole marketing department for Infusionsoft and growing that business and then running your own team.

479

01:52:47.520 –> 01:52:53.100

Todd Staples: What have you done that sort of counterintuitive or unconventional that’s led to some of your successes. Yeah.

480

01:52:53.520 –> 01:53:07.590

Tyler Garns: Yeah, so, so let’s back up though to something you said about it, seeming easy when I always tell people is, look, the bottom line is marketing and growing a business as simple that doesn’t make it easy right the simplicity is

481

01:53:07.590 –> 01:53:08.640

Todd Staples: Correction simple

482

01:53:09.540 –> 01:53:17.820

Tyler Garns: Yeah, the simplicity of it is what makes it feel easy but then when you go actually try and do it. It’s hard, right. It’s a lot of work and it’s tough.

483

01:53:18.660 –> 01:53:25.740

Tyler Garns: But if it’s not simple, then you’re probably doing something wrong. Right. And that’s a mistake that I’ve made, and I’ve seen business owners make a million times is

484

01:53:26.070 –> 01:53:40.110

Tyler Garns: We think that by creating this you know complex funnel and segmenting everyone 37 different ways, whatever is going to make it all better and it just makes it more complex. So I’ve found over the years that the more simple. We can keep it. Often, the better.

485

01:53:41.190 –> 01:53:44.370

Tyler Garns: So just throw that out there before we move on to to the other.

486

01:53:44.400 –> 01:54:03.120

Todd Staples: Yeah, no I it’s great advice as medicine. I need to take probably every few years, right, because I because I think some marketers, myself included, we’re wired to like the complex fancy systems. Right. Well, what the Rube Goldberg business. Yes, everything fits together but

487

01:54:03.330 –> 01:54:04.770

Tyler Garns: But as a marketer to

488

01:54:04.830 –> 01:54:14.220

Tyler Garns: It’s easy to get caught up in that’s part of your identity. Oh, I can create all the fancy stuff you could ever dream up right and run that’s not always the best thing for the client.

489

01:54:14.640 –> 01:54:19.410

Tyler Garns: Yeah. Um, but yeah, let’s get to your question, though, about, you know, the kind of counterintuitive aspects of it.

490

01:54:20.220 –> 01:54:24.030

Todd Staples: And really just what makes what, what have you seen success in. Yeah.

491

01:54:24.420 –> 01:54:37.890

Tyler Garns: The first thing that we do is we actually take a step back from the marketing itself and look at the business because it’s a very, very common mistake that people make thinking that marketing is going to solve their problems.

492

01:54:38.850 –> 01:54:48.660

Tyler Garns: Or that a marketing agency can create miracles in a situation where there are no miracles going to happen, right. So, so first thing we look at is, like, are you even in

493

01:54:49.380 –> 01:55:02.370

Tyler Garns: The right industry, right, is this industry growing does it have momentum, etc. People come to us like oh yeah my funnels don’t work, blah, blah, blah. You guys can fix it. Well, truthfully, your, your industry dying. Right, right.

494

01:55:02.880 –> 01:55:03.270

Todd Staples: Right.

495

01:55:03.330 –> 01:55:06.600

Tyler Garns: But you’re selling you’re selling cassette tapes, my friend, and

496

01:55:07.680 –> 01:55:13.920

Tyler Garns: That’s just not gonna work. Like, we cannot solve that problem. So, first thing is a look at the industry, make sure we’re in an industry that’s growing has momentum.

497

01:55:14.700 –> 01:55:22.650

Tyler Garns: Next thing is to make sure that the product or service is actually profitable again marketing will only heighten

498

01:55:23.130 –> 01:55:32.970

Tyler Garns: Problems that already exist. So if your service itself isn’t already extremely profitable say say it’s unprofitable or it’s barely profitable.

499

01:55:33.240 –> 01:55:38.700

Tyler Garns: Oftentimes driving business up creates more and more problems, you know, if you have very tight margins.

500

01:55:39.150 –> 01:55:55.560

Tyler Garns: Now you have very tight margins, Times 100 times 1000 times whatever. So you got extra people extra overhead extra fulfillment that you’re, you know, beating your head over the wall or against the wall over and it’s not helping to have more business. It’s actually hurting

501

01:55:57.090 –> 01:56:03.510

Tyler Garns: And so again, another another very common mistake we we trick ourselves into believing that more sales equals more money.

502

01:56:04.260 –> 01:56:14.460

Tyler Garns: But it doesn’t more profit equals more money and profit solves problems but sales don’t necessarily. Yeah, so we have to take a step back and look at these fundamental business issues.

503

01:56:15.000 –> 01:56:20.550

Tyler Garns: Or else we fall into the trap of oh yeah let’s go create a nice marketing funnel that grows the business and it just creates challenges.

504

01:56:21.870 –> 01:56:25.530

Tyler Garns: The next thing is looking at the offer, and this is a big one as well.

505

01:56:26.400 –> 01:56:32.520

Tyler Garns: People think oh well you guys have professional copywriters you know you can write better copy and therefore, it’ll sell better

506

01:56:32.790 –> 01:56:40.260

Tyler Garns: Blah, blah, blah, or you’re going to make a funnel with good messaging and that’s going to cause our product to sell better. Well, if the offers bad

507

01:56:40.890 –> 01:56:53.100

Tyler Garns: No amount of good copy can overcome that and that’s a big misunderstanding that people have, if your copy. If your copy is good and the offer doesn’t sell, then the offer has a problem.

508

01:56:54.030 –> 01:57:06.060

Tyler Garns: And the, the opposite is true as well. If your offer is great and the copies bad the offer still sells it may, it may be able to be sold better, but it will still sell if it’s a good offer and so

509

01:57:06.210 –> 01:57:13.590

Todd Staples: You know when you can you just take a moment and from your perspective, because everyone is a little different semantics. When you see the offer. What is that exactly

510

01:57:14.100 –> 01:57:18.780

Tyler Garns: That’s what you’re actually selling right it’s here’s how much I’m charging and here’s what you get for it.

511

01:57:19.020 –> 01:57:25.080

Todd Staples: Okay, does that include guarantees. Does it include turn you know the extra layers sort of the

512

01:57:25.620 –> 01:57:31.710

Tyler Garns: Yeah, all of all of that, it’s, it’s the decision making process for the customer to be able to say, all right,

513

01:57:32.640 –> 01:57:39.660

Tyler Garns: My the value exchange is in my favor. Right. They don’t feel like it is far in their favor. I’m getting a sweet deal on this.

514

01:57:40.230 –> 01:57:47.790

Tyler Garns: A lot of people will equate that to a discount. And that’s not what I mean I’m not saying you need to discount everything I’m actually fairly opposed to discounting, most of the time.

515

01:57:48.930 –> 01:57:52.050

Tyler Garns: But the offer just has to be so compelling right

516

01:57:53.280 –> 01:58:04.830

Tyler Garns: And if it’s not, then the funnel is not going to help the copy is not going to help. We have to get the offer and this is an area where as business owners were very reluctant to look at the offer.

517

01:58:05.160 –> 01:58:09.600

Tyler Garns: And admit there’s a problem there. We always want to blame it on the the marketing team or the

518

01:58:09.600 –> 01:58:10.680

Todd Staples: Salesperson or

519

01:58:10.680 –> 01:58:16.260

Tyler Garns: Whoever’s closing the sale. Like I you just don’t know how to sell it. No, actually, you know,

520

01:58:16.740 –> 01:58:30.300

Tyler Garns: Because if we look at the offer, then it’s a reflection on us right then the business owner. Well, I created that offer it has to be good, we have to be willing to humble enough to admit that. Well now, maybe I created an offer. That’s not great, maybe

521

01:58:33.570 –> 01:58:38.790

Tyler Garns: So yeah that’s that’s the next thing. And then the next part is where we really start getting into the strategy.

522

01:58:39.180 –> 01:58:52.590

Tyler Garns: And that is looking at the business model and aligning it with the right conversion model. So what do I mean by that. Well, we bucket every business into one of four business models. Right. So we have local services.

523

01:58:53.100 –> 01:59:01.440

Tyler Garns: That’s anybody you know a doctor, lawyer roofer pest control, whatever. Someone who who offers a local a service that is bound by geography.

524

01:59:01.980 –> 01:59:08.880

Tyler Garns: And they have online services. That’d be a business like ours. We’re an agency. We offer a service, but we can offer that to anyone in the world right

525

01:59:09.420 –> 01:59:16.320

Tyler Garns: Then we have influencers you know your authors speakers coaches experts gurus, etc. And then you’ve got e commerce businesses.

526

01:59:16.680 –> 01:59:24.450

Tyler Garns: Pretty much every business will fall into one of those four buckets, unless you’re in like wholesaling or manufacturing or something like that which we generally don’t work with

527

01:59:25.860 –> 01:59:34.290

Tyler Garns: And so you got to look at that and then you gotta look at what are the conversion Models that work with that business model because here’s the problem.

528

01:59:34.890 –> 01:59:46.260

Tyler Garns: Most of the educators out there in the marketing world are influencers and so when you and I go to a conference and we watched the guy on stage show off his amazing million dollar funnel.

529

01:59:47.100 –> 01:59:57.420

Tyler Garns: He’s an influencer and he’s teaching influencer style marketing, right. So Ryan Dice brilliant guy, he’ll get up and talk to you about, you know, lead magnet tripwire core offer profit maximizers

530

01:59:58.050 –> 02:00:08.580

Tyler Garns: Amazing. And that works all day long for an influencer, but that doesn’t work for e commerce doesn’t work for local service, you know, if I have a leak.

531

02:00:09.210 –> 02:00:22.110

Tyler Garns: A pipe that breaks. It’s leaking all over my house sewage. I’m not going to go search online and find the guy with the best lead magnet and opt into that and then by his by his $7 book on having

532

02:00:22.710 –> 02:00:23.670

Todd Staples: A bigger problem.

533

02:00:24.570 –> 02:00:26.670

Tyler Garns: I need someone now right and

534

02:00:27.480 –> 02:00:38.370

Todd Staples: Actually, funny enough, you see my nice new blue painted wall. Yes. Bradley freshly painted because I had a sewage leak on New Year’s Eve. This year right out of the ceiling so

535

02:00:39.300 –> 02:00:40.290

Todd Staples: That’s a whole nother story.

536

02:00:40.800 –> 02:00:48.630

Tyler Garns: Yeah so. So anyways, um, there are conversion models that we’ve defined and organized for each business model. So

537

02:00:48.870 –> 02:00:57.270

Tyler Garns: Again, that’s a huge mistake because we go to the conference and we learn and we say, oh, that’s working for them. Let’s try it for us and doesn’t work well the wrong conversion model for your business model. So

538

02:00:57.630 –> 02:01:07.350

Tyler Garns: Those things have to be aligned once we’re aligned to their now we can finally get into messaging copy, etc. But all those other things have to be in line for us. We got to be in the right industry.

539

02:01:07.680 –> 02:01:14.160

Tyler Garns: We got to have a good offer. We got to have a profitable offer. We got to have the right conversion model for our business model.

540

02:01:14.760 –> 02:01:19.470

Tyler Garns: Now we can actually talk about marketing. Right. So there’s just a lot of pre work to to kind of understand

541

02:01:20.010 –> 02:01:32.160

Tyler Garns: What’s going on there. But once you simplify it down to those things you can easily look at and go, okay, I can see where the problem is. Because now I understand. Oh, it’s the offer. That’s the problem and not the funnel or it’s the funnel is the wrong conversion model or whatever.

542

02:01:32.670 –> 02:01:48.780

Todd Staples: And if you look at that, that chain right that tree I could, the closer you can get to the root, the better because like when you make a tiny adjustment at the very beginning, it has a massive exponential impact on what comes at the end of the funnel.

543

02:01:49.680 –> 02:01:55.710

Tyler Garns: Yeah and that that’s something we deal with on a fairly regular basis where you know at the top at the root, you know, as you called it

544

02:01:56.220 –> 02:02:00.510

Tyler Garns: The potential client has a major problem they come to us and they want us to solve it with a funnel.

545

02:02:01.110 –> 02:02:14.550

Tyler Garns: And we have to tell them hey look, this isn’t going to solve your problem either either week we aren’t going to work for you, or we need to make some major adjustments here. And oftentimes, they don’t like to hear those those words. They just want us to solve the problem, and we can’t

546

02:02:15.030 –> 02:02:20.730

Todd Staples: Right. Right. Yeah. And I’ve worked with a lot of clients and in agencies and companies that have

547

02:02:21.120 –> 02:02:28.080

Todd Staples: That have the issue is if it’s common because people bootstrap and they build something and they kind of piece things together and they end up with a

548

02:02:28.440 –> 02:02:38.280

Todd Staples: Product or company or e commerce site, or whatever it is, it’s sort of this Frankenstein mess that they just piled on patch after patch after patch.

549

02:02:39.480 –> 02:02:53.880

Todd Staples: So getting getting a nice clean slate. I can see you know if you if you’re able to which some people are not always able to in a position to do that extra businesses running. Sometimes it’s hard to make a dramatic shift like that I might be neat to hear your thoughts on that.

550

02:02:54.960 –> 02:02:58.830

Todd Staples: But as a strategic approach. I think it’s, it’s great. Yeah.

551

02:02:59.430 –> 02:03:07.440

Tyler Garns: Yeah. And again, that’s kind of, we were talking about earlier about reinventing yourself. You know when you come to those moments of realization realize, oh, wow. My offers not great or

552

02:03:07.860 –> 02:03:10.440

Tyler Garns: We’ve been doing this for five years, the business doesn’t move forward.

553

02:03:11.280 –> 02:03:19.830

Tyler Garns: It’s because you know what, we’re selling isn’t very profitable. Yeah, you have to decide to make some changes in those moments. And those are tough changes to make because you got to keep the business running

554

02:03:20.280 –> 02:03:25.110

Tyler Garns: Keep employees paid to keep the lights on while you create a new product or service.

555

02:03:25.530 –> 02:03:34.200

Tyler Garns: Keep delivering on the old ones start selling the new ones start delivering on the new one, while you’re still doing the old one. It’s top. Those are tough challenges. I mean, we’ve been through those cycles, a few times.

556

02:03:34.530 –> 02:03:34.950

Yeah.

557

02:03:36.000 –> 02:03:43.620

Todd Staples: How do you see like that you know there’s there’s some emotional work that has to be done with people when they’re going through this right. It’s a mindset.

558

02:03:45.240 –> 02:03:50.760

Todd Staples: In order to do something like that to throw away one idea kind of cut your losses. If it’s not the right

559

02:03:51.180 –> 02:03:58.290

Todd Staples: Direction to go in and like I’ve seen you over the past 10 years make a couple of shifts and how the way you’re adding services and the way you’re

560

02:03:59.010 –> 02:04:09.090

Todd Staples: The type of services you’re providing. And I can see it just like, you know, kind of on the scent trail finding out what’s going to be the absolute best for you and your team and do something that has a lot of value, but

561

02:04:10.290 –> 02:04:20.520

Todd Staples: When you’re working with people who might be rigid in their idea, how do you, how do you help them personally grow and learn that maybe it’s time for a change.

562

02:04:21.000 –> 02:04:34.560

Tyler Garns: Yeah. Well, there’s two things. One is sometimes people just don’t want you and we have to acknowledge the fact that it like they’re not listening to what we’re saying. And so we’re not going to take their money will turn them away. Sometimes they get upset about that.

563

02:04:35.700 –> 02:04:42.270

Tyler Garns: But that’s actually the best way we can help them if we take their money and do what they’re asking us to do to build the funnel or whatever.

564

02:04:43.020 –> 02:04:50.430

Tyler Garns: We’re not doing them any good at all, we’re just, we’re just wasting their money. And so we’ve turned a lot of people away over the years. For those reasons.

565

02:04:51.360 –> 02:04:57.750

Tyler Garns: The next thing is it within our company, you know, we have our set of core values which I defined years ago.

566

02:04:58.050 –> 02:05:10.800

Tyler Garns: And we hire and fire according to those core values. So everyone on my team has to be aligned with these core values and that affects greatly how we operate with our clients so

567

02:05:11.010 –> 02:05:14.400

Tyler Garns: A couple of them. I won’t go through all them, but a couple of them that that I’ll share with you is

568

02:05:14.880 –> 02:05:24.330

Tyler Garns: We’re passionate about helping entrepreneurs succeed and we serve with compassion and so that conversation that we have with the client when we have to tell them, like the bad news, like, Hey, your offers really terrible. Most people.

569

02:05:25.740 –> 02:05:26.610

Todd Staples: Nice. You do it nicely.

570

02:05:26.640 –> 02:05:28.230

Todd Staples: Will you let them down easy.

571

02:05:28.260 –> 02:05:35.430

Tyler Garns: Yeah. Most people are totally fine hearing that news as long as you are delivering it with compassion, like, yeah, we understand

572

02:05:35.790 –> 02:05:46.020

Tyler Garns: And I, I’m very open with our team like about how I run day to day as a business owner and I want them to see all of that because I want them to understand what it’s like

573

02:05:46.560 –> 02:05:50.940

Tyler Garns: So that when they’re talking to our clients they get it. They get the stresses, they get the

574

02:05:51.180 –> 02:05:55.920

Tyler Garns: Time commitments, they get, you know, the weight that’s on their shoulders at all times, they get what it feels like.

575

02:05:56.130 –> 02:06:04.620

Tyler Garns: To get to the end of the month and be worrying about are we going to make payroll this month or not like they get all of that stuff because I share it with them. We talk about it openly all the time.

576

02:06:05.130 –> 02:06:18.150

Tyler Garns: And they’re just people who inherently already are compassionate like that and and that’s really, really important because yet when you have to have those tough conversations with people. If you do it with compassion, then it’s fine.

577

02:06:19.320 –> 02:06:26.760

Tyler Garns: If you don’t even if you think your doing it with compassion, but the compassion is not real, then it comes off rude and people are having. Yeah.

578

02:06:27.330 –> 02:06:33.570

Todd Staples: So it’s real empathy like feeling being able to feel someone else’s pain and and address it.

579

02:06:34.050 –> 02:06:43.530

Tyler Garns: Yeah, yeah. So just as an example, years ago, you know, I had a certain team member who would get off of a phone call with a client and

580

02:06:43.920 –> 02:06:48.210

Tyler Garns: It’d be a really frustrating phone call, because the client is not getting it like he’s giving great advice.

581

02:06:48.540 –> 02:06:55.320

Tyler Garns: And he’s trying to guide the client trying to do the right thing for the client, but the clients not listening. You’re off the phone call. And he’d be like, hi guys such an idiot.

582

02:06:56.220 –> 02:07:13.440

Tyler Garns: And I just elated them. I said, Look, you cannot talk about our clients like that. Yeah, I don’t care if they are a real idiot, you feel like they’re an idiot. Then you’re going to convey that unintentionally to the client. And that was not okay.

583

02:07:14.610 –> 02:07:18.540

Tyler Garns: And that person no longer works with best anymore like it. It

584

02:07:19.710 –> 02:07:22.320

Tyler Garns: I need people who, when they get out that phone call.

585

02:07:22.830 –> 02:07:30.090

Tyler Garns: They’re so bothered internally, because they know what’s right for the client and the clients not listening and they just want so badly to help the client.

586

02:07:30.300 –> 02:07:36.870

Tyler Garns: Understand have success. Right. That’s a totally different feel and approach, even if you say the same thing. It’s going to come off differently.

587

02:07:37.200 –> 02:07:50.520

Todd Staples: Yeah, totally. We honestly we could maybe we should do a whole episode on on mindset because those, those things are so critical. When you like the difference in getting off the call and be like such an idiot. Right.

588

02:07:50.940 –> 02:08:01.230

Todd Staples: And then taking a moment to really feel what it’s like to to maybe be ignorant to something and and no you’re right. Right. So you’re fighting the person on the phone, who probably knows more than you do.

589

02:08:01.590 –> 02:08:07.830

Todd Staples: And you could sound like an idiot in that moment, but we all do that stuff just in different areas of our life. Right, sure.

590

02:08:09.060 –> 02:08:20.160

Todd Staples: So yeah, just the way to look at that from okay they don’t know any better. They think they’re right. I know they’re not so I got to find a way to get through to them, you know,

591

02:08:21.060 –> 02:08:28.650

Tyler Garns: Yeah, there’s that as an analogy that I read in a little booklet that I was given by Lisa Sasevich

and I can’t remember who wrote the book, but it’s talking about how

592

02:08:29.160 –> 02:08:34.710

Tyler Garns: We’ve all seen this happen in our house a fly gets in the house. It makes its way to the window because that’s where the light is

593

02:08:35.190 –> 02:08:51.810

Tyler Garns: And the fly is trying to get outside and it’s flying into the window over and over and over, because it sees the light out there. And eventually what happens the flight dies, even if you have like the door open right next to the window that flies gonna die trying to go through that window.

594

02:08:52.980 –> 02:09:03.030

Tyler Garns: Because it doesn’t realize that there’s a door right right around the corner. Right. And like you said, we all. We all fall into that trap and our clients sometimes are in that trap.

595

02:09:03.810 –> 02:09:09.870

Tyler Garns: Not because they’re idiots, just because they haven’t been taught or they don’t know any better, or just because of the pressure

596

02:09:10.170 –> 02:09:15.900

Tyler Garns: Of the business and everything else going on in their lives is so all consuming that they can’t see that those adore around the corner.

597

02:09:16.350 –> 02:09:21.030

Tyler Garns: And so that’s our that’s our goal. And our mission is to help them to guide them around the corner.

598

02:09:21.570 –> 02:09:33.270

Tyler Garns: And help them get out of that trap and be like, hey, there is a door to freedom. It’s over here. It looks a little different than what you were trying to do, but just just trust us. It’s everything’s gonna be okay. Yeah.

599

02:09:33.570 –> 02:09:44.250

Todd Staples: Yeah, you might have to stop flying for your life. Just for a second one is the intensity of building and running a business. It’s a lot so it’s hard to shake that

600

02:09:47.310 –> 02:09:53.370

Todd Staples: That intensity sometimes in order to get the clear mind to think of what the right move is

601

02:09:54.630 –> 02:09:57.000

Todd Staples: Sure. So, um,

602

02:09:58.140 –> 02:10:02.850

Todd Staples: The strategy part. So that’s not developed yet. That’s something that’s in the works.

603

02:10:03.090 –> 02:10:04.500

Tyler Garns: Yeah, I mean we we have a

604

02:10:04.560 –> 02:10:10.110

Tyler Garns: We have a framework of that internally that we utilize for our internal team to manage things with their clients.

605

02:10:10.920 –> 02:10:21.420

Tyler Garns: But like I said, we’re, we’re going to in the future, create a whole service to teach this externally to people, you know, for whatever reason, I feel like that’s just a

606

02:10:22.200 –> 02:10:39.030

Tyler Garns: God given gift that I have is be able to kind of break things down for people and to simple terms, so they can understand what their next steps are. And so I really want to teach that externally to the entire world really but that’s that’s coming

607

02:10:40.380 –> 02:10:42.030

Todd Staples: That’s excellent. That’s excellent.

So Tyler I have, you know, pretty good understanding of your, your history with Infusionsoft. In particular, but maybe you can tell a little bit about that story and

625

02:12:46.350 –> 02:12:58.530

Todd Staples: You know where the position you find yourself in the success you had there and what you learned about building, building a team rapidly building a team and scaling your business and the and the approach that it took to get that done.

626

02:12:59.160 –> 02:13:06.600

Tyler Garns: Yeah. Cool. So what one part of the story that you may not know is that before I started at Infusionsoft. I was actually doing I was working for a pharmaceutical company.

627

02:13:07.020 –> 02:13:09.300

Tyler Garns: pharmaceutical sales and

628

02:13:10.440 –> 02:13:16.170

Tyler Garns: I had prior to that been in the internet industry, you know, internet marketing stuff.

629

02:13:17.370 –> 02:13:27.480

Tyler Garns: But got into pharmaceutical sales and while I was doing that kind of kept sharp on mine, and that skills. I was, you know, had a little side business doing websites for small businesses and things like that.

630

02:13:28.050 –> 02:13:40.860

Tyler Garns: Thought that I was going to leave pharmaceuticals and go do that. But, you know. Luckily, my wife talked me out of it told me I was stupid. And she was, she was right. That would have been a disaster for our family, but eventually I ended up getting a job at Infusionsoft and

631

02:13:41.910 –> 02:13:47.640

Tyler Garns: I had, I had heard about it was intrigued wasn’t sure I wanted to commit wasn’t sure I wanted to leave the

632

02:13:48.060 –> 02:13:58.110

Tyler Garns: You know, cushy lifestyle of a pharmaceutical rep with all the benefits and go work at this like internet startup that, you know, had a very unsure future. So what I did is I went out there.

633

02:13:58.620 –> 02:14:04.980

Tyler Garns: To Arizona. I was living in California. At the time, went to Arizona for a week and just spent a week in the office just

634

02:14:05.760 –> 02:14:15.750

Tyler Garns: Observing and learning and trying to figure out what they were all about. And by the end of the week I had put together a whole like kind of marketing plan presented to the CEO said, hey, I want to work here.

635

02:14:16.170 –> 02:14:20.430

Tyler Garns: Here’s what I can do for you truth of the matter is I had no idea what I was doing. Like I was, you know,

636

02:14:20.970 –> 02:14:27.840

Tyler Garns: I wasn’t totally like I was gonna say I wasn’t lying. I’d had enough experience that I knew. Like you know some of the basic pieces.

637

02:14:28.080 –> 02:14:36.000

Tyler Garns: But I’d never done that at a big company before right i i played around with this stuff like on my own sites and things. So I had no like real

638

02:14:36.630 –> 02:14:51.090

Tyler Garns: Proven history to do what I was proposing to them that I was going to do. Um, but they bought into it, which is great and I got a job and started there as the Internet Marketing Manager, which is basically a glorified term for like the webmaster

639

02:14:55.050 –> 02:14:56.370

Todd Staples: How many people were at the company at the time.

640

02:14:57.150 –> 02:14:58.530

Tyler Garns: About 40 people

641

02:14:59.340 –> 02:15:04.890

Todd Staples: Because now they’re they’re $100 million your business, at least. Right. Yeah, exactly.

642

02:15:05.760 –> 02:15:11.820

Tyler Garns: So about 40 people the marketing department was like three people. It was the marketing director

643

02:15:13.050 –> 02:15:20.190

Tyler Garns: Me and the graphic designer oh four people. And then there was like a marketing coordinator who just did whatever right

644

02:15:21.300 –> 02:15:32.190

Tyler Garns: Until about two weeks after I started though they let go, that the marketing director. He wasn’t performing, I guess. So I went into the VP at the time. I said, hey, look.

645

02:15:33.960 –> 02:15:41.400

Tyler Garns: I’m gonna, I want that director job and I’ve known him for years. He kind of laughed at me, said, hey, I appreciate the you know the

646

02:15:42.390 –> 02:15:51.600

Tyler Garns: Fact that you’re kind of going after it the aggressiveness, or whatever. But you’re not ready. And I said, Okay, well, I’ll just fill that role until you realize that I am ready and you start paying me for it.

647

02:15:54.360 –> 02:15:57.660

Todd Staples: I love that. I mean they had to hire someone anyway right they needed someone to enroll.

648

02:15:58.050 –> 02:16:02.730

Tyler Garns: Right, so about a month later he comes to me. He’s like, All right, you. You’ve earned it, you’ve proven yourself your good.

649

02:16:04.080 –> 02:16:14.670

Tyler Garns: But so then I was director of marketing and eventually the VP of Marketing at Infusionsoft. We grew from about 4 million to like 30 million in annual sales.

650

02:16:15.090 –> 02:16:32.520

Tyler Garns: During those few years that I was there. And it was a ton of fun. That was super exciting is really, you know, fast paced growth environment. You know, I learned so much during that period. It’s insane so much about leadership about hiring about managing people about marketing itself.

651

02:16:33.960 –> 02:16:46.170

Tyler Garns: You know, we were really, really disciplined with our marketing, advertising approach. And I think that’s a big reason why we were successful in those early days, and it was just awesome was a great experience.

652

02:16:46.200 –> 02:17:03.870

Todd Staples: Yeah. That’s really neat. Did you so a lot of what we do with with Scrimmage with the Scrimmage mobile platform is in onboarding and training, but I, I bet I know the answer this question, did you build out internal campaigns with Infusionsoft to do training at the company.

653

02:17:04.950 –> 02:17:07.230

Tyler Garns: at Infusionsoft. We didn’t.

654

02:17:07.290 –> 02:17:09.180

Todd Staples: Oh, I thought you would have. I thought you would have turned

655

02:17:09.600 –> 02:17:12.960

Todd Staples: Out on that and built out a whole internal marketing like automation.

656

02:17:13.350 –> 02:17:20.820

Tyler Garns: You would, you would think so, but we were just such a like scrappy like fast paced company. There was just never time for that.

657

02:17:21.210 –> 02:17:34.350

Tyler Garns: It was kind of an ongoing joke that like you learn Infusionsoft just on the job, figuring it out like there was no training and we were almost kind of proud of that is like if you can’t come in and learn it on your own then you don’t belong here kind of thing.

658

02:17:34.710 –> 02:17:41.430

Tyler Garns: Yeah, yeah. It’s really silly looking back, but it, it worked in those early days, it required people to come in and really just dive in and

659

02:17:41.850 –> 02:17:53.370

Tyler Garns: get their feet wet. Now I have done that a box out, we absolutely have that in my current company. We have a full onboarding process. You know, we don’t use anything like Scrimmage because I didn’t know anything about it, but we use

660

02:17:55.800 –> 02:18:06.090

Tyler Garns: WordPress plugin called mem barium that connects with Infusionsoft automates the whole process of, you know, the learning management system and walking people through everything they need to know as an employee and all that kind of stuff.

661

02:18:06.570 –> 02:18:11.520

Todd Staples: Oh. That’s very cool. Well, that’s a good transition. We can transition into, you know, after Infusionsoft. And they’ve

662

02:18:12.480 –> 02:18:22.590

Todd Staples: dabbled in some one on one consulting and some launches. And now, now you’re doing box out marketing. So we can dive into that and tell me a little bit about what’s going on there. Yeah.

663

02:18:22.830 –> 02:18:24.390

Tyler Garns: So so box, how it’s been

664

02:18:25.470 –> 02:18:38.550

Tyler Garns: For, you know, since 2014 has been a full done for you agency, you know, where we build campaigns we develop the strategy we write the copy we build the landing pages set up everything and Infusionsoft etc so

665

02:18:39.180 –> 02:18:48.870

Tyler Garns: That’s been the core of the business. We’ve done a lot of other things, but that’s that’s the core of who we’ve been at box out for the last six years.

667

02:19:02.610 –> 02:19:09.540

Todd Staples: That’s really cool. Um, alright, well, Tyler. This has been great. I really appreciate you coming on. It’s always great to hear.

668

02:19:10.140 –> 02:19:22.890

Todd Staples: As soon as you do have the marketing strategy school or training program or whatever you end up exactly releasing I’d love to know about it and share it, and we’ll add it to the show notes here.

669

02:19:23.010 –> 02:19:29.940

Tyler Garns: I’ll let you know and let you know. And those who are interested in that kind of help and training. You know, I would suggest following

670

02:19:30.570 –> 02:19:40.650

Tyler Garns: You know, our blog or our social media profiles and things like that because we are putting content out there. It’s just not organized like the way it will be when we put it all together as the product.

671

02:19:40.860 –> 02:19:48.150

Todd Staples: Yeah, and you have I’ve, I can speak from experience that your content, you’ve released a script you give away a lot of lot of really good stuff.

672

02:19:49.020 –> 02:19:58.530

Todd Staples: Thanks so awesome. And that’s boxoutmarketing.com right that’s right. All right. And well, good to see you. But thanks so much. And we’ll be in touch.

673

02:19:58.920 –> 02:20:00.210

Tyler Garns: Alright, thanks. I appreciate it.

The post 043 – 5 Things You Must Know About Marketing Strategy with Tyler Garns appeared first on Learn to Win | The Scrimmage Podcast.