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How A Marketing Agency Uses Podcasts For Growth And Team Alignment With Chris Burres
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- [00:04]
A
This is the Unknown Secrets of Internet Marketing, your insider guide to the strategies top marketers use to crush the competition. Ready to unlock your business full potential? Let's get started. Howdy. Welcome back to another fun filled episode of the Unknown Secrets of Internet Marketing. I am your host, Matthew Bertram. I have a special guest for everyone today. For the longtime listeners, you'll recognize his voice. I have Chris Burris on the show. Chris, welcome to the show.
- [00:35]
B
Hello, Matt. It was great hearing that intro music. I haven't heard that intro music in a very long time and I don't. Do you know the origin of that music?
- [00:44]
A
Your buddy's band, right?
- [00:45]
B
Yeah, yeah, it's a band that, that went defunct and, and I loved that music. And the title of that song is Gold Mine, which I think there's a gold mine. And marketing. There's a gold mine in Internet marketing, there's a gold mine in SEO. So I always liked the song and thought it was appropriate.
- [01:04]
A
And for you first time listeners or recent listeners, Chris is actually the founder of EWR as well as he was the original host of this podcast. We co hosted it for a long time and then I've eventually taken it over and you know, Chris and I stay in contact and I just thought it'd be fun to bring him back on the show.
- [01:30]
B
Yeah, you know, you, you mentioned the founder of ewr. There's been a journey even with the title, with the name. And by the way, you know, one of the things and that I think, you know, there's lots of places that I have lots of room to improve in. One of the places that I'm good is I don't get emotionally attached to some things that other people do. As an example, our company initially was E Web style. Right. So, and it had a hyphen. E Hyphen, Web Style. And funny story, another business partner couldn't find it because he didn't use the hyphen. But we didn't have the choice. Right. So we just were stuck with it. But at some point my business coach comes to me and says, hey, I'm kind of like pitching you guys to work with these clients. And I'm talking about how you're focused on results. And then the name of the company is E Web Style. And. And he was like, I think you should change it to E Web Results. And it took me, I don't know, 30 seconds, like, yeah, okay, yeah, done. And then, then we were E Web Results. And then as you came in, started taking over the CEO role. You wanted to kind of go for bigger marketing, go after bigger markets and kind of bigger clients and you felt like a consolidation of the name. I don't if you want to share your logic on that, but that's been a journey in and of itself.
- [02:51]
A
I still like the name Eweb Results. I think it represents what we do and who we are. I think it was kind of when every, there was a lot of like refresh of brand names like kfc, Kentucky Fried Chicken. And so I really wanted to honor what we had built and what you had built. And so you. EWR is actually E Web Results. A lot of people think it's tied into New York Airport and we are looking at launching a campaign that's talking about, we have a lot of publicly traded companies and international companies now and kind of like the Runway to the skies or, you know, the marketing team's been coming up with some different ideas about it's like an international hub for marketing. And, and yeah, I, I think EWR Digital, when I look back at it, E Web Results is a lot more memorable. So from even like a branding name, there's I, I think a lot of value in that. And you know that, that was definitely an experience to go through a rebrand. For anybody that's gone through a rebrand, that's. That's a really long and hard decision. And then there's a lot that goes into changing everything over, especially when you're a 25 plus year company. Chris.
- [04:12]
B
So, yeah, well, and it's funny, how old of a company are we that we have? E, Right. Because electronic was a big thing. EWR Result. So, so very cool. That's been, that's been a fantastic piece of the journey. I'm the old guy, right, who's been on a podcast since 2009. Right. So here we are, 2026, like that's. What is that, 1620. Wait, if it's 2010, that would be 16, 17 years of podcasting. Because I do have a podcast now called Live beyond the norms related to what I focus on on a daily basis now. But yeah, I'm a, I guess an old school podcaster.
- [05:01]
A
Well, I, you know, the, the E, like the E dash certainly dates the name and I think that, you know, it was time to update from that standpoint. But I think that shows tenure and like stability and length. And then, you know, when we would joke, even eight years ago when it was starting to get hot, we were saying that, you know, podcasting before it was cool, it was really a means to communicate information to a Remote team, like, of like what's going on and what changes are being made. And I, I really think that that format now the one to many, it's a way to disseminate information. And I know that I've, you know, I've done a lot of interviews recently and you and I were talking about it previously, but for the audience, I was going through a Goldman Sachs mba, which I may or may not have mentioned on an episode or two. And I basically prior to that, because there, there's been a couple summers where, when you, when, when you were a lot more involved. Chris. Like, we didn't keep up the cadence of the weekly podcast and that was part of people's ritual and, and we lost a lot of audience during that frame and a lot of other people came out doing stuff and, and so like I had remembered that lesson and, and, and so I banked a lot of podcasts and I, I really just dripped them since the beginning of the year. And you know, I have a lot of great guests that are in the works in line as I'm a lot more active. And you know, I know you and I wanted to maybe talk about some of the things you're doing with your podcast. I know a lot of other people have started podcasts and it's not an immediate successful like result like SEO. Like you make a couple changes and then boom, like you got some improvements and things are getting indexed quickly. It compounds over time. But there are certain things that you can do and learn that are shortcuts and how to be a better podcaster or how to be better at content distribution.
- [07:10]
B
Yeah, I will. So one the immediate results. I'll share how long it took before we got our first call. The way we ended up starting the podcast is we had a sales manager and I didn't know he was the first, really kind of the first hire. And I didn't know like how to train him, right. So I was like, hey, here's this podcast. I can't even remember the name of the podcast out of New Jersey or something. Hey, listen to this. And he probably like a week later came and said, hey, why don't we do our own podcast? That was probably on a Monday and that Friday we recorded our first podcast. Like, that was like, how do we jump on these things? That makes a lot of sense. And so one great way to train up people who are coming on board, like, this is how you do SEO to what you mentioned. This is how you kind of have cohesiveness in the team, right? So everyone on the team is listening to the podcast. They're on the same page, they have the same enthusiasm, the same excitement. And then, of course, you know, potentially, as a marketing strategy, uh, I can tell you we didn't get our first phone call for 12 months. Right. So we were putting a weekly podcast out. Was it week? It was weekly podcast out. And for 12 months before we even got our first, like, hey, you know, you guys exist, I hear you. So, yeah, it can be a longer strategy. And there are things that I would. That I would might do differently now because we didn't do interviews really until you came on board. And it's a smart strategy to do interviews now, I'll tell you. Kind of in the YouTube space and kind of from my experience now, because I actually record and put out two podcasts per week for Live beyond the Numbers.
- [08:56]
A
So I just want to say, like, Chris is on the level of content production as like a Alex Hermosi. Like, I am serious. And you've met Alex Hermosi. Like, I mean, Gary Vaynerchuk, whatever. Like, you are pumping out in your vertical more content than anybody I've ever seen. Like, doing the online, where you did, like, 60 interviews. It was like an online conference. I mean, you've taken podcasting to the next level.
- [09:26]
B
Well, I'm going to share. There's two pieces to this story that you're involved in. So one, I remember when we first started working together, one of your statements was, hey, companies of the future need to be a media company. In my head, I was like, okay, it didn't really resonate. And I'm in a studio now. Right. Like, I know, like, I'm literally at this office, have a studio. And I believe that as a company, we're doing the right thing when I'm in this studio, because we are now a media company, and that's really important. The other piece, being on podcast really wasn't on my radar. So I'm not talking about, you know, having a podcast. Being on podcast wasn't on my radar. You came to me and you said, I've got this vendor who will get you on podcasts. It's not in my budget right now. I need you to buy from this guy so that he gets you on podcast, because I need to keep him in my hip pocket, and I think it'll be a value. What a great decision. Right, Right. Like, so now at this company, I've hired, like, five different companies to get me on different podcasts. I. I think I have two or three. Right. Well, at least two interviewing another to get me on podcast. Because this is a viable strategy. Yeah, go ahead.
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A
Okay. So, Chris, I want to ask you this question. I know you were going to probably get here, but I wanted to interview style, ask you this question.
- [10:51]
B
Yeah, yeah.
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A
What is the most money? Or if you don't want to share that.
- [10:55]
B
Yeah.
- [10:56]
A
But what is the most money that you've ever spent to get on a podcast?
- [10:59]
B
Oh, the most money I have ever spent was $30,000 to get onto a podcast, and we spent that at the end of last year. And. And that was for Dave Asprey's podcast. Right. That was ostensibly 30 minutes of being on his podcast. And I will share. It was well worth it. Like. Like, if I could. If I could do that every whatever time period, I would continue to do that, because that was, you know, when. When. Here's what I joke, because I've been on like, 140 different podcasts, and. And what I say is, if that podcast has audience, which they usually don't. Right. And if that podcast podcaster has influence, which they even have less influence than they have audience typically, then it will move the needle. So a lot of the podcasts that I go on, barely traceable sales, but I'm gonna tell the story, right. You should be comfortable telling the story to anyone who will listen. And if you could potentially get on a podcast and tell it to 10 to 100 people instead of just one, you should do that. Like, that's. That's my opinion. There may be some point where, you know, we're generating enough value and it's not worth my time to do that. I have a hard time seeing where that is. I just believe I'll share with you. I just recorded a podcast. The guys in the vision space, he. We start talking about my product. He's like, oh, I've been looking for you. Right. Like, for you. Related to my product. I sell a lot of this stuff, so I want to use you. Right. Yeah, I didn't. I didn't know that was going to happen. Right. That's because I'm going. And by the way, a couple of things. A previous interview I did, he asked the pre. That person very big in the space. Her name's JJ Virgin. She's been on TV on all sorts of kind of physical training stuff, and she was like, oh, yeah, that was a. That interview was a lot of fun. Right. So I'm building these relationships, and it's one of the things that I think is really valuable. Now I will say, right, because before we started, you were saying, I've got like, my goal is like three interviews and then one of your kind of summaries. I will share. It's been told to me. And I look at the data in terms of like audience size and visibility. It should be three of you talking and sharing your expertise and. And one interview. Interview. Use the interview to kind of collaborate and share audience and build relationship. And then what people are interested in is like, hey, how do I do SEO? Oh, my God, how do I do SEO for AI? Right? And is it different if I want to do well on Grok or I want to do well on. On Gemini or chat? Like, those are the things that people will tune into and connect with you and ask questions about. So anyway,
- [13:47]
A
yeah, no, I mean, I have a whiteboard right here behind me. I have everything ready to go. It's just getting the time, I think I'm speaking at OTC next week. And then about AI.
- [14:00]
B
Okay, hold on. So you just said, I'm speaking at OTC next week. Most of the people, unless they're in the Houston area, don't know what it is. So it's Offshore technology conference. They don't know how big it is. Like, this is Shell Ericsson, right? This is every major oil company and then really major service company from the level of just making generators or everything downhole oil and gas related. It's an amazing conference and the fact that you're speaking there is huge.
- [14:32]
A
Yeah, it's the biggest oil and gas conference in the world and I've been going to it for a long time, by the way.
- [14:40]
B
I don't know if anyone out there knows oil and gas has a big impact in the world. I guess we know that now because of the Strait of Hormuz. But, like, it's huge. The biggest of the most important industry. Go ahead.
- [14:56]
A
Yeah. And that's really. EWR focuses on regulated industries. So we work a lot in healthcare. We got a big footprint here in the Houston area, as well as oil and gas. We actually just got notified for AMA finalists for AI Digital Transformation Award, and that's for a publicly traded oil company that we're working with. Very cool.
- [15:20]
B
So, yeah, American Marketing Association. Marketing association, yeah. We've got a couple truffle trophies from them from there already.
- [15:30]
A
Yeah, I. I need to do a better job talking about what EWR does. When I look at the audience sets, EWR has a very different audience set than the podcast. I think a lot of the people that are podcasters are other agencies, freelancers, web developers, And I really think AI and governance is what I'm talking a lot more about now. And I'm trying to insert it into the conversation a little bit more. But that is really why I bought Modal Point, which is a go to market consultancy for oil and gas from as we're talking about podcasts. This was his former business before he started OGGN Oil and Gas Global Network, which is the largest oil and gas podcasting network. And so you know, certainly Chris, you know, we had the case study which I think is still on the website where we had limited budget and we started getting you into podcasts and now it's like your KPI for what you're doing. So I guess that this episode is about well, let's talk about some longevity at some point. But, but, but about podcast marketing has really been influential and how I've viewed the world and I think it's a part of a go to market strategy about content creation and so really drank our own Kool Aid. But I'm seeing with what is happening with AI and power users of AI will understand what I'm talking about or if we're talking about automation is really understanding like even like a developer like governance and like permissions and like who has the judgment to make decisions because I think it all starts there. So like all the marketing that we're doing and how to make a company AI first and like we're getting a lot of those kind of opportunities with ewr. But, but before all that, like you, you got to make some really hard decisions and map everything out and, and I think that that was a little bit too much for EWR to do it all and so I wanted to have a dedicated focus to that and we're working a lot in energy and so it, it really made a lot of sense as, as Mark was, you know, looking to exit and, and so, so I put my hat in the ring and, and, and we talked about it and, and got. Got that done and, and so that's a new brand that, that we're launching. And for those of you that are looking for podcasts, where you want to hear my opinion, I do do a podcast called Oil and Gas Sales and Marketing but a lot of it has to do with just general marketing, but it's applied to oil and gas and I bring the marketing side of it, Mark brings the sales side of it and then we do bring on other guests so that, that's kind of a different angle. And so you might get a lot of my thoughts there. So might want to go check that out as well.
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B
Very cool. And so your talk at otc, the Offshore Technology Conference, is on AI governance. Is that, is that kind of what that talk is about?
- [18:36]
A
Well, funny enough, I got asked to speak about AI governance. Yes. And then when we got on the call, they asked me to moderate the panel. And so really, Ericsson is setting up their own kind of private networks for people to run agents on. There's more to that. And they have a number of clients. And so we're going to be. Well, I'm going to be moderating a talk and I'm going to just kind of provide a governance framework. There's a lot of things that are happening in AI and a lot of people haven't talked about governance yet. A lot of people are talking about application, but the conversation in the regulations and like, the laws are, are, are getting ahead of what people are talking about. And, and there's a little bit of a mismatch and there's some fines and there's some issues and people are going to start asking. That's why I joined the aipp, the International association of Privacy Professionals of, like, data governance, of, of what are people doing with their data? Like, where are you sending it to? Who has access to it? Like, these questions are going to start getting asked, like AI policies internally at a company. Like, these are things that haven't been talked about. Everybody's just talking about output and like, performance. But yeah, we're seeing a lot with tools. Things are breaking, like, how is it grabbing information? Like, you know, there's always been the issue of, like, people using images that are licensed by somebody else. Like, like all these AIs are ingesting all this data and how does, how is that controlled? You know, so, sorry, I have a client calling me.
- [20:17]
B
Yeah, I think that's really right, AI. You know, again, productivity is, is off the charts. And I'm excited about, you know, what, what's coming down the pipe in AI. But you often, you know, you're so excited and jump in to use it that you're not thinking about what are the risks? Right? What are the, what are the data risks? And I think that's, that's really important that you're, that you're talking about that.
- [20:42]
A
Well, that, like, okay, so like, when AI came on the scene, we certainly started playing around with it early, but I, I didn't talk about it immediately because this is like how my brain works and like a new technology, I'm one that wants to read the manual. Okay. Like, and so like, I, I've done a lot of the online trainings, I've done a lot of, like, masterminds workshops. Like, I really wanted to get my head around it. I took some courses at Harvard and Oxford and like, I just, I wanted to get a very, very solid foundation before I started talking about it. And I knew that this was going to be bigger than the Internet. My mom was one of the first employees of Microsoft. I saw what happened with the Internet. I was like, this is going to be bigger. Like, let me build that foundation. And what I'm finding out, Chris, as I'm talking to people, they don't have the same foundational knowledge as me. So I can't, I have to kind of walk back what I'm saying to get them to the point where we can have a conversation about something. And, you know, I, I, I think I'm relying a lot on all the hours and all the things that I did to put in to, to help frame my mental map of like, how to deal with this and where I sit today. I'm like, anytime we look at a system or, you know, some kind of marketing system that we're building or what we're doing with automation, or like, what's a client doing? It's like assessing what they're currently doing, what their current workflows are, what they're using it, and then how we can apply different applications and how do we get the team to become like a connected worker and hooked into like this new way of thinking. I think that that's this step change that's going to be really difficult for a lot of businesses because there's a statistic out there that something like 71% of businesses are still operating like they're in the industrial era and they're copying and pasting, like things from one spreadsheet to another. And it's like, that can all be done through like, APIs and hooks and, you know, and so I don't know, I, I think that now people are getting confronted with, okay, the world is changing. I need to change with it. How do I do it? I believe it all starts with governance. And, and, well, you know, cyber security is a component of that. We do that with co hosta, but I don't know, like, the world's in a different place now and I think people are running really hard and you hear all these horror stories about AI, but it's like, because people, like, if you give somebody a bunch of weapons, you know, and you don't teach people how to be gonna happen.
- [23:20]
B
Let's go with a nail gun. If you give them a nail gun, like things can go wrong, right? Like they're, they just go, here's a nail gun.
- [23:27]
A
And they don't like explain what it is or how to do it. And then you drop it across everybody in the world. So now everybody in the world has a nail gun. I think that's great. You know, like some, some interesting things are gonna happen. Like people are gonna do some really cool things, but people are going to do some really not so good things as well.
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B
Right.
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A
So.
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B
Yeah, and a lot of those will end up on video on YouTube or would end up on YouTube.
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A
There's got to be a channel for that.
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B
Yeah, things, things not to do with.
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A
Well, Chris, let's talk about, let's talk about what, what it is you're doing. And you know, like they're like, we've talked a lot about podcasts, we've thrown a lot out. People are probably scratching stuff down. I probably need to put a ton of links in the show notes. Like, you know, longevity is like was nascent a couple years ago. I think that you've been one of the biggest influences and in impactors in that space. And now like it's, it's not anti aging, it's longevity. Like it's quality of life. It's, it's life extension. Like this is a different category that may build on top of it or might have a Venn diagram overlay on top with it. But, but this is something totally revolutionary. And like I've seen like I've been following you on social media and when we talk like, I mean there's full blown conferences, there's retreats, there's so many different products out there. There's regimens. Now they're talking about in like peptides and like, like, I mean everything's coming like front, front of mind. Right. And so I would love to hear your kind of framework for how you're looking at the world and how people should be viewing health. Maybe.
- [25:15]
B
Yeah, well, I think they should be viewing health optimistically and longevity optimistically. There's a thing called the longevity escape velocity, which the concept is in any given year the medical community extends life by slightly more than a year. Right. And if you do the math on that, at some point there could be somebody who is the last person to die of natural causes. It would suck to be that. Well, I guess they wouldn't know, but it would suck to meet that person who's the last one to die of Natural causes. And so this longevity escape velocity is something that I wholeheartedly believe in. And it sounds crazy, right Chris? So you believe that we can live forever? I think we can get there. And here is the evidence that I used to do that. So in 1950, medical information doubled every 50 years, every 5, 0 years. When I started talking about this kind of peace and this longevity escape velocity, beginning of 2025, medical information was doubling every three months. Now this is hard to comprehend, but what that means is at the end of 2026, we, we're going to have 16 times more information, medical information than we did at the beginning. Right? So it's not just doubled, tripled, 16 times more information at the end of 2026. So if it is possible, it is going to happen, right? We're going to identify, you know, some of the key things, how to extend telomeres, how to address stem cell depletion because of, I'm going to throw out some stuff, but because of red bone marrow shrinkage, we're going to, going to address the, you know, chronic inflammation. These things are going to be addressed. And if you think about it, the fact that the information is 16 times as much has nothing to do with AI, right? Like, okay, maybe we can write papers a little bit faster or whatever, but the real value is the immense amount of data that AI can process. For example, a really good scientific experimenter wakes up and they have 10, 50, 100 kinds of experiments, experiments that they could run and they're like, ah, you know, whatever. My subconscious brain says we should do these three. Whereas the AI can come in and go, no, you shouldn't do those three. Right, right. Because one one's gonna fail entirely and if the other two succeed, no big deal, you should do these three because they're more likely to succeed in the area that you want to. And they'll also have add on benefits in some other realm of biology. So now not Only is it 16 times more information, it's better studies from the beginning. And so I'm extremely excited about this.
- [27:58]
A
So what I started thinking about when you were talking was one Google mapped all the proteins or something like that a couple years ago. And then as you were talking you're like, oh, AI will be like, let's just do all of them. And because I'm starting to see, and we're using this in ad sets too, where, where you can have a, what is it? Synthetic audience, right? So you can take a synthetic audience, you can drop like a marketing message into that audience and you can see how it impacts and kind of how the virality spreads. You can take like just pure compute processing. You can put like a digital twin, you can create a digital twin of this test and who you're going to test it on. And then, and then you can run all these tests simultaneously and actually figure out what that output is. Or you can start with the most beneficial, you think, and then build on that data to, to go through that whole cycle of testing which could take that 50 years and you could do it in you know, 50 days or something like that, right?
- [29:06]
B
Yeah. So then again, you know what tests to run, you know, the most optimized test to run. And, and, and that's really, I think that's really exciting and, and just to share, like the way I ended up here is because of this molecule, right? So I'm holding up a model of a molecule. If you're listening, just imagine a soccer ball where the lines on the ball represent the bonds between the carbon atoms. You have a spherical molecule of 60 carbon atoms. We call that ESS 60. I'll be real brief here. I can talk for hours on this stuff because it's just fascinating and we're doing lots of research. We're starting clinical trials this year. But the molecule was thought to be toxic. They put it in a toxicity study instead of being toxic. The test subjects that they gave it to, in this case wistar rats, lived 90% longer than the control group. So the single longest longevity experimental result on mammals in history, peer reviewed, published research, is because of this molecule. By the way, I've been manufacturing it since 1991. Right. Like a long time before we started eweb style, eWeb results, EWR Digital. I've been manufacturing and involved in this business from then. It just happens at the time that I kind of started to step out of ewr, the, this moved into the health and wellness space and the kind of entrepreneurial opportunity, double tripled, whatever. And that's another thing that we need to talk about today is, is the, is the gauntlet has been handed over. Right. The crown or the crown jewel of digital marketing has been handed over. And now Matt is the person to, to take this EWR crown and carry it forward and you know, really carry it forward into the AI generation. Like that's a huge piece of it. So I'm really excited. You are complete owner and this is, I feel very happy that it's going into the hands of somebody who's interested in the legacy. Right. Like when you were interested as the CEO in changing the name, you were also very interested in keeping the legacy with it. Right. So you could have gone from E. Web style to just Matt's business or whatever.
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A
Purple Gorilla. I was going out like Purple Gorilla, we actually own that,
- [31:23]
B
but wanted to keep that legacy. Right. And so I really appreciate that you're carrying this forward, and I'm excited about the things that you're going to do and keeping an eye on that and staying in contact so that we can share great stories.
- [31:38]
A
No, well, I appreciate that, Chris. And it was interesting to see when we saw the opportunity and my pharmaceutical background and what we were doing and like, to see the opportunity grow. And that, that's what I wanted to highlight is Chris is like, so one is this Buckyball won a Nobel Prize or something like that?
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B
Yeah.
- [32:02]
A
Okay, so this is like, this is not just like, somebody in their garage making something. Like, this was like, one of the key researchers which you introduced me to was the, like, the assistant to the person that discovered it at Rice and helped kind of get, get all this going when y' all got it going. And he's very entrepreneurial as well and has a bunch of other businesses, but y' all manufacture it. You are the biggest manufacturers in North America of something that is very, very unique. I remember when we started, I, I, you know, I, I, I had some pharmaceutical contacts, but we were bringing in co packers, and we were bringing in different people, and no one would touch it because it wasn't based on benzene. Right. And everything was kind of based on benzene. And so this is, like, completely revolutionary that almost anybody that I was associated with in the, in the pharma industry didn't even know how to approach this. But as we started getting in to, like, personal medicine, doctors, they were like, oh, we're buying this out of Switzerland, and we can only get very small doses of it. And like, I mean, so it was, there was a nascent community around this and the success. And then y' all started manufacturing it in a heavy way. And it, it just grew and grew and grew. And like, for somebody that's like, works at night, you know, or like, okay, like, I'm not a shift worker, let's say, but, like, I mean, when you program or like when you're working, like, at night, it's quiet. Like, you don't, you know, there's, there's issues. Like, you're always looking for something to enhance your cognitive ability to, to stay awake, to sleep, to, well, make sure you're healthy and you don't have issues. And when I was on site with you and like both businesses were growing. Okay. The testimonials that came in blew my mind. And I know that you aren't paying for them and you weren't doing it like anything like, like the quality. Also people were buying what you were producing, watering it down. Okay. And then reselling it and you weren't doing that. And I mean, I started taking it. I remember I gave it to my cat. It saved my cat's life. That the vet said there's going to die. Like I've seen this firsthand. I've heard the testimonials come in. I know the quality of what you're making and it's part of. Actually my. Well, my daily routine is variable as it is, but it would be part of my daily routine. It's certainly part of my weekly routine. I, I always do take this stuff and I, I do just generally feel better for. For doing it. And I know that the quality is there and I know like I. All the testimonials in every area, like it just makes your body operate better. I mean, I don't know. You could speak to this better. I just am looking at it from the outside looking in and. And it's just really incredible what this molecule does for people.
- [35:05]
B
Yeah, a couple things there. So one, we started manufacturing this in 1991. The guys who won the Nobel Prize won the Nobel Prize in 1996. So a whole five years before.
- [35:16]
A
And they use your stuff, right?
- [35:18]
B
Yeah, well, to some degree, yeah. Like basically every. So I'm not a very braggadocious person, but this is as braggadocious as I'll get. It's not unreasonable to suggest that the fact that we were delivering commercial quantities of this carbon nanomaterial to scientists around the world and they could get their hands on it and they could run experiments on it and they could understand how valuable the molecule was. Is part of the reason that those three scientists, Dr. Smalley, Dr. Croto and Dr. Kurl won the Nobel Prize, at least in terms of timeframe. So we're very early on. You talked about some of the benefits. Our most consistent testimonial is people take it in the morning, they report mental focus and energy during the day and then better sleep that night. Those are all brain related. Right. And the reason they're all brain related is because of what's the theory that behind what's driving this, which is the BOSS theory. So that sense for the buffering oxidative stress system. So um, long and short we Know the molecule gets into the mitochondria from peer reviewed published research and we know that the mo. The molecule can hold up to six negatively charged particles. So your mitochondria is an energy source, right? It's the powerhouse of every cell. There's between 50 and 5,000 cells and mitochondria in every cell in your body except for your blood cells which have 0 and your brain and neurons which have 2 million. It's amazing how much energy our nervous system uses relative to our other systems. It's just off, it's off the charts, right? 50 to 5,002 million when that energy source produces the negative byproduct. Because every energy source, you know, produces a negative byproduct. Like a car going down the road has exhaust. In this case it's these negatively charged particles. And because the ES is 60 molecules in there, it can hold on to them so they don't run around and do a bunch of damage and really give your, your mitochondria, your cells, the buffer it needs in order to manage these stress situations, these reactive oxygen species without having incurred damage. Now just a couple things like to, to take something in the morning and positively impact sleep at night. That's phenomenal. I'm not, you know, now I've been kind of eight years asking the question, what do you know that you can take in the morning and positively impact sleep at night? Nobody. There isn't anything even impact you like
- [37:42]
A
weeks, months down the road from what the studies have shown. I mean I know like I did take it this morning not because you were going to be on the show or anything. I like actually legit take it like it's part of my regimen and I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, you know, I have a bottle and I'll do a chug of it, you know, and I definitely like when I know I need that cognitive focus, it's part of the regimen for that. And, and I mean, I don't know like you're talking about, it sounded like you're talking about like free radicals and like, you know, basically like it's a super antioxidant essentially like way stronger than some of the stuff that's out there. It's like, like a, like ultra off the chart kind of thing.
- [38:24]
B
Well, just real quick, there's a study, ad hoc study on the web. 172 times more powerful than vitamin C. Peer reviewed published research. 125 times more powerful than vitamin C.
- [38:36]
A
Yeah, no, that, that's what I was referencing. I'm glad you articulated it better for the audience. It's legit. Like, it, it's, it's legit. My cat's still alive, actually. That's living, like, really a lot, like, way longer. It's like, I think it's like 17 years. Like, the cats really. Wow.
- [38:53]
B
And they were going to put it down. What was that?
- [38:55]
A
Oh, that was, that was five or six years ago. Yeah, yeah, maybe longer. But I, Yeah, I, I really buy into the, the longevity story. And like, I mean, I, I've, I, I always ask you, like, is this guy legit? Or, like, what is he saying? Or whatever. But, I mean, people are talking to, like, getting old is a, A, like a disease that can be, or a illness that can be cured is kind of how I'm starting to see people talk about it. Like, you talk about technology advancements, you talk about health advancements, and, you know, they're going, they're going hand in hand. And I mean, I think that, you know, my vital C is in the conversation and what SES research is producing. So, I mean, I think it's pretty incredible.
- [39:41]
B
Yeah. Well, I, like I said, I just recorded a podcast with a kind of a cutting edge optometrist, and he's like, this is something I'm already giving to my clients and I want to, like, focus on your product since you guys are the originators, right? So if you. Well, and your eyes have a significantly higher quantity of mitochondria in them anyway. Rods, cones, you know, different parts of your eyes because they're so intricate, intricately combined with your brain. Right? Like your eyes and brain and actually even dental work is all like one nervous system all tied together. So. Yeah, it's exciting. One of the things that I do love about pet testimonials, right? Anytime you're hearing about something new, something that's going through your head should be like, what, what percentage of the impact is due to the placebo effect? Because there is some. Like, the placebo effect impacts medications, it impacts your workout. If you do a workout and are convinced it won't do anything for you, it in fact will do less for you. Right? Like, that's how powerful the placebo effect is. The thing with pets is there's no placebo effect, Right? Like your, your pet is alive not because of, like, of a placebo effect. It's because this had some benefits for your cat.
- [40:59]
A
Yeah, Well, I think placebo is about mindset. Okay. And, and like, I was listening this morning, there was a study that Said like if you're thinking about practicing something like a musical instrument or something like that. 50 impact of actually practicing is thinking about practicing. And that's how powerful the brain is. And so being in a positive state of mind, focusing on what you're like directing your attention on impacts it. Like if you're like this is going to heal my body and you're saying that and you're telling yourself that like your body's gonna like fix itself, right? And, and where medication and supplements and all these other things come in is to give it like extra firepower to, to be able to, for the immune system to do what it naturally does. I mean the body naturally heals itself. Like something like what is it? Like the cells turn over every, I don't know, seven months or like, or I don't know, I don't know what cells, right?
- [41:59]
B
Your skin sloughing up all the time. Your muscles is. Every three months, every three months, every cell, every muscle cell you have has been replaced.
- [42:07]
A
That is insane. That's just insane. Like so we're recruit, like we're, I mean we're turning over all this stuff and so to, to, to give the mitochondria the, the ability to, to do that. I think that there's other you know, mechanisms, action associated with it. But I mean I don't know. I, I, I just know that this is going to be huge and it is huge. You know, I'm seeing kind of AI and kind of digital marketing and, and all that are, are people are being affected by it first. Like Chris, the last two agency owners that I interviewed that are like power users of, of AI in like the, the pre interview post interview. Like we've had some lengthy conversations even during the interview. Like I'm seeing that these marketers are, are, are being empowered to step outside of marketing and help businesses and other kind of operations because you, you AI is affecting everything, right? And it affected marketing first. Maybe hr, legal review, but like to become like a, a, a connected worker and understand how all these things work, that's the next skill set that is needing to be developed. And I think even when like people are getting interviewed, it's like do you know like I remember someone was joking with me that back in the day you people put on their resume understanding of the world Wide web and that was actually like something that businesses were looking for and needed to understand. I feel like AI's the same way. Like how AI native are you? Do you understand how these systems work? How productive can you be? And it's not just understanding what it is, but it's understanding like, how to apply it, how to use it. And, and I, I just think that that's going to be the next conversation. And I think that a lot of people that were impacted early by AI are going to have such exponential opportunity because they, they use it day in, day out. Because, like, when I get outside of this bubble that I'm in, and if you're listening to this podcast, you're certainly in the bubble and you talk to people like how they're using AI, they're like, oh, well, like we put it in a spreadsheet and like, oh, it came up with some numbers. Or like, oh, we used it to help, we use Copilot a lot of, to help us write email. Or the best one is I'm using AI overviews. I'm using AI Overviews. Google. So they're using, they're using AI and guess what? They're not wrong. They are using AI. But it's like that, that image of the iceberg, you know, and, and they're, and they're touching the tip of the iceberg. And, and, and I, I just, I don't know. I think that this is where everything's going. I, I have been debating on changing the name quite, quite a while of the podcast. I just, you know, I, I, you know, you start over when you do that and people can't find you. And I think we still have search volume for E Web style. Not as much that tails that tail was quite long, but shortened. But E Web results, people still do search for and we do have the domains redirected to EWR Digital. And so, you know, I mean, it's hard when you're in a world that continues to shift and things keep changing and things that were bad for you are now good for you. And you know, like, things online continue to change. And I think that we just really as humans live in a state of being able to adapt to a changing world. And that's like, the only thing that's consistent is kind of the jagged edge of unstability of where things are going and understanding your place in that and how to transverse that landscape.
- [46:17]
B
Yeah, I think so. I listened to a podcast called Moonshots, which is a lot. I get changed over to AI and one day I'm driving to work and I'm like, and we've got a successful company here. But part of me is like, should I stop everything I'm doing and focus on AI? Right? Because they were, I don't know how frequently their episodes were coming out, but now it's two and sometimes three times a week because AI is changing so much and it's going to be so impactful. And then my ultimate conclusion was no, I should use AI inside of my environment as much as possible. How do I leverage and multiply the productivity so that we're, you know, we're, we're generating more value faster. And so that's, you know, I'm not quitting what I'm doing. I love what I'm doing. I'm utilizing AI for sure.
- [47:08]
A
Yeah, I've had that same battle. Because we're so heavily entrenched in AI, I think it's starting to be ubiquitous and what we're doing and how we're doing things and really moonshots tells you where everything's going in space and longevity and they bring on different people. And it's really good to like, understand the like 10 year like strategy. Yeah. And then walking it all the way back to like what we're talking about as far as like the implementation and the execution. And that's been the feedback Chris, that I've gotten is as like. And we've been labeled as like an advanced SEO podcast or whatever. But I think really maybe getting recategorized into the AI category because I like a lot of these conversations, how they apply to business operations and how to think about governance and all that sort of thing. And marketing certainly gets impacted by that and that's like a big swath of who's going to be affected and I mean, how brands present online and like, what is their reputation and how do you leverage all that is a huge surface area of, of what AI covers because it's the spoken language. You know, I see with like again multimodal AI coming out, the surface areas are, are certainly changing and evolving and I think people. And again, I need to get more on YouTube on, on kind of the implementation and, and showing people how to do this stuff. But that's, that's where I, I think it's going is like the execution component and I like highlighting different case studies. So when people reach out to me and if you're listening, you want to come on the podcast and your agency owner, I love to hear how you're using it, how you're thinking about it, what are the mental models and the frameworks that you're using to put this all together because you have all these different siloed systems and trying to get them to connect. And we're working on a New org chart right now, Chris, where we have two AI employees integrated on the work chart. And what do we give them access to and what are their jobs and defining their duties? I mean, that's an amalgamation of what we learned in EOS and Agile. So I just have a hats off to marketers that I think that sometimes they get put in a category of like this, but to be able to do that, they have to know everything, especially SEO. You have to know everything. And so I think that there's going to be elevation of people that understand how the algorithms work and programmers that can articulate this knowledge to executives are going to be elevated into the room, into the boardroom, into the conversations, because they're the ones that have the data, they're the ones that have the knowledge and the know how to make this stuff happen. And, and I think that there's going to be a huge transformation of what it means to be an agency or a firm in the space and, and how they work with businesses. And you know, again, there's going to be a tail on that as well. And there's going to be a lot of people that, that probably don't change fast enough. But the people that are listening to this podcast are the people that are making those changes and those steps. And you have to grow and you have to learn like anything else. And it's like almost taking like system thinking and becoming like a programmer, like a programmer brain to take that into operations and marketing. And so there's so many different disciplines that you have to learn to make it all fit together. For me, like, I, I, you know, I'm a little bit idea for you. And so I love it. And then I have great people that I can take that and hand it to, like Shantay or Jeff and just like go put this together, operationalize it, train the team and get it pushed out there. And we've been bringing on a number of new people. We've hired four people in the last month. And so there's a lot of great things we're doing over at ewr. I don't promote it enough. Go, go check it out. We are open to sponsors now. I didn't want to take on sponsors when I was going through the Goldman program, but we are open to sponsors that align with like these core goals. You know, like one of, one of the things we just landed on on the other podcast was actually from like a hiring standpoint, like a hiring grading standpoint, utilizing AI, like a grader. But yeah, like, I mean, there's so many different ways to look at this. But where I see everything going is kind of like a, like a connected worker that understands how to use all these tools and that. That maybe started in marketing, but. But branches out into to a lot of other things. And you know, Chris, like, I. I'm sharing this for the first time with the audience, and you and I, like, have these great lunches and like, we go deep in all these different ways. But I, I really feel like this call is, like, coming full circle because I remember when, when I, when you, you, like, I was a consultant and you, like, hired me and, and. And then I was like. It was like three months in, I was like, I'm writing a book. Do you want to tell that story? Because I. Oh, yeah.
- [52:48]
B
Well, here's what I know about that story. At one point, I don't know if we'll call it a Tuesday, Matt's like, hey, I'm writing a book. Would you write the foreword to the book? And I was like, yeah, okay. In my head it was like, yeah, you know, we got months. He's got to write a book. Like, I'm happy to do that. And then I think on Friday, he was like, yeah, I'm gonna need that forward because the book's already done. And like, we were in the middle of kind of a turnaround in ewr, so in the middle of this turnaround, which is, you know, stressful and lots of hours, he's also writing a book. So, yeah, you tend to kind of go all in when you're, you know, when you set goals and then accomplish them really quickly. So it's really cool.
- [53:31]
A
Well, the book was really just documenting the turnaround efforts. For anybody that wants to read it. It's really like my story of coming into this and seeing from my eyes, like, the inside of an agency and what are the different components and how all those things work and documenting. Because I was learning so much, the only way I know how to, like, remember everything that I learned is to, like, write it down on paper. And so I love to document stuff. And now I love to use AI to recall what I'm learning. And that's the big area that we haven't talked about. And I am going to bring on a buddy of mine that that's heavy and has a bunch of patents in this space is memory, okay? Memory, long term, perpetual memory. To remember the right kind of things and, like, think about it, like, when we go to sleep, Chris bringing it back to health when we go to sleep. I believe, like, our Brain is taking all the information we've learned and compressing it and processing it and then storing it into long term memory from short term memory. And that's why it's important to sleep, to kind of process that session. And AI is not like exactly like a map of the brain, but it works pretty similar to how kids learn and processes learn with all the different nodes of when you build a LLM. But remembering something and remembering the right thing and not remembering like, like waiting the memory and the judgment, like how, how to map all that is, is I think like the next big thing, right? And, and I saw that even with ChatGPT 4 to 5, which a lot of people were unhappy about because it, it had perpetual memory and then it was turned off and then people went to other models. But it's like it, it gets fixated on one thing that you've been talking about recently because there's a decay in the memory and it just, you know, will focus on that thing completely. And then people say like, AI gets obsessed with certain things, but it's, it's about a waiting and a decay process. And again, it goes back to governance of how you use this stuff and how you need to have different sessions and how you need to bring in the information and the recall. And like, even if you're like training it like with different skills, like what skills supersede other skills. So if you're building a company, well, you know, if there's a standardized way of doing things and then you have a personalized way of doing things, the company way maybe should supersede that in certain indices. Unless you break that rule. Like, you got to think through all this stuff. But that's for another call, everybody. Hopefully you've enjoyed this hour. I do have a hard stop and we gotta, gotta get going. But Chris, we'll definitely have you back on.
- [56:19]
B
I'll add one. One quick point on my podcast. So live beyond the norms. Please go check it out. I interviewed Randall Cohen. He is the founder of Carbon Copies organization. So their mission is to take the brain and stick it in silica. And he's been doing like, been working and focusing on this for a long time. Fascinating interview. Just had parallels with what you were talking about, like kind of memory storage.
- [56:45]
A
Well, Chris, I love our conversations and we've talked about continuing those be on the buyout. And I would love to keep having you back on the podcast to keep everybody updated because I think that there's a lot of biohackers or kind of like I've had nootropic companies reach out and sponsor the podcast. So optimizing our brains are something that I think a lot of listeners have an interest in. I know I have interested in. And every time I talk to you, you teach me me something new. Like I want to stay up to date with that. So I'd love to have you on as a, a reoccurring guest. I think the audience would enjoy that as well. Before we go tell people like you are, I mean if you just start to look for, you know, ESS 60 or my vital C or search Chris Burst, I mean he's all over the Internet. Like you're, you're, I mean you're blowing up. Like really you're blowing up. But how do people find you? How do they follow you? How do they find out more about this product that you know, changes your brain and extends your longevity potentially? Like you know, no, like asterisks. Like
- [57:59]
B
yeah, you can find me my vital CC as in carbon myvital c dot com. The podcast is called Live beyond the norms. So you can find live beyond the norms.com can subscribe with your favorite podcast app and then on social media it's under My vital C. And yeah, we're pushing out. I'm, you know, from the podcast, I'm pushing out six pieces of content per day. So once you kind of get in the envelope, you'll see me a lot. Maybe you'll get tired of me, maybe you'll just give me a thumbs up, add a comment. I would love that. And yeah, so it's pretty easy to find me.
- [58:34]
A
Well Chris, I just want to thank you for our decade long plus friendship and employer like co working like all the things you've been a meaningful impact in my life and I'm glad to be able to share share you and what you're doing with the audience. Thank you so much for being on for everybody out there if you want to grow your business with the largest, most powerful tool on the planet, the Internet. And now I say AI as well, reach out to EWR for more revenue in your business. Thank you so much for being on. Please Shaiko us Chris. Share Like Follow us and until the next time, my name is Matt Bertram. Bye bye for now. Chris first Bye bye for now.