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- [00:00]
Camille Moore
Court had to break and I had to send it to the judge. Other lawyers are like, literally looked like, yes. And it was their entry point. I wish, I wish that I had, like, mental picture for the rest of my life. Their faces of when I said this. This was the biggest law firm in the country. And I ate their lunch.
- [00:18]
Philip Millars
What a brand, what a brand, what.
- [00:20]
Camille Moore
A brand, what a mighty good brand. Say it again now. What a brand, what a brand, what a brand, what a mighty good brand.
- [00:28]
Unknown Host
You guys are about to listen to Camille on trial. This was an episode that we recorded over a year ago now. This was last summer, and we expected.
- [00:41]
Camille Moore
That we were going to be able.
- [00:41]
Unknown Host
To launch this podcast, but then we were slapped with an appeal notice. So you guys are going to hear everything that happened. Because the small claims was way more interesting than the Ontario Court of Appeal case that happened last week, which we won. Both of them.
- [00:58]
Philip Millars
Well, it's more interesting because the judge didn't even allow me to make arguments. He was just like, your written arguments are enough. I don't need to hear oral arguments. Camille Moore, you win. Like, it was that quick. After they made long arguments that cost a fortune again.
- [01:12]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [01:12]
Unknown Host
And then the judge, she was super annoyed even when he was talking because it was such a waste of taxpayers dollars. It is such a waste of time, energy, effort. But what it wasn't a waste of was what I learned. And I really want you to have some strong takeaways from this episode because we're being really raw and really real. And that was a really cool learning moment for me when I posted that video on TikTok. So we posted a video coming out of the courthouse and it did so well.
- [01:44]
Camille Moore
It did. It's.
- [01:45]
Unknown Host
I think it's out right now, like 35,000. We have tons and tons of comments. And it was such a cool moment because you forget what's interesting to people, and it's these raw, unfiltered moments where you're being a real human. And I got the most growth. Like TikTok video aside, I got the most growth from this experience because I thought my lessons learned was just learning from him as a client, learning from that experience. There was so much to learn, and there's the most to learn from difficult people. And I thought that was my teachable moment. But you pushing me to go all the way and to have kind of my moment in court was really the greatest gift that you could have allowed me to give to myself. Because that's the hard thing about hard things, is that you actually, when you put yourself in places where you wouldn't otherwise do something is where you get the most growth.
- [02:46]
Philip Millars
You've captured something from a leadership learning perspective is that we talk ourselves out of doing hard things, and then we never get that growth opportunity. But the second you kind of take the steps up, step into the box, all of a sudden you can perform, or you have to train yourself to perform in the box. And you were spectacular on that day.
- [03:04]
Camille Moore
Yeah. And the second thing, too, I want.
- [03:07]
Unknown Host
You to take away is bullies win because they're trying to call your bluff.
- [03:14]
Camille Moore
Right.
- [03:15]
Unknown Host
Like that. That was a really big thing of this, too, is that they countersued us, and then they decided to take us to appeal. And there were so many steps along the way where the. The amount was so insignificant for what, you know, what we bill, what we cost. Now that it was. It was easier from every. Every way that I looked at it to not go through it, but it wasn't about the money. And I just really want business owners to stand up for themselves. Yes, I'm fortunate to have Philip in my corner. But small claims court is designed for the business owner to advocate for themselves. And small claims court really frowns upon what he did.
- [03:56]
Philip Millars
No, it doesn't like lawyers bullying people. So the judges in there are good. And what you're saying, I think, speaks to that quote by Edmund Burke, which is something like, the only thing necessary for evil to win is for good men to do nothing. Now, it's outdated, but so, like these bullies, and. And they win when you don't do anything or when you bow down. So step standing up to them is. Is. Is something that's very rewarding.
- [04:18]
Camille Moore
And the thing that I got, really.
- [04:19]
Unknown Host
The most out of this whole thing is what you taught me is that bullies usually don't get faced. And he's been able to counter sue and to get. Basically to get people to back down because he's prepared to go to 11, and because we matched him at 11 as a bully, he isn't usually faced with that.
- [04:47]
Philip Millars
No. And he wasn't ready for it. He wasn't prepared. He just thought he would be able to bully and that at some point you would quit. It was beautiful not to quit.
- [04:55]
Camille Moore
Yeah, it was awesome. So enjoy listening to this episode. Let us know what you think and.
- [04:59]
Unknown Host
What you learned from this, and I.
- [05:00]
Camille Moore
Hope that it inspires you to do.
- [05:02]
Unknown Host
Something bold for you and your business.
- [05:08]
Philip Millars
All right, Ms. Moore, I think it's your time to share some of your personal experiences with your audience, because I know You're a role model to a lot of professionals out there. You've challenged the status quo, stood up to bullies. I've seen you do it to CEOs. But you had your own little challenge recently that I think that journey, if you share it with your audience, could be both inspiring and quite entertaining.
- [05:30]
Camille Moore
Yeah. I think today's podcast is Camille on Trial.
- [05:33]
Philip Millars
Camille on Trial.
- [05:34]
Camille Moore
I went through my first court case last week and I had to go in the witness box and do my testimony and get cross examined. And it was a life altering moment that I am very thankful that you pushed me to go through and to deal with because it was something that would have been so easy to just eat, accept, and kind of brush under the rug.
- [06:06]
Philip Millars
And let's give some context. Every business, everybody has a growth cycle. And when you were start, when you were starting off, you know, you're eager for good contracts. This was like a few years ago, more than a few years ago. And you were getting screwed over by what looked like to be a bully in the legal world.
- [06:25]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [06:25]
Philip Millars
And they tried to silence this young professional business owner. And I think your audience is going to be fascinated to hear your ups and downs and finally getting into that witness box and showing them who was the boss.
- [06:38]
Camille Moore
Yeah. So I, I was fortunate to be introduced to the biggest lawyer and law firm in this area of law in the country. And this was during the beginning days of COVID So this intro was a big deal because when I was growing a new business, intros matter. But intros mattered even more during a time where you couldn't really network or like, meet people outside of like, again, these are the early days of the pandemic where we were, we were locked in, we were in lockdown. Um, so I got an intro to this client and I was kind of promised that they were going to change my professional career. And it was not a healthy relationship. It was very toxic. Probably one that a lot of agencies are used to experiencing in the early days, you know, before they kind of learn wiser of the red flags to look for or how to kind of set the conditions for a good working relationship. And it caused me a lot of stress. It caused me a few employees, and in the end it cost me money because they walked away and hadn't paid a few bills.
- [07:52]
Philip Millars
And may I interject here because your audience probably fascinated in knowing even more the details, but I think one of, one of the indicators you can share about a red flag is that if on the first conversation you have with somebody who thinks they're a big shot. They say, hey, I'm going to make you famous because I drive a Ferrari and I'm on the COVID of the newspaper. You know, maybe a red flag.
- [08:13]
Camille Moore
Probably a red flag. No, you're, I mean, you're so right.
- [08:15]
Philip Millars
But the, well, explain that, that kind of nature there, how you're eager for work, but the psychological symptoms that are being shown to you, you kind of ignore them because you just, you want to be associated with celebrity or something big.
- [08:29]
Camille Moore
It's so true. I think the biggest thing I've learned over the years is that a lot of the big, big people or big businesses or the people that run these big businesses, they actually get there by stepping on a lot of backs. And they're often not good people. And there's a lot of people that they've used and abused that have come before you and there's a lot that will come after you. And they're very used to cycling through people because there is a figment of a character trait. Like CEOs of big companies, like, don't tend to be good people. Right. Like they have very unique good people in the sense of, like, of how, how a regular. Okay, I don't have a, I might.
- [09:16]
Philip Millars
Not say good people. It's like they buy into their own press. Right. And so they just, they're self obsessed, right.
- [09:24]
Camille Moore
Like they're, they will do anything at any cost to get ahead, which gives.
- [09:29]
Philip Millars
Them an excuse in their mind to screw over small people.
- [09:32]
Camille Moore
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
- [09:33]
Philip Millars
Right.
- [09:34]
Camille Moore
And that was, those were the red flags, right. Like looking back, I mean, this person was huge. They had a, a radio show, they're on TV every week. They're the number one cited, you know, expert in the, in this profession, in this industry. They had countless news covers. They've represented the biggest people. They're huge. But for those reasons, they understand how to undercut, you know, how to steal, how to take. And those are things you don't know when you're young. So I was completely taken advantage of in a workplace setting. And where it kind of ended is they didn't pay the bills. And where was the most disappointing is I hadn't gotten my contract signed. So what had happened was we had sent the contract with the invoice to the, all of the partners and the billing department. And they were in a rush to have somebody come in and kind of take over because they had had another agency out of the blue be either fired or quit. I didn't get the details for it, but again, another red flag. So there was this urgency and rush to get me onboarded and started. And because it had come in from a family friend and because they were so big and we had agreed and I had emails of them agreeing and we were talking about the contract details, I overlooked it. And it was what they used against me in the end, to not pay bills. And again, this was during a time where my business has grown a lot. Our price point has changed a lot. And at the time, not paying those bills were a big difference to the growth of the agency. And you were a huge advocate in being like, no, you're going to take them down. Because I was right in that they used a small business to take advantage of not asking questions, not stopping and slowing down. I was eager. And that is what actually bit me in the ass when it came to having to go to court. But would help me in the end because you learn from the toughest clients, you don't learn from the easy ones.
- [11:33]
Philip Millars
And some context. Back then, I was less involved in the business, although I was still supportive in many ways of what you were trying to build.
- [11:42]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [11:42]
Philip Millars
And you know, I have. I had spent a career dealing with bullies.
- [11:47]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [11:47]
Philip Millars
And I remember you calling me saying, great referral from this client. This guy's a big shot.
- [11:51]
Camille Moore
Huge.
- [11:52]
Philip Millars
Yeah, he's going to make us huge. And I was just like, okay, that's great. A couple of red flags. And there were some rumors that he was a bit of a tyrant. But because you were being warmed. Referred in through a friend, you were going to build a brand. And you were so committed. You put so much more work into this client. And for somebody who professed to be so rich, really nickel and dimed at the beginning and then almost deliberately, kind of, I think, didn't sign the contract that you had signed because he's just overconfident and then just started to grind you in the team.
- [12:21]
Camille Moore
Totally.
- [12:22]
Philip Millars
And what burned my ass. And I remember conversations before you saying, hey, it's only this much. It's only this much. But you just didn't pay a small invoice of around, you know, four or five grand. Right. That was completely owed and deserved and earned. And often what you'll find if you're a small marketing agency or any type of small contractor, is that the big guys know you don't have the resources to fight them.
- [12:46]
Camille Moore
Yep.
- [12:46]
Philip Millars
And if you happen to be a law firm and you're a big deal, you're like, I'm just going to fuck you off and you're never going to sue me because I've got all of these resources.
- [12:53]
Camille Moore
Well, that's actually what these companies do, right? And they, that's where they get away with it because. And that's really what they effectively did with us. But because you, you know, you work at ti, you're a co founder and you own a law firm and you love taking on bullies. This was a case that you were willing to take on and I was able to benefit from that because it would have cost me a fortune to hire a law firm and to do this. And before we move forward into this, you can represent yourself in small claims court and you should, because these bullies use their weight to intimidate you to not move forward. And it's what allows them to continue to get away with it. Because we're not armed as small or we don't feel like we're armed with small businesses to defend ourselves. But the courts are very friendly towards people, businesses representing themselves at the small claims court level. And you a hundred percent should. And I'm so glad that I did because for me going into the. So before going into the courtroom, as just kind of an aside, there was tons of bullying tactics that were used. They threw around huge bills.
- [14:11]
Philip Millars
The one thing that they always do is you sue them for an invoice that's owed and then they countersue you for five times what your legitimate claim is. And then what does the business owner think? Oh my gosh, this powerful company has hired a big law firm or this big law firm, I'm going to end up having to pay them and I can't afford it. Pure bullying tactic. And the courts aren't good enough at punishing that. But in small claims court, as you say, those judges in those small claims courts, that's the people's court. And so you can go in there, use ChatGPT, you know, you don't have to spend a ton on.
- [14:48]
Camille Moore
Like I find where I've learned the most of the difficult clients that have threatened to not pay or using kind of their weight to kind of throw you around is that marketing is inherently subjective and a lot of the mid sized companies, they don't understand the work that goes into the product you're offering. They minimize social media content, they minimize logos and because you can't see the work that went into it. And for that reason that's where like small businesses can get really taken advantage of. So I've had, I've had this happen a few times where it's not actually it's nothing that we've done. It's all about their, Their ego, their psychology, their. Their. Them not not being able to trust expertise. And that's the unfortunate reality of our profession, is that it's subjective. There's no objective. Right. Logo. There's maybe, you know, a realm of strategy or pallets that work within it, but you're. You're dealing with personalities and egos where you can't reign them in.
- [15:50]
Philip Millars
And. But they're also smart, and so they intuitively know it's subjective. So they intuitively know that they can get you to do a bunch of work and they can say, I don't think that's good, so I'm not going.
- [16:01]
Camille Moore
To pay you well. And that's. I find too, that actually when I was smaller and I was starting out, I had more edits, way more work went into it, because they don't actually respect the price point. And as you get better and bigger and more established, it's actually the funniest paradox is that the more money you charge, the less edits you get, because they respect the process. And that was another tough thing about scaling and growing is that clients like these would be asking me to do backflips. Like, but really what it came down to, their only claim is that we weren't writing at a. At a lawyer level. Like, the. And this is what was so hilarious that when we went into trial, the first thing the judge said when they looked at the kind of what their issues were, he's like, these, these posts aren't bad. These posts are good. Like, maybe I'd reword them, but, like, this is. This is good work that was done. And even the way that the judge would go into question there, what they raised as, like, completely unacceptable work came down to, like, highly technical legal jargon that even you as a lawyer, like, it was. What was hilarious is you actually helped me write one of the blogs that they said was completely unusable. And that was why I. I'm so l. To have had the growth and the learning that I did by working with you, because you wouldn't have exposure to this. But where I want to go to this, if you don't, you know, if you don't have the Philip Millars on your team, is trust your gut, trust your instinct, you know, like Aaron Brockovich. Yeah. Their goal is to gaslight you.
- [17:39]
Philip Millars
Yeah.
- [17:39]
Camille Moore
And if you've done your job and you feel like you've done your job, don't take it because you're actually hurting all of us. And that's why we went to trial at this point. The money, the money was nominal. You know, like we for what we charge versus where we used to. Like it was actually cost us more money to be there for the day than even what we. You'll get in the end. But it was out of principle because I don't want this law firm to ever do this again to another small business because the way that they negotiated price point and how much they actually wanted to spend is impossible to get at the level of what they were looking to achieve.
- [18:13]
Philip Millars
And for the people who are still here when they hear what happened at the end, they're going to get a lot of joy from what. What you, you and I were able to do to this law firm that thought the arrogance of self importance. Right. Can. Can make people who are successful make huge mistakes.
- [18:29]
Camille Moore
I'm prepared.
- [18:30]
Philip Millars
And these guys made some huge mistakes because they thought they could just bully.
- [18:35]
Camille Moore
Yep.
- [18:35]
Philip Millars
And they would win.
- [18:36]
Camille Moore
Yep.
- [18:37]
Philip Millars
And the counterclaim for a ridiculous amount of money that the judge laughed at the second we jumped in there. You know it. But that was only revealed like let's say you hadn't had the support but you had the courage. Like somebody had the courage to go in. Well the judge right away is like this counterclaim is nonsense. Right. And but you wouldn't know that because you would doubt yourself like saying oh, this law firm is going to be able to do this to me this fear. But like if you're going to move into greatness, you have to struggle through these things.
- [19:05]
Camille Moore
The obstacle is the way. And that's another great point is I. One of the greatest books I've ever read is called When Things Fall Apart and it's by Pima Chodron. And it's really what it's about is her experience of going through divorce and like falling out of love in a marriage. But it's such a larger philosophical concept of what we fear the most is the anticipation is the resistance to doing something. The thing is never as bad as the anticipation. And this trial was such a perfect realization of that philosophy because I had more nerves and stress going into it that I almost couldn't be bothered with it because at this point it really wasn't about money, but going through it. It was the best thing I ever did because the obstacle is always the way. Like to be able to have gone through that and to be cross examined or direct examined by cross examiner by top. By top lawyers and to eat their lunch. Let me was like one of the best growth moments for me.
- [20:10]
Philip Millars
I want to Build up the eating, the lunch for the listeners. Because we. You know, what we were saying is there's no way this should go to court. Like, it's a. It's a four to $5,000 bill, right? Like a day of these. Of any of us is five grand a day.
- [20:24]
Camille Moore
Oh, yeah.
- [20:25]
Philip Millars
And. But it almost gave you. It was a gift to have the primary defendant, the senior lawyer, the famous big shot, his ego. He was so used to bullying people that when somebody said, you're not going to bully me, and truth be told, we actually kind of gave him a little pokes because part of us wanted to say, hey, look, you're going to make a mistake here. So we gave him a little pokes to kind of make him think he's going to come in and show you a lesson. Because probably they were almost going to settle. But because we said you're not. Because we actually called him a bully. I think he just said his ego wasn't prepared to deal with losing to this young female professional who stood up to him. His ego could not stomach it. And he just kind of kept calling or raising in a poker game. And then all of a sudden, the trial date comes, and one of his henchmen calls and says, this is ridiculous. Your client is going to get run over by our firm and that you should just settle. I'm like, you think we're going to get run over? You think Camille Moore is going to get run over by your dude in his rhinestone jackets and sexy little slippers that he wears everywhere I go, Okay, I don't think you met Camille Moore. So then we go to the trial, and I'm thinking, okay, I didn't even think. We thought they were going to settle at the trial. They just want to see if we showed up. And we showed up. And I'll just give this legal context, and then you can talk about what happened on the stand. But for a $5,000 claim, senior partner was assigned to go after you. So a senior partner at a law firm, not alone, but with an articling student beside him. So a senior partner is probably five to $8,000 a day. An article student's probably $2,000 a day. But then the henchman comes. Who's the senior managing partner? Managing partner, like the managing partner of this big firm is also there for the whole day, probably another eight to $10,000. But he's there for an intimidation factor, but it wasn't it. And then the lawyer, the big shot is there all day long.
- [22:28]
Camille Moore
The celebrity lawyer. Yeah.
- [22:29]
Philip Millars
So they've got probably $30,000 in lost revenue.
- [22:32]
Camille Moore
And don't forget about their expert, who they probably also had to pay to be there.
- [22:36]
Philip Millars
You got to talk about that after. Oh, my God. So they. Yeah, they had a. They brought in a marketing person who was a dominated marketing person who testified in their favor, and they were paying him. So complete bias. They completely mishandled the case in the legal. Like, they couldn't get the expert. It was. It was horrific. But at least $30,000 in. In legal time to show you who's boss. Right. And so you could just smell and feel this arrogance of them. And then you and I are just there chilling out, going, okay, these guys are gonna have a good day. Right. And then you can describe what happened because you were the first witness.
- [23:13]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [23:13]
Philip Millars
And just tell. Tell your listeners so you can embolden them on. It's not as bad. Just like Pima said.
- [23:18]
Camille Moore
Yeah, it's. The anticipation was just worse than. Because I knew that I hadn't done anything wrong. Right. Like, again, it's. It's subjective. So nothing the. To not get into details, nothing that the client didn't approve went live. And they were so nitpicky and obsessive over their content that they went through so many edits that by the time the post was finished, it lacked any strategy or effectiveness, but it never went live. And when you're an agency and you have 15 clients, 10 clients, 50 clients, and there's one that has an aggressive amount of edits, it's more likely that it's on them than it's on you. And why I loved it the most was really for me to reflect back on the growth that I've gone through. For me to see this client, that, to me, was. Was my. Was my Hail Mary to a different. A different level of agency. Like, this was my, like, golden ticket into, like, making it fast. But looking back, what I can. What I can say is it there is no golden ticket to making it fast. And the clients that look like that are going to be the gold Tickets are probably going to be the hardest. You're gonna learn the most from them, and you're gonna, in the short term, regret them the most. But later, you're gonna look back and love them the most. Because what I got on that stand was this was the biggest law firm in the country, and I ate their lunch because they're lunch.
- [24:52]
Philip Millars
Let's not get there yet so bad.
- [24:54]
Camille Moore
Okay.
- [24:54]
Philip Millars
I want to set it up so that your readers can relate the particular lawyer who's who was nickel and diming you, who's the big shot in the Fendi and the Ferrari. He's also considered kind of an expert on contracts. And so he's negotiating, being a tough guy, like, liking that he's being a big shot with a young, attractive female. And you guys agree. And so you send him an email saying, okay, I'm going to send you the contract and the invoice. And he goes, deal. But he doesn't get the contract. And we know that they got the contract, but when they defended against our claim, they're like, and when they tried to bully you into not paying, they put another senior lawyer to say, hey, there's not a contract that we've signed, so nothing is binding. And now somebody who doesn't have a lawyer background might have thought, oh my God, they didn't sign it. So this is not enforceable. But that guy knows contract law. He knows it's enforceable because they acted in good faith on the terms of the contract and paid it for four months.
- [26:00]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [26:00]
Philip Millars
But then when they wanted to get out of it, they said, oh, we didn't sign it back then five months ago. So it's not binding. And it's BS in law. And they knew it, but they tried to bully you because they didn't know you were partnered at that time in the business. You had a lawyer who could kind of look at this stuff.
- [26:14]
Camille Moore
Well, I think that's another good point, is that a lot of, like, the law is, is gray, you know, and especially, like, the law can really favor smart small businesses, like, and bigger businesses know tactics to take you for a ride. So it's common, you know, for them to move forward on your terms and be paying you every month and say they're going to get the contract signed back to you. And, you know, it may take a month, may take two months. And I saw that a lot in those beginning phases that they almost have a sense of when they can take advantage of you. And that unfortunately happens when you don't have experience. Right. Like, they can sense it. And, but, but what I wanted, understanding, wait. Understanding the basics of contract law. Like, there's tons of precedents of, like, it's, it's very common knowledge that you can do have a contract on a handshake. Right. And if they're paying like they're. You should have, you should consult either with Chat, GPT or an ILA on the situation. But if you feel like you're right, small claims court will hear your point.
- [27:17]
Philip Millars
Especially when there's a power imbalance.
- [27:19]
Camille Moore
Oh, yeah, right.
- [27:20]
Philip Millars
But the way that they positioned it and what was so disingenuous is the way they wrote it. You could tell they had the version that you had signed because they said, we don't have a version of the contract signed by us. So we could tell that they had received the one you sent signed. And that was a mistake. But their position was that they never received it and you couldn't find it.
- [27:43]
Camille Moore
Right.
- [27:44]
Philip Millars
And just tell a little bit about that because that was freaking crazy. And that was our one worry is.
- [27:49]
Camille Moore
That the whole thing. So this all happened during COVID and small claims court, or courts in general were closed during COVID and small claims court was one of the slower ones to open. And there was a lot of claims because like a lot of shit happened during COVID And so by the time, like this was years ago that this happened and that's why we keep saying it was really on kind of on merit than really on dollar value at this point. And so one of the things I couldn't find was the email sending the contract. But I had so many emails referencing the word contract. Like me saying, oh yeah, based on our contract. And I knew that I sent it, but I couldn't find it. And I find Gmail does this to me where emails like I know that I sent, no matter what search term I put in, like, I can't pull it up. So I thought that we had lost it. And that was a really weak point, really the only one for us in the case. And the. So it was like two minutes to a break and the. The judge flipped on me while I was in the stand. Can you find an email where you reference the contract? And that's when I was like. Cause like, I knew I had sent it. I knew I had give. I always say that our contracts have 30 days notice termination, but I didn't have it. So he broke for lunch.
- [29:10]
Philip Millars
We had. We had looks.
- [29:11]
Camille Moore
Sorry, break.
- [29:12]
Philip Millars
We had looks for it.
- [29:12]
Camille Moore
Oh yeah, there was like, we couldn't find it. I couldn't find it.
- [29:15]
Philip Millars
We thought we could win anyhow, but he seemed to make it an issue. He was like, well, look, you got to be able to show the contract. How is there proof of the contract?
- [29:22]
Camille Moore
The judge asked me and so we're going to break.
- [29:25]
Philip Millars
Yeah.
- [29:26]
Camille Moore
And we're on break. And I realized that the. There was a bookkeeper that was on one of the emails and they had actually said send. The send the contracted invoice to name with email. And I searched her name with Email. And I found the email and they had said that it had never been sent and this was right on the fricking break. And I'm like emailing Alistair, being like, oh my God, get me into sales email. We gotta find. See if I can find the signed contract. Like, let's get us in. This was like during this, like we get a 10 minute break. So I have the email and we start up court again. And you lead me into an. A beautiful entryway. You're like, yes, Camille. So we were talking about the contract and I think you found something during lunch. Can you share? And I'm like, yes. Actually the break was quite fortunate. I found the original email.
- [30:14]
Philip Millars
Hallelujah.
- [30:16]
Camille Moore
And so court had to break and I had to send it to the.
- [30:19]
Philip Millars
Judge lawyers because they had said that they never got it.
- [30:24]
Camille Moore
Yes. And it was their entry point. I wish, I wish that I had like mental picture for the rest of my life their faces of when I said this. So we sent it to them. The only problem is that the email was spelt wrong. But it wasn't me that sent it, it was our sales department that sent it. And so the argument that they tried to use on me during the cross examination was that the royal you. So I am Third Eye Insights. So when Third Eye Insights does something wrong, it really comes on my shoulders.
- [31:02]
Philip Millars
So one of the email like you had multiple email addresses on there.
- [31:06]
Camille Moore
One of them, one was wrong of the five people that were on it. And so the judge was beautiful there. No, I, I said it actually because then, then the. Yeah, because yeah. Because then the lawyer was like. So I go on. I'm like, well yes, but the invoicing contract was sent to the, the billing department and the billing department proceeded to pay. So. So they therefore received the contract. If it's in the same email as the invoice. He goes, well, is the billing department the, the name partner is that. I'm like, well if you're using the royal U argument on me, then it's the same, it's the same argument back. If the company has received then the contract and invoice, then you therefore have to pay. You have to pay. He goes, well, is that in your experience that if your employee makes a mistake on payment that you have to eat it? And I'm like, in fact, this happened last week. I'm like the. One of our, one of our team members had received a contract from a TV company and didn't read proper clauses and we had to pay the entire bill. In fact, it actually happens all the time. So yes, it does happen.
- [32:11]
Philip Millars
Okay, let's, let's go back because you've jumped into your cross examination crushing, but you find the contract. This is the examination in chief, right? So when you sue somebody, you have to get up there and tell your side of the story and present the evidence. And we were able to present the contract and the judge was listening to you and you came across as very professional and confident. And you know, when you go into trials, TV doesn't represent it. Sometimes people exaggerate. But yeah, you don't need to exaggerate when the truth is on your side. You just tell the story and nothing is perfect. And you were just telling it so calmly and explaining things that I was just sitting there saying, I don't even need to ask a question. Like for half an hour you just gave your testimony after that. So then the senior partner of the big firm, right, his big game day. And what's, what's hilarious that people, I wish we could have recorded this. So the, the senior, the big shot. Let's just call him big shot, right? He's outside of the courtroom and senior partner, but he is so nervous that he's actually knocking on the door of the courtroom and asking the articling student to come out so he can tell him what's happening and what's going on. Like, that's how anxious to see like this little guy is like knocking on the courtroom. And everybody's like, what is that going on? I'm like, big shots knocking on the door out there. And then he got instructed not to knock on the door anymore.
- [33:33]
Camille Moore
Literally a trial lawyer.
- [33:36]
Philip Millars
And then you take the stand. And so after examination in chief, where lawyers think they're the best is when they cross examine the witness to kind of show that they're lying. And this guy thought he had his shit together, but he didn't know that you had become a very skilled debater in your experience. So why don't you tell us about what happened under this cross examination that the senior partner thought he was going to hit out of the park.
- [34:02]
Camille Moore
What happened? I mean, I just, I ate the guy's lunch. Like none of his questions. I just, it makes me just want to empower small businesses to just get into small claims court because they have, they have bullying tactics. Like their first kind of strategy was what work did you even do for them? Like, they, he tried to say that, like, because there wasn't really emails of like the content moving back and forth for approval, that we weren't doing any work. Which was nonsensical.
- [34:33]
Philip Millars
It seemed like the first strategy was to belittle, to try to embarrass and. But I think what you remarked to me after is I, I was, I was blown away by how unintellectual.
- [34:46]
Camille Moore
Oh yeah.
- [34:47]
Philip Millars
These people who were supposed to be amazing were. Because the truth wasn't on their side.
- [34:51]
Camille Moore
No. And they really just weren't that smart.
- [34:54]
Philip Millars
Yeah.
- [34:54]
Camille Moore
Like, it just, it really wasn't. It actually was embarrassing. I think really is that it was embarrassing that we were there in the first place. Like, and that's another takeaway that I want these listeners to move with is that the hills that these companies will die on are not the ones to die on. And that's why it's important to move it forward is that if you're justified in your claim and you've done the work, move forward with it. Because it was so mind blowing to me that they'd rather go through this because we poked the bear than just pay, you know, pay money. Because at the end there was nothing that we had done that was wrong and that's why it was such a beautiful moment of growth is that he had nothing on me. Like every time they try to bring something up, I'm like, what is this question? Like what are you trying to say? Like what are you trying to. They made me read back the captions of the posts that they didn't approve. They tried to question me on like the thinking of kind of how it got here and.
- [35:53]
Philip Millars
But he didn't understand marketing either. So you were just giving a class on marketing to the senior lawyer.
- [35:59]
Camille Moore
Oh my God. There was points where like at one of their exhibits was them showing this article and how bad the strategy was because we had back linked the. A major media source to their website.
- [36:11]
Philip Millars
Explain that because that's so.
- [36:14]
Camille Moore
Okay, so what's hilarious is that one of their exhibits that they had pulled again, this was years ago. Years ago. So this exhibit they go to question me on, I look at the exhibit and it's on their current website. They haven't taken it down and their current firm has changed names and rebranded since I work with them because he's such a tyrant that the other partners left and the article is still on their new website and it's not even the brand that I worked on.
- [36:50]
Philip Millars
So the graphic that you created, they're still using way back when.
- [36:53]
Camille Moore
They're still using it.
- [36:54]
Philip Millars
That's citing the lawyer being in a major.
- [36:57]
Camille Moore
Yeah. Huge news source.
- [36:58]
Philip Millars
So it's a backlink strategy.
- [36:59]
Camille Moore
It's Backlink. It's purely SEO.
- [37:01]
Philip Millars
And this. This lawyer holds it up and is like, do you think it makes sense to put on this website?
- [37:07]
Camille Moore
Is it in your expertise that you just post websites on clients?
- [37:11]
Philip Millars
Essentially what you're saying is you created this thing that took people to this major national newspaper, and how bad is that?
- [37:20]
Camille Moore
You are so bad at what you're doing.
- [37:21]
Philip Millars
And I'm like, you understand backlinks.
- [37:23]
Camille Moore
I'm like, well, this could be a strategy. And this was a strategy that was used five years ago. It's called backlinking. But the major issue here is this isn't the site that I worked on. This isn't the company that I worked on. This is a graphic that I did, but you guys are still using it. So how bad could this really be?
- [37:39]
Philip Millars
Make it look like it's bad, but you are on the website and say, it's right there live today, and you're saying that this is horrible.
- [37:45]
Camille Moore
It was honestly so bad, guys. It was so bad. And it was such a gift of growth because, like, even they had this, like, table chart that they had, like.
- [37:57]
Philip Millars
Okay, we got to talk about that. That's a whole different thing, like, the extent at which they would. Because what happens is they bully. And just like all bullies, when you stand up to them, they start to. They start to kind of quiver when you get in a bully's face. And they weren't prepared because they were overconfident. And so they get a little desperate because now it's trial day, you're doing well. And so they're desperate. And then they resorted to some lying. Lying and.
- [38:19]
Camille Moore
And stealing.
- [38:20]
Philip Millars
They actually called one of their companies under contract, kind of a dominated company. They brought in the. The CEO of this marketing company purported to be something she didn't. She wasn't really. And they. This marketing company had created a table that was designed to show how much better their blogs were than your blogs.
- [38:38]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [38:38]
Philip Millars
Now you hit it. And then lead me back into the process.
- [38:41]
Camille Moore
So it was a comparison chart of, like, when we were running their blogs to when, I guess this other company had taken over, and they had given, like, a specific date range for comparison. That was quite close. Well, the funny thing is that the majority of these articles were actually posted a year prior.
- [38:59]
Philip Millars
And.
- [38:59]
Camille Moore
And they were topically all about COVID which is relevant because let's.
- [39:04]
Philip Millars
Let's back up because prior to the trial, they gave this. This table that they believe conclusively showed that your work was crafty.
- [39:13]
Camille Moore
Yeah, because their blogs were better shitty Worker.
- [39:16]
Philip Millars
Their blogs came after TEI had and.
- [39:20]
Camille Moore
The number was like 40 session or 400 sessions versus 7000 sessions. So the numbers were quite, quite big. It looked crazy, but the average session duration on our content pieces were double the amount of time.
- [39:36]
Philip Millars
It was way longer. We had two to three minute sessions. They had 10 seconds, 20 seconds. Yeah, but what I wanted to. For your.
- [39:43]
Camille Moore
But those are the only comparatives and average session duration for listeners.
- [39:47]
Philip Millars
This table was created by the company that the law firm was still paying.
- [39:51]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [39:51]
Philip Millars
And so I brought it, I brought issue. I said like, look, this was. This was produced by somebody you're paying who's not without bias. The CEO goes, these things cannot be manipulative, manipulated. This is just pure data. And so the court should rely on it. And you just, you couldn't make this stuff up.
- [40:08]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [40:09]
Philip Millars
Because you and a couple of the other people started digging into it. And actually one of our articulating students dug into it and found out and she was on the stand and said this could not be manipulated. And then luckily for us, on cross examination, I could say, let's go to your website a year before TI was hired. And there's the blog.
- [40:27]
Camille Moore
No, it's even better than that. You were like, can you confirm that these like that this table is like unmanipulated? And she's like, yeah, of course. You're like, well, are you aware that this first article on the table you created with the highest session count was actually posted a year prior because they.
- [40:45]
Philip Millars
Had left their old website open.
- [40:47]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [40:47]
Philip Millars
And so we could actually go to the blog post to show they just.
- [40:50]
Camille Moore
Changed the brand, they didn't change the website. And why this was hilarious. Is that so? Not only did the blogs have an extra year, but also the time of the year mattered because at the beginning of COVID people were the most afraid about job security. And all of the topics were about, like, working from home, being let go. What are your rights as an employer with COVID Vaccines and vaccines. And these were like hot topic blogs in the first two, three months of COVID And this was a massive name in the industry. So for that reason, the blogs did really well. What I'm writing two or three years into Covid on more or less the same topics. It's noise at this point. It's been done. The view count isn't as demanding and. But they completely lied about.
- [41:35]
Philip Millars
They manipulated. Manipulated it.
- [41:37]
Camille Moore
And you absolutely ate her lunch. She left so pissed off because it completely undermined her expertise.
- [41:44]
Philip Millars
I asked her who should be fired for trying to Manipulate the court and, and, and attempt fraud. And she lost her.
- [41:51]
Camille Moore
Oh my God. It was really bad. But again, like, also, if anyone is listening to this and feels like it's. You do your work because they're not doing theirs. Like, dig into every detail. Like, this is, this was such a. Things like this I wouldn't even think about because. But now going through it, what they're capable of doing is so evil that I, I just, when I looked at the table, I was like, okay, I mean, your blog can perform better. Like you're an SEO company. Like, I don't profess to be an SEO company.
- [42:23]
Philip Millars
Like, but you took them. They didn't have Instagram.
- [42:26]
Camille Moore
Yeah.
- [42:26]
Philip Millars
So you took them from zero followers in four months to 268 followers who had high engagement. The next thing you said, when this bozo is cross examining you talking about your performance, you're like, sir, are you aware of how many followers your law firm has today? Because he's attacking you. He's like, I don't know. And you go, it's 168.
- [42:44]
Camille Moore
It's 100 less than I grew years later.
- [42:46]
Philip Millars
It's 100 less two and a half years later than I grew in four months. And he's like, well, I'm not sure that's. And you're like. And you're like, check it out. Yeah. And then the judge actually wanted to see it. The judge was like, kind of laughing. Like, that's the kind of thing as a lawyer.
- [43:00]
Camille Moore
Oh my God. Even like there was like a typo in the caption that we proposed. Like, not the caption that went live. And I went on their Instagram and I found like three typos live on their current Instagram. I'm like, this is just bullying. This was just bullying. And that's why it was such an amazing growth moment. Is like to be able to go through that and expose what they're capable of is such a leg up because they, it took them down from the pedestal of where they were. And it, I feel so much more empowered as a business owner and as a leader because it's reminds me that if you're like doing the work pays.
- [43:40]
Philip Millars
And if we've probably gone over time here, but if our listeners want to part two, they should comment on it because I think almost equally as entertaining is when big shot in his rhinestone jacket and sexy slippers goes on the stand.
- [43:55]
Camille Moore
Oh yeah, that's a whole other story.
- [43:56]
Philip Millars
And then besmirches you in a very nervous way and then gets exposed to the cross examination machine gun that they thought they were going to do to you. And just to see him melt into a puddle of blabbering mess, it's just. Just a pure freaking highlight that I wish we could have got on camera.
- [44:12]
Camille Moore
Let us know if you want A part 2. This was such a great growth moment for me and thanks for listening. I appreciate.