E308 – Matt Bertram – How to use digital marketing to grow your business.

Junaid Ahmed 0:10
Thank you for tuning in to hacks and hobbies with your host Junaid Ahmed. In Season Two of hacks and hobbies were visited by our amazing guests coming from all walks of life want to learn their story, their struggles and their journey on how they got to where they are today. So stick around.

In this episode, I get to speak with Matt Bertram. He's a CPC or mark, math Bertram. He's a trainer, author, and a local keynote speaker and consultant in the digital marketing and social selling. Now he's also a co host for The most popular SEO podcast on iTunes and is also the CEO at E web results. A very high end internet marketing agency. He's definitely the best. Matt, thank you so much for taking out the time in your day and coming and talk to us and our audience on the podcast.

Matt Bertram 1:19
Not thank you so much for having me in there. You know, we have some construction going on at the office. I got potentially people walk into my office. So you're getting it live in real

Junaid Ahmed 1:29
time. I love it. I love it. So what we just had a conversation in the green room is you know how we all get started. And the one story that I love to get first and out of the way well, not all the way but it really sets us apart to how we all ended up to where we are today. And looking at what you've been doing for the past many years. You know you're a you've got a amazing book out on Amazon. It's called One of the best selling you've got an amazing SEO podcast. I mean, how did it all start uh you've got you know, you've got a very strong standing in what you your expertise is and what your team can do. But there has to be a starting point you know where did it all come from?

Matt Bertram 2:21
know the origin story for sure. And and I think that like a lot of people you kind of fall into things right you don't I guess now you can go to school to get a degree in digital marketing. Yeah, but but when I graduated, there was a marketing degree which I did get that and I wanted to go you know, in that direction, but there wasn't a specific specialty of Internet Marketing. It was kind of getting started this was even before like ad words. Really guy go on. Facebook was developed while I was in college. You know, really started to see the power of that helped out, run some online or not. online but on campus congressional campaigns like so, or student body campaigns then I did some congressional work. And I started kind of leveraging social media at that point, I went to a competition for a big pharmaceutical company that was promoting over the counter products, it was actually for GlaxoSmithKline is like, like to get people to establish brand loyalty early like if you start using toothpaste in college, you'll probably use it for you know, the length of you know, your life. So I got involved in that program and I actually won that but not only did I win it, I like quadrupled the sales production of the entire nation. So it was like 50 something people at all. How did I do it right there like how did you do it? Well, I did it through internet marketing, right. And this was actually before AdWords. So what I did is I in you and I were talking about some, you know, programming stuff before you actually lie, but I think Took a interface I basically built a little API because it was you know I'm a little handy with the programming yeah to a download like so I was I was given out coupons and that's how they tracked it like a coupon code right? So so so I built the interface for me to download them and manually pass them out where they could actually download themselves were like had my login and then there was like big buttons and you could get your coupons for rockfish toothpaste or whatever Yeah, and then I went around and got bandit signs like you know for like elections and you know, buy this home I think you've maybe seen some of that around I cut those in half I bought the domain got free coupons, calm I wish I still owned it. I'm sure it's probably worth some money now. Yeah. And then basically, I just drove all the traffic to people that wanted like, like in college, you and you know, you want you don't have any money. So, you know, you're looking for the deals on whatever is like $1 off on toothpaste, it's like $1 50 or whatever and and so, so really, I I went On the promotion, bandwagon, which they want us to do with the product, but then I also tied the product if like, here's how you get it, so it wasn't, it wasn't tied directly to to to you had to find me and get coupons and then he ran out of coupons. Right. Yeah. And, and and also, they didn't set the program up where it was like, first customer gets a coupon or like, first time use coupon. It was like, anytime you use the coupon, yes, these were these were issues that big companies weren't struggling with yet. Right. And you're seeing all this stuff happened with Mark Zuckerberg in front of the Congressional Council of like, the cryptocurrency and, and and like runo, you know, hey, Senator, we run ads, you know, we actually made a T shirt, you know, associated with that. But but but essentially, the laws and and the way to view things haven't caught up yet. And so that that was an issue and so I I did that I went to Texas a&m. So I did that at a&m. But after work there, I went to all the other Texas schools, UT and University of Houston, Southwest Texas, which not Texas State, and I started doing this all across the the region. Yeah. So so I was, you know, and so that was kind of like I was dipping into other people's territories that weren't doing anything, but I had built the system. Yeah. And it was a scalable system that grew. And so, so so that, that that took me to some big places and, and then kind of fast forward a little bit. I got into the actually, were you and I were talking about kind of staffing right. Yeah, I got into the executive placement world. I really liked aspect of being having a product that I kind of had control over and also relationships that could go with me like so I could, you know, I could be in Hawaii, right? Yeah.

working part time. He had no ad and be able to do everything with the phone and a computer. And so so I, I started doing that. And then that's when LinkedIn got started. So I was like one of the first people on LinkedIn nice. And so started leveraging that for recruitment purposes, because I was like, oh, someone got on LinkedIn at the time. And I was doing the oil and gas because I'm in Houston, and that's top medical. And basically, basically, if they if they were like three to five years, or even 10 years, and they go fill out their profile on LinkedIn, they fill it out like a resume. Yeah, I knew they were interested in so I had like a little alert. That was That said, Do you new new person with this job today call and I'll get the resume out. And then I'll make 20% of their salary. So I was doing that quite successfully for about seven or eight years. And then this big IT company that was moving into, from from Dallas to Houston bought me out. And then I started a startup And I had like a non compete. And so I did, I did a startup where I was kind of doing what indeed did like indeed, basically and Yelp and all these other web two point O's in the search engines. all they're doing is SEO, or some of them were buying ads and doing arbitrage. But but so I got into that a building building, like a platform there, but I didn't, I didn't have the SEO chops that I really needed. I had, I was like, I was really kind of doing affiliate stuff. Um, you know, I had friends that were doing some different kind of things, but they weren't. They weren't long term strategies. Yeah. And, um, you know, I was just really learning and testing out and kind of learning the algorithm and and had some good clients. I was doing some consulting on the side because I was trying to get this thing going that I was self funded. Yeah. And and then and then basically, the Cairo is working with God, God Another group of friends out of Silicon Valley got funded like 10 million bucks. And we're still bootstrapping it. So he pieced out. And then I was like, Well, you know, I only know how to kind of do half of the half of what we're trying to do here business wise. And, and so I was like, all right, so then I just started doing some consulting, started meeting people, networking, all that stuff, right? Yes. Ready to get on podcasts and, and just really exploring digital marketing because I had a lot of success with it. When I was younger. I bumped into a guy, Chris Burrows, he's my partner now. Yeah, I had started this agency. He had grown agency he had, you know, he had a another supplement company that was doing quite well. And you know, he'd been in internet marketing for a long time and, and so so, you know, I just kind of came in and re rejuvenated what what was going on? He had saw what I done with my last company and, you know, I came in and and It kind of took it over to run it. And we've been growing it ever since. And, and and really, for me that catalyst catalyst was to get access or to get understanding of like, how are the bigger brands doing it? How are they building sustainable brand are ranking in Google and in all those sort of things, and then why I was doing that, you know, people were kind of getting to know who I was, and a lot of coaching. And and really, that was kind of how the book came about is is basically we're just like, how do I do this? How do I do this? How do I guess like everybody, like wanted to know? And I was, like, let me write a book and like, here's the book and like, read the book, and then come talk to me. And then we can kind of take it to the next level, but a lot of kind of what I was talking about was very, was very foundational. And you know, we do consulting, we do one on one consulting at the agency, but it gets a little pricey. If you're Just getting into the business. And so you know to go to go download it on Amazon for you know $1 or 10 bucks or whatever like it depends like what platform you're using or whatever. I mean there's a ton of value I mean and I had read, I probably read 500 plus books. At the time that I wrote this I was reading like a book a week I was just diving in and stuff I loved it. And you know, my mom had worked for Microsoft. So it just been a really around it and so I just dove in and and just put down everything that I knew and that I was learning and case studies for me and other case studies in industry and whatever it in books, and so there's just a ton of value packed in there and you know, when when other people kind of find it and are looking to do the same thing of building their brand and attracting their ideal customer to them.

You know, they resonate with it and if you've read anything, a lot of this stuff that I've come up with because I hear the same thing from a lot of the quote unquote gurus over and over again. So you find that kind of consistency. And then, and then you can kind of build a blueprint. And then that blueprint, if you apply it enough times, in, in the marketplace, you find really some best practices. Yeah. And then once you have those, that really just gives you the framework to be able to replicate what you're doing and build kind of a methodology. And that's kind of what we've done is really building a methodology of how we, how we do SEO, what we've done for ourselves, for our clients, and we've taken it actually from you know, we work with some publicly traded companies all the way down to like the pressure washer, or the home services company around Yeah, professional service, any of that. So that's

Junaid Ahmed 12:49
really that's really a cool journey because not only did you saw what people were not doing because You're probably at an age where you had access to technology. And right, so you able to apply that technology because not everybody jumped on, right in the beginning. They're like, Oh, that's, that's, that's the cool kids stuff, you know, you know, back in 91

Matt Bertram 13:16
You know, it wasn't the cool kids stuff. It's

not cool. That

Junaid Ahmed 13:22
was not cool. So people weren't getting on to right. And, you know, when I when I was when I first got an internet was in 95, because before that I was in I was in Saudi Arabia. And I started learning about, you know, all these different names on internet marketing. There's Frank Kern, there's Dan from Australia. Sorry. No, I

Matt Bertram 13:47
said Dan Kennedy. But But Dan, who?

Junaid Ahmed 13:51
I'm trying to remember. Dan live at the I can't remember but he's he's just Australia dude, Australia, Lord, and he had the 30 Day Challenge. That he started, I was like, wow, how are they doing this in it and it was just really amazing. And I remembered when Tony Robbins talk with Frank Kern and the Tony Robbins card, start getting into the inner marketing as well. But what I really see in your journey is you know how you saw something working and you're like, all right, this is beautiful. This formula works. It's scalable. Let's see how Who else can benefit from this? Right?

Matt Bertram 14:29
No, I mean, I'm I think that the like, I love I love sharing information. Yeah, like when you teach you really learn it, like oh my god, absolutely teach it. You don't really, you don't really know it. And so, like constantly sharing and teaching like it and like that, like that's the thing like, like, even today, right? The internet's been around 20 plus years. Right? And, and it's still so young, like, a kid at 20 like, what is it gonna be at 50 Due to it, but like the thing is, it's there's so much opportunity like Houston like the fourth or however you want to rank your biggest city in the US, like yeah, I mean, we have a huge footprint, but we still don't own the whole thing the whole market and nobody else does either. So now it's very fragmented. There's a lot opportunity. There's so many different, I guess, disciplines. There's so many different, you know, there's ecommerce there. Yeah, you know, big corporate b2b, there's b2c, there's local, like, I mean, it's just such a big world and you can do so much with it and it is it's just a lot of fun, you know,

Junaid Ahmed 15:40
absolutely. And, and, you know, you made a really good point, it is a such a huge world. And even, you know, Houston being the fourth largest market in, in that space in the world, for technology and for you know, was that you mentioned, but even Then, right? It's still doesn't have full control over whatever it is. But

Matt Bertram 16:07
no, no, I mean it's very fragmented. Right? It's like

Junaid Ahmed 16:08
a fragmented. Exactly.

Matt Bertram 16:11
You got all these different industries. Yeah. So there's there's medical, there's manufacturing, there's oil and gas, there's Home Services. I mean, there's fast food or restaurants right? There's pet I mean, anything that you have people I go down the list Yeah. And and what does everybody need to live like, you know, you got pest control. You got Pet Grooming you got I mean, and and here's the thing, I'll tell you something super, super interesting. And it was really eye opening for me because I've been, I've been in this world for a while. And so, you know, sometimes, and also a lot of the people that I talked to kind of through inbound marketing or attraction marketing of the content we put out, are very educated themselves, right? So I'm having these kind of like high level or I think just common conversations, but to someone looking And that's not really in the space it might be like a high level conversation so I went to a class reunion not too long ago and and for for like so it's a public school that I went to private school for like the last two years. And usually a private school has a bunch of small business owners as parents, right? So while these kids are taking over their parents, businesses, that's where thing and so I you know, I'm, I'm running into people I know I'm talking to people I know even have a friend she, she went to school together, she saw my content, she needed some help I do her marketing for her family business, right. And so, so she's going around trying to tell people like what I've done for her and how happy she is. And, you know, it was really nice and I was talking to some other people about what they're into. And the level of knowledge in the area of search or SEO, of utilizing the internet to generate business is somewhat foreign to a lot of people. Still, like they don't they don't get it, they don't understand it. They know that they've heard some people do it but also to there's a lot of fragmented information let me just say that going on out there in the place and a lot of people have tested stuff or tried people and they've been burned or it didn't work for them or whatever. So there's, there's still a little bit of apprehension to dive,

Junaid Ahmed 18:24
you know, into it. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. You know, and it totally makes sense because I've seen a lot of people advertising and telling people you know, get on Facebook ad, again, your, your creating a small piece of content, trying to drive traffic to your to your business. But if your business website or if your digital presence is not up to speed, if it's if it does not show that personal or even an authoritative You know, presence, then people are just going to click on the ad, go to the site, and just leave. So there, there's so there's me out,

Matt Bertram 19:08
ya know, there's data out there that says 94% of people go to a website. They check it out, they leave, they never come back. 94% of people, right? Yeah. So so you actually gave me a good idea. We should probably. So I have a bunch of designers that work for me too. I mean, we're full service agency. So I have designers, web designers, you know, people that do ads, SEO, whatever. But yeah, anyway, but but but what I what I want to do is, like, you know, that image that we've all seen in school, it's like an iceberg. You know what I mean? And there's like, something above the surface, and then there's like, what I like and people have used it for all different kinds of things. And I'm sure probably someone's done it for marketing. But when you think about like a sales funnel, okay, yeah. And you think about what is that ads intent and where is it taking them and then what happens when they get there? And how are you Move them through the quote unquote customer journey like who are you targeting right target persona, customer journey? And then what kind of content are you exposing to them along the way, and then also knowing that Okay, once you get them there 94% of time they're leaving never come back. So So where's your remarketing or retargeting to bring them back with ads to chase them around the internet, you've probably seen that there's their email automation, right? following up with them. You can now do text follow ups and you can Alize it with names. I mean, there's just so much out there. Yeah. That that you need to think about that's underneath the surface like that iceberg to help to help get to the sale or get to the schedule a consultation, and even after scheduled a consultation. There's buyer's remorse, there's Yes, you know, there's all kinds of stuff that's going on in human psychology along the way, right. And so you gotta, you gotta think about that whole thing. And even when they become a client, you know, what is that Experience look like is the expectation of what they purchased in the value. They're like so, and all this can happen online, like two thirds, all my clients are across the US, Canada, you know, I got a one or two over the UK and Australia. But what I could tell you is, like, nobody thinks about all that. And they're looking at it at a very, very narrow like, Oh, this ad is going to I'm going to hit paydirt with this one ad. And it's just, it's like the whole, you know, most of people in the startup space, which I was one of them is like, you know, if you build it, they will come know, if you build it, and you've got to have a budget for marketing and then they will know about it, and then you got to convince them to come.

Junaid Ahmed 21:48
You've got to convince them to come. Very, very true. And you actually right you you've and when you were as you were mentioning the iceberg of the marketing right, the victim Visual brand and I found a really nice one. And it's right there's there's so much under the water that you have to do in order to get out there, because the only visual thing that people will see is so say you have a logo, let's say you have a tagline that's all they see. But they don't know who the person behind it and you got to have that commentary or you got to have some kind of content on your site. And the one thing that I've been telling all of my uncles who are running their own websites or their own businesses, you gotta have a blog. Yes, you gotta have a blog so people know who you are, what your thought processes, when you're designing an event when you're designing a you know what you're doing in your business. So you got to have that calm, that commentary going so then people can come and talk to you about what you just shared with You

Matt Bertram 23:02
know, I mean, I think I think I think people do business with people and and the better that they can understand who you are, is is really what's important. So so it can be a blog, it can be written content, it can be video content. It can be sharing what's going on on social media but it's like having a congruent story. It's really all about quote unquote storytelling right and yes and and also long form content I'm seeing have a resurgence what I'm seeing actually online with like, videos and podcasts, which is, you know, voice and that sort of thing is it's getting longer and longer and a lot of people are watching a lot of time on YouTube, and that's why Instagram TV came out. And then yeah, LinkedIn now gives you like 10 minute segments. It's that it's that, you know, before it was like, hey, this picture, right? It was like, Hey, your elevator pitch and really Internet is a one on one thing and and like people are getting news people are getting you know, are watching TV but but we're seeing the shift from people cutting the cord with TV over here in the US. And we're also seeing people going after, or seeking out content where it's kind of like a mini series or like, you know, they might binge watch a little mini series or something like that like, like we'll listen to our podcasts which are 3045 minutes long, like yours. Yeah, come back to back you know, but they like it in smaller chunks. And they like to be able to multitask workout or drive or whatever. And but we're just seeing a lot more people consume content, like as like an on demand thing, right? So like you want to be able to go to Netflix, watch whatever you want to watch posit, stop at whatever. And, and also, people might have an hour or two hours. They don't want to commit, you know, and look this is not an Everybody, right like this. And you got a bell curve. But I mean, there are people out there and we all probably get in those moods where you like binge watch a whole season in like two or three days. But, but but a lot of people just don't have as much time like, technology was supposed to give us more time. And it actually, you know made us I guess, quote unquote more productive but it it gave us the ability to be connected all the time so that from a business standpoint, business business doesn't stop right like Amazon also delivers over here now same day. I mean, it's like, it's crazy. Basically the speed of business is just picked up and so people filled in the gaps and then you also have, you know, kind of the world's becoming a lot more flat with, you know, people working across country lines and, and like it really and offshoring. And really what's happened is it's just got a lot more competitive and have taken Can technology in a way to do more and more and more and, and that's why I think we're having some of the burnout that that maybe we're seeing and some of the data points, but it all goes back, you know, because we can go down all kinds of levels. It all goes back to human psychology and and how people are interacting with the media online and what they're doing with it. But people were still people before the internet with the internet, like, still people just they act a little different, you know?

Junaid Ahmed 26:29
Exactly. Exactly. And when, when you have people, you gotta talk them in people terms. And that's the other thing that people are doing, or businesses are doing is like, Oh, no, you got to have a business voice. Oh, that's great if you're, if you're a big company. Because you want to be let's say you want to be like Microsoft or Dell. But then if you're looking at if you're looking at companies like Ford and Nike Now they've added the soul part, which is what people connect with. And you you will keep going back and you have that brand brand recognition and brand connection. And you you you keep going back to that brand because you have you feel that human connection with them. Oh,

Matt Bertram 27:17
absolutely. I mean, that's why, you know, what is it spokespeople? Right? And really, they're trying to identify with the traits of the person, the spokesperson and also like, you watch these car commercials, and it's it, they're trying to elicit a certain type of feeling or like this car is going to make you feel adventurous or Yeah, we're safe or whatever it is. But then they're also trying to put that personal identity to it if someone that you've already maybe liked or connected with right, and what people are doing now is they're just doing it for themselves. We're seeing that with a lot of big brands to the CEOs getting out there and and branding themselves. I mean, the big thing for me that I thought was pretty hilarious was like the Verizon guy. Yeah, I guess they stopped that kind of that brand persona. And then sprint picked him up and I was like, I was like, there should have been some kind of non compete, you know, into the contract because now that guy's leveraging everything that he did for Verizon for his brand which is good for him. Yeah and good for spread, but man, Verizon has got to be like, like this. And that could be really powerful if you like, connected with them and oh, you know, but but but So, I mean, that's just what's what's going on, people are connecting with people and you know, your voice, you don't want to be a big soulless company anymore. And really, there's a lot of under like, great, the green movement. There's a lot of movements out there that are going to more personalized more local, you know, and, and, and the internet is a way for people to connect with you. Yeah, one on one. But where you have that reach, right where you're just Running a generic ad. But you can tell a story it goes back to I think, I think storytelling and, and and letting like people are going to do business with with people they know like and trust, like yes what I say, right? And if you can present yourself in a way that people know, like and trust and here's the thing, if people call me and they don't like me, well, they're not going to call me right? So you don't have to, like figure that out later. Right? You know, but like, or they don't believe what I'm saying or whatever. Like, if they don't connect with me,

they're probably not going to do business with me. And then vice versa. If they don't like me, I'm probably not going to want to do business with them either. Like so it actually helps. It helps with like a self selection process. And so when the people contact me that that that want to know more potentially work with me or get to know better what whatever. They've already self vetted. You know what I mean? And so that that helps speed up You know, the the business cycle as well, but, but it just makes for, I don't know, like, I love what I do. I like and love a lot of the people I work with Yeah, um, you know, clients, team members, strategic partners etc. Yeah and and so now I get to wake up and do something I love with people I love every day. So like life's really, really good. And also I'm able to put out the information connect with people so I can so people are coming to me so I don't have to focus my time on sales. Yes. And trying to convince people of anything, like they've already made the decision whether you like it or not, and then we can just get down to like helping grow your business. Yeah. And, and, and I can focus on that and it just, it just makes life really good when you get to do what you love and focus on not have to do some of that other stuff. And so that's how I've built this business. And, and that and since I kind of drink my own Kool Aid, right, like, like, instead of saying, Hey, I do it this way, but in like, these internet marketing companies that do all this sales and networking and stuff like that I'm like, you know, and not to say it's not good, and there's not a place for it. And there's not like a component because at some point will will. I mean, we're, we're 27 people now full time. I mean, at some point, we'll probably add that component. So I don't want to like, you know, poo poo it too much. Yeah. But but but the thing is, a lot of internet marketing companies are, are grinding it out networking and doing all these things. And I think that human connection is there, but then they're selling something that they're not doing. Does that make sense? So it's not absolutely not. It's not the networking thing that I'm against, right? Yes, I think it's about personal connections. But I'm like, if you're doing this and you're telling clients, this is how they need to do it, and then you're not doing it for your Self. Yeah. What is that like that? That's the policy like, exactly. So at least if you're an internet marketing company, you should be generating business through online, because that's what you're selling people to do. And if you can do it for yourself, that's what people want people go, Hey, if you can do it for yourself, and you can show me how to do what are you can do it for me. That's what I want.

Junaid Ahmed 32:20
Right? Exactly. And that's a really good point for internet marketing companies and people who are jumping in, in this space of, you know, like, Oh, we just regenerated 10 million per month for this company. And that's how we're doing our own marketing as well. Well, that sounds you know, that sounds and you want to work with that person work with that company. I think one of the ads that I've been seeing a lot is the Harmon brothers. Yeah, right. They are all over the place and they're like they've got some courses and master programs that you can sign up. would with a unicorn sitting on the squatty potty. Oh, that that

Matt Bertram 33:05
that is just pure gold. Yes.

Junaid Ahmed 33:09
So they've done some really cool stuff and now they are playing that their own their own formula for their own stuff, or is it? But so we're makes sense it, you know it it lines that with what they're selling and oh

Matt Bertram 33:26
there's congruence either it resonates absolutely, absolutely, yeah.

Junaid Ahmed 33:31
So what can somebody entering the market? Let's say to an entrepreneur, they want to jump into being an entrepreneur, what can they do? What's the first thing that they should be doing to get their brand out there?

Matt Bertram 33:46
Yeah, so so a lot of people, if you're in the startup world, or you want to start a side business or whatever, they're like, I gotta have the product first. Okay, they're like, I gotta have the product first. Yeah, and Then I'm going to start marketing. I, you know how and this is my viewpoint and like, you know, they say like, your audience should take it as a grain of salt. Because I'm seeing it from my perspective, but what I believe is you need to generate audience, you need to your build an audience, you need to start putting out content, you need to start building yourself as as an expert or a specialist in that space, like people need to know who you are. People need to know what you're about. And you need to be formulating like a email list or, you know, Facebook audience or whatever. So I believe like, you know, by building your brand, you will get your ideal customers and you can, you know, you'll have some raving fans that you can offer into your market of something that you found value and if people find value in what you're saying, vice versa. Typically, if you know you go into business just to make money and you're Not trying to solve a problem, you're going to probably fail, okay, you gotta like, kind of solve a problem, you got to be passionate about what you're doing. And those two things and you communicate your story and your message out there, people are going to connect with that. So, you know, even like, while you're building your, your product or service, I believe you should be kind of generating that content, just pick a platform that you're most comfortable with, and then get consistent, and just produce whatever it is blogs or, you know, videos or social posts or whatever, that you're in on whatever platform you're comfortable with, and probably where your audience would be. Yeah. And and so, you know, that's really one of the first things everything you do. Yeah, you know, and you gotta Also remember, I see a lot of, you know, small businesses, they think marketing's an expense. And it's like, like, I'll give you an example. I got a client that's a plumber. Okay, yeah. And their website, if they were to buy ad traffic, like I use a tool called sem rush if if they were to buy traffic, their website was worth maybe 1500 a month, and they're paying maybe 3500 or 2500 for for marketing month and I looked at I said, hey, you're spending 2500 a month, but if you just bought ads, right, and maybe there's management costs, whatever, but you buy ads, you know, you're only making 1500 so you're you're you're not it's not a good ratio, right? Yeah. And so I was looking at the keywords I was looking at Target persona, we did this to our kind of paid consulting on it for them and, and we we came down with it of like, hey, plumber, Houston, I was like, you need to rank for plumber, Houston. Yeah. And they're like, we knew that I was like, Well, you know, why aren't you doing it like so executions, the other half of it, but also, you're focused on everything else. So you got to execute one you got to be targeted. And also like if you were doing everything to to rank this you could and so that's what we do is really targeted stuff. And and basically we got them right Because there's huge search volume for plumber, Houston. Yeah, check it out, you'll see who my client is, please click on the link to because that will help my client

stay on there for at least two minutes or whatever. But no, but um, anyways.

Now their website, I was looking at it like yesterday or something their websites now worth $80,000 a month Google AdWords. So do you think if you're spending 30 $500 a month or 40 $500 a month, but your website's now worth $80,000 of ad traffic? Yeah, per month over 12 months? And then what's the arbitrage of that multiplied by or then you can work into the formula how many leads you actually close? Like what's the average you know, lifetime value or even short term value of the customer if if a jobs you know one in five jobs or $10,000 or more like is marketing really like a line item? expensive? Snow, it's

driving your revenue if

you have if you have adult. So that's kind of what I do is I assess from a business standpoint, the data analytics, and then apply it to businesses. But to succeed, I don't know how I got off track on that. But how to circle back to what you're saying is, yeah, you know, foundationally like don't invest in anything that you don't understand, like, I bought stocks or kryptos, or whatever, you don't understand what it is you don't understand what it's doing. So you want to have some kind of foundation and I think my book, you know, build your brand mania, right? mania, it's crazy because it's just,

it's at a fever pitch right now.

And check it out. I lay out the fundamentals of how to do that if you you know, you can get it on Amazon or I actually when I launched the book, it's still up there, I think build your brand mania.com you can go check out more about the book. It's a book funnel and then you know, So that's a really good foundational resource. And, and and really, if you don't like if you're reading all these blogs and books and where to start like this Scott, like 500 books crammed in there

that I

read, and it really is the foundation and when people come to me for consulting, I like save them some money, and I just like give them a book, right? Yeah. So So I would say, that's a good place to start. I think YouTube taught me almost everything I know. Oh, yeah. Yeah, to me, you know, you, you dummies, okay. It's kind of hit or miss, like, I don't want to pay for something that is not good. So like, of course, look at the reviews. Yeah. You know, there's tons of books out there. I can tell you, I'll read a book based on the title or the cover or whatever. And I'll get into the book and I'm like, when is it going to get good? Like, when am I going to find the nugget and then sometimes it doesn't ever get good. And I feel like I've wasted all this, but I read it all the way through because I'm like, I could miss something. So I'd say you know, if you find someone that you follow, that's good, and that You like what they're saying, see who they recommend and kind of daisy chain it out. So that's what I typically do is I follow some people, and if they recommend a book, I read it. And then I see like, if I like in the book, they might talk about other books. And so I kind of make sure that there's some kind of some kind of reference or credibility, building on what I do that, you know, and so that that's what I would do, like on a fundamental level, I would start building content early on to kind of understand the internet because it isn't going anywhere, unless

the government just turns it off.

It's gonna keep evolving and growing. And, and like, it takes a while to get caught up with what's happening and everything's moving at such a fast pace. So if you're not involved in internet, I would encourage you to jump in sooner rather than later. Because it's only going to get harder, the motes only going to get wider as the big brands come in. So you got to kind of get in now like I would encourage you to take action and do that. So then, you know if you're in the space and you haven't had success and you're trying to kind of take it to the next level. You know, that's best SEO podcast. com We just build a new website. I like your website hacks and hobbies. com I think it's great. We built a similar website we built it on something called a progressive web app a PDA so you got like mobile websites remember the dot m. net was like a different website and they became responsive now apps are starting to be combined into a website so we just built it on this new platform that just came out and you can actually download it and listen to all the podcasts like as an app on your phone, so it's pretty cool. But that's SEO podcast calm but also it's syndicated out all over the place. Here you know, just just like you have says SoundCloud wherever they're listening to your podcasts they can they can check it out. It's it's called the Unknown Secrets of Internet Marketing The Unknown Secrets internet marketer Kane we also call it best SEO podcast or yet Results he web results is the name of our company because we started it when the he was school you know was he yeah now it's like iPhone dropping the I like my iPhone just goes now this is a phone like there's no i anymore like that's what happened like we didn't think that was ever going to happen but yeah excited did a little data there but but it's got a good brand and people know who we are you know so that's my agency but the podcast is all free we're giving away free information we're gonna be doing some shops and and

Junaid Ahmed 42:33
I do have some few questions for you. Yeah,

Matt Bertram 42:35
let's go. Let's go

Junaid Ahmed 42:36
some what is the one hobby that you wish you got into?

Matt Bertram 42:42
What hobby I wish I got into

Junaid Ahmed 42:46
and I see you an Eagle Scout so you know you've probably done everything.

Matt Bertram 42:50
Yeah, Eagle Scout black bow.

Yeah, I did. I'm like really good at like structured kind of things, right? Yes, very structured. Um, I would say I wish I would have learned to surf or kite board. You know, I really have some friends that did it. I never I wake boarded. I could do some stuff on a whiteboard, but I tore my ACL

a few times and

you know, but kiteboarding I think I have some friends that are pretty good. I've seen some videos and you know, I just wish I I would have done that. I know it's like a great workout. So buddies that serve and kiteboarding

Yeah, I would love that.

Junaid Ahmed 43:28
Nice. I like it. All right, what is your favorite movie or TV show?

Matt Bertram 43:35
Favorite movie or TV show? There's a lot of great stuff like on Netflix like anything that kind of Netflix is coming out was like a Netflix show. And you know, it started to change, right? Everything that that you used to like and that you like now and it also what I'm in the mood for but I would say that the last the last movie that I saw I can give you that and I did really like it was the john wick three. And like, there is there isn't like a lot of like a redeeming value to that show besides just non stop action, which was awesome. Yeah, um, but you know a little desensitized I guess that happens but I saw that like, just

like, awesome.

Junaid Ahmed 44:29
Well, so next question. What movie would you choose if you got to play a character in it?

Matt Bertram 44:36
Got to play a character.

I don't know.

Junaid Ahmed 44:41
Would you? Would you be like to Would you like to be john wick?

Matt Bertram 44:47
I like to be john wayne. He's got a he's got a rough man. Yeah,

Junaid Ahmed 44:50
he does.

Matt Bertram 44:52
You know, I I let's see.

These are good questions, man. I I don't

know. So I get I get that I look like Matthew McConaughey with my hair. He also like,

has a house in Austin and yeah.

And so I get, I get like, Hey, I look like Matthew McConaughey quite a bit. Yeah. And, you know, I'm, I'm okay. I'm okay with with the movies he's been in and to, to be in any kind of role that he's been in, but also, also the guy in john wick, so I'm running a blank, but, you know, he was in the matrix, like all his movies.

Really awesome, too. Yeah. And so,

yeah, Keanu Reeves. So, like, anything that like, like Keanu Reeves has been in for the most part were Matthew McConaughey. Like I could I could see myself like, you know, like,

Junaid Ahmed 45:49
playing those roles. Yeah,

Matt Bertram 45:50
getting those roles. Because they pick movies to that, that they like, you know, another in a similar kind of genre. So yeah. I mean, I would even do frickin the car ads, like back in the car ads for a weekend or so that

I wouldn't even hate you know? Yeah,

Junaid Ahmed 46:09
no, that would be that'd be pretty cool. All right. Who is your favorite superhero?

Matt Bertram 46:16
Well, you know so on my podcast I we have like a little character we even have Oh, yeah, you know, Superman right Superman but but I think that the you know, Batman's pretty good too, right? Because he's got all the gadgets. Yes. I'm a big fan of, you know, all the all the DC Comics and Marvel's and, you know, Stanley so I'm a big we actually have with our company some Star Wars t shirts. We're not like it's not because we're not using their logo.

Junaid Ahmed 46:45
Yeah,

Matt Bertram 46:46
it's but it's, you know, it's esque. We'll go

you know, and but, but yeah, I mean, I think you know, someone that that that can make a really big impact. pact and difference and help a lot of people I think just the motif of being a superhero in itself is pretty awesome.

Yes. And so you know, I'm not gonna nice gonna knock on anybody you know love it

Junaid Ahmed 47:15
well last question. If you are a board game, what would it be?

Matt Bertram 47:21
So more so

a board game that I actually played a lot I'll contribute this to my mom in in kind of early High School. There's a board game called cashflow one on one by Rich Dad Poor Dad. And and like that was like when people were playing Monopoly and all that, like I I played I played that like and then it got to the point where it was too easy and we got like, a cashflow one or two or something and Oh really? Yeah, like not very many people get it and it's like yeah, Stock trading and all that kind of stuff. And so I was really into that but yeah,

Junaid Ahmed 48:06
that really powerful board game actually played the video game of it when I learned about it I was like oh my god this is so cool.

Matt Bertram 48:14
Yeah, no i i loved you know you were talking about Tony Robbins like I used to go to the conferences and see Tony Robbins and Robert Kiyosaki talk. I loved all that. And also I like chess. My parents made me play chess when I was younger, and we got these life sized chess pieces so I can see myself being a chess piece, you know.

Junaid Ahmed 48:36
Nice. I love it. Well, thank you so much, Matt. This was a an amazing, awesome conversation. We learned a lot about what somebody needs to do, when they're starting out and where they need to start. So really good tips. Your book is going to be awesome. I'm gonna jump on it and get get a copy as well because you know, I learned awesome,

Matt Bertram 48:57
please, I'll be awesome.

Junaid Ahmed 49:00
Absolutely. You bet. You betcha. Yeah, man, thank you so much for everything. This is amazing. We'll we'll definitely have to catch up again. All right, well, sounds good.

Matt Bertram 49:09
Get connected.

Junaid Ahmed 49:12
But thank you for listening to hacks and hobbies. You can find additional information on the guest today on their website, hacks and hobbies. com. Please feel free to subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss out on upcoming interviews with amazing guests.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai